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Subject: Traveller-digest V1996 #720
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Traveller-digest     Thursday, December 5 1996     Volume 1996 : Number 720



(R)1996. Traveller is a registered trademark of FarFuture Enterprises.
All rights reserved.

The following topics are covered in this digest:

Re: Starships: Available Yet?
Re: Nuclear Dampers
Re: Emigration in Traveller
Re: Drop tanks
Disintegrators & democracy
Norris to the rescue! Part 3
Ambassadors
punishement
Re: "Basic Traveller"
Traveller Timeline (partial) now on web!
Traveller Timeline revisited...
Re: Traveller Timeline (partial) now on web!
Re: Landing ships.
Re: Traveller-digest V1996 #719
Re: Traveller-digest V1996 #719
Comets in Space
Duke Craig
Re: "Basic Traveller"
Geonee timeline on the WWW
Re: Ambassadors
Top 50 rpg's of all time
Re: punishement

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

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 06:54:22 -0500 (EST)
From: Shalom Zaidfeld <yu145850@yorku.ca>
Subject: Re: Starships: Available Yet?

On Thu, 5 Dec 1996, Phillip McGregor wrote:

> Hi, has anyone received the Starships book (supposedly available from
> November 18)? Is there a delay on it? I haven't seen any glad little cries
> on the group!

Yes.  I got it two days ago in the mail  (A bit of damaged in the spine)..  
Overall a nice SF resource book but not Traveller.   :-(

Contains all the old ship designs + new military ships...   and SSDS.

The deckplans are useless.  :(
Don't waste your money.    
     -Shalom Zaidfeld

- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Email: yu145850@yorku.ca                            |      Anthropology Major
"One day, it will happen.. one day,                 |         York University
 one day it will all make sense"   -Bjork, Debut    |         Toronto, Canada
                      

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

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 13:04:07 +0000
From: anders.backman@macademic.se (Anders Backman)
Subject: Re: Nuclear Dampers

>> So, is there any way to save the weak force damper other than (to me)
>> unrealistic rulings that non-fission pumped fusion warheads are
>> impossible.

>Such rulings *aren't* "unrealistic". Any such setup could be used to
>make smaller "pulsed fusion" powerplants. So you can't build a
>non-fission triggered fusion device that is *smaller* than a fusion
>powerplant of fairly high output.

If the min size of a fusion plant is say 14 Kl then a fusion trigger at
same TL should be much smaller as you'll need no neutron shielding, no
power generator, no cooling, no allowance for wear and tear of parts et c.

I'm saying that min size for non fission initiated fusion warheads is
related to min size of fusion p-plant but generally much smaller, say 10%
or something.


/Backman

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

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 13:05:17 +0000
From: anders.backman@macademic.se (Anders Backman)
Subject: Re: Emigration in Traveller

>Nope. If you check, you'll find that colonization efforts have *never*
>reduced the population of the colonizing nation.

Except the population of Sweden when we emigrated en masse to USA.


/Backman

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

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 13:09:13 +0100 (MET)
From: Hans Rancke-Madsen <rancke@diku.dk>
Subject: Re: Drop tanks

Tim Peters writes: 
>In a message dated 96-12-04 13:44:23 EST, Hans Rancke-Madsen wrote:
> 
>> (An X-boat fuel station in hex 1508 of the Spinward Marches would for
>>example cut weeks off the trip from Jewell to Regina). 
>  
>Who says the Imperium (or the Regency) wants that?  

Who says they have any choice in the matter? Such a station is within the
means of any medium+ population world, any subsector-sized or larger merchant 
company and even any subsector-wide news service. In fact, there's propably
several billionaires on each high-population world that could make a profit
of such an arrangement back on the stock market.

>Remember, Jewell to
>Regina is only two jumps at J-6.  I have always agreed with the notion that
>the government would have ways of disseminating information more rapidly than
>the civilians can get their hands on it.  Great way of keeping a step ahead
>of the locals.  Can you imagine being able to put your spin on a news story
> *before it breaks*!  Very useful stuff, indeed.  

Useful indeed, if you can get a monopoly. But even if we postulate that only 
the Megacorporations, the high-population worlds and the TAS would bother (a
very iffy proposition IMO), we still have over a dozen sources independent 
of the official Imperial networks.

