Topic: Can anyone help? Traveller:New Era to Privateer

[Skaran]

Ok just looked at one of my TL11 150Mj laser barbettes which on the assumptions made so far would by TL20 in SM, using the SQRT approach this would become a Mk12 as a barbette that would be a Medium which the laser table would be a Mk2 but the TL23 version of a medium is a Mk12 so how about this, given that any conversion from Traveller will result in a mixed tech design that ship weapons for Traveller conversions actually be from 3 levels above.
So a TL20 base Traveller ship would have TL23 weapons per the table. For Travellers standard TL15 this would make the spinal weapons equivelant to a fixed SM TL27 Ultra-large. We are only going to get approximations anyway and this seems workable to me. Your thoughts now

PS I think this conversion should only apply to the energy weapons and missiles/torpedoes can stay as is.

As for Nuclear Detonation warheads in TNE these generate a laser attack against the target at about 15,000km a Mk number for this sort of warhead can be derived from the charts in FF&S by comparing them to the generated Mk numbers of normal converted lasers with equivelent penetration ratings.

[Skaran]

Of course all of this only applies if you want a version of your Traveller ships in a SM universe. On the other hand if you just wanted to use SM combat with Traveller FF&S designs then fiddling TLs etc doesn't matter you just need to work out weapon Mk numbers, Hit Points etc.

[markc]

Ok just looked at one of my TL11 150Mj laser barbettes which on the assumptions made so far would by TL20 in SM, using the SQRT approach this would become a Mk12 as a barbette that would be a Medium which the laser table would be a Mk2 but the TL23 version of a medium is a Mk12 so how about this, given that any conversion from Traveller will result in a mixed tech design that ship weapons for Traveller conversions actually be from 3 levels above.
So a TL20 base Traveller ship would have TL23 weapons per the table. For Travellers standard TL15 this would make the spinal weapons equivelant to a fixed SM TL27 Ultra-large. We are only going to get approximations anyway and this seems workable to me. Your thoughts now

PS I think this conversion should only apply to the energy weapons and missiles/torpedoes can stay as is.

As for Nuclear Detonation warheads in TNE these generate a laser attack against the target at about 15,000km a Mk number for this sort of warhead can be derived from the charts in FF&S by comparing them to the generated Mk numbers of normal converted lasers with equivelent penetration ratings.

 Yes I like this a lot. I am thinking about using the designs of Traveler with SM:P combat. But I might also convert the Reactionless Drive and Vacuum Drive to FF&S spec's and use them is some ships also. I just seem to like the compleatness of the FF&S system as it seems more realistic and allows me to include what unreal things I would like.
MDC

[Skaran]

The completeness was one of the things I liked about FF&S too. Also though this version of Traveller was a bit clunky in places (over weight vehicles and underpowered power plants for example) it did have an integrated combat system, you could fire your plasma rifle at a starship and know what effect it could have. It is also easier to follow than Gurps Vehicles.

[markc]

What do you think of T5 rules to reduce the weight of maneuver drives? If you use them or consider them for construction.
MDC

[Skaran]

I havn't had much of a look at the T5 rules though I have the disc somewhere. Have to have a look for it.

Any ideas on DBs for FF&S designs?

Then there are EW ratings, passive presumable would come from EM Masking systems and active from the various jammers, but how to rate them?

[markc]

 For DB's I might use the agility ratings as +10 DB that map to the crafts Maneuverability Units in SM:P VM. EW ratings are limited by tech in SM:P but I will have to look more closely than that to provide anything besides an obvious answer.
 I will take a look later on today.


MDC 

[markc]

  Looking at page 112-113 in SM:P VM the EW chart does not make a lot of sense in that it takes .01 mass per +1. At TL 28 and a rating possible of 200 it would be 200% of the ships mass. So I think there is some data missing from the chart or formula if it was to be possible to make such craft by the rules.
 So some TL modifier is needed to modify the mass, vol, power, crew and $ by.


 I thought I should put that up there first before I looked at FF&S so you could comment on it if you wanted.
MDC

[markc]

 For passive I would have the stealth and EMM features be at most 1/2 of tech level max and TL level max of passive EW for the TL level. But you could also adjust these for specific factions and have one factions P-EW be better than others for specific TL or fraction of TL.
 Also note that in SM:VM the price of passive EW should be 10,000 per point and not just 10,000.


