Etra

[77topaz]

The Etra inhabit an 18-world state in Hfiywitir Sector. Their homeworld is Oso (1213 Hfiywitir), which is also the unofficial capital of the state.
They are vaguely spider-like, and similar to Hivers, but with a number of key differences: the Etra communicate through sound (though their language is for the most part equally hard to understand for Humaniti; more on that later), and they have eyes on stalks protruding from their central bodies, and a number of other differences which will likely be mentioned later.
The Etra had already invented spaceflight and set up an "empire" using sublight ships by the time the Aslan contacted them. One report even says that they should be classified as a Major Race, but the Aslan have prevented much information about the race from reaching the Imperium.
This is mostly because the Etra and Aslan are on bad terms. The Aslan first contacted the Etra around the time the Iyestea and Foseakh Outstates were created. Soon after communication was established, the Aslan offered to convert the state into a steaakh (a state with mixed Aslan and native control, with about equal Aslan and native population; this happened to the Yeasaol (also in Hfiywitir) and the Hlaia in Ahkiweahi' Sector, and numerous other races rimward of the Hierate, creating the Steaakh Yeasaol and Steaakh Hlaia, respectively), but the Etra did not like the concept of a Steaakh Etra (because, while in theory a steaakh is mixed control, in practice they are Hierate-dominated client states), and refused. The Aslan then took to war with the Etra.
Despite being a much smaller state, the Etra were able to prevent the Aslan from occupying Greposhandir (0710 Hfiywitir), which lies just outside their state, and the coreward Etra worlds. They then pushed forward themselves, using jump drives from Aslan ships, and in the space of a dozen years occupied much of the rimward part of the Iyestea Outstate in Fahrealuis Sector. Eventually, reinforcements from the main Hierate itself were brought in, and the Aslan regained control over their worlds, but they did not attempt to invade the Etra state again, and the Etra still have many of their species in the region, and a strong influence. The Etra have inserted themselves in other local conflicts, taking the anti-Aslan side with the Steaakh Yeasaol issues and other minor races in the whole region rimward of the Aslan Hierate.
The Etra are regarded as an "embarrassment" by many Aslan in the region, and attacks upon their region are still common, though less organised. Like stated above, the Etra have fought the Aslan on other occasions, alongside other "Hierate Rim" minor races, and even alongside the Solomani (who are generally quite xenophobic...).

 

[Carlobrand]

How did they manage to repulse a technologically and numerically superior enemy, and why are the Aslan reluctant to formally revisit that episode? The answer to those questions could be key in fleshing out this species.

Something about this species is giving the Aslan a major case of heebie-jeebies, to the extent that the Aslan are willing - officially at least - to tolerate a previous embarrassment rather than going in to settle the score, even as these little upstarts foment problems elsewhere.

Perhaps this species reproduces parasitically, spreading their larval eggs on the winds like so much pollen, and the Aslan only discovered this after the war started, enduring heavy losses among ground units and some naval units before they realized the nature of the problem and imposed effective countermeasures. Having driven the Etra back with some difficulty, the Aslan now have no taste for inhabiting or invading worlds dominated by a larval parasite to which they have absolutely no resistance.

 

[77topaz]

How did they manage to repulse a technologically and numerically superior enemy, and why are the Aslan reluctant to formally revisit that episode? The answer to those questions could be key in fleshing out this species.

Something about this species is giving the Aslan a major case of heebie-jeebies, to the extent that the Aslan are willing - officially at least - to tolerate a previous embarrassment rather than going in to settle the score, even as these little upstarts foment problems elsewhere.

Perhaps this species reproduces parasitically, spreading their larval eggs on the winds like so much pollen, and the Aslan only discovered this after the war started, enduring heavy losses among ground units and some naval units before they realized the nature of the problem and imposed effective countermeasures. Having driven the Etra back with some difficulty, the Aslan now have no taste for inhabiting or invading worlds dominated by a larval parasite to which they have absolutely no resistance.

