MJC- So you're suggesting the early Federation was somewhat similar to the Delian League of ancient Greece? Each member was required every year to provide either money or ships to the mutual defense of the others. Most of them started off giving ships, but slowly substituted more and more money, as the ships were becoming too expensive to operate. Athens, however, gave the maximum number of ships every year and thus came to dominate the League.
So Earth would be Athens and AC is just contributing money (food, whatever)?

By Michael Powers (Mtpowers) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 08:27 am: Edit

Troy: That sounds like a good answer. AC had ship factories, but the economics of the situation made them shut those down and devote their economy to foodstuffs and manufactured goods.

By Jim Cummins (Jimcummins) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 10:21 am: Edit

The AC could have followed a similar path that Canada did after WWII, as I recall Canada had the third largest fleet at the end of WWII, (I could be wrong because I don't remember where I read this stat). We even had an aircraft carrier at one time. Canada also designed the Avro Arrow fighter a very high tech aircraft for it's time, displaying a high Technological infrastructure. Which is what the AC had in the early years, and this made them a desired ally in the formation of the Federation.
Look at Canada now militarily, if the AC followed that pattern when star fleet formed, due to their close proximity to the center of Start Fleet (Earth) they would have continually reduced their military spending and eventually relegated their fleet to the National Guard. The result is that they are no longer one of the major military powers in the GW era.
With respect to economics, Canada is one the developed western nations with a healthy GDP, and we are in the group of 7 nations, but we haven't broken the $1 trillion GDP, and so are not in the highest echelon of nations, in F&E terms AC would have a robust and lively GDP but doesn't make it to the cutoff line for display as a planet on the GW F&E map. They are developed and productive but just below the cutoff line in economic power, and with a marginalized military, so they don’t appear as a minor world.

By Mike West (Mjwest) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 10:29 am: Edit

The reason I would prefer to see option C is because AC is a founding member of the Federation. If it is not represented on map, it would be the *only* founding member of any race to not be represented on the map. It would also be the only "Federation member" world not represented on map.

Likewise, option B doesn't work, as AC was a founding member. I think it would be pretty hard to justify a world as a founding member of the Federation if they had no spacefaring power. It could be small, but it would have to be there.

Option A can work; there are lots of historical examples of states that exerted influence out of proportion to their actual strength, but were then eclipsed as time went on. It just doesn't *feel* right, though.

New, But Related, Issues:

While looking for those "Federation member" worlds in my copy of GPD, I noticed three things:
- The Deians were added in GPD and (from what I can see) hadn't existed prior to GPD. Why were they added as full members rather than associate members?
- What is the Brecon homeworld? I can't find any references on the maps to "Brecon", "Grenpahk", "Sorel", or "Jyrahk" on the maps on pp124-127.
- The world "Antares" is shown to be a "Federation member". Who lives there? I haven't seen any of the races list Antares as their home world.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 11:42 am: Edit

