Faux Pas

The Xboats had been sent out and the cat was out of the bag.
The Scout Service has sworn the group to secrecy because they didn't
want the local populace, nor even the Darrian Empire, to be alarmed,
yet.

However, Bad Pitt (Shane) took it upon himself to tell the local
media. He downloaded everything the party had discovered, including
all the video and radio interceptions, onto a thumb-drive and sent it,
anonymously, to all the TV stations and newspaper-equivalents. So that
night, on the News the story ran on every channel.

And mass hysteria erupted.

The Scout Service was pissed beyond belief and they verified from the
watermarks on the broadcast data that it was from the Lollipop, so
sent some agents over and arrested Bad. He was hauled to the Scout
Service offices and thoroughly questioned.

Bad was given a choice to be pressed into Scout Service service, or
sent to a Scout Service penal colony. And warned that he would
probably be on the Imperium Navy's top Wanted list (part of the
broadcast, of course, was the location of that secret, now destroyed,
494-908 military base (0625) that no one was supposed to know about).
The Navy only had a recruiting base in Darrian, but no agents
"otherwise Bad would be dead now" (as per agreement of the
Imperium-Zhodani treaty*). Bad chose scout service, so they signed him
up.

The group was ordered to stay in their ship until new orders arrived.
Towards the end of the week, they did arrive, but they were told that
these orders are pre-media-release, so the next bunch (from Narsil
(bottom right)) will be more relevant. "But go to Rorre (0526) any
way, and the Narsil orders will meet you there."

As they were leaving, another scout ship took off and followed them to
the 100 diameter point, and saw them jump**.

A week passed.

Then, sure enough, when the party arrived in Rorre, an hour and a bit
later, the other ship arrived too, actively pinging.

The party docked in the small D class port of Rorre. This was a space
station in orbit over a 1850s world below. The ships docked with
umbilicals and have air-bridges between. The other "scout" ship docked
too. Out stepped two Zhodani women.

Orders were waiting here: They were mostly full of invective and
abuse. Bad Pitt now had a 50,000 credit reward in his head by the
military; the Imperium was incensed. But the orders were "Go to Laberv
(0325)". The group wanted to shake off the Zhodani tail, so they
noticed that the Zs were refuelling with their air-raft from the
surface water below (the party had used the last of the Rorre
station's fuel stocks), so when the raft descended for the second trip
(round trip 1 hour), the Lollipop disembarked and flew behind an
asteroid, then jumped ...

Week passed

... straight back to Rorre, a few light-hours out from the starport.

The only message from the Scout Service station in Rorre this time was
"Continue to Laberv (0325). Lemon". So the Lollipop jumped to Laberv.

Week passed. They pondered on the word "lemon" during this trip.

When they arrived in Laberv, a way out, they could hear lots of
traffic, both on Terran frequencies and Zhodani frequencies. They
didn't want to risk doing an active ping, so went silent and headed
towards the station to get in visual range, 100,000 km. Sure enough,
there were a group of Zhodani destroyers and frigates docked there.
They were almost immediately pinged and then hailed "Unidentified
ship, proceed to dock. Do not attempt to head to Jump Distance"

They briefly contemplated running, but calculated that in the 1.8
hours it would take them to get to jump distance (5000km x 100), any
military ship that could do 4G (or a 6G missile) could easily catch
them. So they docked and disembarked. The class B space station was
running almost as normal, except that there were Zhodani girls in
every important spot "just watching". The Zs soon realized who the
Lollipop was, so they sent two soldiers to collect Bad Pitt. He was
taken to the main destroyer, and taken to Captain Nuriev (Salma
Hayak). She gave him tea and thanked him for helping the Zhodani cause
by broadcasting all that informaion about the Treaty-breaking Imperium
base on 0625. She brought out a star chart and asked him heaps of
questions all about the various points. He told all and hid nothing
and told no lies.
She thanked him kindly and wished him well, then two soldiers took him
to another room raped him with probes, beat him to a bloody-pulp, and
eventually unconscious. He was dumped on the steps of the Lollipop.

Ernest Worthington (Chris Whelan), with medical-3, fixed him up.

We stopped for the night.

* = After the Zhodani-Imperium wars of 120 years ago, a Peace treaty
was signed. The whole of the area between Imperium space and Zhodani
space was declared a demilitarized zone, with no military of either
side allowed there. The Scout Service is a Corporate employed by the
Imperium to scout, so they are allowed in this space as per terms of
the Treaty. The Scout Service has branches in Zhodani territory too.

