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Old 06-04-2021, 08:45 PM   #21
Fred Brackin
 
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Default Re: Jump Distance

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Originally Posted by Toltrin View Post
Are there not civilizations that have metallic hydrogen and double J-6 drives even before the 3rd Emperium?
Not metallic hydrogen. The classic era of Traveller setting creation was before that bit of science was really understood.

For the most advanced tech in Traveller see if you can find a copy of GT:Alien Races 3. I think you can get it legally on disk.
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Old 06-05-2021, 02:10 PM   #22
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Default Re: Jump Distance

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Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
Not metallic hydrogen. The classic era of Traveller setting creation was before that bit of science was really understood.

For the most advanced tech in Traveller see if you can find a copy of GT:Alien Races 3. I think you can get it legally on disk.
Or on PDF from Warehouse 23.
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Old 06-06-2021, 10:26 AM   #23
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The real kicker is metallic hydrogen, which, giving that stuff actually labeled "superdense" is available in stable enough form to use as armor, should be *easy* with Traveller tech. And totally destructive to canon ship designs, with theoretical densities *starting* at over 10 times that of liquid hydrogen and going up to like 60 times for some phases.
Then most designs should use metallic hydrogen.

I think that you have to consider why the original Traveller rules made the decisions that they did.

The jump drives and the need to constantly refuel force the players to interact with planets, rather than using a warp drive to travel from system A to system B without having encounters. Most of the fun in these games involves this sort of encounter.
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Old 06-06-2021, 12:29 PM   #24
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Default Re: Jump Distance

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Then most designs should use metallic hydrogen.

I think that you have to consider why the original Traveller rules made the decisions that they did.
Mostly because Traveller is space opera that tries to pretend it isn't.
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Old 06-06-2021, 09:52 PM   #25
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Mostly because Traveller is space opera that tries to pretend it isn't.
I think that the original CT books weren't really space opera. However, once High Guard came out and GDW developed The Imperium, I think it became a space opera, with huge ships.

However, some of us still like to play Traveller with smaller ships only. At least some times.
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Old 06-06-2021, 09:54 PM   #26
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Default Re: Jump Distance

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Then most designs should use metallic hydrogen.

I think that you have to consider why the original Traveller rules made the decisions that they did.

The jump drives and the need to constantly refuel force the players to interact with planets, rather than using a warp drive to travel from system A to system B without having encounters. Most of the fun in these games involves this sort of encounter.
I suspect that the writers knew that nuclear fusion was much more energy dense than chemical combustion, but thought that meant it was 100 or 1000 times better, when it is more like 1,000,000 times better.

If the jump drives are using that much hydrogen, you need a lot of hand-waving to explain why any world with a grounded Beowulf doesn't have effectively unlimited energy too cheap to meter.
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Old 06-07-2021, 12:18 AM   #27
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Default Re: Jump Distance

I think the range of starships are a matter of bounding the abilities of space travel rather than trying to explain how it works.
Having a finite resource, volume, seems to work in limiting what could turn into travelling an almost unlimited range in one jump. I am sure Mike Miller, the founder of Travelers, had discussions like this with his design team.
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Old 06-09-2021, 02:24 AM   #28
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Default Re: Jump Distance

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Originally Posted by ericbsmith View Post
With few exceptions, all Traveller ships are designed to do one Jump at their maximum Jump rating. The 100-dTon Suliman-class Scout is rated for Jump 2, so it has enough fuel to make one 2-parsec Jump and will need to refuel. Or it could make two 1-parsec Jumps without refueling between them.

Some ships may put a collapsible fuel tank in the cargo hold, allowing it to make an extra jump. Others use external "drop" tanks, which allow them to jettison the tanks before they jump, conserving internal fuel for a second jump at the destination.

However, the normal procedure is to make a single jump consuming all internal fuel and then refuel at the destination. Most ships have at least a minimal fuel processor which will allow them to slowly refuel in a gas giant or from ice asteroids if they get stuck in a system without refueling infrastructure.
In TNE, a number of ships can, if they really want, eke out another J1 from maneuver fuel. It's all the same stuff. But that's due to differences in technical architecture in rules. A few can get an additional J2.
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Old 06-10-2021, 02:25 PM   #29
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Default Re: Jump Distance

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Mostly because Traveller is space opera that tries to pretend it isn't.
I think Traveller falls in between hard science and space opera. Faster than light travel, gravity control, power plants without massive radiators, and psionic powers are all superscience, but all conventional features of "hard science except . . ." tradition. (Scooping fuel from gas giants without being cooked by radiation also bends the rules.)

Once things like nuclear dampers (Mercenary) and meson weapons and communication are added (High Guard, it moved deeper into superscience. (Particle beam weapons that can penetrate the radiation shields that allow gas giant scooping also bend science.)

But in spite of the presence of a lot of superscience, I think Traveller stays clear of space opera by keeping a hard science philosophy around its superscience. In other words, I see a distinction between superscience that follows consistent rules and space opera, where the needs of the story regularly overrule previously established superscience.

A good intermediate label might be "rigorous superscience".
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Old 06-14-2021, 06:31 AM   #30
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Default Re: Jump Distance

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But in spite of the presence of a lot of superscience, I think Traveller stays clear of space opera by keeping a hard science philosophy around its superscience. In other words, I see a distinction between superscience that follows consistent rules and space opera, where the needs of the story regularly overrule previously established superscience.

A good intermediate label might be "rigorous superscience".
Marc intended it to be Space Opera, pure and simple. He's said so in a number of venues. The reading list in Sup 4 is very much space opera...

MegaTraveller was done by DGP under license from GDW. Marc had limited input.
TNE was done by others at GDW, with only minimal input from Marc.

Marc admits to having approved both the Rebellion and the Virus.
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