MGT Only: Shouldn't a working Title confer a bonus to SOC?

[Spinward Scout]

Your character goes through University and Graduates with Medic-3. That character can be called Doctor.

Shouldn't that Title give a bonus to their SOC? The Title itself holds some Renown. I mean, the character is given a higher level of respect.

Or would you just treat it as a Boon to SOC rolls, since there isn't a boost if someone doesn't know they have the Title.

The same with Ambassador, Special Agent, or Chief. It's a bit like bragging rights. And some of the highest ranks have a bonus to SOC. But I was surprised at some of the ones that don't.

On the other hand, shouldn't the opposite be done with the Scavenger? Or even Colonist?

 

[Rupert]

I assume that any such bonuses or penalty to SOC is reflected in the chargen tables. Colonists neither gain nor lose SOC, so it would appear that in the default setting it's not seen as a 'good' or a 'bad' career. That so few careers do suggest that the default society has little true mobility, and that what there is is largely via the Navy, becoming a celebrity, or a Scholar. Note that events and mishaps can cause some careers loss of SOC.

I would expect that when a character is interacting with others in a professional capacity, the respect due their profession would be important, with personal SOC only mattering if it was well out of line with that expected for the profession.

If this doesn't suit your vision of the game, add more bonuses to SOC to the chargen tables, or perhaps set minimums (like high-ranking navy officers have) for certain career/rank combinations. While you're at it, give colonists access to skill with guns without having to reach Rank 6.

 

[Spinward Scout]

Makes sense. Thanks!

 

[kilemall]

You could assume a move up to a minimum SOC upon achieving the title, like many college success rolls confer EDU 8 minimum.

 

[Condottiere]

If it's organic, it would reflect how much esteem society has for that title.

Or, profession.

As well as supply and scarcity.

If you have to import medical personnel, it might go either way.

 

[aramis]

To the titular question: Only in scope of career.

Titles from diplomas are not really all that strong a thing.

And can be confusing. I was a patient of an Advanced Nurse Practitioner, who was a DN degree holder, with board certification as a neurologist. She was addressed as Doctor by hospital and practice staff and by the MDs and DO's at the hospital where her practice was... As a physician by the state.

 

[Badenov]

So some careers, Army, Navy and Marines, have +Social on the mustering out table. The Navy has +Social on the Personal Development skill-up table. The Other career has a -Social on that table. The Navy also gives +1 Social on attaining Rank 5 and Rank 6 in LBB1, though this is omitted in LBB5, I am not sure why.

I imagine all societies attach prestige to various careers. But the human condition is different in different societies. In Western cultures, doctors are high Soc, sure, and anyone who can pay their way through Med school (or who is willing to sell their soul to the military for a few years) graduates with basically a new Soc score. In other societies, you can be the brightest and richest person ever, but if you're of the wrong class, you're forbidden from certain things and definitely can't get into medical school.

So, I would totally agree that a Medic-3-level doctor probably desereves being bumped up to Soc 8 or 9 if they were below that, as I am a member of Western society. Almost any 'professional' skill at 2 is probably worth at least Soc 7, (or wherever you put the middle of the middle class, for some of the variant Soc rolls people) because you can afford and are generally expected to maintain a decent lifestyle and not come to work unwashed and wearing rags. And not many CPAs live in trailers. So this is probably the ideal situation for a broad house rule, where anyone that spends the cash for a lifestyle associated with a Soc (and lives that lifestyle, not buying a house and sleeping in the gutter) gets that Soc.

MgT1 has a table (in the Equipment section of all places) detailing the cost per month for maintaining various Social levels. I think that the table could work both ways: spend the cash to maintain Soc, but if you spend the cash, you can get the Soc. The reason that might not work is if a society isn't mobile, or if you pick your nose in public, then wearing a $500 suit and a Rolex won't get you into certain places.

So, end conclusion is YMMV, and Soc probably needs to be addressed in everyone's Travelller Universe for what specifically works in their campaign. The last game I played in took place on a planet that suspiciously resembled Roanapur from Black Lagoon, and anyone throwing cash around and dressing like a traditional noble would last about two minutes. But bribes in the right places and paying off the Hotel Terra faction would help your situation tremendously.

