Ship crew ministration

[EccentRick]

Two loosely related questions from a complete civilian.

1) When filling out the crew (especially of a larger ship), have there been any guidelines for estimating the number of stewards for military ships? The role might be somewhat different, lacking the 'entertainment' aspect but perhaps encompassing some aide / adjutant duties as well as culinary specialists. If stretched broader, would positions like chaplain also get incorporated. A 'mirror' that surprisingly seems to ballpark some of the crew breakouts could be one per 10 officers or 100 crew.

2) Ought there to be consideration of increased common areas 'for marines'? The recommended minimum is 1/4 of the staterooms. For 'standard' middle staterooms that translates to 1 ton per person in a single, or 1/2 ton per person in a double occupancy. While Brigs or other containment housing are not exact comparisons (the occupants are not expected to leave), they also seem to settle around 1/2 ton per person as 'standard', while 1/4 ton is identified as 'cramped'. (The brig can 'make it fit better' by assuming 1 ton for the security measures). As the barracks reduce the 'personal' space down to 1 ton per person, adding just 1/4 more ton for that person to 'move in' seems to make for a very cramped stay onboard. Would altering the common space recommendation to be 1/4 the space of staterooms and 1/2 the space of barracks give some room to breathe, and more closely align with other fatigue considerations?

 

[MasterGwydion]

2) I just add up all of the "living quarters" tonnage and the compute Common Area from that. 25% as standard, but many of My own ship designs are 50+%

 

[Condottiere]

Depends on actual, or, possible, health effects, on the inhabitants.

Mental or otherwise.

Modified by length of habitation.

 

[Terry Mixon]

Two loosely related questions from a complete civilian.

1) When filling out the crew (especially of a larger ship), have there been any guidelines for estimating the number of stewards for military ships? The role might be somewhat different, lacking the 'entertainment' aspect but perhaps encompassing some aide / adjutant duties as well as culinary specialists. If stretched broader, would positions like chaplain also get incorporated. A 'mirror' that surprisingly seems to ballpark some of the crew breakouts could be one per 10 officers or 100 crew.

2) Ought there to be consideration of increased common areas 'for marines'? The recommended minimum is 1/4 of the staterooms. For 'standard' middle staterooms that translates to 1 ton per person in a single, or 1/2 ton per person in a double occupancy. While Brigs or other containment housing are not exact comparisons (the occupants are not expected to leave), they also seem to settle around 1/2 ton per person as 'standard', while 1/4 ton is identified as 'cramped'. (The brig can 'make it fit better' by assuming 1 ton for the security measures). As the barracks reduce the 'personal' space down to 1 ton per person, adding just 1/4 more ton for that person to 'move in' seems to make for a very cramped stay onboard. Would altering the common space recommendation to be 1/4 the space of staterooms and 1/2 the space of barracks give some room to breathe, and more closely align with other fatigue considerations?

High Guard says it is the same number of stewards for military passengers as civilians. I’ve argued that includes crew, but I don’t know if that is settled or not.

 

[Arkathan]

The numbers in the book are minimums. Nothing stops you from adding more. You could base stewards on the whole crew, officers or the number of high or luxury staterooms, and then add those to the required crew.
The existence of a gourmet kitchen would be another factor for additions.
For non-officer crew and auto-kitchens, there is little a steward could do that a rotating extra duty assignment schedule would not, but at the same time nothing prevents you from adding stewards to give a small bonus to crew morale.

 

[Condottiere]

There's probably a lot of leeway for interpretation.

In theory, you could hire colonials to deal with stuff like cooking, cleaning, and laundry, the domestic stuff.

The ratio could be anywhere from two per eight crewmen, to one percent, and a lot of automation and television meals.

You could have dedicated batmen for each officer, while the enlisted take turns heating up prepackaged meals.

Efficiency, especially for large crews, would be having an entire department assigned to take care of household chores; I'd say three percent.

 

[actionman]

Two loosely related questions from a complete civilian.

1) When filling out the crew (especially of a larger ship), have there been any guidelines for estimating the number of stewards for military ships? The role might be somewhat different, lacking the 'entertainment' aspect but perhaps encompassing some aide / adjutant duties as well as culinary specialists. If stretched broader, would positions like chaplain also get incorporated. A 'mirror' that surprisingly seems to ballpark some of the crew breakouts could be one per 10 officers or 100 crew.

2) Ought there to be consideration of increased common areas 'for marines'? The recommended minimum is 1/4 of the staterooms. For 'standard' middle staterooms that translates to 1 ton per person in a single, or 1/2 ton per person in a double occupancy. While Brigs or other containment housing are not exact comparisons (the occupants are not expected to leave), they also seem to settle around 1/2 ton per person as 'standard', while 1/4 ton is identified as 'cramped'. (The brig can 'make it fit better' by assuming 1 ton for the security measures). As the barracks reduce the 'personal' space down to 1 ton per person, adding just 1/4 more ton for that person to 'move in' seems to make for a very cramped stay onboard. Would altering the common space recommendation to be 1/4 the space of staterooms and 1/2 the space of barracks give some room to breathe, and more closely align with other fatigue considerations?

I suppose you could call stewards "food service personnel" or something. If it's a naval vessel that carries a marine detachment, there would probably be food service specialists that feed the crew, and the marines eat at that facility. If it's a troop carrier vessel with a relatively small crew, then the marine unit it's transporting would be responsible for providing its own food service personnel to man the dining facilities. The crew would probably have their own galley.

I'd go with your own good sense, really. If you want to have shipboard contractors who take care of that, that's perfectly plausible. But, I would keep in mind the constant pressure on militaries to keep costs down. IMO, for a relatively small crew, there would probably be a food service NCO and a few enlisted spacehands. For a large crew with hundreds or thousands of people to be fed, there might be contractors.

For a good idea about how important competent food service personnel are, bear in mind that during the Soviet war in Afghanistan, 600,000 soldiers either died or were permanently disabled by illnesses like dysentery. One third of all artillery in theater was out of service at any given time because the crews were incapacitated by illness. The root cause of this problem was extremely poor personal hygiene, poor waste disposal practices which caused a massive vermin problem, etc., but when the Soviet Army authorities investigated, they found that filthy diseased cooks at the major bases were the primary vector by which illnesses spread.

 

[Condottiere]

We have stables.

You could add a butcher.