Turrets, Gunners, and Fire Control

The players are crewing a Far Trader at the coreward end of the Spinward Marches. As they head for the 100D limit, a Corsair jumps in. The grizzled veteran gunner goes to the turret, and straps himself into one of the turrets, trying to buy you time to get to the limit. His control is local, and primary weapons systems are in his hands.

The players are crewing a Patrol Cruiser at the coreward end of the Spinward Marches. As they are on patrol around a world, a Corsair jumps in. As they man battle stations, the gunners reach their stations. While they have back-up control, primary direction is coming from the bridge.

The players are the officers of a Frontier Cruiser at the coreward end of the Spinward Marches. As they are on patrol, a Corsair jumps in. As the watch section maneuvers the ship as battle stations are manned, the gunnery officer on the bridge engages the corsair with the secondary battery. The gun crews exist 

These three examples show how weapons control can work on starships. First, there is local control, as shown the vast majority civilian ships of any type. Then, there are turret mounts with central fire control, as would occur on Adventure class military and paramilitary ships. Finally, there is the central fire control of Battle class ships, capable of turning smaller ones inside out with a single barrage.

On smaller ships, with individual mounts, I think the default image many of us have for starship weapons mounts are the turrets from the Millenium Falcon  in Star Wars. A gunner, sitting behind a console, moves the weapons across his field of fire, assisted by the computer, to fire at other craft. While this is contemporary to the original versions of Traveller, it is hardly realistic. Even in the cinematic visions you may have, ships will seldom be close enough for optical manual to fire control to hit, and they will have velocities where the Force is the only way to have a prayer of hitting the target! The velocity problem has been known since the 1940's when manually operated 20 mm auto cannon were found to be ineffective for anti-aircraft firepower. However, the the local fire control may exist, especially if the ship does not have  quality sensors. Generally, Scout ships, Free Traders, Far Traders, and Fat Traders will not have centralized fire control.

Next, we can move on to centralized fire control for Adventure class ships. Generally, the Type T and Type C ships are among the smallest to have this kind of fire control arrangement. Basically, the local gunner has been reduced to a secondary purpose here, ensuring sand canisters and missiles load properly, and the lasers are functioning correctly. Their operations on the mount are more ensuring the system works properly, and follows the right cues from the main director. The best parallel I can find is the operation of older 5" mounts, where there is the ability to fire from the mount controls, but the primary location is from fire control.

On the largest ships, weapons fire is essentially automatic from the central fire control post on the bridge or combat information center. Examining Supplement 5, it comes across the bridges on a Lightning-class cruiser have a control location for weapons control, alongside local stations on the various gunnery decks, allowing for the main locations to be incapacitated. while continuing to fight the ship. Some of the limitations may be from the era when the deck plans were written, because I see individual (or area) targets getting manually designated, and then automatically engaged when the computers work out the math. Those heavy duty computers on starships running Fire Control/5 should be blowing up targets with out much help from the gunners. An individual with a good skill will help make the shot, but compared to the systems inputs, won't be of much help. If there are manually triggered weapons, I would expect for there to be a physical interconnection, perhaps in the shape of a pistol grip, physically connected to the overall fire control system.

Well, there's some more crunch for gunnery and fire control on starships. Players can discuss if they want local or central control of weapons, and which fits best with your particular campaign style. Space opera Travellers will opt for local control, so heroes can have their moment of triumph over the forces of evil. Harder Traveller campaigns will have a combat information center, or central fire control direction for their turrets. Of course, the key is to ensure the players are the center of the action. 

Watchbills

Being the obsessive type I am, as well as having spent a portion of my life under one of these, here are the watchbills for the Patrol Cruiser Boxing Kangaroo. A watchbill can provide some useful 'chrome' for your campaign. It can tell you who is responsible for ship's operation at what time. Like having your players keep a log, this is another way of bringing it to life.

I set up a three section watchbill, and I assume six hours on and twelve hours off shifts, because that's what I saw most often. The Captain, as a matter of tradition, does not stand a set watch, but can relieve at any point he sees fit. 

UNDERWAY WATCHBILL, INS BOXING KANGAROO

Section I          Section II        Section III       Kick

OOD               Hassan             Zabiyah           Chishan          

Messenger       Castillo            Hall                 Owen                Afari*

Engineer          Maurer             Brand              Kidd                 Franke*

Marine             Appledorn       Fini                  Hoedmaeker    Binici

*Corporal Afari and Marine Franke are standby on Boat Crew in N-space; in J-space they are to serve as above.

Sergeant Valdez and Marine Yap are on call at all times.

