How have you actually used small and large ships in your games? What was the largest ship you've involved in combat in which PCs took part? What was the largest ship you've used deckplans for in actual play? What was the largest ship you've given to your players for their own use? What was the largest ship your PCs were part of the crew of (but not in command)? This polls of refers to actual use in your Traveller games, not to your overall design philosophy (not directly, that is).
Ship Sizes in Actual Use
- Thread starter Golan2072
- Start date
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
I'm a dedicated small ship heretic, although I do allow hulls of up to 12000 tons now 
I have, however, used the AHL deck plans in a game...
speaking of which, has anyone ever counted the squares on the AHL plans to determine the tonnage represented on each deck?
I have, however, used the AHL deck plans in a game...
speaking of which, has anyone ever counted the squares on the AHL plans to determine the tonnage represented on each deck?
The largest ship which I used as a PC ship was a 10,000 ton USA class patrol cruiser, for an active duty game which I ran. The PCs were crew, and we had a complete set of deckplans for it, thanks to an incredible Trav GM and draftsman friend of mine named Dave Davieau. It was a very interesting set of plans as well, unfortunately it got lost in a move, but I think I might have tracked it down. If so I will post them here.
princelian
SOC-12
The largest ship I ran was the Azhanti High Lightning Frontier Cruiser (60,000 dtons). The party was the command crew and several special-purpose groups aboard her, and the campaign was enough like Star Trek: Voyager that I wondered if an ex-player had joined Paramount's writing staff. In that campaign, the cruiser had been thrown innumerable parsecs Coreward by a Zhodani-weapon-caused misjump and had to make its way home across several alien domains. The final run was through Vargr-controlled space, and every 10- and 20-thousand raider ship captain wanted the FC for his very own...and they were pretty damaged and low on supplies by that point, so it was quite a gauntlet.
There are, I believe, eighty-four decks, ten of which are roughly one third of the others in size. Let's say that there's the equivalent of 77 equally-sized decks, or about 780 dtons on each one. The ten decks in the "nose" are therefore about the size of a 150-200 dton ship.
Looking at my deckplans in Arrival Vengeance (unfortunately, my copy of AHL is long gone
), each main deck is a rough rectangle 66 meters port/starboard and 40 meters dorsal/ventral.
The maw of the spinal gun is 7.5 meters in diameter (shudder).
There are, I believe, eighty-four decks, ten of which are roughly one third of the others in size. Let's say that there's the equivalent of 77 equally-sized decks, or about 780 dtons on each one. The ten decks in the "nose" are therefore about the size of a 150-200 dton ship.
Looking at my deckplans in Arrival Vengeance (unfortunately, my copy of AHL is long gone
), each main deck is a rough rectangle 66 meters port/starboard and 40 meters dorsal/ventral. The maw of the spinal gun is 7.5 meters in diameter (shudder).
BetterThanLife
SOC-14 1K
As a GM I routinely show off the bigger ships. I find it is better to show the characters that no matter how big they think they are getting there is someone out there bigger. Besides in my campaign there is a war on, and the setting is close to the front. The big ships are moving about this close to the front, either staging, withdrawing for repairs or moving to intercept other ships. It helps set the stage and campaign background.
Players in my campaigns typically travel about in 100-800 ton ships. There are and have been exceptions. (The Kinunir being typical of one of those exceptions, but they weren't allowed to keep it.)
The biggest ship I ever had a character on, was actually one of my earlier Traveller experiences, I rolled a character, with some crazy results under LBB5. When all was said and done he retired as a Grand Admiral and a Duke. He was given one of the border area subsectors, as his Fief. We then played a campaign of Intrigue, Politics, Economics and in general Traveller at a Strategic level. And he did go into battle a couple of times from the Flag Bridge of a 200,000 ton Drednaught and once on the Flag Bridge of a 750,000 Battletender. Definitely not your typical campaign. We did have plans for the Drednaught. (I now wish I could find my copy.)
Players in my campaigns typically travel about in 100-800 ton ships. There are and have been exceptions. (The Kinunir being typical of one of those exceptions, but they weren't allowed to keep it.)
