Working T5 Resources into MTU (but not RU’s there are no RU’s here.)

[Hairy Jim DeGriz]

Resources : Resources are exploitable natural resources, minerals, ores, metals, energy sources, biological assets, and any other items of limited availability. - T5, Book3, p.27

• Resources = 2d6 + (if TL>8) + GG + PB = (2 – 12) + (0 – 4) + (0 – 3) = Range 2 – 19, AVG ~ 9- 10

Nobody seems to have taken the components of the T5 Economic Extension, specifically the Resource value, and discussed it outside of Resource Units. How many “Raw” Resources does a planet need to be self-sufficient, to be poor, to be rich? I’m not using the T5 RU formula in MTU, I think it needs to be tweaked. But I decided to look at the components, starting with Resources. My goal is to use the data from T5 to tweak my Striker based GWP model, because I still can’t spend RU’s at a shipyard.

Consider two worlds, Alpha with a population of 3 million and Beta a population of 2 billion, both with a Raw Resource score of 12. That’s 400 resources per 100 mm citizens on Alpha but only 0.6 resources per 100 mm citizens of Beta. (I use 100 million to keep results mostly above 1). For the sake of this discussion, I’m going to assume equal distribution of resources across the population, but we all know that only happens on Utopia and Dystopia in the Neverbeenthere Sector.

For this example, both worlds have the same TL 12, the same class Starport A. Alpha is Trade Class = Ag, Ri and has an Importance of 3 with an infrastructure of 5. Beta is Trade Class = Hi and also has an Importance of 3, with an infrastructure of 9.

What I would infer from this is that the citizens of Alpha have a higher standard of living than Beta. BUT not a larger economy. Also, Beta doesn’t / can’t utilize all of the resources that are available. Trade classification aside, 400 raw resources/per 100 mm seems not poor.

I would also infer that Beta is not self-sufficient and imports resources to for its population. I would speculate that Beta purchases resources from Alpha, and that the well-being of Alpha is in Beta’s best interest. Or perhaps Beta plans to conquer Alpha to ensure access to those delicious resources.

The question becomes when is a planet not self-sufficient in terms of Raw Resources? Does a planet need 1 Raw Resource per 100 mm? I’m using that as a placeholder for now. A planet with a population of 1 billion would be self-sufficient if Raw Resources > 9. A world with a population of 2 billion or more can’t be 100% self-sufficient, as a baseline concept. See table below.

In order to be sufficient with 1 Raw Resource per 100 mm, Beta needs 20 raw resources, and has a deficit of 8 Raw Resources. Conveniently, their political ally Alpha only uses 1 resource (actually 3/10) of the 12 Raw resources available to be self-sufficient, and gladly becomes wealthier trading their surplus resources for tasty Beta credits, luxuries and military hardware.

I’m not sure how to convert this into trade surpluses or deficits, nor do I necessarily want to do that. I’m trying to simplify things rather than complexify them. This still doesn’t get me the GWP I need to calculate a MCr based military budget, to spend on SDB’s, destroyers and frigates.

Resources Per 100 Million Population

	UWP Population​
Raw RES​	5​	6​	7​	8​	9​	10​
2​	2,000	200	20.00	2.00	0.20	0.02
5​	5,000	500	50.00	5.00	0.50	0.05
8​	8,000	800	80.00	8.00	0.80	0.08
9​	9,000	900	90.00	9.00	0.90	0.09
10​	10,000	1,000	100.00	10.00	1.00	0.10
11​	11,000	1,100	110.00	11.00	1.10	0.11
12​	12,000	1,200	120.00	12.00	1.20	0.12
15​	15,000	1,500	150.00	15.00	1.50	0.15
19​	19,000	1,900	190.00	19.00	1.90	0.19

Further thoughts

Not all resources are equal in value, so I’m assuming a mix of needed minerals, ores, biological goods, etc.

Agricultural Planets have greater access to renewable resources.

Direct investment by external parties may be needed to increase the infrastructure, and exploit resources. (Insert evil mining corporation on a population 5 world with 15 Raw Resources.)

Does Infrastructure limit the amount of Raw Resources available to world? I seem to recall something along those lines in T4: Pocket Empires. Is there an infrastructure bottleneck? Instead of using 12 Raw Resources, use the Infrastructure of 5 for Alpha and 9 for Beta. Enough resources, but not enough means to get Raw Resources to the population. Raw Resources per 100 mm on Alpha drops to 166.67 and Beta to 0.45. The problem with this concept is that you can’t solve it by importing more goods, since your own resources are already bottlenecked.

This leads into further consideration of Labor and Infrastructure. More to follow...

 

[Hairy Jim DeGriz]

For your reference, I searched Resource Units on the forum and found these useful. Feel free to add any others.

RU, Budgets, and Navies in Pocket Empires | Citizens of the Imperium (travellerrpg.com) Last Entry Jul 5, 2020

Military Economies (A snapshot of Spinward Marches) | Citizens of the Imperium (travellerrpg.com) Feb 9, 2016

Toward a T5 Pocket Empires | Citizens of the Imperium (travellerrpg.com) Apr 19, 2014

Economic Questions | Citizens of the Imperium (travellerrpg.com) Mar 14, 2014

Importance and Economic extensions | Citizens of the Imperium (travellerrpg.com) Nov 10, 2013

military budgets | Citizens of the Imperium (travellerrpg.com) Oct 11, 2009

 

[Hairy Jim DeGriz]

This system assumes that the Raw Resource value is absolute and not exponential. The assigned value of 12 resources has the same “economic value” in every system, though the types of resources may vary. We know that worlds with planetoid belts and gas giants gain additional resources, from which we can posit that the 12 resource "points" may be spread throughout the system, and not laying in a pile under an ancient red dragon. Because Raw Resources are defined and constant, it is divisible by population, providing a measure of per capita economic value.

What is Infrastructure, and what does the value express? Is it absolute, or is it relational to another value? It is relational, as it is derived from the Importance, Population, the presence of a Starport and other interstellar facilities and bases. I conclude that the Infrastructure value is relational to the world population. Infrastructure does not produce value, it is additive or subtractive to the economy in that it increases or decreases the value of the goods and resources through the efficient delivery of the economic output. How efficient is that infrastructure?

An infrastructure value of 9 is not the same on a Population 9 world as on a Population 7 world. An infrastructure of 9 provides more efficiency to the Population 7 world, than to the Population 9 world. For simplicity, an easy formula for Economic Efficiency Modifier ECOEFMO = Infrastructure / Population. A world with INF 9 / POP 9 has an ECOEFMO of 100%, whereas INF 9 / POP 7 produces and ECOEFMO of ~ 128% and INF 7 / POP 9 has an ECOEFMO of ~ 78%. I’m mulling if there should be a +/- 1 in that equation.

The goal of this exercise was to utilize the additional World data from T5 to replace the Striker GWP model.

Striker Model:

• Per Capita GWP based on TL (2,000 Cr – 22,000 Cr)
• x Trade Class Modifier 1.6 Ri, 1.4 In, 1.2 Ag, 0.8 Na, Ni, Po
  • As I understand they stack so Ag, Ri = 1.92
• x Population

Alpha Striker GWP = 12,000 x 1.6 x 1.2 = 30,720 x 3mm = 92 BCr GWP
Beta Striker GWP = 12,000 x 1 = 12,000 x 2,000,000,000 = 32 Trillion Cr GWP

My working house rule:

Replace Per Capita GWP with Resources x 1,000 x (TL/10) x (Infrastructure/Population) and retain the trade modifiers, which I will rework in another post.

From this proposed change Alpha GWP = 69 BCr and Beta GWP = 28.8 TCr or 75% and 90% of the Striker calculated GWP.

• Alpha GWP = RES 12 x TL 12/10 x INF/POP (5/6) x 1.92 Trade Mods = 69 BCr
• Beta GWP = RES 12 x TL 12/10 x INF/POP (9/9) x 1.00 Trade Mods = 28.8 TCr

A random sample of 24 worlds using this method show the remodeled GWP value between 31% and 202% of the Striker GWP with the average being 113%.

