How long and what is the source of Magistry's Bioscience?

[Colt Ward]

How long has the Magistry of Canopus been one of the preeminent Bioscience factions in BT?

What was the source of their boost to being one of the top Bioscience factions?

Was the latest Shrapnel story a rif on the MoC having a corp of Mentats/Maesters/savants for just that discipline?

[Mendrugo]

Canopian medical excellence dates from the 2600s.

"[Carla Centrella's] accomplishments were many, including the establishment of an insurance and health-care program that gave the Canopians a leadership position in the medical field that they have never relinquished."  (Periphery, p. 49)

There's an apocryphal BattleCorps story called "Darkness" (written by Randall Bills) that suggests their acquisition of hyper-advanced medical science (especially in the field of cybernetics) was accelerated by data provided by mysterious, extremely paranoid outsiders who traded it to the Ebon Magistrate for reports on events in the Inner Sphere.  The transaction was concluded with a statement of "Well Bargained."  Depending on how you read it, the implication is that the Minnesota Tribe might be the source for such bioscience tech, but the Magistracy was already well ahead of even Inner Sphere medical tech from the 2600s onward on its own, without needing mysterious data cubes from "beyond the Periphery."

[AlphaMirage]

I've always rationalized it as the Magistracy didn't suffer as badly from the Reunification War so they didn't lose as much Star League tech as the Taurians or Outworlds did during that time or have the same disastrous time as the Great Houses. Additionally they were always a fairly tourist-friendly location so they had some wealth that could be invested into making it medical tourism destination. My own head canon has the MoC as some combination of Cuba and Brazil both of which possess these attributes.

There is also the mandatory government service that every magistracy citizen is required to engage in. Most of the men serve in the military for a time while others have the option for educational or humanitarian Peace Corps style tours. This can also be used to bring in much needed outside revenue to augment their roving Pleasure Circuses and improve the tiny nation's standing in the eyes of the Inner Sphere.

The Magistracy of Canopus was also the only periphery nation to send a contingent as part of BULLDOG and SERPENT and I could see their people looting Huntress and gathering as much medical equipment and personnel as they could get away with including leaving their combat gear behind for the SLDF. In my AU at least and possibly in canon this resulted in medical research that partially enabled the Ebon Magistrate to be on part with the Manei Domini, which when the Magistracy combined into the Trinity Alliance supercharged that industry.

I haven't read the latest Shrapnel yet but I definitely want to look that up although I did do a similar thing in my fiction with Curatis who was IMO a MIM agent.

[tassa_kay]

The Magistracy and the Star League also did a LOT of clandestine genetic stuff in the Canopian Ruins region, with the world of Frobisher being just one concrete example of it and certainly the biggest: it's noted that they turned Frobisher's planetary ocean into the most extensive laboratory ever devised for manipulation of the human genome. When the Star League fell, so did their funding, and a lot of the scientists ended up finding employment in the Magistracy's advanced medical field. It's also noted that the Canopians continued to exploit the remnants of these projects throughout the Succession Wars and the Jihad.

[Frabby]

Fan theory: They found something on Tibolt (see section on "Notes and fan speculation") in ca. 3025.

[Mendrugo]

Fan theory: They found something on Tibolt (see section on "Notes and fan speculation") in ca. 3025.

A Guide to Covert Ops pp. 88-89 says Magestrix Kyalla first alluded to extremely resource-rich worlds located "beyond explored space" during her secret meetings with the Anduriens in the 3020s.  The Periphery sourcebook (p. 92) says those meetings started in 3017.  So whatever they found probably predated 3025.

[Maelwys]

We don't really know how or if there was anything particularly odd about it. Its entirely possible that the Magistracy managed to lead the way in medicine. and then scrimped and saved and struggled to keep the lead during the Succession Wars, while others spent their resources on other things.

