Vargr Breath
SOC-13
So, would all the nuts and bolts be the same? Or would it be like SAE vs Metric. And if metric, would it be like ISO/JIS/DIN?
General What Makes a Scout, a Scout
- Thread starter Rigel Stardin
- Start date
Spinward Flow
SOC-14 1K
It might, but even then there ought to be limits (and yes, I know that the LBBs do NOT even head fake in the direction of what those limits ought to be).
So if we take the example of Kinorb/Regina/Spinward Marches ... yes the world has a type A starport and is TL=8.
Does that mean it is reasonable to assume there are unlimited quantities of standard Z-drives manufactured to TL=15 standard just lying around the starport waiting for someone to buy them?
No, that's stupid.
The closest TL=15 world to Kinorb would be Rhylanor/Rhylanor/Spinward Marches ... a full 16 parsecs (basically 2 subsectors)/10 jumps by XBoat away.
However, TL=13 industrialized Efate is only 5 parsecs/2 jumps by XBoat away, so importation of standard drives up to Q (the TL=13 maximum for standard drives) could be reasonably assumed to be deliverable within 1-2 months should the need arise if the specific drive letter desired is not in stock at the time. TL=9-10 drives could reasonably be assumed to be in stock (Express Tenders use all H drives, for example) but not necessarily (Referee rolls dice...).
That's a more nuanced view of how the interstellar trade for such items could be assumed to operate, but it's not something that easily lends itself to explanation by a "simple rule" that requires a paragraph to lay out clearly. Additionally, there are going to be places where the logistics of importing high tech starship components will simply take a REALLY LONG TIME for an order to go out and come back with a delivery (I'm thinking Five Sisters and Vilis subsectors would be prime examples of this). Aramis subsector would be another location where "getting stranded" waiting for an interstellar delivery could take quite a long time if the specific (standard) item you need is not currently in stock.
When it comes to custom ship components built using LBB5.80 ... you're basically STUCK relying on whatever the local tech support base can provide for you. The starports aren't automatically going to have spare parts on hand for your custom drives (and/or weapons, let's be real) unless the local tech level equals or exceeds the tech level of your ship.
So if you've got, for example, a TL=13 Beam Laser that needs repairing ... if it's a custom mount (LBB5.80 construction rules, hardpoint has no cost, turret to put the weapon into has no cost) that is basically integrated "too tightly" into the ship design ... TL=12- shipyards won't be able to repair that weapon for you without scheduling an import from a TL=13+ world (if they don't already have one in stock, which they probably won't ... Referee rolls dice ...).
Conversely, if you had a standard "off the shelf" weapon mount (LBB2.81 construction rules, hardpoints cost MCr0.1 each, single/dual/triple turrets cost MC0.2/0.5/1 each) for a TL=13 Beam Laser that needs repairing, a TL=12- shipyard would be able to "swap out" your (broken) TL=13 Beam Laser for (say) a TL=12 one (downgrading the factor by -1) until you can get your ship back to a TL=13 world and swap out the laser again. So LBB2.81 turrets and hardpoints "cost more" as standard off the shelf weapon mounts, but they can be exchanged/repaired/replaced in the field much more easily than "cheaper to design" custom weapon mounts can.
This is one of those things that involves giving the Traveller universe more ... local texture ... than simply making bland sweeping universal statements, such as that type A starports can handle maintenance and repairs of ANY starship, regardless of tech level (or polity that constructed it) no matter what because everything is the same everywhere no matter what (ho hum, if you've seen one you've seen them all!).
Getting the map involved in thinking about interstellar trade and supply chains can make the setting of any Traveller campaign at lot more nuanced and interesting in a hurry. When different places ARE DIFFERENT ... suddenly you have a reason to travel from place to place.
Funny how that works ...
Is it a Rule written down somewhere? No, not really.
Does such a concept make for a more immersive and richer gameplay experience? Why yes ... yes it does ...
More like the lower end letters (A-H for TL=9-10) will tend to have the highest demand.
- Scout/Couriers use A drives.
- Free Traders use A drives.
- XBoats use B jump drives.
