What works? How are ships and vehicles armed?

[whulorigan]

The lack of armor in LBB2 is just "one of those things" which is only obvious in retrospect.
LBB5.80 "cleaned up" a lot of stuff, so it tends to be the default for CT, since the LBB5.80 "framework" is more powerful and flexible (formulas instead of just tables, for example). LBB5.80 also lets you "go bigger" than a mere 5000 tons, which makes all the difference in the militarization of space.

Sure. It just seems to me that even for a small commercial / para-military scale RPG setting, the addition of some rules for armour would seem like and easy/obvious addition (even if just for the Patrol Cruiser and Mercenary Cruiser).

 

[Badenov]

Sure. It just seems to me that even for a small commercial / para-military scale RPG setting, the addition of some rules for armour would seem like and easy/obvious addition (even if just for the Patrol Cruiser and Mercenary Cruiser).

The No-Armor thing is a huge paradigm shift, though. In RL, armor for ships isn't much good for anything past small arms, (and even more problematic for aircraft, which are very sensitive to weight) so if that's true for spacecraft as well, maybe no armor for spaceships is a better answer? I can certainly see putting on enough armor to matter against a particle beam might not be possible. Or maybe 1-4 points is a practical limit, just enough to soak the hits from ground-scale guns but not enough to make a big deal in space combat? This is definitely food for thought. 15 points of Naval armor takes turrets completely out of the equation in Mg1, which doesn't sit right either.

 

[Spinward Flow]

LBB5.80 Armor formula

Tech Level	7​	8​	9​	10​	11​	12​	13​	14​	15​
Armor	4a+4​	4a+4​	4a+4​	3a+3​	3a+3​	2a+2​	2a+2​	a+1​	a+1​
Max	32%​	36%​	40%​	33%​	36%​	26%​	28%​	15%​	16%​

So the point is that until you reach TL=12+ armor is "ruinously expensive" in terms of hull fraction that needs to devoted to the stuff. You then wind up with a sort of perverse inversion, in which at lower tech levels power plants and maneuver drives (and thus, agility) is a "better defense" for the tonnage than armor ... but at higher tech levels armor becomes "cheap enough" to neutralize most weapons that aren't spinal mounts or meson guns (or both).

 

[aramis]

So what sorts of ships/weapons are actually useful in Traveller? There are a dizzying array of options, sizes, weapons, and it all seems to go in a circle. I'm looking at Mongoose 2007 rules, so other systems will have different answers, but the answers will help tremendously with worldbuilding.

A small 5000-ton destroyer is overwhelmed by the firepower of a dreadnaught, but a handful of destroyers with meson spinal mounts can take out a DN if they can fire first. Judging by example vehicles I've seen, people just strap on what they can afford and hope for the best. And some of them fall very short of RL examples, in the case of low-TL ground/atmospheric example vehicles, which would get obliterated by RL vehicles.

A 5 KTd destroyer, in CT, MT, and T20, isn't a meson spinal mount ship... because there's no room for crew, fleet speed, armor, screens, and j4...
They're usually a bay or two, and many turrets, as their envisaged fleet role is screening fighters and merchantmen. The minimum meson spinal is 1000Td at TL 13

Is there a hierarchy? A circle (X beats Y, Y beats Z, Z beats X)? It looks like that High Guard small craft with 15 armor are basically immune to anything smaller than a bay weapon (or Meson gun). What's up with the Battlefield Meson Accelerator? It weighs more than a 50-ton bay, but does (about) 1/17th the damage. Still, though, it can take out those High Guard fighters. If it can shoot first.

The fundamental hierarchy in CT is that Mesons are king, but numbers can strip weapons and leave ya' crippled,

It seems, in Mongoose at least, like almost all fights come down to who shoots first wins. Is that the intent?

In MGT1, that was not accurate... the first to get a telling shot in was. But bigger is better, to a point.

I find myself wondering what eurisko would develop given MGT 2e rules...

 

[ManOfGrey]

LBB2.77 and LBB2.81 had NO armor rules for starships of any kind. Starships were also limited to 5000 tons maximum in specific increments (because, drive performance TABLE rather than formula).

Armor was introduced in LBB5.80, prompting a complete revamp of the ship to ship combat system in order to account for the inclusion of armor into things.

I think it interesting that in Book - 2 Starships, armor was not an option. Yet later, in Book 5 - High Guard, armor could be included as an option.

This is in comparison to MegaTraveller, where a minimum amount of armor was required for a ship to be considered space-worthy.