BTW, those vicious claims that the jump-4 X-boat network was a symptom of
blatant cynicism on the part of the Imperium seems to be less than well
founded. Another news brief datelined 101-1105 stated:

        "...a  decision  has  been made to deploy Jump-6 L-Hyd drop 
        tank  express  boats  on all major express routes.  Initial 
        feasibility  studies  indicate  that  such  a  system could 
        average  jump-5.5  per week by executing maximum jumps when 
        possible,  and  leaving  current xboat units to disseminate
        information between the new major relay points.  The system
        is  expected  to cut communication time to the Imperial hub 
        to  under 25 weeks.  The Initial System Deployment Schedule
        indicates  that the Regina subsector can expect to be fully 
        integrated into the network within a decade."

Obviously the project ran into unexpected delays, but the intentions were
there.

Remember that in Classic Traveller Jump-4 was the best you could fit into
a 100 T ship thanks to the minimum size of 20 T for a bridge (And if that
really has been deliberately changed in T4, some important part of the
background has been invalidated. @#$%^&*()_+!!!

>And who is to say that there isn't a secret base there already?  Got to be 
>some comets or something floating around out there in deep space for the 
>military to exploit.  

True, but in the Traveller Universe such black worlds must be very hard to
detect. There should be lots (I don't know if it's thousands or millions,
so I'll settle for 'lots') of such interstellar debris in every "empty"
hex in the Traveller Universe, so if they were anything but incredibly
difficult to spot, bang goes much of the Traveller background. IMO such
bodies are only found as a result of misjumps and they become fantastically
valuable (I've had plans to use one as a McGuffin, but never got around to
it).

Note that I don't argue that this is realistic in Real Life (tm) terms,
just that this is the way things are in the TU (Which does not, contrary
to what some people like to think, bear more than a passing resemblence
the real universe).


      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: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 12:41:51 GMT
From: Stewart Eyres <spe@astro.keele.ac.uk>
Subject: Disintegrators & democracy

>OK: it's possible to dampen the Strong Nuclear Force... what about a
>weapon system that has the _opposite_ effect?  Things go boom?

Isn't an offensive weapons grade Nuclear Damper a Disintegrator? About
TL 17 I think, in MT/CT.  Of course, this isn't the same as
strengthening the SNF, which I guess would lead to the implosion of
matter and little black holes.  It wouldn't go boom in a vacuum
though!  Would probably also have severe effects on the locality of
any battle - not that that has ever stopped the military.  A combat
zone marked off limits because of the chance of being sucked up by a
black hole - punishment duty for the navy is to be in the repulsor
fitted starships charged with keeping the black holes from straying
("...the trouble with black holes, you see is that they are black, and
space is black, so seeing the black holes is difficult...").


>I can't see a democracy in the Western Civilization sense really
>working.

Well, no better than it does in Western Civilization.  Or Eastern or
Southern for that matter.  It depends if your model of "democracy" is
the narrow one of representative democracy, whih is the version the
dominant West is trying to foist on the rest of the world, or a wider
model of democratic accountability - ie. the leadership have to
account to their people for their actions and the consequences
thereof, if they don't they are removed.  Read Lois McMaster Bujold's
Vor/Barrayar series for a world which is moving towards democratic
power without bothering with all this election stuff.  Also,
C. J. Cherryh's Cyteen for a representative democracy with a radically
different method of deciding the representatives.

Stewart Eyres <spe@astro.keele.ac.uk>

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

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 13:58:36 +0100 (MET)
From: Hans Rancke-Madsen <rancke@diku.dk>
Subject: Norris to the rescue! Part 3

Harold Hale writes:
 > From: Hans Rancke-Madsen writes:
> 
>>Your're wrong there, Harold. The worst case scenario is that the 
>>attempt to restore the Imperium provokes the Zhodani into taking 
>>over the Domain of Deneb. 
> 
>   Which if you read the entirety of my originial post is what I postulate
>would happen.  I further stated, however, that this absorption by the
>Zhodanis would be voluntary on the part of Norris, particularly if the
>Dominion of Deneb were faced with the prospect of being destroyed by the
>Aslan and the Vargr.  Think of it as the lesser of two evils.

IIRC what you said was that the attempt would leave the Regency so weak
that the Aslans, Vargr, and Sword Worlds would wreak such havoc that the
Zhodani would interfere. That's wrong. What I said was that the attempt 
could provoke the Zhodani into stepping in. The Zhodani have the strength 
to defeat the Domain; the bit players do not.

