The Prelude to Cataclysm Discussion

[Hopeless]

Just a quick discussion about an idea I had a few years back and ran as a one shot.

The backdrop was that an Imperial capital ship was sent to a neutral inhabited world for an arranged meeting and after the diplomat and his team arrived on the designated ship aboard a ship's boat the other side attempted to betray the Imperials.

The original team consisted of about eight battle dress marines, the diplomat and his own bodyguard within a meeting room that was being gassed and the ship's boat consisting of 3 crew and a member of the diplomat's staff mainly a physician (who wasn't selected as a character so was left behind leaving two character's per player and the rest of the marines as npc's).

They eventually fought their way back to the ship's boat which back then I modified to include shields and weapons of its own so it was able to fight back instead of being blown up in the hangar bay.

What I wanted to ask is if you had to run this yourself what would you have done differently?

 

[rust]

I think my diplomat would have informed the opponents that
the capital ship would begin an orbital bombardment of their
planet unless the diplomat contacted the ship's captain once
per hour to inform him that there is no problem ... no need
to accept a risk if one carries a capital big stick. :twisted:

 

[Greylond]

Just tell everyone involved that the Capital Ship that has brought the negociation team has final orders of, "Nuke it from orbit, it's the only way to be sure... "

 

[Hopeless]

I think my diplomat would have informed the opponents that
the capital ship would begin an orbital bombardment of their
planet unless the diplomat contacted the ship's captain once
per hour to inform him that there is no problem ... no need
to accept a risk if one carries a capital big stick. :twisted:

Its not their homeworld... :twisted:

 

[Hopeless]

Just tell everyone involved that the Capital Ship that has brought the negociation team has final orders of, "Nuke it from orbit, it's the only way to be sure... "

Thats nice, given its a neutral world because the inhabitants have nothing to do with either side of the negotiation teams... :twisted:

 

[Greylond]

Just tell everyone involved that the Capital Ship that has brought the negociation team has final orders of, "Nuke it from orbit, it's the only way to be sure... "

Thats nice, given its a neutral world because the inhabitants have nothing to do with either side of the negotiation teams... :twisted:

Typically it would be the Neutral World's responsibility to handle security. Just the Threat of Nukes should be enough to ensure it. A Neutral Nation/State(or World) accepting itself as the location for Diplomatic meetings has to take into account things like security, especially when dealing with a Nation State that holds the High Orbitals with Nuke Weapons.

 

[Hopeless]

Just tell everyone involved that the Capital Ship that has brought the negociation team has final orders of, "Nuke it from orbit, it's the only way to be sure... "

Thats nice, given its a neutral world because the inhabitants have nothing to do with either side of the negotiation teams... :twisted:

Typically it would be the Neutral World's responsibility to handle security. Just the Threat of Nukes should be enough to ensure it. A Neutral Nation/State(or World) accepting itself as the location for Diplomatic meetings has to take into account things like security, especially when dealing with a Nation State that holds the High Orbitals with Nuke Weapons.

You're assuming the location was selected with the agreement of the neutral system inhabitants?

What if it wasn't?

It wouldn't be unexpected if the meeting was kept secret wouldn't it?

In the one shot the diplomatic team escaped back to the capital ship which fled the area learning that a large number of systems had been destroyed.
The setting I had devised with this as an introduction turned the x boat route into a series of extra stellar gates that allowed pretty much instantaneous travel between them and an unknown incident caused them to self destruct destroying the systems they were located within.

As far as the diplomatic team were concerned the sudden betrayal was unexpected but as far as the crew of the ship they fought their way off it was their worlds that had suffered from an unprovoked attack, it would be years before a truce was declared and even when I started the current game noone knows what caused the cataclysm nor who was responsible although there was still alot of blame being spread around.

Yes thats a bit of information you didn't have but have you ever played a Traveller game where everything was revealed from the start?

For what its worth the players never even queried about what caused the attack on the ship even after when i revealed about the cataclysm that had effected the rest of the alternative Spinward Marches I was using.

I'm still wondering if I should go back and try again which is why I established this thread, might have to start it off with a discussion on the background events if I want to do this properly in case they decide to threaten the nearby world for the same reasons... :shock:

 

[Greylond]

Heh, like I said before, in that situation as a Player the first thing I would have done is the Nuke Threat from On High.

 

[phavoc]

Just a quick discussion about an idea I had a few years back and ran as a one shot.

