2300AD, thoughts and wishes

[lastbesthope]

Not that I am aware of. To avoid any issues, I haven't even looked at Twilight 2013.
That being said, if it looks interesting, buy it. My concerns have nothing to do with the quality of 2013. As I said, I've never seen it. I just don't want to muddy the waters.
Nor do I want anyone to think that I'm advocating NOT purchasing 2013.

Well I looked at it, aprt from the new Reflex game engine, nothing struck me about the setting that was unique enough that I couldn't do it with a system I already own.

Besides my game of choice for potentially apocalyptic warfare is Armageddon 2089.

Having said that if I'd had a little more money I wuold have gotten ti anyway, but my Money is all being swallowed by the Mongoose release schedule.

LBH

 

[Dave Chase]

OK, how about a double twist

Take the War of the Worlds story and add in an asteriod.

An asteroid of decent size that it might actually survive hitting the earth and yet not destory massive amounts of property.

So, some of the scientists and large governments decide to make a huge deal out it.

First they make obtruse statements that the asteriod is moving strangely and has an ususal appearance, and they attempt to debunk any amature astro views and even have some of them 'disappear', that claim its just an asteroid.

Then they use some of the high tech wizardy to add to the media viewing the impact. Knowing where it is going to land, they have pre-planted some 'interesting' devices to be found later.

All of this is to
1) cause a controlled war of sorts where certain governments are working together and yet have left out other goverments.
The controlling governments have go so far as to have 'incidents' which all evidence points to those governments not in control. Like shooting at the asteriod just before it enters the atmosphere, because they don't want the aliens landing.
2) keep the world population eyes on this incident while they are busy doing other things, that normally they could not get away with
3) gain control of the world population as volunteer slave labor under the threat of alien invasion and worse

Just a basic outline of a natural incident being twisted into world control.

Good movie plot yes. :lol:



Dave Chase

 

[EDG]

Generally asteroid impacts don't start wars, they end them.

I disagree. With the devastation caused by mega-tsunamis and a looming impact winter ready to starve/freeze humanity, I don't see people sitting down to singing Kumbuya ala Gene Rodenberry. Human nature is that if you don't have it and can't make it, you take it from those who have it. If those you take it from resist, you kill them. Throw in nationalism--or worse, our old "friend" religion--to justify this mutual plunder and you've got a recipe for World War III.

If you're talking about mega-tsunamis, then you're talking about an ocean impact, and billions of people killed just from those. Most of the major population centres of the world are on the coastlines, and they would be annihilated completely. The results are about the same for the Pacific, Indian, or Atlantic oceans. AND you have all the crap thrown up into the atmosphere too, which would pretty much mean lights out for everyone all over the planet.

Fighting a war in that sort of environment is beyond stupidity. This is hand of god, end of the world stuff that affects everyone, and I don't believe for a second that people would retain an "it's us or them" mentality in that situation. Sure, there'd be panic, looting, and general misery among the survivors, but those who weren't directly crippled by the impacts and who had some technological ability and infrastructure remaining would rapidly take the lead.

In fact, an asteroid impact could just do away with the Twilight War completely - the aftereffects of the impact alone would severely weaken/destroy some nations and cause others to become more prominent.

 

[Sturn]

All that being said, if the direction is to stick to the established canon, well, that's what I can do.

That wasn't my point. I'm not against changing the canon, especially for such things as the German War of Reunification that contradict what we now know. I (just one fan) just don't want anything monumentally different, such as an asteroid strike causing the Twilight War. If anything, even with the Cold War of the old 2300 AD mostly gone, the current state of world affairs has many more reasons to slip into a nuclear Twilight War all on its own. I would love for the updated timeline to delve into that more.

 

[EDG]

If anything, even with the Cold War of the old 2300 AD mostly gone, the current state of world affairs has many more reasons to slip into a nuclear Twilight War all on its own. I would love for the updated timeline to delve into that more.

The problem, as others have pointed out, is that this gets dated real fast. I'm sure it looks very current and likely (to some) today that Al-Qaeda/Iran/Israel/North Korea/whatever will start a nuclear war, but about 10 years down the line this will most likely look about as ridiculous as WWIII starting in 1999 did.

