Jeff M. Hopper
SOC-14 1K
Why not both?
K'kree Ships and Vehicles
- Thread starter Timerover51
- Start date
Could be. I'm going primarily by the supplement information, but there's supposed to be one group of K'Kree dominating the Luretiir!girr sector and making inroads in the Gateway sector who aren't formally acknowledged as part of the 2000 Worlds. I don't know what gives with that, but they seem to be much more interested in expansion than their Kirur relatives. Being both more aggressive and less militarily powerful, they might resort to such clandestine conduct to set someone up for an attack or eliminate a flanking threat. Looks like they control roughly a sector's worth of territory: a quarter of X'Kug and the bulk of Luretiir!girr, though they're still working on absorbing their acquisitions in that sector.
Would you be referring to the K'kree client states visible at http://travellermap.com? They control most of Gh!hken Sector and part of Star's End Sector, and presumably part of Luretiir!girr Sector as well. The Losan Xkeerikulookree state in Kaa G!'kul Sector may or may not be a K'kree client state as well, and the Kr!ghuugna Coalition in Gzirr!k'l Sector is likely K'kree as well.
I don't think so, but I'm not real familiar with that part of space. MegaTrav Journal 4 did a series of bits around a group they called the Lords of Thunder. Near as I can tell, they control that state adjacent to the 2000 worlds, the little blob in the coreward-trailing corner of Luretiir!girr, extending into X'Kug and a wee bit into Gh!hken. Those two sectors are not mapped into TravellerMap.
The K'Kree had fallen into a static phase following their unsuccessful war with the Hivers, and this herd split off about 885, rejecting the Kirur leadership and following a philosopher that taught the importance of expanding aggressively and spreading that K'Kree militant veganism business. A year or so before the FFW over on the other side of the Imperium, they went after the Rankard Union, that other big blob dominating Luretiir!girr sector, conquering and subjugating it. That gave them a presence in Gateway sector, through that little bit of the Rankard Union blob that extends into the lower trailing edge of Gateway.
I don't know anything about these other groups you mentioned. I presumed these other blobs were other species making nice with the neighboring K'Kree of Kirur, but if that one group can break away, there's no reason there couldn't be several such, likewise spurning Kirur and following a more militant path. What sources are they from?
They're all from TravellerMap, in the sector data. Clicking on a sector will show you (at the bottom of the page) its source (and other credits and links related to it). I already mentioned, for each state/group, what sector they were in, so it should not be too hard to find.
Oh, and the Lords of Thunder are also visible on TravellerMap - they control a single world in Crucis Margin Sector.
GypsyComet
SOC-14 1K
I doubt that is their sole possession, especially 220 years after exile. Its a balkanized water world, for starters, and does not have the oomph to take down the Renkard Union.
It's very good, but it's difficult to tell what elements derive from what canon sources. Some of these appear to be ambitious projects by people I don't know - possibly people closely associated with GURPS or some other Trav publishing group that would have sanction for such. Or perhaps the effort is by volunteers with Marc's imprimatur. Gh!hken was attributed to someone named LeRoy Guatney, who links to a now-defunct web page.
Clearly an ambitious and well thought out work, potentially extremely useful, but I know zip about its bona fides. (I like that I can scroll in and out with my mouse wheel. They put a lot of effort into this.)
GypsyComet
SOC-14 1K
Unlike the Wiki, which is open season. the Traveller Map presents Canon data where available. That is largely limited (though sometimes in patches) to the 35 sector rectangle that bounds the Imperium. Crucis Margin, Gateway, Gvurrdon, Ziafrplians, Hinterworlds, and one of the Julian sectors are also under that umbrella. Beyond that is fan effort, though some of it is recognized as "mostly right".
Leroy was an active HIWG member back in the MegaTraveller era, specializing in the trailing end of the map. He fell off the web a few years ago. His site can be found via the wayback machine.
There are several people who have done or are in the midst of fan efforts in the trailing region, and Matthew at Mongoose has hinted at long-term work on the K'kree being done. I suspect the Hivers are also in that category.
Qstor2
SOC-13
what about Capital ships? Would the K'Kree have those too? I imagine they would. I've been working on a Hiver/K'kree sector and from what I've seen in the GT alien module the K'kree have militarized the border with the Hivers so I would think they've poured a lot of resources into naval bases with large ships near the Hiver Border.
Mike
Mike
Qstor2
SOC-13
I edited Leroy's .SEC file for Kaa G!'kul and had Joshua repost it on Travellermap. I tried to fix any plain errors I saw and added in base codes for the K'Kree and Hiver. I started a fan noncanon supplement but been busy and havent made a ton of headway on it.
Dave Thomas who co-wrote the GT K'Kree book was helpful when I emailed him with questions.
Mike
Timerover51
SOC-14 5K
I am not sure I would agree with the idea that herbivores would not have to worry excessively about the K'kree, as unless they are arboreal in say, tropical rain forest with no dry season, they are competitors for grazing and grain production. That also would mean more than one species of intelligent herbivore, and I am not sure how likely that would be.
