"Hi team, we've got an interesting problem this time. "Our shipyards at Lunion want a small civilian transport, something for small high valued cargoes, something that won't stand out in a crowd and attract unwanted attention."

"Lunion?"

"Lunion."

"Are they looking for jump-4 capability?"

"It's not on the list."

"Then why Lunion? I mean, if you want something inconspicuous, you could just put some fake demountable fuel tanks into one of the A1 designs they build on Carey and hide a stealthed G-Carrier. "If that's not okay, there are lots of things you could do to one of the C-4b designs on Mora. But a civilian design on Lunion is going to attract attention. Unless they want an X-boat."

"An X-boat? Operating independently? that's going to attract attention from the tender, never mind every other ship in the system. Very subtle."

"So what does Lunion offer us?"

"Compared to Mora? A cheaper ship. Compared to Carey? A smaller fusion plant. I mean, we could use one of the older yards and build a low tech design but the management on Fornice aren't going to like that. They want something that shows the unique abilities of their yard."

"Well there's no point licencing a C-4b design as a starting point, it would just shout 'low tech wannabe' next to the real thing and there would be enough problems putting in the things that are supposed to be there without trying to fit anything extra."

"So how about building a low tech A1 but using higher tech part?"

"To get more cargo space"

"No, to have a fusion reactor that looks like some ancient monstrosity but which is 45% empty space."

"Not bad. let's go further, how about starting with an Original Tech A2 - you know, one of the Vilani Saucers?"

"That heap of junk? The fission reactor gives it a unique signature - no one would be fooled if we put in a real power plant. Plus you can't find a crew for one."

"No the fusion/HEPlaR version, it's jump 2 with 54dT cargo and four passengers. And with all that excess power, it's very popular with speed freaks. Trade down to jump 1, put in two extra drives and it will pull 5G empty.

"Plus, the basic design has been around since the First Imperium and there are so many variations that no one will spot ours."

Conference Notes

In the Mora subsector - Carey is TL-B and Mora TL-F. Nearby Lunion is TL-D. The C-4b design is a TL-15 update of the A1. Commonly referred to as a Beowulf.

At TL-B you get the choice of Fusion + HEPlaR + Jump 2 which is expensive for 200dT because of the minimum 400MW fusion plant (so you might as well have Jump 2) or Fission + Thrusters + Jump 1 + unstreamlined (because HEPlaR requires Fusion and Fission needs lots of surface area.) The jump 1 design can shift 137dT for 40MCr (at 20% discount) The jump 2 design can shift 65dT for 56MCr (at 20% discount) - but I traded 9dT from 5 small staterooms.

Personally, I don't like thrusters if I can avoid them so I usually use HEPlaR + contra-grav. I've been pretty mean on the HEPlaR fuel, so if you are intending Jump 2, the ship is advised to coast out to the jump point after only an hour or so accelerating ie about 8 hours.