The more they over think the plumbing.....

[san*klass]

Taking the rule (from TTB) that planetary TL relates to the products of that world, I am wondering how this relates to ship construction and repair.

I am assuming that (for example) a TLA world with a class A starport, and so a starshipyard, would only be able to build vessels with up to TLA components? But, also, that repairs (at this starport) can only be conducted on ships with up to TLA components? After all, I cannot imagine trying to replace a 747 jet engine with a DC3 prop engine!

I guess it further explains and supports the small ship – lower TL campaign model? Because an A-Drives, M1 Comp, TL9 “Tramp” Free Trader can get repaired almost anywhere, while it’s shiny, big, higher TL cousin may not be so fortunate.

I imagine a counter argument that, as a default, all class A, B & C shipyards are stocked and supplied with Average Imperium TL components and engineers. However, these would need to be shipped in from off world and so would presumably carry a surcharge to account for this additional cost?

Since very few PC’s will be flying around in shiny 2,000 dt liners, I guess this is more background “fluff” than a vital rules interpretation. But I guess it could lead to a few scenario hooks, if a big, high TL liner gets itself stranded at a low TL Starport, and the PC’s get the offer to go help – take a TLD drive and a handful of engineers maybe? Or the stranded liner needs to wait for the repairs (as above) but the shipping line want to get the passengers on their way, and so hire the local “Tramp” traders to pick up the slack. And the lucky (?) PC’s get an arrogant noble and his demanding entourage who need to get on their way quickly – Yes VERY quickly!!! - and can’t understand why they are being fed commoners food and not the delicacies that they paid for!! And, just maybe, this Noble is the target of a kidnapping or assassination (maybe the assassin/kidnapper sabotaged the liner in the first place?) and now the PC’s are in the cross hairs?

 

[robject]

It also could be reasonable to assume that "off the shelf", swappable components can be stocked in Imperial starports. So ships built from standard plans can typically be repaired at any Class A starport.

Unless the referee needs to impose an event, of course.

 

[kilemall]

My standard breakdown, IMTU or otherwise, is that the LBB2 based drives and ships are all ISO-standardized plugin backwards compatible components that will work across TLs, that a polity that has a TL ceiling would be limited by the TL drive matrix but otherwise the parts are available at an A or B starport for repair.

HG ships are highly customized one-off ships and require their TL, maybe one over, to service their ships.

So they are VERY specifically tailored to military basing, profitable routes and support starports, etc. and might be scrapped or placed in ordinary ahead of their worn out date because the supporting finances, tech or other circumstances make them unsupportable.

This would make the ACS LBB2 ships an enduring value, but also makes them a far more profitable item for pirates to capture since the ship can be parted out and drives sold on the black market. A captured HG ship might be too much trouble to be as profitable to monetize.

 

[ffilz]

Then there's still the issue of a TL 5-8 world with a Class A starport. (or TL 3 or TL 1 for B and C respectively).

 

[atpollard]

Then there's still the issue of a TL 5-8 world with a Class A starport. (or TL 3 or TL 1 for B and C respectively).

Personally, I never had a problem with that.
We have air bases on Pacific Islands and some very primitive parts of the world.

A starport on a world that will not support the TL becomes a small island of TL 9+ on a remote backwater.

[Confession: I never felt drawn to the OTU canonista wars, so I would also have no problem changing a UWP digit if it suited me.]

 

[mike wightman]

Starports A/B have to have an extensive stock of spare parts all the way up to TL15 in order to carry out the annual maintenance of any civilian ship that come calling for such a service.
Implications:
lots of TL15 stuff is available in starports that isn't available outside the starport (or if you want to go with T5 the starport has TL15 makers regardless of local TL).

 

[BillDowns]

Ah, the old Starport/World TL mis-match.

I always thought the Starport rules in CT were not well thought out. My house-rules:

1. Starport TL has nothing to do with the World's TL; anything that cannot be built locally is imported;
2. Starports Type A & B are at the highest (maybe 2 or 3 highest) TL in your setting. Having a Type "A" Starport be TL9 in the Imperium breaks belief for me.
3. Starports Type C & D can range from the highest down to 9 but never lower than that;
4. Starports E and lower are never above 8
5. Starports A to D all have refined fuel; refining and liquifying hydrogen has been around since the 1920's if not earlier and it is plain stupid - IMO - to think a Starport cannot support that technology.