The biggest ship I ever had a character on, was actually one of my earlier Traveller experiences, I rolled a character, with some crazy results under LBB5. When all was said and done he retired as a Grand Admiral and a Duke. He was given one of the border area subsectors, as his Fief. We then played a campaign of Intrigue, Politics, Economics and in general Traveller at a Strategic level. And he did go into battle a couple of times from the Flag Bridge of a 200,000 ton Drednaught and once on the Flag Bridge of a 750,000 Battletender. Definitely not your typical campaign. We did have plans for the Drednaught. (I now wish I could find my copy.)
BetterThanLife
SOC-14 1K
There is a copy of the AHL deckplans from the AHL boxset in the FLibrary. MWM pointed me to a place online to find them and then gave permission for them to get posted here. Though you really do need a copy of Supplement 5 to make proper use of them.Originally posted by princelian:
The largest ship I ran was the Azhanti High Lightning Frontier Cruiser (60,000 dtons). The party was the command crew and several special-purpose groups aboard her, and the campaign was enough like Star Trek: Voyager that I wondered if an ex-player had joined Paramount's writing staff. In that campaign, the cruiser had been thrown innumerable parsecs Coreward by a Zhodani-weapon-caused misjump and had to make its way home across several alien domains. The final run was through Vargr-controlled space, and every 10- and 20-thousand raider ship captain wanted the FC for his very own...and they were pretty damaged and low on supplies by that point, so it was quite a gauntlet.
There are, I believe, eighty-four decks, ten of which are roughly one third of the others in size. Let's say that there's the equivalent of 77 equally-sized decks, or about 780 dtons on each one. The ten decks in the "nose" are therefore about the size of a 150-200 dton ship.
Looking at my deckplans in Arrival Vengeance (unfortunately, my copy of AHL is long gone
The maw of the spinal gun is 7.5 meters in diameter (shudder).
We've gonethrough several ships, starting with an 800t Mercenary cruiser. We got lucky (and I made a mistake with the trading tables) and made enough to buy a 4,500 ton armed merchant vessel (30 turrets, 2 bays). We've since bought 2 smaller vessels as part of our growing undercover fleet for our trouble-shooting company.
The biggest, a ancient jump capable hollow moon, inhabited by a tech 16 race of clones.
The biggest, a ancient jump capable hollow moon, inhabited by a tech 16 race of clones.
The Oz
SOC-14 1K
The biggest ship that has ever shot at my PCs was a 3000-ton Aslan Battle Leader.
The biggest ship I ever used deckplans of was an Azhanti High Lightning, when I ran the "Great Wine Heist" adventure.
The biggest ship my PCs have ever commanded was a 400-ton custom-built Exploratory Scout.
The biggest ship I ever used deckplans of was an Azhanti High Lightning, when I ran the "Great Wine Heist" adventure.
The biggest ship my PCs have ever commanded was a 400-ton custom-built Exploratory Scout.
P
Pickles
Guest
The biggest ship my PCs ever commanded was a 400 dton patrol cruiser. 200 dton ships are the norm.
The largest deckplans I ever used in actual play were for the 10,000 ton 'King Richard' luxury liner. Mind you, the next biggest set was an order of magnitude smaller, for the 'Kinunir'.
Most of the time I stick with deckplans of 600 dtons or under. They're easier to draw, too, and they fit on one or two A4 sheets at a reasonable scale.
EDIT: Oh, and the largest ship ever involved in combat with my PCs was a 50,000 dton carrier, but that didn't count because they only engaged with its heavy fighters (which still wrote off the PCs' ship).
The largest deckplans I ever used in actual play were for the 10,000 ton 'King Richard' luxury liner. Mind you, the next biggest set was an order of magnitude smaller, for the 'Kinunir'.
Most of the time I stick with deckplans of 600 dtons or under. They're easier to draw, too, and they fit on one or two A4 sheets at a reasonable scale.
EDIT: Oh, and the largest ship ever involved in combat with my PCs was a 50,000 dton carrier, but that didn't count because they only engaged with its heavy fighters (which still wrote off the PCs' ship).
Liam Devlin
SOC-14 5K
#1. Largest vessel was a 1kton Ursa class Freight tractor with additional cargo modules pushing her to her 3kton max (ISS Ursula Campaign).
#2. Largest vessel deckplans, dittoes to AHL 4515 ISS Arrival Vengeance, 60kton J5/(2)1G, in our MT days..
#3. My players that would be again, answer #1. Our current TNE group of 12 players has control of a 990dton FASA-designed/ player deckplanned Lucifer-class DE.
