			    TRAVELLER Digest 116

Topics covered in this issue include:

  1) Re: anti-neutrons	by Roger Moore <moore@hep.phy.cam.ac.uk>
  2) Eight Characters (apology)	by Alvin Plummer <plummera@hubble.sheridanc.on.ca>
  3) Re: Deep-site meson guns	by bonn0015@itlabs.umn.edu (STEVEN M BONNEVILLE)
  4) More hassles on the Alliance	by Mark Fletcher <mf1@st-andrews.ac.uk>
  5) Re: Stinkin' Meson Guns	by Derek Smith <Derek_Smith.LOTUS@crd.lotus.com>
  6) Re: comments on deep Site Meson Guns	by merrick@RT66.com (Merrick Burkhardt)
  7) Space Vikings	by "Mary E. Poynter" <3I4KQ7X@CMUVM.CSV.CMICH.EDU>
  8) TNE miniatures	by merrick@RT66.com (Merrick Burkhardt)
  9) TRAVELLER DIGEST 113	by john.bogan@asb.com
 10) Jamming vs sensors	by roger.myhre@niva.no (Roger Myhre)
 11)	by roger.myhre@niva.no (Roger Myhre)
 12) LOOOOONG POSTS	by A.S.Lilly@bnr.co.uk (Andy Lilly)

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

Date: Mon, 28 Nov 1994 18:06:27 +0000 (GMT)
From: Roger Moore <moore@hep.phy.cam.ac.uk>
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Re: anti-neutrons
Message-ID: <9411281806.AA25751@axpf.hep.phy.cam.ac.uk>

> Archie Tindell:
>
> >Anti-neutrons do NOT exist, because the negative of a neutral
> >charge is a neutral charge.... the neuton is it's own anti-particle. It
> >may be created through different means, but a neutron is a >neutron.
>
> Have you ever actually studied sub-atomic physics?  Like, read
> the appropriate chapters in an undergraduate physics text?
> I think the scientists at Berkeley who discovered the anti-neutron
> in 1955 would be rather surprised to be told it did not exist.
>
> Basic principle of anti-matter: matter & anti-matter are symmetrical,
> every particle has a corresponding anti-particle.  Reversed
> charge is the obvious difference between matter and anti-matter,
> but it is not the only difference.  There are anti-neutrinos, too,
> which have neither mass nor charge.

Correct - except that (anti-)neutrinos may actually have a very small
mass - experiments are still being performed to find out if this is the
case.

> BTW, two neutrons colliding will not annihilate each other; an
> anti-neutron and a neutron colliding will, yielding gamma rays and
> a neutrino, anti-neutrino pair, if I remember correctly. (Physicists
> in the audience can correct me...)

Its a LOT more complicated than that. The products depend on the energy at
which they collide. At rest, in the perfect case where all three quark
pairs annihilate you have three interactions and hence 3 photons or 3
neutrino/anti-neutrino pairs can be created (or any mixture of the two).
At higher energies what will happen is something called the 'Drell-Yan'
process where one quark and anti-quark 'scatter' off each other. The two
scattered quarks will then produce showers of particles (99% of the time)
as will the neutron and anti-neutron remnants. As far as I know only
proton-proton and proton-antiproton interactions like the above have been
studied, however the mechanisms should be the same.

I hope that's understandable - sorry for being technical!

Roger

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

Date: Mon, 28 Nov 1994 15:43:02 -0500 (EST)
From: Alvin Plummer <plummera@hubble.sheridanc.on.ca>
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Eight Characters (apology)
Message-ID: <Pine.OSF.3.91.941128154018.16274F-100000@hubble.sheridanc.on.ca>


Sorry about the dupicate posting.  BUT... there were problems posting
previously, and the first post didn't seem to 'catch'...

Alvin Plummer
(And "Bravo!", Cynthia, for your Alternate Vision...)


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

Date: Mon, 28 Nov 1994 15:34:16 -0600
From: bonn0015@itlabs.umn.edu (STEVEN M BONNEVILLE)
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Re: Deep-site meson guns
Message-ID: <199411282134.PAA11722@conch.itlabs.umn.edu>

<lewis@chara.gsu.edu> writes:

>Why would they need sensors off the planet?

