Modern Realm Management Question

[Kaelik]

The EU is poorly thought out and internally contradictory, and very often tries to turn Star Wars into something it was never meant to be. Ignore all of its implications on tech levels. I care about exactly two things: The movies and the BioWare games. I could possibly be persuaded to also care about the Thrawn trilogy.

HA*63

Am not get it. Are you object to specific choice of which bits of the EU to ignore ("all of it except Bioware and maybe Thrawn") or to the very idea of ignoring large swathes of the EU (spoilers, Disney are doing exactly that).

I am objecting to the specific choice to exclude parts of the EU but not the bioware games, and more importantly, the fact that he is excluding it for being "poorly thought out" and "internally contradictory" but is once again, totally fine with relying on bioware games and the well thought out not at all internally contradictory Phantom Menace/Clone Wars/Sith, and frankly, the first three movies too. Star Wars movies are not good at world building. Explicitly world building material in the EU is good at world building. He is not just throwing the baby out with the bath water, he is throwing the baby out with the bath so he can take a cool refreshing drink from the toilet of shit.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Also, I haven't read much of the EU, but like... the EU is the only part of Star Wars that even attempts to answer some of the questions in this thread. As usual, a lot of the speculation I did doesn't even rise to speculation level; I just pulled it out of of my ass. I have a hard time seeing how anyone is going to be able to top Wookiepedia, which is at least peer nerd-reviewed.

Hell, they gave a personnel breakdown of the Death Star I at all and my initial estimates were waaaaay the hell off. You might object to the numbers but at least they're there and sourced. If you just use the movies and Bioware games, then where the fuck are you getting your information? I mean, X-Wings look more advanced and shit than TIE-Fighters, but how many pylons does it take to make each of them? If I put out an order for 5000 AT-STs in the next six months when all I control is, say, Kashyyyk and a bunch of enslaved Wookies does my CO say 'lol no', 'I thought you were going to ask me something difficult', or 'we can, but it'll be putting all our eggs in one basket'? Thus if the EU answers this question with a reasonable degree of plausibility, why do you object to their answer?

[name_here]

I will freely admit that the actual EU numbers are totally fucked and all over the place. We're talking the republic having twice as many star systems as clone troopers, because rather than declaring that when the Kamonian mentioned 1.2 million "units" in production he meant companies instead of individuals, they did not do that. At least at one point they listed 3 million for the entire war and later retconned that to 6 million. It may have gone up again since.

Now, people have attempted to mind-caulk that by saying that the clones were more of a smaller elite strike force and much of the fighting was by non-clones, but that doesn't really fit with what they're actually seen doing. While they are often supported by local planetary forces, they and the Jedi seem to be the only real Republic military force that can actually be called on to go invade a hostile planet or defend somewhere besides their homeworld/subsidiary systems.

[Chamomile]

The idea that space ships in Star Wars aren't basically the most advanced and complicated electronics in the setting is totally insane to me, and nothing you've said on this point makes any sense.

-Username17

While it is obviously true that ships contain some kind of electronics, the idea that ships contain the most advanced and complicated electronics is basically you just pulling things out of your ass. Certainly it is true that the most advanced ships will contain the most advanced electronics, which is why you need electronics to create advanced and elite marine units, but the idea that a beat up old junker like the Millenium Falcon is running cutting edge electronics is actually really strange and weird and dumb. It's not contradictory to any of the source material I care about to declare that the bog standard YT-1300 circuitry is really quite primitive compared to anything you could turn a decent profit on in the consumer electronics market.

I feel pretty confident in stating that you don't generally beat navicomps and hyperdrives for complicated.

Yes. These two completely made up magical technologies which are completely ubiquitous throughout even the poorest sections of space are clearly the most complicated and advanced technologies in the entire galaxy. Hyperdrives are most definitely treated like nuclear reactors and not at all like car engines in the stories we see. Good job.

Also, I haven't read much of the EU, but like... the EU is the only part of Star Wars that even attempts to answer some of the questions in this thread

Yes, technically it does attempt it. And the attempt is such a spectacular failure that I have decided to start over from scratch.

[name_here]

Complicated, expensive, and new are all very different axises. The YT-1300 is in fact pretty old. Wookiepedia lists it as entering production 72 years before the Battle Of Yavin. I sincerely doubt that it was less complex than contemporary consumer electronics such as datapads, and I generally expect FTL drives to be more complicated than the other stuff on at least the most basic ships that have them. Since ships too basic to even have hyperdrives have laser cannons, they're clearly less easily obtainable than the primary energy weapon. I may accept superweapons, various special one-offs, biomechanical ships and Interdictor gravity well generators as being more complicated.

Yes, they are pretty ubiquitous. On a related note, think of all the times characters in Star Wars wrote things on paper. You may have trouble recalling any, because in Star Wars consumer electronics are that fucking ubiquitous. Lots and lots of things are basically ubiquitous.

[Chamomile]

Since ships too basic to even have hyperdrives have laser cannons,

Tie Fighters do not have hyperdrives because they are carrier-based craft intended to be mass produced as cheaply as possible. Laser cannons are necessary to their function. Hyperdrives are not. The Empire is very obviously capable of producing hyperdrives, so the problem is not one of capability.

Unless you're referring to something else, but I can't think of any other craft with weapons but not hyperdrives (or any other craft without hyperdrive, period) off the top of my head.

Complicated, expensive, and new are all very different axises. The YT-1300 is in fact pretty old. Wookiepedia lists it as entering production 72 years before the Battle Of Yavin.

