In response to Catie Helm's post on Zhodani, some thoughts of my own:
The Tavrchedl' (TAH-ver-Chedd-ul) certainly come off as almost superhuman
in their ideals, but no such organization can stay at such levels for
long, and in such large numbers. I see the community monitors as a
type of "beat cop", who must balance public well-being with the local
resources of their organization. Sometimes there can be no balance, and
a society tips over into chaos (in Zhodani terms, anyway).
Where does this idea come from? The old Zhodani module contains rules
for generating Consular space, and a classification similar to the
TAS Amber Zone: Unabsorbed. This classification is based on Port
type (C, D, E) and a die roll (11+). This applies anywhere in Zhodani
space, regardless of proximity to Zhdant. This tells me that, despite
6600 years of Jump Drive and an uninterupted span of government and
culture, the Zhodani still have problems they cannot solve, despite
continued attempts (The "Unabsorbed" classification implies that the
Tavrchedl' are in place and working towards cultural unity).
Once you get under the psionic layers of insulation, the average
citizen of the Consulate is nearly identical to the average Imperial
citizen. There are two main differences: A Consulate Prole has
no self-oriented goals which include social climbing. These are all
oriented on his children, instead. In addition, all proles have that
wonderful feeling of security that a good medical insurance plan gives
you today. This feeling comes from knowing that the "Guardians of Our
Morality," the Tavrchedl', are watching.
Another role I tend to assign to the Tavrchedl' is that of facilitator.
The Guardians' role is that of "keeping the proles happy". The printed
material tells us that this involves "adjusting" an unhappy
individual until he is happy again. This normally involves psionic
or psychological methods. I prefer to extend this to other forms
of adjustment as well. If a prole is not happy in his current
circumstances, despite attempts to make him so, the Tavrchedl' will
determine where he is best suited to be, and make sure he gets there.
SORAG has obtained quite a few crack operatives through this method over
the centuries, as have the Guard and the Core Expeditions.
This is not to say that such changes of career cannot be done alone,
just that those who want such a change, but don't know it, can count
on the Tavrchedl' for help.
With the New Era, and growing social contact between the Consulate
and the Regency, encounters such as Catie describes will be more
common, but not too common. The attitude taken by the Zhodani in
the example is typical only of the more people-oriented nobility,
and the civilian Tavrchedl' (The old Zhodani module didn't give
Proles the Psychology skill). And any Zhodani who made such an offer
without having met (and scanned) the mother-in-law in question, is
asking for a diplomatic incident.
I usually interpret the Zhodani glottal stop as a "hard pause".
Words that end with it do not blend into the following word, but
have a very distinct stop. Words with a stop in the middle will
tend to sound like two words.
Catie says:
<I have noticed that the whole "hard times" flavor of the
rebellion gets editted out of our scenarios, though, and I think this is
an implicit decision on the part of the Ref and players. Playing in
Spinward probably helps buffer the whole "hard times" schtick.>
Before I say more, I should state that I am one of the players in
the 1118 game that Catie mentioned. As this is not a Hard Times era
game, I cannot comment on this part of Catie's post. I ran a Hard
Times game briefly last year, however, and found no shortage of ways
to make the era clear during play. The game was placed in Welling
Subsector (Lishun N), and was much more in the heart of Hard Times.
The Marches never felt the Times, and are thus a poor place for a
"Hard Times" campaign.
Catie says:
<I've not noticed that we have problems bringing new players into our
traveller games, even with the vast onus of traveller history and material
that's out there.>
In the case of the 1118 campaign, this is due to having lots of
open-minded gamers for friends, and because the group is a melding
of two older Traveller groups. Recruiting brand new players is not
nearly so simple. Hopefully TNE will change this.
Catie opines:
<I suspect, however, that the quality of the games has had a lot to do
with the quality of the refs. I have come to the opinion that the
"traveller flavor" of the games, regardless of time-period or rules set,
has far more to do with having a good ref than it does with the imperial
date or the specific rules used.>
In the current role-playing environment, you dare not ignore your
players. A good referee can start a "Traveller Flavor" game, but it
takes good players to finish it (or any flavor of game).
On GDW, Catie says:
<This time last year, I was feeling quite discouraged by what seemed
to be a general lack of interest and/or antipathy on the part of GDW
in what TML participants thought.>
Lest we forget, GDW seemed to be ignoring _everybody_, not just the
TML. Last summer was the hectic time surrounding the release of
Dangerous Journeys. Whatever you think about that game (I DON'T want
to hear about it here, thank you) it tied up GDW's resources and
attention completely during that time (as TNE is doing now).
'Nuff said
James Kundert [email removed]
There was a young lady named Bright,
Whose speed was much faster, much faster than Light.
She departed one day in a relative way,
And returned on the previous Night.
--Albert & the Heart of Gold