Traveller Without Credits

[alex_greene]

I had a weird dream - I dreamed of a Traveller setting where there was no centralised currency. No credits. Not only were there no credits; due to the variety of alien species encountered and the vast distances travelled between star systems, a single currency - the credit - was actually impossible.

That would have made trading a very interesting proposition - but also ship maintenance, adventuring, government, warfare and a host of other activities.

What other motivations could characters have for, as an example, taking on the role of bodyguards for an adventurous Noble who wants to go on a safari on the nearby jungle moon; or accepting some sort of job requiring, say, tracelessly breaking into a secure office and replacing one data crystal in a safe with an apparently identical data crystal?

 

[Nathan Brazil]

What do the non-adventuring folk do to obtain food if they do not directly make it?
Barter, Physical Alternate Units of Exchange (seashells, gold, etc.), or are :roll: post-scarcity :roll: ?

Continuation of existence provides some basic motivation.
Sign found at a spaceport:

Will guard your ship for food

 

[alex_greene]

I suspect that data would become the closest thing to a currency.

Data, knowledge, intelligence, and the characters' skills, expertise and experiences would become sources of value.

 

[Reynard]

I'd say there would be no Imperium. Government would be at the level of the strongest warlords holding together the greatest number of worlds still limited by distance and establishing, or should I say imposing, a very local currency. That would mean hundreds or thousands of currencies, regulations and laws for interstellar commerce and interaction. Prices would be higher and goods possibly more scarce.

Take the Imperium data and look for worlds with A starports, high population, technology, and good Trade classifcation then see what worlds exist within one or two jumps (at their tech level) to see what worlds are easily accessed and controlled. There are your interstellar nations or pocket empires. This will make the familiar very different. Takes Traveller back to the Age of Sail concept.


I'd say adventures would be more locally based unless you have characters skilled in Admin, Advocate, Broker, and probably Languages when crossing myriad borders.

 

[Lord High Munchkin]

Once technology has reached the point that nanotechnology and mass automated-factories/fabbers can make absolutely anything for the "cost" of bothering to collect the raw materials (and that itself would be automated), money would become irrelevant.

Many transhumanist games look at such concepts. 'Eclipse Phase' is probably the best thought out as regards new types of economies (info is spread through a few books though).

Favours, reputation, information, non-reproducible unique items, and services likely become the new currency. This requires serious computational power and communications though, so is likely not suitable for use in the OTU's "retro-1970's" style setting.

 

[Reynard]

Isn't the 'credit' in many sci fi settings usually an abstract digital representation of a person's worth used to aquire goods and services? In a way, we in the 21st century use it with physical currency becoming an extension rther than the rule.

So how is a barter system more efficient than a currency system that establishes a standard frame for valuation?

 

[Prime_Evil]

It's interesting to think about how a central banking system or currency can work in an interstellar civilisation where communication delays postulated by Traveller exist. I've always suspected that the legitimacy of the Imperium in the OTU depends at least partly on its role as the ultimate guarantor of the Credit as a medium for interstellar trade.

 

[Infojunky]

I suspect that data would become the closest thing to a currency.

Data, knowledge, intelligence, and the characters' skills, expertise and experiences would become sources of value.

I might suggest that you read Adam Smith then.... Data is Money and Money is data already. Credits, Dollars, any medium of exchange is the valuation process of Data. Don't get hung up on the media/form of the data.

 

[F33D]

I suspect that data would become the closest thing to a currency.

Data, knowledge, intelligence, and the characters' skills, expertise and experiences would become sources of value.

I might suggest that you read Adam Smith then.... Data is Money and Money is data already.

I don't think it is the same definition of "data"...

 

[Egil Skallagrimsson]

To be honest, taking the credits out of Trav probably won't have that much effect, the various planets and cultures will still want to trade, and barter is very clumsy and economic if you are working at any level above that of a small TL1 tribe. Yes, different planets or pocket empires will use different currencies, but new arrivals will just have to convert their currency into something useable. Not so very different from travelling around many parts of the world today.

Of course, the Imperial Credit is a symbol of the Imperium's power, and allows it enormous economic power. It would also make trade more straight forward. No Imperium, no credits, but still a need for trade and a medium to measure trade.

Egil

 

[Egil Skallagrimsson]

Once technology has reached the point that nanotechnology and mass automated-factories/fabbers can make absolutely anything for the "cost" of bothering to collect the raw materials (and that itself would be automated), money would become irrelevant.

Many transhumanist games look at such concepts. 'Eclipse Phase' is probably the best thought out as regards new types of economies (info is spread through a few books though).

Favours, reputation, information, non-reproducible unique items, and services likely become the new currency. This requires serious computational power and communications though, so is likely not suitable for use in the OTU's "retro-1970's" style setting.

