Traveller-digest       Thursday, June 5 1997       Volume 1997 : Number 1405



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

The following topics are covered in this digest:

Re: Re:FFS Gauss weapons
Escape Velocity: the Traveller plug-in?
Dark Ages were way cool
Re: Traveller-digest V1997 #1404
TNE Forms
3D starmap question
Re: Tech Level differences between M0 and M1100
Re: formula for gravity
Re: Traveller-digest V1997 #1404
Re: Is Cleon scared?
Re: Strange weapons for starships...
Re: FS Atm Question
Re: Strange Weapons for Starships...
Re: Kinetic Kill BB's For T4
Windows in Starships?
Re: My TL-15 Xboat Design
Re: Privateering
Re: TNE Forms
XBoat question

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

Date: Wed, 4 Jun 1997 18:55:03 -0700
From: "Edward Swatschek" <edjs@bitslayer.net>
Subject: Re: Re:FFS Gauss weapons

> From:          "Eric Freitas" <edf@atlantic.net>
> Subject:       Re: Re:FFS Gauss weapons
> Date:          Tue, 3 Jun 1997 11:51:31 -0400
>
> No, it's clearly stated in FFS as bl = v/(100*tlm) and
> FFS2 as well.

Clearly?  In FFS (first printing) it's stated as Lb=V/100Tlm, which 
if calcualted in proper order from left to right, you get the 
appropriate barrel-length vs TL progression (note that the book uses 
a standard divide-by sign rather than the slash I used).  It could've 
been more clearly stated, however.


- --
Edward Swatschek  *  edjs@bitslayer.net
                     edjs@mindlink.net

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

Date: Wed, 4 Jun 1997 22:06:42 -0400
From: Roderick Darroch Elliott <rellio@po-box.mcgill.ca>
Subject: Escape Velocity: the Traveller plug-in?

	Somebody wrote:

>
>- --- Traveller-digest wrote:
>
>>4. This is just *begging* to be computerised - any possibility? (SimEmpire,
>>anyone?)
>
>		Howabaout the plug-in-from-hell for Ambrosias Escape Velocity?
>I haven't been on the cutting edge of this discussion, but I've already
>considered cranking up their plug-in editor and making a TNE-based scenario;
>Vampire Fleets'd be COOL in EV!
>
>- --- end of quote ---


	Yes!  Yes!  Yes!  I'd say that Trav would make a killer EV plugin;
a multitude of ships, weapons, worlds, history, personalities, etc...  I've
been praying that somebody would do this.

R.D. Elliott <rellio@po-box.mcgill.ca>

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

Date: Wed, 4 Jun 1997 23:06:52 -0400 (EDT)
From: Brett Fishburne <bfish@atlantech.net>
Subject: Dark Ages were way cool

<Begin Apology>

Sorry to all the poor maligned Dark Age scientists I compared to
Neanderthals.  I have been soundly, repeatedly, and resoundingly refuted.  I
hereby recant any reference private or public, to the inadequacies of the
Dark Ages.  Blah, blah, blah, nevermind my last dozen or so posts.

<End Apology>

<Begin Soapbox>

I also got resoundingly smacked by an authority in the field for saying that
I couldn't find references to information on the net.  I was told that I was
basically geek fodder.

OK, I recognize the inadequacies of the net as a research tool.  All I said
was that I couldn't find any information on the net -- not that it didn't
exist.  I asked for references when I couldn't find any.  I also indicated
that my research had been minimal.

I know the net is not the be all and end all, but hey, it beats the crap out
of the local library.  It is way better and easier to use than the local
college library.  And I can access it directly unlike the Library of Congress.

<End Soapbox>

Please note, I'm a programmer, not a historian.  My knowledge of the Dark
Ages was from a liberal arts High School (and a good one at that).  If I
don't know individuals in the field, that is why.  Frankly, the only history
of technology book I've ever found was on the history of rocket technology
and the only history of Roman invention was a Scientific American article on
catapults from the 70s.

