			    TRAVELLER Digest 159

Topics covered in this issue include:

  1) Regency territory	by Hans Rancke-Madsen <rancke@diku.dk>
  2) MIMED message	by Alvin Plummer <plummera@SHERIDANC.ON.CA>
  3) Re: Old military bases and stuff	by Mark Clark <markc@brahms.udel.edu>
  4) Striker II	by aboulton@cix.compulink.co.uk (Andrew Boulton)
  5) Old military bases	by Ted7@world.std.com (Mitchell K Schwartz)
  6) Oriflammen Marinen	by Ted7@world.std.com (Mitchell K Schwartz)
  7) Re: Elite Starmen	by Mark Clark <markc@brahms.udel.edu>
  8) Non-Combat RC Adventures	by Rob_Prior@nynet.nybe.north-york.on.ca (Rob Prior)

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

Date: Wed, 11 Jan 1995 11:35:08 +0100 (MET)
From: Hans Rancke-Madsen <rancke@diku.dk>
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Regency territory
Message-ID: <199501111035.LAA01031@embla.diku.dk>

Alvin Plummer writes:
>Note: The Regency has regained all territory lost to the Aslan's during 
>the Rebellion period.  (Three cheers for Tobia!)  

Splendid! That means that those of us who believes that the Aslan ihatei
never had a snowball's chance in hell of conquering any bit of the Domain
of Deneb, let alone places like Aki and Glisten, can just ignore the whole
thing. Well done, GDW!


      Hans Rancke
University of Copenhagen
     rancke@diku.dk
------------
        "A  subsector  official  pompously states that the
        subsector  armed  forces  have  four Kinunir class
        ships in service,  each with enough troop strength
        to put down any military operations that threathen
        the peace of the Imperium."

                        ---Adventure 1, The Kinunir

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

Date: Wed, 11 Jan 1995 08:37:11 -0500 (EST)
From: Alvin Plummer <plummera@SHERIDANC.ON.CA>
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: MIMED message
Message-ID: <Pine.OSF.3.91.950111083145.23634B-100000@hubble.sheridanc.on.ca>


Bruce Johnson asked about the MIME first part of the Glisten adventure.  
As soon as I realized that my messaged was MIMED, I re-posted it (the 
post with no subject heading). 


------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alvin Plummer
"Preserve what we created, Norris, and remember what we stood for."
                               - Strephon, 179-1126


Reply to: plummera@hubble.sheridanc.on.ca   - can you reach me here?

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


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

Date: Wed, 11 Jan 1995 09:19:02 -0500 (EST)
From: Mark Clark <markc@brahms.udel.edu>
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Re: Old military bases and stuff
Message-ID: <Pine.SOL.3.91.950111090048.23910B-100000@brahms.udel.edu>

>>8) It's been 700 years.  How many 700-year old military
bases  do you know of still operational? <<

>Then again, how many 50-100-year-old merchant (marine)
>ships are carrying passengers ? (Except the QE2 and lookit!)

Actually, many cargo ships are equiped with passenger cabins, including 
ships over fifty years old.  If one looks at East Asia island chains, 
especially the Phillipines, you'll find lots of ferries of rather ancient 
vintage.

Merchant ships over 100 years old are not uncommon, even in non-Third
World countries.  A friend of mine is writing a history of the Danish
Merchant Marine.  In a search of the active list of ships in 1920, he
found that 7% were over 100 years old, with some hulls from the 1770s(!)
that had been converted to steam. 

Even airplanes can survive for many years - there are thirty year old 
jets still flying, and DC-3s from the 1930s still in routine service.

Given the high price of starships and the relative technological 
stability of the Imperium, I would not be surprised to see very old 
starships in service.  They would be most common on frontiers and on runs 
between backwater systems.  

Of course, 700 years would probably be right out.  :-)

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

Date: Wed, 11 Jan 95 18:04 GMT
From: aboulton@cix.compulink.co.uk (Andrew Boulton)
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Cc: aboulton@cix.compulink.co.uk
Subject: Striker II
Message-ID: <memo.842950@cix.compulink.co.uk>

A few comments based on a quick skim through the Striker II rulebook (I only
got it a couple of hours ago):

1. The pages of Appendix D are labelled 'Appendix C' 

2. Captions for the pictures and/or pictures of all the vehicles would have
   been nice
   
3. Are there any modifiers for race (eg different movement/morale/etc)?

4. Why no details on Solomani organisation or equipment? Surely this would
   be more useful for Rebellion-era or RC battles than the Zhodani data?

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

Date: Wed, 11 Jan 1995 13:12:51 -0500 (EST)
From: Ted7@world.std.com (Mitchell K Schwartz)
To: traveller@MPGN.COM (Traveller:TNE mailing list)
Subject: Old military bases
Message-ID: <199501111812.AA06104@world.std.com>

Some notes on old military bases:

Portsmouth has been used as a naval base by Britain since the 1500s. 
Continuously. Through a variety of TL changes. Chatham has also been used 
for a long while. Note that the individual buildings change, but the sites 
are dictated by the harbors colocated with the bases (fluctuations with 
the size of forces, etc.)

Various Roman legions stayed in position for a couple centuries at a 
clip, usually in the same base. They sometimes built a new camp nearby 
when a site became to worn to use.

