Traveller Background 14

Gentlesophonts:

>From Tuesday night, Roger Sanger [email removed] writes:

> Therefore, the Regency, the Zhodani Consolate, the Darrian
> Confederation, the Sword Worlds, and all the governments further
> spinward each have a very high stake in keeping the peace and
> tolerating each others' presence.

"Only fools fight in a burning house."
                     - Klingon proverb

> And what of the MegaCorporations?  Wouldn't they want to reclaim
> their companies' assets?

I don't think so.  More like worried their former `bosses' want to
reclaim their Deneb operations!

Where do the megacorps fit in in terms of the Regency political blocs we've
identified?  Certainly, many megacorps will be prominent in the Isolationist
bloc because they'll want to maintain their new-found autonomy.  Megacorps
might also then be expected to support the Autonomists in breaking from
the Imperial past.  In this sense, both the Quarantine and promotion of a
move from `regency' to `independence' or autonomy can be seen as being in
the interests of the major economic concerns in the Regency.  The megacorps
might also support the Aristocrats (since many megacorp leaders are nobles)
and the Santanocheevists because an expansion of psi-talents might not be
good for business (nor would greater accommodation with the Zhodani - at
least not for those in the `military-industrial complex').


James Kundert [email removed] writes:

>  This brings up some good questions, however.  What is the nature of
> "adventuring" in the Zhodani Consulate?  Does such a thing exist
> in the Imperial sense of the term?

Certainly the Zhodani Core Expeditions suggest an `exploratory' interest
in the Consulate.  Has anyone ever run across a Zhodani equivalent to the
IISS?  I would think the Zhodani exploratory service would be similar to
Starfleet in the "Next Generation" era with `counselors' on every ship
to help the crews deal with the stresses of the unknown.


Steven M Bonneville [email removed] writes:

> I'm not sure what will be going on with the Sword Worlds,
> especially considering the partition after the 5FW.

I've always been a Sword Worlder.  (I `served' in the Second Grav Tank Corps
during the 5FW as a result of the *JTAS* `draft' *way* back when.)
We've already noted that the Sword Worlds were the home of the original
`Space Vikings' from H. Beam Piper's Future History.  Obviously, there were
and are Piper fans at GDW but the Sword Worlds never seem to achieve the
`glory' of Piper's novel.

It would seem that the most sensible course for the Domain of Deneb, and later
the Regency, would be to turn the Sword Worlds into an `buffer' state against
the *ihatei*.  The partition of the Sword Worlds following the 5FW, the
natural infighting of the Sword Worlders themselves, and the ability of
the Regency to focus on the SW in light of the Zhodani `rapproachment'
would all seem to facilitate such meddling.

> New scout bases
> (Regency Quarantine Service bases, actually) will be constructed

If the Quarantine Service is the successor to the IISS in the Regency how
does the role of this service interact with the `Aslan-dominated Patrol'
created by Norris during the Rebellion?  [FACT ALERT - I don't have TNE
rules!]  :-)


Allen Shock [email removed] writes:

>    GDW are the aribiters of the OFFICIAL Imperium Space background. They made
> it up, and continue to develop it. In terms of what the OFFICIAL supplements
> say, their word IS "law".
>    The point is, NO ONE HAS TO USE THE OFFICIAL BACKGROUND!
> Even for those who wish to take
> the Imperium and alter it to suit their tastes, such as disposing of the
> Virus
> and even the Rebellion.

I agree but how should we (I?) deal with those responses to criticism of the
official campaign (in effect `altering it to suit my tastes') that say
`such and such doesn't matter' because `it says so in the rule book'?  This
is absolutely true but I don't see how such a response furthers or contributes
to the discussion at all.  IMHO, there's not much point to a discussion about
the `gospel' of the official rules.  That seems to me to be something like
the joke about the guys in prison who just yell out numbers and everyone
laughs except when the new guy tries it because he `just can't tell a joke'.
I can see it now:  TNE page 32!  Yeah, and *PoT* pages 14-17!  No, no.  *FF&S*
page 64 . . . .

>     The one disadvantage of coming up with your own background or altering
> the
> existing one is that there is less support material that you can just use
>"off
> the shelf". However, if you're creative enough to create your own
> background in
> the first place, writing your own support material shouldn't bee too tough.

Another disadvantage is that it's tough to discuss your own campaign on a
public forum like TML!  :-)

> GDW owns the "official" Traveller background, but you DON'T have to use it.

