Drop Tanks... Back From the Dead?

[Terry Mixon]

No bridge drones are by definition controlled by something else, and run with the stated penalties. So I guess some things are simplified.

But it only replaces Pilots, Gunners and Sensops. You can't run a Starship with that rule, even a robot one.

Robotic engineers can handle the mechanical elements. The robotic brain controlling the ship can either directly control them or, if they are advanced enough, simply guide them. Robots, ship's brains, and drones can handle it all.

 

[phavoc]

Robot brains would put a lot of pilots, navigators and captains out of business!

The idea of the crew being in the same location (especially the command crew) would appeal more to the operators than to the designers. One has to take the human component into account, or else you'd just have drones flying everything - and that is clearly not the case in the Traveller universe (not to mention the game play and RP'ing would be far different).

To what extent full automation takes over and crew are just along for the ride remains to be seen. Even today there are proposals to make ships (actual ships) fully automated and to remove the crew from them. Pilot them remotely from a central command center the designers are telling us... what could go possibly wrong???

... till a 14 year old hacks the ship and runs it into a bridge, and whose lawyer will insist he thought he was playing Grand Theft Auto 8.

 

[rinku]

Well, I'm a little annoyed at the potential disconnect between the base "free" electronics coming with the bridge or cockpit, but virtual crews just needing the computer, but I guess in price terms you have to pay for a beefy computer so it probably all works out.

(Never any question that smart computers and drones can handle the engineering and repair work. That's even possible in the CRB.)

 

[Galadrion]

With a Robot Brain, you could replace the engineer as well.

You could replace all crew functions, except the Astrogator under RAW. (And honestly, I do away with that in my home games - I see nothing wrong with automatic Astrogation. The only shipboard function I really restrict is the autonomy of the captain... and that can be gotten around with a sufficiently advanced Robot Brain.)

 

[Sigtrygg]

The sooner that bit of fanon made canon is removed from all Mongoose books the better.