Best Examples of Far Trader Adventures

[Garnfellow]

I've been running an irregular but fun game centered around an Empress Marava class ship, and I'm looking for some nice adventures to have in my pocket. They don't need to be full-fledged modules -- even some short mini-scenarios or single encounters would be good.

So what are some good examples of the genre?

 

[The Oz]

There's always "Night of Conquest," one of the adventures in Double Adventure #6.

For a twist, I once did this with the traders making the deal with an oppressive regime and having the battle be a slave revolt. Made for an ethical dilemma as the PCs knew just what they were dealing with but had been ordered to make the deal anyway.

 

[aramis]

one of the classics is the murder aboard.

Another classic is the "Entry Visa" battle. Negotiations by radio to get permission to land.

Yet another is the "Someone is shipping coldsleeping bodies that wake up unexpectedly" motif (used in Firefly to great effect). One of the containers in a freight lot isn't what it claims. It is a battery bank and 6 LB in a 4 Td container. THe contents and reasons
1) Naval Frozen watch, being sent home. disoriented but cooperative
2) Mercs going home on repatriation bonds. THey set it up themselves, and are pocketing the difference. Reaction varies.
3) Mercs going home, due to major injuries. Need immediate medical attention
4) Refugees escaping political chaos. They misjudged the trip time.
5) Pirates attempting to take over the ship by stealth.
6) Slaves being shipped. Awake due to malfunction. Random reaction.

Another fun one is the "Troop of monkeys, 50Td. 4 weeks food included." paid priority cargo. Unfortunately, they disassemble the crates about day 2 of jump, and proceed on a damage spree throughout the ship.

 

[Gadrin]

These are built around a Marava...

Three Plus Three

I recently picked up some of the Marischal adventures (in fact here's
a FREE REPRINT of some of the ones by the Keith brothers. As you
can see on the cover it's a Marava...

Flare Star

No strings attached. Nice maps and deckplans in there too.

Anyhoo, as part of the deal I also got Far Traveller #1& #2 and it's
a very nice, very detailed set of adventures in the Reaver's Deep.

Plenty of stuff out there. Just holler if you need more.

>

 

[Icosahedron]

I had some fun with Ice Lilies...

http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showpost.php?p=280645&postcount=3

 

[Garnfellow]

Guys, these are all great suggestions -- keep 'em coming!

They are serving two purposes: (1) they are going into my rainy day file for potential use at upcoming sessions, and maybe more importantly, (2) they are giving me good examples of far trader-style adventure design.

My current group of players are loving Traveller, but the core of this group also played through a couple of my D&D campaigns -- and none of us have a ton of Traveller experience.

As such we all have a powerful tendency to play through Traveller scenarios like they are D&D adventures. Problem with the system customs inspector? Local drug lord giving you hassle? Some alien ship just jumped into the system? Break out the ACRs, boys -- let's burn this mother-f*&%$er down! (Well, not quite that bad, but you get the point.)

I'm finding high PC death rates are not a deterrent (the players like rolling up new characters too much). Hence my search for good examples of Traveller far trader adventures. I don't want the game to become a mercantile snoozefest about interest rates, mortgage payments, and IRRs -- these boys are gonna have to have some action -- but I also want to give everyone a chance to really try out the native Traveller cuisine.

If I find I cannot shift the tone of this group the next step will be to embrace it and run a merc-style campaign.

 

[kafka47]

The Psionic Knights Trilogy fits the Mavara quite well or any small character ship. One could also use Deep Shadows combined with the Zhodani module adventure. Does the Mavara have to play a central role or is it just a support for the characters to get from A to B. If a central role, why not adapt some of the Firefly/Serenity adventures/episodes?

 

[the angle]

Hit the Freelance Traveller website (http://www.freelancetraveller.com/index.html) and follow the link to "Active Measures." There you'll find over 70 adventures to download. Quality is variable, as you might expect, but more than a few ought to be suitable.

There's also SJG's JTAS, if you're willing to drop $20 for a two-year subscription and unlimited access to many years' worth of archives.

Steve

 

[FreeTrav]

The direct link to the Active Measures section of Freelance Traveller is http://www.freelancetraveller.com/features/advents/. There is also a subsection of "adventure nuggets" (a scenario with about a half-dozen ideas to take the initial scenario in different directions) called "Getting Off The Ground", at http://www.freelancetraveller.com/features/advents/gotg/.

Thanks for the plug, though, the angle!

 

[E.D.Quibell]

Any of the stuff in Stellar Reaches should be good for a Far Trader's crew:

http://stellarreaches.nwgamers.org/

Also Kightfall and the Flaming Eye were designed around the crew of a Far Trader.

Regards,

Ewan

 

[Icosahedron]

As such we all have a powerful tendency to play through Traveller scenarios like they are D&D adventures. Problem with the system customs inspector? Local drug lord giving you hassle? Some alien ship just jumped into the system? Break out the ACRs, boys -- let's burn this mother-f*&%$er down! (Well, not quite that bad, but you get the point.)

I'm finding high PC death rates are not a deterrent (the players like rolling up new characters too much).

Sounds like you need to hit them with a couple of high Law Level worlds, where the customs men are good at their jobs and carry non-lethal weapons, and the crew find themselves in a world where shooting isn't an option. They can have as many fist fights as they like, but those don't lead to new character rolls - they lead to capture and escape scenarios or chase scenarios.

Take the guns away and make 'em think.

 

[Brian Smaller]

I ran a campaign with a Empress Mavara class ship and the first session had them misjumping (a fault in the drive) and crashing on a TL3 world - in a lake. They had literally a few mioutes of real time to grab gear and get out before the ship sunk. The next four years of game time was their world spanning adventure to get their ship
1) Out of the lake
2) Flying again.

The planet was a lost Solomani colony. The political situation was akin to the US war of independence. The players had to survive harsh winters (think Valley Forge), help fight battles, travel by ship to the main continent and loot bits from the Original Ship that brought the colonists to the planet and get back. Just getting their ship refloated was a mission. They had to co-opt the locals into helping them, make temporary patches to seal their ship, build pumps, refloat the ship and drag it to land. That took six months to achieve.

The population was descended from humans of African ancestory who left Earth to establish their particular Utopia somewhere. It was probably the most fun I have had refereeing Traveller in my life. One of the players even converted to the local religion - the Universal Church of Voodoo.

Probably the funniest moment was in the battle to help their new allies take a fort and town to winter in, the character who had salvaged his combat armour was knocked off his feet by a volley of musket shots, and tried to throw a grenade at the ten guys who were rushing up to hold him down and find a place to push a bayonet through. He fluffed his roll and the grenade went off next to him. He got a badly wounded leg. Their groups medic could hav epatched him up with no problems, but he was dragged to the Regimental Surgeon who, despite his protestations, sawed his leg off in true low tech fashion. The engineer made him a peg leg out of wood fitted to his combat armour.