A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Logistics Ship

[Arkathan]

By the rules, aren't they still 10%?

Yes. A module requires a ship's hull to enclose it, so you cannot get another 50% off on the module.
A pod, for this discussion, is calculated with regular hulls, so the non-grav area is still 10%.

 

[Condottiere]

Base Power Requirements for non-gravity hulls are half that of other hull types.


While the Power required for basic ship systems can be halved in emergencies, a ship may lack enough Power to keep just these systems running.

 

[Nate_Gray]

I think you are all missing a point here.
You are just talking about really big drop tanks that you dont drop, which is a standard option.
Power is irrelevant, gravity hull vers non gravity hull is irrelevant, there are no crew requirements and they are cheap enough as there are no bells and whistles on them that need fiddled with.

"Jump tanks come in two parts. Firstly, there are the docking ports, fuel injectors and explosive collars that allow the spacecraft to mount drop tanks and jettison them quickly. Secondly, there are the drop tanks themselves. A drop tank mount consumes a number of tons on board the ship equal to 0.4% of the tonnage of the drop tank itself (for the fittings needed to transfer fuel). The mount costs MCr0.5 per ton and the drop tank itself costs Cr25000 per ton of fuel space."

So in the case of these of 50,000Dt Tanks, each would only cost 1,250Mcr and requires 200Dt connectors on the main ship.

Using a Non Gravity, Dispersed Hull we can get the cost down further for the tank to 625MCr but in turn although cheaper they need 5000PP (Which would need even using optomised TL12+High Tech 3TL schenanigans 233Dts of power plant) costing 500MCr alone never mind the cost of a UNREP system. With the non-grav tank also needing 25 Maintenance Techs and 3 engineers if not more, which the drop tanks would not require.

 

[Arkathan]

I think you are all missing a point here.
You are just talking about really big drop tanks that you dont drop, which is a standard option.
Power is irrelevant, gravity hull vers non gravity hull is irrelevant, there are no crew requirements and they are cheap enough as there are no bells and whistles on them that need fiddled with.

"Jump tanks come in two parts. Firstly, there are the docking ports, fuel injectors and explosive collars that allow the spacecraft to mount drop tanks and jettison them quickly. Secondly, there are the drop tanks themselves. A drop tank mount consumes a number of tons on board the ship equal to 0.4% of the tonnage of the drop tank itself (for the fittings needed to transfer fuel). The mount costs MCr0.5 per ton and the drop tank itself costs Cr25000 per ton of fuel space."

So in the case of these of 50,000Dt Tanks, each would only cost 1,250Mcr and requires 200Dt connectors on the main ship.

Using a Non Gravity, Dispersed Hull we can get the cost down further for the tank to 625MCr but in turn although cheaper they need 5000PP (Which would need even using optomised TL12+High Tech 3TL schenanigans 233Dts of power plant) costing 500MCr alone never mind the cost of a UNREP system. With the non-grav tank also needing 25 Maintenance Techs and 3 engineers if not more, which the drop tanks would not require.

If it were just a drop tank, that would be a true statement. If it only provided fuel for the tender, it would be a true statement, but it carries the dual fuel/cargo compartments with cargo cranes and a unrep system to supply the riders and any other friendly craft. Supplies, not just fuel.

 

[MasterGwydion]

Base Power Requirements for non-gravity hulls are half that of other hull types.


While the Power required for basic ship systems can be halved in emergencies, a ship may lack enough Power to keep just these systems running.

I doubt it is written anywhere, but it seems to me that the stuff you are turning off when you go to half power is the gravity and such, so non-gravity hulls shouldn't have that option as they have nothing more to turn off.

 

[Condottiere]

Depends on your analysis.

I'm not saying this is the actual energy requirement, just what can be conjectured from the rules.

Ten percent gives you artificial gravity, plumbing, life support, elevators, and hatches.

Five percent gives you plumbing, life support, elevators, and hatches.

Therefore, artificial gravity requires five percent.

 

[MasterGwydion]

Depends on your analysis.

I'm not saying this is the actual energy requirement, just what can be conjectured from the rules.

Ten percent gives you artificial gravity, plumbing, elevators, and hatches.

Five percent gives you plumbing, elevators, and hatches.

