Rail Gun for Space weapon?

[kilemall]

How do you hit anything with them since they are limited to the range of their direct fire control?
Ship mounted fire control must be several orders of magnitude better than the direct. fire control system you can put in vehicles.

One would assume, even at MgT ranges.

Turrets aren't a cheap mounting, one would probably assume fire control is subsumed in that price.

Then of course you have targeting programs being run on ship computers, so that's a level up on computing power applied to the task.

 

[mike wightman]

So why do vehicles not have access to starship grade fire control in Striker? Rhetorical question by the way - Striker was never meant to apply to space combat.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

So why do vehicles not have access to starship grade fire control in Striker? Rhetorical question by the way - Striker was never meant to apply to space combat.

Agreed, but:

Fire control equipment is required if weaponry is to be installed. Each installed turret requires one ton of displacement committed for the installation of fire control equipment.

I would allow a vehicle with 14 m³ fire control to fire space combat scale weapons at space combat scale distances...

 

[whartung]

Balance matters not.
Yes, it does affect play - for MT and TNE - because of all the follow-on assumptions based upon the Striker power plants table, and their conversions in MT, which were equated on the basis of 14 Td of PP = 1 EP (HG)...

... which means the weapon pens are all based upon a striker error of 256 MW instead of 128.

This affects many systems in both, including TNE radiator space needed, laser power factors (and sizes, and in TNE, ranges), and thus available space for weapons, cargo, and crew.

Maybe you can put this in to layman terms.

So, are you saying that TNE made the weapons too powerful? The power plants too small? Or that there is some compatibility issue between Striker, MT, and TNE?

is TNE internally consistent?

 

[aramis]

Maybe you can put this in to layman terms.

So, are you saying that TNE made the weapons too powerful? The power plants too small? Or that there is some compatibility issue between Striker, MT, and TNE?

is TNE internally consistent?

TNE is relatively internally consistent, except for propagating the error.

Simply put: a ship's drive should be 7 kL, not 14 kL, based upon the deckplanning guidelines. Which would make the High Guard EP either half as much, or the plants twice as effective.

Making them half the official 250 MW per EP would reduce the size of the standard lasers, standard plasmas, standard fusion, and standard particle beam weapons in MT, all of which were built from Striker based design sequences.

This would also reduce the Pen considerably, and the maximum range. It would also result in

MT has a nearly 1:1 redesignability from striker sources.

 

[infojunky]

Earlier in this thread it was stated that at TL 13 the mere velocity of the rail gun round would cause the projectile to become plasma. And IIRC it was you who said it.

Ah, got it....

 

[infojunky]

Making them half the official 250 MW per EP would reduce the size of the standard lasers, standard plasmas, standard fusion, and standard particle beam weapons in MT, all of which were built from Striker based design sequences.

Built would be a generous word I believe. Estimated from would probably be a more apt description. And with that that the Estimation was from the 60 armor pre-errata numbers.

The problem with Striker is that there were very few examples, with that and the Armored vehicle centric design the outlying portions where we get these sorts of questions from aren't answered very well.

And yet I circle around to my basic question of what is a Turret Laser equivalent to?

I am finding the earlier answer in this thread of it being equivalent to a VRF Gauss gun to be a vaguely comforting answer. In that it is more powerful than your typical Autocannon.

 

[whartung]

TNE is relatively internally consistent, except for propagating the error.

Simply put: a ship's drive should be 7 kL, not 14 kL, based upon the deckplanning guidelines. Which would make the High Guard EP either half as much, or the plants twice as effective.

Could it have been an adjustment on Chadwick's part? Perhaps there was a design reason he wanted denser power plants than what MT offered?

 

[aramis]

Could it have been an adjustment on Chadwick's part? Perhaps there was a design reason he wanted denser power plants than what MT offered?

He used the same ones.

The predicate error is in Striker. Striker sets the size and efficiencies and also sets the conversion to/from High Guard EP. All the rest (including, according to some things Frank said online), was built upon those numbers.

MT makes the same errors - the DGP guys (who actually wrote MT) used striker directly.

TNE preserves the same errors from striker - with some MT fixes and some small regressions to CT HG in other areas - in FF&S.

It's a fundamental flaw in Striker rule 76 that has affected MT, TNE, and T4 directly, and CT less so (but for some, directly)...

 

[kilemall]

I don't see where this is a big deal.

An engine pack that is 1dton or greater is Darn Big, gets into small boat or locomotive size power generation, or separate power generator for fixed arty.

The volume range is literally 2:1-smaller plants tied into grav tanks where every square meter counts exponentially for greater armor weight and lift capacity vying with weapons for power, yes it's going to be external access.

Starship floor plans on the other hand have always been fuzzy- heck just on the 20% fudge factor you could size the power plants per Striker and still have internal hull access.

Or make it a design decision- cram 20-40% more power into a fighter or small warship, but repairs require a spacewalk or grounded in a hangar or port bay, with much harder rolls if having to do them in space in zero-G.

And not acceptable for commercial or large warship risks.

 

[pendragonman]

Aaaaand I just realized that Striker didn't come with my digital copy of The Traveller Collection.

And the books are lost in storage somewhere.

 

[Blue Ghost]

Aren't Striker, Belt Strike, Tarsus and the rest supposed to be in a different reprint?

 

[kilemall]

Aaaaand I just realized that Striker didn't come with my digital copy of The Traveller Collection.

And the books are lost in storage somewhere.

I had already procured a physical copy, but I got it in the FFE CT CD-ROM too.