First Command - Torchship Captain Quest

Character Sheet
Vehicle Commander Smith
Dakota "Kodi" Smith
Kodi is fascinated with space travel, other cultures, and stories her mama told her about the war. She sees fighting as an unfortunate burden she is taking on to spare others. More of a cat person.
Drives
Investigate Everything, Pursue Truth Relentlessly, Be Merciful, Avoid Social Awkwardness
Relationships
Friend -
Crush -
Rival - Selena Green​
Montana "Monty" Smith
Monty has always wanted to be an explorer, to tell his mom stories about far-away places. Though not inclined to violence, he never backs down. Loves dogs.
Drives
Make New Friends, Be Forward and Direct, Try New Things, Be A Show Off
Relationships
Friend -
Crush -
Rival -​

Traits
Void-Born: You never take complications from 0g or space suits, but take -2d6 to feats of strength and double complications from high gravity.
Shifting Gears: You can spend 1 Determination to switch profiles. Costs +1 Determination each time per episode.
Well-Connected: You can spend 1 Determination to create an old friend, comrade, instructor, etc on any appropriate ship, facility, station, etc you might visit. They are always willing to help if you help in turn.
Certifications
Wild Animal 5+, Physical Instrument 5+, Social Being 5+, Cosmonaut 4+
English 3+, Russian 5+, OSL 4+
Artillery Officer 4+, Drone Pilot 3+, Missile Plotter 4+, Space Marshal 4+
Diplomat +4, Leader +4, Bureaucrat +4, Social Scientist +4
Modern Small Arms 4+, Damage Control 4+
Hobbies: Animal Handling,

Star Patrol Vessel Yeager-1
Statline will be linked above when ready.


Features
Corvette Dock, Transmaterializer

Weapons
x1 Sandblaster, x2 250MW Laser, x2 Probe Bay

Crew
7/42 Crew Assigned!​
PersonDepartment 1Department 2ExpertiseOther Certs & NotesTraits
VC SmithTacticalAdminDemolitionModern Small Arms, Working With Working AnimalsSpacer, Plural, Well-Connected
XO Evelyn Rosa Paz-Admin-SlugthrowersVeteran, Cyborg
SPC Nyiko Shilubana-BolonkinEngineering-Jury-Rigging, FlashfabSpacer
SPC Kroshtnyr SatkolResearch-SensorsAugment (Mental/Medical), Heavyworlder
SPC Selena GreenSecurity--YOUR RIVALHeavyworlder
SPC Kerman Ó CaolaidheAstrogationOrbits-
SPC Ariadna StrunaTacticalDrones-
 
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1-4: Infodump
The next morning, you sat back down in the captain's chair, coffee in hand, and pulled up the data on the main screen.

"Alright, folks, let's take this from the top, cover what we've learned. First thing, what's the status of Holdfast and its orbit?"

"It's scraping atmosphere hard, they're worried they might start tumbling soon," Specialist Paz reported. "They haven't got RCS control without power, so that'd be a problem."

"And the tanker?"

"Gone. Broke up on entry about six hours ago," she concluded. "We found out who they are, at least. They're from the local Aquillian breakaway, the Calesius Compact."

"Aquillians? You think they'd know better, especially," you said.

"Not Aquillians, precisely. They're of a humanoid species called the Trequin. Their homeworld and the three nearest inhabitable planets were colonised by the Aquillians for three thousand years, and they now form a minority on those worlds. Their Compact is an agreement between them and the Aquillian settlers," Specialist Kroshtnyr added.

You let out a long sigh.

"Right, so an historically exploited minority doing something dangerous, so whatever was happening here, desperation is probably a factor. Do we know what the hell was it doing that low?" you asked.

"Holdfast says they suspect they were mining," Kroshtnyr said. "Gas mining."

"All the way out here? That seems wrong. Anything special in the atmosphere?"
"No," Kroshtnyr spat. "It is merely a gas giant with a high methane content. The tanker is an old gas mover, but has been repurposed to carry hydrocarbons from the Compact to the UAS. It normally returns empty, but presumably, they thought they could at least get something for the return trip. We're only about eighteen light years from their border; presumably they figured it was close enough to risk it."

"Well, shit," you said. "Private venture."

"Yes, taking a government contract," she confirmed.