 

[whulorigan]

I imagine all societies attach prestige to various careers. But the human condition is different in different societies. In Western cultures, doctors are high Soc, sure, and anyone who can pay their way through Med school (or who is willing to sell their soul to the military for a few years) graduates with basically a new Soc score. In other societies, you can be the brightest and richest person ever, but if you're of the wrong class, you're forbidden from certain things and definitely can't get into medical school.

So, I would totally agree that a Medic-3-level doctor probably deserves being bumped up to Soc 8 or 9 if they were below that, as I am a member of Western society.

In Ancient Rome, if you were wealthy enough, you could purchase a good Greek Physician in the Slave Market . . .

 

[Condottiere]

Student loans.

 

[TamsinP]

Charles Dance's character, Jonathan Clemens, in Alien3 was a doctor with a very low SOC (in the universe; among the prison population he'd have been higher than most of the others).

 

[Daidoji Dave]

Shouldn't that Title give a bonus to their SOC?

My way of making sense of Soc is to really lean into it. So mine isn't American style upper/middle/lower class, it's more an idealized British as seen by a non-Brit, with a dash of Dumarest series wealthy versus vagabonds. In this scheme, very often people somehow Know. Low or high Soc isn't just clothing and job, it isn't even just manners (though that's a start), it's bearing, language, instincts, what people vaguely recall about your name and your family/house's name - and if they haven't heard anything about your line that tells them something in its own right.

So in my game a 3 Soc doctor has the title, the skill, and the clinic, but he doesn't have a lineage, a House that nobles have heard of. He may still be treated with respect, but his roots are still apparent in language and bearing. And if it's your PC, if you don't want your roots showing in language and bearing, don't dump Soc.

A tangent: the richest person I ever met in real life always treated me with (apparent) great respect and interest. Which didn't translate into invitations to his house, but for the duration of our conversations he was either genuinely interested in what I had to say or supremely gifted at faking it. (Possibly this is the old, non-pejorative meaning of "condescension" rather than absolute friendliness, but either way it's an interesting thing I wouldn't have guessed.) Off a small sample size, I came to take open disdain or rudeness as a sign of "also ran" status - might be richer than me, but not the top of the ladder.

The relation to gaming is, when I think of low Soc I'm not arguing for higher Soc characters taking a dump on them all the time, or for patients disrespecting their doctors, just that it has implications for networking, parties, arranged marriages, whether they'll lend you a spaceship on a handshake...

Your character goes through University and Graduates with Medic-3.

Aycshully, he'd have Medic 2 [Some Other Skill] 1. Graduation increases your two skill picks by 1 each, but can't be stacked onto the same skill. But this does not invalidate your point.

The same with Ambassador, Special Agent, or Chief. ....
On the other hand, shouldn't the opposite be done with the Scavenger? Or even Colonist?

You certainly could, the book mostly doesn't.

I'm leery of stacking a lot of modifiers on that limited 2-12/15 range, but opinions on that vary.

I'll point out in passing that Scholars [including Physicians] have +1 Soc on their Personal Development tables, so there's some chance to raise it, just nothing to count on for a randomly rolled PC.

 

[Rupert]

As I said up-thread (as did others) an option is to have careers set a minimum SOC. Were I doing that, I'd follow TNE's lead and not set those very high. They would, after all, be defining the minimum SOC that someone working in that career be (barring bad rolls on the events tables for those careers where that can damage SOC). For example, even a Diplomat was only guaranteed SOC 5. Doctors (which in TNE are distinct from health-care specialist who do not have a medical doctorate) had SOC 7 as their floor (and no way of raising it).

As for making SOC matter, in TNE it was very important during chargen on worlds with high government numbers (often giving automatic commissions and promotions), and on low-government worlds often giving bonuses to those checks - only on worlds with middling government ratings did networking and nepotism not help you in 'government' type jobs.

If you have access to them, and the time, mining older editions for ideas and ways of doing things is worthwhile.

