Dave's vision

[daryen]

Originally posted by Vargas:
I see your point, however Dave was quite serious regarding what he saw as the immorality of the Rebellion and Black War settings where billions were killed simply because they lived on a strategic target.

Let's see if I have this straight. He felt it was immoral for billions to die in war, but felt is was perfectly OK to have trillions die by a purely malevolent sentient race?

OK. Whatever.

Then, as mentioned above, he not only brought back the criminality and theft, but institutionalized it into the government of the "good" guys. At least with CT criminals were still criminals, not "heroes".

Sounds to me like the "maturity" mentioned here is the same as the type of "maturity" required to watch the Halloween movies.

Quite frankly, what it looks like to me is a guy whose ego wouldn't allow him to work with someone else's universe, so he decided to wipe it out to make it his own.

 

[Kentares]

Well... from what I saw (until GWD closed that is) I liked (and still like) Dave´s vision for TNE (for several reasons).

I think that players have different opinions about Traveller and how they like to play it (I´m sure that before Dave´s vision refs had a lot of ideas to play, after Dave´s vision refs also had a lot of "different" ideas to play).

Did I make some sense with this ?

 

[Nearside]

I liked the setting- more or less. I'm going to try and pick up the Regency setting book on ebay at some point, 'cause I missed it first time around.

The system upset me until I realized that I just had to work on the damage aspect to make it better.

The Rebellion was out of control, I think, as a playable setting- at least if you wanted to do anything more than play against the background of the war.

I'd like to see what Dave had in mind. The Big Picture may turn out to be better than some people think, and might 'redeem' the background for some others.

 

[doomhunk]

That was a good summary of Dave, and I can compensate for the slight bias seeing as you admit to it

Well, in terms of maturity, I thought that Survival Margin was a high point in Traveller's history. It read kind of like a Modernist novel, replete with sources claiming authority in the text; exposure of the inner thoughts of many characters; ironic juxtaposition of information in the master narrative etc. Mainly because of the multiple perspectives, I found it subtler than most other published material. OK, don't laugh. I turned a blind eye to the obvious and blunt 20th century Earth history references, the penchant for unsubtle melodrama etc., and enjoyed it for reminding me that history is just the lies that we've agreed to tell.

It's funny to hear a lot of comment on Dave's unified vision etc., as I always take the tone from Survival Margin as indicating that there is no true history of the New Era, just different opinions. My campaigns focus on the political divisions within the RC and the battle for ideological domination of the emerging empire/republic.... there are many opposing voices and struggles with conscience. There have been quite a few warcrimes trials, different cultures revere different figures as heroes for entirely incompatible reasons etc. In many ways, my New Era RC reflects the fractiousness of the old Imperium and the Rebellion, and my campaign is a constant reminder that people do not learn the lessons of history etc.

I personally find it amusing that people willing to engage in the necessary logical leaps to justify Jump Drive will not offer Virus the same courtesy. But I like the fact that we don't all agree - it fits with my concept of the universe as fractious and divided on such matters. I see modern parallels in the divided debates on GM foods, global warming, the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden, whether or not we should attack Iraq....

Anyway, I hope you don't think I'm a tosser for writing 'Survival Margin' and 'modernist novel' in the same sentence I think it is telling though that I enjoy reading Survival Margin with the same illicit pleasure that I used to get from reading the first edition of Gamma World I love the possibilities arising out of destroyed cultures I guess......

 

[wrandrews]

I did not care for the virus campaign. I had an idea involving the intellegent chips during the MT era, but never developed it after I read about virus.

We settled on the TNE rules because we like the design rules, and for once the combat rules are fairly consistent. You shoot a person in battle dress or a spacecraft with a fusion gun or a starship laser and there is no ambiguity. Some of the rules look like they are designed for WWII situations, such as the inacuracies of direct fire. Indirect fire on a stationary target at TL 15 is not very likely to miss.

We run a lot of military campaigns, and have discovered some interesting things that the designers missed. I am sure that this is due to a lack of time.

We are currently in the third generation of players in a campaign that was begun a few years ago. We begin with the PCs at 17, go through the Naval Academy, and so on. The current generation is in the second year of their first term of service.

Over the years, land holdings and noble patents have been obtained, some of which have been inherited by existing PCs

This approach has given the players a sense of identity with their characters, and has been a lot of fun.

 

[Kentares]

Originally posted by Russ Andrews:
We run a lot of military campaigns...

One of the main reasons we (me and players) liked the setting (reminding the Aliens movies but with Virus instead of crits).

 

[Springstead]

Originally posted by Russ Andrews:
{snip}
We settled on the TNE rules because we like the design rules, and for once the combat rules are fairly consistent.
{snip}

We run a lot of military campaigns, and have discovered some interesting things that the designers missed. I am sure that this is due to a lack of time.

{snip}

I agree with you, TNE's rules and design are very good. I am interested in what those "interesting" things you mentioned are, care to give us a quick list?

--Ramspite