Archive through May 09, 2002
Star Fleet Universe Discussion Board: Prime Directive RPG: NEW KINDS OF RPG PRODUCTS:
GPD Deck Plans:
Archive through May 09, 2002
Garth, I have that PDF that Steve created that shows line weights, doors, hatches, windows, stairwells, turbolift shafts, shafts, etc. I will send it to you. In Smart draw I have been using the following lineweights from the "style" list:
Hairline-not used
dotted line-not used
dotted line-not used
first line-details like chairs, tables, doors, etc.
second line-not used (at least I can't remember using it)
third line-normal internal walls
fourth line-internal bulkheads (thicker than walls)
fifth line-exterior hull lines.
Thicker lines 6, 7, and 8-not used.
Davyd, let me know if you have any questions, I'm happy to help. You can post the files to a private webpage, or send them to me, if I need to look at them to answer your questions.
I could probably send the current Fed Frigate Smart Draw files (they haven't been approved by Steve Cole yet so I imagine there will be some modifications and changes yet to come, but they are complete) to Garth and Davyd if they think they would find those helpful to look over as well.
Assuming that's OK with Steve (I imagine it would be fine.)
Nick
For those interested in deck plans, here is a website that has complete deckplans for the Oberth scout ship (the science vessel from Star Trek III), kind of spiffy.
http://www.coldnorth.com/owen/game/startrek/universe/ships/oberth.htm
Nick, I'll probably e-mail them to you; the college's firewall makes putting stuff on the web a royal pain.
If you could pass that PDF on to me as well, thet'd be great. It fell through the cracks somewhere and never got to me.
Cheers.
At some point I would like to know how any drawing should be formated so that ADB can use them. If I could be involved of course. If the field is not open then....never mind.
Loren,
Ultimately everything must be in a format readable by Freehand, which is what Steve Cole uses to get stuff ready for printing.
Freehand is relatively expensive, but we have found that Smart Draw (about $60 now I think) is adequate for getting a file format that is close, and that is what I have been using.
As far as participating, you would have to ask Gary or Steve what is needed for future products, and they are both real busy getting the final version of the core rulebook done, as you can probably tell from the posts flying back and forth. 
I believe that the products for this year are pretty much accounted for as far as deck plans:
Gurps Prime Directive (Free Trader, done)
Gurps Prime Alpha (Federation Frigate, done but needs SVC review)
Gurps Klingons (Klingon F5 Frigate, in progress)
Gurps Romulans (tentatively Romulan Skyhawk, done but needs to be smartdraw format and SVC review)
So unless something changes this year is taken care of, and next year's products haven't gone onto the production list yet (as they don't really schedule that far ahead in any detail), so I don't know what is available next as far as deckplan requirements go, I don't think anybody is thinking that far ahead yet.
Gary or Steve will point out if I got any of that wrong...
What Nick said is fine.
O.K. Just a couple more questions, please.
1) Are deck plans only going to appear one at a time in products or might there be a deck plan pack. With 2 or 3 hulls. ( I know that would be a lot of work, but its not impossible)
2) So if I was to start messing around with so drawings. What sort of ship would I NOT be wasting my time on? I would like to point out that I do O.K. for myself finacialy. I'm not looking to score off of ADB. That can be a general note for any offer I make to ADB.
Thanks
There might be a deck plan pack.
Remember that GURPS deck plans are of fairly small ships. All of the GURPS deck plans ever printed would have fewer square feet of combined walkable space than a typical heavy cruiser in SFB.
Loren, while no decision has been made, the FELINE EMPIRES book seems likely in 2003. As we seem to be doing frigates in the sourcebooks, the Z-FF seems likely -- but there is no guarantee on this!
Note that any deckplans must repeat MUST be done in SmartDraw for compatibility with our publishing software. Doing it in any other program just won't work!
Well, if they have a Mac and Freehand that would work too....
I'm a PC man and my wifes is a pretty good iMac. Looks like theres plenty of time to work it out.
Thanks.
I'll wait to see a couple of other plans so I can design in a similar "style". NO COPYING! Just for consistancys sake.
I just had a chance to look through the "Standard Symbols PDF", and I'd like clarifaction on one thing:
What's the difference between a "cabin door" and a "bulkhead door"?
Cheers.
Bulkhead doors are heavier. A ship is divided into major compartments by armord bulkheads; doors through those bulkheads are like you see on submarine movies. Big honken steel things with muscle driven handles that "dog down".
Compartment doors are thinner. They'll hold air bur not stop explosions.
On regular ships, the only "walls" that are used toward the calculation of the structural strength of the vessel are the Watertight ( and oil tight ) Bulkheads.
From a design point of veiw all non watertight bulkheads are labled "partitions" and are not counted toward the structural strength of the vessel.
