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From: owner-traveller-digest@mpgn.com (Traveller-digest)
To: traveller-digest@Phaser.ShowCase.MPGN.COM
Subject: Traveller-digest V1996 #770
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Sender: owner-traveller-digest@mpgn.com


Traveller-digest    Wednesday, December 18 1996    Volume 1996 : Number 770



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

The following topics are covered in this digest:

Ship design formulae
Starships - questions and more comments from a newbie
re: Starships
Re: kEwL!!! a FlAmE wAr!!!!!!
Re: RCES LBD
Re: Is T4 Innovative?
RE: Imperium Games, Starships, future products
Re: Jumpspace.
Re: Jumpspace.
Re: Jumpspace.
Re: An opinion and a question...
RE: CORE: ADVANCED CHARACTER GENERATION - Tell Us All!
Re: An opinion and a question...
SSDS FSY Caligula-class 1000Td megayacht
Re: kEwL!!! a FlAmE wAr!!!!!!
RE: But It Doesn't Look The Way _I_ Want It...
Ken Whitman

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 09:19:55 +0100 (MET)
From: Thomas Biskup <tb@saranxis.ruhr.de>
Subject: Ship design formulae

Hi everyone!

After my number of rants about the low quality of the T4 rules and books I
finally decided to do something more constructive: since my first attempt
to design a ship with the Starships rules was pretty frustrating (I hate
them the way they are presented... totally obfuscated to me) I decided to
rewrite the SSDS for more clarity and a little more brevity.  Since I'm
coming from a mathematical background I'll also junk tables whenever
possible and will replace them by nice and short formulae (which IMHO
e.g. show the differences between hull shapes a lot better than huge
tables).

I've started on it this morning and will continue over the next days (as
my time permits) and will provide my revised design system probably in
postscript, HTML and maybe one or two other formats for proofreading and
checking by more experienced Traveller players on the list (if anyone is
interested that is).  If I like my final results I even will consider to
submit them to JTAS (with credit given to everyone who helped on it
naturally).

This leads to a question: how do I subscribe to the GDW-Beta list?  Since
rules discussions for new supplements seem to take place there I'd like to
see what they are doing before (as far as I am concerned; no insult
intended) the jug breaks again, if I dare say so :-)

Studying the tables in Starships already astonished me a couple of times:
is it correct that all the airlock data in all the hull tables is the
same?  Looking at them I couldn't see any difference.  the nice thing
about this is that I can save at least one page of rules by replacing the
air lock data with 6 tiny formulae (is that really the correct plural?  As
a native german I always believed it to be 'formulas'... where's my
dictionary?).

My results so far: it's pretty simple to derive some formulae for the
volume, the size code, the air lock data and the jump drive data without
*any* tables.  For the length and the surface area of a given
configuration I seem to need a table for some basic numbers (up to now I
could not find any real pattern for these things).

Now I'd naturally be interested in formulae for all the weapon data and
such things (figuring them out from the tables probably is a lot of work,
if possible at all).  Any help would be appreciated :-)

Greetings from Germany,

				Thomas.

- --
Thomas Biskup                               email to: tb@saranxis.ruhr.de
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
"Would you choose one life over one thousand?
 I refuse to let arithmetic decide questions like that."
                          -- Data and Picard, "Justice", stardate 41255.6

 

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

Date: Tue, 17 Dec 1996 23:49:33 +0100 (MET)
From: Thomas Biskup <tb@saranxis.ruhr.de>
Subject: Starships - questions and more comments from a newbie

Hi!

This evening I tried to design my first ship ever for Traveller using the
SSDS from Starships.  My initial experiences with the system and the rules
as presented were not very good and I discovered that the rules leave some
more questions open (or I missed something).

First of all I was wondering about the effect of high G-values with
maneuver drives.  The ship I tried to design was a kind of emergency
vessel for the rich nobility should the need arise to leave a planet in a
hurry (maybe because of a rebellion or something like that) and thus needs
good acceleration values (among other things) to get away from potential
pursuit.

