Attracting New Players..

[Nick H]

When Traveller began it shared one important thing with D&D/AD&D: They were both go anywhere, do anything games. Sure, there printed adventures but both games had entire worlds, universes, kingdoms, pocket empires and vast areas your players could journey to. You could ditch the printed adventures and go where the Ref and the players wanted to. To me, that's probably the best thing about both games and Traveller was brilliant at it.

The best Traveller players are the ones that go with that journeying spirit. They understand that combat is just one part of the game, but then there's the skill challenges, the travelling to different worlds, overcoming problems and obstacles, the search for not just wealth...but the chance to spend that wealth on big spaceships and gizmos.

The players that I've struggled to interest in Traveller are those who prefer games that channel them into missions...usually of the ultra-violent kind. "What's the mission in this game? Who do we work for? Where am I supposed to go?" They want scenarios (I can hardly call them 'adventures') where every NPC they meet is either paying them to do something violent or else is the very thing they're meant to kill.

At my previous club, which I was a member of for many years, there was a divide between those who liked games where there was a story and a richness of characters and those where the game system is more important. When D&D 4th edition came out it really divided opinion sharply to the point where heated arguments broke out. The story guys hated it, the system kings loved it.

Then old lags like me meet new gamers 15-20 years younger than me and it's either D20 systems or Savage Worlds and nothing else for them. Traveller becomes an even harder sell....even with it's own D20 variant! I find D20 and Savage Worlds alright, but a bit meh. They're serviceable but the problem is that they're generic. My favourite games have all began as ways to depict a specific genre first, not a system first that can be adapted for different genres.

In summary, Traveller is a hard sell to those who like their RPGs to corner on rails and use the latest trendy gaming system. It tends to appeal to those who like stories and games where you can do more than just combat things.

 

[flykiller]

Quick, how many non-Caucasians have you seen in Traveller Artwork over the past 35+ years?

do vargr count?

for that matter how many ugly females do you see?

will non-caucasians become interested in traveller if they see pictures of themselves in the artwork? "draw them and they will play"?

 

[Highorbit_drifter]

do vargr count?

for that matter how many ugly females do you see?

will non-caucasians become interested in traveller if they see pictures of themselves in the artwork? "draw them and they will play"?

You jest but there is a grain of truth there - images can make a product more "accessible" to a wider audience.

That said I recall the cover of the Rebellion sourcebook had a person of color on the cover.

I can't fault Traveller for making the game "white dudes in space".

 

[Patron Zero]

Pardon my saying but I don't believe making Traveller more 'inclusive' of other minorities, whether that be racial, ethnic or gender-identity based, it seems to follow a demographic of white males between the ages of blank to blank.

AD&D has a similar make-up since it's inception in the mid-late 1970s with the exception of female players making up a small percentage of the game's player base.

So is someone saying the game is broken and needs to be fixed to draw in a more diverse audience, if so I for one would love to hear any suggestions on that subject.

All due respect here but if something isn't broken then pasting a rainbow decal or a child-safe/family-friendly icon on the box is simply bowing to political correctness, and role playing games have a history of being anything but that.

 

[mike wightman]

Dear moderators - may I petition for discussions of racial inclusiveness go to the political pulpit where other issues such as real world politics and religion go.

 

[aramis]

Dear moderators - may I petition for discussions of racial inclusiveness go to the political pulpit where other issues such as real world politics and religion go.

[m;]Not yet.[/m;]
So long as it stays focused, and not political, which it hasn't yet, i'm inclined to let it slide.

 

[Nick H]

Ah, artwork. I know of one gamer who hates Traveller and has always refused to play it....getting his exact reason why he hates it has always been tricky but on one occasion he flicked through some of the CT and MT books, shook his head and muttered "black and white artwork".

 

[epicenter00]

I feel that Traveller's most fundamental problem is simply that it's difficult to quickly and simply communicate to other people what it is about. If someone asks, "What is Traveller?" to a dozen different people on this board, you'll probably get a dozen different answers, some wildly different. I personally do not believe a "generic ruleset that can be used for anything that is simple and great but is usually used to simulate sci-fi!" is a great line to sell the game. In fact, it's pretty lame. A generic set of RPG rules doesn't really have any appeal or traction; it did in 1978 because there wasn't much else around. As other games and settings came out, Traveller gradually began to fade from the limelight because other game systems were able to sell themselves better. Most of these games are gone now, of course, but I believe the inherent problem of Traveller still remains: It lacks a good way to communicate its iconic imagery, and there's even disagreement on what Traveller is.