I always like these utopian ideas, and am reminded of the predictions of the Nineteenth Century, that machines would free man for a life time of leisure, or the Twentieth Century, that electricity would be virtually free and the low costs of power would ensure that we all lived like kings. The thing is, "Favours, reputation, information, non-reproducible unique items and services" have been with us forever, and are usually measured, in the end, in money. Hard to see that changing, whether using the Pound, the Dollar, the Imperial Credit or the Oolaghen Trothytes. Perhaps when we get TL17 and all have our own matter creators, we can finally abandon money, but I doubt it, we will still want to purchase some services, and will need a medium of exchange to measure the services I create compared to those I want to purchase.

Egil

 

[alex_greene]

I suspect that data would become the closest thing to a currency.

Data, knowledge, intelligence, and the characters' skills, expertise and experiences would become sources of value.

I might suggest that you read Adam Smith then.... Data is Money and Money is data already.

I don't think it is the same definition of "data"...

The closest equivalent to that would be the amount of energy one expends in toil and labour, measured in kilowatts.
Which isn't really that much because, frankly, in modern terms, that sort of backbreaking energy expenditure is totally undervalued.
To earn the kinds of financial rewards that would be in the tens or hundreds of thousands of credits in the 3I setting, or any standard Traveller setting with a centralised credit Cr currency with one standard value, the characters would have to have something particularly valued, special and unique.

Their worth, as it were, would depend strongly upon their reputation for getting the job done, or on some other thing such as renowned mastery of a skill set (such as, you know, that whole "Kessel run in less than twelve parsecs" thing) or even something unique and unobtainable somewhere else - mega-smarts, for instance (INT 14-15) or some psionic Talent (see James H Schmitz' "Resident Witch" for a prime example of this kind of demand).

If the characters' cachet was not so unique, for instance, Patrons would just pluck some random piano virtuoso or telepath off the street and hire them for a pittance; so the characters would have to work on maintaining their value, their reputation, so as to draw the attention of the heavy-spending, desperate Patrons before their rivals do.

Oh, did I mention rivals? Consider the impact of rivals on the characters' demand. If they can't be hurt by weapons fire, then it's up to the characters to buff up their own chrome and shine more brightly than their rivals, to catch the Patrons' attention; that's if they want to fly their ship and eat this month.

 

[F33D]

Their worth, as it were, would depend strongly upon their reputation for getting the job done, or on some other thing such as renowned mastery of a skill set (such as, you know, that whole "Kessel run in less than twelve parsecs" thing) or even something unique and unobtainable somewhere else - mega-smarts, for instance (INT 14-15) or some psionic Talent (see James H Schmitz' "Resident Witch" for a prime example of this kind of demand).

Yes and no. In real life, you might initially get hired because of your reputation but, continued employment and long term level of remuneration depend totally on what you can get DONE.

So, you might have "mega-smarts" but if you can't deliver something of value to the enterprise, you're sunk.

 

[Infojunky]

I suspect that data would become the closest thing to a currency.

Data, knowledge, intelligence, and the characters' skills, expertise and experiences would become sources of value.

I might suggest that you read Adam Smith then.... Data is Money and Money is data already.

I don't think it is the same definition of "data"...

Data; are values of qualitative or quantitative variables, belonging to a set of items.

i.e. if a thing has a value in relation to another thing, then it is data. As simple as that.

 

[F33D]

As simple as that.

Um no. You REALLY don't know that different data can have VASTLY different value in that context?

 

[Infojunky]

As simple as that.

Um no. You REALLY don't know that different data can have VASTLY different value in that context?

Yes, yes it can, where is the problem?

You just described one of the reasons currency was invented for, to make those variable valuation judgements a little more uniform....

But the variability is inherent to the system. Ergo the act of Trading....

 

[F33D]

As simple as that.

Um no. You REALLY don't know that different data can have VASTLY different value in that context?

Yes, yes it can, where is the problem?

You just described one of the reasons currency was invented for, to make those variable valuation judgements a little more uniform....

But the variability is inherent to the system. Ergo the act of Trading....

Sorry, I misunderstood you. Yes, currency enables the free market to make the countless value judgements necessary for a viable econ.

 

[Lord High Munchkin]

One thing you have to decide on is whether there is FTL communication.

If not, then money is likely a necessity. If there is FTL communication, then it becomes eventually less important, to the point, that with enough technological capacity, it ceases to matter.

OTU will always require money, post-scarcity economies with FTL communication, not so.

 

[F33D]

post-scarcity economies with FTL communication, not so.

Based on human nature, a total pipe dream.

 

[Lord High Munchkin]

post-scarcity economies with FTL communication, not so.

Based on human nature, a total pipe dream.

In the future, maybe not so.