T5SS: Travellermap.com Update

[inexorabletash]

Many of the system names in Dark Nebula appear to have reverted to an older version based on a bad scan of the data in Solomani and Aslan. That scan included a lot of "l"s for "t"s and "i"s. Joshua had cleaned these up a while back. I think this is the whole list of reversions:

Interesting, given that Don had supplied the corrected data to me!

http://travellermap.blogspot.com/2013/01/dark-nebula-cleanup-help.html

Data file can be found at:

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/i...7c12b4b90bed8082e773/res/Sectors/DARK1120.SEC

 

[DonM]

Depot/Corridor, a naval depot in a sector with eight subsectors but enough Vargr threat to warrant 16 fleets, is tech level D for political reasons, and the Navy makes do. 19 Depots through the Imperium, and no more than 7 are TL F, with 8 TL D and 3 TL C museums. Seems like almost 2/3 are placed for political reasons.

I can understand the desire not to break the rules. With so few real threats, it may be that the Imperium finds old-tech ships adequate for the role of keeping member worlds in line while giving economic boosts to the shipyards of worlds that need it. Perhaps the fleet is equally diverse, a handy mechanism to diminish the power available to some upstart grand duke who might think to assassinate an emperor to claim the throne. It has a certain appeal for those of us who have no fondness for the MegaTrav idea of the Imperium disintegrating in a multi-sided civil war; much harder to support a civil war when the Emperor has a TL F depot in his backyard and another just 2 parsecs spinward of Core in Dagudashaad, while Dulinor settles for a D. Definitely makes it much harder to justify that course of events, which for me makes the lower tech depots very appealing.

However, I also understand that, given paradoxes like a TL D depot supporting a hotly threatened sector, there will be great pressure to ignore that piece of canon for the most controversial locations, so I don't see the effort resulting in the desired outcome in those instances. If one is insistant on hewing to the rules, one should strongly consider revisiting the situation in Corridor, perhaps spiking the population or otherwise making it possible to place a real base where it is most needed, 'cause the politics thing is going to be a hard sell for players familiar with that sector.

I'm also curious as to that rationale in light of the fact that most of the Depot worlds appear altered from their MegaTrav stats. Many law levels were altered, along with some population ratings and government types. I'm curious why the decision was taken to change those worlds, yet not to change them enough to justify a higher tech level for the depots.

Marc accepted a minimum population at all depots, and that all Depot systems would be under military rule. That change has been imposed. There will probably be more depot changes. Note that your comment about altering the depots from the MT stats is in direct opposition to at least two lengthy discussions here on COTI about depots.

Feel free to start another depot discussion. We're listening

Lanth -- several people think Lanth should not be a capital. There's a discussion around here somewhere on Lanth.

 

[DonM]

Interesting, given that Don had supplied the corrected data to me!

http://travellermap.blogspot.com/2013/01/dark-nebula-cleanup-help.html

Data file can be found at:

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/i...7c12b4b90bed8082e773/res/Sectors/DARK1120.SEC

I'll go look at this. I know that for Dark Nebula, I've got FIVE world name lists. Couldn't anyone get this sector right? Fortunately, that's the whole point of doing this in public, getting all of you to help us get it right.

 

[savage]

Marc accepted a minimum population at all depots, and that all Depot systems would be under military rule. That change has been imposed. ...

There are plenty of past discussion threads Corridor Fleet,.. Do you mean Marc reiterated a minimum population (I don't recall anyone requesting it), documenting military rule through an amber zone? And adjusting TL to meet T5 UWP.

 

[DonM]

There are plenty of past discussion threads Corridor Fleet,.. Do you mean Marc reiterated a minimum population (I don't recall anyone requesting it), documenting military rule through an amber zone? And adjusting TL to meet T5 UWP.

The minimum pop for depots was brought up long ago, not recently. No amber zone, the military rule gets a Gov Type 6 and an Mr detail note.

 

[DonM]

Hah! Shows my memory. We did Amber zone them.

Ok, here's the Imperial Depots as of the May update... I know some folks are still unhappy about the TL C depots, but that's much better than the old Zarushagar TL 6 depot (and yes, I did read the e-mail complaining about removing that, you know who you are).

Apparently I've forever shattered the feel of Zarushagar by upgrading the depot there.

So, what problems could potentially be corrected in this data? I'm preferring suggestions that do not break T5's TL rules.

 

[pendragonman]

Don,

Is that attached file just those depots that are subject to correction?

