[TML] [Merchant Shipping] Some ideas I came up with to make merchant shipping more interesing

[Jerry W Barrington]

On 4/10/08 12:20 PM, "Tom B" <kaladorn at gmail.com> wrote:

> Normally, when unloading, sitting in dock, reloading, fueling, being
> worked on, etc., the starship is usually in a Powered Down state, with
> only lighting and other minimal life support systems running. The
> Power Plant is deactivated and batteries are temporarily taking up the
> slack. In order to lift, or to run combat systems, it is necessary to
> power up the main power plant (unless, for some reason, an ungodly
> number of very fast discharge, high reserve batteries are installed on
> the ship...).

I've never understood this.  Given the effort it takes to restart a power
plant, why would it ever be shut down?  Sure, if you're doing maintenance
*on* the plant, or for running silent.

But the plant poses no danger to the port.  After all, it's running for a
couple weeks at a time anyway.  Surely it's safe enough to keep on in port
for a few days!  And in many places where PCs take their ships, being able
to take off on a moments notice or defend yourself could be major
advantages.

It's not fuel consumption: the design systems allow for the plant running
for a month anyway.  And no reasonable batteries are going to run the ship's
systems for days or weeks in port.  Pay the port for electricity when I've
got my own plant?  I don't think so.

The only reason seems to be so the GM can inflict things on the players
"with their pant down", which is a meta-game reason, not an in-game reason.