Thanks, that's a good idea!
One problem is that if they reproduce in that way, they would reproduce very quickly. There must be at least a century or two between the war and the Classic Era for the Etra to have influenced the whole region rimward of the Hierate (half a dozen sectors), and it will probably have taken them centuries to get to a spaceflight TL, as well. But, according to the travellermap.com data, which I presume is "set" in the 1100s, there are only two high-population worlds in the Etra state, with a total population of 15 billion.
Of course, the Etra could have spread out a lot, or maybe, like the Hivers, only small amounts of the larvae would survive (but the rest would still give the Aslan problems before their deaths, or something or other).

 

[Whipsnade]

The Etra...

... are rather troubling on several levels.

They are vaguely spider-like, and similar to Hivers...

While "spider-like" and "similar to Hivers" are not quite mutually exclusive, the Hivers and spiders are different enough not to be thought of as similar. The differences are numerous. Hivers are hexapodal while spiders are not and spiders have exoskeletons while Hivers do not.

If you want to say that the Etra have multiple limbs surrounding a central body say that the Etra have multiple limbs surrounding a central body. There's no need to compare them to two rather different beasties and confuse the issue.

The Etra had already invented spaceflight and set up an "empire" using sublight ships by the time the Aslan contacted them. One report even says that they should be classified as a Major Race, but the Aslan have prevented much information about the race from reaching the Imperium.

Okay, this is just plain wrong.

The Major Race label has been discussed here and other other Traveller fora for decades. While the "official" test of Major Race status is whether a race independently developed jump drive, thoughtful observers both in the game and out of the game know that the Major Race label is just a piece of realpolitik apologia. You're a Major Race when you have enough worlds, guns, and ships to make the other Major Races admit you're a Major Race.

No one who believes the "jump drive" criteria will say that the Etra are a Major Race and the Etra do not control enough real estate to meet the real criteria.

This is mostly because the Etra and Aslan are on bad terms. The Aslan first contacted the Etra around the time the Iyestea and Foseakh Outstates were created. Soon after communication was established, the Aslan offered to convert the state into a steaakh (a state with mixed Aslan and native control, with about equal Aslan and native population; this happened to the Yeasaol (also in Hfiywitir) and the Hlaia in Ahkiweahi' Sector, and numerous other races rimward of the Hierate, creating the Steaakh Yeasaol and Steaakh Hlaia, respectively), but the Etra did not like the concept of a Steaakh Etra (because, while in theory a steaakh is mixed control, in practice they are Hierate-dominated client states), and refused.

Okay, this is just plain wrong too. You're presenting the Aslan as some sort of monolithic state when they're nothing of the sort. The Aslan are a monolithic culture, not a monolithic state, and the many Aslan clans are constantly jockeying against each other for power

The Etra wouldn't have been contacted by the "Aslan", they'd have been contacted by an Aslan clan. That clan would have offered steaakh status and, when the Etra refused, relations between that clan and the Etra would have gone sour. Relations between the Etra and other clans would most likely have improved because every Aslan clan has several enemies. The Heirate is a 1,000 Diplomacy game and the concept of "An enemy of my enemy is my friend" is a universal one.

The Aslan then took to war with the Etra. Despite being a much smaller state, the Etra were able to prevent the Aslan from occupying Greposhandir (0710 Hfiywitir), which lies just outside their state, and the coreward Etra worlds.

Again, not the "Aslan". An Aslan clan instead.

They then pushed forward themselves, using jump drives from Aslan ships...

So the Etra are not a Major Race by the setting's own criteria.

Eventually, reinforcements from the main Hierate itself were brought in, and the Aslan regained control over their worlds...

An Aslan clan, not "the Aslan". And those reinforcements sent by the clan in question mean that the clan in question is now weaker with respect to their enemies.

There are other problems with the story, but you should get the gist by now. As currently described, the Etra do not fit the OTU and will not work within the OTU. That doesn't mean the Etra cannot be tweaked to fit the OTU however.a g

One last word of advice: When creating materials for the OTU it's best to first have good understanding of the OTU and how it works.

 

[Enoki]

An alternative might be that they are like the hydra of legend sort of. That is, that any significant body part will regenerate into an Etra in a matter of days or weeks depending on how much there is. If this were the case, the "new" Etra wouldn't possess the knowledge or thoughts of the original and would have to learn from scratch unless the original creature's brain was present in the portion that regenerated.
Some lizards, snakes, and other life on Earth does this to an extent. They can grow back tails or like a starfish a severed limb. Here, the limb simply grows into a new Etra....

