Reserve fleets are. Those ships are activated in emergencies and recommisioned at naval bases.
Rules Only: The Advantages of Low Tech Starships
- Thread starter Spinward Flow
- Start date
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
There is no computer model requirement in LBB2 77 - the computer must be capable of running the jump program which aything 1bis or greater can.
Let's see, you're the owner of a TL 15 shipyard. You are offered contracts to build TL15 ships at full price or TL9 ships at 90% discount. Which ones would you choose?
That's my main argument to say TL 15 shipyards don't build TL 9 ships...
Super Turcano is a 1999 design (according the link you gave), and I guess (not knowing it) that it's not a WWII TL design.
US (F-22 priducer) is about TL 8. Is Brazil (Super Turcano procuder) too?
And even if so, this would be (at best) making a TL15 ship with TL9 performance, not building a TL9 at TL15 facilities
I don't say no TL9 ships are produced in 3I, just that they are produced by TL 9 local shipyards (and so at full price), and only used when no alternative is possible, at a great disadvantage.
Could current shipuyards build a gallion? I guess no.
Nonetheless at least one (La Pepa) has been built this century (I visited it with my daughters some years ago, and sorry, the link is in Spanish, but I didn't find it translated), but I guess it was not on a commercial shipyard (I don't know the shipyard of Puerto Humbria), nor at the reduced cost you talk about (and Spain has currently quite higher TL than the galions were)...
And try to pitch it against a modern armed merchant (its squivalent, if they currently exist at all), or use it to compete with other commercial ones in trade...
I have a mind that is drawn to shiny objects and simple solutions.
If you are going to make a change to LBB5, then I suggest this:
"Make the cost of all Power Plants PER EP rather than PER DTON."
Try it out and see what happens.
I did.
Hint: At TL 15, a 1 dT PP = 1 EP so it changes nothing.
If you are going to make a change to LBB5, then I suggest this:
"Make the cost of all Power Plants PER EP rather than PER DTON."
Try it out and see what happens.
I did.
Hint: At TL 15, a 1 dT PP = 1 EP so it changes nothing.
It is, but it doesn't have to be. See my comment about formulae, below.
Yeah, that's a problem.
This, I suppose, is where the whole "standard alphabet drive" ecosystem comes from.
Yep. That's not necessarily a bad thing, though -- just different.
The easy fix (and I did it long ago) is to note the TLs from LBB3 in the margin next to the Drives and Power Plants table.
There are formulae, but they're not straight percentages and they get overwritten for the TL-15 drives (W-Z). To be more precise about it, they're functions with defined domains such that the functions' ranges result in integer values that are mapped to letters. These functions are reversible as well, but the maneuver drive one gets nonsensical below the listed lower bound. Still, playing with the allowed values in the domain set can be useful (providing intermediate-sized -- say, A-and-a-half -- drives).
The advantage of a lookup table is that there is a lot less math (which was a big plus before spreadsheet programs, and particularly for non-math-inclined players).
You can, but there's no point because performance can't exceed 6 for Jump or Maneuver, and you never need a power plant with a factor above 6 in LBB2.
You think so, and I fully agree. That said, it's a 6Boat with the crew in double-occupancy and barely more than a week of power plant fuel, which violates Rules As Written.
No, we can't. The LBB3 table describes when they become available, not what TLs they're restricted to (as the example you presented asserts).
The paradigm in LBB2 is "bigger is the only way to get better, and high tech lets you build bigger." It's a bit simplistic, but it's consistent.
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Spinward Flow
SOC-14 1K
They could.
If it's a one-off of a single ship it would be frightfully expensive (custom everything, basically).
So in Traveller parlance you pay "full price plus architect fees" for a "new" build of an antique single ship construction.
If it's something there is a broader market for ... say, 40+ wooden galleons (to start) with the potential for more orders later on ... then only the first single ship produced needs to be paid for at full price, while the volume production of the copies is where you start to see the modern high tech shipyard savings start to kick in. Specific to your question here is the idea that modern woodworking machines would make "short work" of the necessary lumber processing that would have required intensive skilled labor hundreds of years/a few tech levels ago.
