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Any Interest in a Traveller Open Simulator 3D Universe?

N

Nick Lassard

SOC-7
Open Sim is nearly the same as Second Life. It does not run on Linden Labs servers and is therefore much more affordable.

I am curious as to whether there might be interest from the community in building a few slivers of the Marches or Imperial Space (worlds) in the Open Simulator environment.

I have unique access to a grid that is free to build on. Once at an initial operating capability the series of builds would be moved to an operating grid, where the financing would be needed.

Just looking for interest.

Nick
 
(Repost from TAS News Feed)

I already chatted with Marc about this a year or more ago. I would do it again.

Everything would be done with his permission, in fact FOR HIM. It's not for my profit. Traveller without Marc intimately involved has no interest for me. If we did make money it would be funnelled back into the project in order to grow.

That being said, space and star travel are possible in SL/OS. (Note that OS is NOT SL....it just seems like it.)

Note, if you have access to SL there is a nice sim by a friend I worked with before called Kalist VI. It is an Imperial Star Destroyer. Built at 1:1 scale...on a homestead. If anyone understands those limits then you'll be blown away by what she did.

This can be done and given effort will approach the quality of MMORPGs.

The best thing about this is that the Traveller community is now comprised of people who want to build, be it spreadsheets, equipment, etc. These people who are here have RW talents. Given a seed, we could see Traveller gain a
3-D VR foothold as an initial operating capability. With that as proof of concept, if it gets big enough, mabye someone else will pick it up to bootstrap it into a better engine.

However, in terms of user-created content there is NO better system than Open Simulator.

I'm looking to see how much interest there is. Before I jump into this, I want to make sure its wanted.


Nick July 3rd, 2012, 05:43 PM
 
So this would be ... a player-made World-of-Warcraft/DnD-Online kind of thing? Supports actual gaming? Or just a place to build graphics and socialize? 'Cause, with all due respect, I'm not really interested in just making pretties.
 
There are combat systems in Open Sim.

This would not be a small undertaking. It's building a 3D world from basically scratch. I am quited good at doing this but such an undertaking is nothing less than monumental.

It would not be just me doing it. IF people want it, I'll build. If its not wanted I won't waste my time. This means commitment from others by the dozens...

But a full Traveller 3D universe can be done. One brick at at time.
 
Google "Open Sim Romenna" if you want to see what I've done.

Second Life is a good place to start also, the best of which is a 1:1 scale Star Destroyer done by an acquaintance of mine.

(Reference "Kalist VI" in SL.)

If you've been to SL and are appalled...you have good taste. 99% is utter rubbish. It is, however, capable of greatness.
 
Nick Lassard said:
There are combat systems in Open Sim.

This would not be a small undertaking. It's building a 3D world from basically scratch. I am quited good at doing this but such an undertaking is nothing less than monumental.

It would not be just me doing it. IF people want it, I'll build. If its not wanted I won't waste my time. This means commitment from others by the dozens...

But a full Traveller 3D universe can be done. One brick at at time.
Click to expand...

I'm OK at building 3d graphics using Modo. I'm not that fast, but I'd be willing to work on this.

Is the code for OS available so that I could create my own server? I'd want to learn about the system if I could.
 
If y'all will forgive me I'm not just going to rush into this. I'm going to wait until there is a 'critical mass' of interested parties before lifting a finger. I've built a lot of things and most have remained unused.

Building anything in Open Simulator is a major effort. It gets easier with others building.

For those of you unfamiliar with Open Simulator, for all practical purposes it is identical to Second Life. Graphics are pretty good, perhaps the best for avatars in customizibility. The key to OS/SL is that it doesn't require a 3D graphics program. It IS the 3D graphics program...you build everything as your avatar in the world. The first step to building is to create an avatar.

This is a bootstrap project. The more people the better it will be, but if there are only a handful interested I'm not going to waste my time.

As I noted before, there is a great Imperial Star Destroyer in Second Life, Region "Kalist VI". It is an example of what we could do with the tech here now.
 
Oh, as a note...

There is no need to stand up a server. We'd be building in PM Grid where Romenna currently stands.


Right now I'm just waiting on the gearheads to say they want this.


