Morte's "policies" for Gateway adventures

[Morte]

Now that I've run a couple of the published Gateway adventures and I'm doing GM prep for the rest, I'd like to propose a few "guidelines for authors" that QLI should promulgate from here on in:

- Don't assume that the PCs are newly rolled for this adventure.

- Don't assume that they have(n't) got a ship.

- Don't assume that the PCs are broke (especially if they've just mustered out).

- Don't assume that every PC ship in every adventure is a few weeks away from annual refit time.

- Don't assume that the ship has no air/raft.

- Describe all the worlds. That's ALL the *@&#ing worlds. Don't give us pious guff about spending time on each world then say "but we won't be describing them for you; even though you paid for this adventure to save yourself time and effort, you'll have to do the world design yourself".

If the adventure deviates from any of the above, let's have some truth in advertising. The blurb we read before purchase should say "this adventure assumes that the PCs have no air/raft" or "you will need to develop 6 of the 9 worlds inviolved yourself".

Furthermore, it would be really nice if you were to...

- Provide basic hooks for PCs who just finished another adventure 15 parsecs away to get involved in this one.

- Stop using CT deckplans with T20 stats (hello, Broadside of a Barn).

- Write the adventures so the interesting bits generally happen, rather than they only happen on a DC 30 search check or DC 35 Sense Motive check, i.e. they generally don't.

- Stop providing irresponsibly short world descriptions, which are too short to be much use to a GM in the way of adventure ideas but specific enough to tie future canon writers' hands. Do them properly.

- Get your facts right, e.g. don't divide the population of Stoner by 100 or use NPCs whose speed is impossible for their armour. Or at least get a proof-reader who's familiar with T20 and G993.

 

[Keklas Rekobah]

If I may add my 20 millicredits...

- Make the NPC's interesting. Come up a few personality quirks and use them. An excellent source of Advantages/Disadvantages is the game system GURPS (... pardon me, too much coffejuice...).

- Please, no November monsters or Deus Ex Machinae. If the PC's have to be rescued late in the adventure, then provide the means for them to rescue themselves earlier.

- Every detail must mean something; 'throw-away' items are irrelevant to the advancement of the adventure, and should be left out of the main description.

- Provide enough flexibility in the story arc that it will at least seem to be driven by the PC's actions.

- NPC's will react to the PC's actions. They won't just stand around gawking while the PC's commit seemingly random acts of violence. Perhaps a line in the cultural description that includes "... a well-armed militia, being essential for good order, will respond to any civil unrest brought on by offworlders..."

- No re-writing of the core rules or weapon stats. Stick to Traveller canon in this respect. Leave it up to the Ref to insert his or her own house rules, and do not introduce non-standard technology. Ancient tech is the exception, as it is unreliable and few PC's should know how it works, anyway.


IMHO, canned adventures tend to be revisions of previous adventures, or they tend to be vehicles for presenting the authors vision of how the game system should have been written. Traveller provides a framework for adventures; eat away at that framework, and the game is no longer Traveller.

IMHO, grafting aspects of other systems that do not conflict with Traveller canon seems okay, as long as the grafted technology is not some ubermacht that could change civilization. An example would be the 'Stargate' technology; place one on every world, and who needs spacecraft? Place the 'gates on out-of-the-way worlds of marginal economic value, and only one (or less) per sector. Sure, you could jump several hundred parsecs at a time, but you won't be arriving in the Stargate equivalent of Grand Central Station (unless it's in the middle of a radioactive wastelend, for instance...).


Okay, that's 35 millicredits. Keep the change.

 

[Psion]

Originally posted by Morte:
- Don't assume that the PCs are newly rolled for this adventure.

Indeed.

- Don't assume that they have(n't) got a ship.

Now here, I think you have to assume something. Whether or not the PCs have a ship would make a big difference in the way that an advanture runs. At best, you might tack on a page or two of scenarios to provides a ship if they don't have one and the adventure requires one.

- Stop using CT deckplans with T20 stats (hello, Broadside of a Barn).

Since T20 ship rules are a dressed up version of High Guard, I am not seeing the problem here.

- Write the adventures so the interesting bits generally happen, rather than they only happen on a DC 30 search check or DC 35 Sense Motive check, i.e. they generally don't.

Agreed. I'd also add, don't make an encounter a "key" if it's not likely to happen.

- Stop providing irresponsibly short world descriptions, which are too short to be much use to a GM in the way of adventure ideas but specific enough to tie future canon writers' hands. Do them properly.

Hmmm. Nah. I'd rather have something I can work with and gives me some ideas than something that pidgeonholes me and gives me something so extensively detailed that it can't help but be irreconcilable with what I have assumed about the world.

For example, I made up some details about Kiikedia before I knew there was a writeup of it in Objects of the Mind. But as the description was fairly general, so it was not difficult to reconcile the two.

 

[Morte]

Originally posted by Psion:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />
- Don't assume that they have(n't) got a ship.

Now here, I think you have to assume something. Whether or not the PCs have a ship would make a big difference in the way that an advanture runs. At best, you might tack on a page or two of scenarios to provides a ship if they don't have one and the adventure requires one.</font>[/QUOTE]Most of QLI's adventures could work if the PCs arrived with a ship or were hired on to crew one. It wouldn't take much for them to address this (some do, e.g. Kursis Charter).

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />- Stop using CT deckplans with T20 stats (hello, Broadside of a Barn).

Since T20 ship rules are a dressed up version of High Guard, I am not seeing the problem here.</font>[/QUOTE]Its stats say T20 J2/2G. Its deckplan says ancient CT J1/1G ship (not enough room for the plant and drives otherwise). Its design says 20 dtons of cargo, but its deckplan fills that up with "sensor bays" and the like.

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />- Stop providing irresponsibly short world descriptions, which are too short to be much use to a GM in the way of adventure ideas but specific enough to tie future canon writers' hands. Do them properly.

Hmmm. Nah. I'd rather have something I can work with and gives me some ideas than something that pidgeonholes me and gives me something so extensively detailed that it can't help but be irreconcilable with what I have assumed about the world.

For example, I made up some details about Kiikedia before I knew there was a writeup of it in Objects of the Mind. But as the description was fairly general, so it was not difficult to reconcile the two. </font>[/QUOTE]That's becuase you started on the adventure then read the setting material. If you'd got the setting first, you wouldn't have had that problem. You'd have saved time on Kiikedia (by getting it done for you), or if you still didn't like the description in OOTM you could still have overridden it IYTU.

[I'll offer you last post on this, otherwise we're going to go off into the eternal spiral...]

 

[mike wightman]

Morte, the CT Scout ship is jump 2, maneuver 2 in all editions of the game. Why do you say the deckplans show the J1/M1 CT Scout, there's no such thing?
A lot of the CT deckplans, especially those in Traders and Gunboats, are a little on the large side. If you don't like them could I suggest these as an excellent alternative

 

[Morte]

Poor choice of words on my part... it's an ancient deckplan, which does not relate to the design, and could only be J1/1G.

 

[mike wightman]

I always assumed the drive bay was double height and therefore big enough, but I understand your point
Does anyone know in which year the type S Scout/Courier was first introduced in its current form?

 

[Morte]

Originally posted by Sigg Oddra:
If you don't like them could I suggest these as an excellent alternative

I always liked that one. Though it would be nice if it had only one airlock to match the T20 standard design. Or at least, if when it appeared it appeared with a stat block including two airlocks.

http://www.travellerrpg.com/cgi-bin/Trav/CotI/Discuss/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=4;t=000629 the ship my lot are flying. It's not pretty but it does the job.