The Impossible Era: Referees, Rebellion, and Managing Chaos

[Arsulon]

Hey there,
I've heard and read a whole hell of a lot about how the Rebellion/Hard Times/Collapse period was purt-near impossible to GM. The reasons usually revolved around how hard it was to engage players (meaningfully, not peripherally)in the overarching socio-political, military and economic events that characterize a stellar polity tearing its guts out. I've never played or GM'd a campaign that spanned this period of Traveller history so I have no firsthand experience to confirm or deny these obsevations. I understand there was some "campaign anxiety" over GDW's seeming abandonment of its transparent resource policy; that is, the perceived shift from "tell-it-like-it-is" products that fostered a sense of partnership with the GM to resources that played their story-arch cards pretty close to the chest. Apparently some wondered if the next update from TAS would see their campaign stomping grounds overun by Vargr or atomized by Lucan. Apparently there was some worry over aligning one's players with the "right" faction: nobody likes to bet on a losing horse, and I guess it'd be depressing to see your players strung up as part of Dulinor's coronation party. Again, I didn't play or GM during this period so I don't know.
However, I am planning on running a campaign spanning that era. It starts around 1107 and features adventures at 4 year intervals (yes, they coincide with terms) that serve to showcase the concerns of that time. The campaign continues up to the Collapse and takes a break for the Short Nap. The PC's will be randomly separated, some finding themselves in the Wilds, some in the RC and some in the Regency: this lets me run adventures in all three settings and give the guys a feel for which one they prefer as they try out new characters or run their old ones. The idea is more or less inspired by Asimov's Foundation series: I've always admired how he dealt with the broad sweep of history by creating artificial choke-points (Seldon Crises) that showcase turning points in history.
Since I'll be dealing with the Collapse and transition to the New Era, I am very curious to know how YOU handled it. Where were YOUR players when Dulinor did the deed? Who did YOU support during the Rebellion? Did YOU suffer from the aforementioned "campaign anxiety" and how did YOU deal with it in YOUR game? How did YOUR group/PC's make the transistion to the New Era? Gamers are a hardy breed and I find it difficult to believe some campaigns needed therapy over a little star-spanning civil war/apocalypse. The old guard obviously coped with the Fifth Fontier War, so how did YOU deal when the lights went out? Huh?

 

[alanb]

Originally posted by Arsulon:
Who did YOU support during the Rebellion?
...
Did YOU suffer from the aforementioned "campaign anxiety" and how did YOU deal with it in YOUR game?

I wasn't actually running campaigns when either the assassination or the collapse occurred, so I was able to start new campaigns with them having already happened.

The faction problem was a real one, and got worse every time I reread the source material. At times I wimped out and ran games in the Domain of Deneb, while at other times I ran scenarios where people were supporters of "none of the above", except to the degree that it was tactful to claim that you were loyal to whoever was in charge of the local area.

The only faction I personally felt any sympathy for, oddly enough, was Brzk! He ran with his "humans and Vargr are natural allies" stuff, which makes him less obnoxious than most of the others.

And yes, GDW blew him up, and fragmented his faction... I guess campaign anxiety was justified! : )

Hard Times was something else again, though. It was a pretty cool setting, although it wasn't clear why sooner or later one of the bigger factions wasn't going to just roll over the microstates. I suppose that's why Virus happened.

For the post-Collapse period: well, the big story was a bit of a worry. It was especially annoying since I'm a natural born pocket empire freak, so I wasn't all that interested in either the RC or the Regency, but we "knew" that they were going to "win". (From the hints MJD has dropped, he has a rather different view of the outcome, though, so...)

Actually running a campaign wasn't much of a problem, though. If you had wanted to run a game that lasted for twenty years real-time, you would have been in trouble, but there was no reason you couldn't spend an enjoyable six months extending the influence of your local TED throughout the subsector, before overthrowing him in a coup...

Alan Bradley

 

[trader jim]

Huh??? What was that????......hhhhhmmmmmmmmm

 

[alanb]

Originally posted by trader jim:
Huh??? What was that????......hhhhhmmmmmmmmm

I was implying that the difference between "Pocket Empire" and "TED with starships" is, shall we say, sometimes rather fine. This is doubly so if the Pocket Empire "good guys" are engaging in Smash and Grab raids on your world!

