T5SS Update: X Starports

[rancke]

In a polity the size of the Imperium there are going to be all sorts of strange and unusual combinations of governmental, private and public facilities available. The rules can't possibly be expected to enumerate and detail every possible combination.

I don't see why not. A ship with no special affiliations arrives at a starport. Can it buy unrefined fuel? Can it buy refined fuel? Can it have minor repairs done? Can it have an annual maintenance overhaul done? Can the captain have a ship's boat built? Can he have an extra ship built? The answers to these questions should be easy enough to get and should enable you to to assign a starport class. It doesn't matter to the starport rating why you can or can't buy something; what's important is that you can or can't.

I can think of half a dozen reasons why a dictatorship might want to restrict the publicly available facilities while allowing and maintaining more advanced facilities for other uses, possibly including special economic or military purposes. I don't expect to need special dispensation in the rules for every one of them.

It's not the rules as such. It's the resulting setting fact. Why does Forine not sell refined fuel, repairs, annual maintenance overhauls, ship's boats, and starships to passing strangers¹? For some worlds "because it can't" is a good answer, but I don't think it works for Forine.

¹ Strangers with the requisite funds, that is.​

In a way, a class E starport would be easier to explain. "We don sell ANYTHING to filthy offworlders because reasons." But they do sell unrefined fuel.


Hans

 

[Cryton]

Well, it's better than no explanation, but there are problems with it. First, and least, the HG rule only allow governments to build warships; nothing is said about civilian traffic. But more importantly, it raises another question: WHY would a government not want its civilian sector shipyards to repair, maintain, and sell ships to offworlders? It's all taxable income (and offworld currency to boot). Especially since there's no question of a ship monopoly: offworlders can just buy their ships at places like Glisten.


Hans

As I said earlier, it would explain why the government is B (unpopular Leader), and explain WHY the leader is UNPOPULAR as well. As to why he would restrict such things....that's for you, or any other GM to decide.

 

[rancke]

As I said earlier, it would explain why the government is B (unpopular Leader), and explain WHY the leader is UNPOPULAR as well.

"Because he's being stupid," is a good explanation why someone is unpopular, but it doesn't explain why he's being stupid.

As to why he would restrict such things....that's for you, or any other GM to decide.

I've never been impressed by 'I can't (or 'I'm not going to') answer the question myself, but I'm sure there must be an answer' "answers".


Hans

 

[creativehum]

I've never been impressed by 'I can't (or 'I'm not going to') answer the question myself, but I'm sure there must be an answer' "answers".


Hans

Isn't Traveller's World Creation system entirely based on this premise?

I'm not being flippant. The World Creation system not only give the Referee authority to make this kind of decision, but is in fact the best person to make that decision for his or her campaign.

Out of curiosity, what do you think of the World Creation system? What do you think about using it? (If you hate it or think it produces useless results and is a sore upon the Traveller system, that's cool. I'm honestly curious.)

 

[dalthor]

When I first started with Traveller, and read thru the materials, for whatever reason I garnered the impression that starports as listed in the UWP were the IMPERIAL starport and rating.

When I created MTU, I had the Imperial starport as part of the UWP for the system.

I also created "local" ports, totally separate from the Imperial ports, possibly with their own shipyards, import/export facilities, and so on.

They might be mainly for "local" use in that subsector or sector; their size/capabilities were directly tied to the local economy, and they were subject to local trade and tariffs. Materials handled there generally had little or nothing to do with Imperial trade. There were times that the local economy did have better services than the Imps.

I suppose the nearest modern analogy is the International airport, with connections all over the world. Then you have the local metro airport, which may or may not handle international traffic. Then you have the even smaller "dirt" airstrip, for small craft only.

We treated the Imperium like a country, the sectors as different states or regions, and each system like Cities (mainworld) and rural (other worlds in the system) areas.

That segregation gave me opportunities to (try to) strangle interstellar trade by Imperial embargo, and yet allow the local economy to rely on its own resources without necessarily destroying in-system trade and travel.

It made the smuggler campaign I ran REALLY popular with my players. In-system trade was no issue, but they had a BLAST running (or trying to run, many times) the Imperial blockade.

I've learned better since then, but still like the idea that the Imp-ports had absolutely NOTHING to do with a local or regional port, other than possibly being the "gateway" between them.

After I retired, I lost contact with most of my players. Military moves spread us out all over the country, and many of them are no longer interested in gaming. When we do talk, we have many fond memories of extended gaming sessions, and we incorporated a LOT of what we learned (and did) in the military into our games.

Funny how things we took for granted in games back then -- due to common background and consent -- have become subjects of great debate now. Even more interesting to see all the different and entertaining viewpoints the CoTI members have - lots of great ideas and thoughts in here!

You don't realize how insular our worlds were back then, without all the resources the web has made available to us today.

Anyway, I digress. Now back to our regularly schedule programming.

 

[Blue Ghost]

Went away because the trade rules for other supported editions (namely, MGT, but also CT, MT, TNE, T4) make distinctions between "none" and "just a field that they expect traffic at."

Er, but wasn't that a Type-E's description? A leveled piece of bedrock that may or may not have landing markings and / or lights, and even rarer, an office?

 

[Selandia]

The one I'm alluding to directly is Forine. There are plenty of worlds in the OTU where you wonder just how they manage to have as low a starport as they supposedly have whith the traffic that their population and trade modifiers imply. But Forine also has a text statement to the effect that it is "the primary producer of processed and refined metals and minerals for the subsector". How does it manage that without being visited by a sizable number of ships? And how does it manage to service a sizable number of ships with only the facilities of a class D starport? We can also, I submit, deduce the existence of a goodly number of passenger liners to service this high-population world. Just the traffic between Collace and Forine would be sizable.

.......
Hans

you are right, Forine put the ref at work.

P 308 does not provide a table for Roll playing but offers adequate gaming info for Role playing. Possible or not, the "why that starport" table evocated by simonh would be undesirable by me and I would not use it. My take of course, do whatever you wish.

My many time stated explanation for the situation of Rethe is polito-corporate tampering with free trade. If Forine was my problem I would call it as "corporation(s) vertically integrating private starship loading facilities to their operations".

IMTU The UWP starport is the starport open for public business. The one at which your players' ship will have to "dock/land" unless they got the ID code for a private spaceport as part of the adventure.

When they read X, within Imperial space, it means "you are on your own", and before you make it your destination, seek more info (and then it is Ref's job anyway to figure if you want your players to adventure there or not and thus provide an reason for that x that would dissuade or entice them to go). If you feel lasy, just say "Imperial Interdiction for secret reasons".

have fun

Selandia

 

[rancke]

Isn't Traveller's World Creation system entirely based on this premise?

No, but it has been treated that way right from the start. There's a final statement in the original rules (or so I've been told; I've never gotten around to tracking it down and seen it for myself) to the effect that if something doesn't fit, the referee should change it to fit. Despite this, there was for many years strong official resistance to changing UWPs for any reason (Happily this attitude has softened in recent years).

The result was, predictably, that various world writeups simply didn't conform to the UWPs but they were nevertheless not changed to fit the official descriptions, e.g. Pixie, Paya, Zila. Try taking a look at the description of Zila's class E starport in TTA.

(The initial mistake as concerns the OTU was GDW thinking that lists of unvetted UWPs were a finished product.)

I will say that if the rule actually is that you're not allowed to change UWPs under any circumstances, then the rule is rubbish. IMO, of course.

Out of curiosity, what do you think of the World Creation system? What do you think about using it? (If you hate it or think it produces useless results and is a sore upon the Traveller system, that's cool. I'm honestly curious.)

I think it's a good servant but a terrible master. Taking an odd UWP and trying to come up with an explanation can spark all sorts of great 'one-only' worlds. As long as you're allowed to change it when you can't come up with anything that works despite trying hard, I'm fine with it. And as long as TPTB are willing to change an UWP officially if they can't come up with an explanation that works when challenged to do so.


Hans

 

[creativehum]

My question wasn't whether or not the system was a straightjacket. The question was whether or not the World Creation system leaves it to the Referee to come up with a rational for randomly rolled worlds.

The system is clearly not a straightjacket. Here is the text you referred to, identical in LBB 3 (both '77 & '81, The Traveller Book, and Starter Traveller:

At times, the referee (or the players) will find combinations of features which may seem contradictory or unreasonable. Common sense should rule in such cases; either the players or referee will generate a rationale which explains the situation, or an alternative description should be made.

So, the system isn't a straightjacket. In fact, the straightjacket is caused by you being unable to use the rules as written, since you are determined to play in someone else's setting, determined to change nothing. The straightjacket at hand is you refusing one of two paths open to you:

1) Build your own rationale for why the UWP is the way it is. No one can do this for you, because there is no objective reality for the Third Imperium. Any fictional interstellar empire is built on assumptions that are intuitive at best. And all interstellar empires are fiction.

From your posts I get the sense you really think there is a right, objective, rational way to make all elements of a fictional interstellar empire make sense. All I can offer is that most of your assumptions make sense to you. (I've never been sold on the 3I's nearly clockwork precision as a piece of governance, culture, and society.)

No one can answer this question for you, for, ultimately the rationale will only make sense in the context of all the other ways you see and interpret the Third Imperium. Even with people sharing the Third Imperium, the variations in some base assumptions about how the Third Imperium will be large and broad.

2) Change the the UWP if you really can't come up with the a justification. But you deprive yourself of this option because in you are choosing to work in Marc Miller's setting as written.

I don't know what the solution is for this. But as far as I can tell, there you are.

 

[rancke]

So, the system isn't a straightjacket. In fact, the straightjacket is caused by you being unable to use the rules as written, since you are determined to play in someone else's setting, determined to change nothing.

That's almost absolutely true, but not quite. I'm not determined to play in the OTU, I'm determined to make the OTU as self-consistent as possible. You might think of it as a hobby project.

When playing, I play in my own TU (which I do, admittedly, try to keep as similar to the OTU as practical). And I have no problem whatsoever taking these problems worlds and changing them six ways from sunday if that makes them more fun to play in.

The straightjacket at hand is you refusing one of two paths open to you:

1) Build your own rationale for why the UWP is the way it is. No one can do this for you, because there is no objective reality for the Third Imperium. Any fictional interstellar empire is built on assumptions that are intuitive at best. And all interstellar empires are fiction.

But that doesn't mean that someone (ultimately answerable to Marc Miller) can't tell me "You can't get refined fuel at Forine because reasons". And that would settle it, provided the reasons made sense.

From your posts I get the sense you really think there is a right, objective, rational way to make all elements of a fictional interstellar empire make sense.

No, I believe that there are many ways to make elements of a campaign setting make sense. And in any single setting, only one way can be true for any element. In addition, facts have ramifications. So whenever some official publication establishes a fact, it also establishes a host of other facts (many of them negative).

The problem comes when two facts are mutually exclusive, when they can't both be true at the same time.

All I can offer is that most of your assumptions make sense to you. (I've never been sold on the 3I's nearly clockwork precision as a piece of governance, culture, and society.)

Who says what now? What is this clockwork precision you speak of? I don't recall reading about that anywhere.

No one can answer this question for you...

What question?

...for, ultimately the rationale will only make sense in the context of all the other ways you see and interpret the Third Imperium. Even with people sharing the Third Imperium, the variations in some base assumptions about how the Third Imperium will be large and broad.

There's a cure for that. A statement by Marc Miller or any of his minions will nail it down.


Hans

 

[creativehum]

The question, which seems to have slipped away, is the reason Forine is the way it is.

Also, yes: Creating the 3I is its own hobby. I think it is one of two distinct hobbies Traveller has spawned. The other is using the rules to play an RPG game. I'm always curious how much the two hobbies overlap. I know they must -- but I suspect there is some divergence in preference as well!

 

[inexorabletash]

I much prefer X to mean no facilities at all.

IMTU, I'd tweak Aramis' post very slightly to reframe X as:

X means no guaranteed facilities at all.

