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Dumarest -- one of the inspirations for Basic Traveller Boxed Set

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creativehum

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Because of all the talk on this site I nabbed an ebook collection of the first six Dumarest books from Amazon.

I just finished the first book -- The Winds of Gath -- and I loved it.

It's a harsh universe. As harsh as the one I've always thought implied in the Basic Traveller boxed set. It's also a setting of unexpected kindness, good fortune, and loyalty. The overall shape of the writing is also thoughtful, political, and progressive. Something that clearly would have caught Marc Miller's attention from what I know about him.

The point of view of the story shifts between many characters, allowing Tubb to give different points of view to religion, power, econimics, wealth, social standing, the exploitation of the poor by the wealthy, and much more.

This is the kind of color, setting, and point of view that would provide -- in my view -- the grist desired for an adventuring environment. Really good stuff.
 
Funny how people differ. I've tried getting through The Winds of Gath twice and given up half-way through both times. Even the connection with Traveller couldn't keep my interest, and I usually finish books even if they turn out to be less than fascinating.


Hans
 
creativehum said:
Because of all the talk on this site I nabbed an ebook collection of the first six Dumarest books from Amazon.

I just finished the first book -- The Winds of Gath -- and I loved it.

It's a harsh universe. As harsh as the one I've always thought implied in the Basic Traveller boxed set. It's also a setting of unexpected kindness, good fortune, and loyalty. The overall shape of the writing is also thoughtful, political, and progressive. Something that clearly would have caught Marc Miller's attention from what I know about him.

The point of view of the story shifts between many characters, allowing Tubb to give different points of view to religion, power, econimics, wealth, social standing, the exploitation of the poor by the wealthy, and much more.

This is the kind of color, setting, and point of view that would provide -- in my view -- the grist desired for an adventuring environment. Really good stuff.
Click to expand...

Yes indeed.

It contains spoilers but for anyone looking for planet or plot ideas this site has a synopsis of each of the (20+) stories as well as some other Dumarest stuff.

http://jeffbuser.com/Dumarest/index.html

The first ever campaign I ran with my bros I rolled up two sub-sectors (one above the other) and said they were POWs who'd been released on a planet at the top edge of the top sub-sector and they had to travel home to the opposite edge Dumarest style.

It was good fun even though as a kid the jobs mostly ended up being animal hunts as that was all I could think of.
 
Dumarest and Traveller are like chocolate cookies and milk.

The first line of contextual text of BBB T5 is "Traveller is about travel ". The travel in CT use the same modus operandi as Dumarest: interstellar jump, high, middle, low passage, working passage, speculative cargo and free traders is just 100% compatible with Dumarest.

The basic background of Dumarest's errance: individual worlds held together by interstellar trade routes does not need to be shoehorned to be nested in CT rules. It is like the rules of CT were written to play the books.

of course, my humble opinion,

have fun

Selandia
 
Also...

Social Standing as a significant factor of setting and play; exotic features per world for unique adventures; a non-centralized government with localized power dynamics between planetary leaders being the primary source of conflict*; star travel being a big deal (and dangerous if one does not have money); money for survival being a motivating factor for adventure, if not a desperate need inspiring desperate actions.

* Even if one is using the official Third Imperium material, early printed materials are always at a pains to point out that the adventures for PCs take place far from the centralized government of the Imperium. The notion of the Marches as a well oiled political machine efficiently run from the Imperial throne painted over this notion later on. But it is there in books 1-5 and the early adventures.
 
I liked 'Dumarest of Terra' for a few books of the series... but they didn't seem to be more than a change of location, a few name changes, and the rest the same thing over and over. I even skipped a few, and bought one. Same situation. I saw the book numbers go above 20.

Didn't realize they were Traveller type stories. That makes them sound better than I realized years ago.
 
Earl Dumarest
BFCA98 Age 34 Cr - 0 to 100,000
Blade-6, Most other edged weapons-4, Most guns-4, Streetwise-3,
Steward-2, Pilot-1, Tactics-3, Leader3
This individual habitually carries a blade or dagger and wears mesh. Raised on a
tramp trader, he now wanders the galaxy alone, searching for the home he left as
a youth.
In the course of his travels, he has acquired the formula to the affinity twin, a
chemical that, when ingested by two beings (animals, persons, etc) allows one to
occupy and control the other. The occupation ends with the death of one of the
individuals.
Incidentally, he is pursued by nefarious forces that want this formula.

1001 Characters GDW

The books are repetitive as he works as guard, Merc or knife fighter to earn money. But some of the characters are interesting or unique like the Jester at Scar.

Traveller has done little or nothing with super organizations i.e. The Church of Universal Brotherhood or the Cyclan. (Neither are megacorps) There were no large mega-system governments as in 3rd Imperium.

I do use the arm tattoo (an invisible UPC code) banking system from Kalin as easiest way to carry money IMTU.
 
It sounds like Traveller, from the three books up through Starter Edition, was essentially a codified version of this series of novels. Do I have that right?
 
Blue Ghost said:
It sounds like Traveller, from the three books up through Starter Edition, was essentially a codified version of this series of novels. Do I have that right?
Click to expand...