 

[Daidoji Dave]

If I were to increase the frequency of Soc adjustments, I might do something around rolls instead of automatic adjustments. Something like, roll above your current Soc on 2d6 to increase it, or to avoid a decrease. The idea being it gets harder to climb to the very top of the greased pole the higher you go, and harder to fall off the edge into untouchable status the lower you go. You could then start inserting tests at every career entry and certain promotion ranks without things getting too silly, and pushing everyone to the extremes of 1-2 or 12+ from different careers.

 

[Black Vulmea]

My way of making sense of Soc is to really lean into it. So mine isn't American style upper/middle/lower class, it's more an idealized British as seen by a non-Brit, with a dash of Dumarest series wealthy versus vagabonds. In this scheme, very often people somehow Know. Low or high Soc isn't just clothing and job, it isn't even just manners (though that's a start), it's bearing, language, instincts, what people vaguely recall about your name and your family/house's name - and if they haven't heard anything about your line that tells them something in its own right.

So in my game a 3 Soc doctor has the title, the skill, and the clinic, but he doesn't have a lineage, a House that nobles have heard of. He may still be treated with respect, but his roots are still apparent in language and bearing. (emphasis added - BV)

Yeah, pretty much this, especially the part bolded above: a doctor will be treated with the respect due their profession but that doesn't change their social standing in Imperial culture.

Something else, specific to Medical-3 (in CT terms): not everyone who uses the title "doctor" attended medical school, or university at all. A merchant can end up with Medical-3 without ever stepping inside a classroom as such, so clearly what is considered a "doctor" is something else, a demonstrated level of skill not dependent on how it was obtained. IMTU they're AP - associate physician - or PP - physician practitioner = rather than MD or PhD.

[Trigger warning: the next two paragraphs journey to "let me tell you about my character" territory]

In my solo campaign, the belters made friends with the Port Health officer at a neighboring starport; they carried a charter for him and developed a friendship with him on return trips to his port. I decided to add flesh to the bones and rolled up a complete npc: the character attended university and medical school, making him a proper MD, then joined the SPA - on the basis of his education, I allowed him to start commissioned and in the Administration department. He's coming up on the end of two terms as the adventurers meet him, and he's considering whether to continue with SPA or enter private practice.

The character, Dr. Kontos, is Soc 6; with that in mind, I decided as part of his backstory that he attended medical school on a grant which required eight years of public service after graduation; he's about to complete that and he's unsure of what to do next. If he stays in SPA another four years, he could attempt to find a position in the Ministries of Commerce or Colonization, which would very likely raise his actual Social Standing if he's successful; if not, he can be a private physician on a planet full of retirees - Valisa's main industries are tourism and retirement communities, serving "the newly wed and the nearly dead" - which can be lucrative but not likely to advance him socially.

A tangent: the richest person I ever met in real life always treated me with (apparent) great respect and interest. Which didn't translate into invitations to his house, but for the duration of our conversations he was either genuinely interested in what I had to say or supremely gifted at faking it.

An expression of noblesse oblige. To be respected is to show respect.

 

[kilemall]

A doctor title in our culture has something like Medical-3 and EDU A. So maybe that gets the SOC minimum, others don’t being more self taught/experienced and skill validated through results and testing.

I would think that would be multiples of pay over the starship medic, who is more a paramedic or nurse practitioner. Surgeons with EDU A even more so.

Most medical rolls would then use EDU as the attribute base indicating training, but be limited by standard practice and the known- INT would govern the unknown/new disease and especially new colony world problems.

 

[Badenov]

Speaking of high EDU for doctors, I just noticed this from LBB1:



This is from the table in LBB1. It looks like only Scouts, Merchants, and anyone with Edu 8+ even had the option to get any Medical. I think that's way too deliberate to be a coincidence, so maybe high EDU for doctors was a plan?

It's a bit more mixed up in HG, but broadly, Medical School (which is pretty hard to get into), advancing in the Medical Branch (which has minimum requirements depending on a few things for non-Med school graduates), and Petty Officer Service Skills can all get you the medical skill. There's a couple gotchas, like the Imperial Navy doesn't allow people into the Medical Branch unless they're Int 10+ and EDU 9+ or Social 9+ and want it. But Planetary and Subsector Navies, it only requires Int 10+ or Edu 9+. And Med School is super hard to get into, requiring Honors graduation from college or the Academy, which are hard rolls, to even make the attempt, and then a pretty hard roll to get accepted. That really sounds like the deck is stacked against people wanting to be doctors, and there might not be as many doctors as people would like, creating a need for the self taught/untrained Merchants and Scouts that have figured out how to at least put on a band aid.

