Smuggling goods from orbit to planetside

[creativehum]

A Size 9 world with TL 6 wants to track shipments from space to surface. They want shipments to arrive at the planetside starport. A neighboring world of TL B can prioved slightly more tech on a limited scale.

Questions:

How many tracking statins do they need to do this? I asusume eight to ten shoul do it,

If an air/raft descend and runs as dark as possible, can it easily avoid detection?

What methods might smugglers come up with to avoid detection?

IMPORTANT NOTES: This is a straight-up Books 1-3 qurdion; Book 5 does not exist in this situation. Further, the Third Imperium as a setting element does not matter or exist.

Thanks!

 

[McPerth]

My guess is that in most cases, as today, smugglin is done not by stealthy ships, harder to do as TL increases, but by open ships and hidden cargoes.

Of course, that wil ldepend on the volume and weight of the intended cargo to smuggle, but in most case high TL crates will be able to cheat their TL6 sensors about the cargoes they carry, and forged documents will allow the to pas the customs.

Of course, bribery has also a role here, depsite any TL11 Satellites deployed...

 

[creativehum]

My assumption, too, was that the route of my PC gunrunners would be open ships and hidden cargoes.

But at the end of the last session they floated the idea of cheating the sensors and landing off the starport. (Bribery was mentioned as part of this plan.) So I wanted to think it through.

We're only on the third session tonight, and so we're still building out the logic and "reality" of many of the details of a Far Future setting. This may be one of those points where they learn, "Oh, sneaking a ships down to a TL 6+ world is hard!"

 

[jcrocker]

Short version is, "it depends."

A class C or D Starport would have very limited tracking assets, and a ship would have no problem landing off port, on the far side of the planet. Or even a couple of hundred kilometers from the port.

Class B or A ports would have much better coverage, more likely to have it on satellites.

Air/rafts would take roughly forever to get stuff up and down from orbit. A small launch or ship's boat would be better for that.

It also depends upon the population - only a few thousand people on the planet? Not very difficult at all. High pop world in the billions? Lots more chances to be spotted.

Does the planet have an atmosphere? Do they fly passenger aircraft? If there are radar chains to track all those aircraft flying the friendly skies, there's a lot more chance any smuggler gets spotted.

If it's one big happy planet, there's less likely to be defensive radar sites. Is the planet balkanized? How do the nations get along? Think NORAD in the 1950s, there were a few radar chains built to keep the commies from dropping the Big One on New York, for example.

If there's no air, or the place is swept by huge storms so that all cross-country travel is by train and no one needs traffic control radar, that's a factor. Of course, if everyone has weather radar, the ship could still be spotted.

It also depends on how you and the players want to game it - is it very low level? "Okay, Dave, I need a piloting roll, and Mary, roll for sensors use. Then both of you again, for an hour later." Or do you want "roll 8+ for mission success, then we roll for megacredits."

 

[davidjbullock]

At TL6, I imagine it wouldn't be hard to stealth in if they were running dark and radio silent. TL6 air search radars are fairly limited in range (out to a few hundred miles) and resolution. Descending over a remote area and flying NOE to the destination while skirting heavily populated areas should be fairly easy.

 

[whartung]

The other problem is what they can do about it if they do detect it.

If they detect a ship penetrating the atmosphere, but not going where they want it to go, do they have the resources to actually intercept the ship.

If they arrive at the landing site only to find a burned out air raft and tire tracks heading to the west, then what?

 

[creativehum]

The other problem is what they can do about it if they do detect it.

If they detect a ship penetrating the atmosphere, but not going where they want it to go, do they have the resources to actually intercept the ship.

If they arrive at the landing site only to find a burned out air raft and tire tracks heading to the west, then what?

Well, adventure is what happens.

That is anyone committing the act of smuggling -- in real life or RPGs -- runs the risk of getting caught or the authorities catching up to you. There is no guarantee you'll get away with it, and no guarantee the authorities will catch you -- even if they know something untoward will occur.

So it isn't a calculated risk on the part of the Players.

For my part as Referee it is me making a die roll to see what the authorities bring to bear if they get wind of the operation.

Bodai is 90% water -- and a like the idea of fixed dishes on its two major continents and several naval bases that float on water around the globe.

Airlines travel frequently between the two continents. And Bavraa -- a neighboring world that rediscored j drives several hundred years ago -- is trying to make Bodai a client state and has provided tech to help keep tabs on trade.

Sneaking the goods down from

 

[kilemall]

My assumption, too, was that the route of my PC gunrunners would be open ships and hidden cargoes.

But at the end of the last session they floated the idea of cheating the sensors and landing off the starport. (Bribery was mentioned as part of this plan.) So I wanted to think it through.

We're only on the third session tonight, and so we're still building out the logic and "reality" of many of the details of a Far Future setting. This may be one of those points where they learn, "Oh, sneaking a ships down to a TL 6+ world is hard!"

This is a big deal for MTU, given that Earth is under a TC Scouts Red Zone.

