RE: [FT] Tech Level? Is there such a thing?

 > The difficulty with adding tech levels to FT is that it doesn't lend
> itself to small reductions for improved systems: a Class 1 Beam at
> MASS 1 POINT COST 3 is tough to reduce.

Not exactly. This assumes that the base set of rules in the FB's is the
high
end of the tech curve. In my Imperium Campaign (Traveller+) I figure
that
the FB tech is at about TL12 or so. (Star travel starts at TL9 and
humans
top out at TL15-16 in this system, TL12 is the nominal Imperial average
TL)
>From there as the TL goes down the systems get bigger and clunkier and
as
the TL gets higher they tend to get smaller and possibly more efficient.

> My views on tech would be more of an availability issue. In other
> words, something to the effect of "Class 2 Beams don't become
> available till TL 2" or some variation there-of.

This is the other thing that I do. For example, the old and new P-Torps
are
merely different TL's. The other thing that I did was had a beginning
set of
Beam tech called "Disruptors" that are completely ineffectual against
Screens. These have now been regulated to civilian tech for the most
part,
Military grade beams are as normal vs. Screens.
The other TL based modifier that you can use is maximum available
Thrust. If
a beginning warship ship has a max thrust of 1 vs. the cutting edge
cruiser
has a thrust of say 6 or 8 (And still has to spend the same general
amount
of space on the engine...) that has a pretty significant effect on the
balance of power.
The same can be said for vector and cinematic based movement. (The
players
*fear* the appearance of the Eldar on the board... Thrust 8 and
cinematic
movement against their max Thrust 6 and vector movement)
The other thing that you could experiment with is limiting the ship size
against TL. If the biggest starship that a TL(whatever) polity can build
is
size 100 (or 50 or 150) it is sure going to also have an effect.
All in all these "fixes" only work in the context of some sort of
campaign
game, or the SFB situation where there are hundreds of official designs
each
with an official BPV/EPV (or whatever the commercial cost is called, I
can't
remember)