Nicolas Michon
Topic Author
Posts: 54
Joined: Sun 06 Sep 2020, 21:18

[ALPHA] An attempt at summarizing the world building discussion

Wed 02 Dec 2020, 00:35

An attempt at summarizing the "world building" discussion - in a constructive way [Cross-posted from FB page]
Now that we have had a few days to discover all of the goodies our friends at Fria Ligan have prepared for us, I wanted to take a few minutes to try and summarize the discussion. Indeed, threads tend to get very long, people can be unnecessarily aggressive, and this may obfuscate both valid criticisms and relatively easy fixes. I have tried to stick to "issues" that people have been able to back up with logical economic / military reasoning, and that, even my suspension of disbelief dialed to 11 and all of my understanding (if not compassion ....) for fellow game designers who have undertaken such a difficult project, I think should be addressed.
Preliminary issue: as another forum participant (I could not find the post and don't recall the name) brilliantly put it, there is too much information in the Player's book regarding the status of the war, and some of the details. While all PCs would know how the war started and the initial phases, information will quickly degenerate into rumors, etc. For instance, it is very unlikely that US or Dutch soldiers in Poland would know the details of the coup in France: they'll probably know France has been nuked after supporting NATO in the war and that's it. Same goes for the pseudo-Kings in the UK and Sweden. So maybe a lot of that information, at least the most current one, could be moved to the Referee's book (which will also give more flexibility to referees)
Issue 1: Soviet military ground prowess - Suggested fix: Nuke'm!
Many readers agree that the Soviet military, which was, according
to the book itself, "on its knees" in 1991-3, wouldn't have been able to come back that strongly in 97/98. I tend to agree, given the very deep issues affecting the Soviet army. However, the Soviets do benefit from the fact they initially face forces from Warsaw Pact countries they deliberately under-equipped - and, when the better equipped NATO forces (French, German, UK ...) show up, they do have the possibility to use tac nukes on the staging areas for possible counter-attacks. The only change in the timeline is that the Soviets use nukes first, but that's not crazy given how ready they were to use chemical weapons (and some plans made public highlighted that).
Issue 2: Unrealistic Soviet power projection, e.g. UK invasion and Middle East intervention. Suggested fix: downscaling
A lot of readers have commented that the Soviets managed to project power simultaneously in a lot of very far away places .... and that they would never have been able to do it. Some have criticized the Sweden invasion: that, IMHO, could have worked with some planning - and a lot of luck. It would also have caused pretty high casualties to air & naval transport units, which would have been very hard to replace. So, a Middle East invasion AND an invasion of the UK, launched from ... Sweden (all the way across the North Sea), in the face of active NATO opposition, strikes me as going too far. As Churchill pointed out in his Memoirs, amphibious operations are extremely taxing logistically (he would know, he screwed up Gallopoli), which explains why Hitler was never able to cross the Channel even though he had crushing superiority. Here, we are not talking about a few miles of sea .... but the entire North Sea, with NATO controlling a good part of the coastlines of Sweden, Denmark, the UK, Belgium, the Netherlands, France ..... so moving massive forces to the UK is, quite simply impossible. It WOULD be possible to move smaller forces, once, especially if the Soviet leadership was duped as to, say, a potential worker uprising (my favorite version, with the KGB agents embezzling the funds and absconding) which just requires a few elite troops to finish off the dying Capitalist beast, already devastated by tac nukes. When said troops arrive, surprise! No one is there to welcome them, and supply lines back home are cut off.
Issue 3: country-specific issues. Suggested fix: trust your native scouts!
Many UK players, especially JerryB on the Fria Ligan forum, have made well researched points regarding both Issue 2 above and more UK specific issues. They have great ideas, and I think picking their brains for ideas would be a wonderful way to give depth to a UK setting - and relatively easily. I have, also respectfully, made a few suggestions regarding France (tweaks, but that do improve, IMHO, both the "realism" and the dramatic potential). I am sure JerryB and the other UK readers would be happy to help develop this part - I know I am for the French part, and, with the Internet, you have potential contributors from all over. The Polish and Swedish parts certainly benefited from local input - so it's time to think globally and act locally :)
Again, thanks to you Fria Ligan team for all for this: world building is incredibly difficult when dealing with alternative histories as opposed to purely imaginary worlds, and rest assured the overwhelming majority of backers are REALLY grateful and happy.

Moderator Action: Changed the oversized emoji to a smiley of a more moderate size.
- Fenhorn
 
Raellus
Posts: 107
Joined: Sat 28 Nov 2020, 00:13
Contact:

Re: [ALPHA] An attempt at summarizing the world building discussion

Wed 02 Dec 2020, 01:21

For what it's worth, this backer/long-time T2k fan and content creator approves of all of these proposed adjustments.
Twilight 2000 discussion forum @ https://forum.juhlin.com/forumdisplay.php?f=3
 
User avatar
Vader
Posts: 944
Joined: Fri 15 Nov 2019, 14:11
Location: The Frozen North

Re: [ALPHA] An attempt at summarizing the world building discussion

Wed 02 Dec 2020, 13:08

I have great respect for Chris Lites as a writer of games and speculative fiction. He is undoubtedly one of the best people possible to have overall responsibility for writing the world chapter. However, to the best of my knowledge, his background in real-world military matters is not very extensive.

