Deciders and Marc Miller's Traveller Novel

alex_greene

alex_greene

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So Marc Miller's Traveller Novel features a character called a "Decider," whose job basically amounts to identifying and neutralising threats to the Imperium.

I'm reminded of James H Schmitz' novel Agent of Vega, which featured an agency whose job it was to protect the Confederacy of Vega which was rising from the ashes of a fallen Empire of Earth.

The whole idea of Deciders is a new thing. Clearly MWM intends for this to be a part of his T5, and it is definitely set in the OTU - and since this comes from the pen of MWM himself, it's as canon as canon can be.

So. Thoughts. If they're canon for Mongoose Traveller, do you think that the reason nobody's ever seen them in any published material before is that there haven't been any Deciders in the Spinward Marches before?
 
H Beam Piper had something similar. His was called the Ministry of Disturbance, a formal, but hidden, government agency who's job it was to keep the Empire from becoming complacent. You can go to Project Gutenberg and get a copy of the story.

It's an interesting concept. With no external enemy or any real goal, one has to wonder would human society become overly complacent and let things start sliding downhill?

As for Millers' novel... after the huge disappointment on his last Kickstarter project for T5, I will never buy another Miller product sight unseen again.
 
This one's a novel, not game rules. It'd be interesting to see MWM's take on his universe and find out what Traveller looks like from his own mind's eye, as compared to seeing it through the filter of ours.
 
I thought those were Men in Black.

Absolutely nothing new. People whose job is to 'neutralize' subversives in a society at the command of Those in Power is as old as human society. James Bond was a type of Decider. We didn't know there are Deciders in the Traveller Universe until the novel mentions it. Many campaigns could be as such and neither the ref or players ever knew because no one gave it such a descriptor.
 
The Bureau of Sabotage is a fictional government entity set in two of Frank Herbert's science fiction novels, Whipping Star and The Dosadi Experiment, and first introduced in his 1964 short story "The Tactful Saboteur". It is colloquially known as BuSab. Jorj X. McKie, the protagonist of all the works listed below, is a saboteur extraordinary first appeared in the story "A Matter of Traces" in 1958.


Background

In Herbert's fiction, sometime in the far future, government becomes terrifyingly efficient. Red tape no longer exists: laws are conceived of, passed, funded, and executed within hours, rather than months. The bureaucratic machinery becomes a juggernaut, rolling over human concerns and welfare with terrible speed, jerking the universe of sentients one way, then another, threatening to destroy everything in a fit of spastic reactions. In short, the speed of government goes beyond sentient control (in this fictional universe, many alien species co-exist, with a common definition of sentience marking their status as equals).
History

Founded by the mysterious "Five Ears" of unknown species, BuSab began as a terrorist organization whose sole purpose was to frustrate the workings of government in order to give sentients a chance to reflect upon changes and deal with them. Having saved sentiency from its government, BuSab was officially recognized as a necessary check on the power of government. It provides a natural (and lucrative) outlet for society's regular crop of troublemakers, who must be countered by society's regular crop of "do-gooders".

First a corps, then a bureau, BuSab gained legally recognized powers to interfere in the workings of any world, of any species, of any government or corporation, answerable only to themselves. Their motto is, "In Lieu of Red Tape."
Limitations

Forbidden from committing acts of sabotage against private citizens, BuSab acts as a monitor of, and a conscience for, the collective sentiency, watching for signs of anti-sentient behaviour by corporate or government entities and preserving the dignity of individuals. Some essential functions of government are immune from BuSab by statute. BuSab is opposed by such organizations as the "Tax Watchers" who have successfully lobbied to grant themselves the same immunity from BuSab enjoyed by agencies such as public utilities.

BuSab monitors even itself and employs sabotage to prevent the agency from slipping into hidebound stasis. Agents are promoted to the head of the organization by successfully sabotaging the Secretary. By the same token, there is no term limit imposed on the Secretary of the Bureau of Sabotage. As long as he is alert enough to avoid being sabotaged, he remains qualified to lead BuSab.
 
