(hypothetical) What would you ask Dave Nilsen?

[GypsyComet]

Originally posted by kaladorn:
I might actually even be convinced to try to figure a way to migrate my current 1116 campaign to 1248.... (Hmmm.... jump drive accident? battle damage + cold sleep? who knows... we've got time, 1248 ain't out yet!).

Anyway, I agree with Dave. Everyone chill out, have a good Xmas, and a Happy New Year

Agreed.

As for migrating a game, I've found the simple artifice of handing the PCs a working starship can have a salutary effect on the calendar, provided you actually keep track. I'm currently running a Rebellion-era game in Daibei (using the old HIWG version of that sector), and any time the PCs want to leave the relative safety of their chosen Casablanca, the calendar just *hauls*.

Get them deep enough into the Black War period, where they feel they might be doing some good (or have a nice steady profiteering racket) and then "Buck Rogers" them...

 

[RandyT0001]

If it hadn't been for the gold rush of '49 then there wouldn't have been a state of California to anchor the western end of the US. The intercontinental railroad was built basically to transport that gold back to the east coast and to ship goods to the west. A 'trade lane' exists when there is a 'supply' at one end and a 'market' at the other. I view the Regency/RC meeting more like 'Lewis and Clark meeting some Russian explorers in Montana'. But it's Martin who really decides though.

 

[GypsyComet]

Oh yeah. The idea of having a route you've been told is "safe", through which tenuous contact with the other end is maintained and around which is howling wilderness, is one of the attractions of both a 1215-ish setting and (if properly done) a Milieu Zero setting, not to mention a Core Expedition campaign.

In the New Era, that route doesn't even need to be very long. I had plans for a NE pocket empire game out in the nastiest Black War parts of spinward Massilia revolving around a single jump link between two worlds just recovered to the point of looking beyond their link with each other and discovering an Empire Builder strain and it's "servants" is just about to roll over them both.

 

[Malenfant]

I can appreciate why it's done like this, but I'd really like to see an sf game that ISN'T based on some historical equivalent. It's very easy to force the historical equivalent to take priority over the conjectured realities of the far future, so you can get situations that just don't make much sense when looked at in a futuristic context.

I think TNE is very "ahistorical", personally. The less "historical" it is, the more unique it becomes IMO.

 

[Uxi]

I'd buy that. I was really hoping the OTU would grow beyond the Imperium concept into something else... both the Regency and RC were heading for that something else...

I still intend to mine ideas and concepts from the 1248 stuff as it's released, but probably won't be following it's setting IMTU.

 

[MJD]

The engineer I once was wants B.

But I'll go with 'Oh hell yeah!' just to be different.

 

[Dreadnought]

Malenfant--

I can appreciate why it's done like this, but I'd really like to see an sf game that ISN'T based on some historical equivalent.

That's an interesting thought. I never assumed that a scenario was based on a deliberate historical model. I just use those historical models as metaphors and analogies to help people relate to the game-generated things better. People seem to like stuff like that. But it's interesting to see that some people read it with cause-and-effect reversed.

I learn something every day.

Dave

 

[Jame]

Here, I'll try to defuse the tension, but with a hopeful eye to doing the exact opposite - first, Dave, where'd you get your avatar? Second, for your survey, I CHOOSE SELECTION A!!!

 

[Malenfant]

Originally posted by David Freakin' Nilsen:
That's an interesting thought. I never assumed that a scenario was based on a deliberate historical model. I just use those historical models as metaphors and analogies to help people relate to the game-generated things better. People seem to like stuff like that. But it's interesting to see that some people read it with cause-and-effect reversed.[/QB]

Well, maybe I'm mistaken here, but didn't MWM himself once say in one of the introductions to the books (or maybe an article?) that travel in (Classic) Traveller was designed to emulate 17th or 18th century shipping, with the slow communications and jump routes?

I can appreciate how useful historical equivalents are as metaphors - that's what I meant by I understand why they're used - and I'm not against them when used in that context. Obviously, the easier a setting is for a reader to 'grok', the better.

BUT... that said, there's a danger that the historical base can overwhelm a setting. If it just turns into "17th century in space", then it's gone too far IMO. Personally, I never really liked the OTU as a setting because there were too many things in it that seemed highly anachronistic for the far future. I really like TNE however because it gives most of those tropes the boot and introduces things like AI and democratic government and realistic technologies and takes it down a more futuristic path. I can tell the plot hooks and axioms - that are there to make the setting what it is, like Virus - apart from those things that make the setting seem more real and original to me from a social perspective.

My point is that while historical analogues make it easier to grok, there's no guarantee that any future will be based on a historical equivalent. To me, the less historical it is, the more 'real' and exciting it seems.

 

[Antony]

Incidently regarding the battle-rider designs. I have done FF&S1 workups on some of them. On the whole they where reproducable (the ones I did anyway) generally if there was anything off it was a point here or there in a weapon rating.

Find them in the Banners section at
www.skaran.net

 

[vutpakdi]

Originally posted by David Freakin' Nilsen:


Okay, here's a quiz:

The next term in this series:

"Yes! Yes!! YES!" is:

Whatever Sally (Meg Ryan's character) said next in the memorable diner scene with Harry (Billy Crystal's character).

Or, was it what the older woman next to her who said "I'll have whatever she's having."?



Ron

 

[LKW]

Originally posted by Malenfant:
Well, maybe I'm mistaken here, but didn't MWM himself once say in one of the introductions to the books (or maybe an article?) that travel in (Classic) Traveller was designed to emulate 17th or 18th century shipping, with the slow communications and jump routes?
[/QB]

He might have said something similar, but again, that was to give people an analogy to make things understandable.

The reason we wanted communications at the speed of travel was so the people on the spot would have to make decisions on their own, without referring to higher authority. "I cannot fight a war tethered to a wire." to paraphrase that Crimean War British general. We felt this would make for a better game.

My view has always been: History doesn't repeat itself, but historians often do.

 

[MJD]

I get kinda annoyed when people want to impose an exact parallel from history on the OTU.

No, it's not the fall of the Persian Empire, it's the Interstellar Wars. The Regency is not the USA, Norris is not Washington... it's the Regency and Norris is Norris...

 

[jchurchill]

Where is Task Force 34? The world wonders.

 

[Dreadnought]

Where is Task Force 34? The world wonders.

Off kicking Ozawa's a$$....oops, never mind, they turned around and are coming back.

 

[jchurchill]

You've just won a cookie and a set of American Tourister luggage.

Or you could trade it all for what's behind the black curtain...

 

[Dreadnought]

What RPT What kind of cookie?

 

[etherflyer]

Originally posted by MJD:
THAT is what 1248 is about. Characters can captain their own fate, they can make a difference.

Sounds like TNE, actually.

Or rather, the part of TNE I liked most: characters can make a real difference to other people.

 

[Dreadnought]

Jame--

That was Retief's first name, wasn't it?

Dave, where'd you get your avatar?

A picture I took of my dog Wisky around Dec 2000/Jan 2001. I shranked it and Hunter was kind enough to set it up as my avatar. He's magickal.

Second, for your survey, I CHOOSE SELECTION A!!!

Your choice is the cunning inverse of Bryan Ferry's answer to his own "have you a future?" in "Mother of Pearl."

CU,

Dave

 

[Dreadnought]

Hey, Rob! Good to "see" you.

I don't think I've seen you over this way yet, and haven't talked to you in over 10 years. Hope they've been reasonably kind to you.

Dave