Space Travel
- Thread starter phavoc
- Start date
F33D said:
Well, anything crashing is probably going to result in destruction of the vessel and death of all the crew. A 200ton freighter of 60,000 ton passenger liner crashing into a planet from orbit will also result in the death of everyone onboard. Though a spaceship might give you better odds at survival if you have time to evacuate. With a plane you really don't/can't usually.
So lets talk about ships. The recent Contra Costa sinking, only a few hundred yards from shore. Passengers were evacuated from the ship and onto shore. They could have stayed on the wreck and possibly been rescued. The ship might have also shifted and slid off the shelf into far deeper water. An equivalent would be a ship in a decaying orbit, falling into a gravity well and certain destruction for the ship and crew. With no lifeboats, if they stayed on the wreck, they could only hope for rescue - assuming there was sufficient lift capabilities within range. They wouldn't be able to "swim very far. But in any case, passengers and crew panicked and they evacuated. And still people died. I'm sure if they didn't use any of the lifeboats more might have died. It was a total clusterfuck. But human nature being what it is, I'm sure clusterfucks happen at TL7 and TL15.
The Stockholm/Andrea Doria is a good example too. A third ship, Ile de France quickly arrived on scene. Passengers were evacuated via lifeboats. Though in space sense they might have floated across, but there are risks going EVA, just like swimming, so equal risks there. Had the situation been slightly different, or the damage different, the passengers and crew from the Andrea Doria might have needed to evacuate faster/sooner, or been in the sea longer. Stockholm could have been in bad shape and might have needed to do the same. Or perhaps the collision was more violent and caused catastrophic damage and both ships started sinking immediately. All these same issues could be adapted to space-borne vessels.
Thus both may have need for evacuation and awaiting rescue by other ships. Even the SS Minnow needed to find land, and it's skipper was brave and sure, with a courageous crew that was fearless in the face of disaster! :mrgreen:
Hehe, Always find it funny that Airliners have all this equipment for crash landing in water, when everyone knows you are very unlikely to survive. Only one plane survived a water landing, notable recently last year I remember or the year before. But then that was completely freak and on levelish water in a wide river. Literally the 1 chance we are ever likely to see a airliner land on water, ever. And it is gone now.
Anyway back to the convo.
Free Traders regularly go to backwater worlds and backwater subsectors. There is always the possibility of something going wrong that you need to abandon ship with in a system, where the best technology is 6 or worse. And no base present that could support a rescue (Scout base's as an example) Having even at least 2 weeks worth of life support in a launch is better then a vacc suit with 8 hours life support in a poorly visited system.
It is true not all backwaters are low tech worlds, but free traders would often take to such places in search of untapped riches. Seekers would also too, to check out fields in the system to find untapped resources in them. But actual ships would be few and far between that the system may only ever see 1-3 ships per week, each of those likely only visiting one thing. So it could take you at least a week till you were found.
Though, if, you was looking for a more economical design for such areas you would desire a ship design with escape pods. But they only give a couple hours for a single person, not days.
Anyway back to the convo.
Free Traders regularly go to backwater worlds and backwater subsectors. There is always the possibility of something going wrong that you need to abandon ship with in a system, where the best technology is 6 or worse. And no base present that could support a rescue (Scout base's as an example) Having even at least 2 weeks worth of life support in a launch is better then a vacc suit with 8 hours life support in a poorly visited system.
It is true not all backwaters are low tech worlds, but free traders would often take to such places in search of untapped riches. Seekers would also too, to check out fields in the system to find untapped resources in them. But actual ships would be few and far between that the system may only ever see 1-3 ships per week, each of those likely only visiting one thing. So it could take you at least a week till you were found.
Though, if, you was looking for a more economical design for such areas you would desire a ship design with escape pods. But they only give a couple hours for a single person, not days.
To be honest, a lot of the time you don't abandon your sea-going ship either, even if you have lifeboats. Most naval disaster scenarios envisage you getting into the water and staying in boats near the ship until the fire (for example) burns itself out.
Ultimately,if you want credible starship disasters, follow a basic FMEA list.
The systems that are there to go wrong are:
Structure/Hull/Armour
Power Plant
M-Drive/Onboard Gravity
J-Drive
Fuel Tanks
Electronics/Sensors
Computer
Communications
Air Processors
And your standard list of failure types are
Does the wrong thing
Doesn't Start on command
Doesn't Stop on command
Works too little
Works too much
Works too early
Works too late
Leak/Contamination/Unintended Product
Triggers problem in another system
Essentially, it's a 9 x 9 matrix to drop ideas into.
I offer up the following to start.