INPORT WATCHBILL, INS BOXING KANGAROO

Section 1:        Hassan (CDO), Valdez, Zabiayah, Owen, Castillo, Maurer, Hoedmaeker, Binici

Section 2:        Brand (CDO), Chishan, Afari, Hall, Kidd, Appledorn, Fini, Franke

Marine Yap is on call at all times.

Watch Descriptions:

OOD: Officer of the Deck, is the on-watch pilot, and responsible for safe operation of the ship. All others are responsible to this person. In Jump, the OOD is merely the bridge systems manager and control manager, and has his eye on the Jump warning.

Messenger: Roving watch, reports to the Officer of the Deck on all matters. Checks to ensure other watch standers are doing their jobs alertly, and wakes oncoming personnel. This does including getting drinks for the rest of the watch team.

Engineer: Ensures safe operation of all engineering plant equipment during watch, and performs preventative maintenance during the watch.

Marine: responsible for the security of and condition of Marine Force equipment during the watch. May also be standing security watch on the missile magazine if any special weapons are on board, or stand guard over prisoners. Responsible to the Marine Detachment Non-commissioned Officer In Charge for Marine Force Matters, and to the Officer of the Deck for all shipboard matters.

Command Duty Officer: Responsible for the direction of an in-port duty section.

Kick: A supernumerary watch stander, this individual stands a specified watch period every day, allowing additional time for training, administration, or qualification for the others.

I tried to remove slang and excessive TLA use, but please tell me if you'd like any clarifications.

What do You Mean it isn't Just a Liner: Armed Merchant Cruisers

By Source, Fair use, 

I recently re-read David Weber's Honor Harrington up to Honor Among Enemies, and I thought the idea of and use of Armed Merchant Cruisers in the Official Traveller Universe. Armed Merchant Cruisers are a type of auxiliary warship, converted from merchant ships. Generally, they would be equipped with older weapons, and feature limited fire control with no armor.

These ships come about because of commerce raiding as both the wolves and the sheepdogs around helpless merchants. The predatory ones, like the German Auxiliary Cruisers such as Von Luckner's SMS Seeadler. These ships operate under false flags, which are theoretically replaced with the real one to give the victim a chance to surrender. The other reason, like the ill-fated HMS Jervis Bay, are built to be readily available escorts and protection. Q-ships were a subset of these, smaller ships equipped to trap commerce raiders, submarines usually, with a hidden armament.

Thus, an Armed Merchant Cruiser exists because purpose built warships are for some reason unable to complete either commerce raiding or commerce protection and patrol duties. In some cases, you could find a peace time force of such auxiliary ships, especially in Navies looking to ensure a knowledge continuity in unusual craft, or as aggressors. A Naval Depot could include a few as part of it's defense and exercise force, or as part of a Convoy operations school that can be re-tasked in a time of war.

There is a couple of official designs for a Q-ship, also useful as an Armed Merchant Cruiser. First, in SJ Games Deckplan 3: Empress Marava-Class Far Trader, there's the Empress Arbellatara class variant, that replaces the cargo space with Rampart fighters. Another is provided on page 71 of Mongoose Publishing's Traders and Gunboats, based on the Type R "Fat Trader". These are both common enough designs a competent referee could set them on the players as a joker if the PC's have become a bit too ethically challenged. More may be in other books I do not own.

An Open Armed Merchant Cruiser would be operating as a Navy unit in all respects, squawking a Navy Transponder code, and operating as a normal patrol ship or as the escort for a convoy. In some ways, a converted merchant hull would make sense, as it would have similar performance to the ships it is escorting. On patrol operations, it could be set up for a longer duration operation (in-system performance).

The piratical LCDR Tom Dodge in "Down Periscope"

A Hidden Armed Merchant Cruiser would be looking more like a scruffy tramp or fat trader, and suckering in unsuspecting prey of a variety of sources. It wouldn't act Navy in any fashion, until it's too late for it's enemy to escape. In many ways, it's a completely legal pirate. It's a sucker punch like a System Defense Boat wing in the gas giant killing fuel skimmers.

Of course, these could be working together, where an open Armed Merchant Cruiser is 'escorting' a convoy of hidden ones, Most commerce raiders might consider turning tail when the entire convoy starts spitting nukes, and a large group of fighters are being launched.

In my view of the Official Traveller Universe, the Imperium is big and powerful, but just can't be everywhere. In many cases, local Dukes are unable to get the effective ships commerce protection, even in peace time, from the Imperial Navy, or else a world finds its commerce is under attack, and need mildly combatant starship of its own to ensure fewer merchants are lost. As I see it, the Imperium is more willing to give them Armed Merchant Cruisers than 'real warships', as they are not as emphatically Navy as a Patrol Cruiser, or a Destroyer. In some cases, along the lines of various other vessels navies have in war time, but prefer to get rid of as they are not part of the 'proper fleet' and offer opportunities for junior officers to show up their seniors. The subsectors and systems near the Vargr Extents (Coreward frontier of the Imperium) will have Armed Merchant Cruisers on their permanent Navy Lists, while those on the interior will normally see few if any.