Therefore, as M. Michon suggests, allowing Chris to consult with specialists to refine the content where it necessarily connects to factual conditions — in specific geographic locations certainly; but also in considering the greater military and political scenarios — might indeed be highly beneficial for the final product!

As Tomas noted in the worldbuilding thread, the world as the characters enter into it in the year 2000 needs to fill certain requirements — the base premise of a T2k game needs to be what it needs to be.
However, the way the current backstory reaches that point can hardly be the only possible path there ... and perhaps — just perhaps — not even the best?

And if so — should not the ultimate objective of this whole Alpha exercise be to give the final published game the optimal conditions to be the best it can be, in every aspect?
Before you use the word "XENOMORPH" again, you should read this article through:

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/aliens-throwaway-line-confusion
 
AEB
Posts: 171
Joined: Sat 19 Sep 2020, 06:01

Re: [ALPHA] An attempt at summarizing the world building discussion

Wed 02 Dec 2020, 14:17

In fact there are a number of names listed as Military Consultants in the Credits of the manuals, so I assume there is someone with a degree of knowledge and probably even military experience.

And I fully understand from coming up with a few alternate timelines myself just how difficult it is to make an alternate history of the end period of the Cold War work.

In many ways I think this statement doomed any serious alternate world building from the start.

Just like the original version, the new edition is set in a year 2000 devastated by war – now in an alternate timeline where the Moscow Coup of 1991 succeeded and the Soviet Union never collapsed.

They pretty much doomed themselves right there, as there is simply no feasible way that, having lost the Warsaw Pact, the Soviet Union can regain the strength required to pull off the events in the backstory.

I have to backtrack to the mid 1980s to come up with anything feasible.

To a degree the world building concerns me far less than the base rules and equipment as I can easily homebrew a world that would satisfy my players. I tend to have NPCs provide background, so I can have some veteran comment that everything started to go to hell when Reagan was shot and leave the players to fill in the huge blanks themselves.

But we have been asked to provide feedback, so as long as we are polite and don't make demands (pointless as they have our money anyway) we will do so, and then Fria Ligan can choose whether to listen or not.
 
User avatar
Vader
Posts: 944
Joined: Fri 15 Nov 2019, 14:11
Location: The Frozen North

Re: [ALPHA] An attempt at summarizing the world building discussion

Wed 02 Dec 2020, 14:35

In fact there are a number of names listed as Military Consultants in the Credits of the manuals, so I assume there is someone with a degree of knowledge and probably even military experience.


In many ways I think this statement doomed any serious alternate world building from the start.

Just like the original version, the new edition is set in a year 2000 devastated by war – now in an alternate timeline where the Moscow Coup of 1991 succeeded and the Soviet Union never collapsed.

They pretty much doomed themselves right there, as there is simply no feasible way that, having lost the Warsaw Pact, the Soviet Union can regain the strength required to pull off the events in the backstory.

I have to backtrack to the mid 1980s to come up with anything feasible.

It seems to me the military consultants mainly must have been US Army, and mainly concerned with the in-game situation "on the ground", rather than the backstory — not least because the backstory seems particularly lacking in how navies and air forces would impact the scenario, or how the scenario affects or is affected by other than US forces. But I could of course be mistaken in that assessment.


However, I disagree that the statement that this is "an alternate timeline where the Moscow Coup of 1991 succeeded" in itself dooms the setting, plausibility-wise.
In fact, any plausible scenario I can think of would by necessity among other things mean that the Moscow Coup either succeeds, or never even takes place.

So, that statement in my mind is perfectly natural; even inevitable.

The point where it becomes difficult is if you try to make that specific event the timeline's first point of departure from the historical one.

And indeed, as you say — and as I think I may have mentioned once or twice on other threads — if minor deviations from the historical timeline are allowed beginning from the mid-80's, concocting a timeline that results in a shooting war in 1997 without violating too many principles along the way is certainly doable. But it would also mean that the Warsaw Pact remains in place ... which, for the intents and purposes of this premise in my eyes is a good thing.

I wonder though if part of the problem here might not be that the lads at Black Monk could have objections to that...
Before you use the word "XENOMORPH" again, you should read this article through:

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/aliens-throwaway-line-confusion
 
Nicolas Michon
Topic Author
Posts: 54
Joined: Sun 06 Sep 2020, 21:18

Re: [ALPHA] An attempt at summarizing the world building discussion

Wed 02 Dec 2020, 15:28

I have great respect for Chris Lites as a writer of games and speculative fiction. He is undoubtedly one of the best people possible to have overall responsibility for writing the world chapter. However, to the best of my knowledge, his background in real-world military matters is not very extensive.

Therefore, as M. Michon suggests, allowing Chris to consult with specialists to refine the content where it necessarily connects to factual conditions — in specific geographic locations certainly; but also in considering the greater military and political scenarios — might indeed be highly beneficial for the final product!

