Ground Weapons VS Starships

[Solomani666]

Hmmm ... if we intend to continue this debate, we need reliable data on
the frequency of micrometeorites in interplanetary space, as the data on
their frequency in Earth orbit are misleading, because the gravity field of
Earth tends to attract a comparatively high number of such objects - the-
re is a very high probability that such objects will be less frequent the far-
ther one is away from a planet.

Also if you take the volume of the earth (and atmosphere) compared to the amount of debris that actually that actually enters the atmosphere, one quickly realises that the chance of anything hitting a 200 ton starship, outside of an asteroid field approaches ZERO.

I am sure someone will pose an obstenate answer to cotradict these facts.


.

 

[DFW]

Ok, so how many astronauts and starships have been lost to impact speeds of ~9160 km/sec?

As many as we've put into ships that go that fast that have hulls you say Trav ships have.

:wink:

But, I reread the encounter charts. In a system that "Settled Space", you can't roll a collision (71). That tells us that the collision ISN'T with micrometeors (2D6 damage) but with large man made space junk. Hence the pilot roll to avoid. (You aren't going to see .5 gram objects in time) AND you don't need to avoid them to keep from damaging a Trav space ship hull... THAT tells the tail.

 

[far-trader]

...the chance of anything hitting a 200 ton starship, outside of an asteroid field approaches ZERO.

I agree, except to the "outside of an asteroid field" caveat.

This keeps coming up in sci-fi and too many people swallow it whole. Asteroid fields are not a threat. They are not at all like the "asteroid" field in Star Wars or most sci-fi flicks and novels. They are more empty space than anything and the speeds of the elements are mostly low.

Again, you would have to specifically locate and accelerate deliberately at an asteroid to have a good chance of hitting it. Simply plotting a course through an asteroid belt blindly is unlikely in the extreme to actually hit anything. The odds of a random collision are for all practical purposes the same as that for interplanetary space (which is orders of magnitude less than in planetary orbital space), practically nil.

Collisions of this nature are a referee mandated event (fed by extremely biased random rolls if needed) that should only happen once in a lifetime for a ship, if that. Not yearly, weekly or hourly. There will not be extreme insurance or other silly preventitive measures like super heavy armour in place to prevent it.

If it happens to the same ship more than once that ship is obviously cursed and should be sent to the breakers, or the PCs are the target of deliberate acts by really sneaky opponents, probably Zhodani Ninjas...

 

[apoc527]

While I cannot base this upon any numbers, my "gut feeling" is that the
risk is approximately comparable to the risk of an aircraft crash during
the second half of the twentieth century, and that the people of the set-
ting will probably deal with it in the same way as real world humans did
then: Accidents happen occasionally, starships are wrecked or disappear
now and then, but this does not prevent their use, cause paranoid securi-
ty preparations or drive insurance premiums through the ceiling.

And looking at another real world parallel: We all know how many people
die in car accidents each year (well, in fact each hour), and that different-
ly designed, "armoured" vehicles would considerably reduce that risk -
but almost all of us would still choose a cheap dangerous car over an ex-
tremely expensive "safe" one.

Agreed. Furthermore, based on the rules, we know that a ship with Armor 12 will be effectively immune to micrometeorites. Now, I haven't done the math precisely, but even with my house rule conversion rate of 20:1, that's an armor value of 240 on the vehicle scale. Pretty darn immune, really.

And I would bet that insurance premiums for ships with Armor 12 are also lower...

Everyone can be right! hooray!

 

[apoc527]

Ok, so how many astronauts and starships have been lost to impact speeds of ~9160 km/sec?

As many as we've put into ships that go that fast that have hulls you say Trav ships have.

:wink:

But, I reread the encounter charts. In a system that "Settled Space", you can't roll a collision (71). That tells us that the collision ISN'T with micrometeors (2D6 damage) but with large man made space junk. Hence the pilot roll to avoid. (You aren't going to see .5 gram objects in time) AND you don't need to avoid them to keep from damaging a Trav space ship hull... THAT tells the tail.

See Encounter 23 -- Micrometeorite Swarm. Same rules. Plus it's a swarm (whatever that means).

In fact, one could argue that the rules ignore entirely any risk of .5 gram objects in space because they are so rare. In order to pose any danger, there needs to be a "swarm" (a type of "weather" in a solar system arguably), and those are not even possible in highly civilized systems, presumably because of early warning systems that make avoiding them a matter of supreme ease.

By the way, whoever said 1 in 36 chance wasn't right. There's a 1 in 6 chance of having any encounter, and on d66, there are indeed 36 combinations. So the actual chance of encountering a micrometeoite swarm is 1/6 x 1/36 or 1/216. It's also impossible in highly travelled systems.

Interesting.

EDIT: I'm sorry, micrometeorite STORM. Even better. It IS like weather-in-space.

 

[DFW]

See Encounter 23 -- Micrometeorite Swarm. Same rules. Plus it's a swarm (whatever that means).
By the way, whoever said 1 in 36 chance wasn't right. There's a 1 in 6 chance of having any encounter, and on d66, there are indeed 36 combinations. So the actual chance of encountering a micrometeoite swarm is 1/6 x 1/36 or 1/216. It's also impossible in highly travelled systems.

Interesting.

A "swarm" would be what we on Earth call a "shower". We know where these are. Not the same a individual particles. Apply the HG barrage damage hence the 2D6.

