Why? Why?? Why!!!

[EvilDrGanymede]

Why is it that people take TNE as some kind of personal affront? I really don't understand this attitude. I don't think GDW really thought 'I know, let's give the finger to everyone who wrote anything for Traveller before now and turn it all into ash and ruins to spite them'. To me, the collapse and Final War seemed like a very logical results of the Rebellion that was consuming the Imperium. OK, Virus was perhaps a bit over the top, but it really served as the final hammerblow that sent the whole rickety house of cards crashing down around everyone's ears. How else did you expect the Rebellion to end? Eventually either everyone would keel over from attrition, and you'd get a Long Night type thing, or someone would release some Doomsday Weapon out of desparation or by accident, which is what ended up happening in the end. Barring some other Deus Ex Machina (I've heard tell that Antares going supernova was one thing that was originally suggested that would end the Rebellion), how else could it end?

Besides which, a setting in which nothing changes is a bloody boring one, I think. MT and TNE gave CT a much needed kick up the arse IMO, and made the Traveller universe a suddenly much more exciting and interesting place to be. I'd have thought the fall of the Third Imperium would be a setting that people would find much more interesting to adventure in than a nice, stable, not very exciting Imperium. "Interesting Times" are given that name for a reason, you know

.

Empires come and go, and have come and gone in Traveller's history. Hell, they do just that in the Foundation books, and weren't those supposed to be an important influence on Traveller?

As for the Regency, I haven't got the Regency book yet... but do you really think that a small pocket of the Imperium would survive the collapse totally intact, even if it did cut off from the rest of Charted Space? Of course things would change inside it, despite the quarantine. It's not going to be a little pocket of the old Imperium where life goes on as if nothing happened.

 

[TWILIGHT]

i actually quite liked tne(the setting not the rules) too. the idea of roleplaying history appeals to me so it doesnt matter if the universe is about to crumble...pc's still enjoy it. You have the same conceit in Cthulhu. The old ones are coming to wipe out humanity and theres nothing anyone can do to stop it but the pc's still battle against them....the approach of the post-rebellion/virus long night should be treated in the same way in my opinion. I have Pendragon also which lets you play a pc, then his son, then his son etc till the end of Arthurs reign...we play traveller the same way - roughly 1 adventure per 1 game year, which means we start in about 1000 then 20 weeks of real time (or 20 game sessions roughly of 1 night a week) were playing at the tail end of the rebellion with (in 3 instances the previous pc's children). Our group is currently approx half-way through the fall (1160) and having a rough time of it stuck on a world in the solomani rim ruled by a nasty TED. Just an idea for others out there to try as it makes traveller become truly epic in scale and more like a grand saga than just an adventure or two.

 

[daryen]

Originally posted by Evil Dr Ganymede:
Why is it that people take TNE as some kind of personal affront? I really don't understand this attitude.

Whoa there! Where have I said it was a "personal affront"? I simply said that the efforts of those who came before was thrown out. Nowhere did I say it was personal. Unnecessary and wasteful, yes. Personal? No.

If you mean "personal" in that a person (or persons) apparently decided he (or they) hated the background of Traveller (or at least what it had become) and came up with a way to throw it all out, then yes, I guess that is "personal".

But I in no way transfer that attitude to either the fans or the previous writers. They obviously were not out to tweak either group, as both groups were necessary to the survival and success of TNE (at the time).

Besides which, a setting in which nothing changes is a bloody boring one, I think.

Again, whoa there! Where, in all of my rant, did I ask for nothing to change? The ONLY thing I ask is that the "past" be respected and be allowed to play into the "future". The Rebellion did that. The Long Night did that. TNE did not.

TNE was specifically designed to completely wipe out all before it and start with the proberbial clean slate. (It may have actually even said that.) At best, that which came before was to be a hazy legend. At worst, it was to be completely forgotten.

TNE was not a "kick in the arse". TNE was a complete "reboot".

Just because you don't like your current girlfriend anymore doesn't mean you have to shoot her in the head. There are less severe methods to make a change.

As for the Regency, I haven't got the Regency book yet... but do you really think that a small pocket of the Imperium would survive the collapse totally intact, even if it did cut off from the rest of Charted Space? Of course things would change inside it, despite the quarantine. It's not going to be a little pocket of the old Imperium where life goes on as if nothing happened.

Again, you are reading way more in my post than I am writing. Please don't assume more than I am saying.

Obvious the Regency would change. As you point out, it was a small remnant of what was, and was being pressed in on all sides. It had to change.

But the way it was changed by the writers was particularly bizarre. It really was turned into some kind of "Consulate-Lite".

Finally, don't take this as a critizism of TNE in and of itself. While I really don't like FF&S, the overall game system in TNE is fine. And the setting is fine, too. I just hate that to get there TPTB decided to completely toss out all that came before.

 

[EvilDrGanymede]

Well, I wasn't so much directing any of my general comments at you specifically, as just generally ranting about the attitude toward TNE I've seen in CotI. Many people seem to take Virus way too personally.

