TL 14 Collectors In High Guard

[fusor]

You printed the bloody adventure in Signs and Portents and it clearly takes place in the 3I. It flat out states it does in the adventure.

OK, remember the Doomsday Machine from TOS of Star Trek? The big long cone thing that eats planets?

That appeared once in Star Trek. Does that mean that such planet-killing technology should be part of Star Trek's ship design sequences?


Similarly, Annic Nova appears once in Traveller. Does that mean that Collectors should be part of the 3I's ship design sequences?

 

[fusor]

Exactly this came up during the playtest period and no definitive answer was given.

Yay, another HG Playtest Fail.

Some of us put forward the idea of different stars offering slower/faster charge times to ballance collectors (myself included) The longest charge time occuring in Parsecs where there is no star to speak of.

It's not even for the sake of "balance", it's just consistency with what it is. If it collects stuff from stars then it stands to reason that it should do so at different rates depending on the type of star (because not all stars are the same) and the distance from the star (because nothing a star produces is constant at all distances from it).

 

[alex_greene]

They never see the ships. Just the aux craft, heading in and out, off supposedly to colony worlds on moons and remote space stations. These little small craft are ubiquitous, but once in a while you get a bunch of weird ship-sized craft. Two hundred ton jobbies, built with no Jump drives but cavernous cargo holds, and everyone thinks they're capable of 1G because they look like Free Traders, but once on their way and out of range of the port authority scanners they veer off, pull 3G and leg it over to the mothercraft. The port authority hardly even notices.

 

[Sigtrygg]

Alex, I edited the post you quoted, you may want to take a look at the updated version.

Here are the original referee end notes to the adventure:

REFEREES may also want to use the ANNIC NOVA for other activities, either permanent or temporary, within a campaign. The following are a few suggestions:
Privateer Encounter: Assuming a travelling party in a lightly armed ship (perhaps a new free trader or a yacht), they may be pounced upon by pirates (pursuant to an encounter from Book
2, page 36, result:12).
A smart pirate would hit initially with the two pinnaces, attempting to drive the prey in a specific direction, where lies the larger ANNlC NOVA type ship inIambush, with its larger cannon.
Relic: Rumors may lead travellers to an ANNIC NOVA type ship wrecked on a world surface (almost certainly in a remote region far from any starport).
The task is then one of recovery and repair of the ship.
Clandestine Menace: A ship like the ANNIC NOVA could be crewed by individuals with psionic abilities (conceivably, psionic talents could be useful
in deploying, untangling, and retrieving the collector canopy). The fact that the crew can probably tell what the travellers intend (and then do a variety of actions to forestall any shady or dangerous acts) can really mess up the best laid plans.
This situation is ideal for adventurers bent on hijacking a ship.
Working Passage: Characters without a ship of their own might sign on a free trader of the ANNIC NOVA type just for the room, board and travel.
Escape: A few mercenaries on a world where their ticket has almost been cancelled could find that the only way off-world is aboard this type ship, provided the captain can be convinced that he should take them.
Victoria: Finally, the map box in room G, on V deck has a chip installed for a world named Victoria. Check imperial maps will show its location in an adjacent subsector. Full coverage of
Victoria will be contained in issue number 2 of the Journal of the Travellers' Aid Society.

It doesn't have to be a unique ship...

 

[alex_greene]

Alex, I edited the post you quoted, you may want to take a look at the updated version.

Is my bit all right? I can delete the quoted bit.

Edit: Sigtrygg, nice.

 

[Sigtrygg]

They never see the ships. Just the aux craft, heading in and out, off supposedly to colony worlds on moons and remote space stations. These little small craft are ubiquitous, but once in a while you get a bunch of weird ship-sized craft. Two hundred ton jobbies, built with no Jump drives but cavernous cargo holds, and everyone thinks they're capable of 1G because they look like Free Traders, but once on their way and out of range of the port authority scanners they veer off, pull 3G and leg it over to the mothercraft. The port authority hardly even notices.

This is a really good idea, it allows further contact - very slowly, with the strange race that build these ships.

As I posted earlier there are a couple of mysteries that have never been cleared up:
who builds the ANNIC NOVA type ships
which race constructed the Shadows pyramid
who are the intelligent psionic humanoid alien race in the cell in Research Station Gamma.