So, short of either nuking them into atomic dust or incenerating them very thoroughly they just come back in a matter of weeks for more and in greater numbers than the last time. That could be a real problem for the Aslan.....

 

[inexorabletash]

But, according to the travellermap.com data, which I presume is "set" in the 1100s, there are only two high-population worlds in the Etra state, with a total population of 15 billion.

The only vaguely canonical data for this sector is whether a hex is empty or not, and what its allegiance is, based on the dotmaps in DGP's Solomani & Aslan. The rest of the details for this sector on travellermap.com are randomly generated with no human oversight using known-buggy code.

So don't put too much faith in the data. You're welcome to pave over and rebuild from scratch. While I'd prefer to preserve the dotmap data, even that is not inviolate.

Has there been speculation given to why the Hierate and outlying polities have their mapped boundaries? I would assume that as soon as the Aslan achieved Jump drive in -1999 the expanded fairly uniformly from Kusyu. This would be bounded by the Great Rift, and the Border Wars with the Imperium (and now Solomani Confederation), and any polities used as buffers (Reavers Deep, Trojan Reach). And yet, there's a rimward limit to the main body of the Hierate.

(The real reason is that the outer bounds of charted space needed to line up nicely with an 11x8.5 map. And later publications didn't necessarily think too hard about the problem.)

 

[77topaz]

Okay, here are revisions for history of the Etra (the first part):

They were first contacted in 565 by the Faowaou clan, then considered the most powerful clan of Tlaukhu Bloc-6 (all steaakh's are set up by Bloc-6 Tlaukhu clans). By that time, their empire contained most of its current worlds, and was managed by sub-light ships.
In 567 the Faowaou suggested the creation of Steaakh Etra to the main Etra government at Oso, seeking resources from the Etra region, and possible further domination of the non-aligned worlds between the Iyestea and Foseakh Outstates. The Etra refused, and the Faowaou started sending troops to the Iyestea Outstate, where they had full control of numerous worlds, including the capital, Iyestea (2414 Fahreahluis) (this is now reduced to just Sehari (3104 Fahreahluis)). In 568, they had increased their presence in the local non-aligned worlds, including strategic system Ououtaed (0211 Hfiywitir). When they attempted to place units at Greposhandir (0710 Hfiywitir), the local government resisted, and they forcibly took control of the mainworld. This drew the dismay of the local Ui'royeah clan, as well as the Tralyeaeawi clan of Bloc-3, and the Faowaou had made a large amount of Aslan enemies in 568 when they took over a large number of worlds in the Iyestea Outstate. Over the next weeks, the Tralyeaeawi, assisted by the Ui'royeah, invaded the system and successfully freed Greposhandir. There were a few Etra ships in the system by coincidence, and they assisted the Tralyeaeawi, gaining the Etra a position of honour in the eyes of the Tralyeaeawi, who controlled (and still control) Urlal (2514 Fahreahluis), which is located just Jump-1 from Iyestea.
The Faowaou then launched a quick and rather unorganised mission directly into Etra lands. Upon their arrivals at Efe (0712 Hfiywitir) and Upper Oe (0613 Hfiywitir), despite being technologically superior to the Etra, they were swamped by Etra larvae, and the Tralyeaeawi, seeking to "come even" with the Etra for their help at Greposhandir.

 

[77topaz]

The second part:

The Faowaou were very quickly eliminated, leaving the Faowaou back in the Iyestea unknowing of the mission's fate. Over the next few years (570-573) Tralyeaeawi then launched a series of diplomatic missions from Urlal, to limit the control of Iyestea and the other newly Faowaou-ruled worlds, and supplied the Etra with jump technology, which they used to quickly explore and gain support from many other Hfiywitir worlds. Then, in 574, the Etra, assisted by the Tralyeaeawi and other enemies of the Faowaou, invaded the Iyestea Outstate. By the end of that year, they had practical control over Etau, Ausewer, Keiaoeasea' and a number of other worlds, as well as non-aligned Ououtaed and Meire. The Etra/Tralyeaeawi coalition then laid siege to Iyestea, and the Faowaou there sent out emergency messages to the Faowaou in the main part of the Hierate, and fellow Bloc-6 clans Iykyasea and Uiktawa. The Uiktawa were able to identify the "mysterious something that wipes out Aslan" (i.e. the larvae) as falling objects of some sort, and further missions used nets to shield the soldiers, and the combined forces of the clans ended the siege. In 575 this force also retook the Tralyeaeawi-controlled Aslan worlds, but the Faowaou's status was significally impacted by their lack of ability to keep out the Tralyeaeawi and Etra, and they opted to (officially) withdraw most of their forces from the Iyestea Outstate and end their (official) hostilities against the Etra, but they have since then constantly tried to downplay the incident, and prevent clans unrelated to the conflict and outsiders (including the Imperials) from knowing about it at all.
When the Faowaou and the other Bloc-6's established the Steaakh Yeasaol, the Etra defended the Yeasaol against hostilities (which aren't supposed to be caused in steaakh by Aslan, but that's in theory...), and have "interfered" in the goings-on of other steaakh and "Hierate Rim" states, even ones without "hostility" like the Steaakh Hlaia, and have gained an almost peacekeeper-like reputation is the Hierate Rim region.

 

[rancke]

Has there been speculation given to why the Hierate and outlying polities have their mapped boundaries?

To figure that out you have to figure out the difference between an Aslan settlement inside the Hierate border and an Aslan settlement outside the Hierate border. Or rather, the difference when it comes to settlements outside the border that is not on worlds controlled by other interstellar governments. There's no mystery why Imperial Aslan settlements and Darrian Aslan settlements aren't part of the Hierate. But as for the ones just outside the Hierate border, I've never been able to figure out any pertinent difference.

I would assume that as soon as the Aslan achieved Jump drive in -1999 the expanded fairly uniformly from Kusyu.

Except towards trailing. Most of the worlds in that direction were already settled by humans and initially the Aslans were too weak to impose on them. Even when they grew stronger, they were never able to cooperate except when threatened by a mutual foe (i.e. on defense). So the pocket empires in Margyar were able to fend them off until some Aslan clans grew big enough to match them.

This would be bounded by the Great Rift, and the Border Wars with the Imperium (and now Solomani Confederation), and any polities used as buffers (Reavers Deep, Trojan Reach). And yet, there's a rimward limit to the main body of the Hierate.

Yes, that border is a bit of a mystery.


Hans

 

[Whipsnade]

Okay, here are revisions for history of the Etra (the first part)...

Good job. The revisions reads more like the actual OTU except for these bits...

... Bloc-6 Tlaukhu clans)...

What is all this Bloc-6 and Bloc-3 stuff?

Never mind my questions about the bloc stuff. While it can't be found in the CT AM or Rats & Cats, it seems to be part of the Wiki page for some reason. The fannish need to fill in all the blanks has struck again. A few alliances within the Twenty Nine had been mentioned in the past but someone somewhere decided all the alliances needed to be written down no matter what loss in setting flexibility results.

 

[Whipsnade]

Has there been speculation given to why the Hierate and outlying polities have their mapped boundaries?

Some, but it mostly "fanon" rather than canon.

I would assume that as soon as the Aslan achieved Jump drive in -1999 the expanded fairly uniformly from Kusyu.

Hans already explained why expansion to Trailing wasn't uniform.

And yet, there's a rimward limit to the main body of the Hierate.

There was some discussion about this on the TML well over a decade ago and no real consensus was reached. It's really a result of the 11.5x8 paper size you mentioned, but whether plausible in-game explanations can be fashioned depends on your threshold for plausibility. Anyway, here are a few "reasons" why the Hierate seems to have a fixed rimward border:

Accepted Control - The systems shown on the dot map have Aslan settlements whose various governments and allegiances are recognized by most Aslan clans. Because those governments and allegiances are recognized they're ultimately responsible to Tlaukhu. Beyond those Tlaukhu-acknowledged settlements is a "wild west" of sorts where everything is up for grabs, you make your own law, and the Tlaukhu clans turn a blind eye. Putting it another way, what happens on the Rim stays on the Rim.

