20 diameter limit variant

[ShawnDriscoll]

I'm fine with TL15 being somewhat of a limit because that is how far the mapped region of the galaxy has technologically progressed so far. If the setting were to take place 8,000 years later, I'm sure the ruled TL bar would be raised if necessary.

Take a look at http://www.travellermap.com (and scroll out with your mouse wheel) to understand just how much of the galaxy is unexplored. Any TL could be possible for that area.

 

[alex_greene]

I'm all for the characters getting to experience the universe, rather than spend most of their days stuck in Jump space, looking at the interior of their ship all the time and going stir crazy.

I'm still all for having the Starport set in interplanetary space between the worlds by default, forcing the characters to have to travel to and from the mainworld by ship's boat or using the system's cutter shuttle service. It's a quick and easy way to separate the characters from their ship every time, and the characters get to do some sightseeing between adventures.

Also, there's the fun of having the characters stuck in a tin tube with no weapons, a million miles from anything armed, just as a pirate ship arrives looking for something to rob.

 

[High Orbit Drifter]

If jump tech comes naturally for a technological civilization why is the galaxy not filled to the rim with super old hyper tech civilizations?

Thats hard to answer even without jump drive. Just some curiosity and TL9 or so self replicating robotic technology. Say we, in a century or so, build a robot probe, launch it toward Alpha Centuri with an acceleration of 1000th of a g. It gets there in 132 years, finds an asteriod with metals and silicon and builds two replicas of itself that launch themselves toward other stars. The original probe goes about the business of exploring the Alpha Centuri, sending the information back to Terra (and hopefully someone will be there to receive it).

The new probes do the same thing, building a couple of copies of themselves after travelling a century or two, exploring star systems, sending the info back to Terra.

How long will it take until there are Terran probes in every star system in the galaxy? A two, three million years? The blink of an eye in geologic or biological terms.

 

[Condottiere]

The story goes that the probe carries the astronauts in deep freeze; by the time they get there, there's a reception party waiting for them, hailing them as heroes and giving them a ticker parade. Punchline: we've discovered FTL travel in the meantime.

 

[Infojunky]

I'm still all for having the Starport set in interplanetary space between the worlds by default, forcing the characters to have to travel to and from the mainworld by ship's boat or using the system's cutter shuttle service. It's a quick and easy way to separate the characters from their ship every time, and the characters get to do some sightseeing between adventures.

I agree....

 

[Wil Mireu]

The real reason everyone "stopped" at TL15 in setting is entirely meta. Beyond 15 the social pressures of the technology are quite likely to produce a society we don't recognize and can't easily comprehend.

There's also the OTU's ridiculously unrealistic assumption that people will be unaffected by technology, and when they're at TL 15 they'll be just the same as us - which is complete nonsense. Our own society today is pretty much completely unrecognisable to someone even from the early 20th century. A TL9 or A society may be just about recognisable to us today, but a TL 11-15 society should be completely alien. But again, some technologies (such as AI, genetic engineering, and nanotech) are deliberately crippled in Traveller in order to keep humans recognisable at higher TLs.

I do think MM has some very strange ideas about technology if he believes that "The Singularity" won't happen until TL 31 or thereabouts though (which is what is claimed in T5).

 

[alex_greene]

TL 15 is supposed to be the first tech level where people are no longer entirely able to understand their technology.

Technically, going by the number of people who can't code their own iPads, that could be applicable for today's level of technology.

 

[MrBackman]

Seems very much canon.

If someone came up with an interesting and understandable algorithm that could vary the exact distance and/or the risks of a misjump, making highly skilled astrogators worth their weight in gold.

