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Tuesday, August 26, 2014

Traveller Tuesday: X-Boat Routes in the Marches, take two



Instead of doing any writing yesterday, I spent my productive hours updating a previous version of my Xboat route map for the Spinward Marches.  But hey, it's content!




Design notes:
  • The purple lines are for high-speed (J-5 and J-6) military and diplomatic channels. They are not usually available for commercial use, although an obscenely wealthy corporation could buy space on one -- but they likely have their own J-6 ships for that. 
  • I have no way to differentiate between a route that stops at a system and one that simply passes through it. Sorry. You'll have to use your discretion. 
  • Whenever possible, I made a direct line to subsector capitals. 
  • Whenever possible, I made loops instead of lines, both for speed of transmission and for the ability to route communication around damage where needed. 
  • I gave preference for systems with scout bases, naval bases, and class A or B starports unless doing so simply made little sense. 
  • Shaving 1 week off transmission time was insufficient reason to put in a route. Shaving off 2 weeks was given strong consideration, and 3 or more meant the route was added .
  • Using this system, communication from sector capital Mora to the other subsector capitals is damn fast, considering that each hex is a parsec (3.5 light years across):
    • 2 weeks to reach Lunion and Rhylanor
    • 3 weeks to reach Lanth, Glisten and Trin
    • 4 weeks to reach Aramis, Frenzie, Regina, Mertactor
    • 5 weeks to reach Iderati
    • 6 weeks to reach Mire and Jewell (but only 2 weeks from Jewell to Regina)
  • Ivendo and Fosey become these odd J-6 hubs, which become less odd when you realize that Ivendo has both a Navy and a Scout base, and Fosey has a Naval Intelligence office. Hmm....
  • Keen-eyed folks will note there's one route that doesn't quite make sense. This was deliberate on my part and not a mistake. I don't want to get into further detail as my players are likely to read this.
  • Fulacin is now interdicted due to recent events in-game. 
  • Similarly, Walston is now a Class B port and X-boat hub due to the actions of the PCs. (It's going to be integrated into the Imperium as soon as the population gets it racism under control.)
  • I switched the locations of Bronze and Steel because I had an adventure called "Project Steel" which was all about removing the X-boat base at Biter and routing it through Steel, and the canonical position of Steel made that idiotic. Rather than change the adventure (Steel is habitable, Bronze is not), I used GM fiat to switch the positions of the systems. 
  • It's now a Jump-2 for the Sword Worlds to get any mail from the Imperium. Suck it, Swordies. 
  • Flammarion is now even more of a critical hub as it is the official link from the Imperium to the Darrian Confederation. It goes to Spume and not Darrian because I figured it was more important for mail to get onto the Confederation's mail service than to go to the old capital. 
  • There is, however, a J-5 diplomatic link to Mire, as well as an emergency backchannel between Regina and the Darrians via Thanber
  • The Zhodani were deliberately left unchanged to represent the Imperium not fully understanding what is going on in their neck of the woods. 

Sorry to feature what is basically a Lucas rework of a rerun, but I actually spent 3+ hours working on this last night and I'd like to to have something blogworthy to show for it. 

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