But more to the point, it's an event that happened centuries ago in the game setting - and the details of the event itself don't really matter, just the after-effects. It'd be like bickering over what caused the collapse of the Psionics Institutes in the OTU - it's pretty irrelevant to a game set in the "modern" OTU, because all that matters is that they collapsed.

 

[rust]

Fighting a war in that sort of environment is beyond stupidity.

I even doubt that it would be possible.

Fighting a war requires an effort of organization, logistics and resources
that would hardly be possible after a serious asteroid impact - and any
war would almost certainly use up more resources than could be gained
through a victory.

There would be far more urgent tasks for any nation's military than to
engage in warfare. Think of a thousand hurricanes like the one that hit
New Orleans, all at the same time, plus a complete breakdown of all sea
trade and the complete loss of the next harvest, and you have just the
first glimpse of the problems to deal with.

 

[Dave Chase]

Hmm,

I guess that Grandfather has struck at me once again since no one seems to able to read my post. I am a nobody that one needs pay any attention to.


Dave Chase

Last edited by Grandfather on 09/14/2009.

 

[rust]

Well, I did read your post, Dave, but Grandfather somehow deleted my
answer.

 

[Mark A. Siefert]

Right, and magical fairies blow kisses to the stars while garden gnomes make the flowers grow! :roll:

Puh-lease! Humanity is a bloody savage lot kept under control by the weakest of chains. Given half a chance, we will murder, rape, and pillage to survive and appease our whims rather than co-operate and end up worrying about not get enough of what we want. This hippie-dippy, hearts-and-flowers-BS is getting sickening. If I wanted unrealistic science fiction portrays of humanity, I'd watch Star Trek.

 

[Sturn]

If anything, even with the Cold War of the old 2300 AD mostly gone, the current state of world affairs has many more reasons to slip into a nuclear Twilight War all on its own. I would love for the updated timeline to delve into that more.

The problem, as others have pointed out, is that this gets dated real fast....

I completely agree. That is why I would like the historical explanations not to be too detailed, just generalizations. As in don't state, "The Twilight War began in 2013 AD", instead speak of the "Twilight War of the early 21st Century". Since it's ancient history, don't say, "North Korea and Iran's radicalness combined with growing nuclear programs set off a chain of events leading to a world-wide nuclear exchange", instead say, "Radical nations were able to obtain nuclear arms to the chagrin of more moderate nations of the early 21st Century. A global response eventually lead to a chain of events that resulted in a world wide nuclear exchange later known as the Twilight War".

Generalize, no speicifics. Also don't throw in something completely contrary to the original timeline. That way, anyone can provide their own detail (home-made) if they wish, use the T2000 timeline, T2013 timeline, etc without contradicting a new 2300 AD timeline or near future events that catch us by surprise.

 

[EDG]

Puh-lease! Humanity is a bloody savage lot kept under control by the weakest of chains. Given half a chance, we will murder, rape, and pillage to survive and appease our whims rather than co-operate and end up worrying about not get enough of what we want. This hippie-dippy, hearts-and-flowers-BS is getting sickening. If I wanted unrealistic science fiction portrays of humanity, I'd watch Star Trek.

If you want to wallow in your over-blown version of humanity's darkside, then I suggest you go and play Twilight 2000 and enact all those things to your heart's delight. But that's not what 2300AD is about, and never has been, and hopefully never will be.

Past disasters have shown that the majority of people do NOT in fact rape, pillage and murder afterwards, but rather will try to pull together and help eachother. Sure, some idiots will do the bad stuff, but certainly not everyone and certainly not a majority.

 

[EDG]

Though as I said, the Twilight War isn't even necessary any more, if you're going to inflict an asteroid impact on the planet. That alone would change the balance of political power enough to allow the necessary changes.

 

[Mark A. Siefert]

But that's not what 2300AD is about, and never has been, and hopefully never will be.

Co-operation? In the 2300 AD universe? Other than the Kaffer Invasion it's pretty much business as usual for post-Twillight humanity: Conquest, war, colonialism, and nationalism. The only difference is that NOW they can do it on an interstellar scale.

