As for an actual suggestion, here's one I've been kicking around for a while that I think could be introduced into a 2300 campaign without too much disruption:
Non-Tantalum Stutterwarp Coils.
2300's always had a hard sci-fi feel unlike Traveller. So, if you go with the canon universe and assume for whatever reason that Stutterwarp is rare and Tantalum is super-expensive (come on, it's not that rare, even on Earth, but whatever) ... then humans will do something else. It's called: Look for alternatives.
Now, since this is hard sci-fi, I refuse to believe that there is some magical unobtanium quality to Tantalum that makes it the only substance in the universe that can make Stutterwarp coils. That kind of thing rarely happens in real-life. What Tantalum is in 2300 is probably the optimal material to make Stutterwarp coils from. In this case, it probably has the best ability to hold a charge, allowing for the longest distance traveled (7.7ly in the current age of the game).
However, there must be materials that are not as good as Tantalum but still let you get the benefits of Stutterwarp. We'll say, for instance, there's a number of metals or alloys of metals that contain no Tantalum that can create Stutterwarp coils.
Many of these alternatives will be unusable. Some will be more expensive than Tantalum is due to rarity, yet have inferior performance so we won't consider them. Some will be outright hazardous to use, their coil saturation points (and therefore their dangerous decay cascades) will occur at unpredictable points. There's all sorts of other factors we can't consider, such as ones that can't handle that much mass or something else. These aren't discussed with Stutterwarp because 2300 is a game and not a physics of the future textbook. We'll throw all those out, too.
However, there is likely to be at least one substance (element or compound) that doesn't contain Tantalum that has the same smooth predictability of Tantalum coils, but at some drawback. We'll say it doesn't have the range of Tantalum coil (ie; it just doesn't hold the charge as well).
We have a BIG winner at this point.
We'll say that there's a material that is less expensive than Tantalum (because it's more common) but produces coils that only have a range of about 1ly before requiring discharge. This is a revolution in Stutterwarp coils.
Suddenly, a lot of the short-range applications don't require Tantalum: commercial hulls that ply intra-system routes (say, like trans-Uranus to Earth) don't require Tantalum coils. Missiles no longer require Tantalum either. The low habitability, short-mission fighter types don't require Tantalum anymore, either. SDBs, too. Someone who just wants the 2300 equivalent of a pleasure sailboat could use this stuff, too.
Long-term it probably means a drop in prices of Tantalum as a lot of uses of Tantalum can now be substituted by the new substance.
Short-term, there's opportunity for players. A few hulls are probably going to open up as operators see this as a perfect opportunity to overhaul and replace some of their fleets and replace their current Stutterwarp drives with the new coils while they're at it, making Tantalum coils or entire ships available second-hand. Militaries will probably scrap a lot of their missile and fighters, citing bloc obsolescence, making Stutterwarp coils available again. Manufacturers could make new ships with the freed up coils, making them available to players.
There was also an article that I read somewhere (I think maybe Challenge) about piracy in the 2300AD universe, working out all the details of a 2 ship system requiring one armed ship to stop the victim, then another ship to come in and take away the loot to be sold. Unless these were all expected to be state-sponsored privateering, that implies some available ships somewhere.
I could understand there not being privateering in 2300's space. I'm aware that there's this "pirate meme" amongst people for whatever reason that makes piracy and pirates really "cool" to people, so they try and introduce into any game with ships, but 2300 seems to be a universe that might just be too small and high-tech to allow pirates.
On the other hand, I do remember rules on how to handle privateering in the back of the Invasion supplement - privateering during the Kafer war might work, though it seems sort of madness. They really needed to give the Kafers more ship types and I always thought that by psychology, Kafer "freighters" would not the Oscars given in the back of the book*.
* Pet Peeve, so feel free to skip it: This probably should go into my old "Kafer reboot" threads but I always thought that Kafers, by nature, would not have freighters as we envision them. For one thing, due to Kafer psychology, they would have pirates and privateers, especially pirates so they'd have to arm up their freighters. But also, merchant hulls amongst humans tend to be dedicated-built to be inexpensive as possible, haul lots of cargo, and due to laws, tend to have minimal to no weaponry - and that's what a Kafer Oscar looks like. Except freighter duty would be really boring to Kafers - endlessly shuttling supplies around in a slow ship, essentially unarmed ship that must run from any attack? That's a recipe for a frequent mutinies within your ship. The chok'aav couldn't keep order on such boring ships; the moment a commerce raider shows up, the crew would go to fight the raider, knowing full well they'll lose, but at least it's excitement. So it seems more likely that you'd get calmer, more experienced Kafers to crew such a vessel. But those Kafers are the smarter Kafers who'd balk at being forced to crew a slow, paper-thin hulled ship with practically no weapons. Kafers seem really bad at doing convoy work as well, so they wouldn't have any warship guardians.
By Kafer psychology, being weak is literally an invitation to the entire universe to come pick on you. That's an Oscar. I just find it inconceivable the Kafers, by their own psychology, would make such a ship. A Kafer cargo ship would have the same requirements as their other warships: they'd be designed to outfight or outrun enemies. They'd either use obsolescent battleships with cargo modules attached - it might make a slow ship slower, but who cares when you're armed to the teeth and have armor 9? They could probably get veterans to crew such a ship. Either that or their cargo ships would be fast - faster than their warships. Even with minimal guns and armor, crews could depend on being able to flee from enemies. It also means that the boring trips are over quickly, at least so crews could get into the mindset of "well this is bad but at least it'll be over soon."
), htoug I must admit if those shorter range coils are used that may vary, and then the Exeter must be rerated, as would no longer be an SDB.
o:
