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Traveller-digest        Friday, June 6 1997        Volume 1997 : Number 1411



(R)1996. Traveller is a registered trademark of FarFuture Enterprises.
All rights reserved.

The following topics are covered in this digest:

Re: Strange Weapons for Starships...
Star Classification.
PE review and questions
Re: Starports & PE
Re: New old Library Data on the Web!
Re: Sylea
Re: Formula for gravity
Re: New old Library Data on the Web!
Re: Star Classification.
Re: Starports & PE
X-Boat data capacity
Re: 3D starmap question
Re: Formula for gravity
Planetary Densities
Re: Traveller in Valkyrie 13
TNE//Scout Variants//Errata
Re: 3D starmap question
I'll try once again

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Jun 1997 15:55:43 +0100
From: SD Mooney <dom@cybergoths.u-net.com>
Subject: Re: Strange Weapons for Starships...

Responding to Sam Thomas:

>Well I had some players that had installed some custom options. The ship
>that they owned had main corridor that did a 90 degree bend into a U shaped
>section. This left one wall facing down the main corridor. That wall had a
>very decorative wall art on it. Actually the wall art was a plastic
>explosive base with metal and ceramic fletchettes set on top of it.
>Translation a very large "claymore" mine with the direction "Face" down the
>main corridor. They only had to use it once when "pirates" were boarding.
>Net result no alive pirates on their ship. Flechettes make it very hard to
>patch vacc suite holes in a vaccum. Also the all of the fixtures in the
>main corridor were built to take the blast and fletchettes.

There's an old WD article called Boarding stations that goes into some very
nasty traps like this. Written by Marcus Rowland IIRC. The really fun one
was the false airlock with a BFG in it - a large fusion gun or something
that could do lots of nasties by shooting through the docking tube into the
other ship through the airlock's hole in the armour...
Dom

- ------Dom Mooney---dom@cybergoths.u-net.com-------
"Feel the guilt / like shackles round your feet / like a halo in reverse"
                     Depeche Mode "Violator"

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Jun 1997 16:33:41 +0100
From: SD Mooney <dom@cybergoths.u-net.com>
Subject: Star Classification.

Can anyone explain how the stellar classification works in Traveller?

I have an old text book that groups the stars by the letter/decimal
sequence eg M5, K2 etc and absolute magnitude. how do I relate the figures
in Traveller to the absolute magnitude and know which group the star falls
into - is it a dwarf or a giant etc?

Also, somebody recommended a good astronomical text a while ago (in
relation to maps of the galaxy); could you repost the reference?

Dom

- ------Dom Mooney---dom@cybergoths.u-net.com-------
"Feel the guilt / like shackles round your feet / like a halo in reverse"
                     Depeche Mode "Violator"

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 06 Jun 1997 11:40:07 -0400 (EDT)
From: Robert Flammang <FLAMMANG@vms.cis.pitt.edu>
Subject: PE review and questions

   Hi.

> Date: Thu, 05 Jun 1997 19:35:20 +0100
> From: Bruce E J Lewis <bruce@legend.ftech.co.uk>

> 	I may pick up Pocket Empires tomorrow night. can anyone tell me if it's
> worth getting, or does it suffer from the same blight as Starships and
> First Survey? I can't remember seeing a review anywhere, so I would
> appreciate a few people who have bought it letting me into a few of its
> darkest secrets.

   PE is an excellent sourcebook for people like me.  I am running a
   campaign wherein the players are fairly high level emissaries of
   Cleon who are working with extra-emperial worlds to help suppress
   piracy in the rimward regions of the Core subsector published in
   T4:Book1.  (Note that my campaign is not canonical. In year zero the
   Imperium consists of about 40 worlds almost entirely spinward of
   Sylea.  The bulk of Cleons efforts are directed at spinward
   expansion; his biggest problem is Vland.)

   The players have succeeded in drastically reducing piracy in the
   area, have brought new worlds into the Imperium, and are currently in
   the process of building scout bases, naval bases, and upgraded
   starports on these new worlds.  Their actions are dramatically
   altering the economies and cultures of many of these small,
   backwater, low-tech planets.  PE was a godsend to me, because it
   allowed me an objective standard by which to compare these effects.

   It cannot be compared to to FS and Starships; it is far better.  It
   is very well thought out, rather technical, and has many interesting,
   if somewhat specialized, applications to any campaign.  It can also
   be used as a boardgame, using sector maps as the board, and years as
   turns.  It appears to be moderately well playtested --- more on that
   later.