Brett "OK Dark Ages were cool" Fishburne

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

Date: Wed, 04 Jun 1997 22:25:51 -0500
From: Andy Holzrichter <jhereg@southwind.net>
Subject: Re: Traveller-digest V1997 #1404

>Date: Wed, 4 Jun 1997 13:57:03 -0400 (EDT)
>From: fcain@st6000.sct.edu (Franklin W. Cain)
>Subject: Surface Area of Planet...
>
>Someone asked how to compute the surface area of a planet...
>
>The formula for the surface area of a sphere is 4 * Pi * R^2
>(Pi is approx. 3.1415927; "R" is the radius of the sphere).  
>
>Using algebra, we can simplify this to Pi * D^2 ("D" is the diameter).  
>
>Assuming you have just the UWP Size Code, and *not* a specific, actual
>value for the planet's diameter, we can use algebra again to get the
>following...  
>
>(1,000 miles is approx. 1,600 kilometers.)
>
>Surface Area = Pi * D^2
>= 3.1415927 * (UWP Size Code * 1600)^2
>= 3.1415927 * (UWP Size Code)^2 * 1600^2
>= 3.1415927 * 1600^2 * (UWP Size Code)^2
>= 3.1415927 * 2.56 * 10^6 * (UWP Size Code)^2
>= 8.0424773 * 10^6 * (UWP Size Code)^2
>
>Disgustingly simplified formula: 
>  Surface Area = (UWP Size Code)^2 * 8 million square kilometers
>
>Franklin


Now that we have the surface area, does anyone have a formula for gravity?

					jhereg
jhereg

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

Date: Thu, 5 Jun 1997 01:13:24 +0000
From: "Kenneth Bearden" <dreamer@weck.brokersys.com>
Subject: TNE Forms

For you TNE players out there, I am cleaning house.  My old house 
system used to be based on TNE.  Since, I've switched to the T4 
rules, but I still do have several equipment forms that may interest 
you.  

Eventually, I will be converting these to T4 format (like I did the 
TL 11 Automed, if you saw that) and erasing the TNE format.  If you 
play with the TNE rules and would like a set of these, let me know 
quick, because I'll be deleting some of them.

I'm not going to list all of what I've got, and if you ask for one of 
these, you get them all.  But, I can tell you that most of them are 
equipment sheets.

In my game, we use the old DGP style equipment sheets.  Each player 
has a notebook that he carries his character in.  Each piece of 
equipment a character has has its own sheet with stats, rules, and 
description.  When a character wants to use the piece of equipment, 
he has the total write up at his finger tips.  

Using the sheet this way makes it easy to decide who's got what.  I 
just tell everyone to pick there equipment and place it in a 
particular part of their notebook.  Then, during the adventure, if 
there any doubt about what a character has or how much encumbrance 
should be applied to him, we just look at that section of the 
character's book and can see.

I also find that having these sheets helps characters envision their 
equipment better.  If you have a scanner, you can scan in pictures of 
the equipment in the space provided.

These sheets are all TNE format-for instance, if you have a gun, it's 
autofire adjustments for that character can be recorded in a special 
place on the back of the form.  No more figuring recoil for every 
shot!  Just do it once, and refer to the sheet.

These sheets will all be in Word v2.0.  Let me know if you want them. 
 I'll wait a week or so before I delete the ones I'm going to.

Kenneth.

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

Date: Thu, 5 Jun 1997 02:12:16 -0500
From: "The Druid" <tntsrv@10mb.com>
Subject: 3D starmap question

I have not been on the mailing list for quite a while, 
and wanted to know: what is the current trend on 
3d starmaps? Last I checked, it was greatly dissapproved of.
If you would not mind posting a comment, it would be appreciated;
If not here, then at 
http://www.10mb.com/tntsrv/folder/forum.htm
The Druid

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

Date: Thu, 5 Jun 1997 00:13:02 -0700 (PDT)
From: "John R. Snead" <jsnead@netcom.com>
Subject: Re: Tech Level differences between M0 and M1100

Bruce Johnson <johnson@Pharmacy.Arizona.EDU> wrote:

> Again, these numbers are without Vland included, so these represent the
> true function that was used to model the TL drop in generating the 
data. A
> large number of worlds went to TL0, but the drop otherwise is remarkably
> uniform. Here are the distributions at each era:

> TL      M1100   M0      
> 0       3       572
> 1       15      40
> 2       27      84
> 3       42      179
> 4       100     326
> 5       190     459
> 6       277     521
> 7       389     598
> 8       500     600
> 9       582     560
> 10      584     405
> 11      576     343
> 12      570     202
> 13      405     67
> 14      300     12
> 15      341     0
> 16      66      0
> 17      1       0
> 
> Clearly, we just shifted the mean down, without changing the distribution
> curve much.

You know, this looks *very* good to me.  In M 1110 the Imperium had a
maximum TL of 15, with a few TL 16 worlds.  In M 0 the Imperium (and
surrounding area) had a Maximum TL of 12 with a few TL 13 worlds.  This
makes sense to me.  By this logic, by M 300 around 300 worlds will be TL
13 and a few dozen will be TL 14, still sounds good. 