Well, if the 100 diameter rule (or whatever multiple used) is in fact a gravity gradient limit one could argue that a highly skilled astrogator is simply better at precisely pinpoint the location of the ship and the local gravity effects upon it. There will be a position between Earth and Moon for example, where the gravity gradient is extra low where jumps could be safely possible if you could pinpoint it exactly. All this assuming that you buy my explanation for what the '100 diameter limit' really is ie threshold ´for the gravity gradient (how low the rate of gravity falloff is) that happens to match 100 diameter for bodies with the same density as Earth.

The full article on the 100 diameterlimit can be read here
http://vectormovement.wordpress.com/2010/05/30/100-diameters-limit/

 

[CosmicGamer]

TL 15 is supposed to be the first tech level where people are no longer entirely able to understand their technology.

Technically, going by the number of people who can't code their own iPads, that could be applicable for today's level of technology.

What is the number of people that can't compose music on a piano? Fly a plane?

How about the number of people who can't repair cars, change their fuse box to one of them fancy new circuit breaker boxes themselves, use a sewing machine to make their own cloths, operate a telegraph, use a sextant and so on?

 

[Epicenter]

I would posit that the 100 diameters rule harkens back to Traveller's wargame roots. The closer to a world that a fleet can arrive, the less time the defenders have to react. If the only warning that your neighbors are planning a war against you is when when a heavily-armed fleet shows up within firing distance, it changes a lot of things about how feasible it is to defend a world.

 

[phavoc]

I'm all for the characters getting to experience the universe, rather than spend most of their days stuck in Jump space, looking at the interior of their ship all the time and going stir crazy.

I'm still all for having the Starport set in interplanetary space between the worlds by default, forcing the characters to have to travel to and from the mainworld by ship's boat or using the system's cutter shuttle service. It's a quick and easy way to separate the characters from their ship every time, and the characters get to do some sightseeing between adventures.

Also, there's the fun of having the characters stuck in a tin tube with no weapons, a million miles from anything armed, just as a pirate ship arrives looking for something to rob.

I guess it depends on the world they are visiting. I would expect high-tech, high-pop worlds to have a very orderly, if very busy orbital infrastructure. Worlds with a single planetary government could easily have the smaller ships (or at least those with no social pull) dock on orbital platforms, go through customs, and then land on the planet below using only shuttle services (or, conversely, if they had a planetary beanstalk, going down anyone?).

ships with freight might be directed to offload at an orbital warehouse too. But keep in mind that the Imperium operates the primary starport of any system, and they are very pro-trade. Busy ports might keep ships in certain areas (like orbit) because there simply aren't enough landing areas on the planet below. That, too, will keep your players separated from your ships. And blasting out of an Imperial port might get you shot down, intercepted by orbital fighters, etc. It's much easier to run away from a planetary port than an Imperial one - at least consequence wise. You really can't outrun the X-boat network.

 

[Solomani666]

.

It definitely changes planetary defence strategies, giving a clear advantage to the attacker.
Ships can now jump in with velocity at an oblique angle, attack a planet or orbital facility and be off before a defensive fleet can react.

Smugglers and covert ops will love this too.

.

 

[dragoner]

I don't see how this changes anything really? So there is some more distance at 100D.

 

[snrdg121408]

Hello MrBackman,

The canon Traveller rule of jumping beyond 100 diameters from a planet has always irritated me; why 100? (aside from the vague concept of diameter of course).

A starship does not have to jump at or beyond the 100D limit as indicated in Classic Traveller Book 2 page 6

Misjump: Each time the ship engages in a jump, throw 13+ for a misjump: Apply the following DMs: +1 if using unrefined fuel (and not equipped to do so), +5 if within 100 planetary diameters of a world, +15 if within 10 planetary diameters of a world. If the result is 16+ the ship is destroyed.

Of course the games I played in a starship >= 100D had a DM of zero, >= 10D and <100D had the +5 DM, and any jump <10D used the +15 DM.