> Date: Fri, 6 Jun 1997 08:39:39 +0100
> From: anders.backman@aniware.se (Anders Backman)

> BTW Does PE have rules for building starports and what they cost? Where is
> any PE reviews? I don't like buying IG stuff unseen and my game provider
> won't stock IG products anymore unless i order. If PE is good I MIGHT
> computerize it (don't worry - I'll do it in Director so both MAc users and
> poor PC people can use it. I can even turn it into a Shockwave for web
> use).

   Yes, PE has rules (and costs) for building starports, upgrading them,
   and rules for the effect they have on the world's economy (and, if
   there is a colonization attempt going on, it's population).  There
   are rules for improving existing infrastructures as well as building
   new ones from scratch,  rules for research and developement to
   increase TL from scratch (Here's your chance to push your empire's TL
   higher than Cleon's pathetic 12!) along with a few optional rules for
   TL subcategories. There are rules for uplifting TL's using off-world
   training and industry, and rules for the effects that consumerism and
   pop culture have on the local economies.  There are rules for how
   much tax you can impose on a world before losing your popularity, and
   how much domestic spending you have to pay to maintain basic
   government services.  There are rules for using excess budget for
   doing neat things like building militaries and expanding industries,
   as well as rules for deficit spending and its negative implications.

   The reason you have not seen any reviews for it is that it is so
   complicated that I doubt anyone has played it thoroughly enough yet
   to make possible a complete review.  (It would definitely benifit
   from being put into a spreadsheet!)  But since I have played it (in a
   somewhat limited scope), I will offer up a (somewhat limited) review.

   PE is the most USEFUL supplement that T4 has produced so far.  Much
   of what has been published merely duplicated the work of previous
   incarnations of Trav. (AA being an intriguing exception, but one that
   I have yet to use extensively.)  PE is totally new; Trav has been
   needing something like it for a long time.  PE is to interstellar
   trade, commerce, and politics what TCS was to interstellar war.

   The rules governing the effects and interdependance of things like
   TL, industrial infrastructure, starports, culture, law level,
   government type, gross world product, interstellar trade, outsystem
   exploitation, local resourses and supply and demand are very well
   thought out, and mostly quite workable.  There are also rules, not
   yet used by me, for political problems like riots, rebellions,
   assasination attempts, coups, diplomacy, loyalty, etc.

   Now that I've told you how great it is, I will go into my gripes. 
   These gripes should not keep you from buying PE, by any means.  They
   mostly concern broken rules for special situations that I need fixes
   for.  Any suggestions for fixes by the playtesters in general, and
   Hans in particular, would be greatly appreciated.

   Gripe 1: The rules for increasing the infrastructure score of the
   planet are independent of the planet's population, as far as I can
   see. While this may work fine averaged over an entire empire, it is
   definitely broken if one of your players runs a company starport for
   a corporate outpost of about 500 workers.  Small infrastructures
   should not be as expensive to upgrade as large ones.  Proposed fix: 
   multiply the upgrade factor by the GWP instead of by a flat 0.2 RU.
   (The RU, or resourse unit for you unitiated, is the PE unit of
   economic power.  In M:0, One RU costs 5 billion imperial credits; in
   M:1100, the credit is worth more, so 1RU = GCr4.)

   Gripe 2: As per gripe one, but for starports.  It seems like a small
   starport on a low-pop world should be cheaper to build and upgrade
   than the huge arrays of starports that must exist on high pop worlds. 
   No proposed fix as yet.

   Remark: It would appear that PE was not playtested for situations
   like upgrading poor little worlds on the fringes of an empire.  Using
   PE rules, it is hard to see how a world like Sturray, C8A6215-A,
   could even exist.  What company would expend the flat rate necessary
   to build a C-class starport for a tiny little world whose GWP is
   measured in micro-RU's?  These costs should be based on the GWP of
   the world, and not on some flat rate.  The starport rating would then
   indicate the average quality of a world's many, or few, starports. 
   This is, however, a complicated issue which has never been
   extensively addressed by canon.

   Quibbles:  Typos, though very rare, are especially troublesome in a
   book ladden with mathematical formulas.  These formulas should be
   arranged in a more coherent fashion, with more consistent notation. 
   A spreadsheet would be nice.

