Compared to T;ne?

[Gallowglacht]

Hi guys,
I'm new here and could do with an honest opinion. I hope to be running a traveller Campaign soon. I'll be using the new era setting, but am undecided about what ruleset to use. Played a bit of MT but realy fell in love with T;ne. I really like the T;ne game, but using T20 would have a couple of advantages, biggest being that the group I play with already know/play d20.

But there are things I dont like about T20, most are quick fixes and there are bits I do like. I think translating character generation to levels went great for example. I guess the biggest sticking point is armour/damage especially on vehicles and starships. It just doesn't look like it would work very well.

I remember the backlash against T;ne when it came out, despite the fact that I and my group thought it was far better than MT, so I dont want to be all grognardy about the new version. I was going to use a basdardised version of T20 system with T;ne weapon stats (using hp and a masive damage threashold, to make it lethal).

What do people think? Does vehicle/starship combat work in T20 or should I go ahead with a system I feel more confident in?

(ps small arms laser fire penetrating armour just seems weird..........)

 

[Psion]

Personal combat works pretty well IMO.

Starship combat works very good IME as long as you are on the small starship scale. When you start dealing with larger starships, it begins to look very odd and I have a few house rules in place to make it work better for me.

The thing I really dig about T20 starship combat is the way that it involves anyone with any shipboard skills... it's not just all on the pilot and gunner until the post combat mop-up. This is HIGHLY desirable for RPGs AFAIAC.

 

[Rover]

Hi Gallowglatch,
I really like T20 and although I found the combat system a little awkward at first, once the lightbulb went off, I thought it was great.

We had a discussion about person/vehical combat a while back, it my interest you.

http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showthread.php?t=9815

I am curious to know what things you don't like about T20 and what were the fixes you came up with.

R

 

[Gallowglacht]

Thanks for the answers guys.

Psion; your right about the character skills in ship combat, played like that in Tne and B5 and it was fun. When you say the starship combat works fine with small ships, that should be fine. The biggest ships the reformation coalition builds is less than 5,000 dTons and the PC were only getting a beat up victrix(400dTons) or jayhawk(200dTons). There are bigger ships out there but they are mostly broken backed Vampires. Which way does it slant in scaling, do small ships become too powerfull, or large ones?

Glad to hear personal combat works, I am still adjusting my mindset to the new system.

Rover; thanks for the link, I'd already checked out that link. I am still waiting on that lightbulb moment. Still looking at stuff in new era terms, natural side effect of loving that game so much. Glad to hear people like the system, means it might be worth changing over.

As for stuff I dont really like.
First off skills and skill points. Not T20 in this case, just not mad on the d&d skill rules. 1/2 level non class skills and few skill points are death for charcter variety and interesting concepts. Travellers have to be pretty capable and versatile to survive out alone in space. I also dont like the x4 skill points at first level. I dont like people taking a single level of rogue(d&d) or theif (conan) just to get a few extra skill points and never go back.

So I put skills together in small groups, give the group a name, and a point spent on the group gives a point in each skill in the group. Instead of class skills, you have class groups. Instead of non class skills, you can just spend a point on an individual skill that you could reasonably learn. Add a skill group for the persons homeworld (eg. for Aubine; Computers, Grav Pilot and Swim or Diplomacy...For Orriflame Computers, Survival, Intimidate) and a group for the characters background (largely effected by their Soc score) and it should be easy to spend a couple of points matching you background history and still have enough points to do their classes job competantly.
Im hoping this will result in more rounded characters who embrase the strong differences between the coalitions member peoples, without forcing them to be steriotypes.

I miss the way your homeworld effected your stats more in T;ne. But thats and easy fix. A tainted atmosphere gives you -2 con, high grav gives you +2 str, -2 con etc... basicaly double the T;ne effects. This might not suit a third imperium game where characters can be from wherever, but is great for the new era as it reinforces the differences between the 20 tiny worlds of the coalition trying to band together despite they're differences and do the impossable.