 

[whulorigan]

Lanth -- several people think Lanth should not be a capital. There's a discussion around here somewhere on Lanth.

I referenced the discussion in Post #7 of THIS Thread.
It references a discussion on the T5SS Semi-Official Thread, starting at Post #141:

I am rather curious as to why Lanth does have a Subsector Capital. It is a low population backwater, whose "capital" (Lanth) is one of 4 worlds with Importance Ix = +2 (the highest level in the subsector). Lanth would not otherwise even rate a Lesser Duke (C6/Soc=f), which requires minimum Importance Ix = +4 (as all other Subsector Capitals in the Spinward Marches have). In fact, no worlds in the subsector rate either a Lesser Duke or even a Count. Extolay, Treece, and Equus are the most significant worlds (meriting Viscounts), and Lanth itself otherwise merits nothing greater than a Knight.

Seems to me that Lanth would be an ideal candidate for a subsector to be administered from elsewhere.

Perhaps the Lanth Duchy is a legacy from an earlier time?

And Post #152:

However, there's some serious backwater subsectors out there, and they still get capitals. Because otherwise, there's some interesting subsectors that won't have a subsector duke.
.
.
.
And there's some Importance 5 worlds with B starports (it can happen).

So the answer really is, ok, there is an issue, and we'll see what the next update does to fix it.

Perhaps the solution would be that subsectors with Ix<4 have a "Subsector Capital" as a regional administrative center, but do not qualify for a Subsector Duke until the Importance is raised to Ix=4? Such subsectors may fall under the jurisdiction of a neighboring Duke, or have a lesser noble (Marquis - Count) appointed as regional administrator/overseer in the interrim?

 

[Garnfellow]

Aslan Sectors and Other Sophonts

The Dark Nebula data does a nice job of sprinkling human populations throughout the sector, and probably more of the Aslan sectors should do likewise.

The 10 Zodia colonies in Iwahfuah (detailed in Solomani & Aslan, pg. 49) are populated by biological humans who are culturally Aslan; they belong to their own clan, Zodia, a vassal to Tralyeaeawi clan. The allegiance code should probably reflect that and the remarks maybe should list Humans. The Zodia worlds are:

• Katsuto (Iwahfuah 0813)
• New Sydney (Iwahfuah 1015)
• Staten (Iwahfuah 0424)
• Monterey (Iwahfuah 0426)
• Ventura (Iwahfuah 0721)
• Fugawa (Iwahfuah 0924)
• Okiji (Iwahfuah 1022)
• Yokonabe (Iwahfuah 1422)
• Woomera (Iwahfuah 1823)
• Hitoku (Iwahfuah 1933)

On a similar note, Aslan populations should probably be scattered on some Solomani worlds in the spinward areas of Magyar Sector. Possible candidates include Joce/Nemo (0619), Akludu/Eery (0902), and Chorus/Eery (1403), all under military rule.

I'm not a huge fan of having chirper and droyne populations scattered all through Aslan space, particularly the more rimward sectors. The map in the back of the CT droyne book doesn't show many of these. (I'll admit this more a personal hangup than anything, though.)

 

[savage]

The minimum pop for depots was brought up long ago, not recently. No amber zone, the military rule gets a Gov Type 6 and an Mr detail note.

DonM my friend, I realize min pop on Depots are an old discussion. During the MT days DGP offered an explanation of high automation and other resources in system. The CF thread discusses it again in more detail. I don't recall ever hearing anyone in favor of min. pop.

Good that you mentioned the Type 6 Gov. It's very obvious and often neglected. The min. pop. stat is the strange impact on TL in Traveller. I would say that higher populations tend to force increases in TL but not the other way around. A small pop from a colony could still maintain a high TL.

 

[Carlobrand]

Marc accepted a minimum population at all depots, and that all Depot systems would be under military rule. That change has been imposed. There will probably be more depot changes. Note that your comment about altering the depots from the MT stats is in direct opposition to at least two lengthy discussions here on COTI about depots.

Feel free to start another depot discussion. We're listening

Lanth -- several people think Lanth should not be a capital. There's a discussion around here somewhere on Lanth.

I am pretty pitiful at searching old threads. I got 356 threads listed with some mention of "depot". Was it a dedicated thread, or did it come up in a thread about some other issue?

I'm not clear how my comment on altering the depots from MT stats could be in opposition to any prior discussion since it strictly speaking didn't take a position except about Corridor specifically - and frankly some of those MT depots needed changing. In the instance of Corridor though, it creates a, "what were they thinking," moment: Corridor is just too critical and too tight a bottleneck to play politics with, and neighboring Provence sector has several impressively populated TL-F Vargr worlds. I can't believe the Imperials wouldn't factor that into their defensive plans.

