Traveller Ringworld / Known Space

[Nuclear Fridge Magnet]

Mainly, the ship's design served as an illustration of the Puppeteer race's attitude to self-preservation. All the potentially-hazardous machinery like drives, weapons and fuel were on the outside of the impregnable hull, where they couldn't harm its occupants in the case of a malfunction.

I do think there's a degree of unexplored potential to such technology that could prove very hard to manage once in the hands of players. Any time you can start throwing around the words "impregnable" or "invulnerable" when referring to something mobile and flyable, it'll only be a matter of time before your players weaponise it.

(Sigh) I know that all too well. I've had it happen to me several times. One memorable instance was in a Star Wars campaign I ran, using info from Dark Empire. In a nutshell, the players boarded a World Devastator that was chewing up a Rebel-friendly world. They sealed off the bridge, hacked the command & control systems, and turned the damned thing into an anti-Imperial vacuum cleaner... wiping out the ground forces supporting the World Devastator. AT-AT Walkers were being snapped up like popcorn... :evil:

 

[CaptnBrazil]

see http://www.dennisantinori.com/Resources/Ringworld/

 

[superc0ntra]

How about the structural strength of scrith?

I recall Niven said in an interview that someone, somewhere, had made that calculation.

But did they translate it into Traveller terms? Hull, structure, armour points?

No, AFAIK it was some MIT students that actually calculated the tensile strength required for the ringworld not to snap. I've tried finding the figures but w.o luck. If you find it it can probably be converted to Traveller terms as a factor compared to high tensile steel or titanium alloys and that way find the hull points.