Traveller-digest      Saturday, August 21 1999      Volume 1999 : Number 991



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

The following topics are covered in this digest:

Re: Baby [OT, but traditional] 
Re: HEPlar lives!
Re: Vilani Language
Re: Hard Science
Weird worlds (was Re: Four Lords of the Diamond (Re: Poul Anderson...Hal Clement))
re: Hard Science
Re: Four Lords of the Diamond (Re: Poul Anderson...Hal Clement) 
Re: Hard Science 
Re: Pronunciation (was Re: Stereotyped Gamers...)
Re: Asterisks
RE: Dear Loren W., RE: Hats Off to Jesse
Re: Over-the-top-silliness
re: Hudson-class Lander (GTL9)
Orion Drive Modules
GT Streamlining
re: Grav Deckplates
Re: Cloning (was Hard Science)
Re: Asterisks
Re: Experience System
re: Grav Deckplates

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 07:20:46 -0300
From: Michel Vaillancourt <misha@empire.atlantic-online.ns.ca>
Subject: Re: Baby [OT, but traditional] 

At 05:21 PM 20/08/1999 -0400, you wrote:
>Quick announcement: My Wife and I have just been blessed with a baby girl,
>Tammalyn Elizabeth Hostman; 3.335kg, 47cm, 19:38 Alaska Daylight Time, 19
>August 1999.
>
>Wil (who will be unavailable for the next week.)
>
           <CHEERS> <APPLAUSE>


        --Michel
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	Michel R. Vaillancourt	misha@atlantic-online.ns.ca
				ICQ # 31172292
	"Reality Error in Progress....
			....Do Not Adjust Your Penguin"	
	-+=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=+-
	Into Cyberpunk?  Check Out:
		"http://www.atlantic-online.ns.ca/cp2020"
	Into Traveller?  Check Out:
		"http://www.atlantic-online.ns.ca/traveller"
	-+=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=+-
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------------------------------

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 03:07:14 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: HEPlar lives!

In mail you write:

> Leonard Erickson writes:
>  Fried the post and left a nice expanse of trinitite (fused glass). It
>> didn't dig all that *deep*, as we later find out. 
>> 
>> My take is to consider that *mass flow* of that HEPlaR engine. That
>> energy is concentrated in not very much mass. So the exhaust will act
>> more like a "particle beam" or the like. It'll tend to dig long fairly
>> straight holes in what it hits, but not spread out too much. So ships
>> would leave *very* distinctive "landing scars". *Narrow* (a few cm?)
>> *deep* glass-lined holes in solid rock. 
>
> Yes, at the speed of a HEPlaR reactor, the effect is equivalent to a (poorly 
> focused) particle beam.  This doesn't mean that you dig small deep holes.  
> At those energy densities, it pretty much doesn't matter, scattering off of 
> matter means that _anything_ acts like an explosion.

Well, how about "large" deep holes? :-) 

I thought that they had done some work on using electron beams for
tunneling through rock? 

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

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 03:10:06 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: Vilani Language

In mail you write:

>> Also, there's a moderate amount of evidence that *some* aspects of
>> human language are "hardwired". If so, they obviously *can* be
>> overriden, but it'd still tend to make the languages tend back towards
>> something "more human" in such a time span.
>
> What aspects? For that matter, what evidence? This sounds interesting, are
> we talking onamatopeia (sp?), basic phoenetic elements, or what?

Grammar. 

When you throw a bunch of people together without a common language,
they develop a sort of mish-mash of several of the languages. This is
"pidgin" and people use their "native" grammar when speaking it, as
word order and the like have gone out the window as far as being
meaningful grammatical elements.

When a community of pidgin speakers is stable for a generation or so,
you have kids growing up with it as their "native" language. At this
point it acquires "rules" and becomes a "creole".

Since there are no grammatical cues from their parents and other adults
(well, no *consistent* ones) ones, the kids have grown up in a "grammar
free" environment.

Yet studies seem to show that the grammars of *all* creoles are far too
similar to for it to be a coincidence. Even when they throw out the
cases where it's arguable that the sample was "contaminated". 

