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To: dan@engrg.uwo.ca (Dan Corrin), bfwong@ocf.berkeley.edu (Raven Blackburn),
        anthony@cs.pitt.edu (Michael Anthony Kapolka),
        mcknight@f104.n170.z1.fidonet.org (Chuck McKnight),
        fantasci!traveller@engrg.uwo.ca (Joseph "Jo" E Poplawski),
        jamesp@metolius.wr.tek.com (James T. Perkins)
Subject: TML Bundle #276: Msgs 3331-3348
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Date: Wed, 18 Dec 91 21:00:26 PST
From: James T Perkins <jamesp@metolius.wr.tek.com>
Status: R


TML Bundles come from the archives of the Traveller Mailing List,
maintained by James Perkins, traveller-request@metolius.wr.tek.com.

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

Date: Wed Dec 18 21:00:22 PST 1991
From: traveller-request@metolius.wr.tek.com (TML Administrator)
Subject: TML Bundle #276: Table of Contents

-AMN- --Date--- --Sender--------- --Subject-----------------------------------
3331  16-Dec-91 surman@zulu.lgs.l Re: (3324) Random responses << A few response
3332  16-Dec-91 bart@cs.uoregon.e Fusion Neutrons (Re: TML biweekly: Msg 3319 V
3333  14-Dec-91 woodsb@ecn.purdue It's been a lot of fun, but... << I have some
3334  17-Dec-91 gsw@whservd.att.C Re: potential energy << Adrian Hurt <adrian@c
3335  17-Dec-91 givler@bermuda.ra Re: (3326) a quick note on character generati
3336  17-Dec-91 gsw@whservd.att.C Re: spaceship stats << Adrian Hurt <adrian@cs
3337  17-Dec-91 James T Perkins   Comment on Classic Traveller << A funny thoug
3338  17-Dec-91 gt4534b@prism.gat Re: fusion reactions << > By the way, where d
3339  17-Dec-91 Robert S. Dean    Has anyone seen Scott Kellogg? << This sounds
3340  17-Dec-91 Mike.Metlay@ORGAN Re: Has anyone seen Scott Kellogg? << Okay, N
3341  17-Dec-91 Mike.Metlay@ORGAN Cancel that panic attack << Scott's turned up
3342  18-Dec-91 "C. Roald"        Re: grav potential << >> A first approximatio
3343  18-Dec-91 KELLOGG@ducvax.au Travel Report from the Lost Sheep << Geez! Yo
3344  18-Dec-91 burt@ptltd.COM     << Subject: Ships in Spaaaaaaaaaaaaaace! ===
3345  18-Dec-91 Hans Rancke-Madse GDW's sense of proportion << > = Michael A. S
3346  18-Dec-91 Hans Rancke-Madse Changing careers << >Mike Metlay writes: > >O
3347  18-Dec-91 Adrian Hurt       Re: potential energy << Jerry Williams (gsw@w
3348  18-Dec-91 Robert S. Dean    Discomfort Rule for Seats and Staterooms << S

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

Archive-Message-Number: 3331
Date: Mon, 16 Dec 91 12:00:10 CST
From: surman@zulu.lgs.lsu.edu (Michael A. Surman)
Subject: Re: (3324) Random responses

A few responses to Steve Higginbotham (TML msg 3324):

>Since it wants to buy anything brought in, it must do so with 
>Imperial Credits.  Where do they come from?  In the real world, you get 
>nothing anyone wants to buy.  It's a mystery to me!  Government subsidies?
>Not likely, the Imperial government is too Laissez faire to do that.   
>Magic??  Probably.  The GDW people don't seem to be capable of adding, 
>much less doing economic (or any other) analysis of their system.

Can't agree with you more. Especially the last sentence. Therefore,
has anyone seen a commercial game/publication that has a decent
economic system?

>As to the Cosmic Computer analogy, consider that the average merchant 
>There was a ship (approx. 1,000,000 MT tons) described as too small to 
>make it worthwhile to put FTL drives into.  So the average ship like that 
>could buy up the entire wine harvest, store it in one corner of Hold #10, 
>and then finish loading later.  The economic parallels between Piper's 
>works and MT are virtually nonexistant

Two things jump at me here. In the Trav/MegaTrav universe either the 
ships are too small or the planets don't produce as much as in Piper's
books. I would assume that planetary production is relatively similar
in both universes therefore it leaves ship size. Why aren't there big
freighter's in Trav/MTrav? It would seem to be a very economical way
to ship goods. As it stands now, speed wouldn't be affected much because
most ships travel at jump 1 or 2 anyway. Or it could be that since GDW
doesn't understand economics planets don't produce much therefore small
ships are adequate.

As another point. To me there is no way any ship no matter how big
(as in 9,000,000 MT tons) could store the harvest of a planet. Unless
that planet had only a small colony of a few thousand people or so.
The harvest would be so large that it would take several ships of that
size to move it. Of course that is assuming that a significant portion
of the harvest is for export. Otherwise you wouldn't get anyone to come
if the harvest isn't going to make them a profit. 