You could get better range performance.  For Earth, the Moon is at
12 hexes (1.2 light seconds) or so -- perhaps a sensor or ten out
there might be useful.  Also it would avoid the "evil aliens that
sneak up on us from behind the Moon" problem -- a meson gun could
fire *through* the Moon to hit oncoming ships before any other
line-of-sight weapons on the planet can come to bear (are unmasked).

>The planet would be using passive sensors.  With the diameter of a
>planet to work with, you can have a pretty good passive sensor.

Passive sensors are quite expensive and big, so long-range active
sensors still have a place here.

>Tariq, had actually designed this thing to blow through heavy meson
>screens.  He said he will post it soon, probably after finals are done
>with this week.  That is also really expensive, but then again so is
>this meson gun. :)

I'd like to see this!  I have the key component for a deep-site
meson gun finished, a 70000 disp-ton weapon which has a _Battle
Rider_ DV to five hexes (short range) of *20*!  Because of the way
that meson screens work, I think that only the largest ships could
carry a screen of the magnitude needed to stop this.  The BBs in
_Battle Rider_ don't carry screens that powerful.

One house rule I use to restrict deep-site meson guns is that
the gun mechanism itself may take up no more volume than the
sphere it is mounted in.  Power plants, screens, housing, and
other supporting systems need not be in the sphere.  Starships
don't have this restriction since the whole ship orients to
fire anyway.  For the most part, this doesn't cause any troubles,
and it gives a natural power level for the planet-bound weapon
to be designed for.

Incidentally, protecting the meson gun with a meson screen does
not keep it from being able to fire -- battleships and cruisers
seem to have no problem with having both, in TNE.  It *does*
prohibit reciept of meson communications.  However, a deep-site
can remedy this by placing its' meson communicator in a place
buried underground but *outside* the meson screen, and then
relaying the messages by land line, lasercom through a tunnel,
or some such.

>Does anyone remeber what TL Terra was at, when it was captured.
>Wondering if it had any meson guns.

In _Invasion: Earth_, the best Terran and Solomani troops were
equipped to TL14, but many regular troops had to make do with
TL13 equipment.  Urban guerrillas had TL13.  The three best (TL14)
Terran ground-to-air defenses were rated as corps, and had a
larger bombardment rating than the best Imperial BatRons'
defensive ratings.  Furthermore, there were a large number of
lesser static defenses that *matched* the average BatRons'
defensive ratings.  Expected troop concentrations were light
from our current understanding of a high-pop world's military,
but the Battle of Terra was at the end of a long war, and maybe
neither side had much left.  (Or perhaps neither side wanted to
do too much damage to Terra.)

  Steve Bonneville
  <bonn0015@gold.tc.umn.edu>


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

Date: Mon, 28 Nov 1994 21:26:40 +0000 (GMT)
From: Mark Fletcher <mf1@st-andrews.ac.uk>
To: Traveller <traveller@MPGN.COM>
Subject: More hassles on the Alliance
Message-ID: <Pine.3.87.9411282140.A25185-0100000@pasta>

Ken,
A few more questions:

(1) Could you post to me personally the MT stats for your alliance ships;
I would like to try and do a conversion to BL. If you are interested
please post any additional info which may be of help.

(2) The Alliance was founded by.. the Solomani? Yes? If so, when? If the
society is broadly Solomani in origin, that is, originated from pre-Long
Night era, then would they be free of the bigotry towards other races
that was so prevalent in contemporary Solomani before the collapse?

(3) Does the Alliance have a full name?

(4) Is the Alliance a uniform TL 17 culture, or did the Alliance manage
to obtain TL17 due to the threat of the Imperium, that is, Alliance TL is
TL15 (to bring it inline with the rest of charted space) and the Alliance
has TL17 military equipment?

Cheers

Fletch.

P.S. Anyone want to introduce a race to T:TNE that is similar to Iain M.
Banks "The Culture" as featured in his *excellent* Sci-Fi novels?

P.P.S. What is the current financial status of GDW. I know that theyve
changed the method of payment for writers in Challenge, but they arent
going to go belly up in the near future?


