Traveller and modern electronics

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by warellis

Also regarding the Third Imperium, considering it was constructed after the apocalypse of the Long Night, is its tech level lower compared to say the Solomani Second Imperium or the Vilani First Imperium?

The "Long Night" isn't much of an apocalypse. There are worlds that maintain actual interstellar states straight through it, they clearly haven't lost much if anything. It's quite analogous to its prototype the "Dark Ages" - which had cities that maintained their Roman era infrastructure, successor states with varying degrees of continuity of government (enough some of them would consider themselves the same state, not "successors"), and even has some technological advances to its credit.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by warellis

You mean like sending computer viruses into an opposing ship's computer systems?

That, but part of what I was thinking of was, say, removing or reprograming an opponents communications nodes and replacing with one's own in conjunction with an invasion. Or otherwise getting control over the communications on on the planet.

[warellis]

Originally Posted by jason taylor

That, but part of what I was thinking of was, say, removing or reprograming an opponents communications nodes and replacing with one's own in conjunction with an invasion. Or otherwise getting control over the communications on on the planet.

That sounds like you would have to slip in some operatives onto a planet before an invasion. Am I right?

Hm is there a term in Traveller for a planetary/stellar internet (like a star system's internet I mean?) Like does the Third Imperium call it a SystemNet or something?

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by warellis

That sounds like you would have to slip in some operatives onto a planet before an invasion. Am I right?

Hm is there a term in Traveller for a planetary/stellar internet (like a star system's internet I mean?) Like does the Third Imperium call it a SystemNet or something?

That would be one technique and it would probably be wise anyway for all sorts of reasons. Satellites can be removed during the invasion itself and friendly satellites replaced.

As to the other, any number of colorful names can be devised. One I did was "pneumagora" from the metaphor of being "in the wind"(it was devised before I heard of the "Cloud" interestingly enough) and "agora" or "city center" in Greek.

The name given in canon in GF, was "datanet". One can assume "datanet" to be a generic, and whatever you wish to gloss it with to be local chrome.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by malloyd

The "Long Night" isn't much of an apocalypse. There are worlds that maintain actual interstellar states straight through it, they clearly haven't lost much if anything. It's quite analogous to its prototype the "Dark Ages" - which had cities that maintained their Roman era infrastructure, successor states with varying degrees of continuity of government (enough some of them would consider themselves the same state, not "successors"), and even has some technological advances to its credit.

That depends on where you are. Some worlds were economically overspecialized and will have a disastrous fall. And places dependent on artificial environment to sustain them will often simply disappear and if there are not enough ships to evac, the inhabitants will disappear too. There will be a lot of "Raonokes" left afterwords.

Furthermore there will be a general downturn in technology causes by the cut-off of access to specialized resources that require a stable political system to allow production of. Much of the economic and technological network is the result of a hegemony that allows an extremity of comparative advantage.

Even the most advanced states in the Long Night are pictured in canon as fighting continually for existence one way or another.

To dismiss the Long Night because the Old Earth Union managed to get through is to miss the point. A lot of places did not and for the matter of that, a lot of those places were the OEUs business partners.

[Scifi_by_Allen]

Are there any software programs designed to help with the generation of characters, planetary systems, or merchant activity?

[jason taylor]

Here's one thought. Negotiations can be done via computer.

Suppose the police of a given planet are negotiating with the mob: say one of them wants to turn state's or there is a feud going on that they want to put down. Or whatever. Or suppose a rebel leader is negotiating with the government. In any case a party to the negotiation can't afford to have his face seen. Instead he sends a relay of cut-outs to carry the website where the meeting is to take place.

[warellis]

Technologically is the Third Imperium more advanced compared to the Second Imperium or First Imperium?

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by warellis

Technologically is the Third Imperium more advanced compared to the Second Imperium or First Imperium?

It is certainly more advanced then the Ziru Sirka. It doesn't seem to be that much more advanced then the Rule of Man. Probably a lot of technology was lost along the way and there was some catching up to do.

They do seem to build bigger in the Third Imperium. A Tigress has several times the tonnage of an Indomitable. So perhaps mass production has improved.

[Mike Wightman]

In Traveller TL terms rather than GTL:
1st Imperium deliberately stagnated at TL11;
the Terrans achieved TL12, but how much of this spread to the Vilani Empire they took over to form the 2nd Imperium is debatable;
T4 tells ut that the 2nd Imperium/ROM had some TL13 gear;
The Sylean Federation achieved TL12 before it changed its name to the 3rd Imperium;
the 3rd Imperium achieved TL15 over one hundred years before the golden age of Traveller adventure as detailed in CT and GT