Monday, September 21, 2015
General purpose coolness
Saturday, September 19, 2015
The reason I picked a set of rules as a focal point
My previous post was me picking a rule set and a highly opinionated descriptions of the ones I own (I should have put the Big Floppy Books (BFB) as a version just to be taunting) and why I picked ST. The reason I needed to pick a set of rules is to have something to go through in an orderly fashion so I contemplate the major points of Traveller gaming. Also it has been years since I actually read the rules start to finish and I expect to discover things I forgot or never read in the first place. It is likely I will talk about the rejected versions because the most awesome thing about having an online community is getting different views. I can post what I originally think as I have before and the opinions others offer universally lead me to a better idea than I started and I thank everyone who has or does take time to chime in.
So the first section is INTRODUCTION which I thought about skipping with the whole I know what an RPG and Traveller is but decided to read anyways. I am glad I did because two things popped out at me "background drawn from adventure-oriented science fiction" and "interstellar travel will be as common as international travel today". Every group has its own way of playing and everyone has their own preferred aspect of playing but "adventure-oriented" seems to indicate a nod toward larger than life characters. Although I doubt we are talking about Kimball Kinnison as the average PC I do believe the premise is characters can accomplish more than "real" people do. This can explain some of the problems I have had accepting the published adventures.
It is totally meta-gaming but I will start before even beginning any kind of play with the need for everyone to be okay with PC finding adventures that might logically have been found long before they arrived. For instance the "Shadows" adventure that comes with ST it seems somewhat incredulous to me that in the 700 years Yorbund has been settled no one else saw the site. The 700 year estimate comes from the dot map charting the settlement of the Spinward Marches from Library Data N-Z (and The Traveller Adventure). It can save some friction after the game starts if players accept that their PCs will benefit (or suffer) from fate putting them in hot spots.
The second point about travel I think needs to be considered in context. The game came out in 1977 (?) and I am aged enough to recall that time. I can tell you international travel was nowhere near as common as it is today. It wasn't unknown but it was still enough of a novelty that someone who had left the country or was from another country stood out. So that is the atmosphere I will try and have my universe recreate. At starports and startown you wouldn't get a second look as everyone is from somewhere else pretty much but away from those locations and PCs will become minor celebrities "Oh my gosh! You've been to Regina? I have seen holograms but what is it really like?" Nice but kind of annoying and really hard to be anonymous. Which is okay because the more sneaky underhanded stuff should be in the cities of "Blade Runner" style.
The next section is ADVENTURING IN TRAVELLER which only has one point worth I feel like emphasizing, "The characters ... search for their own self-appointed goals" I mentioned I have come to believe my most fundamental failure in trying to run (and play) Traveller before is Players need to drive the story more than the GM. Having done far more in the fantasy genre I got used to adapting to what the GM wanted to run rather than exploring the world presented and following what interested me or allowing player to do the same. I feel to have a Traveller campaign be really satisfying the group (GM included) needs to set expectations before beginning because OTU is the ultimate sandbox. It isn't realistic to expect the GM to be able to provide a good session if the PC randomly pick planets scattered all over the sector "just to see what is there" nor in running a sci fi story is it interesting as a player to buy a ticket on the GM railroad either. So what am I suggesting then? Good question for which I probably won't end up giving a good answer but here goes. There needs to be a reason the group is a group much more than in fantasy I think. Ideally that reason gives a very loose storyline for the GM and players to work with.
That doesn't seem helpful to me using generic terms so I will give an actual example. The solo campaign idea which was the start of all these posts came from my idea that all the characters would be from the Solomani Rim. At the end of their generation careers had opted for a return to their homeworld by cold sleep which terrorist hacked the transit orders and had them re-routed to the Spinward Marches. The cold sleep idea comes from repatriation bonds and my belief the Imperium (or major employers) would have a standard clause saying if we move you half way across the universe during your employment we will give you the choice to be returned home on our dime. This seems like a plausible expectation for employees to have and the sorta time travel aspect of low passage also strikes me as a perk of choosing to take it as well.
This starting point explains (without having to actual explain) why the characters don't know much about the marches and gives the understandable unifying factor of being outsiders. I am drawing on my experience of enlisting in the USAF for this. I went from rural New England to (ultimately) Washington DC and even though I never left the US I can tell you it was pretty lonely and strange there. I ended up with some great friends most of whom were from the rural Midwest. Why? The experience of growing up in a town everyone knew everybody else; no malls close by so it was mom and pop stores; being outdoors because there wasn't anywhere indoors to be really and pretty much living free range (due to when my childhood was) meant those guys were the ones I was most comfortable around as we had similar outlooks. So I postulated that Solomani Rim people are most comfortable around others from that region without having to spend time trying to explain it as a thing during play.
Not having a really good idea of the local area makes taking patron offers believable as they wouldn't have anywhere better idea of where to go. The terrorist thing gives an enemy although not one they are able to do anything about or to immediately and brings up the point the Imperium isn't a united and cohesive as the countries we live in today. There maybe a vague let's go home motive but it is like 6 years if they had the money for awake travel or 6 years further into the future if they low berth back by which point they are 12 years behind everyone and evrything they knew. I am not going to have a conversation with myself about what I want to do but if it was for a group of players I would have a conversation about what genre of gaming they are interested in. Knowing they want to fight in the shadow world of conspiracies is different than being the magnificent seven.