I don't know enough about the other depots to know whether they'd create a similar paradoxical situation. As I said, it's an interesting view: the best-tech depots are along the Solomani border, in Deneb ready to oppose the Vargr and Zho, at Core where the Emperor can use it, and at Dagu literally just barely across the border from Core. The other depots are lower tech. That puts a pair of strong depots ready to back the Emperor against a usurper and strong depots behind the fleet assets of the major combat zones. Except in Corridor.

(I don't know enough about Vland and Lishun to know whether they're facing a problem, but they've got the center of the Imperium to back them if needed.)

It is implied that Imperial fleets themselves are best tech with that mention of obsolescent reserve units, so perhaps Dulinor can endure with a museum piece of a depot, though it leaves one scratching one's head at why the Imperium runs TL15 ships but has TL12-13 depots. I might extend on the premise in my TU by having the sector's fleets reflect the tech level of the local Depot, aside from a few strike fleets, as a means of ensuring that Core keeps an upper hand over its archdukes. Explains the lower tech depots, though it undercuts Dulinor's ability to fend off the Core fleets - but in my personal TU that's not a problem since he never does the deed.

They're debating Lanth's status as sbusector capital? Hadn't ever occurred to me to question that. Pop's light, but it's the only A-port in the subsector. I figured it was like Austin, Texas.

 

[DonM]

The Dark Nebula data does a nice job of sprinkling human populations throughout the sector, and probably more of the Aslan sectors should do likewise.

The 10 Zodia colonies in Iwahfuah (detailed in Solomani & Aslan, pg. 49) are populated by biological humans who are culturally Aslan; they belong to their own clan, Zodia, a vassal to Tralyeaeawi clan. The allegiance code should probably reflect that and the remarks maybe should list Humans. The Zodia worlds are:

• Katsuto (Iwahfuah 0813)
• New Sydney (Iwahfuah 1015)
• Staten (Iwahfuah 0424)
• Monterey (Iwahfuah 0426)
• Ventura (Iwahfuah 0721)
• Fugawa (Iwahfuah 0924)
• Okiji (Iwahfuah 1022)
• Yokonabe (Iwahfuah 1422)
• Woomera (Iwahfuah 1823)
• Hitoku (Iwahfuah 1933)

On a similar note, Aslan populations should probably be scattered on some Solomani worlds in the spinward areas of Magyar Sector. Possible candidates include Joce/Nemo (0619), Akludu/Eery (0902), and Chorus/Eery (1403), all under military rule.

I'm not a huge fan of having chirper and droyne populations scattered all through Aslan space, particularly the more rimward sectors. The map in the back of the CT droyne book doesn't show many of these. (I'll admit this more a personal hangup than anything, though.)

The Zodia pops do need to get dropped in, and I like your Magyar suggestions. As to the Chirper/Droyne pops, your thinking is like mine, and so you've probably noted what I've done to such pops in other sectors. I'll confess to NOT having done that treatment to the Aslan sectors. So all three of these items go into my "right now" pile.

 

[DonM]

They're debating Lanth's status as sbusector capital? Hadn't ever occurred to me to question that. Pop's light, but it's the only A-port in the subsector. I figured it was like Austin, Texas.

I'm borrowing this quote...

 

[DonM]

Perhaps the solution would be that subsectors with Ix<4 have a "Subsector Capital" as a regional administrative center, but do not qualify for a Subsector Duke until the Importance is raised to Ix=4? Such subsectors may fall under the jurisdiction of a neighboring Duke, or have a lesser noble (Marquis - Count) appointed as regional administrator/overseer in the interrim?

If you look at the Marches and elsewhere, those are separate determiners. In fact, there are some other subsectors which don't get Dukes...

And moving the Vilis subsector capital to Frenzie prevents Vilis from having a subsector duke (although it has its own lesser duke). Note that Lanth will keep its capital, but it has only a Baron. And Aramis received its capital back, but doesn't have a Duke...

 

[whulorigan]

If you look at the Marches and elsewhere, those are separate determiners. In fact, there are some other subsectors which don't get Dukes...

And moving the Vilis subsector capital to Frenzie prevents Vilis from having a subsector duke (although it has its own lesser duke). Note that Lanth will keep its capital, but it has only a Baron. And Aramis received its capital back, but doesn't have a Duke...