I also seem to recall that some sounds/expressions/whatever you want to
call them *are* hardwired. Laughing, for instance. 

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

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 03:28:15 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Re: Hard Science

In mail you write:

>> But it's important so that your technology remains constant.  Otherwise,
>> you get a "Star Trek:TNG" environment where every other menace is solved by
>> manipulating particles or forces that never get mentioned again, despite
>> the world-shattering nature of the solution.
>
> I remember Chalker writing something on a simular line, and I *know*
> Niven & Pournelle have, too.  They also mentioned that they had to
> work out the *implications* of their technologies like the Alderson
> Drive to see what kinds of cultures were possible.  For instance,
> given even *current* weapons technologies (1999 AD), no Langston
> Field, and an Alderson Drive that allowed you to pick and choose
> where in a system you could come in at, assuming you could come out
> at orbital distances instead of 'way the hell out there', it's just
> too easy for Bad Guys to come out of space, shoot the place up, land,
> loot, and fade into the woodwork before getting caught.  Planetary
> defense is a *nightmare*, and 'upward mobility' means getting your
> hands on a ship and some nukes and raiding your neighbors.  Damned
> near impossible to create and maintain anything like a stable culture.
  
Check out Niven's essay "Theory & Practice of Teleportation". As he
points out, *any* teleport system that doesn't require both a
transmitter *and* a receiver will result in a short, *nasty* war almost
immediately after being discovered.

For example, just consider what would have happened if during the Cold
War either side had come up with a way to transmt bombs to any point
they chose ("receiverless teleportation") or to snatch missiles and
other items from anyplace they chose ("transmitterless teleportation").

Instant, *very* one sided war.

And if you want to see what happens in a universe where the "plot
saver" devices *aren't* forgotten, try E.E."Doc" Smith's "Lensman" or
"Skylark" series. The arms race in those books is almost enough to
frighten a munchkin! (Hint: at the end of one series, Our Heros have
just destroyed an entire *galaxy*.)

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

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 03:42:50 PST
From: shadow@krypton.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Subject: Weird worlds (was Re: Four Lords of the Diamond (Re: Poul Anderson...Hal Clement))

In mail you write:

Let's see how many of you can figure out the right response to *this* "world".

You've encountered a system containing a ringworld, and two planets.
All orbiting a fairly normal G class star. 

One planet is an airless rockball, and as I recall orbits inside the
"orbit" of the ringworld. The other is rather Earth-like and orbits a
bit outside.

From the spacing of the shadow squares and the rotational speed of the
ring, it would appear that the local day is about 30 hours. 

The ringworld and the Earthlike planet seem to be *very* "under
developed" apparently these folks like lots of space. There's eveidence
of lots of small towns and villages, but the only major urban type
concentrations seem to be at the rim walls. 

There's one *odd* feature on one of the "continents". It looks like
someone sliced off a small mountain range at a few thousand feet up,
and polished the resulting flat surface. Looks like some sort of
marble, not granite.

Anybody recognize the place yet?

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

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 07:48:42 -0400
From: Walter Smith <SmithW@HARTWICK.EDU>
Subject: re: Hard Science

Leonard Erickson wrote:
>>>>>>>>>
For example, just consider what would have happened if during the Cold
War either side had come up with a way to transmt bombs to any point
they chose ("receiverless teleportation") or to snatch missiles and
other items from anyplace they chose ("transmitterless teleportation").

Instant, *very* one sided war.
>>>>>>>>>
For a "literary" example, refer to _Judge Dredd: The Apocalypse War_.

This storyline complilation of the famous british comic series has
two megacities in a nuclear balance of terror. Unknown to the good guys,
the bad guys have developed a defense shield known as the
"Apocalypse Warp". When the good-guy city gets invaded by the bad 
guys, the good guys launch a bunch of missiles - which hit the
Apocalypse Warp, and get teleported to another world. The bad guy 
missiles, of course, meet no such warp on their way to selected sectors
of the good guy city.