That allows X to have a consistent interpretation for your intrepid adventurers - you can't count even on a place to set down the ship - but have many interpretations:

* Unsurveyed - completely unknown. Could be a TL-J world that'll refurb your quaint ship just for nostalgia, or could be a toxic hellhole that will dissolve bonded superdense.
* Unpublished - for whatever reason, the IISS and/or TAS don't have data, or don't want to share it. Shades of...
* Uncertain - the class B on a Balkanized world fell into the hands of a fascist regime who have closed it out. That news made it out, but the fact that there are many class C starports available in system wasn't.
* Unavailable - a perfectly serviceable port was shuttered to civilian traffic by the Navy, Scouts, etc
* Actually absent - not even a marked slab of rock. Maybe it's a waterworld with no platforms, of a desert world with only sand dunes and ice caps.

While Forbidden + Red Zone does convey the meaning of some of those, X captures the important data at the start of the UWP - Travellers can not assume any services are available.

 

[KDLadage]

There exists a Population in the UPP. This is population as measured in the order of magnitude. And within this order, there could be anything from 1x to anything shy of 10x that figure.

Given this...

I think the idea of X being interpreted as "no guarantees" is about perfect.

Starport A means you can reasonably expect to have {A} class of service available.

Starport B means you can reasonably expect to have {B} class of service available; this is a minimum. Depending upon the current climate (political, social, etc.) you may get more -- even services that compare to those provided by a Starport A; but only services up to {B} should be counted upon.

Starport C means you can reasonably expect to have {C} class of service available; this is a minimum. Depending upon the current climate (political, social, etc.) you may get more -- even services that compare to those provided by a Starport B or better; but only services up to {C} should be counted upon.

...snip...

Starport X means you cannot reasonably expect any services at all. There may or may not be a safe landing zone; there may or may not be fuel; there may or may not be {insert item/service here}. Depending upon the current climate (political, social, etc.) you may get more -- even services that compare to those provided by a Starport E or better; but no services should be counted upon.

 

[aramis]

Er, but wasn't that a Type-E's description? A leveled piece of bedrock that may or may not have landing markings and / or lights, and even rarer, an office?

X is no port at all.
E is a port, but one lacking facilities. An E port can provide passengers, life support, cargo... an X is nothing, not even a designated landing space.

if they have a designated port, it is class A, B, C, D, or E, and there is trade flow.

but not even all A ports are equal...

 

[rancke]

Starport A means you can reasonably expect to have {A} class of service available.

I.e. everything you can get at a class B plus having starships built for you.

Starport B means you can reasonably expect to have {B} class of service available; this is a minimum.

It's also a maximum. Thoe only thing you can't get at a class B starport are starships, and if you can get them too it's a class A, not a class B.

Anything 99.9999% of visitors will want can be had at a class B starport. In addition you can get ship's boats.

Starport C means you can reasonably expect to have {C} class of service available; this is a minimum.

This means that at least one thing necessary to get a B rating is unavailable. If it's refined fuel you can't get, the class C is a pretty bad starport; if it's ship's boats you can't get, most visitors won't be able to tell the difference.

Did I mention that IMO the starport definitions suck sewage and blow chunks? Ahem. That is to say, IMO they are far from optimal. The distinction between class A and class B is of interest only to wargamers and the distinction between several of the other categories is very rough.


Hans

 

[simonh]

But that doesn't mean that someone (ultimately answerable to Marc Miller) can't tell me "You can't get refined fuel at Forine because reasons". And that would settle it, provided the reasons made sense.

...

The problem comes when two facts are mutually exclusive, when they can't both be true at the same time.

We've already established there could be many reasons why the published information on Forine is perfectly consistent. They're certainly not mutualy exclusive.

I don't think Marc or anyone else is under any particular obligation to explain every surprising aspect of the setting. If no explanation for a mystery is provided, it's explicitly the domain of the referee to some up with an explanation for their game, if they need one. Leaving space for referees to come up with their own interpretation of the setting is a feature, not a bug.

Of course this opens up the possibility of refs being contradicted by later canon, but that's always an issue for any RPG with a published setting that' still being published for. It's not a new problem special to Traveller, or special to this particular aspect of it.

In fact to my mind, unless Marc or a Traveller licensee has a specific reason or need to detail the situation on Forine, doing so gratuitously just to 'clear something up' is actually actively harmful. If there's no particular value the publisher is providing such as an attached scenario, detailed setting information, etc then all such a decree really does is declare any ref-generated answers to the issue for their own campaign's purposes inconsistent with Canon.

