MegaTraveller starship rules, do they work?

[Cymew]

Hi!

Are there anyone here that can testify that the MegaTraveller rules for designing starships actually work after using the 4/1/88 and 10/1/88 errata sheets?

I remember that the rules seemed very broken and now I have found those errata sheets on the web and wonder if I can use my old MT rules after all. I don't have the money to buy T20 yet...

/andreas

 

[Ben W Bell]

They do work, but are as complicated as hell. It takes some time to design a ship using them.

 

[Cymew]

Thanks for the assurance Ben!

Before I do all the work of pencilling in the errata in my books I'd love to know that the effort would yield a usable system.

I know it is kind of compilcated. That's what I like about it! I know I'm not sane...

 

[Ben W Bell]

Well I like them, they have a more realistic feel to them I think than the others do. More detailed.

 

[dougmedic]

Originally posted by BenBell:
Well I like them, they have a more realistic feel to them I think than the others do. More detailed.

I like them as well...as long as you have a fully errated set!!!!!

I find that, although not necessary, a spreadsheet helps..A LOT!

The advantage to MT ship construction is the level of detail you can get. I also like the integration of the systems with tasks such as sensor ops/etc.

For quick ships, without needing a lot of detail, I use HGS, a wonderful little program!

 

[T. Foster]

Probably the most important part of designing ships in MT is knowing what to ignore. Since the same design sequence is used for vehicles and spacecraft, a lot of the steps and table entries only apply to one or the other. Once you know what steps and tables to ignore, it's not that much more complicated than HG, with a couple of big exceptions:

Power Plant: First off, the power plant fuel consumption rates in MT match those in Striker and are, thus, roughly 1/6 as efficient as those in HG (i.e. a ship designed under MT will require approx. 6x as much fuel for its PP as an equivalent ship designed under HG). Also, because pretty much everything uses power from the PP, you're not going to know how big it needs to be until the end of the design, by which time you probably won't have enough room left in the hull to fit the PP and all its fuel. It's a juggling act and it's hard to do and the only way to get better at it is to design enough ships that you get an intuitive feel for how big the PP will probably be (thinking in blocks of 250 MW (HG's EP) makes this estimation a little easier).

Control Points: This is actually my favorite part of the MT craft design system, but it's not in HG and is kind of a hassle. Every ship system has a number of 'control points' based on its price and TL. Enough control panels and/or computers must be installed to equal the number of required CP. The total CP of the systems also determine crew requirements. This, like the power plant, is another iterative function that you'll probably need to refigure several times per ship design, but at least it's easier to do.

A very helpful hint when designing ships in MT is to prefigure as many calculations as possible. Figure out the size (including fuel requirements for 30 days) for a PP to produce 100 MW and 250 MW at each TL and write it in the margin of the book. Figure out the total costs (power, price, volume, mass) of life support (environ, basic, extended, ic) per dton of ship and write it in the margin. Write the percentage formulae for j-drive and m-drive (from HG) into the margins of the j-drive and m-drive tables. These kinds of shortcuts will help A LOT.

Another hint: if you're designing a ship with significant weaponry install a separate weapons-only PP with a much lower duration (1 day or 5 days). If you don't do this your PP will use so much fuel that you won't be able to install anything else (like, say, decent m-drives or j-drives).

Try to design a couple ships. Start with something easy (like converting CT's standard designs -- but don't try to reverse-engineering the specs in the Imperial Encyclopedia 'cause AFAICT it won't work) and work your way up. Once you get the hang of it you'll probably begin to like it better than HG (I know I do). If you run into trouble ask here and I (or somebody else) will probably be able to help you out.

 

[far-trader]

Good thoughts T. Foster. One thing I recall from when I was able to churn out MT designs years ago is that I found the design order slightly easier if I left the powerplant till last, after I knew how much energy I needed. Of course at that time I had a good feel for the general percentages so I could estimate each section pretty close based on the ship required.

I'd also say, IIRC, that even when I had the last, fullest, errata there were still a few points that needed to be addressed. I'd also advise against using the published designs as a yardstick as I seem to recall attempting to recreate them and finding it not quite working in most if not every case.

