Admirals of the Fifth Frontier War

[Hal]

Hello Folks,
Was there ever any further detailing done in published Traveller materials for the following admirals?

01 Sector Admiral Liang
02 Sector Admiral Shumii
03 Sector Admiral Shanashar
04 Sector Admiral Mtume
05 Sector Admiral Goolanzoon
06 Sector Admiral Santanocheev
07 Fleet Admiral Elphinstone
08 Fleet Admiral Asluda
09 Fleet Admiral Djoulikian
10 Fleet Admiral Vasilyev
11 Fleet Admiral Aledon Duke of Regina
12 Fleet Admiral Romao
13 Fleet Admiral Stvi
14 Fleet Admiral Gascogne

The number preceding the admiral name indicates the Senority - presumably meaning that Sector Admiral Shumii made Sector Admiral before Sector Admiral Shanashar did, but both holding equal rank as it were.

The reason I'm asking is that in my current campaign, Santanocheev is something of a trouble maker for one of my player characters and my player is getting a wee bit paranoid. His character served as an naval aid to Admiral Elphinstone during his character generation phase, and the campaign is set in the year 1003 instead of 1005. This gives me time to ramp things up to where the players are at the right place at the right time for when the Fifth Frontier War begins.

That having been said, I'm not finding much information prior to or subsequent to the material published in CT for just prior to the FFW, and what few entries there are for 1110, show only two names being "mentioned" - that of Santanocheev and Elphinstone.

I've come across references that Sector Admiral Santanocheev was head of the fleet stationed at Regina when the Fifth Frontier War broke out, but all of the other admirals are not named for any connection. While I know I can make it what I want for my campaign, I just wondered if there were other references other than the TNS listed in FIFTH FRONTIER WAR rules booklet and the JTAS books.

 

[Hemdian]

There is a short mini bio (approx 175 words) of Santanocheev on p11 of The Spinward Marches Campaign. There is also similar for Norris and Shtaliajtlas.

 

[Hal]

Thanks for the reference Peter.

So far, I've only got three references for Admirals listed in the Fifth Frontier war, and they are:

Norris
Santanocheev
Elphinstone (vice-admiral in a TNS flash)

In attempting to incorporate the material in SECTOR FLEET for use in my campaign, I'm attempting to assign the various Fleet Admirals or Sector Fleet Admirals to various locations. I think I've spotted an errata in the SECTOR FLEET book in that it lists the 43rd fleet for Lunion as well as for Mora. Looking at the Rebellion map listing the fleets, it would have been the 73rd, which is what I will use for my own campaign.



212th Jewel
213th Regina
214th Aramis
193rd Villis
100th Glisten
23rd Rhylanor
43rd Lunion
18th Lanth
73rd Mora
207th Trin's Veil

At this point, I've been doing PDF searches on Fleet Admirals and Sector Admirals and the like, not really getting all too much information. CT, MT, and T4 don't do more than mention the rank during character generation without really saying what the officer does or is in charge of. It isn't until I get to Martin Dougherty's GRAND FLEET, and subsequent republishing of SECTOR FLEET, do I get the notation that:

T4's IMPERIAL SQUADRONS has this to say about Sector Admirals:

"Sector Admirals are not political officers, but are directly involved in the disposition and logistics of the fleets. They undertake the direction of battle under the general order of the Grand Admiral, assigning and reassigning fleets as necessary. The Sector Admiral commands all fleets in a sector either from a forward-area base or from a flagship."

So that seems to imply to me that there should really only be ONE Sector Admiral, and that was Sector Admiral Santanocheev. This implies to me then, that I should ignore the other listed Sector Admirals from FFW, and downgrade them to Fleet Admirals. The only other "Sector Admiral" that makes sense is if one came in from Deneb. FFW lists that there were five other Sector Admirals with a higher precedence than Santanocheev.

In all, I think I'll stick with the 8 Fleet Admirals, and Santanocheev - as it makes the most sense to me, and even fits in with the general storyline that he was the Golden boy being groomed by a certain Noble house in Trin's Veil (or is that Mora?).

