Star Trek Using Traveller?

[Klaus Kipling]

The pre-refit still has 12. They are still grouped in pairs.

 

[dreamingbadger]

The pre-refit still has 12. They are still grouped in pairs.

yes 2 pairs on the top ... 1 pair on the bottom... 6 in total ... honest , the design pre-refit is asymetrical and only post refit do the top and bottom batteries "match"

http://cid-20273372de129cbd.skydriv...ublic/Star Trek Images/Constitution Class.jpg

 

[Stofsk]

The TOS era Enterprise is approximately 20,000dTons, with a good portion of that in the nacelles, as in more volume than taken up by the jump/warp drives.

How did you come by that figure?

The volume of 4 cylinders - each nacelle, the engineering hull, and the saucer, added together, then divided by 13.5. Got the figures off one of the pics I've downloaded. Can't find the file where I did the calcs, but I rounded it up to 20,000 because it's a nice round Traveler number (twas something like 19,417.35 or summat like that).

I was just curious, especially about working out the volume of each compartment of the ship.

Would be something like that, I guess.

White globes are force fields and the way shields seem to work in Star Trek, they seem to go through percentages after taking enemy fire, which suggests (at least to me) that there are internal capacitors that absorb the energy and obviously this is what keeps the shields up.

It can also explain why internal explosions take place if taking enemy fire, even though the shields are up, if capacitors are overloaded.

There's at least 3 on the ventral side of the saucer section, and 3 on the top. I don't know where the other 10 are supposed to be.

It also has 1 (or I suppose you can consider it 2) forward facing torpedo launchers, not 4.

The phasers are grouped in pairs. There's six on the top of the saucer, six below, then four underneath the secondary hull. I put in 4 torpedo launchers as that would a) add up to 20 bay weapons, and b) it would allow it shoot 12 torpedoes in 10 minutes.

If you're going to count the particle bays like that, I think it would make more sense to make them 50-ton versions. But I don't think you can count the phasers like that:

If they're that close to each other, I would count them as the one bay weapon personally. They obviously fire together. Also, where did you say the four phasers are on the secondary hull?

The torpedo launcher question is simply that the visual evidence suggests two torpedo launchers, not four.

What about that huge 'navigational deflector'? AKA the Enterprise's swiss army knife.

The Enterprise outguns the D7, as per the episode "Elaan of Troyius", which had a sabotaged Enterprise nevertheless prevailing upon a D7 in a fight (fortunately the power plant was repaired in time to give a good hit on the D7 ship that was attacking, forcing it to break off).

D7s have two forward facing disruptors on the two 'wing' nacelles, and the forward facing torpedo tube.

In game terms, though, they are bay weapons, 50 or 100 dTons, with, even if they have massive power requirements, 1 per 1000 tons of ship. The D7 might well be only around 14,000dTons - and might well have less shielding. The D7 could also carry far more troops than the Enterprise, in smaller barracks.

The D7's forward 'orb' compartment may also serve as more than a torpedo launcher. It could also be a spinal mount. In DS9's Way of the Warrior episode, several D7's were seen firing a beam from that forward orb compartment rather than torpedos. It might be that the torpedo launcher runs adjacent to a spinal mounted particle beam. Or, it might just be a different (albeit similar looking) class, after all DS9 takes place roughly 80 years after TOS. (I prefer TOS to DS9 any day of the month)

Also, in ST6 when Gorkon's ship was coming around to return fire on the Enterprise (whom they mistook for having fired on them), you can see the weapon port 'fire up' with a reddish glow. I don't know if that's significant for this discussion, I can't remember if torpedo ports glowed like that before firing.

It could also be geared more for war, and could carry more troops berthed. Enterprise like you've noted has a lot of space inside for luxuries, and its mission was exploration, but it nevertheless is considered a heavy cruiser by Starfleet (and a Battlecruiser by Kruge in ST3). One wonders what the Excelsior falls under!

 

[FreeTrav]

FWIW, a quick calculation of Jump vs. TOS warp makes Traveller ships faster than Star Trek ships.

