Help with literary foundation for CT

[Silverhawk]

I would recommend the two volume Galactic Empires series edited by Brian Aldiss. Excepts from many of the above showing the life cycle of Galactic Empires.

I also draw inspiration from C.J. Cherryh's Alliance-Union novels.

 

[Condottiere]

May I ask you to expand, please? I would appreciate hearing more from you.

You'll sort of notice that pulp science fiction stories have some common themes.

This could be both the influence of the magazine editors, as well as a reflection of the era that they were written in.

Rugged individualism tends predominate most early forms of science fiction, possibly to both due to a prevailing ideological view at that time, and what the writer might be projecting what their audience wants.

Politics gets more prominent b the Fifties, as science fiction is used as a basis to discuss (then) current social issues, and I think, more cynical mid Sixties onwards.

I would say Dune would be one marker, where the cult of the hero gets subverted.

The superhero aspect tends to get transferred to comics.

 

[Ekofisk]

Hello Ekofisk,

Thank you for your many suggestions. It might take me the remainder of my days and a small fortune to follow up on all your recommendations.

Not necessarily. I can't help with the time factor but I might be able to cut down on the expense: Winds of Gath. The internet archive and Project Gutenberg can be a real boon in this. Andre Norton for example.

There are people on this board better able to say what particular author/work influenced Traveller. All I can say is what influenced me which is a far different thing.

Also, a strong seconding of Appelcline's book. It seems tailored to your question.

 

[mike wightman]

Winds Of Gath, the first book in the series, contains just about every Traveller trope.
If you like it read a few more, they are pretty quick reads.

 

[King Midas]

Actually, she wrote several. Her Solar Queen series was highly influential on the Merchant career in Traveller.

She wrote scores. What I mean is that they were almost all the same story.

 

[amsboethius]

I see someone has already recommended Shannon Appelcline's The Science Fiction In Traveller: A Reader’s Guide to Traveller Role-Playing Fiction.
That's a great resource. You might also check out THE VISUAL ENCYCLOPEDIA OF SCIENCE FICTION by Brian Ash. It's a great history of science fiction published around the same time Traveller was created.

Poul Anderson's Trader Team/Future History of the Polesotechnic League Series was actually citied as an
inspiration by the author of the classic CT module Night of Adventure as a great source for merchant adventures, if memory serves:

The Trouble Twisters

David Falkayn -- Few indeed had won their Master Mercha…

www.goodreads.com

 

[Saraband]

I think Jack Vance was an influence. See Planet of Adventure series for a mix of tech levels and the idea that humans are endlessly variegated.
See Demon Princes for classic space opera.

Absent Traveller, you should just read these series as fantastic sci-fi.

 

[Condottiere]

As regards Scouts As A Service, I tend to recall Eric Frank Russell's Next Of Kin.

Next of Kin, also known as The Space Willies, is a science fiction comic novel by English writer Eric Frank Russell. It is the story of a military misfit who successfully conducts a one-man psychological warfare operation against an alien race, with whom humans and allied races are at war. It was published under the title Next of Kin in 1959. A novella-length version was published in Astounding Science Fiction in 1956 as "Plus X", then published in somewhat expanded form by ACE Books as The Space Willies in 1958.

 

[King Midas]

As regards Scouts As A Service, I tend to recall Eric Frank Russell's Next Of Kin.

Next of Kin, also known as The Space Willies, is a science fiction comic novel by English writer Eric Frank Russell. It is the story of a military misfit who successfully conducts a one-man psychological warfare operation against an alien race, with whom humans and allied races are at war. It was published under the title Next of Kin in 1959. A novella-length version was published in Astounding Science Fiction in 1956 as "Plus X", then published in somewhat expanded form by ACE Books as The Space Willies in 1958.

Isn't that Wasp? Or is this a different story with the same premise?

 

[Condottiere]

If it's Russell, it might be a variation on a theme.

Like White, there's seems to be an anti war viewpoint.

