FTL mass drivers from planetary surfaces in Star Frontiers
Recently, a question popped up on whether it would be possible to use a nuclear bomb-powered megacannon to accelerate a payload to void velocity from the surface of a planet. I felt it was a very interesting question that needed a bit of looking into.
Short answer: No. It is not even remotely possible using the level of technology available in the canon Frontier setting.
Long answer:
The fastest man-made object ever launched was a manhole cover.
Yup. That ~300-400 lb plate of 4-inch iron was launched to a velocity of over 66 km/sec by the 300-ton yield Pascal-B nuclear device on 27 August 1957.
The velocity of light is 299,792 km/sec.
1% of the velocity of light is 2,997.92 km/sec.
Any heavier object would not be as fast, any lighter object would…
Injuries and Healing in Star Frontiers
This is from a comment in an article, reprinted here for my convenience.
Injuries in the SF game are healed by medics using either First Aid, Minor Surgery, or Major Surgery;
First Aid can heal a maximum of 10 STA per day, due to the 20-hour limitation of biocort. The skill also uses “any appropriate items from the medkit”. If the injured character has suffered 11+ points of damage, they need surgery to heal the rest. If a character is injured after the healing, First Aid has no in-game effect (because of the biocort limitation), but is needed “fluff-wise” to prevent infection or further damage; to actually heal damage, the medic needs to perform surgery; for minor injuries, this is essentially the same as First Aid (but with an actual skill…
Regarding structural points for Alpha Dawn vehicles
One point about vehicle combat in Alpha Dawn; in the real world, vehicles become inoperable long before they are destroyed; the rules in Alpha Dawn (pp. 31-2) reflect this well; rolls or roll and burn results from loss of control result in either an inoperable vehicle or one that can be driven again in 1d10 turns; high-speed collisions kill the vehicle, while lower speed collisions result in -20m/turn to acceleration and turning speed once the vehicle starts up again after 1d10 turns.
Combat damage requires rolls in the Vehicle damage table; 2d10+the number of dice of damage from the weapon; a 1 SEU laser means a 2d10+1 roll, while the laser set on 20 SEU will require a 2d10+20. Since rolls of 2-19 equal “no effect”, this means that vehicle…
Regarding assault scouts, overhauls, and fleet deployment
Another answer in another forum, posted here for convenient access.
“Looking at the Knight Hawks rules and required drive overhauls, how do fleet actions happen in Star Frontiers? It seems like the logistics of fleet movement would be insane with the way the rules work. All your big ships would be ready to go but waiting on their support ships to get their drives back up. How did the Task Forces stay together to fight the Second Sathar War?”
Looking at the RaW and the implied reality of the setting, this questions requires looking at a couple of aspects of the rules that are not readily apparent in a casual reading of the book.
The first is a misconception about the strategic aspect of the Second Sather War as a boardgame: it is an abstractio…
On agriculture, population, and ship construction
This article is a response that was written to a question on another forum. It is reprinted here for sharing purposes. Questions are welcome.
Worlds that have been settled for a long time (such as Clarion, which canonically has been ruled by the same family for over 400 years) will have a wide range of foodstuffs, combining classic crops and food animals introduced during colonization, to native crops and genemods.
Even heavily industrialized worlds have more than enough space to be self-sufficient under most circumstances. Any agricultural products imported from off-world will be starter seed stock and genetic starters, not foodstuffs ready for distribution.
Why? Simple: lack of ships and lack of technology.
Looking at Knight Hawks, we know h…