So the first section is INTRODUCTION which I thought about skipping with the whole I know what an RPG and Traveller is but decided to read anyways. I am glad I did because two things popped out at me "background drawn from adventure-oriented science fiction" and "interstellar travel will be as common as international travel today". Every group has its own way of playing and everyone has their own preferred aspect of playing but "adventure-oriented" seems to indicate a nod toward larger than life characters. Although I doubt we are talking about Kimball Kinnison as the average PC I do believe the premise is characters can accomplish more than "real" people do. This can explain some of the problems I have had accepting the published adventures.
It is totally meta-gaming but I will start before even beginning any kind of play with the need for everyone to be okay with PC finding adventures that might logically have been found long before they arrived. For instance the "Shadows" adventure that comes with ST it seems somewhat incredulous to me that in the 700 years Yorbund has been settled no one else saw the site. The 700 year estimate comes from the dot map charting the settlement of the Spinward Marches from Library Data N-Z (and The Traveller Adventure). It can save some friction after the game starts if players accept that their PCs will benefit (or suffer) from fate putting them in hot spots.
The second point about travel I think needs to be considered in context. The game came out in 1977 (?) and I am aged enough to recall that time. I can tell you international travel was nowhere near as common as it is today. It wasn't unknown but it was still enough of a novelty that someone who had left the country or was from another country stood out. So that is the atmosphere I will try and have my universe recreate. At starports and startown you wouldn't get a second look as everyone is from somewhere else pretty much but away from those locations and PCs will become minor celebrities "Oh my gosh! You've been to Regina? I have seen holograms but what is it really like?" Nice but kind of annoying and really hard to be anonymous. Which is okay because the more sneaky underhanded stuff should be in the cities of "Blade Runner" style.
The next section is ADVENTURING IN TRAVELLER which only has one point worth I feel like emphasizing, "The characters ... search for their own self-appointed goals" I mentioned I have come to believe my most fundamental failure in trying to run (and play) Traveller before is Players need to drive the story more than the GM. Having done far more in the fantasy genre I got used to adapting to what the GM wanted to run rather than exploring the world presented and following what interested me or allowing player to do the same. I feel to have a Traveller campaign be really satisfying the group (GM included) needs to set expectations before beginning because OTU is the ultimate sandbox. It isn't realistic to expect the GM to be able to provide a good session if the PC randomly pick planets scattered all over the sector "just to see what is there" nor in running a sci fi story is it interesting as a player to buy a ticket on the GM railroad either. So what am I suggesting then? Good question for which I probably won't end up giving a good answer but here goes. There needs to be a reason the group is a group much more than in fantasy I think. Ideally that reason gives a very loose storyline for the GM and players to work with.
That doesn't seem helpful to me using generic terms so I will give an actual example. The solo campaign idea which was the start of all these posts came from my idea that all the characters would be from the Solomani Rim. At the end of their generation careers had opted for a return to their homeworld by cold sleep which terrorist hacked the transit orders and had them re-routed to the Spinward Marches. The cold sleep idea comes from repatriation bonds and my belief the Imperium (or major employers) would have a standard clause saying if we move you half way across the universe during your employment we will give you the choice to be returned home on our dime. This seems like a plausible expectation for employees to have and the sorta time travel aspect of low passage also strikes me as a perk of choosing to take it as well.
This starting point explains (without having to actual explain) why the characters don't know much about the marches and gives the understandable unifying factor of being outsiders. I am drawing on my experience of enlisting in the USAF for this. I went from rural New England to (ultimately) Washington DC and even though I never left the US I can tell you it was pretty lonely and strange there. I ended up with some great friends most of whom were from the rural Midwest. Why? The experience of growing up in a town everyone knew everybody else; no malls close by so it was mom and pop stores; being outdoors because there wasn't anywhere indoors to be really and pretty much living free range (due to when my childhood was) meant those guys were the ones I was most comfortable around as we had similar outlooks. So I postulated that Solomani Rim people are most comfortable around others from that region without having to spend time trying to explain it as a thing during play.
Not having a really good idea of the local area makes taking patron offers believable as they wouldn't have anywhere better idea of where to go. The terrorist thing gives an enemy although not one they are able to do anything about or to immediately and brings up the point the Imperium isn't a united and cohesive as the countries we live in today. There maybe a vague let's go home motive but it is like 6 years if they had the money for awake travel or 6 years further into the future if they low berth back by which point they are 12 years behind everyone and evrything they knew. I am not going to have a conversation with myself about what I want to do but if it was for a group of players I would have a conversation about what genre of gaming they are interested in. Knowing they want to fight in the shadow world of conspiracies is different than being the magnificent seven.
Thursday, September 17, 2015
Okay have publicly stated the goal of ending up with a setting I can run I suppose I need to organize my thoughts a little better. The first thing is which rule set I am going to use. Or a more appropriate description would be what the base system I am going to house rule the crap out of and why. I have pretty much all the version with the exception of Mongoose Traveller. Not that I have anything against it I just don't feel like justifying to myself buying another set of Traveller rules. My choice for the base set is Starter Traveller as it was one of the last CT rule set produced so should be pretty typo free. I own it in print and on PDF and the way I end up running it is inconvenient to have Roll20 up and try and use the same laptop to look at PDF's and Starter is the easiest version to find the base rules in. In case it is helpful to anyone I will give a quick review of the other rules sets and why I went against them. The abbreviation in parenthesis is what I will call them if I mention them again and the links take you to where you can buy them. Another large factor was that I like the G+ Classic Traveller group so if I am using them to improve my ideas I need to use a CT rule set.