Thus I wanted to have a small, high-acceleration ship with good stealth
values and a minor jump drive to be able to escape to the next system.

I decided to read the system while designing the ship (probably my first
mistake) and headed initially for an 8G maneuver drive.  Now the ship
obviously need some compensation for such acceleration values.  On page
103 there are two tables labeled 'G-Tanks (TL 8-9)' and 'Maximum Gs
Compensated' which do not seem to be used in the text (or I missed the
relevant parts; the missing references in SSDS are really annoying and
make it very difficult to learn the system :-( ).  What the heck is a
G-tank and what are its effects?  What is the meaning of the second table?
What meanings do the different G-values in that table have?  As far as I
can see form the table I won't be able to have full compensation for 8Gs
at TL12... so what are the game effects of 'excess G values'?

Then I started to look at the travel formulae for starships in the basic
rules (page 115) since I wanted to get some idea of how fast this little
ship really would be.  The section on interstellar travel mentions that
the transit time for a ship with 1G acceleration from a size 8 world to
100 diameters is about 5 hours.  This value obviously was not calculated
with the travel formulae on that page (size 8 world: 12800km, jump
position at 12800 * 100 = 1,280,000km; T = 2 * square root(D [in meters] /
A) = 2 * sqrt(1,280,000,000 / 8) =~ 25298 seconds =~ 7 hours).  Thus my'd
TL12 8G acceleration ship would need longer than a 1G acceleration ship.
Do these formulae only apply to travel between worlds?  Even then I can't
see the reasoning?  What's my mistake?

Another problem I had with the SSDS itself (maybe it's just my approach) 
is this: rather late in the design process I discovered that I nearly had
used up all the space (volume and surface area) available for a 100t
displacement ship, which either would force me to start over with a larger
ship or force me to forfeit some nifty equipment.  Is there any more
intelligent approach other than just trying and starting again and again 
until one has figured out the best possible configuration (especially
the size)?

I also found it a little difficult to deside for a specific hull type
(checking all those tables to see which configuration might be most
appropriate for my goal is really tedious).  I really miss some textual
advice on this in the rules (which are really lacking comments and
examples for about everything :-( ).  I never liked Fire, Fusion & Steel
(maybe that's my basic problem) since all the math never did seem to yield
any realistic results and thus for me was not worth the trouble -- maybe
that's my basic problem :_)

Other things I didn't manage to figure out:

What's the use of EMM?  The text doesn't seem to mention this.  What's the
difference between basic and standard life support?  How is stealth used?
What use is the artifical gravity/inertial compensation table?

Finally (after some frustration I started to page through the TNE
rulebook) I noticed that the TNE rules provide a very nice start & land
sequence for starships (IMHO; when I bought the rules I put the book away
in disgust before I got that far) where players have to use some skills
and rules for emergency starts, etc.  I really feel that these details are
missing in T4 since many of the spaceship-related skills (especially
Astrogation) seem to be basically useless in the T4 rules (is there any
comment anywhere in the rules on when and how to use this skill?).  I
really plan to use the TNE system (maybe slightly modified)  for my T4
campaign (should I ever get around to start one before giving up in
frustration about the shoddy rules). 
What are you all doing in your games if the PCs want to fly away with
their ship?  Is this automatically possible if they have the skills, do
you make up some checks or were you never concerned about this?

Final comments on the presentation of the Starship rules: the missing
references are annoying, the missing explanations even more troubling, the
color art is really placed in one of the worst possible positions (it
constantly gets into ones way), the number-loaded tables are really
tedious [I'd really prefer a couple of well-organized formulae] and
generally I'd lower my review rating for the rules from 6.5 to about 3.5.
As well the designer probably wanted it to be -- the presentation is
really bad and the editors are really guilty of neglecting to make the
rules readable for persons who want to understand them without knowing how
they worked in previous Traveller editions (thus I'd lower my editing
rating from 7 to 4, too; this makes for a new overall 3.2 out of 10 rating
for Starships... *ouch!*). 

