Traveller 1889

[Werner]

What if we substituted Traveller technology for Space 1889 physics, but kept the 1889 political situation, this setting would be tech level 8, maybe this is because a Time Traveler from the future arrived in a starship from the OTU? According to some source material on Venus, the CSA exists, so one explanation would be that a Southern sympathizer from the Solomani Confederation arrived during the Civil War to help the Confederacy win, much like Harry Turtledove's Guns of the South, over the next 25 years the tech level was advanced to TL 8, what do you think?

Whoever did this wanted to take over the CSA, but he also had a certain fondness for the Germans, unfortunately for the Time Traveller, General Robert E. Lee was highly suspicious of this visitor from the future, he was a bit of a neo nazi and was exceptionally cruel to his slaves, beating them and starving them to death, after the CSA tried to arrest him for trying to overthrow the government, he fled to the German Empire and met with similar results, with Otto Von Bismark ordering his execution.

 

[Timerover51]

From your comments, it appears that you are using the German company's rendition of Space: 1889. Is this correct?

For your information, Robert E. Lee died in 1870, which I do not believe would have changed. Regardless, he would have been 82 in 1889. As he had some health issues towards the end of the Civil War, he probably would not have made it to 1889.

As I do not know when the German company cuts off the Civil War, but if after the Spring of 1862, the Union would have control of New Orleans, the Carolina Sounds, several East Coast ports in the South, as well as Fort Pulaski (blocking the entrance to Savannah, Georgia), what is now West Virginia, all of Kentucky and Missouri, a large chunk of northern Arkansas, along with most of Tennessee, along with a strong Union sentiment in eastern Tennessee. The Union would also control the approaches of the James River at Hampton Roads and the Mississippi River down to Vicksburg, Mississippi. They would also control the harbor of Pensacola, Florida, along with Key West, Florida. The only major ports open to the Confederacy by the summer of 1862 were Mobile, Alabama, Charleston, South Carolina, and Wilmington, North Carolina. The Union had also blocked and turned back the Confederate invasion of New Mexico, meaning that Texas would have been the western border.

I do not think that the Union would have given up any recaptured territory. You also have to assume that England would not have developed alternate supplies of cotton from both India and Egypt, which they actually did. Slavery was not popular in the U.K. except for some of the aristocracy.

 

[Werner]

Well in Harry Turtledove's Guns of the South, the time traveller was a South African Nazi with a bunch of AK-47s, since they were purely mechanical automatic rifles, the Confederacy was able to manufacture them, in this scenario, I'm substituting the Solomani Confederation for the South African background. The time traveller is trying to change history, he stole the time machine from an Imperium Research Facility on Luna, it is an experimental Time Drive installed in a Scout/Courier, the time agent was unable to to alter the ship's library files which contains a complete history from the beginning of civilization all the way to the present day Third Imperium, Robert E. Lee stumbled onto these files, in them he learned about World War II and the Holocaust, apparently the time traveller picked up a passenger from the Third Reich on the way to 1889, the ship's log indicates a stop in the spring of 1945 somewhere in Berlin.

 

[Timerover51]

It is your Universe, to do what you want with it.

I will be doing something with adapting the original Space: 1889 universe to the Cepheus Engine. I was trying to run a Space: 1889 play by post game, using my alternate Space: 1889 universe, but it never really got going.

I never had any interest in the German version of the game, and that company is now insolvent. I do have the Quick Start rules.

 

[Werner]

I don't know anything about the German version of the game, only that the German Empire is one of the major players in the setting along with the British Empire. The Brits are heavily involved with Mars, the Germans with Venus. I was simply looking for a story to explain how they came by the high tech, rather than altering physics to allow for TL4 spaceships.

 

[Timerover51]

I don't know anything about the German version of the game, only that the German Empire is one of the major players in the setting along with the British Empire. The Brits are heavily involved with Mars, the Germans with Venus. I was simply looking for a story to explain how they came by the high tech, rather than altering physics to allow for TL4 spaceships.

The original edition of Space: 1889, that was published by GDW, did not have the Confederate States of America still existing, but followed the standard world history through 1889, with the addition of colonies on Mars and Venus, along with a research station on Mercury. The North clearly won the Civil War, if you bother to take a look at Conklin's Atlas of the Worlds, written by Frank Chadwick in 1983, specifically the map of the United States on pages 42 and 43. There is no Confederate States, but an united United States. This is also confirmed by the discussion of the U.S. Army in Soldier's Companion, and the coverage of the U. S. Navy in Ironclads and Ether Flyers, both written by Frank Chadwick.

