2300AD, thoughts and wishes

[kermit]

Colin - There are courses and even college majors centered around this. I attended Mercyhurst College from 1999 to 2001 will working a major they had called Research and Intelligence Analysis. Much of the course work centered around just what you mentioned...sifting through information to separate the important bits from the mass of irrelevant nonsense. Very interesting but my health has prevented me from making much use of it. If you want to model a skill on it you could call it Research and Information Analysis (This is what one of my professors had wanted to call the major because much of it was geared towards the needs of corporate intel instead of government intel).

http://www.mciis.org/

Benjamin

 

[The Chef]

shudders of thinking of his first A level

Informatics, to give it its (awful) real-life term.

 

[Yatima]

That sort of thing is modeled, I think, by having computers modify rolls. Say a computer/4 adds +4 (or +2...) DM to applicable rolls. So Billy-Jo McAllister's Mod/2 subdermacomp adds a +2 to all info search related tasks, and perhaps other bonuses in regards to pattern recognition, or similar, when the right software is loaded. <snip>

Agreed. In terms of game mechanics, that's what I'd do. I'd also like to illustrate what it can mean to the world the characters move in. So how can this technology be applied in ways that impact the flavour of the setting and the adventures characters can have? Let's see:

1. While these AIs aren't people, they can communicate through virtual personalities, agents that mimic people. The personal assistant who answers your call may be gorgeous, but she's expensive software and it takes a while to tell.
2. Speech recognition works really well, taking in implication, idiom, metaphor and context as well as a person can.
3. Surveillance systems in the core have AIs monitoring countless cameras and sensors, using superb face recognition and other biometric data to track the movements of citizens and erase privacy as we know it.
4. Characters faced with masses of data can have it analysed by software and get a summary or analysis. forget skill rolls to analyse data, like in the Gumshoe RPG the real challenge isn't finding the clues, that just happens, rather it's understanding what they mean.
5. Systems take a long time and a lot of skill to train, but once trained cab be duplicated easily. New systems with better skills and experience will be much sought after. How wealthy you are may be down, in part, to the software managing your investments and legal affairs.
6. It's common for people to have an AI assistant that is embedded in their personal computer, implant or hand computer or whatever. It's only as smart as the hardware it runs on allows. Plug it into a bigger system, and it establishes a secure virtual machine and uses the bigger iron to do more things more quickly. It learns your interests and filters news and entertainment for you, screens your calls, reminds you of appointments, helps you find your way around and so on.

These assistants are mini-characters that deserve some sort of profile, they're just not as versatile as people, don't have moods, don't have ambitions, don't have impulses.

That's my vision, anyway. Close?

John

 

[Colin]

It's not an area that I want to emphasize too much, but I may delve further into with a Core Atlas. It will show up to some extent, as the subdermal technologies, and portacomps, are an area I want to explore further.

Augmented reality is fairly common in the core, especially for people with subdermacomps and high-level in-eye displays. The systems present data in a very customized format, and the program learn from the user, even to things as subtle as what their eyes linger on as they move down the street.

Given the limits to what we can predict, 2300AD, in many ways, reflects the world as we know it now, plus say 20 years worth of extrapolation, plus starships and plasma guns. Throw in some exaggerations of current social trends (body modification, surveillance society, and designer drugs, for ex.), and stir. That approach keeps things in the realm of comprehensible, while still throwing it all into the future. So augmented reality, intelligent assistants, geneered pets, and robotic construction equipment are fine. Posthumans and super-intelligent AIs, not so much.

 

[Dave Chase]

One of my fun takes of AI is the TV show Max Headroom.

Might be something to consider. One of the reasons that AI are not popular is because they develop extremely unusual personalities, every time.

Even B5 had a little bit of this when they attempted to reboot the station's computer and the AI came back on line.

Dave Chase

 

[Colin]

I loved Max Headroom at the time. It looks a little dated now, though. AIs in 2300AD have a bit of that.

Basically, they all go insane, typically within 15-30 days. The more powerful they are, the quicker they lose it. So-called savant systems, though, designed for a particular purpose, can last for up to a year. They aren't too bright in most ways, but are very good at one or two things. They can best be described as quirky.

Insanity problems seem to only affect (infect) powerful systems designed with personality and self-awareness. Systems that only mimic personality, and aren't truly self-aware, don't seem to have this problem. This sort of computer serves on vehicles and starships.