Help would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance,

				Thomas Biskup.

- --
Thomas Biskup                               email to: tb@saranxis.ruhr.de
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
"Would you choose one life over one thousand?
 I refuse to let arithmetic decide questions like that."
                          -- Data and Picard, "Justice", stardate 41255.6

 

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 09:49:26 -0800
From: bmac@astro.ucla.edu (Bruce Alan Macintosh)
Subject: re: Starships

>First the curled fins gotta go. [on the lab ship]

The lab ship (as designed) isn't even streamlined, for god's sake - why
does it need *fins*? 

I suppose my entry for the explain-the-artwork contest would be to suggest
that the "fins" are actually the folding passive sensor array, unfolded.

Bruce

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 12:58:33 -0500
From: TPeterAZ@aol.com
Subject: Re: kEwL!!! a FlAmE wAr!!!!!!

In a message dated 96-12-18 01:43:32 EST, Roderick D. Elliott wrote:

>   I'm going to go disinfect and exorcise my keyboard now, and then go
>  to sleep and pretend that Digest #767 never happened...
>  

A beacon through the fog...Land Ho!!!


Tim Peter
<TPeterAZ@aol.com>
"There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, Ignorance."--- Socrates

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 13:00:05 -0500
From: TPeterAZ@aol.com
Subject: Re: RCES LBD

In a message dated 96-12-18 09:47:20 EST, Leonard Erickson wrote:

> So keeping the stuff cold isn't a big problem. Especially in space.
>  It's the folks on the ground that have the real problems. In space, you
>  can liquefy hydrogen, or even helium simply by sheilding it from the
>  star and local planets, and letting it radiate its heat to empty space
>  (effective temp of the empty sky is 4 K). You have to be patient, but
>  it will work!
>  


Speaking of beacons through the fog...

Hi, Leonard.  Now, I'm assuming that on the ground there would be a kinds of
steam as the outer surfaces of LH2 containers are much colder than the air
around them, right?  Makes for great visual at a starport refuelling area.

Tim Peter
<TPeterAZ@aol.com>
"There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, Ignorance."--- Socrates

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 96 18:16 GMT0
From: aboulton@cix.compulink.co.uk (Andrew Boulton)
Subject: Re: Is T4 Innovative?

In-Reply-To: <32B4E54B.4789@siscom.net>

> I ask the question, "is T4 innovative?" because I'm trying to think
> of some aspect of the game that is not just a recycling of something
> else.  Could the truly hardcore fans of T4 among us list those things
> that T4 does that have never been done before, or are being done in a
> unique way?  I was discussing T4 with a friend, and came up empty.

T4 (IMHO) is not innovative; it does nothing in a new and exciting way. 
But so what? Very few RPGs are (especially these days). Innovation 
doesn't mean it's any good - maybe the reason nobody has used an idea 
before is that it stinks! CT was innovative, T4 is just the latest 
version.

    ---------=========oooooooooOOOOOOOOooooooooo=========---------
Andrew M J Boulton                  http://www.compulink.co.uk/~fubar/
 "Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste"

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 96 18:16 GMT0
From: aboulton@cix.compulink.co.uk (Andrew Boulton)
Subject: RE: Imperium Games, Starships, future products

In-Reply-To: <01BBEB91.E48928C0@ppp-oca-fl-014.atlantic.net>

<< Don't forget the bathrooms either!!!

I don't know how many starship deckplans I've seen that 
have been drawn without any such facilities.  Of course
humans may not need to go to the bathroom a thousand 
years from now.... >>

I thought they were included in staterooms?

    ---------=========oooooooooOOOOOOOOooooooooo=========---------
Andrew M J Boulton                  http://www.compulink.co.uk/~fubar/
 "Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste"

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 96 18:16 GMT0
From: aboulton@cix.compulink.co.uk (Andrew Boulton)
Subject: Re: Jumpspace.

