Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
The 0 and 6 are confusing me, @Sigtrygg. Are they a typo or do they mean something?
PoD - Oleb
- Thread starter MasterGwydion
- Start date
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
I didn’t see that. Which one is it and where in the interview?
What about ships that overuse the tonnage, underuse the tonnage, don’t cost what the book says, or otherwise have basic build errors? I’m not talking design choices here. I’m talking accounting errors that @Arkathan’s spreadsheet makes simple to spot and correct.
As for choosing to ignore their own design rules, that’s worse. Why have rules if you can decide to do things that bypass the constraints you have set on everyone else because they are inconvenient?
Adding design rules on the fly is different and I have no issues there. Making specific ships that are fun in niche scenarios is also fine. The ones I’m talking about are not because of design choices.
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MasterGwydion
Emperor Mongoose
So how can you as a Referee say that your players are not allowed to "cheat" when even the publisher doesn't have to follow their own rules?
Can I change my PC's STR score just because I bribed the Imperial Ministry of Health to say that I have a 15 strength on all of My health information? Will that grant Me a +3 on My skill rolls? No. That would be ridiculous, but that is just what you guys are saying is fine with planetary systems. You can't even complete the basic planet creation rules in the CRB if you don't have an accurate Pop score. Why? Because the Pop score affects the Gov score and several other things (Law Level and Tech Level just off the top of My head)
It’s not cheating you daftie
Quit getting mad at games: it’s bad for you. Relax and have fun.Condottiere
Emperor Mongoose
Inconsistency is frustrating.
It's possible, that the game has grown too large to have complete oversight.
It's possible, errors are due to time constraints.
I audit every canonical ship design before I use it, a habit I developed out of necessity, but would give greater latitude to other aspects, such as system statistics, because they are more generalized, as opposed to a requirement of accuracy, with said ship designs, and equipment design rules.
It's possible, that the game has grown too large to have complete oversight.
It's possible, errors are due to time constraints.
I audit every canonical ship design before I use it, a habit I developed out of necessity, but would give greater latitude to other aspects, such as system statistics, because they are more generalized, as opposed to a requirement of accuracy, with said ship designs, and equipment design rules.
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
Concur wholeheartedly.
MasterGwydion
Emperor Mongoose
If the Referee does not follow the rules, but the PCs are required to, that is the definition of cheating. If the Referee only applies the rules to one group, but not another, it is cheating. If a dealer at the card tables in Vegas decided that for one player at her table she would count an 18 as beating a 21 in Blackjack, but for everyone else it would require a 21, that is cheating. If her boss at the casino told her to do it, it is still cheating. Either the rules apply to everyone (including the referees, writers, and publishers) or they apply to no one.It’s not cheating you daftie
You do realize that if no one like Me is calling for quality control, then the quality of the game will only get worse and worse, right? You do understand that? How else will it ever change for the better? In general, publishers will produce whatever anyone will buy. They don't care about quality. They care about money. Mongoose is better about this (as in they care more about their product, just look at Geir's great work) than any other publisher that I have ever seen, but there is still room for improvement.
It’s not a competition between players and GM.
And you’ll never persuade Mongoose to bankrupt themselves in a quixotic attempt to satisfy “that one constantly-whiny guy on the forum”. They can’t say it but they long ago started tuning you out.
Sigtrygg
Emperor Mongoose
It's a typo. I'll fix it and post the fix here too.
I think it was originally going to be something on parenthesis, bit I think this makes more sense now:
"The last such mission would be jump 6, ten years out and ten years back, and could range for 1560 parsecs beyond Imperial borders."
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MasterGwydion
Emperor Mongoose
Why would consistency bankrupt a company? Do you think any car company would be in business if the cars coming out of the autoplant weren't built to exacting standards? How about the after-market parts companies? Do you think they would be in business if their products didn't fit the cars that they say the will?
What do you have against consistency and quality control? Why are you defending, what could be at best described, continuing mediocrity. Why do you want problems to compound and compound and compound until Mongoose has no choice but to scrap everything and write a new edition? I don't want this. If we can't get the problems right in this edition, then they will never be gotten right in the next edition. That is why the vehicle rules are being rewritten, because they didn't work with any of the rest of the published works. Look at the Field Catalogue. Can you honestly tell me that you are happy with the weaponbuilding rules, or do you think that they should be rewritten to better reflect the game we are playing?
You know the problem with listening to people who are consistently pointing out problems as well as solutions? If they'd been listened to the first time, it would have gotten fixed or been a work in progress and then it wouldn't have to be restated, and no one would have to hear it again. For example, Mongoose not using their own build rules when designing published ships. There is no reason not to and doing so, won't "bankrupt themselves", as you so dramatically exaggerated it.
I am also not the only one pointing things out. @Sigtrygg has mentioned many times jump drives, sensors, computers, and several other things. @Terry Mixon and others have pointed out several things as well. So, you saying that I am "that one constantly-whiny guy on the forum", is dishonest, disrespectful and unproductive.
Anstett
Emperor Mongoose
I think a short essay by Gareth Hanrahan, the writer for PoD has good insight:
Excerpt:
Now, under normal circumstances, I’d have written the nine missions, then looped back, edited and developed them for consistency, written the tenth in the light of the nine developed missions, and then done another development pass over the whole campaign. However, by the time I actually came to write the campaign, I’d left Mongoose and each adventure was treated as a separate freelance project – and released separately.
