daryen wrote:
"I think MJD has pretty definitively stated that CoE won't be in TNE1248."
Daryen,
That's what I've read too, CoE will not be part of the M:1248 timeline. Of course that doesn't mean that Mr. Hale's incrediable work needs to disappear. I've a feeling that Mr. Dougherty will be leaving oodles of wiggle room in M:1248.
"He has mentioned a Terran Federation and a Solomani Confederation, both of which are "successors" to the old Solomani Confederation."
As good and as comprehensive as the CoE setting is, I - for one - will not miss it as part of the M:1248 timeline. CoE is superb, excellent even, but it also not my cup of tea. I've grown increasingly tired of Traveller's hoariest conceit; Earth as a home to loonies. Well crafted loonies, plausible loonies, even sometimes sympathetic loonies, but loonies none the same.
CoE changes Earth from the Holy Talisman for a herd of goose-stepping, Space Nazis ruled over by the classic USSR troika of Party, Armed Forces, and Security to the Holy Planet for a herd of psionically-inspired, Space Jihadists who, in religious fervor and by order of their new caliphs and popes, send forth a gaggle of crusaders and muhajdeen alike in a effort to 'save' the universe. Blecch. The tables and stats dealing with religious tolerance rolls for CoE PCs and NPCs did it for me.
Meet the new loonies, same as the old loonies.
Sincerely,
Larsen