 

[whulorigan]

Yeah, pretty much this, especially the part bolded above: a doctor will be treated with the respect due their profession but that doesn't change their social standing in Imperial culture.

Something else, specific to Medical-3 (in CT terms): not everyone who uses the title "doctor" attended medical school, or university at all. A merchant can end up with Medical-3 without ever stepping inside a classroom as such, so clearly what is considered a "doctor" is something else, a demonstrated level of skill not dependent on how it was obtained. IMTU they're AP - associate physician - or PP - physician practitioner = rather than MD or PhD.

Perhaps it is as simple as allowing the Medical skill-level and/or the MgT EDU Stat-Bonus DM to add to the effective Soc-level in certain situations or environments (or perhaps the lower of the two when compared).

 

[Rupert]

It's a bit more mixed up in HG, but broadly, Medical School (which is pretty hard to get into), advancing in the Medical Branch (which has minimum requirements depending on a few things for non-Med school graduates), and Petty Officer Service Skills can all get you the medical skill. There's a couple gotchas, like the Imperial Navy doesn't allow people into the Medical Branch unless they're Int 10+ and EDU 9+ or Social 9+ and want it. But Planetary and Subsector Navies, it only requires Int 10+ or Edu 9+. And Med School is super hard to get into, requiring Honors graduation from college or the Academy, which are hard rolls, to even make the attempt, and then a pretty hard roll to get accepted. That really sounds like the deck is stacked against people wanting to be doctors, and there might not be as many doctors as people would like, creating a need for the self taught/untrained Merchants and Scouts that have figured out how to at least put on a band aid.

Given it's 'advanced education' in all cases, just that two careers allow that without Edu 8+, I don't think they're self-taught. They might not have gone to medical school, and might've done most of the training using learning courses during jump, but I expect that they've done some kind of finishing course and taken exams and are (unless the player and referee decide otherwise) are certified. For an actual doctor or surgeon level of skill I think they really have to have done some formal training, even if it's not at what we'd consider a 'proper' university or teaching hospital. Again, unless player and ref decide otherwise (mad scientist, here we come).

Interestingly, if we look at the 'Doctor' career in CT's Citizens of the Imperium (Supp. 4), there's no advantage to enlistment, etc. from Edu. Int gets you enlistment and survival bonuses, and Dex gets you a big enlistment bonus at Dex 9+ (so not just good enough to be a surgeon, but enough to be a notably dexterous surgeon). Doctors gets Merical-1 upon enlistment. Past that they've a 2-in-6 chance per roll on the service skills and both education tables, and can get +1 Soc on the personal development table. The better education table gives them chances of +1 Int or +1 Edu rather than repair skills, while the service skills table might get them +1 Dex (or skill with a melee weapon - it's clearly the 'street doc/'chop shop surgeon' table).

Given doctors have no commissions or promotions, and do not get extra skill rolls past term 1, most full doctors will not be particularly young (average of five terms to get Medical-3). However, COTI pre-dates the '81 version of the LBB, so I'd allow them (and the other no-position careers in COTI) two points per term, like Scouts got, making the average number of terms to qualify 'only' three.

For what it's worth, in MT the Advanced Education tables, due to some of the cascade skills having Medical in them, has a higher chance of getting Medical, and doctors average only needing two terms to qualify.

In both editions Doctor is one of the wealthier careers.

