Price-Fixed Travel

[far-trader]

Ah good, the subject has come back

I did look for it but couldn't find it after a small eureka moment, resulting from a bit of a rant over on the JTAS GURPS boards.

Anyway, how it relates here is I'm trying to come to terms with Imperial Naval budget specifics and Imperial Finance in general. It's bound to be very MTU since I'm looking to emasculate them both somewhat, to (among other things) make PC scale ships more important again and justify their armaments against Pirates, since the Navy won't be able to be everywhere at once.

One of the possibilities I'm noodling is that the Imperium doesn't tax planets, only the trade between planets. A part of that is handled through the fixed price model of passage and freight, and specific to the last few posts here, "life support" costs. My thought is a big chunk of the LS charge is a tax based on your ship's revenue potential and you pay it every time you dock at an Imperial Starport. That clears up why you have to pay it even for empty staterooms and why it is so much. That "tax" goes to support the Starport, the Navy, the Bureaucracy, etc.

Anyway just a thought that still needs some work, feel free to help

 

[mike wightman]

The travel and trade tax is a good point. It could explain why 40 year old Free Traders (the ships) out of mortgage, don't reduce freight and passenger prices to undercut those who are still slaves to mortgage payments

 

[kaladorn]

A tax is an interesting take, though only perhaps 25 - 50 % of the cost.

Note one that was missed on the really good list Aramis listed was general decontam - getting rid of vermin, bugs, and possible spores/pollens, etc.

You're going haring off around space, landing on alien planets, picking up passengers and cargo and God knows all what.... seems to me a major investment would be Stericide(TM) to get rid of all the possible contaminants, not to mention odd *smells* that could lurk around a ship.

 

[aramis]

fumigants, anti-microbials, anti-odorants, etc., are part of the cleaning supplies... at least as I think of cleaning supples.

As are hoover bags, barf-bags, toilet seat covers, and breath mints for the pillows. Oh, and the other fun goodies, like the garbage bags.

And don't forget the floor wax, buffer pads, and brasso, either!

Another expense I forgot that would be part of the LS costs:
equipmment check-out. Probably done with automated sensing from a portside dataport... but a quick computerized check of occupancy and airflow regulations. Probably some Cr2 or so... for some stollie to check a readout and go "Yup" to the automated port authority checklist.

Realistically, the only way fixed prices are going to happen at all are due to some form of government (or paragovernmental mega-corporate) interference defining reasonable and customary. (For examples of this, ask your medical insurance provider for a sample listing of reasonable and customary charges, and compare this to the biling sheeet your MD uses.... it may scare you!)

Even the GT method of fares is broken.

Realistically, fares should fluctuate by demand... or at least by a roll on the AVT. Apply modifiers to the roll inverse of the passenger nummbers mods. Apply also a "reputation" modifier of +4 to -4... and by a modifier for excess stewards. And advertizing hype...

Sample methodology for deriving a passenger mdoifier from an asking price:
• Set your price (asking price)
• Determine fare modifiers for AVT roll
• GM makes AVT roll secretly.
• GM determines difference on AVT between ask and roll.
•Apply difference as a modifier to passenger rolls. If Roll was higher, DM is positive. If Ask was higher, DM is negative.
• note also that the AVT roll also generates what "Joe Normal" will offer for passage.

 

[kaladorn]

Also, it occurs to me that routine maintenance of living spaces (checking lock hatches, checking out vacc suits and rescue balls and their 02 supplies, lubricating air circulation systems, checking out fire suppression systems and various environmental sensors, etc) may be part and parcel of the more general LS charge.

 

[Straybow]

Ship's crew should be doing that as a regular practice. Registration/certification would only require annual or semiannual documentation.

Unless those services are required to be performed by local inspectors (bonded by an insurance consortium, or mandated by customs agency, or imposed as a form of taxation/bribery). In that case they would be constant at each port, but variable among individual ports.

 

[kaladorn]

No argument about when or even how it is done. I'm just seeking to illustrate where the costs might be incurred. Who knows, maybe zero G lock-seal lube is very expensive? Maybe the coolant that makes your fusion plant run good needs re-filtered each trip and the filters need replaced? Maybe the sealed life support system has real expensive filters?

Just throwing out some concepts to justify the costs, though I agree that a fixed rate that is exactly the same for occupied/unoccupied seems a bit dodgy to me too.

 

[Straybow]

Boomers hide without surface contact for months. They can electrolize water for O2, but don't have to. If we could do it back at TL7. If it's engineering section stuff (like coolant) it isn't LS.

 

[aramis]

Boomers have some advantages over the space craft:

1) they can discharge the excess CO2 by constant voluume replacement. (They also use the LiHydroxide, IIRC, but carry enough for a 9 month cruise.)

2) they have a nearly infinite source of potable water and O2.

3) they can shed waste heat by conduction and convection instead of radiation alone.

4) They have a viable effluent sump in case of overfill...

5) even if it all dies, they are ALWAYS within surfacing range on ambient oxygen barring hostilities (From ships, subs, aircraft, whales, and giant squid...), fire, or hull failure. Since they have at least 6 hours good air, and even at semi-crippled they can battery blow the ballast tanks enough to surface from near crunch depth to breathable surface.

A spacecraft, especially a jump capable spacecraft, does not always have sufficient ambient air to make it to safety.

Spacecraft need to dump heat when the PP is up. Given the means avaialble to traveller ships, it looks like this is either high-temp radiatiors or hot ballast. Both of which provide some significant impact to space combat and space detection. (I remember a discussion of molten lead flowing through ship's radiators on the TML...)

LS needs to cover 4 weeks of use... 4 weeks O2 with NO exterior inputs. 4 Weeks food. 4 weeks supply of cleaning and filtration products.

Oh, and vaccum-viable lubricants are expensive.

 

[TheRaptor]

Why is everyone talking about the need (or not) of buying O2? Humans breath *air*, not O2. They will be buying/reusing nitrogen, as a mix of O2 and CO2 will equal death. Oxygen at high percentages of air has a tendancy to result in flash fires (what really killed the survivors of the Kursk incident) and a concentration of CO2 above 3% makes breathing difficult to say the least. At a pinch the ships crew could use helium (like deep submergence divers do) but who wants to sound like a chipmunk, and then spen a week decompressing?

 

[Anthony]

Humans may breathe air, but the nitrogen can be very efficiently recycled, as we don't consume any of it, and it can be replaced by gases other than nitrogen.

 

[Pagan priest]

Charging Cr2,000 for each stateroom, full or empty implies that the costs for food and other such comsumables is negligable compared to the life support maintenance. This does not really make sense. Even assuming economic purchasing habits by the ship's steward, food will cost something. Food for high passengers should be costing the steward about Cr15 to Cr25 per passenger per day, or more... even buying wholesale.

On the other hand, there is a lot to be said for keepnig the game simple. By having such recurring costs be fixed, the players and Ref can get on with the adventure part of the game. In the group I play Traveller with, only one person is an accountant, and I don't think he comes to the game to play accounting.

 

[Rupert Boleyn]

Originally posted by kaladorn:

Originally posted by Straybow:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />
"1.5m squares, 8 in a 4 ton allotment" is 18m², closer to 3 dTons rather than 4 (given a 2.4m ceiling height).

Standard deck plans assume a 3.0m height. 3.0x1.5.x1.5x8 = 54 m^3. Divide by 13.5 = 4 tons. The 3.0 m includes deck bulkheads and some piping, ceiling lights, local grav plates, etc.
</font>[/QUOTE]That’s the MegaTraveller assumption. Every other edition uses 14 m^3 DTons. CT recommends using the same four 1.5m x 1.5m squares as MT on the basis that that’s about 14 m^3. TNE assumes a deck-to-deck seperation of 3.5m (with about 0.5m between the ceiling and the next floor, thus making a DTon a 2m x 2m square.

In that you can get by using the half size staterooms and still devote enough space to have communal showers, a galley, some limited storage space... I suppose you could say so. But having that extra doubling of space will merely make your cabin a bit more like a room and not a closet and won't make the remaining space 'luxurious to the point of being wasteful.'

Most design sequences I've used suggest that the staterooms only use about half of their volume allocation, with the rest being for corridors, communal mess-halls, common rooms, and so on.

Almost *EVERY* traveller deck plan falls short on what would be required storage wise. Figure out what you'd need for survival, ship repair (everything from a busted navicomp to a total manual reinstallation of zuchai crystals or whatever, plus welders, hydraulic rams, etc), emergency supplies such as vacc suits, water, medical supplies, rescue balls, firefighting gear, etc. You'll find nearly every official and unofficial design comes up far short.

The overage on stateroom space is the only place you can account for this.

Much of that is stuff I'd assume is part of the engineering spaces. Storage for toolkits and basic spare parts certainly is, IMO. Fire-fighting gear is part of every space, with the over-all system part of the lifesupport.

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />
Even then, the odds of surviving is worse then a term of service in the military! Picture in your mind an activity that incurs a 16% chance of death, or if attended by a fully qualified doctor, an 8% chance of death. I'm not sure that open heart surgery is that risky today; I am sure that in Traveller tech it isn't.

This is admittedly a weakness in canon, at TL of the low berth or medical facilities plays no role, which is ludicrious. Open heart surgery, counting complications from strokes etc, probably is that risky. And in many places, even childbirth is riskier than that.

Not saying it isn't a stupidly high risk.... but it does promote an image of the desperate travelling that way and those who have no other option but just *have* to travel.
</font>[/QUOTE]Of course, the lethality of low-berths depends a great deal on the ruleset in use. CT is very risky, as noted by the OP (though it only takes Medic 2+ to cut the death-rate, and not a doctor with Medic 3+) - this is true to the source material (the Dumarest Saga). In MT you can't die from a low-berth revival accident unless the referee says so or you physical abilities total 18 or less. In TNE if the person managing the revival has no Medical skill and minimal Edu the death chance is 47.5%. If they have average Edu and Medical-1 the death chance is 13%, and if they have Medical+Edu 11+ there's no chance of death at all, unless the "sleeper" has Con 2-.

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />
Instead there should be an economy class ticket for double occupancy bunks in a half-sized room, with limited common area priveledges (a short period each day to stretch and walk a bit). Decent auto-galley fare. Think sleeper compartment on a train. Price (J-1) would be about 2k, or 4k Private compartment single occupancy.

Oh, that much I agree with. There should be a bunk-rack style of transport with limited movement and galley and head priveledges. Life support expenses are constant, but other associated expenditures of space and support would be lesser.
</font>[/QUOTE]TNE had middle passage at Cr5000 in non-Regency areas, and rather than being high passage with reduced service and cargo, it was reduced service and sharing a stateroom. There's also a steerage class (again, not in the Regency) that goes for Cr2500, and involves being given a 1/2DT or so of the cargo hold and an allowance of 100kg. It includes no services and you have to bring along your own food (and that's part of your weight allowance).

 

[far-trader]

Originally posted by Rupert:
That’s the MegaTraveller assumption. Every other edition uses 14 m^3 DTons. CT recommends using the same four 1.5m x 1.5m squares as MT on the basis that that’s about 14 m^3. TNE assumes a deck-to-deck seperation of 3.5m (with about 0.5m between the ceiling and the next floor, thus making a DTon a 2m x 2m square.

Not that it is important but I think TNE arrived at the 3.5m deck height purely by wanting to make the deckplan scale fit the imported personal combat system scale of 1m or 2m squares. And I'm pretty sure CT said that while 1.5m x 3m x 3m (13.5m3) was a dTon it was always meant as an approximation for deckplans and thus the sloppy +/- 20% allowance note.

 

[kaladorn]

TL of the Berth should still play a role in survival odds, or so says me.

 

[Rupert Boleyn]

Originally posted by far-trader:
Not that it is important but I think TNE arrived at the 3.5m deck height purely by wanting to make the deckplan scale fit the imported personal combat system scale of 1m or 2m squares. And I'm pretty sure CT said that while 1.5m x 3m x 3m (13.5m3) was a dTon it was always meant as an approximation for deckplans and thus the sloppy +/- 20% allowance note.

TNE also has the +-20% rule, and I'm sure that the 3m floorplate-floorplate seperation was also chosen to get a good fit with the 1.5m squares used in Snapshot, etc.

 

[aramis]

Originally posted by TheRaptor:
Why is everyone talking about the need (or not) of buying O2? Humans breath *air*, not O2.

Because humans consume so little of the atmospheric nitrogen as to be replaced by their own noxious emmissions resultant from food stuffs. We humans DO consume significant ammounts of O2.

Spacecraft life support systems, as well as some sealed subs, use a system of scrub & replace: the canisters of CO2 absorbant materials scrub out the exhaled CO2, and then tanked oxygen is added to the air mix to replace the lost volume of consumed O2, so as to maintain the needed ratios of O2, CO2, and "Other"; that other can be helium, nitrogen, argon, or other relatively inert gasses, or even some liquids.

Even navy rebreather divers only carry spare O2 most times... the nitrogen and/or helium volume is recylced with almost no losses, and the scrubber removes the excess CO2.

(CO2 is needed to trigger the breathing reflex...)

 

[rancke]

Originally posted by Pagan priest:
On the other hand, there is a lot to be said for keepnig the game simple. By having such recurring costs be fixed, the players and Ref can get on with the adventure part of the game.

That's very true. But when those recurring costs are so large that even a minor saving can be significant, some players will focus on that. For example, passengers only occupy the ship for 8 or nine days per 14 day jump period (jump+time spent in realspace until next jump). Players might legitimately want to know just what it is they're paying for that won't allow them to save 700 credits per passenger per jump. Or maybe the 2000 credits are for 10 days and the crew is assumed not to burden the ship's life support system when they are in port? In which case a ship on a long trip should pay six thousand credits per month?

Incidentally, if it really costs 48,000 credits per year to keep a man alive in a small, closed artificial environment, then a lot of the less populated star systems are in a lot of trouble...

Hans

 

[kaladorn]

Hey, TL-5 Pop-8 Atm-any non viable worlds already have an issue or two.... Don't go heaping on another one, Hans!

 

[aramis]

In MT, if the doc fails the revival roll, it is NOT a "Corpsicle" situation... it is a mishap, and only about 20-30% of revival mishaps will be kills... the rest will be serious to minor injuries. So, arguable, it it probably one of the most survivable. Especially since in CT or T4, if the roll fails, you die. Don't remember for TNE.