[Metallgewitter]

I've always rationalized it as the Magistracy didn't suffer as badly from the Reunification War so they didn't lose as much Star League tech as the Taurians or Outworlds did during that time or have the same disastrous time as the Great Houses. Additionally they were always a fairly tourist-friendly location so they had some wealth that could be invested into making it medical tourism destination. My own head canon has the MoC as some combination of Cuba and Brazil both of which possess these attributes.

There is also the mandatory government service that every magistracy citizen is required to engage in. Most of the men serve in the military for a time while others have the option for educational or humanitarian Peace Corps style tours. This can also be used to bring in much needed outside revenue to augment their roving Pleasure Circuses and improve the tiny nation's standing in the eyes of the Inner Sphere.

The Magistracy of Canopus was also the only periphery nation to send a contingent as part of BULLDOG and SERPENT and I could see their people looting Huntress and gathering as much medical equipment and personnel as they could get away with including leaving their combat gear behind for the SLDF. In my AU at least and possibly in canon this resulted in medical research that partially enabled the Ebon Magistrate to be on part with the Manei Domini, which when the Magistracy combined into the Trinity Alliance supercharged that industry.

I haven't read the latest Shrapnel yet but I definitely want to look that up although I did do a similar thing in my fiction with Curatis who was IMO a MIM agent.

The Maigistracy didn't suffer that much because unlike the other fronts the Marik led SLDf forces fought according to the rules of the Ares convention (most of the time) Though I think that the Magistracy led the groundwork during their foundings. When one of your main income streams is prostitution you better make sure the workers in said industry are well taken care of. And there is also the "do as you will" culture of the Magistracy in general. The SLDF handbook noted that one division which was stationed in the Magistracy got so lax that several troopers had animal ear implants (cat boy/girl soldiers). And this implies (to me) that the Magistracy had these tech for a while. Also don't they also had the stasis tubes? That tech which is basically non existent in the IS was very much home in the Magistracy. Though imho the most advanced medical tech is found in the Belt (if we take the immortal poeple serious)

[jimdigris]

I think that two things are at work here:
1. Operation Holy Shroud didn't consider Canopian medical tech to be worth destroying when there was so much military tech left to exterminate.
2.  In a culture like the Magistracy, being able to have a cure for most if not all STDs is critical.  One thing led to another...

[Maelwys]

The Maigistracy didn't suffer that much because unlike the other fronts the Marik led SLDf forces fought according to the rules of the Ares convention (most of the time) Though I think that the Magistracy led the groundwork during their foundings. When one of your main income streams is prostitution you better make sure the workers in said industry are well taken care of. And there is also the "do as you will" culture of the Magistracy in general. The SLDF handbook noted that one division which was stationed in the Magistracy got so lax that several troopers had animal ear implants (cat boy/girl soldiers). And this implies (to me) that the Magistracy had these tech for a while. Also don't they also had the stasis tubes? That tech which is basically non existent in the IS was very much home in the Magistracy. Though imho the most advanced medical tech is found in the Belt (if we take the immortal poeple serious)

Oh yeah, they've had the tech for a while, its just that they managed to keep a hold of it for quite a while.

And Stasis tubes are bizarre to me. Sure, the Magistracy seems to be capable of maintaining them, but they first show up in the Handbook IIRC..everyone else gets a faction specific kind of cool weapon or armor or RPG gear..and the Magistracy gets a Stasis tube that will leave you with brain damage. And then we never really see the Magistracy do anything with it. I sometimes wonder if its more of a case of "This is mentioned in MWDA, we need it to appear somewhere."

[glitterboy2098]

A Guide to Covert Ops pp. 88-89 says Magestrix Kyalla first alluded to extremely resource-rich worlds located "beyond explored space" during her secret meetings with the Anduriens in the 3020s.  The Periphery sourcebook (p. 92) says those meetings started in 3017.  So whatever they found probably predated 3025.

which is why the magistracy is often used in Wolverine/Minnesota tribe related fanfic . :)

[Daryk]

*snip*
Though imho the most advanced medical tech is found in the Belt (if we take the immortal people serious)

With the Frobisher team in the Magistracy, I'd say the Canopians are on par with the Belters.