#2. Largest vessel deckplans, dittoes to AHL 4515 ISS Arrival Vengeance, 60kton J5/(2)1G, in our MT days..
#3. My players that would be again, answer #1. Our current TNE group of 12 players has control of a 990dton FASA-designed/ player deckplanned Lucifer-class DE.
Shadowdancer
SOC-14 1K
Well let's see:
No. 1: Largest ship involved in combat the PCs participated in was the 10,000 dTon "King Richard" luxury liner someone else already mentioned.
No. 2: Largest deck plans were for the aforementioned 10,000 dTon "King Richard." Ran a whole campaign aboard that ship.
No. 3: Largest ship I've let the PCs command, I believe, was 400 dTons, a special scout courier with long legs (J5) and good speed (3G).
No. 1: Largest ship involved in combat the PCs participated in was the 10,000 dTon "King Richard" luxury liner someone else already mentioned.
No. 2: Largest deck plans were for the aforementioned 10,000 dTon "King Richard." Ran a whole campaign aboard that ship.
No. 3: Largest ship I've let the PCs command, I believe, was 400 dTons, a special scout courier with long legs (J5) and good speed (3G).
Largest Ship Combat involving PC's: 1 MTd Battleship versus PC's in a 400KTd Cruiser.
Largest PC Ship: 10 MTd
Largest I'll use down the road: Probably about 10KTd, maybe 20. I'm starting to think it's time for me to go the ATU route, and ditch using the OTU.
Largest ship I've let a PC have since I turned 21: 5KTd.
Largest PC Ship: 10 MTd
Largest I'll use down the road: Probably about 10KTd, maybe 20. I'm starting to think it's time for me to go the ATU route, and ditch using the OTU.
Largest ship I've let a PC have since I turned 21: 5KTd.
mbrinkhues
SOC-14 1K
Largest ship involved in combat:
A 50000dt Nemesis cruiser (TG 15+) once attacked a craft the PC's where approaching. Huge Meson gun vs. 5000dt Destroyer => Booom. The PC's used the recharge time of the gun to pull an emergency jump with their 600dt Type M
Biggest Ship given to the PC:
Currently a 1000dt "Niven" class frighter, soon in an new campaign a 3000dt "StarWanderer" class SpaceYacht
Biggest Ship with deckplans:
The 3000dt StarWanderer.
A 50000dt Nemesis cruiser (TG 15+) once attacked a craft the PC's where approaching. Huge Meson gun vs. 5000dt Destroyer => Booom. The PC's used the recharge time of the gun to pull an emergency jump with their 600dt Type M
Biggest Ship given to the PC:
Currently a 1000dt "Niven" class frighter, soon in an new campaign a 3000dt "StarWanderer" class SpaceYacht
Biggest Ship with deckplans:
The 3000dt StarWanderer.
#1: The largest ship I ever had in a game was a 60,000 ton, TL-15 battlecruiser. It got mauled by a 30,000 TL-18 battlecruiser that the PCs had helped find in my IMTU Ancients campaign.
#2: The largest ship I've used plans for were the 800 ton Virginia-class schooner, which I used as an IMTU Traveller derelict in a one-off.
#3: The largest ship I've let my players use was a 200 ton ship; if I ever Ref again I might give something between 300 and 800 tons (non-military unless it's a Type T or Type H).
#2: The largest ship I've used plans for were the 800 ton Virginia-class schooner, which I used as an IMTU Traveller derelict in a one-off.
#3: The largest ship I've let my players use was a 200 ton ship; if I ever Ref again I might give something between 300 and 800 tons (non-military unless it's a Type T or Type H).
I'm running a similar campaign right now. Also on an AHL cruiser that has misjumped to the galactic core.
The difference was I made the players part of the frozen watch. So they awoke to an apparently abandoned ship in the middle of nowhere with few supplies.
We've had 10 sessions so far and they're still in the same system. The campaign log is here ... but I've only uploaded the first 5 sessions so far.
Regards PLST
Largest ship my adventurers ever ran into were a couple of BBs. 1,000,000+ ton behemoths. The kind of thing that carried AHLs.
Not that they had a whole lot of interacting with those beasties, mind you, but still...
Not that they had a whole lot of interacting with those beasties, mind you, but still...
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