Originally posted by Evil Dr Ganymede:
But let's look at what you say is so great about the TRP more closely:
random (or at least semi-random) career-based chargen.
Well, for starters, why is this such a good or desirable thing? It just means that players land up with characters that they don't want, because some random dice roll gave them a crappy stat, or forced them to muster out too soon. But anyway, T20 does this.
Surely you realize that this is a game-design-philosophy debate that's been going on for 20+ years and that reasonable minds disagree on it? And anyway, the point I was trying to make wasn't that the TRP is necessarily
better than the alternatives, but just that it is
different. Yes there are some characteristics of the TRP duplicated in the other systems (career-based chargen in T20, non-cinematic tasks and combat in GT, etc.) but neither of them duplicates
all of the TRP's distinguishing characteristics
and therefore someone who likes the TRP might not be satisfied with either d20 or GURPS (and, conversely, someone who doesn't like GURPS or d20
might find they like the TRP better -- not that they necessarily will, but they might...).
You've not explained what your 'preferred style of game/campaign' is though, and why GURPS or D20 Traveller fails to allow you to play in that style. It seems to me that a lot of your TRP can be covered using GURPS at least.
My preferred style is one in which organically-generated characters who are essentially 'regular folks' (as opposed to natural-born heroes) proceed through their lives and adventures in a 'realistic' (as opposed to heroic/cinematic) manner, and that their continued in-game development comes organically, rather than arbitrarily based on achieving 'story' goals. The two rules paradigms that I've found best allow me to achieve this sort of campaign are the TRP and RQ/BRP -- GURPS is fundamentally opposed on the chargen point, d20 is opposed on just about everything else.
*snort*. 'Constant revisions'?! GURPS has been largely the same (3rd edition) for at least a decade, and d20 is getting its first major revision after a few years. Traveller on the other hand has gone through SIX different versions, albeit on a longer time scale.
Okay, you caught me, and I'll cop to rhetorical excess on this one. However, it's still worth pointing out that since the version of the TRP presented in the CT reprints (i.e. the only version of the TRP
currently in-print) was originally published, GURPS has gone through 3 major revisions (GURPS 1st edition, GURPS 2nd edition, GURPS 3rd edition) and D&D/d20 4 (AD&D 2nd edition, AD&D 2.5 ('Skills & Powers' series), D&D3e, D&D3.5). The TRP also went through 3 subsequent revisions (MT, TNE, T4) but those revised versions aren't currently represented in the marketplace and someone new to the hobby investigating different game design philosophies won't see them, he'll only see the 1981 version that's 3-4 evoluntionary steps behind its competitors. If the CT reprints were compared to the versions of the other games current when the books were originally published then the relative merits of the TRP would be more clearly evident, but when comparing 1981-vintage TRP to 2003-vintage GURPS and d20 too many extraneous elements (grapic design, production values, writing style, polish & consistency of the rules themselves) reflect badly on the CT reprints (and thus the TRP as a whole) and obscure the fundamental game-design-philosophy issues.
Well, it's not like CT didn't ever get upgraded. The system was changed in MT, changed again in TNE, and again in T4. Am I remembering correctly that Marc himself said that he viewed the TNE system as the natural successor to the CT system?
CT's already *had* at least three upgrades. Are those really all so flawed that you'd not be satisfied with them? I'm surprised that nobody is keen to use the TNE system as a base rather than the CT.
Hopefully my clarification above has helped a little here. I realize that the CT reprints don't represent the evolutionary conclusion/pinnacle of the TRP, and in fact consider MT at least a vast improvement over CT (I suppose I TNE and T4 are also improvements over CT, but since I consider both as markedly inferior to MT it tends to cloud my judgment of them). At least 70% of what I'd like to see in T5 is already present in MT. But that's completely beside the point: MT, TNE, and T4 are all out-of-print, and someone just entering the hobby and investigating what the TRP is all about isn't going to see them, he's going to see the CT reprints. Therefore, from the point of view of this hypothetical newbie gamer, those sets might as well not have ever existed -- the currently available representative of the TRP in the marketplace doesn't include or address them at all.