So for the sake of argument, let's say that when Traveller is being "sold" we're talking about the Third Imperium setting. Even there, there's a fundamental problem. It's difficult to quickly communicate what the Third Imperium setting is like. Traveller's Third Imperium setting does a really lousy job communicating its core setting concepts and atmosphere. In short, it doesn't sell itself.

The easiest -- and I'll be honest, the best -- way for a setting to sell itself high quality artwork. Flipping through any game rulebook and having worked in marketing and product design, I can tell you one of the first things people notice are the picture and artwork. Are they attractive? Well laid-out? Plentiful? The answer to these for Traveller is all a pretty resounding "no."

I remember a thread on SomethingAwful years and years ago whose topic was ... "Let's have a thread about how terrible Traveller's artwork is!" Sadly, they're pretty much right.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. It's really worth even more than that, especially in our modern society. If you look at other sci-fi properties it's the visuals that grab you and pull you in. This simply doesn't exist in any significant quantity for the TI setting. In fact the artwork is pretty small and what exists is of uneven quality and much of it is pretty bad quality; some of the highest quality being sketches and so on. Because Traveller is so different from 21st century reality, it requires more imagery support. This doesn't exist; things are simply a bit generic, which may be argued by many as a way to let their imaginations run wild, but it's a hard sell to new players. A simple browse through something like DeviantArt will reveal gorgeous, full-color artwork that's honestly light-years ahead of the entire corpus of Traveller artwork, done by in the spare time by graphic artists and graphic arts students. I think the closest that Traveller came to this was T4, which was a brave and good try, but again being at the "dawn of the Imperium" it lacked a lot of the iconic designs we associate with Traveller.

I feel if you really want to sell Traveller, the Traveller community needs to get its collect rears in gear and convince Marc to come up with (or let us come up with for his approval) a lavishly illustrated setting "bible" like you see for properties like Halo or Avatar which would have the canon look for things and at the same time, evaluate what looks good and honestly what kind of things need a facelift or total redesign because they're 30+ years old (and maybe didn't even look good then, I'm looking at you Tigeress-class). Ships like the Empress Marava or Scout Ship are lovely, iconic pieces of Traveller design. The Mercenary Cruiser is a pretty common basic sci-fi design (you can find them in one of the old TTA books or their knockoffs), but again worthy because the look of it transmits a kind of feeling of the universe of Traveller. The Free Trader is honestly kinda hopelessly generic. What does an Imperial Marine's formal dress uniform look like? What does a naval rating's duty uniform look like? How about the Marine's PGMP? What does ethnic Vilani clothing look like? What does Capital really look like? Mora? The AAB on Vland? What do some of the more iconic worlds in Traveller look like, say, when you're in final approach to land at the downport? 3D models of the Astrin and Trepida done by a reasonably skilled 3D artist instead of a quick mockup by a beginner learning Blender or Milkshape. How big is a Patrol Cruiser compared to a person?

Furthermore, Traveller has a certain vibe; it's not a neat and clean universe; it certainly is one of George Lucas' "used futures." This vibe needs to be communicated with images: That free trader is greasy, dented, sometimes even a bit rusty. Starship components look rebuilt, refurbished, sometimes patched. The overhead lightubes sometimes flicker. Crewmembers tend to have some stubble, perhaps old service tattoos, their clothing isn't the most fashionable, mixing civilian clothing with hardworn work clothes, in contrast their bullet-firing firearms are well-maintained and slung at the hip along with a few tools used for starship maintenance on the other hip. Free Traders rub shoulders with a lot of not so savory types; there's a lot of mutually suspicious inspections of cargoes and payment. Crews sometimes involve themselves in shady deals to entertain themselves, fulfill old grudges, or just to make ends meet.

I feel a good jumping off point would be to almost be like LucasFilm's "Shadows of the Empire" project, which was an interesting idea of creating games, novels, and other tie-in products for a fictional movie ("Shadows of the Empire"). I think the best leaping off point for a Traveller setting guide could be pretty well done (and keep focus instead of going all over the place) by creating a setting guide as if Traveller were to be made into a movie and detailing the props, backgrounds, and settings for "fictional" movie like that. Perhaps settle on a few "main characters" of the "movie" - maybe 4-5, involving the classic character types in Traveller - a former military guy, a free trader, an ex-scout would probably be the archetypal required characters plus perhaps two more that get less screentime. While doing this, I think a few things that wouldn't normally be considered would come up, for instance, some years back, a friend who was playing a Vargr character and I were discussing how Vargr ... drink. Due to their lupine head profiles and the shape of their mouths, drinking from a glass or can like humans do would be inconvenient for them. Lapping drinks up might be seen as savage by the Vargr (and certainly would be the source of racist jabs "you want that in a bowl?") so we settled that Vargr on human worlds probably use straws a lot and probably not cheap disposable straws but an engraved, personalized "straw" probably plated with precious metals as a personal statement to show the civilized nature of a Vargr.