>Hmmm.   One Tukera Long-Liner per day landing at Efate.  So we are 
>talking about 90 passengers arriving at a world of 6,000,000,000 
>or so per day.  Atlanta has several hundred arriving flights per 
>day, at 300+ passengers per flight.  Atlanta also has a population 
>of 2,000,000 or so.  Trying to match traffic patterns would result 
>in about 10,000 Tukera Liners per day arriving at Efate.    
>Because of the high cost (similar to Cruise Ships, as opposed to 
>airplanes), divide that by 20.  That would leave about 500 Tukera 
>Liners per day at Efate.  One per 3 minutes.
>It would also result in about one per 20 seconds at Terra or Muan 
>Gwi.

This is what I wrote earlier about flights:
	>Since there would be frequent flights, one per day per major
	>planet for the major lines might be appropriate,...
I'm not sure how you managed to build that up to 500 per day when I
already stated that 1 per day per major line would be appropriate.
Granted that is probably too small but that was referring to Rob Dean's
original question on trying to get a handle on traffic.

>Note that travel by starship parallels travel by merchant ship 
>early in this century, rather than air travel.  Note also that when
>using the city/planet analogy to compare the real world to MT, you 
>should include air transport, water transport, rail transport, and
>highway traffic to get a good picture of amount of trade between 
>cities/planets.  The analogy is really pretty poor, anyway, so try 
>sing the country/planet analogy.  You still have to consider ALL
>cross-border traffic, but the picture is probably more realistic.

I obviously didn't put enough qualifiers in my original statement.
Of course in order to get a more realistic picture all forms of
transport need to be included. I was using airports to illustrate
the size of the companies and the aircraft  involved not what they 
carried. I don't know of anyone that ships bulk goods by air! So that
would be a pretty poor example.

I agree that sea travel is the best form of transportation to use when
making comparisons or using as a model. It includes most of the 
necessary components used when making calculations; time, life support,
cargo types, etc.

Mike Surman


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

Archive-Message-Number: 3332
Subject: Fusion Neutrons (Re: TML biweekly: Msg 3319 V22#7)
Date: Mon, 16 Dec 91 09:34:57 -0800
From: bart@cs.uoregon.edu


> Of course, that means that if (hopefully when) the GDW
> folks decide to make the plant output realistic, they should
> subtract the energy needed to create the neutrons from the
> energy output of the power plant.
....
> Also, a
> plant fusing only heavy hydrogen would have a higher energy
> yield than one fusing normal hydrogen (I don't know what the
> overall difference is -- I don't have the numbers handy).


Although I admittedly don't have the numbers in front of me
either, as I recall the energy required to create a neutron is
pretty negligible compared to the energy gained in 4P + 4e ->
He4 .  Be careful not to confuse the mass defect, which
represents the total energy gain of a nuclear reaction, with
the barrier potential, which represents how difficult it is to
start a fusion reaction (sort of).  The latter number really has
little to do with the former, and the former number is the
interesting one for power output.


> Also, fusion power plants when first introduced would likely
> not have this ability, and would have to use heavy hydrogen as
> I suggested.


My guess based on current results is that heavy hydrogen fusion
for power production is TL9.  I would guess at least TL10 and
probably TL11 for light hydrogen fusion.


> By the way, where does the electron come from?  I was under the
> impression that the Sun, at least the part that is fusing, is
> very positively ionic.  If this is so, then where are the
> electrons coming from?


Practically can't be!  Remember the huge difference between the
universal electric constant C (per particle charge) and the
universal gravitational constant G (per particle mass)...  What
this means is that any object which is even slightly charge
unbalanced is blown apart by the repulsive force of its own
electric charge!


					Bart Massey
					bart@cs.uoregon.edu

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

Archive-Message-Number: 3333
From: woodsb@ecn.purdue.edu (Brent L. Woods)
Subject: It's been a lot of fun, but...
Date: Sat, 14 Dec 91 1:11:33 EST


     I have some bad news to relate.  My accounts here at Purdue will
be going away soon, so I have to ask you to remove me from the list.
With luck, I may get other email access, so I may be back.  In any case,
I'm unhappy to be leaving, but it's unavoidable.  I've enjoyed the
postings on the list, and I'll miss the people on it.

     'Bye; it's been a lot of fun.

     James, if you think it appropriate, feel free to post the above
to the list, as a goodbye of sorts.  I leave it to your judgment.


- --
     Brent Woods

USNAIL:  4419 Myrtle Grove Dr.  /  Indianapolis, IN  46236
PHONE:  +1 (317) 895-8690 (voice)


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

Archive-Message-Number: 3334
From: gsw@whservd.att.COM
Date: Tue, 17 Dec 91 10:37 EST
Subject: Re: potential energy

Adrian Hurt <adrian@cs.heriot-watt.ac.uk> writes:
> 
> >		On the other hand, GmM/r is the escape energy of Sol, 
> > which is the kinetic energy required to produce a velocity of ~30 km/s.
> > For a ship weighing say, 1 T, that's 4.5e11 J, or 450 000 MJ. Not to
> > be sneezed at.
> 
> A ship accelerating at 1-G will achieve that velocity in less than an hour,
> using just its manoeuvre drive.  (To get to 30000 m/s using an acceleration
> of 9.8 m/s^2 will take 3061 seconds, i.e. 51 minutes.)  Maybe not to be
> sneezed at, but that's the sort of figure that all spacecraft play with
> routinely - that's why you don't want to collide with anything!