"And this, kids, is why markets suck," I cut in. "Alright. Evelyn, let's talk options. First thing, what's the odds of whatever happened to them happening to us if we swoop in to rescue them?"

"Both the tanker and Holdfast are fusion powered, and the failure appears to be an inability to achieve fuel ignition," she explained. "It's strange, but not unheard of. I've heard of fusion dampening technologies; some of the oldest Aquillian firebirds carried it, but they're lost tech even to them."

Presumably some kind of metric tech, filtered down from K2 civilizations unevenly into contemporary powers. Such tech was hit or miss; because nobody knew how they worked, you could only build new ones by replicating old ones, with no idea what parts were important and what parts were cruft built up through engineering mythology as it was passed between species. It wasn't uncommon for new replicas to stop working and to be unable to figure out why.

"Their batteries and RTGs still function, so whatever it is, electricity still works. Holdfast has a three-person fission-powered rescue pod they say still functions, but it doesn't carry enough fuel to boost the ship. As an antimatter-powered vessel, we should be fine. The corvette, less so."

"We gotta name that thing," I muttered. The vote had been delayed by all the drills. "Alright, that's good news at least. Still, out of an abundance of caution, if we wanted to move them from a distance, what's our options?" you asked. "Open question, everyone."

"Do they have anything they could use as a solar sail? We have a lot of lasers…" Somebody from behind you suggested.

"Not enough to move them, and not without frying them," Evelyn said sternly. "The corvette is fusion powered, that's out. Likewise torpedoes, but their fusion drives are much more simple, they might still work."

"Could we make a fission engine for the torpedoes?" you asked.

"Possibly, but they'd be weak, we'd need more to boost them to safety," she said.

"Well, it's an option at least," you summarised. "Alright. Let's say we go in ourselves. What if we lose power, which I presume would knock out the engines too."

"We might be able to boost to a higher orbit using residual heat with the RCS, far enough to be safe for the time being," she explained. "In an emergency, we might be able to use the fission reactors powering the artificial magnitospheres as a crude sort of nuclear-thermal rocket, but…"
"Yeah, that sounds like a really good way to irradiate a bunch of engineers and then blow all our remass for a sliver of delta V," you summarised. You're such a downer, Kodi. "Alright, so presuming it's safe, how many people we talking about evacuating?"

"Sixteen from Holdfast and seven from the tanker."

"We can just stuff them in the cargo bay for the last leg of the trip, that's no problem at least. Alright, threats in the system, anything technological?"

"Nothing on our scopes," Specialist Kroshtnyr said. "We are in spitting distance of the DMZ, so Aquillian treachery can't be ruled out, but there's no sign of them."

"And this is an empty system, right, no life forms or anything we know of?"

"It was explored seventeen years ago by Gagarin-2," Evelyn said. "Class-F star, six rocky planets, two gas giants, an ice giant, and a bunch of comets and asteroids. Nothing special. They spent a week here, called it a boring system, and moved on."

"Yeah, boring system," you muttered, shaking your head.

"No such thing, I know," Eveyln said. "Valya may have overlooked something, but it wasn't obvious. She was damn good, you know."

You didn't ask how Evelyn knew the captain of one of Star Patrol's famous early missions; you weren't exactly surprised, but given what happened to her, it might be a sore spot.

"Alright, we're almost there. Keep an eye on the Holdfast's transmissions. And loop in the crew, maybe somebody has a bright idea," you ordered, then sat back in your chair heavily. Trying to think.

---

Okay, when you arrive, what's the initial plan?
[ ] Write In

Rules Reminder: You have 12 Insight. 9 of that will disappear unless spent. You are at Alert Level 3, which means you can spend Insight to create Threads: a bonus which persists for the entire episode. Name something specific (a person, artefact, ship, location, etc) which is relevant to the episode, like "The Space Station", or "The Planet's Surface" or "Ambassador Jerkface Over There".

At any point during the episode, when you make a Check, you can invoke up to 3 relevant Threads to get +1d6 on the Check.

You can also spent Insight at any time to create a new crew member. Define their Department, give them a name, an appropriate Trait, and one cool fact about them. They will now accompany you for the episode, and they can offer Help on rolls being made by other characters.

An additional point can be spent on any of the following when the character is created:

  • Giving them an Expertise (in their department or an elective).
  • Giving them a second Department.
  • Giving them another Trait.

