High Guard: Expectations?
- Thread starter Golan2072
- Start date
simonh said:
Yep, it's right there in book 5, exactly the same an FF&S.
I think it's clear that Book 5 developed on ideas presented in Book 2, the real problem is that things weren't explicitly over-written - they were just presented as an alternative system and book 2 wasn't updated at all to reflect any change in direction caused by book 5.
I think this is exactly why Mongoose really needs to avoid this sort of "two-tier" system.
captainjack23
Cosmic Mongoose
simonh said:
Aramis is right, the LBB2 books don't specify a tech of introduction.
However, its easy to see that in a universe with such mixed tech levels, and one in which the higher tech levels are known about, if not constructable, the main impediment is technique, not theory. The Book 5 limits are when the concept of a jump level becomes possible for the first time.*
So, oddly, to me, it makes sense that in the OTU, its quite possible to know that Jump 6 is possible, but to be unable to produce the required equiptment to do it. And contrarily, to be able to assemble them from imports.
so, to derail the discusssion into broader realms, it may well be that this kind of ability to order high tech stuff off the peg - or at least enough of it to get around local limits, is what is really causing the whole glacial progress and mixed tech in the OTU - why develop the infrastructure and move up a tech level when one can get it mail order ?
There are lots of places on the earth that can't produce a jet fighter (or an fission weapon) but could buy them, likely for far less than the development and infrastructure costs needed to make them locally - and go up a tech level in transportation technology.
*yes, this is a post hoc rationalization fro one point of view - from another its a reasonable explaination for background details. Lets not start up on why one is okay, and another is waste of time.
captainjack23 said:
Marc actually kinda addressed this in a early Journal article. Specifically the article on currency exchange. The summation is if you do your annual maintenance one a world that is lower tech than your ship there is no cost savings as the parts needed have to be imported to do the job. By extension ship construction is going to follow along the same lines.
captainjack23 said:
Yes, why build a plant/industry when it will be more economical to buy from some one who does. i.e. Comparative advantage.
captainjack23 said:
Aramis seems to be implying that you can make a J3 drive at TL 9. That's patently nonsense because the OTU would have been very different if that were true (the Interstellar Wars would have been a lot shorter for a start). The practical truth in the game is that you can't make J3 at TL 9, you can only make J1 drives at TL 9.
There's nothing in there saying that it's anything to do with "understanding jump". Maybe people did understand at TL 9 that you could potentially get J6, just like we understand now that you can potentially go FTL through a wormhole but have no way to make one. But we're talking about being actually capable of building more powerful jump drives here, not understanding the concepts.
For all practical intents and purposes, the High Guard TL charts are what counts in the OTU, not Book 2's poorly-explained implications.
That's the second time you've said words to this effect and it looks like you're trying to say one thing and then stifle discussion about it - can you please stop doing that? We should be able to discuss and argue any points here, not just ones that you think are valid.
captainjack23
Cosmic Mongoose
Infojunky said:
The population levels of most worlds is also going to exacerbate this effect, I suspect...it may not be physically possible to bot run a Manahattan project feed the workers and researchers, , and keep the colony running. 100,000 people on a whole planet ain't many for a major tech advancing research initiative. How many were involved in the Manhattan project anyway ? Including indirect but essential support. (truck drivers, admin staff, etc.)
I'm glad this came up. Interesting implications as ever......
captainjack23
Cosmic Mongoose
EDG said:
I will if you stop using emotionally manipulative rhetoric to enhance your points.
captainjack23
Cosmic Mongoose
EDG said:
Aramis is sayng that the rules allow it in LBB2. And it does.I know you don't like that, but there it is. I suggest it can be easily reconciled, which is my goal, and you use it to illustrate the piss-poor nature of the rules. We're doing two different things here, in case you didn't notice.
Should it matter that the rules don't define what the table in question means explicitly ? Dunno. It also doesn't say anything about vacuum suits*, radiation effects or the flu, advanced medical care or fractional G drives. Should we presume that these don't exist becuase it doesn't "say it anywhere" ?
You've trotted this argument out now at least twice, and I'm simply going to say this, and move on: its mostly so general an argument as to be meaningless. As far as I'm concerned it's a game, not a legal contract. A level of analysis that is appropriate for one isn't appropriate for the other. Who says so ? Me.
*yes, this is a joke. We all know that what Traveller has is Vacc suits....never Vacuum suits.
captainjack23 said:
He's talking about technicalities and rules nitpickery and I'm talking about what actually happens in practice. It doesn't matter that book 2 technically allows you to have J3 at TL 9, the in-game reality (at least in the OTU) is that this isn't actually the case and it was superseded in book 5. And that's what actually matters. It has nothing to do with me "not liking it".
