Crew Numbers

[ardem (OP)]

The more I look at components and crew numbers, they just do not add up.

If we take some modern day combat vessel and tonnage size, we also look at some star trek, star wars vessels and we look around the 6000 to 8000 ton vessels you will see what I mean.

Admittedly a sea ship it different to a spaceship, but in my opinion they would have about the same amount of moving parts and complexity.

I going to put some modern class vessels up for viewing

Spurance Class Destroyer, displacement 8000 tons crew 334
Ashliegh Burke, displacement 8,135 tons crew 303
Udaloy Class displacement 7900 ton, crew 300
Type 052C destroyer 7000tons, 280 crew

This is an example of a 6000 ton Aurora frigate, which besides technology advances would need a similar crew and armament requirements

9 x ICF drives                 225 crew
3 Guass Canon Turrets      72 crew
Single 35cm Laser Turret  110 crew         
10 Engineers Spaces        100 crew
Fire Control                      30 crew
Active Sensor Ship            25 crew
2 Reactors                       20 crew
Crew Quarters                  15 crew
Fuel Storage                     9 crew
Bridge                              5 crew

Total      631 crew

I won't add any Star Trek or Star War figures as they a purely speculative for what is need in space, but they are considerable less, even so they naval figures.

I dont think the issue is with the single components, I think the issue is that the crew numbers to not scale back with multiple components, such as engines or engineering spaces


Curious on other thoughts, I do not believe it is a game breaker or makers as training I am sure has been made for the size, but more interested with do you feel future space crews would be twice the size of current naval requirements

[jseah]

If anything, space crews will be smaller due to the need to minimize life support requirements.  I would expect starships to incorporate alot of automation, the biggest crew requirement would be for maintenance and damage control. 

[UnLimiTeD]

Well, essentially you could half all requirements, and the capacity of the life support.
I mean, 50 tons to support 250 people?
A third of them will constantly sleep there, and they likely do not share the beds.
Auraro so far has no Automation techs, I'd like to invest in Automatic Engineering, Improved Life support, Cyborg Crews that need less sleep, and others.

[Bgreman]

Using these specific numbers, I divided the crew requirements for each department by the square root of the number of identical components (then rounded up), and came up with a total crew complement of 338, which seems more in line with real world values.

Taking dividing the crew requirements for each compartment by the number of components to the 2/3 power yields a crew complement of 295.

[symon]

These are the numbers that seem most out of wack to me:-
9 x ICF drives                 225 crew
3 Guass Canon Turrets      72 crew
Single 35cm Laser Turret  110 crew         
10 Engineers Spaces        100 crew

The 225 for the engines seems too much and why one laser weapon needs 50% more crew than three gauss cannons is a mystery.

[ardem (OP)]

I do think the people numbers to components are out of wack, if steve was to change this to say 2/3 of the current levels would that cause other issues? Admittley there would be less crew quarters needed however I think 50 Tons for a crew compartment for 250 is too small anyway.
So perhaps not.

[Steve Walmsley]

I do think the crew quarters are too small and the crew numbers could probably do with an adjustment downwards, so they would probably balance out. Perhaps I could add some type of automation tech as well.

Steve

[Napoleon XIX]

Would adding automation not reduce the ship's damage control abilities, given that robots are less effective in such situations? That could provide a handy balance and provide the player with some interesting options.

[IanD]

Just what do a crew of 110 in a twin laser turret do? The turret can train in five seconds, so that’s automatic, there are no projectiles to manoeuvre into gun breeches, there are no propellant charges to manhandle. These turrets are not the 15” gun turrets of WWII battleships but have a similar crew. It must be remembered that in the post-war cruisers of the Tiger class the 6" and 3" turrets were capable of 90 and 120 rpm respectively (allegedly for not very long admittedly) and were fully automatic. The crew do not fire the weapon, so just what do all these people do?

Regards

[Panopticon]

They polish the mirrors, and lift huge batteries charged off the power plants into position, also vacuum tubes come into it somewhere, it's very much like Warhammer 40k crossed with Lensmen or something.

[ardem (OP)]

They belong to the gunners union <smile>

[Father Tim]

Whereas I find the crew numbers a bit on the low side, but then I'm using a different ruler than modern US Navy ships.

Cutter,  25 crew
Bomb-ketch, 30-70 tons,  50 crew
Gun-brig, 100-200 tons,  90 crew
Sloop-of-war, 300-400 tons,  100-125 crew
20-gun frigate (6th Rate), 450 tons,  150 crew
28-gun frigate (6th Rate), 550 tons,  200 crew
32-gun frigate (5th Rate), 700 tons,  200 crew
44-gun frigate (5th Rate), 1500 tons,  300 crew
50-gun ship (4th Rate), 1000 tons, 325 crew
60-gun ship (4th Rate), 1300 tons,  425 crew
64-gun ship-of-the-line (3rd Rate), 1500 tons,  500 crew
74-gun ship-of-the-line (3rd Rate), 1750 tons,  600 crew
90-gun ship-of-the-line (2nd Rate), 2000 tons,  700 crew
100-gun ship-of-the-line (2nd Rate), 2200 tons,  750 crew
110-gun ship-of-the-line (1st Rate), 2500 tons,  850 crew
120-gun ship-of-the-line (1st Rate), 3000 tons,  875 crew
140-gun Santissima Trinidad, 5000 tons,  1050 crew

Though since crewing requirements are irrelevant for anything other than roleplay considerations, I don't suppose it much matters.  If Aurora reduces the crew requirements I'll simply multiply the numbers by five or ten in my head and go on enjoying 'The Age of Sail(ing in Space)'.