A High Guard/Trillion Credit Squadron Scenario.
Somewhere on the Imperial frontier, two budding trade companies are having a dispute about access to a valuable resource planet. The local Imperial presence has turned a blind eye, and a series of miscalculations, called bluffs and provocative incidents have led two squadrons of armed merchants into a shooting war.

Overview:
This scenario is intended to match two squadrons of armed civilian merchants against each other, with trade rights as the goal. Each side will have to follow some very strict design limitations, to reflect the Imperial regulations on merchant vessels and some of the realities and customs of merchant economics.

Victory Conditions:
This is a battle for trade rights in this system, and in neighboring ones as well. Therefore, each side gains victory points (VP's) for surviving cargo space, both in this system and elsewhere. The most valuable cargo spaces are those which can be landed on the planet, either by the ship itself, or by small craft with cargo space equaling 10% or more of the ship's cargo space. Streamlined ships are considered to be too busy landing and loading/unloading their own cargo bays to contribute their cargo spaces to the unloading of unstreamlined ships. Small craft cargo spaces can be used for victory points themselves, and to assist unstreamlined ships, as the small craft are considered to travel aboard their mother ship loaded with cargo.

Ships are assumed to be able to replace crewmembers and make up to five repair attempts before calculation of victory points.

Captured ships may score victory points for the capturing player, if they can be sufficiently repaired as above.

A ship that still cannot maneuver or jump after post-game repairs cannot transport cargo, and therefore cannot score any victory points.

Points:
For each surviving ton of cargo space that can be landed on the planet: 5VP.
For each surviving ton of cargo space outside the system, or that cannot be landed: 2VP.
The side with the most victory points wins the battle.

Setup:
Each ship sets up either in line of battle or the reserve, and the range is initially long. All ships are fully fueled*. No small craft have been launched. Any ship capable of jump may jump out during the battle as per standard High Guard rules, as each side is considered to have a base one parsec away from this system. Ships may break off by acceleration, but small craft may not.

Special Rules:

Fighters: No small craft may use any optional fighter rules, such as squadrons or close attack, as these craft are crewed by civilian pilots instead of trained naval officers.

End of Game:
The game ends when one side has no ships remaining, or when both players agree to end the game.

Squadron Parameters:
Budget of MCr2000. Tech Level 12. Squadron Jump-2, all vessels 1G. Squadron ocean refueling required. 20 Pilots. Frontier Merchant design limits as detailed below.

Frontier Merchants:
The Imperium has set both customary and legal limits on merchant ships, differentiating "armed merchants" from "starmercs". Further limits are set by customs, practices and economics of the trading business. For purposes of this scenario, all ships must follow these design guidelines.

Equipment Availability: All ships are considered built at a Tech Level 12, Starport A base. Higher and lower tech equipment is available for purchase at the rate of exchange from the appropriate Trillion Credit Squadron table. Player's credits are local to the Tech Level 12 base, they are not Imperial credits.

Drive Limitations: No Power Plant or Maneuver Drive may be installed with a higher rating than the ship's Jump Drive. Small Craft may not install a Power Plant or Maneuver Drive with a rating greater than four.

Fuel: Each ship must carry at least enough fuel aboard to allow one month's fuel for the power plant and one jump at the maximum rating of the Jump Drive. No special fuel tanks (drop tanks, collapsible tanks, etc.) are allowed.

Computers: No computer may be installed with a higher rating than the ship's Jump Drive rating. Bis computers are not required. Small craft are limited to computer ratings of two or less.

Auxiliary and Backup Systems: Backup bridges are allowed as normal. Backup drives and computers are allowed, but each must be at least one factor lower than the primary system.

Weapons: Only beam lasers, pulse lasers, sandcasters and turret-mounted conventional missiles may be used. Battery size is limited to one turret per battery.

Defenses: No armor, screens or repulsors may be used.

Crew: Each crew member must be allocated a full-sized stateroom. No frozen watches are permitted. Additional crew may be carried to allow crew replacement as a frozen watch, but each such crewman must be allocated a full sized stateroom. Marines are not available, but any number of Ship's Troops may be carried.

Lifeboats: Every ship must carry small craft with enough low or emergency low berths to allow one berth per stateroom on the ship. These small craft may not be armed, though they may transport cargo. If a small craft is a dedicated lifeboat (that is, any cargo space it has will not be counted for victory conditions), then it does not need any dedicated crew.

Cargo: Each ship and armed small craft must dedicate at least 25% of it's total hull to cargo. Dedicated lifeboats (above) are an exception to this rule.

Optional Rule: Each player must spend at least half of his or her budget, then present all details of ships built so far to their opponent. The remaining budget may be spent in secret, on both new ships and refits or upgrades to existing ships.
 

Footnotes
* All ships are fully fueled because this is a battle by consent - both sides have been present in this system for some time before things got out of hand. As a design issue, the intent was to make running a viable tactic in this scenario, especially if you built a lot more cargo into your fleet than your opponent did.

Traveller, High Guard and Trillion Credit Squadron are all copyright Far Future Enterprises. This page is copyright 1999 Walter G. Smith

I'd like to thank Joseph Kimball and the rest of the ct-starships mailing list for their input, they've been a great help in improving this scenario. Several have volunteered to playtest it as well, I hope to put up some battle results presently.

ct-starships is a mailing list dedicated to Classic Traveller starship design & battle simulations, available from EGroups.