By this logic, the maximum TL of an era is defined by the maximum TL which
can be widely found in the Imperium.  In M 1110 this is 15, in M 0 this is
12. Worlds one TL higher exist, but they are very rare (1/6th as many TL D
worlds as TL C worlds in M0) and a number of these worlds are research
bases or experimental colonies. 

The TL 14 worlds in M0 do need to be reduced to TL 12 or 13, since 2 TLs
up is a bit much for this setting. 

Comments?


- -John Snead jsnead@netcom.com

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

Date: Thu, 5 Jun 1997 11:28:32 +0100
From: Timothy.Collinson@solent.ac.uk
Subject: Re: formula for gravity

jhereg wrote:

Now that we have the surface area, does anyone have a formula for gravity?

World Builder's Handbook gives:

G = M x (64/R^2)

where G = Gravity in standard gees (Terra=1)
     M = Planet's Mass
     R = UWP size digit (use 0.6 for S)



to get the Mass:

M = K x (R/8)^3

where:M = Mass in standard masses (Terra=1)
     K = Planet's Density
     R = UWP size digit (use 0.6 for S)




and to get the density you roll 3D on a table that ranges from 0.18 to
2.25.  (Terra =1)


HTH

tc
timothy.collinson@solent.ac.uk

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

Date: Thu, 05 Jun 1997 11:42:17 +0100
From: Bruce E J Lewis <bruce@legend.ftech.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Traveller-digest V1997 #1404

At 22:25 04/06/97 -0500, Andy Holzrichter wrote:
>Now that we have the surface area, does anyone have a formula for gravity?

	This from the Spinward Marches Campaign...hope this table formats okay ;-)

Size	Diameter - Kms	Mass	Area	Gravity	Esc Vol
1		1600	0.0019	0.015	0.122	1.35
2		3200	0.015	0.063	0.24	2.69
3		4800	0.053	0.141	0.377	4.13
4		6400	0.125	0.25	0.5	5.49
5		8000	0.244	0.391	0.625	6.87
6		9600	0.422	0.563	0.84	8.72
7		11200	0.67	0.766	0.875	9.62
8		12800	1	1	1	11
9		14400	1.424	1.266	1.12	12.35
A		16000	1.953	1.563	1.25	13.73


Size is UWP.					
Mass in in Earths (Earth = 1) and assumes density equal to Earth (5.5 grams
per cubic centimeter.					
Area is in Earths (Earth = 1)					
Gravitity is in G's (Earth = 1)					
Escape velocity is in km per sec.					

	See ya...


Bruce E J Lewis - mailto:bruce@legend.ftech.co.uk
Telephone - 0956-506527

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

Date: Thu, 5 Jun 1997 12:56:58 MET
From: "Volker A. Greimann" <GREI5001@uni-trier.de>
Subject: Re: Is Cleon scared?

- -> What if the Old Earth Union is at TL13 at Year 0? Would that explain why
- -> the Imperium stopped expansion towards Terra, and didn't integrate until
- -> the 500s (IIRC)? They waited until they reached a similar TL? And it fits
- -> with the ongoing progress discussion.
No, it sais somewher in TD 18, that there was a sizeable Empire in 
Solomani Rim Sector, above Terra, that pervented Cleon from getting 
there sooner! 


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: Thu, 05 Jun 1997 05:00:34 -0700
From: "Tim.Smith@bbs.logicnet.com" <tim.smith@bbs.logicnet.com>
Subject: Re: Strange weapons for starships...

> From: FKiesche@concentric.net
> Subject: Strange Weapons for Starships...
> 
> Greetings All:
> 
> <<snipp!>>
> 
> So, the question is: Do any of the ship experts on the list have any
> thoughts along these lines to help out a non-Gearhead? Would machine guns
> be worthwhile at all as a weapon (even in scaring off Evil Pirates
> because you are shooting the heck out of their antennas, etc.)? Any
> chance at all of penetrating windows, areas, screwing up engine nozzles,
> etc.., etc., etc.? 
A few alternatives:

Missile racks with high-explosive (ie TL7-8) missiles.
Large bore (short barrel) howitzers.
Mass drivers.
Machine gun arrays (sort of like flechette).

All of these weapons have the same problem - beyond very short range, hitting is basically impossible. Of 
course if you are more worried about the story than the physics, that shouldn't be too problematic. An 
"advantage" of the large bore howitzers and mass drivers is that they'll give the ship one hell of a kick when 
they fire.

