Starship Power System Defective?

[tbeard1999]

And if you like my games, you aren't a fanboy. You're a very astute and insightful gamer who appreciates quality designs, of course

well....obviously.

And yeah, Orc's drift. The name alone was worth the price of admission..... :wink:

Hopefully, another example of parallel evolution. Games Workshop had a supplement for Warhammer 2nd edition called "Bloodbath at Ork's Drift" in the 1980s. I am as certain as I can be that I never saw that title until well after I named my fantasy rules. It is, however, possible that I saw the title, forgot about it, and subconsciously dredged it back up. In any case, it is the perfect title for a game in which late 19th century British redcoats might find themselves fighting fantasy orcs.

 

[TrippyHippy]

I haven't really got time to discuss much at the moment, but seeing an entree point on wikipedia regarding the develepment of FFT in relation to a particular attitude towards GDW games, and then reading a blogsite full of political opinions, only mildly to the right of Genghis Khan, really ought to be required reading before reading tbeard1999's posts - from this point onwards, at least. :roll:

 

[captainjack23]

I haven't really got time to discuss much at the moment, but seeing an entree point on wikipedia regarding the develepment of FFT in relation to a particular attitude towards GDW games, and then reading a blogsite full of political opinions, only mildly to the right of Genghis Khan, really ought to be required reading before reading tbeard1999's posts - from this point onwards, at least. :roll:

Oh yeah. That was an important thing to bring up.

 

[Se Chris]

Mongoose can shut me up anytime by banning me from this forum.

You know what? You're right. I'm tired of your relentless personal attacks against the designers, editors and other posters here and, frankly, I should have done this months ago. Go away, and don't come back.

Just to make my stance on this issue perfectly clear: I have no issues with dissenting voices or criticism of Mongoose products. What I have an issue with is this level of hostility.

 

[GhostWolf69]

(I apologize for continuing down a potentially infected and off-topic path... just delete this post if you think enough is enough Chris.)

I'm not a gamedesigner. But I do work with User Acceptance Testing, and developing solutions to meet my users demands A LOT. So I guess you can say this is my take on it from a pros point of view.

Creative Critisism could well be part of a User Testing. (Meaning you contribute not only what you think is wrong but also why you think it is wrong and what you would like to have instead.)

This is not the same as suggesting a solution.

A user (player) have to tell the designer what he wants out of the game for the designer to have a fighting chance at meeting those demands.

How he goes about trying to meet those demands is up to him/her, and falls within the realm of game design, ofcourse, but feedback has to be paramount when it comes to setting up the goals to be reached.

As a designer, the worst case scenario is when a user comes forth with a request like;

"I need a blue car! This car is red. It has to be blue. Please make this car blue using an airbrush!"

From a designers point of view, the user has just asked for a specific solution to a non-stated problem. The risk here is that I will make what I can to blue, the car... and then the user comes back and says:

"Who told you I wated Navy Blue? And why the heck did you remove the trunk?"

You see, the way designers work, (usually) is trying to see what problems to solve, the underlying need.

User: "I need a blue car!"
I say; "Why?"
User: "Cause I have to impress my woman."
I say; "Oh so you're problem is not the colour of the car, it's that you are affraid you can't impress your woman and you want us/me to help you out with that?"
User: "Erh... yeah I guess."
I say: "You know what, maybe a blue car won't be the right choice for that, let me see if I can fix it better and cheaper for you, ok? How about a silver braclette and a box of chocolates?"

...This analogy has derailed, but you probably see what I'm getting at.

As a designer I would prefer to have feedback in terms of "what you are trying to do, and in what way my system can not do that for you." ...and what you are trying to do, is NOT getting a blue car... I need to have the reason for that, the core. Only the user can give me that and I build from there.

Simply put never define your "need" in terms of solutions, instead try to tell me what you want my solution (what ever it may be in the end) to provide or help you with.

/wolf

 

[barasawa]

You know what? You're right. I'm tired of your relentless personal attacks against the designers, editors and other posters here and, frankly, I should have done this months ago. Go away, and don't come back.

Just to make my stance on this issue perfectly clear: I have no issues with dissenting voices or criticism of Mongoose products. What I have an issue with is this level of hostility.

I'm sorry you are upset, but I think I know what is happening here. The we the players (or a vocal chunk of us) has ran across something that we see as a HUGE issue. We posted about it, waited for some word or change from Mongoose. Nothing. Posters got more frantic. Still silence from Mongoose on this. A new version of the playtest rules came out with the Exact Same Issue in it. It's like Mongoose wasn't even listening. At least a statement of "we like it this way", possibly with an explanation of why, would have mollified many of the posters. But again, MONGOOSE SAID NOTHING. Then posters really started to get mean. It's human nature to start getting mad and yelling when those who asked for your opinion seem to be completely ignoring you on something you think is vital.

