Starports and Minimum Populations

[Chaos]

Originally posted by veltyen:
These population figures seem to indicate nessersary crew.

Of course an bigotted organic suppremicist might not count automated personel

Good point, especially the first part.

I am quite certain that Rhein-Main International, the airport here in Frankfurt - by Traveller standards a class A facility except for the fact it doesn´t do aircraft construction -, is Pop 4 from its employees alone; at some points, with visitors and passengers, it might approach Pop 5. That place is crowded.

In fact, from today´s point of view, I´d rather suggest the following minimum population levels:

Pop 7+ for class A
Pop 6+ for class B
Pop 5+ for class C
Pop 3+ for class D
Pop 1+ for class E

 

[MrMorden]

Maybe Tenalphi is run/owned by an ancient family of custom shipbuilders. They can make anything,and do fantastically detailed work. They thus act like a Class A starport, but only make perhaps one ship a year, or even less. But if necessary they CAN build or fix anything that flies.

 

[mike wightman]

What if Tenalphi starport employs 100,000 expats who don't count on the permanent resident statistics?
Or there are over 10,000,000 construction robots.

Or there is a slave race measured in their billions who aren't recognised by the ruling family of Tenalphi.

etc. etc.

 

[rancke]

Originally posted by MrMorden:
Maybe Tenalphi is run/owned by an ancient family of custom shipbuilders. They can make anything,and do fantastically detailed work. They thus act like a Class A starport, but only make perhaps one ship a year, or even less. But if necessary they CAN build or fix anything that flies.

Even if you believed that explanation (which I don't; 60 people wouldn't be making a ship per year, they'd be making a ship per century), it merely shifts the oddity. It doesn't explain why an Earthlike world lying on the border between the Imperium and the Sword Worlds and on a major trade route has a population of 60 after 800+ years of settlement. Why would the Imperium allow 60 peeple to monopolise a valuable world in a strategic position close to a hostile pocket empire? Why would 60 people who owned a valuable world not exploit it by leasing parts of it to people who'd pay far more in rent than any ships 60 people (that's 15 active workers, folks) could possibly build in a shipyard would sell for?


Hans

 

[rancke]

Originally posted by Sigg Oddra:
What if Tenalphi starport employs 100,000 expats who don't count on the permanent resident statistics? Or there are over 10,000,000 construction robots.

Or there is a slave race measured in their billions who aren't recognised by the ruling family of Tenalphi.

It's not the ruling family of Tenalphi who writes the UWPs. It's either the author of the game, in which case the billions should be mentioned, because they're a pretty damn important part of the scenery if any PCs ever visit the place, or it's the Scouts, in which case the billions should be mentioned because they're a pretty damn important part of the scenery if any Imperial ever visit the place.


Hans

 

[rancke]

Originally posted by Chaos:
In fact, from today´s point of view, I´d rather suggest the following minimum population levels:

Pop 7+ for class A
Pop 6+ for class B
Pop 5+ for class C
Pop 3+ for class D
Pop 1+ for class E

I'd agree about the class A and B ports, with the caveat that in special cases it can be lower: One order of magnitude lower for 'one-crop worlds', i.e. worlds that earn a disproportionate amount of their GWP by selling ships to others (but still grow their own food, dig out their own ore, and build their own subcomponents). Two orders of magnitude lower for worlds that has a shipyard that is funded from outside and simply assemble components that are manufactured elsewhere (You will, of course, need a good explanation of why someone is willing to pay for something like that).

As for class C, D, and E starports, I'm not sure. You don't really need a lot of people to provide the services that define them. There are canonical Class E starports that are nothing more than an automated beacons near a flat expanse of rock.


Hans

 

[MrMorden]

Originally posted by rancke:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by MrMorden:
Maybe Tenalphi is run/owned by an ancient family of custom shipbuilders. They can make anything,and do fantastically detailed work. They thus act like a Class A starport, but only make perhaps one ship a year, or even less. But if necessary they CAN build or fix anything that flies.

Even if you believed that explanation (which I don't; 60 people wouldn't be making a ship per year, they'd be making a ship per century), it merely shifts the oddity. It doesn't explain why an Earthlike world lying on the border between the Imperium and the Sword Worlds and on a major trade route has a population of 60 after 800+ years of settlement. Why would the Imperium allow 60 peeple to monopolise a valuable world in a strategic position close to a hostile pocket empire? Why would 60 people who owned a valuable world not exploit it by leasing parts of it to people who'd pay far more in rent than any ships 60 people (that's 15 active workers, folks) could possibly build in a shipyard would sell for?


Hans </font>[/QUOTE]Oh yeah, sorry...I thought for a minute this was a GAME and a little imagination might be in order.

My point is that with a little thought you can come up with an interesting explanation for anything the UWP can say. I think my explanation above is much more interesting and flavorful to a campaign than just saying "that can't be" and trying to "fix" the UWP.

 

[mike wightman]

Originally posted by rancke:
It's not the ruling family of Tenalphi who writes the UWPs. It's either the author of the game, in which case the billions should be mentioned, because they're a pretty damn important part of the scenery if any PCs ever visit the place, or it's the Scouts, in which case the billions should be mentioned because they're a pretty damn important part of the scenery if any Imperial ever visit the place.


Hans

Such is the nature of the limited info that the original Spinward Marches supplement gave us. There isn't enough space to give even a few lines of description for each world (and look how well some people consider GT:BtC did in doing just that).
And it is the ruling family of Tenalphi who informs the scout service that only they are recognised as citizens of the world, the slave race thing has precedent.

I'd personally go with lots of expats and huge numbers of construction robots as the explanation, cosidering the TL and the location of the world.

 

[mike wightman]

Originally posted by rancke:
Even if you believed that explanation (which I don't; 60 people wouldn't be making a ship per year, they'd be making a ship per century), it merely shifts the oddity.

And if each of those 60 people supervises 10,000,000 TL14 construction robots?

[qb It doesn't explain why an Earthlike world lying on the border between the Imperium and the Sword Worlds and on a major trade route has a population of 60 after 800+ years of settlement.[/qb]

That's a bit harder to answer
Perhaps one of the families are influencial nobles, perhaps LSP keeps it that way so only they can exploit it...

Why would the Imperium allow 60 peeple to monopolise a valuable world in a strategic position close to a hostile pocket empire? Why would 60 people who owned a valuable world not exploit it by leasing parts of it to people who'd pay far more in rent than any ships 60 people (that's 15 active workers, folks) could possibly build in a shipyard would sell for?


Hans

Who says they own and exploit it? The UPP only says how many local sentient native residents there are (human or minor race distinctions don't appear in the simple UPP).
I think it is much more likely that LSP exploits the world to feed its factories on Strouden and Lunion.

 

[mike wightman]

Originally posted by MrMorden:
My point is that with a little thought you can come up with an interesting explanation for anything the UWP can say. I think my explanation above is much more interesting and flavorful to a campaign than just saying "that can't be" and trying to "fix" the UWP.

I agree with you completely.

I'd rather interpret the UPP myself than have someone else detail everything about all the worlds in Imperium and beyond.

 

[Pickles]

I just change the UWPs if I don't like them. The back of my copy of the Introductory Adventure from the old Deluxe Set has become rather lumpy with Tippex(TM) over the decades ...