Duke on board - Need Advice

[Anthelios]

Hello all. I am brand-spanking new to Traveller but a long time fan of science fiction, and apparently a lot of stuff that shares roots or inspiration from Traveller.

I've just started my first Traveller game, and I'm trying to keep MTU as close as I can to the OTU as I can at this point. Well, here is the thing. One of my players ended up rolling up a character with a 15 SOC.

So, he's a Duke. Now this happened as a mustering out benefit from the Navy, which I included as part of his story of receiving news upon leaving the service that his father, formerly the Count of the Imperial Worlds in 268, had been promoted to the rank of Duke for his work in drawing more worlds toward the Imperium, and was shortly assassinated by unknown anti-imperial forces.

Now the player was in the army himself, so chose to go the non-officer path, but managed to hit Master Chief before exiting his career. So I have this plan to maybe give the option of letting him travel to 268 (They are currently in Regina) and claim his birthright, trying to bring the Imperium to the subsector, or let him run away with possible assassins on his tail.

Or should I maybe define his father's Duchy as a subsector over in the Cannon untouched regions (Delphi and such).

So, being new to the game I wanted to ask two questions:
1.) Is this a good idea, or will it focus too much on one player?
2.) What have you done when players end up with high titles, especially Duke.

 

[sandmanninja]

I had some 'on the fly' house rules when I ran games face to face.

I told the player, "You can keep that SOC skill and get stuck at the Palace running the very mundane politics aspect of Traveller, or you can put it on some other attribute..."

I recall - maybe in a Challenge magazine - where there was a table that broke those ultra high SOC skills down a bit. So you ended up a noble in some far remote world or somesuch.

 

[epicenter00]

Ahh, title-racing. It's usually more of a problem in GURPS where my players and I love to see how high of a rank we can get. Usually by informal fiat, we avoid titled characters unless everyone agrees the campaign will revolve around it. As a rule, I usually don't let players get titles higher than Knight without some agreement with the other players. Instead I let them re-roll on the mustering out table.

One thing to remember is that Traveller character generation doesn't really reflect how pervasive noble influence would be in Traveller. I call your attention to a few things:

* No son of a "real" noble (ie; beyond knight or baronet) is ever going to enlist into military service as a non-officer. I just don't see it happening. It would scandalize and shame the character's family in a society where nobles are expected to live lives of service and responsibility, everything an heir does before taking up the title should train him or her for the future responsibility of nobility. Indeed, I'd go further and say it's unlikely an Imperial noble would even be in the army. The army is considered to be "common" by the 3I. Nobles join the Navy or sometimes the Marines, though usually Marines are pretty "common" as well.

* On the same note, I find it exceedingly unlikely that someone would move up too many rungs on the noble scale. You just don't start as a knight (or even worse, some untitled commoner) then end up as a Duke. Typically in in the 3I, knights and some baronets are raised from commoners to that level for some outstanding service, but the title often isn't passed on. The "real" nobles don't really get raised in that way.

That said, I can think of a few suggestions on how you can handle the situation. I'd definitely talk it over with the player, or perhaps all of your players. Perhaps your players will be fine being the entourage of a Duke or his "school/military" buddies. The question then becomes that of responsibilities and obligations.

- Perhaps your Duke character is "out" with his family for some reason. He might be the black sheep, he might be rebellious, or something similar. This might have led him to hide his true identity and join the military as an enlisted man to see "how the other half lives."

- He might not know he's a Duke. This is cliche, but just because it's cliche doesn't mean it's not fun to play around with. For whatever reason, he might have been raised in a situation where he never knew he was a Duke. Likely explanations might include scheming relatives, heirs cached against some enemy's assassins, or the suddenly inheriting son or daughter who wouldn't normally be in that position (not eldest, or born of bastardry, or something similar). Perhaps he was originally assigned some faithful family retainer who'd watch out for him in secret, but this retainer died or was killed.

- Cleon the Weak. Perhaps your noble character is well-meaning but temperamentally or skill-wise unsuited for the scheming and planning of noble duties. However, unlike most "terrible" rulers, he or she recognizes this and has some brilliant administrator act as Chamberlain who handles all the duties of running the fief. Still retaining his title, perhaps he or she is not a wastrel and still feels a sense of responsibility, so instead takes a much more hands-on approach to solving the problems of the Imperium (some of my friends call this archetype the "Bruce Wayne").

