OK, let me rephrase my post for clarity (or correctness): If you use CT rules in your TU...
Small Ship fleet sizes
- Thread starter whartung
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OK, let me rephrase my post for clarity (or correctness): If you use CT rules in your TU...
pendragonman
Absent Friends Margrave
You need further clarity, for CT can include High Guard and High Guard is the definition of a big ship universe.. I think you mean CT books 1-3...
As what I was talking about was the probability of dying when awakening from cold sleep, it really does'n matter if you play prototraveller or you include all LBB (1-8) plus Striker, plus TCS, plus any other supplement, as none of them affect the fact that you'll lose 1/12th of those people set to cold sleep.
The differences here are with MT, where to die of cold sleep awakening may only occur on a mishap, or other versions, where I don't know the chance to die.
pendragonman
Absent Friends Margrave
Ok. Never played MT, so I have to bend to your knowledge here. Just recently picked up Mongoose while waiting for my T5 stuff. Anyone know if there is a death probability in Mongoose?
Keeping some sort of death probability lends itself to a darker view of space: cold, harsh, remorseless. Fleets that keep a cold watch would of necessity figure in the potential losses. Not something that we could sell to our populous today, but if space is that harsh a mistress then our future selves would find a way to accept it.
I always saw the low lottery as a prime reason for passengers to find a way to scrape up the credits to travel at least mid-passage. Otherwise, we have interstellar travel on the model of "The Fifth Element": except for embarkation/debarkation, all passengers are "asleep" in their own coffin hotel room for the duration of the trip and the vast, vast, vast majority of passengers travel Popsicle class. Only the truly rich or medically unable would travel awake.
Which means, you try to stuff military personnel into the Frozen Watch and they'll kill you before you can do it... Not all the rules were thought about before being put into the books...
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Leaving aside the question of whether low travel and the low watch is plausibly as portrayed with a 8% death rate, there's another aspect: Do we actually want travel to be as restricted as the high cost of starship tickets and a low berth death much bigger than that of current everyday travel would seem to imply?
Personally I prefer a universe with tourists and pilgrims and emigrants and students and salesmen and scientists and bounty hunters and all sorts of odds and sots travelling among the stars in much greater numbers than the canonical rules imply. And I would like to point out that most canonical depictions of starports imply that the number of travellers is much higher than one would expect from the canonical ticket prices. It's almost as if the orginal authors just made up some numbers without considering the ramifications.
I assume that low berth lethality is low to nonexistent (as long as there's a competent medic to supervise entering and leaving the low berths), but that there are risks of lesser, but still unpleasant, consequences, such as aches and pains and week-long debilitation. And then I allow 'Economy Passage' which involves double occupancy of staterooms, and reduce life support costs to something a bit more plausible in order to make the gap between low passage and economy passage somewhat less wide.
And I don't hesitate to advocate that TPTB at Mongoose and Far Future retcon the rules to do the same. I'm not going to hold my breath waiting for them to do so, though.
Ah well, perhaps I can persuade Marc Miller to go that way with T6...
Hans
In MT, for a passenger to survive unharmed cold sleep, the doctor awakening him must roll 7+ modified by medical skill and EDU/5. If the roll fails, a mishap roll of 2d6 is made, where a maximum of 3d6 damage may occur. As you see, while some disability may be quite common, death is a rare occurence (not possible if your character phisical stats sum over 18).
Referee: The Medical skill and Education characteristics
used as modifiers to this task roll are those of the attending
physician at the time of deberthing, not those of the character
at risk. Various affects occur for any mishap (roll 20): Superficial
Mishap: The subject temporarily suffers 1D wounds for
1-6 days, after which healing is automatic; skin loses some of
its tone and color for 1-6 weeks, having a gray, wrinkled appearance.