AIs are only used when powerful, creative thinking is called for. Due to the instability of AIs, however, their solutions have to be carefully checked by humans and non-AI computers.

Deathwatch simlulations suffer the same instability problems as AIs, and are truly only suitable for recording a personality as a backup. (Ha! Yes, that technology exists in 2300AD, and it's absurdly expensive.)

 

[BP]

Red Dwarf's AI (Holly?) went senile IIRC...

 

[Yatima]

A nice illustration of Colin's proposed asteroid strike: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18046-asteroid-blast-reveals-holes-in-earths-defences.html

An asteroid no one spotted airburst over an Indonesian city on October 8th with a force of 50,000 tons of TNT (3 times Hiroshima). A close call.

John

 

[Ishvar]

As far as I remember, I have not read the said books for a long time, the technology presented in Blue Planet is very interesting and in the right mood.

 

[GJD]

The old White Wolf Scifi game Trinity (or Aeon as it was originally) had a couple of nice ideas.

There were no true AI's, but there were a number of SI's - Satisfactory Intelligence. These are really just complex decision making programs geared towards specific tasks, that could simulate inteligence to a satisfactory level (although I always thought Simulated Inteligence would have been better).

They worked really well as assistants in the form of an Agent running on a computer - a simulated personality construct that would act on the users behalf. Each had a performance and an intent score. The performance was the raw ability, which specialised ones could add levels in skills to, and the intent was their ability to correctly interpret the users instructions.

So, for instance, say the users requested their Patton military SI get all the information on an approaching enemy ship. The Patton could interpret the request literally and spend hours and hours scouring the interwebnet for every piece of information or, on an sucesssful intent roll, get only the information relevant to the current situation, and since it was a military SI it would even have a bonus to the performance roll with its Expert: Military systems skill.

G.

 

[whenimaginationfails]

The Near Star List and Map are still under review. I like the idea of updating it, but with the updated maps you don't end up with 'Arms' at all. There's just too many small stars to provide links all over the place. We examined this when looking at the Star Maps for 2320AD, and I'm not sure how to proceed.

Two possibilities may be to either lower the stutterwarp max range or say that stars below a certain size won't discharge the engines, so trips to such stars are one way voyages, or require multi-staged stutterwarp engines and so are not economical.

 

[Yatima]

Two possibilities may be to either lower the stutterwarp max range or say that stars below a certain size won't discharge the engines, so trips to such stars are one way voyages, or require multi-staged stutterwarp engines and so are not economical.

IIRC, when Anders analysed the near star list and ways to extend it (http://www.aleph.se/andart/archives/2007/07/back_to_2320ad.html) He found that the stutterwarp limit imposed by GDW, probably through trial and error, is very close to the percolation limit for the distribution of nearby stars. So if you increase or decrease the stutterwarp limit even slightly, you have no arms; either because stars are unreachable or because they are all too easily reachable. You end up with a volume of space rather than a series of arms and that would break the setting utterly.

John

 

[Lord High Munchkin]

Perhaps their solar winds aren't quite right, or contain something that interferes with some component in stutterwarp drive charge capacitors, or aren't gravitationally enough to trip the discharge mechanism, or something.

It doesn't really matter what, it just has to be scientifically plausible.

 

[whenimaginationfails]

Two possibilities may be to either lower the stutterwarp max range or say that stars below a certain size won't discharge the engines, so trips to such stars are one way voyages, or require multi-staged stutterwarp engines and so are not economical.

IIRC, when Anders analysed the near star list and ways to extend it (http://www.aleph.se/andart/archives/2007/07/back_to_2320ad.html) He found that the stutterwarp limit imposed by GDW, probably through trial and error, is very close to the percolation limit for the distribution of nearby stars. So if you increase or decrease the stutterwarp limit even slightly, you have no arms; either because stars are unreachable or because they are all too easily reachable. You end up with a volume of space rather than a series of arms and that would break the setting utterly.

Right, but Colin stated that if you add in the new stars found since the Gliese 1969 star catalog came out (generally small ones it would appear from his comment), then the arms disappear since there are enough small stars that connect the arms. My suggestion would be to then to either:

• 1. keep the new small stars, but decrease the range of the stutterwarp or
  2. change the requirements of the stutterwarp such that trips to small stars are one way or
  3. some other method that keeps inconvenient stars off, but keeps ones that open interesting possibilities on.

