On 19/7/25 16:24, David Johnson - piperfan at zarthani.net (via tml
list) wrote:
> /"The /Victrix/was not completely unrepairable, although quite beyond
> the resources at hand. A fully equipped engineer-ship from Marduk
> could patch her hull and replace her Dillinghams and her Abbot
> lift-and-drive engines and make her temporarily spaceworthy, until she
> could be gotten to a shipyard."/
>
> That's a scene from H. Beam Piper's novel /Space Viking/. The
> /Victrix/, damaged in an orbital battle above a primitive world, had
> been forced to land on the planet, its jump drives out of commission.
>
> Have we ever seen something like this "engineer-ship" in /Traveller/?
> An auxiliary support ship able to jump to a downed ship like /Victrix/
> and repair its jump (and maneuver) drives, at least well enough to
> enable it to make its own way back to a shipyard?
>
> Thanks in advance,
>
> David
> --

David,

Not necessarily _seen_, but have spun up something akin to this in a
game I was running, to wit _Parental Advisory_, set in the early IW period.

After The Goofy Holler (27 pc misjump, but safely returned from), the
PCs (and Das Boot) were hired as a pathfinder to an exploration convoy
heading out past Teapot (Ushuggi 2530), under the command of a TCN
officer (Scout branch), Nikolai Nikov.

_Because_ they were heading out past the back of Bourke, Nikov decided
to double up on pathfinders, survey vessels, and what I called "support
ships" - namely, the _Stacey Thomson_ and the _Batteries Not Included_
(skippered by Ahluvda Hudugurusinha and Reginald Hightower,
respectively).  The only ship whose role wasn't doubled up on was
Nikov's "flag"ship, the _Caerbannog Rabbit Fancy_.

Displacing 800 tons apiece, each support ship had a maintenance deck
where the smaller ships (pathfinders and survey vessels) could dock to
do annual maintenance while the support ship was underway - because the
pathfinders were often jumping 3x a month, Nikov had them do annual
maintenance every six months and preferred not to be bogged down if at
all possible by a ship doing maintenance (it was unavoidable for the
support ships themselves and his "flag"ship).  In addition, both support
ships had parts bins, fluid stocks, machine shops, etc sufficient to
manufacture _and install_ new parts (including jump drive parts, but not
whole jump drives) - this was a little trickier for the ships equipped
with Toyota Starshipworks' prototype Lyman drive.  Each ship's power
systems were enough to also support another ship of its own size thru a
complete cold start, via bidirectional power sockets. Additionally, each
ship also had extra thrust that came in handy when towing another vessel.

The original idea (at least for _Stacey Thomson_ and her sisters,
according to Agro Vation, who masterminded them) was to support asteroid
miners by carting supplies out to, and life support wastes away from,
mining vessels, allowing them to remain on-station longer. In the IW,
complete life support systems hadn't happened yet - there was still some
wastes building up that needed clearing out, usually when the ship
docked.  Agro had read his history, and figured it was better to sell
the miners the supplies (with optional delivery), rather than mine himself.

Although not explicitly designed as "engineer-ships", the support ships
did fill the bulk of that role.

Fat lot of good that did the PCs and Das Boot, when they misjumped
another 20-odd pc rimwards and subsequently crashed, killing all hands
aboard.

Alex