Higher values result when the Raw Resources and ECOEFMO are higher, and decline dramatically for worlds with few Raw Resourced and smaller Infrastructure.

This method provides a per capita GWP derived from T5 UWP statistics, rather than assigning the same base GWP to every world with a certain TL. And it can be easily calculated.

Now that I have an improved replacement calculation for GWP, next up is “Military Budgets, your TCS Navy is Too Damn Big.
Farther down - something on Foreign Exchange rates, now that I can estimate a world's GWP.

*The Random Sample is 24 worlds in the Glimmerdrift Reaches Sector that are Non-Aligned:Human, with a Population > 5, TL > 5 and a Population Modifier of 2,4 or 6. More testing to be done.

 

[Timerover51]

What I would recommend is that you spend some time looking at actual countries in the CIA World Fact Book to get an idea as to what resource levels are reasonable and what military size compared to to available resources is reasonable.

The World Factbook - The World Factbook

www.cia.gov

 

[Hairy Jim DeGriz]

What I would recommend is that you spend some time looking at actual countries in the CIA World Fact Book to get an idea as to what resource levels are reasonable and what military size compared to to available resources is reasonable.

The World Factbook - The World Factbook

www.cia.gov

Thanks TR51, my research is mostly done, because I've been trying to solve this equation off and on since 1980 something. (When was Striker published?) I may be new here, but I'm a long time Traveller. For this equation resolution I'm running with the NATO Annual Report, showing comparative military expenditures and strengths since 2013, as my primary source.

I remember checking out dead tree copies of the CIA Factbook from my local library. Very good production quality, and still a great data set, thank you for a fresh link. The TCS Navy is Too DAMN Big.

 

[Krikkitone]

An important idea is the “resource trap”. If trade is available, infrastructure+population (ie economic development) is going to be much more important than raw resources, which can be imported.

 

[Spinward Flow]

An important idea is the “resource trap”. If trade is available, infrastructure+population (ie economic development) is going to be much more important than raw resources, which can be imported.

Well, until you erect trade barriers against imports and exports that strangle your trading capacity at the behest of nativists who do not understand how trade works (and refuse to understand it if it means they won't get what they want at everyone else's expense) ...

 

[Timerover51]

Well, until you erect trade barriers against imports and exports that strangle your trading capacity at the behest of nativists who do not understand how trade works (and refuse to understand it if it means they won't get what they want at everyone else's expense) ...

There are perfectly valid reasons for a planet to have trade restrictions if they wish. Keeping the planet population employed is one. Avoiding an unfavorable balance of payments is another. Avoiding the costs of importing materials is another, as trade in Traveller is not cheap. It is the Real World equivalent of air freight verses ocean shipping. Blasting a planet as "nativist" for wanting their own industries is more than a bit insulting.

 

[whartung]

How much cheaper is domestic shipping over interstellar shipping?

I think that aircraft will be a novelty, replaced by G-carriers or space/starships. No reason a Free Trader can't move freight from China to New York. Take out the jump drive and jump fuel, and that's a lot of utility.

With ubiquitous fusion energy, ocean going vessels will be pretty cheap to operate, albeit slow going. But are they dramatically cheaper than a spaceship? Given that the spaceship can do the trip in hours instead of days or weeks? Can fly inland and ignore coastal ports?

Now once we get in to spaceship territory, we're simply talking the fuel costs of jump and the amortized, deprecated cost of the jump drive and crew. The one week transit is more than workable. We do that today.

I don't think the hull of a starship is dramatically more expensive than the hull of an ocean going ship.

I think it would be straightforward for space/starships to dominate all shipping, local, in system, and interstellar.

With one week of travel, a syste, 2-3 parsecs away can be as cheap to import from as Chile where we get our strawberries.

 

[Spinward Flow]

There are perfectly valid reasons for a planet to have trade restrictions if they wish.

There are valid reasons ... and there are cut off nose to spite face reasons (or worse, vulture/disaster capitalist reasons).
Both employ the same knock on effects, albeit for different reasons and motivations.

Trade restrictions are not a one size fits all type of solution, and it's always possible that actions taken with the best of intentions can produce the worst of outcomes. Just because the motivation is "virtuous" doesn't mean the results will ipso facto necessarily be virtuous too as a result.

Trade barriers are one of those double edged sword kinds of things.
Best to handle with care and know what you're doing (and why).

 

[Condottiere]

The planet "Old North Australia", or simply "Norstrilia", is the only planet in the Instrumentality of Mankind fictional universe which produces the precious immortality drug "stroon", which indefinitely delays aging in humans. Stroon (or the "Santaclara drug") is harvested from the huge diseased sheep the Norstrilians raise, and has resisted all attempts at artificial synthesis. Since the Norstrilians have a monopoly, stroon sells for astronomical prices, and Norstrilia is fabulously wealthy (wealthier than any other single planet). To safeguard their archaic way of life (resembling Australian ranchers with a British cultural inheritance), the Norstrilians are forced to develop the most advanced defense force and weaponry known (for example, Mother Hitton's Littul Kittons); to protect their culture, imports from other worlds are taxed at rates exceeding 20 million percent, reducing what would be a staggering fortune on another planet to humble penury on Norstrilia itself. They are also forced to cull their young in order to prevent overpopulation (only those who pass the test of the "Garden of Death" are allowed to enter adulthood).

 

[aramis]

There are perfectly valid reasons for a planet to have trade restrictions if they wish. Keeping the planet population employed is one. Avoiding an unfavorable balance of payments is another. Avoiding the costs of importing materials is another, as trade in Traveller is not cheap. It is the Real World equivalent of air freight verses ocean shipping. Blasting a planet as "nativist" for wanting their own industries is more than a bit insulting.

Freight really isn't bad... Cr1 (about $5) per kilo if you assume a cargo ton is (as on rails) mass; if you instead use the TTNE/T4 mass limit of 10 Mg per Td, it's Cr0.1 (about $0.50) per kilo.
USPS parcel select domestic runs $3.75 to $9.75 for a 1 l box massing 1 kg. (There are a variety of options I'm too lazy to puzzle out...)

So, if one assumes 1 Tc = 1000 kg, it's comparable to US mail. If one assumes it's a dual unit as in TTNE, at 1Tc = higher of kl/14 or 10,000 kg, it's comparable to semi-truck.

 

[whartung]

So, if one assumes 1 Tc = 1000 kg, it's comparable to US mail. If one assumes it's a dual unit as in TTNE, at 1Tc = higher of kl/14 or 10,000 kg, it's comparable to semi-truck.

So the question then becomes, what are the motivations to keep manufacturing and production "local"?

We're going through a bit of an exodus right now with the pandemic and remote work to the point that some folks are leaving the cities since they were only there "for the work". Now, it's not quite as necessary (I can't speak to the long term effects of this).

With markets being a week away, for many durable goods, thats more than responsive enough for many purposes as long as you have local labor and expertise. You don't want to wait 2 weeks to have a machine fixed by sending a message out to another system to find an expert and bring them back, so local knowledge and skill is quite valuable. But material and even finished goods, can readily be imported. Important, durable goods (i.e. machine parts) can be warehoused and stockpiled.

A week is a bit long for fresh food, but for frozen it's not a problem at all.

I needed to have my car fixed this week, and I just had a striking awareness thinking about car parts. First, it goes back to when my Dad took his car to Sears for, I dunno, tires, or something. But in the end, he also needed a starter. Not only did he need the starter but what blew my mind as a young teenager, they actually HAD the starter in stock. All of these different cars on the market, and they had a starter for HIS car. Amazing!

(In hindsight, he had a GM car with the 350 V8 - a very popular motor, so not that surprising in the USA.)

But I know I needed an exotic piece for my repair. There are thousands of parts in modern cars. The idea that there's a building (or buildings) out there filled to the rafters with enough "Jeep Kits" to replace all of the unique parts on a car. The idea that this complicated vehicle is a composition of assemblies sitting out there on a shelf somewhere. From the motor to the transmission, from seat warmers to the power windows buttons. It's a staggering thing to comprehend for something that we pretty much just take for granted.

Of course, today, I don't think dealerships necessarily stock a lot of parts. Rather there's a central warehouse to serve a region from which they can order a part and either get same day or overnight delivery. When my mothers German car lost its clutch in Bishop CA, at 2am, it was 3 weeks before we got it back. I don't know if the parts came from a US warehouse or direct from Germany, but we didn't have FedEx back then.

But today we have the infrastructure that a large centralized warehouse works efficiently enough compared to have local dealerships stocking a large assortment of parts. I think even the parts stores work similarly. And nowadays, that warehouse can be located in Indiana or Virginia or anywhere else in the continental US, and be delivered the next day.

So, on the one hand, with ubiquitous, cheap, safe starship travel, off world production is viable and efficient. But it still an interesting question about what would keep a producer local to a world vs going off world someplace else. Here, most of the motivation is labor.

 

[Spinward Flow]

With respect to cars ... specifically ICE cars ... there was a time when the old OEMs did most of the work themselves in terms of manufacturing. But then came the Japanese imports and a different model of manufacturing pioneered by Toyota with lean manufacturing and Just In Time supply chain sourcing and the whole structure of the business model shifted. All kinds of parts manufacturing got outsourced into the (at the time) NEW global supply chains and the core competencies of the old car OEMs essentially devolved down into expertise in final assembly of the vehicles and production of the ICE power plants, with the manufacture of almost everything else that goes into the cars being outsourced to auto parts suppliers.

And then computer control of parts and processes started getting in on the action, so even engines aren't mechanically controlled but instead computer controlled ... and the old OEMs were basically integrating "other people's stuff" into their car designs. It's why you can't just seamlessly integrate new parts nicked from other places and purposes readily and easily into cars that were designed and built in the last 10 years or so, because the computer controls for all the disparate systems don't "talk" to each other same way.

The old OEMs (Ford, GM, etc.) aren't really directly manufacturing that much stuff anymore that goes into their vehicles. Most of the parts in their vehicles are outsourced to other manufacturers to fabricate (the auto parts supply chain) and shipped into the OEM factories where they get assembled using the Toyota model of the production line with Just In Time supply to cut down on warehousing and inventory costs.

Case in point ... GM doesn't manufacture oil filters or lead acid batteries for their cars. Some other manufacturer makes those parts and GM just assembles those components into the cars that GM rolls off their lines. Same deal with a lot of other parts and components. Most of a GM or Ford's (or any ICE car, really) is assembled using components made by someone else ... and those manufacturers discovered that if specific parts were "too common" between brands and models that those cars became targets for thieves to deliver to chop shops. So all of the OEMs needed to "diversify the parts" that go into their vehicles so they didn't have "too much commonality" with other brands and models to reduce the opportunities for vulture capitalism in less than legal markets.

All of which conspired to mean that it became impractical to stock ALL of the parts for ALL models of cars across a dozen OEMs instead of just three of them.



And then Tesla walked in, flipped the table through the roof, started doing what no one else did (which is ACTUALLY MANUFACTURING most of the components that go into their vehicles) by bringing back vertical integration of the business rather than lateral outsourcing of everything (Tesla writes their own software for their own operating system in their cars!) ... and ditching the traditional Assembly Line process for the radically new Production Cell method that allows the company to be Agile with their manufacturing and evolve their products towards improvements in build and quality faster than anyone else in the industry by virtue of scaling what WORKS.

In other words, Tesla is "doing it all wrong" according to the Rules Of The Game™ that have become ossified over the last century with respect to How To Be A Car Company ... which wound up being a case of outsourcing everything you could and just assembling other manufacturer's supplies of parts into your vehicles.



So I'm kind of not surprised that the "auto shop can have everything in stock" of yesteryear is a seeming impossibility in the modern day ... thanks to global supply chains courtesy of containerization and mass transport of goods (and services) around the world that simply weren't possible 40+ years ago (in a world where only local suppliers could compete in local markets).

 

[Condottiere]

Manufacturing is likely to trend in two directions, modularization and automation.

I think I became aware of modularization when you have to replace the entire lamp section of a car if something goes wrong.

And automation, when it's cheaper to get a robot to do the job.

 

[aramis]

So the question then becomes, what are the motivations to keep manufacturing and production "local"?

Time and responsiveness.

Modern system (post 1950):
A needs widgets. They call (or visit the website of) B. They ask if they can get the 50 they need. If they can, they order, and get to determine shipping type and thus price, within certain parameters. Probably have it in 2 weeks.

Traveller:
A needs widgets. They send X-mail inquiries to neighboring systems.
B gets inquiry a week later. We'll assume on route so daily X-mails. Response leaves on day 8.
B Response arrives day 15, delivered day 16. "We only have 50"
A responds on 17, B gets it on 25. B has to put together the shipping package - a day for that (26th).
27th, freight notice posted on the port BBS. several days later (IMTU usually 1d6), someone picks up the job; worst case, 33rd day.
Ship won't leave for 4 days after, so 37th day it jumps.
44th day, it arrives in system. 45th the shipping captain calls the office of A. "Get it within 4 days"
46th to 49th day, widgets arrive.

Now, steady demand items? Assuming your demand is stable, you can arrange for a steady shipment rate. But when company C comes in and undercuts your price... you're still on the hook for at least the shipments in process.... up to 3 before your stop order gets processed.

We're going through a bit of an exodus right now with the pandemic and remote work to the point that some folks are leaving the cities since they were only there "for the work". Now, it's not quite as necessary (I can't speak to the long term effects of this).

With markets being a week away, for many durable goods, thats more than responsive enough for many purposes as long as you have local labor and expertise. You don't want to wait 2 weeks to have a machine fixed by sending a message out to another system to find an expert and bring them back, so local knowledge and skill is quite valuable. But material and even finished goods, can readily be imported. Important, durable goods (i.e. machine parts) can be warehoused and stockpiled.

A week is a bit long for fresh food, but for frozen it's not a problem at all.

A week info travel time isn't one week away. It's 2. Order + shipment.
Having looked at the ship's logs in the national archives, pre telegram, most of the pre-telegram shipping was carrying company owned speculation - goods not owned by anyone at the receiving end prior to arrival.

So, on the one hand, with ubiquitous, cheap, safe starship travel, off world production is viable and efficient. But it still an interesting question about what would keep a producer local to a world vs going off world someplace else. Here, most of the motivation is labor.

The minimum 2 week response before you know whether or not your order was fillable is very different from modern telegraph/telephone/internet demand ordering.

I ordered by mail only a few times - from Lou Zocchi/Gamescience, and from Better Games. For GS, Took my 1st class letter two weeks to get there. Took 8 weeks to get goods back, counting the 2 days between receipt and postmark. (Lou noted date order arrived on the manifest.) I got half of what I ordered. The other was out of stock. He did send me the other one, and a partial refund. (Company out of business for the other one.) But I didn't know for 10 weeks. I could have called, but didn't. I bought 4 games from Zocchi... King's Bounty, Triplanetary, Musketeers, and Alien Space; I also ordered Nexus Magazine issue 4... but he had run out.
Better Games, took 3 weeks round trip... but I emailed for availability, and they were ready to ship the day my check arrived.

 

[Timerover51]

Freight really isn't bad... Cr1 (about $5) per kilo if you assume a cargo ton is (as on rails) mass; if you instead use the TTNE/T4 mass limit of 10 Mg per Td, it's Cr0.1 (about $0.50) per kilo.
USPS parcel select domestic runs $3.75 to $9.75 for a 1 l box massing 1 kg. (There are a variety of options I'm too lazy to puzzle out...)

So, if one assumes 1 Tc = 1000 kg, it's comparable to US mail. If one assumes it's a dual unit as in TTNE, at 1Tc = higher of kl/14 or 10,000 kg, it's comparable to semi-truck.

It would be helpful if you would not use jargon or acronyms to reply to someone. I sort of figured out what you said, but a new person to the forum is likely to be a bit lost.

 

[aramis]

It would be helpful if you would not use jargon or acronyms to reply to someone. I sort of figured out what you said, but a new person to the forum is likely to be a bit lost.

Don't hold your breath on that.

 

[Grav_Moped]

Don't hold your breath on that.

NHMBoT .

 

[aramis]

NHMBoT .

Touché, Monsieur.