Should it be considered non-canon?

[nobby-w]

What is this Canon you speak of?

In that material for a game is Material for a game, period.

I'm 100% in agreement with that - canon is actually two things:

1. A means of ensuring that third party publishers don't release stuff that clashes with other published material, dilutes your brand (e.g. light sabres in Traveller) or paints you into a corner thematically ("No you can't kill off Spider Man. I don't care how cool your story arc is. Just No.").
2. A tool for munchkins to use for attempting to bully DMs into letting them have their way. (Here on page 42 it says ...)

I've seen folks obviously asking around forums for 'Canon' to use for the latter purpose on more than one occasion, and I'm sure everyone's met That guy who knows Monster Manuals 1 and 2, Dieties & Demigods and Unearthed Arcana off by heart. Folks like this are not fun to play with; discussions of canon have a whiff of that and generally put me off the idea of wanting to be involved in a game with the participants.

If you are publishing material then you will have to keep an eye on your setting's canon to ensure you don't write something that trips over it. Otherwise, feel free to run unmodified adventures or set your campaign in the Spinward Marches - or house-rule the whole campaign. For you everything is either source material or house rules, not canon. If you're playing with the sort of people that want to quote canon at you, reconsider their membership in the group.

If you're not in the business of publishing then canon is irrelevant.

 

[kilemall]

Ok, I have read about the other items and even had some of these products, but what is controversial about the T4 Core Rules? I thought GURPS was more 'off the reservation' in rules and/or setting.

 

[Grav_Moped]

...
If you're not in the business of publishing then canon is irrelevant.

I mostly agree, but there's one exception: pick-up (game-store or convention) games. Having a consistent setting and rules-set that you can refer players to for background information -- assuming they're not already familiar with it -- is useful.

 

[Vargas]

My canon is CT, I wouldn't use anything after.

 

[BRJN]

If you're not in the business of publishing then canon is irrelevant.

Almost. The widely-known canon helps new players get a guess at what to expect in the game. Traveller is that game where you can die during chargen, and the Imperium will let you get away with personal law-bending but nothing organized; whereas Star Wars is where blasters get deflected by experts wielding lightsabers.

Internal canon is also important to keep track of at least lightly. If most of the people in System X live in the asteroid belt this time, and next time the group visits they are all on a Gas Giant's moon, they can call shenanigans on you. It won't really matter though if the local year is 1.25 Standard or .8 Standard (because you wrote the fraction upside-down for one of those).

 

[mike wightman]

My canon is CT, I wouldn't use anything after.

While I very much agree with the sentiment there is a problem - CT material is self contradictory.

Here is one example, CT LBB2/3 all editions agree that you can build a jump drive that can achieve jump 3 at TL9.
HG makes that same jump drive TL12.
You can build a jump 4 ship at TL10 in LBB2/3, this again is different in HG which requires TL13.

 

[Tiikeri]

Almost. The widely-known canon helps new players get a guess at what to expect in the game.

Yes. This is vitally important, and for experienced players too. Canon tells us what exists in the setting and what doesnt, it defines the setting so that players have the same assumptions and expectations, or similar enough expectations that people are compatibe with each others games. Otherwise it's a setting tower of babel with everyone speaking different languages / having different expectations/assumptions about what one can or cannot have, do, or be in the setting.

Failure to respect canon as a common set of setting facts and assumptons leads to chaos with everyone injecting their own 'cool ideas' and 'cool equipment' which usually aren't too cool to anyone else or at worst are designed to give them a self-serving advantage.

 

[nobby-w]

[ . . . ]Internal canon is also important to keep track of at least lightly. If most of the people in System X live in the asteroid belt this time, and next time the group visits they are all on a Gas Giant's moon, they can call shenanigans on you. It won't really matter though if the local year is 1.25 Standard or .8 Standard (because you wrote the fraction upside-down for one of those).

That's not canon and it's certainly not what's meant by the folks discussing canon in this thread. That's internal campaign housekeeping and calling it canon confuses the meaning. What the folks are discussing in this thread are which publications are/are not considered canon. Your internal house rules or world building are not OTU canon.

MWM has stated 'Canon is for publishers.' (or words to that effect) on the record. It's there to manage third parties writing material set in the OTU. It's nothing to do with individual campaigns.

 

[nobby-w]

Yes. This is vitally important, and for experienced players too. Canon tells us what exists in the setting and what doesnt, it defines the setting so that players have the same assumptions and expectations [ . . . ]

That's just another way of saying it enables rules lawyering. You can't completely stick to rule or setting canon in an actual campaign with Traveller. The published canon is inconsistent in significant places and the rules of pretty much all editions are broken enough to need significant house-ruling. Traveller is the poster child for house rules - I doubt that there are a significant number of traveller campaigns out there that don't involve at least some house-ruling.

