       TRAVELLER Digest 36

Topics covered in this issue include:

  1) Life paths by Hugh Foster <100326.446@compuserve.com>
  2) TRAVELLER digest 35 by Hugh Foster <100326.446@compuserve.com>
  3) Campaign Notes by Rob Miracle <rwm@MPGN.COM>
  4) Heroes and deckers and virus by rancke@diku.dk
  5) More BR Fighters: OK, they are useful. by "Les Howie"  <lhowie@cpx.Prograph.Com>
  6) Protecting Copyrights by "Les Howie"  <lhowie@cpx.Prograph.Com>
  7) Re: Virus vs. deckers  by Seth "the Lesser" <slb22@columbia.edu>
  8) Re: Infection by Virus through DNI  by Seth "the Lesser" <slb22@columbia.edu>

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: 10 Sep 94 03:45:25 EDT
From: Hugh Foster <100326.446@compuserve.com>
To: "INTERNET:traveller@mpgn.com" <traveller@MPGN.COM>
Subject: Life paths
Message-ID: <940910074525_100326.446_BHB32-1@CompuServe.COM>

>(Incidentally, I have never seen a life path system, but I understand the
>Idea, and could draw up one myself for posting on TML.  An idea there...)

Do it! It looks like no-one else is interested. But do us a favour - do a
MegaTraveller version for the X-Boat list! Thanks. The War Dog.


------------------------------

Date: 10 Sep 94 04:59:08 EDT
From: Hugh Foster <100326.446@compuserve.com>
To: "INTERNET:traveller@mpgn.com" <traveller@MPGN.COM>
Subject: TRAVELLER digest 35
Message-ID: <940910085908_100326.446_BHB53-1@CompuServe.COM>

>> A short note to let you all think on a question that  got
me,  why  has  the scout only have jump 2 engines  as  this  only
gives  a  reliable j 1 range as the entered system may  not  have
any  accessable fuel. My reply to the problem was to  design  two
new  ships with jump 4  , a 300 dispton and a 800 disp ton  ship.
ill post them soon , but any sugestions. <<

Money. Look at the cost of your design and then the scout/courier and then
plan
to build a coupla million units... Also, unless actually exploring new
sectors,
the map'll tell you whether there's fuel - and (I rule anyway) you can scan a
nearby system passively for gas giant radio emanations (the radio waves may
take
years to arrive, but that just means there was a GG there 50 years ago and
it's
unlikely to have moved...). However, nice big scouts are dead useful for
exploratory work (see the Donosev).

  The War Dog.



------------------------------

Date: Sat, 10 Sep 1994 08:05:53 -0400 (EDT)
From: Rob Miracle <rwm@MPGN.COM>
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Campaign Notes
Message-ID: <199409101205.IAA21342@Central.KeyWest.MPGN.COM>

I have a couple of nettiquite questions.  I am currently running a New Era
based Regency campaign where a ship is heading into the wilds of Deneb to
survey the damage there.

1) Would you like to see Travellers News Service messages posted to the list
as the crew of the Steller Discovery turn Deneb on its side :-)?  The benefit

here is background material that others can use.....  While not official in 
any means, it would utilize this list to give a real feel to TNS.

It would include TAS bulletins on systems that have had a travel code change,
News reports from the region (related to what the players do) and so on.

2) Really for Loren and GDW, would this be ok?  It is kinda border line on
the publishing issue.

Thanks Rob.
-- 
Rob Miracle
Tantalus Inc.
rwm@mpgn.com
"You have a problem?  I have a plan!" -- Anton Devious

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 10 Sep 1994 18:54:30 +0100 (METDST)
From: rancke@diku.dk
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Heroes and deckers and virus
Message-ID: <199409101654.AA19483@embla.diku.dk>

>From: Quibell E D <quibez@essex.ac.uk>
>Hans Rancke (rancke@diku.dk) writes ..
> 
>>I
>>will say that if any SF game portrays weapons in a remotely realistic
>>way then going into a firefight with properly equipped adversaries is a
>>really, really dangerous thing to do. This is, in fact, one of my main
>>problems with SF games: If I give my players the kind of weaponry they
>>could reasonably expect to be able to get hold of, then I either have to
>>let them walk all over the opposition (which is boring) or give the
>>opponents equivalent equipment, turning any firefight into a 50/50
>>survival chance (And players don't appreciate rolling up new characters
>>every other day  -  at least, mine don't, YMMV).
> 
>No one said that life was fair, even in the far future, characters should, 
>have enough knowledge to know how to conduct themselves in a firefight, and 
>if they don't they soon learn (by rolling up new characters) ...

