Is Traveller Dead?

[Gray Lensman]

As a seasoned grognard, I think, that I could say a few words...yes, Traveller as we know it has been dead since T4 although, it was brought back in a coma state with GURPS. The mantle of what GDW built went down when the company went under (or went to create MT). Everything that was Traveller from 1977-(1987)-1996/97 died in flames.

I have to agree with Kafka somewhat. I started in '77 with LBB 1-3 and I will probably never will be a writer or producer for the game. IMO TNE started the downfall because Virus turned many people off, T4 was simply dreadful, GURPS success came from not only from a common rules system but from the fact the rebellion never happened (I must admit here that my own system is more MT than CT), T20 ... Bleh, MgT, well I guess anyone can basically do a rewrite on a game.

However, we know that Traveller is a phoenix. It is kept alive by those who keep the base fire alive. Those are people like Jon, MJD, Daryen, Hans and countless others who publish and self-publish...an ever greater array of materials - some good - some terrible but all keep that flame alive.

Yes, it does go through rebirths every time a new system (???) is published and IMO there are more names than Kafka listed (Loren, Clay... I could think of some more).

Till we get to Mongoose, which is the only company, that has gone back to the roots of GDW and expanded upon it. Therefore, yes, there are flaws (just as there were flaws in GDW products) but the phoenix is born anew to a new generation.

Mr. Kafka sir, do you really see MgT as an expansion? Most I can see is a rewrite of CT with slightly different mechanics (although I admit to using a few things IMTU).

Of course YMMV

 

[HG_B]

I have to agree with Kafka somewhat. I started in '77 with LBB 1-3 and I will probably never will be a writer or producer for the game. IMO TNE started the downfall because Virus turned many people off, T4 was simply dreadful, GURPS success came from not only from a common rules system but from the fact the rebellion never happened

I think it started, a little, with the incredibly bad editing job that was done with the MT materials. Although, IMO, MT rules set was very good, the abysmal quality of the materials started it. TNE was one of the final nails with the people I gamed with at the time.

 

[aramis]

Hasn't MGT sold over 10k copies? Sounds lively to me.

CT sold over 150,000 copies in 12 years, most of those in the 1980-'85 window. Mongoose is around 15,000 to 30,000 in 2.5 years, if I read Matts hints correctly. Dresden Files hit 10,000 in under 2 months.

But, as has been noted recently by F. Mentzer, TSR sold at lest 10,000 of almost every supplement and adventure. Now, that's a corebook doing well.

It's market fragmentation.

Burning Wheel uses runs of 5,000... goes through one about every 2 years.
Mouse Guard had a run of 20,000 and sold out in about a year. (And is coming back with another 20k run, in boxed sets.)

 

[dmccoy1693]

CT sold over 150,000 copies in 12 years, most of those in the 1980-'85 window. Mongoose is around 15,000 to 30,000 in 2.5 years, if I read Matts hints correctly. Dresden Files hit 10,000 in under 2 months.

Comparing any RPG sales to the early 80's like comparing any other starship to the Enterprise. There is no comparison. It was a once in a lifetime event. Twice if you count D&D 3.0 sales in 2000-2002. But that's it. All the rest of the time its been a reasonably constant set of numbers. For any non-D&D RPG to sell in the 1000's at all is highly impressive. For MGT to sell 15-30k outside of those two time periods is a massive success.

 

[aramis]

Sorry, D, but white wolf routinely sold 20K units of supplements, as did Palladium, through the early 1990's.

it wasn't the "80's bubble"... it was the combination of the CCG success displacing product space, and the rise of small press in mainstream outlets due to reduced costs to print...

The real culprit, according to Mentzer, Gygax, and a dozen others from the big companies, is that there are too many games on the market.

It's been estimated that total sales of all RPGs are up (WOTC, 2006 or so), but that individual market share of any one of them is smaller because while there may have been 100 with world wide sales in 1985, counting then out of print ones, there are over 1000 games being sold today. Not counting the massive numbers of supplement only producers like yourself.

 

[HiverLord]

Then there is the fact that most modern gamers would rather shoot at things on a screen, or solve pre-determined puzzles which are generally 'spoon-fed' on a video screen. "Action Action Action!"

Traveller gamers are Thinkers. They LIKE to get their fingers (and minds) around the nuts-and-bolts of a situation and/or setting. They like concrete, real-world (if that's possible...) answers to things. Action is great, but we realize that too much action gets one killed quickly.