You can also use that Insight to assign these traits to characters that exist but are undefined; which would be really nice. It's hard writing around character's Specialities!

Character sheets going up soon… brain hurty tho…
 
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My initial thought is for us to fabricate a laser thermal rocket drone tug that will feed from the Holdfast's own remass tanks. We can then use our own lasers to power it, and we can give it a big enough remass tank so that it can cross a pretty long distance and decelerate on the other end so that we don't have to approach too closely.
One there, it will clamp on to the Holdfast and the Holdfast's crew will hook up the feed line to their remass tanks. Then we use our lasers to power it and boost them to safety.

Ie:


edit: Oh! Our laser are pretty short ranged, but that assumes you're trying to do damage, with a reflector on the drone tug, we can stay MUCH further out! Also, assuming a liquid rhenium heat exchanger, we can get temperatures of about 5800 Kelvin - enough to get us an exhaust velocity of 12 km/sec for hydrogen propellant (I'm assuming that civilian ships tend to default to hydrogen since they don't have to armor their tanks and don't need to worry about thrust density, so the extra dV is more useful to them).
 
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laser thermal rocket drone tug

That's really cool! Would we need to use 3 insight to design the drone specifically for this task?

Tentative plan:

[x] Plan LAZOR BOOST
-[x] launch a payloadless torpedo towards Holdfast to determine the range of the effect
-[x] spend insight to give Nyiko expertise in engineering and a relevant elective
-[x] fabricate two laser thermal rocket drones (as described by CyberEnby)
-[x] attempt to boost holdfast out of the effect's range with the drones
 
That's really cool! Would we need to use 3 insight to design the drone specifically for this task?

Tentative plan:

[x] Plan LAZOR BOOST
-[x] launch a payloadless torpedo towards Holdfast to determine the range of the effect
-[x] spend insight to give Nyiko expertise in engineering and a relevant elective
-[x] fabricate two laser thermal rocket drones (as described by CyberEnby)
-[x] attempt to boost holdfast out of the effect's range with the drones

I don't think so? A mature spacefaring civilization should already have designs for this engine lying around!

Why make two laser thermal drones?
 
As far as I am aware, this is our current roster, out of the ~30 or so people we have on board
PersonDepartment 1Department 2ExpertiseOther CertsTraits
VC Smith (That's us!)TacticalAdminDemolitionModern Small Arms, Working With Working AnimalsLoonie, Plural, ???
XO Evelyn Rosa Paz????Admin?Lasers?SlugthrowersVeteran, Cyborg?
SPC Nyiko Shilubana-BolonkinEngineering?N/A?Jury-RiggingSpacer
SPC Kroshtnyr SatkolSignals???????Augment?, Heavyworlder
SPC Selena GreenSecurity??????Heavyworlder

So for @CyberEnby 's totally rad plan to work, we're going to need a few people (and figure out a way to power Holdfast's remass pumps)
A drone jockey (2 Insight)
An astrogator skilled in Flying with low or no control, aka Orbital Mechanics and Slingshots ( 2 Insight)
Someone skilled with propulsion systems OR with flashfabbing up some stuff OR with jury-rigging (1 Insight)

WAIT!
I just realized
Because of how skills (currently) work, Nyiko is automatically Expert at Jury-Rigging, because he's a Spacer in the Engineering Department!

This plan is not complete, because it only spends five insight out of the nine we need to do, so we need four Threads...

[ ] Plan Kantrowitz
-[ ] Read the Crew Roster
--[ ] Specialist Nyiko Shilubana-Bolonkin is Expert in Flashfab in Five Minutes (1 Insight)
--[ ] Introduce Pilot Kerman Ó Caolaidhe, Department Astrogation, Expert in Orbital Mechanics and Slingshots ( 2 Insight)
--[ ] Introduce Specialist Ariadna Struna, Department Tactical, Expert in Drone Programming (2 Insight)
-[ ] Establish Threads
--[ ] ??something goes here #1??
--[ ] ??something goes here #2??
--[ ] ??something goes here #3??
--[ ] ??something goes here #4??
-[ ] Rescue Op
--[ ] Fab up a laser-thermal rocket package that can be carried by a drone (Nyiko)
--[ ] Program and launch the drone to dock with Holdfast (Ariadna)
--[ ] Hook up the drone to Holdfast's remass tanks
--[ ] Pilot Ó Caolaidhe and XO Paz will use the lasers of the Yeager-1 on the now laser-thermal rocket to boost Holdfast into a safer orbit
 