In-Reply-To: <199612170207.NAA25532@blitzen.canberra.edu.au>

> Anyway, we were getting our butts
> kicked, so we jumped into the cutter (or whatever it was) which didn't have
> a jump drive.  We un docked from the ship and floated of in to Jumpspace.
> The Ref didn't have any Idea what do do here, so he kinda made some rules
> up.  Could someone out there please tell me what should of happened?  Also

[passes over blank character sheet and 2D6...]

> could someone tell me what jumpspace is supposed to look like?

I use Niven's 'blindspot'.

    ---------=========oooooooooOOOOOOOOooooooooo=========---------
Andrew M J Boulton                  http://www.compulink.co.uk/~fubar/
 "Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste"

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 96 18:16 GMT0
From: aboulton@cix.compulink.co.uk (Andrew Boulton)
Subject: Re: Jumpspace.

In-Reply-To: <199612170207.NAA25532@blitzen.canberra.edu.au>

> Anyway, we were getting our butts
> kicked, so we jumped into the cutter (or whatever it was) which didn't have
> a jump drive.  We un docked from the ship and floated of in to Jumpspace.
> The Ref didn't have any Idea what do do here, so he kinda made some rules
> up.  Could someone out there please tell me what should of happened?  Also

[passes over blank character sheet and 2D6...]

> could someone tell me what jumpspace is supposed to look like?

I use Niven's 'blindspot'.

    ---------=========oooooooooOOOOOOOOooooooooo=========---------
Andrew M J Boulton                  http://www.compulink.co.uk/~fubar/
 "Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste"

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 96 18:16 GMT0
From: aboulton@cix.compulink.co.uk (Andrew Boulton)
Subject: Re: Jumpspace.

In-Reply-To: <199612170357.VAA24548@eagle.wbm.ca>

<< The general description of jumpspace as viewed through a porthole of 
ship is a hazy uniform grayness. People who stare long enough tend to go 
insane or become otherwise mentally unbalanced -- if they aren't already. 
>>

I once knew a Vargr who used to like 'looking out of the window' (she was 
nuts to start with...). For some reason she tried to breed goldfish who 
could stand it - she'd put a bowl full next to an unshuttered porthole at 
the start of the jump, and at the end she'd eat the ones floating on top 
and breed the survivors...

    ---------=========oooooooooOOOOOOOOooooooooo=========---------
Andrew M J Boulton                  http://www.compulink.co.uk/~fubar/
 "Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste"

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 12:18:30 -0600 (CST)
From: Steven Bonneville <bonnevil@cs.umn.edu>
Subject: Re: An opinion and a question...

Dane Johnson <danger@visi.com> wrote:

> I'm going to be working on some deckplans of my own.  I've settled on a
> 1.5m grid.  I'm trying to decide how "deep" these squares should be and
> I've pretty much decided on 4m, which gives me 2.5m height for hallways
> and rooms while leaving 1.5m for decking, conduits, and the like.  This
> means each square will be 9m^3.  Does this seem reasonable, or is there a
> different/better convention I can use?

Standard convention for a 1.5m grid is a 3m ceiling; then two squares are
almost one displacement ton (2*1.5*1.5*3 = 13.5).  This is why a MegaT
displacement ton was 13.5 kL instead of the more correct 14 kL.

This isn't true on all official ship designs, however.  The old Type S
Scout/Courier had an upper attic deck and lower oversized airlock which 
did double duty as a cargo deck.  There is a vertical ladder aft of the
flight deck which connects all three.  At that point, due to the wedge
shape of the ship, the mid-deck can't be more than about 6 ft 2" high,
and the attic and cargo/airlock can't have a clearance of more than
thirty inches -- it still is enough for access, but the deck plans 
don't show this well.  It gets better as you go aft, of course.

