Lit The Essential Atlas and Galactic Cartography: Official Discussion

I thought Teth was between Hutt Space and Centrality...I was a bit surprised by its location. I thought it was a major OR world in the Empire, but the nearby worlds of Aduba, Dubrava, and Barab are all relatively minor and remote. ?

Is there a relationship between the The Ark of Baron Auletphant
And the Starhunter menagerie arks from Droids cartoons, which Dan referenced in his Castaways of Endor article?

Is Little Kessel the Kessel from the 2nd Kessel Run story with a thriving environment

About the sectors shared by Remnant and NR, does this reflect AFTER the Pellaeon-Gavrisom territory?which, if I recall, included a section that worlds in both governments could switch allegiance at that time if they wanted?

You know oddly enough Jason and Dan made up Carrion Sector.
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Carrion_sector
The capital planet should have been Vulturre Prime

Did the ?World?, homeworld of the ?People?, ie the tripods Luke found on the Eye of Palpatine, make it into the book? It was in the Outer Rim somewhere between Pzob and Belsavis

Ok who exactly was the Imperial top honcho Rogriss answered to during Hunt for Zsinj? Was it Thrawn? And did Rogriss know it was Thrawn? The New Republic was in the dark Thrawn was in charge for a while, so for that big a secret to be kept I always figured not all Imps themselves knew Thrawn was in charge, at least not the rank & file (which, admittedly, Rogriss is not). Was there a puppet government head with Thrawn behind the scenes?

 

I am loving the Atlas so far! I've just skimmed through and read parts of it so far, plan to get to it better tomorrow, since I also finished reading ABYSS today.

But one thing, in the Epilogue, it says the GA was permitted to remain in existence, and Darth Krayt usurped the throne in 137ABY.

I think it was saying that the Imperials let the GA government and bureaucracy be absorbed into the Empire instead of disbanding it all, which I get, but I thought Krayt usurped the throne in 130ABY? Or are my dates confused, I can get it all muddled together sometime, and I'm thinking of something else?

 

Teth in the Han Solo trilogy was established as a sector capital in the Outer Rim, near Hutt Space and the Corporate Sector, and its Moff was given authority over Hutt Space - that was pretty much it.

The NEC implies that Thrawn didn't return until after the campaign for Zsinj's territory was over, and then operated covertly out of the NR's eye (as seen in TG) for 6 months prior to 3T.

 

for some reason I was under the impression the Moff at Teth ruled the whole Outer Rim and was a predecessor of Tarkin...not sure why I thought that

I also recall reading somewhere Teth was bw Hutt Space and Tion/Centrality

 

As pointed out - yeah, the book is in error on when Krayt usurped.

The Sith Imperial War started 127 ABY, finished in 130 ABY, and Krayt took control immediately after. (remember, Cade was in his early teens when the temple was attacked).

137 is when the story picks up again.

 

found nothing about them yet, just that they exist... but to what extent or a retcon for the old travel times and new often different usage in EU and movies is not yet there.

well... we can still hope.

 

How much larger is the Remnant after the Vong Invasion? I mean to get the Atlas, but am still not able to get to a bookstore yet.

Incidentally, the only thing annoying me at the moment is the spears and such present in pre Ruusan battles.

 

Just think about all the running about with swords you do in the KOTOR games.

 

I thought it was funny that Kamino doesn't appear on the main galaxy map! (It's lised in the index as being in S-15, and I know that's right because there's the Rishi Maze.)

"If it does not exist in our records, then it does not exist!"

[image=http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/starwars/images/5/54/Aotc_461.jpg]

 

I really love just how alive and full this makes the galaxy feel. All those little touches, like what the various regions think of each other, just adds so much to create a living, breathing galaxy. It reminds me a lot of WEG in that respect, which is a really good thing. And it's unfortunate that that isn't more common; the NJO did a pretty good job of capturing that there was a bigger world behind the actions of the heroes, but for something like LOTF, the rest of the galaxy might as well be an inanimate stage prop.

