The Hinterworlds Rambler
SOC-14 5K
Awesome, Fox! Great idea. Simple, and entertaining.
Help! Sons want to play!
- Thread starter Mithras
- Start date
wordserpent
SOC-9
Wow!* That would make an awesome boardgame.* If you make it rules-light, then anyone could play it.* You could call it, Sub-Traveller or T ^-1. Sort of a party version of Traveller. The gamepieces could be the ships available to PC's during character generation (Free traders, far traders, fat traders, sulieman's, ect) and they could each have their own board-game advantage.Another idea (although it may be a bit too corny)re-generate some events and write them down on small pieces of paper (things like: "You've found gold ore! You earn Cr50,000", "You're attacked by a passing pirate ship!", or "You've stumbled upon an abandoned mine, with a salvageable Seeker trapped inside"). Fold them in half and then crumple them up until they look like "asteroids", then spread them around your playing surface. Have your sons pick through the asteroid field and uncrumple the notes to see what happens next. Role-play out the results.Just a thought.-Fox
You could have asteroid cards and starship encounter cards which are drawn in space and Patron and Random event cards drawn in port or on planet (you could even have animal encounter cards for those underdeveloped worlds).
Now thats what I'm talking about! Rather than the total freedom that CT provides, I need a tighter structure, and something almost boardgamey would fit that bill. I'd certainly want roleplay in there, but with structure. And I'd keep it all in one system. I was reading through mt JTAS reprints last night and found an article to help with that. I also found a few Amber Zones with an asteroid belt focus that could certainly be introduced.
What would I need?
A board? I'm thinking large scale 30 x 20 squared paper. Or hexes? I might have something in 2300AD for that.
Cards for ships - all stats on each card.
Asteroid/wreck cards and asteroid/wreck markers - or use the crunched up paper idea.
Space encounter cards - ships, pirates, navy?
Simplified ship combat/evasion rules; simplified mining and salvage rules. Down to a few rolls each.
Maybe station/dirtside encounter/event cards. Maybe..
I'll have to think about this. I might start small and see if they bite, building up to something bigger. Or I my just some of these ideas and stay with the rolling and tables CT-style!
What would I need?
A board? I'm thinking large scale 30 x 20 squared paper. Or hexes? I might have something in 2300AD for that.
Cards for ships - all stats on each card.
Asteroid/wreck cards and asteroid/wreck markers - or use the crunched up paper idea.
Space encounter cards - ships, pirates, navy?
Simplified ship combat/evasion rules; simplified mining and salvage rules. Down to a few rolls each.
Maybe station/dirtside encounter/event cards. Maybe..
I'll have to think about this. I might start small and see if they bite, building up to something bigger. Or I my just some of these ideas and stay with the rolling and tables CT-style!
Icosahedron
SOC-14 1K
Would that be the JTAS asteroid mining flowchart? I'm not sure if anyone has mentioned that, I've only been skimming this thread.
Good idea, do you know of a good place to pick that up? I ttried Leisure Games here in the UK,but they don't stock it.
I've heard dealing with FFE directly can get frustrating ....
Paul E
I've heard dealing with FFE directly can get frustrating ....
Paul E
Andrew Boulton
The Adminator
I've never had a problem.
I finally got around to ordering my copy a few weeks ago. Marc sent an email the same day acknowledging the order and that he would send it as soon as he could. The CD arrived in its shiny black case one week later. No complaints (other than it should come with some Visine and something to wipe up the drool with 
)!
-Fox
)!-Fox
Only if
1) you expect deadlines on unrealeased products to be met
2) are wanting to playtest
First game - success!
The family was in a farmhouse on a lonely Scottish island over Easter, no electricity, no cars, shops or roads. I had the 3 LLBs with me (super compact and hundreds of hours of designing in there...).
I rolled up a world one evening, and sketched it out. The next evening my two boys asked to roll up characters which they thought was fantastic. My older son took Book 1 away with dice and rolled up characters on his own. They asked for a game the next day, so I wrote a simple scenario fo my world, Zyra.
I kept it physical, with time constraints, and just went with it, trying not to push them in one direction or another, seeing how they react to the rules, characters and added sophistication, compared to our usual fantasy or historical RPGs.
The world Zyra is B469279-8 Non-Ind NG
May take was an ocean world, tidally locked, with a brightside of boiling seas, boiling mist clouds, twisting whirlpools hundreds of miles across, and a more placid darkside. On the darkside three rival mining clans operate deep sea stations at geothermal vents, piping the minerals up to floating platforms. The world is very volcanic, it has two moons ripping the world apart. These moons also cause great tides. The 10% land is vast mudflats hundreds of miles across that vanish during the freakishly high tides, tidal waves that move at 200 mph and stand 100ft tall, twice each day.
THere is a floating starport, run by an independant business man, primarily for shipping ores off world, and as a repairstation for the jump route passing through. A naval station is located on one of the moons due to this jump route.
THat's the world. The scenario was quite direct. The starport operator hired the boys to recover a disabled cargo barge, a robot ore carrier ferrying minerals from a family's mining platform, to the starport. It needed reprogramming, its believed a rival clan has sabotaged it.