What was a balanced cold war turns almost immediately into 
guerrila warfare versus a conquering army, with vast portions of
Mega City One (the Good Guy city) simply gone.

Walt Smith

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 11:01:35 -0400
From: "Keven R. Pittsinger" <jamstar@accesstoledo.com>
Subject: Re: Four Lords of the Diamond (Re: Poul Anderson...Hal Clement) 

> 
> Actually less than you'd think... and more.
> 
> The physics of the system fall well outside of the range that ANY
> Traveller based design system could create, with three habitable worlds.

Four habitable worlds.  But they were terraformed by nanites.  A bit of a 
reach for normal Traveller tech, but still doable...

> The main effect in the stories, the nanites that change the agent, can
> be hand waved as some type of ancient artifact. Once beyond the fact
> that they are well beyond the highest Trav tech level, their effects can
> be gamed rather easily with Trav's rules. It's quite reasonable to have
> the nanites tied to something on a world or worlds (possibly a central
> processor... anyone see Crusade?) and have one of the effects be the
> death of the host once away form the control of the CPU. 
> 
> The fact that the lead character was a multiple clone with matched
> memories is also beyond the scope of Traveller tech levels.

Actually, the 4 'donor' bodies were natural bodies that had been brainwiped 
and retaped with the personality and memories of the agent.  According to my 
BBB (Traveller 'hardback' rules set), cloning is a TL13 technology, thus 
'brain taping' should naturally start happening around TL14, 15, or 16.  
Thus, the taping is reachable.  <grin>
 
> Best bet would be to modify the scenario to a single world, maybe with
> three distict continents (all artificial and equal in size) that
> "someone" is using as a prison after finding out that the nanite "virus"
> kills anyone infected once a certain distance from the world (say just
> under the jump limit) was reached.
> 
> Another possiblity is to have the nanites create massive jumpspace
> intolerence in the recipiants. THat way they can move at sub-light
> speeds but not jump. This would make the system less effective as a
> jail, however.

Option 1 would work better.  (grin)

Keven

- -- 
tc++ tm+ tn t4- to ru++ ge+ 3i c+ jt au st- ls pi+ ta+ he+ so- vi zh sy
- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                     Science-Fiction Adventure
                                                     In Reavers' Deep

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 11:10:08 -0400
From: "Keven R. Pittsinger" <jamstar@accesstoledo.com>
Subject: Re: Hard Science 

> > an Alderson Drive that allowed 
> > you to pick and choose where in a system you could come in at, assuming you
> > could come out at orbital distances instead of 'way the hell out there'
> 
> I loved the book, but as I remember, you couldn't come out just anywhere.
> There were specific points or areas one had to get to in order to Jump and
> from which one exited from, although they were not limited by the same 100 d
> limit of Trav. I asked about ideas on how the Alderson Drive might work in
> the TU earlier, and am eagerly awaiting the arrival of First In (couple days
> from now, I think.) to see how the steller data is handled.

That's *why* the Alderson Drive was rigged to work like it did.  If you could
pop in right over top of a planet, wait a few tens of seconds to shake off the
Jump effect, you could then attack or invade the planet in question
preactically with impunity.  Planetary defenses would be wired to attack at
detection unless an automated IFF signal with the proper code keys wasn't
transmitted.  And ghod help you if your IFF transmitter was whacked.  <grin>

Without Langston fields, space combat would be short and brutal, with few
survivors.  Ships would be *small*, lightly crewed, and basically 'pt boats'.
Emphasis would be on sheer numbers, and you'd expect heavy losses.  *With*
Langston fields, combat craft would be larger, and you'd get large crewed
cruisers and battleships because they'd *survive* longer.  Space combat would
become more of the long range long duration duels talked about in MIGE.

Keven

- -- 
tc++ tm+ tn t4- to ru++ ge+ 3i c+ jt au st- ls pi+ ta+ he+ so- vi zh sy
- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                     Science-Fiction Adventure
                                                     In Reavers' Deep

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 15:08:26 +0100
From: "Mark Preston" <mark@mpreston.demon.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Pronunciation (was Re: Stereotyped Gamers...)

