------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This could be similar to the avail/use of forcefields (black globes), altho they are avail at (up to factor-4) at TL15, it is mentioned that those are experimental prototypes.
Elsewhere it is mentioned that they cannot even be maintained below TL15.
Furthermore, there is another statement that the 3I recovered thousands of them from an Ancient site somewhere.

--------------------------------------------
On Mon, 3/28/16, xxxxxx@mail.de <xxxxxx@mail.de> wrote:

 Subject: [TML] Relic tech and Scarcity-Driven Imperium (was: Salvage Operations (and Submarines))
 To: xxxxxx@simplelists.com
 Date: Monday, March 28, 2016, 3:36 AM

 I was just toying with a
 handwavium to keep a scarcity-driven TU without giving up
 the standard OTU gadgets, but I am not quite sure it can be
 built up to something resisting serious scrutiny.
  
 The essence of the problem AFAIK is that tech as
 nuclear dampeners imply other tech which imply such a fine
 control of basic forces that one can cheaply generate any
 element one wants, because fusion implies cheap, abundant
 energy. So you end up allowing for Star-Trek-like
 replicators, and large, bulky interstellar shipments make
 little sense.
  
 OK, but the point is not what the existence of tech
 implies, but rather what an understanding of it implies,
 right? What if nuclear dampeners and the like are available
 but NOT understood at all? Shift them to TL 25+. They were
 discovered as relic tech (from the ancients, of course) and
 reverse-engineered. But they are bulky, somewhat unstable,
 and nobody has been able to really understand them. Very
 much how primitive shamans might be taught the operational
 basics of modern medicine (hygiene, etc) without
 understanding the reasons behind them (bacteria, viri...),
 or how you can teach somebody to produce pulver without any
 understandign of chemistry. In my handwavium, for centuries
 many tried to obtain the secrets of dampeners, but there
 were accidents (some University campus was blown up or
 something even worse, think Fringe-style accidents...) and
 the 3I has put a ban on such research, except at a handful
 of imperial facilities (cue adventure idea / cool in-game
 location).
  
 My physics knowledge is insufficient for this. Can this
 work? How many other gadgets would one need to push into the
 relic-tech bag excuse? Am I missing something fundamental
 here?

 --
 Carlos Alós-Ferrer
 Chair of Microeconomics, University of Cologne
 http://www.decisions.uni-koeln.de

  Am 28-Mar-2016 02:06:35 +0200 schrieb
 xxxxxx@gmail.com:

 On Sun, Mar 27, 2016
 at 9:16 AM, Phil Pugliese (via tml list) <xxxxxx@simplelists.com>
 wrote:

 In
 his opinion he thought that there wouldn't be
 interstellar commerce in mass bulk but would concentrate on
 unique high-value items. He mentioned information as
 one of those.
  
 Stars Without Number follows this model, as do I these
 days. Only the newest/poorest of colony worlds needs to
 import much in the way of manufactured items. Most of those
 would be high-end gear which their minifacs couldn't
 make from local raw materials (e.g. they had not been
 pre-loaded with the correct highly-expensive copyrighted
 templates). Everything a trader physically carries between
 worlds is going to be low-bulk, high-value luxury goods. In
 short, I mostly have a low-trade, small-ship,
 relatively-poor-Imperium TU. 

  
 --

 Richard Aiken

 "Never insult anyone by accident."  Robert A.
 Heinlein
 "I studied the
 Koran a great deal. I came away from that study with the
 conviction there have been few religions in the world as
 deadly to men as Muhammed." Alexis de Tocqueville
 (1843)
 "We know a little
 about a lot of things; just enough to make us
 dangerous." Dean Winchester

 "It has been my
 experience that a gun doesn't care who pulls its
 trigger." Newton Knight (as portrayed
 by Matthew McConaughey), to a scoffing
 Confederate tax collector facing the weapons held by
 Knight's young children and wife.

 -----
 The Traveller Mailing List
 Archives at http://archives.simplelists.com/tml
 Report problems to xxxxxx@simplelists.com
 To unsubscribe from this list please goto
 http://archives.simplelists.com

 FreeMail powered by mail.de - mehr
 Sicherheit, Seriosität und Komfort

 -----
 The Traveller Mailing List
 Archives at http://archives.simplelists.com/tml
 Report problems to xxxxxx@simplelists.com
 To unsubscribe from this list please goto
 http://www.simplelists.com/confirm.php?u=EwREIRgLK8vaUEhNlnoNdSGKwnjoID8a