Real World and Traveller

[Timerover51]

I had the following comment made to me on another thread, and it does raise an interesting question.

"this game is stupid for not matching the real world"

Note, I did not say that the game is stupid for not matching the Real World, but pointing out that Real World examples might have some relevance for Traveller.

So, the question which I wish to ask is as follows.

Does the Real World have any relevance to Traveller, or is it totally irrelevant with no application whatsoever?

As a corollary to that, if your response is that the Real World has no relevance for Traveller, then:

how is Traveller a "science fiction role-playing game", instead of a "science fantasy role-playing game" similar to say the old TSR Metamorphosis Alpha?

 

[simonh]

So, the question which I wish to ask is as follows.

Does the Real World have any relevance to Traveller, or is it totally irrelevant with no application whatsoever?

Traveller rules geenrally do attempt to model some aspects of the real world we are familiar with, such as how firearms work, the damage they do, that armour protects from damage, that characters have skills at tasks we are familiar with (as well as SF stuff like piloting spaceships), etc.

What Traveller doesn't do is try to explicitly model science fantasy dramatic conventions, or in fact any purely literary conventions. It's not a modern story game. So for example in Star Wars the characters talk about how wicked accurate Storm Troopers are, yet no hero character is ever hit by a storm trooper blaster bolt no matter how many dozen troopers are shooting at them at close range. Try that in Traveller and you'll end up with a character full of big nasty holes very quickly. Traveller was published by a wargames company, and is solidly simulationist.

Having said that, compared to some games out there Traveller is relatively rules lite and has a fairly crude, 'swingy' resolution system. There are only 11 possible outcomes of a 2D6 roll and even small modifiers can have a very big effect on the odds of success. A +2 DM can change the odds by around 30%.

The consequence of this is that there are a lot of edge cases the Traveller rules don't necessarily handle very well. All RPGs have this issue to one extent or another. Another good example in Traveller is that ships tend to come in sizes that are exact multiples of 100 displacement tons, and turrets are limited to 1 per 100 dtons, and all turrets are heavily standardised as are all ship's weapons. Don't even think about missile sizes and launcher characteristics. This is all pretty unrealistic, but it's a handy simplification that helps ensure that ships are easy to design, and unfamiliar designs are easy to understand. For the purposes of a game, these attributes have useful advantages over a super-detailed hyper-customisable design system.

Regarding science fantasy or science fiction, Traveller presents a consistent view of technological advancement and attempts plausible descriptions of their scientific underpinnings. It tries to present a technically consistent setting. Radiation exposure in Traveller deals damage that can cause sickness or kill, it doesn't cause your character to sprout bunny rabit ears. Last I checked, there is no Tech Level given for the development of the Orgasmatron or other purely fanciful inventions.

I have no idea which particular aspect of the rules your quotes are actually referring to, so I've tried to address the question in pretty broad terms. Is there any specific issue you'd like to raise?

Simon Hibbs

 

[Reban]

"Does the Real World have any relevance to Traveller, or is it totally irrelevant with no application whatsoever?".

For me it comes down to does my knowledge of the real world break my "suspension of disbelief" while playing a game like Traveller.

In my opinion Traveller is somewhere between hard science and space opera, and in the way I Ref its closer to hard science. Certain aspects of the setting break real world physics, such as contra gravity and jumpdrives, but they do so with a consistent internal mechanism which means that they can be explained in game, preserving my suspension of disbelief.

Traveller of course cannot be a perfect simulation of the real world and has to make compromises to make it playable, so its okay if the statistical model used in the rules because you're playing with a d6 does not perfectly mirror real world data, as long as it doesn't give rise to extremes that just couldn't happen in the real world.

Traveller isn't just physics of course, its also about human interaction (even when those humans are aliens). This is where good roleplaying has to be encouraged. I'm the kind of Ref that says things like "Are you sure thats what your character would do?" and makes sure there are consequences if players act inappropriately or ignore their character's motivations and constraints. Even with rules in Traveller for personal interaction that might throw up odd or unexpected results thats just a spur to roleplay the situation.

I'm okay with Traveller not mapping perfectly to the real world in all things as long as a). it's internally consistent and b). it doesn't go so far beyond the realm of what is possible in the real world that even its internal rules can't explain why something happens and breaks my suspension of disbelief

Do real world examples have relevance to Traveller? Yes, but technology or human motivations "in game" may render them irrelevant or at least make them less compelling.

 

[WistfulD]

Traveller plays fast and loose with reality, and where it cuts, it cuts on the side of playability.

Physics comes into play, but only in convenient terms. There's no wind resistence in space, and the laws of inertia come into play, but calculating travel distance between two points with 1/2 accelleration and 1/2 decelleration is non-calculus math. Making jump calculations between star systems, knowing that each one will have a different relative velocity? Not so much. However, it is hard science in that there aren't space storms, wormholes popping up everywhere, and regions of space where time runs backwards or whatnot.

