Dear Folks -
Chuck wrote:
>What I have absolutely never understood about our "hobby" is the level of
>fanaticism that seems to appear.
You and me both, mate. I've concluded people can run amok over *anything*.
>I've got all of the editions of Traveller...
(we even made up our own AD&D version, predating T20 by some 10 years)
>... and I mix and match the pieces that work for me and ignore the ones
that don't.
>I'd like to think this is a balanced perspective on a "game" that is meant
to be an
>enjoyable experience for the participants.
YES!!! +10 (because +1 is not enough.)
Derek said:
>I never see knock down drag out D&D fights.
[EDIT: Rupert's response may have covered this, but...]
Hmmm, ISTR that there was at least some acrimony around the changes that
were made when version 2 came out ("...and THEY'VE CHANGED MAGIC
MISSILE!!!"), and a lot of people hated version 3 (although 3.5 seemed to be
accepted), but almost no long-term gamers liked v4, (many leaving for
Pathfinder). (V5 may be too little, too late??? Jury is still out.)
But I don't know if anyone received death threats (or at least threats of
physical harm); maybe Dave became a target because (a) he was Trav Line
Editor and had his name on the books, and (b) no-one outside really knew how
GDW worked, that it was a real collaboration, and that people such as Frank
and Loren et al signed off on Trav's direction just as much as Dave did?
And regarding the following comment from Dave:
>I know that when I was at GDW, employees of all the other companies (GDW,
>White Wolf, West End, FASA etc.) would mock us, "Ha-ha, your fans are
>insane,"
...here's a tagline in support:
"Teach a man to play Settlers of Catan and he'll complain for an hour. Teach
him to play Traveller and he'll complain for the rest of his life."
- as quoted by Steve Jackson in the Daily Illuminator, 3 November 2004
Personally - and I've mentioned this to Dave more than once - I think C. S.
Lewis' 50-year-old comment about "literature" in general is absolutely
applicable to what's happened with Traveller material:
"Matthew Arnold made the horrible prophecy that literature would
increasingly replace religion. It has, and its taken on all the features
of bitter persecution, great intolerance, and traffic in relics. All
literature becomes a sacred text. A sacred text is always exposed to the
most monstrous exegesis; hence we have the spectacle of some wretched
scholar taking a pure divertissement written in the seventeenth century and
getting the most profound ambiguities and social criticisms out of it, which
of course arent there at all . Its the discovery of the mares nest by the
pursuit of the red herring."
C.S. Lewis, Unreal Estates
This is exactly what has happened with some or our Trav community. Anything
with Marc's name on it is sacred, anything from TNE is heresy. And there is
bitter persecution. And there are profound ambiguities, such as someone
trying to predict Imperium-wide trade from figures given in Trillion Credit
Squadron - leading to the following tagline:
"I once described trying to analyze Traveller economics from the rules as
'Trying to explain the economics of transoceanic container trade by looking
at cross-Indian Ocean dhow traffic.'"
- Bruce Johnson
(I should point out, I'm in no way saying this is Marc's fault - his list of
mileaux inclues EVERYTHING. He's very catholic in his tastes.)
So much for humour. Maybe we should give up and discuss gun control?
<*runs*>
Anyway, to drop the acrimony (hopefully acrimoniously), I gonna turn to
another current topic.
Dave wrote:
>So when BL took it deliberately back to PC skills, that
>may have been jarring, depending on which lash-up of previous editions,
>pseudo-editions, and masquerading editions you had been using.
I've _always_ enjoyed it much more when PC's actually had the chance to
change the outcome of events. And TNE wasn't the first to try nd drag small
ship combat back out of the hands of the pure wargamers - I liked what the
Digest guys did with MegaTraveller: Ship Tactics, Engineering, Navigation,
Sensor Ops, and even Commo all finally got a "look-in". ;-)
So I've always relegated HG to big-ship combat, which is the niche filled by
Battlerider, right? (Disclaimer: I've never played BR, or even BL, even
though I own both. *embarrased shuffle*. Loved the pics and cardstock
pieces, tho'. ;-)
So what do people here prefer? That PC's can, or cannot, influence starship
combat?
----------------------------------------------------------
David "Hyphen" Jaques-Watson ..at.. Beowulf Down (Tavonni/Vilis/SM 1520)
http://www.tip.net.au/~davidjw
"I file things in historical order, with a hashing algorithm of gravity"
Chuck wrote:
>What I have absolutely never understood about our "hobby" is the level of
>fanaticism that seems to appear.