All of these things could be explained with imagery; a setting bible would be a great way to transmit that to new players who could just flip through and pretty quickly build an image of what Traveller's future looks like.

 

[rhialto]

Well, going back to the OP line of "How to Make Traveller More Accessible to the "D&D" Generation." Presumably this breaks down into "how does Traveller attract new players in and of itself", and also "how does a Traveller Ref make the game more accessible to 'D&D' players".

Traveller in and of itself accessibility:

1. Accessible rules. The system needs to be simple and intuitive, especially since it requires more from a player in terms of understanding science and technology than D&D. Of those in print and still being published MgT has an edge over T5 in this regard, but I don't want to derail this thread into that morass. :CoW:
2. Accessible artwork. This means you're going to get what you draw for. Bunch of scantily clad femmes with unrealistic physiques? Puerile. Something more akin to the newest edition of D&D? Much more attractive. :coffeesip:

Traveller Ref'd for D&D players:

1. Accessible setting. This means explaining that Traveller is not heroic fantasy but "pseudo-realistic" sci-fi/sci-fantasy, in whatever universe it's set in (OTU, TNE, etc.). D&D hasn't seem to have suffered from lack of a licensed setting (e.g., Star Wars or Star Trek), so I don't think that's a necessity here. What is necessary is a setting that can be explained fairly succinctly, e.g. "A variety of star-faring human and alien races existing in multiple empires, federations, etc. using FTL travel and other advanced technologies and psionics." That seems to be the lowest common denominator of "Traveller", whatever particular aspect or theme (diplomatic, military, trade, espionage, etc.) adventures exhibit. Which leads to...
2. Accessible adventures. I think Traveller has suffered in this regard lately, as the "currently published" adventures seem to be mostly rehashes of older adventures? My perception may be limited here by not really looking at 3rd party stuff, since much of it appears set in 3rd party settings (Outer Veil, Reign of Discordia, Twilight, Clement Sector, etc.). But while "rehashes" they might still be good (I wouldn't know, since I haven't run any of them).
3. Accessible rules. I could simply repeat my notes above, but a good Ref can make a brand new set of rules accessible as long as the Ref understands them and can maximize player "agency": i.e. can players make intelligent choices within the constraints of the system? I still stand by "simpler is better" here, but there is more leeway for a good Ref to mitigate a complicated system.

 

[The Pakkrat]

A Game's Artwork

In small, superficial ways, this Anchor-rat has to agree that artwork can make or break a game's draw of buyers and players.

For example, FASA's Earthdawn (the first Edition) had awful artwork, both the color and the black and white art. Perhaps it was to show the nitty-gritty of the setting or somesuch, but it killed the desire to play the game, especially for female players. Players like well-imaged and idealistic versions of their heroic characters in their heads and on paper.

For the games I have GMed - and there are quite a few - I thank myself repeatedly for teaching myself to draw since 1991. I was by 1993 able to draw the players' characters, idealizing the settings and themes to the players' tastes and letting them ignore the art in the rulebooks.

By 2008, drawing idealized, comic book heroes for my players made for great visual aids, maps, characters, monsters (oh the Horrors!), and other subject matter to draw and keep players at my table. At one or more points, I found that drawing characters described by the female players caused them to become the majority of the players at my table. Amazing! When the GM also caters to their desired style of play, (some stereotypes do hold here), the ladies have a grand time of gathering, whipping something up in the kitchen, passing around treats and generally have a great time with the adventure, their characters' significant others and the satisfaction of play without being gamer-judged by their gender.

Artwork and being able to show that you can see and put on paper or other image media can be the biggest draw of players. They often do not have time or creative talent and so appreciate your efforts to bring their imaginations to the fore.

There are other means to draw players to the table. Writing journals for the players, if one is gifted with the power of words and grammar, can also be a satisfying magnet to the table or virtual table.

The Mongoose Traveller game that I am currently the GM for is riddled with my doodles, character logs, visual aids, clip art from the interwebs. Add in a touch of journalism and news Anchor-rat voice and you have the initial IN to a great campaign.

For Net-7 News, this is the Pakkrat transmitting from Serue (Knoellighz 1221).