- Far Traders use A and B drives.
- Fat Traders use C drives.
- Subsidized Liners use C and J drives (J requires TL=11).
- Patrol Cruisers use F and H drives.
- Express Tenders use H drives.
- Mercenary Cruisers use M drives (M requires TL=12).
Rigel Stardin
SOC-13
Yeah, you can play the law of averages but it really all about demand. In the real world companies tend to revamp their fleet of vehicles, truck, construction equipment every 5 years. So let's say, once every five years there is a run on Patrol Cruisers. The supply chain ramps up for those specific parts. The good companies can read the market and determine what is next year's most demanded vehicle is going to be. But the average company, has to guest, so they keep parts of all type on hand. It allows them to gear up for the next run on Far Traders.
The military and possibly scouts have to keep a certain amount of parts on hand as well. Such government entities pay good credits for services. So a military base in your area is going to drive the frequency of parts.
War, civil strife can change the amount of parts in the local area as well.
And of course, standardization will alleviate some of these issues.
Those PC's who like the latest and greatest tech are going to be in a world of hurt thou. That Hal 9000 processor may not be available in the Marches. So when it starts acting up, you may end up replacing it with a Standard T2 processor...
The military and possibly scouts have to keep a certain amount of parts on hand as well. Such government entities pay good credits for services. So a military base in your area is going to drive the frequency of parts.
War, civil strife can change the amount of parts in the local area as well.
And of course, standardization will alleviate some of these issues.
Those PC's who like the latest and greatest tech are going to be in a world of hurt thou. That Hal 9000 processor may not be available in the Marches. So when it starts acting up, you may end up replacing it with a Standard T2 processor...
Spinward Flow
SOC-14 1K
Exactly.
As a munchkin player, you want TL=15 everything (and TL=16+ if you can get your greedy mitts on it) because that's the Bestest Stuff™ that can be obtained. But as a more experienced (and wary) player, in an interstellar campaign setting you're a lot better off relying on TL=10-12 since those "lower" tech levels are more widely available and thus in practice more widely and easily supported. Sure, there's "better tech" out there than TL=10-12 but the logistics tail and supply chain for it to keep it in good working order may be more hassle than its worth to go for max tech everything (just because it's better/cheaper/shinier).
I can certainly attest from personal experience of getting back into CT starship designing (after taking a three decade holiday from doing it) that I'm finding low tech starship design to be a much more compelling challenge and "engineering balancing act" than simply going all in on TL=15 everything because TL=14- is all just grey drop vendor trash. There's also an extremely curious set of inflection points between TL=10 and TL=13 when it comes to standard drives (LBB2.81) and custom drives (LBB5.80) in the sub-1000 ton hull size form factors, where sometimes the standard drives are a "better deal" for specific hull sizes, and tech levels that can flip over to custom drives having the advantage simply by crossing a hull size threshold or a tech level threshold. It isn't a case of standard drives "always" being best or custom drives "always" being best, since the two design systems rely on different paradigms and underlying assumptions. The real trick is knowing when to pick and choose from either paradigm to cross compare against each other to determine which option offers an advantage relative to the alternative ... and you can only make that determination when you have a deeper understanding and appreciation (and insight) into BOTH systems, rather than simply pledging allegiance to one system only.
For combat, I'll always prefer LBB5.80 abstracted combat over LBB2.81 wargame map combat (and the sheer insanity of the computer programming rules) during any day that ends in Y ... but for designing starship specs, I'm now rather partial to hybridizing so as to pick the best of both worlds for my new starship design efforts. It makes for a fun challenge.
Rigel Stardin
SOC-13
The character I write stories about, (cough,cough, hack hack, stomp stomp.) who name appears some where on this forum, built a starship out of spare military parts from the 80's-90's, but he was a starship engineer to begin with. Even after become coming connect with a group of scientist (TL 17+) He still had him design his ship with the idea, it could be repaired using say, 60's tech in mind. Personal weapons usually end up being low tech as well. I not like he doesn't have guass rifles or laser gun. It's just you find yourself in more low tech environments, that high ones being an individual exploring planets,
Signal systems (smoke, lighthouse, semaphore, flag) were in use from late Imperial Rome. ground comms were faster than horse in areas with established signal systems. Which is one of the reasons for the "defense advantage" in many warfare sims.
