question about building space stations

[whulorigan]

I was planning on statting up a TL9/TL10 deep space refuelling station, specifically one in Solomani Rim/1928 Solomani Rim/1927, or between Terra and Prometheus and Bernards star, built to support J1 traffic to the colonies. is their any intrest in such a project?

IIRC, in GT: Interstellar Wars it was mentioned that the first Terran jump-mission to Barnard's Star using a J1 drive was accomplished by locating a rogue Brown Dwarf (or other body) in deep space between Terra and Barnard. Perhaps you could add this detail into your wirite-up of the location and its specifics.

I honestly think that a region of space that has had interstellar travel for approximately 10000 years would have far more "way stations" in deep space than is generally assumed in most discussions of interstellar trade and travel.

I am curious though, why TL-9/10? Even a TL-11/12 society would build TL11/12 J1 vessels; it is just that there is no J1 main in the Sol subsector for J1 traffic to exploit. Deep-space Way-stations could alleviate that problem.

 

[RandyB]

It can be as simple as it likes, I just want it to be consistent. is it too much to ask for that a book that details at length how construction yards works, complete with rules for building ships and how long it takes, etc, is able to let a society build the ships that a major previous book said should be possible at a given TL?

A TL 10 society can build a 10,000 Dton ship, according to MgT High Guard. To build a 10,000Dton ship, you need a yard of 20,000 Dtons or more, with its power plant, fuel, crew etc. I'd guesstimate in the 30,000-50,000 dton range for a yard that size.

But ,by these rules, a TL10 society can only build a station of 5,000 Dtons, which, taking the example 5,000 dton shipyard in the book, can only build 1,000 dton ships.

see what I mean?

Absolutely. My comment was narrower, addressing the idea of combining smaller computers to get larger ones, and why that isn't part of Traveller's computer rules (though it could be).

Your point is completely correct - either a given TL can build and maintain all of the necessary components for an artifact of their TL*, or they can't. Rules that result otherwise should explain why the result is otherwise**, ideally with examples. Absent that, I'd call for errata.

*assuming the availability of resources, etc. The whole situation of starport codes vs. starship construction facilities comes to mind here.
**see example in previous note

 

[rancke]

I am curious though, why TL-9/10? Even a TL-11/12 society would build TL11/12 J1 vessels; it is just that there is no J1 main in the Sol subsector for J1 traffic to exploit. Deep-space Way-stations could alleviate that problem.

Once J2 is invented, J1 mains lose all relevance to interstellar transport. It's cheaper to transport goods and passengers two parsecs by one J2 than by two J1s, so J1 would be largely restricted to going back and forth along one-parsec routes. So there are still room for J1 ships at TL11/12, but that room isn't going up and down mains. And it's even less crossing two parsec gaps even with way stations in place (since deep space way stations will have to charge more for fuel).

(There may be short stretches of main where a J1 ship could service a more-than-one-parsec route, but they'd be broken by the first low-population world along the route.)


Hans

 

[Shonner]

Got the Mgt Space stations book for a xmas present to me, and, looking thought it, I see some interesting stuff and some stuff I personally don't like.

Anyway, looking at the station construction rules, I seem to see a bit of a problem, or rather two different parts of the rules saying two different things that are rather hard to reconcile.

On page 3, theirs a table that says how big a station can be built at a given TL. A TL 9 society, can, for example, built a station of up to 100,000 Dtons (which seems reasonable. That's about the size of a rather large skyscraper. Big, but not impossibly so for a "near future" tech level that TL9 is supposed to be)

Now, so far, so good. However, on page 5, theirs rules for the computer system, which place TL limits on the computer which enforce much smaller station sizes. Specifically, A TL9 society can only create a computer that can run a station of only 5,000 Dtons. to build a station type computer that can control a 100,000 Dton station, you need to be TL13, apparently.


Eh? I know we can we can built water craft vastly bigger than 5,000 dtons* right now. I'll accept that building a spaceship is much harder, but still, one of those two values seems to be rather far off the mark.

When you compare what a society can build using HG rules to the station rules, it appears that the computer TLs are way out of wack compared to their ship counterparts. A TL 9 society can build a jump capable ship of 5,000 tons, and a TL 10 society can build a 10,000 ton ship, but only a 5,000 ton station, unless it sticks a capital ship core in the station. A TL 11 society can build a 50,000 Dton ship, but a TL11 station computer is only good for 10,000 ton stations.