And all of that squares well with (or harmonizes) prior canon.
(And actually, Lanth only gets a Knight, not a Baron).

 

[savage]

I'm not clear how my comment on altering the depots from MT stats could be in opposition to any prior discussion since it strictly speaking didn't take a position except about Corridor specifically - and frankly some of those MT depots needed changing. In the instance of Corridor though, it creates a, "what were they thinking," moment: Corridor is just too critical and too tight a bottleneck to play politics with, and neighboring Provence sector has several impressively populated TL-F Vargr worlds. I can't believe the Imperials wouldn't factor that into their defensive plans.
...The other depots are lower tech. That puts a pair of strong depots ready to back the Emperor against a usurper and strong depots behind the fleet assets of the major combat zones. Except in Corridor.

(I don't know enough about Vland and Lishun to know whether they're facing a problem, but they've got the center of the Imperium to back them if needed.)
.

You're on target with this. Corridor now makes no sense. Most depots needed a minor tweak in population, amber zone, military government and a TL uplift. Lishun per DGP is on the closure list when the Rebellion starts. Antares and Lishun were too vulnerable from Julian attacks and mobile bases were being considered. If Lishun is that vulnerable then Corridor and Deneb are more vulnerable to clever Vargr.

IMTU, the CT/MT UWP's we're local standards without military intervention. Simple fix.

 

[Hyphen]

If you look at the Marches and elsewhere, those are separate determiners. In fact, there are some other subsectors which don't get Dukes...

And moving the Vilis subsector capital to Frenzie prevents Vilis from having a subsector duke (although it has its own lesser duke). Note that Lanth will keep its capital, but it has only a Baron. And Aramis received its capital back, but doesn't have a Duke...

Oh bugger. I guess I'll just retain Duke Rjinswand Chrystall of Lanth (IASM Domain Chairman, ret.) in MTU, then.

Am I the only one who thinks that Lanth is named after lanthanum, and that (probably) the system is an important source of that element? And that that is the reason for it's importance? Plus a damn good reason for the Imperium wanting to protect it, and the Swordies wanting to invade it? It does have both a naval base AND a scout base, y'know?

 

[rancke]

If you look at the Marches and elsewhere, those are separate determiners. In fact, there are some other subsectors which don't get Dukes...

And moving the Vilis subsector capital to Frenzie prevents Vilis from having a subsector duke (although it has its own lesser duke). Note that Lanth will keep its capital, but it has only a Baron. And Aramis received its capital back, but doesn't have a Duke...

In previously published material all subsectors had capitals, whether it made sense or not.

My take on the Imperial system is that it has two different administrative layers, the Imperium and the duchies, analogous to federal and state in the present-day US (The analogy is not perfect, since the Imperium has a third level, member world).

The Imperial administration uses the subsector as its lowest organisatorial unit. Duchies use the duchy. In by far the most cases duchies are coterminious with subsectors. 'Subsector' is even sometimes used synonymously with 'duchy'. But in some cases a subsector is, for one reason or another, not a duchy. Examples are Aramis, which is split between three neighboring duchies, Jewell, which is a county answering to the Duke of Regina, Vilis, which used to be a duchy (with capital on Arden), but was gutted by the 3FW peace settlement and is now also a county answering to the Duke of Regina. Lanth is either a county answering to one of the neighboring duchies or (my preferred version) split between those three duchies.

But no matter what, a subsector has an Imperial administrative center. In a duchy it will almost invariably be the duchy capital, but in the other subsectors it's whatever world historical events has selected.


Hans

 

[rancke]

(And actually, Lanth only gets a Knight, not a Baron).

Lanth may actually qualify for a retcon based on previous history. A world with 700,000 inhabitants staving off Sword Worlder attacks for the entire 5FW seems a little... curious.

Of course, if Lanth was a TL15 garrison world run by the Imperium it would be a different matter, but it's a TL11 world with a sovereign government. It does have a naval base, so that may be enough to explain its remarkable resilience.


Hans

 

[Vladika]

Lanth may actually qualify for a retcon based on previous history. A world with 700,000 inhabitants staving off Sword Worlder attacks for the entire 5FW seems a little... curious.

Of course, if Lanth was a TL15 garrison world run by the Imperium it would be a different matter, but it's a TL11 world with a sovereign government. It does have a naval base, so that may be enough to explain its remarkable resilience.


Hans

Given the strategic importance of Lanth, I'd say the Imperial Naval presence would be quite high. Given that, and the TL difference between the Sword World Confederation and the Imperial Navy, there wouldn't be much of a contest.