I recently borrowed a friend's copies of the first three EPIC adventures for a few weeks and had a quick read-through. On the whole I'm very favorably impressed and if I ever manage to finish and sell something to Quicklink, I'm definitely going to buy them for myself. Without having read every page in detail, it's my impression that these books are every bit as good as the old GDW adventures.
But there's one thing about them that really perplexes me and caused me to write this post. Can someone please explain to me what's so bad about vetting the UWPs for impossible combinations before publishing? Looking through the UWPs for the Thorstone, Kraxin, Williamsburg and Tri-Empire subsectors I spot all the old... (what's the antonym of 'favorites'? Disfavorites?) The spaceship and starship yards run by a handful of people, the overabundance of class M stars (including the non-existent M9s), the breathable atmospheres on the worlds that are too small to retain them, the high-population worlds with too little traffic to merit a fuel purification plant, the defenseless low-tech garden worlds that are left in peace by their high-tech neighbors, the thriving low-tech communities on vacuum worlds, the total lack of correlation between habitability and population size.
Half of these could be fixed in 15 minutes by rote and the other half by a minimum of thought in a couple of hours. Obviously the author and editor must feel that it's a bad idea to fix these UWPs. And I can't understand it. I mean, the author himself has tried to write up one of these UWPs and failed. Take a look at the world Arkaene in the Thorstone sector. It's UWP is
Arkaene.......1104 B100000-9.......Va...............630...Im..M9 V..M3 D
On page 13 of The Stoner Express there's a writeup of Arkaene. Here is a condensed version of it:
Arkaene is a tiny rockball world which acts as the gravitational anchor point for Arkaene Highport, a large Class B facility. It is a transshipment point for goods crossing the border via the Phelina Main. The highport is a corporate facility owned and run by Arkaene Highport, LIC. The standard Imperial law level of 4 is maintained on the port. The port sees a lot of shipping traffic and is defended by several squadrons of SDBs. Arkaene itself has no indigenous population. A small community of miners and prospectors makes a living from its mineral wealth. None of their communities numbers more than 100 souls. Each has its own landing area (equivalent to a Class E Starport). [Paraphrase from The Stoner Express, p. 13]
This is a system with 2 or more separate communities (The first paragraph speaks of one community, the second of several). In either case its 'mainworld' is obviously the highport. Which would not generate the social data cluster 000, but rather 314 or 414 (depending on just how many people live and work there, thousands at least and quite possible more than 10,000). If the scouts count the miners at all, it makes the system balkanized (and adds several hundreds of citizens). That would make the social data cluster 474 instead. But no matter how you slice it, there's no way to get 000 out of it.
Don't get me wrong, I thouroughly approve of the changes. I'm happy that the author didn't try to make me believe that 6 poeple were running a spaceship yard. But what I just can't comprehend is why he didn't take the logical next step and revise the UWP to reflect the 'reality' of the writeup.
Arkaene.......1104 B100414-9.......Va...............630...Im..M9 V..M3 D
Hans
PS. Hunter and Martin, I hope I managed to avoid offending you with this post. There's no way I can avoid making it an attack, of course, but I hope I was sufficiently civil and that it didn't come off as a personal attack.
But there's one thing about them that really perplexes me and caused me to write this post. Can someone please explain to me what's so bad about vetting the UWPs for impossible combinations before publishing? Looking through the UWPs for the Thorstone, Kraxin, Williamsburg and Tri-Empire subsectors I spot all the old... (what's the antonym of 'favorites'? Disfavorites?) The spaceship and starship yards run by a handful of people, the overabundance of class M stars (including the non-existent M9s), the breathable atmospheres on the worlds that are too small to retain them, the high-population worlds with too little traffic to merit a fuel purification plant, the defenseless low-tech garden worlds that are left in peace by their high-tech neighbors, the thriving low-tech communities on vacuum worlds, the total lack of correlation between habitability and population size.
Half of these could be fixed in 15 minutes by rote and the other half by a minimum of thought in a couple of hours. Obviously the author and editor must feel that it's a bad idea to fix these UWPs. And I can't understand it. I mean, the author himself has tried to write up one of these UWPs and failed. Take a look at the world Arkaene in the Thorstone sector. It's UWP is
Arkaene.......1104 B100000-9.......Va...............630...Im..M9 V..M3 D
On page 13 of The Stoner Express there's a writeup of Arkaene. Here is a condensed version of it:
Arkaene is a tiny rockball world which acts as the gravitational anchor point for Arkaene Highport, a large Class B facility. It is a transshipment point for goods crossing the border via the Phelina Main. The highport is a corporate facility owned and run by Arkaene Highport, LIC. The standard Imperial law level of 4 is maintained on the port. The port sees a lot of shipping traffic and is defended by several squadrons of SDBs. Arkaene itself has no indigenous population. A small community of miners and prospectors makes a living from its mineral wealth. None of their communities numbers more than 100 souls. Each has its own landing area (equivalent to a Class E Starport). [Paraphrase from The Stoner Express, p. 13]
This is a system with 2 or more separate communities (The first paragraph speaks of one community, the second of several). In either case its 'mainworld' is obviously the highport. Which would not generate the social data cluster 000, but rather 314 or 414 (depending on just how many people live and work there, thousands at least and quite possible more than 10,000). If the scouts count the miners at all, it makes the system balkanized (and adds several hundreds of citizens). That would make the social data cluster 474 instead. But no matter how you slice it, there's no way to get 000 out of it.
Don't get me wrong, I thouroughly approve of the changes. I'm happy that the author didn't try to make me believe that 6 poeple were running a spaceship yard. But what I just can't comprehend is why he didn't take the logical next step and revise the UWP to reflect the 'reality' of the writeup.
Arkaene.......1104 B100414-9.......Va...............630...Im..M9 V..M3 D
Hans
PS. Hunter and Martin, I hope I managed to avoid offending you with this post. There's no way I can avoid making it an attack, of course, but I hope I was sufficiently civil and that it didn't come off as a personal attack.
QLI is not alone in these regards, as there are countless examples of this sort of thing in prior versions of Traveller. In some ways, they may simply be upholding the traditions of old.