(Jn = n pc/wk = 3.26n ly/wk = (52*3.26)n ly/y = 52*3.26*n*C)
(WF n = n^3 * C)
(Jn = WF k where k = (n*52*3.26)^(1/3))

J1 = WF  5.53
J2 = WF  6.97
J3 = WF  7.98
J4 = WF  8.79
J5 = WF  9.46
J6 = WF 10.06

Remember that the TOS Enterprise's top speed, emergency, was WF 8, and normal cruising speed was WF 6.

 

[Stofsk]

That's not a huge issue anyway, as TOS was supposed to depict an age of sail feel with one ship on the frontiers by itself, with sporadic communication with the home base at the best of times. Captains are given a wide latitude with regards to personal authority. I think the warp speeds are a fairly good fit as far as TOS is concerned.

(TNG broke the mold by depicting much faster warp speeds, and while the Enterprise-D seemed to have the same mission as Kirk's, it didn't really feel like they were 'out there' as much as it felt in Kirk's day. Picard would usually get bothered by Admiral Plot Device quite often, while Kirk didn't have to contend with pushy superiors nearly as often, though he still did occasionally)

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

Also Kirk often had a timelag in his communications with Starfleet, Picard never did. So either the range or the infrastructure of the FTL communicators was drastically improved as well.

 

[alex_greene]

Lots more relay posts in established parts of space could do the trick, along with a slightly less centralised command structure and a lot more local Admirals for whom the buck stopped at their desk.

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

Not to start another Canon War, but Jump Torpedos could also fit the bill here.

When you are outside the "grid" of subspace relay stations, you have to use a Jump Torpedo (or Warp Torpedo) to get your message inside the grid. Once inside the grid, the transmission time is zero. So Kirk's delay is in getting his message to the edge of the grid closest to his ship, then instantaneous to HQ and back, then another message torpedo back to the ship. That could account for the delay that we see in TOS and still fit a Traveller rules.

Again, at TL 17+, small FTL capable torpedos should be possible.

 

[dreamingbadger]

FWIW, a quick calculation of Jump vs. TOS warp makes Traveller ships faster than Star Trek ships.

(Jn = n pc/wk = 3.26n ly/wk = (52*3.26)n ly/y = 52*3.26*n*C)
(WF n = n^3 * C)
(Jn = WF k where k = (n*52*3.26)^(1/3))

J1 = WF  5.53
J2 = WF  6.97
J3 = WF  7.98
J4 = WF  8.79
J5 = WF  9.46
J6 = WF 10.06

Remember that the TOS Enterprise's top speed, emergency, was WF 8, and normal cruising speed was WF 6.

Yes, but also remember that the Jump ships have to refuel between jumps, many jump ships only have enough fuel for one jump, which gives you a cycle speed which is much slower, where as the Warp drive ship has a sustained speed

 

[FreeTrav]

FWIW, a quick calculation of Jump vs. TOS warp makes Traveller ships faster than Star Trek ships.

(Jn = n pc/wk = 3.26n ly/wk = (52*3.26)n ly/y = 52*3.26*n*C)
(WF n = n^3 * C)
(Jn = WF k where k = (n*52*3.26)^(1/3))

J1 = WF  5.53
J2 = WF  6.97
J3 = WF  7.98
J4 = WF  8.79
J5 = WF  9.46
J6 = WF 10.06

Remember that the TOS Enterprise's top speed, emergency, was WF 8, and normal cruising speed was WF 6.

Yes, but also remember that the Jump ships have to refuel between jumps, many jump ships only have enough fuel for one jump, which gives you a cycle speed which is much slower, where as the Warp drive ship has a sustained speed

Good point; typically, that halves the effective speed over time. That lowers J1 to WF 4.39 and J6 to WF 7.98.

The question becomes how long the warp drive can maintain that sustained speed, and how long it takes to refuel.

 

[N0-1_H3r3]

(TNG broke the mold by depicting much faster warp speeds, and while the Enterprise-D seemed to have the same mission as Kirk's, it didn't really feel like they were 'out there' as much as it felt in Kirk's day. Picard would usually get bothered by Admiral Plot Device quite often, while Kirk didn't have to contend with pushy superiors nearly as often, though he still did occasionally)

While the mission statement in the opening credits was broadly the same, Picard's Enterprise actually engaged in a wider range of missions - in Kirk's era, the Enterprise was very much a dedicated front-line explorer, one of many of its kind. The Enterprise-D performed some exploration missions in that vein, but was also used for out-and-out military actions as part of a larger, diplomatic and scientific missions and everything else in between, suggesting a different role, perhaps a result of the prestige held by being the fifth ship to bear that identity.

