Well, shoot, I was probably too harsh in my response.
It just felt like you were being condescending.
I'm sorry if I took it the wrong way, TimeRover.
tons
- Thread starter BwapTED
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Well, shoot, I was probably too harsh in my response.
It just felt like you were being condescending.
I'm sorry if I took it the wrong way, TimeRover.
Ok ,sports fans, I am amused. Please note I am limiting my commentary to the 1st editions of any cited publication unless otherwise noted.
Also Note I entered this conversation in the other unnamed forum as well.
Broadly looking at the source material one can conclude that indeed some flavor of mass was in the minds of the authors when they were writing the original game and supplements. Then if one starts to examine the graphics one quick has to come to the conclusion that the actual specific volumes are only broadly related to what the words say. Further more a number of pieces make much more sense if their stated tonnage is their mass instead of volume.
Also Note I entered this conversation in the other unnamed forum as well.
Broadly looking at the source material one can conclude that indeed some flavor of mass was in the minds of the authors when they were writing the original game and supplements. Then if one starts to examine the graphics one quick has to come to the conclusion that the actual specific volumes are only broadly related to what the words say. Further more a number of pieces make much more sense if their stated tonnage is their mass instead of volume.
That's just how it looks to me, too.
But I would rather not cheese off anybody else with an argument about an obscure point of LBB2 1977 rules, so I'm dropping out.
Peace guys.
I do hope that you will all have...
tons of fun.
That's just how it looks to me, too.
But I would rather not cheese off anybody else with an argument about an obscure point of LBB2 1977 rules, so I'm dropping out.
A quick final note, the threads About Proto-Traveller have interesting ideas along these lines as well.
AnotherDilbert
SOC-14 1K
No, of course not:IIRC, in FF&S, the mass of a ship has no bearing on acceleration. Only volume matters. I have an issue with this
FFS said:
And how many TNE ships mass 15x displacement for this to come into effect? In the Reformation Coalition Equipment Guise, the Wildbat fighter is the only spacecraft that masses 15x or more it's displacement.
It seems that for the vast majority of spacecraft, mass is irrelevant.
AnotherDilbert
SOC-14 1K
More or less any decently armoured ship, which also happens to be the ships that care about momentary acceleration since civilian ships tend to be more limited by fuel than momentary acceleration.
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
The vast majority of the book can be used with 3e or with any version of Traveller you care to use, or any other rpg for that matter. The setting info and the ship design system don't require 4e, and the ship design system is excellent.
The approximation to use 10t per displacement ton or 15t for a heavily armoured and armed ship is just that, an approximation to give you an idea of how big to make your drive.IIRC, in FF&S, the mass of a ship has no bearing on acceleration. Only volume matters. I have an issue with this
I always re-calculate the actual g rating at the end when I know the mass by thrust/mass, as it says in the design sequence, and yes the loaded mass will make a difference and hence a recalculation of the g rating, both of which are recorded in the ship data.
This has an interesting effect if you load the cargo hold of a merchant with a very dense cargo - orbital unloading will become a necessity
kilemall
SOC-14 5K
This has an interesting effect if you load the cargo hold of a merchant with a very dense cargo - orbital unloading will become a necessity
The Type J Seeker is an interesting case study. The S7 version postulates 20 tons of ore cargo space. Most of the time the Seeker is going to be working in zero-G, so 'overloading' past any 1000kg/dton limit would be normal- too much volume and money left on the shelf to bother with standards. You're not charging anyone for the haul, just incurring your own operational expenses plus whatever rules obtain to where you are going.
Two difficulties- when the Seeker goes to 1-2G accel, that ore load is going to shift to the bulkhead (or the bulkhead will accelerate into the ore, depending on whether the ore is under artificial gravity or not). The seeker may need to put on more artificial gravity to keep ore in place.
Which brings up a point- does putting things under more then 1G of artificial gravity increase their mass and thus create new load bearing/accel issues?
Anyway, the overloaded Seeker may or may not be able to pull this off, depending on whether the destination smelter/processor facility is in orbit and thus has planetary G or not.
The Seeker will leave empty, so belters living on the edge might try to pull a one-try approach to the facility and if it misses goes slingshotting around the planet and have to make another approach, or in bad circumstances choose whether to dump ore or burn up.
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mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
Perhaps that's why the cargo hold displacement ton is limited to only a metric ton by mass, anything greater and the ship's artificial gravity and acceleration compensation can become compromised.
The blanket adoption of volume-based drive effectiveness (which makes sense for the Jump Drive, but doesn't seem intuitive for a reaction drive) may have been what shifted the M-drive paradigm from reaction drive to gravitic/reactionless.
Remember this was the late '70s. It was tedious enough to run the numbers for a ship design on paper with a calculator using one set of figures (volume); imagine trying to do that for mass as well, in multiple iterations to get close to your desired design goals. For every ship or small craft... Ugh.
Also, it seems to me that the LBB2 maneuver drive was envisioned as a "rocket nozzle" attached to the power plant exhaust. That would at least explain the drive tonnage formula being 2x-1 (x=ordinal value of the drive letter size). The (-1) was the cavity in the exhaust bell...
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
To my mind Traveller ships grew from the Triplanetary paradigm - in that game the chemical rockets have to track fuel while the fusion torch ship doesn't at the scale of the game.
HG'79 explicitly defines the maneuver drive as a fusion rocket.
Not being physicists or engineers - or having access to Atomic Rockets - the folks at GDW gave their fusion rockets some pretty unrealistic performance characteristics.
