Help! Starship Design 1: Long Liner

[pasuuli]

Fellow ship designers,

Here is a long liner, designed using the core book. This ship is built for patrolled and possibly escorted routes, and is basically a "business-class jet" kind of ship, so the stock model has no offences or defences, but it does assume that most of the passengers will be flying High -- any Middle passengers would likely be servants, ehrm, hired stewards, of the High passengers.

Your suggestions and critiques are most helpful.

Thanks in advance.

Barilaan-class Long Liner

Using an 800-ton hull, the Barilaan-class Long Liner is a corporate business and government luxury passenger ship. The Barilaan requires a crew of eight: pilot, boat pilot, navigator, two engineers, and three stewards with combined Steward skill levels of 8. The pinnace is an added luxury for making side trips and for ferrying passengers remotely.

Routes Served

Barilaan liners operate along the xboat route, typically jumping as many hexes as possible. Scheduled flights will often skip stops in order to better connect more important worlds; however, less important stops along the route can of course be chartered.

Riding Barilaan

Passengers aboard Barilaan liners are not idle while aboard. Just the opposite: the passengers' space is designed for planning meetings, breakout sessions, think tanks, and times of intense focus, problem-solving, and even confrontation, compromise, and deal-making. There is a lounge, several meeting rooms, and a library. The four largest staterooms are double suites with an attached office. Twelve more staterooms are one-and-a-half suites, and the remaining twelve are standard size.

To balance out these intense sessions of work, passengers are subjected to excessive luxury. Stewards dote on guests, personalizing each room to relax its occupant, preparing classical shugiili-quality Vilani meals, selecting music and reading material to suit the guest's taste, and organizing various entertainments in the dining lounge, including booking guest lecturers on topics of interest, popular performers, star authors, discussion groups and workshops, games, and so on. Luxury supplies of a bewildering variety are stocked in each stateroom.

Because these liners are for corporate and government use, costs are absorbed by the company or government. If a civilian had the opportunity to fly Barilaan, it would be because a friend or associate had an extra ticket.

Hull           800 tons                             MCr  96
               Streamlined
               Self-Sealing
Armour         None
Jump Drive N (Jump 4)                          70t  MCr 130
Manoeuvre Drive G (2G)                         13t  MCr  28
Power Plant N                                  40t  MCr 104
Bridge                                         20t  MCr   4
Computer       Model/3bis                           MCr   4 
Electronics    Civilian                         1t  MCr   0.05
Weapons        Empty (8 hardpoints)
Fuel           One jump-4 and 4 weeks' power  372t
Cargo                                          42t
Crew Staterooms (8)                            32t  MCr   4.0
Passenger Space (28 rooms)                    144t  MCr  17.5
Luxuries for 16 passengers                      8t  MCr   0.8
Extras
Pinnace                                        40t  MCr  20
Escape Pods    One for every stateroom         19t  MCr   3.8
Software       Intellect                            MCr   1
               Jump Control/4                       MCr   0.4
               Manoeuvre/0
               Library/0
               Expert/3 (Pilot)                     MCr   0.1
               Expert/3 (Astrogator)                MCr   0.1
Maintenance Cost (monthly)                          Cr 345,000
Life Support Cost (monthly)                         Cr  ??,???
Total Tonnage and Cost                        800t  MCr 414.25

 

[phavoc]

Do you feel the ship would be able to support filling all of its cabins as high passage? I ask because you need to allot a minimum of 1 ton per high passenger as part of their ticket. So while you could take away some of the cargo space and allocate it to staterooms, you'd need to ensure you left sufficient cargo for each stateroom (a 1-1 ratio is probably more than adequate).

You also might want to set aside some of the cargo tonnage for a recreation room/lounge for your passengers to gather in and spend their trip time. To the best of my knowledge ship passengers don't want to stay cooped up in their room the entire time.

And if you plan on using this ship as the basis for an adventure, then adding more flavor to it and the deckplans makes it more interesting for PC's.

As to the increased cost for more advanced drives, that again goes back to the reason for the ship. Will it be flying through areas where it can get service and parts for it's higher-tech engines? The average Imperial TL is 12... so depending on where its at, TL-15 parts may be few and far between.