   Overall impressions:
   T4:        *** (****, if I modify tasks and don't use QSDS.)
   Starships: 0
   AA:        *** (I like it, but for some reason, I don't use it.)
   CSC:       ****
   M0:        *****
   FS:        0
   EA:        ?
   PE:        ***** (I have used it extensively for the two weeks I've
                     owned it, and I forsee continual use in the
                     future. It could be better, but it's the best there
                     is. It is truly a groundbreaking supplement!)

   -Rob

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 05 Jun 1997 11:10:31 -0500
From: Ryan Christensen <litefoot@feist.com>
Subject: Re: Starports & PE

Anders Backman wrote:

> BTW Does PE have rules for building starports and what they cost? Where is
> any PE reviews? I don't like buying IG stuff unseen and my game provider
> won't stock IG products anymore unless i order. If PE is good I MIGHT
> computerize it (don't worry - I'll do it in Director so both MAc users and
> poor PC people can use it. I can even turn it into a Shockwave for web
> use).

	Yes, PE does have costs for starport development. They're listed in
terms of Resource Units, a sort of abstract measure of resource usage,
but there is a sidebar to figure out how many credits a Resource Unit is
worth on a particular world. It handles basically every phase of enpire
building, from the ground up; it even gives some really good
background/adventure ideas. I don't like all the tables being grouped at
the end (great fior reference later, but I like 'em in-line with the
text when I'm first reading through). Other than that, I've been pretty
satisfied.

	Hope you have the electronic version done by the time I'm out of boot!

Ryan Christensen
litefoot@feist.com

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 06 Jun 1997 11:31:57 -0500
From: Sam Thomas <sinbad@dfw.net>
Subject: Re: New old Library Data on the Web!

At 03:12 PM 6/5/97 -0700, Douglas E. Berry wrote:
>At 09:31 PM 6/5/97 +0200, Mark Seemann wrote:
>>Hello all
>>
>>I'm very pleased to announce the launch of a big project of mine (one of
>>those project which'll make you wonder if I have a life or not) - a very
>>big collection of Traveller Library Data, gathered from more than 45
>>canonical sources and severely hypertexted!
>>
>>There's more than 700 kB raw html files, so chances are that the
>>information that YOU seek is there! Check it out! The location:
>>
>>http://www2.dk-online.dk/users/mark_seemann/library/
>
>This page refuses to believe that my copy of Netscape Navigator 3 is
>frames-capable.  Did you test it with Netscape?  Or just MSIE?  To be
>honest, I have neither the disk space or patience to wrestle with two
>separate browsers.
Doug,

I have the same issue/problem too, I use Netscape 3.

- -*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-
(c)1997 Sam Thomas  |Email:sinbad@dfw.net|
Sinbad Sam, Owner and Operator of Sinbad Sam's Saloon 
Chief Weapons Designer For Reddkneck Arms and Munitions
- -----------------------------------------------------

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Jun 1997 18:23:13 MET
From: "Volker A. Greimann" <GREI5001@uni-trier.de>
Subject: Re: Sylea

Sylea (Capital) from TD 9:
These data are for CT period!

Diameter 7.652 km; 1.1 std density; 0.27 std mass
Grav: 0.69 g, Day: 24 h 4 min 1 sec , Orbit: 364.97 days
Axial Tilt 20 Degrees 32' 5"
No satellites
2.2 Atmospheres, standard mix.
60% Hydro (Water) (Hyd Terraforming)
Weather Control
4 Tectonic Plates, 5 Major Continents, 1 Minor C. 5 Maj Islands and 9 
archipelagoes
Native Life (Syleans)
Cities: 
Benca, 6 billion, A-Port
Cleon, 4, A-Port
Mifa Lanco, 3, A-Port
Turthu, 9, B-Port
Ton Vorn, 5, A-Port, Orbital Complex

Govt.:
Leg: Several Councils
Exec: Elite Council
Jud: Sev. Councils
Law uniformity: Territorial

Customs:
Unusual Food for men
    Certain fish native to Capital (Sylea) that men find delicious, 
but womn find tasteless. Served in best restaurands, considered 
deliccy. Cause lies in male chromosomes.

Children live at school.
    Because of the crowded conditions in large areas of Capital, 
children are commonly sent to boarding schools at early age!