Again, there you go trying to stifle discussion by deciding what is or isn't worth talking about...
I would say that is very much your opinion. My opinion is that if rules are poorly explained or thought out then those should be pointed out as such, and the book 2 ones are very poorly explained and not very well thought out IMO.
We're talking about things that define a whole setting here, so I think it's fair to analyse them in greater detail than just if it was a casual one-off game that nobody really cared about. By your logic most of the discussions and arguments that have happened about Traveller (about piracy, near-c rocks, economics, world design etc) should never have happened because you think they're too detailed in their analysis - and you've certainly taken part in those when it's suited you.
EDG: Bk5 says that Bk2 designs are valid, and drives may be mixed... <shudder>
So clearly, it's possible to build the drives at lower tech under CT. What isn't buildable is the computer needed to prepare the jump.
Likewise, in canon, no one bothered to develop J3 in the ISW period. Not that no one COULD build them, no one realized they could.
When I run a game, the rules come before the setting materials. Always have. (I started as a wargamer. Still am. I do make a difference between Board and War Game rules and RPG rules; RPG are you can unless it says you can't; board/wargames are you can't unless it says you can.)
In re TL Limits in MGT Bis models don't raise the TL of the computers.
Page 4 says developed.
Jump at TL9 "... lead to the development of the jump drive..."
J2 at TL 11 "Jump-2 travel becomes possible,..."
J3 at TL12 "Jump-3 travel is developed."
J4 at TL13 "Jump-4 travel."
J5 at TL14 "Jump-5 travel."
J6 at TL15 "Jump-6 travel."
Page four also implies strongly the OTU setting; the fluff at the front mentions the marches explicitly in the section on TL.
HOWEVER, the computer tables disagree, since
Mod1 is TL7
Mod2 is TL9
Mod3 is TL11
Mod4 is TL12
Mod5 is TL13
Mod6 is TL14
Mod7 is TL15
and bis has no TL increase, is not limited to models 1-3, and the software table lacks TL's as well.
So by the rules AS WRITTEN, jump can be built further than can be developed....
and I'm OK with that.
Also note: its more expensive to get a 3/bis than a 4.
Quick fix? Add the TL restrictions for the OTU to the software table for jump software.
Oh, and Con, the OTU has canonical TL9 J2 ships. (CT's Scout Courier.)
So clearly, it's possible to build the drives at lower tech under CT. What isn't buildable is the computer needed to prepare the jump.
Likewise, in canon, no one bothered to develop J3 in the ISW period. Not that no one COULD build them, no one realized they could.
When I run a game, the rules come before the setting materials. Always have. (I started as a wargamer. Still am. I do make a difference between Board and War Game rules and RPG rules; RPG are you can unless it says you can't; board/wargames are you can't unless it says you can.)
In re TL Limits in MGT Bis models don't raise the TL of the computers.
Page 4 says developed.
Jump at TL9 "... lead to the development of the jump drive..."
J2 at TL 11 "Jump-2 travel becomes possible,..."
J3 at TL12 "Jump-3 travel is developed."
J4 at TL13 "Jump-4 travel."
J5 at TL14 "Jump-5 travel."
J6 at TL15 "Jump-6 travel."
Page four also implies strongly the OTU setting; the fluff at the front mentions the marches explicitly in the section on TL.
HOWEVER, the computer tables disagree, since
Mod1 is TL7
Mod2 is TL9
Mod3 is TL11
Mod4 is TL12
Mod5 is TL13
Mod6 is TL14
Mod7 is TL15
and bis has no TL increase, is not limited to models 1-3, and the software table lacks TL's as well.
So by the rules AS WRITTEN, jump can be built further than can be developed....
and I'm OK with that.
Also note: its more expensive to get a 3/bis than a 4.
Quick fix? Add the TL restrictions for the OTU to the software table for jump software.
Oh, and Con, the OTU has canonical TL9 J2 ships. (CT's Scout Courier.)
captainjack23
Cosmic Mongoose
EDG said:
Well, since you're not the final authority on the difference between nitpickery, and profound, or an expert on practice, it has everything to do with you liking it.
As opposed to defining what is nitpickery and not worth talking about ?
Well, I suppose I could wait until you use the usual derailing and emotive arguments before responding to them, but this seems much more efficient.
As I said, if you can eschew your usual posting style of bombast and agitprop, we can have a discussion - and I'll bet you you'll have a lot less problem with what you descripe as "everone wanting a piece of you" .
Lucky for you, until I have "admin" after my name, you can , and do, safely ignore my requests.
In all honesty, yes, those general requests for shaping the discussion were aimed at you. Perhaps it was coy of me to make them sound more general, but I was trying not single you out.
