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Old 12-27-2019, 07:35 AM   #1
hal
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Buffalo, New York
Default Revisting the Beowulf

How often have you run a game in GURPS TRAVELLER using the stats as given in the ship without truly SEEING what those stats meant? For instance, below are the stats of my "revised/updated" Beowulf. By revised, I mean that I've taken the time to build the ship's stats per the rules in GURPS TRAVELLER STARSHIPS along with a simple tweak where one space of TL 10 Maneuver drives produces 49 sTons of thrust instead of the standard 40. Why did I make that revision? After analyzing the builds for the TL 10 version of thrusters and the TL 12 version, I found that there was way too much "empty" space involved in the module as compared/contrasted with the TL 12 module. I suspect it was done primarily to come up with evenly divisible by 10 values in thrust. So, when you see something that reads as "14 Maneuver Drive/10 Imp" - it means TL 10 Drive improved.

Stats on the improved module are:

Volume: 1 dtons
Mass: 4.165 stons
Cost: .196 MCr
Crew: .0167
stons Thrust: 49
stons Lift: 49
Power: 4.9 MW

This is in contrast with the original stats:

Volume: 1 dtons
Mass: 3.4 stons
Cost: .16 MCr
Crew: .016
stons Thrust: 40
stons Lift: 40
Power: 4.0 MW

That having been said as a preliminary (the above that is) the next post contains the upgraded version using GURPS TRAVELLER STARSHIP options that were not available when the first edition of GURPS TRAVELLER was published.
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Old 12-27-2019, 07:41 AM   #2
hal
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Buffalo, New York
Default Re: Revisting the Beowulf

Crew: Captain/pilot, navigator, sensor/commo operator, steward, and two engineers. One of the crew will serve double duty as a pilot for the enclosed air/raft if carried aboard.

Hull: 200-ton VGSL, Medium Frame, Standard Materials, Crystaliron (Expensive) Armored Hull (DR 100), Standard Compartmentalization.

Control Areas: Basic Bridge/10 (Complexity 7), Compact Bridge option (Used on Basic or command bridges only).

Basic Bridge/10 Communicator Range (mi)

Radio: 50,000,000

Maser: 0

Laser: 100,000,000

Meson 0


Basic Bridge/10

Sensors Range (mi)/ Scan Rating

Passive: 20,000/37

Active: 100,000/41

Radscanner: 2,000/31



Engineering: Sm Engineering/10, 4 Jump Drive/10, 14 Maneuver Drive/10 Imp (1.10 / 2.79 Gs, 686 stons thrust), 20 Jump Fuel Tank/7, 2 Fuel Processor/10 (1.3 hours to refine ), Small Utility/10.

Accommodations: 10 Stateroom, 5 Emergency Low Berth/10 (20 Cryoberths).

Misc: 20 Hydrogen Fuel (Fire 13).



Armaments: 1 Turret #1 Battery of 1 (Empty; DR 100), 1 Turret #2 Battery of 1 (Empty; DR 100).

Stores: Spacedock/ 7 (0.5 dtons for small craft available), 71 Hold (71xUnspecified Cargo, 0 dtons free for cargo), 0.5 Hold half space (Unspecified Cargo Half Ton, 0 dtons free for cargo).

Statistics: DMass 226.04 stons, EMass 246.04 stons, LMass 623.54 stons, Base Cost MCr29.07, Load Cost MCr0.01, Total Cost MCr29.08, HP 22,500, Damage Threshold 2,250, Size Mod +8, HT 12, 25.9 Man-Hours/day Maintenance.

Space Performance: Jump-1 (1), sAcc 1.10/1.10/2.79/3.03 Gs.

Air Performance: aSpeed 1,496 mph, Skimming aSpeed 5,239 mph, aLift 686 stons.

Sample Times : Orbit 0.21 Hrs, Escape Velocity 0.29 Hrs, 100D 6.09 Hrs, Earth-Mars 104.52 Hrs.

Options
All times are Earth Std, Full Load.
100D and Earth-Mars assume mid-point turnover.


