Re: TMLs Health

I'm going to respond to James Kundert's post of the other day.  Part of the
reason I'm responding is because I feel responsible (at least in part) for
the creation of both TNE-Pocket and GDW-Beta.

[email removed] [James Kundert] writes:
>  That said, I find the lack of apparent enthusiasm for TNE on this
> list distressing and annoying.  Distressing because of the "It's
> different. I don't like different" attitude which accompanies much
> of the discussion ...

Part of it I'm willing to chalk up to T:TNE being a (relatively) new
product.  For people with established campaigns, I doubt that very many are
switching rules systems, at least until the current campaign is over.  And
while sales of T:TNE have been good, I wonder how many T:TNE campaigns are
starting up.

This would be interesting enough that I'm willing to put some effort into
making a tally.  Everybody out there who's currently running or involved in
a campaign, send me a quick e-mail message and tell me what kind of campaign
you're running in, and which rules system you're using.  Just a quick note,
some thing like "I'm playing in a Classic Traveller campaign in the official
GDW universe".  Send it to me at [email removed], and I'll tally the
results (# of Classic/Mega/NewEra in GDW/Other universes) and post back
here.  I'm interested to know how many of you are playing what.

> ... and annoying because all the big-volume posters
> seem to have fled to the pocket-empire list (a list with "No Loitering,
> Private Property" posted at the door), and abandoned the main TML.

> It got worse when the folks who wanted to playtest the FF&S preview
> material went and formed _another_ list to follow that activity.

The limited distribution of the FF&S preview/playtest material was at GDW's
request.  I created a mailing list to facilitate communication between the
various people who recieved the FF&S "preview", and to try and cut down on
the number of redundant comments we generated and sent to GDW.

If ANY Traveller author wants us to review your material and send you some
relevant and constructive commentary, contact me and we will do our best to
help you.  The administrative address is [email removed].

Membership in GDW-Beta is deliberately kept small, for two reasons.  One is
that it's a working group: lurkers don't contribute to the group's function,
which is to provide pre-publication feedback to Traveller writers.  The
second is that the group's mail is handled by a machine where I work, and
that will only be allowed for as long as the total traffic on the group
doesn't interfere with quark.qrc.com's business uses.

Although the original preview/playtest materials themselves are not
available to the general public (again, at GDW's request), the discussions
and commentary *are* archived, and available from the TML archive site.  FTP
to sunbane.engrg.uwo.ca, and look in the pub/Traveller/GDW-Beta directory.
I try to compile the archives monthly, and the December update should be
uploaded to sunbane before the end of the weekend (although it may take a
few days after that for Dan to make them available).

Now that FF&S is out, and we are unlikeley to have more than the occasional
Challenge (or maybe TTC) article to review, the group (like all
institutions) has developed a secondary function.  We are trying to put
together a "Designers' Companion" for FF&S, consisting of "house rules" and
additional options, and lots and lots of examples.  Expect to see some
interesting and useful stuff from us over the next month or so.

> The TML was left a shadow of its former self during this time.  The
> enthusiasm for these projects that could have infected the rest of
> the list was kept behind closed doors (and still is), and thus was
> wasted on those who needed no encouragement.

These certainly aren't the only projects possible, nor there much "off-topic"
discussion on either list.  One main reason for making sublists is that
IMHO, most of the readers of TML aren't really interested in the details of
Aslan-Solomani-Imperial peace treaties as regards to colonization in
Reavers' Deep in the late 900's (an actual example of a recent subject
thread on TNE-Pocket).  If you are interested, or want to pick up ideas
for your own campaign, you can follow the action blow-by-blow in the
archives of the appropriate group, which are available for public access.

>  Please don't think that I consider these other lists a "bad thing."
> Each has a specific mission that it pursues vigorously (I assume,
> not being a member of either).  Their isolation from this list is
> what bothers me. A Lot.

Well, I wanted to tell you what was going on, and why the separation was
done.  I also agree with you on one point: TML has been pretty quiet lately,
and could use some enlivening!

So, before I go, I'll kick out a couple of questions intended to start some
discussion:

Has anyone besides me noticed what wonderful enemies the Star Vikings make?
It seems like the background and history was tailored to make the RCES
nearly perfect bad guys in all sorts of scenarios.  They're even better at
it than the Solomani were!

What about hivers?  Do you think that they deliberately cause the Rebellion,
or did they do it by accident as they were trying to Manipulate the
Imperium?  They sure didn't expect the Virus, or did they?  They certainly
seemed to recover from it quickly --- almost like they knew what to expect!

What do you think happened to Terra?  My personal feeling is that another
Old Earth Union is too much to expect; given the wars of the Rebellion and
then the Virus, my personal choice is that Terra is probably recovering from
a severe Nuclear Winter right about now.


[email removed]
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                                                     Science-Fiction Adventure
                                                     In the Far Future