PoD Harrier 200t TL15 Commerce Raider

tytalan said:
Yea but again the Harrier is neither a Specialized ship or a Capital ship so giving it a Core computers make no sense, especially since it’s described as “ Most capital ships, and certain specialized vessels, have multiple distributed computer networks spread throughout their decks but always include a central computer core “ again it’s a rules lawyer play which means (let ignore RP it has no purpose).

In the end the original poster has admitted that they have not read the campaign which shows in their attempt to redesign the harrier. The ship they designed doesn’t work for the campaign in any way.
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The ship I designed is a high-tech Commerce Raider, which is what the Harrier design is called, in a Pirate campaign. That the original Harrier is a bad Commerce Raider means that that wasn't really it's intended purpose so using Commerce Raider as the ship type is the problem. The Harrier is a diplomatic and intimidation weapon and is not better at commerce raiding than any other armed ship in its class.
As for using Core computers, with the retro tech rules they are vastly reduced in size so I have no problem putting them where they will help. Ship's computers and software is way over priced and more bandwidth costly than it should be. If you're going to be using military software, you should be using military computer hardware and the rules allow for that. I'm not going to argue about rules lawyering because I don't really care. If I wasn't trying to make an optimum build, I would do things differently. It's not any different than how my trader ships try to squeeze every bit value out of the hull space that the rules allow. If the design is supposed to be sub-optimal, I can do that too but mostly I like going for optimization for the designated task the ship is supposed to perform.
 
mavikfelna said:
The ship I designed is a high-tech Commerce Raider, which is what the Harrier design is called, in a Pirate campaign. That the original Harrier is a bad Commerce Raider means that that wasn't really it's intended purpose so using Commerce Raider as the ship type is the problem. The Harrier is a diplomatic and intimidation weapon and is not better at commerce raiding than any other armed ship in its class.
As for using Core computers, with the retro tech rules they are vastly reduced in size so I have no problem putting them where they will help. Ship's computers and software is way over priced and more bandwidth costly than it should be. If you're going to be using military software, you should be using military computer hardware and the rules allow for that. I'm not going to argue about rules lawyering because I don't really care. If I wasn't trying to make an optimum build, I would do things differently. It's not any different than how my trader ships try to squeeze every bit value out of the hull space that the rules allow. If the design is supposed to be sub-optimal, I can do that too but mostly I like going for optimization for the designated task the ship is supposed to perform.
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This is why I don't share my ship designs. I use too many house-rules.

For example - The ship below. Uses some houserules and I may have made some mistakes building the spreadsheet. So, even with my house-rules, it may not be right. lol

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tytalan said:
That’s why the Harrier makes since as mostly written
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As a pirate ship it is still an issue. Piracy in an area where the planets you might use as a base are all sharing data about piracy will narrow the list to you very rapidly. Your ship taking too long to getting where it said it was going and having cargo it can't account for that matches what was stolen. Armed to match the damage done. Data analysts would probably list your ship as suspect after the first attack given its unique design.

If your ship isn't going to any local bases but staying in the outer system and using spies to allow you to target victims the time delay will reduce your ability to intercept your targets. You would need a way to transship your cargo to someone who could sell it and those ships would have the same problem being off the books on a pattern connecting to the raids.

All those ships in the records. All their trips on the books. Then you're on the record but the trips don't match whenever you pirate and likely only then do they not match. You draw a target on your back. You would rapidly have no where you could go into port.
 
Fluffy Bunny Feet said:
As a pirate ship it is still an issue. Piracy in an area where the planets you might use as a base are all sharing data about piracy will narrow the list to you very rapidly. Your ship taking too long to getting where it said it was going and having cargo it can't account for that matches what was stolen. Armed to match the damage done. Data analysts would probably list your ship as suspect after the first attack given its unique design.

If your ship isn't going to any local bases but staying in the outer system and using spies to allow you to target victims the time delay will reduce your ability to intercept your targets. You would need a way to transship your cargo to someone who could sell it and those ships would have the same problem being off the books on a pattern connecting to the raids.

