|
12-01-2019, 11:31 PM | #1 |
Join Date: Dec 2018
Location: Hirakata, Osaka, Japan
|
Space Mining: Ore Availability and Yield
An exploratory prospecting vessel would make an interesting Traveller campaign, but I'm wondering if GURPS has published a system for mining that would give a table of ore availability and yield. The GM could just make it a long task and assign some arbitrary amount of ore available, but it would be fun to have a random ore generator, and a system to see how much prospectors retrieve after working for a set amount of hours.
|
12-04-2019, 06:12 AM | #2 |
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: near Houston
|
Re: Space Mining: Ore Availability and Yield
There was an article in the old print JTAS that covered mining for Classic Traveller, and was reprinted in Best of Vol 1. Included a two page flowchart and a list of all the required rolls. It doesn't go into a lot of detailed on specific ores that can be found.
Book 6: Scoundrels for Mongoose Traveller has a three page chapter on mining, including two pages of charts and one page of "life in the belt". Neither are quite what you are asking for, but they are the closest I have available to refer you to.
__________________
A generous and sadistic GM, Brandon Cope GURPS 3e stuff: http://copeab.tripod.com |
12-04-2019, 07:57 AM | #3 |
Join Date: Jul 2007
|
Re: Space Mining: Ore Availability and Yield
In the brand new Xboat issue #2, there is a four page article on asteroid mining "Based on the original charts from JTAS."
But I am not sure if there is a way to get it yet if you weren't in the Kickstarter.
__________________
-- Burma! |
12-04-2019, 04:11 PM | #4 |
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Berkeley, CA
|
Re: Space Mining: Ore Availability and Yield
Realistically this is going to be super boring (the geological processes that create concentrated veins of ore don't exist in asteroids, so much a question of whether it's mostly silicates or mostly nickel-iron, plus ice in the outer system), but that doesn't make for much of a game.
I would avoid using random tables, though, because the interesting thing from a campaign standpoint isn't the mining itself, it's the shenanigans around the mining (claim jumping, etc). |
12-04-2019, 06:31 PM | #5 |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: traveller
|
Re: Space Mining: Ore Availability and Yield
GURPS Transhuman Space: Deep Beyond discusses asteroid mining (pp. 34-36), but doesn't have any tables.
Classic Traveller offers the Beltstrike module boxed set, which expands on the JTAS article. It has a fairly detailed prospecting procedure, based on somewhat dated (i.e., pre-Grand Tack model) stellar system physics. The asteroid types are still as Anthony says. The discoverable resources are different than the JTAS article: radioactives*, dense metals, crystals, and artifacts. For what it's worth, I tried to write up belters for GURPS Traveller. I couldn't make the economics of independent prospectors and miners work without some kind of "space diamonds" or unobtanium. *Radioactives are mostly not, in fact, good asteroidal resources. They are concentrated by the geological processes that occur on planetary surfaces. |
12-04-2019, 06:57 PM | #6 |
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Berkeley, CA
|
Re: Space Mining: Ore Availability and Yield
That statement is true of just about any resource you might name. They're a bit better for finding siderophile minerals because most of Earth's supply is trapped in its core, but it's still along the lines of "purify a thousand tons of iron to get a kilogram of platinum", and more problematically, there isn't a "mother lode" out there, one nickel-iron asteroid has the same stuff in it as another.
|
12-04-2019, 07:20 PM | #7 | |
Join Date: Aug 2007
|
Re: Space Mining: Ore Availability and Yield
Quote:
The science Anthony and Thrash mention as applying to asteroids untouched by the Ancients is ast least as borign and unhelpful as they imply. The "geology" of these post-catastrophe asteroid belts is the same as that of the terrestriakl type worlds they used to be enlived by Ancint artifacts or at least semi-melted hyperdense battlearmor. Remeber: all Traveller problems that can not be solved by Vilani conservatism can be solved by the Ancients!
__________________
Fred Brackin |
|
12-08-2019, 01:26 PM | #8 | |
Join Date: Dec 2018
Location: Hirakata, Osaka, Japan
|
Re: Space Mining: Ore Availability and Yield
Quote:
|
|
12-17-2019, 08:10 PM | #9 |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Buffalo, New York
|
Re: Space Mining: Ore Availability and Yield
Mongoose Traveller also has rules for asteroid mining that is based upon BELTSTRIKE if that helps.
|
12-08-2019, 01:22 PM | #10 | |
Join Date: Dec 2018
Location: Hirakata, Osaka, Japan
|
Re: Space Mining: Ore Availability and Yield
These sources both sound interesting. I'll check them out. Thank you! :-)
Quote:
|
|
Tags |
science fiction, space, traveller |
|
|