The German company, Clockwork Publishing, acquired a license from Frank to do a new edition of the game, with significantly changed game mechanics, such that the two editions are not compatible. Based on comments in the Yahoo Space: 1889 group, apparently Clockwork Publishing went with the Confederacy winning its independence from the North, and continuing slavery. I can neither confirm or deny that, as all I have are the free Quickstart Rules. Based on your first post, it appears that the Confederacy does exist in the Clockwork Publishing version of the rules. I would assume that would appear somewhere in the core rule book.

In response to a comment I made with respect to the Clockwork Publishing Quickstart Rules, it appears that:

The whole Space: 1889 IP was taken over by Ulisses Spiele.

What they plan to do with it, I have no idea. There are, however, two totally dissimilar editions of the rules. You need to make clear what edition you are using. Both versions are available on DriveThruRPG.

 

[aramis]

The original edition of Space: 1889, that was published by GDW, did not have the Confederate States of America still existing, but followed the standard world history through 1889, with the addition of colonies on Mars and Venus, along with a research station on Mercury. The North clearly won the Civil War, if you bother to take a look at Conklin's Atlas of the Worlds, written by Frank Chadwick in 1983, specifically the map of the United States on pages 42 and 43. There is no Confederate States, but an united United States. This is also confirmed by the discussion of the U.S. Army in Soldier's Companion, and the coverage of the U. S. Navy in Ironclads and Ether Flyers, both written by Frank Chadwick.

The German company, Clockwork Publishing, acquired a license from Frank to do a new edition of the game, with significantly changed game mechanics, such that the two editions are not compatible. Based on comments in the Yahoo Space: 1889 group, apparently Clockwork Publishing went with the Confederacy winning its independence from the North, and continuing slavery. I can neither confirm or deny that, as all I have are the free Quickstart Rules. Based on your first post, it appears that the Confederacy does exist in the Clockwork Publishing version of the rules. I would assume that would appear somewhere in the core rule book.

In response to a comment I made with respect to the Clockwork Publishing Quickstart Rules, it appears that:



What they plan to do with it, I have no idea. There are, however, two totally dissimilar editions of the rules. You need to make clear what edition you are using. Both versions are available on DriveThruRPG.

3 totally disssimilar, as there's material for Savage Worlds (Pinnacle Ent. Gp.)
Material for Ulyssies Spiele's Ubiquity universal system
Material from GDW.

Clockwork didn't redo the mechanics - it appears that Tim Brown got the ok from his bosses to buy the property when Clockwork went under. Sept 2019 was when Ulissies Spiele US (Tim Brown, formerly of GDW, works there) secured the license, with Frank Chadwick apparently on board. Given the half dozen Ubiquity titles on Drive Through, Tim's been busy.

 

[Werner]

3 totally disssimilar, as there's material for Savage Worlds (Pinnacle Ent. Gp.)
Material for Ulyssies Spiele's Ubiquity universal system
Material from GDW.

Clockwork didn't redo the mechanics - it appears that Tim Brown got the ok from his bosses to buy the property when Clockwork went under. Sept 2019 was when Ulissies Spiele US (Tim Brown, formerly of GDW, works there) secured the license, with Frank Chadwick apparently on board. Given the half dozen Ubiquity titles on Drive Through, Tim's been busy.

If the main departure from the timeliness occurred in the 1870s, why would the South have won the Civil War? What was the purpose of making that change to the timeline?

