Morning from WA. Rupert,

> On 06/24/2020 7:36 PM Rupert Boleyn <xxxxxx@gmail.com> wrote:
>
On 25Jun2020 1417, Thomas RUX wrote:

>> Hi Rupert,
>>
>> Mt Referee's Manual p. 58 "Jump Drive: ...Jump drives are themselves a special high-yield power plant..".

> Ah, right. And they don't require external power, unlike in Classic
> Traveller from HG onwards (and thus the LBB 1-3 '81 versions).

Why would they need external power when they have their own power plant.

> So the original LBB ships didn't require external power for the jump
> drive. From HG (including the original 1979 version) onwards you needed
> power from a power plant.

You are correct based on CT LBB 2 1977 p. 13 "The installed power plant must be of a letter type at least equal to the drive letter of the installed maneuver drive (the power plant may be higher than the maneuver drive) and that from CT LBB 5 HG 1979 onward a jump drive draws power from the ship's power plant.

> Then MT says you don't need power, which TNE keeps (along with MT's
> changed fuel requirements). TNE/FF&S (perhaps sensibly) doesn't discuss
> what a jump drive is (aside from mentioning that it's 35% capacitors by
> volume), just what it does and what it requires. In both cases, being
> able to use the jump drive's capacitors to store energy from a black
> globe implies that you should be able to charge them from your main
> power plant, and logically that should save you fuel, unless almost all
> of it is used for what TNE calls 'displacement mass'.

MT does not say "you don't need power" for jump drives. Power to operate a jump does not need to be drawn from the ship's power since per MT Referee's Manual p. 58 "...Jump drives are themselves a special high-yield power plant..".

> Gah. What a mess.

T4 FF&S p. 12 indicates "...The energy needed to initiate a jump is equal to 64 MJ per cubic meter per parsec jumped. This energy must be provided to the drive in an hour or less (meaning that a starship must have 0.018 Mw of power plant per cubic meter per jump number." Which is a return to CT LBB 5 HG  that the ship's power plant provides energy to the jump drive.

Tom Rux