Alan Bradley

 

[trader jim]

sorry about that - i was really trying to follow you but "lost" it - you said a lot more than i could chew - did not mean to sound like a wise ass.

 

[Arsulon]

Alan,
Funny you mention backing Brzk: his faction actually seemed pretty reasonable to me as well. Not only did the League of Antares seem to have a solid moral center but the fact that they were backed by the Julian Protectorate suggested Antares would have no problem holding off Lucan. I was following the Challenge magazine TAS updates at the time and remember wondering if the Protectorate would move in when the Archduke was blown to smithereens. Now that I think about it, I wonder if anyone felt "led on" by all the Trasilon-based adventures appearing in the magazine before the assasination and Collapse. Did you ever consider using the Antares-based transition module that from Challenge that bases a pocket empire around the remains of the defunct League? Did your home-brewed pocket empire interact with any of the ringers (Regency, RC) or did you put it as far away as possible?

 

[alanb]

Originally posted by Arsulon:
Did you ever consider using the Antares-based transition module that from Challenge that bases a pocket empire around the remains of the defunct League? Did your home-brewed pocket empire interact with any of the ringers (Regency, RC) or did you put it as far away as possible?

I missed a few issues of Challenge towards the end, so I didn't see the transition module.

I never really found a totally suitable location for my homebrews. They never interacted with the biggies, though. On the other hand, I did do a bit of stuff with the Hiver Client State in the Hinterworlds, which was like the RC without the high-level plotline.

Alan Bradley

 

[Arsulon]

Ah, I see. The transition module appeared in Challenge #71 and introduced, as a new pocket empire setting, the Confederation of Antares. The Confederation consisted of four worlds in the Ot Zell (L) subsector of Lishun sector. I think an earlier module ("Passing the Flame" or something to that effct) had the PCs, as Trasilon operatives in the wake of Brzk's assasination, transporting government officials to the safety of the Ot Zell Confederation: this pocket empire must be the result.
While poking through the postings this afternoon I ran across your comments on trying to start a pocket empire in the Hinterworlds: I've had friends with similar experiences trying to "collapse" an area but still maintain its viability as a campaign area (in light of the collapse effect itself AND proximity to GDW's settings). One buddy of mine apparently did rather well using DGP material from the Megatraveller Journal #4 to set up of a campaign in Gateway.

 

[trader jim]

after reading your posts i think i may have to rethink my opinion on the New Era. time to break out those old books......hhhmmmmmmm wonder where i stored them???......

 

[Arsulon]

TJ,
I don't know if you've ever played TNE before but, judging by your response to the T2K anecdote about the 30+ man gunfight, you'd love some of the harrier missions from TNE's "Smash N' Grab" book. My God, what a mess some of those "rescue" missions can turn into...

 

[trader jim]

I found em....buryed in the back closet....made a racket, woke the wife...shes Pissed...mumbled something about getting a life!!!......darn woman....the Nerve!!!.....Hey theres a lotta stuff here!!!......

 

[alanb]

Yeah. A lot of it's pretty cool too. My only real problem with it was that I had never played T2K, so learning the new rules was a bit of a worry.

It might have been nice to have had a few more scenarios that weren't Smash and Grabs, but the ones that were written were reasonable enough.

Alan Bradley

 

[Arsulon]

Your point about the overemphasis on RC "hot recovery" missions is well taken, especially if read against your earlier comment about the fine line between TEDs with starships and pocket empires.
The TNE line editior/producer, Dave Nielsen (?), did quite a bit of sermonizing and hand-wringing in an attempt to vilify the Imperium and thereby make the RC seem to occupy a higher moral order; however, we see nothing but "smash n' grabs" aimed at stealing relic technology (thus making it harder for the target world to recover), "decapitation raids" (i.e. assasinations) to destabilize local politics in the RC's favour, and cultural imperialism (everybody in black-and-yellow pajamas). I found it hard to believe the RC culture of violence and blantant cynicsm was being held up as a paragon while, simeltaneously, the events of the Rebellion were being characterized as proof that the Imperium HAD to be swept away. I guess the last straw was the quasi-academic passage in the TNE handbook, which in purporting to discuss the Star Viking "phenomenon", triumphantly concluded they were more aptly called "crusaders" (flourish, crash of cymbals). Crusaders? Could he have picked a worse analogy?
Frankly, I enjoyed the Rebellion/Hard Times/Collapse material because it managed to capture the moral tragedy of a conflict in which EVERY faction thought it was doing the right thing: a phenomenon we see in history all too often. Recognizing the pattern, I guess I never thought it necessary to invalidate the Third Imperium: just as the existence of the United States isn't invalidated by its Civil War, or Great Britain's for participating in the alliance-block madness of WWI.
I never minded that the RC wasn't perfect: I just didn't like being lectured on how crummy the Imperium was.

