Quick Question - Class B Shipyard assembling starships

[Captain Jonah]

Getting your high port blown up or not having one doesn't stop you building starships or space ships. It limits what you can build to stuff that can be launched from the ground since your orbital ship yards where all the bits are put together are on the highport or close by.

I don't see any reason why you cannot build sub 1000Dton star ships that are streamlined on the surface of your world. You just cannot build anything that is not atmosphere capable. So nothing big or distributed.

So if you have the on world capability to make all the bits (or import some) and no high port you cannot be Class A but can build small starships.

 

[locarno24]

Wrong. The TL of a world with a starport IS MOST CERTAINLY correlated with the class of starport. In fact the starport is the single biggest factor in the TL of a world with a starport. And the differences between the factors for the starport are significant.

True. But that doesn't necessarily mean the starport is dependent on the world.

Compare a lot of townships where a major trading stopover was built - e.g. Hong Kong - the 'starport' has its tech provided by the building entity, the local population benefits from it as a result, and will swiftly bridge much of the gap between the two. That said, the 'port still has a tech advantage over the local civil area. Similar effect to Grayson or Sidemore in the Honor Harrington novels - naval bases and shipyards produced a trickle-down in the local tech base, but the base was still capable of building things that the locals couldn't duplicate without outside aid.

 

[phavoc]

OK, I've had a look at the Core Rules...

The TL of a world with a starport does not necessarily have to be correlated with the class of the starport.

Wrong. The TL of a world with a starport IS MOST CERTAINLY correlated with the class of starport. In fact the starport is the single biggest factor in the TL of a world with a starport. And the differences between the factors for the starport are significant.

You could have a TL 3 world on a primary jump route with a Class A starport.

Wrong again. Patently impossible under the rules. The lowest it could possibly be is TL 5 (and that's with a sucky gov code giving it a -2DM. It's far more likely the to be right around TL 9 in fact (1D6 + 6) even without any of the other positive DMs. There might be a few below TL 9 but even they will probably be at least TL 7 (which I can stretch my belief suspenders to excuse but would probably simply apply a minimum TL 9 in most cases... too many "Well, yep, we used to make them fancy starships here, heck we still can in a pinch, but since the layoffs, and factory closings, and the lanthanum mines played out... well, no we can't really make them anymore. I expect that really doesn't make this a Class A Starport no more does it?" type stories will snap my belief suspenders in most settings. Fortunately I don't see the generation rules producing too many of those.

Whoa! Down boy! This from the Starports supplement pg43 (my emphasis added):

Tech Level
Most SPA Starports have full access to TL 12 (or higher) equipment and facilities: they are either based on worlds with a sufficient level of technological development or TL 12 items
can be sourced elsewhere and transported to the planet. This allows these ports to make use of all of the Modules presented in this chapter.

You also should go back and look at the original core supplements put out by GDW. In there you will find planets with TL's that don't match to the starport classification. As the rule states, it's not required, but it is common.

I'm not wrong. I'm merely pointing out that there is not a REQUIRED correlation between a planet's TL and the starport classification. I don't have my old DGP Scouts book handy, but I'm relatively sure each iteration of the rules from the various publishers followed this same format. Skim through the UWP profiles lists and you'll see many examples of the same.

Also, by your logic, a high tech world should have an appropriate high-tech starport, would it not? For example, the world Yori (2110 C360757-D Desert world, Rich, Research station - Beta 713 Im F1V) should have a starport better than C if it's a D TL, right? But it doesn't. That's just one example, but there are plenty more out there "proving" (in your words) that the starport classification and planetary TL are NOT necessarily dependent upon one another.

If there is some other source you are citing and I'm missing it, please do share.

 

[far-trader]

Build a prototype Jump-1 drive at TL8.

Ohhh, TL minus 1 I read that last night as TL 1 hehe (flash-back of watching Stone Trek*)

Yeah, I'd forgotten MgT prototype rules (that's there right? I'm not just mixing rule sets?) Thanks for cluing me in Andrew

* sorry, no link handy but if you can google it up and haven't watched them it's some fun animated short episodes

 

[far-trader]

OK, I've had a look at the Core Rules...

Whoa! Down boy! This from the Starports supplement...

Came on a little strong did I? Not really my intention

Will have to come back to this later when I have more time to address points.

 

[AndrewW]

Build a prototype Jump-1 drive at TL8.