I think that there ought to be a difference between "enforcers working for some Machiavellian scrote clinging to power by hook or by crook" and "agents whose job it is to keep the society alive, even if it means removing usurpers and Machiavellian scrotes whose time is clearly up."
 
It's like James Schmitz's Psychology Service from the Hub series - they're not the muscle supporting the current powers that be, because their remit is to keep the Hub from disintegrating. Antibodies, as it were.
 
Jefferson Swycaffer also wrote an interesting take on secret assassin/agents based in his Traveller universe. Includes some interesting ideas of how the agent would receive their "assignment" etc.
 
I don't get how a 'decider' is different from a decision maker in the State Department or National Whatever Agency. What is actually new/different (and uniquely sci-fi) about "the decider"?
 
Moppy said:
I don't get how a 'decider' is different from a decision maker in the State Department or National Whatever Agency. What is actually new/different (and uniquely sci-fi) about "the decider"?
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The fact they are dead/undead minds that are given a new body and life when they are needed. Thus they live "forever" in a way. Other than that, you are right, not much different than any other MIB type.

I still backed the Kick Starter and will enjoy reading the story. :mrgreen:
 
Moppy said:
I don't get how a 'decider' is different from a decision maker in the State Department or National Whatever Agency. What is actually new/different (and uniquely sci-fi) about "the decider"?
Click to expand...
How is an astronaut in the future different from the ones now?
 
ShawnDriscoll said:
Moppy said:
I don't get how a 'decider' is different from a decision maker in the State Department or National Whatever Agency. What is actually new/different (and uniquely sci-fi) about "the decider"?
Click to expand...
How is an astronaut in the future different from the ones now?
Click to expand...

Many ways to put a unique sci-fi angle on it. Example They have to worry about relativistic time dilation and aging, getting used to the changes on earth each time they return home. That's a unique 'scifi' angle to the same old thing that we already have today.

Now I am not setting out to be critical. I was asking - since people are talking about the deciders, what is the unique sci-fi selling point of the decider?
 
Moppy said:
Now I am not setting out to be critical. I was asking - since people are talking about the deciders, what is the unique sci-fi selling point of the decider?
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Their calling. Sounds like they Decide.

Fates.

They hold the future of the Imperium in their hands, and their job is to choose what needs to be done to ensure that the Imperium stands.
If that means deciding that the Imperium is best served by the death of an Archduke in a freak traffic accident, that is what happens. If they decide that a planet has to be sterilised in order to extinguish a faction which threatens the Imperium, they'll take their ship out to the system's Kuiper Belt and steer a comet towards that planet. A big one.

The easiest fate to arrange would have to be a Misjump. They occur, even in the best-maintained vessels. What could be more expedient than for a "software malfunction" to trigger a ship's Jump engine prematurely, before it gets to the 100D Jump point?

As long as the end point is that a threat to the Imperium has been neutralised, anything goes - and by that, it's possible that regicide's also an option, if the Emperor starts turning into a new Cleon I.
 
Condottiere said:
It would alter your perception of the Traveller universe, and push it along the more conspiracy theorist model.
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Like Vilani being human isn't already? Many years ago aliens came to Earth. They kidnapped humans and took them to some other world, where these humans, no doubt with some forms of subtle alien prompting, developed a star-spanning Imperium, constantly watching Earth for the day when the Solomani would "invent" the jump drive and ... they say the Solomani were a surprise, but what happens when you find the Ancient Relic Database that explains The Great Plan?
 
Condottiere said:
Conspiracy theory is more about unseen and unaccountable forces manipulating events.
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So we're back to the ancients and whatever mysterious code is programmed into human DNA?
 
Only if they still have active agents; so the Deciders may have a longer lineage than actually acknowledged.

The point is to feel and believe that the universe is out to get you.
 
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