I'll tell you what I'm doing with this, as I'm substituting Traveller T20 rules and technology for the Space 1889 physics and technology, I'll going with the South won because someone from the future helped them to win. A Solomani agent stole an Imperium Scout/Courier, it has an Ancient Time drive substituting for the usual Jump drive, it behaves like a Jump drive except that it jumps in time and between two universes instead of jumping in space, it always jumps between 1889 AD and 1105 Imperial and incrementing by the same time units. The Ancients have already messed with the 1889 timeline by terraforming Venus and Mars prior to recorded history on Earth. The Dinosaurs on Venus were actually taken from Earth's past. The Earth timeline remained unchanged until the Solomani agent visited it in 1864. I'll say the Confederate government got wise to his plans and arrested him, and interrogated him for information on how to operate the scout ship. Several Confederate pilots have made visits to the OTU and brought back parts from Terra so they could construct starships and spaceships of their own, they built subsidized Merchants, scout ships, free traders, subsidized liners and Mercenary Cruisers, some Northern spies have managed to steal some of this tech, and with the help of the German Empire, reverse engineered some of it. The CSA in turn shared this technology with the British, so over all the tech level of this world has advanced to TL 8 over the past 25 years. Relations between the USA and the British are very poor at this time, there is an alliance between the US and Germany, and the USA has hot its eyes on Canada, should war ever break out between the USA and UK, with shades of Harry Turtledove in this timeline thrown in.

Now if the Confederate States make contact with the Third Imperium, what do you think would happen?

 

[Werner]

I do like the detail of the Space 1889 Venus supplement, now if it were a tech level 8 Traveller supplement, how would it be different? Tech level 8 is a bit more advanced than we are today.

Tech level 8 has laser carbines, snub pistols, vac suits, auto-cannons, Model/2 bis artillery computers, air/rafts, non-starships, nuclear fusion reactors, this is the science they understand, culturally it is still the 19th century, a lot of this technology comes to the elites of this society over the span of about 25 years, but it has not yet reached the masses, most people's homes are still not wired for electricity, you still see horses in the streets alongside ground cars, many highways have not been built yet.

The population of the World is between 1.5 billion and 2 billion people, advances in medicine have created a population explosion in the third world, many people still live on single family farms, though the cities are swelling in population, one major metropolis with gleaming towers rising up from the ashes of the Civil War is Atlanta, Georgia, it is the New York City of the South and the industrial hub of the Confederate States of America, a lot of plantation owners have manumitted their slaves, they just don't need them anymore, and more importantly those plantations don't want to feed them as advanced agricultural techniques have made them more efficient, automation has greatly reduced the need for unskilled laborers on the field, robots do the many menial chores that slaves used to do, so the technological explosion has basically eliminated slavery in the South.

Since the CSA won the Civil War in this timeline, there is less racial tension that there was in our timeline, there is competition for jobs in the big cities like Atlanta, and Charlston, South Carolina, not to mention Richmond, Virginia, a lot of this prosperity has spilled over to the North as well in the United States. The issue of slavery has largely dwindled down to nothing due to the sudden technological explosion. Highway construction has largely been curtailed due to them arrival of air/raft technology, so there are antigrav vehicles flying over farms with families feeding themselves on the farm with the help of horse and plow.

People from those farms move to the big cities and look for jobs and find their skills not relevant, many of them become colonists and travel to Venus and Mars, there is more of a demand for this in European countries, but since the CSA is ground zero of the technological explosion, many immigrants from Europe travel to the CSA as their farms are too small in Europe to support them, and many go on to become colonists on Venus and Mars where their is a lot of wilderness to clear, especially on Venus, as there is about twice as much land area due to its shallow oceans as on Earth, despite the fact that Venus is a little smaller. The the population of the United States is around 50 million and the population of the CSA is around 25 million, it used to be 30 million for the United States and 10 million for the CSA during the Civil War, a lot of these extra people come from Europe.

The Germans have a larger presence on Venus and the UK has a larger presence on Mars. The British have made great use of the technological artifacts found on Mars to reduce their dependence on the Confederate explosion, the Germans have made advances in chemistry due to all the biological products found in the jungles and swamps of Venus. The USA and CSA are still developing their frontier areas, but don't want to miss out on having colonies on other planets as well, though they take a back seat to Europe as another wave of colonization spreads out into space.

 

[Werner]

I have an idea, what if Confederate agents working with Solomani Rebels kidnap some people in the Imperium, people the Solomani want disappeared without a trace, the CSA is suffering from a labor shortage of people with the right skills, so kidnapping them from the OTU makes sense, the military government sends more people out, and they get kidnapped, they find themselves waking up in a hotel in Atlanta, they go outside and find horses and ground cars on the streets with air/rafts flitting across the sky, the see a Moon that looks like the moon on Terra but without the technological improvements, spaceships are taking off from the Atlanta spaceport, an unfamiliar Terran city with unfamiliar confederate flags flying on flag poles. No explanations given, the Confederates had nothing in mind for them in particular so they just let them loose with a wallet full of Confederate dollars, about $100 in paper currency, the PCs will have to find a job to support themselves as they navigate through this strange society, their hotel bill is paid up through the week by the Confederate government. What do you think they will do?