Perhaps that is one answer -- require all ships entering jumpspace to
have enough kinetic energy (speed) to escape from the local star's
gravity well.  Then, a ship jumping from Sol to empty space would end
up with (almost) no kinetic energy after the jump, then after jumping
to Alpha Centauri it would gain as much kinetic energy as potential
energy that it lost.

Of course, there will have to be extra energy expended for the jump
itself.  Probably that energy would be expended as lost heat energy
or something.

> So the ship expends its 4.5e11 J, and get into jump space.  One week later,
> it emerges from jump space near Alpha Centauri, and gets 4.5e11J back -
> what happens to this energy?  Presumably it gains this energy as it emerges
> from jump space, and the energy ends up back in the ship's jump capacitors.

As I mentioned, the energy could just as easily be transferred into
kinetic energy.  Or it could go into the jump capacitors.  As long
as you aren't getting free energy from the jump, I don't mind how
it is modelled.

Jerry Williams (gsw@whservd.att.com)

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

Archive-Message-Number: 3335
Date: Tue, 17 Dec 91 10:25:21 EDT
From: givler@bermuda.rain.COM (Greg Givler)
Subject: Re: (3326) a quick note on character generation

Gee, Mike that is one of the things that I wanted to work on in TDR.
When I played Traveller regularly, the GM that I played with used an
old White Dwarf article that allowed a character to change careers.
As you got older and depending on your last career choice your
choices got less and less. 

This has lead me to have characters that spent times as a Bounty
Hunter and a Rogue, some folks may say that is the same thing. 

The system used your age and then gave you choices to make and
the rolls required for entry. There were die modifiers depending on
your previous experience. Some things were automatic. If you had a
social standing of >10 you could always join the Nobles. Rogues was
also always a possiblity, you can always turn to a life of crime. :-)
My GM used Other as skills that you learned in prison life, when
being a Rogue was not entirely successful. The number of terms
determined by your sentence. Isn't that what reabilitation is about?

:unless you're a Vargr. You're a Navy man when you're 18, and the only way
:you can try something different when you're 26 is to muster out and 
:become an adventurer, with a big set of gaps in your skill lists as compared
:to the 42-year-olds out there. My personal bias would be to state that a
:person can only serve in one MILITARY establishment in their career, and

I disagree slightly. It is possible today to leave say the Air Force
and then enlist in the Army. It is unusual, but not unheard of. 

:would then need to move to paramilitary or civilian organizations. This
:would lead to careers like the following:
:
:"Well, I was a bomber pilot in the War-- got a bunch of decorations. Then
:I decided to give civilian life a try, so I used my piloting experience
:to hire on as a commercial pilot hauling passengers and cargo. After some
:years of that, it got kind of old, so I decided to give writing a try.
:And now I make a living doing writing and mass media production, with my
:skill base as a means of qualifying me as a technical consultant."
:
:Sound like the typical sort of random hashing around that you'd expect 
:from an easily-bored Vargr? Well, surprise surprise: as anyone who
:wears plastic ears to conventions could tell you, that was Gene Roddenberry's
:resume at any point in the last two decades of his life. Think about it.
:

Well let's see, I went to college for Music Education. Dropped out
after realizing that I didn't want to teach. Then attended and
graduated Piano Tuning and Repair School. Was self-employed for 5
years. Got married and found out that Piano Tuning would not pay the
bills alone. Got a part-time job as a School Bus Driver, and tuned
pianos. Then landed a job as a Housekeeper, (read Janitor) at the
local VA. Then quit that job to enter Customer Support at a computer
company. After two years in Customer Support, I got a job in the
Product Assurance Dept. So here I am. Seems reasonable to me. I am
teaching myself how to program in C. So maybe my next step will be as
a programmer somewhere.

:metlay
:

Greg


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

Archive-Message-Number: 3336
From: gsw@whservd.att.COM
Date: Tue, 17 Dec 91 11:15 EST
Subject: Re: spaceship stats

Adrian Hurt <adrian@cs.heriot-watt.ac.uk> writes:

> > I was thinking along the lines of Larry Niven style jump drives, I guess.
> > In that case, jumps are made between stars, not into open space.
> 
> This messes up the trick of a ship with a jump-1 drive but enough fuel for
> two jumps, which executes one jump-1 into empty space and then a second
> jump-1 to the destination, thus making a 2 parsec journey possible.

Yes, but it also makes higher jump number ships more attractive.

> > OK, so maybe altering the stats won't be enough.  But Jump-4 and
> > Maneuver-3 should still be understandable under the new system.
> 
> Yes, but the snag is that a ship capable of Manoeuvre-3 under the old
> system will either no longer be capable of it (because the drives are
> now bigger), or be capable of it but now have some new cargo space
> (because the drives are now smaller).