[I came up with the figures above independently; does anyone know what
the old _Traders and Gunboats_ said about this?]

The Azhanti deckplans used a 4.5 m convention; the hangar decks were
set as being four standard decks (18m) tall.  This is about 3 squares
for two displacement tons (3*1.5*1.5*4.5 = 30.375 is a bit more than
14*2 = 28).  The Sub Merchant had a 6 m high cargo deck but left the
crew deck at 3 meters.

Pick one you like and go with it.  Note on the plan which convention
you settle on.

  Steve Bonneville
  <bonnevil@itlabs.umn.edu>

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 12:41:37 -0600
From: "K.C. Komosky" <kc@mb.sympatico.ca>
Subject: RE: CORE: ADVANCED CHARACTER GENERATION - Tell Us All!

Andy Lilly wrote (in a response to a response of mine):

>>> No no no no! Don't bring back advanced character generation (BTW, its 
ala
>>> Books 4-7 for CT). While the characters that were created with 
Mercenary,
>>> HIgh Guard, Scout and Merchant Prince were very interesting, they were 
just
>>> too overpowering when compared to characters generated using the 
standard
><SNIP>
>>But, I also like the detail you get on a character when you create
>>him year by year.  My absolute favorite char gen system is the 1 year
>>method.
>
>If you can generate a 1-year system that isn't _too_ much more work to 
roll
>up, _plus_ gives you a better feeling for character background, and which
>gives _equal_ skills to those in the basic T4 book (much easier than with
>CT, since T4 has started off with 1 skill min per year), then I don't 
think
>you can go wrong.

	Well perhaps I was a little too hasty with the " No no no no!" line. *IF* 
you can pull off the above paragraph, I for one would love to see the 
return of advanced character generation.
	Thats a big if, though (although I don't mind if it is more work to roll 
up, since its entirely optional, and doesn't give you more powerful 
characters).

>CORE is currently planning out a series of such books. The obvious 
question
>is, what would you like to have in such a book other than the 1-year 
system?
>More detail on the character _class_,

sure,

>or splitting major classes into subclasses

has a lot of potential

>, or just adding lots of new careers?

yes yes yes!!!!

> How about little things specific to classes, i.e. special contacts or 
equipment - >perhaps even ships.

Where appropriate, and not as a major focus

>Would you want to see career-oriented adventures (several A4 pages),
>say 1 per career, or just plots that the ref' can flesh out?

If I have to chose, just brief plots, but I'm not crazy about either.

>Would you want the career detail to be Milieu-specific?

Thats a hard one - its difficult to discern IGs intentions as to the 
different Milieus i.e. are they going to start pumping out a bunch of 
different M books, or just put out M0, and the others "sometime". It would 
depend where you see T4 in the next year or so going.

> How detailed do you want the career
>description - i.e. a technical discussion of how the Imperial army's
>organised, or just a brief bit of fiction describing a typical trooper in 
a
>warzone.

I WANT PLENTY O' DETAIL!

>TELL US WHAT YOU WANT AND WE'LL SEE IF WE CAN EXCEED YOUR >EXPECTATIONS...

If you can create a 1 year character generation system tha creates 
characters of equal poer to 4 yearers, you will have already exceeded my 
expectations.

Good luck, can't wait to see it!

K.C. Komosky
kc@mb.sympatico.ca

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 13:56:11 -0500
From: rellio@po-box.mcgill.ca (Roderick Darroch Elliott)
Subject: Re: An opinion and a question...

Dane Johnson wrote:

>
>First, A Question:
>
>I'm going to be working on some deckplans of my own.  I've settled on a
>1.5m grid.  I'm trying to decide how "deep" these squares should be and
>I've pretty much decided on 4m, which gives me 2.5m height for hallways
>and rooms while leaving 1.5m for decking, conduits, and the like.  This
>means each square will be 9m^3.  Does this seem reasonable, or is there a
>different/better convention I can use?