You're missing the point. People (at least, I and every rpg'er I've ever
talked with) play rpgs to be heroes. We don't play them to be ordinary
joes. Now, there are two kinds of role models for heroes: fictional and
real. Fictional heroes take desperate chances and survive. How many 
times have I read about a hero taking a 1 in 10 chance of surviving and 
succeeding? Many! And why do they succeed? Because the author is on his
side. We've also heard of real life heroes who survived against desperate
odds. How can that be? Easy. We never (almost never) hear of the poor 
bastards who took the same chances and failed. For every real life hero
there are hundreds of real life loosers.

You try one day to run a 1990 spy campaign or something and equip both
PCs and their opponents with highpowered rifles with laser sights and 
see how much (and how long) your players enjoy that. 

How long do you think a PC hero would survive taking realistic chances?
Not long enough to be any fun. So a rpg _can't_ be realistic if it's to
fulfil it's function. The best kind of rpgs give the illusion of being
realistic, but PCs need to be able to survive making heroic choices.
Not always, and not automatically, but certainly more often than real life
people survive making heroic choices. Make it 9 chances in 10 to survive
and you have the making of a fun game. But spare me anything approaching
true realism.

>>>while decking into virus infected cyperspace would be suicidal.
>> 
>>How do you know? We have no real idea about how a true computer/brain
>>interface would work. That leaves us delightfully free to define our
>>own rules to provide maximum fun and entertainment. Unlike with weapons,
>>where we can reasonably extrapolate from know data (and where we come
>>up with instant-death-no-saving-throw pocket cannons at TLs only slightly
>>beyond what we have today (or even AT our present-day TL)) we really
>>don't know enough about how such an interface would work out to rule out
>>anything.
> 
>I'm sorry to say that we do know enough about this kind of technology to
make
>"reasonable" assumptions about how it would work. 

But it's all assumptions. You don't need to accept those assumptions. It's
even easier to disregard assumptions than it is to disregard facts, and
Traveller disregards lots of facts. (Like the fact that anyone hit by a 
functioning laser weapon runs a grave risk of getting blinded even if he 
isn't killed. Like the fact that the chance of hitting someone at 6 meters
distance is considerably different from the chance of hitting them at 50
meters distance.)

>[...] ... replace the VR interface with a neural jack,
> and there we have it ...

Replace the VR interface with a neural jack and, as it turns out, all those
TL 8-9 assumptions prove wrong. Just fancy that!

>That`s why there is decking in cyperpunk games, cos we understand in enough 
>to know that is probably the next stage of computing ....

There's decking in cyberpunk games because William Gibson invented decking
and cyberpunk. Not because anyone KNOWS how it would work. Noone knows for
sure.

>Traveller is a Hard Science games, that`s what FFS was all about, it bases 
>it's rules on things we know about, to make the future realistic, and make 
>playing traveller more fun, by being realistic, 

I couldn't disagree with you more. What's important in _any_ game is that
the rules are CONSISTENT, not that they are realistic. A player need to
feel confident that the rules won't chance under his feet. By using the
rules of the real life universe (except when inconvenient) you gain an 
awful lot of consistency for very little effort. That's why realism is
generally a good thing. But whenever realism interferes with the game
experience, out is should go. Like when we use FLT drives or make the
galaxy flat (how's that for realism, btw?).

>>Assuming you agree that the second option has considerable more appeal
>>than the first, I'd suggest that we turn the argument around and approach
>>it from the other direction: Given that we want human deckers to have a
>>fighting chance against the Virus, what rules and assumptions do we have
>>to make? 
> 
>You assume wrong, I don't find the second option considerably more
appealing,

Your privilledge.

>I find the fact that decking against a virus, would not be impossible, if
>someone wanted to try it no one could stop them, it would just be suicidle,
>instant death (to the conciuosness, if not actual death).