 

[Cymew]

Thanks for the hints Foster!

 

[Vargas]

MT ship design has nit picky details, is mathematically intensive and I've yet to see two people come up with identical ships even if they try.

 

[Swiftbrook]

Originally posted by T. Foster:
Probably the most important part of designing ships in MT is knowing what to ignore. {snip}

Power Plant: First off, the power plant fuel consumption rates in MT match those in Striker and are, thus, roughly 1/6 as efficient as those in HG (i.e. a ship designed under MT will require approx. 6x as much fuel for its PP as an equivalent ship designed under HG). Also, because pretty much everything uses power from the PP, you're not going to know how big it needs to be until the end of the design, by which time you probably won't have enough room left in the hull to fit the PP and all its fuel.

Yes But ....

Jump drives fuel is much less in MT than in HG for jumps greater than 1.

Jump-1 HG = 10%, MT = 10%
Jump-2 HG = 20%, MT = 15%
Jump-3 HG = 30%, MT = 20%
Jump-4 HG = 40%, MT = 25%
Jump-5 HG = 50%, MT = 30%
Jump-6 HG = 60%, MT = 35%

You can design a good ship using pencil, paper and a calculator but it really takes a spreadsheet or deticated program to design a great ship. I spent a long time writing a Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheet that I use. There are a lot of things that are just very tough to do without a computer. For example, calculating PP fuel consumption. Expert starship designers typically have three 'levels' that their PP runs at, In jump (typically 5%-10%), Cruising (no weapons, little or on agility), and full combat (100%). Then there are the tweaks like not placing life support in your fuel tanks.

Originally posted by Vargas:
MT ship design has nit picky details, is mathematically intensive and I've yet to see two people come up with identical ships even if they try.

True, very true.

I also use several "House Rules" or "Designers Tricks" in my design sequence. One other trick that I haven't mentioned yet is the way you compute control points. Instead of multiplying all systems by the ships TL, multiply each individaul item by its TL. For example, if a ship is built at TL 15 but uses a TL 13 Jump Drive, calculate the control points for the Jump Drive based on TL 13 not TL 15. Why should the exact same drive need more control points in a higher TL ship?

-Swiftbrook

Just My Thoughts

 

[GypsyComet]

Originally posted by Vargas:
MT ship design has nit picky details, is mathematically intensive and I've yet to see two people come up with identical ships even if they try.

Hmm. I don't recall it being *quite* that bad, but it was close. The math is no worse than Striker or FF&S. A key to simplifying design work is to "pre-assemble". Dive into the various fiddly bits sections and build yourself standard packages for sensors and commo, so you have *one* set of numbers on the starship spreadsheet instead of seven or eight. This is one of the secrets that allowed Rob Dean to produce several hundred designs with that system *without using a spreadsheet*.

 

[GypsyComet]

Originally posted by Swiftbrook:

I also use several "House Rules" or "Designers Tricks" in my design sequence. One other trick that I haven't mentioned yet is the way you compute control points. Instead of multiplying all systems by the ships TL, multiply each individaul item by its TL. For example, if a ship is built at TL 15 but uses a TL 13 Jump Drive, calculate the control points for the Jump Drive based on TL 13 not TL 15. Why should the exact same drive need more control points in a higher TL ship?

Simplicity. Given the penchant for the system to produce diffrent results for different people, I'd think that a little simplicity would be a good thing.

The other reason comes down to the automation differences between those TLs. factors not necessarily seen at the design system level, but rather in actual play. In the specific example you use, I'd tell the pilot who'd just heard his engineer go off-air in a burst of static that while he could control and even diagnose a drive problem from the bridge, the simpler automation on the drive wouldn't let his bridge station actually *fix* the drive or adjust those fiddly settings that the engineer had just gone to Engineering to do...

 

[Zutroi]

If you really want to make a hot-sh!t vessel using MT, get a copy of "Hard Times" to go with it.