 

[rancke]

That having been said, I'm not finding much information prior to or subsequent to the material published in CT for just prior to the FFW, and what few entries there are for 1110, show only two names being "mentioned" - that of Santanocheev and Elphinstone.

Very senior fleet admiral Elphinstone is presumably not the same as fairly junior vice admiral Elphinstone. I've always assumed that they were related. Perhaps the Elphinstones is one of the Imperium's naval families.

I've come across references that Sector Admiral Santanocheev was head of the fleet stationed at Regina when the Fifth Frontier War broke out, but all of the other admirals are not named for any connection.

According to TNS, Rear admiral Santanocheev was commander-in-chief of Naval Intelligence for the Regina Subsector on 004-1106. That's a fairly low admiral's position, one department head out of half a score.

An organization the size of the IN would need far more general officers than implied by the 14 counters in FFW. Each individual fleet is roughly the size of the entire US navy, and there are a dozen fleets in the Spinward Marches alone. Assume a (rear) admiral for each department, assume 8-10 departments, and you've got a hundred admiral slots for that alone, before you even beging to look at the batrons (the crurons are probably commodore's commands).

Anyway, when next we hear about Santanocheev it's 268-1107, and it's a press release issued by the Imperial Navy Press Staff on Regina signed by Sector Admiral Santanocheev. That doesn't even prove that Santy himself was present on Regina at the time, although he could have been. 268-1107 is 81 days after the Zhodani attack, time enough for the news to reach Mora by navy courier and for Santy to react, either by sending orders or by going to Regina himself.

The MgT adventure A Festive Occasion (by me) has a writeup of Santanocheev as of 001-1105:

ADMIRAL LORD FREDERIC MUUDASHIR SANTANOCHEEV, IN Navy (Line) 4

Abilities [redacted]¹

Languages [redacted]¹

Skills [redacted]¹

Lord Frederick is the second child of Count Sebastian Santanocheev of Fornice (3025) and Aliisha Muudashir, a niece of Duchess Delphine of Mora, and currently serves as the Imperial Navy’s attaché to the Spinward Marches senate. At 34 he is quite young for his rank; as the son of Duchess Delphine's staunchest supporter, his career has been fast-tracked with lots of cushy assignments and frequent promotions. Lord Frederick, however, believes that it is all due to his own merits as a superior tactician and strategist.

As second in line for his father's county, he holds the courtesy title ‘Baron of Solstice’ but does not use a baronial prefix with his name.
​

¹ I'm not sure if giving game stats is acceptable; if it is, let me know and I'll post the redacted material. Matt?​

He's about to get married to the daughter of the sector admiral at that time, Marquis Ottmar Manolis, which isn't going to hurt his prospects.


Hans

PS. I'm fairly sure that I'm the person Hal is ignoring, so this is more for the sake of others who might be interested. But if you want to do him the favor of repeating me, feel free.

 

[mike wightman]

Very senior fleet admiral Elphinstone is presumably not the same as fairly junior vice admiral Elphinstone. I've always assumed that they were related. Perhaps the Elphinstones is one of the Imperium's naval families.



According to TNS, Rear admiral Santanocheev was commander-in-chief of Naval Intelligence for the Regina Subsector on 004-1106. That's a fairly low admiral's position, one department head out of half a score.

An organization the size of the IN would need far more general officers than implied by the 14 counters in FFW. Each individual fleet is roughly the size of the entire US navy, and there are a dozen fleets in the Spinward Marches alone. Assume a (rear) admiral for each department, assume 8-10 departments, and you've got a hundred admiral slots for that alone, before you even beging to look at the batrons (the crurons are probably commodore's commands).

Anyway, when next we hear about Santanocheev it's 268-1107, and it's a press release issued by the Imperial Navy Press Staff on Regina signed by Sector Admiral Santanocheev. That doesn't even prove that Santy himself was present on Regina at the time, although he could have been. 268-1107 is 81 days after the Zhodani attack, time enough for the news to reach Mora by navy courier and for Santy to react, either by sending orders or by going to Regina himself.