If you are making the ship to generate revenue, you'll need to balance cost vs. performance. If it's simply a plaything for the ref, but built to the rules specs, you need not worry about profitability or long-term viability. Go ahead and give yourself the extra tonnage to play with to make it more fun to run the adventure on.

 

[pasuuli]

Very good observations, Sr. Havoc. I shall keep a steady eye on the cargo hold. And the extra lounge is a fine idea which will be implemented.

Whether or not TLF components and service are available at regular stops is indeed the question. I shall investigate.

 

[Captain Jonah]

Humm well you did ask :twisted:

20Dtons of luxuries will cover 40 high passengers or 100 middles so you are massively over luxuried when you add the 8 ranks of steward though you can live with this since you are a luxury liner.

With 29 passengers you can drop the luxuries to say 12 and with the stewards still have more than enough to fill the ship with high passengers. That is 2 extra staterooms.

As a question why a small craft on a streamlined ship. You are under a thousand dtons so star port and groundside landings are fine. If you are going to refine your own fuel you can use the ship, at 20Dtons a trip in the pinnace that is going to take a week to fill the tanks and two and a half weeks to refine it with one fuel processor. As an emergency perhaps one fuel proc but the pinnace takes up 40Dtons, that is a potential 10 more high passengers and with 12Dtons of luxuries plus the three stewards you can handle 40 at once.

Perhaps drop the pinnace for extra staterooms and use a bit of cargo or the 8Dtons from dropping the luxuries to increase the Manoeuvre drive, they are small and cheap and you can tuck in a 2G drive fairly easily.

You will not make much money on such a small cargo hold since a big chink of it goes to high passengers anyway.

If your ship is paying 500credits per dton for fuel then five fuel processors would help a lot.

With regard to the extra space from the high tech drives. If the ship is not intended to be commercially viable then maybe the owners want to run a state of the art no expense spared ship.

In terms of costs adding 50% to the price (and mortgage) for adding 6 passengers will cost a bundle. The mortgage alone is 1.6 million a month, half again if you add tech 15 drives.

 

[navanod]

My handy-dandy spreadsheet says that, following RAW, assuming full complements of only high and low passengers, plus a full hold of freight making Jump-4 runs twice per month, you'll make about Cr 175,000...assuming you skim all of your fuel. Buying unrefined fuel cuts your profit down to Cr 135,00. Refined fuel puts you in the red, losing Cr 13,500 per month. Adding higher tech drives (thereby driving up your mortgage) only makes the problem worse. Making anything less than Jump-4 runs is also a losing proposition - even a pair of J-3 runs winds up losing half a million credits. Carrying only middle passengers, there's no way to make it profitable.

So, to make a profit, you need a solid J-4 run, sell all of your tickets, and stick to unrefined fuel (or skim it yourself). Once it's paid off, the ship payment expense turns into a MCr 1.6 profit.

Just my nickels worth; numbers could be off somewhere, but seem about right.

 

[pasuuli]

20Dtons of luxuries will cover 40 high passengers or 100 middles

Then I must have read the text wrong! I thought it said 1t = 1 high passenger. I'll re-read.

As a question why a small craft on a streamlined ship.

That's a good question. But consider that if smaller merchants have launches and yet can land, then smallcraft appear to serve multiple purposes: multiple destinations for preferred customers; fast transit between surface and orbit; emergency use (beyond that of escape pods of course); and even, perhaps, some cargo capability thrown in.

A launch might do just as well. It seems that the pinnace also screams "luxury", while the launch just screams "utility".

If you are going to refine your own fuel you can use the ship

That's a very, very, very good point. Consider that suggestion taken to heart. And I should add more fuel processors.

increase the Manoeuvre drive, they are small and cheap and you can tuck in a 2G drive fairly easily.

It is difficult to argue with that.

With regard to the extra space from the high tech drives. If the ship is not intended to be commercially viable then maybe the owners want to run a state of the art no expense spared ship.

That's the idea. However it's not clear to me whether or not TLF drives can be serviced on TLE or lower starports.