1) LBB (LBB) More or less I am using these rules just with a better layout and Starship combat being far easier to run.
2) The Traveller Book (TTB) Again the same rules but somewhat more unwieldy in format also I don't own a dead tree version of this one.
3) MegaTraveller (MT) A very close second on my final choice and one I will be stealing actual rule stuff from. Layout; Typos and a realization that a bunch of the things that changed don't strike me as adding to the fun of playing the game. And again it is still pretty much the same rules.
4) Traveller the New Era (TNE) The version that I feel guilty about. They worked hard on it and I never gave it a chance. 2D6 is Traveller to me and other things are games using the setting. If I am going to game in the Traveller universe it is going to be by playing Traveller. I also hate the setting and can't conceive of how to fix it enough for me to buy into and run. If anyone is reading this who worked on it accept my apology for my prejudice.
5) Marc Miller's Traveller (T4) I love the additional background but failed to expend the effort into learning the system well. It should be an awesome time to adventure but I didn't work out to my satisfaction how much the Imperium should be controlling expansion. Without a unified currency only people without ship payments could go exploring. Even with all that BITS "Space Dogs!" is probably still my favorite published adventure if Scopes where real I would kick them in the ding ding A-hole D-bags.
6) Traveller20 (T20) Again awesome additional background but a completely different game in the Traveller setting. I could bash on this some more because it is so different than Traveller but that is just me being whiny.
7) GURPS Traveller (GT) Setting = Yes Game = No. This one however has a ton of awesome stuff to steal from. I think the SPA originated in the "High Passage" magazine but the Starport book was pretty cool. I consider "Behind the Claw" a vital resource for lootable ideas. Seriously consider if you want any of these publications as the GT license is expiring so they could soon be no more. I still wish they had re-issued the Traveller Cardboard Heroes sets in PDF though. Crap trying to find a link for the "High Passage" magazines I found instead I can get the Cardboard Heroes from FFE <sigh>
8) Comstar's 1248 books don't present a set of rules and the setting tries to recover from TNE so maybe it would be okay. The books are well written and the premises made I can live with I just am not sure I understand wanting to play Sci Fi where tech is actively trying to kill you.
9) Traveller5(T5) <sigh> So many very cool ideas presented in a way I can't wrap my feeble little brain around. I have been told this is because I only have the PDF/CD version but if I am unwilling to spring for the E-version of Mongoose there is no way I am spending for the dead tree version of this unless I win the lottery. I don't see anything I hate I just can't find the time or desire to see how it works together as a system.
In addition to Starter Traveller I am going to use Supplement 4 Citizens of the Imperium to give needed depth to career choices. If anyone is looking for advice on what to get I would say get the CT CD from FFE if you can/want to afford it, The JTAS pdf and all the Challenge Magazines and you are pretty much set with a ton of ideas waiting to distract the crap out of you.
1) LBB (LBB) More or less I am using these rules just with a better layout and Starship combat being far easier to run.
2) The Traveller Book (TTB) Again the same rules but somewhat more unwieldy in format also I don't own a dead tree version of this one.
3) MegaTraveller (MT) A very close second on my final choice and one I will be stealing actual rule stuff from. Layout; Typos and a realization that a bunch of the things that changed don't strike me as adding to the fun of playing the game. And again it is still pretty much the same rules.
4) Traveller the New Era (TNE) The version that I feel guilty about. They worked hard on it and I never gave it a chance. 2D6 is Traveller to me and other things are games using the setting. If I am going to game in the Traveller universe it is going to be by playing Traveller. I also hate the setting and can't conceive of how to fix it enough for me to buy into and run. If anyone is reading this who worked on it accept my apology for my prejudice.
5) Marc Miller's Traveller (T4) I love the additional background but failed to expend the effort into learning the system well. It should be an awesome time to adventure but I didn't work out to my satisfaction how much the Imperium should be controlling expansion. Without a unified currency only people without ship payments could go exploring. Even with all that BITS "Space Dogs!" is probably still my favorite published adventure if Scopes where real I would kick them in the ding ding A-hole D-bags.
6) Traveller20 (T20) Again awesome additional background but a completely different game in the Traveller setting. I could bash on this some more because it is so different than Traveller but that is just me being whiny.
7) GURPS Traveller (GT) Setting = Yes Game = No. This one however has a ton of awesome stuff to steal from. I think the SPA originated in the "High Passage" magazine but the Starport book was pretty cool. I consider "Behind the Claw" a vital resource for lootable ideas. Seriously consider if you want any of these publications as the GT license is expiring so they could soon be no more. I still wish they had re-issued the Traveller Cardboard Heroes sets in PDF though. Crap trying to find a link for the "High Passage" magazines I found instead I can get the Cardboard Heroes from FFE <sigh>
8) Comstar's 1248 books don't present a set of rules and the setting tries to recover from TNE so maybe it would be okay. The books are well written and the premises made I can live with I just am not sure I understand wanting to play Sci Fi where tech is actively trying to kill you.
9) Traveller5(T5) <sigh> So many very cool ideas presented in a way I can't wrap my feeble little brain around. I have been told this is because I only have the PDF/CD version but if I am unwilling to spring for the E-version of Mongoose there is no way I am spending for the dead tree version of this unless I win the lottery. I don't see anything I hate I just can't find the time or desire to see how it works together as a system.
