[email removed] (John Bucsek) says:
>>As far as a short jump to make insystem travel quicker, GDW changed
>>the M-drive mechanics in order to make the game more realistic.
>>I agree with that viewpoint.
My only problem with this change (and it is a DRASTIC change when your
players move about a system) is how to explain the transmogrification of the
starship to the players when they finally thaw from their 60+ year sleep.
Telling them it takes weeks to travel a distance a distance it only took days
to travel in the old system does not contribute to campaign realism and
consistency (not to mention the disappearance of the triple-beams).
Of course, according to Mr Nilsen's rant from january, were should all just
throw pixie dust out the back of our ships.
Mr John H. Bogan states:
>To illustrate the point: under CT/MT, a Dragon-class SDB could
>be reassigned from Earth to Neptune, and take up station within
>a week. Under BL rules, even if it burned every last gram of fuel
>accelerating and decelerating, it would take the same ship about
>2.5 MONTHS to make the same transit.
This severly undercuts the usefulness of SDBs and other non-jump
capable ships. Even with microjumps, the micro-jdrive and fuel (for at least
two microjumps) cuts into their efficiency.
>Merchants need to move ships to generate revenues in excess of
>their expenses. The Military needs to be able to redeploy ships
>quickly. To move things around in a timely fashion, especially
>outside of orbit #4, in-system ships NEED to be able to microjump.
Since the microjump takes you out of the picture for a week, the
situation will certianly change by the time you get there. There will be no
n-space chases, piracy will be curtailed, and the planets in a system will be
more isolated from each other than from neighboring systems.
What this also does is almost completely eliminate the strategic
usefulness of gas giants for military operations. No longer will a system have
to scatter its now-crippled SDBs amongst the system covering gas giants, they
can orbit a primary planet shoulder to shoulder and wait for the enemy to come
to them. But, when the enemy gets there, they'll be short on fuel.
This really cuts down on planetary invasions (difficult already) while
changing the strategic movements of a fleet. Why show a system has a gas giant
when its going to take you a month out of the way?
>Under the "standard" starport classification, most merchant ships
>that operate in the outer system, as well as virtually ALL
>military boats and monitors will have to be made at class A starports.
>Not just in the New Era, but during the Rebellion, the Frontier Wars,
>the Interstallar wars, at the dawn of Vilani star travel, during ALL
>of the history of Charted Space.
Why not? Since the physics of the universe has change for TNE, why not
the history of it as well? This time, GDW has shown that it doesnt care about
the established history of Traveller, much less my TL13 'just add water'
mercenary unit. (Fusion gun *ammo*? Geeeze..)
(Personally, I often wonder how Mr Nilsen can stand to berate
reactionless drives as being unrealistic while giving us the 'fudge factor' of
gravitic focusing then telling us to 'get over it'.) Realism? Ha.)
>That means most of the sorts of ships that class B ports built now
>have to be handled by A-class ports. Like I said, that doesn't sit
>well with me. My solution was to redefine the capabilities of
>starports slightly to shift the relations between ports and
>in-system craft back to what it used to be:
>Class A's build _starships_ (ships with a jump number if 1+)
>Class B's Buils _non-starships_ (ships with a jump number of 0)
>Class C's can build non-_jump_ ships
Have you noticed the cost increase of an SDB if microjump drives are
added? Less SDBs per system, but no problem, sice all you have to
patrol/defend now is the primary. Given the drastic changes in the universe of
the New Error, your change seems to be the easiest and most sensible change.
As for me, our gaming group is keeping the MT ship rules, heavilly modified to
use weaponry as designed in Striker. We'll probably change the weapon design to
FF&S, but with different damage/pen ratings (weve already changed the slug
throwers). As a quick change to keep the 'feel' of the game similar, I've
contimplated dividing the fuel use of HEPLAR by 10, therefore multiplying the
g-turns of a ship by 10. This gives the SDB boat from BL (112*10=)1120 g-turns,
or (1128/48=) 23 days of thrust.
(Interestingly, this also changes the g-turns of the sub merchant to
600 turns, or 12.5 days, the far trader 10 days, and the free trader 11.7 days,
all close to the 2 week duration I used to design into my MT merchants.)
If I can convince myself of this change, *then* I'll get rid of reactionless
drives. Of course, IMHO, TNE would have been a better game if it hadn't been
called Traveller. (Does that mean I'm stuck in my ways?:))
Still In Service to the Imperium,
-Vanya