The backdrop was that an Imperial capital ship was sent to a neutral inhabited world for an arranged meeting and after the diplomat and his team arrived on the designated ship aboard a ship's boat the other side attempted to betray the Imperials.

The original team consisted of about eight battle dress marines, the diplomat and his own bodyguard within a meeting room that was being gassed and the ship's boat consisting of 3 crew and a member of the diplomat's staff mainly a physician (who wasn't selected as a character so was left behind leaving two character's per player and the rest of the marines as npc's).

They eventually fought their way back to the ship's boat which back then I modified to include shields and weapons of its own so it was able to fight back instead of being blown up in the hangar bay.

What I wanted to ask is if you had to run this yourself what would you have done differently?

You mentioned that the diplomat and his escort guard are onboard a "designated ship", which implies they are in orbit aboard the other sides ship. Is that correct?

Eight battle dress marines would most likely not be allowed onboard with standard plasma or fusion weaponry. If so, the inside of the ship is quite fragile and the marines can make short work of anyone NOT in battledress. But, assuming the other side has ships troops with the same tech level, most likely they have similarly equipped men. That will make a mess of the insides, with only heavily-reinforced bulkheads holding them back.

The ships boat, unless the hangar has defensive weaponry inside, will be immune to small-arms fire. It's own weapons can play havoc, though unless turreted or the hangar is quite large, they may not be able to bring them to bear on invading troops.

The Imperial ship would, most likely, attempt to disable the opposing ship with its diplomat onboard. Not knowing the two ships specs, it's hard to say who might win that, or if its a futile effort.

You mentioned gassing. I doubt the diplomatic team would be equipped with the right gear to do anything about gas. So they would be rendered helpless I suspect, and the marines would have to carry them along, which reduces the capability of the marines.

There's really too few specifics here to render a good opinion.

As for the comments about nuking from orbit, the Imperials don't casually use nukes. Besides, you wouldn't need to. A kinetic energy attack from orbit would give you much more precision and far less collateral damage. And the ship most likely would have additional marines it could drop onto the facility (assuming it was planetside) to provide assistance.

If the facility were planetary 3rd party, then the planetary forces (assuming right TL and capabilities) might intervene with both sides and the crews are on their own. Again, not enough detail here to render a good opinion.

 

[Hopeless]

You mentioned that the diplomat and his escort guard are onboard a "designated ship", which implies they are in orbit aboard the other sides ship. Is that correct?

Eight battle dress marines would most likely not be allowed onboard with standard plasma or fusion weaponry. If so, the inside of the ship is quite fragile and the marines can make short work of anyone NOT in battledress. But, assuming the other side has ships troops with the same tech level, most likely they have similarly equipped men. That will make a mess of the insides, with only heavily-reinforced bulkheads holding them back.

Good points they never tried that tactic merely escorted the diplomat back to the ship's boat.

The ships boat, unless the hangar has defensive weaponry inside, will be immune to small-arms fire. It's own weapons can play havoc, though unless turreted or the hangar is quite large, they may not be able to bring them to bear on invading troops.

It does but they took out the internal weapon system before they could penetrate the ship boat's shields which was the first time I actually ran Traveller in any form so little realised it was far overpowered fortunately noone thought to ask if the diplomat was using a vacc suit which might have led to such an attempt.

The Imperial ship would, most likely, attempt to disable the opposing ship with its diplomat onboard. Not knowing the two ships specs, it's hard to say who might win that, or if its a futile effort.

It was a fighter versus fighter battle for the most part when they got outside, I never expected them to make it back to the capital ship but had I planned beyond the initial fight inside which led to their escape I'd have probably had the capital ship fending off some escort vessels helping the ship they were escaping from since the diplomat's capture would have been more important than just a slugging match with an Imperial warship.

You mentioned gassing. I doubt the diplomatic team would be equipped with the right gear to do anything about gas. So they would be rendered helpless I suspect, and the marines would have to carry them along, which reduces the capability of the marines.

This was derived from the Phantom Menace and in hindsight should have been expanded upon rather than take that scene entirely since it would have been more effective to disable the battle dress and then send in troops if capturing the diplomat was the intended result.

There's really too few specifics here to render a good opinion.

Yes.

Yes that caught me by surprise but it wasn't something I even considered back then as I originally thought about them fleeing down to the planet below, but they managed to get the ship's boat back to the capital ship so I went to them jumping out of the system.