        I've found that working from a grid actually hampers the deckplan
process personally.  The way I've done it (three sets of deckplans so far)
is to work up the dimensions of the ship (based on the length, volume, and
shape data from SSDS), and then draw front, side, and top elevations of the
ship to scale using a draw program.

        Then I figure out roughly where the decks fit into it, trace the
appropriate outlines on the exterior, and use those to draw the outlines of
the decks, which I then fill in with plans.

        The advantage of doing this to scale is that one can have the
front/side/stop elevations on one sheet of paper, and then have each deck
to a sheet at a smaller scale to show it in greater detail.

        Of course, you need decent drawing software to do this...

*-------------------------------------------------------------*
| Roderick D. Elliott... rellio@po-box.mcgill.ca              |
|                        elliot_r@lsa.lan.mcgill.ca           |
*-------------------------------------------------------------*
| "...an imperfect plan implemented immediately and violently |
| will always succeed better than a perfect plan."            |
|                        -Gen. George S. Patton.              |
*-------------------------------------------------------------*

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 13:56:20 -0500
From: rellio@po-box.mcgill.ca (Roderick Darroch Elliott)
Subject: SSDS FSY Caligula-class 1000Td megayacht

        Did this up a little while back; was in a rather
decadent/megalomaniac kinda mood.  Was my first SSDS attempt; may have
botched things a bit.  Did it to TL-11; figure it could have been around
for several decades prior to Milieu 0.



Famille Spofulam Yards Caligula-class MegaYacht

Tons: 1000 td         Volume: 14,000 M^3                         Cost: 515 MCr
Crew: 29              Pass H/M: 18                               Pass L:52
Cargo: 25 td          Controls: TL-11 Adv. Civ Hi-auto/bridge    TL: 11

09 Size rating                          02 Jump rating
03 Fire control rating                  03 G maneuver drive
01 Battery 4X 143 Mj lasers             03 Power plant rating
                                        4200 fuel/S/R
                                        00 Meson screen rating
                                        02 Sandcaster rating (48)
                                        00 Damper rating
                                        10/04/0 A/P/J sensor rating

               03 (?) armour rating     18 structure rating


Got a bit over half a billion credits (not counting crew costs) to spend on
impressing your fellow nobles or MegaCorp directors?  Then the Famille
Spofulam Yards Caligula-class megayacht is just what you need!

        The Caligula is built into a 1000td airframe saucer hull, with
elegantly styled vertical stabilizers said to resemble the fins of an
aquatic terran mammal known as "the dolphin".  Overall, the styling evokes
the classical opulence of bygone early Space-Age Terra.   With its 3G
thruster plate maneuver drive and 2-parsec jump drives, the Caligula has
the accelleration and range to meet the most demanding of civilian
applications.  Nobody takes their customers' safety to heart more then
FSY's design bureau; Caligula owners can venture safely into the riskiest
regions of an expanding Imperium thanks to its four MFD-linked 143
megajoule lasers, armour, and twin sandcaster turrets.

        Its superlative flight characteristics and armament aside, the
Caligula is also a very capable ship, with extensive fabrication and repair
capabilities (it carries complete electronics and machine shops), an
onboard laboratory, and a full sickbay.  It carries a 50-td modular cutter
(tracked ATV module comes standard) in a spacious hangar and a 30td ship's
boat in a minimal hangar, to meet auxiliary craft needs.  For wilderness
refuelling, it comes equipped with fuel scoops and an on-board fuel
purification plant capable of refining 700 m^3 every 6 hours, thus enabling
full refuelling in a single 24-hour period.  Massive power-systems
redundancy is provided by 3 500 MW fusion generators.

        The crew complement of 29 (7 gunners, 2 maintenance, 5 electronics,
4 engineering, 2 flight deck, 3 command, 2 small-craft pilot, 3 steward,
and 1 doctor) are lodged in exceptional comfort in 21 small staterooms for
junior crew and 4 large staterooms for officers and the doctor.  The two
junior stewards and six junior gunners sleep two to a stateroom; the others
junior crew sleep one to a stateroom.  13 4-person emergency low berths are
provided in case of need.