So in terms of thinking about this specific question of low tech ships constructed by high tech shipyards, you do raise a valid point.
I would therefore argue that there is NO cost savings for any single ship/one off construction efforts.
First (and only the first) ship produced pays FULL PRICE.
However, serial production of copies of that ship (which we call volume production) by that SAME shipyard both should (and I argue, would) have additional cost discounting for lower tech level production than what the shipyard is capable of.
Additionally, the lower tech level ship (in volume production) can optionally in effect "waive" the low tech/high tech differential price discount (partially or in full) so as to produce a more luxurious/boutique copy of the original design.
Note that such a low tech luxury from high tech nuance has some interesting implications for the luxury Yacht market.
A TL=9 rated Yacht in volume production constructed at a TL=15 shipyard would be rather extravagantly opulent in its appointments, fit and finish ... wouldn't you say? Essentially a "modern day antique" kind of thing.
Essentially, you "pay more" for an artisanal version of something that is already in volume production ... so the shipyard pulls "your" ship out of the "stock" specs construction line and lets the boutique artisans go to work on it, raising the construction price.
That way, you can have a TL=15 shipyard building a TL=9 starship to a TL=12 equivalent of luxury (for example, to highlight the options at play), but which only needs TL=9 for annual overhaul maintenance (still pay 0.1% of purchase price for overhauls, so the luxury "premium" will persist after paying construction costs).
Instead of getting a +6 TL differential on cost discount, you would only get a +3 TL differential on cost discount.
Instead of getting a +6 TL luxury effect, you would only get a +3 TL luxury effect.
Having that ... range ... of possibilities available makes the universe of starship design (and construction) much more diverse and interesting than simply looking at a Free Trader and thinking "if you've seen one, you've seen them all" ... or words to that effect. Same deal with a Type-Y Yacht. Imagine the variety of possibilities between a TL=9 Yacht constructed in a TL=9 shipyard ... versus a TL=9 Yacht constructed with "maximum luxury settings at full price" in a TL=15 shipyard with no tech level differential discounts involved. When it comes to Lord and Lady Huffy Puffy that would most definitely mark a difference between the TL=9 shipyard and the TL=15 shipyard ... even if both starships cost the same to buy, one will be more luxuriously appointed than the other for the exact same USP stats.
If nothing else, allowing for that range of possibilities to be in the game makes for a richer (in multiple senses of the word) game experience than a One Size Fits All™ kind of oversimplification.
Spinward Flow
SOC-14 1K
More tonnage without greater cost on power plants for lower tech levels does really radical things to the cost of starships under LBB5.80.
For my High-G Courier Ships Under 200 Tons ... in the TL=9-12 range it's a cost reduction of MCr59.4 when billing per EP rather than per ton.
That's a reduction in the final cost of those TL=9-12 ships of 33.7-38% ... which is ridonkulously huge when it comes to cost savings on construction.
The disadvantage of a lookup table is that it's remarkably inflexible.
And for those of us who can do simple arithmetic, it's constraining to the point of chafing (badly).
So long as you "ride the rails" and do everything to "stay in lanes you're assigned" then the lookup table works just fine.
As soon as you want to do something more/different/outside the lines the whole thing breaks down with a rather ugly failure mode.
Skip the table, just give me the formulas.
I can do math.
Arithmetic isn't that hard ...
Closest we get to this is the Class discount.
Obviously, small craft are mass produced -- like cars. But you start getting bigger, and I think boats start diverging. Like houses.
I live in a new tract. Ostensibly, all of the houses of my model are identical. But I know they're not. The foot print is the same (mostly, there's one exception). I know some owners moved walls during their builds. Obviously, many made different material choices, and the builder gave them all different exterior finishes.
I think that the houses are the same more so as much as dealing with approval processes (having to have all the plans approved by local governments) than anything else. In the end, all of the houses were hand built. I'm sure things like the trusses were ordered with the same specifications, but in the end, they're all "custom" homes. Interior things like the cabinets came from specialized services. But the framers framed the walls individually, the trades did all their work on their own. Familiarity in the plan, but not necessarily "mass produced".
I think it's the same for ships. They may start from similar plans, they may use common components (power plants and what not), but in the end, they're all custom welded and laid out to the needs of the clients.