The mission is to keep nature pure and replenishing after humanity's exit from the planet, partially altruistic but mostly to protect DNA 'IP', keep the plague that caused said exit/depopulation from escaping to space, and keeping the locals that refused to leave at TL3 so they can't tear up the biomes or get to space.

So you can think of the Scouts in this context as subsidized DNA explorers/Park Rangers with lasers and a medical quarantine to keep both space and Earth safely separate.


Potential business models for 'non-licensed transport' is shipping medicine and arms down to help space colony's homeland win little wars, getting DNA samples up to get advantage in the major biotech/pharma industries, locals who want to emigrate to modern space but are prevented by the quarantine, rare earths and oxygenated minerals that don't exist outside Earth, and exporting priceless artifacts illegally from the ruins of Earth's cities.

Smuggling in plain sight of course is a premium option, except that there isn't a lot of trade going on, mostly operational and personnel support for the Scout mission. Which means they are watching those shipments like hawks.



This is a major reason why I developed an over-complicated sensor subgame, as getting that last 50,000km between Earth and space undetected is highly problematic.

I have the usual Radar/IR/optical sort of sensors, did the EM spectrum so UV, X-ray etc., LIDAR is paired with the spectrum passive set in it's bandwidth, and added some not in the usual pantheon, such as Acoustic and Particle.

Each model number level of computer gets 1 long range set that is going to be picking up even passive at 100,000-900,000 km, and 1 short range set at less then 100,000 km. Exact numbers are determined by TL and/or computer model.

Detection is against a roll that takes the HG ship size into account for both target AND detecting ship, the competing computer models, and whether the target is passively or actively emitting.


Ships can be stealthed- basically 10% of the total cost tacked on per sensor type being stealthed against per DM. So a -1 DM against radar would cost 10% more, -4 DM would cost 40% more, and -4 DM for both radar and IR would be 80%.

On a practical basis this means navies might consider doing larger ships for lower detection against known enemy preferred EM bands. But for a stealth ship meant to slip through possibly the heaviest sensor net known, only a small craft will be even fiscally feasible. A -5 DM against 11 sensor types would cost 550% more.

And the computer/EW aspect means a very large computer would have to be mounted to even have a chance. Powerplants can only be so large, at higher TLs perhaps batteries or capacitors would have to be installed to keep the EW up until the small craft is down or up.

Grav vehicles would be the cheaper choice for stealthing, with the caveat that they probably cannot mount higher computer EW and would likely require a ship in orbit to operate/leave the planet from.

The other option would be stealth cargo missiles- much smaller and thus cheaper to stealth, cannot mount computers worth EW but would be stealthed at a far higher -10 DM rate (so a complete -10 stealth missile is 1100% x usual cost so figure Cr5000 x 11 = Cr 60000). For a 30kg potential payload that's Cr2000 per kg, best be worth it!

 

[McPerth]

At TL6, I imagine it wouldn't be hard to stealth in if they were running dark and radio silent. TL6 air search radars are fairly limited in range (out to a few hundred miles) and resolution. Descending over a remote area and flying NOE to the destination while skirting heavily populated areas should be fairly easy.

Agreed, if not for the TL 11 planet helping on it...

The other problem is what they can do about it if they do detect it.

If they detect a ship penetrating the atmosphere, but not going where they want it to go, do they have the resources to actually intercept the ship.

If they arrive at the landing site only to find a burned out air raft and tire tracks heading to the west, then what?

They probably can do little, asside than to send some Spitfires or at best Me262 equivalent, to little, if any effect on a spaceship, or some troops that can take time to reach the landing zone...

Of course, if they detect them, they ca nreport to IN (to varying effects, depending on the interest the Imperium has), and, of course, to bann this ship from its spaceport, effects depending o n he interest they might have i nfuture landings there...

 

[BRJN]

The adventure Marooned / Marooned Alone has a little bit on 'does the starport see me escaping the pirate-attacked ship?' that you might adapt.

If your players want a Millennium Falcon smuggling run to the planet scene, read "Han Solo at Stars End" and the rest of the Han Solo Trilogy, where he does just that a few times with differing circumstances around him. Decide what comes close to the PCs' situation and make up some die rolls. Sensors, Comms (for radio silence), Engineering, Pilot (for fancy maneuvers).

The TL 11 world would probably provide a dozen detector satellites for traffic control and some grav craft or a Ships Boat to get a platoon of Rapid Reaction force on the smugglers' trail. Maybe a special 6-G fighter to get halfway around the world fast, equipped with the best sensor gear they can pack in where the weapons used to be.

 

[Timerover51]

Given the planet as described with Tech Level 6, unless the players do something really stupid, I would role 2D6, and have their ship detected coming in over the Poles on a roll of 12.