Therefore, artificial gravity requires five percent.

20% gives you artificial gravity, not 10%, so half of that is 10% with no gravity.

 

[Condottiere]

That's with built in redundancy.

 

[Arkathan]

I doubt it is written anywhere, but it seems to me that the stuff you are turning off when you go to half power is the gravity and such, so non-gravity hulls shouldn't have that option as they have nothing more to turn off.

In battle, you can shut off all non-essential systems and most life support. That halves the power drain, but you can't stay like that much longer than your vacc suits will hold out.

 

[Condottiere]

The thing about life support, you only need to keep the lights on in the staterooms.

 

[MasterGwydion]

The thing about life support, you only need to keep the lights on in the staterooms.

Life support includes things like heat as well as the environmental systems such as the air handling systems and CO2 scrubbers. It is not just lights.

 

[Condottiere]

I hear constant complaints that spacecraft are overheating, and we need radiators.

I think the only independent life support system mentioned are the detachable bridge for two weeks, and the cockpit, and the cockpit is limited to twenty four hours.

 

[Nate_Gray]

If it were just a drop tank, that would be a true statement. If it only provided fuel for the tender, it would be a true statement, but it carries the dual fuel/cargo compartments with cargo cranes and a unrep system to supply the riders and any other friendly craft. Supplies, not just fuel.

Freely admit I missed the part where you intended them to be multi role pods after the earlier mention of even if they are only carrying fuel. But I would still recomend the drop tank angle just split them into 50/50 drop pods and cargo pods, or what ever ratio suits the supply needs of your initial battle rider force you are resupplying this way, you are still being more efficient.

 

[J. L. Brown]

This is why I buy 'Breakaway Hull' on all my Battle Tenders and Battle Riders. For 2% of the hull volume (works out to 40 kCr per dTon of the whole hull). The separation of Breakaway Hull takes 6 to 36 (average of 21) minutes; the actual Jump initiation takes 10 to 60 (average of 35) minutes. If you want to add extra burdens that are not explicitly in the rules, you could also set aside tonnage and expense to treat the 'rider' as a drop tank -- but it (and an UNREP system to move fuel) are really not required. Fuel moves around between ship & rider exactly like it moves around in normal operation of a single ship; so the jumping ship should be allowed to use the fuel from the rider for a jump.

I will point out that jump-tanks as written are cumbersome and fragile -- they provide a 15 minus TL penalty to the 'Jump' maneuver. They are also only recoverable on an 8+. Both of these are due to (HGu 2022, p48)

'Jumping is a delicate procedure, greatly complicated by having big empty fuel tanks drifting close to the jump bubble.'

If the rider / tanks are a breakaway-hull ship instead, it can maneuver (even at sub 1G) away from the jumping ship to lessen or negate both effects.

Assuming the Rider / Drop-Tank has only a M0 station keeping drive (good for short bursts of 0.25G), and that it is backing directly away from the Tender (and can only bring 10% of its' drive rating to bear); in a single six minute / 840 second space turn it will move to 86.4 km away from the Tender -- well outside 'Adjacent' (and even 'Close') range, while ordinary drop-tanks could be expected to stay within 'Adjacent'.

 

[Condottiere]

In theory you could do that with drop tanks.

Two reasons I don't is because there is not enough information on what you could add on the drop tanks, and because they are incredibly fragile when the primary hull is damaged.

 

[phavoc]

As everyone has pointed out, it's not really specified in the construction rules how much of a hull goes into the different types of systems (life support, gravity, sensors, air locks, mechanical, etc).

In times like this you have to ask yourself a few questions about the pod, and then wing it. The biggest - is the pod going to be a cargo hold that will receive people or not? If so then, at least when people are onboard, it needs life support. Lighting is really a non-issue b/c LEDs and other lighting systems require zero power (or as was mentioned, its just a rounding error). If that cargo pod is gonna carry cargo of any sorts, assume that it will get grav plating. Why? Because without it the cargo is subject to the G-forces of the drive, and only very specific types of cargo could survive that (example - grain, or raw ore). Anything else is apt to get damaged. Life support could possibly be turned off or minimized. Containerized cargo may actually employ their own containers with refrigeration or heating, so while that's a power consumption, it's not a life support cost.

