Lucan's fate?

[Carlobrand]

I would worry more about that stuff if we could get historians in the modern era to agree with each other, but they can't even agree on the modern stuff, so I don't sweat it too much.

 

[aramis]

I have sort of gotten the impression that the point of the Galaxiad is that there is a "Dark Age" of some sort occurring sometime between 1248 and 1900, and that all material from earlier published versions of Traveller is just that: different historians' interpretations and reconstructions based on fragmentary historical records. Thus, the "true" version of the Universe history is up to the referee.

In essence, the Galaxiad is the way of reconciling the various versions of the History of Charted Space: technically none of them are entirely correct - the "true" version is up to the GM's preference (or to retcon as he/she sees fit).

Channeling of your inner Marc, eh? Pretty much nailed it.

 

[Nathan Brazil]

I have sort of gotten the impression that the point of the Galaxiad is that there is a "Dark Age" of some sort occurring sometime between 1248 and 1900, and that all material from earlier published versions of Traveller is just that: different historians' interpretations and reconstructions based on fragmentary historical records. Thus, the "true" version of the Universe history is up to the referee.

In essence, the Galaxiad is the way of reconciling the various versions of the History of Charted Space: technically none of them are entirely correct - the "true" version is up to the GM's preference (or to retcon as he/she sees fit).

Channeling of your inner Marc, eh? Pretty much nailed it.

You are both correct. I do not claim to KNOW Mr. Miller's mind but I have taken his statements as the Gospel truth if you will.
In his talk at Gamercon he spoke about how there were elements of the OTU, that if he had made the decision with knowledge of what would come of it, he would have chosen differently. But he "is bound by canon". That is to say he would not retcon something out of existence (ex. Virus never happened"), but rather the retcon would be reinterpretatation (ex. Virus was a bunch of 5-dimension psionic space butterflies that like the smell of IFF transponders). Silly example but I hope you get the idea. But his escape route route, if you will, is that none of them are entirely correct. Lookng into the far past via the lens of history is always foggy, but some events are less subject to interpretation than others.

This is the reason I have his quote in my signature. I operate on the principle that all versions are valid to one degree or another, until Marc says different.

 

[Nathan Brazil]

So going further with Lucan in the "current canon" OTU:
After the impertinence of the Vilani invasion attempt, Honey Badger.....um....Lucan decided to punish the Vilani. He decided the best way make the Vilani understand their error was to SCOUR Vland Yep, as in Agent of the Imperium Scouring, but with new and improved weapons of mass destruction. And decides that its time do a flag tour throughout Charted Space. He has heard about some upstarts called the Reformatio Coalition or some such and sets off to conquer them.

Nothing turns enemies into friends faster than a bigger enemy coming to kill you both. Surviving Vargr worlds are frightened and send ships to help the Vilani. The Vilani call upon the Regency who they finished fighting in early 1208. The Regency helps a little, but they are in their first Civil War so not so much. Over by the Coalition side, they have dealt with the Vampire Highway for decades, but now things are so bad the RC cuts a deal with The Mercantile Guild

Thus Lucan accidentally does good by having previous enemies become comades in arms. But this is incidental. Lucan the Savior has not yet arrived,

NEXT TIME IN LIFE WITH LUCAN: :coffeesip: The Vindication of Mike Wightman! oh and Lucan finds out there's always a bigger fish...

 

[Blue Ghost]

"Dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria!"

Seriously, my biological database ends at MT as far as OTU history goes. Wow, I had no idea. Dude never popped up in any session I ran ... come to think of it, he never made an appearance in any of our gaming sessions.

Okay, Lucan's out of the fan fic picture. He's too nutty, and I don't mean in the pejorative sense either.

Wow, here I thought he was this sort of mainstream villain who made a power grab. Turns out he's just "out there" in the astronomical married to psychiatry sense.

Having said that, and reading Nathan's and everyone else's take on him, and this is just my humble opinion here, he does strike me as a bit over the top for Classic Traveller. But I guess that's why he's evolved to what he is in TNE+ post CT era.

Incredible.

 

[Nathan Brazil]

Yea you would not likely meet Lucan personally during The Rebellion. Before his uploading you might meet a clone or double, but not "Lucan himself" since he is sitting on the throne at Sylea.

MJD writes him 1248 in a larger than life way. The first 1248 book, to me, reads like watching the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. The Big Bad, Sauron, is sitting pretty at home in Mordor, sending out his agents. Yea everyone knows he is the Big Bad, but he seems so far away. In the meantime lets do some petty fighting among ourselves, he wont come here..

Until his armies show up at your kitchen door and take your stuff.

Thematically, it reads like LotR in that at the end of all the epic battles things settle down. In the 1248 setting this the year 1248 with the "epicness" happening between 1208 and 1247.