        However, it is in the passenger accomodations that the Caligula
truly shines; 8 large staterooms and a truly enormous owner's suite are
provided, along with another 250 m^3 of customisable leisure space; the
first Caligula-class commissioned carried a small arboretum, for which it
is now famous.  Other uses to which this space has been put are swimming
pools and alleys for an ancient Solomani sport known as "bowling".

*-------------------------------------------------------------*
| Roderick D. Elliott... rellio@po-box.mcgill.ca              |
|                        elliot_r@lsa.lan.mcgill.ca           |
*-------------------------------------------------------------*
| "...an imperfect plan implemented immediately and violently |
| will always succeed better than a perfect plan."            |
|                        -Gen. George S. Patton.              |
*-------------------------------------------------------------*

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 18:55:59 -0800
From: Neil Simpson <catwalk@ibm.net>
Subject: Re: kEwL!!! a FlAmE wAr!!!!!!

TPeterAZ@aol.com wrote:
> 
> In a message dated 96-12-18 01:43:32 EST, Roderick D. Elliott wrote:
> 
> >   I'm going to go disinfect and exorcise my keyboard now, and then go
> >  to sleep and pretend that Digest #767 never happened...
> >
> 
> A beacon through the fog...Land Ho!!!
> 
> Tim Peter
> <TPeterAZ@aol.com>
> "There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, Ignorance."--- Socrates-----------------------------------------------------------------------------I think the main problem is the cruel fact that Starships is not a "good" 
product.The copy of Starships that Eamon wanted to rip up was mine and I do 
have to say that I agree with his sentiments,if not the idea.However much 
people may dislike reviews here slagging off IG products,I feel that someone 
has to point out that the emperor is wearing no clothes and it might as well 
be done here than in the mainstream gaming press.                            
 As a ref who isn`t interested in the founding of the 3rd Imperium(my own 
campaign is set outside the Imperium in Theron sector)I`m waiting for the 
Aslan border war supplement to get some TOE`s for the pussy`s so that the 
gallant human`s can fight off the encroaching kittens once more.             
                         Death to the Aslan invaders!                        
                                                   Neil

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 13:14:16 +0000
From: "Kenneth Bearden" <dreamer@brokersys.com>
Subject: RE: But It Doesn't Look The Way _I_ Want It...

On 17 Dec 96 at 21:18, K.C. Komosky wrote:


> Okay, I was with you up to here Kenneth. If something would cost IG a lot 
> of money, that equals higher retail prices, which WILL effect wether there 
> is a market for it.

I think you are still with me, KC.  It's just that I didn't explain 
myself well.

What I was trying to say is this.  Let's say someone proposes an end 
all Traveller equipment book.  IG actually goes through all of the 
things ever published on Traveller, pulls all of the equipment, 
updates it for T4, and publishes a series of books on it.

Then someone says, "No.  We can't do that.  It would cost too much.  
There would be multiple volumes, and people just wouldn't buy it."

Well, that is the type of cop-out crap that I'm talking about.  If 
there is a market for it, then it will be bought.  IG will have to 
make a decision whether they can make money on the idea.

I'd buy such a product.  And as an example, I will cite the series of 
D&D books (the ultimate guide on magic items), selling at $25 a piece, that 
everyone I know who plays D&D will buy.

So, I'm not saying that economics is not a factor in business.  I 
just don't like an idea being shot down on unobvious economic 
opinions.  Gold plated T4 books is an obvious economic opinion, and 
I'd agree with you that IG would not sell many of them.

I just thought of another example of this, but it is not related to 
Traveller.  Let me give it to you just to sum my point.  

I saw a preview to Starship Troopers the other day, and I'd heard 
from others that it looked exciting.