Buildings 
Grand Palace, built -7 to -5 by Cleon I
    Not only home for imperial family, alsomilitary fortress. 
    Collection of Slopes and spikes (hard on Grav-Troopers to gain 
    foothold)
Moot Spire: built ????. 1.75 km high, tallest building on Capital. 
    Top: High moot, for deliberations by selected councils. Base: 
    Great hall of nobles, for tourists from the entire imperium.
    Imperial Family not allowed in Spire. 
More later, but not relevant to m:0

It seems more info was in TD 8 which i don't have. Most info in TD 9 
is about M:CT, but can be retrograded to M:0.


Ad Astra,
V.A.G.       
- ------  Volker A. Greimann, also known as: Grei5001@uni-trier.de  ----
- -- Am Weidengraben 86,C6 - 54296 Trier - Germany - T+F: +49651148846 -
- ------- check out: http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Vault/4061 --------
- ---- Student of Law, Gamer, Illuminatus Primus, Slayer of Windows95 --

- -----  "Don't hold me up: I am just barely ahead of insanity!!!" -----



Ad Astra,
V.A.G.       
- ------  Volker A. Greimann, also known as: Grei5001@uni-trier.de  ----
- -- Am Weidengraben 86,C6 - 54296 Trier - Germany - T+F: +49651148846 -
- ------- check out: http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Vault/4061 --------
- ---- Student of Law, Gamer, Illuminatus Primus, Slayer of Windows95 --

- -----  "Don't hold me up: I am just barely ahead of insanity!!!" -----

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Jun 1997 09:34:14 -0700 (PDT)
From: Craig Berry <cberry@cinenet.net>
Subject: Re: Formula for gravity

> Date: Fri, 06 Jun 1997 09:45:42 +0200
> From: Nicolas LEJEUNE <nlejeune@suresnes.marben.fr>
> 
> Craig Berry wrote:
> 
> >Planetary densities for rocky worlds typically should run from around 0.7
> >to perhaps 1.2, with larger worlds probably tending to have higher
> >densities.
> 
> Err. Rocky planets have a density around 5. Pluton is a very special case
> (0.7). 

We're using different units.  Yours is g/cc, where d(water) = 1.  Mine is
a normalized scale, where d(earth) = 1.  Normalized units are often far
more convenient and intuitive -- that's why Gs for acceleration and
atmospheres for pressure are in such common use.

> As for GG, they are from 0.7 to 1.5 on average density.

Yes, with Saturn being the 0.7 g/cc case -- meaning that the whole planet
would float in water. :)

- ---------------------------------------------------------------------
   |   Craig Berry - cberry@cinenet.net
 --*--    Home Page: http://www.cinenet.net/users/cberry/home.html
   |      Member of The HTML Writers Guild: http://www.hwg.org/   
       "Every man and every woman is a star."

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Jun 1997 11:55:09 -0600
From: Joseph Heck <ccjoe@showme.missouri.edu>
Subject: Re: New old Library Data on the Web!

>At 03:12 PM 6/5/97 -0700, Douglas E. Berry wrote:
>>At 09:31 PM 6/5/97 +0200, Mark Seemann wrote:
>>>Hello all
>>>
>>>I'm very pleased to announce the launch of a big project of mine (one of
>>>those project which'll make you wonder if I have a life or not) - a very
>>>big collection of Traveller Library Data, gathered from more than 45
>>>canonical sources and severely hypertexted!
>>>
>>>There's more than 700 kB raw html files, so chances are that the
>>>information that YOU seek is there! Check it out! The location:
>>>
>>>http://www2.dk-online.dk/users/mark_seemann/library/
>>
>>This page refuses to believe that my copy of Netscape Navigator 3 is
>>frames-capable.  Did you test it with Netscape?  Or just MSIE?  To be
>>honest, I have neither the disk space or patience to wrestle with two
>>separate browsers.
>Doug,
>
>I have the same issue/problem too, I use Netscape 3.

Me three - but I faked it & looked at the source code to get into the data
anyway.

 joe                          (573) 882-2000
 ccjoe@showme.missouri.edu    http://www.missouri.edu/~ccjoe
 PGP Fingerprint: E3 3F DF 08 BE 3E 44 A0  EE A9 80 7E 22 99 CD DF
 "with a little practice, writing can be an intimidating and
 impenetrable fog!" -- Calvin

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 06 Jun 1997 09:45:00 -0700
From: "Douglas E. Berry" <dberry@hooked.net>
Subject: Re: Star Classification.