Minor Mishap: The subject temporarily suffers 2D
wounds for 1-6 days, after which healing is automatic; subject
experiences motor function problems for 1-6 weeks with corresponding
loss of 2 points of dexterity during that time. Major
Mishap: The subject suffers 3D permanent wounds; the subject’s
internal organs are damaged; and the subject must
undergo medical diagnosis and treatment to restore full health.
Destroyed Mishap: This is not possible on a 2D mishap.
(MT IE, p.87)
used as modifiers to this task roll are those of the attending
physician at the time of deberthing, not those of the character
at risk. Various affects occur for any mishap (roll 20): Superficial
Mishap: The subject temporarily suffers 1D wounds for
1-6 days, after which healing is automatic; skin loses some of
its tone and color for 1-6 weeks, having a gray, wrinkled appearance.
Minor Mishap: The subject temporarily suffers 2D
wounds for 1-6 days, after which healing is automatic; subject
experiences motor function problems for 1-6 weeks with corresponding
loss of 2 points of dexterity during that time. Major
Mishap: The subject suffers 3D permanent wounds; the subject’s
internal organs are damaged; and the subject must
undergo medical diagnosis and treatment to restore full health.
Destroyed Mishap: This is not possible on a 2D mishap.
(MT IE, p.87)
Note that on a natural 2 on the task, the mishap is aggravated to 3D, making death possible on a 17+ on the mishap.
Assuming Joe Normal 777777... and Mike Medic 777777 medical-1.
Mike actually needs a 5+, and if he takes extra time, a 3+ (due to natural 2 failure), on 2d6.
So, not taking extra time, due to urgent need...
| Roll | Chances | outcome |
| 2 | 1/36 | 3d mishap |
| 3-4 | 5/36 | 2d mishap |
| 5-12 | 30/36 | safe |
| Roll | 2d chance (x5/36) | 3d chance (x1/36) | effect |
| 2 | 1/36* | 0/216 | reroll mishap |
| 3-6 | 14/30 | 20/216 | 1d wounds for 6 days, cosmetic effects for 1d weeks |
| 7-10 | 18/30 | 88/216 | 2d Wounds |
| 11-14 | 3/30 | 88/216 | 3d wound permanent |
| 15-18 | 0/30 | 20/216 | implied dead |
TY por the clarification, Aramis.
So death may be expected in about 20 cases every 7776 (1 in 388.8, or about 0.25%) and about 178 every 7776 (1 in 44 or about 2%) of the travellers would have serious injuries in MT against the 1 in12 from CT. I think this risk is quite more affordable.
So death may be expected in about 20 cases every 7776 (1 in 388.8, or about 0.25%) and about 178 every 7776 (1 in 44 or about 2%) of the travellers would have serious injuries in MT against the 1 in12 from CT. I think this risk is quite more affordable.
A medical skill of 3 and an education of 10 (quite a reasonable expectation of someone who has gained a medical degree) would give a bonus of +5. Wouldn't that reduce the number of injuries to below the granularity of the rules?
(Also, I would argue that the consequences of a mishap ought to be subject to some sort of DM derived from the medical competence of the attending physician. Even if he can't prevent an injury it seems reasonable that he could mitigate the adverse effects in many cases.)
Hans
Medical 2 edu 10 hits the maximum resolution...
which, by the way, is 3+, and which Medical 0 and Edu 1 can hit by taking extra time. MT has autofail on nat 2, and that's always aggravated.
Which makes it:
20/7760 = 0.25% 1d damage
88/7760 = 1.13% 2d damage
88/7760 = 1.13% 3d permanent damage
20/7760 = 0.25% dead
It cannot get better than this rate.
Autofail on a 2 with 2D, I see.
Actually, all that means to me is that for game purposes the risk a PC (or an NPC significant to the plot) runs when he gets into a low berth cannot get better than this rate. But a setting where the minimum fail rate for any activity with any risk at all is 3% is utterly unrealistic, so I do not accept that such a game rule proves that the minimum fail ratio of low berths for setting-building purposes is 3%.