> > Also, they should have at least the same range of weapons and
> > equipment.  If I have characters aboard a ship in the old system,
> > I want to be ABLE to convert to the new system.  And I don't want
> > to have to give up my repulsor bay because these are not included
> > in the new rules.
> 
> No, but you may have to give up your repulsor bay because the new
> rules say it uses more power than the old rules, and your ship can't
> provide the required power.

OK, so maybe it will be impossible to design the 1000 ton merchant
ship that you are carrying over from MT.  But you COULD put the
same equipment on board a 2000 ton ship now.  Big deal.  When you
do the conversion, change the ship tonnage.  Some of us don't use
ship's statistics in normal play.  Also, if it is difficult to
build large ships with high maneuver ratings under the new rules,
then I would just drop the maneuver rating a notch or so.  I'm
sure that I'd eventually get around to changing the ships to the
new rules.  I just don't want the new rules to replace jump drives
with warp drives and missiles with photon torpedoes or other such
drastic changes which would make conversion impossible.

Jerry Williams (gsw@whservd.att.com)

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

Archive-Message-Number: 3337
Subject: Comment on Classic Traveller
Date: Tue, 17 Dec 91 11:25:19 PST
From: James T Perkins <jamesp@metolius.WR>


A funny thought.  On my X-windows display, the configured icon image for
my shell windows is an Imperial starburst, not a shattered sun ala
MegaTraveller.  I created both icon images, but the one I unconciously
chose is the Classic one.  I wonder if I was trying to tell myself
something when I selected it a couple years ago.

James

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

Archive-Message-Number: 3338
Date: Tue, 17 Dec 91 15:03:48 -0500
From: gt4534b@prism.gatech.edu (JARRIO,MARTIN MICHAEL)
Subject: Re: fusion reactions

> By the way, where does the electron come from?  I was under the
> impression that the Sun, at least the part that is fusing, is
> very positively ionic.  If this is so, then where are the
> electrons coming from?  Is there another form of mass decay
> taking place?  Or is this simply one of the means by which the
> Sun regulates its rate of fusion?  Or am I simply misinformed?

> Jerry Williams (gsw@whservd.att.com)

  Don't forget that there are *two* decay routes which can change a proton
into a neutron: beta absorption (proton plus electron -> neutron plus
neutrino) and inverse-beta decay (proton -> neutron plus positron plus
neutrino); I believe the latter is much more common, because the proton is
not at all dependent on "finding" an appropriate electron which allows the
decay. Also, being a nuclear physicist, I should point out that a free
proton will not decay to a neutron in any case (not energetically favor-
able). However, in a nucleus containing a large number of protons (relative
to the number of neutrons) *will* undergo such a decay.
  So, look at a collapsing interstellar gas cloud composed entirely of
hydrogen-1. As it collapses, grav potential energy becomes kinetic energy--
the gas heats up. Eventually, the gas reaches a temperature (or energy)
high enough to let the protons (which make up the hydrogen-1 nuclei)
overcome their electrostatic repulsion. Somewhere in the cloud, two
protons come close enough to experience the strong nuclear force. This is not
sufficient, however; the di-proton is energetically unfavorable and will soon
fall apart. But, before they fall apart, it is possible for the weak nuclear
force to cause an inverse-beta dacey of one of the protons--bingo! We have a
deuteron. At this point things get more complex, but we see the basic 
procedure:

  p + p + 0.5 MeV  -->  He-2*  -->  d
   \ /      |             |         |
    |       |             |         +--> deuteron
    |       |             +------------> excited di-proton (unstable)
    |       +--------------------------> coulomb barrier (rough calc.)
    +----------------------------------> two hydrogen nuclei (protons)
 
  The number 0.5 MeV may be dead wrong; I used a guess based on about
thirty seconds worth of thought.


JARRIO,MARTIN MICHAEL            |  Everyone's out to get me, and frankly,
Demented Physicist               |    its starting to make me paraniod. 
Georgia Institute of Technology  |
uucp:	  ...!{decvax,hplabs,ncar,purdue,rutgers}!gatech!prism!gt4534b
Internet: gt4534b@prism.gatech.edu

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

Archive-Message-Number: 3339
Date:     Tue, 17 Dec 91 15:39:05 EST
From: Robert S. Dean  <rsdean@crdec8.apgea.army.mil>
Subject:  Has anyone seen Scott Kellogg?

This sounds a trifle alarmist, but has anyone seen Scott Kellogg?  He was 
supposed to stop off at my house yesterday on his way home for Christmas,
and he hasn't been found.  His parents are panicking, and called me to see
if I'd seen him, which I hadn't.  Hopefully this will all be resolved before
long...

Rob Dean



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

Archive-Message-Number: 3340
Date: Tue, 17 Dec 91 19:53:11 EST
From: Mike.Metlay@ORGAN.MUSIC.CS.CMU.EDU
Subject: Re:  Has anyone seen Scott Kellogg?