 

[pasuuli]

So, to make a profit, you need a solid J-4 run, sell all of your tickets, and stick to unrefined fuel (or skim it yourself). Once it's paid off, the ship payment expense turns into a MCr 1.6 profit.

Just my nickels worth; numbers could be off somewhere, but seem about right.

Can we try an additional scenario?

If we assume that the ship is bought outright, and that refined fuel is paid for by corporate, but passenger utilization averages 67%, then how do the numbers look?

 

[navanod]

Assuming 20 High passengers, 8 low, full holds, two jumps per month -
J-1 = + Cr 257,000 (each additional High = +Cr 10,000, after LS costs)
J-2 = + Cr 525,000 (each additional High = +Cr 22,000, after LS costs)
J-3 = + Cr 874,000 (each additional High = +Cr 38,000, after LS costs)
J-4 = + MCr 1.3 (each additional High = +Cr 58,000, after LS costs)

So yeah, that's a viable scenario.

EDIT: Err, yeah, forgot one minor detail...subtract your salaries from the above numbers. Didn't take that into account, but did include maintenance and LS.

 

[AndrewW]

20Dtons of luxuries will cover 40 high passengers or 100 middles

Then I must have read the text wrong! I thought it said 1t = 1 high passenger. I'll re-read.

Each ton of luxuries counts as one level of Steward skill. Each level of Steward skill can care for 2 high passengers, or 5 middle passengers.

 

[pasuuli]

You lot are helpful.

About half of the Luxury tonnage is gone.

Now there's a total of five fuel processors, installed on the ship itself. It can refine a full load of fuel in about four days, if absolutely necessary.

The Evade program is removed, shaving off MCr 2. If a refitter wants to install it, he can, along with a brace of turrets too.

 

[phavoc]

You lot are helpful.

About half of the Luxury tonnage is gone.

Now there's a total of five fuel processors, installed on the ship itself. It can refine a full load of fuel in about four days, if absolutely necessary.

The Evade program is removed, shaving off MCr 2. If a refitter wants to install it, he can, along with a brace of turrets too.

One thing to keep in mind is that most planets you will be docking at won't be allowing frontier refueling for free, so you still have to purchase unrefined fuel. It's really not practical financially to jump to the habitable planet zone, land/dock, unload cargo, take on cargo then fly to the gas giant a few days away to get fuel, then spend about another day refueling and flying away from a gas giant to jump. Completely ineffecient.

So factor in the cost of unrefined fuel. But assume you'll have 3-5 days to actually process it into refined fuel. This will govern your sizing of your fuel processors. After you have landed you know you'll be on planet for a few days at least, and therefore you can immediately refuel and begin the on-board fuel purification cycle.

 

[Jak Nazryth]

I have not had the time to review high guard etc... since I'm still in the office.
However, based on the function of this ship to cater to the super rich, the first thing I would do would be to dramatically modify some of the staterooms.
I would have at least 2, 8 ton suites, perhaps more
Then at least half the remaining as 6 ton rooms,with the standard 4 ton taking up the rest for passengers. You don't need to sweat pricing, just figure out how much "per square foot" you can charge per room by the rules, then double it.

I would also include an office suite / meeting room(s) since this is where big business brokers can rub elbows with the local nobles.

I would also double a portion of the size of common areas, then break it down into specific spaces like "bar" or "theater" or "private lounge" etc...

Your total room count will drop, but your income should increase dramatically per room.

 

[far-trader]

In this case I think the business model should be different from that of a tramp trader that has to spend days or a week in port to find freight and passengers. It should be operating as a scheduled route liner and have staterooms and cargo space presold when it arrives allowing a faster turnaround and more profitability.

That's going to mean no time to mess with processing fuel. So drop the purifiers and use the space for revenue generation (more cargo or pax). Most of the ports of call will have purified fuel and those that don't can have private purifier support attached to the company warehouses and ticket office. In fact if you want to play it that way the company can refine their own fuel from unrefined at the better ports as well to save money.

In the same model of efficiency and profits you could also drop the small craft. Just have them operate out of the company port office as well. Upon arrival the ship is met underway by the shuttle to speed important cargo and the pax to the world. Having it for the uses stated is redundant or eliminated above. And having it operated by the Pilot doesn't sit well with me. It's possible use as a lifeboat is unnecessary with the escape pods.