At 04:33 PM 6/6/97 +0100, Dom wrote:

>Can anyone explain how the stellar classification works in Traveller?
>
>I have an old text book that groups the stars by the letter/decimal
>sequence eg M5, K2 etc and absolute magnitude. how do I relate the figures
>in Traveller to the absolute magnitude and know which group the star falls
>into - is it a dwarf or a giant etc?

The size number.. this is the roman numeral after the K3 bit.  It runs from
Ia (bright supergiant) to VII (dwarf)  our sun is a G2v, V being the main
sequence.

>Also, somebody recommended a good astronomical text a while ago (in
>relation to maps of the galaxy); could you repost the reference?

Do yourself a favor and pick up _World-Building_ by Stephan L. Gillett.
(Writers Digest Books, 1996)  This book explains everything about building
realistic worlds, and addresses stellar age and components.  It also
struggles to justify some of the more popular SF cliches, like
silicon-based life and acidic seas.

- --
+------------------------------------------------+
|   Douglas E. Berry         dberry@hooked.net   |
| Gearhead & Planetologist, Traveller since 1977 |
|         http://www.hooked.net/~dberry/         |
|************************************************|
|    "Traveller assumes a remote centralized     |
|   government (referred to in this volume as    |
|    the Imperium)...                            |
|       -Introduction, Book 4: Mercenary (1978)  |
+------------------------------------------------+

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Jun 1997 19:01:17 MET
From: "Volker A. Greimann" <GREI5001@uni-trier.de>
Subject: Re: Starports & PE

>>PE is one of the better gaming products I've bought in the last few 
years.
It works on many levels as a development tool for Traveller, a solo game,
and political intrigue game set in a single Empire, a game of expansion
among several PEs, and is perfect for PBM/PBEM.

This is a must buy.  It uis one of Traveller products that will enhance
your game no matter what Millieu or setting you play in.<<

Drool! Must....purchase...this....book...! Can't wait to see it in 
Europe!

Ad Astra,
V.A.G.       
- ------  Volker A. Greimann, also known as: Grei5001@uni-trier.de  ----
- -- Am Weidengraben 86,C6 - 54296 Trier - Germany - T+F: +49651148846 -
- ------- check out: http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Vault/4061 --------
- ---- Student of Law, Gamer, Illuminatus Primus, Slayer of Windows95 --

- -----  "Don't hold me up: I am just barely ahead of insanity!!!" -----

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Jun 1997 10:35:28 -0700 (MST)
From: Bruce Johnson <johnson@Pharmacy.Arizona.EDU>
Subject: X-Boat data capacity

Someone, (I forget who...I accidentally deleted the message)suggested
reverse engineering the Xboat to see how much was spent on computers, to
determine it's capacity.

That won't work, the data is in 'databanks' which are some form of on-line
storage, NOT computers. 

However, I was browsing through my stuff last night to see what there was
about the express boat system, and I came across the entry in the Imperial
Encyclopedia. In that entry, there are no 'X-boat tenders'. An X-boat
jumps in system, beams it's data to an Xboat Station, which then beams the
data back out to another Xboat waiting to jump out. This process usually
takes under four hours, and has been recorded at a record of seven
minutes.

(WARNING WARNING I am working from possibly faulty memory here about the
rate at which data can be transmitted at a given frequency...I think it's
1/2 bit per cycle)

This gives us some numbers to work with. The frequency of a modulated beam
gives an upper limit to the amount of data that can be transmitted using
that beam (this is a basic restatement of Shannon's Law) at a bit density
of 1/2 bit per cycle. We'll use tight beam maser communications. Masers,
microwave lasers, operate in the frequency range of about 10^9 to 10^11
Hz. lets say 10^10 for ease of calculations.

By Shannon's law, we can transmit a maximum of 5 x 10^9 bits per second.
Using modern day standards, of 8 data 1 start 1 stop and no parity bits,
that's 5 x 10^8 bytes per second, a transmission rate of 500
megabytes/second.

Ok, we have the bandwidth, Now there are two ways that the xboat station
can handle the data.

1) they can accept all the data, then retransmit onnce it is done. This
gives us at a first approximation, 3.5 minutes of data transmission time,
or 105 Gigabytes of data.

2) They can stream the data to the reciever from the moment they start
recieving it from the incoming x-boat. This gives us the full seven
minutes of data, or 210 Gigabytes of data.