In addition to Starter Traveller I am going to use Supplement 4 Citizens of the Imperium to give needed depth to career choices. If anyone is looking for advice on what to get I would say get the CT CD from FFE if you can/want to afford it, The JTAS pdf and all the Challenge Magazines and you are pretty much set with a ton of ideas waiting to distract the crap out of you.
Something I always wanted to do but haven't yet
Virtualcon 15
Unfortunately I also find out these things thanks to +Joe Johnston
https://plus.google.com/+JoeJohnston-taskboy/posts/GqLGWjMFvth
Tuesday, September 15, 2015
The end goal of my Traveller discussions
I thought I would tell you all why I have been making my posts on my version of the OTU for clarity. I have been trying and failing to run and or play in any kind of Traveller campaign since 1980 and the fault is solely with me. Holmes D&D is how I entered the hobby and pretty much every other game was run by my teenaged self as D&D in different settings. Traveller (and any non-fantasy game really) requires a lot more pre game prep to succeed which I understand now and didn't then. CT provides stuff to go on in the background of a campaign (if you are using the OTU) but almost nothing along the lines of a WOTC setting or Adventure module.
The Third Imperium as a setting is pretty much a couple paragraphs for how it functions and then tons and tons of past or current events to go on around your characters which means the GM (and players) need to decide how it impacts the course of a session to be in the imperium. GDW Traveller adventures are probably the number one reason our group never "got" traveller. I have picked on Adventure #1 before so I will use it again. Being used to running dungeon crawls I tried to railroad the 4 situations in order and everyone was underwhelmed as they should have been. At 50 I grasp what I didn't at 15 the GM should use the material provided to have news stories pop up about Kinunir's and senators and missing ships but if the PC's don't bite move on. GDW were geniuses that I failed to appreciate by trying to put the PCs in the driver seat rather than the GM.
The Double Adventures go the closest to other companies version of adventures but even they required the party to be at a certain place to start and required some forethought if they were to be satisfying Annic Nova for instance has your space dungeon but the GM needs to decide where it came from and other stuff to make it worthwhile. Even the BBG isn't obvious and can take a longish time to be revealed by which point the PC's could have wandered far a field.
And of course there are the two biggest sources of stuff library data and TNS stories both done in a style that were totally gameable. I don't know if gamers have a short attention span or if it just normal to not be able to read a page and a half or set up info and retain anything but GDW gave us info in little chunks in these two forms and even more they gave us little bits of trivia not related to the adventure itself that added to the feeling of a thousand year old empire.
Okay so that is my take on why I failed before, so what is the point of these posts now? Roll20 and the Classic Traveller G+ community makes me think I could try running a traveller game again but this time I want it to be fun. To do that I need to have a clear idea of how the setting is going to affect the game and be able to articulate it in a simple enough and short enough way that PCs don't feel like they are taking a course in Warren's Traveller 101. I also am grateful that the G+ group is full of descent and really creative people who I can bounce these ideas off of and have them improved by the comments. At the end of this I want to end up with is a setting that is different than today in a gameable way.
An easy trap to fall into is using analogy. A starport is like an airport; psionics are like the force and others. They are a handy way to try and get a shared vision going but detrimental to playing in a future different from our current life. On the other hand you can't get to far away from where we are now because we have lives that limit how much time and effort a game can take up. If you get to far away player enjoyment will suffer because it turns into work to play or they don't understand the point of something. So I want to end up with "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow" in a rubber suit in effect, there is a functioning government but stand alone heroes running around doing what they wish as well.
To that end I have a couple premises:
1) The population in general (non-PC & non-NPC) are much more concerned about their worlds government that the imperium which is reflected in game as a disinterest in off world affairs.
2) System governments have a certain rivalry going on within the Imperium along the lines of sporting team rivalries to cover why being naughty on one world is mostly problematic on that world only.
3) A certain degree of ambivalence toward the Imperium because if it lack of involvement in day to day affairs to explain the apparent prevalence of people engaging in extra-legal activities. If there are that many people comfortable with saying to strangers "Someone told me you're okay with stealing" it can't be viewed as all that illegal.
4) The Imperium has to provide something at least because I am not interested in the space nazi empire everyone is wanting to overthrow.
5) Bringing the time of travel element out in play. In the internet age I think we miss how dramatic this would be on a day to day basis. If you aren't in the same system it is 2 weeks minimum to engage in a conversation and that is going to be limited in nature as well. You can't just call someone up and ask them what is going on.
6) Because of the impossibility of hands on running of things trust has to be more important. T4 talked a lot about this with good reason. You can't for whatever reason go do something yourself so you have to send someone to do it for you and they will have effective autonomy in how they go about it because of #5.
7) The overwhelming majority of citizens never leave their home system to feed into 1-3 to also make PCs special.
8) A reason for why there is the technology and population spread that exists in the Imperium. I know the basic Long Night premise but there has been 1100 years to get everyone up to TL 9 Interstellar society and there are way to many worlds that aren't for me to accept this. There are also lots and lots of worlds that don't have a self sustaining gene pool. I don't have a biology background to know what that is so I am going with the BattleStar Galactica (SyFy version) 50k number or Pop 5.
