Originally posted by Jame:
Ooo, I'm going to adapt that idea into a campaign that I'm writing (very slowly and with the help of people from whom I haven't heard in a while - poke to those concerned!), for when one gov't meets another and goes to war...
Jame,
Please, please, please do just that! And then please post what you and the folks you're poking come up with. I would very much like to see what other grognards/wargamers come up with.
Strategic warfare - the catagory that commerce raiding falls into - is a sadly overlooked part of Our Olde Game. I suspect this is because strategic warfare is so hard to model in a wargame. That's a shame because strategic warfare operations are a place where PCs can fight in a big war and
not get lost in all the brouhaha.
Strategic warfare does play a role in the OTU's history. The Terrans kept the Ziru Sirka off balance more through the economic dislocations caused by raiding and trading than anything their battle fleets did before jump3 and the meson gun. The nascent Julian Protectorate used a risky, massive strategic raid and stopped the Third Imperium cold in its drive to reabsorb the First Imperium territories beyond Antares. The Rebellion's Black War phase is pure strategic warfare (besides being bad PR!).
Goin off on a tangent here: The Spinward Marches have always been puzzling to me. The Imperium was on Mora by 60 and had settled Regina by 75, but the Marches are woefully underdeveloped once you consider the fact that the Imperium has been there for over
one thousand years.
Naturally the real reason for the Marches backwardness is game play. It makes for a much better RPG setting than a fully developed sector as there are plenty of 'frontier' spaces for the PCs to get frisky in.
An 'in-game' reason for the Marches' troubles is a little harder to ferret out, but it is staring us right in the face. It's those five Frontier Wars with the massive population shifts and strategic warfare campaigns involved.
During the first two Wars, the Zhos evicted and/or absorbed Imperial colonies in the subsectors (and sectors!) beyond Jewell. The continued influx of refugees from the worlds ceded to the Zhos must have been terribly unsettling on economic, social, and political levels for the Marches. That influx may have goen for for nearly a century as the Zhos allowed the unassimilated to emigrate rather than make the effort to absorb them.
The Third War beginning in 979 is the Marches' back breaker IMHO. Imperial territory has had a little over three centuries(1) to sort out all the social problems left over from the first two wars, then war strikes. It isn't a 'normal' war either. According to canon, it was;
"... less characterized by the planetary seiges of previous wars wars, and more by commerce raiding (emphasis mine)
, deep thrusts by cruiser squadrons to disrupt shipping, and by harrassment of civilian shipping."
In other words, the Zhos imposed Long Night conditions on the Marches while slagging as many facilities off of the mainworlds as they could. Adding to the injury, the aftermath of the war saw more territory lost by the Imperium, more evictions by the Zhos, and more refugees for the Marches to deal with.
Is it any wonder why the Marches are still a mess in 1100s?
Anyway, commerce raiding - real commerce raiding mind you and not 'Yo-ho-ho, board the Beowulf!' nonsense - is made to order for your PCs. They won't get lost in the huge armies and fleets of the 'real' campaigns. They can make a real difference.
I'm sure MJD & Co. are planning commerce raiding adventures for their TAs set in 1000 Gateway. There are many hints of this in the earlier ones, especially the presence of mid-sized Sollie cruisers just over the border who could act as flotilla leaders and/or bases of support for the actions of smaller raiders.
Have fun,
Bill
1 - Surely three hundred years is enough time to get their stuff together you ask. Look at Germany, I counter. Most of that region's troubles and subsequent worldwide unpleasentness up to 1945 can be laid to the Thirty Years War which ended in 1648. Instead of slowly growing into a nation during that period like so many other European states, Germany's progress was stillborn. Germany, and the world, later paid the price for it. The Marches can best be described, IMHO, as the 'Stillborn Sector' or Sector, Interrupted'.