The Plot Thickens

Last week, we left the party in Nosea last time. There was an
abandoned space station in orbit around the inhabited water planet
there.
And a foreign nav beacon in a geo-sync orbit too.

So they refuelled using the water from the planet (ferried from the
surface via several loads using the air-raft), then stole the nav
beacon in their hold and jumped back (two Jump-2s) to Orcrist
via 0925. During those two weeks of jump-space time, they carefully
cut open a panel on the nav beacon, and analyzed it best they could.

For all intents and purposes, this looked very much like Zhodani
technology - right down to the Zhodani insignias on the outside,
through to the Zhodani "electronics" on the inside and the Zhodani
"circuit boards". Zhodani electronics doesn't use copper wired and
printed circuit boards like Imperium tech, they use tubes carrying
fluid, much like arteries carry blood (recall Zhodani are vampires).

Back in Orcrist they reported in to the Scout Service and delivered
the stolen beacon for detailed analysis. Then were ordered to report
to Narsil thence to Darrian via either 0726 or 0728: the
party was to choose. The party chose 0726 which was empty.
When they arrived in Darran, three weeks later, the detailed report
was waiting for them (which had arrived via a Jump-6 X-boat) of the
analysis of the nav beacon. It was Zhodani certainly, and the Zhodani
was assuming an aggressive stance. The Imperium had been told - it
seemed the Zhodani was breaking the Spinward Marches treaty.

The was an Imperium military base on 494-908 (0625) which was a
forbidden zone (any non military ships entering are shot out of the
sky - including Scouts). Nevertheless, the Scout Service (independent
of the military) wanted to check it out, so they ordered the Lollypop
there. So Bobby (Jeff) spent several three hours accelerating at 2G
before engaging the Jump engines. This meant they were travelling at
216km/s when they entered Jump space (normally you are stationary) and
would be travelling at that speed when they arrived in 494-908 a week
later.

The week passed and they appeared in 494-908, travelling at the huge
speed, 25 light-minutes away from the base, and did aggressive
long-range active scanning the moment they appeared, and immediately
started burning fuel for a return jump - it takes an hour to burn the
fuel to power up the Jump capacitors.

Sure enough, the military base around the planet was in pieces and
there were three Zhodani destroyers in the system. There would be a
ten minute window of danger where the Z destroyers could detect them
after 25 mins, and if they did try long-range shots, the effect would
take another 25 minutes to arrive, but the party gambled on any damage
would be minor over that huge range (450 million km), and chances are
that the Zs might not be able to get into attack state in that time,
or would miss.
Sure enough, the party was right, and they jumped out safely.

Back in Darrian a week later, they docked and made the report to the
Scout Service. The cat was out of the bag, and they had confirmation
of the Z's aggressive status.

Into the Wild Blue Yonder

They started in Orcrist. Belter (Darryl) is a Scout with a scout ship, so is
working for the scouts. Seymour Standage (Ian) is a Diplomat, Ernest Worthington (Chris) a Doctor, Bad Pitt (Shane) a Marine, Bobby "Blade" Morton (Jeff) a Navy and  Matt yet to play.

The scout ship has Jump 2 but I gave it enough tanks for two jumps. Scout ships do not have guns. Grav 2 drive.

They were sent to map 1024 - someone had reported an Ancients site on
one of the four planets in 1024 (no water nor gas giants nor bases
here).
As soon as they jumped in, they came across a debris field of a
destroyed ship - a Imperium navy frigate the "Lovechild".
So they checked out the hulk and found some bodies and bits. No sign
of the black box. Forensics revealed plasma damage, beam weapons, and
that the wreck was a few weeks old.

A day or so passed and they started to detect navigational signals
from a buoy in orbit around p4 (shaded by the planet when they first
arrived).
These signals did not match any known frequency band nor config.
So they headed off up there. Enroute, another ship jumped in, so they
went silent-running and prepared for a Jump themselves. They timed the
jump (one hour prep) so that they could get close enough for a visual
and scan before the fuel was burned and jump engines engaged. So back
to Orcrist to make a report.

The ship spotted was a Zhodani destroyer, but the Zhodani are at peace
with the Imperium at the moment, and 1024 was off limits to Zhodani.
(1024 was off-limits to the Imperium, too). Nevertheless, Seymour Standage
went to visit the Zhodani embassy (in the Orcrist Star-port).
(Zhodani in my Traveller are pale buxom vampires rather than psionic
arabs - I don't have any psionics.)
The Z ambassadoress claimed that the ship spotted was a fake or a look-alike.