The MgT adventure A Festive Occasion (by me) has a writeup of Santanocheev as of 001-1105:

ADMIRAL LORD FREDERIC MUUDASHIR SANTANOCHEEV, IN Navy (Line) 4

Abilities [redacted]¹

Languages [redacted]¹

Skills [redacted]¹

Lord Frederick is the second child of Count Sebastian Santanocheev of Fornice (3025) and Aliisha Muudashir, a niece of Duchess Delphine of Mora, and currently serves as the Imperial Navy’s attaché to the Spinward Marches senate. At 34 he is quite young for his rank; as the son of Duchess Delphine's staunchest supporter, his career has been fast-tracked with lots of cushy assignments and frequent promotions. Lord Frederick, however, believes that it is all due to his own merits as a superior tactician and strategist.

As second in line for his father's county, he holds the courtesy title ‘Baron of Solstice’ but does not use a baronial prefix with his name.
​

¹ I'm not sure if giving game stats is acceptable; if it is, let me know and I'll post the redacted material. Matt?​

He's about to get married to the daughter of the sector admiral at that time, Marquis Ottmar Manolis, which isn't going to hurt his prospects.


Hans

PS. I'm fairly sure that I'm the person Hal is ignoring, so this is more for the sake of others who might be interested. But if you want to do him the favor of repeating me, feel free.

Many thanks for posting this - it is going straight to my save file

 

[rancke]

In attempting to incorporate the material in SECTOR FLEET for use in my campaign, I'm attempting to assign the various Fleet Admirals or Sector Fleet Admirals to various locations. I think I've spotted an errata in the SECTOR FLEET book in that it lists the 43rd fleet for Lunion as well as for Mora. Looking at the Rebellion map listing the fleets, it would have been the 73rd, which is what I will use for my own campaign.

There is a reshuffle of fleet stations after the 5FW. Only a few are mentioned in SMC, so for most of them you can assume the number remained the same (no reassignment) or used to be something else (reassignment).

MgT:The Spinward Marches mistakenly used the post-war deployments for 1105. SECTOR FLEET may be making the same mistake.

212th Jewel
213th Regina
214th Aramis
193rd Villis
100th Glisten
23rd Rhylanor
43rd Lunion
18th Lanth
73rd Mora
207th Trin's Veil

The pre-war deployments were:

125th: Jewell
193rd: Regina
1st Provisional: Regina
23rd: Vilis
212th: Rhylanor
213th: Lunion
214th: Glisten

No fleets are shown in Aramis, Lanth, Mora, Trin's Veil, and Five Sisters. They either didn't have a fleet stationed or it didn't get involved in the fighting. My take is that Lanth and Aramis didn't have any fleet stationed and that Mora and Trin's Veil most definitely did.

So that seems to imply to me that there should really only be ONE Sector Admiral, and that was Sector Admiral Santanocheev. This implies to me then, that I should ignore the other listed Sector Admirals from FFW, and downgrade them to Fleet Admirals. The only other "Sector Admiral" that makes sense is if one came in from Deneb. FFW lists that there were five other Sector Admirals with a higher precedence than Santanocheev.

Sector Admiral seems to be both a rank and a position. There's only one admiral in command of a sector, but I think (this is not canon) that there would be some junior sector admirals in each sector. IMTU I have a vice sector admiral and a CinC Rimwards at Glisten and a CinC Corewards at Rhylanor. (I attribute Santanocheev's promotion over the heads of scores of more senior admirals to all four line sector admirals being eliminated by a concatenation of events (one sick, one maimed in an accident, two involved in a procurement scandal of massive proportions). This allowed Duchess Delphine to exercise her imperium and give Santy a brevet promotion and appoint him sector admiral.¹)

¹ Not quite as egregious a case of favoritism as it sounds. Sector admirals must have the rank of baron, so the pool of candidates would have been limited.​

There would (I believe) be a number of sector admirals in Deneb and Corridor. Whoever commanded the Corridor Response Fleet (four numbered fleets) would certainly rate the rank of sector admiral. And if there's half a dozen junior sector admirals in Deneb and half a dozen in Corridor, those five that the countermix makes senior to Santanocheev seems a reasonable number to make a bee-line for the action as soon as they hear about it.


Hans