World Building.

[Timerover51]

Cosmic: No, each port isn't a good comparison. Perhaps each state is. But still, the notion that the largest ports are the the shipyards is not congruent with real practices.

Sure, SEA-TAC is a large airport - but O'Hare is just as big, and doesn't have boeing's yards. LAX does more traffic last I checked. So does London's Heathrow. But Heathrow has no manufacturing, either.

O'hare does have extensive aircraft maintenance facilities though, so would qualify as a repair facility. The Waukegan airport, just two miles south of me, has a small repair and maintenance facility for the business jets that operate out of it, and if Illinois ever gets its act together and fixes Green Bay Road properly so that the runway can be lengthened enough for Boeing 737s, there are plans to back some of O'Hare's maintenance work to there.

As for shipbuilding, the Sturgeon Bay yard is capable of building 1,000 foot Lake boats. There are a couple of shipyards on Lake Erie that can also build them. Because most of the repair and refit work is in the winter, a very large proportion of the workers at the Sturgeon Bay yard are in the town and the immediate vicinity. The American Bureau of Shipping also maintains a large office in Sturgeon Bay to monitor all work being done on the ships, along with a US Coast Guard Marine Safety office that also monitors the ship work for compliance with Coast Guard regulations. Basic Marine in Escanaba, Michigan can build tugs and barges up to 200 feet, as can a yard in Sault Ste. Marie.

What is needed in Traveller is also a distinction between ship yard sizes, with some capable of building your smaller ships like Free Traders and in-system ships, while other yards are capable of building much larger ships.

 

[BytePro]

...
What is needed in Traveller is also a distinction between ship yard sizes, with some capable of building your smaller ships like Free Traders and in-system ships, while other yards are capable of building much larger ships.

MgT does restrict C to small craft and B to spacecraft (insystem) - only Class A supports starcraft.

Its not very detailed, though. But it would not be hard to extend the system without changing RAW (size of craft is not specified any more than limiting C to less than 100 tons). Further, construction refers to hulls and ability to 'build' - actual component fabrication could be limited as well. So that 0 pop world might have a shipyard capable of construction of 1,000,000 ton ship, but depend on imports for actual drives and plants and fixtures...

 

[Timerover51]

MgT does restrict C to small craft and B to spacecraft (insystem) - only Class A supports starcraft.

Its not very detailed, though. But it would not be hard to extend the system without changing RAW (size of craft is not specified any more than limiting C to less than 100 tons). Further, construction refers to hulls and ability to 'build' - actual component fabrication could be limited as well. So that 0 pop world might have a shipyard capable of construction of 1,000,000 ton ship, but depend on imports for actual drives and plants and fixtures...

As I just purchased Mongoose, I will have to look at that. I need to codify some of my ideas on star ports and shipbuilding, and then see about putting them out.

 

[aramis]

MgT does restrict C to small craft and B to spacecraft (insystem) - only Class A supports starcraft.

Its not very detailed, though. But it would not be hard to extend the system without changing RAW (size of craft is not specified any more than limiting C to less than 100 tons). Further, construction refers to hulls and ability to 'build' - actual component fabrication could be limited as well. So that 0 pop world might have a shipyard capable of construction of 1,000,000 ton ship, but depend on imports for actual drives and plants and fixtures...

Which is actually no better than the standard TU definitions, where C has no maintenance/repair other than possibly some spare parts, B has repair only yards (and can manufacture small craft), A can build large craft (both system and star ships.)

Realistically, the drydock at Kenai could build a 300' from the keel up - all the needed tools are present - but the yard doesn't, since it's a single slip.

I think, for my future ATU, I'll divorce Yards from the Port rating, tho' they'll be linked.

 

[McPerth]

MgT does restrict C to small craft and B to spacecraft (insystem) - only Class A supports starcraft.

Its not very detailed, though. But it would not be hard to extend the system without changing RAW (size of craft is not specified any more than limiting C to less than 100 tons). Further, construction refers to hulls and ability to 'build' - actual component fabrication could be limited as well. So that 0 pop world might have a shipyard capable of construction of 1,000,000 ton ship, but depend on imports for actual drives and plants and fixtures...

First of all, let me tell you I have not read Starport book, so all what I say is from MgT Core Book.

This said, I'm afraid you (as most of us, too tainted by earlier versions) confuse the term spacecraft in MgT with taht in those earlier versions.

