			    TRAVELLER Digest 227

Topics covered in this issue include:

  1) Transponders	by Hans Rancke-Madsen <rancke@diku.dk>
  2) Insane Insights II	by CyHiggin@aol.com
  3) It just popped in there...	by erich@bush.cs.tamu.edu (Erich Schneider)
  4) How does body armor effect concussion damage?	by tab@cco.caltech.edu (Tab Stephens)

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Date: Sat, 18 Mar 1995 19:18:20 +0100 (MET)
From: Hans Rancke-Madsen <rancke@diku.dk>
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Transponders
Message-ID: <199503181818.TAA28599@embla.diku.dk>

Harold Hale writes:
>   As I indicated, if foreign governments thought the chips were so good
>(and apparently they did) then they would have started their own captive
>breeding programs.  The Deyo chips would be able to tell their foreign
>cousins from their own breed, but that wouldn#t stop the Aslan Hierate
>from using them for the same purposes that the Imperium was.   

Harold, when I argue that what GDW says here dosen't make sense then I don't 
really see the relevance of a counter argument that it would make sense if
they said something different. 

>   The Zhodani would be a perfect example of someone who would get
>hold of a few of the Deyo chips and copy them.  Ditto the K#Kree.  The
>Hivers being TL 16 in electronics (which is why they#re still around as an
>interstellar power) may have had ways to analyze the box without the
>chip inside knowing what was going on.

Well, when I said that the chips as described did seem to be tamperproof I
failed to consider the local magic system, mostly because the capabilities
of psionic adepts being so ill-defined it is possible to say that per def
no psionics can affect them (actually, a built-in psionic shield will do
the trick). Without such a shield a cybernectic telepath could propably
make love to a chip and persuade it to lie ;-)

>>But the Deyo chips are not a transponder standard.
> 
>   Then why hand them out?  How do you explain to the ambassador
>from Gram why he should mount it in his ship instead of what he is using
>now?  They would have had to demonstrate some advantage in using
>them, and the best way would be to show how they were constructed.

Read what I'm saying, Harold. The chips are not a standard that the other
governments can design their own chips to, they are small electronic etc...

>He also says about Terra and the Solomani:
> 
>>The whole reason for the survival of the Jews as a seperate identity up
>>through the Middle Ages was that they were not allowed by their
>>oh-so-christian neighbours to integrate. As a counterexample I can cite
>>scores of tribes who were forcibly expelled from their ancestral lands,
>>moved somewhere else, settled down, and became Somewherelsians.
>>You don't find many Englishmen swearing one day to return to their
>>ancestral Russian steppes, do you?
> 
>   Their lack of integration was due to more than prejudice.  In areas
>where they were allowed to settle and become part of the community,
>they still maintained a degree of seperateness.  

But what degree? Greater than the English catholics? Examples, please.
>From areas where they were allowed to settle _and become part of the
community_, mind you.

>Many Jewish communities went so far as to forbid their children to marry 
>outside their faith.

So does most other faiths.

>  Jews did evolve over the time of their exile and even developed
>new hybrid cultures (this is where we get Yiddish from), but always
>there were those who kept alive the hope that one day they would
>return to the Holyland and rebuild the Temple.

Yes, and those were mostly the ones who was having a hard time where they
were. That's my whole point. You don't maintain that kind of burning
desire if you're reasonably well off where you are. Examples: The Jews
in Scandinavia and Germany around 1910.

>>The people of Home have their own T-prime planet to live on. Why the
>>hell should they be interested in going back to Terra. Especially the
>>leaders, who have access to the best the rich, unspoiled Home can
>>provide.
> 
>   Because Home is not home, Terra is.

Look, if you're going to insist that most people would consider the tales
of their parents more of a home than the place where they were born, grew
up, own land, and are making a decent living, just say so and I'll agree 
to disagree with you.

>   Probably much longer than that, unless political developments warrant
>it.  If, for example, China continues down the road of reform and
>democratization, Taiwan will have little incentive to ever declare
>independence.  On the other hand if China evolves toward an even
>more oppressive regime, the majority on Taiwan may eventually give up
>on returning #home# and seek a separate path.  It has already been
>almost 50 years since the Nationalists lost the Chinese civil war--I have
>every confidence that they will continue to hang on to the hope of
>retaking China for another 50.

