Good Reading for the Traveller GM

[clementk]

Originally posted by Aramis:
Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson do a wonderful job.

Obligatory Penny Arcade comment on the Dune pre-equals to get the otaku negative reaction to them out of the way. Note: not safe for work or around small children.

The Vorkosiverse would be a fun place to play in... too bad for me it's a GURPS product in progress... It has had little impact upon MTU, but happens to parallel a lot of the bits about MTU that existed before I encountered the novels.

Well if it's like most GURPS books it'll still make a good sourcebook to crib from once it's released. Gurps: New Sun (link) for example is a good companion piece to Gene Wolfe's Urth books alongside the Lexicon Urthus by the same author. It's also substantially cheaper than Lexicon Urthus. Both sourcebooks are useable for a Traveller or other SF game.

As always YMMV,
Casey

 

[FlightCommanderSolitude]

Someone several pages back mentioned Jack Vance. I'm a huge fan of the riotously funny and endlessly creative Dying Earth series, and was wondering if any of his sci-fi stuff is up to par?

 

[Klaus]

Jack Vance! The Demon Princes quintology (or is that pentology?) are some of my favourites. Great florid prose and macabre problems with elegant solutions. Follows the escapades of Kirth Girsen, trained as an assassin by his grandfather, to get revenge on the 5 pirate princes that raided and enslaved their home.

As to other stuff mentioned on this thread, I'm glad Vorkosigan gets alot of interest. The later books are better than the earlier ones (I find The Warriors Apprentice far fetched and I cannot suspend disbelief), but its all good stonking stuff.

Also mentioned is Peter F Hamilton Night's Dawn Trilogy. You should also check out Fallen Dragon (very Heinleinesque military adventure) and Pandora's Star (I think a little inspired by The Mote in God's Eye). His earlier Greg Mandel novels are worth a look too (they're set mid-21st century and feature psionics and some well paced action).

Alistair Reynolds (Revelation Space, Redemption Ark, Absolution Gap, Chasm City) is great. Good aliens, convincing post-humans, hyper-pigs, and a lovely noir atmosphere.

Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy is the definitive account of an alien planet and the steps required to survive on it. Also some clever political and economic speculation.

Have to mention Richard Morgan who I've just discovered. Altered Carbon is a great future detective noir with some incredibly brutal ultraviolence and an intersting conceit: FTL travel is possible by digitising yourself and 'needlecasting' into a new 'sleeve' (body) on a different world. Your personality is stored in a tiny 'stack' and as long as this is intact you can be re-sleeved over and over. The protagonist is a super-warrior/diplomat (by mental training) whose main weapon seems to be body language. The loose sequel Broken Angels could almost be a Traveller novel, as a black ops artefact hunt on a mercenary saturated war-torn planet find a relic of the 'Martians'(read Ancients: they look almost identical to Droyne, winged reptiles; first discovered on Mars, hence the name). It also features some of the most brutal and ruthless 'executive actions' I have ever read.
quote:
"You aren't developing moral qualms are you Kovacs?"
"Don't be absurd, Hand. I'm a soldier."

 

[RainOfSteel]

I'll toss in:

Scott Westerfield
The Risen Empire --A great novel!
The Killing of Worlds --Still searching for this sequel.


A great novel that combines super technology with a simple love story in an incredible milieu where those who are the most wealthy are all dead, and the Emperor is "risen", and quite dead himself.


EDIT---------
Ok, their exact Traveller applicability may be limited, the technology level is like, 17-20 (with FTL quantum entagled communications, but no FTL travel), however, The Risen Empire is still a great read.

Oh yes! Now I remember. I think of Traveller when I think of this novel because a major Naval weapon is "sand", and they have "sandcasters" (it's an artificial diamond sand, of course).

 

[Jame]

Anything by David Drake, but specifically the RCN/Lt. Leary series or Fireships (apparently it's third in a trilogy, but I can't get the other two outside an omnibus, which I won't get).

 

[Rossoneill]

The Honour Harrington Series by Steven Weber
To me its a great "Big ship Traveller Universe Imperium"Example .
Or it could be a Pocket empire outside the borders of the imperium

 

[Jame]

You mean David Weber.

Everything else sounds just right, though!

 

[The Hinterworlds Rambler]

I gotta agree with penny arcade on this. I found "Atredies" like a Danielle Steele novel in space. The Butlerian one I had to walk away from. It was too "typical" and could have easily been interchanged with the novelization of a TV show or Video Game. Dune is waaaaay beyond that kind of stuff.

These strikes me as "Michael Bay Presents: Lord of the Rings"

Also, why is it only Military Sci Fi books that are cited here and above? No Foundation? No Ringworld? Or are these "givens"?

 

[stofsk]

Originally posted by Baron Saarthuran von Gushiddan:
I gotta agree with penny arcade on this. I found "Atredies" like a Danielle Steele novel in space.

They have a way of cutting through the crap and getting to the point. Obviously I agree with them on the matter.

Also, why is it only Military Sci Fi books that are cited here and above? No Foundation? No Ringworld? Or are these "givens"?

Meh, to each his own. Given the nature of FTL in both Foundation and Ringworld, I don't think they have the same 'feel' as Traveller. In Traveller, FTL is slow.

Something like The Moat in God's Eye is kinda-sorta similar. Although the FTL in that is instantaneous, it's set down very specific routes, and also it does nothing about warping you close to a planet. If you come out at one end of the system and you need to be at the other end, you gotta go the long way.

That's not to say that elements of Foundation and Ringworld are not comparable to Traveller. Foundation has the whole Imperium angle, and Ringworld has the whole 'traveller/explorers' angle.

 

[Tobias]

As a tangent from another thread, ahem, I would recommend Stanislaw Lem to anyone interested in peeking outside of the English-language SF tradition. I think these and these are probably the best starting point, especially for Traveller fans.

Regards,

Tobias

 

[shield]

Try the Empire by H Beam Piper, it is a set of short stories set throughout his future history. The first story is a classic description of an imperial annexation of a world after the long night.

The Fuzzy series by the same author does quite nice detail of a company owned colonial world.

Cheers
Richard