Journal of the Travellers' Aid Society - Volumes 7 & 8

[MongooseMatt]

Volumes 7 and 8 of the Journal of the Travellers' Aid Society are now available and ready to ship! Each is jam-packed full of Traveller articles, including new adventures, playable alien races, creatures from the interstellar bestiary, patrons, encounters, a fleet's worth of ships, and new gear to aid your travelling among the stars.

You can grab your own copies right here: https://www.mongoosepublishing.com/collections/sourcebooks

 

[ColinD]

Mapping is so central to Traveller and Volume 7's article "Stellar Cartography" by Dalton Calford is great. The explanation for two dimensional map representation in a three dimensional space is elegant and the art very straightforward and clean. Its worth a purchase for both a physical and electronic copy.

 

[MongooseMatt]

Mapping is so central to Traveller and Volume 7's article "Stellar Cartography" by Dalton Calford is great. The explanation for two dimensional map representation in a three dimensional space is elegant and the art very straightforward and clean.

We are actually looking for opinions on that article, and how it is being received - we want to know if that should be canon-canon as an explanation...

 

[Annatar Giftbringer]

We are actually looking for opinions on that article, and how it is being received - we want to know if that should be canon-canon as an explanation...

will re-read it in depth and comment

 

[Sigtrygg]

My opinion, for what it is worth, is to canon-canon it, I really like it.

 

[Geir]

It's a really good article and would work well enough at the subsector scale. The bigger you get, though, the more problems any 2D representation of 3D space is going to become. The other problem, if I read it correctly, is that the map would only be valid from one particular hex. I'm pretty sure if redrawing the map from a different system's hex, you'd get a very different looking map. Can't prove it but that's what spins in my head.

Every time I've tried to do any realistic map for the local stars around Sol, I eventually run into what I called the 'flayed fish problem': two stars that are supposed to be really close together end up on opposite sides of the map.

While I was considering the question, I came up with an idea that I think could work - but not for subsectors and sectors as currently defined. You'd have to go with 49 hex 'megahexes' (Anyone member those from Melee and Wizard?) for subsectors, and to show multiple subsectors, every subsector would need to have a different map centred on it to show the 'new' six adjacent subsectors. And even then, you still have a bit of a 'corner problem'. Easier to explain with pictures...that I haven't drawn... In any event, while it would result in close-to-accurate 2D hex star maps, it wouldn't be a Traveller map in any sense. Closer to a 2300AD map (or set of maps) if anything. Of course, for continuity purposes, 2300 is going off a 40-year-old star map with lots of missing systems and recomputed distances, but that's an unrelated issue.

 

[shammond42]

From my first read through it, I really liked it. I intend to go back through it, thinking harder about the math and geometry. I'll try to do that soon.

 

[wmarshal]

I hate to bring this thread back up, but did anyone have problems understanding the map article? Maybe my brain is just glitching, but I couldn’t make good sense of it. Has there been any other follow ups or additional explanation given?

(Currently at work, so my replies may be tardy.)

 

[Sigtrygg]

No problem understanding it after a couple of read throughs, and I still think it should be canon canon.

 

[CordwainerFish]

I hate to bring this thread back up, but did anyone have problems understanding the map article? Maybe my brain is just glitching, but I couldn’t make good sense of it. Has there been any other follow ups or additional explanation given?

(Currently at work, so my replies may be tardy.)

The Stellar Cartography article? No offense to the author, but my rule has always been "reconciling the three dimensionality of space with the obligatory flatness of maps will only end in tears, so just look the other way whenever the subject comes up".

 

[Condottiere]

Think of them like subway maps, navigating jumpspace.

Three dimensional, you'll want that on a computer screen.

 

[wmarshal]

The Stellar Cartography article? No offense to the author, but my rule has always been "reconciling the three dimensionality of space with the obligatory flatness of maps will only end in tears, so just look the other way whenever the subject comes up".

But I’m hoping I can make sense of it as some of the other posters here have. You might be right, but I’d like to gain enough of how they’re understanding the map so as to get past the tears.

 

[wmarshal]

Think of them like subway maps, navigating jumpspace.

Three dimensional, you'll want that on a computer screen.

So is the argument to drop the idea that the flat maps have any kind of representation to real space at all?

 

[Vormaerin]

Traveller's map is not remotely representational, even without the 2D issue. You can just look at the vicinity of Earth/Sol and see that it has a small fraction of the number of stars actually present.

So clearly the map is reflecting something other than straight astrographical reality.

 

[ColinD]

I enjoy the article and like the idea.

But I’m hoping I can make sense of it as some of the other posters here have. You might be right, but I’d like to gain enough of how they’re understanding the map so as to get past the tears.

I do like the article. What you mean by the tears?

 

[wmarshal]

I enjoy the article and like the idea.

I do like the article. What you mean by the tears?

That was in reference to CordwainerFish’s comment "reconciling the three dimensionality of space with the obligatory flatness of maps will only end in tears,…”

 

[Condottiere]

I would say that the case was for, rather than an argument, that Mongoose can cheap out, feed the maps to an artificial intelligence programme, and ask it to create a three dimensional map, that can be zoomed in and out, and viewed from any angle, like our Travellermap.

 

[MasterGwydion]

I am sure that they can, but will it actually add anything to the game? We have a map currently. It works for everything that We need it to. Why replace it with something that can't be laid out on a table?

 

[Sigtrygg]

Wouldn't such a use of AI to produce graphics not be akin to using AI for art, which is something Mongoose is against?

 

[MasterGwydion]

Wouldn't such a use of AI to produce graphics not be akin to using AI for art, which is something Mongoose is against?

I doubt that it would require an AI. Seems to me to be a simple formula that plots distances from a starting location. A "relatively" simple computer program, not an AI, to perform all of the necessary calculations. The only thing that you'd need an AI for is if someone was too lazy to input the location data and wanted the AI to find all of that data for them.