In Archive-Message-Number: 6084, [email removed] (Jo Jaquinta) writes:
>
>The first thing I hit was _Ask Commodore Bwana_. "As a fictitious
>[sic] amalgamation of numerous letters and phone calls, I would
>like to know..." My eyebrow raised, and I thought about sticking
>my fingers down my throat.
>The "Traveller News Service" really did make me puke. It was a full
>page of complete gibberish. Sort of like typing an executable file.
>This infuriated me. "How dare they!"
We should probably bear in mind that different viewpoints are
present here. I bought a copy of Challenge 70 last week, and when I
got to the Traveller News Service page, I almost fell over laughing.
I thought it was hysterically funny. I told the fun folk at GDW that
on GEnie, too.
It seems to me that being unamused by the joke is understandable,
as senses of humor differ. Being angry, however, strikes me as being
a bit extreme.
>So they killed the Imperium.
They killed *their* Imperium. This is an important point. In *my*
Traveller games, the rules system changed, but the background didn't.
The Rebellion never happened, the Virus isn't going to happen, and
technology will continue to develop and improve unabated by any
catastrophe. In my universe, the average tech level of the Imperium
is right around 17. You see, I *like* technology. ;-)
I haven't bought a copy of TNE yet. I'm waiting for the boxed
set. I may or may not use the game system. I won't, however, use the
background. There will be no Virus in my game--I'm the GM, and I can
do whatever I want. ;-)
That *is* the whole point, isn't it? You can do anything you
want. There's no reason to be constrained by the published materials
if you don't want to. Why get angry over something that doesn't
affect you if you don't let it?
>quashes all this with some sort of convoluted (implausable) story
>involving different branches of Imperial espionage working at
>cross purposes which was the "real" cause fo the promulgation of
>the virus. Sounds rather like the FBI, CIA, DEA, NSC...
Oh, on the contrary--all *too* plausible. It happens all the
time. I've worked for various branches of the US government in the
past (civilian and military), and I've seen it happen. The right hand
department has no clue what the left hand department is doing, because
the *other* left hand department has fed it disinformation.
Yes, it really *is* that byzantine on a day-to-day basis.
>For the science-fiction fan who finishes a
> novel only to wonder what happens next...
>For the fan who wishes they could be there,
> if only for a few minutes...
>When just reading isn't enough...
> ...there is Traveller
>
>*That* is my Traveller. I could not better put it. Endless
>posibilities in a limitless world. The bright joy and wonder.
>Shining spaceships, dubious traders, mysterious aliens.
>But then, that was then.
Still is, if you want it to be. The game is only as limited as
your imagination. From what I've seen and remember (there've been a
couple of breaks, but I'm one of the original members of the TML),
that's not very limited at all. Just exercise your creativity neurons
a little and build a new world.
>Why has the game I so much respected come to look like the world
>of the politicans I respect so little? Is The Great American
>Guilt Complex over the State of the World more than just a myth?
>Does this represent how it is being internalized even as far as the
>games industry?
It is a myth. Let's be serious, shall we? The average 'Murrican
doesn't waste one split microsecond of guilt over the state of the
world. Frankly, we're a bunch of natural isolationists. Sure,
there's a vocal (*very* vocal, unfortunately) minority that noises off
incessantly, but for the most part, we don't care.
No, actually, it's general 1990s pessimism speaking. The world
is a festering mass of fecal matter, and all we can expect in the
future is more of the same on the long slide downhill into chaos.
That's where Virus came from.
>I *don't* play Traveller for escapism.
Um, well, okay. I *do* play Traveller for escapism (it *is* a
- --
Brent Woods
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