So? You might recognize industrial worlds reproducing older designs while only commercial worlds can produce cutting edge models as exactly what my system is intended to accomplish.

On a related note, think of all the times characters in Star Wars wrote things on paper. You may have trouble recalling any, because in Star Wars consumer electronics are that fucking ubiquitous.

And if someone began mass producing Commodore 64s again, how well would that sell? Hand-me-downs pass from the wealthy heart of the galaxy down to the outskirts. You could point out that the same could apply to hyperdrives, and it is true that it could, however I have decided that it does not, and that the Outer Rim is capable of maintaining and creating simpler, outdated hyperdrive models. Unless this contradicts source materials that my players are likely to be actually familiar with, no amount of your throwing a temper tantrum is going to change my mind. Feel free to modify my existing system (assuming you pull your head out your ass long enough to help me solve the problem I came to you with so that I will have a finished draft to actually show you people) to better suit your personal vision of the Star Wars universe if you want, but I'm sure as Hell not going to do that for you.

[name_here]

Okay, I will suggest between 1/3rd and 2/3rds of a population unit dedicated to producing something is employed in production of that thing. More than two service industry workers per goods-producing worker feels to me like it's unreasonably high if you're insisting on low automation, and while you could say that it's rolling in the guys who make shoes and stuff, I think it would make more sense to have an abstract "consumer goods" resource for interplanetary trade. Not all of the productive workers in an agricultural unit are necessarily actually farming, but they probably work for the farming company doing maintenance or paperwork.

Obviously, that's too many people for the player characters to pay for out of pocket. Have them get appointed to head a corporation or government agency. Individuals probably don't need to interact with galactic logistics anyway.

So? You might recognize industrial worlds reproducing older designs while only commercial worlds can produce cutting edge models as exactly what my system is intended to accomplish.

Your system may allow that to happen, but not in a satisfying organic manner, especially as it does not model industrial worlds being able to produce outdated consumer electronics in bulk. This is a significant problem because if you have a campaign that runs long enough for something to move from cutting edge to outdated you're going to have to recalculate the price manually.

Here is an idea that handles both of those: instead of the current continuum, planets have a "development number" that goes from 1 to some other value. Planets can expensively advance their development number or auto-increase after sustained trade with a higher-level planet and both produce and desire goods at that number. Let's say Kuat is development level 5*, as is Coruscant. They both desire level 5 consumer electronics, medicine, and assorted consumer goods. Kuat produces level 5 ships and also probably some other stuff. Coruscant produces governance and level 5 holoprograms and presumably makes at least some of the level 5 stuff it consumes. Meanwhile, the agricultural circuit is level 3 or something and thus wants level 3 stuff and produces food. They can't afford level 5 stuff, but they sell food to Coruscant and go spend the money at a level 3 planet.

At some point, Kuat expends the resources to become a level 6 planet, letting it make more advanced ships and want newer datapads. Coruscant is the seat of galactic governance and can damn well afford to upgrade itself too. The agricultural circuit sees the shiny new datapads the Coruscant freighter captains are coming by with, and the workers get restive and start demanding at least level 4 stuff, which is a minor issue until some more factory tech filters down from Kuat and the planet they were buying from starts making level 4 stuff.

*my instinct for your scenario is to make it arbitrarily extensible so you can staple a development number onto specific ships and smoothly advance from the war droids of Xim The Despot to MonCal cruisers, but obviously you don't want to track too many at once. A range of five at any given point in time sounds good. Or you could have a range of 7 or so and rescale every time you make a jump large enough that stuff which had been cutting edge is so obsolete it's stopped being made

[Kaelik]

Unless you're referring to something else, but I can't think of any other craft with weapons but not hyperdrives (or any other craft without hyperdrive, period) off the top of my head.

I feel like we need some kind of song for you. Ignoratio!

You could point out that the same could apply to hyperdrives, and it is true that it could, however I have decided that it does not, and that the Outer Rim is capable of maintaining and creating simpler, outdated hyperdrive models. Unless this contradicts source materials that my players are likely to be actually familiar with, no amount of your throwing a temper tantrum is going to change my mind. Feel free to modify my existing system (assuming you pull your head out your ass long enough to help me solve the problem I came to you with so that I will have a finished draft to actually show you people)

If your actual standard is, "tell me what I am thinking, because I'm just going to use whatever stupid shit I make up, even if it includes iPods being harder to make than interstellar travel, unless it is directly contradicted by movies that explicitly never address this issue, because they are too busy telling a basic hero's journey story with minimal world building, so you telling me literally anything I didn't decide first is just going to piss me off," you should probably just not ask for help.
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[name_here]

Oh, incidentally the Jedi starfighters in the prequel movies that Kenobi and Anakin fly don't have internal hyperdrives and instead have to dock with external ones mounted on rings. But that's obviously to keep the mass down for combat performance reasons, since the rings can't be cheaper than internal ones.

My point with the TIE series, though, is that when producing a super stripped-down fighter they left out the hyperdrive. That means the TIEs need carriers to move between systems, which is a fact the rebels exploited the hell out of. In turn, that means that the hyperdrive must be rather expensive for the savings to justify the loss of tactical utility, and they're not that big so they must be complex.

I will also point out that the Millennium Falcon has a hyperdrive, shields, and lasers. Admittedly the shields are aftermarket courtesy of the thing being modded to hell and back. The scan-shielded underfloor compartments aren't in the stock model either. But I'm pretty sure that's just because it's supposed to be a civilian freighter and thus theoretically doesn't need shields, since the Rebels have a "Shields for everyone!" policy despite being resource-limited.