Spanish military archives are known to back to the 1500s, though the 
archive buildings themselves change every few centuries.

Assuming reasonably stable technology, and stable strategic needs, it 
probably continues to be more cost effective to reuse a military base, 
refurbishing it or updating its technology from time to time, than to 
abandon it and move elsewhere.

OTH, the US Arny kept several frontier forts as military sites long after 
their original purpose had ended: Ft Huachuaca (sic) in Arizona stopped 
being a necessary Apache watch post by 1890, but it still operates. Its 
function has changed over time, its facilities upgraded to suit the needs 
of the function.

					ted7

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

Date: Wed, 11 Jan 1995 13:21:25 -0500 (EST)
From: Ted7@world.std.com (Mitchell K Schwartz)
To: traveller@MPGN.COM (Traveller:TNE mailing list)
Subject: Oriflammen Marinen
Message-ID: <199501111821.AA15322@world.std.com>

The Oriflammen may have 5 division equivalents of Space-trained marines - 
but no one says that oriflamme has the lift or jump capacity to move them 
all at once. I'd suggest that they proibably can stretch to move a full 
division (by leasing ships, threatening seizure, and full mobilization 
orders, etc) of troops, including jumpers and/or follow on forces.

Consider the size of ships you'd need to move 10,000 men at a clip! (Not 
to mention heavy equipment and supplies for the month or so they would 
have to fight before non-jump 3 ships could go home and return with more 
supplies...The RCES I have read about does not have all that many spare 
bulk freighters running about!
						Ted7

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

Date: Wed, 11 Jan 1995 15:51:08 -0500 (EST)
From: Mark Clark <markc@brahms.udel.edu>
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Re: Elite Starmen
Message-ID: <Pine.SOL.3.91.950111143611.1708A-100000@brahms.udel.edu>

>Steve Bonneville recently noted that only a few people in a hundred
>thousand would ever serve in the Imperial Navy (or any space navy, for that
>matter...).

>This simple fact should greatly change the character of the
>Imperial Navy.  This implies that the Navy should be composed strictly of
>*the best*, ie. perfect health, very smart, quick thinking, skilled in
>physics, great looking, heros of the galaxy... imagine an entire navy of
>Buck Rogers types! (I shrudder to think of it.)

>But assuming that this is the case (and it _is_ the case), then this
>should be the minimum UPP for...
>   Enlisted 888888-8
>   Officers AAAAAA-A

>Please, someone prove me wrong...

When I first looked at this, I thought "no problem, probability will take
care of this."  If we assume that average Imperial citizens are generated
just like player characters (a stretch, but why not), then one out of
7,776 citizens is officer material (AAAAAA or better), in classic
Traveller anyway.  In an Imperium of 15 Trillion, that means almost 2
billion potential officers.  If we assume a uniform age distribution from
ages 1 to 70 (rather conservative), that's about 27 million new officers a
year.  At twenty years of service each (probably a bit generous given the
re-enlistment rolls), that's about a half-billion potential officers for the 
Imperical fleet. 

The one flaw I see is that character generation gives too many nobles -
one out of six, actually, which is the chance of throwing 10+ on 2d6. 
Unless the Imperium is a much differnt place than I thought it was, a lot
less than one-sixth of the population is noble.  If we eliminate the A
social class requirement, then we have an officer pool of over three
billion.  Is that enough?  You tell me.

Frankly, in Classic Traveller, every naval officer should be BBBBBB or 
better - we're talking studly. 

Note that in the New Era the requirement for officers would be more like
999999-9, since the way stats are rolled up is different (2d6-1) plus
there's seven stats instead of six.  A New Era Character with stats of
AAAAAA-A or better is literally one in a million (actually one in 35.8
million).  If the Regency population is one trillion, there are less than
30,000 folks that good - not enough officers, I think.  If we eliminate
social status, that's about 350,000 people, probably plenty.   Stats of 
all 9s or better gives a character that's one out of 46,656 - there would 
be over 20 million of them in the Regency.

So, offhand I'd say the navy could be pretty picky, especially about 
enlisted men, as long as you come from a BIG political grouping.  
AAAAAA-A may be a bit too high, however.  It's certainly too high for a 
pocket empire or the RC.

This may be why big empires can last so long even when faced with
barbarians on their border.  With such a big population, they can skim off
the cream of their population for the military and fight the barbarians
with very competant people.  When competant people no longer go into the
military, empires fall. 

Mark Clark

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

Date: 11 Jan 1995 23:12:56 GMT
From: Rob_Prior@nynet.nybe.north-york.on.ca (Rob Prior)
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Non-Combat RC Adventures
Message-ID: <327286782.146044568@nynet.nybe.north-york.on.ca>

I've noticed that most of the adventures being published for the RC are
military strikes.  In "Path of Tears" some planets are coded "Trade and
Diplomacy Only" and military strikes are preceeded by intelligence gathering
- but these haven't been turned into published adventures.

Given that my group doesn't like military action ("Albert the Commando
Accountant" prefers an "audit with extreme prejudice"), this is a bummer.

Has anyone run any trade, diplomatic, or intelligence-gathering adventures
set in the RC?  If you're willing to share, I'd love to see a copy (and I'd
strongly encourage you to publish: TNE needs to break the 'Twilight in Space'
label).

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

End of TRAVELLER Digest 159
***************************