Back to the Scout Depot and the group was ordered to 0925. There was
another buoy here, with the same strange signals.
Nothing else, so they then went on to Nosea (0724).

Intro to Andrew's Traveller

House rules for my Traveller.


PSIONICS
Psionics do not exist at all.

JUMP DRIVE
The jump drive works as per the Traveller wikis (and is all but canon
now anyway):
But important details: the jump fuel takes one hour to burn and this
charges up the jump capacitors.
But the capacitors are lossy and can not hold their charge for long,
so the jump must go ahead within 5 minutes of full charge, or else
they discharge past the crucial 99.9% requirement. If this happens, it
takes an hour to dissipate all that energy safely, and you now have to
refuel.
The jump field generators make a timed Einstein-Rosen bridge and the
ship slides into Jumpspace with the current movement vector (universe absolute).
This mechanic does mean jump drop-tanks can be used, bearing in mind
that they must be successfully jettisoned to more than 100 diameters
away before the jump engine is engaged.

ZHODANI
Zhodani are *not* Psionic Arabs as per the official Traveller canon.
They are now buxom vampires - a matriachal society of vampire women. .
Not vampires in the undead sense, but vampires in that they feed
solely on blood of other creatures.
Sun doesn't burn them, nor does garlic or crucifixes have any effect.
Though they are repelled by chocolate, cocoa and palm oil.
The were originally from human stock eons ago, and do breed normally,
but males in the Zhodani society are few and far between, and are only
used for breeding stock. The gene pool has not changed enough to make
Terran-Zhodani coupling infertile, and so the Zhodani augment their
genetic pool occasionally with out-crosses. Though any males born from
these unions are not reared.

GRAV DRIVE & PLATES
Grav plates as per the Traveller canon do not exist. You get too many
inconsistencies and problems with the infinite field strength that
ensues around the edges of the traditional grav plate. Instead, we
have miniature point-sources of gravity which can be increased or
deceased, at finite rate-of-change, up to 6G.
The effect is similar for manoeuvring around in space, but it means
ship design is very much different. At high G manoeuvring, you will
have certain areas of the ship were you cannot go because the gravity
will be too high, and other spots were it is 0G.
Getting space sick will feasible.
It also means, because if the structural integrity of the vessel,
space-faring ships can not enter the atmosphere of planets,  nor land
on the surface.
Air-raft and other kinds of shuttles have to be used to ferry
passengers below, or scoop up water for refuelling. They do not use
grav drive and instead use other forms of propulsion.
Gas giants will still be able to be skimmed.

AIR-RAFT
Air-raft is spelt with a hyphen and not as "air/raft" as per the
official Traveller canon.
Spelling air-raft with the slash is a capital crime in all cultures
and creeds, and is enforced rigorously.


SCANNING

Visual-range is short in space terms. Visual-frequency on-board, 10m focal-length cameras can see 0.01 arcsecs. (10pt text (1mm pixel) @ 20km, or ship-id (5m pixel) @ 100,000km). Image-processing techniques can give you a five-fold resolution increase.This is the only form of silent running.

Short-range scan is used for most navigation and identification. It
has a range of 1 light-minute (18 million km). Short range scan
activates the transponder that all ships have in them, so you will get
this data too.

Medium-range scan will spot any ship-size object within 1 light-hour
(7.2 AUs). This doesn't activate the transponders (well it does, but
the reply would not be heard, so most transponders don't reply).
Medium-range scanning radiates a lot of energy so is forbidden within
a few million km of a space station or planet. Nav buoys do this.

Long-range scan scanners can see any ship in a light-year by sending out a
powerful ping, but it is directional, so you can only "see" things in
an 5 degree cone, and of course it is not very useful if you want to
get the information back in a reasonable time (who wants the reply two
years later?).

Transponders - all ships have transponders. In most ships they can not
be turned off, and in fact it is an offence in all jurisdictions to
switch them off; you will get shot out of the sky. The Scout Service
scout ships can switch them off, but the crews are warned, of course.
Transponders can not be faked, but they can be changed. This is also
highly illegal and the Scout Service doesn't indulge in this.
Transponders do not broadcast all the time, they are activated by a ping.

If you are with 10,000km of a ship when it jumps, and in
line-of-sight, you can work out (by the "angle of entry" into Jump
space) where the destination will be.