• Welcome to the new COTI server. We've moved the Citizens to a new server. Please let us know in the COTI Website issue forum if you find any problems.
  • We, the systems administration staff, apologize for this unexpected outage of the boards. We have resolved the root cause of the problem and there should be no further disruptions.

New Campaign - Need Ideas

Sturn

SOC-13
With the new rules systems on the horizon, I'm starting a new campaign involving two players completely new to Traveller. My RPG campaigns are always thought out, with some randomn-like encounters, but always with one or two large central plots tying things togather. Not a "I have an adventure, bring whatever character your rolled up" campaign.

Campaign is to begin in 1105, enough time to introduce the characters to the game before the 5th Frontier War breaks out (which they will not know is coming).

I need help with ideas on what my first few "teaching" adventures will be. My two players are new to Traveller. Here are the ideas I want to get across in the first few adventures:

Brief History of the Imperium (could be a hand out)
Nobles (want players to eventually have a high noble contact in the SM)
Mystery of the Ancients (and the Solomani Hypothesis)
Setting up the 5th Frontier War (geography, history, Zhodani)
Major Races including differences between Humaniti
Importance of Trade on the setting
Vastness of the Imperium (and slowness of communication)
Mercs as an accepted practice in the Imperium

I would rather this information come across during adventures, not me just explaining it to the players (boring).

Not important for the first few adventures, but past experience with these players leads me to think they will eventally found a small merc unit after making enough credits from trading and general adventure.

Players will determine their own history for their characters. As a referee, I always use the first adventure to get the players togather. By tradition, all of my campaigns have begun with some sort of "meeting" adventure tied around an encounter at an inn/tavern/gambling house/bar, etc. The players know this.

The players will not be starting with a ship of their own. I want to feed the players the basics of the rules first, then let them get ahold of a starship to introduce the other half of the rules (starship economics, trade, space battles).

Any ideas, they don't need to be detailed, would be welcome. Like I said, I would like some adventures that teach the ideas I posted, teach the rules, and which lead to a long campaign verging into the 5th Frontier War breaking out.

I have a few of my own ideas, don't want to post them and stem any other creative output from fellow Traveller fans.
 
Last edited:
Many of the classic GDW CT adventures would suit your needs. You could pick-n-choose two or three of them, linking them together into a campaign.

Plus, there's the "unofficial" campaign that links Shadows, Research Station Gamma, Twilight's Peak, and Secret of the Ancients together.

GDW adventures are bare on details and heavy on story, so they're real easy to use with another Traveller game system besides CT. And, their design lends themselves to be highly customize by the GM (so you could easily, if you wanted to, work in more noble influence if you wanted).

When I break in new players, I always like to start small, doing something simple like HTH combat. Maybe I'll have the characters mugged or something on the first game session. And then I build, slowly touching all the areas of gameplay (fire combat, commerce, starship combat, vechicle combat, chases, etc) until, slowly, they've been exposed to most of the combat mechanics.

I think the four adventures mentioned above would suit your needs, if only because (A) they can easily be conformed to your stated campaign goals, and (B) they deal with Traveller history/ancients/Droyne/Psionics.

But, there are several other GDW adventures that I think would suit your needs as well. Many (most) of them are very open ended and indeed open to interpretation--making it quite easy for you to tailor any of those adventures to your GM whims.
 
Some silly ideas to start with ... :oo:

The high noble contact could hire the characters to escort a scientist who
specializes in the research on psi-controlled Ancient artefacts to Esalin, a
neutral mixed Imperial-Zhodani-world, where this scientist will meet with col-
leagues from the Zhodani Consulate and the Darrian Confederation to discuss
the idea of a joint research project.
From there they could accompany the scientist and two of his non-Imperial
colleagues to Nakege (TL 2), travelling on a far trader together with a small
unit of mercs, who were hired to protect the planned excavation on Nakege
from potentially hostile natives.
The only sure way to keep the said natives peaceful is to offer them some
trade goods, which the characters were asked to organize on Esalin - without
any knowledge about Nakege and what the people there might accept as a
gift.
 
Depending on the characters backgrounds

You could use the basic concept of B5 type characters being placed into a new and unusal setting

Vir and Lanir (Ambassador aids yet became friends because of their same type of positions and troubles) are a good example

Recently transfered to Security of the base. Great way to introduce them to every walk of life (and a good way to make some useful contacts.)
And/Or mantainence personel or one security and one mantainence and they are friends or become friends.

What every their backgrounds the are these ideas could be used
Sent to the base to establish contact (business or other) for their employer
Sent to the base to pick up some relatives/friends of their employer
Sent to the base to open a business or work at a business for their employer

They don't have to know much about the new enviroment because their employer believes in them (their skills, backgrounds, etc). So they can learn about their new enviroment thru interaction or Roleplaying research.

Just some generic suggestions

Dave Chase
 
As has already been suggested, keeping things small and simple is probably the best way to introduce new players.

