I'll begin with a 'bug' of some sort: The specie currency is listed as
Copper Cr0.2 50g, Silver Cr10 30g, and Gold Cr300 30g. I do not doubt for a
second that this comes from the markets convention of listing the current
price of gold in dollars per troy ounce (about 30g) which is around $350 today
I think:)
The trouble is that 30g coins get awfully large. The old and rightly
disdained AD&D 1st edition "gold piece" came ten to the pound, which indicate
a weight of 45g. Even 2nd edition AD&D coins have much more resonable weights.
So I propose that the weights and values are to be divided by five, except
for the copper which is divided by two. Still too large but less too large
because otherwise the value gets too low.
This, btw, ignores any problem with unstable metal prices.
Now, on to Earth:
Earth Now has an UPP of (E867972-8 514) adapted from a template in The
Traveller Book. Earth 1121 has (A867A69-F 414). Earth when the Long Night
begins should have an UPP of (A8*7***-C *14) where the atmosphere might be
normal or normal-tainted, The population is probably around 8 to 12 billion,
The government might be considered a 4 (representative democracy) or an 8
(civil service buerocracy) depending on how you view the UN and how it might
evolve. The lawlevel is almost totally irrelevant and the techlevel is 'C'
because the Terrans got jump-3 during the Interstellar Wars.
Depending on wether you regard the Solomani Rim during the Long Night as a
Frontier or an Outland different outcomes are possible. The S&A talks about
raiders from the chaos inside the ROM, and some Aslan incursions, so I'm leaning
towards Outland, but it is not certain.
Columns of letters are all the different values that can occur. Columns
marked with * are those where the changes result from Hard Times effects. Only
the extremes will be listed for the lawlevel figure. Xeno is the effective
xenophobia of the planet, it is the number of levels the lawlevel is higher
for outsiders than for natives. Isol lists if the planet has a *chance* of
becomming isolationist.
Frontier:
* ** * Xeno Isol
Possible UPP: A877A40-C 814 0 N
B 6 95| B 9 1
C 78 A 0 2
8 9 1 3
9 8 2
Outlands:
* ** * Xeno Isol
Possible UPP: A877A10-C 814 0 Y
B 6 94| B 9 1
C 58 A 0 2
D 6 9 1 3
7 8 2 4
8 7
9
While we should remember that Hard Times only talks about the Twilight
period of a Night, 20 years out of 1800, I think that it shows that
balcanization is a possible outcome. A prerequisite for balcanization is
however that the government was a representative democracy before.
- -bertil-
PS: Regarding balcanization: It is a very interesting word in that it exists
in Swedish but is (was) almost never used, except by historians and
people who play Traveller. When I noticed this, I begun to ask people who
used it if they played Traveller, and three out of the four who used it
did:)
- --
"Why is it 'Solomani and Aslan' and 'Vilani and Vargr' and not 'Aslan and
Solomani' or 'Vargr and Vilani'. That would be the alphabethic order, you
know!"
"*Real* travellers use UPP instead of UWP!" :)