Heretics - Unlike with the Vargr, Aslan behavior is a choice. It's primarily a cultural artifact and a stringently enforced cultural artifact. Within a few decades of obtaining jump drive, the Aslan went though a cultural purge. Everyone who didn't subscribe to the new rules was either butchered or fled. Canon makes mention of heretical Aslan colonies beyond the borders of the Hierate. If the scattered human colonies in Dark Nebula could hold off Aslan expansion to Trailing, scattered heretic Aslan colonies might be able to do the same to Rimward.

Distance and Division - The Hierate is a 1,000 man Diplomacy game. If a clan stregthens itself in one location, perhaps because it's launching a colonial or military expedition, it will became relatively weaker in another location. Weakness for one means opportunity for others. Major clans cannot dispatch significant forces rimward from their holdings older and "deep" within the Hierate with risking the loss of those older, "deeper" holding. This means that assets used for rimward expansion much primarily be drawn from pre-existing rimward territories making that expansion a bootstrap effort.

Naturally the border could be a result of all three "reasons" I listed.

Finally, the border is only a snapshot in time. It's fixed at 1105 or whatever the time of the map is and could be rather different by 1120.

 

[Carlobrand]

...One problem is that if they reproduce in that way, they would reproduce very quickly. ...

That is indeed a problem. One presumes that it's not a problem on their homeworld. The local ecology would adapt: only the sick or old, animals with impaired immune systems, would be vulnerable to infestation. On other worlds, they could ruin whole ecologies in ways that could lead to failure of the Etra colony itself - a massive die-off of land animal species throwing the entire ecology out of whack and leaving the colony with little alternative food if their own imported plants and animals failed to thrive. Or, differencies in biology could make every local animal inhospitable to the parasite form, leaving a colony with no way to reproduce other than whatever animals it brought with it.

With their spread limited by the light-speed barrier and the need to rely on colony ships, such setbacks would have seriously delayed their early expansion until they figured out the problems and came up with solutions - communicating the problems and the solutions would have alone been a process of generations. Perhaps they have learned from that, developing medications or methods that inhibited spore production.

Their sub-light history implies they are extremely effective at constructing and maintaining artificial environments - even to the point of allowance for reproduction within the artificial environment. That suggests they make more use of space-based resources - asteroids, moonlets, and such - than other species might. However, they also clearly want the planets that Aslan want, so there is something driving them to settle planets, I've no idea what - I'm not entirely clear why even humans bother with it when there are abundant fuels, metals, and so forth to be had without having to confine yourself to a gravity well.

One limiter is that once spore-producing adults left or self-controlled their spore production, the cycle would stop. It is a potential two-edged sword, useful on their own worlds where the local ecology is adapted to them, but potentially destructive not only to the Aslan but to the ecologies of worlds the Etra might want - not to mention the impact on potential allies - prompting them to be rather judicious in the use of that tactic.

Or perhaps there are only specific animal species in their natural environment that the parasitic form can host in, and the unfortunate Aslan just happen to share certain lung characteristics that make them similar to the host species.

With nothing like a "maternal instinct" and quick reproduction, they likely share the Hiver contempt for their own "infant" forms, but in this case it could extend to the post-parasite juvenile form as well, the Etra only adopting those that manage to successfully complete the transition to full adulthood, so quick reproduction does not necessarily mean a large populationif the post-parasite juvenile form was tasty to larger predators and a nuisance to adult Etra. Juveniles of this species, unlike the Hivers, would be more effectively designed to be ambush predators - which could make them rather unwelcome vermin in the vicinity of agrarian Etra trying to raise livestock. There may be some pheromonal cue that triggers newly matured adults to seek the company of adult Etra and triggers their fellow Etra to accept them as peers rather than pests.

 

[77topaz]

That is indeed a problem. One presumes that it's not a problem on their homeworld. The local ecology would adapt: only the sick or old, animals with impaired immune systems, would be vulnerable to infestation. On other worlds, they could ruin whole ecologies in ways that could lead to failure of the Etra colony itself - a massive die-off of land animal species throwing the entire ecology out of whack and leaving the colony with little alternative food if their own imported plants and animals failed to thrive. Or, differencies in biology could make every local animal inhospitable to the parasite form, leaving a colony with no way to reproduce other than whatever animals it brought with it.

Hmm... half the Etra worlds seem to be vacuum worlds, so they probably wouldn't even have an ecosystem to begin with, which would cause problems for the Etra finding hosts.