 

[alanb]

Originally posted by Arsulon:
I guess the last straw was the quasi-academic passage in the TNE handbook, which in purporting to discuss the Star Viking "phenomenon", triumphantly concluded they were more aptly called "crusaders" (flourish, crash of cymbals). Crusaders? Could he have picked a worse analogy?

I'm not so sure that the Crusades are such a bad analogy. After all, the Crusaders stole everything that wasn't nailed down, crippled the (Eastern) Roman Empire, and killed everyone who got in their way.

And like the RC, it was their sacred duty to commit these crimes...

Alan Bradley

 

[Arsulon]

Exactly. Why, then, couldn't Mr. Nielsen see that by dubbing the RC "crusaders" he was inviting the same conclusions you've just made? One of the disheartening things about the comparison was that it, by extension, condemned the Regency to the role of Byzantium. I imagined that lurking on the horizon was a scenario in which a newly resurgent Zhodani Consulate (or its successor, perhaps led by a Prophet, divinely inspired by the Empress Wave) batters away at the Regency. Meanwhile, the Vargr and Aslan begin nipping away, the Sword Worlds get up to the same old mischief and WHO does the Regency turn to for help? Why, the good old RC of course, freshly envigorated after conquering the various polities in Diaspora as well as the Solean Empire. Yeech. I'm looking forward to seeing more material on the "Diaspora Phoenix" just to be reassured the the RC don't have their way. I truly don't hate the RC (they work well, conceptually, for the New Era and provide lots of plot opportunites) but I just couldn't stand the self-righteous tone attached to the supplements. For all I know it might have been intentional, to highlight the tragedy of their eventual fall. Hmm. This possibility begs an altogther new post, I think.

 

[T. Foster]

At the time I skirted all these issues by setting my campaign in the Domain of Deneb and sending the PCs out beyond the Spinward border on a Trek-like exploratory/diplomatic mission. The Rebellion was only something they heard about from news and rumors.

Although I have no current prospect of ever actually running it, I have lately been working on a Rebellion-era campaign set in Massilia sector. It helps to know the whole story in advance, but since I'm probably not going to follow it anyway it's largely academic (but it does bring up an interesting observation: it's easier to make a clean break with the Official storyline when it's all laid out in front of you than when it's being revealed a piece at a time -- you follow each small development, none of which seem too outrageous, and only realize too late that the official storyline has painted your campaign into a corner you didn't want to be in).

As far as the various factions, the method that seems best to me is to have the PCs be free agents in a neutral/contested area. They may have sympathies with one faction or another (and various members of the group might even have DIFFERENT sympathies), but really they're just looking out for themselves (and, eventually, perhaps a small trade union or pocket empire). After all, with the possible exceptions of Lucan (all bad) and Norris (all good) all of the factions were depicted as having good and bad qualities in more-or-less equal measure. To attach your fortunes permanently to a single faction is to overlook that faction's flaws, and the other factions' strengths, and to render the milieu less complex and less interesting. And besides, since we know that in the OTU timeline EVERYONE loses, remaining free agents 'above the fray' is the only way the PCs can ever possibly 'win.'

 

[kafka47]

The Rebellion certainly did create moral dilemas. But, I don't think that you can catagorize Lucan as all bad. Rather, Lucan is the blind ally where unquestioned loyality leads and Norris is the self-concieted hypocrite who could have stopped the Vargr incusions diplomatically, by showing the flag with the Blackheart Ships.

As for the other factions, they just show how difficult it is to live in the real world, not hiding behind the claw or having the most powerful space fleet behind you.

 

[cgriffen]

Originally posted by Arsulon:
One of the disheartening things about the comparison was that it, by extension, condemned the Regency to the role of Byzantium. I imagined that lurking on the horizon was a scenario in which a newly resurgent Zhodani Consulate (or its successor, perhaps led by a Prophet, divinely inspired by the Empress Wave) batters away at the Regency.