But me, I'm with Lord Iron Wolf. Enough with the endless rehashing of Third Imperium Eras, it's been done to death already. Let's see Traveller evolve into something new. On with the Fourth Imperium, I say!

(Oh wait. If they do that, they'll get endless hate mail from all the CT nuts again

)

 

[Lord Iron Wolf]

Hey Doc,

If you like the idea, how about adding to it and lets make this future Imperium more fleshed out.

Take some part of the outline I have above and expand upon it. I'd love to see this thing go organic and get some new ideas/sparks to continue expanding it.

LIW

 

[EvilDrGanymede]

Well, the TNE:1248 book is on the cards apparently. It'd be nice if there was more discussion about it. Over on JTAS they have an Interstellar Wars board even though work on IW hasn't officially started yet (as far as I know anyway) - although that's petered out somewhat now, in the first few months it was up it got a HELL of a lot of traffic.

I think it'd be neat if the Powers That Be here add a TNE:1248 board to CotI for people to brainstorm about what they'd like to see.

 

[robject]

Sounds like a good idea, actually. Someone should create a "Fourth Imperium" forum...

 

[EvilDrGanymede]

It'd also be handy if MJD re-posted his summaries of future history that were on the TNE board that described the Dominate and all the other stuff that happens between 1200 and 1248. They seem to have disappeared now.

Unless it's all top seekrit and hush-hush now

 

[T. Foster]

Originally posted by robject:
Sounds like a good idea, actually. Someone should create a "Fourth Imperium" forum...

Well, that's what the TNE forum was originally intended to be (it was created right after Martin announced the M:1248 project, well before the CT, MT & T4 boards). There's little/no M:1248 discussion going on there now, but I think that's due mostly to Martin not having dropped any M:1248-related tidbits recently (understandably, as he's got about a dozen other projects on his plate). After its initial flurry of activity, the IW board on JTAS is now just as quiet, waiting to see what the designers have to say.

That said, when Martin gets back to work on M:1248 and releases some more goodies for discussion/speculation/kibbitzing, a specific M:1248 open discussion board (as opposed to a closed playtest board) would probably be a good idea. Leaving such discussion on the TNE board would both tend to bypass people who don't like the TNE rules or M:1201 setting but would be interested in M:1248, and also annoy/crowd out those people who feel the opposite (like original/M:1201 TNE and don't care about M:1248).

 

[daryen]

Just for the record, I am quite interested in seeing what fruit MJD brings to bear with M:1248. Regardless of how I feel about aspects of TNE, it is still canon and, like the Evil Doctor, I look forward to seeing the timeline advanced again.

BTW, TFoster is right. The main point of the TNE groups on CotI was for the support of the new M:1248 book. It is quiet right now because many of the points have already been discussed to death and there is no new information to fuel speculation.

The TNE/M:1248 discussion groups aren't dead, just waiting for something new. It will likely take some new tidbits from MJD (who, in all fairness, has already spilled a huge amount) or someone pushing out some new ideas to get discussion moving again.

 

[EvilDrGanymede]

Fair enough. I assumed that the TNE board was set up just for talking about the TNE setting, not anything beyond it.

 

[MJD]

One thing that is carved in stone about the 1248 New Era, is that the past was not swept away. Indeed, there are many legacies of the Third Imperium and its contemporaries.

One of the things that will make 1248 so rich is the meeting of the old and the new. In some places, the Imperium is a legend, in some the memory is perverted for the ends of the current states. But some areas have kept what was best about the Imperium and built upon it.

I don't see any 'good guys/bad guys' per se in the 1248NE. There are lots of basiucally benevolent (and otherwise) people doing the besyt they can. But everyone makes compromises.

The 1248 book centres on the 4th Imperium as its main region and base polity. However, there are several great polities out there. Three Regency fragments, the Vilani, the two Solomani and so on. With wilds in between and the odd pocket empire.

This means that there will be room for exploration and even empire-building. Things are sufficiently unsettled for PCs to make a difference without the need for grandiose and unlikely plot devices.

My aim in doing all this? Well, I have to tie up the plot threads and oddments lying ariound from previous versions. I have to create a familiar yet fresh setting. And I have do it all while maintaining a sense of wonder.

I'm prepared to answer the odd question about the setting, BTW. You want tidbits to ignite discussion? Ask....

 

[Liam Devlin]

Thank you Boss! I see a topic coming...<wicked evil grin>, and some more questions to follow..

 

[daryen]

Originally posted by MJD:
One thing that is carved in stone about the 1248 New Era, is that the past was not swept away. Indeed, there are many legacies of the Third Imperium and its contemporaries.

And this is the biggest reason I am excited by the M:1248 project. I want to see the history regardless, but it is comments like this (and others you have made) that make me look forward to seeing it.

I'm prepared to answer the odd question about the setting, BTW. You want tidbits to ignite discussion? Ask....

OK, I'll take you up on this. But I am asking it over in the TNE groups, so as not to clutter the T5 groups up too much.

 

[EvilDrGanymede]

Oh yeah. This is the T5 board isn't it. Whoops

 

[ACK!!]

Ok, I have to back up Lord IronWolf here.