Looking at TNE, interestingly it's possible to make a doctor who is only marginally competent at medicine (though you have to actively work at it, by making really dumb choices about skills), and a character can enter the medical career with no prior experience or qualifications, and have only Medical 2, and as it's a cascade skill put those points into two specialties (of three) and thus be very barely qualified (normally you'd put them both into one specialty and thus have two levels in that and one effective level in both the other two). So you can have single-term med-techs that shouldn't be allowed near a bottle of asprin, and three-term full doctors (with undergrad and medical degrees, plus a completed internship) that are marginally competent to prescribe that asprin. OTOH, most full doctors will have skill-10 in their specialty, which even with TNE's inflated skill levels is really rather good. Full doctors get double normal money per term, though as they have to have spent two terms in non-paying education 'careers', they only come out ahead after three terms as a doctor (so 5+ terms all up). Young doctors are poor, old ones are rich (amusingly, old lawyers are probably even richer).

 

[Condottiere]

Though, there probably is a minimum age to get a license to practice medicine.

 

[Badenov]

Given it's 'advanced education' in all cases, just that two careers allow that without Edu 8+, I don't think they're self-taught. They might not have gone to medical school, and might've done most of the training using learning courses during jump, but I expect that they've done some kind of finishing course and taken exams and are (unless the player and referee decide otherwise) are certified. For an actual doctor or surgeon level of skill I think they really have to have done some formal training, even if it's not at what we'd consider a 'proper' university or teaching hospital. Again, unless player and ref decide otherwise (mad scientist, here we come).

Totally agree that Scouts and Merchants can both pursue self-directed training while in Jump, where the other services probably have official duties that keep them busy. Either might get a tour, or part of a tour, at a hospital or clinic run by some corp or the scout service, for OJT also.

Interestingly, if we look at the 'Doctor' career in CT's Citizens of the Imperium (Supp. 4), there's no advantage to enlistment, etc. from Edu. Int gets you enlistment and survival bonuses, and Dex gets you a big enlistment bonus at Dex 9+ (so not just good enough to be a surgeon, but enough to be a notably dexterous surgeon). Doctors gets Merical-1 upon enlistment. Past that they've a 2-in-6 chance per roll on the service skills and both education tables, and can get +1 Soc on the personal development table. The better education table gives them chances of +1 Int or +1 Edu rather than repair skills, while the service skills table might get them +1 Dex (or skill with a melee weapon - it's clearly the 'street doc/'chop shop surgeon' table).

Given doctors have no commissions or promotions, and do not get extra skill rolls past term 1, most full doctors will not be particularly young (average of five terms to get Medical-3). However, COTI pre-dates the '81 version of the LBB, so I'd allow them (and the other no-position careers in COTI) two points per term, like Scouts got, making the average number of terms to qualify 'only' three.

For what it's worth, in MT the Advanced Education tables, due to some of the cascade skills having Medical in them, has a higher chance of getting Medical, and doctors average only needing two terms to qualify.

In both editions Doctor is one of the wealthier careers.

Makes sense, given their rarity, and the wealth heaped on the good ones.

Looking at TNE, interestingly it's possible to make a doctor who is only marginally competent at medicine (though you have to actively work at it, by making really dumb choices about skills), and a character can enter the medical career with no prior experience or qualifications, and have only Medical 2, and as it's a cascade skill put those points into two specialties (of three) and thus be very barely qualified (normally you'd put them both into one specialty and thus have two levels in that and one effective level in both the other two). So you can have single-term med-techs that shouldn't be allowed near a bottle of asprin, and three-term full doctors (with undergrad and medical degrees, plus a completed internship) that are marginally competent to prescribe that asprin. OTOH, most full doctors will have skill-10 in their specialty, which even with TNE's inflated skill levels is really rather good. Full doctors get double normal money per term, though as they have to have spent two terms in non-paying education 'careers', they only come out ahead after three terms as a doctor (so 5+ terms all up). Young doctors are poor, old ones are rich (amusingly, old lawyers are probably even richer).

So, I think the generally accepted thing in the thread is that you need Medical 3 to be a fully qualified and titled MD. Medical 2 would rate as something like an Independent Duty Corpsman (in the RL US Navy), some advanced sort of Nurse, or a physician Resident or Intern (in the words of Weird Al, "I still make a mistake or two..."). No idea about skill or cash levels in TNE. Amusingly, you only need Medical 1 to qualify as a Medic aboard most ships per LBB2, though your pay is among the lowest in the crew, between a Gunner and a Steward.