[gurps] Traveller to buy or not to buy?

[Onno Meyer]

> GURPS TS:Under Pressure I can't get my hands on
> I have Gurps space witch was going to be used for a different project
> the scenarios are what I am looking at
> 
> I am looking at search and rescue, accident investigation like scenarios
> dose gurps have any these scenario in any of the books?

I'm planning the vehicles of the week for the next couple 
of weeks. What are your TL and technical choices? To make 
SAR fun, the TL shouldn't be too high, you wouldn't want 
to make it a matter of activating the rescue robots. On 
the other hand, you need a sufficient TL to spacelift a 
colony on another world. 

According to the old Space books, experimental FTL drives 
are available at TL9 and mature FTL drives are TL10. The 
tech rules don't describe TL9 FTL, however, and neither 
do the Vehicles rules. 

So assume that starships stay in orbit and hence need no 
complete stats, that colonial shuttlecraft are TL9 (even 
if Earth is reaching TL10), and that colonial equipment 
is either ruggedized TL9 (for imports) or cheap TL8 or 
less (for local construction). 

A major decision would be if you want to allow nuclear 
fuel sources (RTGs, NPUs, or MHD fusion) for surface 
vehicles. The shuttlecraft probably need TL9 fusion 
rockets, so the technology does exist, but there could 
be regulations against their widespread use. So fuel 
could be hydrogen (in fuel cells or MHD turbines) or 
biofuel (in internal combustion engines or multifuel 
turbines). 

SAR aircraft could be helicopters or tiltrotors. Fixed
wing planes are used for search and aerial refueling.

Vehicles to be rescued can range from sailboats (with 
or without GPS and transponders) to the occasional
1,000-ton, 500-passenger shuttle. 

Accident investigations could range from human error 
and freak waves to foul play involving TL10 gadgets. 

At a fully developed TL10, reactionless thrusters and
fusion reactors would allow vectored-thrust VTOL craft.
They would have a minimum size around 20 to 50 tons and
would be orbit-capable. On the other hand, they could 
bull through bad weather and maneuver in close quarters,
and they would give the campaign global reach ...