As explained under Pilot skill (MgT CB page 57) and Starports description sidebar (MgT CB page 178), in MgT ships are classified as Small Craft (under 100 dton, may not be jump capable and may be built by starports C or better), Spacecrafts (ships among 100 and 5000 dton, regardless of its interstellar capability, may be built by spaceports B and A) and Capital Ships (over 5000 dtons, again regardless their interstellar capability, that may only be built in starports A).

While it's not specified in MgT (at least that I have read), as the maintenance rules only talk about it needing a shipyard, my guess is that it can be performed on any starport capable to handle (read build) a ship of its size.

See that if we extrapolate the relation among pop and maximum total building capability of a system given in TCS (I have neither read MgT versión, so I'm speakingabout CT one. IDK if this realtion has been kept in MgT's TCS), that reinforces Hans point, as there's no point to have a strport capable to build ships over 5000 dtons if your maximum total building capability is only (let's say) 1000 dton.

See also that (at least in CB) the pop multiplier is forfeited, so pop is in absolute digits.

 

[robject]

They need to decouple some of these rules or, better yet, supply a generic world gen system. (not talking about the genre options)

Let's say an independent world gen system as opposed to hard wiring 3I setting assumptions into the thing.

You're talking about "Ur"-Mainworld Generation. Yes, I've wanted this for a couple years now. There are lots of tasty possibilities for this.

 

[Timerover51]

I guess when it comes to world building, I use the die roll as a starting point, and then look at the basic results and ask myself, can I explain this planet to the players, and also justify it to myself. If the results are sufficiently odd that I cannot do one or both, then I look at what I have and decide if it just needs tweaking or are the results so weird that I need to toss it out and start over.

I also have no problem simply assigning the world characteristics that I need, along with system characteristics.

 

[BytePro]

First of all, let me tell you I have not read Starport book, so all what I say is from MgT Core Book.

This said, I'm afraid you (as most of us, too tainted by earlier versions) confuse the term spacecraft in MgT with taht in those earlier versions.

Oops, yeah - actually just forgot as I never cared for MgTs abuse of the term!

Thanks for pointing that out.

See that if we extrapolate the relation among pop and maximum total building capability of a system given in TCS (I have neither read MgT versión, so I'm speakingabout CT one. IDK if this realtion has been kept in MgT's TCS), that reinforces Hans point, as there's no point to have a strport capable to build ships over 5000 dtons if your maximum total building capability is only (let's say) 1000 dton.

They simply take longer than a year to build a capital ship.

Not seeing how that is any kind of problem at all - look up how long it takes to build U.S. Aircraft Carriers.

See also that (at least in CB) the pop multiplier is forfeited, so pop is in absolute digits.

In MgT, all population descriptions past 2 are plural, ala 'Millions and Billions'. So, Population does not refer to absolute digits.

 

[McPerth]

Oops, yeah - actually just forgot as I never cared for MgTs abuse of the term!

Thanks for pointing that out.

As I said, I'm afraid most of us are too tainted from earlier versions. See that someone absolutly ignorant of those earlier versions could have a fully different view of the rules, as the issue of which starport might make the anual maintenance might not even come to his head, not knowing that previous versions specifies only A and B starports could.

Frankly, I know probably there are few of those in this board, but sometimes I'd like to read posts from people whose first contact with Traveller is with MgT Traveller, just to avoid this tainting...

They simply take longer than a year to build a capital ship.

Not seeing how that is any kind of problem at all - look up how long it takes to build U.S. Aircraft Carriers.

IDK about how those large ships are built, but sure it will take quite longer to build them on such a planet, as (to give an example) if a 50 kdton ship is being built in a A rated starport with a total capability is 1000 dton, it would take (at least) 50 time longer, so it would be probably better to have it built in another system and carried there when built.

In MgT, all population descriptions past 2 are plural, ala 'Millions and Billions'. So, Population does not refer to absolute digits.

So was too in LBB 3, and one of the criticisms for TCS and FFW is that all the military budgets are based on pop multipliers of 1 (Hans has been very critic in many a thread about this), so those numbers would be changed once pop multipliers came to play.

I guess another point were th etaint from earlier versions (where PPB was on the system descriptions) clouds our view...

 

[Vladika]

So that 0 pop world might have a shipyard capable of construction of 1,000,000 ton ship, but depend on imports for actual drives and plants and fixtures...

:rofl:

Ummmmm Yeah... I can see the total perplexity of the scout finding this planet on a preliminary survey.