If the facility were planetary 3rd party, then the planetary forces (assuming right TL and capabilities) might intervene with both sides and the crews are on their own. Again, not enough detail here to render a good opinion.

Hadn't expanded this game beyond the original one shot, since this was my first time running Traveller I figured that was a good place to stop.

Now if I plan on rerunning this I'll have to expand on the original idea.

 

[Epicenter]

What I wanted to ask is if you had to run this yourself what would you have done differently?

Almost everything, I'm afraid. There's a lot of things with the situation I just can't reconcile.

Why are the Marines in battledress (and assumably heavily armed)?

- If the reason why was because there's a danger of betrayal, the Imperials wouldn't show up in just a dinky little vessel that could land in their opponent's vessel and essentially be at their mercy. These "little things" are a huge deal in politics, just like who sits where in a dining room or whose name gets announced first or who eats first or who stands first and last from a dining table are huge points in politics. In fact, they got started almost precisely because of the situations you're describing: political meetings are heavy on ritual because they reduce the opportunities for misunderstanding as well as making everyone feel secure. Alternatively, if there's no danger of betrayal, the Imperials are unlikely to bring much of a honor guard at all for the envoy since it'd suggest to the other side the Imperials either don't trust you or they don't think much of you and don't mind having their soldiers tramp all over your honor.

- If it's some forlorn hope negotiation (like that guy who gets beheaded in the beginning of the movie Gladiator) he'd probably be sent off alone since the Imperials aren't likely to waste the lives of Marines (it's less the lives of individual Marines are important but more of the prestige of the Imperial Marines being tarnished).

- If it's some warrior culture the Imperials are dealing with where shows of strength are required all the time, it's doubtful they'd engage in poisoning/gassing. It's dishonorable.

Why would the enemies gas the Imperials when the Marines are going to be in Battle Dress?

- The enemies seem a bit stupid to me. If they're planning betrayal, they're not going to go for some mustache-twirling solution like gassing the Imperial envoy when he or she is surrounded by heavily armored guards. If the enemies are planning betrayal, they probably have to realize that no matter how the envoy dies on their ship, it was their responsibility to keep the envoy safe and the Imperials are going to demand heavy compensation for the life of their envoy if not outright war. In either case, they're probably going to bring weaponry that is utter overkill to gun the Marines and the envoy down from surprise.

You meet on a neutral world so you can reduce the tension level. Why are the Marines there?

- What it says. If they're going to meet near a neutral world that's inhabited, they would be meeting on that world because it is a neutral party that both the Imperials and the other side have agreed to meet on (both sides trust the neutral world). The neutral world has probably agreed to it and will aid in providing security. There'd be no battle-dress armored Marines, it'd be all relatively low-key security, like INI guys and gals in concealable armor with gauss pistols and so on. If it's a clandestine meeting (like diplomats meeting in Switzerland), it's likely the envoy and the person they're meeting are of sufficient small prestige so that even if one or the other is assassinated, it'll put a dent (a big one) in the relations between the Imperials and the other side, but "honor" won't require the sides to go to war.

- If the neutral world below has no input on the goings-on between the Imperials and the other side, they'd probably be fairly affronted that some incident occurred over their world. Not very bright thinking for the other side; they now have the Imperials and this formerly neutral world mad at them. If they didn't want to involve the neutral world, both sides would probably be meeting in some uninhabited system.

Diplomats are rarely attacked, even during "sneak attacks" and so on. If you look at history - diplomats are not executed or even held prisoner. They leave the country, but it's on the hosting country's honor at the diplomat be protected. Even as the two side's militaries are tearing each other up, the diplomat will be allowed to leave the country in peace. Now, the other side might so vile or honorless or be aliens who don't understand human honor but in those cases, I don't think your scenario would occur.

Now, admittedly, many players are unlikely to care about any of this but it still does bug me as a GM.

* I'd move the meeting down to the planet's surface. The Marine bodyguard might still be present, but they'd be in formal dress with their sabers and maybe a sidearm. Or perhaps they'd just be INI bodyguards. There'd be a third faction involved. This might be the other side manipulating the Ine Givar to attack the proceedings or it might be some radical faction trying to mess up the negotiations because they want them to fail (perhaps the king's brother or something).

