I'd think that the build time to make weapons would be prohibitive, it'd probably just be a whole heck of a lot easier and more profitable to land with a cargo hold full of AKM's. A ship board printer would be most useful for one off weapons and replacement parts.
IE - The crew of Lady Luck lands on Gresham where they intend to sell a cargo hold full of gear including a few crates of weapons, while they're dirtside on of the characters finds out that the local lord has a soft spot for antique revolvers. A quick search of the database aboard the ship reveals a variety of images of a .44 caliber smith and wesson double action and the crew decides to use the images to make plans and bases the internal workings on a modern snub revolver. The crew makes some rolls for the GM and successfully fabricates a very nice knock off of a classic weapon which they in turn present to the suitably impressed local lord.
When they get ready to leave the ships engineer notices that the primary buffer panel has fallen off during re-entry given that the nearest starport likely to have a spare buffer panel is 4 jumps away so she decides to fabricate a replacement until they get back to somewhere civilized. Needless to say the Captain pays no attention to his engineers warnings that this is a temporary fix and 9 months later the Lady Luck is still flying about with a temporary spare.
Derek Stanley
Sent from my iPad
> On Feb 12, 2014, at 5:20 PM, Todd Kes <> wrote:
>
> I'd wonder about the relative TL difference between the Traveller crew, and the local planet. If the Traveller crew can make advanced weaponry, while the locals only have shotguns and carbines, thy might make some money providing advanced weapons.
>
> Though the smart thing to do would be using their computers and predictive algorithms to play the local stock market. Once they have control over certain businesses (that they know will take off with the next wave of tech advancement), they bring another item, and keep making money.
>
> This stock market fun could wind up making the players more money than running cargo, and since they only need to stay on one planet, they can get more done.
>
> The local powers will frown on your actions though, as your crew is trying to replace the current elite, and they will do their best to make sure the PCs don't cause problems. This can be by marrying them off, or putting them down. If marrying them off, expect lots of social complications. If wanting them dead, expect lots of well-trained and smart opponents to make the players take a hint.
>
> Todd Kes
>
>
>
> On Wednesday, February 12, 2014 10:48 AM, Tim O'Reilly <> wrote:
>
>
> that's also a point but since traveler is such a hand-wavium anyways let's "assume" (a truly dangerous word) and say that this has become practice, and that such code is hard to find - not impossible, but truly difficult. And to remove it without destroying the program would require some high powered computer skills - available for a price I'm sure discounts available to the "connected," etc., etc.
> OTOH going back to the 3d printer, such a fabrication module or "fabber" / exists in 1a. real life machine shops with differing capabilities whether in a town or on a ship. Repair ships have better, and more extensive capabilities than the run of the mill vessel.
>
> 1b. Some shops are more geared for one product line than another, and to switch requires more extensive re-tooling - the 3d printer tech only advances this to a degree the size limitation being the primary restriction for them.
>
> 2. the use of fabbers also exist in the realm of SF and what we see now, may become common in such a future - Star Trek food production and its mishaps being one area of several with wide possibilities.
> regards
>
>
>
> On Wednesday, February 12, 2014 6:12 AM, Mario Butter <> wrote:
>
> If this "shutdown date" is not documented and agreed to by the customer, I would consider this unethical and borderline fraudulent. It's nothing short of extortion. As a software engineer, I would never put code like this into a client's software, and I would let the powers that be know about any that I find (I have - and removed them; other companies have been sued because of these).
>
> --
> Mario
>
> http://mario.silent-tower.org/
>
>
> On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 6:27 AM, Ian Wilson <> wrote:
>
> Hi,
> The real issue in all this maybe cost, and to a degree copyright.
> The Traveller universe works differently in regard to its commercial relationships with individual planets. The Imperium strives to make no world truly independent and self sustaining.
> So would it be commercially viable for a starship crew to 3D print or cnc cut their own firearms, against a world of 3 billion who make nothing but shotguns and carbines.
> A slobbering tale to add with reference to computer boards etc. I work in telecoms, a company I work along side brought several telephone exchanges via another company. With the supplier they had a maintence package (all normal industry stuff). To save some money they decided to unofficially drop the support package. Unknown to the the supplier had fitted a date code into its software, which when the maintence was performed was reset. Predictably the date expired at 4pm on a Friday afternoon, all the exchanges shut down, much to the duty on calls misery.