In addition, as they are virulently anti-predator, that means that all predators larger than probably a mouse/rat/ferret have been eliminated from Kirur. You eliminate the predators, and the remaining herbivores are only limited by the carrying capacity of the land area. That would make them strongly competitive with the K'kree. As I see it, the K'kree are not going to tolerate any competitors that they cannot make use of, which means that all herbivores larger than a mouse are going to be eliminated.
Also, water worlds and near-water worlds are pretty much useless to them, as they need worlds with a lot of arable land area to colonize. Assuming that their metabolism is similar to that of a horse, they are going to need a certain amount of roughage in their diet in the form of grasses or hay. Hay needs, assuming about 10 pounds of grain per day for each K'kree, are going to be about 10 pounds of hay, or the equivalent in green grasses. Good grazing land will support one animal unit of circa 1,000 pounds for one month. With good production, you might average about 4 tons of hay per acre per year, assuming a 6 month growing season. That is about what you will get in the Midwest. Further west, in cattle country, in might take 5 to 10 acres of land to support one 1,000 pound herbivore for one month. Mountainous terrain, tundra, and desert are all pretty much useless to the K'kree, and forests are going to be cleared very quickly for grain crops and grazing. Add in that one-story building limit, and the K'kree are going to be constantly battling to keep their population within the limits of a planet's carrying capacity.
I cannot see them doing well in asteroid belts or airless worlds either, as the enclosure requirements are going to eliminate possible settlement.
GypsyComet
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Using the old CT AM rules for K'kree and Hiver worlds?
GypsyComet
SOC-14 1K
The K'kree militancy is aimed specifically at meat eaters, and has more than a little religious fervor behind it. It doesn't need to make sense or be applied predictably.
Does the map differentiate between canon and fanon? Is there a consensus that the fan effort material is or will be accepted as canon?
I can't see any reason they wouldn't. Capital ships would appear to be ideal - large crews, not likely to have the space problem the smaller ships have. I can't find a source that speaks to K'Kree naval tech level in general, but Kirur is TL15. Only curious thing is that the Robots supplement talks of K'Kree robot tech being down at TL13.
The K'Kree were quite peaceful with each other on their own world as they worked toward unification. No evidence that they were violent about competition with each other. That might not extend to other herbivore races, but I don't see any reason why it wouldn't. As to how many species of intelligent herbivores there might be - I don't have any basis for judgment, there being only one actual intelligent species in our current sample.
I can't agree there.
First, a point of agreement: the K'Kree are not Champions of Herbivora. Their prime motivation is security: eliminate that which threatens the herd. In that respect, a horde of rabbits that threatens their crops is every bit as threatening as a predator - they will starve if the crops fail. Given their ruthlessness in other quarters, I don't see them having any compunction in eradicating invading pests.
However, that ruthlessness very clearly was never extended to their fellow K'Kree of different herds. Unless I missed something, Alien Module 2 makes clear there was no violence among the differing K'Kree herds as the world grew toward unification. K'Kree society has evolved some sort of mechanism to deal with K'Kree herd vs. K'Kree herd competition without resorting to violence. It is more likely that the K'Kree would extend those mechanisms to other intelligent herbivore competitors than that they would decide to treat those intelligent competitors the way they treat pests or predators.
Or at least, one would have to find some pretty special circumstances to explain why another herbivore occupying its own territory needed to be treated as an invading pest rather than as a trade partner.
The K'kree are a high-tech herd-oriented society. They've been space-faring for over 5000 years. I don't see any reason they wouldn't have managed population control by now. They do need more calories per individual, and the inability to live in the stacked boxes we prefer would set an upper limit on their population, but Kirur's managing a population density of more than 27 individuals per square kilometer.
Alien Module 2 includes a K'Kree world-generation system. Instead of the standard 2d6-2 straight roll, they have a system where an initial roll tells whether the world is K'Kree-dominated or inhabited by a subject race, and if K'Kree then there's a 1d6 roll modified heavily by the planet's characteristics, as you suggest, but not to that extreme:
A world with an unusual volume of water also suffers a penalty: a hydro-8 world gets a -1 DM, a hydro-9 gets a -2, and the water world gets a -3 DM to pop, but there still may be a small population, especially if the atmosphere's just right. That water world with a good atmosphere and a class-A port could on a high roll host up to hundreds of millions of K'Kree among its scattered islands.
The smallest water world is a size-5: 8000 km diameter, 200 million square kilometers surface area. Water world has less than 10% land surface. Let''s call it 1% for simplicity - that's still 2 million square kilometers of land, about 20 Cubas and Icelands scattered about the planet. Crowded if it happens to be that A-port with a good atmosphere and a pop roll of 6, but anything else is no more crowded than Kirur and typically less crowded.