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As far as I am aware, this is our current roster, out of the ~30 or so people we have on board
PersonDepartment 1Department 2ExpertiseOther CertsTraits
VC Smith (That's us!)TacticalAdminDemolitionModern Small Arms, Working With Working AnimalsLoonie, Plural, ???
XO Evelyn Rosa Paz????Admin?Lasers?SlugthrowersVeteran, Cyborg?
SPC Nyiko Shilubana-BolonkinEngineering?N/A?Jury-RiggingSpacer
SPC Kroshtnyr SatkolSignals???????Augment?, Heavyworlder
SPC Selena GreenSecurity??????Heavyworlder

So for @CyberEnby 's totally rad plan to work, we're going to need a few people (and figure out a way to power Holdfast's remass pumps)
A drone jockey (2 Insight)
An astrogator skilled in Flying with low or no control, aka Orbital Mechanics and Slingshots ( 2 Insight)
Someone skilled with propulsion systems OR with flashfabbing up some stuff OR with jury-rigging (1 Insight)

WAIT!
I just realized
Because of how skills (currently) work, Nyiko is automatically Expert at Jury-Rigging, because he's a Spacer in the Engineering Department!

This plan is not complete, because it only spends five insight out of the nine we need to do, so we need four Threads...

[ ] Plan Kantrowitz
-[ ] Read the Crew Roster
--[ ] Specialist Nyiko Shilubana-Bolonkin is Expert in Flashfab in Five Minutes (1 Insight)
--[ ] Introduce Pilot Kerman Ó Caolaidhe, Department Astrogation, Expert in Orbital Mechanics and Slingshots ( 2 Insight)
--[ ] Introduce Specialist Ariadna Struna, Department Tactical, Expert in Drone Programming (2 Insight)
-[ ] Establish Threads
--[ ] ??something goes here #1??
--[ ] ??something goes here #2??
--[ ] ??something goes here #3??
--[ ] ??something goes here #4??
-[ ] Rescue Op
--[ ] Fab up a laser-thermal rocket package that can be carried by a drone (Nyiko)
--[ ] Program and launch the drone to dock with Holdfast (Ariadna)
--[ ] Hook up the drone to Holdfast's remass tanks
--[ ] Pilot Ó Caolaidhe and XO Paz will use the lasers of the Yeager-1 on the now laser-thermal rocket to boost Holdfast into a safer orbit

That's assuming the Holdfast even needs pumps to move remass to the engines? Most modern design just rely on autogenous presurization combined with an ulage motor (a short burst from RCS to get the fuel gently settling on one side of the tank, at which point the engine pumps can draw propellant directly). A sane design would feature a smaller start-up tank near the engine that's kept topped up for micro-gravity starts, or a dedicated chemical ulage motor.
But we might have to make a splice into the hot gas pipe for the autogenous pressurization system so that it runs from our engine instead.
 
I don't think so? A mature spacefaring civilization should already have designs for this engine lying around!

Why make two laser thermal drones?

I figured that since Holdfast has lost RCS we'll need one on each side to stop it from tumbling while they burn? But also, if there's something funky going on we have a bit of breathing room if one gets destroyed or disabled somehow.

Edit: to expend on this a bit, as the thrusters on Holdfast are irradiated, we probably cant just push directly from the rear while running lines out to the drone/repairing anything that goes wrong. If we have one on either side of the center of mass and they can vector their thrust it should allow us to control attitude while the drones burn without making the orbit wonky. Not sure how much of an issue that would be, my knowledge of orbital mechanics is derived mostly from playing KSP so... grain of salt. Also figured that we have the two laser arrays so powering two at once shouldn't be an issue, speeding up the rescue.

As far as I am aware, this is our current roster, out of the ~30 or so people we have on board

Where'd this come from?
 
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I figured that since Holdfast has lost RCS we'll need one on each side to stop it from tumbling while they burn? But also, if there's something funky going on we have a bit of breathing room if one gets destroyed or disabled somehow.



Where'd this come from?

Hmmm, it's not a bad idea actually, but not so much for RCS (we can just use gimballed nozzles on the drone(s). It's more so that we can put two or three above the Holdfast's radiation line, so that the crew doesn't need to use remote controlled waldoes.

