New thought about the course of Traveller

[robject]

Let me embellish on Savage's comment earlier with the way I would want CT Plus to work.

* Chargen that's somehow in between basic and advanced chargen. Education, yes. Special missions, no. Roll under characteristic for the career checks. Etc.

* Rules on how to use the senses.

* More than 6 careers, but not the COTI/MT list of 18 (some of those aren't careers, they're skills). Army, Navy, Marine, Merchant, Scout, Rogue, Scholar, Agent, Entertainer, Noble.

* Update the skills list to be narrower (and more) than CT, but wider (and fewer) than MT.

* Armor absorbs damage in combat. But also, I'd mine the Azhanti High Lighting personal combat rules for ideas. Ranges, mapped to range bands, would be standardized across the game and tuned to tasks in combat.

* Something similar to GunMaker, ArmorMaker, VehicleMaker, ThingMaker, Quality, Value, and Manufacturer data for enabling consistent design.

* Book 2 extended to include arbitrarily large hulls. Regularize the drives based on formula, update the available mounts and weapons, add defenses, armor, sensors. "Provide for" small craft design using these rules.

* Use simple mass fire rules to reduce the number of attack rolls. Replace Book 2 combat with a ship-based variant of personal combat, keeping the two as closely related as reasonable.

* T4's psionics.
* Genetic manipulation rules.
* Star system generation rules.
* World mapping rules.

* Generalized version of Book 3 trade. Scrap Merchant Prince.

* Replace animal encounters with a more robust Beast Maker system, and extend Sophont Maker from it.

* Replace Book 8 with a Robot Design system as a variant of Beast Maker.


There are 15 points of contention. I doubt anyone else will agree with 100% of my list. Potentially there are more than 32,000 ways to disagree with this list...

 

[savage]

There's very little of the "adjusting" - it's almost all "let's design a game with the same tropes" type parallelism.

Bingo B I N G O

Game designers, in general, want to stand out, so they all thing that is the appropriate approach. It is also more interesting for them.

 

[savage]

Let me embellish on Savage's comment earlier with the way I would want CT Plus to work.

* Chargen that's somehow in between basic and advanced chargen. Education, yes. Special missions, no. Roll under characteristic for the career checks. Etc.

* Rules on how to use the senses.

* More than 6 careers, but not the COTI/MT list of 18 (some of those aren't careers, they're skills). Army, Navy, Marine, Merchant, Scout, Rogue, Scholar, Agent, Entertainer, Noble.

* Update the skills list to be narrower (and more) than CT, but wider (and fewer) than MT.

* Armor absorbs damage in combat. But also, I'd mine the Azhanti High Lighting personal combat rules for ideas. Ranges, mapped to range bands, would be standardized across the game and tuned to tasks in combat.

* Something similar to GunMaker, ArmorMaker, VehicleMaker, ThingMaker, Quality, Value, and Manufacturer data for enabling consistent design.

* Book 2 extended to include arbitrarily large hulls. Regularize the drives based on formula, update the available mounts and weapons, add defenses, armor, sensors. "Provide for" small craft design using these rules.

* Use simple mass fire rules to reduce the number of attack rolls. Replace Book 2 combat with a ship-based variant of personal combat, keeping the two as closely related as reasonable.

* T4's psionics.
* Genetic manipulation rules.
* Star system generation rules.
* World mapping rules.

* Generalized version of Book 3 trade. Scrap Merchant Prince.

* Replace animal encounters with a more robust Beast Maker system, and extend Sophont Maker from it.

* Replace Book 8 with a Robot Design system as a variant of Beast Maker.


There are 15 points of contention. I doubt anyone else will agree with 100% of my list. Potentially there are more than 32,000 ways to disagree with this list...

Cool. Glad your a friend.

But wait I have seen people complain about T4 psionics and some like merchant prince.

In actuality, its not CT plus is it. It's another version

 

[robject]

Cool. Glad your a friend.

But wait I have seen people complain about T4 psionics and some like merchant prince.

In actuality, its not CT plus is it. It's another version

B I N G O.

And, "CT Plus" is a mythological wrapper covering something that's not really CT at all, and guaranteed to displease everyone if actualized.

 

[Vladika]

B I N G O.

