An Immediate Ban on the OTU - Effective 8.11.08

[Gruffty the Hiver]

You wanna talk canon? Here's one.

Project Steel has been okayed by Marc and the Canon Committee.

Project Steel contains an answer to the Jump Torpedo question.

So there we are.

... wibble ...

[Allensh]

The only people who should be even remotely concerned about "canon" are people who write stuff in the Official Traveller Universe for official publication.

If I want to have jump torpedoes, hyperdrives and Aslan warriors with pink bunny slippers, I will! It is MY game!

I won't do that last one by the way...as that would be silly.

Allen

[Gruffty the Hiver]

Yes. It would be *very* silly.

Do it anyway

[far-trader]

You wanna talk canon? Here's one.

Project Steel has been okayed by Marc and the Canon Committee.

Project Steel contains an answer to the Jump Torpedo question.

So there we are.

... wibble ...

Yeah, I'll second that wibble

Not having clue one what the new canon answer from on high is to jump torpedoes any comment seems pointless, but I'm in that kind of a mood sooo...

...big deal. Marc has the right to do however he likes. And he's been inconsistent in the past so if this is another flip-flop so what. Still we all like the game and play it, we'll survive whatever this latest ruling on jump torpedoes is too, either as OTU canonistas or ATU refs.

[Klaus Kipling]

Maybe it's about time Canon the Barbarian stormed in to crush the Zhodani, see them jump-driven before him, and hear the lamentation of the Vegans.

[Klaus Kipling]

error

[captainjack23]

Returns back to corner and sits down....Jack wheres my beer ?

Oh, hey ! I put it over there on that novelty coffee table.

[looks at hiver waving at him]


.....crap.

[Tathlum]

An announcement from "Archduke" Norris of the Domain of Canon

You will all by now have heard the disturbing news from Core, that our beloved Game System is being ravaged by terrible viruses, of which those codenamed GURPS and Mongoose are but the most destructive. The whereabouts of Emperor Mark are unknown. Consequently I, "Archduke" Norris [can someone find out where those pesky quote marks keep coming from already! - N] have ordained that the Domain of Canon shall henceforth be sealed off from the outside universe to preserve the sanctity of the Game Universe. It may have been corrupted beyond all hope of redemption elsewhere, but we shall keep the flame burning bright! I, "Archduke" Norris [stop that! I have a genuine grant of archducal privilege signed by Emperor Mark milliseconds before he disappeared! - N] will be the chairman of the Regency Council and picket boats will be posted at all borders to turn back incoming vessels, especially those arriving from empty hexes. Yes - even if they are armed with bay weapons that should not be found on ships of such low displacement we shall drive them back! To arms, Canonites, to arms!!!! And can someone get those Zhd20ani refugees out of my kitchen!

hahahahahahahahahahahahaha awesome.

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

(moves over to the corner, grabs a Guinness and a handful of sweets...)

Who let the riff-raff in ?, thats ruined the house prices.

[cbrunish]

Of course this is an Imperial Plot to ruin the Solomani Confederation!!!!! They even went so far as to place the blame on those weird guys with the starfish for a face!!!

-SolSec Coordinator

[FreeTrav]

/me is wondering if he needs to [re]post his ... diatribe? ... on Canon from the TML from 8 Aug 2003, reposted lightly edited to the TML on 12 Feb 2006.

[Ommadawn]

/me is wondering if he needs to [re]post his ... diatribe? ... on Canon from the TML from 8 Aug 2003, reposted lightly edited to the TML on 12 Feb 2006.

Why not? There are many new players here, and many of us might not have seen the posts on the TML (I've joined and left the list on and off half a dozen times in the last 15 years )

I'd be interested in it, anyway.

[rust]

So am I, please go ahead.

[Gruffty the Hiver]

Go on, post it, I'm certainly interested in reading it

[FreeTrav]

Since people have asked for it, here it is... (This is the original text, from August of 2003)

Of late, there has been much verbiage expended on the topic of canon, and what should and shouldn't be. I think that some of the folks expending the verbiage are forgetting that which is of critical importance in any discussion of Canon...

Canon is for Authors
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

An Author is not an ordinary person; an Author is someone who is writing material that will be Given the Imprimatur. Such people cannot with impunity go against What Has Been Established, for the Imprimatur says to one and all, "This is part of What Has Been Established.". Thus, all Authors need to be familiar with the material under the Imprimatur, that is, the Canon.

Most of the people on the list are not Authors - although we are blessed with the presence of some who _are_ Authors, and even with those who may Give the Imprimatur.



For players, all rôle-playing games are is an evolution of "Let's Pretend" - "Let's pretend that I'm a cowboy and you're an indian and I'm gonna stop you from scalping the women of the town and bang! bang! I shot you and you're dead -- " "Am not! You missed!" "Did not! Cheater!" "Did too! Cheater yourself!"...

All that the funny dice do is provide an impartial arbiter of whether or not you missed. All that the pages and pages of rules do is provide the information you need to understand what the dice are telling you. And all that the pages and pages of source material do is provide Imagination, collected and distilled, to establish the context in which to interpret the dice to determine whether you really did miss...

And no, none of that is trivial, else we'd never have had the "You missed!" "Did not!" arguments when we Pretended before we started RPGing. But it's still that simple.



What then does de-canonization of material mean? It simply means that the material in question need not be considered when an Author writes to Receive the Imprimatur. If what an Author writes has nothing to do with the de-canonized material (as in a Solomani Rim sourcebook not needing to consider the astrography of the Glimmerdrift Reaches), then the de-canonization of the material is of no moment. If the Author writes about what is covered by the de-canonized material, however, it becomes important - for Canon must be followed, and the Story shoehorned into the material that Has Gone Before - but if the material is de-canonized, the Author need not fiddle with the Story to fit the material, but may change the material to fit the Story, without fear of Losing the Imprimatur thereby. If the Author chooses to write his Story such that the de-canonized material is still accurate, then none will criticise him thusfor, nor if he choose otherwise, and write the material anew and differently.

To a player (which includes the Referee, the arbiter of the reality of the Story), the canon status of any material is Irrelevant. For the player, the first rule of the Rôle-Playing Game is "An ye like it not, CHANGE IT!". Canon or not, the Referee is Telling a Story, Interactively, and the Story is all. The conformance to Canon is a convenience, not a necessity.

Then what purpose the discussion of Canon? "...Imagination, collected and distilled,..." The discussion of which we partake on the list is part of the process of collection and distillation, providing a common basis for sharing our Imagination. To do this without reference to what has Received the Imprimatur would make our shared experience that much more difficult to achieve; thus, the Canon provides that common base upon which to build - and build we do, else would the formulation "IMTU" be devoid of meaning. Even so, Canon must always defer to IMTU in the final analysis, for when we play, we make Traveller _our_ Game, and none shall gainsay us that power.

[GamerDude]

[humor] After seeing so many threads here and elsewhere turn into bloodbaths about versions and canon and canonicity, I believe everyone will best be served by an IMMEDIATE BAN on all OTU stuff, discussion, products, new games, scenarios, supplements, websites - the lot.

I don't have any worry about what is OTU and what is not. I've heard from Marc M, I've discussed it with Sean Punch (GURPS Line Editor), etc. I know nothing from GT is canon, as canon only comes from what CT, MT, TNE, T4/MMT (and now Mongoose).

So I don't see what all the arguing is about, not that I care any more.

[rust]

To a player (which includes the Referee, the arbiter of the reality of the Story), the canon status of any material is Irrelevant.
...
Even so, Canon must always defer to IMTU in the final analysis, for when we play, we make Traveller _our_ Game, and none shall gainsay us that power.

I liked the entire text very much, but could I please have these two sen-
tences carved in stone and painted red ?

[atpollard]

To a player (which includes the Referee, the arbiter of the reality of the Story), the canon status of any material is Irrelevant.
...
Even so, Canon must always defer to IMTU in the final analysis, for when we play, we make Traveller _our_ Game, and none shall gainsay us that power.

I liked the entire text very much, but could I please have these two sen-
tences carved in stone and painted red ?

He is not an Author. BURN HIM!!
[just kidding]

[GamerDude]

While I understand the desire for knowing what is canon/OTU, I probably will never understand the intensity some people will push to have a product they are overly emotionally attached to be canon/OTU.

I mean, unless all you do is use OTU sources and run OTU adventures (i.e. provided by a source that is considered OTU by MM), then you are automatically running an ATU. No changes to material, no modifying the adventures, nothing.

But, having a clear canon/OTU gives all of us a base line to discuss ideas from. FTL communications: Do they exist or not? Of course we know they don't in the OTU (well, not any faster than ships can travel) but imagine what the OTU would be like if it existed. VERRRYYY different.

That's why I simply emailed MM with the simple question: "What products are canon so I can try to buy them all", and also took the time to go by the SJ Games booth at Gencon and ask the GURPS line editor "is ANYTHING in GT OTU?" Go to the source, ask the question nicely without dragging them into an argument and BAM! you get a solid polite answer.

So now I have a good baseline of the canon/OTU when deciding what to do in my ATU, how I update CT/MT/TNE adventures, set up plot lines, etc.

[lastbesthope]

You may not realse it, but you do realise that your ban as dated doesn't get enforced on this side of the atlantic for about 2 and a half more months?



LBH