I played up the dangers, the barge had drifted into brightside waters; a G-Carrier dropped the boys off on the deck in swirling steam clouds, Vacc-Suit boots hissing on the deck. They had 4 mins to get below. And 30 mins before the barge was pulled into a boiling whirlpool. Immediately, the door into the ship was locked, that was their first problem. After four minutes of attempts, with one damaged Vacc Suit, they were in. They then faced electrified floor gratings and reprogrammed repair robots wielding flamethrower cutting torches. An SMG dealt with them fairly well.
They reprogrammed the ship, and jumped back onto the G-Carrier that returned for them...
I put in obstacles to test their skills, Computers, Mechanics, Electronics, Vacc Suit, and I think they like that - especially the "only someone with Electronics skill can attempt this..." moments.
So, a success! Next another mission on Zyra, then I think an invitation to try some salvage or mining in the system.
The family was in a farmhouse on a lonely Scottish island over Easter, no electricity, no cars, shops or roads. I had the 3 LLBs with me (super compact and hundreds of hours of designing in there...).
I rolled up a world one evening, and sketched it out. The next evening my two boys asked to roll up characters which they thought was fantastic. My older son took Book 1 away with dice and rolled up characters on his own. They asked for a game the next day, so I wrote a simple scenario fo my world, Zyra.
I kept it physical, with time constraints, and just went with it, trying not to push them in one direction or another, seeing how they react to the rules, characters and added sophistication, compared to our usual fantasy or historical RPGs.
The world Zyra is B469279-8 Non-Ind NG
May take was an ocean world, tidally locked, with a brightside of boiling seas, boiling mist clouds, twisting whirlpools hundreds of miles across, and a more placid darkside. On the darkside three rival mining clans operate deep sea stations at geothermal vents, piping the minerals up to floating platforms. The world is very volcanic, it has two moons ripping the world apart. These moons also cause great tides. The 10% land is vast mudflats hundreds of miles across that vanish during the freakishly high tides, tidal waves that move at 200 mph and stand 100ft tall, twice each day.
THere is a floating starport, run by an independant business man, primarily for shipping ores off world, and as a repairstation for the jump route passing through. A naval station is located on one of the moons due to this jump route.
THat's the world. The scenario was quite direct. The starport operator hired the boys to recover a disabled cargo barge, a robot ore carrier ferrying minerals from a family's mining platform, to the starport. It needed reprogramming, its believed a rival clan has sabotaged it.
I played up the dangers, the barge had drifted into brightside waters; a G-Carrier dropped the boys off on the deck in swirling steam clouds, Vacc-Suit boots hissing on the deck. They had 4 mins to get below. And 30 mins before the barge was pulled into a boiling whirlpool. Immediately, the door into the ship was locked, that was their first problem. After four minutes of attempts, with one damaged Vacc Suit, they were in. They then faced electrified floor gratings and reprogrammed repair robots wielding flamethrower cutting torches. An SMG dealt with them fairly well.
They reprogrammed the ship, and jumped back onto the G-Carrier that returned for them...
I put in obstacles to test their skills, Computers, Mechanics, Electronics, Vacc Suit, and I think they like that - especially the "only someone with Electronics skill can attempt this..." moments.
So, a success! Next another mission on Zyra, then I think an invitation to try some salvage or mining in the system.
Last edited:
Fritz_Brown
Super Moderator
Hoorah! And more Travellers are born! Good job, Mithras!
chshrkt
SOC-12
Mithras,
That sounds so awsome!
You basically created a dungeon crawl for your boys, which, if I remember my childhood well, was exactly what enticed me about D&D back in the day. A bit of Hack-N-Slash (or Spray-N-Pray with the SMG )with puzzle solving and lucky dice rolls thrown in.
Brilliant!
That sounds so awsome!
You basically created a dungeon crawl for your boys, which, if I remember my childhood well, was exactly what enticed me about D&D back in the day. A bit of Hack-N-Slash (or Spray-N-Pray with the SMG
)with puzzle solving and lucky dice rolls thrown in.Brilliant!
Thanks!
World write-ups are my favourite part of CT, Gadrin. Last year I took the LLBs on holiday and created and wrote up half a dozen, then created random encounter tables for each, and designed a universe for them, the Human Republic. Not looked at them since. Its probably my qualifications and amateur interest in geography and geology (and history) that makes Book 3 so damn, appealing!
World write-ups are my favourite part of CT, Gadrin. Last year I took the LLBs on holiday and created and wrote up half a dozen, then created random encounter tables for each, and designed a universe for them, the Human Republic. Not looked at them since. Its probably my qualifications and amateur interest in geography and geology (and history) that makes Book 3 so damn, appealing!
You might also try the scavenger hunt route some times. The boys or at least one of them gets a ship in cgen, but it needs something in the way of repairs to be fully functional. Maybe it is missing a part for the jump drive, but everything else works. (That way they can get used to operating the ship without having to worry about problems of intersystem traveling.) They start out in a backwater system without a spaceport. There is a mining outfit in the asteriod belt that may have the part they need. The miners do have the part, but they want a favor in return. Carry that on back 4 or 5 steps more so that they have to locate different things or accomplish some tasks in order to earn what they need. That way you can mix action and problem solving and especially teamwork into the needed solution. Just remember to keep it at a level they can handle personally especially if their PCs are capable of more than they are. That way they don't have to have you via a guardian angel NPC do every thing for them. The fun is in doing it yourself, not in being rescued by that NPC every time something goes wrong.
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