Empress Wave and Virus
- Thread starter daryen
- Start date
LeperColony
Traveller Card Game Dev Team
I don't have the 1248 stuff (yet), but it's never really held a lot of appeal to me since it seems to be an effort to turn back the clock. The idea of a 4th Imperium by 1248 seems questionable, especially since you'd think people in the Wilds would be very adverse to another Imperium, and the Regency of 1201 has moved in a very different direction.
Regency is very different in 1248 as well, it's just a small part around Mora and in the Trojan Reach. IMO the Imperium does make sense for being a customs union and defense pact and people will remember fondly the golden age, much the way medievals looked back to the Roman Empire. IMTU, I have it return for that reason, but they don't call it the 4th Imperium, it is really 3.1 anyways, same territory, descendant of Strephon on the throne, etc. .
I call the period of the Imperium between the rebellion and Avery's coronation the interregnum. The Imperium is back but it isn't as vertically integrated anymore, the archdukes have a lot more power. I am going to post it for feedback soon enough. Part of my handwave over things is that some things that happen are either impossible, like if the warring factions had destroyed their fleets fighting with each other, then where do the huge vampire fleets come from? or unrealistic, such as billions of people sitting around on planets waiting to die? No they would leave as refugees, which is a large part of where the fulani sector and such get their pop from are refugees wound up on the Zho's doorstep and the Zho's gave them these sectors as a resettlement area, nobody is going to watch billions die either without helping.
It is fun thinking of TL16-17 stuff, puts the sci-fi back into Traveller.
I call the period of the Imperium between the rebellion and Avery's coronation the interregnum. The Imperium is back but it isn't as vertically integrated anymore, the archdukes have a lot more power. I am going to post it for feedback soon enough. Part of my handwave over things is that some things that happen are either impossible, like if the warring factions had destroyed their fleets fighting with each other, then where do the huge vampire fleets come from? or unrealistic, such as billions of people sitting around on planets waiting to die? No they would leave as refugees, which is a large part of where the fulani sector and such get their pop from are refugees wound up on the Zho's doorstep and the Zho's gave them these sectors as a resettlement area, nobody is going to watch billions die either without helping.
It is fun thinking of TL16-17 stuff, puts the sci-fi back into Traveller.
LeperColony
Traveller Card Game Dev Team
That's why people like it I think. It basically tries to paste together the original setting with a dash of TNE flavor. At least from what I understand.
As for people looking back on the Imperium fondly in the same manner as ancient Rome, I doubt it. Ancient Rome's fall didn't cause the death of trillions. Remember, the Collapse was such a traumatic event that the Hivers were induced to help the RC in order to prevent a xenophobic and technophobic galaxy. Also, the central tenant of MT was that the Imperial system didn't work. Now, I don't really agree with that necessarily, but if it's true in the OTU, then it's hard to see why people would want to recreate it.
Having not seen the 1248 stuff yet (though I do intend to get it someday!), I can't make any opinions as to how well it is written or thought out, but from what I do know, it appears to me to largely be a compromise milieu. Not that there's anything wrong with that necessarily, I just don't think the timeline makes a lot of sense.
That is me going to TL16-17, not 1248, they actually hold back TL. 1248 basically uses the same trope that MT used, the civil war, except to break up the Spinward Marches, and has some continuity problems, it's thin on the ground where they create a backstory but don't do much meat to it, like actual describing the world profiles and such.
Aliens of the Rim seems to say the Hivers caused the Imperium to fall, 1248 says they didn't, so who knows. If anyone is responsible for the deaths it Dulinor and imtu, he is blamed (and Hivers). I wouldn't say trillions died, it's an exaggeration, people left as they tend to do from a warzone, it's more logical then just to say they sat there and died.
At least with the Imperium, there is a lot of material to be used and the reason for the Imperium still exist, the K'kree, Hivers and Solomani Empire are the big enemies imtu; developing a thousand tiny states from scratch is a nightmare. I'm going to try to move forward without metaplots, millenial angst or technophobia that seems to inhabit the later editions.
Aliens of the Rim seems to say the Hivers caused the Imperium to fall, 1248 says they didn't, so who knows. If anyone is responsible for the deaths it Dulinor and imtu, he is blamed (and Hivers). I wouldn't say trillions died, it's an exaggeration, people left as they tend to do from a warzone, it's more logical then just to say they sat there and died.
At least with the Imperium, there is a lot of material to be used and the reason for the Imperium still exist, the K'kree, Hivers and Solomani Empire are the big enemies imtu; developing a thousand tiny states from scratch is a nightmare. I'm going to try to move forward without metaplots, millenial angst or technophobia that seems to inhabit the later editions.
Human beings have a strong tendency to think in Us and Them terms. Assuming that the Solomani Confederation made itself into Them, I see no reason why the people of Terra would not start to think of the Imperium as Us. After all, the Imperium didn't start those witch-hunts... :devil:
Sure, it requires assuming that the Sollies did throw their weight around enough to become really, really tiresome, an assumption I have no trouble making, but note that it is only an assumption. YM is more than welcome to V.
Hans
I thought maybe you did, as you are mentioned in the credits, does Mike West post here?
I am? I wonder if I can get a comp now that the license has run out? Anyway, what I helped with was the history bits, not the contemporary setting bits.
Mike is Darrian, or rather, Darrian is Mike.
Hans
Do you mean daryen, who started the thread?
Rats & Cats says the Solomani were being careful to be benevolent on Terra since they wanted to exceed Imperial good will. Confederation Centrists would have resisted the revival of the Old Earth Union, but it should have been inevitable, particularly with the efforts of the Booteans so close, if not the other member states. Outside of standard counter insurgency, I would expect a very light foot print, especially from SolSec.
I have been doing more Virus and AI work (substrains of Sandman and further evolution and differentiation of the Black Curtain Puppeteers). Did the 1248 stuff address any of that? Sandman NPC "crew" became standard on first select then all RCES and then RCN ships IMTU through 1203-1204. I've had ideas on making them available for players but wanted to do more prep first.
I have always had definite ideas going to take advantage of the metaidentity concepts with both Psionics and Virus even without the Empress Wave, but that makes me consider some other interesting crossover angles, too.
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Page 5, towards the bottom.
David Johansen
SOC-12
If I remember right Dave Nielsen showed up here and explained a bunch of what he remembered about TNE a few years back. Anyone else remember that?