Okay, NOBODY PANIC! Last I heard from him he was saying goodbye and 
on his way home, but if I hear anything I need to be able to reach 
someone. Rob, please email me your phone number and that of Scott's
family.

metlay

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

Archive-Message-Number: 3341
Date: Tue, 17 Dec 91 23:49:42 EST
From: Mike.Metlay@ORGAN.MUSIC.CS.CMU.EDU
Subject: Cancel that panic attack

Scott's turned up OK, folks. Ignore the previous message, assuming James
didn't pull it in time.

metlay

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

Archive-Message-Number: 3342
Date: Wed, 18 Dec 91 02:09 -0400
From: "C. Roald" <HOBBIT@AC.DAL.CA>
Subject: Re: grav potential

>> A first approximation calls M(Sol) about the same as M(AC), so the net
>> cost of the jump is ~= 0, plus the drive energy to make a jump of twice 
>> the distance.
>
>Why twice the distance?  (I assume that in this sentence, "distance" means
>"distance from Sol to Alpha Centauri".)  If the energy require to make a
>jump of this distance is E, then you're saying you need to expend 2*E.

I meant twice the distance of the hypothetical jump to the midpoint 
between Sol and AC.

>>		On the other hand, GmM/r is the escape energy of Sol, 
>> which is the kinetic energy required to produce a velocity of ~30 km/s.
>> For a ship weighing say, 1 T, that's 4.5e11 J, or 450 000 MJ. Not to
>> be sneezed at.
>
>A ship accelerating at 1-G will achieve that velocity in less than an hour,
>using just its manoeuvre drive.  (To get to 30000 m/s using an acceleration
>of 9.8 m/s^2 will take 3061 seconds, i.e. 51 minutes.)  Maybe not to be

You realise what you just said?  A spacecraft with a 1-G maneuver drive
can produce 4.5e11 J in 3000 s, for an average power output of 150 MW.
Constant-acceleration drives are scary.

>So the ship expends its 4.5e11 J, and get into jump space.  One week later,
>it emerges from jump space near Alpha Centauri, and gets 4.5e11J back -
>what happens to this energy?  Presumably it gains this energy as it emerges
>from jump space, and the energy ends up back in the ship's jump capacitors.

Depending on how jumpspace is supposed to work, I shouldn't think the 
hundred billion joules of GPE would have to be 'spent'.  The only 
relevent number ought to be the difference in initial and final 
energies.  If the energy did have to come from somewhere, it would be
a very blatant violation of the 2nd law of Thermodynamics to get it back 
in the capacitors. More plausible would be to get it as kinetic energy,
but physical reality would almost certainly produce it as heat. Which
would vapourise the ship, very quickly.

   roald.

- --
Scientific Progress goes 'BOINK'?	-- Hobbes

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

Archive-Message-Number: 3343
Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1991 10:49 CDT
From: KELLOGG@ducvax.auburn.edu
Subject: Travel Report from the Lost Sheep

Geez!

You miss one little check point and everybody goes Nine O'Clock Bannanas!
Well, this is just to inform you all that I am alive and well.  The KGB has
Not, repeat NOT caught up with me, though I am leading them a merry chase!

Well, I intercepted the plans in the diplomatic pouch ok, but somebody seems
to have found out about my dead drop.  When I went to drop off the package,
there was a hit squad watching.  Since then I have been on the run in
various stolen vehicles of different types and performances.  (Bertil, you
were right about the Viggin's fuel problems, thank god for drop tanks!)
I will make a more detailed report at the rendezvous site on Barnard's Star
on or about January 3.

Scott S. Kellogg
Number 6

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

Archive-Message-Number: 3344
Date: Wed, 18 Dec 91 12:27:44 EST
From: burt@ptltd.COM (Burton Choinski.)

Subject: Ships in Spaaaaaaaaaaaaaace!
===============================================================================
Jerry Williams Notes:
[]It's been a while, but I once used this equation to
[]determine how much fuel would be required for a
[]fusion plant to accelerate a ship to 0.1c.  Assuming
[]all deuterium, I think that 1/2 of the ship needed
[]to be fuel.  That drops down to about 4% (I think) of
[]the ship if antimatter is used (assuming total energy
[]conversion -- I don't know what the real output of an
[]antimatter reactor would be).

Perhaps T:TNE should draw upon the Niven "Known Space/Kzin Wars" idea of
ships.

In "Man/Kzin Wars" (post hyperdrive) Ships are equipped with a contra-gravity
drive as well as the hyperdrive.  Ships have a maneuver reserve in
deltaV (i.e. in the thrid book, one character noted that Kzin standard warships
have a 1.5c DeltaV reserve for maneuvering.

However, no fuel use was mentioned for this reserve (but I presume it was
something low).

===============================================================================
When I recently ran Traveller, I modified my system generation program to
figure Tech Levels differently.  My system assumed a "General TL" and
worked down based on Starport.  For the Imperium, GTL was 15, 16 in the core,
the Zhodani had a GTL of 14, Sword Worlds has 12, etc.

A Starports reduced GTL by 1d2-1 (i.e. 0-1), B-starports reduce it by 1d3-1
(0-2), C ports by 1d4 (1-4), D by 1d4+1 (2-5) and  E by 1d6+2 (3-8). X ports
were a special case. (straight 1d6-1 or soemthing).

