Imperial Calendar

[smiths121]

Hi All,

Bit confused about the concept of a "month" that his part of starship maintenance and costs.... Not sure what a month is in the 3rd Imperium.

Mortgage or Debt on page 137, sates 480 months is 40 years - so 12 months a year. Spinward Marches states there are 365 days in year, with 52 weeks. Canon suggests that day 001 is not part of any week so assuming not part of any month.

Is there a JTAS article defining a month (sure I have seen a calendar somewhere)?

How do others handle paying back the mortgage, and other monthly expenses?

Simon

 

[CosmicGamer]

Hmm, what world has a 365 day year and uses a calendar with 12 month years and 7 day weeks? I'd just look at a handy wall calendar unless someone knows where it is written different.

There is another issue in that same paragraph
See http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=39892&start=0&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlight=month+year

 

[smiths121]

Thanks for your response, your method clearly has some merit for simplicity - r to put it another way - Nice point - well made - very Solomani of you

Given day 1 is not part of a week, I was thinking more 30 days, 30 days, 31 days as a qaurter repeated 4 times to make up 12 months. Familiar enough but different to the Solomani calendar.

Given some of the threads about how rich players can become through trade, I wanted to to pressure on early with the need to wire by a certain date every month the mortgage to a certain system. I also wanted to make the players visit starport A or B every month and buy "spares" for the maintenance payment - which is what got me thinking about a month.

Not a huge thing, but it got me wondering how we did it back in the 80s, I suspect as we were young and just did not bother with the accounts.

I was curious how others did it, so thanks for your response.

 

[BP]

CT Supplement 12 - Forms and Charts had the Imperial Calendar.

It stated the 'Imperial year does not vary in length...' and 'Weeks of seven days and months of about 28 days are used to refer to lengths of time, but rarely to establish dates.'

By this there would be exactly 13 even durations 'months' of 28 days (4 weeks) and one special day left over (Holiday - 001).

For my quarterly ship payment plans (each being three months payments) each quarter is exactly 91 days (13 weeks) - always skipping Holiday/New Years day (001) - as no bank would be open . This nicely avoids the whole 13 month versus 12 month issue and gives easy to figure dates.

As for 'monthly' maintenance - that is a little too rigid for believability. The same price each month and without a 'month' really being defined - there obviously wasn't a lot of thought wasted on that one... I prefer to account for each jump/transit as DMs against damage with maintenance expenses determined based on them (+/- with one die - so probability is linear - and should add up to annual). I hope to refine this and share - but its still a work in progress (just fudge things right now).

Another good fix would be to set a months duration at 28 days and then change the handfull of things (starship payments/maint) to use 13 months per year instead of 12 (makes things a bit cheaper per - but same final price).

 

[AndrewW]

As for 'monthly' maintenance - that is a little too rigid for believability. The same price each month and without a 'month' really being defined - there obviously wasn't a lot of thought wasted on that one... I prefer to account for each jump/transit as DMs against damage with maintenance expenses determined based on them (+/- with one die - so probability is linear - and should add up to annual). I hope to refine this and share - but its still a work in progress (just fudge things right now).

I always just figured the monthly maintenance was an average and some months would be less, some more and it just averaged out to that.

 

[Matian]

I always just figured the monthly maintenance was an average and some months would be less, some more and it just averaged out to that.

Me too. I also figured it included general "cleanup" maintenance and/or costs for extra personnel needed to keep the ship in working order. So, one month it might be paying someone at the downport to scrape out all the fuel tanks, another month it might be hiring an extra hand to make sure the new M-Drive works properly and paying in room and board (with maintenance costs reflecting extra rations, rather than having to calculate extra life support).

My players tend to like this, and have developed their own timelines of when things should be done.

 

[smiths121]

CT Supplement 12 - Forms and Charts had the Imperial Calendar.

Thank BP - I know I had seen it somewhere.

I like the idea of 13 x 4 week months, and using quarters.