That's my thinking, anyway.

 

[BillDowns]

Didn't get to finish my post - had to reboot my laptop.

Further house-rules:

1. All Type A Starports are highports but there is always at least 1 C or D downport associated; depending on the Pop and TL of the world, there may be several of each;
2. Type B starports are 50-50 between highports and downports;
3. Type C are 33-67 Highports/downports;
4. Type D are all downports as is anything lower.

 

[kilemall]

Bill, so how does a TL9 starship ever get built? Stuck on planet?

Of course, the issue is world gen. Determine TL and pop, THEN use those mods to drive starport level rolls.

 

[BlackBat242]

Here is an example of a class C starport replacing the jump drives on a TL-12 liner (converted to Sol III in 2016AD):

http://ironmaiden.com/news/article/ed-force-one-damaged
http://ironmaiden.com/news/article/ed-force-one-repaired

 

[BillDowns]

Bill, so how does a TL9 starship ever get built? Stuck on planet?

Of course, the issue is world gen. Determine TL and pop, THEN use those mods to drive starport level rolls.

You sort of answered yourself

The customer can always request a specific TL for his ship. Presumably decision that would be based on where he/she expects to ply their trade. It should be trivial for a yard to "build down Tech Level", to coin a phrase.

 

[kilemall]

You sort of answered yourself

The customer can always request a specific TL for his ship. Presumably decision that would be based on where he/she expects to ply their trade. It should be trivial for a yard to "build down Tech Level", to coin a phrase.

Don't see how I did, as a starport A is required for jump-capable shipbuilding and you specced the incompatibility of TL 9 and an A starport.

As to TL-1, I'd like to see you go to a modern day shipyard and order a triple expansion reciprocating steam plant.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marine_steam_engine

Good luck. They can get plans well enough, but there won't be any kind of experienced crew with it, at best historical preservation specialists with knowledge on parts replacement and maintenance, not manufacture.

The sort of thing they would do to rebuild a pioneering ship for the 4000 year anniversary of the first Terran jump, not a standard build.

Another example- build me a 1990s 486 DX PC.

It could be done, but would require ace-level scavenging and period software installation.

I don't think the original mainframe type I learned on could be made operational, virtually or otherwise, too much has been discarded on the software side even if you could somehow cobble together a machine, and new manufacturing would likely be impossible (a lot of precious metals went into those things for example).

You would likely just hand me a tablet computer with an emulator at best.

 

[flykiller]

It should be trivial for a yard to "build down Tech Level", to coin a phrase.

actually, it's not. try building a vacuum tube computer today. in general, industry orients not towards capabilities but towards profits. industrial machinery that builds products that don't sell is sold for scrap and industrial personnel that build products that don't sell scatter looking for other work.

heh. told a local car dealer that I didn't like the new ford focus and that I wanted another 2002 ford focus. he shrugged his shoulders. they're gone.

 

[atpollard]

Actually, those are half truths.
For a long time we had a plotter that had a bulb that was discontinued a LONG time ago and there was a company in China that specialized in manufacturing old technology parts for people like us and companies in India that were still using that technology. If you wanted a vacuum tube computer, I suspect the parts are still manufactured some where. That could very well be why that low TL industrial world has a Class A starport ... it imports out of date tech, and builds parts and ships using old Technology for niche markets. TL 5 Industrial World provides lots of cheap labor for all that hand fitting needed to make it work (and a good exchange rate on wages).

 

[whartung]

Bill, so how does a TL9 starship ever get built? Stuck on planet?

Why does anything but the highest TL ship ever get built.

 

[whartung]

Actually, those are half truths.
For a long time we had a plotter that had a bulb that was discontinued a LONG time ago and there was a company in China that specialized in manufacturing old technology parts for people like us and companies in India that were still using that technology. If you wanted a vacuum tube computer, I suspect the parts are still manufactured some where. That could very well be why that low TL industrial world has a Class A starport ... it imports out of date tech, and builds parts and ships using old Technology for niche markets. TL 5 Industrial World provides lots of cheap labor for all that hand fitting needed to make it work (and a good exchange rate on wages).