Ohhh, TL minus 1 I read that last night as TL 1 hehe (flash-back of watching Stone Trek*)

Yeah, I'd forgotten MgT prototype rules (that's there right? I'm not just mixing rule sets?) Thanks for cluing me in Andrew

Yup, Book 2: High Guard page 53. The drive will be bigger and cost more then a TL 9 version but can be done.

 

[Hans Rancke]

Forgive my ignorance but wouldn't that mean if the world's TL is less than 8 that if it has a class A starport its because another race or people have built it there and are using it rather than the locals?

Yes, the explanation for some starports have always been that they are built and maintianind by outsiders. Which is perfectly fine as far as it goes, but it means that you have to explain which outsiders and why they'r paying good money to maintain a shipyard and a repair shop in a a system with less trade than Jersey Island.

This new requirement that a Class A starport has to have a highport increases the difficulty of coming up with an explanation. It's easier to explain why someone would come up with the money to finance a shipyard that can build a couple of several-hundred ton starship per year than to explain the financial reason for investing in (subsidizing?) a massive highport on a backwater world off the main trade routes.

Sure, there are going to be some dodgy worlds with Class A ratings that can be explained one way or another, but just how do you justify a highport on Pixie/Regina? (I can't even justify the small shipyard).


Hans

 

[rust]

... but just how do you justify a highport on Pixie/Regina? (I can't even justify the small shipyard).

Pixie is an important center of trade with the Vargr just beyond the
border, and most of the business consists of the production and sale
of starships and is done on the highport in order to evade the planet's
high taxes ? :wink:

 

[Hans Rancke]

... but just how do you justify a highport on Pixie/Regina? (I can't even justify the small shipyard).

Pixie is an important center of trade with the Vargr just beyond the border,

That would be through traffic, an explanation for having a larger amount of traffic than the population justifies (Which, incidentally, no Traveller trade rules have ever taken into account). It would explain a Class C+ starport (the + is my own code for refined fuel available). You could justify a space station with fuel at Pixie's 100D orbit (though it would be more economic to place such a station in orbit around the gas giant), but that would hardly be a highport within the meaning of the act (i.e. the high infrastructure construction featured in the definition phavoc quoted).

...and most of the business consists of the production and sale of starships and is done on the highport in order to evade the planet's high taxes ? :wink:

What taxes? The official sovereign population of the Pixie system are 90 people living in an anarchy (Which is my greatest problem with Pixie, but since it doesn't have anything to do with the highport argument, I'll manfully refrain from elaborating on it :wink: ). And why build starships, spaceboats or small craft in the Pixie system at all? There's not even any justification for conducting annual maintenance there, let alone first paying for the shipyard (everything imported, mind you), then importing components and assembling them there, let alone putting the whole shebang on a cost-inflating space station.

BtC claims that Pixie serves a function as a stop on the X-boat route to Kinorb, but that's another crock; an X-boat route from Boughene to Kinorb has absolutely no justification for detouring to Pixie -- that simply adds another jump and delays communication needlessly. And in any case, an X-boat station does not need a highport to exist.



Hans

 

[rust]

What taxes?

Those of Boughene, perhaps ?

Moving a shipyard from Boughene to a highport orbiting Pixie, whose
inhabitants have neither the wish nor the means to interfer in the bu-
siness of selling marginally legal starships to the Vargr and to perform
repairs on questionable Vargr starships, does not seem such a bad idea,
especially when it can be combined with a semi-legal grey market for
various other goods - and perhaps the Imperium even accepts this as
an underhanded way to support certain Vargr factions.

 

[Hans Rancke]

What taxes?

Those of Boughene, perhaps ?

You were talking about building ship on a highport above Pixie to avoid taxes. Naturally I assumed you were talking about Pixie taxes. Though that wouldn't work even if there had been a government of Pixie to impose taxes, as it would be able to impose taxes on a highport just as easily as on the surface.

As for avoiding Boughene taxes, that's a possibility (Though what taxes could Boughene impose on the sale of finished starships that it can't impose on the sale of manufactured components?), but avoiding Boughene taxes does nothing to justify a highport.

Moving a shipyard from Boughene to a highport orbiting Pixie, whose inhabitants have neither the wish nor the means to interfer in the business of selling marginally legal starships to the Vargr and to perform repairs on questionable Vargr starships, does not seem such a bad idea, especially when it can be combined with a semi-legal grey market for various other goods - and perhaps the Imperium even accepts this as an underhanded way to support certain Vargr factions.