- Disposessed. Perhaps your character's father was Duke of a world in Spinward Marches that was seized by the Zhodani in the last Frontier War. While allowed to keep his title, he is in no position exercise power over it. While this sounds like the best idea, in reality it's not as it cheapens the institution of nobility, which is one of the big social contrasts in Traveller against our own familiar world. In addition, if your player wants to keep his title in effect instead of just technically, he'd be expected to live and entertain in the manner of his title, which usually far beyond the means of players - he'd constantly be in mounting and ever-greater debt.

 

[aramis]

Canonically, unless he was in the Noble career, he's a "reward noble".

He's got a spiffy title, but nothing else. He gets to hobnob with "working" nobles as an equal. He might even get to pass on said title (IMTU, they degrade...). But he's not a mover and shaker.

He is entitled to demand to be addressed as "Your Grace" and should expect to sit at the Captain's Table when a passenger, and gets first pick at the dinner line...

If he's crew, he's just crew addressed as "your grace" instead of "Crewman" when on duty.

If you have SCA experience, think of honor nobles like court barons, viscounts and counts, and working nobles as territorial barons, princes, and kings.

 

[Anthelios]

* No son of a "real" noble (ie; beyond knight or baronet) is ever going to enlist into military service as a non-officer. I just don't see it happening. It would scandalize and shame the character's family in a society where nobles are expected to live lives of service and responsibility, everything an heir does before taking up the title should train him or her for the future responsibility of nobility. Indeed, I'd go further and say it's unlikely an Imperial noble would even be in the army. The army is considered to be "common" by the 3I. Nobles join the Navy or sometimes the Marines, though usually Marines are pretty "common" as well.

Well, I actually said that the PLAYER was in the army, hence why he chose to do a non-officer. He has real life experience working with them and knows that EM who gain rank tend to be more respected by the men under them. His character was indeed in the Navy.

Also as far as the Marches are concerned, the Duke of Regina was also a Navy man. Though I'm sure he was an officer.

I still need to talk to the player about this, but I was thinking his father was just below the Title of Duke, or was Duke of a far away system. Now, he was no where near the next in line. Youngest heir of a lot of heirs would live him with very little, so he disappeared when old enough to make a way in the world himself, thus choosing the enlisted route even though he began the game with a SOC 11.

I think it would be interesting to base the game around the possible ramifications of him being a Duke in the wake of a slew of assassinations, which means there are people after him as well. The other players are all lower SOCs, except one knight who actually followed the Nobility career path. The other two players are an ISS scout and a front line marine.

Anyway, thanks for the advice! Any more would be appreciated.

 

[sandmanninja]

I've seen some Adventure Nuggets where a high-SOC PC had his House deposed while he was off-world. An adventure could be he has the Title but no lands. Even his Title is questionable. He might have some people that were in his Family's employ for generations and are loyal. The PC might try to convince his Friends (i.e. the other players) to try to overthrow the current Noble Family. It might go down better if his family was assassinated (sympathy factor), or died under 'mysterious circumstances'.

"I have no money to offer you presently. However, if you were to aid me in restoring my Family name, I'd see that you were taken care of..."

Or, he can ignore it and have 'regular' adventures...

 

[Anthelios]

It was pretty great, he ended up mustering out totally broke (like 8Kcr or so). But did start the game with a Ship's Boat, worth a few million.

Which I have to say that's a very odd muster out benefit, so valuable compared even to ship shares.

I will bring up the whole idea with him when he gets back from Turkey-Day vacation. Thanks for the advice.

I have this idea of him being hounded by a mysterious assassin who's seeking to clean up the loose ends for the next administration. Even if his character doesn't to be involved, it's going to catch up to him.

"Who is that guy? He keeps showing up and shooting at us!"

"Uh, he's shooting at you."

 

[Andrew Boulton]

There could be all kinds of groups after him - assassins trying to finish the job, other nobles trying to discredit him, Imperial agents making sure he gets home and starts Duking (whether he wants to or not), TNS reporters looking for a good story...

 

[Imperial Planetologist]

The Imperium is vast and communications are slow.