- -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

I don't know, but I suspect the Astronomy article will have been
written by an American. The pronunciation was actually changed - very
amusingly to the British, I assure you - during the fly-by, due to
pressure from a group going by the name of the 'Moral Majority'
(whatever that is) which felt that it was an inappropriate
pronunciation for prime time television reports. If you check the
dictionary (not Webster's) you will find that "your anus" is the
correct pronunciation.

- - -----Original Message-----
From: Leonard Erickson <shadow@krypton.rain.com>
To: traveller@lists.imagiconline.com
<traveller@lists.imagiconline.com>
Date: 19 August 1999 00:15
Subject: Pronunciation (was Re: Stereotyped Gamers...)


>In mail you write:
>
>> In a message dated 8/18/99 1:18:55 AM Eastern Daylight Time, 
>> xrp@sierratel.com writes:
>>
>> << 
>>  And how does one pronounce Uranus? ;-)
>>  BZA >>
>>
>>     In English it should be correctly pronounced in as "Your Anus"
just as 
>> all the jokes say.
>>     If you affected the Latin pronunciation it would sound something like 
>> "ore Anne us"   (the middle syllable pronounces as the girls name Anne)
>
>Sorry, wrong on *both* counts. It's *not* pronounced "your anus" nor is
>it Latin.
>
>I just happen to have an article (from this month's Astronomy) on how
>to pronounce the names of various things.
>
>Uranus is pronunounced "YER'n-us" according to the article. I'd have
>written it "YER-uhn-us" but you get the idea. And since it's the name of
>a Greek God, no, the pronunciation *isn't* allowed to shift.
>
>I recommend the article. 
>
>
>
>-- 
>Leonard Erickson (aka Shadow)
> shadow@krypton.rain.com        <--preferred
>leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com     <--last resort
>
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------------------------------

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 10:38:42 -0600 (MDT)
From: Merrick Burkhardt <merrick@shell.rt66.com>
Subject: Re: Asterisks

 
> I could use _underlines_, but that requires using the shift key, and is
> a lot more awkward to type.
 
Um, don't take this as a flame, but on all my computers "*" requires
a shift key.

:-)

Italics would be the standard print way to do so I guess, but it
would be impolite to use other than the plain ole ascii you use.

- -Merrick

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 13:27:26 -0400 (EDT)
From: Robert Prior <robert_prior@sympatico.ca>
Subject: RE: Dear Loren W., RE: Hats Off to Jesse

>As Loren is busier than I am, you may want to send suggestions / requests
>directly to him at lkw@io.com.  The more people that ask for stuff like this
>(and I'm certainly one of them :) the more likely it is that they'll
>consider doing it.  It can't be very cheap to do full color prints of
>starships onto t-shirts :)
>
>Best,
>Jesse

Well, I can do transfers at work. Kodak Pantone printer hooked up to a Mac
(we usually print from Photoshop). IIRC, transfers were $5 in real money
(not that overvalued US stuff :-) ).

T-shirts would have to be bought. MEC has a nice organic cotton for $11, so
costs would be $16 Cdn + shipping. How does that look to folks?

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 13:27:31 -0400 (EDT)
From: Robert Prior <robert_prior@sympatico.ca>
Subject: Re: Over-the-top-silliness

>>From: Robert Prior <robert_prior@sympatico.ca>
>>Subject: Hudson-class Lander (GTL9)
>>
>>I promised Steve I'd name a nuclear-powered lander after him.  Here, then,
>...
>
>  To be fair, I was thinking of something a lot more reasonable  - a self-
>sanitizing landing zone is nice, but there's no need for it to be most of
>a hundred square kilometers...
>        ...of course, it shouldn't hurt if we wait for it to burn out :)

But I wanted a nice acceleration.

This afternoon I'll post the really extreme version: the Comrade
Hudson-class Assault Lander, a small craft immune to a battleship.