But. I looked back at the playtest stuff and discovered I spent an amazing amount of time arguing with you, and generally most of that was arguing about what you considered the valid terms of the argument, or my right to argue, or weather my responses were worth even considering. I also found no example of you changing your opinion, or in any way backing off on an argument save by blithely dropping the subject, or turning it into a meta argument; and certainly few if any examples of you apologising for insults.
So, I can only assume that when you say, you don't care about what people think about your posts, (which you say a lot) you mean more than just your agressive style - in fact you seem to mean that you have no interest whatsoever in discussion about what you post, or any kind of informative exchange.
Good enough, and it's not against the TOS. But it is a waste of time.
If you want to continue this, we might want to move to another thread, possibly titled, "help help Captain jack is repressing me". feel free.
AKAramis said:
I think that's really subject to interpretation. Nobody has ever said that J3 was even possible to build until the end of the ISW period (when it basically won the war by literally running rings around the Vilani).
And even if it was theoretically possible to build J3 at TL 9, nobody actually did it in canon and there's no evidence that anyone even tried. Arguably the moment you build a J3 drive, you can be said to have gone up to TL 12 in jump technology.
The trick is to temper the "in RPGs you can unless it says you can't" part with some degree of logic and common sense...
I'm looking at the Scout/Courier descriptions in book 2 and in Traders and Gunboats and nowhere does it says it's TL 9. In fact I can't see mention of TL at all. What makes you think it's TL 9?
Oh wait, I got it, it's in Fighting Ships. Though that also says that J4 Express Boats are TL 10...
That's nuts. How exactly is "standardised technology" that book 2 is supposedly based on capable of making ships jump further than their TL allows? Are they just magic black boxes that nobody understands? Who's building this "standardised technology", and at what TL? If you have TL A ships with J4 capability then the Jump drive has to be built at TL D.
Book 5 and FF&S both say that jump drives have a specific technological progression - Book 2 (implicitly) says something different. These simply aren't reconcilable - if you've got "standardised technology" that lets you build and use jump drives at lower tech levels than stated in book 5 , then you have to be able to build and use customised versions of those jump drives at those lower tech levels too. It's like saying you can mass-produce something at a given TL but you can't hand-produce it, which is completely ass-backwards.
EDG said:
Except in Fighting Ships, which is clearly OTU.
EDG said:
Remember, Con, the OTU is NOT:
(1) the Traveller Rules drawn to logical conclusions
(2) sane even by approximation
(3) self-consistent
(4) consistent to the rules.
The OTU is a veneer applied in haphazard layers over the framework of rules and rules-built setting materials.
Applying Occam's razor: Bk2 drives produce similar results with different technologies to achieve them than do Bk5 drives. I reached that conclusion back in 1986...
The Bk2 JDrive D is identical, and TL9, no matter whether it is in the J2 four hundred tonner, J1 800 tonner, or J4 200 tonner.
Bk2 has progressions limiting both drive size and thus hull size.
Meanwhile, in the Bk5 type drives, each has a custom built drive, a drive much smaller, as well
200Td: Drive D j4 25Td; J4 Bk5 drive 10Td
400Td: Drive D J2 25Td; J2 Bk5 drive 12Td
800Td: Drive D J1 25Td; J1 Bk5 drive 16Td
Note that the 200tonner needs a TL10 Model 4.
Bk5 JDrives are FAR more efficient for space for smaller ships.
Bk2 Jdrives are able to generate higher jump numbers at lower tech.
What's been shown of T5 also uses the letter drives ala bk2.
MgT has a disconnect; the table of tech is OTU based, but the rules do not support nor follow. (I didn't catch this issue in the playtest, either. I checked my feedbacks.)
And I was using TL9 J3 well before I ever heard of the ISW period. Mongoose has, however, opened it up to far more abuse by removing the size limits.
AKAramis said:
OK, that's by your own admission. And yet you're sitting there selectively applying rules to it (based on whatever standards you're using). Same as me, except I'm clearly using different standards than you.
But the thing is, Occam's razor goes out of the window here. If the OTU is so haphazard and inconsistent (again, by your own admission) then there's no point in even discussing anything because there's no stable reference frame to use.
You can justify what you say all you like, and I can justify what I say all I like too, and I'm sure we can construct equally valid arguments. But the fact is that nobody can be correct when talking about the OTU.
The whole house of cards just came tumbling down. For any meaningful discussion to take place the OTU needs to be torn down and rebuilt on an internally consistent foundation (in terms of rules and setting).
(and in case any wise-guys start accusing me of stifling discussion, I'm not. You just can't have a meaningful discussion about anything that is so fundamentally inconsistent and self-contradictory).
This has been pointed out before. Pirates are supposed to exist but cant if you apply setting force levels.TLs get jerked around and ships cna be built several ways.
