MarcusIII
Cosmic Mongoose
much faster than bio reactors. See my post on food synthesizers
Mating Airlocks to Cargo Hatches
- Thread starter Terry Mixon
- Start date
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
Sadly, food synthesizers aren’t documented in the rules, so we have to use what we have.
MarcusIII
Cosmic Mongoose
I use whatever I like in game
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
As well you should. It just doesn't help the default universe.
MarcusIII
Cosmic Mongoose
In all the dozens of rule books I couldn't find any details about TL 14 & 15 food production. Anything in yours?
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
Nothing I'm aware of.
MarcusIII
Cosmic Mongoose
Right, so they might have food synthesizers. At those TLs there is some amazing tech and it would fit with post scarcity supposedly happening at those levels.
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
While I'm no expert on the game, people keep talking TL17 as the post-scarcity spot. That's linked to Advanced fabricators which are too slow to make meals on demand. That's Superior fabricators are TL19.
Nothing in the official materials has mentioned high tech level worlds as being post-scarcity either. It's an interesting game device, but it might be premature at TL15ish.
The setting is absolutely not portrayed as being post scarcity. It just is difficult to think of reasons why it isn't given the technology that they do have. It's just one of the conceits of the setting. Like why humans actually do things that you'd reasonably expect automation or robots to do. Or, to stick with the wildly off topic topic we've been, on, we have trade that looks reasonably like trade we as we understand it today even though that seems unlikely. It's because it makes for a better game.
While it's true that ships can just park in orbit and use shuttles to transfer to the high port or downport (which is what I assume C meant by using 3 dimensions; actually 4 dimensions since time is a factor...) that's just shifting the port capacity to the small craft. There would still be a finite capacity to process those.
Generally though, most ship designs are intended to land or dock. A subsidised merchant is CLEARLY a roll-on/roll-off pattern. A Free or Far Trader only has an Air/Raft to service cargo transfer, and so on. Of course, the port may be the one providing cargo shuttles, so any option is possible...
However, a port isn't going to have an infinite shuttle capacity either.
In relation to "post scarcity"... the setting generally isn't, no. But within the setting post-scarcity worlds do exist. And the original intention, that still informs the game, was that play was happening at the fringes of civilised space, where Adventure still happens. Ergo, The Spinward Marches.
There is, however one area which is post-scarcity: Energy production. Traveller fusion power is basically available anywhere that matters and is dirt cheap.
Generally though, most ship designs are intended to land or dock. A subsidised merchant is CLEARLY a roll-on/roll-off pattern. A Free or Far Trader only has an Air/Raft to service cargo transfer, and so on. Of course, the port may be the one providing cargo shuttles, so any option is possible...
However, a port isn't going to have an infinite shuttle capacity either.
In relation to "post scarcity"... the setting generally isn't, no. But within the setting post-scarcity worlds do exist. And the original intention, that still informs the game, was that play was happening at the fringes of civilised space, where Adventure still happens. Ergo, The Spinward Marches.
There is, however one area which is post-scarcity: Energy production. Traveller fusion power is basically available anywhere that matters and is dirt cheap.
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I find it somewhat difficult to imagine that a Free Trader or Fat Trader would actually use a highport unless the downport has some significant element of danger associated with it. Direct pick up and delivery to the surface would be one of their few actual advantages over full sized commercial craft.
I'd have thought if a world HAS a highport that it likely has sufficient trade being warehoused and brokered at the high port, rarely seeing a planet's surface. Also, not every shipment is getting delivered to the planet, I'd have thought. Aside from anything else, the destination may be a space habitation or a secondary world within the system. It would seem counterproductive to land that on a surface then lift it back out to orbit if there was an orbital delivery option, in most cases.
Free traders are an important part of servicing a trade hub, too... they might land on the Type-C to pick up freight to be delivered to the high port at the Type-A next door, and move on to the next job. The freight they delivered is loaded up into a serious cargo vessel to be transferred in bulk to another hub, where other Free Traders may be involved in final delivery from its highport to the surface of a nearby destination.
Free traders are an important part of servicing a trade hub, too... they might land on the Type-C to pick up freight to be delivered to the high port at the Type-A next door, and move on to the next job. The freight they delivered is loaded up into a serious cargo vessel to be transferred in bulk to another hub, where other Free Traders may be involved in final delivery from its highport to the surface of a nearby destination.
MarcusIII
Cosmic Mongoose
Yes, but remember worlds with atmos vacuum up to very thin and asteroid worlds.
? Obviously if the destination isn't the planet, then there's no reason you'd land at the planet. If it's going to some space station or whatever, the free trader can likely just go there. Probably just directly arrive in the vicinity as part of the jump instead of going anywhere near the mainworld in the first place.
I'm sure that there are some cases where a cargo from an E or D port has the highport as the destination. Whether the highport actually has cargo docking for free traders would depend on whether that's profitable. It could easily be cheaper to have them land on at the downport and then bring the goods up to the highport via the regular cargo shuttles than to build little used cargo berths.
Back to requiring information we don't have on the economics of the far future.
MarcusIII
Cosmic Mongoose
I don't think so. Because the economics of such ships doesn't include, for instance, jumping from Alpha .C main-world to Jupiter orbital facility in Sol system then traveling interplanetary all the way to Earth to look for cargo and spec trade before jumping again. At least not according to everything I've see published over the last 45+ years. More likely cargo is dumped at Terra Highport to be hauled by 50 ton cargo cutters to Jupiter.
That assumes that you can't get any cargo or passengers at the alternate destination or that you aren't compensated for any additional expenses if that's the case.
It isn't hard to not see things in the published material, when there's approximately no published material covering the topic. You can't even find much published material that says that cutters haul it to the station. Or that anything besides the mainworld exists in 99.9% of the systems in Traveller.
But here is a thing that actually IS in the published material: skimming fuel from gas giants. So if that's happening, someone has to actually be going to the gas giant. So it can't be impossible.
It isn't hard to not see things in the published material, when there's approximately no published material covering the topic. You can't even find much published material that says that cutters haul it to the station. Or that anything besides the mainworld exists in 99.9% of the systems in Traveller.
But here is a thing that actually IS in the published material: skimming fuel from gas giants. So if that's happening, someone has to actually be going to the gas giant. So it can't be impossible.
MarcusIII
Cosmic Mongoose
Correct. So you need to first modify published trade rules to implement.
Fluffy Bunny Feet
Emperor Mongoose
Also there might have been no other cargo for you at the origin point. It could be we have cargo for Jupiter or nothing. So jump for free or Jump to Jupiter and hope for a cargo there or a cargo you can pick up elsewhere in Sol system.