I would upgrade the maneuver drive if anything. At least 2G to allow landing and takeoff at high G worlds and as a safety margin. As well as reducing time to arrive and depart. Again, idle time costs money.

I see this having about a 24hour layover for transferring freight, fueling, stocking supplies, and pax processing. So it can make almost twice as many trips a year as a tramp merchant, nearly doubling its comparable revenue. That should make the books more black and less red.

 

[pasuuli]

Jak: you're right, there should be room to do business on this ship, and the rooms should reflect a corporate hierarchy. Modifications along those lines will be made!

Dan: as you mentioned, the business model doesn't come from consumer- or trader-pricing; it comes from government and corporate contracts and charters. Something like taxpayer dollars / executive travel budgeting. Not designed to pull a profit by running routes, but rather by attracting the luxury market.

But this needs to be discussed further. In the meantime, here are the rebuttals, such as they are:

It should be operating as a scheduled route liner and have staterooms and cargo space presold when it arrives allowing a faster turnaround and more profitability.

A fast turnaround is not a primary concern (!).

Thus there is plenty of time to refine fuel; HOWEVER, it does seem like a ridiculous thing for a luxury liner to have to do. So you end up being correct anyway; the purifiers are gone, as of right now. But, the extra space will go to the passengers, per Jak's suggestions.

Most of the ports of call will have purified fuel and those that don't can have private purifier support attached to the company warehouses and ticket office. In fact if you want to play it that way the company can refine their own fuel from unrefined at the better ports as well to save money.

You are so right on with this one.

In the same model of efficiency and profits you could also drop the small craft. Just have them operate out of the company port office as well. Upon arrival the ship is met underway by the shuttle to speed important cargo and the pax to the world. Having it for the uses stated is redundant or eliminated above. And having it operated by the Pilot doesn't sit well with me. It's possible use as a lifeboat is unnecessary with the escape pods.

Though true, it still seems that having a pinnace screams "LUXURY", as in "Yah, we're so sure of ourselves and we're so swanky we made room for this nice high-tech smallcraft. Use? Naffed if I know, we just got one, is all."

I would upgrade the maneuver drive if anything. At least 2G to allow landing and takeoff at high G worlds and as a safety margin. As well as reducing time to arrive and depart. Again, idle time costs money.

Despite your desire to save money, your other arguments are reasonable, plus Sr. Havoc made the same suggestion. The M-drive shall be upgraded, as of right now.

I see this having about a 24 hour layover for transferring freight, fueling, stocking supplies, and pax processing.

This is quite reasonable; however, the Company is at the tender mercies of the governments and businesses which contract for this special ship; some of them want a quick getaway, but the scheduling is entirely up to them.

 

[BFalcon]

I agree with Far Trader.

The passenger trade is one where a small craft coming out to meet the liner would be a far better option than wasting time refining fuel and everything else. An orbital facility to offload passengers and freight would be too expensive, I think, but a local corporate ship to meet outside the 100d limit and transfer fuel, passengers and freight (probably would want to have 3 airlocks here and refuelling ports to allow this (1 airlock for the passengers, one for the cargo bots to move the personal belongings across and one for the freight (quite possibly mail containers, given the high jump rating).

If you don't have enough room, don't forget the drop tanks in HG... since you're only jumping between established systems, the (TL15) fuel drop tanks are risk-free and would free up enough room inside for more passengers. I would reduce the fuel to allow tank-free 3-parsec jumps. This would mean that you could have a less established 3-parsec link in the chain (most likely at the end) which would not need drop tanks for the return trip.

You could, using extremely large drop tanks, even have a 7-parsec jump in two stages, using a full 4-parsec jump with the tanks and keeping a full 3-parsec tank load on board for the second stage... and the tender would be fitted with the cargo grapples from Merchant Prince to recover them once the liner has departed, for reuse the next time. I've not run the figures, so not sure if it would be possible, but it would make for more revenue during that leg, given that it might be able to go further than some ships are actually able to get to (a jump-3 route to the same system might take months, so you'd pretty much name your price for a mere fortnight's trip to that same system).