Hmm, on the other hand... what if we just engineer the drone with a plug that sticks itself to the propellant output of their fusion nozzle? Save them the EVA?

[looks at the detailed roster, skill breakdowns, the aerospace engineering, astrophysics, etc.]

...meanwhile me, the theatre majormission specialist:

FTFY :V
 
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Where'd this come from?
Combing through the updates.

Nyiko introduces himself as an Engineering Junior (i.e. he probably only has one department)
Paz is described as a laser jockey, a veteran, has requested permission for a slugthrower, and spent a lot of time doing admin work at the main airlock.
Kroshtnyr Satkol was on a spy station for years and is currently on scopes (I think she might be Signals/Research)
Selena is a Security Senior (i.e. she probably has a second department), and is a Terran. Terrans and Zinovians tend to have the Heavyworlder trait, and Kroshtnyr is almost certainly an Augment.
 
I think "launch a few drones to watch the perimeter" should be somewhere on our to-do list. The first episode of Onward was "pirates lurk near a mysterious anomaly and ambush ships who get caught" and while I doubt Sketch is going to repeat that plot exactly, I wouldn't be surprised if something nasty showed up while we were busy with the rescue.
I figured that since Holdfast has lost RCS we'll need one on each side to stop it from tumbling while they burn?
I think a gimbaled engine would be good enough, if I'm remembering my Kerbal Space Program.
 
Hmm, on the other hand... what if we just engineer the drone with a plug that sticks itself to the propellant output of their fusion nozzle? Save them the EVA?

That's a good idea! Assuming that they're able to operate valves internally by hand?* We could also rig up a drone to transfer power to them with the lasers, or include some of that in the design.

*I don't suppose anyone has seen For all Mankind?S3E1 LOL

Combing through the updates.
Darn, nice! Thanks for doing that

I think a gimbaled engine would be good enough, if I'm remembering my Kerbal Space Program.

Aye, but even if it compensates for rotation, it has to thrust into the center of gravity to change the... oh, there's no reason to maintain Holdfast in line with their orbit. Doy! We just rotate it so that we're pushing it sideways. It's not like there's too much atmosphere, right?
 
I think "launch a few drones to watch the perimeter" should be somewhere on our to-do list. The first episode of Onward was "pirates lurk near a mysterious anomaly and ambush ships who get caught" and while I doubt Sketch is going to repeat that plot exactly, I wouldn't be surprised if something nasty showed up while we were busy with the rescue.

I think a gimbaled engine would be good enough, if I'm remembering my Kerbal Space Program.

I think tachyon sensors render the point moot? @open_sketch, could we get some specs on our sensors? Range/resolution/temperature graphs, that sort of thing.

That's a good idea! Assuming that they're able to operate valves internally by hand?* We could also rig up a drone to transfer power to them with the lasers, or include some of that in the design.

Aye, but even if it compensates for rotation, it has to thrust into the center of gravity to change the... oh, there's no reason to maintain Holdfast in line with their orbit. Doy! We just rotate it so that we're pushing it sideways. It's not like there's too much atmosphere, right?

My understanding is that they still have emergency power? Valves don't take that much energy to open. Some power transfer would be good, but it would require another hookup, and I want to keep it simple unless the need for it comes up?
Edit: I hope they have electronically actuated valves there, since it's behind the radiation line. :p

What do you mean sideways? I've been assuming that Holdfast is still pointed pro-grade since they lost power while attempting to get away.
 
I think tachyon sensors render the point moot? @open_sketch, could we get some specs on our sensors? Range/resolution/temperature graphs, that sort of thing.



My understanding is that they still have emergency power? Valves don't take that much energy to open. Some power transfer would be good, but it would require another hookup, and I want to keep it simple unless the need for it comes up?
Edit: I hope they have electronically actuated valves there, since it's behind the radiation line. :p

What do you mean sideways? I've been assuming that Holdfast is still pointed pro-grade since they lost power while attempting to get away.

They don't have enough power to use rcs:
"They haven't got RCS control without power, so that'd be a problem."
Which I suppose isn't just opening a valve on these ships is it? Maybe they can, or there's a mechanical interlink they can operate safely?