By the AM-2 world gen system, it is possible to find a small K'Kree population on a vacuum world with no water. No air gets a -2 DM, no water also gets a -2, but you get a bonus for a class-A or class-B port. On a dry vacuum world with a class-A starport there can be up to tens of thousands, no more. Statistically unusual combination, but possible. Running the numbers, your dry vacuum world has a 2.8% chance of rolling a class-A port and tens of thousands of K'Kree, a 7% chance of rolling an A or B with thousands, a 30% chance of rolling any kind of port with hundreds or tens - in all cases most likely in the most spacious habitat-style construct they can build - and a 60% chance of being uninhabited. Size isn't considered, so that's whether it's an asteroid or a planet.
(Being the mercantile type that I am, I can't help thinking that somewhere amongst the thousands of K'Kree worlds, there should be a sapient giant groundhog or some such minor herbivore race that the K'Kree would trust to mine asteroids and airless worlds for their wealth, that would fill out the population of those vacuum worlds and run the local starport.)
Carlo, canon says the K'kree are militantly anti carnivore, to the point of genocide if an encountered species cannot adapt to a vegetarian lifestyle. They don't even tolerate breastfeeding by mammalian species. They are racially psychotic about making the universe safe for vegans.... Them first, other vegan species second... but no sentient carnivores are tolerated by them. They have, however, two major threat empires noted for predation... The 3I is predators, and to a degree, so are the hive federation.
Returning to the thread name about K'kree starships, and while I must admit I have not followed it throughly, only skim reading it from time to time, I must say I'm amazed as I didn't find on it any reference to the article K'kree Starships: A Human Prespective, appeared in the Challenge 28 (pages 22-25).
In this article (written form a human who travelled with a K'kree merchant mision in their ship) a 6000 ton Xeekr'kir Class Merchant is fully described by him and a map is in pages 24-25.
As is told there, speaking on staterooms is moot, as the ship is described as being mostly a single large dome representing a praerie, where all the herd lives together, mostly assembling in the central structure (the controls, representing a tree), and with grass and plants (even a prowled zone for cultiving) in all the floor.
In this article (written form a human who travelled with a K'kree merchant mision in their ship) a 6000 ton Xeekr'kir Class Merchant is fully described by him and a map is in pages 24-25.
As is told there, speaking on staterooms is moot, as the ship is described as being mostly a single large dome representing a praerie, where all the herd lives together, mostly assembling in the central structure (the controls, representing a tree), and with grass and plants (even a prowled zone for cultiving) in all the floor.
GypsyComet
SOC-14 1K
Click on a sector and check below the map for sources. The 'Data' link will get you a text file for the sector with sources listed.
Ummm, yes, it does. Unfortunately, I'm not entirely clear what specific statement prompted the response, so I'm fuzzy on what you're trying to correct.
The Imperium's 64 parsecs off and out of reach, and AM2 tells us the K'Kree abruptly ended their war with the Hivers over 3000 years ago with "a mutual agreement to avoid future interference in non-aligned cultures between the two powers." As near as I can tell, canon doesn't speak to more than border incidents between the two powers since then.
The Journal article says the 2000-worlds' borders have been pretty much static since then. It also speaks about a group of K'Kree splitting off from Kirur, getting exiled for following the tenets of a philosopher who preached a "philosophical and moral stance largely discredited since the Hiver war," attacking and conquering a carnivore world just outside 2000-World space 250 years back, and spreading from there into a power strong enough to conquer and hold the territory of the former Renkard Union. I'm not sure how strong the Journal is as canon, but it clearly paints the picture of a 2000-Worlds grown static within its own borders while a dissident group takes up the mantle of militant expansionist anti-carnivorism.
Am I reading something wrong there?
GypsyComet
SOC-14 1K
The assertion that the K'kree are out to kill other herbivores due to competition, while killing the omnivores and carnivores for being eaters of meat. The K'kree were driven to space and the stars by the biological fear of *being eaten*. Herbivores and omnivores who can behave are not a threat, and will only be stomped if they fight or harbor unrepentant meat eaters.
While it has become religious over time, the whole thing is centered in their sense of smell (which is excellent). If you smell like you've been eating meat, you are the enemy.
Timerover51
SOC-14 5K
Actually, when I said that the K'kree are going to be very hard on herbivores, I was thinking on un-intelligent ones that eat the same type of food as the K'kree. Also, when you eliminate predators, the herbivores are going to increase to the maximum carrying capacity of the area, and typically, that results in an overshoot of population, with devastating results to the flora that they consume. Consider the effects of rabbits in Australia, rats on sub-Arctic islands, and other instances of herbivores introduced to limited areas with no effective predation.
I can imagine that one nasty way of getting at the K'kree would be to introduce something like field mice or voles to one of the planets. With no predators, a plague of small furry animals would develop quite rapidly. I assume that the K'kree do allow for insect predators to exist.
Also, do not invite the K'kree Ambassador and the Aslan and Vargr Ambassadors to the same dinner.
I can imagine that one nasty way of getting at the K'kree would be to introduce something like field mice or voles to one of the planets. With no predators, a plague of small furry animals would develop quite rapidly. I assume that the K'kree do allow for insect predators to exist.
Also, do not invite the K'kree Ambassador and the Aslan and Vargr Ambassadors to the same dinner.
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