As Tomas noted in the worldbuilding thread, the world as the characters enter into it in the year 2000 needs to fill certain requirements — the base premise of a T2k game needs to be what it needs to be.
However, the way the current backstory reaches that point can hardly be the only possible path there ... and perhaps — just perhaps — not even the best?

And if so — should not the ultimate objective of this whole Alpha exercise be to give the final published game the optimal conditions to be the best it can be, in every aspect?
Thanks Vader & Raellus, this is really the point of my post: helping to make the product as realistic as possible without completely changing the premise. Hence, I have deliberately limited the points on which I was commenting. And Chris & team did a brilliant job with the atmospherics - the more strategic view is always harder to grasp, and it is true that most of the military experience is more "on the ground" - indispensible, but does not cover the more "big picture" points I made.
 
JerryB
Posts: 24
Joined: Fri 27 Nov 2020, 02:28

Re: [ALPHA] An attempt at summarizing the world building discussion

Wed 02 Dec 2020, 17:05

I think my main concern really is what becomes canon when the game is finally released, and how much that canon might affect the creation of future material in support of the RPG. This means that the details and history of the setting are important, otherwise the finely crafted RPG itself might run out of steam quite quickly. All the rules etc might work really well but without a working setting they are almost operating in a vacuum, and as this particular RPG is built upon a very particular premise, the setting has to make sense in the long run. So if canon is flawed in various ways, it kind of hobbles future content, as you'll perhaps have to bash it over the head a lot to make it work, and then risk it not being all that successful. At the end of all that, if things are a bit messy, the RPG will fizzle out in a year or so after release.
 
Nicolas Michon
Topic Author
Posts: 54
Joined: Sun 06 Sep 2020, 21:18

Re: [ALPHA] An attempt at summarizing the world building discussion

Wed 02 Dec 2020, 17:25

I think my main concern really is what becomes canon when the game is finally released, and how much that canon might affect the creation of future material in support of the RPG. This means that the details and history of the setting are important, otherwise the finely crafted RPG itself might run out of steam quite quickly. All the rules etc might work really well but without a working setting they are almost operating in a vacuum, and as this particular RPG is built upon a very particular premise, the setting has to make sense in the long run. So if canon is flawed in various ways, it kind of hobbles future content, as you'll perhaps have to bash it over the head a lot to make it work, and then risk it not being all that successful. At the end of all that, if things are a bit messy, the RPG will fizzle out in a year or so after release.
I completely agree - hence my proposals. And your points are well taken, so I wanted to make sure they were put forward.
 
User avatar
Vader
Posts: 944
Joined: Fri 15 Nov 2019, 14:11
Location: The Frozen North

Re: [ALPHA] An attempt at summarizing the world building discussion

Wed 02 Dec 2020, 17:31

I think my main concern really is what becomes canon when the game is finally released, and how much that canon might affect the creation of future material in support of the RPG. This means that the details and history of the setting are important, otherwise the finely crafted RPG itself might run out of steam quite quickly. All the rules etc might work really well but without a working setting they are almost operating in a vacuum, and as this particular RPG is built upon a very particular premise, the setting has to make sense in the long run. So if canon is flawed in various ways, it kind of hobbles future content, as you'll perhaps have to bash it over the head a lot to make it work, and then risk it not being all that successful. At the end of all that, if things are a bit messy, the RPG will fizzle out in a year or so after release.

QFT!

You're highlighting an extremely important point.

If the people who do care about the plausibility of the setting constitute a large enough portion of the customer base to affect sales of in-world supplements (as opposed to specifically equipment/system add-ons), then it might well be worth going the extra mile at this point to ensure they, too, are fully on-board with the quality of the product.

At this point, I've seen people divide pretty much into three categories:

  1. Those who actively like the world as currently presented
  2. Those who want to play the game out of the box, but have plausibility issues with the current world
  3. Those who don't really care one way or the other, as they intend to use the system for their own game setting anyway

#1 are obviously the ones that any future sales of supplementary material would rely on. However, I am not entirely sure they are currently in the majority.
#3 are obviously a lost cause — they'd need to be presented with something pretty specific to care, and that won't likely happen anyway.
I am not convinced that any amount of browbeating or name calling can get the #2's into the #1 camp. I suspect that the only way to make that happen would be to put all prestige aside, look at the issues they present objectively, and then address them.
Before you use the word "XENOMORPH" again, you should read this article through:

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/aliens-throwaway-line-confusion
 
User avatar
Fenhorn
Moderator
Posts: 4429
Joined: Thu 24 Apr 2014, 15:03
Location: Sweden

Re: [ALPHA] An attempt at summarizing the world building discussion

Wed 02 Dec 2020, 17:45

<>
I suspect that the only way to make that happen would be to put all prestige aside, look at the issues they present objectively, and then address them.
You can't please everybody. No matter what you do, there will always be some people who don't like what you do. If you start to remake everything just because some people dislikes it, you will most likely just end up with something else the same group dislikes or you upset another group of people that thinks that it should be rewritten again.
That said, of course they should listen to what people say (and they most likely do) and they may do changes here and there.
“Thanks for noticin' me.” - Eeyore

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: paladin2019 and 0 guests