Moving the assembly of starship components from Boughene to Pixie might make economic and/or legal sense despite the increase in production costs, but why put it on a highport? Note that I'm not just talking about delivering the components in orbit and assembling them there; that makes a certain amount of sense (once we assume the sense in building the starships at Pixie in the first place). I'm talking about building a highport of the kind mentioned in the aforementioned description of Class A starports. I gather that not just any small tin can of a space station would qualify.

If the trade with the Vargr is dodgy, I wouldn't chose a system with an Imperial Navy base to conduct it in, especially when Yres is a more suitable transshipment point. If the Imperium winks at the trade, there's no reason to conduct it in a clandestine venue. And if a clandestine venue is nneeded for trade, it's probably smartest not to focus attention on it by manufacturing to questionable goods in the same place.


Hans

 

[phavoc]

From the Kinuniur LBB, here's an entry about General Shipyards, which has a shipyard @ Pixie:

The largest starship manufacturer in the Regina Subsector, with yards at Regina, Efate, and Pixie. Originally a military contractor. General no longer produces ships for military use, instead concentrating on the more lucrative commercial market. The yard at Regina is capable of producing ships up to 5000 tons, while the subsidiary yards at Pixie and Efate are limited to 600 tons per ship, and devote most of their attention to annual maintenances.

Just to throw more things on the fire.

 

[Hans Rancke]

From the Kinuniur LBB, here's an entry about General Shipyards, which has a shipyard @ Pixie:

The largest starship manufacturer in the Regina Subsector, with yards at Regina, Efate, and Pixie. Originally a military contractor. General no longer produces ships for military use, instead concentrating on the more lucrative commercial market. The yard at Regina is capable of producing ships up to 5000 tons, while the subsidiary yards at Pixie and Efate are limited to 600 tons per ship, and devote most of their attention to annual maintenances.

Just to throw more things on the fire.

Well, it does highlight a problem with Pixie that I've only alluded to so far. Pixie isn't on a trade route and does not generate any trade of its own. So any ship going to Pixie for the sole purpose of getting an annual refit is losing the revenue of two jumps: It's going empty to Pixie and it's goin to leave Pixie empty. That's a loss of 8% of the ship's annual income. Gross income, that is.

Rust suggests that Pixie is on a trade route to the Vargr Extents. If it is, it's a jump-3 route to Gvurrdon 2040 (named Ougzdaelzoerrg according to the Traveller wiki). So any ship with legitimate business at Pixie is coming from Efate, Feri, or Ougzdaelzoerrg (Note that only the trade to and from Feri has to go through Pixie; the trade to and from Efate has the perfectly viable alternative of going over Yres). All three of which have starports that offer annual maintenance. So why have the annual maintenance done in a place where all the parts and manpower has to be ferried in, thus making the maintenance cost extra?

Still, I suppose it's at least possible. And if there's a possible way to explain canon, it should be accepted, even if it is a little odd. But annual refits does not require shipbuilding capacity, so we still don't have any explanation for the shipyard, let alone the highport.

The next question is, where is the trade going through Ougzdaelzoerrg coming from/going to? Anything coming from the Commonality of Kedzudh can just as easily or more easily (jump-2) go though Dentus or Kinorb. The 40th Squadron (a state hostile to the Imperium) squats right across the other direction. So any trade seems to be generated on Ougzdaelzoerrg?!? A place with a population level of 3?

And how many ships/how much trade are we talking about? For a ship to elect to have its annual maintenance done at Pixie, its presense on Pixie must dovetail with its maintenance shedule. That is, its 25th jump that year must be the one that brings it to Pixie (Unless maintenance at Pixie is so much cheaper that it's worth while doing maintenance before the year is up -- which is highly unlikely). So if Pixie can handle only one 600T ship per two weeks, those 25 ships it can handle must represent 4% of the ships passing through. That works out at 625 600T ships jumping back and forth. And the amount of trade 625 600T ships can carry would be better served by 75 5000T ships...

Any assumption that makes Pixie's capacity higher than 600T makes the amount of trade/number of ships involved higher.


Hans

 

[rust]

Thinking of the average mentality of adventurers (especially
player characters), the most probable explanation is easy ac-
cess to otherwise more difficult to get weaponry.

