Barekdoldin-Class Darrian Patrol Cruiser

[mike wightman]

A long time ago I promised more TNE to T20 ship conversions. Here's one I just had to give a go.

hull- 500t streamlined cylinder, SI- 160, AC-24

armour #6- 35t, with chameleon coating
(to represent EMM)

bridge- 20t

10fib computer- 17.2t, 15EP
consisting model 10 computer, sensors and comms, model 2 avionics and model 9 maser comms

jump 4- 25t, 20EP

maneuver 6- 85t, 30EP (+30EP for agility-6)

TL16 powerplant- 29t, generates 87 EPs

200t jump fuel, 29t powerplant fuel, fuel scoops

Fuel purification- 2t

1xTL16 PA turret- 2t, 5EP
(1x#3 battery)

2xTL16 tpl beam laser turrets- 2t, 6EP
(2x#5 batteries)

1x tpl missile turret- 1t

3x missile magazines- 3t

1x manipulator barbette- 5t, 1EP

"pod"- 10t

1x stateroom- 4t, single occupancy

12xsmall staterooms- 24t

cargo-6.8t

crew- pilot, astrogator, 4x engineers,
5x gunners, medic

cost- MCr650.28

The TL16 weapons are taken from MT and the manipulator a best guess from TNE. It can be treated as a #2 repulsor for ship combat(whatever they do in T20 ship combat?) but at 1000km or less it can exert a gravitational force and maneuver a 50dt object 1G in any direction or 10dt up to 5G etc.

What do you think?

[edit] with hindsight the armour factor is too high, AR#3 would be closer to the original TNE design.
That frees up 15t, so I'd reduce the missile magazine by 1t and have an extra four staterooms.[/edit]

 

[savage]

Sigg Oddra,

Looks like great fun. Have you determined if there is a performance improvement in the wpns at TL16?


Savage

 

[mike wightman]

Thanks Savage

Yes, the weapons get a performance increase.
A factor 5 beam laser battery(+5 to hit, 5d8 damage) at TL13-15 would require two turrets with six lasers total. The PAW turret is 1 ton lighter and 1 USP factor higher than its TL15 equivalent.

Shame the missiles aren't any better .

A TL ship with these weapon USPs would have to be at least 700t or 800t if you gave it an extra weapon in place of the manipulator.

 

[Pwyll]

heya Sigg

i had a few thoughts as i was looking at your design. please bear in mind i am not T20 literate, so i am probably missing some things.

packs quite a punch looks like it could dispatch a merc cruiser pretty quickly.

does it carry personnel for boarding parties?

is it an economical proposition at a cost equivalent of about four MT standard patrol ships?

how old is it?

iirc, OTU Darrian highest current production TL is E to F. all their TL G stuff is thousands of years old, from back before they messed with their sun (the Maghiz). have later editions of traveller advanced the Darrian's level of technology?

traveller alien module 8 (Darrians) specifies "probably fewer than two dozen Darrian TL G ships survive today."

an interesting note, a small number of them were actually built as merchant ships, and have since been armed with TL 14 weapons.

some other mentioned charactersistics of these ships are "extremely capable of evading interception and efficiently breaking off from an engagement" and great survivability and endurance. additionally, they have TL H air/rafts.

Darrian starship computers built since the Maghiz generally use fibre-optic primary circuits, rather than the Imperial custom of reserving fibre-optics for back up. since MT simply doubles the cost of a computer to add fibre-optic back up, it would seem reasonable to allow that Darrian ship computers are built with fibre-optics primary circuits for the same price, volume, etc as a standard, non fibre-optic Imperial model. i don't know if you took that approach, just a thought.

 

[mike wightman]

Hello there, Pwyll.

packs quite a punch looks like it could dispatch a merc cruiser pretty quickly.

It'll trash it

does it carry personnel for boarding parties?

The original TNE design allows up to thirteen troops to be carried by doubling up the occupancy of the staterooms or putting bunks in the cargo hold (or both for 26?). It uses the "pod" and manipulator to send the boarding parties across.

is it an economical proposition at a cost equivalent of about four MT standard patrol ships?

With the 20% discount given to standard designs in T20(this thing in built by the Darrians and the Regency, under licence) it costs 520.224MCr, a bit less than two TL12 patrol cruisers from the T20 rulebook. The costliest component on board is its computer.

how old is it?

It's brand new (in TNE)

I like your computer idea, it would save quite a bit of weight but I've already bent the rules with the manipulator.

Happy New Year

 

[Whipsnade]

Pwyll asked:

"how old is it?"


Mr. Pwyll,

Oh, have no worries. The Barekdoldin-class are newly built vessels, no pre-Maghiz leftovers here. However, calling these patrol cruisers 'Darrian' is something of a lie.

TNE's Regency Sourcebook explains it all in the Referee's Section. The Barekdoldin's were designed at TL16 using pre-Maghiz Darrian relics as a guide. You know, 'half the battle...' and all that. The Darrians turned over relic tech to the Regency; who had a better chance of copying it, in return for part of the production stream originating from that technology. Every Barekdoldin is actually built in the Regency! The Darrians fly the hulls they've been given - not built.

A weak historical analog may be found in Britain's tech missions to the US in WW2. The Brits shared out atomic weapon research (code named 'Tube Alloys'), the cavity magnatron (radar), digital computing (code breaking), and host of other advances with the US. The US then was able to churn out vast quantities of devices that depended those hi-tech breakthroughs.

Only the US, and not Britain, could have afforded the Manhattan Project with its two separate; uranium and plutonium, fissionable material production streams. The Rad Lab at MIT took the cavity magnatron and produced radar sets compact enough to be used in aircraft along with enough sets to install on every plane, ship, shore station, control towers, and hen coop the Allies owned. Early on, the 'bombes' used to crack German Enigma messages numbered less than a dozen hand-built examples. Once the US was given the design, the Singer Sewing Machine company built thousands in less than six months. The list is rather huge.


Sincerely,
Larsen

 

[Pwyll]

heyas Larsen and Sigg

thanks for explaining to me, i knew i was missing something.

May the new year bring you only the best

 

[rancke]

Originally posted by Larsen E. Whipsnade:
TNE's Regency Sourcebook explains it all in the Referee's Section. The Barekdoldin's were designed at TL16 using pre-Maghiz Darrian relics as a guide. You know, 'half the battle...' and all that. The Darrians turned over relic tech to the Regency; who had a better chance of copying it, in return for part of the production stream originating from that technology. Every Barekdoldin is actually built in the Regency! The Darrians fly the hulls they've been given - not built.

Note that BtC had the Darrians building Barekdoldins in and before 1120 in the GTU. This is two or three generations before they (or rather, the Regency) managed it in the OTU. Not being able to figure out how the Rebellion not happening would allow the Darrians (without help from the Regency) to lop 80 years off that achievement, I changed that retroactively in Humaniti by noting that the Darrians had found a cache of 8 mothballed Barekdoldins and used them to run a bluff, putting out the story that they had managed to build them from new.


Hans

 

[Whipsnade]

rancke explained:

"Note that BtC had the Darrians building Barekdoldins in and before 1120 in the GTU. This is two or three generations before they (or rather, the Regency) managed it in the OTU."


Mr. Rancke-Madsen,

And BtC strikes again. Will SJG be publishing a 'corrected' version that supercedes the original? Much like how HG1 was made moot by HG2?

"Not being able to figure out how the Rebellion not happening would allow the Darrians (without help from the Regency) to lop 80 years off that achievement, I changed that retroactively in Humaniti by noting that the Darrians had found a cache of 8 mothballed Barekdoldins and used them to run a bluff, putting out the story that they had managed to build them from new."

A neat fix and one that builds on stories already known in canon; i.e. the Darrian TL16 'fleet' and pre-5th FW Star Trigger that were bluffs also.


Sincerely,
Larsen

 

[daryen]

Originally posted by Larsen E. Whipsnade:
Every Barekdoldin is actually built in the Regency! The Darrians fly the hulls they've been given - not built.

Just a point of clarification. While it is true that all TNE Barekdoldins were indeed made the the Regency, that was purely do to effeciencies. The Darrians do have TL16 shipyards, but they are devoted to prototypes, leaving the Regency TL16 shipyards to production.

The Darrians (in the TNE timeframe) are just as TL16 capable as the Regency, and could make the Barekdoldins (or any other TL16 design) if the need ever arose. The problem is that there is no way for the Darrians to touch the Regency's capacity, and so leave general production to the Regency's TL16 shipyards.

 

[Badbru]

Sigg I'm not T20 literate, so forgive me but I don't see if you've factored in the battery banks that allowed boosted performance of the PA, or increased fuel range? or powered down stealth operations neutrino emissions wise?

And, someone asked if they could beat a broadsword? Heck they could probably beat a Midu Agashaam, or atleast put up a good fight.

 

[mike wightman]

Yes, the turrets are boosted performance.

The TL16 triple laser turret has a factor of 5, which is one higher than a TL13+ turret from HG/T20.

The PAW is one ton lighter and is one factor higher than the TL15 turret.

These changes were adapted from MT.

The manipulator barbete is a conversion from TNE/FF&S to T20, based a lot on the performance of repulsor bays in HG/T20.

The stealth operations are modelled by the inclusion of chameleon coating from the vehicle design section of the T20 rules.

The computer et al is extrapolated from the T20 tables.

HTH