Traveller has no equivalent.
As for jump and scouts... the Type S is only viable in a pure Bk2 setting as a fleet scout. this is because at TL 13+, the fleet is faster than the scout. The scouts thus need to be in enemy Jn depth, and keeping in mind, any help is two weeks out.
It's not age of sail - tho' similarities exist - and it's not submarine warfare... tho', again, there are similarities.
Let's recap a few key rules bits...
- Jump takes a week. 165 hours ±10%.
- No faster method of sending information is known in the canonical Traveller rulesets.
- Non-jump information travels at C
- Coordinated jumps allow the fleet to use 165 ±1.65 hours, but all within a single one-hour window. (MTJ. Forget which issue)
- The duration cannot be predicted until one is in jump
- The destination can be reverse engineered in under an hour (TNE Reg. SB)
- Fleet speed is 4 from TL13-16, and Max by TL before that.
- (Faster jump vessels don't have enough space for effective battle line armaments)
- Fast Fleet vessels at TL 11 and 12 can make 2 jumps... by sacrificing some armament.
- Sensor systems are also enhanced by size
Fleet scouts in Traveller are very different.
If they're sent a jump out, when they come back, the data's a week old, and further, the fleet will get there a week later still. This makes them almost worthless for maneuver warfare on the strategic/operational level. So they're not "scouting for the enemy." They're serving as couriers - letting HQ know where the fleet is going.
Or, they're stationed in a system... and when the enemy jumps out, they figure out where to, and follow, in hopes of beating the invader fleet there... which, per scout, is pretty much a coin toss.
Enemy fleets are likely to prefer coordinated jumps, so that they're harder to "defeat in detail"...
So 3-4 scouts gives one a roughly 75% chance of beating them there... and half an hour's warning is much to be appreciated by the defenders.
The result? Scouts can't tell you where to intercept the enemy fleet; they can only tell you where they have been, and if they're coming in at you; anywhere else, they can be gone before you can get there, even allowing for fleet wilderness refueling.
Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
They're jumping in somewhat blind, but I suspect that fleet scouts are spread more widely than just four parsecs ahead, giving the admiral a larger amount of aged information to draw a picture of what's happening in front of him.
Spinward Flow
SOC-14 1K
Imagine watching a movie about the Battle of Midway where the PBY flying boat scouts don't have radios to report findings with. Instead, after making a contact detection the PBYs have to turn around and fly back to base, land ... and THEN they get to make their sighting reports by handing a piece of paper through a window hours after the sighting.
The lack of communications beyond short range handoff (the interstellar scale involved makes that much of a difference!) would completely change how events would have unfolded and how various scouting assets would have been used.
The lack of communications beyond short range handoff (the interstellar scale involved makes that much of a difference!) would completely change how events would have unfolded and how various scouting assets would have been used.
Quoted for s'truth.
Information sufficiently old as to render intercept too late to matter
good scenario - a chop shop merchant gang with a low law level with above-average tech. A place that Snake Plissken would feel at home with his friends.
Rigel Stardin
SOC-13
If Fly-by-Night doesn't have the the parts, there is always Virgil over on the corner of 5th and Main. He can also get those speciality parts, that no one else has.
Spinward Flow
SOC-14 1K
You have just described Space Tortuga.
The chop shop element alone would make it a destination for pirates with prizes to fence their ill gotten gains.
Think about it.
Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
In terms of money, starships tend to be worth more than their cargo, and below four hundred tonnes, probably easier to dispose of.
Starjacking.
Starjacking.
Rigel Stardin
SOC-13
You mean 'Ghosted'. That when the Transponder has been wiped clean and the data plate has been change, The only way to know if you have a stolen ship is by checking the VIN number on major component. Even then, you'll have a hard time telling whether or not the ship is stolen, because of After Market Retrofits and upgrades.
Or by the blood stains under the floor panels, just sayin'
Or by the blood stains under the floor panels, just sayin'