All those ships in the records. All their trips on the books. Then you're on the record but the trips don't match whenever you pirate and likely only then do they not match. You draw a target on your back. You would rapidly have no where you could go into port.
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That's why you get a beard. The Harrier shouldn't be stopping at every world. It raids gathers loot and a second Trader sells the cargo on low law level worlds.
 
hopsnbaer said:
That's why you get a beard. The Harrier shouldn't be stopping at every world. It raids gathers loot and a second Trader sells the cargo on low law level worlds.
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Yeah! The beard is a hapless group of local pirates. PCs show up in the Harrier after one or two attacks claiming to be pirate hunters. Then you scapegoat the local pirates and earn a reward for capturing them :P
 
MasterGwydion said:
Yeah! The beard is a hapless group of local pirates. PCs show up in the Harrier after one or two attacks claiming to be pirate hunters. Then you scapegoat the local pirates and earn a reward for capturing them :P
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Don't forget to take one or two juicy local prizes before you wipe out the pirates -- obviously the pirates were a bigger threat than anyone had previously imagined. More glory for Drinax; and more loot, too!
 
hopsnbaer said:
That's why you get a beard. The Harrier shouldn't be stopping at every world. It raids gathers loot and a second Trader sells the cargo on low law level worlds.
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Operating those extra ships and the distances they have to travel drives down those profits and delays them. You also need a spy network telling you what ships are carrying worthwhile cargo where and when. Problem is if you aren't in the system they are leaving from by the time you get the data they have already arrived at their destination. So you have to lurk undetected in a star system for weeks or months waiting for a ship worth raiding. You have to have your cargo ship waiting somewhere else for you to deliver a cargo (or accompanying you without being stealthed) so they can pick up the maximum cargo.

You'd be better off doing without the cargo vessel and carrying prize crews (low berths) to take the whole ship elsewhere far enough away to sell it and its cargo. But then they have to wait around until a ship comes to pick them up to go home. There would be the risk of the prize crew just taking the money and running off to live a life of luxury.

Now if those cargoes weren't being sold but taken to Drinax to build the planet up it would be more sensible. If they could (or had a partner to do so) rebuild those ships to be unrecognizable as the pirated vessels they could be useful doing trade under the Drinax flag to make profits towards buying cargoes (insure them, pirate them and have more money for more cargoes). You might even be able to enslave crews and passengers (ransoming those worth the risk of doing so) to help build Drinax up. In this scenario anyone who gets a look at your ship ends up dead or enslaved.

Piracy due to time delays and interstellar cooperation in fighting piracy does not function well. Raiding lower TL worlds that are independent can be profitable if you are ruthless enough and have a large cheap cargo vessel to go with the raider. They have no one to report to and nothing to fight with.
 
Fluffy Bunny Feet said:
Operating those extra ships and the distances they have to travel drives down those profits and delays them. You also need a spy network telling you what ships are carrying worthwhile cargo where and when. Problem is if you aren't in the system they are leaving from by the time you get the data they have already arrived at their destination. So you have to lurk undetected in a star system for weeks or months waiting for a ship worth raiding. You have to have your cargo ship waiting somewhere else for you to deliver a cargo (or accompanying you without being stealthed) so they can pick up the maximum cargo.
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You are not targeting Travellers. Your spy network, as detailed in PoD gives you info on scheduled ships and shipments. That is how you can be where you need to be to intercept the ship.
Fluffy Bunny Feet said:
Piracy due to time delays and interstellar cooperation in fighting piracy does not function well. Raiding lower TL worlds that are independent can be profitable if you are ruthless enough and have a large cheap cargo vessel to go with the raider. They have no one to report to and nothing to fight with.
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Spy networks are for advance knowledge. Learning at the last minute is useless. The Trojan Reach is great for pirating specifically because there is not much interstellar cooperation and most ports can become very friendly to pirates with the right incentives. The rules are all in PoD
 
mavikfelna said:
. That the original Harrier is a bad Commerce Raider means that that wasn't really it's intended purpose so using Commerce Raider as the ship type is the problem.
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I don’t often agree with Tytalan but this shows he is right and that you just don’t understand the Harrier.
 