Assorted replies.
=
Known Facts:
AC residents are transplanted humans (sometime in last 20,000 years).
AC was good enough to build warships in Module Y1.
AC is "not a major part of the fed military industrial economy" in time of general war (GPD).
=====
Richard Wells
Even breadbasket won't account for the earlier fleet.
SVC: What I said was that it would be the breadbasket after giving up ship production about Y70.
=====
Hugh Bishop
Boy did I open a can of worms!
SVC: Yes, you did.
=====
Hugh Bishop
I think that we should leave everything the way it is with a special notation in GPD4e that the Alpha Centauran situation will be further clarified in GURPs Federation.
SVC: Not a workable solution. GPD needs to either say that AC is not a major economic part of the Federation or that it is. A decision must be made in the next few days. What we print in GPD4e is what we live with forever.
=====
David Lang
are the ACs native to their world or decendants of earth colonists?
SVC: they are descended from humans moved there by another, unknown, race 20,000 years ago.
=====
Hugh Bishop
According to everything I have seen
SVC: Then you haven’t been looking very hard.
=====
Richard Wells
The GPD version calls them "almost identical" with "recent common ancestry."
SVC: Yep.
=====
Richard Wells
The older TFG published history included a much longer history (1200 years from
the destructive wars) that would be incompatible with Terran colonizing efforts
SVC: I don’t care what was in UFP by TFG. We’ll use it or ignore if it we want.
But be sure to know that the colonization was 20,000 years ago by a precursor race.
=====
Gary Plana
I think I can offer a suggestion as to what happened to the AC shipbuilding capability
That being destruction by a natural disaster.
SVC: That could be part of the Gurps Feds history if we go with solution A.
=====
Richard Wells
Gary: The Alpha-Centauri ships can't land on planets leading to the necessity of construction facilities in orbit and any natural disaster will be unlikely to have its damage limited
to just the construction facilities.
SVC: so we just need a natural space disaster.
=====
Andy Palmer
C. Leave Y1 alone. Have AC be minor planet in Capital Hex.
SVC: This isn’t possible as the F&E LSM says that AC is NOT a minor planet in the capital hex.
=====
michael john campbell
Remember that since AC is our closest star, the closest star to AC is very probably US.
SVC: correct.
=====
michael john campbell
Is there anything in Y1 that says they had more than 1 ship of each type?
SVC: Yes, they had a serious fleet. 10-20 ships anyway.
=====
michael john campbell
You don't need a disaster, you just need a move in the culture and ecconomy.
SVC: spurring this by a disaster wouldn’t hurt.
=====
Loren Knight
Option C tarnishes the Large Scale Map even before it's printed.
SVC: One reason I really don’t want to do this.
=====
Hugh Bishop
AC's probably had a significant force of ships before unified star fleet.
SVC: Yes.
=====
Hugh Bishop
Are all the planets in a Capital hex actually named on that map?
SVC: yes.
=====
Hugh Bishop
I thought that the big map just put names on the outlying planets from the capital
SVC: you would be wrong.
=====
Hugh Bishop
I thought all the capital planets were named in a special box in the margin or some such.
SVC: correct. They are NAMED in a box on the margin. Which means option C makes the Map WRONG and the most loyal fans paid serious money for it.
=====
Loren Knight
It tarnishes the Map by making the map wrong. Albeit a really minor wrong and if the thing didn't cost $100 then this might not be an issue.
SVC: point taken.
=====
Loren Knight
Besides, doesn't the "explain Y1" thing work best anyway. No printed material needs to be changed. All products remain accurate.
SVC: indeed, the most logical choice.
=====
Richard Wells
Hugh: The sublight timeframe presents problems. If AC has working sublight interstellar craft, why did they fail to reach Sol? If they did not have sublight craft, why did a
technologically backward society with limited industry and population develop their own significant space fleet after meeting the presumably friendly Terran expedition? Or we
need to adjust AC views to reflect the aftereffects of any hostility.
I tend to prefer giving AC an existing space craft. Unlike the population of Earth which has a historical effort at exploring the nearest but unlivable object, the AC ignored the
poisonous metal tainted worlds of the Sol system which lacked the solar tides needed for life to evolve. Instead, any major AC exploration went to other binary or trinary systems
with appropiate stars. At least that is the basic history I will use for my SFU, with placement of original sublight AC colonies in the systems they would have sought out, and other
species sensibly eschewed.
SVC: I prefer my version.
=====
Andy Palmer
So we impact GPD AND SFB(Y1) because of an F&E Map that 100 people will buy?
SVC: Actually, if we go with Option A, then the map is right, GPD is right, and Y1 is right.
=====
Jim Cummins
The AC could have followed a similar path that Canada did after WWII, as I recall Canada had the third largest fleet at the end of WWII, (I could be wrong because I don't remember
where I read this stat). We even had an aircraft carrier at one time. Canada also designed the Avro Arrow fighter a very high tech aircraft for it's time, displaying a high
Technological infrastructure. Which is what the AC had in the early years, and this made them a desired ally in the formation of the Federation.
Look at Canada now militarily, if the AC followed that pattern when star fleet formed, due to their close proximity to the center of Start Fleet (Earth) they would have continually
reduced their military spending and eventually relegated their fleet to the National Guard. The result is that they are no longer one of the major military powers in the GW era.
With respect to economics, Canada is one the developed western nations with a healthy GDP, and we are in the group of 7 nations, but we haven't broken the $1 trillion GDP, and so
are not in the highest echelon of nations, in F&E terms AC would have a robust and lively GDP but doesn't make it to the cutoff line for display as a planet on the GW F&E map. They
are developed and productive but just below the cutoff line in economic power, and with a marginalized military, so they don’t appear as a minor world.
SVC: Parts of that mesh with my theory.
=====
Mike West
The reason I would prefer to see option C is because AC is a founding member of the Federation. If it is not represented on map, it would be the *only* founding member of any race
to not be represented on the map. It would also be the only "Federation member" world not represented on map.
SVC: As noted, Option C isn’t workable. AC isn’t on the map, therefore at the time of the General War, AC wasn’t just a part of the provincial background economy. I don’t know that the list of founding members was ever declared to be complete, and the list of full member planets is certainly not complete, so those arguments don’t hold.
=====
Mike West
Likewise, option B doesn't work, as AC was a founding member. I think it would be pretty hard to justify a world as a founding member of the Federation if they had no spacefaring
power. It could be small, but it would have to be there.
SVC: Actually, that doesn’t stop B from working, even though I decided against B. AC could have had no fleet, been contacted by Earth, and Earth could have forced AC (with its multi-billion members) into the Federation as an independent world.
=====
Mike West
Option A can work; there are lots of historical examples of states that exerted influence out of proportion to their actual strength, but were then eclipsed as time went on. It just
doesn't *feel* right, though.
SVC: Given the proximity to Earth and the identical genome, it seems entirely plausible that AC just slowly got absorbed into Earth.
=====
Mike West
New, But Related, Issues:
While looking for those "Federation member" worlds in my copy of GPD, I noticed three things:
- The Deians were added in GPD and (from what I can see) hadn't existed prior to GPD. Why were they added as full members rather than associate members?
- What is the Brecon homeworld? I can't find any references on the maps to "Brecon", "Grenpahk", "Sorel", or "Jyrahk" on the maps on pp124-127.
- The world "Antares" is shown to be a "Federation member". Who lives there? I haven't seen any of the races list Antares as their home world.
SVC: The deians came from something Tim & Mark did, not from GPD.
Brecon is another of Tim & Mark’s doing. I don’t really know where they are. Or care much. But we’ll pick a nice hex for them in GFed.
Antares is another member planet. The Antareans live there. We’ll publish them and some other fed member races in GFed.
=====