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

Date: Thu, 5 Jun 1997 01:16:49 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: FS Atm Question

In mail you write:

> I just read in TD 18 that planets with insidious Atms could not be 
> settled before 318 or so. Question to the people with the statistical 
> programms: Are there any worlds with Atm C that are settled?
> If so those worlds should be set to Pop, Gov, Law, TL = 0 !

Rather, any such woulds must have *natives* rather than colonists.

- -- 
Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
 shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort

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

Date: Thu, 5 Jun 1997 01:08:05 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: Strange Weapons for Starships...

In mail you write:

> Another thought was to weapons capability. I thought of giving them some 
> decent defensive capability (sandcasters and the like), but very limited 
> offensive capability...my memory went back to...
>
> Triplanetary, First (1973) Edition
>
> Didn't this version have ships equipped with .50 caliber machine guns? 
> Now I don't pretend to be a Traveller Gearhead (I leave that to other 
> members of the TML group), but this might be a interesting (and for the 
> players frustrating...think of the attempts to get ammo!) way of gunning 
> the ship...until they can make enough money to buy a "real" weapon like a 
> laser!
>
> So, the question is: Do any of the ship experts on the list have any 
> thoughts along these lines to help out a non-Gearhead? Would machine guns 
> be worthwhile at all as a weapon (even in scaring off Evil Pirates 
> because you are shooting the heck out of their antennas, etc.)? Any 
> chance at all of penetrating windows, areas, screwing up engine nozzles, 
> etc.., etc., etc.?

The bullet from a .50 BMG round weighs around 50 grams (guess, based on
memory of the last time I handled one). At 3 km/sec it'll explode as if
it was a 50 gram charge of TNT. At 6 km/sec like a 200 gram charge, at
9 km/sec like a 450 gram charge. etc. Energy goes up with the square of
the velocity. 

So the trick is to be moving fast enough *towards* the other guy, fire
off a few hundred rounds (at several credits each!) and hope he runs
into them. The firing velocity is so low that you can ignore it. 

Given that 30 km/sec is not an uncommon relative velocity, that gives
the equivalent of a 5 kilo charge of TNT per hit. Of course you aren't
likely to get many. 

- -- 
Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
 shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort

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

Date: Wed, 4 Jun 1997 23:42:47 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: Kinetic Kill BB's For T4

In mail, sinbad@dfw.net writes:

> "Bighot"tm Kinetic Kill BB's are a 1 cm diameter sphere of Bonded
> Superdense armor material. Each has a volume of 0.0000005 m^3 and mass of
> 0.0000075 tons.

<snip>

>
> Data for the damage/pen at common accelerations:
> Flight   |
> Time     |Acceleration of Carrier/Missile
> Minutes  |6   12   18   24   30   36
> -------------------------------------
> 30       |24  32   39   44   49   53
> 60       |32  44   53   60   66   71
> 90       |39  53   63   71   79   85
> 120      |44  60   71   81   89   97
> 150      |49  66   79   89   98   107
> 180      |53  71   85   97   107  115
> -------------------------------------
> Example: a 12g missile traveling for 30 minutes before Bigshot releasing,
> does damage/pen of 32 to any targets hit.
>
> As to how many hits well that is something that will have to be worked on
> for each system ie CT/MT/TNE/T4.
>
> My idea right know is one hit per 100tons of hull displacement for a normal
> success and two hits for every 100tons of hull displacement for outstanding
> success.

It's reasonably easy to design a deployment method that will spread the
projectiles in a manner that approximates a flat disk. Assume equal
spacing at 1 BB per 100 sq m.

> The .1 m^3 RAAM page module can carry up to:
> Number: 153,438 projectiles                     

Spread covers a circle 2.2 km in radius. 

> The 1 m^3 RAAM page module can carry up to:
> Number: 1,814,953 projectiles                   

Spread covers a circle 7.6 km in radius.

> The 10 m^3 RAAM page module can carry up to:
> Number: 19,072,352 projectiles                  

Spread covers a circle 24.6 km in radius!

Narrow the spread and you increase the number of hits. But at 100 m^2
per BB, that's one in each 10x10 meter "square". That's gonna give
*more* than 1 hit per 100 dtons!

- -- 
Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
 shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort

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

Date: Thu, 5 Jun 1997 11:51:39 +0100
From: Chris Lloyd <cdl@delcam.com>
Subject: Windows in Starships?

