What Was The Catastrophic Event That Caused The EW?

[daryen]

To be clear, when I talk about the purpose of the EW, I am purely speaking from a meta-game level. So, however canon is contorted to make the EW work is irrelevant to the points I am trying to make.

Also, I am not saying the Zhos would have gone and conquered everything. They would, however, have dominated everything in their reach. In addition, they would be the most powerful empire in all of Charted Space by a long shot. The EW makes sure they are crushed like everyone else, so things are on a much more even footing. That was the practical effect the EW had at a meta-game level.

Again, I don't care where the EW was when. All of that is retcon all over the place, anyway. The EW wasn't made until TNE, then it was retconned to have existed before. I am not worried about any of that. All I care is that in 12xx it was finishing off the Consulate and would then wash over the Spinward Domain. And its primary effect was to stop the Consulate.

Likewise, yes, it was intended to increase psionics. Even though psionics was permitted in the Regency, it was highly regulated and anyone violating the rules was subject to heavy censure. Whether in the old Imperium, in the Consulate, or even the Regency, psions were the "other" and there were heavy limitations and rules about how they could operate. With the EW "randomizing" things, the point was to make it so that anyone could have psionics and it would just be how people were. Instead of "othering" psions, they just become people who happened to have psionic abilities, not some special class or criminal or noble.

That was one of the things done in 1248 Spinward States. There were multiple societies with permitted psionics, but they all treated psionics differently. In Chronor they used the traditional Zho model. In Regina, they used the Regency model. In Querion they experimented with less rules and no proscribed roles. In in the Jewels, well, things got way more interesting ... But, again, the point was to give many more options for someone to play psions.

Anyway, IMO, YMMV, IANAL, TTFN.

 

[mike wightman]

The Zhodani had no interest in dominating anything. They grew to a polity of four sectors and stopped. They then put their resources into core expeditions.
They only fought the frontier wars to prevent Imperial expansion.

MT makes it clear, and TNE canon backs up, the Zhodani are not as you portray them. There is no need to "crush" them as the TL16 two sector Regency would be more than capable of defending itself against the TL15 Zhodani. If the Zhodani had wanted to crush the Domain of Deneb they could have done so easily post 1120.

If the wave was such a threat instead of launching a core expedition in 1149 they could have invaded the Regency.

In 1201 the bulk of the Consulate is still in the Consulate, the refugees can not give a proper reason for them fleeing and the plot point of what is behind the wave in Consulate space is not explored.

 

[daryen]

Well, two things:
1) I am not saying the Zhos wanted to invade. As you say, they could have but didn't. What they *would* do is export their culture and be an economic powerhouse that dominates everything around them. It isn't that they necessarily *want* to take over. It's just that as they do whatever they do, they will extend their influence irrespective of their stated intentions. It's just what superpowers do when there is nothing around them to temper that.

So, they would not invade the Regency and take over. That is expensive and counterproductive. What they would do instead is to send out more trade and more diplomatic missions and whatnot so they could start to shape the Regency into something they were more comfortable with over time. Which, I want to add, is exactly what they started doing to the Regency after Norris realized the Zhos were not a direct threat. The best example is the Regency acceptance of psionics. Sure, the Regency made sure that how they accepted psionics is different than the Zhos, but the Zhos are cool with that. They know they are playing the long game. They have time. Eventually, the Regency, or whatever replaced it, would look close enough to the Zhos.

So, why do you keep thinking I am talking about a military conquest? That isn't necessary. Not when they have so many much more cost effective ways to spread their influence. Without an EW, they have all the time in the universe. Having literal mind control capabilities is remarkably useful. They are experts on the use of soft power and they would (and were) using it. The Zhos want to extend their influence. But they want to do so using the tools they think they are the best at using: the tools of the mind, not the tools of war. The Zhos know above anyone else that if you are using guns to solve the problem, you have already failed and are now just limiting the damage.

