I've just finished the TL16 fast courier, and I'm wondering what
to do next.
* I've been tossing Eric's idea of a latticework FTL tug around,
and one of the concepts it mutated into was a non-atmospheric,
space-only ship in the 100-ton range, but it is difficult to
justify the lack of landing capability at TL14 or TL15.
- A transport that keeps the crew section far from the engine
and power plant. Fission?
- A satellite or buoy tender, with a 'flight deck' to park
sats with large antenna arrays.
- A jury-rigged contraption of a 10-ton ship fused to three
30-ton pods, one a habitat, one a hangar, one a workshop to
keep the whole lot flying.
- Solar power for a high-TL starship? But how do you keep it
in hyperspace? Additional power cells might last for a few
hours, but then it pops out in deep space, an eternity to
recharge.
There might not be enough to get seven different TLs, but I
don't have to go the whole way. What are the memes? Crazy old
tinker/trader. Neelix? Corporate professionals?
* Then there was the idea of a FTL tug/transport that stays at
the edge of the system, or at least in very high orbit.
- Too big for atmospheric ops? A million tons? Ten million
tons? Heighliners from Dune, for the look-and-feel. But
that runs into the question how you run adventures with
a flying city.
- Too paranoid to get into a gravity well? Why? And how does
that affect the looks of the ship?
- Jump drive, not hyper, and a ship optimized to shuttle
from one jump point to the other end of the line, no need
for STL other than maneuvering thrusters.
* Trying to get the last bit of speed out of the Fast Couriers
got me thinking about the most cost-efficient ships, instead.
My tentative efficiency formula is (cargo plus people) times
hyperspeed divided by cost. If you increase speed at the
expense of cargo, the performance should become a parabola
with a clear maximum.
Those would be boring ships, however. No excuse to add a
cloaking device, or go-faster stripes, or whatever.
Any comments?
Regards,
Onno
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