On Wed, 24 Feb 2021 11:47:52 -0600, greg caires <xxxxxx@gmail.com>
wrote to Freelance Traveller:

>I think we would want to know law level, government, water and atmosphere.
>Is star town a haven from tyranny (Casablanca?) or a mildly sinful
>entertainment center (Vegas?) or a truly dangerous place (mos eisley). Is
>it under a dome? Is it surrounded by a fence or a massive wall? Are people
>pleading to get in, tunneling to he’ll get in, or can they come and go
>freely?

"Terrestrial shirtsleeve environment" - assume that it's _not_ a domed
city.

As to whether it's a Casablanca, Las Vegas, or Mos Eisley... That doesn't
need to necessarily be defined. Neither does the government or law level,
unless and until it plays a part in a story that someone chooses to write.

Remember, "Don't overspecify" is a cardinal rule of worldbuilding. In
_Thieves' World_, we knew very little about the empire that Sanctuary was
at the ass end of; it was a generic fantasy-universe empire. For this
project, the world might be a tyranny, or it might be a republic, or it
might be ... anything.

The focus is on what's going on in startown - the stories of _startown's_
*people*, including but not necessarily limited to those who come in on
ships, or those who visit from the world, or even those who have made their
lives here - it's not about the world at large, or even necessarily the
city at large.

Even if the world is a democratic republic, the startown might have a
"refugee quarter" where those who are at serious odds with the
world/continental/national government may be tacitly allowed to huddle,
provided that they don't do anything that will provoke a response. Or it
may be full of refugees from off-world. Or both. Ditto the Vegas and Eisley
aspects of it; during the '70s, NYC did, after all, have Coney Island
(family entertainment), Times Square (not-always-family entertainment), and
the South Bronx (seriously dangerous, if you didn't know how to deal). And
enforcement was "tuned" somewhat; things that were ... not seriously
pursued... in the South Bronx would have been dealt with in the other two
places; some of the sleazier aspects of Times Square that passed unremarked
as long as not excessively blatant would have generated a strong response
in Coney Island.

Borders? Well, who says that extrality applies at all? If the world is
fully within a canon-compatible Imperium, it does - but what if it's a
client state, not fully a member - or a "non-aligned" world? No
extraterritoriality in either of those two cases... although off-world
representatives may have diplomatic presence in startown as well as the
political capital. Does your story _need_ to have tunnels under a wall? Go
ahead and write them; maybe startown is just barely on the "West German"
side of the "Inter-German Border" on a balkanized world, and the wall and
the tunnels under it are on the "East German" side.

Right now, all I need is the broad strokes for StarTown; it is the stories
that fill it in. When Robert Asprin first laid out Sanctuary, he basically
set the location of the docks, the palace, the broad avenue leading from
the first to the second, and _some_ of the main streets and neighborhoods.
He left it to the authors to define the rest of it - "the Maze" wasn't part
of _his_ Sanctuary, but an author needed it, so it _became_ part of the
shared Sanctuary. That's how I propose to handle this, ultimately. Right
now, I just want your ideas for the "gross structure" of the city - what
are the most important locations, and how are they situated relative to
each other, and how are they connected?

