Potential Traveller Setting

[Tom Kalbfus]

Here is an interesting site:
http://rddnickel.com/systems-sol.htm
Just to give you a sample of what's there. Could it be used as a setting in a Traveller Campaign?

 

[Tom Kalbfus]

Here's the title page. Its a bit smaller than Charted Space, but there is a lot more system detail.
http://rddnickel.com/atlas.html

So what do you think?

There is also an interesting timeline. Someone did a lot of work here!

 

[Reynard]

Interesting. Be nice to know what other background might go with this. Has a victorian look.

 

[Tom Kalbfus]

Interesting. Be nice to know what other background might go with this. Has a victorian look.

I read a bit of the timeline, there is no present, it goes from the beginning of time to the end of the Universe, so you can pick your date. Also faster than light travel gets invented way in the future, and is in the form of wormholes. Timeline includes some Biblical events such as Adam and Eve being cast out of the Garden of Eden, but also includes the Big Bang, Global Warming, at one point it says George W. Bush was the Greatest President in US History, and then it says Arnold Schwarzenegger became President in 2017 and was an even better President, I suspect it was a joke.

 

[Tom Kalbfus]

Here is a portion of that timeline I mentioned concerning faster than light travel:
Faster than light travel is discovered in 770,000 AD. It is wormhole travel, faster than light communication prior to that allows for Galactic Civilization. Though I suppose if you allow for Star Trek style Transporters through these tiny wormholes, they could be used for "Travel" though I suspect many people would not want to be disassembled atom for atom and the have the information transmitted through wormholes and then have their bodies reassembled atom for atom at the destination - Probably would involve nanotechnology. Robots and computers could probably transmit their software through these wormholes, and would not mind doing this. 770,000 AD is when they build wormholes human beings can travel through in one piece rather than Star Trek Transporter style. A Traveller campaign could probably take place after the Quaoar Device is invented in 88,900 AD. Prior to this the speed of light is the limit.

c.80,250 AD
In an effort to achieve the ancient dream of Faster-Than-Light travel, the Almighty King Alalium orders the construction of a particle accelerator four billion miles wide around the outskirts of the Solar System.


c.82,000 AD
Construction is completed on the Almighty King’s great particle accelerator. A group of the greatest scientific minds from his small empire are immortalized by encasing their brains in jars and installing them in spider robot mechanisms to work for centuries in a secret subterranean base on the ice planetoid Quaoar to operate Alalium’s Accelerator and discover the secret of Faster-Than-Light travel.


c.88,900 AD
The ageless scientist slaves of Quaoar finally succeed in creating what comes to be known as the “Quaoar Device”, which function by maintaining microscopic wormholes.
These impressive machines are capable of allowing Faster-Than-Light communication but not travel.


Infuriated by their perceived failure, the Almighty King orders the destruction of the scientists. He nevertheless utilizes their devices to conquer the largest empire ever seen by Man, ruling hundreds of planets across dozens of parsecs.


The blueprints for the Quaoar Device are stored in Alalium’s Sciocron, a device made to preserve vast amounts of data for vast lengths of time.


89,049 AD
The four inhabited planets of the Lambda Arae System are conquered by Alalium’s Empire forcing the peaceful Jeshuron people into servitude.
~ Secretly, in the outskirts of their solar system, the Jeshuron begin constructing gigantic civilisation ships, the sixteen Vecnos, to usher their people away from servitude and slavery.


c.89,050 AD
A young Jeshuron prophet speaks of the prophecy of the “Astrothanatos”: the destruction of Mankind and the end of his reign in the Universe.


89,630 AD
In the Lambda Arae System: the sixteen Vecnos are completed. The Jeshuron escape their doomed system in their gigantic civilisation ships, some embark towards a supernova that occured in the galactic west, others travel towards Earth to wage a hopeless war with Alalium’s Empire for centuries.


89,630-90,060 AD
The Jeshuron’s Holy War against Almight King Alalium


90,060 AD
The Death of Almighty King Alalium
The catacylismic eruption of the Yellowstone Super-Volcano coincides with the defeat of Alalium’s Empire to the heroic Jeshuron people.
Alalium himself is defeated in hand-to-hand combat with the Jeshuron hero Iaron but mortally wounds his opponent in the process.


The body of Iaron, hero and saviour of the Jeshuron, is sent floating towards the supernova in the west, following the fleet of Vecnos. Meanwhile, Xahn, the enigmatic leader of the Ordaqian Jeshurons, steals away with Alalium’s Sciocron.


c.110,000 AD
Man has colonised 100,000 planets (across 900 parsecs).


c.127,000 AD
The Jeshuron arrive at their destination and discover a beautiful new home for themselves on the planet Leuca.


127,000-134,000 AD
The Seven Thousand Year Peace on Leuca.


c.145,000 AD
Man has colonised 1,000,000 planets (across 1,500 parsecs).


c.420,000 AD
Man has colonised 6,000,000 planets (a quarter of the Galaxy).


~ Colonisation reaches the Galactic Core.


481,830 AD
The planet Antichton, near the center of the Galaxy and destined to one day rule it, is colonised.


c.488,000 AD
The planet Sagarion, in the Sagittarius Arm, is colonised.


c.540,000 AD
Man has colonised 12,000,000 planets (half the Galaxy).


c.597,000 AD
The planet Atreon, in the Crux Arm, is colonised.


c.619,000 AD
The planet Perseon, on the far side of the Galaxy, is colonised.


c.630,000 AD
Man has colonised 19,000,000 planets (three quarters of the Galaxy).


c.678,000 AD
The planet Centarus, on the far side of the Galaxy, is colonised.


c.700,000 AD
Man has completely colonised the Galaxy, inhabiting 25,000,000 planets.


c.743,000 AD
In the nearby Intruder Galaxy, a small satallite galaxy of our own: the planet Darxta is colonised.


c.749,000 AD
On the planet Darxta: King Matan Beliar is approached by a mysterious man known as Abaddon who brings with him, from the far side of the Galaxy, an ancient artifact rumoured to allow Faster-Than-Light communication.