>>then the Aslans and the Vargr can be dealt with by the reserve 
>>fleets while the regular forces goes a-battling.
> 
>   The Imperial reserve fleets in the region are no where near powerful
>enough in this era to hold off simultaneous attacks by the Aslan and Vargr.

The defensive forces of each world amounts to 70% of the naval budget. That
gives them 3.5 trillion credit squadrons per billion inhabitants. The
reserve fleets gets half of the rest and the regular fleets the other half.
Even with all the regular forces gone away, the reserve fleets are almost
as powerful on their own. They are supposed to be a TL lower than the
regular fleets, at least on the average, but I'm not sure just how much
sense that makes. Even if that is true, they are still equivalent to the
Aslan clan fleets and a TL up on their _ihatei_ fleets and the Vargr.
Hell, Norris could send off the reserve fleets and all he would lose would
be the low and medium population worlds. The high-population worlds, which
accounts for 99% of the strength of the Domain, are invulnerable to any-
thing the Aslans and the Vargr can muster. And that is only if Imperial
regulations forbid single worlds to build starships; if 10% of the
defense forces of Tobia, Glisten, Mora, Rhylanor, Trin, Deneb, Vincennes,
and the rest of the high-pop, high-tech worlds are jump-capable then he
could propably defend the other worlds too, though I admit that now the
Aslans and the Vargr have a sporting chance. Until Norris gets the idea
to offer the _Ihatei_ land for fighting the Vargr, of course...

>The combined Imperial forces present (both frontline and reserve fleets)
>were only powerful enough to keep the OutWorld Coalition in check until the
>massive Corridor Fleet could arrive and save day like the cavalry riding in
>to save the town in the old American Westerns.  

The Outworld Coalition included the Zhodani. In fact, the Zhodani must have
been 90+% of the Outworld Coalition. That made all the difference.

>With the Cooridor Fleet off fighting Dulinor for Lucan, and the frontline 
>fleets off on a fool's errand trying to rescue Strephon (as proposed), 
>you'd see a repeat of the blitzkrieg the Solomani pulled in the Old E
xpanses early in the war.

The Aslan _ihatei_ are handicapped by the fact that they are divided, using 
inferior ships, use a big slice of their budget for transport ships, wants
to settle down with their family in peace, and is at the end of a multi-
parsec supply line. The notion of rational being genociding a planetary
population and then settling their own family down as a nice big fat
retaliatory goal is really ludicrous. The Vargr are handicapped by the fact
that their raiding is (supposedly) a business proposition. But raiding
against an armed enemy is a losing proposition. Pirates make a profit
by attacking defenseless merchant ships, not planetary defense forces.
And their ships are inferior too. The Domain starts out with a 5 to 1
advantage from the TL difference between 15 and 13 to start with.

>>Whether they would do any good at all is quite another matter. I 
>>think you'd need at least three factions cooperating before they'd 
>>have a chance. 
> 
>   As the storyline was written, this simply wasn't going to happen.

No, of course not. That's the way the storyline was written. But aren't
we talking about "what-ifs"?

> >If Strephon had started out by going to see first Brzk and then Margaret 
> >personally and convinced them that he was genuine, then gone to the Vilani
> >and sent for Norris' forces then he might have been able to pull it off.
> 
>   Remember, the only people who know Strephon is really Strephon is Strephon
>and his closest advisors.  Pretty much everyone else outside of Strephon's
>territory is convinced that he is a fraud.  It is unlikely that anyone would
>meet with him, even if he could manage the journey.

Brzz and Margaret are some of the people that Strephon could convince in a
face to face confrontation simply because there would be things Strephon
would know that even a duplicate wouldn't. These are people who usually
meet him personally. (It's rather strange that Dulinor wasn't informed
ahead of time that Strephon wasn't available; as an Arch-duke who must
have been close to Strephon on numerous occasions he'd surely know the
score and rate the truth (It's also strange that he didn't try to make 
sure of the clones too)). Brzz appears to have been an honourable Vargr
and it would have been to Margaret's advantage to hook up with a genuine
Strephon, since she would propably have thought herself his natural heir.