I tend to use brief news reports as a way of introducing aspects of the traveller universe to players. It reveals background without intruding too heavily on the current scenario.
Then, when you're ready to bring that part of the setting into your campaign, the players already have some knowledge and can pick up play more quickly.

You can also use the news reports as player handouts too.
 
Thanks for the replies!

Here is what I'm currently planning, but it will change many times before this summer's campaign. As a reminder, my campaign will have two players who are completely new to Traveller. I plan on them starting with only one character each plus an NPC for guidance. When they make a move to space (get a ship), they will probably add one space-oriented character each (perhaps as hired crew).

Ine Givar Story Line

A run-in with thugs, that turn out to be Ine Givar. This will lead to a friendly law enforcement or military contact, and make the players the enemies of the local Ine Givar. Not sure if I want this to be the entry adventure of my campaign or not. I could easily have a "bar fight" at a high port bar, keeping with tradition in my campaigns, but it's very cliche and expected by now. Perhaps they respond to a terrorist attack while lounging in a bar at a high or star port.

The new contact will lead to more adventures against the Ine Givar. This will teach the personal combat rules. The players will eventually stumble upon a Zhodani spy amongst the leadership of the Ine Givar. This may be the Zhodani discovered and told about in the TAS news release (can't recall the details, a Naval officer reports a Zhodani spy being discovered, then later retracts the message just before the 5th Frontier War - the officer might be my contact from above - I like tying player exploits into canon events).

The Ine Givar campaign will thus transition nicely into the 5th Frontier War story line. By the time the FFW breaks out, the players should have at least gained a ship and thus been introduced to space combat, economics, and trade.

Fifth Frontier War Adventures

I'm not going to plan much here, I will have to wait to see what the players do in the earlier adventures.

One plan I have is the players will be sent by their naval/noble contacts to find Duke Norris's lost writ from the Emperor. If you know what I'm talking about, was their an official adventure detailing this? I don't mind (actually prefer) making my own adventures, but only have found pieces of information about the mission to find Norris's lost writ.

Another tie-in to canon during the FFW would be to have the players find the Zhodani secret base on Fulacin? (going from memory). This is detailed in one of the CT adventures Supplement 4 spoke about above.

The players could also engage in privateering, smuggling, rescue missions, scouting missions, and merc strikes, all depending on their resources, play style, and contacts developed before the FFW broke out.

Ancients Story Line

I usually don't use published adventures, but I may use the Research Station Gamma - Twilight's Peak - Secret of the Ancients adventures as suggested by Supplement 4. I may modify them greatly. If I do, I will skip Shadows, never liked it and it seemed redundant after I reviewed the stories above (you get the coyns and meet a chirper in RSG anyway).

Twilight's Peak, if my memory is correct, details the discovery of the secret Zhodani base. This ties things in with my FFW adventures, so both story lines may be run concurrent. Hopefully that doesn't get too complicated to the players. I think Secret of the Ancients may be saved until towards the end of the entire campaign, it's kinda a huge accomplishment, almost an "end-game" scenario, with discovering Grandfather and all.

This story line will include many low-combat adventures that will work nicely when interspersed with the FFW missions. These three adventures may be greatly spaced out during the Ine Givar / FFW adventures. An on-going mystery story that is eventually revealed throughout the entire campaign.

My campaigns are very open-ended. I don't push players the way I want them to. I do like to have plans in place though. Part of the fun as a referee for me is seeing where the story actually goes, which is often not what I had planned.

Any comments or further ideas welcome. Be critical if you want!
 
Last edited:
As has already been suggested, keeping things small and simple is probably the best way to introduce new players.

I tend to use brief news reports as a way of introducing aspects of the traveller universe to players. It reveals background without intruding too heavily on the current scenario.
Then, when you're ready to bring that part of the setting into your campaign, the players already have some knowledge and can pick up play more quickly.

You can also use the news reports as player handouts too.

I'm making a small website built around a TAS terminal or ship's computer layout. Links to TAS news, astrography, a ship's log to keep track of what the players have done, Library, etc. Something for the players to look at between adventures or on my laptop during adventures (it becoming the "in-game" computer terminal).

I did this in the past for a Star Wars campaign and it worked nicely. I even had an instant messaging system set up, where the players would be contacted between adventures in character by potential patrons if appropriate.

I can't post the link to the Star Wars site since I kept it private due to using possibly copyrighted Star Wars graphics, etc. It had a "datapad" entry, with links to news networks, player diary, galaxy map, library, player database of contacts, equipment, etc. A public version (with referee notes) of the characters' computer diary may be looked at here.
 
Last edited:
I'm making a small website built around a TAS terminal or ship's computer layout.

That's a great idea, if you have the capability. The reason I think it's a good idea is specifically for the new players. A lot of the stuff that you want to introduce by adventure seems to me would be mostly "common knowledge" to any local citizen, depending on where they come from.

Having a "library computer" that they can read and surf after the session I think is a good way to catch them up, and maybe not quite as "cheesy" as a handout.
 
Back
Top