Problematic canonish technology

[ProfGrizzlyJon]

I personally have enjoyed energy shields, and found them to not be overpowering in game. However, I adjusted the power requirements from a fixed cost (as in HG22) to a multiplier of hull size (base*hull tonnage/100). This made shielding capital ships prohibitively expensive in terms of power needs.

 

[alex_greene]

You must absolutely hate handwaver referees. "Energy shields on capital ships? Sure, why not? And your characters have a 100,000 ton ship which uses spacefolder drives with unlimited range and a solar collector to power it? Let's do that. Oh, you want your characters' ship to just have a Solar Pulse Generator weapon? *writes notes* We can do that."

 

[Sigtrygg]

Not a bad idea for a science fantasy setting...

 

[k0k0pelli]

Now I kind of want to build a Jump-8 prototype with massive drop tanks to hold the Imperium record for longest planned jump. Give it energy shields to annoy my GM.

 

[alex_greene]

The fun part about science fantasy, rather than space opera or hard sf like The Expanse, is that your characters can own a ship which is exceptional, compared to the run of "ordinary" vessels. Look at Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda (ignore the problematic Kevin Sorbo), Lexx (ignore the hordes of naked people) and the Golan Globus movie Lifeforce (ignore the blatant nudity, and Patrick Stewart kissing a dude).
And Doctor Who (for diplomacy's sake, just talk about the Tardis), and Star Trek Discovery (for diplomacy's sake, let's just talk about the Spore Drive).
Science Fantasy is a genre which allows your characters to own the space equivalent of Verne's Nautilus, basically. Run with it.

 

[Vormaerin]

I don't hate any of these technologies. I hate dropping technologies into a setting and then not having them affect anything. If shields are a thing that are effective, there should be shields in use in the materials. If you can burn off all the fuel before jumping so that the fuel's former volume doesn't affect your drive requirements (aka drop tanks) then that should be radically altering ship designs and travel behaviors.

It drives me up a wall when they say "hey, let's include this cool thing but do absolutely nothing with it." Or just handwave some "oh, we have this thing but no one uses it for reasons."

Put them in a setting that uses them. Like Mindjammer does with personal and ship shields. Then they are great.

 

[ProfGrizzlyJon]

You must absolutely hate handwaver referees. "Energy shields on capital ships? Sure, why not? And your characters have a 100,000 ton ship which uses spacefolder drives with unlimited range and a solar collector to power it? Let's do that. Oh, you want your characters' ship to just have a Solar Pulse Generator weapon? *writes notes* We can do that."

Is this directed at me?

 

[alex_greene]

I don't hate any of these technologies. I hate dropping technologies into a setting and then not having them affect anything. If shields are a thing that are effective, there should be shields in use in the materials. If you can burn off all the fuel before jumping so that the fuel's former volume doesn't affect your drive requirements (aka drop tanks) then that should be radically altering ship designs and travel behaviors.

It drives me up a wall when they say "hey, let's include this cool thing but do absolutely nothing with it." Or just handwave some "oh, we have this thing but no one uses it for reasons."

Put them in a setting that uses them. Like Mindjammer does with personal and ship shields. Then they are great.

I like the idea of the Travellers getting a hold of an exceptional ship, or a component such as a space folding drive which fits into their old ship, and cutting a dashing swathe through known space. Look at Blake's Seven with its alien ship The Liberator and its portable hypercomputer Orac.
Also, remember how Blake's Seven ended - the protagonists all died, the Liberator had been lost, and the evil Federation won. They cut a dash, but in the end, they didn't change a thing, not even to slow down the Federation's progress.

 

[ProfGrizzlyJon]

I don't hate any of these technologies. I hate dropping technologies into a setting and then not having them affect anything. If shields are a thing that are effective, there should be shields in use in the materials. If you can burn off all the fuel before jumping so that the fuel's former volume doesn't affect your drive requirements (aka drop tanks) then that should be radically altering ship designs and travel behaviors.

It drives me up a wall when they say "hey, let's include this cool thing but do absolutely nothing with it." Or just handwave some "oh, we have this thing but no one uses it for reasons."

Put them in a setting that uses them. Like Mindjammer does with personal and ship shields. Then they are great.

That is a good point about jump tanks.