$100 = Cr10,000 just so you know, so knock off two zeros of the price of every item on the equipment list TL8 and lower.

 

[Condottiere]

Didn't Rian Johnson make a movie about that, with the guy from Third Rock From The Sun, and the other one from Fifth Element?

 

[Werner]

Didn't Rian Johnson make a movie about that, with the guy from Third Rock From The Sun, and the other one from Fifth Element?

I don't know, I was thinking about adding some native humans to Venus, in addition the the lizardfolk. The Ancients messed with the planet and there was some intelligent life in the form of humans on the third rock from the Sun, some of those were transported to Venus, others went to Mars, and the Ancients reached back in time and brought forth some dinosaurs, one interesting effect of the nanovirus is the birth ratio of women to men has been altered, there are 4 native born women for every single man born on the planet, so there are a bunch of so called Amazon tribeswomen running around on the planet in addition to the lizardfolk. The women average around 6 feet tall and have pale skin and white or pale blonde hair, as the cloud layer above tends to block much of the ultraviolet rays from reaching the surface, the men tend to be shorter on average or about 5 feet 8 inches.

I was thinking further on Venus, I want to bring the environment back similar to that described in the 1889 book, technically the atmosphere would be classified as 9 in Traveller terms, it is Dense, tainted, though humans and other Earth animals like horses and dogs can breath the atmosphere without technological assistance the atmosphere has a deleterious effect on technology, oxydizable metals corrode, living things are not affected, in fact the atmosphere was seeded with a nano bacteria which causes water droplets to form a perpetual cloud cover over the entire planet, and it also destroys technology except for stone, treated wood, any technological items except those kept in a cool and dry environment will be destroyed in 24 hours, this includes lasers, vac suits, you name it, so there is much need for low tech skills in this environment. Guns are not reliable, in 24 hours the nanobacteria destroys circuit, batteries corrode and even certain types of plastic will get eaten.

A lot of manumitted exslaves end up on Venus, plantations here require a lot of manual labor and beasts of burden. The local starport is on the Summit of Mount Maxwell, this mountain juts above most of the cloud layer where all the luddite nanobacteria lives, technology can be kept long term up there. Certain types of ceramics work very well below the cloud layer, so there are a lot of hardened ceramic blades, axes and shovels that are as hard as steel but without the corrosion problem, these are highly valued by the lizardfolk that live in the low lands and such items are used as trade goods to obtain labor and information from the lizardfolk and amazon tribes.

Earth men have a tendency to "disappear" in those areas inhabited by the amazon tribes, technology breaks down and Amazon's often rapid settlements by colonists and kidnap the men, typically if the men are held by amazons for over a month, they tend to be brainwashed by their captors and go native, and often children are born to those tribeswomen that have darker skin than normal, particularly when it was a black male exslave that was kidnapped.

 

[Fireforge]

So I have a question for the group. Is anyine actually running or planning a Space 1889 type game ?? I am interested in doing almost any type of Traveller game and the premise does sound quite interesting ??

 

[aramis]

So I have a question for the group. Is anyine actually running or planning a Space 1889 type game ?? I am interested in doing almost any type of Traveller game and the premise does sound quite interesting ??

I've not recently. I don't have the ubiquity system (didn't care for their QS at all), and my players have little interest in victorian/georgian eras.

 

[whartung]

I thought this was something @Timerover51 was interested it and did some work for.

 

[Fireforge]

Thank you for responding. I am interested in joining a game so please keep me in mind when an opening comes up.

Keith

 

[daryen]

Didn't Rian Johnson make a movie about that, with the guy from Third Rock From The Sun, and the other one from Fifth Element?

Wow. The "other one from Fifth Element"? Seriously? With every movie and show he's ever been in, that's the *first* place you went for Bruce Willis? And Third Rock is where you went for Joseph Gordon-Levitt? An interesting filmography to be sure!

Anyway, Looper is what you were looking for.

Sorry for being off-topic, but that's the name of the movie being referred to.

 

[Timerover51]

I thought this was something @Timerover51 was interested it and did some work for.

Thanks for remembering that.