What do you mean sideways? I've been assuming that Holdfast is still pointed pro-grade since they lost power while attempting to get away.
I was assuming so as well. We could rotate Holdfast 90 degrees on an axis, then push it from the center of gravity without having to deal with the drive cone and associated radiation. Might be closer to the remass tanks as well?

But if they can send us fuel through the drive cone that seems like the sensible choice.
 
They don't have enough power to use rcs:

Which I suppose isn't just opening a valve on these ships is it? Maybe they can, or there's a mechanical interlink they can operate safely?



I was assuming so as well. We could rotate Holdfast 90 degrees on an axis, then push it from the center of gravity without having to deal with the drive cone and associated radiation. Might be closer to the remass tanks as well?

But if they can send us fuel through the drive cone that seems like the sensible choice.

If they need power for RCS, them I'm assuming they're using resistorjets just like the UFO's steam thrusters. Without reactor power they can't use those, but the valves should still work.

A lot depends on the construction of the ship. Generally rockets don't like to have force applied amidcraft - they're optimized for longitudinal load transfer, through in this case that might not be the case since we're not applying a lot of force and this is a rescue ship so it would be pretty sturdy. The bigger issue is that I'm not sure there would even be propellant hookups amidships. Plus, rotating the ship will expose more of it to the atmosphere and accelerate it's descent. Might need an EVA too, which is extra time and risk.
 
We can use Threads to establish things like switch SCE to AUX "manual valve release" or "otherwise empty system" or "lots of ice to refill remass with afterwards"

And we're going to need to establish threads anyways, to use that Insight.
 
I think tachyon sensors render the point moot? @open_sketch, could we get some specs on our sensors? Range/resolution/temperature graphs, that sort of thing.



My understanding is that they still have emergency power? Valves don't take that much energy to open. Some power transfer would be good, but it would require another hookup, and I want to keep it simple unless the need for it comes up?
Edit: I hope they have electronically actuated valves there, since it's behind the radiation line. :p

What do you mean sideways? I've been assuming that Holdfast is still pointed pro-grade since they lost power while attempting to get away.
You have the Standard Awesome Star Patrol Sensors. If you were looking at another Star Patrol ship which has no shielding, here's what you'd see at various ranges.
- Ten light years: A fuzzy, inconsistent, and changing energy which might be a very distant quasar but is probably an antimatter reactor.
- Next star system over: A hazy blob whose composition can be read and determined to be a ship or ships.
- 1 light year: It's obviously a ship, you have count and mass estimate and may be able to determine the type of ship.
- Edge of the solar system: You know the type for certain, you know what weapons its carrying and how its using power.
- 1 AU: The ship is an open book. You know its internal layout, the major wiring junctions, and can tell roughly what power its shields are at.
- 1000 kilometres: You know where individual people are in the ship.
- 100 kilometres: You know what the individual people on the ship look like.
- 1 kilometre: you can read the text on their computer displays and make medical diagnosis of crewmembers.
- Touching the Hull: You can read the bits changing inside their computers, though you'll miss a handful.

As a general rule, the two things that stand out on tachyons are energy and atomic weight; the more of either, the more tachyon vectors, the farther away you can tell it from baseline. Reactors of all sorts are bright, ships hulls are fairly bright, people are fairly dim.

However, Tachyon sensors are not completely reliable. They can be fooled by:
- Nearby high-energy events drowning them up (lurking near a star). You don't know its happening, but they have to keep low-energy to achieve it.
- Cloaking devices, via containment of tachyon vectors in an area of warped space. You don't know its happening, but there's tells if you're looking for them.
- Active jamming by the interference from teleporter locks and variations thereof. Very obvious its happening.
- General shielding: Does not prevent readings or lower overall detection distance, but does reduce resolution considerably and obfuscates the locations of crew.
- Rare specialized shielding scattering tachyons; effectiveness varies, works best if you're hiding so the computer discards hits as false positives.
- Tachyon reduction by refrigeration: effectiveness varies considerably with temperature.


They don't have enough power to use rcs:

Which I suppose isn't just opening a valve on these ships is it? Maybe they can, or there's a mechanical interlink they can operate safely?



I was assuming so as well. We could rotate Holdfast 90 degrees on an axis, then push it from the center of gravity without having to deal with the drive cone and associated radiation. Might be closer to the remass tanks as well?

