Interstellar Communications in Traveller
- Thread starter DeHammer
- Start date
Condottiere
Emperor Mongoose
They actually use Guild Navigators.
That kind of setting change and growth should be determined by the GMs, not by publishers. It just pisses off players.
The published setting should be pretty static, because once it's at the table, it belongs to the players. Publishing Singularity is fine. Making Singularity the basis for future publications, not fine.
Right now, there's a bunch of "Futures" and your table can pick one or make up your own. Singularity and Wrath of the Ancients are different futures. Whatever outcome of the 5th Frontier War is potentially other splits in the future. I would think it pretty cool if they did a proper player facing Rebellion campaign.
But at no point, imho, should the setting just jump to 1120 with Mongoose's choices for which of those things apply and in what way now being standard in new publications. That's my job as the GM.
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
Your milage may vary.
It didn't wreck the setting because it isn't actually applied. That's actually a big problem for a lot of the rules. They write the rules. They don't actually use them. It's now pretty straightforward, if not easy, to cross empty hexes but everything still pretends Rifts are major obstacles. There's personal force fields that are better than most armor and no one in the setting uses them. There's rules for massive automation and nothing is actually massively automated.
This is because they are fine with saying 2300 or Pioneer or whatever have their own tech paradigm, but they don't want to clarify the tech paradigm of Charted Space. But they also don't want to do the work to update the setting for the impacts of the new rules.
A few years back, Matt said that they don't intend to advance the setting but rather they are going to continue to publish various campaigns fanning out from 1105(ish) with possible futures. Or, at least, that's how I understood his statement. I think that is vastly better than GDW's constantly churning the setting with their latest and greatest "update" to the setting.
If Mongoose wants to start running different product lines for Charted Space: 1105! 1150! Whatever and commit to actually writing books that implement the new technologies with all their effects at the society and structures, that would be interesting. As long as they are clearly labelled. But that, again, requires them to decide on tech paradigms and they've been resistant to doing that.
Whether that's better or worse than rolling out a new setting with different assumptions? I don't know.
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
While every GM should and will control what is appropriate for their Traveller Universe, even leaving aside Singularity, this is a clearcut use of the prototyping rules and isn't a stretch to them at all. No one has to use it even if secret time travelling Imperial Intelligence agents show up at their houses. Personally, I would love the chaos and upheaval, but I know not everyone shares that view.
And no one is stopping you from doing that job.
Want to run Traveller in the Third Imperium of 1105? Not a problem! Knock yerself out! Have fun!
Want to run Traveller at the outset of the Third Imperium? Go ahead! It's your game, your table, and the rules are provided! Again, go ahead!
Want to run Traveller in the Hard Times/Rebellion/Virus era? Personally, I don't see the appeal beyond - maybe - the Hard Times Era, but it's within the rules. Ain't nobody got the right to say you can't/shouldn't/are forbidden. Regency? Likewise, although a Star Vikings campaign has more appeal for me than a Virus campaign.
Hey, here's a novel approach! Want to run Traveller - get this! - without including the Third Imperium at all? Guess what? It's possible! (In fact, I seem to recall something about the referee creating his/her own game setting being mention all the way back in the LBBs! Strange thought that, innit? Almost like this game was intended to allow the players - oh, I don't know? - something like freedom?)
As a matter of fact, I've been toying with the idea, for quite some time now, of a homebrew setting where the Third Imperium either does not exist, or is so far away (and was departed from so long ago) that no one in the setting area knows about the 3I. (Honestly, I haven't decided yet which way the setting is going to be decided. The original colonists for the new area fled from Terran space during the war with an overwhelming opposition - if I use the 3I timeline it would be the Vilani Imperium, but it could be something filling a similar role - so technically, the Second Imperium hadn't even come into existence at the time, much less the Third.) You know something? With all this planning and - gasp! - outright heresy against the Holy Writ of the 3I, I've still noticed a distinct lack of the Mongoose Orthodoxy Patrol kicking down my door. I don't really expect them, either. ("Nobody expects the M.O.P! Among our weapons are..." No, no, that's just silly...)
So run your game your way. I'll do the same with mine., and not say a word against yours. Show me the same courtesy.
I am. Where did anyone say anything about how you run your game?
My position is that *you* should be running your game. Saying I don't want Mongoose publishing material that assumes an particular outcome of a random adventure they published and expecting new material to conform to that is not saying a single thing about *your* campaign.
Or, if Mongoose has decided to be telling their own story for us to admire, then they should actually do that. Why isn't there a discussion in the Singularity campaign about how the Wrath of the Ancients' super humans and their high technology will affect Naalir's plans? If Singularity is "fact", then so is Wrath of the Ancients. The "fact" that the Ancients destroyed the Imperial battle fleet in District 268 should affect the Fifth Frontier War in some way, you'd think. Don't you think a raging 5FW would have a teensy bit of an effect on the finale of Drinax?