Combat I'm still wrapping my head around. The hit points in T;ne were way off, my only problem with the system really. But the weapons damage and armour stats worked great. There was no scaling needed. They look like they would work great with a hit point system. Plus I wouldnt have to convert iconic Star Viking equipment. An acr has five damage dice. An RC body sleeve has an armour of 1. 4d6 damage get through. If a character gets hit for more damage than his con score he has to save for massive damage. You fire an acr at a Pyruss sled it bounces. You fire a lyrebird and if it hits you know how much damage gets through the armour. No scaling, rolling and removing bucket fulls of dice etc.
Dont get me wrong, I see definate good points about T20 combat. Its quick and easy. Detailed enough to get a result, abstract enough to keep the game moving (I hate you ICE/LEG). Its just that when something hits there seems to be too much scaling and juggling and it looses its beautiful symetry. Theres also less variety of weapons and equipment. I loved the personality of the RC equipment, such as the slowmoving but hard hitting Lyrebird (or Liarbird) missile...
RCES1;" dont worry about that Tank, I called in an air strike"
RCES2, looks at the sky, looks at his watch. Looks at the sky again.."Liar"

At first I didnt get the combat. Taking full stamina damage in armour seemed strange until I remembered the armour adds to your AC. So armour protects vitals and deflects a lots of minor hits for no harm. Fine, makes sense, what were worried about is hits that hurt, not where every round goes. But last campaign I ran included a large meteoric assault on the planet Promise. There were Battledress armoured Marines, blackpowder armed militia, big combat robots, Grav Tanks, Support Sleds, Ortillery, planetary defence batteries, Starships, cyborgs and sharp pointed sticks in this fight and it all just worked. (And awed the players to, it truely rocked).

I just dont have the same confidence that scaling and the T20 weapon variety could handle that as well. Am I wrong? I havent tested it yet, myself. I would prefere to fully embase the new system, and use its advantages ( starships seem easier to design than in Fire Fusion and Steel for example).

But I would be insane to throw away a damage system that has character and my confidence, to use a potentialy buggy system that could so easily be replaced. I would love to hear of peoples examples experiences with the Scaling and with vehicle combat, and any houserules/ fixes people have (surely Fusion/plasma weapons should have AP).

Mostly, I'm sold on T20. But should I use as is, or with my quick little fix??

(most other stuff that I'm not to keen on, fuel rates (or lack of for normal drives), sensor ranges, TL differences in equipment, bits of starship combat resolution, speeds etc, can just be ignored, I just change my view of the trav universe to match the new game. Just like changing my mindset from playing d&d to Vampire. Each game has a different atmosphere that is more important than any "rules")

 

[Psion]

As for stuff I dont really like.
First off skills and skill points. Not T20 in this case, just not mad on the d&d skill rules. 1/2 level non class skills and few skill points are death for charcter variety and interesting concepts.

Yeah... it's a bit rough. I like that characters have some core concept, but I do like room for exceptions. FWIW, World Skills in T20 give you a little room for this sort of thing... in T20, world skills give you as many as 5 skills as permanent class skills. Still, this is more about your world than your character, but in a way it makes a certain sort of sense.

I like Spycraft for this a bit more; certain character origins and feats give some or a few skills as class skills, without trumping the role of classes.

Add a skill group for the persons homeworld (eg. for Aubine; Computers, Grav Pilot and Swim or Diplomacy...For Orriflame Computers, Survival, Intimidate) and a group for the characters background (largely effected by their Soc score) and it should be easy to spend a couple of points matching you background history and still have enough points to do their classes job competantly.

I think you could tweak the existing world skill rules to do this pretty easy.

Combat I'm still wrapping my head around. The hit points in T;ne were way off, my only problem with the system really. But the weapons damage and armour stats worked great. There was no scaling needed. They look like they would work great with a hit point system. Plus I wouldnt have to convert iconic Star Viking equipment. An acr has five damage dice. An RC body sleeve has an armour of 1. 4d6 damage get through.

That's really pretty close to T20. Except the weapons don't get as many dice. But autofire can ramp that up.

But I would be insane to throw away a damage system that has character and my confidence, to use a potentialy buggy system that could so easily be replaced. I would love to hear of peoples examples experiences with the Scaling and with vehicle combat, and any houserules/ fixes people have (surely Fusion/plasma weapons should have AP).

Mostly, I'm sold on T20. But should I use as is, or with my quick little fix??

Fusion weapons have enough damage they slag most armor anyways.