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 13:27:37 -0400 (EDT)
From: Robert Prior <robert_prior@sympatico.ca>
Subject: re: Hudson-class Lander (GTL9)

>Robert Prior <robert_prior@sympatico.ca> writes:
>
>>I promised Steve I'd name a nuclear-powered lander after him.  Here, then,
>>is the Husdon-class Lander -- my attempt at a credible landing craft for
>>the Sword Worlds. Note the lack of weapons: I felt that after decelerating
>>with five 20 kton bombs per second, there wouldn't be much more for the
>>marines to do than occupy what was left of the target. :-)
>
>Hmm. and I thought that it was designed to land against overwhelming odds
>transmitting 'Game over man'...
>
>Dom

Hm. Maybe I should add exterior speakers, so the Marines can play "Will ye
no come back again" to the fleeing enemy? :-)

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 13:27:42 -0400 (EDT)
From: Robert Prior <robert_prior@sympatico.ca>
Subject: Orion Drive Modules

Orion Drive Modules
Also called nuclear pulse drives, Orion thrusters work by detonating a
nuclear bomb under a large hemispherical baseplate. The plate, with the
rest of the ship mounted on large shock absorbers, is thrust forwards.
Orion drives are large, uncomfortable, and anything but subtle-but they
work.
Orion engines are rarely encountered in the Traveller universe, because of
the early advent of reactionless thrusters. However, they can provide
low-tech planets with a nasty surprise for intruders: the bombs themselves
are dangerous at close range, while they can also be used to trigger
nuclear-pumped x-ray lasers. The effective thrust of an Orion drive is
dependent on two factors: the yield of the propellant bombs, and the pulse
rate (the number of bombs exploded per second).
thrust = 200 tons x yield x pulse rate
An Orion drive consists of a baseplate module, plus a variable number of
shock absorber and bomb delivery modules.
Baseplate Module
Every Orion drive requires one of these.
Volume: 2 spaces
Mass: 50 stons
Cost: 0.1 MCr x Sqrt(BPS)
Bomb Delivery Module
Every Orion drive requires at least one of these. Multiple modules can be
used to give higher pulse rates, up to a maximum rate of 10 bombs per
second.
Volume: 0.5 spaces
Mass: 12.5 stons
Cost: 0.25 MCr x Sqrt (BPS)
	Maximum output:	GTL7	2.5
		GTL8	5
		GTL9+	10
Shock Absorber Module
Every Orion drive requires at least one of these. Install one shock
absorber module for every kiloton yield of the drive bombs.
		GTL7	GTL8	GTL9+
Volume (spaces):	2	1	0.5
Mass (stons):	50	25	12.5
Cost (MCr):	0.1	0.05	0.025
Note: multiply cost by Sqrt (BPS)
Bomb Rack Module
An Orion drive requires bombs. Divide the number of bombs carried by the
pulse rate to determine maximum time under full acceleration. (Of course, a
lower pulse rate, and hence lower acceleration, is always possible.)
Volume: 1 space
Mass: 12.5 stons (when loaded)
Cost: 25 MCr (to load)
Depending on yield and tech level, each bomb rack module can store the
following number of bombs.
	Yield	GTL7	GTL8	GTL9	GTL10+
	1	595	1190	2380	100000
	2	568	1136	2272	50000
	5	500	1000	2000	20000
	10	416	833	1666	10000
	20	312	625	1250	5000
	50	178	357	714	2000
	100	104	208	416	1000
	200	56	113	227	500
	500	24	48	96	200
	1000	12	24	49	100
	2000	6	12	24	50
	5000	2	4	9	20
	10000	1	2	4	10

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 13:27:48 -0400 (EDT)
From: Robert Prior <robert_prior@sympatico.ca>
Subject: GT Streamlining

Can anyone remember what the GT streamling catagories "streamlined" and
"unstreamlined" translate to in both CT and GURPS Vehicle terms?

I've been thinking that I should update GT Shipyard to calculate air speeds
for USL ships, but to use the formula in VE2 I need to know what the
equivalencies are. I know David or Chrsi mentioned it sometime in the
spring, but I can't find where I saved that message.

