Time Travel in a Traveller campaign
- Thread starter Werner
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Proneutron
SOC-13
Via a jump malfunction
Have an Imperial Research Station on Luna, have it open a gateway to the past, a Luna to Luna gateway, some Ancient device left on the Moon is involved, and then pick a year. What if it connects to 1889 AD?
Timerover51
SOC-14 5K
Then you can have some fun in the Space: 1889 alternate universe. I am considering that possibility in a sector that I am working on. Liftwood flyers meet contra-gravity ships.
Or you could simply use the historical 1889, and substitute Traveller tech for liftwood. What if Venus and Mars were as 1889, but they physics were the same as Traveller.
What would the Imperium do with a time portal on the Moon? Assume it was found in an ancient lava tunnel and it was big enough to allow passage of starships of less than 1000 dtons.
Ground Rule 2: the time period reached cannot be changed, when its 1105 Imperial on one side of the wormhole, it is 1889 on the other, when its 1106 Imperial on one side, the year on the other side will be 1890, the Imperium and its scientists can't change this time period.
One thing they have done is perform some experiments, they buried a time capsule under the Lunar regolith of the 1889 Moon and attempted to recover that same capsule on the 1105 Imperium Moon and they were not able to find it, in fact the area of the Moon where they dug the hole to bury the time capsule showed no evidence of being disturbed for billions of years, so they concluded that it is the past of a parallel Universe, so the Imperium then has to decide whether to make contact with the 1889 Earth in the parallel universe and set up diplomatic relations with the various governments there, including the United States and the British Empire, how do you think that is going to go?
The Imperium sets up a class A star port on the 1889 Moon's surface prior to contact, the construction proceeds swiftly, the Imperium devotes a lot of resources to this project, they send scout ships to the various planets in the Solar System, and it turns out that the planets Venus and Mars we significantly altered millions of years in the past. Venus has dinosaurs and human inhabitants, and Mars has canals, cities, and ruins of cities with humans and other intelligent species on its surface, but the Earth is unaltered, and history is proceeding according to history books until the Imperium makes first contact. What happens?
Ground Rule 2: the time period reached cannot be changed, when its 1105 Imperial on one side of the wormhole, it is 1889 on the other, when its 1106 Imperial on one side, the year on the other side will be 1890, the Imperium and its scientists can't change this time period.
One thing they have done is perform some experiments, they buried a time capsule under the Lunar regolith of the 1889 Moon and attempted to recover that same capsule on the 1105 Imperium Moon and they were not able to find it, in fact the area of the Moon where they dug the hole to bury the time capsule showed no evidence of being disturbed for billions of years, so they concluded that it is the past of a parallel Universe, so the Imperium then has to decide whether to make contact with the 1889 Earth in the parallel universe and set up diplomatic relations with the various governments there, including the United States and the British Empire, how do you think that is going to go?
The Imperium sets up a class A star port on the 1889 Moon's surface prior to contact, the construction proceeds swiftly, the Imperium devotes a lot of resources to this project, they send scout ships to the various planets in the Solar System, and it turns out that the planets Venus and Mars we significantly altered millions of years in the past. Venus has dinosaurs and human inhabitants, and Mars has canals, cities, and ruins of cities with humans and other intelligent species on its surface, but the Earth is unaltered, and history is proceeding according to history books until the Imperium makes first contact. What happens?
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Proneutron
SOC-13
THAT could be cool
I'm thinking either make a connection to the 1889 universe or do a Spelljammer Crystal Sphere but not both. Spelljammer comes with it's own laws of physics in order to have wooden sailing shipsmin wildspace and sailors on deck, but the 1889 universe has the same laws as the standard OTU, this is not the one with the Aeither impeller powered by steam, but it does have the planets Venus and Mars as such, and standard TL15 technology substitutes for all the steam driven retro tech of the official 1889 product. The Imperium makes contact with 1889 Earth, it sends representatives to the USA, Britian, Germany, Russia, and China, not playing favorites, the idea is the play the great powers of the time against each other to get them to do what the Imperium wants them to do. At one point, the Emperor shows up and meets with Queen Victoria, they have a sit down together over tea and crumpets, then he pays a visit to President Grover Cleveland of the United States, and then to the Emperor of China, the Czar of Russia and so on, then the Emperor of the Imperium goes on his way to other things, leaving things to his diplomats. One of those diplomats is Cybelle, a character I detailed in the T20 Traveller characters, she is a junior diplomat an assistant as she is quite young. (24 years old.) There are Solomani agents here, the Solomani Confederation wants a piece of this action so they have place spies in the Imperial entourage.
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
There are a couple of canonical 'answers' of sorts. If you check out the library data on Imperial Research Stations it has this to say:
There was also a MT adventure on the drawing board that would have the PCs as personnel travelling into the future via stasis in the hope of discovering the cure to what is killing them - need to reload my MT sources to link more about this one, it is an advert in a Challenge magazine and at the back of the MT supplement COAAC.
