Greetings Crew,
Well, I got Survival Margin yesterday, and I have to say it is an
excellent quality product. I must admit, after hearing Metlay and
Rob Dean's comment on it, plus the fact that the first half of the
book is dedicated to describing the masochistic death throws of the
game universe we have come to know and enjoy, I was not thrilled by
most of the content of it. I now christen the book by it's
unofficial nickname: S & M.
But basically, what do we have left?
The Spinward Marches is more or less intact. Now remember that the
Marches is *THE* most detailed part of the entire Imperium. There
are PLENTY of worlds in there for the type of adventure that we
have come to enjoy of the entire Imperium. Rhylanor is still
there. Regina, Mora and all the other high tech high population
planets that cause our imaginations to palpitate.
Confession time:
I have always felt uncomfortable trying to deal with the whole
bloody 3rd Imperium. 11,000 planets? I have enough trouble trying
to understand how 240 million people on one CONTINENT can behave
(USA) I can't deal with trying to try and figure out what the whole
Imperium must be like.
I know I know I know. I've seen Wildstar's projections of the
Imperial budget. We all have... Comprehend them? Me? FORGET IT!
S&M says that the Regency is basically the same old Imperium on a
smaller scale. It's... What? 1/8th of the size of the Imperium?
Ok class, now what's Infinity divided by 8?
Infinity. Dig?
The Regency is still too large for me to fully estimate. To say
that the reduction in scale will affect campaigns is kinda silly to
me.
What *IS* lost are the areas of the Imperium that were interesting
because they were DIFFERENT from the Spinward Marches. Gone are
the Vargr-Human integrated cultures of Antares. Gone are the
Vilani cultures of Vland. Gone are the Solomani and their
machinations. Gone are the K'Kree and their... frozen vegetables.
It is a great shame that in order to save the Regency, they had to
close the borders off. If the refugees from these areas had come
in, it could have kept all of what I consider to be the good parts
of the 3rd Imperium.
Still, what *IS* left is my personal favorite part of the Imperium.
The Gveug Vargr are still there. The Aslan Ihati are still there.
And the Zhodani are now the strongest force in the galaxy.
And who's to say that those other cultures WON'T show up in the
Regency? There *are* Vilani worlds in the Marches. There would
have been K'Kree and Hivers cut off from their homelands, cut off
by the border closings. The Solsec agents, cut off from the
confederation could have finally set up the Spinward Marches branch
of the Solomani Party. Now that the Vargr are at least partially
to thank for the saving of the Regency, maybe new integrated
cultures will spring forth.
So maybe we Didn't lose so much after all. We can only hope so.
What has changed? Psionics. BOO!!! I liked psi the way it was.
Hard to get and you better keep it HIDDEN. Despite my strong
interest in the Zho's, I don't like psi. Especially easily
obtainable psi. I'd rather have people use their wits and
technology to get out of trouble. I don't like magic. And face it
psi is just magic spelled differently. The legalization of psi
will decrease the enmity between the Zho's & the (Regents?). Well,
that whole psi and anti-psi bit was too much fun for me. I'm
sorrowed by it's passing.
Ok, so what do we GET for our losses? Well, actually, I have to
admit, the remains of the Imperium start to look a lot more like my
own visions of my own version of the Traveller universe. You may
recall from the 4.5th Frontier War, that my campaigns are almost
exclusively set in Iakr sector (Foreven to you Imps) which is just
spinward of the Marches.
Iakr was a sector I put together from worlds I made up, found in
amber zone articles, bits and pieces I found about Traveller and
even other game systems where I thought the idea was neat. All of
it was outside the Imperium, and 80 % was outside the Consulate.
Sure, things got transplanted around. The Dynchia got pulled in
from clear across the Imperium. I pulled subsectors out of
Reaver's Deep. I pulled 'em out of Trojan Reach & Far Frontiers.
Jungleblut Subsector from FASA was a personal fave.
Well, in Iakr, there are a lot of technologically poor worlds. Or
worlds with weird technologies. I recently made notes on putting
a version of Metlay's Pallique in there. (I think it's a neat
idea, I just don't think it would really work inside the Imperium.)
Some of you may recall the chapters of the 4.5th Frontier War:
Down on Welles. The world I came up with would never fit inside
the Imperium, but outside it worked. It WOULD work in the TNE
Imperium. A world conquered by a Technologically Elevated
Dictator, (equipped with grav powered Ironclads ala Space: 1889)
being invaded by rival bands of space vikings.
I wanted an opportunity to explore the planets I'd come up with.
With every world in the Imperium detailed (or some kind of detail
available to the players) there was no real opportunity for that.
Well, now they're gonna be publishing exploration and contact
adventures for planets which will FIT inside Iakr for me! Lots of
unknown worlds surrounded by technologically advanced power hungry
neighbors. (But don't count on me to be running a boot strap or
virus campaign any time soon.)
And furthermore, (if S&M's quality is any clue) these worlds will
be well thought out and free of typos!
About Longbow, I have my suspicions. Longbow was supposed to
started long back five hundred years back. TL 10-11-12? Well, it
either sounds like a long range faster than light communications
system, or what I'd consider more likely: Stutterwarp. By making
it TL 10-11-12, that way it makes Stutterwarp a lot easier to
obtain. Alternately it could be the Star Gates again.
All in all, I guess I'm looking forward to TNE. Ya'll hear that?
I'll buy. It has to be better than the MegaTrav setting. I always
hated the rebellion. I just hope there's a good craft & robot
design system.
Scott 2G Kellogg