How long can a person survive in a low berth?

[Anonymous]

I agree with Dale. My games are going to be much more affected by that one low berth in the plot than by whatever the standard answer is. My campaigns have yet to suffer for this question not being answered.

Ultimately everything is like that though, isn’t it? We could play the whole game without dice and character sheets and it would still be ok. I know we’ve ignored dice rolls enough times that the system and the skill levels have little meaning in those situations. One doesn’t really need any Traveller files at all.

 

[Reynard]

I would say low berths were never purposely designed to last centuries or millennia let alone decades. Planned obsolescence. Creating a unit meant to function continuously for incredible spans of time should be, at best, the work of megacorps with very deep pockets and suspicious motives. As we see today, the vast majority of technological products age and break down, the more complex the more often it needs maintenance and still breaks down.

We do have the time travelers but they're an odd cult with huge trust funds. Even they wake regularly to sightsee in the future then go back to sleep possibly not In the same low berth to avoid a degrading unit. Everyone else have no sane need to leave the universe they know for a very uncertain future. Oh, now there's a bit of karma! Time travelers wake up on a Virus ship!

 

[Condottiere]

If the plot intersects with this particular piece of technology.

It's an open question, especially if you recall that Terra, and presumably other early spacefaring civilizations, built Generation Ships.

 

[Reynard]

I would love to see those generation ship designs especially since T5 introduced Not As Fast As Light drives. I'd also like to know why Terra was sending colonial ships many dozens of parsecs when there are plenty of systems close by and would have much more information or were we doing this to piss off the Vilani just to start a war. Colonies don't (normally) disperse like dandelion seeds to become isolated from the homeworld for centuries. This is especially true for the OTU that has spacefaring races colonizing EVERY rock no matter how inhospitable. Realistically, even with NAFAL ships will spend months at worst reaching a useful world in a sphere, establish a working colony then use those colonies as jumping points for the next wave of colonies not too many parsecs away.

 

[Anonymous]

. I'd also like to know why Terra was sending colonial ships many dozens of parsecs when there are plenty of systems close by

Personally I feel that if you are never coming back and never seeming a ship from Earth again, it doesn’t matter how far out you are. I just want a really nice planet.

 

[Condottiere]

 

[Anonymous]

Good point. “Get rid of the weirdos, send them far far away”

 

[Reynard]

Hairdressers and phone cleaners?....

Even our history attest that colonies don't go solo and isolationist thinking they can handle every issue. They often want an avenue for goods they can't produce until they are WELL established with plenty of resources, the means to harvest and manufacture materials and the population to handle all the work.

Considering the substantial cost and resources to maintain a single ginormous ship or a fleet of ships on a one way journey, the farther one goes the risks become very serious and fragile. It's literally do or die. These are the greatest of miracles if they survive and become viable. They would also be some of the most alien if the behavior and mentality that drove them to be so drastic grows and evolves in such isolation.

 

[Linwood]

CROATOAN....

 

[silburnl]

Is there any indication in the canonical rules that low berths move away from the cryogenic approach at higher TLs? Funky applications of jump tech to put people into stasis fields or similar? I know that you start getting practical teleportation in the TLs above peak-Imperial and if that is the done like Star Trek does it, with some kind of scan/transmit/reassemble cycle, then you could set up teleporter buffers as your low berths and just beam in your low watch from the buffers when you need them.

Bringing this back to the OP, these sorts of ultratech low berths strike me as being a bit less 'analogue' than a bunch of popsicle coffins and so rather more practical for the longer timescale use-cases than the kit in a tramp merchant that will only be built for duty cycles measured in weeks.

Regards
Luke

 

[Condottiere]

Ideally, you want to stop the biological clock infinitely.

Cheaper variants could just make you hibernate.

 

[phavoc]

I don't think the books explain whether or not low berths are suspended animation or hibernation. They are clearly different than slow drug since as far as I can tell the person inside appears to be sleeping.

Since there is risk to be woken up, I would think that points more towards hibernation than suspended animation.

 

[NOLATrav]

I’ve always done TESB style tanks of liquid, hibernation not frozen watch. Can’t get past what happens to frozen veggies after they thaw out.

The only way I see around cellular disruption/destruction is not freezing but rather suspended animation.

The Fast/Slow drug nomenclature in Traveller has always been problematic for me, but the one that slows metabolism is a major part of my low berths. On naval ships it can be a tactical decision when to wake the “Frozen Watch” as they need time to re-orient themselves to normal space-time.

Hasn’t come into play at the player level yet but I’m sure it will

 

[Anonymous]

I’ve always done TESB style tanks of liquid, hibernation not frozen watch. Can’t get past what happens to frozen veggies after they thaw out.

The only way I see around cellular disruption/destruction is not freezing but rather suspended animation.

The Fast/Slow drug nomenclature in Traveller has always been problematic for me, but the one that slows metabolism is a major part of my low berths. On naval ships it can be a tactical decision when to wake the “Frozen Watch” as they need time to re-orient themselves to normal space-time.

Hasn’t come into play at the player level yet but I’m sure it will

Damage to vegetables from freezing comes from not freezing them quickly enough, which allows ice crystals to form. If the food is quickly frozen e.g. in a blast chiller, it turns out a lot better - professionally frozen vegetables are often indistinguishable from fresh. It's unlikely you will have this equipment in a home kitchen but modern freezers have a quick freeze mode that helps out a little. None of these would work for humans but that does not mean it can't at Traveller tech levels.

I'm unaware of the difference between freezing and suspended animation, I guess suspended animation is the goal, and freezing is a method by which this goal might be achieved. Drugs and stasis fields being another?

 

[Condottiere]

Dehydration seems unlikely to be a viable method, except if you want mummies.

However, Mummy Lords retain their personalities and grow more powerful with age.

Fry was quick freezed, without preparation.

In Alien(s), the cat survived.

I would assume that low berthers will perform their ablutions prior to entombment.