 May 27, 2011 - 8:12pm | Got to tour the Mexican Navy's training ship which is a tall ship It got me thinking about training ships in the Frontier What do they look like? chemical engines? HS 5 with chemical engines and configured to land on a planet? or would they have atomic engines? hard to imagine what would be the SF equiv of sails I'm guessing at least 1 LB and 1 Torp for weapons- it is a training ship and that would let officers with either space ship gunnery skill be trained. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
May 27, 2011 - 8:19pm | Personal belief: in the Capella system the planets Homeworld and Faire have large bodies of water; book says that Faire is a water world with 5 islands. I beleive that wet water sailing is actually the tradition that the CFM evolved out of and that wet water sailing continues to be a passion with ifshnits. Thus part of your accademy trianing for the CFM, if you're an ifshnit, is a tour on a wet water ship. So i can easily see the CFM having training ships that are sail powered. Its all very romantic but the captains that took the time to do a tour on such a ship is often fast tracked to his captaincy of a interstellar craft. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 May 27, 2011 - 9:09pm | I understand the point of cadets going on a training mission, but surely the only reason here on earth they take out sailing ships is because its navy 101... AND ALL OUR SHIPS TRAVEL ON... you guessed it, water. I would think that training ships in a SF setting would be the same sort of 101 where you'd train on a very basic space going vessel (chem drive, 1 LB, 1 RB, maybe Tx1) and likely nothing bigger than a HS 6. The basics prepare you for the intermediate, then for the advanced. If they for some reason used a water going vessel to train cadets destined to be on a space going vessel, I'd think they would at least use a submarine instead of a one-plane surface going ship (and sails?). My SF website izz: http://ragnarr.webs.com |
 May 28, 2011 - 6:15am | Who's doing the training, that they need to dedicate a whole ship to it? Spacefleet, or some merchant line? Hmm, could there be a corporate-run Spacers' Academy? Or small-time schools? IMO, an awful lot of spacer training is probably done with simulators (on planet or on a station) and OJT on working starships. |
 May 28, 2011 - 6:23am | Maritime technology doesn't have to be based on the Cloth-sail. I am rather fond of the alternative wind powered ships being in common use by alien maritime histories. Consider that the early Norse ships could have supported Windmill Driven, Turbo-Sails, or Plane-Sails on their designs, and these technologies don't require high-tech implementations to be successful, or even better than traditional Sails. Very radical histories of some aliens could even attribute early maritime technologies, to large mason-battery power decks, to used to run electro-magnets, or something, for electro-magnet hydro-jets. (since I give Dralasites holographic technology that predates their own 'renaissance era' equivalence, such alien-anachronisms are fine by me, when used sparsely). I agree submarines would make more sense as a space-trainer alternative. Assuming you couldn't just keep a few small transports, patroling around the close-system ports, to train on readily. Computer VR-Sims only get you so far as they are not fully-immersive, and Holo-Sims are not available for the 'full ship experiance' like holodecks would be, but I am sure those would both be useful when a full trainer isn't available. Oh humans!!  We discover a galactic community filled with multiple species of aliens, and the first thing we think about is "how can we have sex with them?".~ anymoose, somewhere on the net... so... if you square a square it becomes a cube... if you square a cube does it become an octoid? |
 May 28, 2011 - 6:07pm | Ah Civilians they usually miss the point. The American Navy still uses the USS Constitution (Old Ironsides) as a training vessel and I am certain other navies have similar vessels. They are usually manned by cadets attending naval academies and some permanent personnel. The purpose of these ancient training ships has nothing to do with skills or preparing for the cadets to be great captains. Their purpose is to instill a sense of pride and tradition in the new naval personnel. Officers are expected to make great sacrifices and put the needs of their service ahead of all else. That does not come without a good deal of pride in service. Serving aboard a tall ship and working closely with other cadets helps helps to foster this. That is why you train on a ship which should be in a museum. Now training on ships older but still servicable ships is done simply as a matter of cost. Ships are expensive. If a ship is still working but not really frontline service then using at as a training vessel makes good financial sense as it can teach necessary skills and keep newer ships toward good purposes. Also remember cadets are not learning to tie knots and hoist sails. They are learning how to lead and solve problems. Putting them in situations they have not faced before gives them the opportunities to develop these skills. Now how would the Ifsnits, Vrusk Merchant Houses, PGC, UPF, Militias and other groups train their future officers? Sounds like a great job but where did you say we had to go? |