You and me both, mate. I've concluded people can run amok over *anything*.
>I've got all of the editions of Traveller...
(we even made up our own AD&D version, predating T20 by some 10 years)
>... and I mix and match the pieces that work for me and ignore the ones
that don't.
>I'd like to think this is a balanced perspective on a "game" that is meant
to be an
>enjoyable experience for the participants.
YES!!! +10 (because +1 is not enough.)
Derek said:
>I never see knock down drag out D&D fights.
[EDIT: Rupert's response may have covered this, but...]
Hmmm, ISTR that there was at least some acrimony around the changes that
were made when version 2 came out ("...and THEY'VE CHANGED MAGIC
MISSILE!!!"), and a lot of people hated version 3 (although 3.5 seemed to be
accepted), but almost no long-term gamers liked v4, (many leaving for
Pathfinder). (V5 may be too little, too late??? Jury is still out.)
But I don't know if anyone received death threats (or at least threats of
physical harm); maybe Dave became a target because (a) he was Trav Line
Editor and had his name on the books, and (b) no-one outside really knew how
GDW worked, that it was a real collaboration, and that people such as Frank
and Loren et al signed off on Trav's direction just as much as Dave did?
And regarding the following comment from Dave:
>I know that when I was at GDW, employees of all the other companies (GDW,
>White Wolf, West End, FASA etc.) would mock us, "Ha-ha, your fans are
>insane,"
...here's a tagline in support:
"Teach a man to play Settlers of Catan and he'll complain for an hour. Teach
him to play Traveller and he'll complain for the rest of his life."
- as quoted by Steve Jackson in the Daily Illuminator, 3 November 2004
Personally - and I've mentioned this to Dave more than once - I think C. S.
Lewis' 50-year-old comment about "literature" in general is absolutely
applicable to what's happened with Traveller material:
"Matthew Arnold made the horrible prophecy that literature would
increasingly replace religion. It has, and its taken on all the features
of bitter persecution, great intolerance, and traffic in relics. All
literature becomes a sacred text. A sacred text is always exposed to the
most monstrous exegesis; hence we have the spectacle of some wretched
scholar taking a pure divertissement written in the seventeenth century and
getting the most profound ambiguities and social criticisms out of it, which
of course arent there at all . Its the discovery of the mares nest by the
pursuit of the red herring."
C.S. Lewis, Unreal Estates
This is exactly what has happened with some or our Trav community. Anything
with Marc's name on it is sacred, anything from TNE is heresy. And there is
bitter persecution. And there are profound ambiguities, such as someone
trying to predict Imperium-wide trade from figures given in Trillion Credit
Squadron - leading to the following tagline:
"I once described trying to analyze Traveller economics from the rules as
'Trying to explain the economics of transoceanic container trade by looking
at cross-Indian Ocean dhow traffic.'"
- Bruce Johnson
(I should point out, I'm in no way saying this is Marc's fault - his list of
mileaux inclues EVERYTHING. He's very catholic in his tastes.)
So much for humour. Maybe we should give up and discuss gun control?
<*runs*>
Anyway, to drop the acrimony (hopefully acrimoniously), I gonna turn to
another current topic.
Dave wrote:
>So when BL took it deliberately back to PC skills, that
>may have been jarring, depending on which lash-up of previous editions,
>pseudo-editions, and masquerading editions you had been using.
I've _always_ enjoyed it much more when PC's actually had the chance to
change the outcome of events. And TNE wasn't the first to try nd drag small
ship combat back out of the hands of the pure wargamers - I liked what the
Digest guys did with MegaTraveller: Ship Tactics, Engineering, Navigation,
Sensor Ops, and even Commo all finally got a "look-in". ;-)
So I've always relegated HG to big-ship combat, which is the niche filled by
Battlerider, right? (Disclaimer: I've never played BR, or even BL, even
though I own both. *embarrased shuffle*. Loved the pics and cardstock
pieces, tho'. ;-)
So what do people here prefer? That PC's can, or cannot, influence starship
combat?
----------------------------------------------------------
David "Hyphen" Jaques-Watson ..at.. Beowulf Down (Tavonni/Vilis/SM 1520)
http://www.tip.net.au/~davidjw
"I file things in historical order, with a hashing algorithm of gravity"