| From: | "P. Steele" <P.C.Steele@*********.AC.UK> |
|---|---|
| Subject: | London Source Book |
| Date: | Fri, 13 Aug 1993 15:29:37 BST |
since. I've got to admit that whoever wrote this certainly has a sense of
humor but it doesn't tend to tell you very much about real English people.
Stil, it can't all be perfect.
Anyhow I see NERPS are back (NERPS for endorphins) but one of the best in (ie
Americans won't get it) jokes is the description of the Renraku UK boss. Frank
Butcher, does not hold very much respect as he used to be a second hand car
dealer in the East End of London (he he). I love the part about the Lambeth
Containment Zone but the book seems inaccurate in several places. It paints
the North and in particular the North East as a dirty grimy area. That only
goes to show it was written by Southerners or by Americans who've been
listening to Southerners. The North East may have been an industrial heart
land and had the pollution to go with it 10 - 20 years ago but all that has
long since changed. Lets face it, Britain just can't compete in the heavy
manufacturing area any more.
What else, ah yes polliclubs. I'm certain one of the biggest ones would be
CAMRA (CAMpaign for Real Ale), this is virtually a policlub now except that it
has nothing to do with politics. But some intresting runs could be developed
from that as CAMRA would push pubs to keep genuine hand pulled ales with real
cask conditioned beers. Any pubs not complying would be fire bombed etc..
Of course this would only be the radical edge of CAMRA the majority of it's
members being made up of middle aged men.
The nobility I think is over done. Today the nobility don't have half as much
power as they used to 50 years ago and if anything that trend would continue.
Nowadays foreign ownership of English corps is much more likely. What power
the nobility did have would be concentrated between 5-10 major families with
direct family members (mainly father-son, but occasionaly uncles) wielding
that power. The rest of the 'nobility' would live the good life and just hold
general contempt for the working class that they have done for years anyway,
without interfereing.
Druids, nicely done but the level of secrecy is under emphasised. I suppose
this is so that the GM knows what is going on. But info about inner circles
and especially hidden circles would be very very hushed up and the GM should
not allow his players access to this part of the book (of course that is hard
to do if the players buy the book). The conservative downfall, well I suppose
it might happen but what the book didn't really emphasise is that the same
group of guys are still in power. The old conservatives would have seen the
tide turing against them and probably forged close links with the NDM very
early on with all but a few making the change so as to hang on to power. The
few real right wingers who rejected the NDM would have gone on to form the
Conservationist party. Any split between corporations and the NDM will only
occur where the corporation is mainly foreign owned and doesn't have old school
tie links to those high up in the NDM. Ie the NDM would have no power of the
corps.
Other stuff, alot of the pubs show modern names. This isn't that likely,
most English pubs got their names hundreds of years ago and they aren't likely
to change them. I don't think I saw one Rose and Crown or other traditional
British pub name when flicking through. The SAS and MI5, I find their merging
somewhat strange as alot of MI5 stuff is techno stuff, electronic surveilance
etc with most of it's members no more trained in firearms than your average
bod on the street. The SAS however is trained for combat and infiltration,
they tend to be a bit more active that MI5. I supose MI5 could have replaced
the role of Special Branch but I still feel that the SAS would be reserved for
more tactical work.
Oh well there's my opinions. Lets here some feedback, in the meantime I'll
read some more of the book.
Phill Steele
-The Powerhouse
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Phillip Steele |
|
P.C.Steele@***.ac.uk |
