2300AD - Scout Services?

[ubiquitousflex]

Greetings— long time lurker first time poster.

I’ve been completely smitten by the 2300AD setting for the past 6 months. There is an incredible wealth of information (new and old) to discover online both canonical and less so.

Suffice to say I haven’t found/read a great recollection of how Scout Services work in 2300AD. I can surmise each power/nation/trans-national may have its own parcel/exploration/prospecting services, but am I missing an obvious entity/analog to the traditional Scout Services in I’ve been missing in print so far?

Stutterwarp offers some unique advantages in being able to quickly transmit/transit information and I would have figured to find some specific information on the formality of mail, data transit, etc.

Similarly curious—is there any detail as to how communication functions while in Stutterwarp in-system?

Perfectly capable of making up my own answer for each— but curious if this is written or otherwise established in canon somewhere.

Thanks!

 

[CordwainerFish]

Imperial Interstellar Scout Service, there's only one of them. I have no idea where a certain popular video maker got the plural from.

 

[ubiquitousflex]

I can’t say I inherited this from any popular video. Arguably, if you are providing different services in addition to courier the errant “s” should not offend anyone. Thanks for your contribution.

 

[Jame Rowe]

Imperial Interstellar Scout Service, there's only one of them. I have no idea where a certain popular video maker got the plural from.

That's for the 3rd Imperium setting, not 2300AD.

 

[CordwainerFish]

That's for the 3rd Imperium setting, not 2300AD.

The 2300CE books only ever use just 'Scout', and only to refer to the career.

 

[Jame Rowe]

The 2300CE books only ever use just 'Scout', and only to refer to the career.

Yes, and the  Imperial ISS is setting-specific to the Third Imperium setting, not the 2300AD setting.

 

[Sigtrygg]

There are many different organisations in T2300 that would have the Scout career option.

Many world governments will likely have a scout service, if not in name then as a branch of some other organisation.
Then there are the various foundations and corporations with enough resources to also sponsor scout missions and thus have the scout career open to them.

 

[Condottiere]

Imperium Scout Service, like all bureaucracies, probably mission creeped into every role and function that wasn't nailed down by the Navy.

This early on, it's probably explorers.

 

[Sigtrygg]

There is no Imperial Scout Service in T2300, different universe.

 

[Bryn the 2300AD guy]

Scout is a career in GDW 2300AD, described thus:

"Initial survey of a system is done by scouts. These scouts use their ships and ships' sensors to detect the large scale characteristics of systems and worlds. Mapping and starcharting are their specialities, breaking new ground for exploratory teams and settlers. Scouts are often the first to contact high-technology alien races."

Their primary skills are space crew skills, sciences and survival.

Most scouts are members of government agencies (like AECA for America) and related foundations (AR-I, the Royal Society etc.), but pioneering new systems is an involved job. Humanity advanced at a star system per arm every 5-10 years or so. Sending scouts to an adjacent system is a significant undertaking. Of course, the Bayern module undercut this, but it worked under different rules. By Ships of the French Arm (GDW edition, page 80), with the very latest technology, an explorer can complete the initial survey of a new system in a year. However, this new scout ship (Vogelperspektive) which is expected to be able to chart a system in a year still hasn't explored any new systems, but was initially used to chart colonised systems.

Scouting a new system is a significant undertaking, involving many ships, large expenditures and probably burning a drive on system entry, since no discharge point is known. Before the scouts go in, pioneers probably go in first, whose role is to enter the system, dump their drive and bring up a secondary, and simply find a discharge point for the follow-up scout ships.

Similarly curious—is there any detail as to how communication functions while in Stutterwarp in-system?

Yes. In all probability, any high bandwidth communications involve both parties disengaging their stutterwarps. If both vessels know each others location course and speed (inc. drive frequency) perfectly, the computer may be able to decode the cut up messages. However, if you really want to talk, spin the drive down.

Any very large downloads (like a mail delivery) would best be affected by docking and physically passing a cable.

I once wrote that maybe ships could vary their drives to send simple messages. I was wrong, but it was incorporated into Mongoose I think.

 

[CordwainerFish]

I once wrote that maybe ships could vary their drives to send simple messages.

I think Poul Anderson did something like that in one of the Falkayn/van Rijn stories. (I would not be surprised if the stutterwarp drive was inspired by Technic History.)

 

[ubiquitousflex]

Most scouts are members of government agencies (like AECA for America) and related foundations (AR-I, the Royal Society etc.), but pioneering new systems is an involved job. Humanity advanced at a star system per arm every 5-10 years or so.

Thank you for such a detailed answer, Bryn! I just began reading on your blog and this is wonderful! I had found some of the 2012-2014 2300AD books and began noticing differences between those and 2nd Edition Mongoose. For the game I'm planning I've been taking the best of both worlds where it makes the most sense to the sort of head-cannon I've been developing. The older books are rich in source material. I enjoy the new books, but I very much enjoy the exposition included in many descriptions and planets in the last version. It really helps fill out the feel for 2300AD.

Is there a go-to community online for 2300AD where these sorts of things are discussed more often?

 

[Sigtrygg]

Go to the Far Future Enterprises website (MWM owns it) and order the 2300AD compilation disc - on cd or USB drive. For $35 you get everything ever written by GDW for 2300 plus some stuff that never got as far as print product.