Utilizing this secret, ancient technology, the Darxtarians conquer a large interstellar empire, while Abaddon is granted a fleet of starships to colonise a planet of his choosing a thousand parsecs away, at the other end of the Intruder Galaxy.


The Founding of the Darxtarian Empire


756,145 AD
Abaddon (actually an immortal) and his Darxtarian conquest fleet arrive at the planet Extar and Abaddon is made king.


756,201 AD
The immortal Abaddon begins his great endeavor of creating Faster-Than-Light travel.


770,000 AD
Faster-Than-Light Travel is Invented
After fourteen thousand years of perilous research and arduous work, Abaddon and his humble people finally discover the secret of Faster-Than-Light travel, opening a wormhole portal between Extar and the nearby planet Terminax.

 

[Tom Kalbfus]

Interesting. Be nice to know what other background might go with this. Has a victorian look.

There are many periods where technology regresses to medieval levels. Earth has a second middle ages, and the planet orbiting Alpha Centauri also regresses to medieval levels for a time. lots of opportunities for a post Apocalyptic setting. Lots of biblical references too, go figure.

Also there is this:

75,273 BGE, 802,701 AD
Edward Poppins, an English gentleman from the 1890’s AD, travels to the future in a time machine and visits the Eloi and Morlocks who by that time inhabit the planet Earth.

A little bit of everything is thrown into this timeline.

I'd say never mind the timeline, you can just use the maps if you want, I can make my own timeline for them if I want, and the fact that the planets are named is very helpful, one of the things that is hard is coming up with names for all the planets and make them seem like real places, here that works is done for you. The Solar System here is very similar to my Triplanetary setting in broad outlines, the circumstances are different though.

 

[Nathan Brazil]

The timeline also has portions involving the rise of the Antichrist, a "White Rider", legends of individuals rising from the dead three days after their death and Israel being destroyed so tropes are being mixed in. The look is nice otherwise.

 

[Tom Kalbfus]

The timeline also has portions involving the rise of the Antichrist, a "White Rider", legends of individuals rising from the dead three days after their death and Israel being destroyed so tropes are being mixed in. The look is nice otherwise.

Don't take the timeline too seriously, you might take the times the planets were colonized and terraformed as gospel though, and then write in your own timeline to fit them in. One unified theme, though seems to be the collapse of representative government and the rise of autocracies. Remember how the FTL Drive was invented in this timeline:

c.80,250 AD
In an effort to achieve the ancient dream of Faster-Than-Light travel, the Almighty King Alalium orders the construction of a particle accelerator four billion miles wide around the outskirts of the Solar System.


c.82,000 AD
Construction is completed on the Almighty King’s great particle accelerator. A group of the greatest scientific minds from his small empire are immortalized by encasing their brains in jars and installing them in spider robot mechanisms to work for centuries in a secret subterranean base on the ice planetoid Quaoar to operate Alalium’s Accelerator and discover the secret of Faster-Than-Light travel.


c.88,900 AD
The ageless scientist slaves of Quaoar finally succeed in creating what comes to be known as the “Quaoar Device”, which function by maintaining microscopic wormholes.
These impressive machines are capable of allowing Faster-Than-Light communication but not travel.


Infuriated by their perceived failure, the Almighty King orders the destruction of the scientists. He nevertheless utilizes their devices to conquer the largest empire ever seen by Man, ruling hundreds of planets across dozens of parsecs.

This King ruled for about 8000 years at least, employing slave scientists to build his precious FTL device, and then killing those scientists, when they can't build to big enough to transport material objects instead of just information, You know this doesn't sound like a nice future, kind of lost in it is the idea that the government is to serve the people. This Mad King wants to build this FTL device so he can rule a larger empire, you see the speed of light sort of limits his ambitions, since he can't control a lot of stars if there is a big time delay in travel and communications. All he needs though is communications. If you have FTL communication, you can teleoperate a robot that is light years away, even if you can't go their yourself. If you want to go their yourself, you can send information to reconstruct your body at the other end, but I suppose most people would not want this to happen to them, as the person at the other end might end up thinking he was you, but he might not be you, and if there is no way to tell the difference, why take the chance? One could build a robot at the other end that looks like you, establish real time communication with it, and then get in a body suit or otherwise hook up the communications leads to your brain and you could in real time control a robot body that is light years away and receive sensory input from it, and practically for all purposes be their without actually having your body there. The Communications Wormhole has to be kept fairly close, probably less than one tenth of a light second away, which is about 30,000 km or less, the wormhole would have the mass of an asteroid and be smaller than an atom, with gamma ray beams being used for communications through the wormhole. The robot body at the other end can be made to look just like a human being, it might even have organic parts, clone grown from a DNA sample taken from your body. Yeah I can see how you might have a Traveller campaign based on that, after all waiting til 770,000 AD is a long time to wait, microscopic wormholes are easier to transport anyway, You have to accelerate one of the ends at STL speeds to go where you want, then use virtual reality controls to control the robot.

I could convert the map about to a Traveller Map. I'd have to draw hexes of the right size and overlay them on top of that map. Maybe I'll use this for my Triplanetary setting, lets say the Earth gets replaced with one from the 1940s, some kind of nanotechnology mated to a virtual reality simulation of a historic time period might do this if it got out of control! Probably in the wake of the machine wars.