Bruce Pihlamae:
>The simplest solution to this would be to slow down StutterWarp
>in-system and change the 100 diameter rule to 1,000. You could really
>complicate this by having StutterWarp not work at all within a certain
>range of a planet and force use of standard TRAVELLER in-system drives.
The simplest solution is just to raise your hand, and decree that
stutterwarp has always been the way things work. But it wouldn't be the
Imperium we've been playing in all these years if you did. Anymore than
changing the jump limit to 1000-diameters would be.
And stutterwarp already won't function within some specific distance
(the point where local gravity is greater than 0.1G).
Consider also that if you switch to 1000-diameters, then all I have to
do is NOT USE SW. If I accelerate through normal space, then I'm
probably moving a couple thousand Km/s relative to a SW-driven pirate,
so after he disables me, he has to spend a couple of days matching
course before he can loot me. By then, I've made repairs and pushed the
jump button.
Lewis Taylor Goss:
>The 100 diameter rule is an aspect of TravPhysics only, a creation for
>game purposes, to make the travel time to jump point about 3 days for
>the most common (1G) craft. The TravPhysics argument is that only at
>this range is gravity weak enough to allow a safe jump. But, why 100
>diameters, as opposed to say 1000 diameters, or 10,000 diameters? In
>Traveller/MT, it takes far too long to travel this far on even 6G. But
>in TNE, even an emasculated Stutterwarp can travel to 1000 diameters in
>less than three days. I suggest that the diameter limit be explicitly
>set so that a ship equipped with the most common type of Stutterwarp
>drive takes about three days to travel that distance.
Where did you get the impression it takes 3 days to reach the jump limit
in Trav? At 1G in our solar system, it can be done in less than 4.5
hours. If you push the limit to 1000-diameters, then a 6G ship can do
it in 2.5 days. A 1G ship could make 1000-diameters in a little over 6
days.
>This would allow us to have our Stutterwarp and Piracy too. So, maybe
>the diameter limit has increased by a couple of orders of magnitude.
No. Then you'd have to change sensor ranges so you can detect those
ships at long enough ranges that you can find them. Then change weapon
ranges so you can get a few hits on them. Then when you realize that
the navy has the same stuff, change them all again so the Navy can't
detect the pirates, but the pirates can detect the merchants.
And if you are making random changes to Trav physics, why not just
switch to SW completely, discarding the last ten years worth of work
completely?
>Like it really matters. This can even be worked into the MT/2300AD
>background, like so:
>There was an article in the Journal of the Traveller's Aid Society
>several years ago, in which Marc Miller suggested that nothing was
>known about Jump Drive physics in our era because a society could not
>begin to do the proper research until it had set up permanent bases
>beyond 100 diameters from its primary star. In the case of the
>Terrans, this meant not until they had developed bases in the Asteroid
>Belt.
Yes, I read the article. Fascinating. But wrong. 100-diameters from
Sol is only 139,190,000Km. Which is closer to the sun than Earth is.
So all you'd really need is a lab about 1,300,000Km from Earth.
>In Traveller: The New Era, this becomes: Nothing was known about Jump
>Drive physics in our era because a society could not begin to do the
>proper research until it had set up permanent bases beyond N diameters
>from its primary star. In the case of the Terrans, this meant not
>until they had developed deep space bases beyond the orbit of Pluto.
>(I assume hear that N will be quite large, placing any ships attempting
>to jump in deep space).
Again, why bother? If you want to throw out all that has gone before,
you can just wave your hand and say whatever you want. But is it
Traveller if you do? The rules are going to be different, so if you
change the background assumptions, you're playing a completely different
game. Possibly a lot of fun, but not Traveller.
>The best thing about this retcon, is that it leaves things largely
>unchanged. Travel time from port to jump-point will be unchanged.
>Travel time from port to gas-giant will be much shorter, but travel
>time from gas-giant to jump-point should be approximately the same,
>perhaps a bit longer. Travel between planets in a system will be much
>shorter, but the most common form of travel in Classic Trav is
>interplanetary, the time for which should remain unchanged.
Not really. Have you ever tried to predict the position of a SW ship an
hour in advance? If not, try it sometime. Then try to predict the
position of a normal M-drive ship an hour in advance. Notice the
difference between the two. Changing the physics so that the timing is
the same WILL NOT leave a virtually identical universe, with a few
buzzwords changed.
>And finally, it will make piracy a realistic option. Pirates will be
>able to lurk in deep space, waiting for the unsuspecting merchant ship,
>and then pow!
See above for comments on changes required to make piracy work in deep
space. Remember that sensors only detect ships within about 500,000Km.
So when you are travelling through 1,000,000,000Km+ to the jump point, a
pirate has about one chance in 5,000,000 of ever spotting you. This is
not profitable. If you change the sensor ranges so the pirates can spot
you, the Navy can spot him. And SW means that if the Navy is going in
the opposite direction from you, then he immediately turns around and
matches course. Unlike the old M-drives, where he takes five or six
days to match velocity even if he is only 1000Km away when he starts his
course change. That alone is enough to do bad things to the picture.
A lot of you may have gotten the impression that I want to keep piracy
in the picture. I don't really care. In all the Trav I have played,
the only pirates that ever made a difference were cruising around in
Imperial Navy warships, or foreign equivalents. I've gone YEARS without
even a hint of piracy, and not cared at all.
What I am concerned with is doing damage to the world-picture in Trav.
Once you start changing the technology arbitrarily, you'll find yourself
having to predict the side-effects of all your changes before you
release the game. If not, the game will be as much a disaster as MT
was, and if so, then it will take YEARS of playtesting. Which I DON'T
want, because I happen to have a perverse liking for the T2K2 system,
and have been looking forward to a Trav conversion for some time. I'm
not looking forward to the possibility that GDW may make vast, arbitrary
changes to hang onto a picture that NEVER fit Traveller (lines of
battle, for instance). Nor am I looking forward to them changing the
basic world-picture enough that it ISN'T Traveller. I can play GURPS
space if I want to play some random SF game. I WANT to play Traveller.
In the Imperium, or its ruins (Cynthia and I have started to work out
the necessary assumptions to bring the Imperium crashing down in only
thirty or forty more years, game time). Not something that calls itself
Traveller that has nothing in common with what has gone before but the
name....
---Steve