Can T5 still be called Traveller if you are not arguing about the fuel consumption of the Fusion power plant, its efficiency/energy output and what the extra hydrogen is REALLY used for?Originally posted by atpollard:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by robject:
And since they can use Fusion+ power, you still have a yearly refuelling schedule.
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I see some things that have surely stirred my curiosity. Any word on DEEP SPACE propulsion? (like what happens past 1000 diameters). </font>[/QUOTE]Yes, but first:
Power
After a certain size of craft (a hundred tons or two or three...), it becomes less desireable to use a Fusion+ plant; the starship power plant, aka the Power plant, becomes more pleasing to more naval architects. It packs more bang for the ton, and the larger the drives, the greater comparable advantage the Power plant has.
As we all know, the Power plant leaks fuel, and is expensive, and requires drive techs on board. It also has a minimum size of 4 tons. Those reasons are why most of my small craft generally make do without.
So much for the P-plant and F+plant. There's also Antimatter power, Collectors, and Trickle plants. I'm fuzzy on exactly how they all work, and I know there have to be TL minimums for each plant -- I just don't know what they are.
Propulsion
There are half-a-dozen ways of getting around. If you've checked out my smallcraft, you already know about the G-drive: a sealed, gravitic drive with an integral Fusion+plant and a 100-diameter limit. And you probably already know about the M-drive, with its 1000-diameter limit.
Using other Traveller rules, you can also infer Lifters, which are even more primitive gravitic drives, with a 1-diameter limit and a very low horizontal thrust. I don't know all of the details about Lifters, except that they can be very small -- i.e. the grav belt has a Lifter as propulsion. Call it nullgrav and you're on the right page.
Past these drive limits, the drives generally stop working. The M-drive still has a fraction of push, but its performance just stinks. The G-drive has next to no push beyond 100D, and Lifters have none at all past 1D.
If you want to push your way through deep space, I don't know what you're going to have. I was thinking that this could be a gap to fill, assuming the Near-C-Rock problem can be ignored. There is a HEPlaR drive, which is absurdly small, highly effective, but has a high fuel consumption rate, so I would hesitate to call it an effective deep-space drive. There's also a Rocket -- at least there was -- but I haven't seen details on it, and it appears to have been shelved.
Another drive that was shelved was an inertialess drive. Obviously it would've been a very high-tech device.