> The point being when being pursued by star destroyers, the last thing you need is copyright issues with your jump drive :-) due to dodgy parts.
> Ian
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
IE - The crew of Lady Luck lands on Gresham where they intend to sell a cargo hold full of gear including a few crates of weapons, while they're dirtside on of the characters finds out that the local lord has a soft spot for antique revolvers. A quick search of the database aboard the ship reveals a variety of images of a .44 caliber smith and wesson double action and the crew decides to use the images to make plans and bases the internal workings on a modern snub revolver. The crew makes some rolls for the GM and successfully fabricates a very nice knock off of a classic weapon which they in turn present to the suitably impressed local lord.
When they get ready to leave the ships engineer notices that the primary buffer panel has fallen off during re-entry given that the nearest starport likely to have a spare buffer panel is 4 jumps away so she decides to fabricate a replacement until they get back to somewhere civilized. Needless to say the Captain pays no attention to his engineers warnings that this is a temporary fix and 9 months later the Lady Luck is still flying about with a temporary spare.
Derek Stanley
Sent from my iPad
> On Feb 12, 2014, at 5:20 PM, Todd Kes <> wrote:
>
> I'd wonder about the relative TL difference between the Traveller crew, and the local planet. If the Traveller crew can make advanced weaponry, while the locals only have shotguns and carbines, thy might make some money providing advanced weapons.
>
> Though the smart thing to do would be using their computers and predictive algorithms to play the local stock market. Once they have control over certain businesses (that they know will take off with the next wave of tech advancement), they bring another item, and keep making money.
>
> This stock market fun could wind up making the players more money than running cargo, and since they only need to stay on one planet, they can get more done.
>
> The local powers will frown on your actions though, as your crew is trying to replace the current elite, and they will do their best to make sure the PCs don't cause problems. This can be by marrying them off, or putting them down. If marrying them off, expect lots of social complications. If wanting them dead, expect lots of well-trained and smart opponents to make the players take a hint.
>
> Todd Kes
>
>
>
> On Wednesday, February 12, 2014 10:48 AM, Tim O'Reilly <> wrote:
>
>
> that's also a point but since traveler is such a hand-wavium anyways let's "assume" (a truly dangerous word) and say that this has become practice, and that such code is hard to find - not impossible, but truly difficult. And to remove it without destroying the program would require some high powered computer skills - available for a price I'm sure discounts available to the "connected," etc., etc.
> OTOH going back to the 3d printer, such a fabrication module or "fabber" / exists in 1a. real life machine shops with differing capabilities whether in a town or on a ship. Repair ships have better, and more extensive capabilities than the run of the mill vessel.
>
> 1b. Some shops are more geared for one product line than another, and to switch requires more extensive re-tooling - the 3d printer tech only advances this to a degree the size limitation being the primary restriction for them.
>
> 2. the use of fabbers also exist in the realm of SF and what we see now, may become common in such a future - Star Trek food production and its mishaps being one area of several with wide possibilities.
> regards
>
>
>
> On Wednesday, February 12, 2014 6:12 AM, Mario Butter <> wrote:
>
> If this "shutdown date" is not documented and agreed to by the customer, I would consider this unethical and borderline fraudulent. It's nothing short of extortion. As a software engineer, I would never put code like this into a client's software, and I would let the powers that be know about any that I find (I have - and removed them; other companies have been sued because of these).
>
> --
> Mario
>
> http://mario.silent-tower.org/
>
>
> On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 6:27 AM, Ian Wilson <> wrote:
>
> Hi,
> The real issue in all this maybe cost, and to a degree copyright.
> The Traveller universe works differently in regard to its commercial relationships with individual planets. The Imperium strives to make no world truly independent and self sustaining.
> So would it be commercially viable for a starship crew to 3D print or cnc cut their own firearms, against a world of 3 billion who make nothing but shotguns and carbines.
> A slobbering tale to add with reference to computer boards etc. I work in telecoms, a company I work along side brought several telephone exchanges via another company. With the supplier they had a maintence package (all normal industry stuff). To save some money they decided to unofficially drop the support package. Unknown to the the supplier had fitted a date code into its software, which when the maintence was performed was reset. Predictably the date expired at 4pm on a Friday afternoon, all the exchanges shut down, much to the duty on calls misery.
> The point being when being pursued by star destroyers, the last thing you need is copyright issues with your jump drive :-) due to dodgy parts.
> Ian
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>