A shipyard capable of building 1,000,000dTon ships. And nobody is there... Anywhere... on the whole planet... (Population 0? Maybe an old janitor?)

If I was said scout, I'd think twice (or more), before I turned in that report. They'd think I was either drunk or crazy.

 

[McPerth]

They'd think I was either drunk or crazy.

Well, Scout Brew is know Imperiumwide...

 

[rancke]

So that 0 pop world might have a shipyard capable of construction of 1,000,000 ton ship, but depend on imports for actual drives and plants and fixtures...

I submit that there's a lower limit to the number of people you'd find on a world with a shipyard capable of putting together imported components to make a functional spacecraft. Even if you assume a fully automated factory (which has implications for the rest of the Traveller universe, as autofactories have not been in evidence anywhere), you'd still at the very least want enough guards to defend such highly portable chunks of wealth as spacecraft from acquisitive passers-by.

And then you need to come up with a reason why anyone would pay the added expense of building an automated ship assembly facility on a world with no prior infrastructure, pay for shipping in components, and pay to added security expenses the lack of system defenses would impose. You might be able to come up with one or two explanations (I doubt it, but I could be wrong); you certainly couldn't come up with enough to cover the number that is needed for the OTU.

And keep in mind that to get a Class A starport rating, you need to provide all the other services a Class A starport provides. A shipyard alone does not a Class A starport make. So there's another source of employment.

And, no, transients don't hep explain anything. Transients count towards the population score too. There are canonical worlds where most of the population are transients; there's at least one where the entire population is explicitly composed entirely of transients.


Hans

 

[McPerth]

And, no, transients don't hep explain anything. Transients count towards the population score too. There are canonical worlds where most of the population are transients; there's at least one where the entire population is explicitly composed entirely of transients.

True, but there are also canon examples where transient population is not counted on the system's pop (or do you believe thet while FFW, or while the Rebelión, Pixie's transient population was on the range of thenths?).

So canon does not help us to decide if transient population is counted among the system's pop (but it helps to keep this discusión alive :devil.

Where those A and B starports in low pop worlds hold a Naval/Scout base or way station (as Pixie again) I always have considered it as an inactive or semi-active Naval/Scout base, with the capability to (at least) repair large ships, but that needs the supporting pop to be transfered from elsewhere for this capability to be usable.

NOTE: I know Pixie is considered a special case, but I guess is the best known example for such a low pop high starport system, so I use it. Change the name for a similar system of your like if you want.

 

[rancke]

And, no, transients don't help explain anything. Transients count towards the population score too. There are canonical worlds where most of the population are transients; there's at least one where the entire population is explicitly composed entirely of transients.

True, but there are also canon examples where transient population is not counted on the system's pop (or do you believe thet while FFW, or while the Rebelión, Pixie's transient population was on the range of thenths?).

But are there any canon examples that work? Take Pixie, for example. If Pixie actually do have thousands of transients working for General Shipyards and operating shipyard and starport, why does the Imperium consider a handful of transient belters with no government the sovereign population instead of counting General Shipyard's manager as the local ruler (a captive ruler, of course). And the belters are going to be just as transient as the General Shipyards people; 90 people is not a viable population.

And if there really are thousands of transients living on Pixie, how come they don't generate any trade or traffic at all? According to the trade rules, freight and passengers are generated with the modifiers the official population score provide for.

So canon does not help us to decide if transient population is counted among the system's pop (but it helps to keep this discusión alive :devil.

If canon provided two mutually exclusive facts, you weigh them against each other and chose the one that makes the most sense or gives the best game rules. We either have to believe that transients don't affect traffic and that worlds with tens of thousands of transients should have population scores of much lower than their number, or we have to believe that transients do count towards the population score. I submit that the second option makes a lot morse sense than the first.


Hans

 

[McPerth]

I submit that the second option makes a lot more sense than the first.

One of the problems we have for what's transient population and what's counted (IMHO censed) population is our own experience on earth.

To put yourself as example (if you allow me), you're profile puts you in Copenhagen (Denmark). You could work at Malmö (Sweeden) and yet spend each night at home (IIRC the ferry takes less tan an hour). You could work in Barcelona (Spain) and yet spend each weekend at home). In both cases I guess you will find absurd to be accounted on Sweeden or Spain population, where you will be a transient for some hours or days.

In Traveller, where space travel takes a week at mínimum, if you work outside your system, you cannot, so I guess the meaning of Transient Population (and so not counted on the census) changes quite a bit.

