T20 Scout/Courier (Type S) - Arming the turret

[binky]

I'll admit up front that I'm no starship gearhead - I've always gone with the standard designs and used them as is.

However, I want to use the T20 Type S Scout/Courier as the basis of a PC ship. From the description in the THB, it says that fitting energy weapons in the turret would require a bigger power plant.

Could someone with a better grasp of these things than me, please enlighten me as to what would be the best armament for the turret and what the knock on effect would be to the amount of capacity left for cargo.

For the record I'm using the deckplans by Brook West as my starting point.

Thanks in advance.

- Neil.

 

[mike wightman]

The TL11 scout/courier must be a cut down, refurbished model for detached duty scouts and the like, IMHO. Or very, very old

.

First of all consider the computer and sensor suite. Model 1, hardly enough for a scout IMHO. Higher rated computers are going to cost you cargo tonnage and EPs(and money, of course ). The extra EP(s) required will cost you agility or cargo tonnage again as you install a larger power plant.

Now to consider the two excess EP which give it an agility of 2. If you install a laser(beam or pulse) it costs you a point of agility per weapon.

A few choises present themselves, IMHO.

1.Add a larger TL9 power plant, this would cost you 2.5t of cargo space per extra EP(including fuel).

2.Upgrade to a TL13 power plant of the same size. This gets you 2 extra EPs to power up to two lasers but you lose 2t of cargo to fuel.

3.As 2, but also make the power plant bigger. 2t of cargo lost to power plant and fuel would get you enough EPs for 3 lasers.

4.Upgrade to a TL15 power plant.

As far as the weapon loadout, are you going to stick with the double turret or upgrade to a triple turret?

If a double turret I would be tempted to install a single pulse laser(longer range, more damage, greater critical potential) and a missile rack.

If a triple turret then the classic mix of one laser(pulse), one missile rack and one sandcaster(+3 to your AR on asuccessful point defence role can't be bad).

Are you going to give them TL13 weapons. If so don't forget they are one factor higher(except the sandcaster, it's maxed out at TL10).

Hope this helps.

 

[binky]

Okay, this is doing my head in

But I think I get the basics...

To provide 2 EPs extra, with a TL9 power plant, would mean an additional 5 tons of space (2 x 1.5 for the plant and 2 x1 for the fuel).

At TL13, 6EPs total would require only 6 tons of power plant (the same as the original TL9 plant) and an additional 2 tons of fuel capacity.

I like the second idea better. The players can then decide the armament and I can just say that the cling in the cargo bay is lower (to allow for the extra space required for fuel.

The stripped out computer they are going to have to live with

- Neil.

 

[graden1]

Alternately, it would also be possible to arm the "stock" ship with a missile rack and a sandcaster, which wouldn't require extra power. Space would have to be allocated for ordnance; one ton would be sufficient for ten missiles plus ten sand canisters, to supplement the three of each held in the turret. Lucky 13, twice over.

DGv2.0

 

[mike wightman]

Oop's, forgot about the extra fuel for option 2(I'll have to edit that in). That's partly because I sometimes use a house rule where the power plant is run at a lower rating during cruising and weapons usage during combat, training, etc. It costs you hours or days of endurance when you switch everything on though.

This comes from MT days when power plants were so thirsty you would use every possible "rules interpretation" to lower fuel tonnage. IIRC it was originally presented in optional rules for High Guard in a JotTAS article. MT went one step further by having multiple power plants(one for ship systems on all the time, one for agility, one for weapons, etc) with different fuel durations depending on how many are on.

Take the scout/courier in question. Does it need agility 2 for the full four weeks? If not, then why can't you turn the power plant down to conserve fuel? The same argument goes for weapons and screens. You could then keep the 4t fuel tank, which should last you 6 weeks of maneuver at 2G and two jumps. Enter combat and suddenly you are using fuel at three times the rate. So each day in combat(?) costs you three days endurance.

Just a thought.

 

[notagoodusername]

Or stick a second power plant with it's own fuel tank in the hold, strapped down. That gives a traditional "strapped together" PC ship feel.

Shane

 

[binky]

Originally posted by Shane Mclean:
Or stick a second power plant with it's own fuel tank in the hold, strapped down. That gives a traditional "strapped together" PC ship feel.

Shane

And you'd be happy flying in such a beast?

- Neil.

 

[vutpakdi]

Most of the standard designs don't seem to have enough power for energy weapons unless they specifically included them in the design (like the patrol cruiser). Seems rather silly to me, but that's the way that they were designed.

My own preference would be to assume that the smaller standard design ships do, in fact, have enough power for energy weapons without modification and leave it at that unless the PC's what to do something like mount a 50 dTon bay weapon in the cargo bay.

Ron