: From: Adrian Hurt [email removed]
: Subject: Re: potential energy in the Traveller (and other) universe
:
: What is the equation relating potential energy to distance, once you allow
: for the fact that gravitational attraction is itself dependent on distance?
: Specifically, does your potential energy increase or decrease as your distance
: from the attracting body increases? I know the simple equation for potential
: energy assuming that gravity is constant, which is a reasonable approximation
: as long as you don't get too far from Earth, but which is useless at distances
: such as from Earth to the Moon. I never did take Physics beyond high school,
: unfortunately!
I don't remember the formula either. I think that there is a certain
amount of energy which is enough to overcome ALL of the gravitational
potential energy of the Earth. If you assume that energy is kinetic
energy, then you can divide out mass from the equations and get an
escape velocity. I would say that for a jump drive to land you 1/2
way between Sol and Alpha Centauri, it would have to expend more than
enough energy to bring the ship to escape velocity.
Also, I might have misled you by saying that both Sol and Alpha Centauri
dominate the equations. This would be true perhaps if a ship jumped
directly from Sol to Alpha Centauri. Jumping only half way, though...
Hmm... I guess that you do lose potential energy over that 2 lightyear
span. I don't know how much it would account for so far away from
Alpha Centauri, though.
I was thinking along the lines of Larry Niven style jump drives, I guess.
In that case, jumps are made between stars, not into open space.
: > True, but I don't think Traveller was THAT broken. Some of the
: > stats might have to be altered or given further constraints.
:
: Well, the fact that the computer rules are going to have to be rewritten will
: make ship designs obsolete. Besides, most MT ships are designed at TL 15,
: and are therefore knocked out by this stupid virus. The same probably goes
: for any TL 15 vehicle more advanced than an air/raft. If the drive rules are
: changed, so that fuel and drives take up more or less volume, then old ships
: will be either illegal or sufficiently inferior to be useless.
OK, so maybe altering the stats won't be enough. But Jump-4 and
Maneuver-3 should still be understandable under the new system.
Also, they should have at least the same range of weapons and
equipment. If I have characters aboard a ship in the old system,
I want to be ABLE to convert to the new system. And I don't want
to have to give up my repulsor bay because these are not included
in the new rules.
: > Actually, if you want realistic rolls, you should provide for
: > open-ended die rolls. For example, use a d12 numbered from
: > 0-11, where 11 means roll again and add 10, and 0 on the first
: > roll only means roll again and subtract from 0. This makes it
: > possible for anyone to succeed or fail tremendously at any
: > task.
:
: Apart from the D12 (who needs yet another sort of die? :-) I'd agree
: with that.
You're right, and open-ended rolls can be made on d6's (6 means
roll again and add 5, 1 means roll again and subtract 5 -- once
you roll a 6 or 1, the other (1 or 6) loses its special meaning).
: > If GDW decides to use d20, however, they should NOT make the
: > low rolls mean success. People naturally tend to think of
: > high rolls as success.
:
: On the other hand, it means that all those loaded dice are going to be
: useless. I quite like the idea of having some things be successful on
: high rolls, and some things be successful on low rolls. Just watch
: for people who have two sets of dice. :-)
Why not just load the dice to always roll 10's and load up on skills?
8-)
gsw