The question becomes how long the warp drive can maintain that sustained speed, and how long it takes to refuel.

The top emergency speed of a Constitution-class starship (as per TOS, rather than the larger and demonstrably more sophisticated version that appeared in the new divergent timeline of this year's movie), apparently, could be maintained for about 4 hours (as mentioned in an episode or 2), though that's primarily due to wear on the engine mechanisms (warp field coils, etc) rather than lack of fuel.

Refuelling isn't an issue, by and large, for Federation starships or others like them - the concentrations of fuel present are sufficient for extremely long periods of time.

The Star Trek: The Next Generation technical manual (a secondary canon source at best, but still useful for guidelines) explained that the approximately 62,500 cubic metres of deuterium and 3,000 cubic metres of antimatter (almost universally antideuterium) aboard a Galaxy-class starship should last about seven years assuming an average cruising speed of Warp 6 (per the scale used from TNG onwards, where Warp 6 is about 390c)

Needless to say, that's orders of magnitude greater than the fuel efficiency demonstrated by the average Traveller ship...

 

[Sevya]

Also, where did you say the four phasers are on the secondary hull?

Also, in ST6 when Gorkon's ship was coming around to return fire on the Enterprise (whom they mistook for having fired on them), you can see the weapon port 'fire up' with a reddish glow. I don't know if that's significant for this discussion, I can't remember if torpedo ports glowed like that before firing.

According to Ships of the Star Fleet, Volume 1 Revised, the Enterprise class (read as refit Constitution) has four larger single mount phasers in a square around the lower navigation light. There are also two more above the shuttle bay.

As for the glow, that may just be an effect of Klingon torpedo technology. The same glow appears on the Amar just before she fires in Star Trek: the Motion Picture.

The Klingon philosophy on building ships seems to mimic the Soviet philosophy on tanks in world war 2; just get as many out there as you can!

Sevya

 

[AndrewW]

The Klingon philosophy on building ships seems to mimic the Soviet philosophy on tanks in world war 2; just get as many out there as you can!

Sevya

Or the US with the Sherman tank. Though some of the later WWII era Soviet tanks where pretty good.

 

[Stofsk]

(TNG broke the mold by depicting much faster warp speeds, and while the Enterprise-D seemed to have the same mission as Kirk's, it didn't really feel like they were 'out there' as much as it felt in Kirk's day. Picard would usually get bothered by Admiral Plot Device quite often, while Kirk didn't have to contend with pushy superiors nearly as often, though he still did occasionally)

While the mission statement in the opening credits was broadly the same, Picard's Enterprise actually engaged in a wider range of missions - in Kirk's era, the Enterprise was very much a dedicated front-line explorer, one of many of its kind. The Enterprise-D performed some exploration missions in that vein, but was also used for out-and-out military actions as part of a larger, diplomatic and scientific missions and everything else in between, suggesting a different role, perhaps a result of the prestige held by being the fifth ship to bear that identity.

Well, Kirk had his fair share of diplomatic missions ("A Taste of Armageddon", "Journey to Babel" and "Amok Time" stand out, not to mention the plot of ST6 rests on Kirk and the Enterprise offering the laurel branch to Chancellor Gorkon and the Klingon high command), military missions (patrolling the neutral zone in "Balance of Terror", resupplying a outpost in "Arena"), as well as the usual mix of scientific and exploration missions.

The Enterprise, even in Kirk's time, was already a legend. But in TOS there was more of that feel that the Enterprise was on the edge of the frontier, by itself, far from support or reinforcements should things turn south. Whereas Picard's Enterprise felt like it really was playing around in the Federation's backyard. Although it was absolutely abysmal film, Insurrection nevertheless had one good line (which ironically demonstrated how awful a film it was) with Picard bitterly complaining about having to hold 'yet-another-boring-diplomatic-reception' on what was supposed to be a front line exploration vessel, and he remarked "Does anyone remember when we used to be explorers?" How true, I thought.