And finally I am going to switch to blog posts so I can find stuff again. G+ is awesome to have freewheeling discussions but it really sucks to try and find something after about 2 days.
The Third Imperium as a setting is pretty much a couple paragraphs for how it functions and then tons and tons of past or current events to go on around your characters which means the GM (and players) need to decide how it impacts the course of a session to be in the imperium. GDW Traveller adventures are probably the number one reason our group never "got" traveller. I have picked on Adventure #1 before so I will use it again. Being used to running dungeon crawls I tried to railroad the 4 situations in order and everyone was underwhelmed as they should have been. At 50 I grasp what I didn't at 15 the GM should use the material provided to have news stories pop up about Kinunir's and senators and missing ships but if the PC's don't bite move on. GDW were geniuses that I failed to appreciate by trying to put the PCs in the driver seat rather than the GM.
The Double Adventures go the closest to other companies version of adventures but even they required the party to be at a certain place to start and required some forethought if they were to be satisfying Annic Nova for instance has your space dungeon but the GM needs to decide where it came from and other stuff to make it worthwhile. Even the BBG isn't obvious and can take a longish time to be revealed by which point the PC's could have wandered far a field.
And of course there are the two biggest sources of stuff library data and TNS stories both done in a style that were totally gameable. I don't know if gamers have a short attention span or if it just normal to not be able to read a page and a half or set up info and retain anything but GDW gave us info in little chunks in these two forms and even more they gave us little bits of trivia not related to the adventure itself that added to the feeling of a thousand year old empire.
Okay so that is my take on why I failed before, so what is the point of these posts now? Roll20 and the Classic Traveller G+ community makes me think I could try running a traveller game again but this time I want it to be fun. To do that I need to have a clear idea of how the setting is going to affect the game and be able to articulate it in a simple enough and short enough way that PCs don't feel like they are taking a course in Warren's Traveller 101. I also am grateful that the G+ group is full of descent and really creative people who I can bounce these ideas off of and have them improved by the comments. At the end of this I want to end up with is a setting that is different than today in a gameable way.
An easy trap to fall into is using analogy. A starport is like an airport; psionics are like the force and others. They are a handy way to try and get a shared vision going but detrimental to playing in a future different from our current life. On the other hand you can't get to far away from where we are now because we have lives that limit how much time and effort a game can take up. If you get to far away player enjoyment will suffer because it turns into work to play or they don't understand the point of something. So I want to end up with "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow" in a rubber suit in effect, there is a functioning government but stand alone heroes running around doing what they wish as well.
To that end I have a couple premises:
1) The population in general (non-PC & non-NPC) are much more concerned about their worlds government that the imperium which is reflected in game as a disinterest in off world affairs.
2) System governments have a certain rivalry going on within the Imperium along the lines of sporting team rivalries to cover why being naughty on one world is mostly problematic on that world only.
3) A certain degree of ambivalence toward the Imperium because if it lack of involvement in day to day affairs to explain the apparent prevalence of people engaging in extra-legal activities. If there are that many people comfortable with saying to strangers "Someone told me you're okay with stealing" it can't be viewed as all that illegal.
4) The Imperium has to provide something at least because I am not interested in the space nazi empire everyone is wanting to overthrow.
5) Bringing the time of travel element out in play. In the internet age I think we miss how dramatic this would be on a day to day basis. If you aren't in the same system it is 2 weeks minimum to engage in a conversation and that is going to be limited in nature as well. You can't just call someone up and ask them what is going on.
6) Because of the impossibility of hands on running of things trust has to be more important. T4 talked a lot about this with good reason. You can't for whatever reason go do something yourself so you have to send someone to do it for you and they will have effective autonomy in how they go about it because of #5.
7) The overwhelming majority of citizens never leave their home system to feed into 1-3 to also make PCs special.
8) A reason for why there is the technology and population spread that exists in the Imperium. I know the basic Long Night premise but there has been 1100 years to get everyone up to TL 9 Interstellar society and there are way to many worlds that aren't for me to accept this. There are also lots and lots of worlds that don't have a self sustaining gene pool. I don't have a biology background to know what that is so I am going with the BattleStar Galactica (SyFy version) 50k number or Pop 5.
And finally I am going to switch to blog posts so I can find stuff again. G+ is awesome to have freewheeling discussions but it really sucks to try and find something after about 2 days.
Tuesday, September 8, 2015
I mentioned in an earlier post that I felt one of the services the imperium would provide on every world was issuing prepaid debit cards and I thought I would expand on my probably deranged reasoning. First a summary of my points of gammery view for why they would followed with a more detailed reasoning.
1.) Hacking and forging of electronic records.
2.) Control of capital
3.) Money Trail
4.) Deliberate inconvenience
5.) Interest payments
It seems (correctly or incorrectly) the more integrated our world becomes the more prevalent cyber crime is getting. Add to that a built lead time of a week before any flim flam can be detected and I am very dubious the current E-Bank model we have would survive in the Imperium. So travellers would need to take something with them between worlds other than banking records. Currency is possible but unwieldy and if our governments have decided allowing people to stockpile huge amounts of cash is bad I would believe the Emperor would frown on it as well. The prepaid debit card analog works okay for me because you need to get it issued from the Imperial Consul (IC) so it should be harder to forge and makes it an Imperial Crime if you do. Forge it and you are chased throughout known space not just by one or two worlds. Also the card (or cards) need to be turned in at the destination world's IC to get turned back into spendable money. To clarify for most worlds these are not legal tender and have to be turned into local currency although this usually means opening a bank account to access E-Banking on worlds capably of doing this. Worlds lacking the infrastructure to do so more often than not will use them as legal tender and locals doing business with travellers have a POS linked to the IC.