In the case of fringe areas (spinward marches, etc) the variance was increased
by 1 (thus, in the marches, a B-starport rolls 1d4-1, not 1d3-1).  In the
core variance is reduced by 1 (in the capital sector, B-starports roll 1d2-1).

Tight collectives (Darrian, Sword Worlds) reduce variance by 1 as well.
Very tight collectives (small, 5-world federations) reduce variance by 2
(never below 1d2).

Within the imperium and Vargr areas, roll 2d6: a 12 indicates +1 TL.

This system gets a littl sticky when rolling random systems outside any normal
collective body, but I think it handles the idea of technology following the
heavy-traffic planets better.
===============================================================================
Clay Bush Requests:
[]Someone in recent discussion noted that Aliens were getting dropped during
[]each revision of Traveller. MT made obsolete the Alien Modules, and now a
[]T:2000 conversion will invalidate important parts of the two MTA books.
[]Aliens are very important to any si-fi game, and deserve careful attention
[]in GDW's marketing plans.

Yes, Aliens should have a part in T3.  It wouldn't be traveller without the
Doggies :)

===============================================================================
Burton Choinski                                       Phoenix Technologies, LTD
"All opinions are mine, not Phoenix's"                            Cambridge, MA
===============================================================================

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

Archive-Message-Number: 3345
From: Hans Rancke-Madsen <rancke@diku.dk>
Subject: GDW's sense of proportion
Date: Wed, 18 Dec 91 20:54:07 MET

>   = Michael A. Surman
>>  = Steve Higginbotham (TML msg 3324):

>>Since it wants to buy anything brought in, it must do so with
>>Imperial Credits.  Where do they come from?  In the real world, you get
>>nothing anyone wants to buy.  It's a mystery to me!  Government subsidies?
>>Not likely, the Imperial government is too Laissez faire to do that.
>>Magic??  Probably.  The GDW people don't seem to be capable of adding,
>>much less doing economic (or any other) analysis of their system.
>
> Can't agree with you more. Especially the last sentence. Therefore,
> has anyone seen a commercial game/publication that has a decent
> economic system?

I started to work on one a few years ago, but put it aside as too big a job.
I did analyse the trade tonnage in a couple of subsectors and got unmanagably
huge numbers. Glisten subsector (not one of the high-population ones at all)
wound up with 44.000 ships of an average tonnage of a 1000. I based this on
the naval budgets of Trillion Credit Squadron as showing a bare minimum. (I
assumed that in order to pay the few planets who actually built these ships,
the rest of the planets had to deliver goods to other planets (Glisten will
hardly be satisfied with an IOU for umpteen billion akian guilders unless
they can buy something for those guilders AND have it delivered)). The one BIG
assumption I made was that every ton of military ship "represented" two tons
of commercial ship (I got that number out of a fantasy RPG. Does anybody know
what the numbers are for real-life nations? That is, what is the proportions
between America or Britain' or France's naval and trade fleet?)

The fix I came up with consisted of dividing trade ships in two categories:
bulk and luxury. Bulk carriers are huge ships ranging from 10.000 T for the
very smallest to 1-200.000 T on the average to millions of tons for the
largest. They are engaged in long-term haulage of food and rew materials
between the worlds. They have regular routes that don't change from one year
to another (You don't build a super- or hyper-carrier unless you have a
guaranteed employment for it for the next several decades). Luxury trade is
evrything else. Everything we've seen in any Traveller and Megatraveller
publication to date, up to and including the 5000 T Akerut freighters from
"The Traveller Adventure".

Bulk trade is boring (which is why we've never heard of it before :-). It is
also 99.9% of all trade. I originally choose 99% as the number and then
checked with the trade of Aramis subsector. In "The Traveller Adventure" we
get a considerable amount of information about the companies trading there. I
made a few interpolations and a couple of rather big (but not unreasonable)
assumptions and came up with a number that was almost exactly the one I got by
calculation, except it was off by a factor 10. So 99.9% is what I use now.

>>As to the Cosmic Computer analogy, consider that the average merchant
>>There was a ship (approx. 1,000,000 MT tons) described as too small to
>>make it worthwhile to put FTL drives into.  So the average ship like that
>>could buy up the entire wine harvest, store it in one corner of Hold #10,
>>and then finish loading later.  The economic parallels between Piper's
>>works and MT are virtually nonexistant
>
> Two things jump at me here. In the Trav/MegaTrav universe either the
> ships are too small or the planets don't produce as much as in Piper's
> books. I would assume that planetary production is relatively similar
> in both universes therefore it leaves ship size. Why aren't there big
> freighter's in Trav/MTrav? It would seem to be a very economical way
> to ship goods.

Yes, if you use them all the time. Imagine the capital loss (I think that's
what I mean) of a 1.000.000 T ship standing idle. That's why I feel justified
in making bulk trade tightly bound to loooong-term employment.


>               As it stands now, speed wouldn't be affected much because
> most ships travel at jump 1 or 2 anyway.

Another advantage of long-term haulage is that you know in advance what size
jump you're going to need. Whereas I consider Free Traders with jump-1 quite
silly. (The ability to bypass an unprofitable or even dangerous star-system
is IMO indispensable for a roving trader. Forget about trading mains. A planet
that dosen't buy or sell anything is a barrier to jump-1 ships in itself.)