Norris he could propably even convince with a simple letter once he heard 
about his "elevation" to Archduke. Who else but the true Emperor could be 
_sure_ that it was a sham? (Including a confirmation would be a good move ;-)

No, I think a Grand Tour of the periphery of the imperium while Lucan and
Dulinor battered each other would have been worthwhile. Imagine how many
more defections a Strephon backed by an Archduke and a close personal
relation would have inspired. The Solomani would be a problem in any case
and the Rim is propably irretrivably lost, but I think Strephon could have
put the rest of Humpty-Dumpty together again.


      Hans Rancke
University of Copenhagen
     rancke@diku.dk
- ------------
        "The referee should determine the nature of subsequent
         events based on the individual situation."
                                _76 Patrons_, p. 8

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

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 12:57:04 GMT
From: Stewart Eyres <spe@astro.keele.ac.uk>
Subject: Ambassadors

Hi there

>Can you imagine the negotiations?
>
>   Strephon: "Well, we'd really like the Aslan not to engage in fleet actions
>in the Reaver's Deep sector."
>   Aslan Ambassador: " I think that would be acceptable, I'll get back to you
>on that in a year-and-a-half."

Well, if you really want to make that sort of agreement, you give your
ambassador a damn good briefing and plenipotentiary powers.  Such work
has been carried out with restricted and long communication lags for
most of the history of the major Terran Empires, prior to the 20th
Century.  Of course, who is to say that the Ambassador hasn't already
made agreements with say Duke Craig - but Craig is a vassal to
Strephon, so the Ambassador travels to see the Emperor to convey the
goodwill of his clan, and magnify the honour of both parties, and on
his return he is accompanied by Duke Craig to Kusyu to present the
Duke's credentials and assure the Aslan clan head of the Imperium's
good intentions.  Of course, the ambassador never got the chance to
make the return journey...

Just because the subordinates make the deals doesn't mean the heads
aren't involved, especially in honour-and-fealty bound systems like
the Imperium and the Aslan Hierate.

Stewart Eyres <spe@astro.keele.ac.uk>

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

Date: Thu, 05 Dec 96 13:29:40 -0800
From: Timothy Collinson <tc@library.solent.ac.uk>
Subject: punishement

I wrote:
>>I love the idea but wouldn't that count as 'cruel and ususual'   >>punishment?

Hugh Foster replied:

>Yup, in a democracy. But how many Traveller worlds are democracies? Not >many, Betty!

I take your point but I would have thought that the concept needn't 
necessarily be limited to democracies.  After all a religious 
dictactorship could be constrained by its 'religion' and I'm sure 
(every?) other government type could have exceptions like this too.  (If 
only I had time to think of them all!)

Perhaps another UPP could be designed.  A universal punishment profile.  
Obviously its generation would be linked to law level, government type 
and maybe even population.  It could detail (or give guidance to 
travellers regarding), length of judicial process, type of process, 
severity of punishment (which maybe entirely unrelated to law-level), 
types of punishment (e.g. only corporal, no imprisonment, small fines, 
etc.), portions of population it doesn't apply to, and so on.

While I appreciate the detail isn't always going to be necessary, if a 
'generation' procedure was designed, it would be handy on some occasions. 
 Certainly might scare the whatevers out of PCs if they're caught doing 
something illegal and think they'll get off lightly only to find that the 
world they're on has a complex legal system which will take years to 
resolve say, or uses some form of psionic mind adjustment however trivial 
the offence!

The possibilities (as ever) seem endless!

tc

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

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 09:05:51 -0500
From: CardSharks@aol.com
Subject: Re: "Basic Traveller"

In a message dated 96-12-03 23:06:23 EST, you write:

> 
>  Was it the three little black books (the products that list these 
>  four are all from the era when TTB and the two-book (Rules, Forms & 
>  Charts) verson were dominant)?  I don't believe I've seen a boxed set of 
>  the three black books that is designated "basic traveller."  Was there a 
>  third boxed set that I don't know about?  Or was this just something used 
>  internally at GDW, but not on an actual product box?
>  
>  
The original edition of Traveller (ie Basic Traveller) was a three book
set...
B1 Characters and Combat
B2 Starships
B3 Worlds and Adventures.
They came in a black box much like the original D&D set.

Marc Miller

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

Date: Thu, 05 Dec 1996 8:27:43 CST
From: Don McKinney <dmckinne@csci.csc.com>
Subject: Traveller Timeline (partial) now on web!

I'll be adding more Traveller stuff soon, but my Traveller Timeline (from
everything I own) is now at "http://www.prairienet.org/~dmckinne/trav.html"

I am wanting more timeline information from stuff I don't own, and I use a 
Microsoft Works 3.0 database to manipulate it  - contact me if you can help!
- --
=============================================================================
= Donald E. McKinney, Release Coordinator, Communications Industry Services =
= (217) 351-8250 x2365  Computer Sciences Corporation dmckinne@csci.csc.com =
= Official Kibitzer for Digest Group Publications   dmckinne@prairienet.org = 
= Winter War XXIV Convention Chairman, February 14-16, 1997, Champaign, IL  =
=============================================================================

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

Date: Thu, 05 Dec 1996 8:33:18 CST
From: Don McKinney <dmckinne@csci.csc.com>
Subject: Traveller Timeline revisited...

Please feel free to submit campaign-only or non-official material to my
timeline (I have a priority code in the database).

If you submit any thing, use the following format:

Date 		Details
		Reference (Publisher, Book, Page)

Thanks!
- --
=============================================================================
= Donald E. McKinney, Release Coordinator, Communications Industry Services =
= (217) 351-8250 x2365  Computer Sciences Corporation dmckinne@csci.csc.com =
= Official Kibitzer for Digest Group Publications   dmckinne@prairienet.org = 
= Winter War XXIV Convention Chairman, February 14-16, 1997, Champaign, IL  =
=============================================================================

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

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 08:36:49 -0600 (CST)
From: "Joseph E. Walsh" <ransom@connect.iconnect.net>
Subject: Re: Traveller Timeline (partial) now on web!

On Thu, 5 Dec 1996, Don McKinney wrote:

> I'll be adding more Traveller stuff soon, but my Traveller Timeline (from
> everything I own) is now at "http://www.prairienet.org/~dmckinne/trav.html"

Even as a work-in-progress, that timeline is fantastic.  Everyone 
involved with making Traveller products should have a copy of it.

Thank you for putting it together, Don!


- -Joe
______________________________________________________________________________
Joseph E. Walsh      |  Atari 8-Bit User and Programmer Since 1982
ransom@iconnect.net  |  Classic Traveller Referee Since 1983
Stuck in the '80s    |  Microsoft-Free and Loving It! :)
       .....Official Reporter of Imperium Games Product Info.....

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

Date: Thu, 05 Dec 1996 10:00:22 -0400 (EDT)
From: Robert Flammang <FLAMMANG@vms.cis.pitt.edu>
Subject: Re: Landing ships.

Hi.

> From: "David P. Summers" <DSummers@Mail.ARC.NASA.gov>

> Now I have decided that the point is a) it takes a while to
> properly get a ship ready for takeoff and b) since they
> weigh a "lot" even grass over hard packed dirt can be
> assumed to be sufficient to safely support a ship.

> I was just wondering what other people's takes on this
> were?

Your points sound reasonable.

My take has been that the obstacles to landing outside of a starport
are (usually) purely bureaucratic. The interstellar government wants
to keep control over interstellar trade. See the sub-adventure "Zilan
Wine" in the Traveller Adventure for example.

- -Rob

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

Date: 05 Dec 1996 14:11:45 GMT
From: ajpursell@babylon.montreal.qc.ca (Alan Pursell)
Subject: Re: Traveller-digest V1996 #719

okay fine... I'm sorry... my unsubscribe that I sent wasn't sent after all...
wasn't supposed to happen...

how about a thread on a neo-luddite type underground political movement among
the solmani...

severe hatred of computers, a believe that everything was so much better a
few minutes ago and if things could only be like they were back in the early
days...

the creation of mega-viruses...

smashing of terminals et al...

really daring wackos could go after jump-ships and the jump port to try and
their little culture a self-contained paradise...


alan

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

Date: 05 Dec 1996 14:11:45 GMT
From: ajpursell@babylon.montreal.qc.ca (Alan Pursell)
Subject: Re: Traveller-digest V1996 #719

okay fine... I'm sorry... my unsubscribe that I sent wasn't sent after all...
wasn't supposed to happen...

how about a thread on a neo-luddite type underground political movement among
the solmani...

severe hatred of computers, a believe that everything was so much better a
few minutes ago and if things could only be like they were back in the early
days...

the creation of mega-viruses...