Which means when the bureaucrats screw the pooch it takes a long time to discover the mistake.

The wrong name was entered into a database on Capital.

Meet the new Duke.

 

[Ran Targas]

There could be all kinds of groups after him - assassins trying to finish the job, other nobles trying to discredit him, Imperial agents making sure he gets home and starts Duking (whether he wants to or not), TNS reporters looking for a good story...

Maybe it's the Imperial agents who are trying to stop him so the Emperor can appoint a successor of his liking. With the character already an unconventional sort, maybe there are worries he won't toe the Imperial line.

 

[BlackBat242]

Or those who secretly ordered the wiping out of his family are looking for him... to install as a puppet!

And they are planning very shady dealings with his dukedom...

"He's been so isolated that he won't have a clue, and will have to rely on us for everything. If anything goes wrong, he gets the blame,not us".


In the immortal words of the Joker (Jack Nicholson, the best)... "Who can you trust?".

 

[Anthelios]

Blackbird, I really like that idea. Could even think up a few factions each trying to use him to their own ends. The only problem I see is that they will be needing him to stay close to ensure their puppet doesn't get it's strings cut.. or killed.

Which may end his Traveller career. Though the whole group loves tactics and wargames, and I can see them getting into roles of a growing military. One of the reasons I liked the District 268 idea. They would have to build a subsector fleet out of nothing, especially if I introduce Zhodani aggressions/scouts as a precursor to war. Then they have the need to Traveller to enlist aid from nearby subsectors.

 

[Rev Round]

I have it from good "authority" (grand daughter of a countess) that not all aristos are wealthy or powerful. There are carpenter aristos, small farmer aristos, anarchist aristos, librarian aristos, and etc. As a group there is the whole of society within. Think of any job, profession, level of wealth, interests, and etc. However there is a tendency for them to be successful even at being poor. Aristos of lineage tend to mostly drop the striving for wealth and power having had family members go for that and find it a dead end in terms of accomplishment.

Wealthy and powerful aristos are a tiny minority amongst aristos.

 

[BlackBat242]

Of course, there is the version I have used for an NPC in my most recent Traveller game... the Remittance Man.

remittance man
noun

1. An unwanted or underachieving man, or occasionally a youngest son, sent by relatives to a distant land and sent regular remittances of upkeep money, in order that he doesn't come back.


Jimmy Buffet (inspired by a Mark Twain story) did a song about such a person in 1995:
http://www.oldielyrics.com/lyrics/jimmy_buffett/remittance_man.html

 

[rancke]

I've just started my first Traveller game, and I'm trying to keep MTU as close as I can to the OTU as I can at this point.

Unfortunately, on the subject of Imperial nobles, the OTU is totally inconsistent. On the one hand, doing a top-down analysis, the Imperium has about 300 dukes (roughly one per subsector), maybe 1000 counts and viscounts (one per star cluster), 3-4000 marquesses (one per important world) and 7-8000 barons (one per not-important world). If you instead do a bottom-up analysis based on the assumption that the character generation system is anywhere near any sort of resemblance to "reality", you start with one baron and two knights out of every 36 people and go on from there. Since the Imperium has a population of 15 trillion, you can see that the Moot Spire is going to need a rather large meeting room...

Some people argue that the character generation system doesn't create average people but PC type characters, and that PCs may be expected to exceed the norm. A very good argument, were it not for the fact that for 30 years Traveller authors have created NPCs by using the Character Generation System (there's even a JTAS article about NPCs that suggests fudging NPC stats a bit to make them better able to perform whatever job they have, making NPCs a biy BETTER than PC ;-).

Adding to the problem is the fact that everybody get a mental image of a futuristic version of a character from The Three Musketeers whenever they see the title 'baron' or 'count' or 'duke'. But an Imperial duke governs a political entity far greater than a piddling little fraction of a subdivision of a single world. He's not the equivalent of an Old European duke. He's several social levels above the futuristic equivalent of the World Emperor of Earth (If we had one of those)!

Well, here is the thing. One of my players ended up rolling up a character with a 15 SOC.

So, he's a Duke. Now this happened as a mustering out benefit from the Navy, which I included as part of his story of receiving news upon leaving the service that his father, formerly the Count of the Imperial Worlds in 268, had been promoted to the rank of Duke for his work in drawing more worlds toward the Imperium, and was shortly assassinated by unknown anti-imperial forces.