 

[atpollard]

For books by E.C. Tubb, I suggest reading the FREE ones first ... Internet Archive Digital Library (out of copyright)

 

[infojunky]

Greetings infojunky,

Do you believe the Golden Age of Sci-Fi (‘30s and ‘40s) had a greater influence on Classic Traveller than the New Wave Sci-Fi of the ‘60s and ‘70s?

Honestly both have a lot to do with Traveller.

There is a more than little amount of Noire in Traveller, hence I tend to start with the Pulps and move on from there.

 

[Sci-Fi Neophyte]

I would also suggest grabbing Shannon Appelcline's The Science Fiction In Traveller: A Reader’s Guide to Traveller Role-Playing Fiction. I think it's only ever been released as a Kindle book, but I found it helpful myself.

Thank you for recommending this book. While it is available on Amazonia in print, I also found it at DTRPG as a PDF for $0.00 (not PWYW, but actually free).

I couldn’t pass this up, so I added it to my online library. I will give it a considered read.

 

[Sci-Fi Neophyte]

You'll sort of notice that pulp science fiction stories have some common themes.

This could be both the influence of the magazine editors, as well as a reflection of the era that they were written in.

Rugged individualism tends predominate most early forms of science fiction, possibly to both due to a prevailing ideological view at that time, and what the writer might be projecting what their audience wants.

Politics gets more prominent b the Fifties, as science fiction is used as a basis to discuss (then) current social issues, and I think, more cynical mid Sixties onwards.

I would say Dune would be one marker, where the cult of the hero gets subverted.

The superhero aspect tends to get transferred to comics.

I agree with rugged individualism/self-reliant man as a theme. I noticed that myself in the HB Piper books I’ve read thus far. I have also noticed themes of the past repeating itself, and man’s understanding of his own limitations in/of knowledge.

 

[Sci-Fi Neophyte]

I see someone has already recommended Shannon Appelcline's The Science Fiction In Traveller: A Reader’s Guide to Traveller Role-Playing Fiction.
That's a great resource. You might also check out THE VISUAL ENCYCLOPEDIA OF SCIENCE FICTION by Brian Ash. It's a great history of science fiction published around the same time Traveller was created.

Poul Anderson's Trader Team/Future History of the Polesotechnic League Series was actually citied as an
inspiration by the author of the classic CT module Night of Adventure as a great source for merchant adventures, if memory serves:

The Trouble Twisters

David Falkayn -- Few indeed had won their Master Mercha…

www.goodreads.com

Thank you for your recommendations, amsboethius. I think Appelcline’s book will prove to be beneficial. I picked it up at DTRPG.

Appelcline states the reason I started this thread very succinctly in his Introduction:

“I think that one of the best ways to prepare yourself for a roleplaying game is to immerse yourself in its fiction. It’s a way to gain a visceral, unconscious understanding of a game world — allowing you to instinctively respond to your player’s action in the context of a real universe.”

Emphasis mine.

 

[Quint]

The Dumarest Saga consists of about 30+ books. Can you shorten that up a bit, please? Even if I cut the list off in the same year CT came out, that is still 17 books by Tubb.

That is fundamentally more like asking "which episodes of Star Trek were influential" than "which of the Star Trek movies were influential" - these are old scifi novels and by modern standards are incredibly short (barely beyond a novella) - which also establishes the nature of the series. While there was certainly an overarching narrative thread I'd hate to even call it a metaplot, more like a fictive conceit to provide some basic cohesion between essentially unconnected novels with the same character (which is how a lot of old scifi series worked 'back in the day').

Tubb's Dumarest, Norton's Free Traders, Bradley is probably work mentioning but it's hard to pick specific novels because the Darkover series is so omnipresent, Heinlein, Herbert (not just Dune, he wrote other things as well), Dickson's Dorsai books, Le Guin, Cherryh, Anderson, Niven, Pohl,... Honestly, just goodle "classic scifi novels of the XX's" decade and you're going to get a good sense of what to read.

D.

 

[infojunky]

Ok, straying from the core theme...

For my games a bunch of the Early "Cyberpunk" books form a core of sources for my early games.