Warning: Lots of stuff snipped in order to change topic completely.

Bill Prankard writes:
> Frederick Paul Kiesche III writes:
> >Any chance at all of penetrating windows
>
> [..] and the bridge didn't look to cool either!

Having seen comments like this on several occasions, I'd like to ask,
how many people have windows in starships in their games, and the
bridge in a vulnerable position?  Does it make a difference if the
ship is a military ship or a civilian ship?  What do your players
actually use the windows for?

Personally none of my ships have windows, and the bridge is located
right in the centre of the ship along with all the other important
sections.  As far as I'm concerned, windows are just too delicate to
put on the hull of a ship.  The shuttle has already had a window
cracked due to a paint fleck in a retrograde orbit, how much damage
can you expect if a traveller ship encounters a speck of dust at roll
over on it's way between two planets.  Not to mention the liability
they are if it comes to hostile fire.  The only advantage I can see
for windows is the passengers actually get to look out a "real window"
and actually see the new planet, rather than just seeing it as a video
feed from a camera on the outside of the hull.

Is there anything I've missed?  Am I wildly out on how much people are
going to be able to see through the windows?  Or have I missed the
point completely?

			Chris.

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

Date: Thu, 5 Jun 1997 00:22:15 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: My TL-15 Xboat Design

In mail you write:

> Data densities at TL-15 have got to be quite staggering, and since an
> X-boat has tons and tons of displacement for these databanks, I suspect
> that the X-boat network easily managed to stay within the 'bandwidth'
> required for the Imperium's traffic...if one Xboat is filled up, or a
> route continually overloads, they'll throw more X-boats into the traffic
> stream.

Data densities *now* are pretty amazing. Sure, we can't *practically*
use "1 atom = 1 bit" but we've demonstrated that it is *possible*. My
*personal* "guess" for the max density is storing bits as spin states
in metallic hydrogen. That'd give you 1/10th of Avogardo's Number per
cc.[1] Call it 2^200 bits per cc. That's a *lot* of storage.

[1] assuming metallic hydrogen has a density of .1 g/cc

> Think of it as a switched packet network with LOTS of space
> between packets; you can ramp up packet density quite a bit before you
> start seeing collisions. I wouldn't be surprised if the heavily traveled
> interior lanes of the Imperium have _hundreds_ of X-Boats moving through
> daily.

Given likely data densities, I bet that they can just stuff more data
storage modules into the Xboat. Consider the bandwidth of a postal bag
(20-70 lbs) full of CD-ROMs. 

> The switches are the X-boat tenders and their stations.
>
> Remember, space is big, really, really mind-bogglingly big. An X-boat
> might hold several megaterabytes of data (remember, it may be carrying
> material meant for the farthest reaches of the imperium at any given time)
> so even at the rate a TL-15 society generates data, I suspect data STORAGE
> technology will keep up, and throwing another X-boat into the breach
> will probably work for some time. 

What I want to know is just what they are using to *transmit* all this
data. Bandwidth starts getting *real* scarce at these data densities.
I'd think it'd be easier to tranship the data modules (remember that
postal bag?). And given privacyu concerns, I bet the link is
*physical*, say a few hundred optical fibers running at terabit rates.
that'll handle your "megaterabytes" in 9 hours or less. (assume 1
megaterabit of data, 1 terabit data rate, 256 parallel fibers, result
is 32768 seconds)

> I suspect that the real bottleneck (other than jumpspace time) is dumping
> these gargantuan amounts of data into the planetary networks. I suspect
> that really BIG customers have dedicated X-boat tenders. and on some
> routes, dedicated X-boats (Can you IMAGINE the traffic that say, Nassirka
> generates to their headquarters and back out on a daily basis!!!???)

See above. At 9 *hours* to dump that one load over a cable,
broadcasting is right out. 

> When that much traffic is cruising through an Imperium subsidized service,
> we can see why X-boat rates are so low.

If I can ever get data on the proposed HDTV standards I can work up
what the result would be as a type of "v-mail". Assuming 2048x2048x4
billion colors at 120 frames a second I get 848,000 *days* of such
video in 1 "megaterabit".

Assuming a 32-bit character set like unicode, each "frame" of that
video is around 800 pages of text. Assuming better than CD audio, I get
200,000 *days* of audio per frame.

No wonder mail is "free", and still pictures almost so.

If anybody has the CT Forms Supplement handy, give me the character
count for the message form and the pixel count for the "picture" form.
As well as the suggested prices.