Ah, ho!


Cynthia Higginbotham [email removed] writes:

> From: [email removed]
>
> >Why not a middle ground? Imperial Culture (capital letters, please)
> >that had 1,000 to ingrain itself won't be wiped out by a 70-year
> >gap.  Even the entire Dark Ages didn't wipe away the influence of
> >Rome on, for example, Northern Europe.
>
> Good point.  My idea was that most worlds NEVER HAD an Imperial
> Culture ingrained; that *most* worlds had their own culture with a
> "interface" layer of Imperial Culture among the nobility and the
> starport personnel.  It would be more reasonable to assume that the
> Imperial Culture never *replaced* the original culture on these worlds
> - -- even as the peasant cultures of France and England are more Gallic
> Celt and Angle/Saxon/Celtic than Roman even in the 20th century.  But
> Imperial influence on Art, Religion, Philosopy, Architecture,
> Literature, Language, and Technology might be as pervasive as the
> influence of Roman and Greek cultures in the former Roman Empire.

Well, yes, but won't most of those worlds venturing into space during
TNE be doing so through the *technological* heritage of Imperial Culture?
And won't this make a Revenant [FACT ALERT - I don't have TNE!] just as
comfortable in most Pocket Empires, including the RC, as an ancient Greco-
Roman would be among the Neoclassical `gentlemen citizens' of Jeffersonian
America?  More so even since the temporal displacement is only 70 years
rather than 700?

> However, I see the true Imperial Culture being as dead as the Roman
> Culture is now -- a lot of wannabes shortly afterward, and a
> pervasive, lingering influence on all the "liberal" Arts, but never
> quite the same again.

Say it ain't so!  :-)

> From: zcfbj00 [email removed]
>
> > Seriously, I would appreciate some kind of reasoning behind
> >condemning millions of people to live in a 750 atm pressure,
> >radioactive Hydrofluoric Acid atmosphere with oceans that corrode you
> >if you even THINK about them.....
>
>     I put 'em in orbital habitats, myself.

I face the music - the world generation rules, to be polite, leave much
to be desired.  Being the heretic that I am, I lower the population
level.  I mean, come on, you might find *some* rational for millions of
sophonts in that sort of system (wherever they live) but you're stretching
any reasonable limits of the imagination to do it several places in the
same sector.


Jeff Zeitlin [email removed] writes:

>    Actually, ghettoization is probably the wrong word.  What I'm
>    thinking of is the planet that becomes a "banana republic" - its
>    only source of foreign (interstellar) exchange becomes raw
>    materials that high-tech cultures need but will not pay high
>    prices for.

Okay, but didn't this exist in the Imperium too?  How is this different
in TNE?

>    OK, I finally have it straight, once and for all.  It's NOT in
>    AV.  It's NOT in TNE itself.  It _IS_ in Survival Margin.

[FACT ALERT: I don't have *SV* either!  But if anybody's got a *used*
copy . . . . :-) ]

>    On P30, Strephon effectively makes his decision to abdicate by
>    choosing not to cooperate with IRIS.  That this is his attitude,
>    rather than it being beneath his dignity, is confirmed by the
>    statement that IRIS will "get me out of this" and by (P31) his
>    apparent happiness at his claim being disallowed.  So we know
>    that Strephon has abdicated.

We learned this in *AV* too.  We're told that Strephon refused to
cooperate with IRIS because he was distraught by the violence and
suffering that resulted from his reappearance in Gushemege.

>    to Norris on P51, where he sends Avery "with them" [the AV],

So Avery appears in *SV* too?  Do we learn anything more about him
there?

>    Strephon confirms Norris's assumption of the title of
>    Archduke, gives him Jumpstart, and warns him about Longbow.  He
>    also makes it clear that Norris is the only one left to carry on
>    the traditions of the Imperium.  Recall also the Domain's last
>    words to the interstellar communications network: "We keep the
>    flame".  Though veiled, this can be taken as a reference that
>    they _know_ that they have the only rightful claim to the mantle
>    of the 3I.

Here's an interesting question: does Strephon have this authority?
Also, we (the `real' us) are told that Strephon is genuine but the information
in *AV*, including the ref's info, suggests the PCs, and therefore
Norris and the rest of the Domain, are less certain.  Does *SV* shed any
light to confirm to Norris that Strephon is genuine?  What good is this
`claim to the mantle of the Imperium' if Strephon's identity remains
suspect?

>    Recall, however, that after a much
>    shorter period, a previous regent (during the Civil War (in the
>    600s)) took the thrown as Regent, rather than Emperor, until she
>    was asked, by the Moot, to take the title as well as the
>    authority.

This suggests that Strephon *didn't* have the authority to `pass the crown'
on to Norris.  In order to become Emperor, he or his descendant would have
to be `confirmed' by the Moot - or ignore them like Lucan did.  Of course
if the only Imperial aristocracy to survive is in the Regency then this
issue of Moot approval may become moot.  ;-)

> It is not unreasonable to assume that the same will
>    happen with Norris or his successor, or possibly Avery or one of
>    his descendants.

I agree, but what does this say about the eventual fate of the new
Democrats in the Regency?

> TML::>The fact that the `Rape
>    ::>Trin' became wide-spread pubic knowledge
>    ::>mean that it served Norris's purposes somehow.
>
>    Not necessarily.  News that is not in the Government's best
>    interests _will_ get out somehow.  And it will spread by the
>    fastest available route.  Remember a break-in at a major
>    Washington, DC, hotel, around about 1974?

Hmmm, this might be a decidely `American' view about press freedoms.  Any of
our British friends care to interject a few words about the "Official
Secrets Act"?  Watergate is a poor example because powerful political
interests (Democrats) existed who benefited greatly from the disclosure.
I can't imagine the Isolationists being that powerful in a multi-bloc
Regency, unless *Norris* wanted them to be.

And keep this in mind.  If *news* of a Virus assault on Trin (or Gram?)
got off-world (or out-system, at least) then the *Virus* might have as well!
That's a good enough reason to keep the news under wraps in and of itself.
So I maintain, if the news broke, it served Norris's interests.

>    No, not really more powerful.  The primary evolution of Virus
>    was toward a non-suicidal, and non-homicidal form - because it
>    is more conducive to spreading Virus, i.e., survival.  This
>    evolution was facilitated by the ability of many substrains and
>    strains to interact with each other.  But this kind of
>    interaction is slowed down when you have a situation in which
>    the spread of Virus is slowed down.  Thus, strains of Virus
>    approaching the protected states through the Vargr Extents will
>    tend to be earlier strains, and therefore more dangerous ones.

If you meant to write ". . . this kind of interaction *increases* (rather
than *is slowed down*) when you have a situation in which the spread of
Virus is slowed down" then I get your point.  Sorry I'm so dense.  :-)

>    I refer you to the outcome of the Civil War of the 600s.
>    History _does_ tend to repeat itself.

Maybe, but Arbellatra was the `one, true choice' that was so missing in
the Rebellion.  Norris isn't if any other factional power manages to
survive the Collapse.  *We* know none have (with the possible exception
of whatever's behind the Black Curtain) but *Norris* doesn't - at least
not yet.

>    Can _anyone_ descended from
>    _any_ factional leader, no matter how "good" his/her lineage,
>    and how pure his/her motives, establish a _morally_ justifiable
>    claim to the Iridium Throne?

Certainly.  Lucan would have enjoyed universal support if he hadn't been
implicated in the death of Varian.  (That's why Dulinor tried to have him
killed).  The Imperium doesn't have the `Klingon' tradition of offspring
bearing the burdens of the crimes of the parents so any `kinder, gentler'
descendant of Lucan might enjoy widespread support.  An usurper in Illelish
might gain support if she managed to topple Dulinor - even in Illelish -
once Dulinor went completely off the deep end into religious fanaticism.
(Convenient how GDW played that, isn't it?)  Margaret might have done it
in the Rebellion if she hadn't turned out to be a bigot.  (More convenience.)
A `kinder, gentler' descendant of hers would have advantages similar to
Lucan's heirs.  Likewise `regencies' in Antares or Daibei might offer
claims nearly as valid as Norris's and would enjoy similar levels of
support in their cores had they managed to survive the onslaught of Virus.

>  I suspect that when/if this
>    situation arises, and push comes to shove, that the people of
>    the Regency will stand behind the Regent, rather than the
>    Pretender.  At that time, when the _people_ realize that the
>    Regent is in fact the Emperor, the Regent will "reluctantly
>    accept the summons to the Iridium Throne."

Despite my points above, I'm convinced you've divined where GDW is headed.

Peace,

David Johnson
Houston, Texas, USA