[Shipyard] Ship Design Program

[Murdoc]

Don't ask me man, I'm just telling you where to find them in the program. Taking a quick look at the book (p 342), that is what they are listed as. Maybe there is some real-life reason, since world-range weapons can only go to 50,000 km max, maybe real-world lasers are thought to have that as a maximum effective range as well? I'm just speculating here, I really don't know the reason.

Ok, I'm just taking a look at the Distances chart on p 41. It says that the next highest range category is 250,000 km, which it lists as having a light delay of 1 light-second. That means at that range lasers would not be instant-hit weapons and would at least require target leading, assuming the target was on a constant vector. So maybe that's why. Or maybe lasers can't be focused effectively at that range. Again, just speculating.

 

[pendragonman]

Crew Requirements?

I am trying to locate how to calculate the crew requirement. Does anyone have the page number?

 

[Major B]

346 and 326.

 

[pendragonman]

346 and 326.

I saw those. Those two pages discuss structure of a crew but not how to calculate crew itself. For instance, once upon a time there were x engineers required for y tonnage of drives. I see no such definitions in T5. Is this the correct interpretation or is there errata that needs pointed out?

 

[Cynnewulf]

There doesn't seem to be a hard and fast rule, but rather just the guidelines that the Naval Architect (the player or GM) will determine how many crew are required and also that some crew positions may be omitted on smaller ships.

Since there doesn't appear to be a hard and fast rule in this addition, a possible rule of thumb for the "how many Engineers" question may be extrapolated from the examples given in Ship descriptions on pages 358-9.

The 100 T, Jump 1 Scout requires 1 multitasking Engineer.
The 200 T, Jump 1 Free Trader requires 1 dedicated Engineer.
The 200 T, Jump 2 Far Trader requires 2 dedicated Engineers.
The 400 T, Jump 2 Lab Ship requires 2 dedicated Engineers,
The 500 T, Jump 4 Yacht requires 3 dedicated Engineers.

How about, # of Engineers should equal Jump potential / 2 (rounded down) + 1. And perhaps given the apparent size relationship between J-Drives and M-Drives, M-Drive potential / 5 + 1 for system defense boats. Or the greater of those two numbers for high acceleration, low jump potential starships.

Of course this wouldn't work for X-Boats or Small Craft, so perhaps it should only apply to ships larger than 100 tons (or using Hull size B or greater).

This would chart out as:

                   # Engineers       
Potential      J-Drive or M-Drive                   
  1                1            1
  2                2            1
  3                2            2
  4                3            2
  5                3            2
  6                4            2
  7                4            3
  8                5            3
  9                5            3

A suggestion, anyway.

 

[robject]

More or less, if there's a Console, think about having a Crew Member.

And, every Control Panel reports to a Console. So if you network all of your drives to one console, you only need one Engineer. In the unlikely event that he needs to manage all three drives at the same time, he faces grave odds, but how often does that happen?

Similarly, it becomes likely that a military vessel will have redundant positions, and perhaps multiple shifts as well.

But, some guidance on the matter would be nice.

 

[pendragonman]

More or less, if there's a Console, think about having a Crew Member.

And, every Control Panel reports to a Console. So if you network all of your drives to one console, you only need one Engineer. In the unlikely event that he needs to manage all three drives at the same time, he faces grave odds, but how often does that happen?

Similarly, it becomes likely that a military vessel will have redundant positions, and perhaps multiple shifts as well.

But, some guidance on the matter would be nice.

It is that lack of guidance that has me confused...

 

[Cynnewulf]

It is that lack of guidance that has me confused...

It appears the lack of guidance was by design. The closest to hard guidance in the rules would seem to be that every device larger than 35 tons requires a separate control panel (CP) per 35 tons. So any drive larger than 35 tons would require a second Console/Engineer to avoid multitasking penalties for routine operation.

Now, you can link more than one control panel to a single console, but linking two control panels from the same actual drive means that, whenever it is operated, the Engineer is subject to multitasking penalties. A second control panel becomes required by the rules for M-Drives at size U, J-Drives at size G, and P-Plants at size M. It would seem a reasonable Naval Architect (player/GM) should design for multiple Engineers at this point.

Example; on a Hull K starship, the Naval Architect desires it to have 3G acceleration and Jump 1. This would require an M-Drive Q, J-Drive J, and a P-Plant V. The masses for these being 29, 50, and 61 respectively. So, this would require one control panel for the M-Drive, and two each for the J-Drive and P-Plant. The designer could link all five of these control panels to one Console, but then every time the ship jumped or some operation of the P-Plan required a roll, the Engineer operating the console would be subject to multitasking penalties. Two Consoles (with an Engineer assigned to each), however, splitting the load between them, would only be multitasking if there were some usage of more than one of the drives at a time.

The only reason I suggested my rule of thumb is that the legacy starships (the Far Trader, Lab Ship, and Yacht) simply do not mass enough drive tonnage to require the number of engineers they are described as requiring under T5 rules. I guess you could always hand-wave it as having been due to their ancient design origins.

 

[Kaeto]

If only you hadn't written it to require flash 11. My computer is too old to run that, and I can't afford the money necessary to buy a newer one.

 

[Nerhesi]

You said you were putting in smallcraft, is it in now?

 

[Murdoc]

I just wanted to bring up a few minor issues I came across while making the Donosev. Am I missing where Life Support is in the program, because I couldn't find it and had to do the modified cargo entry thing. And things like the Drive, Living, and Craft components don't always load up, and I usually have to reload several times to get them to appear. And what is TN exactly? I assumed that it has something to do with TL, but it never seems to conform to what I design, or is it part of the Stage Effects TL problem I mentioned earlier? Because I notice it gives me higher values for items I give a higher stage to. I think maybe it is adding the SE TL mod to the base production TL instead of the technology's base TL?

Not big deals, still an awesome program. Just annoyances.

 

[Licheking]

Ok am i missing something. If you use the default Frame and Plate to build your starship it is equal to the TL of the build so TL-12 is 12AV, but then Armour Layers do they start at 12 or do they start at 8 and have to be modified by TL effects, for example Ultimate +4TL /2 tons, but gives you AV12 based on the new TL. Or is it 12 like the base Frame and Plate in which case what is the point of the TL effects, since you wouldn't be able to apply any of them, except maybe the minus TL ones, like Early or Prototype, but why would you?

Some help with this could make designing a bit easier. The first method can give you different AV to various layers, while the second method would give the same AV for every level, but makes the TL effects redundant.

 

[GrayPennell]

I just wanted to bring up a few minor issues I came across while making the Donosev. Am I missing where Life Support is in the program, because I couldn't find it and had to do the modified cargo entry thing. And things like the Drive, Living, and Craft components...

I want to make a suggestion. Why dont we go through and use this program to compile stat sheets for all know adventure class ships. This is good for several reasons. 1. It will get us stats not provided by T5. 2. It will put the program threw its paces always a good thing. 3. By using known ship designs we can test T5 for interoperability

 

[Murdoc]

I want to make a suggestion. Why dont we go through and use this program to compile stat sheets for all know adventure class ships. This is good for several reasons. 1. It will get us stats not provided by T5. 2. It will put the program threw its paces always a good thing. 3. By using known ship designs we can test T5 for interoperability

I think we're doing that already. A good portion of the main "classic" ones have already been made, mostly by Rob. He's even compiled a list of them, and provided many "skeleton" (unfinished) stats too. Feel free to hop in and help out.

 

[robject]

I've started editing the Original Post with some guidelines on how to use this program.