Matt (et al.)--
I spent a few minutes digging around last night and found FF&S (but not
any RC books) to confirm my recollections. FF&S is clear that you can't
install computers from a different TL or sensors or MFDs from a higher TL
than the controls. I am sympathetic to the argument that dynamic linked
controls from TL 10, 11, or 12 are interchangeable (or holographic linked
from 13, 14, 15, 16), but I followed the strict interpretation that hulls
would be shipped without installed controls (see below) to the highest TL
world where they would be installed. All controls regardless of TL have
identical mass and volume, so setting aside the space is straight-forward.
I pictured the hulls being shipped with empty cable runs (or whatever, the
stuff is probably "fly-by-wireless") and decks and equipment shimmed into
place or temporarily bolted or tack-welded to allow controls installation
at the destination. Empty "cable conduits" could have leaders in them to
enable pulling cables through at the destination. Or it could all be
little fly-by-wireless relay boxes that you just stick to the walls, or
it's a conductive jello solution that you pump through the control pipes
and then all the little nano-chips in the solution automatically align
when you say the magic words. It doesn't matter, but in a 20th century
game it's most common for players and artists to imagine tech the way
they're used to seeing it.
Similar-ish thing with HEPlaR maneuver drives. It's not just a big bell at
the back, but has internal ducting to multiple points for roll-pitch-yaw
thrusters. Since these are simply based on the power devoted to thrust
they can be installed at TL 10+ and a fusion plant of any TL can be
dropped in (subject to controls TL), but the HEPlaR can only deliver the
thrust it was built for.
Armor, on the other hand (with an exception for Coherent SD), I saw no
reason to say that TL 14 bonded SD is different from TL 15, or TL 12
Superdense from TL 13. You could have a PC who's a connoisseur and could
see that from the herringbone alignment of the atoms that slab was
obviously built with TL XX manufacturing techniques, but that's color.
> Matt--
>
> Yeah, that was the intent, and it sounds increasingly clear from your and
> other recent responses that the intent was conveyed in the materials. I
> know this would be in my working materials and would eventually have been
> published, but I'm wondering if the published designs included discussion
> or notes about, "higher tech XX is limited to YY performance by lower-tech
> ZZ supporting systems." I've got all these materials, but I never have it
> all unpacked at the same time, and I'm not in a position to create a
> full-blown TNE archaeological site at the moment.
>
> Dave
>
>> Dave
>> I got the impression from the published material that the Clippers in
>> particular were built at varying tech levels from hull structure and
>> modules to the J drives and weapons. Wasn't there a few multimission
>> ships that were built with drop in, lower tech modules as well?
>>
>> Matt
>>
>>
>> ---In , <dcndcn13@...> wrote :
>>
>> I don't know if this was clear in the published materials, but RC ships
>> were definitely intended to be built the way you describe, big hulls
>> built
>> as economically and at the lowest TLs possible, with key
>> force-multiplying
>> systems (jump drives, power plants, computers, sensors, weapons, etc.)
>> dropped in from higher TLs so the higher-tech worlds could focus their
>> labor force on manufacturing key technologies that would be used
>> elsewhere. If that wasn't clear it was probably because we had to
>> publish
>> ships that followed the "classic" approach of an entire ship being
>> manufactured at a single tech level as examples of the normal approach.
>> There were also limitations on plug-and-play, as you can't drop a TL 15
>> computer onto a TL 10 network with a TL 12 databus and expect to get
>> full
>> TL 15 performance out of it.
>>
>> But the idea of maximizing production efficiency was embedded in a
>> bunch
>> of places, the one I'm thinking of right now is in the Covenant of
>> Suffren
>> where the waterworld had a big submarine hull industry that was going
>> to
>> provide a lot of help in producing kludgy spaceships. Going down an
>> atmosphere is a lot easier than going up one atmosphere per 10 meters,
>> the
>> problem would be that off-the-shelf submarine hulls would be heavier
>> than
>> necessary, but they should have good G performance, and you could get
>> SDBs
>> or starships that look like Star Trek's SS Botany Bay.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
I spent a few minutes digging around last night and found FF&S (but not
any RC books) to confirm my recollections. FF&S is clear that you can't
install computers from a different TL or sensors or MFDs from a higher TL
than the controls. I am sympathetic to the argument that dynamic linked
controls from TL 10, 11, or 12 are interchangeable (or holographic linked
from 13, 14, 15, 16), but I followed the strict interpretation that hulls
would be shipped without installed controls (see below) to the highest TL
world where they would be installed. All controls regardless of TL have
identical mass and volume, so setting aside the space is straight-forward.