Referees are free to make stuff up to answer these questions - the problem I have always had with canon is if these sorts of questions are answered then my answers are wrong

 

[fusor]

Also, if Collectors magically create fuel for the Jump Drive, then doesn't that mean they can magically create fuel for fusion plants? Jump Drive fuel is hydrogen (like fusion plant fuel), after all.

 

[fusor]

They never see the ships. Just the aux craft, heading in and out, off supposedly to colony worlds on moons and remote space stations. These little small craft are ubiquitous, but once in a while you get a bunch of weird ship-sized craft. Two hundred ton jobbies, built with no Jump drives but cavernous cargo holds, and everyone thinks they're capable of 1G because they look like Free Traders, but once on their way and out of range of the port authority scanners they veer off, pull 3G and leg it over to the mothercraft. The port authority hardly even notices.

...because apparently they're idiots who go "hey, look at those weird ship-sized craft with no jump drives and huge cavernous holds that we've never seen before" and then just forget all about them?

 

[phavoc]

Also, if Collectors magically create fuel for the Jump Drive, then doesn't that mean they can magically create fuel for fusion plants? Jump Drive fuel is hydrogen (like fusion plant fuel), after all.

ASFAIK, the answer is no. At least in MGT version it shouldn't quite work that way. The collectors are supposed to gather exotic particles that the hydrogen is used to create. Though I haven't gotten HG2 yet.

They never see the ships. Just the aux craft, heading in and out, off supposedly to colony worlds on moons and remote space stations. These little small craft are ubiquitous, but once in a while you get a bunch of weird ship-sized craft. Two hundred ton jobbies, built with no Jump drives but cavernous cargo holds, and everyone thinks they're capable of 1G because they look like Free Traders, but once on their way and out of range of the port authority scanners they veer off, pull 3G and leg it over to the mothercraft. The port authority hardly even notices.

...because apparently they're idiots who go "hey, look at those weird ship-sized craft with no jump drives and huge cavernous holds that we've never seen before" and then just forget all about them?

I don't think any busy orbital traffic control is going to allow an unknown ship to enter the 100D radius and remain there. It's a traffic hazard, potentially, as well as a unknown threat. For worlds that dont have traffic control, then yes, that would be the norm. But outside the 100D limit is technically Imperial territory and planetary navies aren't responsible for it, though that doesn't mean they wouldn't stop and look at a possible threat or maybe even a vessel in distress.

But no planet that has the ability to see incoming traffic is going to ignore something in their space. Even without weapons a spacecraft is a potential threat to a planet. A modular cutter falling out of orbit can take out a city if it crashes, and larger ships would be able to take out even larger areas.

 

[Sigtrygg]

Also, if Collectors magically create fuel for the Jump Drive, then doesn't that mean they can magically create fuel for fusion plants? Jump Drive fuel is hydrogen (like fusion plant fuel), after all.

No, be cause the collector is collecting exotic particles needed to open the rift to jump space the extension to this is that the fusion

reaction part of the normal jump procedure also generates these particles. At sufficiently high TLs matter/antimatter can be used to generate the jump conditions.

Trouble is it is all a handwave.

Personally I wish GDW had done what they once contemplated - retcon the stutterwarp into Traveller and remove the jump drive (this was actually seriously considered according to interviews with Dave Nilsen and Frank Chadwick)

 

[Sigtrygg]

...because apparently they're idiots who go "hey, look at those weird ship-sized craft with no jump drives and huge cavernous holds that we've never seen before" and then just forget all about them?

They have jump drives. The first few encounters with this type of ship had them jumping away from Imperial ships sent to intercept.
Tell you what - read up on it yourself it is in issue 93:
http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/signsnportentsarchive
Ask yourself where the Annic Nova type ships are first encountered - right at the edge of the most out of the way sector in the 3I in 1103. Worlds that are not on the x-boat communication routes are also not major trade routes, if these ships stay away from the major trade lanes and worlds with Imperial bases it could take a while.

 

[alex_greene]

Port authorities probably have better things to do. If some small craft comes in with a cargo, showing all the proper transponder codes, sending out its inventory of spare parts or wobbly headed geisha dolls and making itself available for customs inspection like all the other in-system small craft, they're never going to notice.

There might be a bunch of people who repair gutted old Free Trader hulls and retool them for insystem use. They haul big cargoes around in-system to the moons and space stations that need it, and nobody notices a few of those ships coming in from the Trojan points because everybody assumes there's another mining base or research station set up by another Megacorp on a need-to-know basis, or another bunch of hippies living in an abandoned planetoid that's been hollowed out and turned into a space station or something.

And if the sensors spot a flash of light from a distant location in the system, it could be a ship cruising along on solar sails very slowly - a lab ship or something.

The point is, you could have a fleet of big ships, operating in the fringes of Known Space, and nobody gets to know they're even there until one of their abandoned pyramids turns up, or a few of them get captured and turned into zoo specimens.

And the ones that are turned into zoo specimens ... well, now you know why the others don't let anybody know about their ships.

 

[rust2]

This seems rather interesting:

Working Passage: Characters without a ship of their own might sign on a free trader of the ANNIC NOVA type just for the room, board and travel.

So these ships could be so common that one could use one of them as a normal free trader without any fear that a planetary government will confiscate it in order to retroengineer the technology - because this technology is already general knowledge ? :shock:

 

[Nerhesi]

Some of you folks are making very big logical leaps. The title / conversation is about collectors in HG2. That direction is clear based on the text/description of high technology in HG2.

Insert portents, T5, CT, mgt1, whatever else, ofcourse you will end up with inconsistency. You dont have a unified canon-governance committee or so.

This doesn't change point #1. HG2 is utterly clear on that. We passionately drove to make sure collectors were moved to high-technology (I can't remember who else voiced their opinion with me).

Is there a problem with canon consistency in general? Absolutely! Did HG2 cause it? Absolutely not.

Perhaps recommend to Marc/Matt to have governance group to review all official publications.

 

[Sigtrygg]

And I will say it again.
In the playtest I pointed out some high tech stuff is baseline 3I setting and that some of the basic construction stuff does not appear in the 3I. Someone decided to ignore this and push ahead and as a result we have the confusion about what is 3I and what is not.
Annic Nova and collectors are 3I - period. Mongoose have actually printed the adventure.
Meson bays are 3I - you use then in the ships in the examples in HG.

I could make a list. It would take a sidebar at the most to explain which technologies are 3I and which are not - but if a referee wants to include them in their game there is no issue - canon is for authors, not referees.

What you didn't do was take any notice of the playtest comments about clearly differentiating between 3I and wider options.

You went ahead and mixed them up and caused the confusion.

 

[fusor]

Annic Nova and collectors are 3I - period. Mongoose have actually printed the adventure.

You're actually causing a lot of confusion here yourself by saying this.

Annic Nova exists in the 3I, yes. That does not mean that the technology used to construct Collectors is available for the major races to use in the 3I - it has certainly never meant that before now. You're conflating those to mean that it is. Collectors should not be available for 3I ship construction. As such they should definitely be presented as an alternative technology that is not available for use in 3I setting for shipbuilding (they'd only be available if you're building ships for the race that actually built the Annic Nova).

If soemone's suddenly decided that they ARE available for 3I shipbuilding then a hell of lot more thought needs to be put into the implications of this development for the 3I, and how it changes the existing setting by significantly altering the economics and strategies used in the setting. Which apparently has not been done.

(as I said earlier, big cone shaped Planet Destroying Doomsday Machines exist in Star Trek. That doesn't mean that any of the races currently in the Star Trek universe can build them or should be able to build them).

 

[fusor]

Also, if Collectors magically create fuel for the Jump Drive, then doesn't that mean they can magically create fuel for fusion plants? Jump Drive fuel is hydrogen (like fusion plant fuel), after all.

No, be cause the collector is collecting exotic particles needed to open the rift to jump space the extension to this is that the fusion reaction part of the normal jump procedure also generates these particles. At sufficiently high TLs matter/antimatter can be used to generate the jump conditions.

So wouldn't that mean that jump drives connected to these Collectors would be significantly smaller/require less power as a result, since they don't need the 'exotic particle' generating paraphernalia anymore?

 

[Nerhesi]

And I will say it again.
In the playtest I pointed out some high tech stuff is baseline 3I setting and that some of the basic construction stuff does not appear in the 3I. Someone decided to ignore this and push ahead and as a result we have the confusion about what is 3I and what is not.

Correct - you're not owner/line editor. Even contributors, editors, and writers are in the same boat as you. You make a recommendation, it can be accepted or ignored.

Annic Nova and collectors are 3I - period. Mongoose have actually printed the adventure.

Yes - on a unique ship. Although as you pointed out, somehow there is a referee note in adventure, pointing out "Annic Nova TYPE" - ships. That does seem to run counter to what we were dealing with HG2.

Meson bays are 3I

Factually incorrect. It without the qualification of which 3I? 3I from CT? 3I from T4? 3I from T5?

I would also ask the question of Andrew as it seems Meson bays were removed from almost every ship except... Carriers?! That seems Odd.

I could make a list. It would take a sidebar at the most to explain which technologies are 3I and which are not - but if a referee wants to include them in their game there is no issue - canon is for authors, not referees.

Incorrect. You cannot make a list because you are not the authoritative source on what is 3I or what is not. No more than I am. The authoritative source is what Marc/Don/Matt/Whomever publishes. It may even change from day to day if they so wish it.
You can point out inconsistency - sure, but you cannot in any way state what is in 3I unless it a point-in-time-statement.

What you didn't do was take any notice of the playtest comments about clearly differentiating between 3I and wider options.

Incorrect. You have no factual way of differentiating between taking notice, actioning, agreeing with, or choosing to ignore.

You went ahead and mixed them up and caused the confusion.

Again - incorrect.
You fail to define who is "you", you have no evidence of "mixed them up", you have no basis by which to judge what "should be canon" vs "what was canon", or if there was any confusion at all. All of these decisions were out of our hands. I was most definitely not handed a carte-blanche (not by a long-shot).

The only confusion you can attest to, is your own, and any others' who confirm theirs as well.

You have been consistently incorrect because your base argument is invalid. Your base argument is that you are somehow aware of what should be 3I as some axioms/truths that have always been.
That is incorrect.This has been pointed out time and time again. Canon has changed before, it continues to change - one can even assume there is no interest in keeping it from changing.
We can only point out changes in canon from a previous edition - and they will either be heeded or ignored.

 

[fusor]

Canon has changed before, it continues to change - one can even assume there is no interest in keeping it from changing.
We can only point out changes in canon from a previous edition - and they will either be heeded or ignored.

Then it seems the only way that anyone is going to stay sane over this is to say that canon is unique to each edition. We should stop attempting to make a coherent, unified setting from all the editions because each universe is totally different.

But that said, if canon is now different in MGT (which is what matters - I don't care what T5 says, I want to see it in MGT to count here), then the effects of those changes on the setting must be considered and accounted for in the canon too. You can't just change something in the rules or add a new technology and expect it to have no effect on the setting. And the more annoying this is that it seems that MGT 1e may be a different canon to MGT 2e now as a result of these changes.

 

[Sigtrygg]

Annic Nova and collectors are 3I - period. Mongoose have actually printed the adventure.

You're actually causing a lot of confusion here yourself by saying this.

Annic Nova exists in the 3I, yes. That does not mean that the technology used to construct Collectors is available for the major races to use in the 3I

Did you read my post on the last page?
The Imperium was unaware of collector technology until it started to encounter Annic Nova type vessels, which first occurred in 1103. None of the major races used this technology , they had all gone the fusion powered jump drive route instead.

- it has certainly never meant that before now

I'm not claiming it does - I am flat out stating that in the setting the major races of the OTU circa 1103 are unaware of collector technology.

You're conflating those to mean that it is.

No, I am not. Just because the rules say something is available at a certain TL even within the setting it does not necessarily mean a culture discovers that technology.
Ever hear of Sabmiqys - TL17 but never invented the jump drive.

Collectors should not be available for 3I ship construction.

They are not - but they are available to the race that exits in the 1105 setting that builds them .
{quote]As such they should definitely be presented as an alternative technology that is not available for use in 3I setting for shipbuilding (they'd only be available if you're building ships for the race that actually built the Annic Nova).[/quote} and that race exits in the setting.

If soemone's suddenly decided that they ARE available for 3I shipbuilding then a hell of lot more thought needs to be put into the implications of this development for the 3I, and how it changes the existing setting by significantly altering the economics and strategies used in the setting. Which apparently has not been done.

That's up to the referee - see my post on the last page.
A group of adventurers bring one back - how long until the IISS, IN or a megacorporation takes an interest and then starts the process of reverse engineering the technology.
The adventure is 1105 - I figure about 10-15 years to get this to civilian markets by which time Dulinor is finalising his travel plans to go pay his friend Strephon a visit.

(as I said earlier, big cone shaped Planet Destroying Doomsday Machines exist in Star Trek. That doesn't mean that any of the races currently in the Star Trek universe can build them or should be able to build them).

But it does mean someone did and another race with sufficiently advanced technology to reverse engineer them could.