Hard Points

[matrix cypher]

I guess its always had me wondering.

is there a reason for the limit of one turret per 100 ton?

then why would a 10 ton ship mount a hard point.

my guess is it has something to do with imperial design laws or conventions. You may mount one hardpoint per 100 tons of displacement for defencsive purposes. You could mount more, its just that it will get the authorities wonderin.

I wuld think as long as you have space and power you should be able to mount just about what you could fit.

grantted it may result in some seriously armed ships, but hey just think of the system defence boats that could be designed. Small heavilly armed and armoured.

a 100 ton system defence boat that can fight as a 400+ ton starship.....

i might try to cram a 50 ton bay into a 100 or 200 ton ship (power may be the problem here)

anyways... it must be the coffee juice...

thoughts???

 

[J]

That 1 hardpoint/100t rule has always been a bit of a mystery. It can't really be an Imperial design law, if it was the Vargr would be building ships with more than 1 hardpoint/100t and Corsair's would be busy fitting extra turrets to their ships.

If you remove the hardpoint limit it completely changes ship design, warships become alot smaller and are loaded with turrets. Bays and Spinal mounts become inefficient, why fit a 100t bay when you can have 100 turrets? change that one simple rule quickly invalidates all the published warships. It's still an interesting exercise to design a few ships without applying the rule and see what happens.

A 10t craft does not have a hardpoint, well not according to High Guard. The rules say "A small craft may mount the equivalent of one turret. In actuality, the mountings are probably rigid,....". They do not say that a small craft has a single hardpoint.

The rules on bays are a little less clear, 1 bay is allowed per 1000 tons. Is that one bay per full 1000t or one bay per 1000t or part thereof? Most people only allow a bay per full 1000t. But if you do allow bays to be fitted in ships of less than 1kt it does open up some new design options. If you want to try building a small ship with a bay weapon the best thing to fit is a missile bay, they have no power requirements.

J.

 

[daryen]

The 1 hardpoint per 100 dton is assuredly a game balance issue. Specifically to prevent the overgunning that were just mentioned. You can come up with whatever technobabble handwave you want, but it is a game balance issue.

One nit: no limit on turrets does NOT invalidate bays or, especially, spinal mounts. Spinal mounts can hit and penetrate targets that turrets won't even scratch the paint on. And mounts can reach ratings that turrets just can't match. (E.g. a missle bay can get a 9 rating, turrets max out at 7.)

Bays may not be mounted on hulls smaller than 1000 tons. The rules in Bk 5 are pretty clear on that (as is GT). I can't speak for T20. Specifically, allowing 50-ton missle bays on small ships is ridiculously unbalancing. Allow at your own risk. Just remember that the *other* guys get to use them, too.

 

[Tom Schoene]

You can propose a coupe of different in game reasons for the turret and bay limits. One is hull strucutral integrity; there's got to be some sort of limit to the number of big holes you can open in the hull. You can pick about any number you like, but one turret per hundred tons is an easy one to calculate.

Another justification might be "clear arcs." Just as WW2 warships had to account for arcs of fire as well s weight when adding weapons, too many turrets on a Traveller ship may interfere with each other, or with critical sensors and other systems.

Of course, these are just justifications. The real game design issue is playability and game balance. If very small warships can carry large numbers of weapons, then the typical PC armed merchant ships are so totally outmatched by even tiny patrol ships or pirates that they are better off not being armed at all. (This is very much the contemporary situation, BTW.)

That said, T20 does have an optional rule that would allow bays on small ships (this is an old option; a few designs in the old FASA "Adventure-Class Ships" had such bays). It is possible to build a 200-ton SDB with a 50-ton missile bay that way.

 

[TheColonel]

I have always been bothered by this limit as well. Best example is why can't a 100t scout have a ventral turret as well dorsal? You would have to be able to fit and power it but why not?

 

[J]

Originally posted by daryen:
One nit: no limit on turrets does NOT invalidate bays or, especially, spinal mounts.

I didn't say that it would invalidate large weapons, but it would make them inefficient. I agree that in HG there are some things that can only be touched by a spinal mount. But in T20 it's a bit different.

Bays may not be mounted on hulls smaller than 1000 tons. The rules in Bk 5 are pretty clear on that (as is GT).

I've always stuck to not mounting bays on sub-1Kt ships. It wasn't until I saw an argument on a mailing list about that I realised there was more than one way to look at the rule. The fact that people have argued about it shows that the Book 5 rules can't be that clear.

As for fitting 2 turrets to a scout/courier, the simple solution is to allow 100-199t ships to mount 2 turrets, all other ships are restricted to 1 per 100t. This allows 100t ships to have two turrets without breaking larger designs.

J.

 

[julianlove]

Well, its been a while (long lost Trav player returning to the fold), but IIRC, there were no hardpoint limits in FFS for TNE ships, but the power and space requirements for turret weapons were considerably larger.

I rather liked the feel that this gave to ship designs, weapons were large, power hungry and expensive, and useless without adequate Master Fired Directors (MFDs). I`m not much of a fan of arbitrary limits. However, with the tiny size of CT and HG turrets it is necessary.

 

[GBoyett]

In T20 the rule is 1 bay takes up 10 hardpoints. Spinal mounts have a similar rule that is based on the SM's tonnage.

Now THB does have an optional rule that allows the possibility of mounting bays in <1000 dtons. IIRC <Don't have THB with me at work > it takes a more literal take on the bays.

The rule I've used is 100dton bay uses 10 hardpoints and a 50dton day uses 5 hardpoints. This reflects some FASA designs from the Adventure Ships Volumes.

 

[Simon Jester]

The way I've usually rationalized the hardpoint limit was that the 1 hp/100tons reflected a combination of several factors: vehicle surface area available, firing arc clearance, power and control system wiring space, and structural reinforcement to deal with the stresses a constantly turning and firing turret would place on a ship's hull during combat. Without the 1 hp/100t limit, it would theoretically be possible to install 10 sandcaster or missile turrets (triple turrets, of course) on a 100 ton scout. I'm sticking with the limit.

As for allowing bay weapons in a <1000 ton ship hull, the THB variant rule allows 1 bay mount of any size provided that the ship actually has the space available to install it. All other requirements, such as power, necessary gunners, etc., must be met as well.

Simon Jester

 

[N.I.C.E. Labs]

Another thing to consider is the name. Hardpoint. A place on the ship specially designed and reinforced to withstand the rotational momentum of an active turret and the shock of weapons fire.

I've always held that a ship has a finite amound of free space. Some things on a ship are essential...avionics, conduits, life support rigging, etc. What's left over is the area you get to 'play with'. On a hundred ton ship there might not be enough of this 'free space' to allow any reinforced area in a given hundred tons beyond one hardpoint and still allow the vessel to remain structurely sound, hence the restrictions.

Of course this would give rise to the possibility of adding more anyway, but you'd have to give up to get. Yah you could have two turrets on a scout ship but the second hardpoint has to come from somewhere....so which one of you loses his cabin?

Or perhaps you may decide the ship only needs half it's cargo space.

Of course here we get into developing special designs. It's not a scout ship any more...it doesn't have the facilities a scout ship has...it's now a gunboat. This lends to the idea of why the SDB is legal. All of the interior space that would have been used by jump drive, cargo, and Travelling gear is now reinforced bulkheads, stabilizers, and high-energy cabling. It's no longer a ship with weapons....it's weapons with a bit of life support and maneuver drive.

 

[Father Fletch]

Of course here we get into developing special designs. It's not a scout ship any more...it doesn't have the facilities a scout ship has...it's now a gunboat. This lends to the idea of why the SDB is legal. All of the interior space that would have been used by jump drive, cargo, and Travelling gear is now reinforced bulkheads, stabilizers, and high-energy cabling. It's no longer a ship with weapons....it's weapons with a bit of life support and maneuver drive.

Got to concur with you there. Another thing about the S/C or any other "Small Ship" is the generalized nature of what they do. They have to be flexible to perform a wide variety of missions. Even the small traders have to be able to operate in a wide variety of markets.
You might even have to limit specifically designed traders, like the sub merchant, to fewer turrets because of all the extra access points created by the many cargo doors. this is an example of design trade offs. the structural integrity of a fat trader is already compromised by
1. No bulkheads transverse across the cargo bay area
2. big ass doors that open front, back and sides (depending on design)
this would tend to limit the number of places on the hull and frame that could be beefed up to place a turret.
two planes that are about the same size and rough layout but yet come up with two totally different and appropriate solutions to what they need to get done mission wise are the Gulfstream executive jet and the A-10 Warthog. Both use turbo fans mounted high on the aft of the plane, both have low mounted cruciform wings for good lift and cruising/loiter efficiency, yet one carries executives and movie stars in comfort and the other carries a cannon the size of a VW Bug which rains DU hell from above.
Design compromise within a given envelope.
The C-130 can be converted into a hell of a gunship/fire-support friend to the Infantry, BUT it is no longer a kick ass short field transport plane.
“Whadda ya want? Well here is what fits, and ya can’t have it all!”
Gaashiikaan “Gas-Can” Jones, Chief Hull fitter, Aubaine recovery yards, RCES Reservist

 

[BluWolf]

"Cheaper, better, faster. pick two?"

or more appropriate;

"Range, Capacity, combat, pick two? by the way there is no cheaper."