I really should just try to map it and just send it out. but for the time, but for the time...

 

[Yatima]

It doesn't really matter what, it just has to be scientifically plausible.

Come to that, you simply add in the extra arms and edit out link stars to get the effect you want. We know there are fictional stars in the nearby star map as it is, and that other stars positions are incorrect and cannot be fixed without breaking the setting.

That being accepted, forget hand waved changes to stutterwarp, simply edit the extended star map to get what you want. In a 100 LY volume, what are a dozen missing stars between fellow troubleshooters?

John

 

[Colin]

It's a little more complicated than that. There are a LOT more stars in RECONS and Hipparchos than in the old Gliese 2, and some of the positions have changed (more accurate). Among other issues, Wolf 359 (Nyotekundu) is 7.8 light years away. Using new data means no Arms, which greatly changes everything. No chokepoints, no strategic systems, and a clear run from Cucaracha space to Earth.

 

[Yatima]

It's a little more complicated than that. There are a LOT more stars in RECONS and Hipparchos than in the old Gliese 2, and some of the positions have changed (more accurate). Among other issues, Wolf 359 (Nyotekundu) is 7.8 light years away. Using new data means no Arms, which greatly changes everything. No chokepoints, no strategic systems, and a clear run from Cucaracha space to Earth.

It's only complicated if we feel compelled to include the latest and more accurate data.

My point is that we have the setting we have, which was based on data that was imperfect, and peppered with fictional systems to suit the plot. It was lauded at the time for being based on real star data sets, which was largely true, but GDW weren't slaves to accuracy.

Now we find that we have better data, and feel compelled to use it, but that could potentially break the setting. My position would be to favour preserving the setting, and use the new data only as far as it suits.

Must we bend the setting to fit more accurate data sets, or vice versa? what's the trade off in your mind, Colin?

John

 

[kermit]

As some of my previous comments may have already revealed, I'm with John on this. Keep the setting as is, even if you need to ignore actual accurate stellar data.

If you feel compelled to include some of the new and interesting extrasolar planets that we are discovering feel free. They could add a bit of scientific realism without ruining the setting. Reworking the canon star systems to take current knowledge into account is cool but keep their 2300AD locations.

In that same vein there could be a brief discussion concerning the apparent lack of brown dwarfs in this alternate reality and perhaps a bit explaining why dark matter is unsuitable for use as a discharge point. It could even be the presence of nearby dark matter bodies that make most brown dwarfs unsafe for stutterwarp ships.

Using real world data while tweeking it to fit the 2300AD universe could end up creating a great setting with enough realism to remain truly "hard-scifi" while keeping true to the original setting.

Benjamin

 

[Lord High Munchkin]

Using real world data while tweeking it to fit the 2300AD universe could end up creating a great setting with enough realism to remain truly "hard-scifi" while keeping true to the original setting.

Benjamin

Ah, that's the problem. Most people wouldn't consider it to be still "Hard-SciFi" if that approach was used. It wouldn't alter the setting of course, but it wouldn't really be able to be called "hard" anymore.

Another sideways astrophysical (or pseudo-mechanical) solution to the issue probably offers more scope, I feel, to keep the setting working.

 

[GJD]

Using real world data while tweeking it to fit the 2300AD universe could end up creating a great setting with enough realism to remain truly "hard-scifi" while keeping true to the original setting.

Benjamin

Ah, that's the problem. Most people wouldn't consider it to be still "Hard-SciFi" if that approach was used. It wouldn't alter the setting of course, but it wouldn't really be able to be called "hard" anymore.

Another sideways astrophysical (or pseudo-mechanical) solution to the issue probably offers more scope, I feel, to keep the setting working.

I disagree. The setting was created with the best available data at the time. The physics and "rules" of the universe, with one exception - stutterwarp (and maybe heat dissapation), are all "real". It IS hard sci-fi.

I don't see that there is any option but to keep the NSL and the map as presented. The rules we are using are set - Mongoose Traveller, so all we have to make the game into 2300AD is the setting. Changing something as fundamental as the NSL and map will mean that it's not really 2300AD any more.

G.