>                                           Or it could be that since GDW
> doesn't understand economics planets don't produce much therefore small
> ships are adequate.

It was amazing the way naval ship sizes changed when GDW produced Trillion
Credit Squadron. In "Twilight's Peak" the squadron that enforces the Algine
interdict consists of a Kinunir class "cruiser" and a couple of Gazelle
class escorts. In "Fighting Ships" the squadron that enforces the interdict
of Andory consists of two Tigress class battleships! Not to mention the way
a Kinunir before TCS was a mighty 1200 T cruiser and afterwards was a puny
1200 T "cruiser". Nowadays cruisers are spinal-mount carrying ships of between
20 and 75.000 T and are produced by the hundreds, but back then a Kinunir was
a ship to be reckoned with and had been produced by the dozen. It is a pity
that GDW didn't stop for a moment and think about the consequences of
upscaling the naval ships.

I wonder how the 400 T corsairs make out nowadays. They used to be a threat,
at least in the 1000 year old authentic frontier sector Spinward Marches. It
sure is lucky for us referees that the Imperium never decided to build just
one less battleship and place a squadron of Gazelles in every star system,
empty or not, thus ending piracy forever...

BTW. I've also decided to reduce the naval budget of high-population worlds.
I haven't worked out the details, but the main idea is to introduce an
_optimum_ population for each star-system. Once you exceed that, the extra
people won't generate extra naval revenue (that is, any increase in
productivity from having more people producing is swallowed up in having
still more people not producing, but still requiring support). After all,
the proportion of telephone sanitizers and bureaucrats are higher in a
society of millions than a society of thousands. So a system with an optimum
population of 1.2 billion and an actual population of 4 billion would have
it's naval budget based on 1.2 billion and not 4. Of course, a sliding scale
would be better, perhaps even one that resulted in a _lower_ revenue the more
the population were above the optimum, but that would be more complicated than
I care for.

How to determine the optimum population? That's the bit I haven't had the
time to work out yet. Something based on the physical characteristics of the
system's main world, plus a random roll of 2D* 100 million to reflect the
value of the rest of the system (the last factor only for sufficiently
high-tech societies, of course). Come to think of it, tech level would
come into the first part too, wouldn't it?


      Hans Rancke
University of Copenhagen
     rancke@diku.dk
- ------------
"I know there are some people in the world who do not tolerate their
fellow human beings, and I just can't _stand_ people like that!"
                                (after Tom Lehrer)

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

Archive-Message-Number: 3346
From: Hans Rancke-Madsen <rancke@diku.dk>
Subject: Changing careers
Date: Wed, 18 Dec 91 21:08:42 MET

>Mike Metlay writes:
>
>One other small matter that I hope will be addressed by the new character
>generation system in TNE: multiple career changes as a legal part of the
>rules. The average person in our society changes careers over twenty
>times in his or her life; in Traveller you're not allowed to do it at all,
>unless you're a Vargr. You're a Navy man when you're 18, and the only way
>you can try something different when you're 26 is to muster out and
>become an adventurer, with a big set of gaps in your skill lists as compared
>to the 42-year-olds out there.

I agree. I have a half-finished article with rules for career changes lying
around somewhere. My character for the PBM game spent a term in the army
before beginning his main career. The (NPC) doctor in my naval campaign is
an ex-doctor merchant purser who joined the navy during the 5th Frontier
war and stayed.

>                               My personal bias would be to state that a
>person can only serve in one MILITARY establishment in their career, and
>would then need to move to paramilitary or civilian organizations.

One of the rules I have is that you can't join the law enforcers if you've
had a dishonorable discarge (I use a missed survival roll as an involuntary
career end and a missed reenlistmint roll as a voluntary one). On the other
hand, ex-military with good papers recieve a bonus on the law enforcer
enlistment roll.


      Hans Rancke
University of Copenhagen
     rancke@diku.dk
- ------------
"I know there are some people in the world who do not tolerate their
fellow human beings, and I just can't _stand_ people like that!"
                                (after Tom Lehrer)

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

Archive-Message-Number: 3347
From: Adrian Hurt <adrian@cs.heriot-watt.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: potential energy
Date: Wed, 18 Dec 91 10:03:24 GMT

Jerry Williams (gsw@whservd.att.com) writes:
> Adrian Hurt <adrian@cs.heriot-watt.ac.uk> writes:
> > 
> > >		On the other hand, GmM/r is the escape energy of Sol, 
> > > which is the kinetic energy required to produce a velocity of ~30 km/s.
> > > For a ship weighing say, 1 T, that's 4.5e11 J, or 450 000 MJ. Not to
> > > be sneezed at.
> > 
> > A ship accelerating at 1-G will achieve that velocity in less than an hour,
> > using just its manoeuvre drive.
> 
> Perhaps that is one answer -- require all ships entering jumpspace to
> have enough kinetic energy (speed) to escape from the local star's
> gravity well.  Then, a ship jumping from Sol to empty space would end
> up with (almost) no kinetic energy after the jump, then after jumping
> to Alpha Centauri it would gain as much kinetic energy as potential
> energy that it lost.