Perhaps Pixie is (in)famous for outfitting Vargr ships with ad-
vanced Imperial weaponry and / or for building armed "fron-
tier merchant" ships which can easily be modified into those
corsairs beloved by certain Vargr. This might well attract suf-
ficient interest to justify a (small) highport.

 

[Hans Rancke]

Thinking of the average mentality of adventurers (especially player characters), the most probable explanation is easy access to otherwise more difficult to get weaponry.

Thinking of the average mentality of arms dealers, such transactions are more likely to take place on Pandrin. (You know, Gvurrdon 2240, the place Oberlindes uses as a homeport for the Emissary because its weaponry means it can't enter the Imperium to visit places like Pixie).

Besides, installing weapons is not the same thing as building ships.

Perhaps Pixie is (in)famous for outfitting Vargr ships with advanced Imperial weaponry and / or for building armed "frontier merchant" ships which can easily be modified into those corsairs beloved by certain Vargr. This might well attract sufficient interest to justify a (small) highport.

Yeah, because the Imperium is notorious for being helpless in the face of formal legal impediments. It's not like the Duke would be able to send a task force to Pixie to clean out any piracy-supporting enterprise there.

Oh, wait... :twisted:

No, what I actually wanted to point out was that a small space station in orbit around a world with no industry of its own does not seem to me to be the sort of space station that is considered a Class A starport type highport. Not from the aforementioned quote about Class A starports.


Hans

 

[locarno24]

Build a prototype Jump-1 drive at TL8.

Still need Jump Control software, but yes.

 

[steelbrok]

You could look at things differently.

Perhaps a generation or so ago Pixie had a much larger population and a flourishing economy. Then there's a nuclear strike during a Frontier War, maybe a biowar agent gets loose, maybe a megavolcano erupts. Result economy bad, emigration soars. Geral Products decide to keep a small operation going to give them a claim to the planet once its abandoned and the disaster bates.

 

[phavoc]

The wiki did mention a few other things. There was a Kininur class ahem "cruiser" hulk in orbit of the gas giant as a prison.

And in the Pixie system was a rumored Ancients site that was being studied by the Imperium. The system boasts a naval base, which is probably the reason its on the X-boat network and is a primary stop for merchants. The naval base is the only one besides Efate in the region. I would suspect that Pixie is there to deploy ships against the Vargr to the galactic north, and Efate is there to deal with incursions from the Zhodani. There are other entries in the wiki that talk about Vargr incursions and small naval groups deployed elsewhere (like Heya). I would suspect each of these task forces is homebased out of Pixie. A large, active naval base will generate a great deal of shipping, and the ancillary civilian population will generate additional traffic.

It is also possible that Pixie does a lot of shipbuilding for the surrounding region. So a small shipyard that builds ships of 600 tons or less would be about right for the Traveller merchant model. Most of the planets in the area could not afford or pay for large shipping fleets and therefore would buy smaller liners and ships.

Boughene, right below Pixie, has a Class A starport as well, except that its exclusively a highport/station, with no ground facilities (starport or otherwise). It has a scout base instead of a naval base. While both systems have shipyards, I would imagine that Boughene's is also quite small.

 

[RichardP]

I can see 3 possible reasons for the Class A port at Pixie

1) its a general products shipyard. They established it at pixie to avoid paying higher local govt taxes at a major world. They could pay each pixian Mcr1/year and still payout less then they normally would in taxes - that sort of cash may explain why pixie has no real govt - a bunch of rich playboys with robot servants - something like various tax havens etc. GP uses the shipyard to product ships and do annual maint. They open the port to the navy and the public to get a bit of extra cash in - cafes, hotel rooms, fuel sales etc.

2) It was a speculative venture or a govt white elephant - someone spent lots of cash hoping for extra cross border trade and it didn't work - there are several examples of regional spanish govts building airports and full international ports that have not seen a single plane / ship. If the original owners go bust, the bank will try and sell it off at a reduced price. That reduced price might be enough for another company to come in, buy it, and make a small profit from shipbuilding / maint / misc sales.

3) One of the above but subsidised by the Imperium - they either want to encourage trade / development in the area and a class A port is seen as an infrastructure investment or the navy paid for it as an emergency refugee / maintenance port in the event of war with zhos or vargr. they may want a forward repair base / yard to support patrols vs vargr raiders - what other good ports are nearby - remember efate is not secure what with all those Ine Givar about.

Cheers
Richard