+--------------------------------------------------------------------+
|"Well, Im away to tell children who go    |Mark Fletcher,           |
| to boarding schools, that their parents  |University of St Andrews.|
| hate them. Good night!" Dominick Diamond.|(mf1@st-and.ac.uk)       |
+--------------------------------------------------------------------+



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

Date: 28 Nov 94 17:02:14 ES
From: Derek Smith <Derek_Smith.LOTUS@crd.lotus.com>
To: traveller <traveller@MPGN.COM>
Subject: Re: Stinkin' Meson Guns
Message-ID: <9411282157.AA16345@internet1.lotus.com>

lewis @ chara.gsu.edu wrote:
>Does anyone remember what TL Terra was at, when it was captured.
>Wondering if it had any meson guns. That assualt took along time, if
>I remember correctly, can't remember the source though.  Anyone have
>a better memory.

Assualt?  What's an assualt?  Oh, you mean Assault!  Silly me. 8^)

I don't remember what TL Terra enjoyed when it was captured, but
it definitely was high enough for Meson Guns.

I have an issue of Challenge with an adventure in it that tells how
the Vilani of the *FIRST* Imperium were horrified the first time the
TERRANS used Meson Guns on THEM.

Remember, Meson Guns first become available at TL 11.

And Meson *SCREENS* don't become available until TL 12!!!

(What fun!)


-----------------------------------------------------------------
Derek Smith - Lotus Development Corporation - Release Engineering

"A lot of stuff in school... you don't appreciate 'til you get to
be older, you know, little things, like being spanked everyday by
a middle aged woman... Stuff you'd pay good money for later in
life."
                         --Emo Philips

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

Date: Mon, 28 Nov 1994 15:45:17 -0700 (MST)
From: merrick@RT66.com (Merrick Burkhardt)
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Re: comments on deep Site Meson Guns
Message-ID: <9411282245.AA26798@RT66.com>

> Erich Schneider says:
> >One would think one could use triangulation-type techniques to locate
> >it based on its firing patterns.

>Lewis replies:
> I can't see how. The only way to detect the mesons is to be a target,
> and  the target probably won't be long for this world.  Meson guns are
> firing rather tight beams of particles, triangulation normally works
> for broadcasting, like Tv or radio signals.


As Erich mentioned, pions decay very quickly (like 10E-15 seconds or so
if memory serves). You have to remember that while the beam will be
narrow, the z focus (z being the distance along the beam) will be
regulated by the uncertainty of the meson decays.  Even with very
careful attention, some of the mesons will decay to gammas along the
way---and the resulting gammas don't *have* to travel along the beam,
they are free to radiate the way they 'want' to.

The bottom line is that you'd expect to see some extraneous gamma
radiation coming from the beam pathway.

-Merrick

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

Date:         Mon, 28 Nov 94 20:49:54 EST
From: "Mary E. Poynter" <3I4KQ7X@CMUVM.CSV.CMICH.EDU>
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Space Vikings
Message-ID:   <941128.204954.EST.3I4KQ7X@CMUVM>

Mr. Basinger,
  I have a copy of Space Vikings by H. Beam Piper. It's yours for the postage
to send it to you. Contact me at 3I4kq7x@cmuvm.csv.cmich.edu.

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

Date: Mon, 28 Nov 1994 19:39:35 -0700 (MST)
From: merrick@RT66.com (Merrick Burkhardt)
To: traveller@MPGN.COM (traveller)
Subject: TNE miniatures
Message-ID: <9411290239.AA07850@RT66.com>


Howdy folks,

well, I just got the first of my TNE minis (I had to order it since no
one in town carries them).  It's a Patrol Cruiser.

The scale is hard to figure out.  Does anyone have the FASA deck plans
for this critter?  According to the stats in BL, it is 66m long (of
course this is the goofy number you get from the config table, so it is
meaningless).  If it *is* 66m long, then the figure represents a 72 ton
boat (at 1:1138 scale).  The sculpting is pretty good, though.  The
casting job is decent, but it appears to be compressed dorso-ventrally.

I guess I have to buy another to see what the scale really is (an SDB
seems good for this, or a free trader).

On a related note, what would you guys prefer, tiny (5-6 cm) ships in
different scales (so they'd fit more or less over the BL hexes) or
slightly larger ships in a consistant scale (so players could have a
feel for relative sizes of the ships they live and work in)?

So far my sculpts have all been in 1:1000 scale, so a scout is 38mm
long, etc.  It was *really* surprising to mock up a Tigress BB in this
scale... I used to think 500,000 tons was big, it really isn't, though.

Anyway, I thought I'd comment since I had asked about the scale earlier.