Again, if you really think that there is not a profound difference between
the wiews of 1st and 2nd generation exiles and those of 3rd and 4th 
generation exiles, then that's your priviledge. All I can say is: You
are wrong, Sir.

Try coming up with one example of a people who, _having established 
themselves comfortably in exile_, really were anxious to return to
their ancestral lands. Note the qualification, because that's the
lynchpin of my argument. The people, especially the rulers, of Home
are IMO comfortably established on Home. They might talk a good return
to Terra, but when it came to action...

>Andy Lilly writes regarding Transponders, etc.:
> 
>>There's been a lot of discussion about transponders, etc.
> 
>   Thank you for your post on the subject.  It is a beacon of light in
>what is rapidly becoming a very murky thread.

Haven't we reached a consensus? The Deyo chip may hold water in a technical
sense, but in terms of human nature the official history leaks in all
directions. Right?



      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: Sat, 18 Mar 1995 15:06:44 -0500
From: CyHiggin@aol.com
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: Insane Insights II
Message-ID: <950318150642_53516853@aol.com>

From: "Harold D. Hale"

>Cynthia from her death bed writes:

>>Hahaha! <snorkle! guffaw> He he he! <insane tittering...>
>>ROFLAO!  Secret frequencies... what a concept! Hehehehe!
>><Pick self up off of floor.>  

>   When you're through, please call your local Air Force base and
>ask them if they'll give you the frequencies their IFF interogators
>operate on.  When they tell you hell no (and ask for your name) ask them
>why they won't tell you.  I bet they say such information is classified.

Sure, they're classified... which is why I don't ask the Air Force what they are.
I ask my RF engineer friends with the spectrum analyzer.  Which bands are
reserved for military use is well-known (i.e., published), so you eliminate
non-military chunks of the spectrum right there.  Presumably, if I want to know the
freqs, I know something about the signal I'm looking for -- what it's for, what the
minimum characteristics? performance? *must* be to do the job it has to do -- so I'll
know it when I hear it and the laws of physics might give me an idea what piece of
the  remaining military spectrum it MUST be in.  If I'm a hostile government, I
then have lots of technicians and engineers with spectrum analyzers and computers to
listen for signals across the suspect bands, and analyze them.  If you use those IFF
interrogators, I'll eventually find their frequencies.  
      Yes, you can have "Secret" frequencies, as in 'they have a red stamp on the
paper saying "Top Secret"' -- but you can't have "secret" frequencies as in "no one 
will ever find out what they are".

>   The Army introduced code books at the platoon level after their
>experiences in Vietnam.  There you had NVA and VietCong types who
>could not only talk with a perfect accent (take your pick, Australian,
>Alabama, Ohio, etc.), but would assume the role of "Birddog One" or
>whatever call sign someone might have been using for the past month.
>I've heard tapes of some of the conversations these people had over
>the air with American and Allied troops.  Pretty scary.

I'm actually surprised that they didn't have them before that... the Germans 
pulled the same kind of trickery in WWII once in a while.  The Army Air Corps
boys certainly had enough experience with that... German fighter pilots in captured
Allied fighters with Allied markings still on them used to infiltrate bomber formations
and attack the bombers.  It got so bad that the B-17 gunners would shoot
anything that got too close, no matter whose markings were on it.  OTOH, the Vietnam
War seems to have been when McNamara's young hotshots decided to toss out 
everything we learned about running a military over the last 2000 years as 
"old-fashioned" and start over from scratch...

Hmm.. the German fighter trick would be a good one to pull in Traveller --
Vargr/Zhos/Sword Worlders flying captured Imperial fighters/destroyers, infiltrate the
Imperial formation, and shoot the crap out of something big and expensive.  
Then bug out.

>Cynthia (still on her death bed) writes:

>>As the owner of a Ford Explorer who drives up to the local shotgun
>>range to get in some skeet shooting every other week,
>>"I resemble that remark..."  :-)  And I *do* live in the South...
>>YEEE-HAAA!!!