Frank Chadwick is on record as stating that one of the design goals of TNE HEPlaR was to go back to the CT paradigm of reaction drives and that fuel should be a resource players would track.
In FF&S it actually gives rules for realistic fuel use rates that almost go as far as requiring the rocket equation...
HG'79 explicitly defines the maneuver drive as a fusion rocket.
Not being physicists or engineers - or having access to Atomic Rockets - the folks at GDW gave their fusion rockets some pretty unrealistic performance characteristics.
Frank Chadwick is on record as stating that one of the design goals of TNE HEPlaR was to go back to the CT paradigm of reaction drives and that fuel should be a resource players would track.
In FF&S it actually gives rules for realistic fuel use rates that almost go as far as requiring the rocket equation...
Straybow
SOC-14 1K
Ah, another entry in the Great Cargo-Price-Jump Controversy.
Here are some ancient threads that may be of interest.
Far Trader cargo/Freight manifest questions
Price-Fixed Travel has some discussions about LBB2 design requirements: stateroom size, etc.
Making a Jump 2 freighter profitable mass tons vs dTons.
Traveller Cargo Standards use 2 cargo (mass) tons per dTon fixes nearly everything.
Going Pirate I discussed the problems with PPPP fusion vs DD fusion, etc.
Here are some ancient threads that may be of interest.
Far Trader cargo/Freight manifest questions
Price-Fixed Travel has some discussions about LBB2 design requirements: stateroom size, etc.
Making a Jump 2 freighter profitable mass tons vs dTons.
Traveller Cargo Standards use 2 cargo (mass) tons per dTon fixes nearly everything.
Going Pirate I discussed the problems with PPPP fusion vs DD fusion, etc.
kilemall
SOC-14 5K
Eh, I note Aramis came up with the same 10 metric tons per dton figure, good enough for me.
For profitability Straybow I worked out less a mass tonnage multiplier (although that's not bad) and more a cargo handling multiplier where shippers pay more for getting more real material shipped per dton because the ship operator is providing specialized space/containers.
Else the regular Cr1000 rate is no shipping arrangements/equipment, all such arrangements are being made by the shipper and a specialized container is presented for loading, all liability on the shipper and their 'packer/LCL provider' for cargo leaks, radioactive or otherwise.
Extra profit potential for taking on more up-front capital/ship modification costs and back-end cargo liability beyond the usual 'get it there without pirating or operating your ship in a dangerous stupid manner'.
Precedent in this direction with mail-handling contracts requiring an armed ship. Weight isn't changing, chances of cargo getting through without being jettisoned/captured increases.
For profitability Straybow I worked out less a mass tonnage multiplier (although that's not bad) and more a cargo handling multiplier where shippers pay more for getting more real material shipped per dton because the ship operator is providing specialized space/containers.
Else the regular Cr1000 rate is no shipping arrangements/equipment, all such arrangements are being made by the shipper and a specialized container is presented for loading, all liability on the shipper and their 'packer/LCL provider' for cargo leaks, radioactive or otherwise.
Extra profit potential for taking on more up-front capital/ship modification costs and back-end cargo liability beyond the usual 'get it there without pirating or operating your ship in a dangerous stupid manner'.
Precedent in this direction with mail-handling contracts requiring an armed ship. Weight isn't changing, chances of cargo getting through without being jettisoned/captured increases.
aragraph: To combatmedic, wherever you may be, patch up the rules wherever broken until you think the ship spaceworthy. Fare thee well!
Straybow
SOC-14 1K
10-15 mT per dT is from one of the Trav versions. Water would be 14 mT per dT, and for higher density stuff a mass limit is imposed.
5 mT per dT is from the old 100 ft³ British register ton (4.94 per dT), which was based on how miscellaneous cargo is placed and secured for load stability and seaworthiness, rather than maximizing density. It generally applies for road travel as well, with a standard US 53' trailer being 3300 ft³ and nominally limited to 32 short tons.
Even with inertial compensators you'd want loads to be well-secured with straps and nets. You'd want everything accessible for inspection by the crew and by any port authorities. Therefore it can't be simply stacked up and packed wall-to-wall.
My proposal was 5 mT/dT as a limit, with 2 mT allowed without performance penalty. Anything less than 2 mT would have a benefit to performance.
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
10 metric tons per 14 cubic metres is the approximation used in TNE, although you can, at the end of your design sequence calculate the ship's actual mass and thrust and calculate its unloaded and loaded acceleration.
Actually that limit has to do with axel loading on roads and Bridges...
Straybow
SOC-14 1K
And maneuver stability, and transmission/tire/road wear, and braking... it's the safe loading limit.
Yes, you can stuff a whole lot more into that trailer, and there's a good factor of safety built in to run through before the trailer itself breaks. Heard a scary story of a trucker whose client-filled trailer was so overloaded it broke the weigh station scale. Yeah, the rig could still pull it, but the danger while turning or braking is huge. People do stupid things, and the limits are there to minimize the stupidity.
A spaceship is no more amenable to having a load shift under maneuver than a truck.
Yes, you can stuff a whole lot more into that trailer, and there's a good factor of safety built in to run through before the trailer itself breaks. Heard a scary story of a trucker whose client-filled trailer was so overloaded it broke the weigh station scale. Yeah, the rig could still pull it, but the danger while turning or braking is huge. People do stupid things, and the limits are there to minimize the stupidity.
A spaceship is no more amenable to having a load shift under maneuver than a truck.