>> On Feb 24, 2021, at 6:37 AM, Jeff Zeitlin <xxxxxx@freelancetraveller.com> wrote:
>>
>> ?On Tue, 23 Feb 2021 19:21:41 -0600, greg caires <xxxxxx@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Jeff to do this I think we need to start with the planet’s UPP. That will
>>> help us understand the juxtaposition of the starport/town. Can you please
>>> generate some please? I think this is a fun idea.
>>
>> This is a good point; I haven't actually worked up a firm UWP. I would say
>> that a 'hard' UWP isn't really necessary, though; rather, any world that
>> would be a "terrestrial shirtsleeve environment" should do the trick.
>>
>> (Note that any renderings won't be able to show e.g., grav vehicles or
>> starships; the program in question really only supports a TL7-8 type of
>> environment. For those that are interested, it's _Cities in Motion_, from
>> Paradox Interactive, with a couple of minor usermods.)
>>
>>
>>> -30-
>>> Caires sends via iPhone
>>>
>>>>> On Feb 23, 2021, at 6:53 PM, Jeff Zeitlin <xxxxxx@freelancetraveller.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> ?A year or five ago, I floated the idea of a shared-setting _Tales of
>>>> Startown_, conceptually similar to _Thieves' World_, but set in a Traveller
>>>> startown on a world where the startown was built as a roughly TL8 city
>>>> (because I have a program that can do renderings of city scenes from such a
>>>> setting).
>>>>
>>>> I _think_ I'm coming around to a point where I can think about perhaps
>>>> considering the idea of resurrecting the idea. It'll help if you will...
>>>>
>>>> I'd like some ideas from you. I can detail the city accurately as long as
>>>> it fits within a square 15.5km on a side. That's almost the size of
>>>> Washington DC plus Alexandria VA!
>>>>
>>>> I figure the port will be a Class C port, somewhat off the largest trade
>>>> routes, but not necessarily a complete backwater. Although C ports don't
>>>> generally have highports associated with them, I don't rule it out - but
>>>> startown includes/is associated with the downport, and the highport
>>>> shouldn't be a central feature if it's decided that it exists.
>>>>
>>>> So... I'd appreciate it if people would work up ideas for the *general*
>>>> layout and character of the port and city - where, in that square, is the
>>>> port, how big is it, what is the character (e.g., steel-and-glass offices,
>>>> industrial, brownstones, detached housing, semidetached housing,
>>>> apartments, retail, etc.) of which neighborhoods where relative to such
>>>> features as the port itself, rivers, sea/lakeshores, etc.... how do streets
>>>> line up with adjacent areas? through streets or cul-de-sacs? Highways?
>>>> Railroads? Trams? Monorails? Bus lines? Metro (elevated, surface,
>>>> underground?)? Parks? Tourist attractions? Entertainment facilites? Slums?
>>>> Shantytowns? Without going into detail, what is the layout of the major
>>>> thoroughfares? Is the extrality line a fence, a Berlin-type wall, a
>>>> notional line on the ground?
>>>>
>>>> Ideally, sketch it out and label it, scan it, and email it to me with any
>>>> additional text notes you feel appropriate.
>>>>
>>>> I'll go through them all, and pick and choose what I like, and put together
>>>> an amalgam of features. Then, I'll detail a couple of areas, put together
>>>> some notes, and make them available for people to use when they write their
>>>> stories for the _Tales_ (which will be published in FT and posted in a
>>>> separate section of Raconteurs' Rest). I won't detail everything; that will
>>>> be left to be done by the stories as needed, just as was done with
>>>> _Thieves' World_'s Sanctuary.
>>>>
>>>> DON'T FEEL THAT YOU HAVE TO PLAN ON BEING AN AUTHOR IN ORDER TO BE A CITY
>>>> PLANNER! DON'T FEEL THAT YOU HAVE TO BE A CITY PLANNER IN ORDER TO BE AN
>>>> AUTHOR! You don't; some people have talents in one direction, some in
>>>> another.
>>>>
>>>> ®Traveller is a registered trademark of
>>>> Far Future Enterprises, 1977-2020. Use of
>>>> the trademark in this notice and in the
>>>> referenced materials is not intended to
>>>> infringe or devalue the trademark.
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Jeff Zeitlin, Editor
>>>> Freelance Traveller
>>>>   The Electronic Fan-Supported Traveller® Resource
>>>> xxxxxx@freelancetraveller.com
>>>> http://www.freelancetraveller.com
>>>>
>>>> Freelance Traveller extends its thanks to the following
>>>> enterprises for hosting services:
>>>>
>>>> onCloud/CyberWeb Enterprises (http://www.oncloud.io)
>>>> The Traveller Downport (http://www.downport.com)
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>>
>> ®Traveller is a registered trademark of
>> Far Future Enterprises, 1977-2020. Use of
>> the trademark in this notice and in the
>> referenced materials is not intended to
>> infringe or devalue the trademark.
>>
>> --
>> Jeff Zeitlin, Editor
>> Freelance Traveller
>>    The Electronic Fan-Supported Traveller® Resource
>> xxxxxx@freelancetraveller.com
>> http://www.freelancetraveller.com
>>
>> Freelance Traveller extends its thanks to the following
>> enterprises for hosting services:
>>
>> onCloud/CyberWeb Enterprises (http://www.oncloud.io)
>> The Traveller Downport (http://www.downport.com)
>> -----
>> The Traveller Mailing List
>> Archives at http://archives.simplelists.com/tml
>> Report problems to xxxxxx@simplelists.com
>> To unsubscribe from this list please go to
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®Traveller is a registered trademark of
Far Future Enterprises, 1977-2020. Use of
the trademark in this notice and in the
referenced materials is not intended to
infringe or devalue the trademark.

--
Jeff Zeitlin, Editor
Freelance Traveller
    The Electronic Fan-Supported Traveller® Resource
xxxxxx@freelancetraveller.com
http://www.freelancetraveller.com

Freelance Traveller extends its thanks to the following
enterprises for hosting services:

onCloud/CyberWeb Enterprises (http://www.oncloud.io)
The Traveller Downport (http://www.downport.com)