But if they can send us fuel through the drive cone that seems like the sensible choice.
If they need power for RCS, them I'm assuming they're using resistorjets just like the UFO's steam thrusters. Without reactor power they can't use those, but the valves should still work.

A lot depends on the construction of the ship. Generally rockets don't like to have force applied amidcraft - they're optimized for longitudinal load transfer, through in this case that might not be the case since we're not applying a lot of force and this is a rescue ship so it would be pretty sturdy. The bigger issue is that I'm not sure there would even be propellant hookups amidships. Plus, rotating the ship will expose more of it to the atmosphere and accelerate it's descent. Might need an EVA too, which is extra time and risk.
Because of the high energy reactors on all these torchships and the fact that most of them carry water as reaction mass (they don't need the extreme efficiency and frustrating logistics of huge H2 tanks, because they only add extra reaction mass when they need more kick and water is easier to work with, as well as absorbs heat more easily), the two most common form of RCS is either water resistojets, or cutting out the middleman and superheating that same water with the reactor directly. That's what your ship does.

It's a lot more logistically efficient, but it does mean that no reactor = no RCS.

We can use Threads to establish things like switch SCE to AUX "manual valve release" or "otherwise empty system" or "lots of ice to refill remass with afterwards"

And we're going to need to establish threads anyways, to use that Insight.
Not quite. Threads aren't establishing facts about the scene, they're establishing expertise about the facts. "The ship's RCS systems" is a Thread, but "i am declaring the ship has X RCS system" isn't.

Basically, it's you betting that something is going to be important to the story, and if you're right, free dice fall out of the sky.
 
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So we're looking at something lik
You have the Standard Awesome Star Patrol Sensors. If you were looking at another Star Patrol ship which has no shielding, here's what you'd see at various ranges.
- Ten light years: A fuzzy, inconsistent, and changing energy which might be a very distant quasar but is probably an antimatter reactor.
- Next star system over: A hazy blob whose composition can be read and determined to be a ship or ships.
- 1 light year: It's obviously a ship, you have count and mass estimate and may be able to determine the type of ship.
- Edge of the solar system: You know the type for certain, you know what weapons its carrying and how its using power.
- 1 AU: The ship is an open book. You know its internal layout, the major wiring junctions, and can tell roughly what power its shields are at.
- 1000 kilometres: You know where individual people are in the ship.
- 100 kilometres: You know what the individual people on the ship look like.
- 1 kilometre: you can read the text on their computer displays and make medical diagnosis of crewmembers.
- Touching the Hull: You can read the bits changing inside their computers, though you'll miss a handful.

As a general rule, the two things that stand out on tachyons are energy and atomic weight; the more of either, the more tachyon vectors, the farther away you can tell it from baseline. Reactors of all sorts are bright, ships hulls are fairly bright, people are fairly dim.

However, Tachyon sensors are not completely reliable. They can be fooled by:
- Nearby high-energy events drowning them up (lurking near a star). You don't know its happening, but they have to keep low-energy to achieve it.
- Cloaking devices, via containment of tachyon vectors in an area of warped space. You don't know its happening, but there's tells if you're looking for them.
- Active jamming by the interference from teleporter locks and variations thereof. Very obvious its happening.
- General shielding: Does not prevent readings or lower overall detection distance, but does reduce resolution considerably and obfuscates the locations of crew.
- Rare specialized shielding scattering tachyons; effectiveness varies, works best if you're hiding so the computer discards hits as false positives.
- Tachyon reduction by refrigeration: effectiveness varies considerably with temperature.



Because of the high energy reactors on all these torchships and the fact that most of them carry water as reaction mass (they don't need the extreme efficiency and frustrating logistics of huge H2 tanks, because they only add extra reaction mass when they need more kick and water is easier to work with, as well as absorbs heat more easily), the two most common form of RCS is either water resistojets, or cutting out the middleman and superheating that same water with the reactor directly. That's what your ship does.

It's a lot more logistically efficient, but it does mean that no reactor = no RCS.

Not quite. Threads aren't establishing facts about the scene, they're establishing expertise about the facts. "The ship's RCS systems" is a Thread, but "i am declaring the ship has X RCS system" isn't.

Basically, it's you betting that something is going to be important to the story, and if you're right, free dice fall out of the sky.

Are we able to have Holdfast provide fuel to a tug through their drive cone?