The only thing I find quirky myself is that older characters tend to be able to keep going where younger ones peter out with stamina. That's not such a big deal if you view it as being as much a measure of "keeping a cool head" as physical endurance.

I've seen some folks tweak it, use d20 modern damage variants, put slow stamina advancement, etc. Play with it, find out what works for you, and tweak it to taste.

 

[Coality]

Hi guys,
...

What do people think? Does vehicle/starship combat work in T20 or should I go ahead with a system I feel more confident in?
...

I'm just starting a T20 campaign. I'm finding the strengths of d20 are in the combat and miniatures play. If you're running a firefight, you should be all set. The "Social Skills" on the other hand -- gather information, intimidate, bluff, K/Interstellar Law, bribery, sense motive, and their rules for alien contact -- as written, they can be used out of context to destroy any adventure or role-playing.

My initial caper is geared around smuggling, armed robbery, and hidden motives, so I have to insist that narrative and role-playing are factors in the outcome of social skills checks.

Bribery especially is a complete narrative-killing skill which I have had to re-write. As written, every NPC in a given system is equally bribe-able: a sixth-level Navy officer with SOC 17 heading a public anti-corruption task force vs. a sixth-level dimwit functionary with a gambling habit and a dead-end job. Any NPC is subject to the same roll, based only on the system's law level.

Gather Information suggests that military-level secrets are available at a DC of 25, so if interpreted broadly, means any detail of the adventure has to be handed over to my high-level players after a Take 10.

Okay looks like I'm griping. Bottom line is that d20 is a miniatures system first, a roleplaying system second, so watch that if plot is important to your game. I can post my solutions to these skills if you like.

 

[Gallowglacht]

Yeah... it's a bit rough. I like that characters have some core concept, but I do like room for exceptions. FWIW, World Skills in T20 give you a little room for this sort of thing... in T20, world skills give you as many as 5 skills as permanent class skills. Still, this is more about your world than your character, but in a way it makes a certain sort of sense.
...............
I think you could tweak the existing world skill rules to do this pretty easy.
...............
Fusion weapons have enough damage they slag most armor anyways.
...............
I've seen some folks tweak it, use d20 modern damage variants, put slow stamina advancement, etc. Play with it, find out what works for you, and tweak it to taste.

Those 5 skills might be class skills, but for a marine with 2-4 skill points a level, the player will find it hard to do its job and add some personality. My current d&d cleric character has a background of a soldier and blacksmith, before finding his faith. My 3 points a level are spread between k/religion, concentration, diplomacy, blacksmith, weaponsmith, spot and listen. As you can imagine most of my ranks suck.
My way may seem a bit to generous or unbalencing, but the real power from skill ranks comes from specialising in a few and getting high ranks. Not having quite a few low level ones. A level six marine in my campaign wont be more powerfull just a bit more versitile. Plus the more a character can do the more I can involve the player. I'd like the Luhtalan character be able to wax philosophical with a Montezuman data priest, because his upbringing has exposed him to lots of philosophical/theological ideas, but I cant see a character with 3 points spending any on philosophy. Even if I make it a class skill for Luhtalans.

You're right fushion small arms do ok. I was thinking more of the big ones on Tanks. Tank v Tank seems a little too much about chipping away. Doesn't have to one shot kills every time, I'm fine with the idea that a challenger 2 would have trouble taking out a challenger 2. Second thought, maybe I can leave it and just introduce AP bonuses for top attacks, flank and rear attacks, to make it a bit more tactical rather than a slugging match.

Thanks for the feedback Psion. I will be tweaking the game (always seem to end up tweaking, my FRPG is a love child of Conan/Slaine/Pendragon/Iron Heroes). I may well be back for more opinions on changes/balence, if you dont mind.

@Coality
Thanks for the reply. Love to hear your solutions. As you can see I'm all for tweaking the game.
If I can say one word in these skills defence. Skills like bribing and gather info, sense motive etc. are handy for the type of gamer who wants to play a smooth, social character but who in real life isn't, the kind who when the guards show up demanding to know what your up to, panics and blanks rather than blathering his way out. Like V who plays our bard. IRL he is a quiet reserved guy, but he wants to play the smooth talking, gregarious bard. Personaly I prefered the old school way or roleplaying every last detail out, but as this would prevent V playing the type of character he wants, I'll happily accept the rules for it in game. Just like my out-of-shape self gets to play the big stocky cleric and cast spell.

However, as you say, just accepting them as is can ruin parts of the game. As ref we need to stop it spoiling the game by changing/overruling rules that dont work. This I can and do one the fly. But I think its fairer to players to have an alternative in place so they dont feel your nerfing them unfairly. Arresting the players for military espionage or feeding them dangerous misinformation, is a nasty suprise for some just using a skill like the book told them it could.
Which is where Coality steps in with his/her fix....................................

 

[Coality]

You've got the situation exactly. Players want to push on the weakness of the rules on social skills, and whine if I override without explanation.

Don't know if it's a fix or merely a way of encapsulating the typical DM (er, Referee) compromises necessary when truculent players attempt to abuse social skills, but here are some modifiers to Bribe I came up with.

....

BRIBERY
Not present in d20 Modern. As written in T20: Bribery check DCs are determined by the level of the crime or infraction, and the world's law level. The bribe amount, but not the DC, is related to the target's level. No game mechanic mentioned for circumstances. Does not mention whether Take 10 is allowed. Basically, Bribery checks vs. the world's law level assume all people in a solar system in all circumstances are equally bribe-able, uniformly with the severity of the crime.

In the Coality campaign I'm running, there is no shortage of bureaucrats, functionaries, and security guards looking for handouts. However, I interpret the generous Bribery table in T20 to be a best case -- the target is initially impartial to the situation, the bribe attempt is in private, and the consequence for the target getting caught is ambiguous, and the target is not already under any third-party influence.

With these four leverage points, I want to alter the DC as follows.

Impartiality
The target's job or role is anti-corruption or ethics, or a law enforcement emphasis in the crime or infraction being bribed: +2
As above, but the target is a leader or public advocate in that area: another +2
The target has an adversarial history with the character: use Intimidate instead, or increase the DC by one level (+5 plus bribe amount change)
Miscellaneous circumstance modifier: +/-2 (target is leaving his job next week -2, target's peers or society are generally corrupt -2, target hears gunshots and sirens in the background during the bribe attempt +2)
Target has been bribed by bribing character without consequence to either: decrease DC by one level (-5 plus bribe amount change)

Privacy
Tech level 9+: +1
Tech level 12+: another +1
Other people present during bribe attempt: +1
Target's peers present during bribe attempt: another +1
Target's superiors present during bribe attempt: another +4
Target suspects he is being electronically recorded or observed: +2
Target has reason to believe he is being electronically recorded or observed: additional +2
Note: a successful Innuendo check can neutralize these mods.

Consequences for the target getting caught
Choose the initial DC based on the impact of the crime/infraction on the target if caught. If it just so happens that getting caught accepting a bribe on a parking ticket is a 20-year felony, then the DC will be for "Serious Crime" even if the ticket itself is "Infraction". Conversely, if the functionary is immune to prosecution, a felony bribe may be "Infraction".

If the target believes it is very likely the bribe will result in his arrest, a successful bribe attempt is meaningless. The moment the target is away from the bribing character's influence, the target will revert to an unbribed state (similar to Intimidate) or worse.

Outside influences
There are situations where the bribing character is up against the will of another third party influence in the bribe attempt. For example, the target has already accepted a bribe, the target has been intimidated to behave a certain way, the target works for someone who will chop off his finger if he is disloyal and the target already is down to nine. In that case the target may have to overcome the existing influence before accepting (or acting on) the bribe. This will depend on the influence. These situations will be handled in play.

Other limits on Bribe
If the target doesn't keep his mouth shut, nothing is preventing a successful bribe from attracting any and every other civil servant who hears about it to come to the character with their hand out. This problem will compound itself as the character's reputation for generosity expands.

Also, Bribe does not mean the NPC is in the character's pocket forever and for all things -- although that may happen, it is not under the auspices of a single Bribe roll. Bribes refer to a specific event, crime, infraction.

Finally, characters who use bribe often and indiscriminately are going to end up under the scrutiny of people in high places on both sides of the law.

 

[Coality]

Those 5 skills might be class skills, but for a marine with 2-4 skill points a level, the player will find it hard to do its job and add some personality...