A 1 in 6 chance over what time period? A busy border world in the SM could be a roll every 6 hours. On a cross system trip of a day or two... But anyway, that collision is with hundreds of micrometeors, not one.
But, then again, how strong is the hull metal that a 100 ton ship could be hit by a nuke missile and not be totally destroyed?

 

[Jeraa]

But, I reread the encounter charts. In a system that "Settled Space", you can't roll a collision (71). That tells us that the collision ISN'T with micrometeors (2D6 damage) but with large man made space junk. Hence the pilot roll to avoid. (You aren't going to see .5 gram objects in time) AND you don't need to avoid them to keep from damaging a Trav space ship hull... THAT tells the tail.

You need to check that again. a 71 (collision with space junk) can be rolled in "settled space". So can number 23 (micrometeorite storm) Both are considered a collision for 2d6 damage.

 

[apoc527]

See Encounter 23 -- Micrometeorite Swarm. Same rules. Plus it's a swarm (whatever that means).
By the way, whoever said 1 in 36 chance wasn't right. There's a 1 in 6 chance of having any encounter, and on d66, there are indeed 36 combinations. So the actual chance of encountering a micrometeoite swarm is 1/6 x 1/36 or 1/216. It's also impossible in highly travelled systems.

Interesting.

A "swarm" would be what we on Earth call a "shower". We know where these are. Not the same a individual particles. Apply the HG barrage damage hence the 2D6.

A 1 in 6 chance over what time period? A busy border world in the SM could be a roll every 6 hours. On a cross system trip of a day or two... But anyway, that collision is with hundreds of micrometeors, not one.
But, then again, how strong is the hull metal that a 100 ton ship could be hit by a nuke missile and not be totally destroyed?

Don't get me started on MGT nuke damage. I understand the inverse square law just fine, which is I think that Effect should modify damage with nuclear missiles. Thus, in my games, a standard nuclear missile (which I consider to be a very low yield weapon) does 2d6+2xEffect (which I calculate off the final to hit roll), and nuclear torps do 6d6+6xEffect (a standard medium yield torpedo warhead). However, "high yield" missiles doing 4d6+4xEffect can be built and super high yield torpedoes doing up to 18d6+18xEffect can also be created. Those last are what I would consider "metropolitan area busters" and would represent a yield of 100+ megatons.

Do I have data to back those numbers up? Nope, it just "seemed right" to me, so I went with it.

The science I do care about though, I tend to get from Project Rho, which others have mentioned.

 

[Solomani666]

Don't get me started on MGT nuke damage. I understand the inverse square law just fine, which is I think that Effect should modify damage with nuclear missiles. Thus, in my games, a standard nuclear missile (which I consider to be a very low yield weapon) does 2d6+2xEffect (which I calculate off the final to hit roll), and nuclear torps do 6d6+6xEffect (a standard medium yield torpedo warhead). However, "high yield" missiles doing 4d6+4xEffect can be built and super high yield torpedoes doing up to 18d6+18xEffect can also be created. Those last are what I would consider "metropolitan area busters" and would represent a yield of 100+ megatons.

Do I have data to back those numbers up? Nope, it just "seemed right" to me, so I went with it.

The science I do care about though, I tend to get from Project Rho, which others have mentioned.

I like your rules. So far I have just been adding +1 x effect damage for all missles. I'll probably just add +2 x effect for torps and no added bonuses for HY since the HY part seems to be enought IMHO already.

Thanks for the insight.

.

 

[rust]

I'll probably just add +2 x effect for torps and no added bonuses for HY since the HY part seems to be enought IMHO already.

Ah ... what does "HY" stand for here ? :?

Thank you for any hint.

 

[DFW]

You need to check that again. a 71 (collision with space junk) can be rolled in "settled space". So can number 23 (micrometeorite storm) Both are considered a collision for 2d6 damage.

Typo. I meant "can only"

 

[apoc527]

I'll probably just add +2 x effect for torps and no added bonuses for HY since the HY part seems to be enought IMHO already.

Ah ... what does "HY" stand for here ? :?

Thank you for any hint.

I think high yield. And I wouldn't change those upgrade rules, but they only add a few points of average damage, and I wanted base damage to be more impressive.

 

[atpollard]

Ok, so how many astronauts and starships have been lost to impact speeds of ~9160 km/sec?

As many as we've put into ships that go that fast that have hulls you say Trav ships have.
:wink:

LOL
Good answer.

Just for the record, I believe that Traveller Starships do have very tough shells. I just don't see high speed impacts with space dust as a sufficiently likely event (encounter tables not withstanding) to be the justification for it.

I think that the ever present space radiation and the far more likely risk that, at some point, somebody with bad intent will hurl 'trouble' in the direction of your ship, is a better justification. This 'justification' plus the definition of nuclear missile in YTU, allow for a lesser definition of 'very tough' than 'hitting an iron marble at 9000 km/sec and not penetrating the hull' would suggest.

IMO, a ship with a 1/8" aluminum skin could safely travel between planets with almost no chance of hitting debris of greater than molecular size - but such a ship would instantly vaporize under even a 'miss' from a missile or laser [slight hyperbole] and would need lots of iodine to treat the crew's radiation exposure. Thus such a ship is not the Traveller Norm.