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 11:42 am: Edit

The choices were:
- - - - -
C. Change GPD4e, leave Y1 as is with no explanation, Chuck's map is wrong.
SVC: It would be the height of bad customer relations to make a $100 map wrong while it’s physically on the printing press.
- - - - -
B. Leave GPD4e, change Y1, Chucks' map is fine.
SVC: The problem here is that changing Y1 is hard. It won’t be reprinted forever, maybe never. Changing the country that a fleet belongs to by errata is just tacky, and no other member race fits the bill. Hence, this option just isn’t a realistic one.
- - - - -
A. Leave GPD4e, explain Y1 somehow, Chuck's map is fine.
SVC: this becomes the only logical choice and future discussion can focus on how to explain it.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 11:42 am: Edit

Current theory of history is:
1. they had some exploration ships. They contacted Sol or Sol contacted them. Whatever.
2. they became incredibly good friends with Sol, closer than US-UK.
3. AC built its own fleet (Just as Earth, Andor, and Vulcan did) for local defense and further exploration and mutual defense.
4. a natural disaster wrecked their shipyard. rather than spending money on a new shipyard they just used the earth shipyard. When the change to new ship technology came along, they were glad not to have to spend money on converting their shipyard.
5. AC has limited space-relevant industry but produces much of the food for Sol.
=====
I have made a decision. Let’s move ahead and not spend more time arguing about ABC. I picked A. Let’s get busy fleshing out the A history.

By Andy Palmer (Andypalmer) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 12:37 pm: Edit

SVC. 4-5. With the formation of the United Star Fleet, the AC might have been the lone disenter who didn't mind this fact and was happy to drop their fleet and just convert their shipyard to civilian construction (to better move their ample food supplies across the Federation). With their proximity to Earth, they were the first to form integrated crews with the Terrans, so being just "part of the team" was a much smoother transition for them.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 01:06 pm: Edit

I don't think that a natural desaster needs to totally destroy the ship yard. A simple but strong Ion Storm might have put it out of commission and it was simply packed up and moved to Sol. In fact, there might have been a condition left that would hang around for some time that just made it impractical to locat a shipyard there. Say, a nearby star went nova and AC is subject to occasional Ion Storms as a result, not too powerful and it doesn't hurt the planets or anything prepared with shields but it makes ship building a real pain. Say, mild Ion storms annually?

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 01:13 pm: Edit

Let me put this proposal more clear:

A star nearby AC goes nova.
This pelts AC with a strong Ion Storm than puts the ship yard out of commission.
Efforts begin to rebuild it.
Another comes and stops recovery efforts.
With the help of Humans and Vulcans it is determined that more will come and that ship building costs are going to skyrocket. AC regularly faces Ion storms of lessening degree for the next 20+ years. Most are minor but would still make shipbuilding prohibitively expensive.
Humans offer to host AC shipbuilding. AC agree having trust for humans, they are close by, and the costs will be even less due to the fact that materials will be even cheeper.
Federation is formed and national fleets are disbanded for Star Fleet.

By Mike West (Mjwest) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 01:18 pm: Edit

If AC has a comparatively low population (i.e. no more than 1 billion, maybe less), then they could have afforded the EY (and earlier) ships, but just didn't want to pay the money as time went on, especially since they don't have to.

