'Imperial Culture' (non-canonista)

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by cptbutton

One of my own IMTU ideas is that if a planet has any significant habitation at all, there will be a basic set of communication, weather, and navigation satellites.

I take that pretty much for granted, assuming they are reasonably technologically advanced or in contact with someone who is and are not constrained by troublesome or otherwise unusual circumstances (Vargr dropping by every year sort of qualifies as troublesome for instance).

[Dr. Beckenstein]

Originally Posted by jason taylor

I take that pretty much for granted, assuming they are reasonably technologically advanced or in contact with someone who is and are not constrained by troublesome or otherwise unusual circumstances(Vargr dropping by every year sort of qualifies as troublesome for instance).

Shouldn't any world with a star port will have at least a few weather / GPS satellites in orbit, provided by the Empire?

[cptbutton]

Originally Posted by Dr. Beckenstein

Shouldn't any world with a star port will have at least a few weather / GPS satellites in orbit, provided by the Empire?

I would assume so, deployed by the same space craft that dropped the Starport cutter module and bulldozed the field.

One flourish I'd add is that at least one would be would actually be substantially larger than it needs to be, and geostationary above the starport or some other notable location. So that it is visible to Mark I eyeball, so that locals can use it to determine longitude and latitude.

[SteveS]

Originally Posted by cptbutton

. . . One flourish I'd add is that at least one would be would actually be substantially larger than it needs to be, and geostationary above the starport or some other notable location. So that it is visible to Mark I eyeball, so that locals can use it to determine longitude and latitude.

This would only be useful on worlds where visible light routinely reaches the surface; it wouldn't be much use on a planet with perpetual clouds. The one such world we know about, Venus, isn't habitable anyway, but it seems likely that some habitable worlds would have either perpetual cloud cover or such great light pollution that the sky isn't meaningfully visible.

Assuming that a sky is visible, such an artificial star would be easier to use if it were conspicuously different from natural stars. One way would be a distinctive color. For example, green stars do not exist; stars with their peak color in the green part of the spectrum look white because they have a lot of redder and bluer colors in their spectrum too.

They would also benefit from a station keeping drive that isn't dependent on reaction mass; presumably a Traveller thruster with a few millinewtons of thrust would presumably be within the power budget of a solar panel.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by cptbutton

One flourish I'd add is that at least one would be would actually be substantially larger than it needs to be, and geostationary above the starport or some other notable location. So that it is visible to Mark I eyeball, so that locals can use it to determine longitude and latitude.

A large reflective balloon tethered to the satellite would seem like an easy solution to that problem.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by Dr. Beckenstein

Shouldn't any world with a star port will have at least a few weather / GPS satellites in orbit, provided by the Empire?

Could they have a multipack that would have a beacon, weather scanner, and ortillery in it(the last probably should not be advertised but once in a while The Natives Might Get Restless)? Some sort of general purpose that is set above a typical Class 1-Class 2 port?

[jason taylor]

In Dune the Atreides were kept from deploying sats because the Guild had artificially pumped the price to harass them or keep them from seeing something or something like that. Politics could get involved in infrastructure budgets in similar ways.

Another possibility is that the Natives have some taboo that would be broken by putting up sats. That is also a possibility if you wish their to be difficulties along that line for some reason.

[jason taylor]

Imperial Ministry of State Corps of Footmen and Pages:

This was inspired by watching Five Fingers (1952). It was a loose remake of the Cicero case and made me wonder in retrospect why there were not enough qualified domestics in the whole British Empire to staff such a critical post-even allowing for the drain caused by conscription. Why in other words did they hire an Albanian?

So I assumed that the Imperium would be unlikely to take that risk. The CFP are picked from a number of criteria. This includes such things as Appearance, Savoire-Faire and Skills in an appropriate number of obscure things that would give a good appearance to the Imperium. A formidable geneology is also useful or just being Somebody's Nephew. But the main criteria is being able to stand the vetting process.

Some members of the CFP are given basic counterintelligence training, and others just learn it by doing. In fact having a valet who can spot a foreign agent is considered a useful thing for Imperial Diplomats.

CFP members often go on to a full time career in the Foreign Service or branch out into other areas. Another common option is to specialize in the ceremonial aspect of Imperial Government.

Adventures in the CFP are likely to be of the espionage or intrigue sort. Others can be thought of. For a Free Trader based game, a CFP agent can be negotiating with the PCs to supply an embassy with victuals, or transport an expensive art object, or whatever.

[jeff_wilson]

Originally Posted by jason taylor

In Dune the Atreides were kept from deploying sats because the Guild had artificially pumped the price to harass them or keep them from seeing something or something like that. Politics could get involved in infrastructure budgets in similar ways.

Kynes put the Fremen up to bribing the Spacing Guild with spice to keep hidden the patches of green and other signs of Arrakis' ecology recovering as well as the movements of the sandworms and the Fremen themselves.

In Traveller, The Imperial Navy exists to prevent anyone other than the Emperor and the Moot from having power over space travel and inter-world trade.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by jeff_wilson

Kynes put the Fremen up to bribing the Spacing Guild with spice to keep hidden the patches of green and other signs of Arrakis' ecology recovering as well as the movements of the sandworms and the Fremen themselves.

In Traveller, The Imperial Navy exists to prevent anyone other than the emperor and the Moot from having power over space travel and inter-world trade.

Which does not prevent local fluctuations of such kind from taking place. In any given polity the actual performance will look sloppy compared to it's stated reason for being.