That's a maintenance issue, not a manufacturing one. Spending more money for a lower spec part for a new build, in general, doesn't make much sense. The stories of ancient, creaky hardware being maintained for all sorts of reasons are legion.

There's always edge cases, but for the general market, it's cheaper/faster/better.

Not speaking of computers, here is an interesting anecdote:

In the space is takes to put a transistor on the original silicon of the 6502 microprocessor (used in Apples and C-64's among many others), you can put an entire ARM M0 Cortex processor. The original 6502 had ~3500 transistors. Now imagine that space with 3500 CPU cores instead. Just, wow.

That said folks still build things with 6502s, today, in new production, but they're just synthetic cores built in to other chips - not 40 PIN DIP packages like the Olden Days.

Anyway, back to Starships…

 

[kilemall]

Why does anything but the highest TL ship ever get built.

Well for war a second best ship means likely losing and having a loss of both ship and the assets/people it is intended to protect.

Commercially, in most TUs it would be because there is no exchange rate difference between most planets re: currency valuation or pricing, and so it is more advantageous to have the higher TL systems rather then say have a Type A that costs 15 MCr instead of 30 MCr because it's TL9.

Even a 10-20% price differential would be worth it and make a lot of Type A owners rich, assuming one qualifies for the same standard rates for freight and passengers.

 

[Condottiere]

I think in Europe there's only one company in either Poland or the Czech Republic that still has the machines to manufacture vinyl records, and current fashion for retrotech has them running at full capacity, probably with a waiting list.

So if you want something that's not really viable to be manufactured at the local tech base, you'll likely can import it, though marked up plus shipping costs.

Or find it at a scrap yard, storehouse or in an enthusiast's collection.

 

[flykiller]

So if you want something that's not really viable to be manufactured at the local tech base, you'll likely can import it, though marked up plus shipping costs. Or find it at a scrap yard, storehouse or in an enthusiast's collection.

at that point the issue is well beyond being trivial.

 

[Whipsnade]

actually, it's not. try building a vacuum tube computer today.

True, but I don't think that's what is happening when a TL F yard builds a "TL 9" starship.

They're not building a TL 9 ship with only TL 9 tools, techniques, and theories. Instead, they're using TL F tools, techniques, and theories to build a ship which can then be maintained and repaired with only TL 9 tools and techniques.

It's the techniques and theories part of tech levels concept which always trips people up in questions like this. They forget that a TL 9 world in the Imperium already knows what can be achieved at TL A, B, C, and so forth. Their knowledge isn't somehow magically capped at TL 9 with everything beyond that a complete mystery. More importantly, thanks to what is known at TL F they can do more with TL 9 tools and techniques then someone with only TL 9 knowledge can do.

I've always used two examples to get this idea across; crystal radio sets and pot-in-pot "refrigerators".

You can build a crystal radio set as soon as you make wire, roughly TL 1. Of course we didn't discover radio until TL 4 or 5. We needed the knowledge and theories at TL 4 or 5 before radio could be developed. However, once we had that knowledge and those theories we could use TL 1 tools and techniques to build radio receivers, an allegedly TL 4 or 5 technology.

Similarly, pot-in-pot, convection/evaporation, refrigerators can be built with TL 0 tools and techniques. While there might be some evidence in murals that the ancient Near East may have used the technique, the idea seems to have been lost. Our modern version dates from the late 20th Century and required an understanding of thermodynamics, a TL 4 theory. (The modern version's pot sizes and shapes are calculated to produce as much cooling from convection/evaporation as practical.) Again, we've a TL 0 device which required a theory from TL 4 before it could be built.

So, our TL F yard isn't manufacturing the TL 9 version of vacuum tubes and what not for that TL 9 starship. Instead, it's applying TL F knowledge and theories through a TL 9 tools and techniques "lens" of sorts.

Instead of someone whose knowledge is capped at TL 9 saying "This is the only way we know how to build a gravitics generator...", we have someone with knowledge of TL F saying "Knowing what we know now, we can build a gravitics generator at TL 9 by doing this...".

I've used the label "retro-tech" to describe this observation for years now. It's a rather poor phrase, but I've never been able to come up with a better one.