TNE Only: Timings?

[Bromo33333]

Reading the Hard Times, Survival Margin and the rough timeline of TNE, does it seem to be a little ... quick considering the size of the Empire?

Considering it takes a simple message nearly a year to go from one end of the Empire to the other, could the empire disintegrate in a dozen years? I could see certain clusters of worlds?

I was thinking that the wars would be over 20-30 years if not more, and the SHTF (Stuff Hits the Fan) Virus could take 3-5 years to fully propagate?

1116-1125 seems a little short if we use the Roman Empire which had similar logistics?

 

[McPerth]

Well,according MT:HT, those clusters (Pocket Empires) were formed, and, as I understand TNE, some remained until 1200...

I see it oposite than you: the communications lag helped this disintegration, as before orders arrived the local leaders had to take their own decisions. As Lucan was acting, some those local leaders might find themselves in danger due to their actions being contrary to Lucan's mad pólices, helping the desintegration (not unlike the ignorance VIlani Empire had about the emergence of Terrans until too late while the Intestellar wars).

OTOH, I see the 70 years time from the fall of 3I to the TNE setting far too short for people forgeting the 3I. Being 90 years old is not as rare in Traveller (less so among the VIlani, whose life expectancy is longer), and any 90 years old person would have lived 3I as a youngadult (probably even having faint memories of before the Assasination).

And don't forget many documents will remain from 3I...

So, the situation in 1200 as presented in TNE, where meomries of the 3I seem to be faint and nearly legendary, is quite diffi cutl to swallot to me, as there will still remain live memory of it.

 

[mike wightman]

When Traveller Third Imperium setting material is written well it is usually
written from the point of view of a biased author (unreliable narrator), contains many read between the lines inferences and leaves a lot to the referees and players to fill in the details.

Now take what we know of the later MT era. Hard Times details the slow decline, then we get Survival Margin (and Challenge articles) detailing the release of Virus... all written for a Third Imperium centric viewpoint.

The Third Imperium was wrecked from years of civil war and decline as detailed through Hard Times, then Virus propagates throughout the corpse of the Imperium and a whole lot of misinformation, scare stories and downright lies are told about it. By the end of the 1140s though the vast majority of the Imperium has been swept away, and yet the Regency survives...

We are asked to believe that Virus caused similar collapses within the Hiver Federation, The Solomani and the Vargr extents - balderdash I say. The Imperial survivors wanted to believe charted space had suffered as they had, the brutal truth is they didn't.

The Hive would have countered Virus easily from the outset, but it would suit Hiver manipulation to go along with the story of collapse. The Solomani were likely tipped towards civil war throughout the 30s and 40s, with a tinge of Virus added to the sectors closest to the Imperium. Virus isn't really that great a threat once you are aware of it and take basic precautions. Some plucky Solomani adventurers likely found a way to warn several of the Confederacy member governments that were worth saving.

Fast forward to the 1200s and the Hive are helping the RC rebuild - the RC convinced of the collapse of everything, but are they right to hold that belief?

 

[aramis]

Reading the Hard Times, Survival Margin and the rough timeline of TNE, does it seem to be a little ... quick considering the size of the Empire?

Considering it takes a simple message nearly a year to go from one end of the Empire to the other, could the empire disintegrate in a dozen years? I could see certain clusters of worlds?

I was thinking that the wars would be over 20-30 years if not more, and the SHTF (Stuff Hits the Fan) Virus could take 3-5 years to fully propagate?

1116-1125 seems a little short if we use the Roman Empire which had similar logistics?

That's a J6 rift crossing.

DGP didn't do a good job on the jump math. Then again, it's much easier to get a more valid answer now. Home computers at the time of MT being written had trouble past 3-4 loaded sectors into a database.

 

[Condottiere]

There tends to be an organic limit to the size of human empires, and it seems tied to stable communications, economics, society and politics.

It's obviously the equivalent to a hydraulic empire, with primary expansion and control along a riverine analogue.

Communications lag would require provincial governors to have some autonomy and access to military assets to deal with local disturbances, as compared to Johnson being able to micro manage military engagements from the Oval Office.

The system tends to break down through a combination of corruption at the centre and external pressure.

 

[Bromo33333]

There tends to be an organic limit to the size of human empires, and it seems tied to stable communications, economics, society and politics.

It's obviously the equivalent to a hydraulic empire, with primary expansion and control along a riverine analogue.

Communications lag would require provincial governors to have some autonomy and access to military assets to deal with local disturbances, as compared to Johnson being able to micro manage military engagements from the Oval Office.

The system tends to break down through a combination of corruption at the centre and external pressure.

Agreed, there seems to be a certain amount of time that capital to frontier can take before it has to be fairly autonomous, and even then, strain.