One of the distinctions of the game is that it is story-modelled after age of sail/steam shipping, trade, and imperialism. Sometimes that story model bleeds into the physics of the game, and you get results less than realistic to space travel than hoped. This makes things less realistic, but I guess more familiar to those of us earthers who really have to put things in nautical metaphor.

 

[Quint]

I tend to see Traveller as more Reconstructionist than Romantic, but it certainly has elements of both, but the Romantic aspect is more focused around a vision of Empire and human society. Even in the breaks with hard science TRaveller tries to create and maintain a coherent and consistent "science" to explain things.

I think that has been the constant battle of Traveller - Realism vs. Roleplaying. CT is very much a "rules-lite" OSR kind of game, as the industry and the game itself have evolved it has grown increasingly granular and simulationist in nature.

(I think this is where MgT wins over T5, it went the Romantic/Roleplaying route while T5 when the Realistic/Reconstructionist route - different strokes, but I don't think that's what most gamers are looking for these days)

In general, I'm usually for some level of verisimilitude in my RPGs - so "real world" models are important to me. Sometimes it's because I need to explain how far someone can march in a day (often to gamers who have never hiked, backpacked, or done a road march), at other times it's because I'm trying to figure out how many -person-weeks of stores I can pack into a Scout/Courier...

D.

 

[Selandia]

Real World is in effect unless modified by the rules (OTU or MTU rules).

have fun

Selandia

 

[Timerover51]

For me it comes down to does my knowledge of the real world break my "suspension of disbelief" while playing a game like Traveller.

Hmm, I think that you hit the nail on the head when it comes to my problem with some of the rules in the later editions of Traveller.

These are some of the earlier threads I posted covering design sequences from or derived from MegaTraveller.

http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showthread.php?t=29055

http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showthread.php?t=27245

Based on what I have in my library and photocopy collection, the level for breaking "my willing suspension of disbelief" is pretty low.

One of the reasons that I like Classic Traveller is that it does not attempt to go into a design sequence for anything except space ships, and then only the larger ones. I still need to work on a better design sequence for small craft that makes them more affordable, while at the same time being simple and easy to use.

 

[JimMarn]

When I first read the 'sequence of historical events' for various things in Traveller, I was saying things to myself like 'I would put that in a slightly different era', etc.

Then I decided, it was basically looking back from thousands of years in the future.

That may not be the real reason, but that is what helped me accept some parts of the history of technology in Traveller.

I've read enough history books to realize, such things do happen. Like 1800s scholars thinking the Roman Empire had tipped over part of Stonehenge. Turns out it could have been Julius Cesear, and it could just as easily been someone many years earlier.

 

[simonh]

Based on what I have in my library and photocopy collection, the level for breaking "my willing suspension of disbelief" is pretty low.

The issues you cite seem to me to just be errata points. The Mega Traveller vehicle design rules were notoriously buggy as they were rushed to publication, I think to get it out for Gen Con. Many a game has suffered for doing that. I remember printing out half a dozen pages of errata for it.

I think there's a distinction to be made between 'this game sucks because this considered deliberate feature of the setting causes serious issues in my game' and 'this game sucks because someone accidentaly put the decimal point in the wrong place on this chart in a technical manual'. Just move the decimal point, or shift starburst shells from column B to column A. No drama required.

On the specific issue of TL categorisation, recent editions of the game have been very clear that some technologies are sometimes available at earlier TLs as experimental or limited availability*. Looking at WW2, America had the atom bomb while Germany had the V2 rocket. Tech levels are broad categories intended to cover a planet as a whole. If we go another 100 years in the real world without gravitic technology then yes, the Traveller TL scale is going to start seriously showing it's age, but I'm not going to lose any sleep over starburst shells.

Simon Hibbs

* During an 1890s Call of Cthulhu game a friend came across a reference to an American who invented a pump-action shotgun design. He wa ssuccessfuly sued by Remington on the basis they had patented the repeating rifle, but apparently a few cases had been shipped to London as samples before he was shut down. Our characters tracked down the gunshop and bought out the entire stock. Cha-Chink... BOOM! But I wouldn't use an example like that to argue for re-categorising the TL of shotguns, or claiming that the Call of Cthulhu weapons list for the 1890s is unrealistic for not including them. It's just an edge case.

 

[Reban]

I've never found any game that I found the technical design sequence or technical architecture satisfied me and I've collected a lot of them.

Traveller's FF&S and the Traveller compatible 3G went along way for me and probably were what attracted me to Traveller rather than the setting, game rules or anything else, but they are still far from perfect.