The best (or worst depending on your perspective), is Lucan IS NOT the Big Bad in 1248. That one will be revealed next time. :smirk:
MWUAHAHAHA

 

[Blue Ghost]

That's interesting. Part of my continued solo-toying and efforts to write for the game was it's grounded setting that let you as players or referees conjure really fantastic stuff if you so wished using the TL chart and animal encounters table.

But, hearing about how Lucan went all 5150, and the degree to which he did after Rebellion, combined with the "oncoming storm" in the form of the Galaxiad and whoever else, it strikes me that Traveller, post MT, has taken on comic book like dimensions to story telling and dramatic space saga.

Oh well. My best to the Lucan story arc, but reading your equivocation it sounds like Lucan is taking on mythic parameters as a figure in the OTU.

I guess I'm kind of curious here, if he's essentially a small task force of BBs, then how does he, his wafer persona, command the crew and marines to do his bidding? Or are his ships unmanned? I'm a little hazy on the subject, and the 1248 sourcebook is out of print. Any answers to these questions is appreciated.

I guess I'm trying to grok with his transformation from major (yet petty) dictator to BB-cyborg supervillain....this sounds like something DC or Marvel would come up with.

 

[whartung]

I'm a little hazy on the subject, and the 1248 sourcebook is out of print.

All the 1248 stuff is on one of the TNE CDs from FFE.

 

[Blue Ghost]

Thanks. I'm thinking I'm a CT kind of guy, so I'll beg off unless someone runs a TNE game locally.

 

[inexorabletash]

I assume Nathan Brazil is already working on documenting this already but...

It's interesting to walk through Chapter 1 of the 1248 Sourcebook 1: Out of the Darkness - specifically pages 46 - 79, which cover 1195 through 1248 while at the same time charting the advance of the Wave, and see what must change.

There's the lack of reaction to the Wave by the major powers, and the lack of a flood of refugees fleeing. Those could be chalked up to denial by the powers who are too busy fighting petty wars to realize that doom is bearing down on them, and simply overlooked by the historians.

Anything that happens in the Domain of Deneb is rendered mostly invalid - the Regency, Zhodani, etc.

What Lucan does to Vland can still happen in 1211, although it's rendered moot a few years later as the Wave hits in 1215.

Usdiki, Capital and Gateway are fine through 1248.

 

[Nathan Brazil]

I assume Nathan Brazil is already working on documenting this already but...

It's interesting to walk through Chapter 1 of the 1248 Sourcebook 1: Out of the Darkness - specifically pages 46 - 79, which cover 1195 through 1248 while at the same time charting the advance of the Wave, and see what must change.

There's the lack of reaction to the Wave by the major powers, and the lack of a flood of refugees fleeing. Those could be chalked up to denial by the powers who are too busy fighting petty wars to realize that doom is bearing down on them, and simply overlooked by the historians.

Anything that happens in the Domain of Deneb is rendered mostly invalid - the Regency, Zhodani, etc.

What Lucan does to Vland can still happen in 1211, although it's rendered moot a few years later as the Wave hits in 1215.

Usdiki, Capital and Gateway are fine through 1248.

Why, yes I am. :coffeegulp:
What nexorabletash says, and as mike wightman speaks of are both correct. As I allude to, the new Wave kills some events, moods and themes of the future history. MJD has expressed his...disappointment... about what happened to his work. One can imagine how this would feel to a writer.

There are several very "interesting" developments that have value to be kept. My opinion is that these development warrant being kept, not just because I personally like them. Some of you will groan, but operating under the "I am bound by canon" principle, they have to be kept. The origins of these events do happen. The Wave in itself cannot stop it. The ending, well maybe not.

My first example I gave, the Solomani make some treaties in 1129-1130 just before Virus hits them is one. In the narrative, this allows the Confederation to survive. Yea Solomani! Then experiments from the Interstellar Wars destroy it. Uplifts and altered Terrans were not the only things that came. The Terrans had made genetically enhanced humans who finally rose up and toasted the Confederation. It is implied that this finally breaks the Solomani Superiority Hypothesis. By 1248 you have the (mostly) white-hat Terran Confederation, and the (sort of) black-hat Solomani Imperium. The change in the Wave cannot stop this happening.

 

[Blue Ghost]

That's pretty interesting. But I've got a question here, there seems to have been a shift in scope and scale of Traveller "events" and history. Grandfather aside, and his out-of-control kids running around hurling planets at one another, for us mere mortal humans Traveller was more of a "down to Earth" (no pun intended) cops-and-robbers or James Bond in space, and not really ... I don't know ... some anime or Marvel Universe fare.