Other people have already had 25 years to see it, and evidently they weren't sufficiently impressed to adopt it in their droves. GDW kept the system alive and evolving through MT and TNE, then they folded in the 90s. Since then, there was the abortive T4 attempt, and that was that. Now we have Traveller adopted into two very successful systems - d20 and GURPS - and people are complaining about it, or even resentful of it?
Numbers check: according to the data in FFE001, the CT rules (including Basic Traveller, Basic Traveller revised, Starter Traveller, Deluxe Traveller and The Traveller Book) sold almost 250,000 copies over ten years (248,585 exactly). While some of that can be attributed to lack of competition, numbers this big certainly suggest that
some people found things to like about CT...
As for why MT, TNE, and T4 weren't able to retain and/or build upon that base, there's plenty of room for speculation, blame-assigning, and finger-pointing (q.v. the
very long thread devoted to this very topic) but I think to claim that it's because people didn't like the TRP is at best a great oversimplification and at worst just plain wrong.
You do realise how fanatical you sound, right? Your implicit assumption is that the tweaked CT system is simply brilliant, that it's an inherently great system that's just been overlooked by everyone.
Yes, I am fanatical on this matter, so I'm glad that comes across
. And, with a slight rewording, I would agree with the 'implicit assumption' you assign to me: "the tweaked CT system is simply brilliant, it's an inherently great system that's just
currently being overlooked by everyone" (the key difference being that it wasn't always overlooked -- remember those 250,000 rulesets).
I don't think people are all that interested to see yet another Traveller system, given that there have been so many alraedy.
But new gamers don't know or care that there have been multiple Traveller rulesets. All they know and care about is what they see on the shelves at their FLGS. If it gets their attention and it's good they won't care if it's the first edition of the game or the twentieth. If T5 were being marketed solely to grognards and the existing Traveller fanbase then you'd be right, and that's why I've consistently argued AGAINST marketing T5 solely to grognards and against 'reinventing the wheel' yet again -- IMO the key to T5 is to take the proven and successful CT/TRP system, bring it up to modern standards, and present it to those who weren't around to see it 10-25 years ago. Some/many would claim this is exactly what T20 did, but since T20 uses a system which is not only
not the TRP but is in several philosophical ways
fundamentally opposed to it, it should be obvious why that wouldn't satisfy me. YMMV.
Most of the current generation of gamers probably aren't even familiar with the old CT system (I doubt if many of them have picked up the CT reprints) - they're likely to have started with GURPS or T20. Right now, the CT system is probably looked upon as a quaint relic that really shouldn't be allowed out of the retirement home, rather than as a highly innovative, elegant rules system that is actually worthy of serious attention.
And here you're making my point for me every bit as well as I could've made it for myself. The mass of the modern gamer audience doesn't know CT or the TRP. They
could try to discover it through the CT reprints but they won't. For those who think the TRP really is a quaint museum piece and nothing more, then T20 and GT are sufficient to keep the Traveller brand/universe/style alive and there's no need for a T5, now or ever. But for those who believe that the TRP really IS "a highly innovative, elegant rules system that is actually worthy of serious attention" (as I do -- you may have meant this description facetiously but it really does reflect my opinion), surely it's in the interest of the system to present it in a manner which will allow people to see it as such? I'm not asking that you agree with my opinion that the TRP is the best ever rpg-engine, or that T5 is therefore a necessary or even desrirable thing, but I am asking that you acknowledge that there are some of us who do feel this way, and that our desire to see T5 is based on something more substantial than knee-jerk nostalgia and grognardism.
You're probably right that we're only a small minority of the current fanbase, and that our desires are at best totally impractical and at worst just plain wrong, but even given that I still don't see what harm we're doing by talking and dreaming about seeing the TRP once again at the forefront of the rpg industry. It's not like we're constantly going onto GT and T20 boards and berating everybody with how bad those systems are and telling people not to buy them, we're just quietly, in our own little neighborhood, wishing for an alternative. Why is this so offensive?