I pictured the hulls being shipped with empty cable runs (or whatever, the
stuff is probably "fly-by-wireless") and decks and equipment shimmed into
place or temporarily bolted or tack-welded to allow controls installation
at the destination. Empty "cable conduits" could have leaders in them to
enable pulling cables through at the destination. Or it could all be
little fly-by-wireless relay boxes that you just stick to the walls, or
it's a conductive jello solution that you pump through the control pipes
and then all the little nano-chips in the solution automatically align
when you say the magic words. It doesn't matter, but in a 20th century
game it's most common for players and artists to imagine tech the way
they're used to seeing it.
Similar-ish thing with HEPlaR maneuver drives. It's not just a big bell at
the back, but has internal ducting to multiple points for roll-pitch-yaw
thrusters. Since these are simply based on the power devoted to thrust
they can be installed at TL 10+ and a fusion plant of any TL can be
dropped in (subject to controls TL), but the HEPlaR can only deliver the
thrust it was built for.
Armor, on the other hand (with an exception for Coherent SD), I saw no
reason to say that TL 14 bonded SD is different from TL 15, or TL 12
Superdense from TL 13. You could have a PC who's a connoisseur and could
see that from the herringbone alignment of the atoms that slab was
obviously built with TL XX manufacturing techniques, but that's color.
> Matt--
>
> Yeah, that was the intent, and it sounds increasingly clear from your and
> other recent responses that the intent was conveyed in the materials. I
> know this would be in my working materials and would eventually have been
> published, but I'm wondering if the published designs included discussion
> or notes about, "higher tech XX is limited to YY performance by lower-tech
> ZZ supporting systems." I've got all these materials, but I never have it
> all unpacked at the same time, and I'm not in a position to create a
> full-blown TNE archaeological site at the moment.
>
> Dave
>
>> Dave
>> I got the impression from the published material that the Clippers in
>> particular were built at varying tech levels from hull structure and
>> modules to the J drives and weapons. Wasn't there a few multimission
>> ships that were built with drop in, lower tech modules as well?
>>
>> Matt
>>
>>
>> ---In , <dcndcn13@...> wrote :
>>
>> I don't know if this was clear in the published materials, but RC ships
>> were definitely intended to be built the way you describe, big hulls
>> built
>> as economically and at the lowest TLs possible, with key
>> force-multiplying
>> systems (jump drives, power plants, computers, sensors, weapons, etc.)
>> dropped in from higher TLs so the higher-tech worlds could focus their
>> labor force on manufacturing key technologies that would be used
>> elsewhere. If that wasn't clear it was probably because we had to
>> publish
>> ships that followed the "classic" approach of an entire ship being
>> manufactured at a single tech level as examples of the normal approach.
>> There were also limitations on plug-and-play, as you can't drop a TL 15
>> computer onto a TL 10 network with a TL 12 databus and expect to get
>> full
>> TL 15 performance out of it.
>>
>> But the idea of maximizing production efficiency was embedded in a
>> bunch
>> of places, the one I'm thinking of right now is in the Covenant of
>> Suffren
>> where the waterworld had a big submarine hull industry that was going
>> to
>> provide a lot of help in producing kludgy spaceships. Going down an
>> atmosphere is a lot easier than going up one atmosphere per 10 meters,
>> the
>> problem would be that off-the-shelf submarine hulls would be heavier
>> than
>> necessary, but they should have good G performance, and you could get
>> SDBs
>> or starships that look like Star Trek's SS Botany Bay.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>