If you really want to calm down this situation of upset posters that are so obviously desperate for some kind, heck, any kind, of response, then please don't yell at them to "...Go away and don't come back...", but rather Address the issue (starship power situation) by acknowledging it's existence and either making a statement about why it's not changing, or reassurance that Mongoose is looking in to it and will do something about it.

This is not any sort of attack. It is simply an assessment of the situation at hand, along with advice on how to handle these types of issues. I know this is basic Customer Service stuff, and that it can be very hard to remember to do when you feel you are under attack. I've been there, and I'm guilty of not following it myself on occasion. Please try to remember that most of the posters here, even the belligerent ones, are reasonably intelligent and experienced gamers who are only trying to help with what they perceive as a game-busting mechanics issue while those who asked for their input seem to be giving them the total pushoff and don't care. Yelling at them will only make the situation devolve into something much worse. It can still be resolved by simply acknowledging the issue and giving some form of explanation or reassurance.

Thank you all for reading this post, even though it's a bit long.

 

[jtfc]

You know what? You're right. I'm tired of your relentless personal attacks against the designers, editors and other posters here and, frankly, I should have done this months ago. Go away, and don't come back.

Just to make my stance on this issue perfectly clear: I have no issues with dissenting voices or criticism of Mongoose products. What I have an issue with is this level of hostility.

I'm sorry you are upset, but I think I know what is happening here.

Please note the bolded portion.

What is happening here is that somebody with a bad history has been banned. I seriously doubt that you know what is happening here. I'm quite certain that I do not.

 

[AKAramis]

Fundamentally, power has been an issue in Traveller ship designs since Bk5 High Guard.

CT Bk2 1st ed: Power plants had to equal or exceed the rating of the Maneuver drive. Only one PP may be in use at any given time.


CT Bk2 2nd ed: Power plants had to equal or exceed the rating of the Maneuver drive or the Jump Drive, which ever was higher. Only one PP may be in use at any given time.

CT Bk5 2nd ed: High Guard officially required you to power all weapons, driving power plants up in size (and thus warships and armed merchants in cost). Power plants had to equal or exceed the rating of the Maneuver drive or the Jump Drive, which ever was higher. MD took no power from the plant's PP, however. Only one PP may be in use at any given time.

MT: Ships had to power weapons and maneuver drives, and life support, AG, Staterooms, etc... about the only things not requiring power are Jump Drives, hull structure, and armor. Later addenda indicates that you can build the PP as several smaller units, so you only burn fuel for the ones in use, and may have multiple plants online.

TNE: same as for MT.

T20: see Bk5...

T4: Same as for MT.

GT: Power plants are distributed in all other modules installed, so you need a core, and then the modules add enough power to operate the module to the core. (I do not know, nor really care, if GT:IW or GT:S are different.)

So the concept of power has existed since the begining, and been a design factor. I think the power system is a great idea, poorly executed.


My suggested fix:
PP Produces 1 EP per letter, can store 6 per letter
MD draws 1 EP per letter
JD draws 5 EP per letter
Beam Laser draws 3 power per shot
Pulse draws 2 per shot.
Keep the ability to push drives, perhaps make it easier.
Go back to drive letter damage.
Allow multiple plants to operate at once.

Now, if you are not aware of it, a really fun little boardgame called Battlestations came out a couple years ago, and at first glance, the ships looked underpowered... but it turns out that the expectation is for engineers to push plants... and played that way, the above mods (plus the movement system from mayday) made for QUITE a fun game of the Mongoose system.

 

[barasawa]

...Please note the bolded portion.

What is happening here is that somebody with a bad history has been banned. I seriously doubt that you know what is happening here. I'm quite certain that I do not.

The bold already noted, I've been lurking in these forums for Traveller for a rather long time. Longer than the ship rules have been posted. If you do a search, you'll even find some of my posts.

Ok, someone got banned, someone even said "ban me". And a Mongoose employee went rather monkeynuts with a post of his own, clearly indicating that he feels persecuted. Yeah, I've been reading the posts. He kinda is being persecuted, well, him and the other Mongoose employees on this project. Of course it's mostly because they aren't saying Jack about something numerous people think is an issue, even though there have been WAY too many posts on the subject.