mavikfelna said:
The ship I designed is a high-tech Commerce Raider, which is what the Harrier design is called, in a Pirate campaign. That the original Harrier is a bad Commerce Raider means that that wasn't really it's intended purpose so using Commerce Raider as the ship type is the problem. The Harrier is a diplomatic and intimidation weapon and is not better at commerce raiding than any other armed ship in its class.
As for using Core computers, with the retro tech rules they are vastly reduced in size so I have no problem putting them where they will help. Ship's computers and software is way over priced and more bandwidth costly than it should be. If you're going to be using military software, you should be using military computer hardware and the rules allow for that. I'm not going to argue about rules lawyering because I don't really care. If I wasn't trying to make an optimum build, I would do things differently. It's not any different than how my trader ships try to squeeze every bit value out of the hull space that the rules allow. If the design is supposed to be sub-optimal, I can do that too but mostly I like going for optimization for the designated task the ship is supposed to perform.
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This is what happens when you try to “Fix” something with out first reading the campaign or the lore.

No the Harrier was designed as a commerce raider and did a good job when it was designed the key there is when it was designed. The Sindalian Empire rose to power durning the long night. Sindal started out at TL 12 or 13 when everyone in the Trajan Reach had back slid in TL most of them well below TL 9. Trade ships were extremely rare (and those were the TL 9 jump 1 ships) and no one had the resources to build warship except Sindal. Sindal started out as essentially interstellar Viking raiding planets and ship at the point of a pulse laser. There was no one to stop them so terror was their weapon of choice, merchant ships didn’t run because they had no one to run too they either surrendered choice parts of their cargo or got blown to pieces. As the Sindalian Empire grown it changed to more like the latter day Roman Empire where they expected their member worlds to pay their taxes and fall in line if they didn’t nuclear strikes and plagues would be unleashed (they didn’t build up the infrastructure on member worlds so they couldn’t resist). Like the Romans the Emperor was always afraid of his own military and nobles. These factor determined the make up of the Sindalian navy, the navy consisted of squadrons of 2-5 200dt ‘harriers’ controlled by a 600dt Rorix command ship (which had a detachable bridge and could blow up the ships in it squadron with a command code). Since the Sindalian Empire never had to deal with any other military (again this was the long dark and the nearest multiple system group was Darrian and they were none expansionist) the biggest threat to Sindal was its own Navy so while some aspects of their ships were very advanced (stealth jump, accurate Particle weapons, etc) other aspects were kept less effective. Also you have to understand that while raiders the Sindalian’s were never pirates to be pirates you have to have a government that is likely to hunt you down they never did so terror was their weapon of choice.

Drinax being the last remaining piece of the Sindalian Empire tried to operate in the same manner terrorizing nearby worlds demanding tribute and nuking or dusting rebellious worlds. This is why they continue to use the ships designs from the days of the Sindalian Empire (ie Harrier and Rorix) but unlike it’s ancestor the Drinax Empire did have other Empires to deal with and paid the price when the Aslan’s got fed up.

So while the ship is not the great high tech Raider that you think it should be it does fit the lore and the campaign. And that’s why you should do your research before you Fix things
 
Fluffy Bunny Feet said:
As a pirate ship it is still an issue. Piracy in an area where the planets you might use as a base are all sharing data about piracy will narrow the list to you very rapidly. Your ship taking too long to getting where it said it was going and having cargo it can't account for that matches what was stolen. Armed to match the damage done. Data analysts would probably list your ship as suspect after the first attack given its unique design.

If your ship isn't going to any local bases but staying in the outer system and using spies to allow you to target victims the time delay will reduce your ability to intercept your targets. You would need a way to transship your cargo to someone who could sell it and those ships would have the same problem being off the books on a pattern connecting to the raids.

All those ships in the records. All their trips on the books. Then you're on the record but the trips don't match whenever you pirate and likely only then do they not match. You draw a target on your back. You would rapidly have no where you could go into port.
Click to expand...
Read the lore just because it’s being used as a pirate ship doesn’t mean it was originally designed as one. There are different types of raiders
 
tytalan said:
Read the lore just because it’s being used as a pirate ship doesn’t mean it was originally designed as one. There are different types of raiders
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Please note what I said "As a pirate ship". My comments were on the use it was put to NOT the use it was designed for.
 
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