OTU Only: T5SS Semi-Official Thread

[inexorabletash]

What's up with 0221? The odd name field caught my eye, but when I looked it up that world is entirely missing from the Ares version of the (half) sector. It doesn't appear to be a misplaced world from my half of the sector, either.

Hah! Good old # Krobob, the kids call it "Hashtag" for short of course!

Actually... 0221 Krobob appeared in Dale's manuscript but not Ares or TTC. I discussed with Don and we settled on removing it so I commented it out of the SEC file. Apparently it didn't actually get deleted during the import into the T5SS dataset, and instead got the comment marker as part of the name. Oops!

I'll delete it. (EDIT: Deleted)

 

[GypsyComet]

Here is FarF I again, with Belt and Gas Giant numbers courtesy of the dice. I suspect those Ws were generated based on "known" data with no provision for un-generated data. Not wanting to change them, the result is a region with lightweight systems.

0123 Acropolis A887556-9 Ag Ni Ga Pr { 1 } (845+1) [4648] - KV - 822 9 SaCo G6 V
0124 Belekz A553413-A Ni Po { 1 } (634-2) [1527] - - - 300 5 SaCo F8 V
0125 Drawmij E569955-7 Hi Pr { -1 } (B88-3) [7835] - - - 903 9 SaCo G9 V
0128 Salinaikin A000347-E As Lo Va Cx { 1 } (621+1) [345E] - K - 613 9 SaCo M7 III
0225 Natlus C859457-7 Ni { -2 } (631-2) [4257] - - - 611 7 SaCo F2 V
0226 Stamfor D542885-6 He Po Ph Pi { -2 } (A75-4) [6634] - - - 613 11 SaCo K7 V
0228 Arbelletia C435435-9 Ni { -1 } (732-3) [2337] - - - 311 8 SaCo G4 V
0229 Yith C423558-C Ni Po Da RsE { 0 } (844+1) [555C] - V A 611 6 SaCo K6 V M8 V
0322 Carcosa X400000-0 Ba Va Fo { -3 } (200-5) [0000] - - R 011 5 NaHu F1 III M3 V D
0324 Pleroo BA86698-6 Ag Ni Ri { 1 } (855+1) [6756] - M - 432 10 SaCo M1 V
0326 Bytar A435212-E Lo { 1 } (511-3) [131A] - - - 601 9 SaCo K8 V
0327 Mitra B975740-A Ag Pi { 3 } (A6C-1) [2A15] - K - 803 9 SaCo M3 V
0329 Al-Jebel A430454-C De Ni Po Da Px { 1 } (734-1) [253A] - K A 301 7 SaCo G7 V
0425 Manchu B000100-D As Lo Va { 1 } (411-3) [1218] - K - 311 6 SaCo K8 V M6 V D
0426 Kretakios C998423-6 Ni Pa { -2 } (631-5) [1223] - V - 711 11 SaCo M8 III
0428 Maried C656650-8 Ag Ni Ga { -1 } (953-5) [1513] - - - 201 9 SaCo G0 V
0430 Atlantis E768955-7 Hi Pr Pz { -1 } (B88-3) [7835] - - A 911 8 NaHu F0 V
0523 Sere E6315A8-8 Ni Po { -3 } (841-3) [5258] - - - 101 9 SaCo G1 V
0524 Servaas AA979B9-B Hi In Pz { 4 } (C8F+5) [AD6C] - K A 911 7 SaCo M3 III M2 V
0526 Dunsel E7628D9-3 Ri Ph Pz { -1 } (A75+1) [9764] - - A 622 14 SaCo F8 V
0528 Summer A886610-C Ag Ni Ga Ri { 3 } (957-1) [1917] - KV - 701 5 NaHu M0 V
0530 Roentgen E8C7673-9 Fl Ni { -2 } (952-5) [3426] - - - 322 10 NaHu A8 V
0623 Dreamland C431631-9 Na Ni Po { -1 } (953-5) [2515] - - - 512 8 SaCo M2 V
0625 Tanner A763AD9-A Hi Pz { 3 } (D9D+4) [BD6B] - K A 102 9 NaHu A7 V
0630 Hali B8A6759-B Fl { 2 } (A6C+3) [896C] - - - 611 7 NaHu G7 V
0722 Drako B865AC9-A Hi Ga Pz { 3 } (D9D+4) [BD6B] - K A 112 8 NaHu M2 V
0727 Nehagen A677A99-B Hi In { 4 } (D9F+5) [BE6C] - K - 121 8 NaHu G7 V
0730 Groneitz C696738-5 Ag Pi { 0 } (967+1) [7755] - - - 722 12 NaHu F6 V
0827 Psagin A101722-C Ic Na Va Pi { 2 } (96C-2) [3918] - V - 510 9 NaHu F2 IV M5 V

 

[ovka]

I hate to be indelicate, but with Don's passing, who is the keeper of T5SS data?

Baron Ovka

 

[aramis]

I hate to be indelicate, but with Don's passing, who is the keeper of T5SS data?

Baron Ovka

Marc Miller

 

[ovka]

Hmmm. It seems Marc has enough on his plate. Don't get me wrong, it's his baby, but one thing more added to the list will slow things down.

Cheers,

Baron Ovka

 

[aramis]

Hmmm. It seems Marc has enough on his plate. Don't get me wrong, it's his baby, but one thing more added to the list will slow things down.

Cheers,

Baron Ovka

Technically, Marc's been reviewing it all "over Don's Shoulder", anyway, but for the most part, the same working group is doing the same work, but with Marc hitting the commit. (Somehow, I got added to that email list... I've not seen anthing I felt strongly enough to comment on in the last week.)

 

[ovka]

Stellar Data

It appears that T5SS has eliminated the color designations for dwarf stars (DB, DA, DF, DG, DK, and DM) in favor of just D. I am guessing that this is because the color of the dwarf star is inconsequential under the MOARN (map only as really necessary) principle.

I do see two stars in the T5SS data with the BD designation (GUSH 2815 and SPIN 1910, yes Regina!). Are these correct? If so, are they intended to be the only two dwarf stars in charted space that are more than companion stars? I know that in the case of Regina (stellar data "F7 V BD M3 V" in T5SS), the second star used to be a DM companion.

Will there be an attempt at some point to reorder the stellar data? I am looking at EMPT 1816 and seeing "D M9 V" in T5SS. I'm guessing that the dwarf star should be orbiting the M9 main sequence star.

Is there a way to determine which star is a close companion star (and to which other star it is a companion)? I see entries like "K7 V M3 V M2 V", "G8 IV K2 V G3 V", and "M0 V M6 V M3 V M7 V" in T5SS, and wonder which star is which.

Cheers,

Baron Ovka

 

[inexorabletash]

I do see two stars in the T5SS data with the BD designation (GUSH 2815 and SPIN 1910, yes Regina!). Are these correct? If so, are they intended to be the only two dwarf stars in charted space that are more than companion stars? I know that in the case of Regina (stellar data "F7 V BD M3 V" in T5SS), the second star used to be a DM companion.

BD = Brown Dwarf. Old rules don't generate these so only a few have been hand-placed. Changing Regina's companion was a deliberate retcon to keep the rest of the system intact - there should be comments from DonM elsewhere in this thread.

 

[whulorigan]

I do see two stars in the T5SS data with the BD designation (GUSH 2815 and SPIN 1910, yes Regina!). Are these correct? If so, are they intended to be the only two dwarf stars in charted space that are more than companion stars? I know that in the case of Regina (stellar data "F7 V BD M3 V" in T5SS), the second star used to be a DM companion.

BD is the designation for Brown Dwarf. And yes, the "DM" was deliberately changed to BD, since Regina has native intelligent life, which is not consistent with having a Close/Near binary star in the system that is a White Dwarf.

Will there be an attempt at some point to reorder the stellar data? I am looking at EMPT 1816 and seeing "D M9 V" in T5SS. I'm guessing that the dwarf star should be orbiting the M9 main sequence star.

Is there a way to determine which star is a close companion star (and to which other star it is a companion)? I see entries like "K7 V M3 V M2 V", "G8 IV K2 V G3 V", and "M0 V M6 V M3 V M7 V" in T5SS, and wonder which star is which.

This was an ongoing discussion with DonM and others some time back (in this thread, I believe). While Don and I both were in favor of getting a parsing code for this sorted out, enough people were disinterested or thought that other data was of greater priority that the stellar-parsing data format got shoved to the back-burner.

Chjeck out this thread:
[FONT=arial,helvetica]Suggestion for T5SS and stellar data [/FONT]

 

[G. Kashkanun Anderson]

BD is the designation for Brown Dwarf.

Which is a bit problematic in a different way. While it does make it more likely that Regina is habitable, placing a Brown Dwarf in that close to a primary of that size doesn't fit what is currently known about how multiple star systems are formed. Brown Dwarf companions just aren't found that close in to near Solar Mass primaries*, and in any triple system like Regina, the third body is nearly always the smallest one (the only exception being a captured star, which is a rare phenomenon, as far as is known).

And yes, the "DM" was deliberately changed to BD, since Regina has native intelligent life, which is not consistent with having a Close/Near binary star in the system that is a White Dwarf.

A traditionally evolved White Dwarf is a problem, yes. But the (former) White Dwarf in the Regina system looks to be close enough to Lusor (the primary) so that the stellar material ejected from Speck during its post Main Sequence phase could have accreted directly to Lusor during a stable mass transfer event, meaning that Speck could have transitioned into a White Dwarf without ever becoming a world-wrecking type II/III giant. If Regina could hang on during Speck's alternative 100-million-year dalliance as a Blue Subdwarf, it should have no further problems down the road.

If all this hypothetically happened relatively recently, then I can see how there would be problems for any already existing advanced biosphere. But if it happened a few billion years ago, when Regina's biosphere was presumably much simpler and more reliant on extremophiles, it might have been little more than a blip. Alternatively, it could have 'reset' Regina's biosphere back to an earlier, extremophile state, and what we are seeing today are the descendants of that second wave.

*That empirical observation could change, of course, and I'm not trying to be dogmatic about this. In other words, none of the above should be interpreted as me advocating a return the Regina system to its original configuration.

 

[77topaz]

Typos?

In Alpha Crucis Sector, there are numerous world names that look like typos: shouldn't Archernar (0719) be Achernar, Aplhaville (1216) be Alphaville and Katmandu (0816) be Kathmandu? Were those spellings intentional or mistakes?

 

[Garnfellow]

Mongoose Traveller: Solomani is the canonical source for that sector. None of these worlds are high population, so didn't appear in the Atlas of the Imperium, and they aren't mentioned in the text of the Mongoose book -- they only appear in the subsector data tables and maps. Although the Solomani book is excellent, the high rate of typos in any Mongoose book means we should be suspicious.

"Aplhaville" is almost certainly a typo, as it is "Alphaville" in the table and map. "Katmandu" and "Archernar" are spelled the same in both the table and map, and are probably OK.

 

[whulorigan]

Mongoose Traveller: Solomani is the canonical source for that sector. None of these worlds are high population, so didn't appear in the Atlas of the Imperium, and they aren't mentioned in the text of the Mongoose book -- they only appear in the subsector data tables and maps. Although the Solomani book is excellent, the high rate of typos in any Mongoose book means we should be suspicious.

"Aplhaville" is almost certainly a typo, as it is "Alphaville" in the table and map. "Katmandu" and "Archernar" are spelled the same in both the table and map, and are probably OK.

I think Katmandu can work as a variant future phonetic spelling of Kathmandu, but I am fairly certain that "Archernar" was supposed to be the canonical star "Achernar" (Alpha Eridani), since it lies approximately in that region of space relative to Earth. (Astronomically: about 43 pc at a bearing of 290^o by -58^o, (which is ~ 22.5 pc @ bearing 290^o when projected onto the TravellerMap plane).

However, the real Achernar is a B6 V star (and has a near binary companion of Type A_V), whereas the Alpha Crucis Sector data lists "Archernar" as a G4 III solitary star.

 

[77topaz]

I think Katmandu can work as a variant future phonetic spelling of Kathmandu, but I am fairly certain that "Archernar" was supposed to be the canonical star "Achernar" (Alpha Eridani), since it lies approximately in that region of space relative to Earth. (Astronomically: about 43 pc at a bearing of 290^o by -58^o, (which is ~ 22.5 pc @ bearing 290^o when projected onto the TravellerMap plane).

However, the real Achernar is a B6 V star (and has a near binary companion of Type A_V), whereas the Alpha Crucis Sector data lists "Archernar" as a G4 III solitary star.

Yeah, Spica (2205 Spica) doesn't have the correct stellar classification in the sector data either (TravellerMap says K7 II M7 V, Wikipedia says B1 III-IV B2 V - which means it probably should be an asteroid belt as the mainworld, too), though that sector is still "in review".

 

[whulorigan]

Yeah, Spica (2205 Spica) doesn't have the correct stellar classification in the sector data either (TravellerMap says K7 II M7 V, Wikipedia says B1 III-IV B2 V - which means it probably should be an asteroid belt as the mainworld, too), though that sector is still "in review".

I am a big proponent of having the TravellerMap / T5SS data for known, real-life, named stars match their actual, real-world stellar data when it is reasonably clear by astrographic position that the stars in question are one and the same. (I can deal with Spica having a world as an "anomaly" or as a captured world).

At least in the case of the former world Regulus in the Regulus Subsector of Alpha Crucis, the name of the world in the hex was changed to Basilicus before the star was changed to a M2 III / M3 V binary.

 

[Garnfellow]

Yeah, Spica (2205 Spica) doesn't have the correct stellar classification in the sector data either (TravellerMap says K7 II M7 V, Wikipedia says B1 III-IV B2 V - which means it probably should be an asteroid belt as the mainworld, too), though that sector is still "in review".

I have to admit, I am a little at a loss as to what to do when reviewing T5SS data in light of real stars. Now, I am perfectly willing to accept that jump space, being 2-dimensional, does not map neatly to normal space distances, and that a star might be 10 1-parsec jumps away from my position and simultaneously 5 or 15 parsecs away in normal space.

And I am perfectly fine with accepting that some real stars have been placed in canonical locations on the map that do not correspond very well with their real world distances or directions from Terra.

But for those real world stars that have not been canonically fixed, I would prefer to have approximately the right stellar description in approximately the right position. (And really, we are updating our understanding of real stars all the time, anyway.)

Take Canopus. The real star is about 96 parsecs away. We have a sector named Canopus, but even the farthest point in that sector from Terra is, what? only 73 parsecs away. Should the star Canopus actually be in Canopus Sector? I write this as someone living on a continent whose native inhabitants were called Indians, even though India is on the other side of the world.

 

[77topaz]

I am a big proponent of having the TravellerMap / T5SS data for known, real-life, named stars match their actual, real-world stellar data when it is reasonably clear by astrographic position that the stars in question are one and the same. (I can deal with Spica having a world as an "anomaly" or as a captured world).

Agreed; that's the approach I've taken with my sector data for the Orion OB1 Association, too (I have a database of all the major stars of Orion with their stellar classifications and distances from Terra, though I believe I may have placed the stars too far trailward, and some of the stars are meant to be in Charted Space but aren't specifically named there).

At least in the case of the former world Regulus in the Regulus Subsector of Alpha Crucis, the name of the world in the hex was changed to Basilicus before the star was changed to a M2 III / M3 V binary.

Basilicus? Was that named after Basilicus Prime?

 

[77topaz]

I have to admit, I am a little at a loss as to what to do when reviewing T5SS data in light of real stars. Now, I am perfectly willing to accept that jump space, being 2-dimensional, does not map neatly to normal space distances, and that a star might be 10 1-parsec jumps away from my position and simultaneously 5 or 15 parsecs away in normal space.

And I am perfectly fine with accepting that some real stars have been placed in canonical locations on the map that do not correspond very well with their real world distances or directions from Terra.

But for those real world stars that have not been canonically fixed, I would prefer to have approximately the right stellar desciption in appoximately the right position. (And really, we are updating our understanding of real stars all the time, anyway.)

Take Canopus. The real star is about 96 parsecs away. We have a sector named Canopus, but even the farthest point in that sector from Terra is, what? only 73 parsecs away. Should the star Canopus actually be in Canopus Sector? I write this as someone living on a continent whose native inhabitants were called Indians, even though India is on the other side of the world.

Yep. Deneb may be the brightest star in the sky of Terra (which it isn't for Earth), but at least it has the right stellar classification. And, in sector data I've created, I've tried to (at least roughly) match the stellar distances as well.

 

[whulorigan]

Agreed; that's the approach I've taken with my sector data for the Orion OB1 Association, too (I have a database of all the major stars of Orion with their stellar classifications and distances from Terra, though I believe I may have placed the stars too far trailward, and some of the stars are meant to be in Charted Space but aren't specifically named there).

Actually there is a beneficial fudge-factor inherent in the Map of Charted Space. Alpha Centauri (Prometheus) in reality lies at bearing 315^o, whereas on the Map of Charted Space it lies at 270^o. That is rotated exactly 45^o. This happens to be true for about 75% of the named real stars on the Map of Charted Space that I have checked. So the "real" direction of "Coreward" (for the purposes of placing stars) lies parallel tot the Lesser Rift (i.e. Sagittarius A* would be seen from Earth looking thru K'kree space).

So when I want to place a real star in relation to Charted Space, I consider that I have a fudge-factor of 45^o regarding the coordinate axes between Coreward as marked on the Charted Space Map and 45^o clockwise from that bearing.

In the case of Rigel, it would be somewhere between due Rimward and Rimtrailing relative to the Map of Charted Space. I generally place it Rimward at about 4-7 Sectors distance from Terra (depending on how you want to account for the fact that it lies along a southerly bearing, and not in the plane of the map - i.e. it is really Rimsouth/Rimsouth-Trailing ).

Basilicus? Was that named after Basilicus Prime?

Actually, Regulus is Latin for "Little King" (it was the term the Romans typically used for Tribal Chieftains). Basilicus is probably derived from Greek "Basileos" (= "King"). "Saint Peter's Basilica" means "Saint Peter's Palace".

 

[whulorigan]

Yep. Deneb may be the brightest star in the sky of Terra (which it isn't for Earth), but at least it has the right stellar classification. And, in sector data I've created, I've tried to (at least roughly) match the stellar distances as well.

Regarding my post above, Deneb is another one of those stars whose bearing is off by about 45^o clockwise. In reality it is almost due Spinward, not Corespinward. (And it lies at best at about half the distance from Terra on the Traveller Map as it does in real life [as you alluded to above]). If you leave it at its shown Corespinward bearing as on Traveller Map, it should lie just beyond the Coreward border of the Zhodani Consulate.