Of course, things don't balance out quite so neatly when the destination
star has more or less mass than the departure star.  Maybe part of the jump
calculation involves arranging that you exit jump space at a distance such
that the escape velocity from the destination star at that distance, is equal
to the escape velocity from the departure star at the distance at which you
entered jump space.  Using distance from the star to balance out the different
mass of the star ensures that the escape energy at each end is about the same,
and the jump drive doesn't get overloaded trying to compensate for the
different energies.

The jump drive would then convert the ship's kinetic energy into jump energy,
and back again when the ship exits jump space.  Kinetic energy would probably
be meaningless or totally different in jump space.

> Of course, there will have to be extra energy expended for the jump
> itself.  Probably that energy would be expended as lost heat energy
> or something.

That's accounted for by the huge amount of fuel which has to be burned by the
jump drive.

When you exit jump space ...

> As I mentioned, the energy could just as easily be transferred into
> kinetic energy.  Or it could go into the jump capacitors.  As long
> as you aren't getting free energy from the jump, I don't mind how
> it is modelled.

And now you know why you have to be at least 10 diameters away from the
planet before you jump, preferably 100 diameters.  (And probably some
significant distance away from the star, too.)  If you're too close to
a gravity source, the jump capacitors or jump drive get overloaded.  Boom.

And now for something completely different:

James T Perkins <jamesp@metolius.WR> writes:
> Subject: (3337) Comment on Classic Traveller
> 
> A funny thought.  On my X-windows display, the configured icon image for
> my shell windows is an Imperial starburst, not a shattered sun ala
> MegaTraveller.

Use the shattered sun to indicate when something goes wrong.  :-)

- -- 
 "Keyboard?  How quaint!" - M. Scott

 Adrian Hurt			     |	JANET:  adrian@uk.ac.hw.cs
 UUCP: ..!ukc!cs.hw.ac.uk!adrian     |  ARPA:   adrian@cs.hw.ac.uk

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

Archive-Message-Number: 3348
Date:     Wed, 18 Dec 91 13:12:17 EST
From: Robert S. Dean  <rsdean@crdec8.apgea.army.mil>
Subject:  Discomfort Rule for Seats and Staterooms




            SUGGESTIONS FOR DISCOMFORT RATINGS IN MEGATRAVELLER, or
                Putting Some Teeth in the Accommodations Rules

     The MegaTraveller design sequence rules have always been full of  flaws, 
holes,  and  inconsistencies, which GDW has regrettably not yet  made  right.  
The level of detail of various sections is incongruous, with 'agility genera-
tors'  of zero mass and volume (but using hundreds or thousands of  megawatts 
of power nevertheless) side by side with communicators smaller than your fist 
whose volume we are supposed to track in a ship the size of an office  build-
ing.  Enough of that.

     MegaTraveller  introduced  the use of seats of varying sizes  (from  'no 
access'  to 'roomy') for the crew and passengers of small vehicles, but  gave 
no rules for their use.  What difference can it possibly make, do I hear  you 
ask?  Well, as someone who does not like to be stuffed into a subcompact  car  
('cramped'  seats)  for  eight hours at a stretch, I have come  up  with  the 
following  rules  suggestion.  Like most suggestions, this is  not  something 
that  I would keep track of on a regular basis, but rather something  that  I 
would use when the players seemed to be abusing the system (or abusing  their 
characters!)

     I  would suggest that a task roll be made occasionally, with the  timing 
to  depend on the type of accommodation, to avoid discomfort.  The effect  of 
discomfort would be to reduce all applicable skills by one per failed discom-
fort  roll,  with a maximum reduction to an effective skill  of  zero.   This 
represents  fatigue.  Try checking for 'seats' once per hour,  for  'extended 
occupancy seats' once every four hours, and long term accommodations daily.

     To avoid discomfort, <difficulty>, Determination, <time> (absolute)

Difficulties would be:

                    No Access seat, or Bunk: Formidable
    Cramped or Open Seat or Small Stateroom: Difficult
Adequate seat or Double Occupancy Stateroom: Routine
   Roomy seat or Single Occupancy Stateroom: Simple

Thus, a space fighter pilot on a six day patrol mission in a craft with small 
craft staterooms would roll a difficult task once per day to avoid discomfort 
related  to the length of his patrol.  The driver of a small ground car  with 
cramped seats would roll once per hour for a difficult task, and will  proba-
bly  be driving at less than his maximum efficiency as he approaches the  end 
of a ten hour trip.

The effects of discomfort would be ended when the affected character has time 
enough  to  rest in a 'larger environment', let's say for at least  half  the 
time  increment of the seat type.  Thus, a driver could remove the effect  of 
one level of discomfort by spending a half and hour at a rest stop along  the 
highway.  I have to think about this section a bit more, but it's a start.

Judicious  application  of this rule should encourage players  to  spend  the 
extra  money on larger vehicles with spacious accommodations, which helps  to 
give that realistic feel to the game.

Rob Dean

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

End of TML Bundle
*****************

