Wednesday, June 04, 2008

Starports, Drive Tech, Fuel, And Stuff

Edited:

A starport can build to its world's native tech; If that tech level is below that which is capable for building starships or spaceships - for instance, an A-port on a tech 7 world - the port is limited to the minimum tech possible for that class of ship: A-ports build to tech 9, B-ports build to tech 7. Moreover, such ships are produced using imported drives and are confined to standardized designs.

I'm ruling that IMTU, no A-port, no starships produced locally. A tech 15 world without an A-port might have a fleet in orbit, but it probably won't be theirs. There are a number of B-worlds in Festrian space which supply the empire with excellent riderships, fighters, and small craft.

Within the bounds of the Festrian Empire, tech 13+ construction is reserved for military vessels. Commercially classed vessels are to be produced between tech 9 and 12, except in cases where official dispensation has been given.

The Independent Interstellar Scout Service has all of its ships produced at tech 13+ worlds; within the bounds of the Empire, they hold official dispensation allowing this.

Ships built to tech 13+ Military/Scout spec enjoy the benefits of extended detection range (2 light seconds, as opposed to half a light second) and can use unrefined fuel safely. The same is for any ship built outside the Festrian Empire at tech 13 and up.

Ships built to Festrian Commercial Specs at any tech level, or built at tech 9-12 worlds elsewhere, have the short detection range and cannot use unrefined fuel without risk of misjump.

6 Comments:

Blogger Omer Golan-Joel said...

What about the Squill you've described a long while ago, with their usual non-starships and salvaged jump-drives grafted into them?

1:08 AM  
Blogger Jwarrrlry said...

Good point! But then, I'm mainly hashing out broad systemic stuff with this - there are bound to be exceptions, the Squill being one of 'em.

There's a 6-7 world cluster in the frontier which has only one A port; the A port's tech is too low for spacecraft and the only other world in the cluster which looks like a candidate for space travel is a B world. Now in this case, I think the B world might have jump, but might not be allowing its general production locally: perhaps to exert control over the local cluster. The A port might indicate a well-developed trade hub?

Case by case, that stuff.

4:25 AM  
Blogger Omer Golan-Joel said...

I'd also use minimal tech levels for starport types; Starport-A would require TL9 (for jump-drives) and Starport-B would require TL7 (for spacecraft production).

11:52 PM  
Blogger Jwarrrlry said...

Someone on CotI mentioned a DGP fix that I kinda like, where an A-port on a low tech world can produce ships to Tech 9, and a B port can produce ships at tech 7; I could probably just go with that.

11:11 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

I like your approach.

I have always have a problem with players wanting to build everything at TL15, with the assumption that any A or B port can fix it, when they are puttering around the Marches

8:20 AM  
Blogger Jwarrrlry said...

Thank you!

Nobody in the PC realm has any business monkeying around with TL 15 gear. They might *see* it sometimes. They've heard of it. If they were in the Navy or Marines, they might have even used it.

But build it? Buy it? Hah.

9:52 AM  

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