>   Speaking as the grandson of Kentucky coal miners and the proud
>owner of a Stephens Model 311 (made before serial numbers) double
>barrel shotgun, and a member of the Greene County Fish & Game Club,
>I can tell you the difference between plain good old country folk and
>brainless red necks [snip]
>   I take it Cynthia you are one of the country folks, and not a red neck....

Well, actually I've lived in the city or suburbia most of my adult life :-) 
I appreciate your analysis -- you hit it right on the nail.  I said I live in
the South -- I'm not Southern myself, I'm a Sourdough -- born on the Last
Frontier.
A lot of Alaskans still have the frontier mentality, and my husband *is* Southern
"country folk"... and we both spent years in the military.  I appreciate the military
for the job it does, and for the wonderful educational experience of living under
a (mostly) benign dictatorship.  It makes you appreciate your Rights, both Civil
and Divine, and makes one a bit testy about those who would whittle them away.
I find most (American) military folk to be that way.  

Down here (Mississippi and Lousiana), people tend to be a little sensitive about
the term "redneck" -- for years ignorant Yankees and other liberals have been
calling any conservative Southerner a "redneck", tarring "country folk", "rednecks",
and Republicans with the same brush.  As a result, true "country folk" defiantly
call themselves "rednecks" and are proud of it -- same reason they display Confederate
flags -- not to "annoy blacks", but for the reason you mentioned and to show
their defiance of those who would tell them that their ancestors were evil for defending
the 10th Amendment rights of the States they lived in.  I am seriously
considering getting a Confederate Flag bumper sticker, just because of all
the hurrah in the media about the Georgia and Mississippi state flags having
the Confederate Battle flag incorporated in them.  

Anyway, because I have several "country folk" friends who defiantly call themselves
"rednecks", what you call "redneck" I call "stupid jerk" or something less printable
on the TML (it starts with 'a' and ends with 'ole').  Although I tend to reserve the less
printable term for those who display a certain level of malevolence as well
as stupidity.

What does this have to do with Traveller?  I don't know.  Think of something.  Some
key words and tricky phrases just set me off in "rant" mode.  I understand
Steve is
having a nice argument over on xboat about merits of the 2nd Amendment, so it isn't
just me... or Steve.  Curiously enough, many of my views on government and people
are mirrored in the writings of some well known science-fiction writers: Robert A.
Heinlein, H. Beam Piper, Jerry Pournelle (though he's a little too monarchist), and
some less well known: F. Paul Wilson, for instance.

I also thought of another version of the Free Citizen's answer to 
> "Why does a civilian *need* BD?"

"Why, to wear with my TL15 Automatic RAM Grenade Launcher, the one that fires
anti-armor HEAP rounds... Why do I need that?  FGMP-15 are far too conspicuous
when fired from cover.  Oh, why do I need something like that at all?  To help the rest
of the militia take on the Imperial Marines if the Imperium gets too
oppressive..."

                                           -- Cynthia, who is recovering...

   "An armed man is a citizen; an unarmed man is a subject" 
               -- Bumper sticker on my truck.


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

Date: Sat, 18 Mar 95 15:02:07 CST
From: erich@bush.cs.tamu.edu (Erich Schneider)
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Subject: It just popped in there...
Message-ID: <9503182102.AA24106@ bush.cs.tamu.edu>

The idea just popped into my head ... please forgive me.

Virus-controlled cyborg K'kree. A "God" Virus which infects a K'kree 
library database.

Let's see the Hivers try to manipulate _that_!

-- 
Erich Schneider  erich@bush.cs.tamu.edu  http://bush.cs.tamu.edu/~erich

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

Date: Sat, 18 Mar 1995 15:24:17 -0800
From: tab@cco.caltech.edu (Tab Stephens)
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Cc: tab@cco.caltech.edu
Subject: How does body armor effect concussion damage?
Message-ID: <v01510104ab9113353949@[131.215.4.247]>

Regarding TNE planetary combat rules:

How does personal body armor effect concussion damage?  The rules for
explosions (TNE main book p. 283) tells how to apply concussion damage to
body parts.  What if these parts are armored?  Should there be a combination
of penetration and/or Blunt trauma?

"Official" answers are preferred, but all comments are welcome.



Thanks,


Tab

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End of TRAVELLER Digest 227
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