That is why I for one was hopeing SM could be updated to get rid of the worst of the sillinesses. And that Merc and HG will fix still more.
If not, I have been playing Traveller for some time now and am used to changing things until they make sense to me.
That is why I for one was hopeing SM could be updated to get rid of the worst of the sillinesses. And that Merc and HG will fix still more.
If not, I have been playing Traveller for some time now and am used to changing things until they make sense to me.
captainjack23
Cosmic Mongoose
EDG said:
Which, QED, is why discussing it requires politeness and a lack of bombast and denigrating adjectives; as well as accepting responsibiity for having at least a modicum of respect for differing opinions.
Otherwise, its just a fistfight.
That said, we are discussing High Guard expectations.
I too have to admit I'd like a more seamless system that doesn;t require much rationalization from small ships to large: OR one that explicitly separates the two; honestly, I don;t know enough about Maritime architecture to know is there is a continuum from private to commercial to military ships (or airplanes) , of if they really should use different rules systems.
It would be nice and convenient if one could design a ships boat and a tigress using the same rules - but it isn't necessary, I guess. Differences of scale do exist - and I can imagine that they matter enough to have two different shipbuilding systems......explicitly stated, though.
EDG said:
I went so far as to suggest that with T5 Marc should publically invalidate all prior canon.
You find it not worth discussing, so don't. Pack up and find a discussion that doesn't do you heartburn. Real simple. Not like anyone is holding a pistol to your temples forcing you to debate, EDG... Or are they?
In case you decide to continue discussing
OTU:Traveller::Yrth:GURPS
Yes, it's the default setting, but it has never been the only setting used. It is the majority used, but not the only. There is setting stuff in both not convered by the RAW...
Now, knowing that the Mongoose chaps have stated they based upon CT, CT has some validity in examining the means and methods. The OTU, well, not so much, as the OTU isn't part of MGT's core rules. MT, TNE, and T4, far less so.
The rules themselves provide for (in CT) J3 at TL9, as both drives and computers provide for it. The OTU does, but only by weirdnesses... Like the Bk2 designs in Sup9.
The simplest solution is as I said: different means of providing the same result, said result being "Pop into JSpace, fall for a week, and fall out many lightyears from where you started." What I failed to add: that Bk2 drive system probably requires knowledge that wasn't available to a TL9 culture. (Modern materials science has a number of such developments Titanium-silica 3d weave heat shielding, for example, made on 18thC looms and in 17th C kilns from materials manufactured with early 20th C techniques and late 20thC knowledge of how they interact... ref: Beyond Tomorrow, 1996... specific ep & airdate not known.)
Mongoose has a similar situation as bk2 due to rules not supporting the tighter OTU limits. Mongoose may "fix" that, or might not. But it is giving me ideas on the nature of the setting I'm going to run...
captainjack23
Cosmic Mongoose
To which I would again add, if you think Traveller needs a new, consistent "U", and that the OTU is beyond repair, right now you've got a golden opportunity to write it and publish it.
Or, you can continue to pick nits with Myself and Aramis, and argue about what we are arguing about, how we should argue about it, and what we should be arguing about, with and for.... and in six months you'll have a stale thread to show for it, and possibly , heartburn.
Your call.
Or, you can continue to pick nits with Myself and Aramis, and argue about what we are arguing about, how we should argue about it, and what we should be arguing about, with and for.... and in six months you'll have a stale thread to show for it, and possibly , heartburn.
Your call.
captainjack23 said:
Part of exploring what we expect from HG is knowing what we have RIGHT NOW...
And what we have right now is
J1 Developed at TL9, Buildable at TL7*
J2 Developed at TL11, Buildable at TL7*
J3 Developed at TL12, Buildable at TL9
J4 Developed at TL13, Buildable at TL11
J5 Developed at TL14, Buildable at TL12
J2 Developed at TL15, Buildable at TL13
Those sevens are due to drives not being listed with TL's... So... if we knew the formulae, we should be able to build a J1 drive with 1980's tools...
EDG said:
That's true up to a point, but IMHO there are different levels of credibility to different sources.
Book2 and Book5, as design systems, are only very vague approximations to the actual engineering 'realities' of the OTU and it would ver very surprising if those approximations didn't throw up some oddities from time to time. On the other hand the canonical history of the OTU is pretty clear about which Jump technologies are available at which TL, and even base the outcome of a war on the relationship between TL and Jump capability.
It seems to me more likely that the historical notes are more likely to accurately reflect the intentions of the game designer. However again not all setting background is always going to be consistent, at the end of the day you just need to take your best shot.
Fortunately my Traveller universe doesn't have to consistent with yours or anyone else's. I truly feel sorry for Mongoose having to cope with maintaining consistency with canon though. It can't be easy.
Simon Hibbs