Has their been any official word on this? I can't be the first person to point out this disconnect.

*I tried to work out the dtonnage of the Seawise Giant, but couldn't get a good answer for its total height. but its somewhere upwards of 60,000 Dtons.

Traveller is not a simulator of real life.

 

[Cryton]

[m;] Should I catch a hint of trolling on this board again, I will lock the thread down and take actions as appropriate. THIS IS NOT A WARNING. [/m;]

 

[atpollard]

Since the original question has been answered and any potential errata will need to wait on Mongoose ...

... I would like to offer a thought on space stations in general ... contrary to what has be said earlier in this topic.

The argument has been made, and correctly so IMO, that large stations are easier to build once Grav tech is available.
However, it has also been suggested that a TL 6 to TL 8 station would be useless except as proof you could reach space ... I respectfully disagree.

In point of fact, I see just the opposite being true.
In a pre-Grav society, the cost to and from orbit is substantial.
Enough to justify engineering mega projects like an orbital elevator to a giant space station.

In a post-Grav society, the cost for vehicles to be able to land on the surface is trivial, so there is no real economic need or benefit to a large highport.

So that's my opinion and I welcome any thoughts anyone might want to share.

 

[mike wightman]

There is also the much overlooked possibility that a culture may reach TL10+ and never develop grav technology or jump drive.

Their materials technology should be up to the task of building the space elevator you have mentioned, and large industrial space stations established to build the fusion engine craft that would then exploit the resources of the system.

Contact with a jump drive/grav tech culture would render such infrastructure redundant, but since its already there it could be retasked to highport facilities and jump ship production.

Such a system could be an interesting place to adventure for a bit.

 

[phavoc]

Since the original question has been answered and any potential errata will need to wait on Mongoose ...

... I would like to offer a thought on space stations in general ... contrary to what has be said earlier in this topic.

The argument has been made, and correctly so IMO, that large stations are easier to build once Grav tech is available.
However, it has also been suggested that a TL 6 to TL 8 station would be useless except as proof you could reach space ... I respectfully disagree.

In point of fact, I see just the opposite being true.
In a pre-Grav society, the cost to and from orbit is substantial.
Enough to justify engineering mega projects like an orbital elevator to a giant space station.

In a post-Grav society, the cost for vehicles to be able to land on the surface is trivial, so there is no real economic need or benefit to a large highport.

So that's my opinion and I welcome any thoughts anyone might want to share.

I think your point is quite valid. You may have a TL7 planet that has built and supports its orbital station using locally sourced parts. However they use some 2nd or 5th hand shuttles or antiviral craft to reach it. Then the model perfectly fits.

The game has always alluded to a mix of tech levels across space. It makes no sense for a world to use rocket tech to get to orbit when you can buy antiviral capable craft. Today you have nations like Sudan that fly 787 Dreamliners. They sure as hell can't build one, or do the D checks. However they can fly it and make basic repairs and maintenance by importing the parts and getting trained. All it took was their use of cash earned through trade. And loans backed up by future trade. The Imperious would be ripe with the same sort of things I suspect.

 

[WistfulD]

Unless TNE's "the Virus" is significant to your comments, I think you might have had some significant autocorrect issues there.

 

[WistfulD]

Since the original question has been answered and any potential errata will need to wait on Mongoose ...

... I would like to offer a thought on space stations in general ... contrary to what has be said earlier in this topic.

The argument has been made, and correctly so IMO, that large stations are easier to build once Grav tech is available.
However, it has also been suggested that a TL 6 to TL 8 station would be useless except as proof you could reach space ... I respectfully disagree.

In point of fact, I see just the opposite being true.
In a pre-Grav society, the cost to and from orbit is substantial.
Enough to justify engineering mega projects like an orbital elevator to a giant space station.

In a post-Grav society, the cost for vehicles to be able to land on the surface is trivial, so there is no real economic need or benefit to a large highport.

So that's my opinion and I welcome any thoughts anyone might want to share.

BBC just had an article on space elevators (I think the mods will let me post it: http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20150211-space-elevators-a-lift-too-far). What they mentioned that caught my eye is the idea that the elevator would carry small passenger cars. That got me thinking: When (if) a society first builds space elevators, they might be small affairs that can't bring up the structural supports and such to build a station.