I am not very knowledgeable about international monetary policy but I do know that countries get into to trouble when too much capital is withdrawn as Russia and Greece have recently shown. The imperium is obsessed with free trade so I don't think capital transfer controls would be the norm I do think there is a vested interest in knowing how much is leaving and where it is going. By forcing the transaction to go through the IC the Imperium would have access to data it might not otherwise. Also world governments could petition for some kind of action if there was a crisis. It also allows the Imperium to keep world economies isolated from each other so if the local currency craps out the IC stops issuing the cards. Further any rebellious world suddenly has no ability to buy off world except using physical goods. This gives the IC a very big stick to threaten world governments with.
To have one of these issued I am sure the IC would have access to better than average means of confirming a person's identity. So the Imperium could track individual's money if it was necessary to hinder money laundering and other criminal enterprises. Creepy police state! How could the adventures do anything right? Not really every traveller would be doing this so the amount of data would be staggering so if the Imperium wasn't looking at you it is unlikely they would catch anything. Also remember the Imperium is only concerned with economic crimes for the most part and even those have to threaten interstellar trade.
It makes moving money a hassle to a certain degree by design. Long term investments are the most beneficial to both the investor and the economy as a whole so the Imperium would have a reason to try and keep money on a world to develop that world into a more valuable one. However if you are the champion of hands off governing you don't want to pass many laws and then try and enforce them so you come up with indirect ways to encourage behavior you want. I am leaning toward the view that each card would have a maximum value of 10Kcr so it would be really irritating to move any truly huge amount of cash but not for the "average" traveller encouraging people to take the minimum they feel they will need leaving the rest in local circulation.
And finally banks are more likely than not willing to back this because of the weirdness of when would the transfer take place and who is paying interest when. These days interest gets calculated in ever diminishing fractions of time but where is the capital when it is traveling in jump space? If financial markets are controlling the money transfers it could cause headaches for them so it would behoove then to dump it in someone else's lap. The Imperium wouldn't worry about it because the prepaid cards don't earn interest.
How does any of that effect gaming in the Imperium? Well foremost their first and last stop at any world would be to the IC to convert their filthy lucre allowing the GM to impose imperial entanglements easily. It can encourage the desire for stuff rather than money that will be traceable. It gives pirates something to steal. Yes that is total meta-game but ideally you want a reason for pirates to attack and for merchants to surrender. Everyone wandering around with a cash equivalent provides the target and after a drawn out process the Imperium reimbursing the victims means NPC's have a good reason to give in as most pirates would take their stuff and leave them their lives and ship. Player's of course will fight to the death because it is what we do but if they are passengers and get robbed you have just created the most intense thirst for blood and they will relentlessly pursue the pirates who robbed them.
Or I could just have to much time on my hands and think this stuff up.
1.) Hacking and forging of electronic records.
2.) Control of capital
3.) Money Trail
4.) Deliberate inconvenience
5.) Interest payments
It seems (correctly or incorrectly) the more integrated our world becomes the more prevalent cyber crime is getting. Add to that a built lead time of a week before any flim flam can be detected and I am very dubious the current E-Bank model we have would survive in the Imperium. So travellers would need to take something with them between worlds other than banking records. Currency is possible but unwieldy and if our governments have decided allowing people to stockpile huge amounts of cash is bad I would believe the Emperor would frown on it as well. The prepaid debit card analog works okay for me because you need to get it issued from the Imperial Consul (IC) so it should be harder to forge and makes it an Imperial Crime if you do. Forge it and you are chased throughout known space not just by one or two worlds. Also the card (or cards) need to be turned in at the destination world's IC to get turned back into spendable money. To clarify for most worlds these are not legal tender and have to be turned into local currency although this usually means opening a bank account to access E-Banking on worlds capably of doing this. Worlds lacking the infrastructure to do so more often than not will use them as legal tender and locals doing business with travellers have a POS linked to the IC.
I am not very knowledgeable about international monetary policy but I do know that countries get into to trouble when too much capital is withdrawn as Russia and Greece have recently shown. The imperium is obsessed with free trade so I don't think capital transfer controls would be the norm I do think there is a vested interest in knowing how much is leaving and where it is going. By forcing the transaction to go through the IC the Imperium would have access to data it might not otherwise. Also world governments could petition for some kind of action if there was a crisis. It also allows the Imperium to keep world economies isolated from each other so if the local currency craps out the IC stops issuing the cards. Further any rebellious world suddenly has no ability to buy off world except using physical goods. This gives the IC a very big stick to threaten world governments with.
To have one of these issued I am sure the IC would have access to better than average means of confirming a person's identity. So the Imperium could track individual's money if it was necessary to hinder money laundering and other criminal enterprises. Creepy police state! How could the adventures do anything right? Not really every traveller would be doing this so the amount of data would be staggering so if the Imperium wasn't looking at you it is unlikely they would catch anything. Also remember the Imperium is only concerned with economic crimes for the most part and even those have to threaten interstellar trade.