2) Getting back to meta-game, whether it was necessary to flatten the Consulate or not in your opinion, it is still what happened.

 

[mike wightman]

The Regency is the superpower of the setting, not the Consulate. And once again the Consulate is not and never has been interested in extending its influence over the entire Spinward Marches. If they had wanted to do that they have had many opportunities.

Also Norris had already embraced psionics long before any Zhodani overtures of peaceful coexistence post assassination.

The two sector TL16 Regency with its emphasis on TL15 industrial development and considerable Aslan fighting capability is more than a match for whatever the Consulate has become behind the wave.

2 - there is no evidence the Consulate was flattened "behind the wave" - there could be a completely democratic multiworld polity ruled over by a supraspace meta intelligence coordinating the congress for all we know.

 

[daryen]

The Regency is the focus of the setting. The Regency book goes into great detail in how vulnerable they were. They were not a superpower. (Though they did mess up the Sword Worlds badly.)

That Norris already embraced psionics doesn't change a single thing I described above. He was ... an interesting fellow.

As for what was really going on in the Consulate, that is a problem. The issue is that the EW wasn't introduced into the game until TNE. That means everything written prior to TNE didn't talk about it because it hadn't been invented yet. And the only TNE book in position to explain it, the Regency Sourcebook, was setting up the effects, not explaining them. So it provided no insights either. The main source for talking about it was the 1248 efforts, and there the Consulate was indeed shredded. Of course, since 1248 has now apparently been consigned to the waste bin, take of that what you will.

And if the EW doesn't flatten the Consulate, then what was the point of even introducing it? Why have this big ole lead up to a nothing burger? Obviously, it was supposed to have an impact. And the RSB did set the table for an overwhelming Exodus. Putting it together, yes, the Consulate was supposed to get hammered by it. In 1248, they took it in the teeth. With the new EW, who knows?

The big meta-game issue with the EW is that it was introduced as a galactic event so late into the game's history. Whether it moves at the speed of light, or it moves one parsec per year, it is still going to be rolling through the Consulate for many decades. How do you explain that there was nothing written about the Zhodani turmoil before TNE, and now it is retroactively a mess? Trying to get that to make any sense at all is going to not be easy. Again, 1248 gave it a great try and I like what was done there. (But then, I have a vested interest to say that.)

As for what is behind the wave now? Well prior to TNE being published, it was roses and sunshine because there was no wave, so there was nothing to be behind. In TNE itself, there was ominous foreshadowing. We can see the wave coming, but can't see behind it yet. In 1248, the Consulate was indeed flattened. In any new products? It hasn't been written yet, so we can't know. But, until that book is written and the EW is present anew, we can still go off what was written before, and the Consulate got stomped.

 

[Nathan Brazil]

And one other source more recent than TNE and 1248 and some explcitly effects:

In Agent of the Imperium, Marc has Wave of Madness flatten everyone and everything
including plants ....

 

[mike wightman]

Marc was gone from GDW before TNE and the wave, for some reason he has never asked Dave Nilsen, Frank Chadwick etc. about it.
I get the feeling that third party interpretations of the wave rather than canonical source material was used to inform his retcon.

 

[tjoneslo]

The original, TNE, reason for the EW was to answer the question of why was the Emperor not on Capitol when the assassination took place. You needed an imperial level threat to pull the Emperor away from a long planned meeting with an ArchDuke. That was the original retcon. Strephon not being killed.

 

[daryen]

The original, TNE, reason for the EW was to answer the question of why was the Emperor not on Capitol when the assassination took place. You needed an imperial level threat to pull the Emperor away from a long planned meeting with an ArchDuke. That was the original retcon. Strephon not being killed.

While a separate point, I do want to stress that when MT was originally written, Strephon was deader than a door nail. He was totally assassinated on Capital and was as dead as his wife and child, and the Aslan ambassador. The idea that Strephon was away on some top secret mission was done much later in the process and the idea that a clone was who died on Capital was a retcon. When the factions were originally set up, the Usdiki faction was a joke and a side-show.