There is indeed a perfect compatibility. However, when said the way you just did: "essentially a codified version of this series" some learned traveller scholar usually denies it (to avoid intellectual property and copyright trouble?). So just let us believe that we have here a case of parrallel thinking yielding perfect compatibility.

have fun

Selandia
 
Blue Ghost said:
It sounds like Traveller, from the three books up through Starter Edition, was essentially a codified version of this series of novels. Do I have that right?
Click to expand...

I would not say this. There are elements taken straight from the Dumarest books and placed into Traveller. But there are many things in Traveller not in the books.

Off the top of my head; Dumarest never owns a ship. He is always a passenger. Meanwhile, the Traveller system encourages owning a ship -- or pursuing owning one. That's a big difference!

Also, Dumarest makes it clear he has no military training. He wins fights as an observant, brutal street fighter. But, of course, almost every PC generated for Traveller is built with a military service background.

(Really, we can't overlook Marc Miller's time in the service in Viet Nam as a piece of vital context for the game's intentions. A specific kind of war with specific cultural and social contexts. A former colonial state of a European powers, now propped up and fought over by two powers with highly advanced weapons being dumped into a land of farmers. The soldiers fighting for one of the political powers which is an empire in all but name. The soldiers are far from home, at the edge of the empire's power in an alien land. The sources of Traveller are varied!)
 
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Between Tubb's Dumarest novels, Norton's Free Trader and Forerunner books, and Anderson's Flandry novels I always figured we had the majority of the early Traveller literary canon (aka "Appendix N").

Hammer's Slammers came out about the same time as Traveller and quickly added to my list (among others) but it was those first three authors that I always imagined MM reading as well - just looking at the RAW and the NAW makes this relatively obvious if the ubiquity of at least Norton and Anderson in the scifi of that era didn't.

D.
 
Dumarest had military training, he fought in several merc campaigns once as a the commanding general under an assumed ID.

Dumarest was called a Traveller, it was a perjorative.

He travelled low, (undernourished folks often died) middle (normal space time), high (Accelerated so trip passed quicker, diff from rpg), working passage. Stowaways were routinely spaced.

He usually served as a Handler on ships. Cargo and low berths and steward were his responsibilities. He could Pilot but not well, probably should be Pilot-0. Couldn't Navigate.

He frequently made money as a professional knife fighter and rarely carried anything but a knife and preferred gray clothes to offend no one. The Bowie-type he used was frequently referred to as a Blade. His mesh was plastic coated so as not to appear so blatant.

He had a very high charisma and usually picked up a male buddy/companion or two who always called him Earl as well as almost always finding a female lover. He usually lost them at the end of an adventure or in the next book, sometimes dead or crippled but usually to keep them from the Cyclan who pursued him relentlessly. This was the most formulaic and repetitive part of the series.

Grav vehicles were called Rafts.

Both the Cyclan and Brotherhood had interstellar comms, don't recall any one else did although the Factors Guild might have.

Jumps weren't used and trips took variable time lengths hence the different High Passage.

Unlike Trav most every world was 'Class M' many were hell worlds because of some odd affect or Alien device. I don't recall many Aliens but their artifacts were about.



Another Traveller-ish series is Expendables by Richard Avery aka Edmund Cooper, more a 1st Imperium period as FTL is brand new.
 
Blue Ghost said:
It sounds like Traveller, from the three books up through Starter Edition, was essentially a codified version of this series of novels. Do I have that right?
Click to expand...

I wouldn't go that far.

Running a Dumarest game used about 1/2 of the books IIRC as you lost most of the space stuff which includes most of the careers.

A Traveller written specifically for Dumarest would have a much more drifter orientated career options - perhaps including a list of personal grails as they'd need to be seeking something - and most of Book 2 would be planetary generation - like a set of tables to generate what the planet was like starting from the UWP.
 
Easterner9504 said:
Grav vehicles were called Rafts.
Click to expand...
Incidentally, has it ever been explained why in Traveller an air/raft is punctuated like that, with a slash, as opposed to a hyphen?

creativehum said:
Also...

Social Standing as a significant factor of setting and play; exotic features per world for unique adventures; a non-centralized government with localized power dynamics between planetary leaders being the primary source of conflict*; star travel being a big deal (and dangerous if one does not have money); money for survival being a motivating factor for adventure, if not a desperate need inspiring desperate actions.

* Even if one is using the official Third Imperium material, early printed materials are always at a pains to point out that the adventures for PCs take place far from the centralized government of the Imperium. The notion of the Marches as a well oiled political machine efficiently run from the Imperial throne painted over this notion later on. But it is there in books 1-5 and the early adventures.
Click to expand...
Arguably some of that local-nobility-acting-against-the-wishes-of-the-central-authority returned with the Rebellion setting for MT, including "Archduke" Norris and his possibly forged Letter of Patent. And it was always there in world governments being mostly autonomous with respect to the subsector/Imperial nobles who had particular fiefs but couldn't necessarily throw their weight around on another world.
 
Note that I'm still looking for an author who would be willing to tackle a Dumarest Traveller writeup...
 
Easterner9504 said:
Dumarest had military training, he fought in several merc campaigns once as a the commanding general under an assumed ID.
Click to expand...

I think I misspoke on this point above.

In the first book Dumarest states he has no military training. I'm more than wiling to believe he was lying.
 
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