In my campaign, I have two characters with 18 INTs, one of which is a merchant, the other a belter. That means 12 or 11 skill points a level, respectively, plus with four- and five-term Prior History ... so I'm not seeing any shortage. If I grouped skills it would be generally ridiculous, as opposed to limited ridiculousness.

 

[BetterThanLife]

In T20, as I told all my characters starting off with character creation. The most important attribute is Intelligence. The second most important attribute is Dexterity. After that it is a matter of choice.

The second thing I tell them is to specialize.
IF they pay attention and listen to my advice then the characters work out, after game mechanics, much like a CT campaign with consistency that was never in the CT rules.

I personally love the T20 system and would play or GM it over any other version of Traveller. Is it perfect? No. Does it have a couple of issues? Yes. Does it have less issues than previous versions of Traveller? IMHO YES!

Take my Large ship combat rules, allow the guys dealing on the other side of the table when it comes to Spec trade to also be Brokers and full blown merchants, and it actually plays better than other versions of Traveller, without losing the CT feel. (Which definitely gets lost in MT, and from what I remember of TNE.) You can design ships, and vehicles without having an advanced math and engineering degrees. And they will interact with each other correctly. Allow two equal fighters to get into a dog fight and they can hit and damage each other. Large ships have some issues, and Gunnery skill causes some issues, but otherwise it is solid.

Of course any game can be bad, but that, in this case, depends more on the GM allowing it to be bad than the rules.

 

[Gallowglacht]

In my campaign, I have two characters with 18 INTs, one of which is a merchant, the other a belter. That means 12 or 11 skill points a level, respectively, plus with four- and five-term Prior History ... so I'm not seeing any shortage. If I grouped skills it would be generally ridiculous, as opposed to limited ridiculousness.

Which is fine for the int 18 Belter but not so much for the int 12 Marine, who I want to pull his weight on board, act as a gunner have a background skill or 2 and still take part in a meteoric assault, while occasionaly spotting a clue or an ambush. Dont forget that this is part of a system that doesnt multiply first level skill points by 4 and has a max rank equal to your level (not lvl +3, you need a feat to get the plus three). A few high ranks is more powerfull than quite a few low rank skills, so its not a free for all power boost, but means I get less blank, worried stares across the table when I ask for a skill check, and opens up more roleplaying hooks.

It would take too long and go too far off topic to explain it in depth and give examples (but from experience it plays well and adds interest). Bear in mind I just mentioned this in response to a Q about what I disliked about the look of T20. In fairness I did say this was something I dont like about d20, not t20 and always work around. My question was more about the damage/scaling aspect of t20, that worried me. I'm not trying to "sell" my d20 system...

@bhoins
Thanks for opinion. Thats kinda what I wanted to see. Just some reasurance that it holds together. The more I look at t20 the more I find to like. TNE wasn't perfect either but I loved it. Guess I'm a little worried about it leaving me feeling let down. The flat +/- 5 scaling factor just worried me as it would fall apart at either extreme, but this is still probably better than dealing with minute details.

BTW where are your large ship rules? Are they on this site? your notes? your head? Sounds like their worth a look.

Of course any game can be bad, but that, in this case, depends more on the GM allowing it to be bad than the rules.

QFT

(but great rules set help)

 

[BetterThanLife]

Which is fine for the int 18 Belter but not so much for the int 12 Marine, who I want to pull his weight on board, act as a gunner have a background skill or 2 and still take part in a meteoric assault, while occasionaly spotting a clue or an ambush. Dont forget that this is part of a system that doesnt multiply first level skill points by 4 and has a max rank equal to your level (not lvl +3, you need a feat to get the plus three). A few high ranks is more powerfull than quite a few low rank skills, so its not a free for all power boost, but means I get less blank, worried stares across the table when I ask for a skill check, and opens up more roleplaying hooks.

It would take too long and go too far off topic to explain it in depth and give examples (but from experience it plays well and adds interest). Bear in mind I just mentioned this in response to a Q about what I disliked about the look of T20. In fairness I did say this was something I dont like about d20, not t20 and always work around. My question was more about the damage/scaling aspect of t20, that worried me. I'm not trying to "sell" my d20 system...

@bhoins
Thanks for opinion. Thats kinda what I wanted to see. Just some reasurance that it holds together. The more I look at t20 the more I find to like. TNE wasn't perfect either but I loved it. Guess I'm a little worried about it leaving me feeling let down. The flat +/- 5 scaling factor just worried me as it would fall apart at either extreme, but this is still probably better than dealing with minute details.

BTW where are your large ship rules? Are they on this site? your notes? your head? Sounds like their worth a look.

In T20 there is 4xskill points at level 1. The max skill level is level +3. And it works better than expected. And a Marine can have an 18 intelligence. After all a high tech soldier has to work with high tech equipment.

The straight +/- 5 works better than expected as well. (Because of the way the armor rules work.)

Yes, my rule mods are on my campaign website. There are three or four threads where these were developed, and I ran a weekly campaign for about 2.5 years with these rules and they appear to work and iron out some of the issues.

 

[Gallowglacht]

In T20 there is 4xskill points at level 1. The max skill level is level +3. And it works better than expected. And a Marine can have an 18 intelligence. After all a high tech soldier has to work with high tech equipment.

I know, its the same system in Conan, d&d and so on. But personaly I dont like it and have a system myself. My personal system is the one without the lvl +3, and 4x skill points. I dont like relying on characters being supergenius' to work. My system ends up with characters generaly having more skill points, generaly slightly lower max point and more "background" skills. d20 can have 2-12 skill points a level. Potentialy one person can have 6x the skill points of another. I dont like this in a skill driven game. In my version the int 18 guy has 2x the skill points of the int 10 guy.

Again, it works for me, might not work for others.

The straight +/- 5 works better than expected as well. (Because of the way the armor rules work.)

Sweet. How about with Battledress being consider a vehicle? How good is a plasma shot against it?

Yes, my rule mods are on my campaign website. There are three or four threads where these were developed, and I ran a weekly campaign for about 2.5 years with these rules and they appear to work and iron out some of the issues.

Sadly, for some reason I cant view the page. Is the link in you siggy up to date?

[btw this thread has convinced me to go with the T20 damage/scaling rules, my original concern, guess I should start converting Auroras and victrix over to T20 stats]

Thanks to all.

 

[BetterThanLife]

I know, its the same system in Conan, d&d and so on. But personaly I dont like it and have a system myself. My personal system is the one without the lvl +3, and 4x skill points. I dont like relying on characters being supergenius' to work. My system ends up with characters generaly having more skill points, generaly slightly lower max point and more "background" skills. d20 can have 2-12 skill points a level. Potentialy one person can have 6x the skill points of another. I dont like this in a skill driven game. In my version the int 18 guy has 2x the skill points of the int 10 guy.

Again, it works for me, might not work for others.

Try it stock before making changes. the system is well balanced and you hit some unintended issues if you make changes without actually seeing how the system is supposed to work first. (I did lots of work before I came up with those rule changes I use.) This is not D20, even though it is based on the D20 rules. For example, without a skill level of at least 10, a take 10 on a simple docking procedure is going to fail. If you, or your players go into this thinking it is D&D or D20 Modern, or some other D20 game it won't play well and will likely be a disaster. You want your players to be using skills in the 12-15 range. the average character leaves prior history between levels 7 and 10. Level 12 if they are very lucky.

Sweet. How about with Battledress being consider a vehicle? How good is a plasma shot against it?

Depends on the battledress. I wouldn't recommend letting the average character walk around with any version of it on a regular basis, but I feel the same way about combat armor. The rules let you design your own battledress. I consider the one in the book to be "Paramilitary" and use some custom battledress for Imperial marines. It provides a level of protection above normal Combat armor but it is also larger and more difficult to get into places a person can go.

This is a 1.5m wide by 3M high hallway and the big guy is actually, roughly, between 250vls and 280vls, instead of 300vls of stock battledress. He can't square up in the hallway and has to duck through doors.

<Click the picture for full size view.>

Both combat armor and battle dress both provide serious protection against small arms. Where the Battle Dress changes things is against vehicle weapons and against critical hits (where it still removes the first 5 dice from the damage roll).

Sadly, for some reason I cant view the page. Is the link in you siggy up to date?

[btw this thread has convinced me to go with the T20 damage/scaling rules, my original concern, guess I should start converting Auroras and victrix over to T20 stats]

Thanks to all.

I just checked it and clicking "Located here" takes me right to the page.

 

[Gallowglacht]

I just checked it and clicking "Located here" takes me right to the page.

Tried again, still getting page cannot be displayed...


ps. weren't you bhoins yesterday??

 

[BetterThanLife]

Tried again, still getting page cannot be displayed...


ps. weren't you bhoins yesterday??

There is nothing special or complex in the html on the page. Weird!

Here are my rule changes.

There is no Gunnery Skill. Use BAB instead.
Shipboard Weapons are limited to a Crit Multiple of x4.
There is no +5 Crit Modifier for a Spinal Weapon.
Spinals do damage based on UPP Code Not a flat 16 dice.
Freight and Passengers pay per Parsec, not per Jump.
Locals use brokers to buy and sell cargo.

The use BAB instead of Gunnery makes the system more symmetrical though does allow a Marine gunner to be better than a Navy gunner, if the Marine takes the feat to fire ship board guns. If Navy gunners take the Marshall Feat the difference is minor. (Especially with all the mods in starship combat.) It looks worse than it actually is in practice. It also eliminates the PMOS Gunnery option and the auto crits it can generate with a spinal Meson gun.

Limiting Shipboard Weapons to a Crit multiple of x4 eliminates the auto vaporize that any ship with a spinal meson can generate against a ship up to 750,000 tons, and auto destruction of any ship up to 8 million tons. (Though no ship will enjoy a hit from a spinal meson or spinal particle accelerator anyway.)

Losing the +5 crit to hit factor, eliminates the Spinal Meson being more likely to score a critical hit than a normal hit.

Adjusting damage for the Spinal Meson to account for the actual Meson Gun USP gives you a reason to actually build Battleships and Drednaughts. (Aside from their ability to soak up more damage now that they aren't being vaproized outright by a single Type A Spinal Meson.)

The last two rules are something I have always applied to Traveller, even before T20 and are not required to fix T20. IMHO they help fix the OTU starship finance and other economics of Traveller and the OTU.

The first one allows Jump 2 and Jump 3 merchants to actually make their mortgage payments and keep them approximately at the same % of profit (if they run close to flat out).

The second one makes sense as the local Merchants should not be at a disadvantage to some merchant on a ship that is making their first contact on a world they have never been to, and don't know the markets. Besides our speculating merchants aren't going to be dealing with some sheep farmer out in the countryside, they will be dealing with Merchants at the Starport. (The farmer is unlikely to be able to afford the load anyway.)

Oh and yes, Hunter restored my long time handle on here last night.

 

[aramis]

Under T20, pay-per-jump doesn't preclude making the payments on J3.

Pay-per-parsec isn't required for making the payments on J2/J3 ships, unless one is making the assumption that ships are in the hauling business. They shouldn't be. THey are in the speculation buisness, with cargo or passengers as an add-on.

The spec trade rules in T20 allow a ship with a broker to make more than enough to pay the mortgage. Often ahead of time, due to the broker being able to push down the purchase prices AND push up the sale price.

A true TRAMP speculator doesn't even post where he's going until he's bought his cargo! At which point, the T&C speculation system takes on a life of its own, and money gets made pretty much hand over fist.

Further, J2 ships, given security and priority cargos, can make a considerable lot more than standard freight rates.:file_22:

 

[BetterThanLife]

Assuming that these speculators actually have enough capital to invest, and assuming that they are lucky, then yes they can make a profit doing speculative trade. However, given that the merchants that these speculators are dealing with to buy and sell their commodities, should be of approximately the same skill level as our speculators, and have the advantages of being on their home turf, which is the normal circumstances IMTU and that should, in general, be the situation in the OTU, then the profit margin on Spec trade goes down significantly or becomes much riskier. (And you can't pay off a ship with one cargo.) Which in a Hard Science Sci-Fi RPG is actually more likely to be the case than the assumption that the Players breeze in with a load of something and can unload it at a significant profit to someone who has no skills.

And as I have said before, I can see asking for a mortgage from any reputable finance institution.
"I would like a mortgage on a starship."
"Certainly sir, a starship makes excellent collateral. What is your occupation?"
"I am a speculative trader."
"You are a gambler?"
"No, I said I am a speculative trader."
"And the difference is?"
"I buy low and sell high."
"Oh so you are a precognitive gambler. I will take that into account as I process your application. Don't call us, we'll call you, if your loan gets approved."

In a Universe where the local Merchants, who call the planet they are standing on home, have the same skills as the players, there should be a significant advantage to the home team. Or do you think you can walk into the Commodities market in NYC, with a couple of grand and walk out with a million? (Especially when everyone around you works that particular floor for a living and you just walked in off the street.) While I don't give the home team an advantage, I do even the playing field.

At carriage rates, which is the only way to quantify the profitability of a starship, a Jump-2 ship under T20, which is what we are discussing, can not makes its mortgage payments. If it is a far trader and only shuttles between two high population worlds that are 2 parsecs apart and within 2 tech levels of each other, then it can make its payments by carrying priority cargo, usually, but the profit margin is thin and that is useless for an RPG. Anything bigger can't keep the hold filled. Any other destinations and you can't fill the hold or make the payments. (There are precisely three choices for such a route in the Spinward Marches and you can't travel between them.) A similar sized ship that is Jump 3 can do the same thing in one place in the Spinward Marches. Hazardous cargo does not pay the mortgage.

Further since I prefer a role playing game to a roll playing game, I tend to steer away from ships that aren't inherently capable of making their payments. The simplest way to do that and allow players to actually get off the mains, is to charge per parsec instead of per jump. This means there is more time for role playing, and less time pouring over charts and making die rolls. (For one player while the rest of the group sits on their hands and gets bored.)

 

[aramis]

BTL:

The RULES set up in T20 make it quite possible to make money with a J2 by speculation.

Quite honestly, I don't see J2/J3 ships as normally being financed by the bank, but instead by the speculation profits.

If you are insisting upon imposing outside considerations explicitly exculded from the rules, then you are not using the RULES, and no RULES argument is useful. The RULES however, are workable, if one can unwrap one's head form the modern "freight moves the world" mindset.

Quite simply, the broker rules are NOT opposed rolls. It's presumed that the opposing broker is already accounted for in the AVT (actual Value Table) rolls.

Also, consider this: in the playtest, we went to the 3d AVT to tone down speculation. We didn't up the modifiers on the tables. We didn't allow a higher modifier for brokers (and in fact took away the stability of broker). Routinely my players, in an A2, made money using T20's T&C. Heck, with speculation and a broker, they made money in a financed Type R.

At the end of the playtest campaign, the party had paid off 4 ships by speculation. A J1 Type A, a J2 Type A2, a J1 Type R, and a custom J3 merchant.

A typical party starts off with *Just* enough to leverage a few tons of excess.

And, to paraphrase Mr. Marc W. Miller: routine shipping should just barely pay the bills, so that speculation and adventures have a reason to happen.

 

[BetterThanLife]

BTL:

The RULES set up in T20 make it quite possible to make money with a J2 by speculation.

Quite honestly, I don't see J2/J3 ships as normally being financed by the bank, but instead by the speculation profits.

If you are insisting upon imposing outside considerations explicitly exculded from the rules, then you are not using the RULES, and no RULES argument is useful. The RULES however, are workable, if one can unwrap one's head form the modern "freight moves the world" mindset.

Where does the rules specify that merchant skills only belong to player characters? Does the same apply to the combat rules? This is supposed to be a hard science game, economics, specifically a free market economy is science. But if you want to go into fantasy land and all the merchants are PC spacers that only sell to people with no merchant skills instead of dealing with merchants, that is your right.

More importantly the question asked was what were my rule changes to make T20 playable, successfully in my campaign, which is what I did and was explaining when you entered the conversation to smack me down for being a heretic by claiming that a Jump-2 ship can not make its mortgage payments as the system is set up, in any measurable way. There is no way to meaningfully measure, mathematically, with any accuracy, the profitability of a starship that is going to strictly engage in speculative trade. It is a crap shoot, (Actually that isn't correct, in Craps the odds and percentages can be fairly accurately determined, this isn't even close to a crap shoot.) and financing and insurance can not work that way. Finance companies, banks, etc. do not gamble their money. Further, regardless of what you want what you do in YTU, or what some single quote from a rule book is, it will never work that way in any campaign I run because it is totally divorced from reality in any century.