It makes moving money a hassle to a certain degree by design. Long term investments are the most beneficial to both the investor and the economy as a whole so the Imperium would have a reason to try and keep money on a world to develop that world into a more valuable one. However if you are the champion of hands off governing you don't want to pass many laws and then try and enforce them so you come up with indirect ways to encourage behavior you want. I am leaning toward the view that each card would have a maximum value of 10Kcr so it would be really irritating to move any truly huge amount of cash but not for the "average" traveller encouraging people to take the minimum they feel they will need leaving the rest in local circulation.
And finally banks are more likely than not willing to back this because of the weirdness of when would the transfer take place and who is paying interest when. These days interest gets calculated in ever diminishing fractions of time but where is the capital when it is traveling in jump space? If financial markets are controlling the money transfers it could cause headaches for them so it would behoove then to dump it in someone else's lap. The Imperium wouldn't worry about it because the prepaid cards don't earn interest.
How does any of that effect gaming in the Imperium? Well foremost their first and last stop at any world would be to the IC to convert their filthy lucre allowing the GM to impose imperial entanglements easily. It can encourage the desire for stuff rather than money that will be traceable. It gives pirates something to steal. Yes that is total meta-game but ideally you want a reason for pirates to attack and for merchants to surrender. Everyone wandering around with a cash equivalent provides the target and after a drawn out process the Imperium reimbursing the victims means NPC's have a good reason to give in as most pirates would take their stuff and leave them their lives and ship. Player's of course will fight to the death because it is what we do but if they are passengers and get robbed you have just created the most intense thirst for blood and they will relentlessly pursue the pirates who robbed them.
Or I could just have to much time on my hands and think this stuff up.
Sunday, March 29, 2015
Enough already XP has to go
Why does Google want me to find a domain name for my already existing blog? Anyways, so obviously this post isn't my RPG characters that wasn't something I kept up with anyways. No surprise to anyone who knows me.
I just switched my laptop to Xubuntu 14.10 and thought I may help anyone who should find this blog by accident chronicling my journey. I am not an IT professional I am a security officer with a High School diploma so if I can do this so can you. If you ask a question I will try to answer it but be prepared for I don't know.
First up would be why I finally switched. I got fed up with the weekly "You computer is old buy a new one" messages from Java and other supposedly free software. I have a T61 Thinkpad from 2007 yes it is not cutting edge but it runs everything fine. Java and other web technologies have stopped supporting XP which I can't blame them for as Microsoft doesn't support it either. However I am swimming in left over computers that still operate they just can't run the new OS's because they don't write for old tech. Also fine after all Microsoft only makes money on OS sales from new computers. So if I am ok with this why not buy a new computer? I damn well don't need one and Canonical has made it so I don't have to. Actually crap loads of people and Canonical because most of this stuff is made by volunteers. So screw it I will just go to Linux.
Why Xubuntu? I have been fooling around with the various Linux distro's for a couple of years and Ubuntu makes installing Linux easy and has tons of software available. Ubuntu also has the Unity shell I won't go into that to much and advise against looking up stuff about it on the web as it is quite heated. Xubuntu uses XFCE as its shell (the thing you see on your screen) which pretty much works they way XP did. Key point I don't want to have to learn how to use a computer again and with Xubuntu I don't have to. I am running the 64 bit version if you know what that means skip ahead some the next couple of sentences aren't for you. That means gibberish, mumble, cacaphony and white noise. I looked up an old review of my laptop found out the CPU, looked up the CPU and found out under architecture I had a 64 bit machine. I intend on forgetting this useless piece of knowledge as quickly as possible you only need it to know which version to install. I used the minimal cd ISO file. Stay with me that seems to mean nothing and for most people it doesn't beyond telling you what to download. If you go off to Xubuntu.org you need to pick your installer and their are a ton of them. If you are moving from windows you want either the I386 or the AMD64. If you don't have a 64 bit CPU you want the I386 otherwise you want the AMD64. You then need to burn the ISO file to a CD try double clicking the file and hopefully windows opens up a program that gives the option to do this. If not, well crap to many software choices for me to guide you go to sourceforge (google it) and get an open source program that will.
Installing Xubuntu is pretty easy actually. I use the minimal installer because I can never seem to get my computer to boot from a DVD which could be its age I don't know. However as long as you can connect to the internet during the install it makes no huge difference. The regular installer is prettier and a little easier but as soon as it is done you are going to need to update the system. The minimal installer pulls almost everything from the web during the install so when your done you have the latest version. You need to know your wireless password and decide if you are going to keep a portion of the hard drive for windows XP. I advise against keeping XP as you will just keep using it instead of Xubuntu making this a wasted effort. Also you need to copy everything you want to keep from you hard drive even if you decide to keep an XP partion. I have resized a different computer this way and it seems to work but I wouldn't count on it.
Pop your newly burnt CD offering in the drive reboot and off you go. It asks some standard stuff most of which you can just take the default on. Even the minimal installer will probably be able to connect you to the web it had the driver for my laptop on it. You also need to know what kind of blah blah gibberish thing you have fortunately the 2 options have the abbreviations you can find for your network WEP and WPA/WPA2 if you don't know pick one and if after you enter the password your connection fails back up and pick the other one, worked for me. Then you need a user name and password just like using a Windows computer at work. Make sure your password is something you remember as you do use it more than in windows. Then you get your first scary screen when it asks how you want to install itself with dire warnings of dog and cat cohabitation levels of chaos. Eh pick the guide option and accept what it suggests then okay writing the changes to disk. Heads up this defaults to not doing what you are asking unlike every other screen so tab to yes. Kind of late to mention it but no mouse in minimal install. It will chug along for a bit then ask you what you want to install besides the minimal kernel and this is where you can actually pick which distro you will be using as pretty much it is a list of the various frontends for linux. I like XFCE, LXDE is also windows like, go with XFCE or I will be of less use to you. It chugs away for a while longer tells you to take the CD out before you reboot (don't do it yet) hit enter and does a couple other things and restarts your computer now hit the eject button.
