02-Z42-Jackrabbit Mid-Bulk Transport (Class C)

[OneSeventeen]

I am running a GURPS campaign set in the Firefly universe with the intent of telling the same kinds of stories as seen on the show. Thus, the PCs are a sort of grab-bag collection of people on a small freighter trying to make their way in the Verse. Since Serenity plays such a big part in the show, I felt like we needed a way for the ship to really feel present. I decided that big 24x36 poster-sized deck plans would do the trick.

I did a ton of preliminary sketches trying to decide what shape the ship should have from the outside and how things should be laid out on the inside; decided which rooms are required and why you might put them next to which other rooms, etc. I wanted the ship to feel sort of like Serenity, so I decided that the Jackrabbit class was made by a competing manufacturer as a sort of me-too design to the Firefly class. The Mark 2 Jackrabbit (seen here) came out somewhat after the Mark 3 Firefly (of which Serenity is an example) and you can see some common design decisions/plagiarism. Overall, though, the Jackrabbit is a smaller vessel; much more compact.

I started out in Google Sketch-Up and made several passes, but eventually had the whole ship modeled out to a level of detail that would look good (I think) on a map. So then I exported a bunch of images of the model all cut up and layered them together in the GIMP. I did all the icons and font stuff in the GIMP, as well. The Chinese is probably very poor and is courtesy of Google Translate.

In any case, the maps:
jackrabbit_map_deck_1_04.pngjackrabbit_map_deck_2_04.pngjackrabbit_map_deck_3_02.pngjackrabbit_map_lateral_cut_02.png

I painted one wall of the room where we play with magnetic paint and hold these and Quantum Mechanix's Map of the Verse to it with neodymium magnets so we can take them down and put them up at will without destroying them or the wall with tacks. They turned out WAY better than I'd hoped. These have a couple of touches of color, but they're printed in black-and-white (since I was using the plotter at my wife's office, I thought asking for color ink would be a bit much of an indulgence).

So... whatcha think? Feel free to ask any questions and whatall. I spent... a significant amount of free time on this project.


117

[Coyotemax]

omg those are awesome.

as a huge fan of Firefly, I have to say you really did capture the feel, and the process to come up with the ship, and the class.. that was very well thought out. Feels very authentic. And holycarp that's a goodsized printout!!

yknow, it occured to me.. it's too late now, but you could have had it set up with a sensor array that opens up over the cockpit for extra range/sensitivity .. or a ramscoop type thingy so it looked like it had jackrabbit ears when deployed

[OneSeventeen]

We'd discussed putting radio equipment up there (me and my co-creator buddy), but it never looked right. However, we did stick four rockets on the back. Each is smaller than a Firefly's one big one, but together, they have a bit more oomph. That, and the fact that they're designed to take a raw fuel dump (or some other technobabble) in an emergency means that if you get into trouble... you can jackrabbit.


117

[Coyotemax]

Perfectly fair.. and once again, i'm impressed with the way you worked that one in. The way you describe it sounds like it was picked right out of one of the episode scripts

[Gamerprinter]

Very cool - have some REP!

I haven't played Space Opera, nor Traveller since the '80's, with the Serenity feel - its got my angst up for a sci-fi game. It's been along time...

GP

[Jaxilon]

I love it! Also a big fan of the series and movie. I own them all and think it was a real pity they cut it....the swine.

But you have here an awesome ship that smacks of the setting. I have always wanted to do a game in the verse but don't get to play enough of the homegrown world I have so it's always been on the back burner.

Thanks so much for sharing!

[zaffu]

This is fantastic. Looking at these plans, you can totally imagine yourself wandering around the spaceship. I love that.

[OneSeventeen]

...you can totally imagine yourself wandering around the spaceship.

Speaking of that: Because I modeled it in Sketchup, I can sort of do that and take interior "photos" as if you were doing just that.

This one's standing, I think, on the gangway halfway between the cargo bay floor and the galley level looking back towards the front of the ship (the robotic arm features prominently):

cargo_15.png

This one is looking out the med-bay windows into the crew lounge (note the lathe on the work bench in there; awkward space-sharing):
crew_11.png

This one's the standing in the back corner of the cockpit. It's a small space and didn't photograph really well, but just right of the frame is the suit locker and just left is the nav computer. Sticking down into the top is whatever device Mal addresses the crew at the beginning of the film with his, "...slight turbulence and then explode" line:
cockpit_01.png

Thanks, everyone, for your kind words.


117

[Steel General]

Nicely done!

[Ascension]

I could spend years just making these little interior shots in SketchUp, very addictive. I'm very slow and not well versed to make things faster but it's a lot of fun sometimes. These look great, dude.