May 29, 2011 - 4:16am | @ Rattraveller: thankyou for making the point. good thing is that we can incorporate several ideas for training ships. I can easily see a militia using a chem drive HS5 ship that is so out of date it doesn't even have elevators on it. The ship dates back to the first Sathar War and is kept in continual commission (like the USS Constitution) It may have mounted a different drive during that war but now they just use chem drive for cost and for training purposes. (I seem to remember that 1st level of piloting skill only qualifies you to fly system craft or in other words chem drive) the cannon explicitly states that Faire in the Capella system is a water world and I make the assumption that Homeworld has significant bodies of water 40%-70%. Its not to unreasonable to image that 2 out 3 inhabitable planets could have significant water resources in one system (for the 3rd planet I assume its only just inhabitable and probably more of a barren ice ball). All of that adds up to the ifshnits must have a significant maritime tradition and if you assume that its not a far stretch to think that the Capellan Free Merchants, while a space based organization, probably evolved or had its roots in this hypothetical maritime tradition. So any setting fluff needs to embrace or color the imagined maritime tradition in some way. Pregular system is the headquarters of the UPF so any training ship is likely to be based here and attached to Gollwin academy. However since Space Fleet is tasked with defense of the whole Frontier I doubt they'd bother with keeping a "system defense" craft on the rolls; their training ship would need atomic drives for the eventuality of another war with the sathar as every ship available would need to fight. Merco, being the megacorp that specializes in mercenaries, would fund a spacer academy at Madderly's Star, though vrusk need not apply There could equally be a private academy based at Gran Quivera or Traid I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 May 29, 2011 - 1:35pm | In my opinion the training ship would be more basic than a relic from the Sather Wars. I think it probably would date back to the first faltering steps in space of one or the other races. I am thinking chem engins and rotating parts of the craft to simmulate gravity A La Babylon Five or 2010 a Space Odysy. Reasonable men adapt to the world around them; unreasonable men make the world adapt to them. The world is changed by unreasonable men. Edwin Louis Cole |
May 29, 2011 - 3:29pm | Exactly, I don't see a lack of training vessels being an issue... considering how they are usually picked for the role. But yeah, something too old, probably wouldn't be any nicer than a computer-sim, Ironsides aside. At what level of training is the ship to be suited for? Those points offered by rattraveller are without a doubt valid for their own merit, but not the only reasons for a training vessel, especially in a young historical framework, where tradition is still evolving a foundation. A Sathar War relic would be preferable for officers testing, but a pre-contact chem-thrust gun boat design would suffice for basic environmental, crew cohesion, and gunnery training. A submarine could still be used in the place of the later in a pinch, strap rockets on it and launch it into orbit even, if you are confident of it's structural integrity and still want the environmental and trans-atmo practice. The starsystem isn't necessarily all that important, any UPF/SF spaceport or starport could have a few 'mothballed' ships, those are then brought out to 'clear the engines' as part of the training programs at that port, simple enough. Comparisons to modern military procedures are good to consider, but so are older and foreign military procedures. I am on-board with the Maritime traditions being ported into the Celestime foundations of the frontier, as the crossover between the needs of the two are likely to develop a lot of similarities of procedure and terminology, even independently or without previous knowledge of the other, this is likely. However, it would be a 'whole-new-ball-game' imho, and Air and Land traditions should be considered equally valid where they can be modeled, and new models should be expected that are not easily recognizable to current perspectives. It definitely makes sense for the Ifschnits, given their background, to have a Celestime founded of an evolved Maritime/Airborne styalized tradition, as these were likely more historically important than land based traditions, as landing fleets would likely immediately garrison and/or hold a conquered target, and be called Portholders, Defenders, or Landhelms, rather than Infantry, Marines, or Cavalry or any such mobile terms. Oh humans!! We discover a galactic community filled with multiple species of aliens, and the first thing we think about is "how can we have sex with them?".~ anymoose, somewhere on the net... so... if you square a square it becomes a cube... if you square a cube does it become an octoid? |
May 29, 2011 - 9:19pm | Basic requirements for a training ship would be engines, guns, rockets, bridge, atmosphere and alot of staterooms. The ship would need to hold the entire class and instructors and some plus room for instruction. Thinking a troop transport would work best. Sounds like a great job but where did you say we had to go? |
May 30, 2011 - 3:58am |  Definitely would work for simplicity, and would be easy to keep a few around.Don't forget, engineers can get training keeping those older ships maintained and refited, also. Even if the refit is removed every few rotations, just to keep it refitable for new crews.  military logistics... isn't always observably logical, but there is usually a method to the madness.That kind of rotation is certainly more economical on smaller, and less complicated, training craft. Oh humans!! We discover a galactic community filled with multiple species of aliens, and the first thing we think about is "how can we have sex with them?".~ anymoose, somewhere on the net... so... if you square a square it becomes a cube... if you square a cube does it become an octoid? |