MDC

[markc]

 For detection EW IMHO a chart needs to be made for each type of detection equipment and also if you are looking to include the equipment into SM:P VM construction rules then create the equipment there (active, passive, HRT, Ladar, Radar, Neutrino, Neural, and density). IMHO using the info from FF&S with its detection ranges is a leg up from SM:P VM range bands and no weapon ranges. 
MDC


Does that make sense? Or help in any way?


BTW, when you are done I would like a copy as I think I would like to use it in my game. As of now I just have a small collection of notes and thoughts in my head that I jump back and forth to when thinking about things.
MDC

[markc]

 I have been also thinking about doing a very rough convert to have the J-Drive in T act like a highly modified Q-Drive from SM:P. In that each jump # of the T J-drive acts as a x10 speed multiple for the ship over a given distance or time period (have not quite decide yet)*. This would be very different from T as faster maneuver drives will get to destinations slightly faster then slower M-Drives.
 *So for the J-Dives a 1 would be x10, 2 x100, 3 x1000 (Q-D Lvl1), 4 x10,000 (Q-D Lvl2), 5 x100,000 (Q-D Lvl3) and 6 x1,000,000.


MDC

[Skaran]

I'd noticed some of the errors or omissions you mentioned. Really we need a new edition with these fixes included.

FF&S sensors and ranges in SM would work but their power consumption is way over the top. Technically I would assume that at least the EM sensor suites would be subsumed into SM's sensor suites. Perhaps these could be 'devolved' intocomponent parts if you wanted the various other sensor types. Really depends on how generic a rule set you want. TNE with FF&S was fairly generic.

Is SM supposed to be able to reproduce approximately any SciFi setting?

Additional drive types are always useful. The ships on my web site are divided into two sections. The Banners Campaign used standard jump drives, but looking at the other campaign - Core Worlds, the ftl system seems to be a faster flux drive type, 1 light year per day rather then 1 light year per week.

I think that a vessels mass should not be a function of volume either, looking at my Traveller warship designs for example the Assyrian class frigate this has a mass of 19,248 tons with a hull volume only slightly larger at 19,600 kiloliters. To o this though the hull shell and armour belt need volume.

Incorporating Traveller armour types should not be a major problem though since both list crystal iron as a hull material so all the others can be rated based on that.

I can picture a hybrid system coming.

[markc]

Yes SM is supposed to be able to be adaptable to any setting.
MDC

[Skaran]

Need Gravitic sensors and alternate screens for the Honorverse, point singularity weapons for Andromeda etc.  But that's diverting a bit.

When I started looking at SM the original aim was to allow the reintroduction of plasma weaponry as a starship weapon into a FF&S universe. There the weapons ranges are measured in meters, earlier versions had from memory ranges of a few hexs so about 60,000km.

Also nuclear detonation missiles -a few more reasons why I use a lot of missiles on my own designs. Up to Traveller TL11 nuclear damper technology is unavailable meaning that this type of missile has to be taken out using normal point defence systems which are not that good in Traveller. The ND warhead when it detonates generates a bunch of x-ray lasers which even though they won't penetrate the hull of a battleship will remove surface fixtures like antenna rendering such a vessel blind.

Converting these to SM Torpedoes I would make the paylod pallets larger for the 7 kiloliter FF&S missiles and use the maneuver details as generated in FF&S. It is possible to design smaller missile or larger but the 7 kiloliter is the most common in a TNE universe.

[Skaran]

Running through TNEs nuclear detonation missiles. These always detonate at their effective range so Megajoules or intensity on target was easy. Then using the houserule that spacemaster Mk# is the sqrt(Mj) you get this;

Yield (kt)    Spacemaster Laser Mk#
10                     Mk10
20                     Mk14
50                     Mk17
100                   Mk22
200                   Mk26
500                   Mk31
If used in space use the standard laser charts if detonated in an atmosphere they are standard nuclear weapons since the x-ray laser propagation will not work as the atmosphere absorbs and scatters them.

Normal detonation range for these weapons was 0 hexes in Traveller (1 hex was 30,000km) so I assume a range of 15,000km. At higher tech levels greater ranges were possible at increased cost but due to the nature of the weapon intensity at target is unaffected.

For those who wanted to you could work out a different Mk# for a spacecraft weapon based on its Traveller range band, for example a Traveller TL11 67Mj Laser Turret would become a Mk8 laser at short range, a Mk4 at Medium, Mk2 at Long and Mk1 at extreme. Or you could alternately use the effective Mk# Mk8 for this laser and apply the appropriate range penalties. It should work either way.

[markc]

Looks good.
MDC