I hate the Rebellion and the Virus as much as anyone else.

The Reformation Coalition and the TNE Universe is not my cup of tea.

However, it is time to move the canon forward forward not backwards.

There was the hint of some interesting technology and stuff coming right at the end when the MT stuff took us down into the Hard Times.

Still, T4 and T5 will take us back not forward to a history that is essentially already written.

I think a lot of people took IronWolf's post as being a pro-TNE remark. I think that is wrong.

Marc Miller has two choices to move canon forward.

1) Pull a GURPs and say screw the Rebellion and the Virus and bring us back to the CT times. (BTW, I believe that Marc has said no way to this.)

2) Take us forward and map out what the Fourth Imperium might be. This is tough. Considering the hate for the Virus and TNE out there.

Would the Reformation Coalition become the Fourth Imperium (yep I know there is a thread on just that in the TNE forums)?

What happened to Margaret (TNE forums again)?

What is the role of the Hivers?

What about the Solomani?

Lots of interesting stuff.

The funniest part of all this is how the Rebellion/TNE flies in the face of common wisdom about environments for play.

Most people did NOT like to play in an environment of total chaos.

Nobody wanted to hear that the system they used as a base for their campaign outside the Spinward Marches typical stuff ended up fried in the rebellion, for example.

I will assert something -- the edge of chaos is better than total chaos.

I found this out in D&D when I played the Greyhawk campaign and hated the Greyhawk wars. Greyhawk was originally set up on the edge of chaos and that was fun. When TSR drug the world into total chaos then it became too hairy to map out your own intrigue because all of that was already being written for you.

I assert that it would be a far better thing to map out a new canon from the ashes of the TNE disaster.

It would be better to map out a stabilizing world risen from the ashes but still on the edge of chaos. That is why the Frontier was always so much fun.

Surrounded by Adventure but just a few jumps from a safe port.

There has to be a good set of enemies for the intrigue factor. The old school Marches campaign had the Zhodani, Vargr corsairs and well a lot more.

There has to be a good quest for the Ancients kind of idea running through the thing to give a sense of purpose.

The milleu and the rules have to be seperate. Not even necessarily seperate products all together but seperate booklets or sections depending on the format.

I was thinking myself that the whole thing had to make a big jump forward to a more stable and reformed space with the Virus almost completely eliminated.

Almost a Fourth Imperium to give the old-schoolers that warm and fuzzy but with some new twists and new threats.

 

[ScottB]

I liked the Rebellion, as of MT's initial release at any rate. To me, it did two things I really liked: it effectively made the Imperium smaller and less powerful, and it added uncertainty and conflict to the setting. Both of these are good things from the point of view of a PC group tooling around in a Free Trader/Scout/whatever living in the margins of lawful society.

For Virus, I liked the concept but not the execution. An AI computer virus is a neat trick to spring on players, but not a campaign-defining (or destroying) one, IMHO.

I guess I might be considered to be in the highly heretical anti-CT Imperium crowd - I just found it too big and well-ordered for adventure. Published settings seemed to concentrate on areas of instability where extralegal adventure could be had, which always made me wonder why such a huge Imperium was necessary or even desireable from a gaming standpoint.

 

[savage]

The people I played CT and myself were big on minimizing Imperium impact on the campaign too.
It was far too messy. I'm a big fan of Virus,
the Rebellion and bringing down the dull Imperium.

If there were a T5, why do anything other than CT Advanced. T4 was an attempt to reinvent everything
and didn't go very well. Actually, I'm suprised Marc doesn't do a "general" topic book every now
and then and just outsource rules to T20 and Gurps.
A CT Advanced might bring back some of the old players to CT though.


Savage

 

[binky]

Originally posted by ACK:
[Content actually snipped]

It should be pointed out that the 1248 book from QLI will address a lot of the stuff you are raising and is intended to be as system independent as possible, so it should be possible to use T5 with that if you wish.

- Neil.

 

[ACK!!]

Originally posted by Savage:
The people I played CT and myself were big on minimizing Imperium impact on the campaign too.
It was far too messy. I'm a big fan of Virus,
the Rebellion and bringing down the dull Imperium.

If there were a T5, why do anything other than CT Advanced. T4 was an attempt to reinvent everything and didn't go very well.
Savage

Ok, I disagree with the boring Imperium thing. I ended using the Imperium, the nobility, the Imperial Research Stations and a number of aspects of the government into my campaigns.

I do however completely agree with the idea that T5 in most fans minds should be a system that is CT Advanced or like I say a fully-fleshed out corrected version of MT. Take a look at the MT rules Savage. Most of that stuff as I am sure you well know is just an update of the CT rules. In fact most of the updates were straight out of older rules, house systems and Digest Group suggested changes.

Take the Task System for example, that was straight Digest Group stuff.

To Binky,

I do know about 1248 and even responded to a MJD thread on the topic. It would be nice to leap ahead a while and put some distance between a new universe built on the old and the era of disgust most fans had for the Virus era.

I was thinking something even further down the pike to give the old TNE folks some breathing room to still play.

Just some ideas and opinions anyway...

Have fun.