T5's design sequences have surprised me because they are rather light on detail, but they do output reasonable designs that are comparable to each other and that I as designer can explain by adding descriptive detail to them.

There might also be something to the fact that your examples TimeRover51 come from MegaTraveller a version of the game that has always just given me a "yuk" :nonono: feeling.

On Tech Level I've come to two conclusions:

1). Its an artificial measurement imposed by a high tech culture looking back, not just at Earth/Human history but many worlds and many societies. So if it doesn't always match what I know is possible here on Earth, I'm okay with that. In fact as a Ref it gives me licence to surprise players when they visit TLX worlds with slightly more advanced or less advanced tech than they expected from the published TL.

2). TL reflects mature technology. TL is a guide to what is in common use and is fully integrated into society. Its not a clock that ticks over into a new TL and suddenly a new technological wonder appears. When I say this world or period is TLX I mean that you may assume that you will encounter X technology in everyday life and it will not be remarkable to anyone with experience of it.

 

[Frankymole]

One thing I did like about late DGP classic / early Megatraveller was the Grand Census / World Builder's Handbook detailing of tech levels in different areas of progress. So (for example) a planet like Earth in the 1980s/90s could be ahead on robotics/cybernetics, computers etc but lagging on space flight and vacc suits. As indeed we are.

 

[WistfulD]

Hmm, I think that you hit the nail on the head when it comes to my problem with some of the rules in the later editions of Traveller.

These are some of the earlier threads I posted covering design sequences from or derived from MegaTraveller.

http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showthread.php?t=29055

http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showthread.php?t=27245

I read through these. There are some issues that could be called (and I will) "glaring inaccuracies," such as the number of crew needed per area of sail. Others, such as the shaped charges before TL7, perhaps "improper terminology," in that I think they meant shaped charge munitions as we think of them today.

Finally, I'm fond of invoking the "unspoken caveat" concept, and I think it applies to the 1 crew per kilogram of ordinance rules. Regardless of them applying it to all pre TL4 vessels, they meant it for ships of sail of the wooden hull and before era, and lumping wrought-iron armored vessels, with guns to match, breaks their algorithm. I'm have no idea if lumping those in with TL 4 makes the numbers work out better, but I'm guessing that that's the psychology behind it. Given that they are lumping everything below a certain level together, they are putting ballistas in with early cannons, so the exactitude of that rule is clearly pretty vague.

Based on what I have in my library and photocopy collection*, the level for breaking "my willing suspension of disbelief" is pretty low.

*first of all, did you mean a library and photocopy collection of game rules, or of historical naval weights and measures?

Either way, I believe that therein lies the true crux of the situation. You have a library of accurate weights and measures of boiler masses of late age-of-sail/age-of-steam naval vessels and are comparing it to an all-tech-level vehicle builder for a science fiction game(s) most concerned with giant contragravity spaceships. That makes you close to singular. Neither the people who designed the system, nor the people for whom they were expecting to use it, have that specific expertise or focus.

The counter-argument of course is: if they didn't want people going over their measures with a fine toothed comb, why did they build exacting wet-ship design rules? All I can say to that is, well, it's a discontinued line and you'll notice (if what I hear around here is correct), that the T5 builder affords itself a lot more vagueries.

I'm certainly sympathetic (perhaps more than a previous thread would indicate). Over on Dragonsfoot, we've had a rollicking discussion about the nature of longswords, shortswords, and bastard swords. I have to remind myself that the game isn't a historical emulator, it's a sword-swinging, treasure-getting game.

I think your best bet is to, as it was hinted at in those previous threads, make revisions as you see fit, and, if you so desire, submit them as potential errata. I don't have solid numbers on how many people still play MT (and check here for updated material), but there might be others who would appreciate it.

One of the reasons that I like Classic Traveller is that it does not attempt to go into a design sequence for anything except space ships, and then only the larger ones. I still need to work on a better design sequence for small craft that makes them more affordable, while at the same time being simple and easy to use.

That is certainly a design decision that makes it significantly harder to quible with. Modelling systems tend to break down when they hit scales for which they were not intended. Saying, "over here there be dragons" innoculates people from from criticism for not designing a working model for areas they aren't concerned with.

If you come up with a smallcraft system that works, I'd love to see it.

 

[Blue Ghost]

Traveller plays fast and loose with reality, and where it cuts, it cuts on the side of playability.

Physics comes into play, but only in convenient terms. There's no wind resistence in space, and the laws of inertia come into play, but calculating travel distance between two points with 1/2 accelleration and 1/2 decelleration is non-calculus math. Making jump calculations between star systems, knowing that each one will have a different relative velocity? Not so much. However, it is hard science in that there aren't space storms, wormholes popping up everywhere, and regions of space where time runs backwards or whatnot.