Look at some of the discussions on these posts; how many D&D or Runequest or whatever gamers will dig deep into how a particular ship should be laid out, or discuss in great detail how a weapon is or should be designed? I haven't see that level of detail in other gaming systems (though of course I haven't played most of them, either).

The Traveller game and setting is very much a niche, inhabited by the few, the proud, the... dare I say it, geeky? (*I* certainly fit the mold, at least according to my teenage daugther!:rofl

Most young kids these days, raised largely by Madison Ave advertisers, don't want to take the time to think about their games, from what I can see...

Perhaps they lack vision? (Not all of them, of course! Just an apparent majority of them...)
<sigh>

 

[FreeTrav]

Rather than directly give you my answer to your question, I'll let you infer it from my comments below...

I run a Traveller website, and have done so for over ten years. In that time, I have never lacked for new material to add to the site - material created mostly not by me, but by the Traveller community.

A year ago, I decided to try to take the website in a new direction - instead of adding material ad-hoc, I poured it into a desktop publishing program, added some prefatory comments of my own, and a bunch of layout elements like you would find in print magazines. I then generated a PDF file for an eight-page proof-of-concept, and called it by the same name as the website - which, at the time, had over a thousand articles on it.

The proof-of-concept PDF was well-received. In January 2010, I started monthly publication - and haven't been able to keep it below about 20 pages, each month. When I post the December 2010 issue, shortly after US Thanksgiving, if nothing interferes, I expect that I will have shared about 320 community-contributed pages of material over the course of the year.

I have a stack of Traveller material sitting on the table near me. It is roughly 36 inches high. Most of it is from Mongoose Publishing; what isn't, is from current third-party publishers. OK, there's two items that are neither Mongoose nor Traveller, but they're items which, on inspection, I felt could easily provide ideas and inspiration for the Traveller community, and as such, have been/will be reviewed in the magazine.

There are not less than three active online web forums - including this one - where Traveller is actively discussed. There are several email lists devoted to Traveller. There is a convention annually, in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, devoted to Traveller, and there is a fair-sized chunk of the Traveller community at BayCon, in San Francisco.

Need I be more explicit?

 

[ShapeShifter]

Traveller is a niche within a corner within a cubbyhole within a pocket universe. There, if you can find it, it is alive...wheezing while taking generous puffs of air from the respirator, but alive. RPGs in general are not doing too well since the Economic Crash, so we'll have to be patient for better times. *crosses fingers*

 

[Enoff]

Is Traveller a philosophical perspective?

I somewhat remember the title of a thread something like, "Do you play Traveller or are you playing Traveller?"

Somewhat of an ambiguous idea or as I mentioned a perspective. Still, even though I am not currently playing Traveller, I do think a lot about Traveller. I enjoy learning as much as I can of it and even speculating about it. I can't think of it as dead. There are too many discoveries to be made.

 

[fiat_knox]

Unless Mongoose or whoever tries to splurge a bit on advertising and thereby bring Traveller and RPGs to mainstream attention, it may never break through that perceived barrier.

2000AD has long been perceived as niche, yet its launch in 1977 included TV advertisements - and as far as I can tell, neither the Beano nor Dandy has ever really done that, beyond the occasional "The 6000th Beano gets published today" drivel news slot in some dreary BBC evening magazine show.

An advert for Traveller made available even online would help break it free of its somewhat close orbit of Planet Obscurity. "Looking for something exciting and different in this year's Christmas sticking? How about Mind-Reading Alien Diplomats, Laser Pistols, Strange Creatures ... And A Ticket To Explore Mind-Blowing Alien Worlds? Try the Traveller tabletop roleplaying game today!"

 

[Jay LaRosee]

I am a self-avowed Traveller addict who has never sought intervention. I am also a game store owner (shameless plug for Medieval Starship in Pembroke Ma.) In the store I have the actual GDW sign on display along with original Traveller art. And, for all that, I have just one shelf of Mongoose Traveller. But then, I only give one shelf over to most any RPG other than D&D or Pathfinder. The why is because that's the shelf space each product earns in the store.
Want more Traveller at your FLGS? Plan an afternoon with your friends and go play Traveller, any version, in print or out, at the store. Invite questions from folks and share the fun the game brings you. And when you finish buy something- anything- from the shopkeeper so he can appreciate your support of his store. Then go back the next week and do it again.
Build some buzz for the game and the FLGS will start stocking it in. If you think it's the sole responsibility of the store to promote the game, it will fade away for lack of interest. There's just too many other games looking for the same disposable income.