Other things to consider is the pod would need access - large cargo hatches and smaller personnel access. If it's to be accessed by a ship while in transit that's more than just a few maintenance hatches. The total number is dictated by size. If it's just maintenance access then it's like 1. Cargo doors may be more numerous to facilitate in/out movement of the cargo. Solid cargo, like grain, would still have definitive cargo holds. Best bet would be to model whatever cargo you want to carry on actual cargo ships. They are already built to effecient standards.

Pods should be much simpler than a ship, with less redundancy, less structure and less of everything. They will be built to simply and cheaply carry their loads. So I'd say between 20-40% of a normal ships hull cost would get you a space-rated cargo pod for most any type of use. A more specialized one might run you 50%. But these aren't people-pods - that would be a full starship hull minus sensors, power and engines. Pretty much everything else is required.

Oh, and I'd say that pods don't get hard points either. That seems unfairly double-dipping into cheap and making it useful. Then everyone would start designing cargo-pods loaded with weapons "because rules say they are only 50% hull cost!". That's something I wish more rules designers and game companies would do - to thoroughly think through the rules and see what pitfalls and cheats are present and at least put some verbiage to limit the inevitability of people looking to make min/max designs that violate the spirit of the rules and just skirt what's in the books.

 

[Condottiere]

We do have pods, and pods do have weapons.

But podification requires weeks in spacedock to install.

Deinstallation, who knows?

 

[Terry Mixon]

As everyone has pointed out, it's not really specified in the construction rules how much of a hull goes into the different types of systems (life support, gravity, sensors, air locks, mechanical, etc).

In times like this you have to ask yourself a few questions about the pod, and then wing it. The biggest - is the pod going to be a cargo hold that will receive people or not? If so then, at least when people are onboard, it needs life support. Lighting is really a non-issue b/c LEDs and other lighting systems require zero power (or as was mentioned, its just a rounding error). If that cargo pod is gonna carry cargo of any sorts, assume that it will get grav plating. Why? Because without it the cargo is subject to the G-forces of the drive, and only very specific types of cargo could survive that (example - grain, or raw ore). Anything else is apt to get damaged. Life support could possibly be turned off or minimized. Containerized cargo may actually employ their own containers with refrigeration or heating, so while that's a power consumption, it's not a life support cost.

Other things to consider is the pod would need access - large cargo hatches and smaller personnel access. If it's to be accessed by a ship while in transit that's more than just a few maintenance hatches. The total number is dictated by size. If it's just maintenance access then it's like 1. Cargo doors may be more numerous to facilitate in/out movement of the cargo. Solid cargo, like grain, would still have definitive cargo holds. Best bet would be to model whatever cargo you want to carry on actual cargo ships. They are already built to effecient standards.

Pods should be much simpler than a ship, with less redundancy, less structure and less of everything. They will be built to simply and cheaply carry their loads. So I'd say between 20-40% of a normal ships hull cost would get you a space-rated cargo pod for most any type of use. A more specialized one might run you 50%. But these aren't people-pods - that would be a full starship hull minus sensors, power and engines. Pretty much everything else is required.

Oh, and I'd say that pods don't get hard points either. That seems unfairly double-dipping into cheap and making it useful. Then everyone would start designing cargo-pods loaded with weapons "because rules say they are only 50% hull cost!". That's something I wish more rules designers and game companies would do - to thoroughly think through the rules and see what pitfalls and cheats are present and at least put some verbiage to limit the inevitability of people looking to make min/max designs that violate the spirit of the rules and just skirt what's in the books.

All good points, except one quibble. The g forces are negated by the maneuver drive, not the grav plates. They can be in zero g, perhaps all locked into place for an UNREP system to move them, and be unaffected by high-G maneuvers.

 

[Condottiere]

Depending on how you interpret the Handbook, it's possible that gravitational tiles can be used for inertial compensation.

Efficiency seems somewhat up in the air.

 

[Arkathan]

Since the level of inertial compensation is directly tied to the M-Drive rating, there really is no room for interpretation.
A spinning hab ring in a non-grav hull benefits from the inertial compensation, and does not require acceleration couches for maneuvers.