Was there a shift in thinking for TNE, and is that why Lucan is this ultra-bad mofo supervillain, instead of just some paranoid locked up in his castle?

 

[Nathan Brazil]

Why should you care? The shape of Canon in Galaxiad.

Yes it is ~700 years after the Golden Era, but the wave does not hit the 1248 borders of the new Terran Condfederation until about 1365 or so and Terra itself until the 1390s. Around 200 years more civilization before the fall...

What is the character of the Terrans in Galaxiad? Do they survive?
Do they have a chance to have higher TL before they get Waved? (More high tech artifacts?)
The Wave hits the Spinward Marches in 1202 and the Rim almost 200 years later. So 200 years less recovery? Do the Terrans have a lower sustained TL? The Marches are said to have Hop Drive. Do the Terrans have Hop Drive?
Should they be called Terrans due to the cultural shift or do they go back to being Solomani?

 

[mike wightman]

TNE had very little to say about Lucan. The presence of Lucan within the Black Imperium is mentioned in Dave Nilsen's comprehensive interview, as is the original intent of the metaplot that would lead to Lucan's downfall; the StarViking atrocity that ends the Black Imperium threat, and Lucan, that I have inferred is how i think it would have played out as a PC scale adventure series rather than a Lord of the Rings grand opus.

TNE has lots of sideboxes written from the future of the setting, from them we know the Black Imperium was a major threat (but not initially in 1200), the Star Vikings committed a necessary atrocity and that new political entities rose from the ashes of the RC, Regency etc.
This is what DN had to say about the Black Curtain:

What's inside the Black Curtain?

A nasty, creepy, sharp, spiky, cyber-icky civilization involving Virus and K’kree. If any of you bought the TNE T-shirt, those beetly-looking things with six legs are cyborged K’kree. Imagine the K’kree just as pissed-off as they’ve always been, but now they’re even more pissed off because they’ve been wired and chopped and channeled. These K’kree would not be contiguous to the old 2000 Worlds government, but their native militance, manifest destiny, and general grouchiness would be similar, although in the service of a different ethos. (And just as tasty to Ithklur. Oops, I’ve just pissed you off.)

The “Black Curtain” is a figurative phenomenon, not a physical one. It’s like a Black Hole where there is an event horizon which is the point/curve/radius at which no information (light) escapes. The “Black Curtain” simply means, “beyond this line, no one has ever come back to tell us what the heck is on the other side.”

The reason no one ever comes back is that the area controlled by this civilization is just so technically superior to anyone around that anyone who goes in is killed or captured. The ships are high-technology, and run by sentient computers/cyborged organic minds, as are the weapons, troops, etc. They just outclass anything they come up against. They would have the benefits of the research of the various weapons research projects that Lucan was always reported to be working on, which would include psionics, chemical/biological warfare, large-scale socio-psychological control, whatever. One of the weapons they would have is a logical application of the “meta identity” concept in which a consciousness can move from one host to another. They can implant a processing unit in an enemy, say by a projectile, which would allow a viral host to move itself or a copy of itself into a processing center that could control the target through rapidly-penetrating biochemical, bioelectrical, or simple coercive means (injectable poisons and a speaker system: “if you don’t do as I say, I’ll inject you again,” or “detonate this warhead in your chest”). Such persons could be rescued and surgically restored, but otherwise would be added to the Lucan labor pool.

Within the Black Curtain is a civilization completely run by intelligent machines, and which has made free use of a variety of cyborged concepts. Their shock troops are the cyborged K’kree, but they’ve also got cyborged humans and whatever else. Lucan is still there, cyborged and wired into the main control system on Capital. Why? Because everyone would want to know, “where’s Lucan? What happened to Lucan?” Easiest answer is he’s still there. If you don’t have him in there in some fashion it’s just sort of anticlimactic, and it’s another piece of continuity. I believe he was going to be so corrupted by being sliced and diced and/or anagathics that it might not even be possible to tell if it was really him or a virus intelligence taking on his persona, and I think he was going to have had multiple presences in multiple bodies that could move from one locus to the next, and take over new bodies as described above.

Bear in mind that the concept of the Black Curtain requires someone to be trying to look inside. Before the RC and Regency meet each other nearby, there are precious few trying, so the only notion of the Black Curtain is rumor from Guild ships, free traders, pocket empires, etc. Then as the Regency and RC come up against it, they start to see ships disappearing. Eventually they try harder and trigger a response from the Black Curtain, and the forces behind that “event horizon” burst out and attack the Regency and RC forces.

It is the RC’s “tame” virus ships and Ithklur allies that enable them to withstand this onslaught, along with new, improved, psionic weapons and powers from the Regency, plus the usual good old desperate fights.

