Re: Maximizing ship designs

On Wed, 2 Apr 1997, Oerjan Ohlson wrote:

> The only problem is that unless this "thrust as % of mass" relation
changes 
> as mass goes up, you'll have exactly the same problem for small ships
- 
> ie, they too can choose either to be fast or to carry weapons. After
all, 
> under the FTII rules all starships spend exactly the same percentage 
> (50%) of their mass on useful non-engine systems.

Well, it *is* realistic... but no more on that unless someone insists.

You could say that small ships are faster, because that's the only 
defense they can afford in their small hulls! This is probably the most 
realistic approach.

How about: The point cost could be similar to current system, but the
mass
requirement strictly linear. 

Or how about the BTech way: Choose your engine from a table (though I 
hate tables), tack on stuff and then see what your power:mass ratio is.

All in all, do we want to retain the intuitive but somewhat unrealistic 
system (small & fast -- big & slow), or do we want to model naval,
space and physics realities better?

It might pay to separate raw speed from maneuverability. Raw main drive
power is linear, but maneuverability isn't. There's even some real
justification to this: J (angular mass, for lack of a better word) is
proportional to the *square* of radius. Ok, so momentum is proportional
to
distance which cancels it out if you can mount your turning thrusters on
the outer edges. But you could invent a number of semi-plausible
explanations based on this. 

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