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 10:35:38 -0700
From: Richard Hough <rdhough@home.com>
Subject: re: Grav Deckplates

>IMTU, I just made it take a while for grav plates to build up "charges".
>Not a long time, a matter of minutes for the usual 1G to tens of
>minutes for the heaviest plates (which weren't that heavy).

According to FF&S the deck plates provide both inertial dampening and
internal gravity. That is, they both hold you to the deck and prevent you
from going splat when the ship accelerates. This is a good ruling, IMHO,
since it explains why large ships' acceleration is limited to that of grav
compensation and not the propulsion technology, why missiles are not
limited in the same way, and why there are not separate "acceleration Gs",
"maneuver Gs", and "habitable Gs" in the design rules.

However, this makes it necessary for deck plates to be able to change their
interior field at least as fast as the ship can maneuver; probably
instantly. Otherwise you'll get "grav pong" whenver the ship changes facing.

>The idea of a grav plate at the far end of a corridor being effective at
>turning the corridor into a deadly pit always struck me as a little wrong
>anyway. How is a grav plate the size of the corridor going to project
>effects tens of meters away, when the usual floor-section sized
>grav plate only effects its section of one deck?

First of all, they have to be able to turn a corridor into a deadly pit
because in most ship designs corridors already are deadly pits when the
ship accelerates.

Leonard's answer to this is that the grav effect is generated between pairs
of deck plates, so they don't have to "project" anything. I think this is
an excellent ruling because it also explains why you can't use deck plates
as a tractor beam or grav gun, and why Traveller starships have parallel
decks stacked up like earthbound buildings instead of allowing crew to walk
all over the entire interior of the ship including the walls and ceilings.

- --
IMTU t4+ ru ge+ !3i(3i++) jt-- au+ ls- 

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 10:49:47 -0700
From: "Tom" <tbergman@brawleyonline.com>
Subject: Re: Cloning (was Hard Science)

Let's see if I can kill another topic by responding to it...  :)
- -----
J-Man wrote:

I've mentioned this before, so I will again.  <grin>.  There is an even
greater miracle in their tech.  What do you get when you combine replicator,
communicator, computer and transporter technology?  The ability to recreate
someone who has died, with their computerized 'copy' constantly updated via
communicator.  Therefore, death is meaningless in the long run.  sure, its
unfortunate for the copy who dies, but just replicate via the transporter
another copy and presto.  Stephen Goldin writes about such a thing in his
book, "The Eternity Brigade" which is a damn good read.
- -----

Perhaps this is one of the reasons that cloning never took off big in the
3I, Ziru Sirka, or Rule of Man.  Surely the nobility in all three Imperiums
wouldn't want an emperor/emperess to live forever even in cloned form.  The
Moot would never stand for it.  OTOH there were alot of emperors in the 3I
that were suceeded by assassination.  Maybe they were looking in to the
forbidden(?) science of cloning?

I do remember reading somewhere (maybe the Rebellion Sourcebook) that the
Strephon who appeared after the assassination in MT was an android or robot
duplicate?  The dependence on robotics and computers in the 3I (even in MT)
fits the premise for TNE....  A cloning technology wouldn't have allowed for
the kind of history that TNE shows.

Any thoughts?  Opinions?  Flames?  :)

Oriontwin
orion 0609 C36AA84-A hi- va+ vi+ so++ A633
tc+ tm+ tn t4+ tg-- ru+ he+ 3i!(+) c+ jt- st++ pi+ ta ge

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 11:04:24 -0700
From: "Benyamene' ZeAbe' Akella" <xrp@sierratel.com>
Subject: Re: Asterisks

> I could use _underlines_, but that requires using the shift key, and is
> a lot more awkward to type.