- -- 
Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
 shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort

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

Date: Thu, 5 Jun 1997 00:03:12 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: Privateering

In mail you write:

> The Commander wrote:
> -----------------------------------------------
> The proposal on International Starship issues has made me think of the
> question of Privateering in the early 3rd Imp.  I remember that back in MT
> days, Pirates could get a "Letter of Marque" From a Sector Duke (or Faction
> Leader as it was in MT) where they could only prey upon ships of an enemy
> nation.
>
> I don't remeber exactly, but I believe basicaly your govt gives you
> missions, but if you're caught by the enemy, they don't even acknowledge
> your existance (FNORD!)  You are then subject to the enemy's piracy laws.

Nope. A letter of marque and reprisal made you legal. As long as you
stuck to raiding vessels of the right nation, you got treated like a
navy ship would be. Officers imprisoned, possibly under parole, men
just imprisoned.

That's *why* letters of marque were so important. They kept you
(usually) from an appointment with the hangman.

They seem odd to us, but do recall that at the exact same time you
could outfit a regiment of troops and *purchase* a commision as a
colonel! So "privately owned warships" aren't so unusual.


> I imagine Letters of Marque are around in Mileu 0.  A Letter of Marque
> entitled the bearer to seize or destroy the assets of an enemy, and granted
> a certain legal immunity for those actions (immunity from the laws of the
> government that GRANTED the Letter of Marque).  The advantage of this is
> the granting nation gets a free naval asset (albeit not a Ship of the Line)
> and is able to hurt an enemy state without expending resources.  If the
> privateer is caught, the granting government can either repudiate the
> Letter of Marque, or simply ignore the situation, or use the situation as
> an act of provocation to declare war (you are holding our loyal servant
> Commander X?  Prepare to feel the might of our fleet!).

During war, you'd get tried for *violating* the letter of marque by
*either* side. So a smart man would be careful. Of course, he'd also
staty away from anything he couldn't outfight (much easier in the days
of sail).

The enemy could ignore your letter of marque, but that risks two
things. First, they may have privateers out there and not want the same
done to them. Second, if they lose a fight to a warship and it's known
that they'd hung privateers, they might at the very least get a lot
worse treatment than normal. 

In reality, you'll be "nice" to captured privateers in direct
proportion to the extent that you believe you or others on your side
could be hurt if you *weren't* "nice".

- -- 
Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
 shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort

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

Date: Thu, 5 Jun 1997 19:21:43 +0800
From: "Benjamin Barton" <aramis3d@iinet.net.au>
Subject: Re: TNE Forms

Please send us the lot

> For you TNE players out there, I am cleaning house.  My old house 
> system used to be based on TNE.  Since, I've switched to the T4 
> rules, but I still do have several equipment forms that may interest 
> you.  

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

Date: Thu, 05 Jun 1997 13:56:04 +0200
From: Nicolas LEJEUNE <nlejeune@suresnes.marben.fr>
Subject: XBoat question

Someone wrote :

> Since the Xboat has *always* been a maneuver-less ship with minimal cargo

I'm not  very clear with the Xboat network.

If those ship don't have maneuver drives, how can they land or approach
orbital startports to change crew, refuel or repair. I assume that the data
are transfered directly by communication devices at a range of nearly 100
diamerters. 

They jump in at 100 diameter with 0 speed, transfert data to a grounded or
orbital "post office" which will deliver mail after. Then wait that the
"post office" send new delivery, and store  all the data in their banks.
After the final acknoledge, the jumped to the next world.

Right?

Maybe there are other utility space ships which can refuel the Xboat or
change the crew or attached itseft to the xboat to carry it top the nearby
orbital station for repairing. 

But then, how can they be sure that they always be near 100 diameter of the
next world. How can they compensate the gravitationnal field which will
attracked them to every world. their speed will always increase toward
inside of 100 diameter. So when they'll be inside 100 diameter the jumps
would be much more dangerous.

Further more it's quite impossible to follow orbits (even far ones) when
you constantly change the G-field by jumping in another system.

Could anyone explain me why the Xboat don't have any maneuver drives even a
0.05G just to correct the low speed of the ship and stay on stable orbit?
- -----------
Nicolas LEJEUNE
   Engineer, Paris, France
   Traveller (TNE), and WhiteWolf RPG
   Mailto:nlejeune@suresnes.marben.fr 
   Mailto:marben@worldnet.net (Week-end only!)

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End of Traveller-digest V1997 #1405
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