 

[Selandia]

Id say TL differential is key, specially if instead of trying to hide a standard Air Raft with ecm pod, you use a craft designed as Stealth craft. The organisation doing the insertion is also relevant. Covert mini sub operation by the US navy are more likely to succeed than cartel drug running by mini sub.
have fun
Selandia

 

[sudnadja]

I don't think there are really any book 1-3 rules to cover this exact situation. By the rules (book 2), "Planetary masses and stars will completely conceal a ship from detection". That could be read as "if a detecting ship is trying to detect a ship that is masked by a planetary mass, it cannot be detected", otherwise ship-to-ship detection ranges apply, 1/2 light second for commercial sensors and 2 light seconds for military, divided by 8 if the ship is running quiet, for 1/16th light second commercial (18737 km) or 1/4 light second military (74948 km). In either case, as long as the ship isn't masked by the planet's horizon, sensors mounted on ships should be able to see other ships at those distances.

It's not covered for changes in tech level or if they are ground based sensors, that I am aware of, in book 1-3.

In comparison to the real world though, I suspect orbit-to-surface smuggling would be easy. If you are a hobbiest satellite-tracker, you're probably aware that there are a fair number of NORAD tracked objects that appear for which it is unclear what the launching country was. We have events like Malaysia Flight 370 that was able to just vanish for which we would have no knowledge of except for the active transmitters on that flight, and even high energy meteors will reenter the atmosphere and get completely missed by ground detection equipment.

So - strictly following book 1-3 I think it's probably next to impossible to smuggle anything in, but logically it would be easy.

 

[Diveguy]

Are the players tied to personally delivering said items?

Because, my route would be to cover the "cargo" in an ablative shield of some means, and launch it on a trajectory to land at certain coordinates unpowered. Throw a pinger/beacon of whatever nature needed to guide your buyers to the cargo.

Lower detection rate, since you mask it as "just another meteor" and it's not moving under power. Lower risk to seller, since you're not physically holding the goods at delivery.

Of course, I'm sure the buyers would have some need to assure the items were delivered once they paid - giving you another adventure hook point.

 

[Timerover51]

Are the players tied to personally delivering said items?

Because, my route would be to cover the "cargo" in an ablative shield of some means, and launch it on a trajectory to land at certain coordinates unpowered. Throw a pinger/beacon of whatever nature needed to guide your buyers to the cargo.

Lower detection rate, since you mask it as "just another meteor" and it's not moving under power. Lower risk to seller, since you're not physically holding the goods at delivery.

Of course, I'm sure the buyers would have some need to assure the items were delivered once they paid - giving you another adventure hook point.

You are going to need more than just an ablative shield for any cargo being smuggled in, as you are going to need some way of breaking the speed of fall of the cargo. The Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo capsules all had a fairly elaborate breaking parachute system to get the capsules down without smashing everything to a pulp. Now, once the parachutes deploy, the fun can start with them being blown by the wind into all sorts of unlikely and undesirable places.

 

[jcrocker]

You are going to need more than just an ablative shield for any cargo being smuggled in, as you are going to need some way of breaking the speed of fall of the cargo.

Grav modules seem to fit that bill nicely.

Sure, there`s a few engineering problems to work on, but if we can read about how drug cartels build subs to smuggle drugs in the real world, I`m sure some of the bad guys would be working on the technical end of things.

 

[aramis]

You are going to need more than just an ablative shield for any cargo being smuggled in, as you are going to need some way of breaking the speed of fall of the cargo. The Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo capsules all have a fairly elaborate breaking parachute system to get the capsules down without smashing everything to a pulp. Now, once the parachutes deploy, the fun can start with them being blown by the wind into all sorts of unlikely and undesirable places.

The system isn't elaborate - the mechanics are pretty simple, really - explosive bolts instead of pullstraps or linear motors, so actually simpler than some of the cargo rigs for light vehicle airdrops.

The thing is, while not elaborate, it requires very high precision on the timing, in the manufacturing, and the materials, in order to prevent lithobraking.

 

[Diveguy]

The system isn't elaborate - the mechanics are pretty simple, really - explosive bolts instead of pullstraps or linear motors, so actually simpler than some of the cargo rigs for light vehicle airdrops.

The thing is, while not elaborate, it requires very high precision on the timing, in the manufacturing, and the materials, in order to prevent lithobraking.

To follow up on all the above - yes, depending on how much you want to nerf things with rules and tech for how it works. My point was more the concept of orbital delivery to a spot on the ground, instead of doing a manual drop off. Whether you use parachutes, grav modules, or a plotted orbital decay all depends on how your universe needs to work.

 

[aramis]

To follow up on all the above - yes, depending on how much you want to nerf things with rules and tech for how it works. My point was more the concept of orbital delivery to a spot on the ground, instead of doing a manual drop off. Whether you use parachutes, grav modules, or a plotted orbital decay all depends on how your universe needs to work.

Without some other element, planned orbital decay results in either non-delivery, random dispersal, or lithobraking (whole or partial). (ala many satellites, Shuttle Columbia, or any number of meteor impacts).

 

[Diveguy]

Without some other element, planned orbital decay results in either non-delivery, random dispersal, or lithobraking (whole or partial). (ala many satellites, Shuttle Columbia, or any number of meteor impacts).

Of course - I just tend to avoid trying to get into full-on physics discussions in my games (YMMV as always sir). My theory being, a culture which is capable of jump travel, cold sleep, and all these other technologies most likely has a pretty easy handle on "How to get materials from orbit to the surface at a low cost and high success rate."