Printed with GMV Version 2.32.01 on 12/27/2019 9:25:39 AM
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Old 12-27-2019, 08:30 AM   #3
hal
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Buffalo, New York
Default Re: Revisting the Beowulf

So, you're probably thinking "So what" right? What 'hidden" thing is not readily apparent based on the read out above in post #2.

What the rules state in GURPS TRAVELLER STARSHIPS is that if you want to know the power output of the powerplant, total up all of the energy used by all systems - and that is the power plant output.

As it just so happens, Thomas Bont's software permits one to export the data on how much energy is used by which systems.

Stateroom: 0.2 MW
Basic Bridge/10: 2.51 MW
Maneuver Drive/10 Imp: 68.6 MW
Jump Drive/10: 40 MW
Emergency Low Berth/10: 0.01 MW
Fuel Processor/10: 16 MW
Small Utility/10: 5 MW

Total energy produced on this Beowulf (revised) works out to 132.32 MW. Of that, 40 MW are set aside for the jump drive (which is not used in normal space transit. In addition, the fuel processor only requires 1.3 hours to refine a full fuel tank. That frees up 16 MW for use in other things when not processing fuel.

What can you do with 56 MW of energy?

At present, a single 360 Megajoule laser requires 17.3 MW of power to operate. When you have a single laser with a rate of fire of 1/60 (one shot per 60 seconds), your laser gains a +7 accuracy value for its rate of fire bonus.

Now - instead of 17.3 MW, we're going to feed into it, a total of 17.3+56 MW (all of the unallocated energy not being used by the Jump drive or fuel processor).

This means that the battery for firing the laser will recharge faster, thus, changing its rate of fire. We can increase its rate of fire to 4/60 seconds, or 1/15. This changes its accuracy from a +7 bonus to a +9 bonus.

But why stop there? Why not change the energy that you feed into the laser by diverting all power from the maneuver drive into the laser? That allows us to feed 141.9 MW into the laser, which is 8x the normal 17.3 MW. This changes the rate of fire from 1/60 to 8/60 or 1/8 (technically 1/7.5, which gets bumped back to 1/8).

A single laser could have its rate of fire changed to 8x that of a single laser, bumping up its accuracy to +10.

Why buy 3 lasers when for the price of one, and feeding it all of the energy not required for life support, bridge operations, freeze tube operation, etc - and get a single shot off with a +10 bonus?
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Old 12-27-2019, 08:37 AM   #4
hal
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Buffalo, New York
Default Re: Revisting the Beowulf

Now for the next thing people likely haven't thought about...

Let's say for the sake of argument, you have a revised Empress Marava class ship whose space performance stats are:

Jump-2, sAcc 1.12/1.12/2.33/2.73 Gs.

What that means is that if you take all freight and fuel off, the ship is capable of attaining 2.73 G's.

What people may not think to check is "What is the drive functionality when coming out of jump space?" The Empress is 40 tons lighter than it was when it first headed towards its jump point.

How does that change the stats?

Jump-2, sAcc 1.20/1.20/2.33/2.73 Gs.

In other words, for those who like to track that kind of information for their campaigns, exiting jump space generally (for Jump-2 and higher ships) results in the ship being slightly faster than when it was fully laden with fuel and freight/cargo.
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Old 12-27-2019, 08:55 AM   #5
hal
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Buffalo, New York
Default Re: Revisting the Beowulf

In conclusion - for those who want to perhaps explore changes they can make with their ship designs, I would suggest looking at the power slice information on page 124 of GURPS TRAVELLER STARSHIPS and determine just how much volume of any given module can be reduced and how much money would be saved.

For example, if we don't need 40 MW of TL 10 power plant provided in the Jump Drive (and use instead, the energy that would normally be allocated to the maneuver drive in normal space to the jump drive when jumping) - then we'd divide 40 by 20. That equals 2.

So, money saved is .2 x 2 MCr (or .4 MCr), 2 x .5 spaces (or 1 space) and 2 x 2 sTons of mass (or 4 sTons total).

Now, we have room for an extra space of something. Ditto with the energy used to power the fuel refinery module (that is 16 dTons, but let's remove 1/2 dton of space etc - because we have POWER to spare big time (what is 16 MW vs what the maneuver drive uses!)

In all - for those who are inclined to tweak the rules and optimize the material a little, I would suggest that you may want to take a look at the ship designs with a new mentality asking yourself "Is this really necessary"?

GURPS TRAVELLER STARSHIPS has nice modules in there that are almost never used. Want more life support capacity for your starship? Remove the unnecessary power slices and instead, install an enhanced life support system. For the same volume of the removed 40 MW of energy, one could install additional life support for 10 people.

Now, all I have to do is start looking at the sensor rules for determining what went into the construction of those enhanced sensor suites. Why? The max scan rating any given ship may have is equal to its size modifier +36. That means that a 200 dTon hull with enhanced sensors can only be as good as scan rating 44. If it would normally be scan rating 48, that's four scan ratings too large for the ship - which costs money, energy, and mass that could be saved for a "purpose built 200 dTon hull enhanced sensor suite".

Now, why am I even going there? The Pirates of Drinax adventure has a ship design that is a TL 12 "Privateer class" 200 dTon basic stealth hull with 6G acceleration, electronic warfare suite and enhanced sensors. It wasn't easy to get a GURPS TRAVELLER Ship that met those specs. :)
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Old 12-28-2019, 06:46 AM   #6
Anaraxes
 
Join Date: Sep 2007
Default Re: Revisting the Beowulf

I wouldn't assume that a cheap freighter has extra power output to run both its J- and M-drives simultaneously. You don't need them both at the same time. Why spec the power plant for both?

(The Vilani custom of dimming the lights for jump suggests that it was, at least at one point in Vilani history, common to divert all sorts of non-vital power to the jump drive. That's going to lead into the discussions about how jump drives really work, how capacitor charging (if any) works and how long it takes, and all that. So go with whatever you find fun.)

If there's a problem, it's in the offhand rule "add up the power of all the systems to get power output" rather than having the PP output spec'd in the tables, so ship architects can choose the amount of power they want in their design -- making it literally overpowered, if they want.

Similar quibble about the lasers. I wouldn't assume you can just throw more power into a laser and automatically get higher RoF out of it. The hardware would have had to have been designed for some maximum level of input, cycle rate, and cooling. You could certainly create a laser meant for higher input and RoF, and install that in the ship (upgrading the power cabling, switching, breakers, busbars, heatsinks and conduits, etc. along with the laser itself.) But just slamming quadruple power into existing wires probably wouldn't work well off the cuff for any random hundred-year-old Beowulf that's been knocking around the sector for a while. Give the players yet another thing to spend their ill-gotten gains on to upgrade, the ship's engineer something to do, the ex-Navy character a reason to use their contacts with old service buddies to acquire the restricted mil-spec hardware. Much more interesting gameplay than just giving it away as a rules loophole.
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Old 12-28-2019, 10:14 AM   #7
Fred Brackin
 
Join Date: Aug 2007
Default Re: Revisting the Beowulf

Quote:
Originally Posted by Anaraxes View Post
I wouldn't assume that a cheap freighter has extra power output to run both its J- and M-drives simultaneously.
To come to Hal's defense he isn't assuming anything. The rules from the Various GTrav books he's referred to and from Ve2 which were used to build the modules say exactly what he says they do.

For example, those are Ve2 lasers with an innate ROF of 1/2. There were no alterations made to them to slow them down to 1/60. If taken to a gound unit and hoked up to a alrger power source (quite possibly an energy bank) they would fire at 1/2 in the default Gurps scale of time and distance quite happily.

Now Hal is choosing to play Gurps Traveller at a higher resolution than the authors of GTrav originally intended but that's his right and something I'm sympathetic to. IMHO too much of GTrav is a case of Gurps being adapted to Traveller whether that makes sense or not.

Just personally I never went farther than rebuilding the missiles to make sense.
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Old 12-28-2019, 12:08 PM   #8
hal
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Buffalo, New York
Default Re: Revisting the Beowulf

Quote:
Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
To come to Hal's defense he isn't assuming anything. The rules from the Various GTrav books he's referred to and from Ve2 which were used to build the modules say exactly what he says they do.

For example, those are Ve2 lasers with an innate ROF of 1/2. There were no alterations made to them to slow them down to 1/60. If taken to a gound unit and hoked up to a alrger power source (quite possibly an energy bank) they would fire at 1/2 in the default Gurps scale of time and distance quite happily.