A disaster (natural or otherwise) isn't really necessary. They just didn't want to keep paying the improvement costs, linked up with Sol, and scrapped their shipyard.

And, if the Sol/AC relationship is so close, it is quite likely that Sol may have subsidized or at least helped pay for AC's EY fleet. As Andy suggests, AC was probably more than willing to toss the "proprietary" fleets and sign onto the unified fleet concept.

Also, with the small population, they would naturally be eclipsed as a "major player", as more members with much higher populations (and subsequently greater economies) join. It is quite possible that Mars and Luna have larger populations than AC. So, by the time of the GW, AC just doesn't rate a "world" on the map.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 01:22 pm: Edit

Andy: Yep.
Loren; No nova.
Mike: one theory. I'm not sure their population is small, but I'm not sure it's large.

By Kerry Drake (Kedrake) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 01:41 pm: Edit

"Natural Disaster" -- How about a clash with a Jindo caravan? Jindo's destroy the military ship building capabilities of AC before being driven out of the system by some AC ships with the help of some EY Fed ships...

Sounds like a good scenario for a Captains Log.

By Garth L. Getgen (Sgt_G) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 01:55 pm: Edit

Unusally strong Sun Spots could do it as easily as an Ion Storm. A "nearby" Nove would affect Sol/Earth, too.


Garth L. Getgen

By Garth L. Getgen (Sgt_G) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 01:56 pm: Edit

Actually, I'll second Kerry's idea!!


Garth L. Getgen

By Gary Plana (Garyplana) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 04:26 pm: Edit

I'd prefer a natural disaster like the ones we saw on the TV series, which are usually too inappropriate for SFB to deal with.

For example, where do space dragons build their nests? (While correct, "anywhere they want" is not the answer I'm looking for!)

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 04:36 pm: Edit

On planets I have assumed.

Ion storms were the most common. Maybe there was a meteor storm from a comet colliding into an asteriod in their asteroid belt.

So what other forms of natural space desaster are possible. One that would do little harm to the planet but disable or destroy a space construction yard.

By Mike West (Mjwest) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 04:37 pm: Edit

While I am apparently in the minority on this, I would much rather see an "ordinary" explanation than something "spectacular".

Most "spectacular" explanations only work once. AC has plenty of "ordinary" reasons that could work. Why needlessly waste one of those "spectacular" explanations?

Besides, if you use an "ordinary" explanation, it looks more seamless. It looks like you always intended it that way.

By Gary Plana (Garyplana) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 04:53 pm: Edit

World coordinates (with race names)

2505 Paktar (Deians)
2306 Shresha (Cynans)
2215 Mantor

I can't find any reference to the Brecon homeworld, which probably means it hasn't been specified yet. It is a very minor world, no biggie. The one significant refrence I CAN find is that the Brecon had TL8 (but not TL9) with many colonies within their home system at the time they were discovered by a Fed "Galactic Survey vessel". Knowing Tim I suppose he meant a GSC.

The YIS for a GSC is Y140, so that makes the Brecon a recent addition to the Federation.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 05:09 pm: Edit

Possible wrinkle on Kerry Drake's Jindo suggestion...

Not only do the Jindarians destroy the primary Alpha Centauri shipyard, but the primary source of mineral wealth in that system was not on the planet itself but in the asteroid belt. Jindo ships being overwhelmingly powerful against EY ships, (imagine trying to blast through the rock armor with EY weapons - and oh, by the way, the asteroid ship is as fast as your own ships) the Alpha Centauri/Federation forces are unable to drive them away. Eventually, the Jindo leave because the asteroid belt is largely mined out. For that same reason, the Centaurans (if that's the correct term) never bother to rebuild their military shipyard.

By Gary Plana (Garyplana) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 05:23 pm: Edit

Jindo's in the central core of the Federation raises a lot of questions in my mind, like why didn't they mine out OUR asteroid belt (the one between Mars and Jupiter). After all, it's only a few light years away? That did NOT happen.

I have a LOT of problems with Jindo's coming that close to Earth. If it were anywhere else, it would be a possibility, and an excellent suggestion, but not THAT close to Earth!

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 05:33 pm: Edit

Why would the Jindos attack anything when they could go to the next uninhabited system to the left?

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 05:42 pm: Edit

The AC had really good asteroids?

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 06:18 pm: Edit

The AC had really good steroids?

By Garth L. Getgen (Sgt_G) on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 06:37 pm: Edit

It doesn't have to be a natural disaster; it could have been an accident -- a ship under construction (prototype, perhaps) blew up and took out much of the shipyard.

If AC is an agrarian planet, perhaps the people tend to be technophobes; thus part of the reason to not rebuilding the lost shipyard.


Garth L. Getgen