 

[Klaus Kipling]

The pre-refit still has 12. They are still grouped in pairs.

yes 2 pairs on the top ... 1 pair on the bottom... 6 in total ... honest , the design pre-refit is asymetrical and only post refit do the top and bottom batteries "match"

http://cid-20273372de129cbd.skydriv...ublic/Star Trek Images/Constitution Class.jpg

Ulp. You are of course correct, according to Franz Joseph.

However, the TMP number seems more reasonable, as we never actually see how many on the TOS version, and FJ was just speculating like we are. Going from 6 to 16 (actually, it's 18 phasers - 2 right at the back - and only 2 torpedoes - I made it 4 in my head!) is quite a lot for a refit, and 16/18 matches the HG rules so well it seems a shame not to use it.

 

[dreamingbadger]

Good point; typically, that halves the effective speed over time. That lowers J1 to WF 4.39 and J6 to WF 7.98.

The question becomes how long the warp drive can maintain that sustained speed, and how long it takes to refuel.

I never saw them put in for "gas" the MGT rules say essentially you can ignore space for fuel with Anti-Matter, but don't say how often you need to refuel. But, if you consider most of the Star Trek cannon, almost nothing covers "operating range"... though you had one episode where they "replace the dylithium crystals"...

You could try and draw some parallels between USN CVA refuelling times, which is typically "20 years" or so, you might guess that that gives rise to the "5 year mission", even so the likelihood is that other working parts will "fail" or require maintenance "slowing the sustained speed down...

The Prime Directive RPG has some numbers which seems to indicate that starships travel about 5.3 times faster than the warp speed WF^3=speed calculations:

http://www.starfleetgames.com/documents/Warp_Speed_in_SFU.pdf

WF6 = 353 Parsecs per month or 11.77 Parsecs per day
WF7 = 561 Parsecs per month or 18.7 Parsecs a day

the "unit of scale" is 1 hex = 500 Parsecs.

It also says that a warship has a range of 6 months before it needs to refuel/take a half day pit stop before continuing... which roughs out at about 34 parsecs at warp 6 (e.g. (6^3/2)/3.26= 33.75pc) before maintenance refuelling is required.

The main problem here is "how big is the Federation , if it really is 19 hexes and you use the numbers above 353 Parsecs per month, crossing the Federation takes 2.24 years, using the pure WF^3 route it takes 133 years "ish" to cross.

FASA said the Federation was a much more manageable 180pc across, which gives us a Warp 6 transit time of 2.6 years, much more in keeping with the 5 year mission.

My conclusion, is that the Federation should be about 180pc across, and that a 6 month maintenance cycle is not unreasonable in that.

It also has a nice section on "communications lag" of 15 minutes per hex (each hex 500pc) e.g from HQ to the border represents a "lag" of about 2.5 hours, which doesn't feel right to me ...

If you assume that the Federation is 180pc across and a "subspace carrier wave of WF 20 (e.g. 2500pc/y), you get a message transit time of 26 days from one side of the Federation to the other or 13 days from middle to the border, which has a nice isolation "feeling of the age of sail"/"loneliness of command" to my mind.

 

[Twin Agate Dragons]

Thanks to dreamingbadger for putting together a nice start to a campaign reference for those wanting to play Trek using Mongoose Traveller.

http://cid-20273372de129cbd.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/.Public/DRAFT%20Star%20Trek/Role%20Playing%20in%20the%20UFP%20for%20MGT.pdf

Don't try downloading it directly, just follow the link.

 

[dreamingbadger]

Thanks to dreamingbadger for putting together a nice start to a campaign reference for those wanting to play Trek using Mongoose Traveller.

http://cid-20273372de129cbd.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/.Public/DRAFT%20Star%20Trek/Role%20Playing%20in%20the%20UFP%20for%20MGT.pdf

Don't try downloading it directly, just follow the link.

This is very draft right now, I'll update it over the next couple of weeks

 

[Mithras]

Dreambadger, thanks for the acknowledgement in your game ... now I have just one thing to say ... get it finished!

 

[dreamingbadger]

Hi Guys,
I have had a chance to do some more work on this, quite a few changes still a lot more to do here's the URL:

http://cid-20273372de129cbd.skydri...ar Trek/Role Playing in the UFP for MGT.pdf