[gurps] What good is microgravity to a spacer?

[Onno Meyer]

> > Take a setting without artificial gravity and without engines
> > which allow continuous acceleration. That leaves only spin to
> > simulate gravity.
> >
> 
> First thing to remember is, unlike traveller, in a realistic setting,
> ships
> will be either be for inter-planetary use or for surface to orbit use.  

Both as a player and a GM, I have found the problem of separating 
PCs from their starship a challenge and a disruption. The problem
gets magnified if the plot has to juggle ships AND shuttles (or 
ships and high-end air/rafts in the case of Traveller).

* For a team of scouts or the like, the starship is their only 
  way home, plus their greatest stockpile of gear. It was just
  logical that they should assign some of their party to guard 
  it. A subcraft closer to the action (be it a shuttle, air/raft
  or ATV) again needs a driver or pilot to guard it. A three-way
  party split unless there are enough NPCs.

  My last GM had the bright idea that the PCs of absent players 
  should guard the ship as temporary NPCs, which caused many odd 
  plot twists when an encounter lasted longer in realtime than
  planned, and the players were back a week later. Then we had 
  crummy coincidences to get the party united again ...

  As a GM, I told my players that properly parked vehicles had
  'plot immunity'. Any threat to the vehicle would materialize 
  while characters were in range to do something about it, not
  while they were away. That worked halfway, but sometimes it 
  stretched the suspension of disbelief.

* The other side of the coin is that an orbiting ship with a 
  backup shuttle can provide a deus ex machina for dirtside 
  action. What good is a velociraptor-lookalike nesting in 
  the airlock if they can call down the second shuttle with
  a big tranquilizer gun?

In my experience, shuttles work best if the ship and shuttle
are supposed to go away before the real story begins. "We'll 
be back next year with the first colonists. Have fun."

> So
> you won't have streamlined ships, except for shuttles.  

I will, for the reasons outlined above ... 

> That means you'll
> have ships that can be quite a bit larger radius than they would be for
> their volume (two compartments, separated by a long cable, spinning
> perpendicular to the thrust axis, for example.)

That would be an option for paired atmosphere-capable ships,
too.
 
> that gives you numbers a whole lot better than 0.03 g.

Perhaps for the big liners plying established routes. Not for 
the ships which go into exciting places :-)

So my question stands -- does it make sense to spin a 30,000-cf
streamlined spaceship for 0.03 G, or is that the worst of both 
worlds?