Re: Deep Space Refueling

> > I always thought that there weren't deep-space refueling stations in
> > Traveller because ships don't just refuel, they discharge energy. I know
> > that was true in 2300AD and I'm pretty certain that's how jump worked in
> > Battletech, and I guess I always assumed it was true in Traveller. Jump
> > Drives must discharge accumulated energy before moving on, and they must do
> > so in a significant gravity well. A deep space station with that much
> > gravity would need a celestial body, or be a truly immense (possibly Dyson
> > Sphere-scale) station. Lemme know if I'm wrong. . .
>
> You're wrong. :^)

Officially, they don't work that way, although some of the early CT
material seems to imply that you must end at a star system.  I find
it useful from several angles to force jumps to only be to large
celestial bodies:

o It prevents certain "abuses", such as creating a jump-1 ship
  that's 95% jump fuel (in drop tanks for you purists) and can
  jump 30 times without refueling.  I guess such a ship would be
  useful for exploration purposes, but this blows a hole in the
  effectiveness of the Great Rift as a barrier to travel (early
  CT definitely suggested that you could not jump further than
  jump-6 without refueling).  Allowing jumps only to celestial
  bodies does not eliminate such ships, but only allows them to
  operate along J-1 routes.  Without this restriction, the Virus
  would be much harder to stop (and the Regency's blockade would
  be futile, but I don't want to get into that discussion).

o It explains why misjumped ships always end up in star systems
  (at least according to the rules I have, which don't include
  TNE).

o It helps to explain the 100-diameter limit.  The presence of
  the 100-diameter limit means that gravity wells play a part in
  jump mechanics.  Technology will eventually determine what the
  effect is and attempt to exploit it.  Since 100 diameters seems
  to be a constant, it makes more sense to determine the effect
  from the start and use it to explain jump mechanics.

o It eliminates certain "free energy" scenarios by microjumping
  away from a star or planet then gaining more kinetic energy
  than total energy you put into the jump (note microjumps would
  only be to celestial bodies also).  This "free energy" problem
  is often misunderstood: thrusters were fine, they just used
  too little energy for the kinetic energy they imparted.

o It can be used as a hand-waving aid to improve "feasibility"
  of jump drives.  If you accept that in some dimension space is
  curved by gravity, then jump drives might make use of this by
  exiting normal space and heading along an "equipotential line"
  towards another star or planet.  The 100-diameter limit would
  then represent a compromise, which is close enough to the
  celestial body to make use of this effect, but far enough away
  to insure that you don't crash at the destination (energy loss
  during the jump could cause you to arrive closer to the star
  or planet).  The distance also makes it easier to target the
  destination.  Notice that this interpretation does not preclude
  precision jumps, which can be within the 100-diameter limit.
  If you really want to prevent jumps to or from within that
  limit, do some hand-waving about "second or third order effects
  of the gravitational potential well" (this can also be used as
  an explanation to allow jumps to a planet's 100-diameter limit
  even if it is inside of a star's 100-diameter limit).

o This interpretation does not preclude jumps to interstellar
  space, just makes them very difficult and more dangerous.
  The two ways to do it are to start your jump from well beyond
  the 100-diameter limit (in which case even gravity wells as
  small as large ships could pull you back to normal space, but
  targetting would be VERY difficult) or to expend extra energy
  during the jump to bring the ship up to a "zero gravitic
  potential" and into normal space (probably the way they would
  get those extremely rare refueling stations out there).

o An interpretation of jump mechanics can by itself open new
  adventure possibilities, or can be used as a lead-in to a new
  adventure ("You come out of jump and see--blackness, an utter
  void of blackness" as the ship emerges in the center of a
  dark cloud that only a few pirates knew about, until now).

o As far as "discharging energy" is concerned--that never was
  a part of Traveller.  That was a hack to let the 2300AD
  universe have a "Traveller" feel rather than a "Star Trek"
  feel while still using stutterwarp drives.

,-----------------.
|Gerald S Williams|
|[email removed]|
|  [phone removed] |
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