I don't like the underline style, I've seen it on a few posts, and I find it
very distracting. They break up the flow of words even worse than asterisks.
But don't asterisks also require the shift key? They do on my keyboard,
unless I reach way over to the number pad.
BZA
////////////////////////////////////////
Akella 0609 C654474-6 S kk+ hi++ as+ va+ dr+ da+ so@ zh- vi+  A523
IMTU tc++ ?t4 ru@ 3i+(-) c+ jt au@ st- ls+ pi+ ta@ he+

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 11:12:32 -0700
From: "Benyamene' ZeAbe' Akella" <xrp@sierratel.com>
Subject: Re: Experience System

> People in real life build on their past accomplishments, travels, friends,
> jobs, and experiences without getting bigger, stronger, and faster as they
>age.

That was one of the first things that caught me about Shadowrun. After the
first game the arbiter started handing out rewards, and along with the cash
and experience I was expecting came a couple of contacts to write in the
appropriate box. It turned out to be a major part of the campaign, the
contacts, allies, rumours, etc.
BZA
////////////////////////////////////////
Akella 0609 C654474-6 S kk+ hi++ as+ va+ dr+ da+ so@ zh- vi+  A523
IMTU tc++ ?t4 ru@ 3i+(-) c+ jt au@ st- ls+ pi+ ta@ he+

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

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 14:44:35 -0400
From: Walter Smith <SmithW@HARTWICK.EDU>
Subject: re: Grav Deckplates

Richard Hough Wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>
According to FF&S the deck plates provide both inertial dampening and
internal gravity. That is, they both hold you to the deck and prevent you
from going splat when the ship accelerates. <snip>

However, this makes it necessary for deck plates to be able to change their
interior field at least as fast as the ship can maneuver; probably
instantly. Otherwise you'll get "grav pong" whenver the ship changes facing.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
IMTU I was declaring inertial compensators to be a seperate system,
one that nullified all gravity and acceleration effects - within the
effects of the inertial dampening field, the only acceleration/gravity
would be that generated by the g-plates.  Turning inertial comp off
and on was similar to turning grav plates off and on - it would take a 
matter of minutes for a charge to build up in the system, once it was
"up" you stopped feeling gravity and acceleration effects.

I can see that it would be easy to combine both into the same 
system. Have the grav plates substitute their own vector - 1G "down",
for example - for any vectors applied by gravity or acceleration from 
outside their own field. This allows inertial dampening, varying internal
gravity (including "zero G" - the grav plate substitutes *nothing* for
external accelerations, very different than having the grav plate 
turned off completely), *and* allows the "build a charge" effect I
was talking about.

Richard again:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
>How is a grav plate the size of the corridor going to project
>effects tens of meters away, when the usual floor-section sized
>grav plate only effects its section of one deck?

First of all, they have to be able to turn a corridor into a deadly pit
because in most ship designs corridors already are deadly pits when the
ship accelerates.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I thought the original FF&S grav & inertial compensator plates in the 
floor (and ceiling?) of the corridor were taking care of that...oh, I see, 
inertial compensation is through application of more or less gravity,
which only works towards or away from the plates...thus the entire
internal surface of any inertial comp'ed area has to be lined with
grav plates, ceiling, floor, walls and all the corners.

Grav compensation must also not be dependent on the distance from
the plate, otherwise a 6G counter-acceleration on me while I was
50 meters from the plate would squish the person standing next to
the plate, what with the usual distance squared laws.

Richard again:
>>>>>>>>>>>>
Leonard's answer to this is that the grav effect is generated between pairs
of deck plates, so they don't have to "project" anything. I think this is
an excellent ruling because it also explains why you can't use deck plates
as a tractor beam or grav gun, and why Traveller starships have parallel
decks stacked up like earthbound buildings instead of allowing crew to walk
all over the entire interior of the ship including the walls and ceilings.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I like this idea as well, I think I may make us of it. It makes the
classic yacht with a transparent ceiling for the ballroom a little more
difficult, though.

Speaking of stacked decks:

What if grav plates work best if you apply them in large sheets? That
is, the larger the area of each deck, the better they work?

That would explain a lot of the ship designs in the OTU with deck
layouts paralell to thrust, when perpendicular ("stacked like
earthbound buildings") often makes more sense from an acceleration
point of view.

Walt Smith

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

End of Traveller-digest V1999 #991
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