Thema: Babylon 5 - Was wird im Centauri-Buch sein?

[Ludovico]

Ich hab mir nun endlich mal das B5-Rollenspiel zugelegt und bin doch etwas entäuscht, daß so wenig über das Volk der Centauri drinsteht, wobei die ausgerechnet noch zu meinen Lieblingen zählen.

Nun würde mich mal interessieren, was denn so feststeht, was im Centauri-Buch stehen soll?
Ich finde immer nur die übliche Einleitung, die sich über den Inhalt ausschweigt.

[Visionär]

Du wirst auch nicht mehr erfahren, bis es endlich draußen ist. Die Leute von MPG scheinen mir ziemlich verschlossen zu sein.

[Ludovico]

Mist!
Es hat mich wirklich entäuscht, daß so wenig über die Centauri im Grundregelwerk zu finden ist.

[Visionär]

Es ist mittlerweile wohl in englischsprachigen Ländern erhältlich. Hier eine Bewertung, die im Bab5 - Forum von MPG gepostet wurde:

OK...

Got it, read through it...

...and...

...it's GOOD!!!

There are a few little things that don't quite seem logical, but the rest is great. It's like the Minbari book with a bunch of ideas thrown in for refinement - this time there Are names for every "starship picture" so even those who're new to B5 gaming will from now on know how a Kutai gunship or Covran scout looks like; an suggestion that popped up here on the forums (for all you doubters - Mongoose does indeed pay attention to their customers feedback!). There are of course the expected starship & ground vehicles descriptions and planetary info pages, as well as nice prestige classes, sample characters, history and everything else people have come to expect from Mongoose factbooks, with a lot of nice centauri specific stuff thrown in (status and it's effects, houses, and a section for every centauri player who wants some subtle chemical influence to apply in his dealings...  ).
(See August, this time I remembered to do the praise before going on to the things that annoyed me a bit - much less of that then the last time though)

There are a few things that bug me though...
- a minor one is that some ships changed more then I'd have liked from B5W, so much that they quite lost their "sense" (Centurion shrinking to a size roughly half that of a Vorchan, while retaining it's cruiser level armament, etc.). However, there were a few alterations that I fully approve of - like the Altarian loosing it's fighters (I had always thought that it was packing a little bit too much in the hull).
- more annoying is that noone thought to correct the logical boo-boo that made some centauri weaponry much less effective then their much lower-tech EA counterparts (Battle Laser vs. Heavy Laser - the BL Still has the same range, but half the damage of the HL... The comment "...but the centauri have refined the laser beyond the capabilities of most other races" made me laugh though.)
Well, maybe those will be reviewed when the space combat game comes out.

More annoying was the one big continuity error I found in the history section...
Let's see... what do you people think of this:
C.E.2361 would be around 2257 a.d. (the time of B5 as stated in the factbook history)
That'd mean the last Shadow War (Valen's war) was around C.E.1350 or so (as stated in the show: "a thousand years before our time").
Now...
The factbook history states that the Technomages may have first visited the Centauri somewhere around C.E.450: and were there for sure at C.E.500 when the Shoggren came (if I extrapolate the date correctly from the text - it mentions the first TM's may have arrived as early as the invasion of the Centauri against the Xon, which must have been shortly after the forming of the Centaurum at C.E.440, and also gives the end of the Xon at C.E.800, and mentions that was 300 years after the first Emperor Kiro who had that "Technomage Endorsement"; which combined with the mention that they departed after that gets us the second date).
However, in the TM trilogy we can read that they were first created as Shadow-Allies only a short while before Valen's shadow war when the Taratimude made their deal with the Shadows, fought in that war and only after that war established the techings that made them the "Technomages" as we know them in B5 times.
That'd mean there were technomages on Durana (=Centauri Prime) 850-900 years or so before they were first created!
What's more, this first meeting also had the Shoggren, who from the way it is described in the factbook tried to invade Durana, and were repulsed by the pre-industrial age Centauri aided by the 'Mages. Who else here has a problem with picturing early centauri cannons beat off a full scale invasion from space faring aliens?

Personally I'd do a little rewriting of that history for my campaigns...

In my opinion the best way to handle this one would be taking the Shoggren/Technomage incident out of the history entirely until the time it could have happened; the Xon war would then end directed by the Centaurum instead of an Emperor, letting the Centauri come up with crude space flight on their own in C.E. 1134 (the "War of Heaven's Wrath" preceeding that then being about possession of nuclear weapons instead of salvaged alien tech), and slowly start a space program (it took us humans some decades too between the first space flight and the capability to do it routine). Or maybe add a century or two to that date, to let them go from pre-industrial to early space age in a more realistic time set - no harm to the history there (in that case they'd just set their eyes to the stars with more vigor then we have done in our history so far).
And then in C.E. 1363, when the Centauri have barely established outposts on a moon or mayve even a few planets of their system, a Taratimude ship carrying some early Technomages enters the system pursued by a Shadow-loyal Shoggren ship or small task force (who want to punish them for deserting their masters cause after they got defeated by Valen's alliance). The 'Mages hide among the Centauri (who don't detect them as they already have the Stealth tech that allowed Galen to follow even the Excalibur undetectd), the Shoggren attack and are shot down by combined Technomage/Centauri forces (if one assumes the Shoggren have no such stealth tech the Centauri, not aware of the Technomages presence, would see the Shoggren as invaders, and invaders whose superior tech gets their early space fleet in deep trouble as the Shoggren see the Centaurti as allies of the Taratimude, blowing them apart to get at their intended target - until suddenly the Technomages pop up from empty space and help in the battle, catching the Shoggren in the flank while they're occupied with the Centauri ships - which of course gives the 'Mages a big reaction boost when they start talking with the Centauri after the Shoggren are defeated).
The Centauri now KNOW alien races with much better tech are out there, and this unites them more then ever before, and they choose one of their nobles - the one who made first contact with the 'Mages, and was endorsed by them - to be their first Emperor. The Technomages leave again (because if they'd stay more Shoggren or worse ShadowAllies might come for them), and the Centauri get a big tech boost and jump drive technology from a shot down Shoggren ship they discover (maybe also helped along by the 'Mages as payment - they could easily have explained the crystal jump drive to centauri engineers).
Add 150 years to the first inter-stellar colony (not C.E.1224, but now C.E.1374 - easily and quickly done once they do have a jump drive and interstellar-scale tech) and from then on the history is back on track! (with the Garmak/Minbari conflict at C.E.1591 or so, heralding the period of almost unlimited expansion for the Centauri)

That's all. Everything else seems great at first glance. Thanks Mongoose and August for another great B5 book!!!
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ShadowScout
Roman A. Perner