For most ships you'd want a PC to have (I've tried it at least up to 1000 d-ton) it's invariably more efficient and cheaper to use the TL9 "Fusion Rocket" instead of anti-grav or thrusters and a big-@$$ powerplant. I always throw in 1G worth of thrusters anyway, on the principle that port authorities aren't going to like you if you land in a cloud of concrete-fusing drive plasma...

Second cheap trick, put in a tiny little powerplant, just big enough to run life support, sensors, etc. and enough fuel to give you the typical 15 to 30 days endurance. Mount a second drive big enough to power your full weaponry array, provide emergency agility, etc. This only needs a day or so worth of fuel.

If you can't defeat or retreat in 2 days, you don't deserve a ship; if your engineering crew can't light up your main power plant before the enemy can close to firing range (or they're too stupid to fire it up prior to your n-space transition) they don't deserve to be breathing!

 

[GypsyComet]

I've seen the multiple powerplant technique taken to extremes, with as many as four or five seperate "step" power plants installed and fueled according to percieved need. The longest term need is life support, computers, and A/G (in its various forms). Next you have M-Drive (at two weeks out of a month in use) and the active sensors (ditto), followed by weapons (sometimes broken into individual plants based on need, like one for the Spinal/Bays and another for turrets), and finally the "emergency Agility" plant, which is fueled on the basis of maybe a two day need at the outside.

All of these are large enough to take advantage of the best scale efficiency, so no space is lost, and you have more efficient fuel tankage and very good tracking of resources ("Only two more hours of evasives before impacting jump fuel, Captain."), and it can provide some fairly specific RP-level combat results if the ship is hit ("Weapons reactor Two is dead, sir.")

It is a bit more interesting during the design process, though. This practice, which was in use by several of the well-known designers of the late MT era, was a contributing factor to the change in powerplant fuel usage in TNE. A growing understanding of RW fusion was primary, of course...

 

[clair_rand]

this is how i've always designed ships.. normally only with two reactors though.. one tiny one and the other one operating at several 'levels'.

Question: Errata for the MT sequence? is this on line anywhere? actually is more general technology on line anywhere in the same format?

 

[Malenfant]

It's not Megatraveller, but TNE's "Fire Fusion & Steel" is a veritable ship and tech building bible IMO. You can buy a PDF of that from www.drivethrurpg.com along with lots of other GDW stuff...

 

[Border Reiver]

I used to have a whale of a time using FF&S but I have recently bought a copy of FF&S2 for T4 on e-bay, any user comments?

 

[Malenfant]

From what I've heard, you just bought something that was rendered largely unusable by horrific editing (equations frequently don't make any sense), and atrocious layout.

I stayed well clear of FF&S2 and stuck with the TNE version

 

[mike wightman]

Having both versions of FF&S can be useful since number 2 does include some things missing from number 1.
It does take a bit of work to understand the hieroglyphics FF&S2 equations are written in

 

[aramis]

MT's system is, IMO, well worth the time to get a feel for, even though it produces a very different feel than CT or TNE.

If you choose, however, the rating process for DP is design system independant.

There is erratta in the following sources:
The GDW erratta is on the web
The x10DP erratta is in the Ref's Screen (Referee's Gaming Kit) by DGP
The link with Bk8 Robots is in 101 Vehicles, as are some missing weapons tables.
Wood, Wind Fire and Steel, Wet Navy 1-3, One small step, and Two Small steps are all from challenge, but the One Small Step materials are in the back of Hard times as well.
COACC includes an alternate design system for aircraft.

Missing items can be figured out using striker for non-hardpoint weapons.

Note: the MT Vehicle Combat Stats and turret weapons damages and pens ARE NOT STRIKER CONVERSIONS... a 250 MW laser from striker is 16kL

Note: MT Armor takes no volume unless you use Wet Navy or WWF&S

as for FF&S1 & 2: most of the non-weapon nonPP formulae and systems can be used as is in MT. FF&S assumes a much lower fuel use rate; more than an order of magnitude for many, and several for Fusion. FF&S2 also uses the CT style 10%*Jn for 1Jn fuel, rather than 5*Tjd=5%*(Jn+1).