The Star Liners produce some amazing speeds, but no interesting
vehicles. So I thought about something Mike mentioned, Stargate
SG-1, and my reply re the lack of vehicles in the series. What
is the difference between a vehicle transported through a gate
and one carried by a starship?
* I'm usually assuming that the vehicles carried on a starship
have the same TL as the ship. Entire starships as higher-TL
artifacts are possible, but by and large the people who run
the ships can also build them, and they will build vehicles
at their best TL.
By comparison, the stargate network is an ancient artefact.
(It doesn't have to be, compare Peter F. Hamilton.) The gate
explorers could have TL7 or TL8 vehicles on strange worlds.
Or conversely, at a lower TL as needed for the mission, particularly if
the venture is a "routine" mission...*
* That said, I'm re-reading GURPS Uplift, and it springs to mind a
particular civilization might purchase/lease a Higher-tech device,
probe, fighter, or even whole sub-ships.
* Somewhat similar things happen in Traveller, with tainted or
airless low-tech worlds. TL10 traders carry people to those
worlds, and they maintain lower-TL settlements there.
The old "Set up jump point, drop a
* A starship sets out with a complement of ground vehicles. It
might not know in advance what planets it will visit, or it
could go with the same complement to different worlds.
Gate vehicles can be more specialized -- you send a probe
to check the environment, then you call the right kind of
vehicles from central storage.
Calling Thunderbird 2!
( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbird_2 )
Although the gate dimensions are reminding me more of Traveller's
Modular Cutters, with a cylindrical payload module held in a
standardized "truck"...
* The gate in SG-1 is not rated for mass or volume, just for
diameter. (The Gate on VXi16 is the same.) Vehicles would
be optimized to fit through the gate, not for low mass.
Long vehicles, and vehicles with swing wings...
* Hamilton suggested trains for an established gate network.
The VXi16 gate is a minimum of $50 billion, so it needs to
be used efficiently. (About five times the cost of the
channel tunnel.)
It depends on the relative ease of making gates (Babylon 5 universe
background mentioned that a typical solar system had enough material for
one or two of its hypergates...).
--
Eric Funk
Knowledge Brings Fear -- Motto of Mars University, Futurama
_______________________________________________
GurpsNet-L mailing list <[email protected]>
http://mail.sjgames.com/mailman/listinfo/gurpsnet-l
