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Post by Grog on Dec 5, 2013 12:15:33 GMT -8
here's a question. Ill keep it short. why are the "gaps so significant? for example: the whole history of the fall of the vilani empire and rise of the terrans hinges on a 3-parsec gap between the terran space and the empire. each jump requires 10% of the ship's volume in fuel. why not build a long range ship with fuel reserves that can make two sequential jumps without refueling?
the reason I ask is that I have an idea for a campaign based on the lost fleet series, (terran fleet misjumps way into vilani space and has to get home with sthe mcguffin (the jump 3 drive critical for the terran victory?) but I don't want then to have to refuel after every jump, maybe every third jump or so.
Thoughts?
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maxinstuff
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Post by maxinstuff on Dec 5, 2013 13:35:42 GMT -8
here's a question. Ill keep it short. why are the "gaps so significant? for example: the whole history of the fall of the vilani empire and rise of the terrans hinges on a 3-parsec gap between the terran space and the empire. each jump requires 10% of the ship's volume in fuel. why not build a long range ship with fuel reserves that can make two sequential jumps without refueling? the reason I ask is that I have an idea for a campaign based on the lost fleet series, (terran fleet misjumps way into vilani space and has to get home with sthe mcguffin (the jump 3 drive critical for the terran victory?) but I don't want then to have to refuel after every jump, maybe every third jump or so. Thoughts? I think this is less to do with how far the jump is and more to do with how long it takes. I'm pretty sure there are ships mentioned in the books built for several jumps before refueling is needed. These are bastardised trade / smuggling vessels though - for travelling outside of heavily patrolled areas. This is the type of vessel you should use if the party need to smuggle the McGuffin back across Vilani space As you are aware - this takes up a lot of space (10% of the ships volume per jump). So it is rather conspicuous and you are likely to be picked as smugglers if two thirds of the ships volume is fuel The reason jump 3 was so important to the war is that regardless of distance, it takes 1 week to make a jump. This is the same whether the jump is 1 or 3 parsecs due to the accelleration/decelleration cycle. There WERE long range ships that could do several jumos but it took them several weeks to get across the rift. So if you are trying to win a war - you need your big guns out in front as quickly as possible. That means an enormous gun with a jump 3 drive. A 20% smaller gun that takes 3 weeks to get across the rift puts you at a significant disadvantage.
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Post by Grog on Dec 5, 2013 16:44:38 GMT -8
You know, I thought that was a pretty good explanation and I was willing to buy it an then I kept reading the Gurps traveller interstellar wars book. They made mention of a "math" explanation, being that at lower tech levels the math for jumping into an empty hex essentially hadn't been discovered yet. This made the chokepoints history make a lot more sense. Then I found a discussion on the Mongoose boards where someone proposed that the TL required for an "empty hex" jump was 1 higher than the normal Jump possible. Makes sense to me.
But now my brain hurts. Wizards are so much less complicated than FTL travel.
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maxinstuff
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Post by maxinstuff on Dec 5, 2013 17:06:43 GMT -8
I have only read the Mongoose core book. That's where all my information comes from.
I can't say for certain whether the GURPS books contradicts it or not, having not read it and all :/
The mongoose book certainly mentions ships with large amounts of volume dedicated to fuel payloads designed for just the type of smuggling you describe.
So yes, what you describe can be done - if you dedicate the required ship volume to fuel.
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Post by Grog on Dec 6, 2013 5:45:10 GMT -8
Until yesterday morning all I had read was the Mongoose core book, which is surprisingly complete. Then everything changed. I don't intend to to use the GURPS rules, but I am using the setting information as its the best "near future" history of the Traveller Universe. It's essentially the story of the "Terran barbarians" knocking on the gates of the decadent and brittle "Vilani empire". The technological development of jump 3 drives and spinal mount meson guns allows the Terran Confederation to steamroll the Vilani. Good reading if nothing else.
I've got a steampunk savage worlds game in which my players have point-blank told me point blank they "aren't done with" the stories of their characters (I take that as a compliment, I'm not really done with it either). I've also been really wanting to run a World of Darkness god machine chronicle, and now I can't get my mind off of a Traveller campaign! Oh yeah, and I should probably see my wife and kids and go to work from time to time. Sigh...
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Post by Stu Venable on Dec 30, 2013 13:32:15 GMT -8
This is going back to the original version, with 30 years of drinking to befuddle my memory, but as I recall, it was difficult to make a ship with the fuel capacity to make multiple jumps.
If you look around on travellermaps, you'll find the "secret" Imperial Navy Jump-5 route from somewhere in the Solomani sphere to the Spinward Marches, presumably with unmanned fuel depots spanning the vast gulf of emptiness between them.
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Post by gandalftheplaid on Jan 8, 2014 15:54:32 GMT -8
I'm just tickled to see a "jump distance" question for an RPG that doesn't involve calculations for height and distance a running start parameter.
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simonsays
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Post by simonsays on Feb 18, 2014 23:54:09 GMT -8
The idea that there needed to be more tech to do a Jim from an empty hex is in complete contravention of the MGT explanation of the jump process and it's limitations. The jump drive creates an miniature singularity which is then injected with hydrogen (fuel) to inflate the pocket universe beyond the event horizon to a bubble just large enough to contain the ship. The only limitations on this process are availability of fuel and the lack of gravitational interference (thus the need to move in real space to get out of the gravitational pull of any planet or sun). Assuming you've jumped with a big enough fuel tank into an empty hex, then you should be fine, as there should be no significant gravitational forces in an empty hex (unless you're unlucky enough to jump near a black hole). The jump of one hex by a jump1 ship should take the same amount of time as a two hex jump by a jump2 ship, since the time elapsed is based on the relationship of linear time to the sustained existence of the pocket universe, which does not travel through space as a linear object but rather more like a strange tachyon.
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simonsays
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Post by simonsays on Feb 18, 2014 23:54:46 GMT -8
*jump not Jim, stupid autospell
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Post by Grog on Feb 19, 2014 19:41:00 GMT -8
simonsaysYou're right...supposing that you are basing that on MGT. Unfortunately, Traveller has a supposedly coherent "canon" that is supposed to remain consistent across a half dozen versions of the rules, of which MGT is only the (second) most recent. The idea that the 3 parsec "gaps" were essentially uncrossable was kind of a central concept in some non-Mongoose parts of the continuum. I feel like if all it took to get a secret fleet past the battle lines was an additional 10% ship tonnage dedicated to fuel storage, one of the two sides of the Interstellar Wars definitely would have done that and attacked some poorly defended shipyards or somesuch. Doolittle raid anyone? Of course, I'm arguing about the logic of a historical interpretation of a hypothetical future interstellar war based on the concept of "space" which we had in the 1980s, sooo....
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