smashing of terminals et al...

really daring wackos could go after jump-ships and the jump port to try and
their little culture a self-contained paradise...


alan

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

Date: Thu, 05 Dec 96 10:45:04 -0500
From: lewis@slipher.chara.gsu.edu.chara.gsu.edu (Lewis Roberts)
Subject: Comets in Space

Tim Peter wrote:
>Got to be some comets or something
>floating around out there in deep space for the military to exploit.  In MT
>Arrival Vengeance the AHL-class cruiser conducts comet-refueling deep within
>the Great Rift.  In fact, I've been curious as to how plausible that is.  Any
>astronomer types out there know?  Let me know.  

It is thought that when stars come near each other that they will
gravitationally eject comets from each other's Oort Clouds.  I even
read that some of the comets that we see from the earth might have been
from other star systems.  This all assumes that most stars have Oort
Clouds, an assumption that seems to be true in Traveller.  I don't know
hard numbers for how many comets there would be in deep space, but my
feeling is not very many. But this isn't my field of study so I could
easily be wrong.


Lewis Roberts
- -----------------------------------------------------------------
Q:What did Noah use to light up the Ark? 
A:Floodlights!        
       
lewis@chara.gsu.edu
http://www.chara.gsu.edu/~lewis/roberts.html
- ----------------------------------------------------------------- 

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

Date: Thu, 05 Dec 96 10:47:25 -0500
From: lewis@slipher.chara.gsu.edu.chara.gsu.edu (Lewis Roberts)
Subject: Duke Craig

Douglas Berry wrote:
>The leader I wanted to see come out of the Rebellion intact was Duke Craig
>of Daibei.  A calm, competent man who withdrew into his borders and refused
>to sentence his people to ruin because two madmen wanted the same shiny chair.

Speaking of Duke Craig, does anyone know why in the Rebellion
Sourcebook instead of his picture there was a picture of a lizard? 
Never understood that

Lewis Roberts
- -----------------------------------------------------------------
Q:What did Noah use to light up the Ark? 
A:Floodlights!        
       
lewis@chara.gsu.edu
http://www.chara.gsu.edu/~lewis/roberts.html
- ----------------------------------------------------------------- 

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

Date: Thu, 05 Dec 1996 07:52:00 -0800
From: Douglas McCorison <douglas@camax.com>
Subject: Re: "Basic Traveller"

Mused wrote:
> 
> Joseph E. Walsh wrote:
> > The question comes when they list a fourth version: "Basic Traveller" -
> > to what are they referring?  Which version of the Traveller rules was
> > "Basic Traveler?"
> While not 100% sure, I think basic traveller was the first 3 books, a spinward marches
> mini-supplement in a Striker (first version) sized box

I just got a copy of "The Traveller Adventure".  I was reading the introductory 
material.  It specifies that you must have ".... or Basic Traveller" and then 
follows in parentheses a list of the first three books.

Douglas

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

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 19:36:12 GMT
From: Carlos Alos-Ferrer <alos@merlin.fae.ua.es>
Subject: Geonee timeline on the WWW

        Thanks to Scott Galliand, the extended Geonee Timeline I was
speaking about is now available at the WWW. Check Scott's page:
http://members.aol.com/sgalli5794/traveller
- --------------------------------------------------------------------------
Carlos Alos-Ferrer                          E-mail: Alos@merlin.fae.ua.es
Dpt. Fundamentos del Analisis Economico     Phn: (34) 6 5903400, Ext. 3226
Universidad de Alicante                          (34) 6 5903614
03071-Alicante (Spain)                      Fax: (34) 6 5903685
- --------------------------------------------------------------------------

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

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 12:43:11 -0500
From: TPeterAZ@aol.com
Subject: Re: Ambassadors

In a message dated 96-12-05 08:05:39 EST, Stewart Eyres wrote:

> the Ambassador travels to see the Emperor to convey the
>  goodwill of his clan, and magnify the honour of both parties, and on
>  his return he is accompanied by Duke Craig to Kusyu to present the
>  Duke's credentials and assure the Aslan clan head of the Imperium's
>  good intentions.  Of course, the ambassador never got the chance to
>  make the return journey...
>  
>  Just because the subordinates make the deals doesn't mean the heads
>  aren't involved, especially in honour-and-fealty bound systems like
>  the Imperium and the Aslan Hierate.
>  