And, "CT Plus" is a mythological wrapper covering something that's not really CT at all, and guaranteed to displease everyone if actualized.

We are a tough audience aren't?

 

[robject]

We are a tough audience aren't?

Well, this is the CT Burial Grounds, after all.

 

[Jame]

Sorry for the confusion. Their position. I had attempted to use Rob's own words in my argument.

Okay, now I feel better.

Though my dissatisfaction with some of those within MgT's fanbase is summed up by, when I referenced Pathfinder to support my desire to have a characteristic-improvement method within MgT (after chargen, that is), having a certain poster tell me "there's T20 for that" instead of saying "I don't want a mechanic of that type in MgT." Basically telling me that my modifying it with a house-rule is wrong. I'd happily accept another group's house rules, or even their sticking to their understanding of the rules-as-written, as long as they don't tell me that my wanting to modify the rules disqualifies me from playing Mongoose Traveller.

 

[aramis]

B I N G O.

And, "CT Plus" is a mythological wrapper covering something that's not really CT at all, and guaranteed to displease everyone if actualized.

ACT was getting pretty positive reviews from the playtesters - IIRC, it was...

• CT careers and characters with a few MT upgrades (more cascades)
• T20's Bk5 variant* as the core design system for ships and small craft
• CT Bk2 Mainworld Generation
• Book 6 System Generation, possibly with minor frequency tweaks
• CT Bk1 damage mechanics (tho' I'm not certain about the rest of combat)
• A Task system nearly identical to that of MT, and using the same 5 levels

*T20 made two small changes - the computer rules, and the addition of an Airframe component; it added more TL16+ options backported from MT as well. All the other changes to the design sequences were accidental and errata should have corrected them.

If it had been allowed to come out, it probably would have been quite popular with a lot of Traveller fanboys. And it would have been compatible with both CT and T20, and very easily adapted to/from MT. Which, at the time, covered about 75% of the demographics of COTI.

 

[Blue Ghost]

Well, there are 155 plus people at SJ Games looking at the GURPS section of the forums. That, as opposed to the 8 people here cruising the lone Star section.

I don't think Traveller, in anyh iteration, will be as big as a D&D, Warhammer, what not, but I think it can reach near GURPS numbers with the proper edification, and do so without skimping on the "real science" aspect of the game.

Just me.

 

[savage]

ACT was getting pretty positive reviews from the playtesters - IIRC, it was...

• CT careers and characters with a few MT upgrades (more cascades)
• T20's Bk5 variant* as the core design system for ships and small craft
• CT Bk2 Mainworld Generation
• Book 6 System Generation, possibly with minor frequency tweaks
• CT Bk1 damage mechanics (tho' I'm not certain about the rest of combat)
• A Task system nearly identical to that of MT, and using the same 5 levels

*T20 made two small changes - the computer rules, and the addition of an Airframe component; it added more TL16+ options backported from MT as well. All the other changes to the design sequences were accidental and errata should have corrected them.

If it had been allowed to come out, it probably would have been quite popular with a lot of Traveller fanboys. And it would have been compatible with both CT and T20, and very easily adapted to/from MT. Which, at the time, covered about 75% of the demographics of COTI.

Who was trying to do Advanced CT? I still like MT world builder and a few other bits from TNE, but sounds interesting.

 

[savage]

B I N G O.

And, "CT Plus" is a mythological wrapper covering something that's not really CT at all, and guaranteed to displease everyone if actualized.

CT Plus wording is just a marketing ploy.

Which is why I have asked these questions (more details) of others in the past.

 

[aramis]

Who was trying to do Advanced CT? I still like MT world builder and a few other bits from TNE, but sounds interesting.

Not "Advanced", but "Avenger" - Avenger Classic Traveller. Which was Avenger Enterprises - Essentially, MJD. It was in affiliation with Comstar Games (which was MJD and a couple partners).

 

[Garyius2003]

Well, there are 155 plus people at SJ Games looking at the GURPS section of the forums. That, as opposed to the 8 people here cruising the lone Star section.



Just me.

I subscribed to the forum for five years there, but it turned into a circle jerk (unlike here, where we tend to rehash topics, but with a new view) after the Traveller production petered out at SJG.