That meant that when I was writing the fourth adventure, the first was already available for download and people were already playing the campaign. It was the roleplaying equivalent of serialised fiction – I couldn’t go back and change things, but had to work with whatever got printed.
This is what happens in a growing campaign setting. The first people in get to make up things that then become rules that others choose to use or not, in this case even the original author.
The same applies for rule sets. Things get scattered in dozens of books.
I maintain that the best thing the fan base can do is a fully annotated cross reference index, similar to what someone recently shared for the Sword Worlds. No discussion of here is says X and here is says Y for what the population number means. Just Here are all the spots in the various books that talk about the population number.
Edit: add link to the original essay:
garhanrahan.com
Excerpt:
Now, under normal circumstances, I’d have written the nine missions, then looped back, edited and developed them for consistency, written the tenth in the light of the nine developed missions, and then done another development pass over the whole campaign. However, by the time I actually came to write the campaign, I’d left Mongoose and each adventure was treated as a separate freelance project – and released separately.
That meant that when I was writing the fourth adventure, the first was already available for download and people were already playing the campaign. It was the roleplaying equivalent of serialised fiction – I couldn’t go back and change things, but had to work with whatever got printed.
This is what happens in a growing campaign setting. The first people in get to make up things that then become rules that others choose to use or not, in this case even the original author.
The same applies for rule sets. Things get scattered in dozens of books.
I maintain that the best thing the fan base can do is a fully annotated cross reference index, similar to what someone recently shared for the Sword Worlds. No discussion of here is says X and here is says Y for what the population number means. Just Here are all the spots in the various books that talk about the population number.
Edit: add link to the original essay:
The Pirates of Drinax
The Pirates of Drinax is up on the Bundle of Holding, and digging through my emails it’s about ten years since the project really kicked off, so let’s take a quick jump down memory lane…
garhanrahan.com
MasterGwydion
Emperor Mongoose
PoD is still one of My favorite Traveller campaigns ever! It is also the one my players ask for the most.
It is sad that it happened this way. I would have loved to have seen the finished product written, editing, and checked for errors as one product instead of several. This was a disservice to the great material that was written. Not Gareth's fault, but this is what happens when you change things before the author is finished, but after he is no longer writing for your company, and then don't re-edit and re-quality-control it so that it makes sense as separate adventures as opposed to as a campaign or vice versa.
That is why I say it is a quality control problem. Do not let future writers ignore or rewrite what previous authors have written. The exception to this is, that if Mongoose as the publishers, wishes a change to occur, only they can approve that. Once that change has been written into that one book, then Mongoose must now go back to every other book and figure out what that one new change changes about rules or setting information in other books of the current ruleset. Previous rulesets can diverge as much as they want. Not the same rules, not the same world.
Personally, I would love a setting index organized by sector or subsector. Showing what books I need to buy to have absolutely everything that has been printed about that chuck of space including things that happened in it. So, adventures and such too, not just setting info.I maintain that the best thing the fan base can do is a fully annotated cross reference index, similar to what someone recently shared for the Sword Worlds. No discussion of here is says X and here is says Y for what the population number means. Just Here are all the spots in the various books that talk about the population number.
Edit: add link to the original essay:
The Pirates of Drinax
The Pirates of Drinax is up on the Bundle of Holding, and digging through my emails it’s about ten years since the project really kicked off, so let’s take a quick jump down memory lane…
As the fan base, all we can do is make our voices heard. The choice of what to do will always be up to Mongoose.
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
If they want free quality control on ships and robots, all @MongooseMatt needs to do is send them my way. I’ll audit the builds for him. Done.
Edit: If one is irked enough to complain about something, one should have a solution to offer. I’ll put in the time and effort to make the builds legal gratis. Me giving back to the game I love.
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MasterGwydion
Emperor Mongoose
I know and many others of the community would jump to help as well with quality control in other areas. I would be a disaster trying to do quality control for shipbuilding. None of My designs are legal by RAW either.
On the PoD thing that’s a perfect example of getting it good enough. It’s a consistently profitable top seller that has driven Traveller sales for years. I’m sure it will get a refresh at some point but it was edited enough to be broadly recognised as up there with Masks, the Dracula Dossier and Enemy Within as an all-time great. They did enough (the Drinaxian Companion is another matter!)
Geir has done this for the vehicle rules to an extent, and Hanrahan did it when he wrote the original MgT rules, too.
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
I know and many others of the community would jump to help as well with quality control in other areas. I would be a disaster trying to do quality control for shipbuilding. None of My designs are legal by RAW either.
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
I participated in the Vehicle Handbook Update in just this way and have volunteered to do the same for the upcoming High Guard and Central Supply Catalogue updates. It’s a great idea and I was happy to do my part.
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
Im not finding the virtual mining software in High Guard Update 2022. Did it get removed?
MasterGwydion
Emperor Mongoose
Retconned. Thankfully.
Terry Mixon
Emperor Mongoose
What? How can I have my secret background NPC mining the nets to get rich now?Retconned. Thankfully.
