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scc · 10-16-2021, 04:23 AM

So to deal with a brain worm I need some help coming up with new formula's for Vehicles for Hypderdrives, Reactionless Thrusters, Artificial Gravity, and maybe some other things. Please note that what I need help with isn't advanced enough to be called an idea, it's more of a vision, that of a single early Starfighter and a small carrier that carries it, coupled with some ideas I've had for a Sci-Fi/Space setting for a while, and please send help because the side of me that likes to tinker wants to design these two ships with Vehicles with a side order of Mecha for weapons.

Now as I'm going to be building this in Vehicles I need to spend a moment talking about Tech Levels, Vehicles, being a 3rd Ed book, uses that editions TL's, which place things about one TL lower, and I'm going to be using 3rd Ed. TL's for the rest of this post, so in your head add 1 to any TL's mentioned from here on. For example Lasers are TL8 in 3rd Ed. but TL9 currently.

So, yeah the rules, such as they are, for what I'm wanting to do. Reactionless drives exist and their subject to the Boost Drive rules sort-of, maybe. Yeah, because that makes sense. Starting this is hard, but for tactical combat a Reactionless drive has a top speed, something like 30 seconds of acceleration, because that's the way they seem to work in fiction, yes break the laws of physics, but Reactionless drives do that anyway, so it's not really a big problem to do it to make craft using them act like space fighters. That's for tactical drives. Transit drives are either Reactionless drives switched to a mode that allows for a much higher, or unlimited, top speed, but at the cost of acceleration, or normal reaction drives are used for transiting. It's quite possible that it's a two stage thing, reaction drives at first, switching to reactionless once they're figured out better.

So my thoughts are the TL10 Super-Thruster @ TL8, the TL11 Standard Thruster @ TL9 and then then TL11 Super-Thruster @ TL10, with a revised cost. And that should be enough for the short term. This is why I make these sorts of posts, they help me work things out. Powering this is a problem, looks like I'll need MHD turbines or power banks, at least for tactical combat early on, which is an interesting complication. And also answers the question transit drives, they're reaction, at least early on.

Artificial Gravity, Vehicles says it's TL10, but it's also superscience, so if I want it at TL8, it's at TL8. That said, what does it cost to add it to a ship at that level? Do I just use the stock TL10 costs or do I increase them or something else entirely, let me know!

So last, Hyperdrives, the hardest one to do. The system I'm going for most closely resembles Babylon 5 with a side order of Dune or BattleTech. There are two pieces of equipment that are related to hyperspace travel, the Hyperdrive, which keeps you in Hyperspace, and is mounted on vessels the size of modern cruisers; and the Hypermotivator, which allows you to access Hyperspace and is the size of a cruiser. Early on Hypermotivators can only be found in B5 style Jumpgates, which are still important later on simply because Jumpgates allow for faster travel. For the Hyperdrives I'll probably use existing Hyperdrives costs and size, but for Hypermotivators, well there are at least two factors that control them, the max tonnage that can pass through them and their speed factor, this speed factor is important because this cubed is how much faster vessel that used it is faster then it would be in real space, and it squared should probably be part of the equation, so this is where I really need help, any suggestions for how big one of these should be?

10-16-2021, 04:23 AM	#1
scc Join Date: Mar 2013	Help With Hyperspace! So to deal with a brain worm I need some help coming up with new formula's for *Vehicles* for Hypderdrives, Reactionless Thrusters, Artificial Gravity, and maybe some other things. Please note that what I need help with isn't advanced enough to be called an idea, it's more of a vision, that of a single early Starfighter and a small carrier that carries it, coupled with some ideas I've had for a Sci-Fi/Space setting for a while, and please send help because the side of me that likes to tinker wants to design these two ships with *Vehicles* with a side order of *Mecha* for weapons. Now as I'm going to be building this in *Vehicles* I need to spend a moment talking about Tech Levels, *Vehicles, being a 3rd Ed book, uses that editions TL's, which place things about one TL lower, and I'm going to be using 3rd Ed. TL's for the rest of this post, so in your head add 1 to any TL's mentioned from here on. For example Lasers are TL8 in 3rd Ed. but TL9 currently. So, yeah the rules, such as they are, for what I'm wanting to do. Reactionless drives exist and their subject to the Boost Drive rules sort-of, maybe. Yeah, because that makes sense. Starting this is hard, but for tactical combat a Reactionless drive has a top speed, something like 30 seconds of acceleration, because that's the way they seem to work in fiction, yes break the laws of physics, but Reactionless drives do that anyway, so it's not really a big problem to do it to make craft using them act like space fighters. That's for tactical drives. Transit drives are either Reactionless drives switched to a mode that allows for a much higher, or unlimited, top speed, but at the cost of acceleration, or normal reaction drives are used for transiting. It's quite possible that it's a two stage thing, reaction drives at first, switching to reactionless once they're figured out better. So my thoughts are the TL10 Super-Thruster @ TL8, the TL11 Standard Thruster @ TL9 and then then TL11 Super-Thruster @ TL10, with a revised cost. And that should be enough for the short term. This is why I make* these sorts of posts, they help me work things out. Powering this is a problem, looks like I'll need MHD turbines or power banks, at least for tactical combat early on, which is an interesting complication. And also answers the question transit drives, they're reaction, at least early on. Artificial Gravity, *Vehicles* says it's TL10, but it's also superscience, so if I want it at TL8, it's at TL8. That said, what does it cost to add it to a ship at that level? Do I just use the stock TL10 costs or do I increase them or something else entirely, let me know! So last, Hyperdrives, the hardest one to do. The system I'm going for most closely resembles Babylon 5 with a side order of Dune or BattleTech. There are two pieces of equipment that are related to hyperspace travel, the Hyperdrive, which keeps you in Hyperspace, and is mounted on vessels the size of modern cruisers; and the Hypermotivator, which allows you to access Hyperspace and is the size of a cruiser. Early on Hypermotivators can only be found in B5 style Jumpgates, which are still important later on simply because Jumpgates allow for faster travel. For the Hyperdrives I'll probably use existing Hyperdrives costs and size, but for Hypermotivators, well there are at least two factors that control them, the max tonnage that can pass through them and their speed factor, this speed factor is important because this cubed is how much faster vessel that used it is faster then it would be in real space, and it squared should probably be part of the equation, so this is where I really need help, any suggestions for how big one of these should be?