[TML] Scientific realism

[Richard Aiken]

On Tue, Jun 3, 2008 at 8:19 PM, Jerry W Barrington
<jerry.barrington at gmail.com> wrote:
> Thus pirates need 6 gee ships, and merchants (who need the cargo space)
> generally *won't* have 6 gees.  Hard to have enough sensor range to escape
> better speed.

Well, I've said versions of the below a few times before . . .

The classic Traveller pirate is just a barely-converted merchant ship.
 Primarily - I suppose - so it can pretend to be a merchant ship when
this is convenient (such as when it comes time for annual
maintenance).  He's not going to have six gees, for the same reason
that the real merchant doesn't.  If you've got a "pirate" ship capable
of 6 gees, he isn't a pirate.  He's a commerce raider, a purpose-built
naval ship.  His mission is pure destruction.

Traveller pirates exist to furnish PCs with some excitement.  After a
long stern chase - during which they are shooting to disable while the
PCs are shooting to kill - they pull alongside their disabled victim,
board, take everything not nailed down (and what they can pry up isn't
actually nailed down) and then leave . . . with a unheard villianous
laugh floating in their non-existent wake.  A fun time is had by all,
with the PCs left alive to tell the tale to their who . . . er . . .
ladies at the next port call.

This doesn't make sense, on several levels.  First - logically - the
best way to take a ship is through an inside job.  This is the way
modern pirates do it.  I read an article by a guy who got some to show
him how they took ships in the South China Sea.  This has been brought
up before, in many piracy debates.

But secondly - and in my view more importantly - even if we have
pirates who seek to take ships from the outside, the above Traveller
model still makes no sense.  Much more likely, a tradition closer to
that which evolved during the Golden Age of Caribbean piracy would
prevail.

In this tradition, pirates transmit a demand for surrender and fire a
warning shot.  If the victim stops manuevering and meekly submits to a
boarding, they are merely robbed of their cargo - and personal
possessions of passengers - and maybe have the ship taken as well (fi
the pirates figure they can sell or use it).  But everyone on the
victim ship is left alive and unharmed, either being marooned on a
convenient spot or left to make their way as best they can in a
lifeboat/small craft (pirates prefer the former, since they can sell
or use the latter).  The crew's personal possessions are not (usually)
stolen and if the *crew* owns the ship/cargo in common (and are
sufficiently poor-looking), the pirates *might* just say, "Oh.  Excuse
us.  We didn't know you were fellow ECMs. Go on about your way."

But if the victim tries to run or fight, the outsome is completely
different.  The pirate "hoists the red flag" (meaning "No Surrender
Will Be Accepted) and pursues in deadly earnest.  Now we get another
long stern chase, but nobody is shooting to disable; it's in deadly
earnest of both sides.  If they succeed in boarding, the victim crew
is murdered outright (if they're lucky) or tortured to death (if they
aren't).  Any passengers are usually similarly treated, although some
of these are usually left alive.  After all, how can you expect to
inspire true terror in the hearts of your future victims (so they'll
roll over without fighting), if you don't leave anyone alive to spread
the tale of your villiany?  Sure, the pirate loses this prize (he's
blowing up money).  But by establishing the twin equations "Resistance
= Gory Death" but "Surrender = Nothing Much Reall Bad," he better
assures his future income.

-- 
Richard Aiken

"Never insult anyone by accident." Robert A. Heinlein