So, for example, M-Drive/Onboard Gravity & Doesn't Start on command is an easy one to see - the drive is dead. This shouldn't provoke evacuation though, unless you're literally at anchor orbit and are just popping to the highport for parts, or you find yourself unable to decellerate after turnover in an interplanetary jaunt (a much bigger deal).
M-Drive/Onboard Gravity & Does the Wrong thing is either the gravetic drive sending you the wrong way (not the end of the world) or some sort of 'short' in the system.
M-Drive/Onboard Gravity & Works Too Much could either be a 'dutchman' situation (although you'd think physically cutting power to a drive should salvage matters in time) or, if dealing with the AG onboard, a serious problem. We don't know enough about gravetic technology to know how the 2-3G well that provides the oomph is kept seperate from the 1G that allows you to pour tea. Getting them...err...mixed up? could result in a rapidly uninhabitable ship - especially for a warship with a 5-6G drive. We know the drive projects a 6G gravity well - what happens if that ends up inside the ship?
M-Drive/Onboard Gravity & Leak/Contamination is a classic of every engine system ever. There will almost certainly be coolants/hydroplastics/something that is inside the engine that you don't want to come out. Even if it's just heat. I can see this rapidly making the engine room/deck uninhabitable but it would need to be something serious to affect the entire ship.
etc, etc.
Reynard
Emperor Mongoose
I never had the chance to run it but I had a long campaign history partly as a What If exercise. The actual campaign would involve the players as the crew of the first manned prototype starship to journey to Alpha Centauri. The fun part for me was what lead to that historic first and that was the development of advanced space travel within the Solar system for many decades after receiving radio signals when SETI was turned on.
Earth now could stop gutting and souring the planet as fusion power and gravitic drives make traveling in space cheap enough to exploit the resources out there. Personal travel is possible and resorts around the Earth, on the moon and Mars and even the edges of the Belt are reality as well as cruise packages touring the system. Research installations are numerous while orbital manufacturing making use of solar power are a must.
You can imagine the diversity and volume of vessels and facilities everywhere in the system. That's a lot of potential for player activity without ever touching terran soil or going to the stars. This is the example we can easily picture. If any system has a high enough tech, enough population and a decent starport, it can be repeated with whatever flavor the color of the sun(s) and the type of worlds existing there.
Earth now could stop gutting and souring the planet as fusion power and gravitic drives make traveling in space cheap enough to exploit the resources out there. Personal travel is possible and resorts around the Earth, on the moon and Mars and even the edges of the Belt are reality as well as cruise packages touring the system. Research installations are numerous while orbital manufacturing making use of solar power are a must.
You can imagine the diversity and volume of vessels and facilities everywhere in the system. That's a lot of potential for player activity without ever touching terran soil or going to the stars. This is the example we can easily picture. If any system has a high enough tech, enough population and a decent starport, it can be repeated with whatever flavor the color of the sun(s) and the type of worlds existing there.
@Locarno24 - Yay! Somebody who gets it! 
I agree you aren't going to abandon your ship at the first signs of disaster, but isn't it comforting to know if you DO have to evacuate, you have a safe haven to be in, or in a worst-case scenario, a way to possible get to somewhere that you might have a chance for survival?
Great list of ideas there. I may have to steal, erhm, borrow, them.
@Reynard - Exactly. In-system traffic can easily rival traffic coming in from outside the star system. It's far cheaper to ship locally then through jump-space.
I agree you aren't going to abandon your ship at the first signs of disaster, but isn't it comforting to know if you DO have to evacuate, you have a safe haven to be in, or in a worst-case scenario, a way to possible get to somewhere that you might have a chance for survival?Great list of ideas there. I may have to steal, erhm, borrow, them.
@Reynard - Exactly. In-system traffic can easily rival traffic coming in from outside the star system. It's far cheaper to ship locally then through jump-space.
Yes. I'm not a fan of escape pods and rescue bubbles, because the former strikes me as something soley for 'running away' and the rescue bubble just seems like a way to die in space near a ship with a problem rather than on said ship.
However, a lifeboat that's undocked and moved twenty metres off the ship's beam is essentially immune to any disaster on the ship except the ship going up like a nuke, but can dock again. It seems the best option to have. Hell, if there's a serious problem, there's something to be said for putting the passengers off in a lifeboat whilst you deal with the problem to get them out from underfoot; for example it opens up the option of a general decompression of the ship (a great last ditch firefighting tool) despite none of the cretins being competent with a Vacc Suit.
I was going through some really old Classic Traveller stuff (Space Gamer articles, FASA books) and saw that the concept of lifeboats/lifepods was pretty standard for a lot of the passenger designs, and some of the others as well.
So this isn't a new idea, just one that seems to have fallen out of designers favor.
So this isn't a new idea, just one that seems to have fallen out of designers favor.