You might want to have a differnce between "walls" on the ship maps to define some of the walls as Pressure-tight Bulkheads and the rest merely as partitions.
The amount of damage one must inflict to penertrate these "walls" being radically different.
And then throw in a line or two about the Cabin doors and bulkhead doors being different in that they povide a continuation of the structial strength of the "wall" they are mounted on depending on the structural srtength of the original wall.
You might also throw in a line about the difference between a hatch and a door. Doors have their bottom edge ( when closed ) level with the deck and hatchs have thier botom edge raised above the deck, just so that referees will know when to say which.
Note I haven't read the document and thus this may already be covered.
And a reference to Pressure-tight hatches and doors, still being "dogged down" at all times before and after use would be kind of cool.
Fan boy reference;
Do you remember in ST II, the scene in engineering after they had taken their hit and there was that big muckin door coming down? That would be an example of a bulkhead door. A cabin door are those ones on quarters that go "swooshh!".
Robert
Oh yeah, that brilliant door design that cuts the intermix chamber in half and thus cuts off the warp drive.
They should have had too doors, one on either side of the intermix chamber, with a permanent segment of wall between the two doors for the intermix chamber to tunnel through. Then they could lower the doors when aft engineering lost pressure, but still have the warp engines.
Quote:, with a permanent segment of wall between the two doors
Assuming there are Pressure-tight bulkheads to go with each door, you are talking about a "cofferdam".
They're common between the collision bulkhead and the first watertight bulkhead ( although a collision bulkhead is watertight; just very thick ) on regular shipping.
A cofferdam is quite simply a small space for the purposses of flooding mittigation.
MJC; already covered. We do know our business. The interior walls ARE airtight, just not "tough". The difference is between plain metal or plasteel and "armor".
Quote:We do know our business.
That's likely the most true statment I've read on a BBS in 6 months...not counting the stuff I've posted of-cause.
.
I would like to say that having non air-tight interior partitions does put the "fear of god" into players when they hear a quite "Hisssssssssss". But I like my players to always feel they are behind the eight-ball.
It could be something to mention in a Referees guide if one is ever published our perhaps it just isn't "the vision/cannonical".
At anyrate, the fact that the authors have it figured out in the minds is the most important bit.
SVC: Thanks. I've been going through and adjusting my roughs to match the .PDF, and needed to know what colour to make what door.
All walls and doors on a ship or base -- ANY ship or base -- are airtight. How much damage it takes to make them non-airtight is the important question!
On deckplans, thicker lines = more damage-resistant, NOT thicker. The walls and doors may just be built out of tougher materials.
There are also safety devices that prevent doors from being opened if there is vacuum on the other side. Unfortunately, these frequently get damaged...
SVC: ok did you just get my last email. Free Trader and Sec Skiff.
please look it over. Notice that the free trader is a very large ship. LOTS of cargo. But the deck plans that I saw printed in CL23 hardly has any cargo.
Can we assume that the cargo portion of the ship is "off the deck plans"
I mean compaired to a "fleet repair dock" it has half of the cargo. And a fleet repair dock has enough supplies to fix entire ships from long range (huge amounts of cargo).
by my calculations.
if the ship mentioned in CL23 is 1,113,000 cft (i guestimated from the dimentions) and those don't enclude the volume of the warp engines (i think it stated that in the article).
then
my ship is about 1,113,000 cft bigger about 103x103x103 feet of cargo space.
your going to give me "who cares" answer aren't' you?
The three rear cargo bays are each about 5 meters tall (about 16 ft), the forward cargo bay is only about 3 meters (about 10 ft) tall, there is nowhere to place a cargo space that is 100ft by 100ft by 100ft, one of those dimensions (the vertical one) is way off .
well I assumed that each cargo box is worth 150 GURPS spaces (for all ships).
so one, cargo box one one ship,is the same size as one cargo box on another ship.
one cargo box equals 75,000cft of space.
It just seems to me that if you are going to take cargo from planet to planet or from star to star system, then you'd want to pack it with ALOT of cargo.
I cargo ship (modern day) carries a &$^&*$ load of cargo. I kind of based cargo space on the small and large Freighers (basic set) and found that 150 spaces per SSD box would be good.
I can change it... I just need to make sure that the other SSD conversions I did have the new data.
Nick, I wasn't trying to jump on you. Its just that we came up with two different systems at the same time.
For the record I sort of based by cargo boxes on the space needed for drones. I "knew" that each cargo box must hold 50 type-I drones. I "Knew" about how big a type-I drone is by guestimating its size off of the picture on the cover of Module J (this has a kzinti fighter, on the wing you can see a type-I (one space) drone, and a type-VI (half space) drone. So I tried to approximate my overall cargo space that way.
So I was using 25,000 cu ft per cargo box, and you were using 75,000 cu ft per cargo box.