What I don't remember is if these were two separate retcons, or just one. I feel like deciding the real, actual Strephon was holed up in Usdiki, rather than the "Real" Strephon, is the first retcon, but that the reason he was away wasn't fully defined. Giving the explanation was a later retcon of the first retcon.

 

[mike wightman]

With wafer tech and the like why would he need to be away at all? Send a Strephon wafer to Longbow and then bring it back and download to Strephon.

The first retcon was the reveal that Strephon is alive and well in Arrival Vengeance - which was written by Greg Videll with input from Dave Nilsen:

Strephon's Story: On 132-1116, a clone of Strephon was
gunned down by Archduke Dulinoron Capital. The real Strephon
was meanwhile en route to the Core Naval Depot on a matter of
utmost importance to the empire. When news of the hssassination'
reached his cruiser, Strephon was spirited away to Usdiki
by his loyal crew. There he decided to make his stand.

Survival margin fills in some gaps but is not another retcon.

 

[rlmercad069]

With wafer tech and the like why would he need to be away at all? Send a Strephon wafer to Longbow and then bring it back and download to Strephon.

As defined so far, wafer tech is a destructive method of doing a brain backup.

 

[mike wightman]

No it isn't
Read the rules in T5.

A Personality Can Be Recorded
Personality Scanners make an editable, reproducible record of a
Personality from any sophont. The record preserves the Elements of a
Personality in a digital format.
The Scanner.
Brainscan technology is commonplace and part of modern medical diagnostic practice.
Any ship (or other) Autodoc has the ability to perform a brainscan (it takes about an hour).
Formats.
A recorded personality can be saved as an
electronic file. For safekeeping and convenience, the recorded
personality file is usually written to a Wafer[/paste]

And:

Life Insurance archives a personality scan and DNA (or
equivalent) sample during the Mustering Out Process. When
notice of death reaches the archive, it enables the creation
of a Clone and Implantation of the character’s personality.
Notice that unless updated, the replacement clone will revert
to the memories and skills recorded at Mustering Out.
Life Insurance may be purchased: the premium is MCr1
to start a policy and Cr100,000 to update.

Bland's wafer required destructive scanning but it looks like the mature technology doesn't.

 

[rlmercad069]

So TL12/13 is destructive, but TL15 isn't. Good to know.

 

[aramis]

These proles are psionic now remember

But not trained...
And probably can't operate the psionic switches that are common in zhodani security...

 

[mike wightman]

They have had since 1040 to learn by doing...

it's akin to a health system that can cater easily for a population of 60 million but then you increase the population very quickly - say over a few years you add a few million, many of who have health needs above the "normal" - without increasing the medical infrastructure, in fact you reduce it because it had been doing a good job with coping at the previous levels.
Yhe result is to collapse the entire health system.

This is what happens to the consulate's ability to cater for mental health...

which has the knock on affect that some now psionic proles want more from society and organise their movement, but now can evade the powers that be.

 

[Condottiere]

Then a tiered system develops.

 

[DED]

In Agent of the Imperium, Marc has Wave of Madness flatten everyone and everything
including plants ....

That makes no sense.

 

[whartung]

Personality Scanners make an editable, reproducible record...

Ho ho ho, boy does THAT open up a whole can of pandora's boxes.

 

[mike wightman]

There is a "lost" CT adventure that has all the PCs do a job for a patron and then have their memories edited to forget it - they come to realise after a while there is a missing member of the crew...

 

[Nathan Brazil]

In Agent of the Imperium, Marc has Wave of Madness flatten everyone and everything
including plants ....

That makes no sense.

So does Greedo shooting first and missing...
But that is Marc Miller, the IP holder, statement on the matter in 2015 when the book came out.
Since then we have gotten hints in Mongoose 2E and travellermap.com

I didn't study psionics, or literature in college. so I leave making sense to the IP holder.