 

[EDG]

But that's not what 2300AD is about, and never has been, and hopefully never will be.

Co-operation? In the 2300 AD universe? Other than the Kaffer Invasion it's pretty much business as usual for post-Twillight humanity: Conquest, war, colonialism, and nationalism. The only difference is that NOW they can do it on an interstellar scale.

Exactly. And we're not all raping, murdering and pillaging at the first sign of trouble today.

 

[Mark A. Siefert]

Exactly. And we're not all raping, murdering and pillaging at the first sign of trouble today.

Ummm... the Kaffer Invasion is the exception... oh just skip it!

As for "we're not all raping, murdering and pillaging," what fantasyland do you live in? Open up a newspaper or turn on the news; it's Hell out there!

 

[EDG]

As for "we're not all raping, murdering and pillaging," what fantasyland do you live in? Open up a newspaper or turn on the news; it's Hell out there!

It must be hell for you in Mogadishu. Or has US society gone that far downhill overnight?

 

[Colin]

Gentlemen, please don't poop on my thread. I genuinely want to read what people would like to see, what they like, and what they don't like. I don't want arguments over what is "good" and what isn't.

Roleplaying games require conflict. That conflict doesn't need to be violence, but that is often easy, and indeed even cathartic for many. The universe of a game has to have conflict in it as well. Without an outside threat, Humanity will tend to gfight with itself. Given that outside threat, however, and Humanity (or most of it) will draw together.

What the good doctor suggests is similar to what I did with 2320AD, and is a good enough explanation in and of itself. I want to examine the impact as a trigger (or war-ender) in part to explain why space travel and space technology iare so advanced, and other technologies lag behind.

 

[EDG]

What the good doctor suggests is similar to what I did with 2320AD, and is a good enough explanation in and of itself. I want to examine the impact as a trigger (or war-ender) in part to explain why space travel and space technology iare so advanced, and other technologies lag behind.

The obvious answer is that after the impact (presumably one smaller than a billion-people killer), nations become a hell of a lot more interested in not being hit by anything else (if you want to talk about human nature, that's a prime example of it - events are out of sight/out of mind til they kill people. Just look at the Indonesian tsunami response - before that, there was no tsunami warning system, afterwards everyone's nervous about it). Even though it's really unlikely to happen again within a few hundred years, it would just take a single asteroid of the right size to wipe everyone out, so it's in everyone's interested to take the threat seriously.

So most of the initial tech would be going to developing methods to find potentially dangerous asteroids, go to them, and move them out of harm's way. And that would lead to long-term space habitation, manned travel, etc.

 

[Vile]

I want to examine the impact as a trigger (or war-ender) in part to explain why space travel and space technology are so advanced, and other technologies lag behind.

Combined with some of the earlier ideas about not being too specific about the details of the Twilight War, this sounds like the best way forward. You don't have to bend the established setting too much, you are not building in near-future obsolescence, and you leave referees enough wriggle-room to determine the flavour of their 2300AD universe.

Mind you, I've always liked the sort of 'alternate history' feel I get when re-reading 2300AD materials today. 8)

 

[rust]

I do not remember which of the space or science fiction pioneers first
talked about the necessity to create human colonies in space in order
to avoid to have "all eggs in the same basket" (or so), but I could well
imagine that the shock of even a minor impact on Earth could create
a movement with the aim to explore and settle the "high frontier".

And some prudent politicians could also come to the conclusion that a
space race would be preferable to an arms race, and might even help
to reduce some of the tensions between nations by channeling their
energies outwards and away from their potential enemies on Earth.

While mentioning international politics ... 2300 AD to me had a strong
19th century feeling when it came to the description of the various na-
tions and their relations, especially in Europe.

I may well be wrong, but I cannot imagine a future where the major Eu-
ropean nations dissolve their current ties and return to the kind of natio-
nalism of the 19th century, or where micro-nations like Bavaria (I hap-
pen to live there) would even try to "go it alone" and to become major
players.

Could you imagine Vermont or Yorkshire as a plausible interstellar po-
wer ? :lol: