ship design and hard points

[Anonymous]

Any one out there perverting the 1 hard point per 100 dTon rule?

Anyone care to explain why the ratio 100 dTons per 1 hard point exists?

I get that it's abstracting stuff so you don't have to worry about energy requirements in ship design but, what else is there to it?

 

[Subzero001]

Page 111 of the CRB (Core Rule Book)

The number of turrets or bays that may be installed is limited by the tonnage of the spacecraft. A ship has one hardpoint per 100 tons of ship and each weapon system takes up one hardpoint. A weapon system may include multiple weapons – for example, a triple turret contains three lasers, missile launchers, sandcasters or some combination of three weapons.

Good luck in your shipbuilding.

 

[phavoc]

Any one out there perverting the 1 hard point per 100 dTon rule?

Anyone care to explain why the ratio 100 dTons per 1 hard point exists?

I get that it's abstracting stuff so you don't have to worry about energy requirements in ship design but, what else is there to it?

Since Traveller doesn't track energy, per se, it's more a rule of thumb for the design system than anything else. The original rules were pretty simple, built from tables and simple rules and tables means having things like this that don't always scale well up or down.

In theory you should be able to cram as many weapons as you can find a space to stick them (that still makes sense). Navies did it during WW2 with AA guns, as none were equipped at the time to deal with aircraft defense. After the war they removed them because the threat was less (and was changing as well).

 

[Condottiere]

The anti-aircraft defences put up a wall of lead against a lot of aircraft.

The threats numbered less but got smarter, and you didn't need to clutter up the decks with stuff that couldn't match that.

The Soviets certainly tried jamming their ships with stuff.

 

[Ishmael]

The usual design systems tell us that you get a single hardpoint per 100 dtons. But this seriously shortchanges smaller ships when compared to larger ships.
For example, a 100dton cube ship gets a single hardpoint for its 732 square meter surface area, whereas a 100,000dton cube ship gets a hardpoint per 73 square meters of surface area. A million dton ship gets a hardpoint per 34 square meters.
This has carried over since the beginning with all versions following it except TNE and maybe T4.

Personally, I think hardpoints should be related to vol^(2/3) of a ship.

 

[Reynard]

Alright... it's a game. They needed a simple way to arm ships and, since ships were in tonnages of 100, it made sense to have 1 HP/100 tons. A small ship has less weapons than a large ship which has less weapons than s huge ship. If you really need to munchkin a vessel to bristle with guns then take a clue from the in between editions of Traveller and just remove the HP restriction and use weight, volume, crew and energy to limit what can be packed on the hull.

As to shortchanging smaller vessels, if you allow a small vessel more hardpoints then the larger vessels also get those same new rules and really explode with arms, The smaller vessel is still burnt toast. I'd rather stick to Kuz It's a Simpler System.

 

[F33D]

Any one out there perverting the 1 hard point per 100 dTon rule?

Anyone care to explain why the ratio 100 dTons per 1 hard point exists?

I get that it's abstracting stuff so you don't have to worry about energy requirements in ship design but, what else is there to it?

Realistically it is a game balance thing. I've messed with it but came back to it because it became "messy" not having an easy, set limitation. There is really no reason why a 100t ship cannot have 4 missile turrets. Weight isn't a problem. Power isn't a problem...

Look at the Douglas Skyraider. It weighed in at ~7 tons and by time the Vietnam war rolled around the Navy had put so many new hardpoints on it that it was getting off the deck carrying 14 ton bomb loads.

 

[Condottiere]

It's abstract.

Nothing says that you actually have to distribute the weapon systems evenly across the ship; I'd leave some space towards the exhausts.

While it feels like an artificial constraint, if the design system allowed energy points that would limit the number of beam based weapons, and physical ordnance ammunition would find itself competing for space.

 

[phavoc]

The anti-aircraft defences put up a wall of lead against a lot of aircraft.

The threats numbered less but got smarter, and you didn't need to clutter up the decks with stuff that couldn't match that.

The Soviets certainly tried jamming their ships with stuff.

I've always been interested in the relatively clean versions that the US navy puts out vs. the visually menacing versions the Russians used to put out. With everyone going to VLS systems decks are getting kind of universal. It's not like you used to be able to compare say a Spruance class DD vs. the Sovremennyy class DD. The Russians liked to pack their ships with weapon systems, even if it didn't always make the most sense in the long run. But differing design philosophies produce different ships.

It's abstract.

Nothing says that you actually have to distribute the weapon systems evenly across the ship; I'd leave some space towards the exhausts.

While it feels like an artificial constraint, if the design system allowed energy points that would limit the number of beam based weapons, and physical ordnance ammunition would find itself competing for space.

Yes, it simply makes it easier to do with pen and paper. Striker in ssspppaaaaaaaccceeee need not be the goal for most players.

Coming up with energy points for fusion power plants could make for some interesting design changes though, more so at least than what there is today in regards to bays and screens.

 

[Anonymous]

Coming up with energy points for fusion power plants could make for some interesting design changes though, more so at least than what there is today in regards to bays and screens.

Which is what I'm doing for an alternate 2300 setting.

I figure that one interpretation of the 1 hard point per 100 tons is to do with recoil and the stress the hull/structure is built for but lasers won't induce recoil and missiles have little. Lasers will require energy as will rail guns.

I'm interested to know how anyone has handled alternate hard point limits.

 

[Anonymous]

Cost and intended use should also limit how many weapons a ship carries but how many people work to a strict budget when designing ships? I don't!

 

[Condottiere]

Spaceships: Armaments

If you're a military vessel and have space to spare, upgrade the turret to a bay.

If you're a commercial vessel, being over-armed is going to attract official scrutiny.

 

[phavoc]

Coming up with energy points for fusion power plants could make for some interesting design changes though, more so at least than what there is today in regards to bays and screens.

Which is what I'm doing for an alternate 2300 setting.

I figure that one interpretation of the 1 hard point per 100 tons is to do with recoil and the stress the hull/structure is built for but lasers won't induce recoil and missiles have little. Lasers will require energy as will rail guns.

I'm interested to know how anyone has handled alternate hard point limits.

Unless you are using chemical-based propellants you shouldn't have to worry about any sort of recoil or stress from weapon firing. Energy weapons don't have any appreciable recoil and while missiles do, the stress from the drive would be far greater. You could even eject the missiles using a mechanical or gas-based mechanism so their drives only ignite when they are outside the ship, thus removing any recoil from the equation (aside from the ejection process).

If you look at say the 100ton Scout, it should be possible to up-gun it from a pure design perspective. Adding in a VLS missile system in the upper cargo bay, or removing a pair of staterooms and install a pair of torpedo launchers. Physically it could work, but from a game mechanic view it starts to get complicated extremely fast on making rules that allow you cram so much into such a small volume.

The original US PT boats (some were 2 torps, some had 4) had a measly machine gun armament. After 1941 they got significantly up-gunned. And crews were very creative in scrounging additional weapons, like anti-tank cannons or mortars that later became standardized armaments. Basically if there was room on the boat and it could take it, crews added anything they could to do more damage to the enemy or become more survivable. But in a game it's a much different matter to codify a ruleset to cover all this AND remain fun and playable. So abstractions fit the bill relatively well.