There's no master plan there. These are all separate stories that various people wanted to write and Mongoose thought would be cool to publish. And I'm fine with that.
If you want to include Singularity in your campaign, great! Do it. If you want Mongoose to update the setting to make Singularity "fact" that affects all future publications and everyone who doesn't buy Singularity is going "uhh, what's happening here?" I don't think that's great.
But the absolute worst thing, imho, is Mongoose publishing things as "fact" in a rulebook or sourcebook and then pretending nothing changes because of it. If Charted Space is designed to showcase the rules, then actually use the rules...including all the cybernetics, AIs, empty hex space exploration, personal energy shields, and all the rest. If, on the other hand, it's designed to have it's own tech paradigm, then just say that.
Because this "the telephone now exists, but everyone's still pretending the world is relying on the telegraph" approach to technology is garbage.
Fluffy Bunny Feet
Emperor Mongoose
Hop Drive Astrogators must be Psions? Maybe ones with clairvoyance specifically?
Maybe Psions as Astrogators secretly should have a bonus to handle jumps? Even more if they are specifically clairvoyant?
Reminds me of E.E. Smiths Subspace novels where a Psion deduces that the inventors of the Subspace drive were themselves psionic and that is what allowed them to invent the subspace drive and power systems.
Have to consider integrating this with my personal Traveller setting. It would mesh with certain existing elements.
Yes? That's true.
Maybe I misread something, but I was under the impression the argument was being made that *MONGOOSE* should be doing the applying of these things to the wider setting in an official manner. I couldn't care less what someone does with the setting on their own. More power to you. Publish cool TAS stuff about what you think it will do when it's more widespread. Go to town.
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
I don’t think I was saying they should do so but I could have been clearer. It is canon if one includes Singularity, unless they strip that part out. If you don’t want that future, it isn’t canon though the research station is likely still working on something like that. I was more saying it’s an option for us rather than Mongoose.
MonsterX
Emperor Mongoose
Having some super-tech which could change the setting is fine, if it shows up in some kind of exceptional situation and there are reasons why it stays contained and can't be generalized. It can make a good MacGuffin. However, something like the Hop Drive becoming generalized would change the balance of power, shift routes and economies, upend the geography of Charted Space. How can you have your cake and eat it too?: maybe reliable Hop Drive tech is always 50 years away, like nuclear fusion nowadays. But we have these prototypes, which aren't quite safe, are very limited in production, expensive and impractical. "We just need some brave volunteers to use it and help work out the kinks."
There is a bit of a contradiction in that good science fiction is often about these kinds of wondrous advances, which alter the setting, and part of what makes it interesting is seeing how that plays out. It is different from fantasy, in that in fantasy, magic plays the same role, but it is inherently individualized and limited - it is not necessarily made int o something that every can just start doing. However, the instability which changes the setting is also not necessarily what you want - it makes it hard to keep a consistent universe.
There is a bit of a contradiction in that good science fiction is often about these kinds of wondrous advances, which alter the setting, and part of what makes it interesting is seeing how that plays out. It is different from fantasy, in that in fantasy, magic plays the same role, but it is inherently individualized and limited - it is not necessarily made int o something that every can just start doing. However, the instability which changes the setting is also not necessarily what you want - it makes it hard to keep a consistent universe.
Canon's a term only relevant to Mongoose authors. The original canon on Hop drives is that they don't get deployed to a significant degree for another 8 centuries, but that "fact" is pretty much irrelevant to any actual game at the table. And may not be true any more. Absolutely someone is working on better jump drives, whether that's J7 or H1 or warp engines.
The issue of canonicity of the epic campaigns is mostly that they are obviously not designed to exist together. But if Mongoose wants to fix that or declare some canon and others not, they can. That declaration would still only be relevant to authors publishing official material.
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
Personally, I think the upheaval would make for lots of exciting opportunities for the Travellers. Virus and rebellion don’t do anything for me, but something like this does.
Which is the point of all these different campaigns. Some people are excited by super powerful aliens and gaining personal power for their characters. Some people want to do big military stuff. Some people want to see a technological revolution. Others want to survive as it all burns down. And so on.
It is my opinion that Mongoose should be publishing as wide a variety of possible futures and styles of campaign as possible without making GDW's mistake of trying to force the story down a particular path.
I don't particularly care if they publish something that doesn't suit my interests. I'm sure it suits someone's and I can probably find something I can adapt in it. Or, at least, enjoy reading it. My only real ask is that the stuff they publish actually be player facing (which the 5FW stuff largely fails at so far).
AndrewW
Emperor Mongoose
No Skip drives?
WHULorigan
Emperor Mongoose
Not at the current Charted Space TL. (Not even experimentally - they are Standard TL20).
AndrewW
Emperor Mongoose
The Third Imperium TL isn't there yet in the current timeline, true. Doesn't mean stuff isn't being experimented with somewhere.