Historically, I'm guessing that the largest "mass produced" ships we ever built were the Liberty ship during WWII.
Spinward Flow
SOC-14 1K
Ever heard of a little boutique shipyard known as Electric Boat ...?
Consider foreign military sales of US combat aircraft. This keeps production lines for obsolete (well, not cutting-edge) aircraft going when the state of the art moves on.
LBB2 does this. All of the drive costs are directly proportional to output, not drive tonnage.
Well, except for the W-Z drives, but they're explicit overrides of the drive size/capability formula (or more precisely, function).
Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
I think in terms of population against the number of starships actually operating, it's skewed towards the unicorn end of the spectrum.
The alphabet component compatibility would make it more like kitting out your personal computer: the case could be heavily customized, but the components that make it work are basically standardized.
The alphabet component compatibility would make it more like kitting out your personal computer: the case could be heavily customized, but the components that make it work are basically standardized.
Spinward Flow
SOC-14 1K
A more fulsome answer to this question amounts to ... they had better be.
Let's take a simple example ... the ubiquitous Type-S Scout/Courier.
MCr27.63 to build (LBB2) and construction takes 9 months per ship in volume production.
13 months per year (check your Imperial Calendar) / 9 months = 1.444 ships per year in serial production (start the next one when the last one finishes).
If a shipyard constructed a single ship per drydock slot in a serial fashion, within 40 years of construction time that one drydock slot would be able to produce 40*13/9=57.777 Type-S Scout/Courier ... and when they finish building those 57 Type-S, the next one they produce (#58) will need to be used to replace the first one they "splashed" out of drydock (#1) because it will be reaching the end of its 40 year service life soon.
How many Type-S Scout/Courier starships have the IISS constructed over the past few centuries?
Minimum answer: MILLIONS
More likely answer: TENS OF MILLIONS
There's simply no possible way to achieving that level of production capacity without resorting to mass production (ala real world auto factories).
You can bet your sweet bippy that some starship classes are mass produced.
Not all are ... but some most definitely are.
This, in theory, explains the "Standard Hull Discount" in LBB2.
In practice, there are two reasons it doesn't. The first is that (out-of-universe) there are a plethora of player-drawn deckplans for each of the canon standard designs so they're not standard -- this also implies that every ship with a standard hull will look nearly the same as any other ship with a standard hull. The second is that about half of the standard hulls don't actually match any possible combination of drives that could fit into them.
The standard hull discount is a game artifact meant to direct players toward specific ships with constrained capabilities, while concealing its purpose by not dictating specific drive combinations.
Spinward Flow
SOC-14 1K
Quoted for truth (emphasis added).
If it was an organic result of in-universe economics, you'd get boring-looking ships (I'm partial to prolate spheroids and spheres) but it'd make a lot more sense.
HanleyTucks
SOC-11
It's also skill-locked. The level 1 pilot can't do a 3-parsec Jump. Now, in the big wide universe you're going to find plenty of high-level pilots. But it might take you a while, you might not be able to pay what they demand, and they might prefer staying on the nice, safe and civilised spacelanes.
Logically this would apply to Engineering and similar skills.
So you might want TL-9 Jump-1 ships simply because it's a lot easier for shipping companies to staff them, and you can sell them to more people. Consider it like SUVs, delivery vans and so on - in many jurisdictions they're designed to be just under the size limit for a regular drivers license; a little bigger and they'd need a truck license, which far fewer drivers have.
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In LBB2 and HG (which re-uses LBB2 on this for the most part), neither pilot skill nor navigation skill has any effect on Jump whatsoever (though both are required in larger ships, skill levels beyond skill-1 do not affect the necessary rolls for Jump).
Spinward Flow
SOC-14 1K
Citation please.
I don't remember ever seeing anything to that effect anywhere in the LBBs.
Jump limited by computer model, I know about that one.
Jump limited by pilot skill ... never heard of that before.
Where is this rule from? AFAIK any Pilot may perform any jump...
No need of a big ship universe for that. just advanced CharGen, Anyone from the flight school may start with pilot up to 3, and in the flight branch you're likely to receive Pilot skill several times.