It appeared that that's where they were headed. That perhaps the Regency would have to ally themselves with the RC just to survive the Empress Wave. The way I see it, Nilsen (not Nielsen as some have posted) had to manufacture this artifice to make sure the Regency was weakened. Otherwise, it would be far too easy for the Regency to make short work of the RC should a conflict arise.

I truly don't hate the RC (they work well, conceptually, for the New Era and provide lots of plot opportunites) but I just couldn't stand the self-righteous tone attached to the supplements.

Man, I hate 'em. Hate the whole claustrophobic RC campaign. Boring, pigeonholed, self-righteous. I detested it. Trying to run adventures there felt like being stowed into a closet compared with the wide-open Traveller campaigns of the past.

The Regency gave me much more freedom to run things as I wished, even though compared with pre-Collapse Traveller, it too was rather limited.

 

[T. Foster]

Originally posted by kafka47:
The Rebellion certainly did create moral dilemas. But, I don't think that you can catagorize Lucan as all bad. Rather, Lucan is the blind ally where unquestioned loyality leads and Norris is the self-concieted hypocrite who could have stopped the Vargr incusions diplomatically, by showing the flag with the Blackheart Ships.

When I characterized Lucan as all bad (and I specifically labeled it as just a 'possible' interpretation) I only meant to refer to Lucan the person who, to an increasing degree as the MT storyline progressed, was portrayed as a little more than a charicature of the raving psychotic -- 'insane' decrees, gunning down his own advisors, and so on. I'd certainly agree that many of those in 'Lucan's faction,' from Archdukes Adair and Tranian on down to the lowliest soldiers and citizens, are by no means 'all bad' and are, in fact, in probably the most complex moral situation of anyone in the milieu. After all, by the letter of the law they're the ONLY ones entirely in the right -- everyone else is, to one extent or another, a traitor or a criminal -- and yet their loyalty and prudence have managed to land them squarely on the side of the 'bad guys.'

Archduke Tranian is actually becoming one of my favorite characters from the Rebellion milieu, and if I ever do get my campaign off the ground and begin moving my own timeline forward I'll almost certainly end up making him much more important than his essential non-role in the OTU timeline (what was this guy doing from 1117 onwards? Is he ever mentioned again outside of those few paragraphs in the Rebellion Sourcebook?).

 

[Arsulon]

Kafka:
Given the inherent bias of CT and MT toward the Spinward Marches, it takes a lot of courage to attack the Domain of Deneb's response to the Rebellion: bravo. While I personally like and identify with the Marches, Norris' actions DO suggest a degree of moral cowardice. Harmless inaction is not moral simply because it is the opposite of harmful action. If Norris believed so fimly in the idea of the Imperium, why didn't he do more to defend it in its time of need? As an archduke, shouldn't he have taken a stand on the emperor's murder and Lucan's unilateral seizure of power, as well as illegal suspension of the Moot?
T. Foster:
I find Lucan to be a really compelling figure: it was a pity he degenerated into a stock sci-fi Caligula. Here we have a spoiled brat second son called to wield a power he neither understands or appreciates. He epitomizes "the-end-justifies-the-means", Machiavellian style of rulership but he is interesting in that, rather than retreat into himself, he stays obsessed with destroying Dulinor in order to justify all the blood he's spilled. Fascinating. Likewise Adair and Tranian (who are NEVER mentioned again, to my knowledge): tragic creatures of duty who struggle to "hold the line" while the Imperium turns on itself. This is captured succinctly by a late 1120's TNS transmission noting that while the factions struggle, elements of the faithful Gateway Fleet have repulsed a K'kree incursion.
Starpilot:
Yeah, the RC got me felling pretty claustraphobic as well. All of those damn acronyms for everything, the Hivers looking over your shoulder when you go to the bathroom, the silly baby-names RCES kept churning out (e.g. "Spunky to Spanky, is Binky in Positon? Roger that, Spunky, Cuddles has your six, and Puppy-Ears has established an OP 2 klicks up the ridge"). Yeesh. I was so frustrated at one point that I thought a Merchant Guild campaign might be in order: their founding principles about free trade make a lot of sense and the dark, slaver-oriented character of the Guild is a recent phenomenon. Why not start out a group of players as Guilders who are beginning to question the direction the organization is taking and become the nucleus of a coup?
My compliments on your online stuff for TNE (Domain of Deneb) by the way, I thought it was brilliant.