This is basic customer service stuff here. They asked for help. Posters are trying to give it. Posters are apparently being totally ignored about an issue they think is very important. Posters get upset. Mongoose, still doesn't do anything about the actual issue, but spazzes out on the posters.

This is not the way to handle ANY situation. My post was to highlight what the root cause of this conflict is, with a very simple and easy to do suggestion on how to resolve it. Well, things have gone kinda pear-shaped already, so it will only improve the situation, not really fix it. Besides, there are always a few dissenters that don't like something for whatever reason. I'm just trying to help as much as possible. But just like you, I'm just another poster on these forums. The only ones that can take care of this is Mongoose. If they do it quickly by acknowledging what the posters have been trying to tell them, so much the better. On the other hand, they could do it by banning everybody that talks about this issue on their site. That won't go over well with anyone, but it's an option. The worst option is to continue to ignore the posters. No, I take that back, the worst option is to get into a pissing match with the posters, much like the one that's starting right now. It's not just the posters, and it's not just Mongoose. But Mongoose is the only group that can actually resolve it.

 

[barasawa]

AKAramis, you're trying to make suggestions to help. That's good, though I'm not too thrilled with your system. That's ok, I'm not too thrilled with mine either. Don't have something better, so I can't make another offer of solutions right now.

Though there is a small issue with the idea of multiple generators. As the rules are currently written, only ONE generator will EVER be active at any one time, all the others would just be backups for when the active one goes down. Yeah, I don't like it either, but that's how it stands at the moment. I've stopped posting suggestions on the power systems since I too have gotten fed up with Mongooses Silent Treatment. I've just started reposting on this subject because of the outburst by Mongoose Chris. That's always bad news when the forum moderator flips out. Hopefully people will read the post, calm down, and try to resolve the debacle that is currently assailing us all.

By the way, I did an analysis of efficiency, and the smallest generator has the absolutely BEST performance. (Yeah, I can figure out how to feed fuel to multiple generators, and power and exhaust out from them, so I see no reason why the engineers in Traveller can't...)

 

[EDG]

MT: Ships had to power weapons and maneuver drives, and life support, AG, Staterooms, etc... about the only things not requiring power are Jump Drives, hull structure, and armor. Later addenda indicates that you can build the PP as several smaller units, so you only burn fuel for the ones in use, and may have multiple plants online.

TNE: same as for MT.

I forget what MT did, but TNE actually had power plants rated in MW, didn't it (i.e. none of this "letter code" stuff). In which case, you just totted up the megawattage of all the component systems and for the ship to work that had to be less than the output of the power plant. (yes, I know that sort of approach makes some people come out in hives. I don't care about the details, the point is that you had X "power points" total, and all the components had to total less than that)

 

[barasawa]

MegaTraveller also used Megawatts.

Actually I like the game rule of using power points as opposed to megawatts. There were a few to many arguments in the old days about real world megawatts to MT megawatts... :roll: (only from the rules lawyers of course)

 

[AKAramis]

MegaTraveller also used Megawatts.

Actually I like the game rule of using power points as opposed to megawatts. There were a few to many arguments in the old days about real world megawatts to MT megawatts... :roll: (only from the rules lawyers of course)

Yeah, it cause no shortage of "Damn, I can run Anchorage on a coupl of scoutships!"

It also resulted in massive 6-10 significant place figures for power consumption... (from 10^6 to 10^-3)

Power points work fine for me, and I like simple, and I do like the letter code drives (especially when they are also the damage steps...)

I don't mind allocating/using power in play. Neither do my players... they like Battlestations, too... and MoTrav space combat felt very much like Battlestations.

 

[-Daniel-]

I have to say I like the Power Points over a real world measure just so I do not have to deal with the Real World issues or with the rules lawyers.

Just my .02

Daniel

 

[DaltonCalford]

Gentlemen,

I have been very quiet on this thread, as I have seen some very good constructive posts and some very destructive posts.

Personally, I do not like the argument that "This is the what Traveller is/was" as I find it limiting to those trying to improve or expand the system.

If people want to use their own home rules, great.
If they want to use one of the many different systems that where produced for Traveller over the years, great.

What I know is that I want a new system that is self consistent and can be used to simulate the OTU, since many of the original rules, regardless of version, did not actually allow the OTU to exist without major intervention by the referee or alot of handwavium.

Personally, I do not like the "Jump Drive A, Power Plant B" system unless it is built up from a more detailed customizable system.

I have house rules that I use, and I will probably use years after this version of Traveller joins the ranks of forgotten Traveller rule systems.

From the playtest materials, I have noticed that in a 15 minute time period, such as the original BK 2 space combat turns, I have time to fire all my weapons once, manoeuvre and perhaps save enough to jump. The fact that the playtest has made the details of those 15 minutes more granular, so that I now have to play out 2 minute combat turns and need to be more concerned over when I perform an action, makes me think that the new system works well.

I do not think it is perfect, but, I do not think it would be perfect until the highguard rules are produced. I would far prefer the base system to NOT include any ship design rules, unless the Highguard ship and combat rules are playtested. This would make the base rules consistent with the advanced rules, which would be a first for any traveller rule set.

I also think that the mongoose guys are watching the forums and listening, but I also think that it would be great if we can see the current rendition of the rules with all the current rule tweaks.

I am holding back from any further suggestions until I know where the rules are currently sitting as we may all be arguing over a point that was fixed weeks ago.

best regards

Dalton

 

[TrippyHippy]

Delete duplicate.

 

[TrippyHippy]

Ok, someone got banned, someone even said "ban me". And a Mongoose employee went rather monkeynuts with a post of his own, clearly indicating that he feels persecuted. Yeah, I've been reading the posts. He kinda is being persecuted, well, him and the other Mongoose employees on this project. Of course it's mostly because they aren't saying Jack about something numerous people think is an issue, even though there have been WAY too many posts on the subject.

With respect to tbeard1999, it is pertinant to note that he was complaining bitterly about the playtest rules before he started to link up issues with time/effect and statistics. It is also worth noting that he wasn't explicitely banned for criticisms he made, but for the level of hostililty (rudeness) in his posts.

The writers have been on the forums, from time to time, to acknowledge criticisms or address them, but because they don't always simply say "you're right/we'll do exactly what you want", they can sometimes be drowned out. Secondly, at this stage, I do think that they are probably a little bit busy writing up all the various changes they will make, to be able to respond to every hostile poster on here....

 

[EDG]

I think I put my finger on what's bugging me about all this power stuff - if you've got a 100MW power plant, then that means it's producing 100MJ of energy per second (that's what a Watt is - joules per second). So do we really need to keep track of all these energy points being used over a two minute round (or 15 minute round or whatever) given that 100MJ are being generated every second?? Power isn't a resource that can be "used up" like that because it fully replenishes every second.

It seems to me that any ship should be designed to have more than enough power to do whatever the heck it liked per round, especially given that weapons and other things that use energy are bound to have capacitors/homopolar generators/flywheels whatever to store the energy for when they need to be used, and those can be recharged really quickly - well below the resolution of the 2 or 15 minute round.

So long as the total amount of energy per second required to run all the necessary systems on the ship is not greater than the total output of the power plant plus any energy stored in capacitors, HPGs, batteries, or whatever, the ship should be able to do whatever it likes.

 

[AKAramis]

I think I put my finger on what's bugging me about all this power stuff - if you've got a 100MW power plant, then that means it's producing 100MJ of energy per second

[snip]

So long as the total amount of energy per second required to run all the necessary systems on the ship is not greater than the total output of the power plant plus any energy stored in capacitors, HPGs, batteries, or whatever, the ship should be able to do whatever it likes.

Ah, but there's the rub. Almost no energy weapons are continuous draw; they draw only when they are firing. In TNE, you power for the recharge cycle, and add the capacitors/HPGs to the weapon.

MoTrav assumes the capacitors are in the PP. so if an EP is a megawatt turn, and the turn is 6 minutes, thats 3600MJ per EP... and that beam laser is drawing off 5 EP (18GJ) in a few seconds of firing... if it is 250MW, then it's 900GJ/EP, and that laser is 4.5TJ. If a drive is devoted 1EP, it takes it (most likely) at the base rate... but a weapon usually needs its power in short bursts.

in any case, EP should be measured in Joules if converting to real world numbers, and the PP can then be rated in watts.

Note: HG used EP as well, just not a capacitor system in regular use. The rules stated you had to provide power for maximum draw load. Even though, for the time spent in jump at least, those spinals and turrets are not drawing any power...

 

[EDG]

OK, but are we really talking about Terajoule lasers here? That sounds more like the realms of Spinal Mounts to me (if anything). I can't recall offhand the sort of energies you need for destructive lasers (assuming "gravitic focussing" armwaving to actually make them effective over long distances), I think it was 30-100MJ?

(just for edumacational comparison, from a quick google scan it looks like modern nuclear (fission) submarines have power outputs of 50-200 MW?)