I gotta give big kudos for the Hutt Space section. Hutts as a group are a topic a lot of authors seem to have trouble with; descriptions tend to veer into a contest of how many unpleasant adjectives can be piled into one paragraph. It's rare to get something that captures the whole Hutt character, faults and strengths alike, well and fairly?Luceno in the NJO is one who really got it?but this was a great portrayal of them.

 

Galactic infrastructure has completely collapsed, causing massive shortages of Tibanna gas.

At that point they're just conscripting random masses of people and not even bothering to issue them any weapons.

Or the Gammorean Guards with cleavers (sorry WEG, they don't look like vibro-weapons).

 

Comparing the galactic map from the end of the Vong (where it's this tiny shrivel in the outer rim) to the galactic map for the New Galactic Civil War (where it reaches much farther south and east, all the way to Bilbringi in the Expansion Region because of their agreement with Caedus) it seems to be 4 or 5 times the size. It grows from being a small fraction compared to Hutt Space, into being a little larger than Hutt Space, for comparison.

 

Finally got this yesterday afternoon and I havnt been able to put it down. Wow...just wow. Im glad you dug up the Herglics and gave them a place in the spotlight. The opera was HILARIOUS! I havnt even started Abyss yet because Ive been trying (and failing) to absorb all of the the information in this book. I declare this a WIN. Utter WIN.

 

Loving the Atlas so far, very detailed and a lot to take in. My only real nitpick so far is that they didn't put Kamino on the galaxy map. It's only removed in the Jedi Archives, if you are going to give a grid location for it then just go ahead and include it in the actual maps in the Atlas. Would have been much better if they did that instead of mimicking the Jedi Archives and not putting it on the map.

 

Answers to a couple of your questions, Distinguished Senator....

1) The way we worked out the arrangement between Baxel sector and Hutt Space demanded that Teth be bordering Hutt Space -- and the CW movie strongly suggests Teth is relatively close to both it and Tatooine. As for it's being a major OR world, it can't be TOO important as it's in Wild Space during the CW and seems fairly uninhabited. The Empire does pour credits into it, so it becomes a more important place by the time we see it in the Han Solo books. (I suppose we could have come up with a Teth Minor.)

2) Yes. A bit of a "Hoth Stuff" style retcon, perhaps, but I thought it worked OK.

3) No -- as with a lot of these things, placing it would have demanded a name and a fairly lengthy explanation linking that name to it, about a part of history we didn't particularly chronicle. There are a handful of worlds placed without explanation, which we'll detail in the Atlas endnotes, but in general we tried not to do that to avoid frustrating folks.

A public thank you, BTW, to the good Senator for digging up so many obscure star systems and adjectives that could be worlds as the Atlas took shape. That was invaluable help, and it's much appreciated.

 

Since I won't be receiving my book for a while, and my previous questions seem to have been lost, can anyone who has it answer:

1) Anything on the Alderaan Ascendancy Contention?
2) What is there on Kuati history and politics?

 

Just in case anyone is interested, I skimmed through the index to see if any worlds stood out. Don't know why I did it, but it was fun.

The Nagi and the Tof homeworlds are officially listed "extragalactic" and N/A on the map.


Worlds in the Unknown Regions, which I got from the index, are:

Viis
Valtaullu Rift
UR41-284
Tiil
Shikitari
Rhand and the Perann Nebula
Morcanth
Lao-Mon
Kro Var
Krin Koda
Gunninga Gap

And Kamino is off the charts.

But it seems like everything else is mapped, or at least given a location from the index.

 

Hmm, Jason, Dan?

Why does the part about Solos journies mention two different origins of him? (1 as orphan aka Crispin books, and the other as raised by Wookiees during the Clone Wars) As far as I know, the last version invented by GL was discarded before ROTS release and never used officially. So, why include it? I like it even if it does contradict the other fleshed out tale we have (I could even retcon one to follow the other somehow), but.. IS THIS A THE CLONE WARS SERIES SPOILER? Will we see young Boba, young Han and Kashyyyk in early Clone Wars?

Also: Your Clone Wars section is great taking into account old and new CW stuff, though I wonder if that will not change. So why/how did you decide to use that text and get it okayed through? It seems most sources like Jabiim stay at their original timeline placements despite TCW series having messed with the timeline. But the TCW novel by Traviss mentioned Jabiim as already having taken place before the series, in the weeks Wild Space mentioned had passed since AOTC.