Oh, absolutely, 100 percent agreed.  My point was, more specifically, that
the subordinates *DO* make the deals.  The emperor lends credence to the
whole thing, but isn't terribly involved in the actual negotiations (if at
all.)  To give the closest thing I can relate from my experience, I worked
for a while in technical sales as a field rep.  My "office" was located right
here in my house in Phoenix, AZ.  The corporate offices are located in Texas,
and the national sales manager lived in Florida.  For a variety of reasons
Arizona doesn't follow daylight savings time (don't get me started), so for
half the year I was 2 hours behind the home office, and three hours behind my
boss.  In my experience, customers (and probably foriegn dignitaries) don't
like to get hung up waiting too long over "the fine print."  If a customer
called my at 4:30pm MST (long after my boss and the "home office" called it a
day) and wanted to place an order that was contingent on various provisions,
it was my call whether or not to accept them, in full or in part.  I always
had the ability to tell them, "No way.  It's against company policy," whether
it was or not, if I felt we (the company) weren't getting a fair deal.  Twice
per year, the sales manager would come out and glad hand my large accounts
(like the Ambassador going to see Strephon, except, for reasons of etiquette,
the "customer" goes to the "boss," rather than the other way around.)  When
he arrived, I would brief him on "company policies" I had created for certain
deals, and he just played along.  And I'm only talking about a delay of a
couple of measly hours.  Imagine the power I would have needed to have if the
delay were weeks or months.  That's the point I've been eating up bandwidth
trying to make for the last couple of days.  Duke Craig could probably say
with complete confidence, "The Imperium is unable to comply with your request
Mr. Ambassador," or something of the sort, and Strephon would probably agree
if called on it.  Why do you suppose it's brought up so often that nobles are
taught to serve.  Hell, you wouldn't need to teach 'em anything if everything
was set in stone or if there was someone they could ask.  Also note the
Imperial Encyclopedia entries (players and referees section) about Imperial
Stationary.  I bet the a duke or duchess could use it to write an "Imperial
decree" in the name of the emperor when absolutely necessary, for the
credence lent by the name.  Obviously, if this was abused, the emperor would
not be pleased and would likely remove the noble from office, but it's
possible (and probably necessary to effectively run the Imperium) for the
dukes to wield that power.  Divergent opinions welcome, but I (obviously)
feel pretty strongly about this one.


Tim Peter
<TPeterAZ@aol.com>
"Never let your schooling get in the way of your education."--- Mark Twain

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

Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 17:43:32 +0000 (GMT)
From: mark james wilkin <aa4mwi@zen.sunderland.ac.uk>
Subject: Top 50 rpg's of all time

Arcane Magazine has just had a vote from its readers on the best rpg's ever.
And Traveller came in at number 3, just below AD&D and Call Of Cuthulu at 
number 1. Check out its page on www.futurenet.co.uk they might have put 
the article on line by now.
*That piece of point useless information was brought to you by*
mark wilkin
 

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

Date: Thu, 05 Dec 1996 09:52:25 -0800
From: "Douglas E. Berry" <dberry@hooked.net>
Subject: Re: punishement

At 01:29 PM 12/5/96 -0800, you wrote:

>I take your point but I would have thought that the concept needn't 
>necessarily be limited to democracies.  After all a religious 
>dictactorship could be constrained by its 'religion' and I'm sure 
>(every?) other government type could have exceptions like this too.  (If 
>only I had time to think of them all!)

Example: The Roman Catholic Church claims to follow the teachings of the
Prince of Peace, Jesus Christ.  The RCC also launched the Crusades, the
Spanish Inquisition, and the complete destruction of the Inca when they
politely told the Spanish to go away.  Every Christian sect has this
problem; in the US we get people gunning down women's health workers in
God's name, the Ku Klux Klan claims to follow God, etc...  Just because the
priest says "love your neighbor" and "turn the other cheek" doesn't mean
that the Holy Office is going to go lightly on you if you commit heresy.


+----------------------------------------------+
| Douglas E. Berry          dberry@hooked.net  |
|     Professional Driver - Traveller Guru     |
|        http://www.hooked.net/~dberry/        |
|**********************************************|
| "Life's a journey, not a destination."       |
|                                   -Aerosmith |
+----------------------------------------------+

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

End of Traveller-digest V1996 #720
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