But don't, please don't, talk about "facts" when you express your notions
of how decking works or how the virus works. The only facts there are 
about those subjects are what each of us decides he wants to assume. (OK, 
about the virus whatever GDW says is fact as long as we want to adhere to 
the GDW Traveller universe, but as soon as we are willing to deviate those 
facts become debatable too).

>So rules for decking against other human and alian deckers I would like, but
>to deck against the virus would be suicidal ....

OK, Ewan, in your universe decking against the virus is suicidal. I accept
that. 

Now, does anyone else want to discuss how things could work out so it 
wasn't invariably suicidal to deck against the virus? 

(See you in another discussion, Ewan. A spin-off about how realistic
Traveller really is, perhaps?).



      Hans Rancke
University of Copenhagen
     rancke@diku.dk
------------
"I used to argue the matter at first, but I'm wiser now. Facts
are stubborn things, but not half so stubborn as fallacies."
                - Stella Maynard in "Anne of the Island"

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 10 Sep 94 14:54:28 ADT
From: "Les Howie"  <lhowie@cpx.Prograph.Com>
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: More BR Fighters: OK, they are useful.
Message-ID: <9409101754.AA04715@Prograph.Com>

> From: bonnevil@mermaid.micro.umn.edu (Steven M Bonneville)
> They *are* missiles.  You don't expend them, but they could be used in 
> combat much as missiles are.  They have some advantages, too.  You can
> give them heavier armor and more g-turns for maneuverability.  Missiles
> may make 12G acceleration, but they only have 12 g-turns using the 
> standard designs.  Furthermore, fighters are reusable, not just from
> combat to combat, but from *turn to turn* in combat -- they can fire
> many times.  They can also usually fire from greater ranges, which 
> helps to offset the size disadvantage they have.  They're a bit more
> flexible -- you can use them as air cover for ground troops, which is
> harder to do with a disposable nuclear missile.  

As laser platforms, you have a problems with the actual potential to do
damage. 
Could you put a laser on a fighter (a sub-100 ton 1-3 man platform) with more

than 1 or 2 (BR) damage points?  If you can't, how can they do effective
damage 
against a capital ship? Play bloody hell with the screen, though. 
 
John Bogan writes
 
> Well, the use that comes to mind right away is as missile launcher/guidance
> platforms.
> Some of the Imperial Navy carriers carried hundreds of fighters.  Imagine 
> a few hundred missles heading RIGHT FOR YOUR SHIP! ;-)

With the missile loads some of the other ships carry, this looks looks a
normal 
state of affairs... :-)

Nevertheless, this use of fighters makes more sense to me.  And you should
have 
better odds of getting an FC lock since you have cuddled up close to the
target.

Outside of fleet actions, fighters would be handy as "space control" ships --

doing long range patrols, customs look-overs, etc.
 
As far as fighter rules goes, I have a couple of thoughts:

Fighters always operate in flights of (say) 5-16.  Targetted as a unit - diff

mods for quantity.  DV/2 (say) is number killed.  All take same action (fire
at 
same target, launch missles, etc.) missile spread looses missiles as flight 
looses fighters.  

Treated as one ship for sensor, some sort of cumulative rules for jamming,
sesor
activity, etc.

Could have fun with rules for opposing fighters in same hex with same vector 
using evasion G's to "dogfight".  Maybe special rules for same hex/vector as 
target - no boarding, but some sort of "Star Wars" style close attack rule 
(didn't JTAS have a set of HG optional rules on those lines long ago and far 
away?)

I'll give this a try and report back.



Les Howie
Technical Architect (Database)
Prograph International


------------------------------

Date: Sat, 10 Sep 94 15:05:36 ADT
From: "Les Howie"  <lhowie@cpx.Prograph.Com>
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Protecting Copyrights
Message-ID: <9409101805.AA04728@Prograph.Com>

GDW writes, concerning the below quited text:
>  > 1) Let's say I write a programme for (e.g.) TNE vehicle
>  > design. I want to distribute it freely, so I make the
>  > programme table-driven and require the user to
>  > provide a flat file containing the GDW tables.
>  > This way all players can benefit from the programming
>  > and interface expertise, but at the same time it
>  > distributes no GDW material, requiring each user
>  > to buy that themselves and type it in.
>  
>  IMHO, this would be OK.
>  
I would not be two keen on this as a solution to copyright hassles.  Pretty 
soon, some lad will realize that he could give it to his buddy WITH the table

that he had typed in, and you would be in the soup.