 

[Keklas Rekobah]

... Plan an afternoon with your friends and go play Traveller, any version, in print or out, at the store. Invite questions from folks and share the fun the game brings you. And when you finish buy something- anything- from the shopkeeper so he can appreciate your support of his store. Then go back the next week and do it again...

Aye, there's the rub. The nearest game store is a Warhammer venue, and its employees do little, if anything, to encourage (or protect) Traveller players. The next nearest one is 30+ miles away.

 

[Icosahedron]

No matter how much advertising is done, Traveller will remain a niche market. You have only to look at the shelves of your local bookstore - the Fantasy section is often many times larger than the Scifi section. Scifi itself is a niche market, and Traveller has just one small corner of the scifi game market. Looking at the current bookshelves (and online-gaming sites) Vampire games probably have bigger sales potential than our niche.

 

[giant.robot]

Traveller isn't dead for me, in fact I'm getting back into it not having played since the 90s in high school. However I can easily see how this question might come up. Between high school and now I hadn't seen hide nor hair of Traveller in game stores, book stores, or game news sites. I had nearly forgotten about it until I saw the Mongoose books at a FLGS this year. Traveller suffers from a serious advertising problem. It's an awesome game but if you don't ever tell anyone about it no one is ever going to pick it up.

Paizo and WotC have the right idea with their organized play nights, Pathfinder Society Organized Play and Encounters respectively. New players can sit down with no prior experience and play a game. The adventures are self contained episodes but fit into a larger story but nothing prevents someone from just jumping into a random game. There's plenty of gamers that would like Traveller if they played it but have no idea what it is so aren't about to ask.

 

[mbrinkhues]

Is Traveller dead? At least it is dying and it has been so for quite some time. Most buyers of the material are "old times" or "collectors", the influx of new players is small even compared to the general "die out" of RPGs as a hobby.

Looking at the major conventions here in germany Nelson at Trafalga could have counted the number of Traveller scenarios run IN TOTAL. Similar looking at boards, games meets etc. Most groups are old/established and "new" groups are often "have relocated" long term Traveller players.

This has something to do with the nature of the game (Lack of Maggi and other Fantacrap elements) running contrary to what is "in"

 

[HG_B]

Just a random marketing thought formed early in the morning. I have worked a lot with Indian tech companies and have hired over there. I wonder if the growing tech economy there (with the attendant geeks) would be a good market for Traveller? At least no translation costs...

 

[far-trader]

You want to outsource our RPG?

:rofl:

If that works I could to move to India, get a job, AND find a game. Sounds like paradise

 

[HG_B]

You want to outsource our RPG?

:rofl:

Um, no. I want Trav to be marketed to a very large, new, potential pool of players...

Apparently, Marc needs someone who knows how to market B2C as there isn't anyone in his "circle" that has a clue.

 

[far-trader]

It was just a joke HG_B

I think we all get the idea that some new marketing ideas might be good. I'm sure it's not as simple as taking out an advert though. And for pen and paper RPGs, geeks or no, I'm not sure any potential pool of players is an actual market any longer. Certainly not any who have access to computers/consoles and a high speed connection.

P&P FtoF RPGs are in fact a dying form imo. Unless and until they can be updated to take full advantage of the internet connected graphic interplay out-of-the-box they won't grow or attract many new gamers. It'll just be us diehards, and the few we inflict our hobby on in person. We who can actually remember a time before the internet (before even dialup 300baud let alone always-on high-speed), before a connected computer in every hand and on every desk, before a connected console (or 2 or 3) on every TV (every BIG HD Widescreen flat dispaly, one per person) before cell phones, etc...

...unless all our tech suddenly implodes and we lose all that and are forced to once again engage in actual face-to-face real time entertainment that doesn't have to be plugged in.

Actually, it you want a real market for RPGs in the traditional sense, that's where to look, somewhere so far behind the tech curve that they aren't distracted by all that. That's the only place you'd have a shot at making it work.

EDIT: And I'm pretty sure Marc and his "circle" has more than a clue. Your insult is not appreciated.

 

[Andrew Boulton]

Just a random marketing thought formed early in the morning. I have worked a lot with Indian tech companies and have hired over there. I wonder if the growing tech economy there (with the attendant geeks) would be a good market for Traveller? At least no translation costs...

There's a *cultural* translation, though. They're big on storytelling, so RPGs in general should work. We're gonna need rules for the song and dance routines...