So, as a thread we could do:
"Holdfast's drive system" or "vehicle fuel interfaces"?
And apply that as the bonus as we design and or attempt to link systems together?
 
So we're looking at something lik


Are we able to have Holdfast provide fuel to a tug through their drive cone?

So, as a thread we could do:
"Holdfast's drive system" or "vehicle fuel interfaces"?
And apply that as the bonus as we design and or attempt to link systems together?
It's certainly plauslble, we'll find out more when dice hit the table!

and yep that's exactly how it works.
 
Modifying @samdamandias' plan:
[x] Plan Laser Tug
-[x] Read the Crew Roster
--[x] Specialist Nyiko Shilubana-Bolonkin is Expert in Flashfab in Five Minutes (1 Insight)
--[x] Introduce Pilot Kerman Ó Caolaidhe, Department Astrogation, Expert in Orbital Mechanics and Slingshots ( 2 Insight)
--[x] Introduce Specialist Ariadna Struna, Department Tactical, Expert in Drone Programming (2 Insight)
-[x] Establish Threads
--[x] "Vehicle Fuel Interfaces"
--[x] "Structural analysis of Holdfast"
--[x] "Beamed Power Operations"
--[x] "Remass scanning"
-[x] Rescue Op
--[x] Attempt to use a disarmed fusion drive torpedo to determine the extent of the anti-fusion effect (Smith, Satkol)
--[x] Fab up two laser-thermal rocket packages that can be carried by a drone (Nyiko)
---[x] Primary goal is to interface with Holdfast's drive cone for remass
---[x] Secondary goal is to attach to side of Holdfast if drive cone integration unsuccessful
--[x] Program and launch the drones to dock with Holdfast (Ariadna)
--[x] Hook up the drone to Holdfast's remass tanks (via drive cone if possible)
--[x] Pilot Ó Caolaidhe and XO Paz will use the lasers of the Yeager-1 on the now laser-thermal rocket to boost Holdfast into a safer orbit

Included testing the bounds of the anti fusion effect with a torpedo (unsure if insight is needed to bring in Satkol? Might be worth swapping 'Remass scanning' for a skill), and stipulated that we make 2 drones just in case.
 
I would be happier if we spent our remaining 3 insight more speculatively on stuff that will plausibly help us with defending the ship or unraveling the mystery, rather than laser focusing (hah) on rescuing the other ships and crews. If we are able to retain our 3 insight and spend it to create threads when we come across a problem, then we will probably prefer that, but I don't know that we'll get the opportunity.

Here are some suggestions:

- Metric technology bullshit
- Hostage negotiation
- Drone warfare

Also the laser thermal rockets are a great idea and it is great that we are going to get a pilot called "Kerman" and I am very excited.

[x] Plan Laser Tug

[x] Plan Laser Tug + speculative threads
-[x] Read the Crew Roster
--[x] Specialist Nyiko Shilubana-Bolonkin is Expert in Flashfab in Five Minutes (1 Insight)
--[x] Introduce Pilot Kerman Ó Caolaidhe, Department Astrogation, Expert in Orbital Mechanics and Slingshots ( 2 Insight)
--[x] Introduce Specialist Ariadna Struna, Department Tactical, Expert in Drone Programming (2 Insight)
-[x] Establish Threads
--[x] "Vehicle Fuel Interfaces"
--[x] "Structural analysis of Holdfast"
--[x] "Beamed Power Operations"
--[x] "Remass scanning"
--[x] "Metric technology bullshit"
--[x] "Hostage negotiation"
--[x] "Drone warfare"
-[x] Rescue Op
--[x] Attempt to use a disarmed fusion drive torpedo to determine the extent of the anti-fusion effect (Smith, Satkol)
--[x] Fab up two laser-thermal rocket packages that can be carried by a drone (Nyiko)
---[x] Primary goal is to interface with Holdfast's drive cone for remass
---[x] Secondary goal is to attach to side of Holdfast if drive cone integration unsuccessful
--[x] Program and launch the drones to dock with Holdfast (Ariadna)
--[x] Hook up the drone to Holdfast's remass tanks (via drive cone if possible)
--[x] Pilot Ó Caolaidhe and XO Paz will use the lasers of the Yeager-1 on the now laser-thermal rocket to boost Holdfast into a safer orbit
 
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