If the true length is known, let me know and I'll post the scale of the
mini Patrol Cruiser, as well as its actual displacement (I think it
would have to be over 120 meters long to displace anywhere *near* 400
tons).


-Merrick


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

Date: Mon, 28 Nov 94 22:17:04
From: john.bogan@asb.com
To: uunet!mpgn.com!traveller@uunet.uu.net
Subject: TRAVELLER DIGEST 113
Message-ID: <9411282217.A9619wk@asb.com>



 >  ... which is scheduled to arrive at New York City's
 >  _Compleat_Strategist_ \when\?  They seem to get stuff late; I was

Jeff, maybe we should get together some time.
I work at Plenum Publishing down in Soho, commute
from LI, and do my prime game shopping at Strategist.

John Bogan

TNE-Pocket and GDW-Beta wonk

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

Date: Tue, 29 Nov 1994 09:12:12 +0200
From: roger.myhre@niva.no (Roger Myhre)
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Jamming vs sensors
Message-ID: <eb1f66f0@smtplink.niva.no>

A.S.Lilly@bnr.co.uk (Andy Lilly) Wrote

>JAMMING
>Jam the meson gun sensors from a starship (probably disguised as a merchant
>ship) or, better still, from one or more covert teams operating on the
>ground (requires far less power than from space because the jammers are so
>much closer to the sensors).
Wrong, actually there is easier to "burn" through the jamming when the
jamming
source get closer to the sensor. It is better to jam from orbit, but still
better to detonate a few nukes, cheaper too :)

StarWolf

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

Date: Tue, 29 Nov 1994 09:38:12 +0200
From: roger.myhre@niva.no (Roger Myhre)
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Message-ID: <eb1fc890@smtplink.niva.no>

     I wrote:
     >> 2. Detonate several nukes in the upper atmosphere. This will
     >> destroy most electronic hardware. And sensors are very hard to
     >> shield against these types of attack. Their antennas have to be
     >> disconnected *before* the Electromagnetic Pulse arrive. Circuit
     >> breakers may protect the process units against EMP, but the
     >> antennas will most likely be fried.
     Lewis Roberts writes:
     >I kind of assume by tl 15 electronics can be hardened pretty easily,
     >and cheaply.  Isn't this normally done with by encasing all
     >electronics in metal.
     Metal do conduct current it won't work I believe. A Farraday cage
     or something will help, but you can't encase the whole thing into it
     Besides sensor use will be pretty rotten anyway as the nukes will
     cause static disturbances for normal sensor use. It will be even more
     effective than traditional jamming.
     Another matter is that the civilian population will probably revolt or
     do something when their daily appliances stop working as
     refridgerators, vehicles, elevators, computers and so on. As food,
     money and security disappears a few nukes destroying all electric
     machines by EMP will make the bombing of London and Germany during the
     war as a field trip.

     StarWolf

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

Date: Tue, 29 Nov 1994 09:42:18 +0000
From: A.S.Lilly@bnr.co.uk (Andy Lilly)
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: LOOOOONG POSTS
Message-ID: <199411290945.EAA27671@Mithril.MPGN.COM>

Two points and a conclusion:

(1) Rob Miracle can correct me if I'm wrong, but it's pretty easy to access
the archives for traveller and xboat by sending a mail message to the MPGN
server and saying send me the messages for a particular day (I've got the
details stashed somewhere from my original 'you have been accepted on xboat'
message). i.e. no ftp gimmickry, just plain e-mail messages.

(2) Long posts to both traveller and xboat are moderately annoying because
they double my e-mail (to no purpose) and also double the size of the
traveller/xboat combined archives.

(Conclusion) If you have a long post, check which mailing list it is most
appropriate to and send it there. Wait until you know which message bundle
it has appeared in (i.e. less than 24 hours to wait) and then send a short
message to the other mailing list saying "Just in case you are interested,
the following blah blah blah was posted to blah and can be found in message
bundle blah which can be retrieved using the command blah blah sent to
blah@MPGN.COM.

Just a thought, I'd appreciate anyone's feedback.
Cmdr Lilly, PITS (Political Intelligence Team, Scout)
PITS Team motto: "We are never outgunned."
* Nothing I say or do in any way reflects the views of my very kind
  and generous employers who have no interest in outgunning anyone. *

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

End of TRAVELLER Digest 116
***************************
