pirate fleets?

Baransky:

>I'm excited by the discussions about TCS.  Does this mean that people
>are playing it, or are interested in playing it?  Anyone want to play
>over the net?

Sure!  I'm willing if you are.   ---Steve.


As to your piracy comments, I agree with almost averything (for once).
You overlooked the need for maintenance in your assertions about pirate
basing:  it doesn't matter how big space is if there are only 12 worlds
in the sector that can do annual overhaul on your ship - you'll have to
be one of those places sooner or later.


Hans:

>Halving the number of ship works better (though not well). Jump-4 ships
>can get from Jewell to Rhylanor and from Iderati to Glisten in less
>than six weeks. That means 3/4 of a fleet is available for patrol duty
>at all times, even in Jewell and Five Sisters. And the ships going back
>and forth can do a spot of patrolling on the way to and from refitting.
>That makes Lanth and District 268 some of the _best_ patrolled area in
>the Marches!

Well, if you cross Lanth in less than six weeks on the way to Jewell,
you won't patrol more than a few hours in each of three systems in
Lanth.  That isn't much patrolling.


>Well, since I've always assumed that navy ships could refit at naval
>bases (and this is also the impression one gets from other Traveller
>material  - look at the piece about naval bases in _Fighting Ships_ for
>example), that is one "solution" I hadn't even contemplated. I have
>now, and no thanks.  I'd like a half-way believable explanation,
>please. If I'd been satisfied with an explanation to the effect that a
>tech-15 culture can't make things that can survive more than a few
>months without servicing, I'd have chosen something even easier and
>just as believable (like the merchant fleet uses up nearly all the
>lanthanum, and there's very little left over for the navies (how's that
>for a clever explanation? ;-)). An explanation that makes naval ships
>worse_ than civilian ships is no help at all...

True.  However, halving 5,000,000 anti-piracy ships to 2,500,000 is not
really any help either.


>I think we're both arguing the same side of the issue. Wether TCS makes
>a false asumption or ignores a crucial element is immaterial. Something
>is wrong anyway.

Also true.  Suggestions on how to fix?


>Whoa there! Let's not destroy the Traveller universe completely! Forget
>unlimited selfreproducing robots. If you allow them, you might as well
>roll up the universe and carry it away. If that means we have to
>believe an impossible thing or two more, so be it. A culture who can
>build self-reproducing robots would be nice to live in (I'd be able to
>play games all the time and let the robots worry about the food and
>rent), but it would be a lousy place to game in. Soething like that
>"Safe at any speed" story by Larry Niven. Repeat after me: "There are
>limits to ressources in all Traveller societies! There are limits..."

I agree here.  Notice that I assume that society still plays monetary
games so as to ARTIFICIALLY limit resources.  Yes, I made the comment
that you responded to, but I am willing to argue a point from internal
logic without reference to Gaming logic:  It SHOULD be true at TL15.  It
makes a lousy game so it's not, but it SHOULD be.


>But changing the way the military budget is divided between System,
>Subsector and Imperial Navy might help. I've been using 1/3 each, so
>changing that to 1/2, 1/4, 1/4 or something could help a bit.

Check background material:  The existing split should be 70% system, 30%
split between subsector and Imperial navies, in whatever ratio is
convenient (slightly less to the Impy Navy, since TL15 ships cost less
than TL13 ships do).


>Good point. I hadn't considered that. Sigh! On the other hand, one
>little merchant can keep a pirate fed for a long time, so the
>pirates wouldn't need more than a very small amount of piracy...

No.  The pirate has some expensive repairs to make fairly regularly.
His maintenance facility is not nearby, so he has to make regular LONG
transits with no income (it wouldn't do to give the Impy computers
enough data to guess where you get your ship overhauled).  The pirate
will need to make a lot of hits during the period he is on station to
make ends meet.  If he takes out one ship in three hundred, then
Imperial trade will collapse.


>What has that got to do with it? At the very least there was one
>government after them (Spain), and that government fleet were too
>small to deal with them. And no, they didn't shelter behind another
>country's fleet, because for long stretches of time neither England,
>France or Holland had any warships in the Carribean at all.

At the very least, it gave them a safe place to buy new cannons.  You
don't have to shelter behind their fleet, you have to shelter in their
harbors.


>>In virtually every case of persistent piracy in this world,
>>the "pirates" were essentially foreign warships operating against
>>merchant shipping.
>
>I have to disagree most strongly here. It's true that lots of pirates
>tried to hide behind letters of marque (often having a set from each
>beligerent), which tended to give privateers a bad name, but there was
>a great distinction between them. Privateers that were known to stick
>to privateering were tolerated by their friends and might even survive
>being captured by the enemy. A pirate would be hunted down by both
>sides.

Depends on how you define "pirate" I suppose.  The British (during the
Napoleanic Wars) did not issue Letters of Marque, and did not respect
them.  The French did.  The Americans did.  Notice that the highest
levels of piracy in history were during wars, and caused by the
privateers of one side.  Invariably the other side called them
"pirates".  The writers of Histories called them whichever their own
prejudices lent them to.


Later...

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I have learned to use the word "impossible" with the greatest caution.
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