Hopefully you quickly get asked your password get logged in and really really fast you are good to go. If not you probably are kind of screwed comment on this and I will do my best to help. You should have a couple (3 icons) on the desktop and a menu bar on the top of the screen. I will put my choices for customization's in the next post. The little picture of the mouse face in the upper left is Xubuntu's start button.
I just switched my laptop to Xubuntu 14.10 and thought I may help anyone who should find this blog by accident chronicling my journey. I am not an IT professional I am a security officer with a High School diploma so if I can do this so can you. If you ask a question I will try to answer it but be prepared for I don't know.
First up would be why I finally switched. I got fed up with the weekly "You computer is old buy a new one" messages from Java and other supposedly free software. I have a T61 Thinkpad from 2007 yes it is not cutting edge but it runs everything fine. Java and other web technologies have stopped supporting XP which I can't blame them for as Microsoft doesn't support it either. However I am swimming in left over computers that still operate they just can't run the new OS's because they don't write for old tech. Also fine after all Microsoft only makes money on OS sales from new computers. So if I am ok with this why not buy a new computer? I damn well don't need one and Canonical has made it so I don't have to. Actually crap loads of people and Canonical because most of this stuff is made by volunteers. So screw it I will just go to Linux.
Why Xubuntu? I have been fooling around with the various Linux distro's for a couple of years and Ubuntu makes installing Linux easy and has tons of software available. Ubuntu also has the Unity shell I won't go into that to much and advise against looking up stuff about it on the web as it is quite heated. Xubuntu uses XFCE as its shell (the thing you see on your screen) which pretty much works they way XP did. Key point I don't want to have to learn how to use a computer again and with Xubuntu I don't have to. I am running the 64 bit version if you know what that means skip ahead some the next couple of sentences aren't for you. That means gibberish, mumble, cacaphony and white noise. I looked up an old review of my laptop found out the CPU, looked up the CPU and found out under architecture I had a 64 bit machine. I intend on forgetting this useless piece of knowledge as quickly as possible you only need it to know which version to install. I used the minimal cd ISO file. Stay with me that seems to mean nothing and for most people it doesn't beyond telling you what to download. If you go off to Xubuntu.org you need to pick your installer and their are a ton of them. If you are moving from windows you want either the I386 or the AMD64. If you don't have a 64 bit CPU you want the I386 otherwise you want the AMD64. You then need to burn the ISO file to a CD try double clicking the file and hopefully windows opens up a program that gives the option to do this. If not, well crap to many software choices for me to guide you go to sourceforge (google it) and get an open source program that will.
Installing Xubuntu is pretty easy actually. I use the minimal installer because I can never seem to get my computer to boot from a DVD which could be its age I don't know. However as long as you can connect to the internet during the install it makes no huge difference. The regular installer is prettier and a little easier but as soon as it is done you are going to need to update the system. The minimal installer pulls almost everything from the web during the install so when your done you have the latest version. You need to know your wireless password and decide if you are going to keep a portion of the hard drive for windows XP. I advise against keeping XP as you will just keep using it instead of Xubuntu making this a wasted effort. Also you need to copy everything you want to keep from you hard drive even if you decide to keep an XP partion. I have resized a different computer this way and it seems to work but I wouldn't count on it.
Pop your newly burnt CD offering in the drive reboot and off you go. It asks some standard stuff most of which you can just take the default on. Even the minimal installer will probably be able to connect you to the web it had the driver for my laptop on it. You also need to know what kind of blah blah gibberish thing you have fortunately the 2 options have the abbreviations you can find for your network WEP and WPA/WPA2 if you don't know pick one and if after you enter the password your connection fails back up and pick the other one, worked for me. Then you need a user name and password just like using a Windows computer at work. Make sure your password is something you remember as you do use it more than in windows. Then you get your first scary screen when it asks how you want to install itself with dire warnings of dog and cat cohabitation levels of chaos. Eh pick the guide option and accept what it suggests then okay writing the changes to disk. Heads up this defaults to not doing what you are asking unlike every other screen so tab to yes. Kind of late to mention it but no mouse in minimal install. It will chug along for a bit then ask you what you want to install besides the minimal kernel and this is where you can actually pick which distro you will be using as pretty much it is a list of the various frontends for linux. I like XFCE, LXDE is also windows like, go with XFCE or I will be of less use to you. It chugs away for a while longer tells you to take the CD out before you reboot (don't do it yet) hit enter and does a couple other things and restarts your computer now hit the eject button.
Hopefully you quickly get asked your password get logged in and really really fast you are good to go. If not you probably are kind of screwed comment on this and I will do my best to help. You should have a couple (3 icons) on the desktop and a menu bar on the top of the screen. I will put my choices for customization's in the next post. The little picture of the mouse face in the upper left is Xubuntu's start button.
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