I am a huge fan of “reasons” things aren’t being used. Energy fields attract sandworms, Hyperdrives can attract energy beasts or rip space, genetic engineering is blasphemy and religious zealots will declare a fatwa, networked computers and AI can go insane, cyberware can be hacked or hit with viruses, etc.

There are reasons why certain tech isn’t prevalent- it is unreliable, hard to maintain, or too quirky.

 

[ProfGrizzlyJon]

Now I kind of want to build a Jump-8 prototype with massive drop tanks to hold the Imperium record for longest planned jump. Give it energy shields to annoy my GM.

Have you seen the Reftbreaker Jump-4 Scout? You could do the same to a Survey Scout

 

[Condottiere]

Artefacts or relics, are one offs.

In theory, even black globes should be very difficult and expensive to replicate.

Even collectors are problematic.

 

[alex_greene]

Artefacts or relics, are one offs.

In theory, even black globes should be very difficult and expensive to replicate.

Even collectors are problematic.

Because they don't fit the narrative of Traveller that everybody must be the same vanilla boring Homo sapiens and everyone have the same boring technology?

 

[Vormaerin]

That is a good point about jump tanks.

I am a huge fan of “reasons” things aren’t being used. Energy fields attract sandworms, Hyperdrives can attract energy beasts or rip space, genetic engineering is blasphemy and religious zealots will declare a fatwa, networked computers and AI can go insane, cyberware can be hacked or hit with viruses, etc.

There are reasons why certain tech isn’t prevalent- it is unreliable, hard to maintain, or too quirky.

Sure. I wasn't clear. "For reasons" is slang for "for reasons no one can explain or make sense of". You can have good reasons or even science fantasy reasons. But mostly it's just "well, they don't use it because they don't." Or it remains experimental for decades without improving. Or something is so loathed that 11,000 worlds and multiple alien species and independent states don't use it. "for reasons".

 

[Condottiere]

If I recall correctly, technological level sixteen was supposed to be when things get magical.

Eight to fifteen were basically the Gravitational Age.

 

[Vormaerin]

Because they don't fit the narrative of Traveller that everybody must be the same vanilla boring Homo sapiens and everyone have the same boring technology?

Don't confuse The Third Imperium with Traveller. Traveller has a lot of alternate technologies within its purview. Though I don't know where you'd get any kind of traction with an argument that everyone even in the Third Imperium setting "must be the same vanilla boring Homo Sapiens".

But, yes, the Third Imperium does have some defining characteristics. And of those things that shapes how the system works is the nature of Jump drives and the trade offs between fuel volume and movement speed. Drop Tanks and Collectors radically change that trade off.

There's nothing wrong with creating a campaign using those technologies (or even more radical ones). But large swathes of the THIRD IMPERIUM SETTING would be significantly different with the additional of certain technologies.

Again, go ahead and introduce them if you are going to do the work to reflect the impact that they would have. Or have it be alien tech that we won't fully understand until after the campaign is over so it hasn't changed things yet.

But if it does exist and it is better than having 60% of your ship taken up by fuel storage, it should be in widespread use. Even if its not better in every case, it is better in a lot of cases. Same with Energy Shields.

 

[alex_greene]

Didn't Freelance Traveller come up with a workaround which said that the maximum amount of fuel a J-drive consumed was 15% of the ship's mass? Something like that? 15% allows your J-drives to operate on a "there and back again" basis, if you gave no more than 30% of the ship's mass over to fuel. Jump-1 was still 10% of ship's mass, so a Free Trader with 30% of the ship's mass devoted to fuel could make a J-2 or J-3 without refuelling, just taking everything one Jump-1 at a time.
In any case, I do like the M-Space approach, which put the fuel storage into the drives, made them part of the drives, and kept refuelling in the background.

 

[Condottiere]

Not with the design rules that I'm aware of.

However, I'm willing to look it over, just indicate the issue number and date.

 

[alex_greene]

Not with the design rules that I'm aware of.

However, I'm willing to look it over, just indicate the issue number and date.

Got it!
The Lyman Drive, reprinted in November/December 2020 - here.
Also, here..

 

[Condottiere]

Okay, I get it.

Or, I think I get it ...

 

[Condottiere]

It's too drastic a reduction, forget commercial implications, regardless of costs, starwarships are going to penetrate very deeply into the hinterland, and wipe the floor with the monitors.