^^

 

I haven't had time to actually read the text, but the maps are just so damn pretty.

 

The Han stuff just seemed like a fun thing to do -- there was no intent to override anything, and it's not a spoiler or hint. (Or if it is, it's a coincidence.) Plus I thought Saberhing and Coonee were cool, and wanted a way to get them onto the map. (That may turn out to have been a bad idea -- Lucas tends to come back to old names eventually. Witness the case of Mace Windu the Squib.)

We had to address the Clone Wars despite the timeline complications, so we wound up taking a somewhat thematic approach to that chapter, and it went back and forth with LFL a few times. It's far from the most elegant part of the book, but given the uncertainties we had to work around, I hope we get a mulligan there.

 

Hey Bill, my answer over at NJOE probably addressed this, but for posterity's sake: We left Kamino off the main galaxy map because it's not in the main galaxy -- it's in the Rishi Maze, which is a satellite galaxy. The jumping-off point for it is on there, though, and as you note we listed it in the appendix.

Hope that addresses your nitpick; glad you're liking the rest so far!

 

I liked it
Though I could take your Clone Wars section and say... that as per TCW novel there was a battle of Jabiim in the weeks after Geonosis and another one later in the war. Good opportunities. The way you worded it with mostly dropping planet names and giving it a rough order is actually good for retcons in the future. Lets wait and see

ps: I also liked how you grouped the Clone Wars battles by type of weapon used (virus attempts, superweapon stuff, etc.) that way it looks more cohesive and as if all these attempts were connected no matter when they took place.

 

As for Little Kessel, the whole situation requiring this retcon (as with most such situations) is sad, and I find this retcon far superior to previous fanon attempts (including my own) of making both environments fit on the same planet! There was just too much canon going against THAT for it to work. And on Earth there are many locations with the same or similar names very near each other for various reasons, such as names describing geographical features (all the Bath's), famous namesakes (the multiple Antiochia's, Seleucia's, and Alexandria's) or religious significance (the multiple Kadesh's--Kadesh meaning "holy city"), not to mention all the colonies that are named after their mother cities. So I found it very believable. If only we could republish the comic in question and insert "Little" in there!

hmmm...ok not to put too much on your plate but if you ever want to do a little online addition to this a way to include the home"World" of the tripod "People" might be to make a little map of the route taken by the Eye of Palpatine from Pzob to Belsavis...which IIRC also includes Bradden, Tattooine, and Alzoc III, though not necessarily in that order.

another thought: as new works came out perhaps you could run preliminary coordinates by leland and publish them on yall's blogs with the full understanding they are not really Canon per se and subject to change as later canon works dictate????

 

Jason, you are a Fleet Junkie, from our astrocartography branch.

You guys did a real outstanding job on the Calamari Space. For starters, I like how key Rebel safeworlds like Sanctuary and New Alderaan are either in Calamari Space or on the border. Given that Mon Calamari was literally the only world in the Rebellion that qualified as a fortress world, it makes sense that the Rebellion would keep their safe worlds close to one of their centers of power.

IIRC, Mon Calamari is the only Rebel world I can think of that had a permanent detachment of the Alliance Fleet, per the old RASB from West End Games. This also ties in well with the offensive launched from Mon Cal in 4-5 ABY. Your idea of the Mon Cal offensive being a mix of actual NR and local Mon Cal defense forces works quite well.

BTW- I noticed you also placed Dornea near Mon Calamari Space. Was this intentional? I ask because I wonder if you and Dan placed it near the Mon Calamari to also help explain how Dornea's 80 ship navy held off the Empire during the Galactic Civil War.

--Adm. Nick

 

Thanks for the response, but this does have me thinking about something. This isn't directed at you guys, but if it is in another galaxy and that means it doesn't show up on the galaxy map, then the entire "Oooh, it's been removed from the Jedi archives galaxy map" idea from AOTC feels like a lot of bunk. That pretty clearly came across like a map of the SW galaxy proper, and I guess I'm having a hard time reconciling it being in a different galaxy with it being looked for in regular galaxy maps in AOTC.