Nick
 
Nick Lassard said:
Tabled due to lack of interest
Click to expand...

You're tabling this after what, a week?

You're also trying to do something that has *never* been done. The boring civilian side of Traveller is mostly an unknown. There have been several articles in the fanzine's about this, but not much in the way of canon sources.

You're trying to build a world, or rather a script to build a world, which means that somebody has to understand a great deal about worlds which have mainly been described by a UWP or a few paragraphs of text.

Even one world would be an extremely difficult thing to build. I can barely imagine building one entire system by hand.

This will almost certainly have to be built by tools which will take some sort of description and then use parts to build *most* of a system. And these tools will have to be generic enough to build other systems also.

I'm willing to help. But I don't think that I'll ever get it done by myself, but some things are worth trying.

Anybody else want to help?
 
Only to have mentioned it: there already was an attempt in bringing Traveller RP to Second Life, I briefly was part of a small group that had regular RolePlaying events about once every week. There was a landing field, a scripted starship with 'working' controls which enabled thruster use, sensors, converters and turrets as well as the usual social area for the crew. The RolePlaying was a mix of social components and included meeting with patrons, talking to fellow crewmembers, encountering other NPCs played by the GM using different avatars and a floating text description if neccessary - and combat using Second Life scripts that used a hit point system based on Your characters attributes and the weapons You were using. So yes, there is a lot of possibility there, be it in Open World or in Second Life. All it takes is a dedicated group of people who try to make it work and keep it running. That it is possible is being shown by other groups in Second Life (f. e.) where there are at least two large Star Trek communities still going strong with regular events - and a Star Wars Roleplaying group does exist as well as one dedicated to the Avatar movies.

Old Traveller in SL thread here in the forum:
http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showthread.php?t=1215 - regrettably the links in the thread seem dead now.

(Star Trek in SL) Galaxy Fleet Command group homepage: http://galaxyfleetcommand.com/blog/category/activities/
One brief RP teaser from that group: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6sJ4R1JVEI

(Star Wars in SL) SWRP Galactic News with pictures from Second Life RP events: http://galacticnewssl.wordpress.com/
 
I can help out with this, if it moves in that direction. No idea on how much time I can spare.

Sounds like it could be fun developing it
 
Getting started

Assuming this is the correct thread....

An open source project is like any other project.

First, need to gather requirements, what is the near term end goal.
 
Since the OP was ready to give up after a week in which he received somewhat equivocal support, I am not exactly sanguine about the project's prospects.

If you want my opinion, coming up with a much smaller "proof-of-concept" may be a better way to rally enthusiasm. A Beowulf free trader with crew or something. Just a thought.
 
requirements

Yep. A POC is a great course as a first objective.

- a ship, characters, ability to operate some basic functions....
 
Folks, tabling this is more of a measure of seeing 2000 people jump on the bandwagon for T5 ... of which I was happily one, then see perhaps 5 show interest in bringing Trav to a new dimension (literally). I was expecting folks to jump at this. The resources alone to put this online require at a minimum hundreds of dollars per month, potentially much more.

Kind of depressing.

That being said, I'm not an amateur at SL or OS. I built Romenna, an expansive Tolkien themed sim in SL then rebuilt bigger and better in OS. I know exactly what it takes to build, particularly the time requirement. I also know that beyond the 'structure' of the sim(s) it will take more than one person, perhaps many to bring something worthwhile to life. Eventually we'll need ship builders, clothing designers, systems designers and community admins. I'm not interested in organizing the community because I want to spend my time building the world.

If you want to see what I mean Google "Romenna Open Sim". If that intrigues you, get an account on OS and Hypergrid there for a look.

As far as SF, a good example of what can be done starship-wise is the Imperial Star Destroyer at Kalist VI in SL. It is the best I've seen in scale, and pretty good in the interior although I think the woman that made it ran short on prims. It simply takes time (and prims.)

Perhaps I was too hasty tabling this, but I at least need to have people raise their hands to have the desire to put such a monumental effort into it.

It would also find some gearheads that know the SL/OS system.

BTW, I tried to go to the Trav sim in SL but arrived a month or two after it was gone. I assure you that what we'd do will rival video games in scope and artistry.
 
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