* If it were on board the enemy ship, I wouldn't have gas. You have to assume the enemy, once it has the players aboard, the players are at the enemy's mercy in regards to: "if the enemy is allowed to choose the timing and method of attack, the enemy will be successful." So change things up a bit. Perhaps the enemy has bought special cloning containers from a TL17 world. These clones will reach maturity in a week. The idea the enemy has is to grow the clones to maturity and in the meanwhile, hired psionic mercs will be slowly be programming the clone's minds to pass as the originals (plus some extra, nefarious programming). The enemy wants clones to pass as the originals for a while, so the psions say they'll require a week to create a convincing personality and memory model. Because the clones won't be ready for a week, the originals must be kept alive, active, and unsuspecting for that week. There'll be various banquets and negotiations lasting a week as the players are a guest aboard the enemy ship. They'll have one week before the enemy unleashes their plan. If the players can't figure it out in that week, it's an automatic loss for them (don't force the players into a battle they can't win is my philosophy. Just tell them the results) but there will be clues that there is something odd going on and the players will have to investigate while not rousing suspicion by the enemy.

* Perhaps the diplomat is indeed visiting a people with a very finicky code of honor and they're a feudal society. It's an early negotiation over something relatively minor. The a local king, a newly crowned young man, wants to use it to increase his prestige to his vassals to cement his hold on power. Unfortunately, the Imperial envoy makes some serious gaffe during some function (like at some banquet, feeling that the situation is relatively casual, does something that is extremely offensive to the other side). Now the other side's king is in a pickle. The king, honestly understands at the envoy is an foreigner and can't be expected understand the subtleties of their culture. Unfortunately, the king made the mistake of inviting his powerful lords to the banquet, including a few who are ambitious and nearly as powerful as the king. To the twitchy honor of these people, the insult is unforgivable; to forgive it would be a mortal stain on the king's honor and the more ambitious lords could use this as a pretext to pull the king down with the support of the people and similar powerful forces back home ("as king you're the defender of the faith, but you let the unbelievers openly flout the Great Contract!") and the king's position is not so strong as to weather this. Under standard honor, this requires the king and the envoy to duel to the death in a trial by combat. However, the king and the envoy may also elect a second to duel in their place. If the king loses, it's the same as forgiving the offense, so the Imperials must lose the duel or the king will be ousted and the ambitious lords are pro-Zhodani which would be a disaster for the Imperium. Normally, Imperial honor says that the envoy would duel and die to protect the interests of the Imperium. However, the Imperial envoy can't duel to the death (perhaps the envoy has important relatives in the Imperial nobility or has some important position). So he elects a second, who must of course lose the duel. This second will be one of the player characters. The duel is set to occur in three days time. Now it is up to the players to simply do this (a Marine with sufficient honor might cut his opponent then allow himself to be killed, satisfying Marine and personal honor while still protecting the interests of the Imperium) in which case the game ends there. But the players should know that there might be another way out, such as somehow discrediting the pro-Zhodani lord so that the king could forgive the offense and get away with it, or perhaps they might some obscure precedent where the players could still live and satisfy the king's honor ("it's said that the two mythical warrior brothers went to this island and fought 'metal demons' ... we suspect they're still active Ancient Warbots ... with nothing but hide armor and obsidian-tipped weapons and won, thus securing the forgiveness of the God of War. You might be able to do the same...though I'm sure we'll be watched.").

 

[locarno24]

If it were on board the enemy ship, I wouldn't have gas. You have to assume the enemy, once it has the players aboard, the players are at the enemy's mercy in regards to: "if the enemy is allowed to choose the timing and method of attack, the enemy will be successful." So change things up a bit. Perhaps the enemy has bought special cloning containers from a TL17 world. These clones will reach maturity in a week. The idea the enemy has is to grow the clones to maturity and in the meanwhile, hired psionic mercs will be slowly be programming the clone's minds to pass as the originals (plus some extra, nefarious programming). The enemy wants clones to pass as the originals for a while, so the psions say they'll require a week to create a convincing personality and memory model. Because the clones won't be ready for a week, the originals must be kept alive, active, and unsuspecting for that week. There'll be various banquets and negotiations lasting a week as the players are a guest aboard the enemy ship. They'll have one week before the enemy unleashes their plan. If the players can't figure it out in that week, it's an automatic loss for them (don't force the players into a battle they can't win is my philosophy. Just tell them the results) but there will be clues that there is something odd going on and the players will have to investigate while not rousing suspicion by the enemy.

Good one - when it was said that diplomats aren't attacked, my immediate response was "unless there's something to be gained by doing so".

