PC's and Space Stations

[email removed] (David Johnson) writes:
>From Monday night, Andy Lilly [email removed] writes:
>
> > Sound the alarms! We're under fire! Man the bunkers!
>
> Glad to have you back, but *man* the bunkers?  :-)

Yes, *man* the bunkers!  PC PC's (politically correct player characters) can
stand outside the bunkers if they wish. :-)

[email removed] (John Bucsek) writes:
>
>							Some ways to use
> colonies would be: 1) As a setting for the development of the first Jump
> capable ship. 2) Lot's of uses for a colony in a balkanized system. 3.) The
> colonies are the space faring government in the system, and the planet is
> home to a space fearing, zenophobic government.

I've been playing the computer game "Frontier" recently, and for reasons
which are not Traveller-related and would take quite a bit of space to
explain, I spent some time considering the planet Riedquat.  Those of
you who have played "Frontier", or its predecessor "Elite", will know
that name; Riedquat is an anarchic world, a haven for pirates and a
great place to go if you want to kill something or buy stuff to smuggle
to somewhere else.  In "Elite" it had a small, basic space station to
serve as a starport, mainly because "Elite" didn't simulate landing on
planets so orbital ports were the only place you could go and trade.
In "Frontier", the station has been upgraded, whereas almost all other
star systems in that region still have the same small stations that they
had in "Elite".  What I wanted to figure out was why.

Riedquat is the home of numerous families who compete for dominance of
territory.  The competition is waged with any weapons available.  Think
of a cross between Bosnia and the town in "A Fistful of Dollars", on a
planet-wide scale.  At some time in the past, someone managed to get a
small space station in orbit.  Nowadays, as more powerful weapons have
found their way to the planet, there is no ground port because if one
was built, it would probably be destroyed again within a day.  Besides,
the economy of the planet is agricultural.  Practically anything which
can be grown is available there, especially narcotics.  Any family which
made the effort to build a ground port would be spending less time on its
agriculture, which would leave it with less money to import weapons with
which to defend itself.  For the same reason, no-one has built any arms
factories there; doing so would temporarily leave the builders poorer
and thus less able to afford to defend themselves, and the factory would
probably be destroyed soon anyway.  All families therefore depend on the
orbital port in order to sell their products and buy weapons.  The port
presumably has some shuttles which can take weapons down and narcotics
up, and which do not need a ground port to land.

Now comes my speculation.  The people in the orbital port realised that
they were in a unique position.  With more civilised planets, the orbital
port depends on the planet below for trade goods.  It is built, maintained
and controlled by that planet.  In the case of Riedquat, though, it is the
planet which is dependent on the orbital port.  The orbital port takes a
percentage of the price of all goods going both ways, payable by the people
on the ground.  It also does everything possible to make space travellers
welcome; docking fees are among the lowest around, and there are very few
laws except those needed to protect the station itself.  A squadron of
fighters enforces those laws.  The port exercises almost total neutrality
in its dealings with the families on the ground; it trades fairly and
equally with all.  Except, that is, if a family decides to object to the
trade tariffs being charged.  Then the port just stops trading with that
family.  The family is then left with a surplus of tradeable goods and a
shortage of weapons with which to defend them, making it a perfect target
for any neighbour who fancies a bit of plundering, which basically means
everyone.  At the same time, the people of the orbital port make it quite
clear that they have no ambition to take any land for themselves.  They do
not have the manpower to take or hold any ground.  Besides, if they did
show any inclination to do so, then given time they would easily be able
to conquer the whole world, as they have the advantage of controlling the
only way for weapons to enter the system.  So at the first sign of such
ambition, the families on the ground would have good reason to temporarily
forget their squabbles, unite and attack the port first.  But while the
port people show no intention of taking land, the families continue to
concentrate on fighting each other.  The space port continues to dominate
the planet's economy.  And anyone who visits the system had better be well
armed.

- --
 "Keyboard?  How quaint!" - M. Scott

 Adrian Hurt			     |	JANET: [email removed]
 UUCP: ..!uknet!cee.hw.ac.uk!adrian  |  ARPA:  [email removed]