While I see your point, I keep thinking that pop is (at least most cases) about those who are censed in this world, and most transients use to keep themselves censed in their origin places.

So, to me, it makes more sense the other way, tansient pop not counted on the pop stat.

 

[Thanos]

One of the problems we have for what's transient population and what's counted (IMHO censed) population is our own experience on earth.

To put yourself as example (if you allow me), you're profile puts you in Copenhagen (Denmark). You could work at Malmö (Sweeden) and yet spend each night at home (IIRC the ferry takes less tan an hour). You could work in Barcelona (Spain) and yet spend each weekend at home). In both cases I guess you will find absurd to be accounted on Sweeden or Spain population, where you will be a transient for some hours or days.

In Traveller, where space travel takes a week at mínimum, if you work outside your system, you cannot, so I guess the meaning of Transient Population (and so not counted on the census) changes quite a bit.

While I see your point, I keep thinking that pop is (at least most cases) about those who are censed in this world, and most transients use to keep themselves censed in their origin places.

So, to me, it makes more sense the other way, tansient pop not counted on the pop stat.

Based on what I know of Traveller (very little) that would make sense if traveling from world to world was a matter of hours but as you said above it's a week minimum. It's also expensive to boot. Traveller is age of sail. It's not moving from country to country in Europe it's moving from Europe to the Americas, in the 1800's at best.

 

[BytePro]

Why would the Scouts count people twice?

The [small] city I grew up in did not count the migrant and foreign shipyard workers in their population. Many of these resided semi-permanently in town more time than in their home countries during the construction phases of large ships. [Which would definitely qualify as Class A - also servicing both conventional and non-conventional vessels - and whose terminal handled in the top 10% of U.S. traffic by tonnage. Which, btw, moved directly to rail cars and smaller ships - there were no facilities for offloading to the city itself.]

Also, ship building, especially adjunct to military needs, is very often a subsidized industry. The U.S. Federal construction differential subsidy program for the commercial shipbuilding market lasted from the mid 1950's (IIRC) to the 1980's - when it was terminated and the U.S. commercial shipbuilding market collapsed. (Federal programs exist again today, but on a much smaller scale.)

In a setting with Royalty - why rule out 'trophy' shipyards, either. What a prestige symbol... 'Yes, she is a rather fine ship. Had her built right in my own yards. You should jump by for a visit sometime. I can send George ahead to bring it online. Its absolutely marvelous - state of the art, and one of my most prized possessions...'

 

[BytePro]

Based on what I know of Traveller (very little) that would make sense if traveling from world to world was a matter of hours but as you said above it's a week minimum. It's also expensive to boot. Traveller is age of sail. It's not moving from country to country in Europe it's moving from Europe to the Americas, in the 1800's at best.

And in the age of sail, people worked in other countries for extended periods of time due to the lengthy time for travel... yet kept their original citizenry and generally, I suspect, still not counted in local populations (though indubitably counted when it benefited someone in power or scheming for it ).

In the case of shipyards - ship construction in Traveller can be quite lengthy - (CT HG) upto 3 years for 5,000 ton and smaller. 2 to 5 years for larger. Can definitely see long period work visas for transient workers (esp. with week long trips and high trip costs - well, baring Low Birth for the low end workers...). If counted in the population, they would logically be separately counted for purposes of interstellar records.

 

[rancke]

In Traveller, where space travel takes a week at mínimum, if you work outside your system, you cannot, so I guess the meaning of Transient Population (and so not counted on the census) changes quite a bit.

That's just my point. How many people are there on an oil rig? Would you say 'none' because all of them are transients? How many Britisher live in India during the British Raj? A good deal more than none. In Traveller transients from outsystem are there for months or years. And the ones that work for an outside company, as all these "transients don't count" explanations assume, represent one warm body per job. When transient A's tour of duty runs out and he returns home, transient B arrives to take over his job. That sort of transient (permanent transients, as it were) would have much the same 'footprint' as a local resident.


Hans

 

[rancke]

And in the age of sail, people worked in other countries for extended periods of time due to the lengthy time for travel... yet kept their original citizenry and generally, I suspect, still not counted in local populations (though indubitably counted when it benefited someone in power or scheming for it ).

Nothing in the rules or the setting information says that the population score has anything to do with citizenry. But the rules do imply that the population score indicates the only people who affect trade and passenger traffic.


Hans