Well, you've already deviated quite a bit from the OTU here. There is no Count of District 268 (Highest Imperial noble in District 268 is the Marquis of Mertactor), and the Imperium hasn't gotten many new worlds in the last couple of centuries, cretainly not in District 268.

So, being new to the game I wanted to ask two questions:
1.) Is this a good idea, or will it focus too much on one player?

Played (and reffed) properly, an Imperial title is a campaign-distorting advantage. It's a HUGE social asset. Just imaging all the plots that could be rendered moot because the PC can pop in at the ducal palace on Regina and have a chat with Norris (or his deputy) any time he wants. Also, think about the amount of media attention royalty gets here on Earth. An Imperial duke (or close relative of one) would be wading through paparazzi. Quite a handicap when you're engaged in many PC type shenanigans.

2.) What have you done when players end up with high titles, especially Duke.

I increased the number of social levels. The Emperor is SL 33. An Imperial baron is SL 24. World leaders are around 20-22. Someone of SL 15 *is* the equivalent of a planetary duke. If he has any Imperial title, it's a knighthood in one of the Imperium's lower orders. None of my players ever did get that high, but if one had, I might have made him a second son of a planetary duke and given him a decent allowance and a few social connections. He might have known the son of the world's Imperial baron in school.

If for some reason I had to stick to the CT social levels, I'd seriously consider just veto'ing so high a social position. Just as I wouldn't allow players to receive ships as mustering out benefits unless it fitted in with the campaign I planned to run. ("OK, we'll keep Johny's ship because it's the best. We'll sell Beth's and Carl's ships and pay off the mortgage, then use the rest of the money to hire a team of mercenaries to solve today's plot.")

Bottom line is, do YOU want to run a campaign with an Imperial duke among your PCs?



Hans

 

[rancke]

Canonically, unless he was in the Noble career, he's a "reward noble".

In which case he's almost certainly not a duke. Honor and reward titles above marquis are extremely rare.


Hans

 

[rancke]

Maybe it's the Imperial agents who are trying to stop him so the Emperor can appoint a successor of his liking. With the character already an unconventional sort, maybe there are worries he won't toe the Imperial line.

The Emperor doesn't need him dead to strip him of his title and give it to someone else. Not performing his duty as a noble to the satisfaction of the Emperor is grounds for losing the title.



Hans

 

[aramis]

In which case he's almost certainly not a duke. Honor and reward titles above marquis are extremely rare.


Hans

Not really... just old men with loads of time in the Navy.

Most of my retired navy captain and admiral characters gained 4 soc or more.

Still, only a fraction. Start with Soc 9 (getting the bonuses), and make admiral and you're knighted (via rank skills). MoBs at +2 each can push that up quick (if rank5+: 1/6 chance, minimum 5 rolls; expect a +2, and it's about half who make it to duke in that crowd.) Loads of old men with Ducal Circlets courtesy of the IN.

 

[rancke]

Not really... just old men with loads of time in the Navy.

Most of my retired navy captain and admiral characters gained 4 soc or more.

Still, only a fraction. Start with Soc 9 (getting the bonuses), and make admiral and you're knighted (via rank skills). MoBs at +2 each can push that up quick (if rank5+: 1/6 chance, minimum 5 rolls; expect a +2, and it's about half who make it to duke in that crowd.) Loads of old men with Ducal Circlets courtesy of the IN.

I can't recall where, but there's a statement somewhere to the effect that honor and reward titles very rarely are higher than marquis. Reward dukes are certainly not routine. I don't dispute that the character generation system implies the creation of scads of reward dukes. I just think that this feature of the system fails to reflect the underlying "reality" that is the OTU.


Hans

 

[aramis]

I can't recall where, but there's a statement somewhere to the effect that honor and reward titles very rarely are higher than marquis. Reward dukes are certainly not routine. I don't dispute that the character generation system implies the creation of scads of reward dukes. I just think that this feature of the system fails to reflect the underlying "reality" that is the OTU.


Hans

And as you might recall, when "fluff" contradicts rules, I usually take the rules.

Also note that the Navy is about the only service where this happens.