Small Ship Traveller

[Infojunky]

I have been pondering ship building again. Which is always problematic as I quickly get frustrated with the systems as written.

Partly this is from the tradition scale of Traveller where bigger is better in that most of the combat and construction options don't kick in until ship's reach 1000 dTon level.

Partly this is due the ambiguous tonnage of weapon options especially with turret and fixed mounts and the arbitrary limits. Couple this with design systems that don't quite mesh, I'm looking at the small craft design.

Another issue here is the coarseness of the basic system presented in TMB and High Guard.

So here is the question, What would You do to expand the options available to smaller ships including smallcraft?

 

[AndrewW]

Use the Complete Space Builders Handbook of course. Now if we could actually get one...

 

[Infojunky]

Use the Complete Space Builders Handbook of course. Now if we could actually get one...

Ok what is in said Handbook?


One of the things I have thought is setting the tonnage of Turret weapons. And including them as part of a ship's total Tonnage...

Say your standards Lasers, Missile launchers and sandcasters at One dTons each.

 

[captainjack23]

Use the Complete Space Builders Handbook of course. Now if we could actually get one...

Well, Andrew, get the heck busy writing.... :wink: :wink: :wink:

 

[AndrewW]

Ok what is in said Handbook?

See this thread:

http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=39483

One of the things I have thought is setting the tonnage of Turret weapons. And including them as part of a ship's total Tonnage...

Say your standards Lasers, Missile launchers and sandcasters at One dTons each.

Sounds like the one ton for fire control.

 

[captainjack23]

Use the Complete Space Builders Handbook of course. Now if we could actually get one...

Ok what is in said Handbook?


One of the things I have thought is setting the tonnage of Turret weapons. And including them as part of a ship's total Tonnage...

Say your standards Lasers, Missile launchers and sandcasters at One dTons each.

Specific stuff or detail that can be assumed (or defined -same thing really) to be worthwhile in smaller scale ships, but fail economy of size or numbers considerations in large ships.)

Probably some of these are redundant with the actual options available in the Core and HG rules, but WTF; off the top of my head:

More internal stuff related to crew needs/duties.
Crew areas and passnger areas: ships shop, cafeteria, excercise area, theater, kitchen.
More variations of stateroom space.
Med bays, kitchens, a variety of lab types, rec machine shops, design rooms, biosecure stuff. Garbage disposal

cargo storage areas better specified:
bulk, liquid, pallet, open
A variety of hangar spaces (suppose you want to carry lots of airrafts -do they need the same maint space as a fighter ? Or a Cutter ? And what do those spaces consist of ?).

Magazine areas and ships locker. Ships stores.

Engineering and tech details:
On board drones and droids. More.

More detail on suites, both from a rules perspective and from support structures (arrays) and internal areas (as a low tech example: darkrooms)

More smaller ship bridge options.

variants for most componants: Hi reliability, cheap, easy access, easy replacement/repair, hi performance, etc. (These would be independent of tech mods)

Did I mention a wide variety of science labs ?


Weaponry

Turrets:
variants as heavy light, commercial, basic, cheap ;
Self loading, self powered (independent of ships PPlant), automated options.
Targeting options (specialized for point defence, advanced targeting, advanced missle control, designate/fire and forget systems)

Similalrly, variants of bays and Barbettes.

individual weapons and weaponry:
same as above; especially with regard to low cost civilian versions -and high cost military versions.

MAGAZINES

maybe some more smaller craft weapon details and types ?
(in particular anti personnel stuff)

More detail on Missles and torps and probes.

On the other side predifined task specific option packages become possible once the hull sizes are topped at (say) 3000 , as opposed to being open ended.

example:
stealth and intelligence gathering package Stealth hull + low sig drive + spoof drones + stealthed cutter + Spook crew with support rooms and accomidation; low signature factor 4 Power plant, M and J drives; low sig weaponry; hi reliability engines, rapid rejump, long loiter capacity (12 weeks) :
x tons per hundred hull tons @ XXXXmCr ).

 

[rust]

Sounds very interesting, although a bit like GURPS Traveller Starships
- which is probably why I still use it to complement Mongoose Traveller
High Guard.

Seriously, GT: Starships really has much of that stuff, and since the ba-
sic design principle (1 dton = 1 space = ca. 14 cubic meters) is identi-
cal, the conversion is not difficult.

 

[Infojunky]

Say your standards Lasers, Missile launchers and sandcasters at One dTons each.

Sounds like the one ton for fire control.[/quote]

Per weapon? I don't think so....

 

[Infojunky]

Sounds very interesting, although a bit like GURPS Traveller Starships

Kinda.... But I want to break the mold some.

I kinda like the option of sub 100 dTon jump craft.

More smallcraft..... I kinda am looking at the starfighter model for PCs, I have two crowds one that the standard Traveller model works for with everybody in one ship and it goes everywhere. The other wants more autonomy, able to go where they will within the system.

I have been pondering changes needed to meet the needs of this second crew.

The first change was to basically deconstruct the basic drives. To the end of having 50 dTons being the minimum jump hull size. I am not changing anything else so it will be a push to get Jump Cutter.

The other issue is the damage scale the linear 1 hull, 1 structure per 50 dTons is a very stilting mechanic, all the small craft start looking the same in that they mostly fall under the minimum. I have ponder a rating system based on the cube root of the tonnage. It seems to work in the smaller ranges.

Please note that I am pondering a small ship universe so the big ships tend to max out in the 5 to 10k range, and those are commercial ships.

 

[rust]

To the end of having 50 dTons being the minimum jump hull size. I am not changing anything else so it will be a push to get Jump Cutter.

Another very interesting idea.

My setting has a small ship universe as its background, the biggest and
most powerful warship has 10,000 dtons (with 4,000 dtons of it modules
of various types), and the introduction of the jump message drone did
not damage that universe in any way, so perhaps a 50 dton jump cutter
would be a nice addition - although I would introduce it as a ship class
built by the alien Pashi in order to test it first.

On the other hand, I am not really sure what the advantage of a 50 dton
jump ship over a 100 dton jump ship would be, except of course for the
price tag.
It seems that there would not be much space left for cabins or equipment
or cargo, so in a way it would be the equivalent of a motor bike compared
to a pickup, I think.
But then, X-boat pilots in the OTU usually travelled under probably even
more cramped conditions ...

As for the structure, I think that your idea should work well if you introdu-
ce a "ceiling" for the formula, perhaps at 100 dtons, like the "ceiling" be-
teen "normal" and capital ships.

 

[AndrewW]

Per weapon? I don't think so....

Ah, meaning per weapon not per turret. That would take a bit more space then leaving less room for other stuff.

 

[AndrewW]

It seems that there would not be much space left for cabins or equipment
or cargo, so in a way it would be the equivalent of a motor bike compared
to a pickup, I think.
But then, X-boat pilots in the OTU usually travelled under probably even
more cramped conditions ...

Well, X-wings have a hyperdrive so why not smaller Traveller ships having jump drive.

 

[rust]

Well, X-wings have a hyperdrive so why not smaller Traveller ships having jump drive.

I am thinking about that week in jump space, a problem the X-wings in
the movies managed to avoid ...

I have no problem at all with small jump ships, I just wonder whether
their advantages (cost, size ?) would be worth the effort, and whether
people (in general and in my setting) would really be willing to buy
them instead of already not very comfortable 100 dton ships.

 

[The Chef]

well what about putting the pilot in cold storage? automed coupled with a tank, works in my book.

currently i'm wrestling with the idea of a diplomatic launch. a ambassador's yacht gets destroyed in orbit while the abassadors on the planet below. now i either have a 100dt "shuttle" or the option of a jump capable ship smaller than 100dt.

Chef

 

[Gaidheal]

Economics.

If the price is right, I can see a 'heartless' megacorp using a glorified jump-engine+low-berth type small ship across their fleet rather than more expensive and comfortable small ships.

 

[rust]

If the price is right, I can see a 'heartless' megacorp using a glorified jump-engine+low-berth type small ship across their fleet rather than more expensive and comfortable small ships.

A good point, and even some governments may act that way for eco-
nomic reasons, for example because a 50 dton X-boat network would
be cheaper than a 100 dton X-boat network.

 

[GypsyComet]

Note that a 50-ton vessel is still the size of a 2500 square foot house...

 

[rust]

Note that a 50-ton vessel is still the size of a 2500 square foot house...

True, and a quick look at the design rules seems to show that one would
only have to sacrifice 11.1 dtons to make a modular cutter jump capable:
Probably 5 dtons for a jump drive (1/2 Type A), 5 dtons for jump fuel,
0.1 dtons to upgrade the power plant to Type A, and 1 dton of fuel to
give it a second week of operations ?
This would still leave 20 dtons from the module space and 2 dtons of the
cargo, it seems - even enough for a proper bridge and proper cabins.

 

[Klaus Kipling]

If you go by the small craft rules. a 100dTon ship can have 5 weapons, albeit still with only a single turret with 3 of them and then 2 in a fixed mount.

Extrapolate that to starships, and it kind works out at 1 turret of up to 3 weapons and one additional fixed mount of up to 2, per 100dTons of vessel (or 5 in any comination, but no more than 3 per turret).

Fixed mounts do not require the 1 ton fire control, at least according to TMB, so if we add weapon space it's not too much of a change.

Say 0.5 tons for a laser, 0.25 for a missile launcher, 1 for particle beam, etc.

Also, better missiles. Missiles are rubbish against even light armour, only effective against civilian ships. More types, like decoys and sensor jammers, or sensor drones for an expanded network.

And, why not 'deadfall' bombs? The physics is the same as on a planet, just that the bomb would retain the velocity the bomber had when it released the bomb. It wouldn't fall in an arc, but in a straight line. Be quite useful at short range, and hard to intercept, being inert (maybe stealthed?), and with enough 'dive bombers' at hit becomes likely.

 

[Gaidheal]

Strap a low-berth to a fusion plant, a jump drive and fuel tank. Now that is cutting corners, sorry, I mean, cutting costs. :¬)