Well, I was with my gaming group (there, that ties it in to 
Traveller), and I was explaining that I just didn't think it looked 
as good as it could have been.  I thought that the digital creatures 
the marines were fighting looked very digital.

Excuses abounded.  "Well, they have to look that way.  You couldn't 
put all those people in suits."

That's bull.  The film did not HAVE to look that way.  It could have 
looked much different.  Look how great the predator looked in 
Predator.

"Yeah.  But that's a man in make up.  Starship Troopers has a horde 
of bugs attacking them.  You had to do it digital."

And, I said that digital was fine.  But digital creatures don't have 
to look digital.  Look at Jurassic Park.

KC, what I'm talking about is acceptance.  Just because somebody says 
that it is cost prohibitive doesn't mean that it is.  And I've seen 
this happen on this list.  Once you work out the details, maybe it is 
not cost prohibitive, or maybe the extra cost will be worth the extra 
sales.

Kenneth.

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

Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 13:14:16 +0000
From: "Kenneth Bearden" <dreamer@brokersys.com>
Subject: Ken Whitman

On 17 Dec 96 at 21:32, Ken Whitman wrote:

> ...If you can's say anything nice, dont say anything at all.


Hi, Ken,

I wasn't going to respond to this post, but since you addressed it to
me I felt that you deserved a reply.

First off, you are trying to make the point I made with my original
post on Starships written the day I got it.  But, there was one
difference.

I said that we should be constructive in our reviews of 
Starships--not just say that it is crap.  I said that IG may be 
thinking that they had a good product on their hands and be 
scratching their heads wondering why the response to the book has been so
negative.

So, I wrote what no marketing test could give you.  I wrote my 
feelings from the point I entered the store, picked up the product,
and took it out to my car to read it.  And, I wrote about the buyer's
regret that set in almost immediately.

I also wrote about the responsibility I feel to help promote 
Traveller.  After reading this, Jeff Zeitlin concurred, and changed
his policy on T4 products reviews in Freelance Traveller.  I think this touched 
a chord with many TMLers out there, because I have seen many of the 
posts become more constructive.  I think I said what a lot of people were 
already feeling.

I have even been accused of not being constructive with my post on the
Starships pictures when my intent was nothing but to give examples of
what I, and everyone else on the TML, wanted.  There has been a lot of
negative talk about the look Chriss Foss has given T4, and it was
logical to me to cite examples of pictures and say which were and were
not Traveller.

The difference in what I've been saying and what you just posted is
that I don't think Traveller is going to be helped by just saying good
things about it.  As fans, it is important for IG to know about what
the fans are upset about.

Heck, this is a marketer's dream!  IG has instant consumer reponse!

I know that you are worried about the newbies tuning in to this list
and getting a negative reaction to T4, and as I stated in my original
Starships post, that is a concern of mine as well.  

But, more importantly, this list is not a bunch of yes men.  You will
get the cold hard facts about T4 here.  If IG is doing well, then this
list will reflect it.  If the list members don't like something, then
IG will hear about that here too.   And if IG is smart, they will take
this to heart and make T4 the premier science fiction role playing
game that it should be.

This purpose of this list is the free, unrestrained discussion of
Traveller.  If that ever changed, I'd leave it.

So here is my recommendation.  Let's make T4 the best rpg ever.  Let's
have the best rules, the best background, the best entire system.  If
we do that, people will play it, and T4 will be the success we all
want it to be.  I want to be able to teach my kids about Traveller.

How do we do that?  Well, we continue with the good stuff and fix the 
bad stuff.  How do we know what is bad and what is good?  Sales and 
the instant consumer response available on this list.

If we do it your way, and the supplements from T4 continue to be like
Starships, then I'm afraid that Traveller will die again.

Ken, I think your heart was in the right place, and I think we both 
want the same thing.

And that is for Traveller to be a success.

Thank you,

Kenneth.

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

End of Traveller-digest V1996 #770
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