To my mind what would be much more helpful would be some advice to referees about coming up with their own answers to such questions, and ways the surprising outcomes of the world gen and trade system can be interpreted creatively.

Simon Hibbs

 

[rancke]

We've already established there could be many reasons why the published information on Forine is perfectly consistent. They're certainly not mutualy exclusive.

What makes you juxtaposition the two bits that you're quoting? One of them is making one point; the other is making a different point.

I don't think Marc or anyone else is under any particular obligation to explain every surprising aspect of the setting.

No, but any publisher of a setting is obliged to try to avoid aspects that have no possible explanation or only highly implausible ones.

If no explanation for a mystery is provided, it's explicitly the domain of the referee to some up with an explanation for their game, if they need one. Leaving space for referees to come up with their own interpretation of the setting is a feature, not a bug.

If an explanation is possible, it might arguably be a feature (actually, it's just not a bug); if no explanation is possible, or any possible explanation puts an undue strain on suspension of disbelief, it's a bug.

Of course this opens up the possibility of refs being contradicted by later canon, but that's always an issue for any RPG with a published setting that' still being published for. It's not a new problem special to Traveller, or special to this particular aspect of it.

Agreed, and I've never complained about that.

In fact to my mind, unless Marc or a Traveller licensee has a specific reason or need to detail the situation on Forine, doing so gratuitously just to 'clear something up' is actually actively harmful. If there's no particular value the publisher is providing such as an attached scenario, detailed setting information, etc then all such a decree really does is declare any ref-generated answers to the issue for their own campaign's purposes inconsistent with Canon.

No, it's not harmful. That's a fallacy that distressingly many people buy into, but it's not true. If a setting detail is ambiguous, with both options perfectly plausible, a referee can choose the one he likes best. And if an official publication later establishes the other option as the one that applies in the OTU, the referee's TU is different fromn the OTU. But if the detail was nailed down from the start, the referee was free to reject it and go with another option, wityh just the same result. The difference is that if there is no ambiguity in the first place, referees knows which is the truth in the OTU and can make a better informed choice of his own.


Hans

 

[KDLadage]

It's also a maximum.

I think this, perhaps, is the issue then.

I disagree.

I think the Starport rating, if read as a minimum (just as the population rating is a minimum of 10^(P) people but can be anything up to but not including 10^(P+1) people), clears up a lot of potential confusion and allows some flexibility within the setting.

I think the Starport rating, if read as a maximum clears up a lot of potential confusion and allows some flexibility within the setting.

I think the Starport rating, if read as a minimum and a maximum -- an absolute -- has the potential to create confusion and restrict flexibility within the setting.

In the end, due to the definitions of Starport A and Starport X, I think the view of Starport ratings as a minimum has the ability to be the most useful from a Game Mastering perspective and a Universe Building perspective. Obviously, your view differs.

 

[rancke]

I think this, perhaps, is the issue then.

I disagree.

Perhaps you didn't realize what my argument was. It was that there is only one thing (starships) you can't get at any class B starport, and if you can get it, the starport qualifies for a starport A rating.


Hans

 

[atpollard]

Perhaps you didn't realize what my argument was. It was that there is only one thing (starships) you can't get at any class B starport, and if you can get it, the starport qualifies for a starport A rating.

Hans

Along the same lines, isn't the difference between an X and E port just one thing ... a marked landing pad (even if it is just a slab of exposed bedrock)?
I viewed that as the difference between landing a 1920 biplane on a dirt landing strip or a farmer's field ... one is expecting someone to land from time to time, the other is not.

What are the T5 differences between Class D and Class C ports?
Traditionally, I know it was repairs and sometimes Refined Fuel (depending on rule version).
With respect to Forne, I could imagine a large port dominated by bulk freighters that might not need to offer repair facilities ... a Class D port?
Sort of like the large cargo ports that lack cruise ship facilities.
I am too unfamiliar with the other details to know whether Forne should have a large passenger facility as well and warrant upgrading to Class C (risk to human lives seems like a good justification for needing to be able to make proper repairs.)
So I am simply arguing for the logical possibility of a major Class D port, not whether it is appropriate for Forne.