But I too would go with a missjump situation to introduce the possibility of time travel.
There was also a MT adventure on the drawing board that would have the PCs as personnel travelling into the future via stasis in the hope of discovering the cure to what is killing them - need to reload my MT sources to link more about this one, it is an advert in a Challenge magazine and at the back of the MT supplement COAAC.
But I too would go with a missjump situation to introduce the possibility of time travel.
Okay, you are in a scout/courier, you misjumped and your ship is orbiting the Earth and its 1889, what would you do?
I have an idea. What if you landed the ship in Washington DC, and you asked one of the US Army soldier in blue if a meeting could be arranged with President Grover Cleveland and then ask for lots of paper and lots of ink, and you start printing out every file of the ship's library and start selling the pages to the Library of Congress to cover your cost in paper, ink, and printer maintenance.
Eventually you could raise the local tech level so they can repair your jump drive.
Eventually you could raise the local tech level so they can repair your jump drive.
Proneutron
SOC-13
That would take at least 50 years
Taking into account the relations among Imperium an Solomani in 1105, probably destroy it and hide the fact...
I like the misjump start too--we already know misjumps can do strange things with time, such as longer time passing (months, years, maybe centuries or millennia?) or differences in time between shipboard vs. external universe. What if it went back 3000 years, but the ship crew only noticed a week or three passing?
What would I do?
1. Make sure the ship and crew were disinfected etc. as much as possible. And vaccines were up-to-date. Don't want to loose the Red Death!
2. Gingerly approach someone like Edison or Faraday or Steinmetz to explain higher tech/science. Printing out some of the ship's Library might be useful. (Did this happen to Einstein in 1905?)
What would I do?
1. Make sure the ship and crew were disinfected etc. as much as possible. And vaccines were up-to-date. Don't want to loose the Red Death!
2. Gingerly approach someone like Edison or Faraday or Steinmetz to explain higher tech/science. Printing out some of the ship's Library might be useful. (Did this happen to Einstein in 1905?)
My favorite Time Travel story snippet was from a story published in Omni magazine a gazillion years ago.
Simply, it was a trapped time traveler that was going around to all of the towns that were installing time capsules and he was trying to put a message in to them to tell the folks in the future to come get him.
Simply, it was a trapped time traveler that was going around to all of the towns that were installing time capsules and he was trying to put a message in to them to tell the folks in the future to come get him.
Well if you arrived by misjump, chances are the jump drive suffered some damage, and of course you'd need Mr. Spock to do the calculations in his head to make the misjump back.
You could definitely have some fun in the 19th century, you could print out blueprints for internal combustion engines, airplanes, cars, ships and become very rich. The setting would have to advance one tech level at a time, build infrastructure and then advance to the next tech level after that 1889 is tech level 4 I believe.
I'm not sure the crewmembers would have been vaccinated for smallpox. Nicola Tesla, don't forget him! I'm not so sure how old Einstein would be in 1889, I think he would be a child.
Timerover51
SOC-14 5K
It depends if it is the historical 1889 or the alternate Space: 1889 universe, and if I am by myself or have some additional people with me, either more Scouts or simply adventurers.
I first would check my data banks for any and all information on Terra circa 1889, and probably discover not much. As my sensors detect no radio, radar, or television emissions, I do not have to worry about being detected in orbit. Go into polar orbit and look for a sub-Arctic or Antarctic island to set down on and refuel first to maintain power plant and maneuver drive ability. Then check the Jump Drive and figure out if still operable. However, jumping anywhere might be a bit of a problem as I cannot guarantee another time transfer occurring. The 1st Imperium is a lot ways away, and might not exactly be welcoming, except for the technology boost from the Scout Ship. As a case of current MREs requires 0.93 cubic feet of space for 12 meals, 360 days of MRE-equivalents should occupy under 90 cubic feet or 0.2 dTons, so emergency rations for 4 people would occupy under 1 Traveller dTon, so food should not be an emergency. Fresh food would be appreciated thought. Contact with any native human would be quite iffy, as that could trigger a massive plague. Means of exchange for supplies would also be a problem.
«The same thing we do every week, Pinky.... Try to take over the world!»
THe thing is, if its the 1889 of GDW's game, they roast you with the heliograph....
Naw, I just picked the year, it isn't the setting, Traveller technology takes the place of Space 1889's own unique physics. I figure just pick one year, as there are many to choose from, I don't want time haunting from year to year to year, that is difficult to handle, especially if the players choose the year, and I have to do some instant research on the time period they suddenly chose to go to. 1889 is fairly recent, there is a lot of information, there are photographs, we know how people dressed, the World Population was around 1.5 billion the UWP would be X867971-4, I believe. You can impress the locals just by flying around, as the first airplanes haven't been built yet. A scout ship landing in Washington DC would change history in a major way, it might set off assassination attempts against the PCs if they are seen as favoring one nation over another, modest and uneven shifts to technology would seriously shift the balance of power.