JTAS 24 pages 34 through 38 has an article titled Jumpspace written by Marc W. Miller

I assume it came about as a way to force characters to Travel (it is called Traveller after all) a bit before entering hyperspace. I have seen no space combat system where a planet and a safe jump distance from it could ever fit on a map. To be chased from a planet to jump point, to exit hyperspace directly into action etc, all of these have been impossible due to the huge measure of distance that 100 planet diameters really is. A space combat system with ranges maps a million km large would feel a way too super science (try focusing anything but x-rays over those ranges and learn what insanely-huge-mirror means)

Per Marc W. Miller's article in JTAS 24 a starship reaches the jump point with zero velocity, which means the ship arrives with zero velocity. My guess, Mr. Miller doesn't saying anything on this that I could find, is that when the starship exits jump that it takes seconds, more likely a few minutes before ship's sensors begin detecting anything. Of course I could be out to lunch.

[/quote]I propose reducing the safe jump to 10 diameters and see what changes with the Traveller canon? Does anyone well versed in Traveller canon, adventures, fiction etc know anything that would make such a change weird or contradictory?

For an article on what 'diameter' really mean when calculating safe jump distances read this
http://vectormovement.wordpress.com/2010/05/30/100-diameters-limit/[/quote]

I'm confused the title of the topic is for a 20D limit not 10D.

Mongoose Traveller rules per Core Rulebook page 141 is a -8 DM for making a jump within the 100D limit.

Misjumps would be almost impossible to happen with the suggested change.

 

[GypsyComet]

Misjumps would be almost impossible to happen with the suggested change.

Thus taking away a tool of the Referee.

 

[Wil Mireu]

Misjumps would be almost impossible to happen with the suggested change.

Thus taking away a tool of the Referee.

IMO misjumps should ONLY happen when the Referee wants them to happen. Derailing entire campaigns (possibly killing all the PCs at once) just because of a single dice-roll is incredibly bad game design IMO.

 

[Condottiere]

Gravity screws up jumps.

The diameter limit could be considered a safety guideline; machinery in good working order and a competent navigator can guarantee the safe departure from that point.

A canny engineer, a clairvoyant navigator, cutting edge computer and finely tuned jump drive might be able to jump from twenty diameters with a reasonable chance of getting away with it.

 

[coldwar]

I have read this a bit.
I prefer that it is affected by gravity. But when you factor things in The Milky Ways gravity, that is proportionally easier to compensate for then a star or planet. Especially since even in the OTU, the known universe is just a tiny speck and the differences to be calculated at that level are tiny.

Also with Gravity, if I ever have ships jumping in to a system closer then 100d to an object then the ship gains a vector relative to their diameter distance, and what the object is. Belts would be , but still scary especially if they jumped out at 20d's. Plus I would be prudent on the ship suffering structural stress in these cases to, representing the G units being over powered as they try to compensate for the sudden acceleration.
Which in my view, explains why ships should come to a full stop before jumping in some respects.

Also jumping to and out of nebulas, would be also easy to predict, as long as you have up to date information about the particular nebula.

Remember though, you universe is always different to another GM universe. And the rules allow easy quick room for a little modification to suit your requirements. Obviously always think of how these affect them.

Personally, for a 10d diameter, I think the most pivatol devices that would be seen less are pirates. However their is one benefit. Ships passing by each other, one heading to the destination and the other to jump, will be passing by each other at much lower maximum velocities, then they would at 100d's.

Also, I do not think an invading fleet would have an advantage either, unless the planet is small. Distant range is 50.000Km A Military ship (4-6G's) would be at the 50.000Km mark away from the planet in just over half an hour after appearing from jump. And still at the same velocity and still decelerating for battle still as if it was coming from 100d. Or thats different is the defense has less chance of an adhoc sighting of the fleet by a random patrol or civilian that sees them.

So looking at that, I don't see any real advantages, given ranges of being able to detect ships.

(Note: the figures based on a sized 8 world. Something like mars, they would still be accelerating at 50.000Km away from the planet, but still Minimal Visuals and Heat sensors detection.)