 

[robject]

ACT was getting pretty positive reviews from the playtesters - IIRC, it was...

Found my list.

Extended character generation, with more than 20 careers.
Experience points.
More skills than MT (more than 150 IIRC).
Armor soaks damage (T4-like).
Vehicle combat separate from personal and ship combat.
MT task system.
CT-like (i.e. not T4-like) psionics.
Some cool extra base codes (R=Ruined) and some I'm less certain of (N=Trade Nexus).
Book 6 star system gen.
Modified High Guard (e.g. weapon factors; computer software loadouts; all ALL bridges are 20 tons to control ships of any size; design beyond Jump-6).
Book 3 trade system.
About 350 full-sized (non-digest) pages.

 

[Vargas]

I don't think Traveller, in anyh iteration, will be as big as a D&D, Warhammer, what not, but I think it can reach near GURPS numbers with the proper edification, and do so without skimping on the "real science" aspect of the game.

I believe that it's the nature of the hobby/industry at this point that nothing will ever hit the level of sales and ubiquity that D&D has achieved. The relative ease with which RPGs can be produced today insure they will never fade away but also dilute the amount of interest and support that can be thrown behind any one product line.

 

[Golan2072]

This is a great analysis! I love this sort of commentary; it's something I can sink my teeth into, and we can all benefit from a little 20/20 hindsight.

I know that I'm quoting a post from three weeks ago, but I missed it back then (too many job troubles to attend to) and you deserve a "thank you for your kind words".

Anyhow, I think that an additional engine of change in Traveller rules is the drive to standardize everything. One task system to rule them all, one ship/vehicle design system to rule them all, and so on. In later editions, everything has a "maker" to design it, usually requiring a good deal of math. Though not a bad thing by any means, this is very different thing from what the three little books presented.

The magic of the three little books is in their ability to generate much complexity quickly and without too much math or book-keeping. You can generate a character, a world or an alien beast in 5 minutes; a ship takes 10-20 minutes to design from scratch. A character is a few rows of text on an index card (no character sheet actually necessary), a world is one line on a table, a starship is one paragraph of readable English text, a gun is practically damage and a list of modifiers. Careers are very simple so creating new ones is very easy - well, the system is very simple, so changing stuff is easy. But yet, this creates a lot of interplay and internal complexity arising from the interaction between the various sub-systems.

Later CT supplements scrapped this in favour of standardizing and cataloguing everything, as well as explicitly providing the details which were once hand-waved.

 

[Supplement Four]

Anyhow, I think that an additional engine of change in Traveller rules is the drive to standardize everything. One task system to rule them all, one ship/vehicle design system to rule them all, and so on. In later editions, everything has a "maker" to design it, usually requiring a good deal of math. Though not a bad thing by any means, this is very different thing from what the three little books presented.

Excellent point, Omer.

The, shall we say, open method that CT uses for throws (tasks) is one of the game's strengths. I think more people would embrace it if there was a chapter showing examples of how a Ref can handle throws--an advice chapter on creating CT throws.

And, there's nothing wrong with having a system to make vehicles, and having a different system to make slug throwers and so on.

If you know what you need to do, you just use the appropriate set of rules.

 

[savage]

Not "Advanced", but "Avenger" - Avenger Classic Traveller. Which was Avenger Enterprises - Essentially, MJD. It was in affiliation with Comstar Games (which was MJD and a couple partners).

Really? Interesting. I never knew Avengers was trying their own mix and clearly ended up supporting Mongoose. Did anything, a white paper, or anything ever get published? guess i need to look.

Not that i have anything against Mongoose. There is good and bad about every system. I just didn't like loosing all the competition.

 

[aramis]

Really? Interesting. I never knew Avengers was trying their own mix and clearly ended up supporting Mongoose. Did anything, a white paper, or anything ever get published? guess i need to look.

Not that i have anything against Mongoose. There is good and bad about every system. I just didn't like loosing all the competition.

They had a several hundred page playtest draft.

 

[Blue Ghost]

I believe that it's the nature of the hobby/industry at this point that nothing will ever hit the level of sales and ubiquity that D&D has achieved. The relative ease with which RPGs can be produced today insure they will never fade away but also dilute the amount of interest and support that can be thrown behind any one product line.

Very true.