And this is for the fastest transfer on record...so I suspect it was with
a minimal data load. The IE article mentions that the usual turnaround
time is about four hours. Lets give that a 50% slop time, and say
they're only transferring data for 2 hours. 2 Hours at 500 Mb/second is
1.8 terabytes for an 'average' Xboat load.

Without hardware compression ;-)

This analysis makes some restrictive assumptions, too, in using maser
communications. If laser communications are used, then the data
transmission rate goes up by almost 5 orders of magnitude.

We can get insane, and use a downpowered X-Ray laser. X-Rays inhabit the
range of 10^16 - 10^21 Hz. At 10^18 Hz you will get a rate of 5 x 10^17
bits/second, or a final data rate of roughly 500 PETAbytes /second.

this gives an Xboat an astonishing data capacity...

Discuss among yourselves...please, If I'm wrong fix this now, because this
isn't only relevant to X-boat capacity but to all forms of communications
in Traveller...how much data goes out over those ship communicator pipes?

Bruce Johnson
University of Arizona
College of Pharmacy
Information Technology Group

Institutions do not have opinions, merely customs

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Jun 1997 17:42:23 +0100
From: John Wood <John@elvw.demon.co.uk>
Subject: Re: 3D starmap question

Craig Berry <cberry@cinenet.net> wrote,
>I think most people on the TML would *like* to use 3D starmaps, all
>other things being equal.  Unfortunately, all other things aren't
>equal.  3D maps have two inherent disadvantages:
>
>(1) Moving to them now would invalidate 20 years of Traveller canon --
>    this isn't a problem if you're creating your own background, of
>    course.

I like the rationale presented by someone a couple of years ago in an 
old tml message (before my time, but I've been reading from the 
archives): the 2D maps are maps of jumpspace, which only has two 
dimensions even though realspace has three.  This also dodges the "real 
stars not where they should be" problem.

John

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 06 Jun 97 13:54:00 PDT
From: Glenn Myers <gem188@ansyspo.ansys.com>
Subject: Re: Formula for gravity

This is my second attempt to post this. Sorry if anyone gets 2 copies.

Hi All,

A while ago I assembled all the CT grav related equations. Here is a 
comparison of the CT rules to RL.

Gravity
*  Gravitational Law:  g = (G)*(M)/(r)^2
   Where G = 6.67E-11 Nm^2/kg^2
For Earth M = 5.98E24 kg, r = 6.37E6 m   This gives g = 9.81 m/s^2

How does traveller do it?
Way back in Book 2 I found three equations:

Equation              Units           Comments (what is it?)
(1)  M = K*(D/8)^3     [Earth Masses]  Planetary mass
(2)  Gs = K*D/8        [standard g]    Surface gravity
(3)  L = 64*(M/G)^0.5  [km]            Distance to reach given "gravity 
band"
Here, D is the Size UPP number, K is density ratio (compared to earth = 1)
Radius R = 8*D [1E2 km]

Eq (1) can be checked vs earth:
>  D = 8, K = 1, Therefore M = 1 (kind of obvious, isn't it?)

Eq (2) can be checked vs gravitational law for size A world:
>  D = 10, K = 1, r = 80E5 m, M = 5.98E24*1.953
>  Gs = 1*10/8 = 1.25 g
>  Grav Law gives g = (6.67E-11)*(5.98E24)*(1.953)/(80E5)^2 = 12.1716 m/s^2
>  When divided by 9.81 m/s^2
>  You get  Gs = 1.24 g            Not too bad

Eq (3) seemed to be mostly useless in given form. Rearranging it I got
the following
(3a)  G = 4096*(M)/(L^2)
Which will give you the percentage of surface gravity of a body experienced
at a distance L from the body's center.
Again, for size A world:
>  G = 4096*1.953/(80E2)^2 = 0.9999    Good enough

A combination of (2) and (3a) will give you actual gravity at that point
(4)   g = 512*(M)*(K)*(D)/(L^2)
So the g at the 10 diameter Jump point is
>  g = (512*1.953*1.0*10)/(10*2*80E2)^2 = 3.906E-7
>  Grav Law gives
>  g = (6.67E-11)*(5.98E24)*(1.953)/(10*2*80E5)^2 = 3.0429E-2 m/s^2

_____________________________________________________
Glenn E. Myers
ANSYS Inc.                Email: glenn.myers@ansys.com
275 Technology Drive      Phone: (412) 514-2913
Canonsburg, PA 15317      Fax:   (412) 514-3118
_____________________________________________________

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 06 Jun 97 13:52:01 -0500
From: eris@pen.net (Eris Reddoch)
Subject: Planetary Densities

On 06/06/97 at 09:45 AM,  Nicolas LEJEUNE <nlejeune@suresnes.marben.fr>
said:

> Craig Berry wrote:

> >Planetary densities for rocky worlds typically should run from around 0.7
> >to perhaps 1.2, with larger worlds probably tending to have higher
> >densities.