 

[aramis]

That's just another way of saying it enables rules lawyering. You can't completely stick to rule or setting canon in an actual campaign with Traveller. The published canon is inconsistent in significant places and the rules of pretty much all editions are broken enough to need significant house-ruling. I doubt that there are a significant number of traveller campaigns out there that don't involve at least some house-rules.

You're missing the point. Setting-Canon as a starting point means that informed players don't have to rely on questioning the GM for the setting materials.

For example, in Legend of the 5 Rings, when I pull together a group of fans, I don't have to explain who Hantei XXXVIII is. I don't have to explain the relationship between Crab and Crane Clans. Nor how Shugenja work magic. Nor where the Capital is (tho' I do need to specify which one if the player isn't aware of the discussions point in the history timeline). All of that is explained in the setting-canon. (Now, with 5E out using a different system, the rules-canon is broken into two broad groups - old-L5R and L5R5... )

And rules canon? It provides a mechanical understanding of what the character can and cannot do, that the player may not otherwise grasp.

Further, Most of the groups I've run for have had few to no house rules, and the house rules have been trivial. most of my recent games have been public play, and a large part being part of organized play, where the rules choice is practically non-extant. For example, in my Rogue Trader campaign, there was ONE house rule - altering the method of calculating the effect bonus number from a subtraction then division by 10, to a division by 10 round down. A rule that appears in the new WFRP from Cubicle 7 as an explicit rules option in the core. (Parallel evolution.)

Now, for Traveller, my houserules amount to a new edition... they are numerous and collectively alter the feel of MegaTraveller to fit better my conceptions of the setting. Striker ranges, CT2 damage scores, MT damage methodology. Incorporation of several concepts of TNE into the Character Generation. Using the Vehicle Combat rules merged with the mass combat rules for replacing the nasty High Guard chapter. T4 Psionics. Modified T20 design sequences (adding mass).

 

[mike wightman]

Here is a silly example:
Player 1 - "We blast off from the starport"
Player 2 - "So our m drive is some sort of rocket, cool"
CT ref - yup your M drive is a fusion rocket, the starport uses repulsor fields and nuclear dampers to contain the drive plasma.
MT ref - no, it not like that at all, your m drive uses gravitic technology to push against spacetime itself
other MT ref - that's not what it says in the SoM
TNE ref - actually the CT ref has it almost right, its a plasma rocket rather than fusion, and you can use the ships contra-grav lifters to make it a bit more gravitationally buoyant.
all the others - "What contragrav lifters?"

T5 ref - "actually the right answer is... hang on while I check the three different editions of the T5 rules, my secret files for the forthcoming next edition..." "Stuff this, what did the CT guy say again?"

Ok that was a bit tongue in cheek to make my point - the contradictions inherent in the various iterations Traveller mean that the referee will have a hard time deciding exactly what is the 'canon' that answers a question. Broad setting elements are discernible, the devil is in the detail, and the more detail there is the more opportunities for contradiction and conflict.

 

[robject]

My guess is (and I am very confident in this guess) the entire notion of canon did not exist at all at the start of the hobby in the sense it is often a concern today.

I'm sure it's an import from existing hobbies/media franchises, naturally emergent as RPGs became widespread.

I wonder if it's an offshoot of the hierarchical organization of all human endeavors?

 

[nobby-w]

You're missing the point. Setting-Canon as a starting point means that informed players don't have to rely on questioning the GM for the setting materials.
[ . . . ]
And rules canon? It provides a mechanical understanding of what the character can and cannot do, that the player may not otherwise grasp.
[ . . . ]

I'll buy that to a certain extent, but you're describing canon at the level of a few pages of FAQ, not at a level that merits years of repeatedly debating its minutae or exactly which published works are to be considered canon vs. apocrypha. While it's perhaps worth noting that light sabres and the force are not a part of the OTU, no drop-in player is going to give a monkeys whether jump torpedoes are canonical or not.

Just to be clear, I'm defining canon for this purpose as "The set of things - whether in print or held in Marc's head, whether stated explicitly or the basis of a subjective decision at the time - that would get your publication vetoed or requested to change if you went to publish a licensed work that contradicted them.". That's the 'canon is for publisers' definition, although some folks here are using a broader definition along the lines of "shared understanding about key aspects of the OTU".

Now, for Traveller, my houserules amount to a new edition... they are numerous and collectively alter the feel of MegaTraveller to fit better my conceptions of the setting. Striker ranges, CT2 damage scores, MT damage methodology. Incorporation of several concepts of TNE into the Character Generation. Using the Vehicle Combat rules merged with the mass combat rules for replacing the nasty High Guard chapter. T4 Psionics. Modified T20 design sequences (adding mass).

Q.E.D. Traveller is easily the worst franchise for this phenomenon (which is what makes it such fun to play with). I've done more house rules than you can poke a stick at as well.