There may be some pheromonal cue that triggers newly matured adults to seek the company of adult Etra and triggers their fellow Etra to accept them as peers rather than pests.

I presume Hivers have that, too? (I don't want the species to be too similar, but these are good suggestions, though )

 

[rancke]

What is all this Bloc-6 and Bloc-3 stuff?

Never mind my questions about the bloc stuff. While it can't be found in the CT AM or Rats & Cats, it seems to be part of the Wiki page for some reason. The fannish need to fill in all the blanks has struck again. A few alliances within the Twenty Nine had been mentioned in the past but someone somewhere decided all the alliances needed to be written down no matter what loss in setting flexibility results.

The blocs are described in TD18. I would have thought they'd been mentioned in S&A too, but perhaps I'm wrong. They're not fanon, though.

A3 is the allegiance code for the power bloc formed by the Tralyeaeawi, Yulraleh, Aiheilar, and Riyhalaei clans. A6 is the allegiance code for the Tlaukhu power bloc formed by the Uiktawa, Iykyasea, and Faowaou clans. It would be more correct to refer to them as the Tralyeaeawi bloc and the Uiktawa bloc after the most powerful of the clans involved.

The Tralyeaeawi clan was ranked 4th in the Tlaukhu in (ca.) 1120. It is the dominant clan in Ealiyasiyw sector and shares domination of the Karleaya Sector with the Aokhalte. It also dominates large parts of the trailing part of Hlakhoi Sector. I can't find anything about the holdings of the allied clans or any joint goals and policies.

Most of the assets of the clans of the Uiktawa bloc lie along the Hierate's spinward and rimward borders. They wish to exploit these frontiers and strongly support exploration efforts. Uiktawa may also have large holdings in Kefiykhta, Yahehwe, and Hkakhaeaw sectors, but the text refers to the Uiktawa bloc which can easily mean other clans of that bloc (notably the Faowaou).


Hans

 

[77topaz]

I might be adding a write-up for this race to the possible fanzine. Main Page of corresponding website: http://explorerbase.wikispaces.com/
Are any already existing fanzines, such as Freelance Traveller, interested?

 

[77topaz]

Hm, since Joshua Bell replaced the rimward sectors of the Aslan Hierate on TravellerMap with placeholder dotmaps, the data I used for the Etra texts is no longer available or visible anywhere. I do recall, however, that there is a page on the TravellerMap site which shows all the revision histories of the sectors, but I can't remember where. Does anyone know the URL of that index?

 

[tjoneslo]

Hm, since Joshua Bell replaced the rimward sectors of the Aslan Hierate on TravellerMap with placeholder dotmaps, the data I used for the Etra texts is no longer available or visible anywhere. I do recall, however, that there is a page on the TravellerMap site which shows all the revision histories of the sectors, but I can't remember where. Does anyone know the URL of that index?

The code is all in the github archive. This is the URL for the original Hfiywitir sector data. You can look through the history for every sector that's been posted.

https://github.com/inexorabletash/t...bcd37da204c42b7c458/res/Sectors/Hfiywitir.sec

 

[whulorigan]

Hm, since Joshua Bell replaced the rimward sectors of the Aslan Hierate on TravellerMap with placeholder dotmaps, the data I used for the Etra texts is no longer available or visible anywhere. I do recall, however, that there is a page on the TravellerMap site which shows all the revision histories of the sectors, but I can't remember where. Does anyone know the URL of that index?

Perhaps here?
http://travellermap.blogspot.com/

 

[inexorabletash]

since Joshua Bell replaced the rimward sectors of the Aslan Hierate on TravellerMap with placeholder dotmaps...

For the record, I did that only for sectors (1) I generated and (2) were completely random and un-vetted apart from the allegiances. If anyone wants to dust one off (via links to github history above) they're welcome to resubmit after giving it some real attention.

 

[77topaz]

For the record, I did that only for sectors (1) I generated and (2) were completely random and un-vetted apart from the allegiances. If anyone wants to dust one off (via links to github history above) they're welcome to resubmit after giving it some real attention.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking about doing with the areas involving the Etra and the Lanthusandr anyway.

Thanks for the link to the github, Tjoneslo!