 

[Nick H]

Traveller has had artwork from William Keith, Steve Venters, Rob Caswell and even Chris Foss and yet the feeling is that Traveller has always had lousy artwork?

D&D artwork has always had a lurid quality about it. 4th ed. got to the point that the art overwhelmed the product. And do we want Traveller to add more boobies to the art just to appeal to D&D gamers? I don't want the game to go down that route. As an aside, Savage Worlds has minimal artwork other than the front covers and yet that has done very well.

My experiences with D&D gamers over the years is that Traveller is a game that has never really appealed to them....actually hard SF games have this problem in general. Traveller, with or without the Imperium setting (and in this regard, The Imperium is like Greyhawk), is a sandbox kind of RPG...not generic "one size fits all genres"...but a sci-fi game that can be used in a variety of settings. This can be offputting to those players who like their settings tight, with specific purposes given to them by a ref controlled NPC patron and where going on missions to kill enemies is the primary purpose of the game. Take zombie games, for example; you don't need much backstory to exposition to start playing them....just tool up, kill and run. And they're extremely popular.

Traveller doesn't need to change itself to fit that kind of D&D inspired gaming. I think it should set itself as a hard SF game where you can go anywhere, do anything and appeal to role players, not roll players.

 

[whartung]

I feel that Traveller's most fundamental problem is simply that it's difficult to quickly and simply communicate to other people what it is about. If someone asks, "What is Traveller?" to a dozen different people on this board, you'll probably get a dozen different answers, some wildly different.

But that's this board, and we're crazy.

Traveller has the most perfect pitch man that says more than we can in a single word.

"What is Traveller?" "It's Firefly."

And anyone interested in this genre at all, save for perhaps the youngest, has seen Firefly.

Is Traveller bigger than Firefly? Absolutely. Firefly encompasses just one campaign style that fits perfectly in the universe of Traveller. But if any singular thing catches the "essence" of Traveller, it's Firefly.

If your players aren't attracted to Firefly in some way, I doubt they'll be attracted to Traveller. If they are, then they probably will be. No long thesis's required.

 

[mike wightman]

Traveller is science fiction role playing - from cavemen and monoliths to the far far future. If you can imagine it, Traveller can run it.

 

[flykiller]

In small, superficial ways, this Anchor-rat has to agree that artwork can make or break a game's draw of buyers and players ... it killed the desire to play the game, especially for female players. Players like well-imaged and idealistic versions of their heroic characters in their heads and on paper.

this is male thinking. women like social interactions. go read any one of literally thousands of best-selling harlequen romances, and think of how THAT could be fit into anything you would recognize as traveller. can't be done, not in any game the paying fans would play.

"What is Traveller?" "It's Firefly."

"shotguns in space" works pretty well too.

D&D artwork has always had a lurid quality about it.

it's the one thing they can sell with minimal effort. it's the one thing any game company can sell at a profit at all times. as I always say, anyone who can play traveller (or any rpg) is intelligent enough to play it their own way with their own rules. most do. look at all of traveller's settings/rulesets, and still people adjust or add their own settings/rulesets. but the art, that's a specialty, and SOME (ahem) purchasers are attracted to SOME (ahem) artwork because <you fill in the blank>.

 

[DickNervous]

WOW! To say that this post generated a lot more discussion than I expected would be a massive understatement! And it's all really, really good stuff, even the stuff that went in directions I would never have expected.

But that's this board, and we're crazy.

Traveller has the most perfect pitch man that says more than we can in a single word.

"What is Traveller?" "It's Firefly."

And anyone interested in this genre at all, save for perhaps the youngest, has seen Firefly.

Is Traveller bigger than Firefly? Absolutely. Firefly encompasses just one campaign style that fits perfectly in the universe of Traveller. But if any singular thing catches the "essence" of Traveller, it's Firefly.

This is something that I have used to describe Traveller to people, and it works very well in getting their attention. The trick is turning that attention into interest and it seems that the best way to do that depends on the audience.

Traveller is science fiction role playing - from cavemen and monoliths to the far far future. If you can imagine it, Traveller can run it.

This is another sentiment that I have used to describe Traveller. I elaborate by going so far to say that if you want to create a universe like Star Wars, you can. Star Trek, yup. Battlestar Gallactica, Farscape, Firefly, Mass Effect, and so on. Some may take a bit more tweaking than others, but they are all possible. Of course that could be overwhelming for some.

One thing I also point out to new players it that there are no levels, no XP, etc. I do this because I think that everyone who has been exposed to any RPG (tabletop or computer) will be expecting that stuff to be there.