Navies might not be the only operators of Armed Merchant Cruisers. A shipping line of type R's or A2's may buy an Armed Merchant Cruiser based on their fleet hull, as a way to ensure their cargoes get through. An mercenary Armed Merchant Cruiser could operate beyond the Imperium, supporting various small states against both pirates and rival small powers, particularly in the Extents.

In a campaign, an Armed Merchant Cruiser would be a different way to run a war, and to keep it at the players scale. A group of middle aged spacers looking to get out of a boring retirement would be a very skilled crew for one. Former Navy and Scouts would be the crew, boarding parties for Marine and Army characters, a Merchant type would add believably to the ruse of being a trader. Reformed pirate types would be useful as well; for understanding the piratical mindset better than some stuffy Navy type. Encounters would help the referee determine the course of the war. Successes help move the front along, but failures lead to losing the war. It can also be a mechanism to draft the party into the Navy, "Since you have been successful in this, we're promoting you, and sending you to a new cruiser," could be the response they get from success. It helps keep it at the Adventure Class ships level, where it's all smaller ships, and the PC's make the important decisions. The fleet units are escorting the Megafreighters, while the small Armed Merchant Cruisers are stuck herding cats forming Free Traders into a convoy.

Abandon Ship! Not quite...

Here's an interesting post I got via the Classic Traveller G+ group.

I left an extended comment on how also to conceive of escape attempts, and that while unlikely, a life boat of some sort may be nice to have.

The Ship

The crew mans the newly built Patrol Cruiser INS Boxing Kangaroo (PC-1589234), a typical, if newly built, 400 displacement ton member of it's class at the Imperial Naval Yard, Light Craft Section at Alice Springs, Australia at Terra/Sol (SR 1827). This assumes it is the version on pages 118-120 of Mongoose Publishing's Supplement 2: Traders and Gunboats.

A Quick Guided Tour

When moored planet side, the ship is boarded either through the G-Carrier garage, Ship's Boat Hangar, or one of  two airlocks on the ventral surface. The preferred method is to use the G-Carrier garage, with the belly mounted doors retracted, and a set of stairs known as the 'brow' that lead up to the iris valve. A larger fork system is used to move pallets up to the cargo bay. Shipboard security begins at the foot of the brow, and a 'comms box' is placed here for the watchstander to use.

Up the brow, we go into the cargo bay is a 4.5 m *15 m space. It contains a variety of power hookups for attaching fresh food preservation units, as well as tie down points. Across the cargo bay is a standard 30 dTon Ship's boat in its full hangar. Among other items, it is used for stowage of the Marine's Battle Dress, and can be quickly reconfigured into either a personnel shuttle or for cargo use. Forward is the barracks space for up to 12 sophonts, Normally, it is empty, and the racks are stowed, and this area is used as a crew's lounge. Forward, is the missile magazine for 120 standard 210 mm missiles, supplied to two missile racks. The aft end of this level is taken up by the ship's jump drive.

To go up to the second upper level, there are iris valves in the two airlocks that connect to lower engineering, a third forward of the iris valve to the jump drive in the cargo bay, and a fourth in the missile magazine. For the purposes of this tour, we will go up through the cargo bay.

This leads us to the main engine room, where we are at the power plant. The two units of the maneuver drive, capable of providing 4 g's of acceleration, sit at the outboard edges of the room. Forward of this is the staterooms, providing accomodation for twenty. They feature double bunks, a fresher, and standardized fittings for stowage of personal belongings. Forward of this is small common area, used for messing. The Kangaroo is modified from the standard design, with the port forward bulkhead here pushed out into some of the space used as the Captain's Office, for use as a small galley.

Forward of this is the bridge. Aft, in the center is the Captain's chair, with  a variety or read outs. It also has the ability to takeover any other bridge station. Forward, are on the port side the pilot's console, and starboard the astrogator's station. The two forward most stations are multi-function stations, but normally the port side one is set up as engineering control, and the starboard as sensors. The turrets can be controlled from here, but this is considered to be doctorinally inferior to local control with the captain selecting targets. The forward most section of the ship is the electronics bay, full of the radar, lidar, and other sensor systems. Most of the equipment is mounted in standardized modules easy to swap out to repair. At the aft end of the bridge, there are two small spaces. On the port side, the captain has a small office, this is also where the ship's in port routine is conducted. The starboard has the ship's locker, and stores the vacc suits and small weapons. Heavier weapons are stowed with the Battle Dress. This space is normally locked.