Even if your software prompts "enter the mass of a range 10 TL 13 beam
pointer 
(page xx, line xxx)" every time it recalculates, you have still lodged the 
formulas in your system.

By the time you have stripped out everything naughty from your design aid,
you 
have written a spreasheet program!!.

The only good soultion is for GDW to cut a deal for a competent commercial 
implementation.  Mac and Windows, please, guys -- real soon now, and I will 
gladly pay good money for it.

Les Howie
Technical Architect (Database)
Prograph International


------------------------------

Date: Sat, 10 Sep 1994 16:13:25 -0400
From: Seth "the Lesser" <slb22@columbia.edu>
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Re: Virus vs. deckers 
Message-ID: <199409102013.AA09008@mailhub.cc.columbia.edu>

Peter Brenton <pete@biochem.uchicago.edu> discusses at some length (and with
funky margins) the reasons why the Virus can't "infect" a human brain.

I won't quote him, because of the line-length problems, but I'd like to
respond
to a few of the points he makes:

1.) Have you ever heard of Neuro-Linguistic Programming, Pete? Less
    controversially, have you ever heard of brainwashing, sensory-deprivation
    experiments, and hypnotism? If you control someone's sensory input
    completely, you can perform arbitrarily nasty modifications of his/her
    consciousness.

2.) Furthermore, if you assume "strong AI" (which all the Traveller technical
    stuff seems to), there is absolutely no a priori reason why the Virus
    *shouldn't* be able to reprogram the human brain.  How does it infect a
    computer? By feeding it data containing "eggs".  Why shouldn't a
    particularly sophisticated strain be able to feed "eggs" over the total
    sensorimotor link you describe?

--
Seth L. Blumberg, M.S.E.   |     Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
slb22@columbia.edu         |
CUSFS President-in-Exile   |                I'm not a linguist,
walking the road of ashes  |         but I play one on the Internet....

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 10 Sep 1994 16:27:42 -0400
From: Seth "the Lesser" <slb22@columbia.edu>
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Re: Infection by Virus through DNI 
Message-ID: <199409102027.AA10020@mailhub.cc.columbia.edu>

Also sprach Dale Thompson:
> 
>    Here is my argument: Virus can be propagated through ANY
>    transmission medium. ANY!  (Remember Virus can infect a computer
>    by encrypting itself onto printed matter and then unsuspecting
>    people can scan that material into their computer and infect it).
> 
>    By this reasoning, people operating or communicating with an infected
>    computer could become infected just by visual input from computer
>    terminals, etc.
> 
>    DNI might provide a more efficient infection mechanism, but it is not
>    necessary for people to become infected by Virus.

Have you read _Snow Crash_, Dale? How about "Press ENTER"?

> So either Virus cannot infect the brain or computer use of any kind is
> extremely dangerous.  Since there is no indication that anyone has ever
> become infected by Virus through these indirect means, then I submit it
> as highly unlikely that the brain is susceptible to Virus infection.

When dealing with biological viruses, there is a world of difference,
infectiousness-wise, between handling an object that has been in contact with
an object handled by an infected person, and being sneezed on by that person.

To make use of your argument, the Virus would have to encode its entire
structure into a stimulus (video clip, printed document, whatever) in such a
subtle way that the target person's ego defense mechanisms would not trigger.
Such an encoding would require vast amounts of computer power to accomplish,
as
well as much more knowledge of the human mind/brain than even Grandfather
possesses.

To infect someone via DNI, on the other hand, could be much simpler, as the
Virus needn't try to slip past the human's defense mechanisms, but can just
steamroller right over them (total sensory deprivation and the ability to
project any desired stimulus with all five senses make a powerful arsenal).

Let it be noted that I'm just playing Devil's Advocate here.  I wouldn't let
the Virus infect a human brain in my game, because it wouldn't be fun.  I can
justify that position just as easily as I am justifying the opposite.  This
is
all pseudoscience anyway.

--
Seth L. Blumberg, M.S.E.   |     Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
slb22@columbia.edu         |
CUSFS President-in-Exile   |                I'm not a linguist,
walking the road of ashes  |         but I play one on the Internet....

------------------------------

End of TRAVELLER Digest 36
**************************