So now I am going to try to summarize the main themes that have been discussed in relation to the two primary questions:

How to get new players interested in Traveller?

• Play in public, people will come and ask what is going on.
• Keep it simple for the players. They don't need to know how everything works.
• Start them with pre-generated characters and once they are comfortable with the system, they can create their own.
• In the beginning, don't focus too much on minor details such as encumbrance or detailed tracking of time or money (unless it is critical to the adventure) so the players can focus on having fun.
• As a GM: Be flexible and roll with what the players want to do. Even if you aren't prepared. (This goes for any game...)

The second question is the one that really opened :CoW: and led to discussion in all directions! The only problem with most of them is that, IMHO, they seem to be mostly differences in how people interpret things and their opinions on what will work and what won't. Topics like the Third Imperium setting, represenation of races, transhumans, and "space opera vs hard sci-fi" can be very subjective and make it much harder to summarize what was discussed with one exception: Artwork.

Artwork came up several times and I have to agree. There is some truly amazing artwork out there that people have done. I have found amazing stuff on DeviantArt by people like RobCaswell, Biomass, NyrathWiz, riftroamer, Scarecrovv, SteamPoweredMikeJ, JayThurman, and jcalvoces just to name a few. However, as best I can tell, other than the line art style (like RobCaswell's stuff) none of it has been featured in official Traveller publications. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love the classic line-art style, and for black and white printing it is by far the best way to create detailed and beautiful artwork, but we all know that in order for Traveller to grow and thrive that we need to attract the under-30 crowd, and these are people who grew up on MTV, the Internet, and flashy colorful 3D graphics.

How exactly this flashy new artwork gets incorporated into things, I do not know. I think that GypsyKnight has done a nice job with the Clement Sector stuff by including more "modern" (for lack of better term) artwork in their stuff and may be on the right track. I really like the ship artwork they publish as it is colorful and 3D yet still retains that "Classic Traveller Art" feel. Though the stuff that includes people feels like it just misses the mark, at least for me, but I couldn't put into words why.

Okay, this post is long enough.

 

[DickNervous]

it's the one thing they can sell with minimal effort. it's the one thing any game company can sell at a profit at all times. as I always say, anyone who can play traveller (or any rpg) is intelligent enough to play it their own way with their own rules. most do. look at all of traveller's settings/rulesets, and still people adjust or add their own settings/rulesets. but the art, that's a specialty, and SOME (ahem) purchasers are attracted to SOME (ahem) artwork because <you fill in the blank>.

You just need to take a look at my home office to see how impactful artwork can be. I currently have 3 18x24 character posters from Dragon Age : Inquisition and an 16x20 gilcee print from Mass Effect on my walls. I have the Fallout 4 garage print on order as well as other smaller items from different games I have played. I would be more than happy to purchase and hang some Traveller artwork along with that stuff.

 

[DickNervous]

Exactly. Just don't terrify them with needing to know that 600K years of history to play. Last new player I had I told only two things: roll 8+ to succeed and don't annoy anyone in BattleDress with an FGMP.

Last night I ran a session with my group and we had a new player: my 14 yr old son Dylan, which quite honestly, worried me quite a bit. I love my son to pieces, but he has some behavioral issues and is considered a "special needs" kid as far as school is concerned. In a nutshell he has ADHD, is oppositional (more than you typical 14yr old), prone to outbursts (both verbal and sometimes physical), and can be generally disruptive. Everyone in the group had met him already so they knew what to expect, but I was still concerned. But he really wanted to play and had managed to focus long enough to roll up a character last weekend, so we gave it a whirl and I used some of the concepts discussed in this thread, mainly "Keep it simple", just like the quote from Scratches above.

I told him, pay attention to what the others are saying, don't talk over people, and if I ask you to roll dice, just roll 2d6 and try to get an 8 or better. Other than the fact that he was very excited to be playing (and therefore a bit loud) it went very well. So thank you for the advice.

 

[SanDragon]

You just need to take a look at my home office to see how impactful artwork can be. I currently have 3 18x24 character posters from Dragon Age : Inquisition and an 16x20 gilcee print from Mass Effect on my walls. I have the Fallout 4 garage print on order as well as other smaller items from different games I have played. I would be more than happy to purchase and hang some Traveller artwork along with that stuff.

Traveller calendars!!!

 

[flykiller]

see how impactful artwork can be.

Traveller calendars!!!

certainly have some material available for one ....

 

[Condottiere]

Needs a comic book franchise, which would be cheaper than a movie or a TV series.