Substitution is one. Capture and interrogation is another (the problem with ambassadors and protecting them is striking the fine balance between someone expendable enough to get backstabbed and someone important and knowledgeable enough to make decisions - especially in the traveller setting where the default 'I must consult with my government' would mean weeks of delay).

A possible third is simple outrage. Not useful to either party but terriblyhandy for a third party who'd quite like the negotiations to break down into armed conflict with lots of messy and angry finger-pointing. Assassinating an ambassador during tense negotiations on another power's ship, using agents everyone believes are naval crew of that ship (or, hell, even intercepting and replacing the entire ship itself) is the sort of thing that demands a military response, and will whip up enough anger that even if some bright spark goes 'hang on, this smells fishy' he or she will be shouted down.

 

[Hopeless]

What I wanted to ask is if you had to run this yourself what would you have done differently?

Almost everything, I'm afraid. There's a lot of things with the situation I just can't reconcile.
Why are the Marines in battledress (and assumably heavily armed)?

Back then this was my first attempt at running a Traveller game and in retrospect they should have been in combat armour at best.

The enemies seem a bit stupid to me. If they're planning betrayal, they're not going to go for some mustache-twirling solution like gassing the Imperial envoy when he or she is surrounded by heavily armored guards. If the enemies are planning betrayal, they probably have to realize that no matter how the envoy dies on their ship, it was their responsibility to keep the envoy safe and the Imperials are going to demand heavy compensation for the life of their envoy if not outright war. In either case, they're probably going to bring weaponry that is utter overkill to gun the Marines and the envoy down from surprise.

Yes they are stupid.
Looking back I should have done alot differently but one of the things I didn't do was discuss this here at the time...

You meet on a neutral world so you can reduce the tension level. Why are the Marines there?

I should have set this up by having the world be assumed uninhabited or considered harmless and then have three ships arrive, the imperial with one, the people they're meeting on the second and a neutral aligned third ship.
Then explain the ships are ambushed by an undisclosed foe and in the confusion the diplomats assisted by their bodyguard escape to the planet below whilst the fight continues in space.

Diplomats are rarely attacked, even during "sneak attacks" and so on. If you look at history - diplomats are not executed or even held prisoner. They leave the country, but it's on the hosting country's honor at the diplomat be protected. Even as the two side's militaries are tearing each other up, the diplomat will be allowed to leave the country in peace. Now, the other side might so vile or honorless or be aliens who don't understand human honor but in those cases, I don't think your scenario would occur.

I agree but when I thought this up it was intended as an introduction to Traveller for both myself and the players, now however this could go one of many ways thanks to your reply.

So three ships, one imperial the second with the Sword Worlds and a third with a neutral arbitrator during which the extra stellar gates self destruct taking all but a couple of the Sword World systems which causes the Sword Worlders to go to war and their reason for starting the fight.

So the Imperial ship is attacked by the Sword World ship and those stuck on the neutral ship have a fierce firefight taking place aboard as the respective groups fight each other and to regain control the respective diplomatic teams are evacuated to the world below.

However there's more going on than the unexpected destruction of the Gate Network, I'm wondering if I should just let my players create their own characters this time with the choice of either Imperial, Sword World or Theocrats (version of the Zhodani not psion based but theocratic instead) and cope with being stuck on a world with various forces after them and no clear idea of whose friend or foe...

 

[Hopeless]

You know after that game when I got as far as starting the character generation by email I was thinking about the back story and the intended idea was that a century before the Empire stretched beyond the Great Rift and a political struggle for power with the spinward marches resulted in a coup following the end of a war with a rather nasty foe that holds sway on the otherside of the Rift.

The Empire wants to hide the fact that the past they've taught every subsequent generation is a complete pack of lies and the destruction of the gate network heralds the return of a long thought dead force thats been trying to lay low until the official start of my campaign in 1256 (The gates self destructed in May 1242 and thats assuming the war was in 1105 as per the Spinward Marches supplement timeline).

Could even have the meeting take place in the system where the Armistice returns... I won't go any further into detail but it involves the Empire making a number of dreadful mistakes that their successive generations have little or no idea about and part and parcel of the game I'm planning involves the PCs eventually discovering one or two of those secrets and the ramifications they're going to have to resolve if they want to save whats left of their society... :shock:

Going way too far there!

Anyway this sounds better if I make this like an official meeting and the events of the cataclysm is whats tears them apart...

Makes me think it might work better if I actually ran this and see what my players do... :twisted: