Re: [DS2] Vehicle Design

Tony Christney wrote:
> 
> I had been working on an alternative design system about a
> year ago. I was trying to solve most of the problems that people
> seem to find with the system.
> 
> The approach that I started from is to introduce an energy
> capacity to the system. So you decide how many capacity
> points you want. Then you decide on the size and type of
> power plant that you want.
> 
> Each system that gets added to the vehicle requires space
> and/or power. Each movement unit for a given mobility type
> costs a certain amount of power per capacity used. Armour
> is handled as a system that takes capacity per facing but
> requires no power. So the amount of systems and armour
> on the vehicle directly affects the speed.

I can't make out exactly what the proposal is here.

If I understand correctly (correction welcomed) the vehicle has
capacity points, of which a certain number are consumed as a power
plant to provide power points. Systems require either or both or
capacity and power points, armour requires capacity points and
movement requires power points. Is that right?

If capacity points are directly exchangable for power points
during the buying-power-plant step, then power points can be
eliminated from the design system. Everything (systems, armour,
movement) just requires capacity points, whether in the form of
capacity, or in the capacity that's being traded in for power
points.

This is succinctly the sort of triangular design trade off that is
commonly associated with AFVs, that is to say that an increase in
one of (firepower, protection, mobility) leads to a decrease in
one or both of the others, unless one introduces new and better
technology. Higher technologies could be included by increasing
the number of capacity points per size factor.

The current design system stumbles by not penalising increased
armour levels except in points value.

-- 
David Brewer

"The mentally disturbed do not employ the Theory of Scientific 
Parsimony: the most simple theory to explain a given set of 
facts." - P.K.Dick (from VALIS)