Mark F. Cook · 14 February 1990
This one ought to draw some interesting comments.
I'm about to start up my traveller game with all-new PC's that my players
just generated. Out of the entire group, two of the PC's have starships
(a class-S for the retired scout PC, and a Far Trader for the retired
merchant PC). Now this is where it gets interesting.
The scout PC is assumed to have his ship as a loan of indefinite duration,
but the merchant PC is assumed to have acquired his via purchase or some-
such (the rules are not specific about this). However, the rules DO say
that he also acquired a 40-year mortgage to go along with the ship. They
do not go into detail about how this should be managed.
Let us assume that the merchant acquired a USED Far Trader (list price:
MCr. 41.07) and that after initial depreciation and down-payment, that
he is left with MCr. 20.535 (50% of the original price) to amortize over
a 40 year period. I also assume quarterly, rather then monthly, payments
(since being in a position to drop off a check at the mortgage-holding
financial institution on a monthly basis may be difficult for a ship
that could be anywhere within a 50-or-so parsec radius).
Given these assumptions, let's used the information from "Starship
Purchase" (pg. 89, MT Imperial Encyclopedia) to generate an amortized
loan payment schedule and see what happens.
After all of the numbers given, the book says that the final cost to the
new ship owner (principal and interest) should be 220% of the original
purchase price. For the used starship (above), that would be MCr. 45.177.
Reverse calculation of a 40-year amortized loan with that amount as the
ultimate total gives us an interest rate of 4.63%. The quarterly payment
turns out to be Cr. 282,496.92 (every 3 months). This is a lot of cash!
If we assume that this is reasonably accurate, then the question is: Can
the PC actually expect to generate enough income to make the payments and
still have enough left over to live on? Notice that we haven't even touched
on the issues of crew salaries, annual maintenance costs, fuel, and general
upkeep. These will be considered later.
According to specs. in "Supplement 7: Traders and Gunboats", the ship can
carry 7 High/Mid passengers, 4 in Low Passage, and 46 tons of freight. If
we assume best case (7 High Psg, 4 Low Psg, and full cargo hold) then we
have Cr. 10,000 x 7, Cr. 1,000 x 4, and Cr. 1,000 x 46. This represents
a potential maximum of Cr. 120,000 per week. So assuming this PC is Super-
Trader, and could accomplish this week after week, we have a revenue
potential of MCr. 1.44 per quarter, before expenses, and not considering
port time for freight transfer, refueling, etc. After deducting the
quarterly mortgage payment, we're left with MCr. ~1.158, before expenses,
as profit. So much for best case.
Now, let's try something more realistic. Assume 50% of the time is spend
in port, refueling, haggling for freight and passengers, etc. Further
assume that, on average, the ship is only operating at have capacity for
cargo and passagers. This reduces the gross quarterly income to Cr. 360,000
(again, before expenses). Deduct the quarterly mortgage payment, and we're
left with Cr. 77,503.08 to cover 3 months worth of expenses.
Now, let's look at what it costs to run this starship.
First, there's fuel. In 12 weeks, this ship will jump 6 times and burn
45 days worth of maneuver and powerplant fuel (based on the 50% active
assumption). The ship has a jump-2 drive but we'll assume that only 1/3
of the jumps are jump-2; the other 2/3 are jump-1. This means that total
fuel consumption for 4 jump-1 and 2 jump-2 trips (based on ship design
from MT Referee's Manual) is 1,620 kliters, at Cr. 35/kl., works out to
cost of Cr. 56,700. For the powerplant, which uses (1.107 kl./hr. x 24 hrs.
x 45 days x Cr. 35/kl.), we have a total maneuver & powerplant fuel cost of
Cr. 41,844.60. Add these two together, and we get a total quarterly cost
of Cr. 98,544.60. Oops! We've already exceeding our available cash!
Therefore, the ship must rely, at least partially, on refuelling from
natural sources (gas-giants or water-worlds). Let's assume 50% of the
fuel is acquired this way. Now, our quarterly fuel bill drops down to
Cr. 49,272.30. Let's hope the ship doesn't wear out prematurely from all
of that atmosphere skimming :-).
Next, we have life support for 3 crew members, 1/2 of 7 High/Mid passengers,
and 1/2 of 4 Low passengers (we will assume for the sake of the merchants
wallet that none of the freight requires life support). The Imperial
Encyclopedia says that each stateroom requires Cr. 2000 of support per
2 week trip, and each Low berth requires Cr. 100 per usage. If we assume
that the crew-members consume life support equal to 1 Mid psg. passenger,
(say, 80% of 1 High psg. passenger), then for each 1-way trip we use
(High Psg=Cr. 2000 x 0.5 x 3.5) + (Mid Psg= Cr. 1600 x 0.5 x 1.5) + (Low
Psg= Cr. 100 x 2) for a total of Cr. 4,900. We assume no LS is used while
a ship is in port.
Then there are crew salaries to worry about. For a Far Trader, the crew
consists of 1 Bridge crew-member (Pilot), 1 Engineer, and 1 Medic/Steward.
If we assume that the pilot is the owner, then we must only pay the Engineer
and the Steward. Given the "skill levels" recently posted by METLAY (which
are pretty good definitions, IMHO), the Engineer and Steward are probably
both level-2 for purposes of salary determination. For these levels (and
assuming the Engineer achieved O-3 in the Merchants), the salaries should
be Cr. 1950/mo. for the Engineer and Cr. 1000/mo. for the Steward. Quarterly,
this would be Cr. 8,850.
The annual maintenance fee cannot be avoided, if the ship is to keep flying.
This amounts to 0.1% of the cash price of the ship annually (Cr. 20,535,
in this case), which works out to Cr. 5,133.75 per quarter.
Finally, we have berthing costs. This includes landing fees, handling costs,
facilities use charges, and other miscellaneous starport expenses. The
average cost is Cr. 100 for the first 6 days in port, plus Cr. 100 for each
additional day beyond 6. If we assume that the ship is in port 50% of the
time, the we have 6 weeks at Cr. 200/week, or Cr. 1,200.
So, the bottom line is Cr. 49,272.30 for fuel, Cr. 4,900 for Life Support,
8,850 in salaries, and Cr. 1,200 in berthing fees, which works out to a
total of Cr. 64,222.30. Out of Cr. 77,503.08, we are left with Cr. 13,280.78
for quarterly profit, or Cr. 53,123.12 per year.
Before taxes, but that's another story.
Mark F. Cook
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