Hans
Considering that the risk could have been much less if the task were defined differently (as in, making a simple failure take 1 point and wake up) rather than a mishap, which would also make the mishap 2d, it's quite obvious that there is never "no risk of death", and a 0.25% risk of death is WAY better than CT's 3%.
Heck, it's not even 1.5% have permanent effects.
by the way, that 3% rate is OPERATOR ERROR, not the failure rate of the berth itself - which, in MT, is presumed to be pretty reliable. It's the thawing medic (or non-medic) who kills the guy, not the machinery.
Who could argue that 0.25% isn't way better than 3%? I just don't see the relevance. What I said was that a game rule that mandates an automatic failure on a natural 2 isn't proof that the in-setting failure rate is actually 3%. It could be. Certainly there must be risky activities where the statistical failure rate just happens to be 3%. But the auto-failure rule simply means that it's impossible to distinguish the risks of such activities from the risks of any other activity with a failure rate of less than 3% without further evidence.
And, incidentally, if you accept the MT rule as canonical, you automatically dismiss the CT rule. Although they are both canonical, they can't both be true at the same time. But they can both be wrong. Who's to say that the death rate is 0.25% any more than it was 3%?
Another irrelevancy.
And you actually believe that an operator error of 3% would be acceptable? An inescapable risk of dying inherent in the process is one thing. I think a death rate of 3% (let alone 8%) would have a chilling effect on the use of low berth that isn't really reflected in the canonical descriptions of low berth usage, but it isn't inherently implausible. But operator error!?! Do you also believe that, say, flight controllers with an operator error rate of 3% is plausible? Or surgeons who botch one in 36 appendectomies?
Hans
pendragonman
Absent Friends Margrave
Hans,
An article from the Lancet:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/h...gery-death-rate-twice-as-high-as-thought.html
Overall death rate is 3.6% for those with today's surgeries within 2 months of the surgery.
You do agree that someone with medical skill is required to revive a lowbee? As such, bringing someone out of a coma state is a somewhat challenging task, even for the trained person and therefore more difficult than minor surgery?
Then as the statistical probabilities as stated in either version are accepted rates TODAY, and the game designers are actual beings from TODAY they are using the model they have.
I said appendectomy, not surgery. How many of those deaths were "operator errors"?
But I can easily come up with other examples. How about police snipers who miss 3% of the time?
I agree that the setting details for cold berth revival could plausible be established to be a complex operation comparable to major surgery. I don't agree that an automatic failure on rolling a natural 2 on 2D proves that such is the case.
It can also plausible be established as a routine operation that only requires supervision by a competent medical technician to be almost perfectly safe.
Hans
My guess is that this 3% adverse effects is not only operator error, as, as hans says, this would be quite unacceptable, but also intolerance by the traveller, secondary effects, undetected health conditions, etc...
Maybe not death, but the rate of adverse effects (from trivial to fatal) in hospitalization is closer to 8-10%. Anyway, one thing to take into account is that people that is hospitalized is not the same supposed helaty people that goes to cold sleep for travel.
My take is that some kind of medical test would be done before allowing someone to cold sleep, as I agree it should have inherent dangers.
Why not have 2 rolls.
One to put the sleeper under. ( uncertain task )
The second roll to bring the sleeper out.
The amount that the first task roll was made by or missed when the sleeper was being put under then becomes a dm for the roll to bring the sleeper out of the cold berth. A failed first roll may mean the medic missed something or made a mistake. Miss the first roll by 2, for example, then there is a -2dm for the second roll.
Should a mishap occur on the second roll, then first aid tasks must be made to stabilize the patient.
it's on par with major surgery rates, so yes, I'm good with it.
You mean that 3% of surgeries result in deaths due to mistakes made by the surgeon? Over and above the deaths that are due to some of the people who need surgery being, you know, in a certain amount of danger of dying even without the help of a surgeon who makes mistakes?
I doubt that very much.
Hans
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