Somewhere in here, in order to defeat the virus Lucan force, the “Star Vikings” end up having to commit some big atrocity, I don’t remember what. While this does end the Black Curtain threat, it so destroys their ability to work productively with other human factions that the remaining leaders and those identified closely with the acts choose to join with Avery’s forces and head for the galactic core. I say “Star Vikings” because that doesn’t mean every inhabitant of the RC worlds, or all of the members of the RCES, just those who got branded with the act, and had to bear the guilt away to allow those left behind to reconcile and build a future.

I seem to recall writing some “Why didn’t Maggart tell us it was going to end like this?” soundbites, but don’t know if they ever got published. I suspect they did not, but I can’t prove it.

And again, by the time we got there, we would have maybe gone a different direction. So you gotta write those soundbites kinda open-ended.

 

[Condottiere]

I interpreted it as the Confederation had to deal with a Pournellian plot development:

Among the Empire's many worlds is Sauron, where the culture has grown militaristic and adheres to a literal interpretation of the philosophy of Nietzsche, namely that "man is something to be surpassed." In service of this aim, they engage in extensive genetic modification and eugenic breeding programs to turn themselves into supersoldiers known in the galaxy at large as the Sauron Supermen. Bristling under Imperial hegemony, in the 27th century they lead several worlds into open revolt.

 

[Nathan Brazil]

Yes but you see what I am trying to get at. The "lost decades" of the Virus Era (1130-1195) shape "canon" as it stands currently in 1248 as much as the build up based on the previous TNE books published 10 years previous.

Other areas in 1248 are not impacted heavily by the Wave and have stories that will impact the various cultures. Like:

The Kkree - The Lords of Thunder come down, come to Kirur and kill the Steppelord of the 2000 Worlds. In the 1150's. He did keep his Herd safe enough. They take over and finally dream the one thing they ALWAYS wanted: Jihad! Kill all the meat eaters! They have a Viruss helping them as well. This is scary at first, but they know one truth:
Virus does not eat meat.
So off they go, reclaim the 2K Worlds and then head Spinward. They rise back faster than most everyone else because they have a unified goal. The entire species knows. Protect the Herd. Kill the meat eaters.
And have you ever seen just how many Navy Bases and Naval Outposts are generated using CT World Generation in Kkree space? Hilarity ensues :smirk: as each human and Vargr is exterminated.

Virus cannot stop the beginning of the Jihad. Only the ending. Before the Wave was changed Blue Ghost how successful do you think they were. Even with the change they get a good 40-50 years of genocide in.
How will the Kkree think of the chance of paradise being taken away from them? Wll they try again? Will they forswear violence? Will they blame the meat eaters (We Hates The Bagginsss! FOREVER!)
For those who survive the new Wave relatively sane, what will they think of the six limbed sophont devils that were as big as a poni, carried pikes and deliberately killed over 90% of your planet's ancestors before they unleashed the Wave of Terror that dove the rest insane leaving only .01% of a planet that had billions. WE WILL NEVER FORGET. Stay alert stay ready. The devils will return one day.

Might effect the culture of the Kkree in Galaxiad... :devil:

 

[Nathan Brazil]

And some things do get toasted. PERIOD.

If the Wave enters the Marches in 1202 as scheduled and is as deadly as now written, the Regency portion of TNE is gone, gone, gone. No more Keepers of the Flame. No breakup or Spinward States, etc. So unless some deus ex machina comes along and saves their bacon all you will hear is the sound of crickets that did not go insane...

 

[Blue Ghost]

... cyborg K'Kree ... a "here be dragons" black region of space ... great.

But dude, if you start talking about Lucan's one ring ... I'm cashing out of this thread. o:

 

[Condottiere]

 

[Nathan Brazil]

...The presence of Lucan within the Black Imperium is mentioned in Dave Nilsen's comprehensive interview, as is the original intent of the metaplot that would lead to Lucan's downfall; the StarViking atrocity that ends the Black Imperium threat, and Lucan, that I have inferred is how i think it would have played out as a PC scale adventure series rather than a Lord of the Rings grand opus.

TNE has lots of sideboxes written from the future of the setting, from them we know the Black Imperium was a major threat (but not initially in 1200), the Star Vikings committed a necessary atrocity and that new political entities rose from the ashes of the RC, Regency etc.
This is what DN had to say about the Black Curtain:

MJD brings this up in the introduction and mentions that much of was kept, but he did toss the rest that did work with the end goal. Most of that is in 1248 in one form or another but not EXACTLY as Dave Nilsen had outlined for TNE.

1.No, no cybered Kkree. Virus assisted? You betcha. OK that's a lie. At least one makes the change. For reasons TBA.

2.No rings. But we are so going over the top next. And Lucan is not the one to do it.