 

[manley_t]

I had players that once talked me into letting them mount missiles on 'racks' on the outer hull of their scout ship. In fact the argument lasted for quite some time. I argued that hard-points had to be emplaced onto wings and that you just couldn't slap a missile anywhere and they argued that in PT boats in WW2 you could put torp tubes wherever you could fit them and in fact, bolt any kind of weapon you could to the damn thing (in fact they used Kennedy as an example, I guess he bolted a mortar or grenade launcher onto the deck of his PT boat).

Reluctantly I allowed it. And their engineer installed the clamps onto the outer hull of the ship. Their scout ship was then bristling with missiles. Well, that little scout-ship was able to handle anyone they met because of that. It was expensive; but they’d fire a salvo of a ½ dozen missiles at first and that would generally turn the time. Only a much larger warship could beat them.

That game lasted for some time before they mis-jumped and ended up in empty space….boy where they pissed. I think traveler is the only game where you can have an entire party die based on one die-roll.

 

[Father Fletch]

I have usually had a house rule that missiles don't actually launch from the Turret. They are in tubes that face forward, or to the stern or whatever, but since they are space torps in most TU that I have read, they then orient towards the target and begin boost. You still have to pay the mounting costs, turret costs, magazine costs, etc. and you are still limited to 3 max in a turret, but the "special effect" is a launch from a tube or ickle-bickle bay (think F-117)
The sand casters are kind of the same, but they are more like the smoke dispensers on a TL 7-8 AFV, around the hull in strategic positions, and reloadable from within for some of them, others need an EVA to reload (keeps the players on their toes)
The lasers, NPAWs, plasma and fusion weapons all are in 360 turrets, since they are LOS weapons.
YMMV

 

[N.I.C.E. Labs]

Originally posted by Big Tim:
I had players that once talked me into letting them mount missiles on 'racks' on the outer hull of their scout ship. In fact the argument lasted for quite some time. I argued that hard-points had to be emplaced onto wings and that you just couldn't slap a missile anywhere and they argued that in PT boats in WW2 you could put torp tubes wherever you could fit them and in fact, bolt any kind of weapon you could to the damn thing (in fact they used Kennedy as an example, I guess he bolted a mortar or grenade launcher onto the deck of his PT boat).

Reluctantly I allowed it. And their engineer installed the clamps onto the outer hull of the ship. Their scout ship was then bristling with missiles. Well, that little scout-ship was able to handle anyone they met because of that. It was expensive; but they’d fire a salvo of a ½ dozen missiles at first and that would generally turn the time. Only a much larger warship could beat them.

That game lasted for some time before they mis-jumped and ended up in empty space….boy where they pissed. I think traveler is the only game where you can have an entire party die based on one die-roll.

A downside I can see to that arrangement was the missiles are exposed without the benefits of a protected armored turret. What happens in combat when a beam laser slices across a couple warheads. For that matter, what happens if the pilot drank too much last nite and doesn't do re-entry just right. I think blowing off half of their ship would cure them of that.

Another thing to consider would be, yes you can mount them there...do you have the fire control facilities to launch that many? That thought raises another question: Does computer size govern turret number? I don't have my books in front of me (at work) so I can't check, but it would stand to reason that a model-1/bis might not be able to handle multiple turrets (assuming you don't have gunners)

 

[Simon Jester]

Originally posted by N.I.C.E. Labs:
A downside I can see to that arrangement was the missiles are exposed without the benefits of a protected armored turret. What happens in combat when a beam laser slices across a couple warheads. For that matter, what happens if the pilot drank too much last nite and doesn't do re-entry just right. I think blowing off half of their ship would cure them of that.

Another thing to consider would be, yes you can mount them there...do you have the fire control facilities to launch that many? That thought raises another question: Does computer size govern turret number? I don't have my books in front of me (at work) so I can't check, but it would stand to reason that a model-1/bis might not be able to handle multiple turrets (assuming you don't have gunners)

My take on external racks (yes, my players have tried them, too) has been that missiles fired from them take twice as long to reach their target (since they don't have the launch impetus provided by the turret launch mechanism). In addition, if any are still mounted if/when the ship tries to jump, they either act to increase the displacement of the ship (preventing jump, reducing the range of the jump, or causing a misjump) or are sheared off, missiles and rack together (since they are outside of the jump grid).

Generally, my players tend to leave external missile racks alone, unless they are running an SDB Crew adventure (SDBs can use them without running the risk of having them sheared off in jump, although the missile racks _do_ tend to restrict the firing arcs of the turrets, and degrade sensors and jammers by blocking the antennae, until they are launched).

Simon Jester