Now Hal is choosing to play Gurps Traveller at a higher resolution than the authors of GTrav originally intended but that's his right and something I'm sympathetic to. IMHO too much of GTrav is a case of Gurps being adapted to Traveller whether that makes sense or not.

Just personally I never went farther than rebuilding the missiles to make sense.
And to further back up what Fred is saying...

GURPS TRAVELLER is its own beast when compared against the original Traveller and even subsequent Traveller.

For example, Mongoose Traveller's rules are such that they still retain the life support costs every 2 weeks, and that the fusion power plants still utilize a given amount of hydrogen fuel every week measured in 500 cubic feet amounts per week (ie dTons of fuel per day/week based on power plant rating). T5.1 is Marc Miller's ultimate rule system that has a VERY detailed ship design system - which GURPS VEHICLES could not emulate in the slightest.

So, back to the topic...

If you accept the modules without thinking, then you won't realize that what I pointed out is true - t hat the energy production of a standard tramp freighter is over powered for what it needs.

Now, here's a thought experiment - assuming you're the GM of your game...

If you told your players just how much energy is being produced by the power plants of a standard Empress Marava class ship, and then you told the players how much each "system" required in game play, how long do you think it would take for a player to realize that there is a fair amount of energy not being used?

The ONLY energy plant hits in the basic rules (Page 174 of GURPS TRAVELLER 2nd edition) suggest that the ship either loses sufficient energy that both the Jump Drive and the Maneuver Drive values can only be powered to half value (A roll of a 9 on the Major Damage Table) or all of the power plant energy is useless (a Roll of an 18 on the Major Damage table).

There are NO other damage results for power plants.

I can see why GURPS authors chose the path they did, because running a ship combat using the GURPS VEHICLES 2nd edition rules might have been more prolonged and perhaps less satisfying. Truth be told?

I get more enjoyment playing MAYDAY and Little Black book #2 style ship combat in TRAVELLER than I do with GURPS TRAVELLER. Where I like GURPS TRAVELLER however, is that their sensor rules are nicer than the rules given in the original classic Traveller rules from the late 70's and early 80's.

Ever try merging Mayday with High Guard? Interestingly enough, it is possible.

On that note, I'll let you have fun digging into the rules - as Fred points out, nothing I did was outside the rules as written, nor was what I pointed out a function of "loop holes". I went strictly with the rules for module design and paid close attention to them (much as I did back in 1998).
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Old 12-29-2019, 07:01 AM   #9
Anaraxes
 
Join Date: Sep 2007
Default Re: Revisting the Beowulf

Quote:
Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
To come to Hal's defense he isn't assuming anything. The rules from the Various GTrav books he's referred to and from Ve2 which were used to build the modules say exactly what he says they do.
Sure. That just means the rules author was the one making assumptions. But if Hal (or some other GM) doesn't like those implications, it's pretty easy not to make the same assumptions. Always worth taking a look at, simply because your players probably will at some point -- and it's better if the GM has already considered the implications and decided which of the alternative consequences they want to see.

Some people like to play the rules deconstruction game for its own sake. But if you're going to get around to actually playing the game, at some point the group or at least the GM has to make some decisions about how they want the game to look and feel. And those decisions are really personal preference. (Will it be fun if the PCs all hotshot their lasers out of the gate? (Will it still be fun when everyone else does the same thing, as they're just as logical and capable as the PCs, so you're playing the very expensive eggshell with hammers game? Is it only fun when the PCs have a pocket battleship compared to the mooks in other ships? They're all valid styles.)

Ultimately, whether the rules are complete homebrew, published rules with houserules, or rules that are a bible of canon slavishly adhered to with any logical consequences accepted on their face (perhaps discarding the rules entirely and moving from system to system to find one you like under this interpretation), the group is making some pre-determined assumptions about what they want to see and deciding whether or not they're accepting some projected consequence of any rule that doesn't match their preferences. Making those individual decisions is inevitable, so you might as well do it consciously.

Which awareness involves investigating the consequences and questions raised by any particular set of rules. (So, thanks, Hal! It saves the rest of us that much more work.)
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