A quick revision to one of my ship deck plans, showing battle damage from a pirate attack.
Click [here] for the original deck plans and [here] for additional images.
"What happened" is up to the referee. I kept the text vague enough that several options are available. Maybe the bank holding the mortgage hires the PCs to investigate, or since this ship was designed as kind of an "armored car in space", maybe the owner of the cargo wants it investigate. Missing cargo, missing crew, some spilled blood... very suspicious. Was it pirates, as it appears? That area of space has a lot of pirate activity. Did the crew do it themselves and stage it to look like piracy? What was the cargo anyway, and who benefits most my its disappearance? I'd like to sit down and write the adventure someday, but real life is kicking my butt lately and my Traveller hobby time is extremely limited for the time being.
My one, long time question/problem... How does one gauge/judge/estimate/finagle the ship's "Tonnage" tto the ship's "Shape" as drawn/depicted?
So, the 800 Ton merc Cruiser is a 'Ball' X squares across at the diameter. How much bigger is a 1000 ton ball? A 500 ton ball? How might the 'Scout' wedge scale up?
Thanks Darin, In my early days of starship design I would just draw the deck plan on grid paper, so calculating tonnage was very easy - one ton per two 1.5m x 1.5m squares. Once I started drawing exterior views of those designs I realized how ugly those first ships were. As my skills developed I would create more interesting exterior forms and use geometry to calculate the tonnage.
These days I use 3D software to create the volume of a ship and then scale it up or down to whatever tonnage I want the ship to be. When that's done I slice up the volume as necessary to create the deck plans. There's usually some back and forth in this part of the process, but the payoff is that I can get nice looking, functional deck plans wrapped in a hull of accurate tonnage.
Might one ask a favour? I have an idea for a 'shape' of a hull in my head. If I were to transribe it to paper... might an amazingly talented person, such as yourself, be able to 'adjust' said shape it to fit hull tonnage?
Am happy to offer moneys for your time.
Much cheers to you and yours. Please keep up the amazingly goodwork. :)
I'm extremely busy with a new architecture venture right now (damn you, real life!), but if I don't get some Traveller diversion I'm afraid my brain might implode. Why don't you send me what you've got - drawings, hull size, any other ideas - and I'll take a look at it. No promises, and designs with a lot of curves will probably be rejected outright. If it is something I think I can resolve in a very short time I'll take a crack at it. No need for moneys. You can e-mail your stuff to me at pearcedesignstudio@gmail.com.
Differnt time zones, life challenges etc for ourselves obviously dictate our correspondance between each other. I shall endeavour to do my best to scratch something together, scan said image and send it to yourself.
Again, very much thanks for your comunications and much cheers to you and yours.
Ouch. That looks bad, what happened? :)
ReplyDelete"What happened" is up to the referee. I kept the text vague enough that several options are available. Maybe the bank holding the mortgage hires the PCs to investigate, or since this ship was designed as kind of an "armored car in space", maybe the owner of the cargo wants it investigate. Missing cargo, missing crew, some spilled blood... very suspicious. Was it pirates, as it appears? That area of space has a lot of pirate activity. Did the crew do it themselves and stage it to look like piracy? What was the cargo anyway, and who benefits most my its disappearance? I'd like to sit down and write the adventure someday, but real life is kicking my butt lately and my Traveller hobby time is extremely limited for the time being.
DeleteI hear that, life is kicking my butt too, with the same result, less Traveller time. Still enjoying your work as always.
ReplyDeleteAlways being amazed by your works. (^_^)
ReplyDeleteMy one, long time question/problem... How does one gauge/judge/estimate/finagle the ship's "Tonnage" tto the ship's "Shape" as drawn/depicted?
So, the 800 Ton merc Cruiser is a 'Ball' X squares across at the diameter. How much bigger is a 1000 ton ball? A 500 ton ball? How might the 'Scout' wedge scale up?
*Sigh*
Much cheers to you and yours.
Thanks Darin,
DeleteIn my early days of starship design I would just draw the deck plan on grid paper, so calculating tonnage was very easy - one ton per two 1.5m x 1.5m squares. Once I started drawing exterior views of those designs I realized how ugly those first ships were. As my skills developed I would create more interesting exterior forms and use geometry to calculate the tonnage.
These days I use 3D software to create the volume of a ship and then scale it up or down to whatever tonnage I want the ship to be. When that's done I slice up the volume as necessary to create the deck plans. There's usually some back and forth in this part of the process, but the payoff is that I can get nice looking, functional deck plans wrapped in a hull of accurate tonnage.
Oooo... :)
DeleteMight one ask a favour? I have an idea for a 'shape' of a hull in my head. If I were to transribe it to paper... might an amazingly talented person, such as yourself, be able to 'adjust' said shape it to fit hull tonnage?
Am happy to offer moneys for your time.
Much cheers to you and yours. Please keep up the amazingly goodwork. :)
I'm extremely busy with a new architecture venture right now (damn you, real life!), but if I don't get some Traveller diversion I'm afraid my brain might implode. Why don't you send me what you've got - drawings, hull size, any other ideas - and I'll take a look at it. No promises, and designs with a lot of curves will probably be rejected outright. If it is something I think I can resolve in a very short time I'll take a crack at it. No need for moneys. You can e-mail your stuff to me at pearcedesignstudio@gmail.com.
DeleteDear Sir.
ReplyDeleteThank you immensly for your reply and interst.
Differnt time zones, life challenges etc for ourselves obviously dictate our correspondance between each other. I shall endeavour to do my best to scratch something together, scan said image and send it to yourself.
Again, very much thanks for your comunications and much cheers to you and yours.
Sincearly,
Darin C.