And yet... despite that adding additional armor to a starship was optional, it is surprising how few naval architects took advantage of that option, and designed starships that were meant to go into harm's way do so with only the minimum amount of armor required.

 

[TamsinP]

You forgot the most egregious example of the "minimum armour to be spaceworthy" - the Voroshilev-class battleship which is 40G.

Never mind - just checked the Errata - it's 50G.

 

[aramis]

Sure. It just seems to me that even for a small commercial / para-military scale RPG setting, the addition of some rules for armour would seem like and easy/obvious addition (even if just for the Patrol Cruiser and Mercenary Cruiser).

The problem being that each bk 2 hit was one letter off, and most weapons did 1 hit. Only missiles did significantly more.
So... how to implement a suitable armor system for Bk 2?
I've given it a bunch of thought over the years.

My best solution:
Armor is a 2 Td per letter install, rating from the table, to maximum 5; when hit, roll 1d per hit of damage; if 1d ≤ armor rating, armor absorbs the hit, no effect. Any damage through to Hull hits armor first. Pulse Lasers +1 on the pen.
It works, minimum additional cruft, but, man, does it ever slow down fights.

@Badenov:

there have been basically 3 "scales" of universes discussed at length on COTI...

• Small Ship Universes 100⋯5000 Td, or MGT 1e's 100⋯2000 Td. Warships begin a 400Td, and typically peak at 2000 Td, simply due to drive issues
• Medium Ship Universes: 100⋯20,000 Td. Warships generally run 800⋯20,000.
  • Some go an extra 5-10 k... with battleships in the 25-30 kT... to get in the Trek Dreadnought size.
• Large Ship Universes 100⋯500,000 Td. Warships generally 10,000-300,000, some BB's to 500,000

Note that Classic Trek as portrayed in the Star Fleet Tech Manual is to about 25,000 Td... So the Mid Ship universe is on a familiar scale for many grogs (and, since STisco and ST:SNW are using smaller ships, too, some new trek fans.)

Now the OTU is a large ship, Bk5 universe; most of the TNE and T4 ships were converted from Bk5 into the FF&S system, and tweaked a touch.

In a Bk2 SSU, you wind up with cruisers and battleships being carriers and/or troop ships. due to quirks of the 1 per 100 Td turret limit, and the lack of bays and spinals.

We've only got a few canonical warship sizes for the SSU... well, by comparison to

Tons	Code	CT Data Ref	CT Plans	Ship	comments
10	F	Bk 2 Mayday	—	Fighter	CT core fighter. 6G, Mod/1
???	???	Mayday	—	fighter	4G, no computer
100	S	Bk 2	S07	Scoutship	Missing system: mission bay
100	???	Mayday	—	Scoutship	Launch, not A/R
100	???	Mayday	—	Escort	No carried craft
100	???	Mayday	—	Courier	Launch
400	T	Bk2 Mayday	S07	Patrol Cruiser Patrol Cutter	Great as a small Bk2 warship. Lousy as a bk 5 one.
400	CE	S07	S07	Close Escort, Gazelle	a 400 Td design with 100 of that the drop tanks... also incorporates draft material for Bk5.
400	P	S04	—	Corsair	Bk 2 & undocumented stealth features.
800	C	Bk2 A07 Mayday	A07	Cruiser (Mayday) Mercenary Cruiser (CT Core)	2 cutters as well as its own weapons, but it can theoretically replace one of those with 5 fighters...
1250	BC	A01	A01	Battlecruiser	Mixed HG preview and Bk2 design.

A lot more than I expected. This would likely put BB's at 2,000 Td. Types BC, CE, and the A07 text include some high-guard features.
Types P & S have documented but not mechanically described features
the 100 Td Mayday ships appear to be different mostly in programs used.

 

[whulorigan]

We've only got a few canonical warship sizes for the SSU... well, by comparison to
A lot more than I expected. This would likely put BB's at 2,000 Td. Types BC, CE, and the A07 text include some high-guard features.
Types P & S have documented but not mechanically described features
the 100 Td Mayday ships appear to be different mostly in programs used.

In the various CT Alien Modules, the "Cruiser" was usually 1000Td.

The Zhodani Vlezhdatl Strike Cruiser was 2000Td.

I would go with 3000Td for a BB in a Small Ship Universe.

 

[aramis]

In the various CT Alien Modules, the "Cruiser" was usually 1000Td.

The Zhodani Vlezhdatl Strike Cruiser was 2000Td.

I would go with 3000Td for a BB in a Small Ship Universe.

They're all written after bk 5.