 

[aramis]

I'll buy that to a certain extent, but you're describing canon at the level of a few pages of FAQ, not at a level that merits years of repeatedly debating its minutae or exactly which published works are to be considered canon vs. apocrypha. While it's perhaps worth noting that light sabres and the force are not a part of the OTU, no drop-in player is going to give a monkeys whether jump torpedoes are canonical or not.

No, I'm not. I'm describing it at the "Sups 8+11" level. Or stronger.

I pretty much expect my traveller groups to skim either the bulk of 8 & 11 or of MT IE Player's Library Data. And I make those available to them prior to play. (which is why I own 5 copies of IE in dead tree...)

 

[nobby-w]

No, I'm not. I'm describing it at the "Sups 8+11" level. Or stronger.[ . . . ]

That's a pretty clear definition of the boundaries of the canon you expect your players to be familiar with. For this application it's pretty unambiguous and certainly not worth rehashing over two decades of forum discussions. Really, I think the question of 'what is canon' had been done to death on the TML by 2000, if not before.

 

[aramis]

That's a pretty clear definition of the boundaries of the canon you expect your players to be familiar with. For this application it's pretty unambiguous and certainly not worth rehashing over two decades of forum discussions. Really, I think the question of 'what is canon' had been done to death on the TML by 2000, if not before.

MT IE pages 10-51 - 42 letter-sized pages. And just a skim is needed except... The Nobles article (straight out of CT) is required. The last 10 lines of the timeline, too. Those are things EVERYONE from a TL≥7 LL≤9 world should know.

 

[kilemall]

Ok, I have read about the other items and even had some of these products, but what is controversial about the T4 Core Rules? I thought GURPS was more 'off the reservation' in rules and/or setting.

Still looking for an answer here.

 

[ManOfGrey]

OK...just remember, you asked, (twice)...

Ok, I have read about the other items and even had some of these products, but what is controversial about the T4 Core Rules? I thought GURPS was more 'off the reservation' in rules and/or setting.

Still looking for an answer here.

The problem with the map of the Core sector in the back of the T4 Core Rules has come up several times in the past, (I believe in this thread, as well.) I wouldn't know who, or why, but when the T4 Core Rules were written, the Core sector was simply created from scratch...anew. So that particular map, in the back of the T4 book, does not match, in any way, the map presented in the original Atlas of the Imperium, or the later supplements, Milieu 0, or First Survey. Between those maps, the star systems are in different places, with different names, with different UWPs.

Other than that...I don't believe there is much else in the T4 Core Rules that particularly breaks canon. (Which was what the polling question was about.)

However, there are several irreconcilable contradictions between the supplements Milieu 0, and First Survey, regarding the size of the Imperium, and what star systems had been rediscovered by Year 0.

Lastly, if you compare, in particular, the Referee maps in the back of First Survey, you will notice they bear only a passing resemblance to the Traveller map of the Imperium on-line. UWP data has changed, but usually for things that fluctuate anyway...population, government type, and law level. But, for some reason, the names of the systems, rarely match.

But this really isn't what I wanted to talk about...

 

[ManOfGrey]

Forgive me for asking, but I'm curious. What did you learn?

First of all, please allow me to apologize for posting this question, more or less, twice. But robject recently conducted two different polls regarding canon in the OTU, presumably looking for two different answers.

So...I'm curious, robject...what did you find out? Now that this poll has had over a week to circulate, and now that you have data...was your original thesis validated? Or did you find out something that you might not have suspected?

And how is this conclusion different from the one conducted in the other, but very similar poll, regarding canon in the OTU?

 

[kilemall]

The problem with the map of the Core sector in the back of the T4 Core Rules has come up several times in the past, (I believe in this thread, as well.) I wouldn't know who, or why, but when the T4 Core Rules were written, the Core sector was simply created from scratch...anew. So that particular map, in the back of the T4 book, does not match, in any way, the map presented in the original Atlas of the Imperium, or the later supplements, Milieu 0, or First Survey. Between those maps, the star systems are in different places, with different names, with different UWPs.

Other than that...I don't believe there is much else in the T4 Core Rules that particularly breaks canon. (Which was what the polling question was about.)

However, there are several irreconcilable contradictions between the supplements Milieu 0, and First Survey, regarding the size of the Imperium, and what star systems had been rediscovered by Year 0.

Lastly, if you compare, in particular, the Referee maps in the back of First Survey, you will notice they bear only a passing resemblance to the Traveller map of the Imperium on-line. UWP data has changed, but usually for things that fluctuate anyway...population, government type, and law level. But, for some reason, the names of the systems, rarely match.

Okay, that's large enough to matter.


Last I knew, the principle around here was T5 supersedes all previous material for the purposes of canon, and if T5 doesn't address, it's the latest material.


I would presume Travellermap would need to be settled as to how canon it is.