Prompted by the thread <a href="http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showthread.php?t=25811" target="_blank">[FONT=arial,helvetica] Size of the merchant fleet IYTU? [/FONT]</a>.</p> I have decided it is time to present my vision of interstellar transport.
Most of this should be rules set independent till the discussion turns to actual ship designs. I will try to not challenge canon, and where I might or canon does not exist I will make evry effort to call that out.
First I have always thought the commercial ports would be what I would term 'Far ports' Consider them the same as major commercial ship ports, or large truck terminals. Only commercial ships with contracts would operate through them. Other traffic would never even come close enough to see them, let alone travel through them.
They would be operated by the mega-corps, or possibly sector wide corporps.
They would always be placed outside of the 100-d jump limit of any body within the system. Even with a 100 Mdt terminal facility, at 1g ships would clear the jump shadow and be free to jump in a few minuets. In T20 there was a suggestion that with high nav skill the navigator could select the jump parameters that minimized the amount of time in jump, or the radius of error emerging from just. how effective that would be be up to game masters to determine, but making them less variable, along with the minimal time to and from the jump zone would maximize the efficiency of the ship.
Elsewhere there have been discussions that a ship that does not have the distractions of booking cargo would be able to make 3 jumps per month, instead of just 2. I would also take it as a matter of course that the crew spend the entire jump doing the routine maintenance, cutting the cost and probably the time diverted to annual maintenance. All bookings would be done by the agents working at the port, as well as warehousing to maximize load and unload times. 3 jumps per month leave a given ship in port for three days between jumps.
Since such ships would NEVER have a need for more than maneuver 1, all that space could be directed to cargo. Most ships would be jump 1 and simply travel back and forth along the jump 1 mains. Long jump ships would only travel at their longest jump between such ports. Ships would run a set route, over and over, terminating at the world where annual maintenance is preformed.
Ships would never encounter atmosphere, or gravity, and would be as large as can be built and absolutely bare bones. Roughly equivalent to Supertankes and modern container ships. They would be a hull with just enough drives and crew to make the ship move so that they maximize cargo capacity.
For routes that cross voids all of these advantages would be required to maximize trade across the route.
They would be built just outside the jump shadow of the main world within the system.
they would be 100% outside the authority of the local system. No customs, no extrality lines. Those would be dealt with at either the local high ports, or more likely at the final destination low ports.
Normal passengers would almost certainly be handled through similar facilities, although long jump ships might be more common.
These facilities would only be built at high traffic worlds, and would almost exclusively handle the standard shipping for the system. anything with a standard monthly volume, from major industries. All traffic these ports would be at the imperial mandate shipping rates.
There would of course be a constant stream of in system traffic to and from the various high ports around the system. All of the cargo would be in standardized shipping containers, and there would be purpose built tugs that would transport the containers to the High ports.
For shippers, and passengers, their journey would start at the low ports, or if space elevators exits, those terminals, or whatever terminals in space feed the high ports. Virtually no traffic should go from the high port directly to a destination, but would go through a terminal of some sort.
In systems too small to support the large ship trffic, ships would jump to and from the high ports, as most people accept as normal. Also the small percentage of cargo that is to infrequent or too unconnected to ship through the major carriers, would also jump directly from the primary high port in the system.
The bulk of that traffic would be picked up by the regional carriers, and the local subbies.
The tiny fraction remaining would be picked up by the little independent companies and the free traders. At this point I would disagree with canon. Whats left would be left because it cannot be contracted, or will not be contracted through the larger carriers. A tiny amount of it would be passengers holding imperial passages at the Imperial common carrier rate, but most of the traffic available would be contract negotiated on the spot.
This leaves the independents filling their hold and cabins with whatever they can snag at the going rate.
There would also be priority, and security transports, that charge significantly more, and would NOT be subject to common carrier rates.
Next will be some of the large scale economics.
Mr Tek.
Most of this should be rules set independent till the discussion turns to actual ship designs. I will try to not challenge canon, and where I might or canon does not exist I will make evry effort to call that out.
First I have always thought the commercial ports would be what I would term 'Far ports' Consider them the same as major commercial ship ports, or large truck terminals. Only commercial ships with contracts would operate through them. Other traffic would never even come close enough to see them, let alone travel through them.
They would be operated by the mega-corps, or possibly sector wide corporps.
They would always be placed outside of the 100-d jump limit of any body within the system. Even with a 100 Mdt terminal facility, at 1g ships would clear the jump shadow and be free to jump in a few minuets. In T20 there was a suggestion that with high nav skill the navigator could select the jump parameters that minimized the amount of time in jump, or the radius of error emerging from just. how effective that would be be up to game masters to determine, but making them less variable, along with the minimal time to and from the jump zone would maximize the efficiency of the ship.
Elsewhere there have been discussions that a ship that does not have the distractions of booking cargo would be able to make 3 jumps per month, instead of just 2. I would also take it as a matter of course that the crew spend the entire jump doing the routine maintenance, cutting the cost and probably the time diverted to annual maintenance. All bookings would be done by the agents working at the port, as well as warehousing to maximize load and unload times. 3 jumps per month leave a given ship in port for three days between jumps.
Since such ships would NEVER have a need for more than maneuver 1, all that space could be directed to cargo. Most ships would be jump 1 and simply travel back and forth along the jump 1 mains. Long jump ships would only travel at their longest jump between such ports. Ships would run a set route, over and over, terminating at the world where annual maintenance is preformed.
Ships would never encounter atmosphere, or gravity, and would be as large as can be built and absolutely bare bones. Roughly equivalent to Supertankes and modern container ships. They would be a hull with just enough drives and crew to make the ship move so that they maximize cargo capacity.
For routes that cross voids all of these advantages would be required to maximize trade across the route.
They would be built just outside the jump shadow of the main world within the system.
they would be 100% outside the authority of the local system. No customs, no extrality lines. Those would be dealt with at either the local high ports, or more likely at the final destination low ports.
Normal passengers would almost certainly be handled through similar facilities, although long jump ships might be more common.
These facilities would only be built at high traffic worlds, and would almost exclusively handle the standard shipping for the system. anything with a standard monthly volume, from major industries. All traffic these ports would be at the imperial mandate shipping rates.
There would of course be a constant stream of in system traffic to and from the various high ports around the system. All of the cargo would be in standardized shipping containers, and there would be purpose built tugs that would transport the containers to the High ports.
For shippers, and passengers, their journey would start at the low ports, or if space elevators exits, those terminals, or whatever terminals in space feed the high ports. Virtually no traffic should go from the high port directly to a destination, but would go through a terminal of some sort.
In systems too small to support the large ship trffic, ships would jump to and from the high ports, as most people accept as normal. Also the small percentage of cargo that is to infrequent or too unconnected to ship through the major carriers, would also jump directly from the primary high port in the system.
The bulk of that traffic would be picked up by the regional carriers, and the local subbies.
The tiny fraction remaining would be picked up by the little independent companies and the free traders. At this point I would disagree with canon. Whats left would be left because it cannot be contracted, or will not be contracted through the larger carriers. A tiny amount of it would be passengers holding imperial passages at the Imperial common carrier rate, but most of the traffic available would be contract negotiated on the spot.
This leaves the independents filling their hold and cabins with whatever they can snag at the going rate.
There would also be priority, and security transports, that charge significantly more, and would NOT be subject to common carrier rates.
Next will be some of the large scale economics.
Mr Tek.