> Err. Rocky planets have a density around 5. Pluton is a very special
> case (0.7). 

Craig, probably meant 0.7 to 1.2 times Earth's density. I think the
densities for rocky planets are expected to be in the range of 3 to
6g/cc. Stars, Iceballs (like Pluto) and Gas Giants would be around
1g/cc..sometimes a little more, sometimes a little less.

Eris
- -- 
- -----------------------------------------------------------
eris@pen.net (Eris Reddoch)    using MR/2 ICE #245
- -----------------------------------------------------------

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Date: Fri, 6 Jun 97 20:19 BST-1
From: aboulton@cix.compulink.co.uk (Andrew Boulton)
Subject: Re: Traveller in Valkyrie 13

In-Reply-To: <v03102802afbd4d843405@[205.184.181.73]>

<< Haven't seen any sign of this on the list.  Last Saturday at one of the
local bookstores I found a couple of interesting magazines.  One of these
was "Valkyrie 13" Volume 2 Issue 2.  It looks to be a VERY nice RPG
magazine, one I'll be keeping an eye out for further issues of.  It has an
interview with Marc Miller, a six page adventure, and some patron
encounters. >>

Yeah, Valkyrie is a good mag. Only problem is, it's not very regular at the 
moment (supposed to be monthly, actually more like quarterly), so the news & 
reviews tend to be a bit out of date.

    ---------=========oooooooooOOOOOOOOooooooooo=========---------
Andrew M J Boulton                  http://www.compulink.co.uk/~fubar/
 "Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste"

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Jun 1997 17:17:02 -0400 (EDT)
From: fcain@st6000.sct.edu (Franklin W. Cain)
Subject: TNE//Scout Variants//Errata

There is an error in the FF&S worksheet for the _Ronin_-Class
Scout/Escort.  The _Ronin_ has *72* G-turns (not 48).  The volume and mass
listed are correct.  

Sorry.  

Franklin

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 6 Jun 1997 16:24:54 -0500
From: "The Druid" <tntsrv@10mb.com>
Subject: Re: 3D starmap question

 Craig Berry <cberry@cinenet.net> wrote,
>I think most people on the TML would *like* to use 3D starmaps, all
>other things being equal.  Unfortunately, all other things aren't
>equal.  3D maps have two inherent disadvantages:
>
>(1) Moving to them now would invalidate 20 years of Traveller canon --
>    this isn't a problem if you're creating your own background, of
>    course.

I like the rationale presented by someone a couple of years ago in an
old tml message (before my time, but I've been reading from the
archives): the 2D maps are maps of jumpspace, which only has two
dimensions even though realspace has three.  This also dodges the "real
stars not where they should be" problem.

John

I like that! I have been beating my head for excuses for using 2D; but that
almost makes sense!
Rich Travis
http://www.vrhome.com/traveller

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 7 Jun 1997 00:10:53 +0200
From: "Mark Seemann" <mark@dk-online.dk>
Subject: I'll try once again

Ooops! Looks like I had made a little(!) mistake with my newly announced
Library Data website. A lot of people on the list has been so kind to tell
me that it couldn't be seen at all with Netscape Navigator, which certainly
wasn't the intention :-/

Craig Berry was so kind to tell me _what_ I had done wrong, so it should be
fixed now. I'm writing my html raw, so it's pretty easy to make a mistake.
The real bummer was, off course, not to test it with Netscape too, but I
didn't think the download time (via modem and with some pretty steep Danish
telephone rates) was worth it for a program I wouldn't use very much.
Hmm...

I know Netscape is much bigger than MSIE, but I actually happen to _like_
the latter. Poor me...

Anyway, the site should now be available to Netscape users as well (I
hope). The url is still:

http://www2.dk-online.dk/users/mark_seemann/library/

but with my luck I probably just spelled something wrong :-/ Well, give me
another chance...

Mark Seemann
mark@dk-online.dk
http://www2.dk-online.dk/users/mark_seemann

------------------------------

End of Traveller-digest V1997 #1411
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