Just a thought...

 

[pasuuli]

Car Sr. Falcon,

I agree with Far Trader.

The passenger trade is one where a small craft coming out to meet the liner would be a far better option than wasting time refining fuel and everything else. An orbital facility to offload passengers and freight would be too expensive, I think, but a local corporate ship to meet outside the 100d limit and transfer fuel, passengers and freight [...]

This is an excellent setup, and Dan has already made the case to drop the refineries, but the smallcraft rendezvous is far, far too efficient for the clients in this particular case. The passengers will appreciate the upgraded manoeuvre drive rating to be sure, and might enjoy a flight in the pinnace; however, they are also the people who make schedules, rather than keep them...

If you don't have enough room, don't forget the drop tanks in HG... since you're only jumping between established systems, the (TL15) fuel drop tanks are risk-free and would free up enough room inside for more passengers. I would reduce the fuel to allow tank-free 3-parsec jumps. This would mean that you could have a less established 3-parsec link in the chain (most likely at the end) which would not need drop tanks for the return trip.

This is a consideration that was on the table. You might be right about it.

You could, using extremely large drop tanks, even have a 7-parsec jump in two stages, using a full 4-parsec jump with the tanks and keeping a full 3-parsec tank load on board for the second stage... and the tender would be fitted with the cargo grapples from Merchant Prince to recover them once the liner has departed, for reuse the next time. [...]

Just a thought...

The more you write, the closer you hit the mark, and that scares me. However that solution is not for this design.

 

[Jak Nazryth]

At another quick glance, I would keep a ships boat, not because of the need to shuttle passengers to and from the surface, but to allow more flexibility for "special" deliveries.
Some high and mighty official on a jaunt with one of their favorite "companions" might not want to be seen boarding the normal way by the voting (or buying) public.
Also there are always special requests for high paying people who the captain might need to a corporate moon installation for an important meeting while the rest of the ship continues onto dock at a primary high port. You might not need a 40 boat, but maybe 30 ton or even 20.

I have a change to the small craft design on a new thread.

 

[FreeTrav]

When this is finalized, please send a copy to Freelance Traveller (editor@freelancetraveller.com) with your real name for credit. After I get done with another deckplan/interior picture project, I'd be happy to try to do up plans and interior shots for this using The Sims 2.

 

[BFalcon]

Car Sr. Falcon,

I agree with Far Trader.

The passenger trade is one where a small craft coming out to meet the liner would be a far better option than wasting time refining fuel and everything else. An orbital facility to offload passengers and freight would be too expensive, I think, but a local corporate ship to meet outside the 100d limit and transfer fuel, passengers and freight [...]

This is an excellent setup, and Dan has already made the case to drop the refineries, but the smallcraft rendezvous is far, far too efficient for the clients in this particular case. The passengers will appreciate the upgraded manoeuvre drive rating to be sure, and might enjoy a flight in the pinnace; however, they are also the people who make schedules, rather than keep them...

If you don't have enough room, don't forget the drop tanks in HG... since you're only jumping between established systems, the (TL15) fuel drop tanks are risk-free and would free up enough room inside for more passengers. I would reduce the fuel to allow tank-free 3-parsec jumps. This would mean that you could have a less established 3-parsec link in the chain (most likely at the end) which would not need drop tanks for the return trip.

This is a consideration that was on the table. You might be right about it.

You could, using extremely large drop tanks, even have a 7-parsec jump in two stages, using a full 4-parsec jump with the tanks and keeping a full 3-parsec tank load on board for the second stage... and the tender would be fitted with the cargo grapples from Merchant Prince to recover them once the liner has departed, for reuse the next time. [...]

Just a thought...

The more you write, the closer you hit the mark, and that scares me. However that solution is not for this design.

Fair enough... you know what you need better than I...

 

[nats]

We need a few subforum sections with these sorts of things in it - player created ships, creatures, characters, adventures and the like.

Not wishing to stand on Citizens of the Imperium's toes but Mongoose Traveller needs its own separate forum for this kind of thing....not to mention ways to upload player created files, etc.