One of the distinctions of the game is that it is story-modelled after age of sail/steam shipping, trade, and imperialism. Sometimes that story model bleeds into the physics of the game, and you get results less than realistic to space travel than hoped. This makes things less realistic, but I guess more familiar to those of us earthers who really have to put things in nautical metaphor.

Which is one of my core beefs with the game's stated intent verse its implementation of its own rules.

In the end, like all RPGs, it is what you make of it. Still, it would be nice for some internal consistency.

 

[Timerover51]

Which is one of my core beefs with the game's stated intent verse its implementation of its own rules.

In the end, like all RPGs, it is what you make of it. Still, it would be nice for some internal consistency.

GDW games do have that problem, internal consistency, even within the same rule book.

 

[Blue Ghost]

GDW games do have that problem, internal consistency, even within the same rule book.

Like I put down in the legacy thread I started; the rules say one thing, but then there's an emphasis on canon which counteracts it.

I've stuck with Traveller because it is still largely a DIY game system. Regardless of what anybody says about the background, Marc Miller himself, Loren or Don, it's still ultimately a house rules games. They put the background there as a helper to the players, but Traveller has suffered a good amount of what could be called "canon creep".

It's not really a big deal until elements of canon get legislated as "must haves" to play. Eventually that will clash with real world chemistry, physics, mathematics, and the softer sciences. So...what do you do?

 

[rancke]

It's not really a big deal until elements of canon get legislated as "must haves" to play. Eventually that will clash with real world chemistry, physics, mathematics, and the softer sciences. So...what do you do?

You use the bits that you can swallow and reject bits that stick in your craw. Or you switch to GURPS or Basic Roleplaying or Fudge or Savage Worlds or BESM or whatever works for you.


Hans

 

[Enoff]

If you want to play real world reality combat join a [real] mercenary unit and fight [criminals]. We would appreciate any update on weapon lethality to the human body that might be inconsistent with the game rules.

 

[Timerover51]

If you want to play real world reality combat join a [real] mercenary unit and fight [criminals]. We would appreciate any update on weapon lethality to the human body that might be inconsistent with the game rules.

The following weapons all cause 3D6 of damage, regardless of range.

Automatic Pistol: A 9mm caliber weapon firing a 10 gram/154 grain bullet at 400 meters/1312 feet per second. I am not using 500 meters per second, as that velocity is hard to achieve in an automatic pistol, and the recoil for the average shooter would be prohibitive. The above load is a bit hotter than the standard 9mm Parabellum at a 7.5 gram/115 grain bullet at 347 meters per second/1140 feet per second. The muzzle energy of the Traveller automatic pistol would be about 600 foot pounds, and is on par with a good .357 Magnum load.

Carbine: A 6mm caliber weapon firing a 5 gram/87 grain bullet at 900 meters/2952 feet per second. These ballistics are pretty close to the .250 Savage round, of an 87 grain bullet at 3020 feet per second for a 6.35mm round. The muzzle energy of a .250 Savage is 1780 foot pounds and it is an excellent cartridge for hunting up to and including deer. Similar rifles, in the hands of expert shots, firing round nose full-jacketed bullets, have been used successfully on brain shots at elephants.

Rifle: A 7mm caliber weapon firing a 10 gram/154 grain bullet at 900 meters/2952 feet per second. A .30-06, firing a 150 grain bullet at 2970 feet per second, has a muzzle energy of 2930 foot pounds. The .30-06 round has more energy at 200 yards than does the .250 Savage at the muzzle.

All data on ammunition is taken from Cartridges of the World, by Frank C. Barnes, 3rd Edition. This book is a standard reference work on small arm cartridge data and performance.

As stated, all of the above weapons have the same damage rating of 3D6, regardless of range. Cloth body armor also gives the same hit reduction to all three weapons.

 

[simonh]

It's not really a big deal until elements of canon get legislated as "must haves" to play. Eventually that will clash with real world chemistry, physics, mathematics, and the softer sciences. So...what do you do?

Legislated.

Because if one of your players dobs you in for not following canon, a Game Police SWAT team will come round at 02:00am and no-knock raid your ass

The way I see it, as a GM you own your own game at your own table and you are responsible for the rules you use, the setting you present and the situations you put in front of your players. Nobody else, just you. Published rules can be a powerful tool in your kit, and we reasonably have high expectations as customers that they will do what they say on the tin, but at the end of the day they're just tools.

Tabletop pencil-and-paper RPGs are fundamentally different from most board games and card games. The printed rules and setting information are a starting point, they're a point of reference from which each game will inevitably diverge, if they even all actualy start from that point in the first place. They're never truly complete, never totaly consistent, and always open-ended.

Simon Hibbs

 

[salochin999]

Everyone has their own level of suspension of disbelief so you have to adjust the rules so they fit your personal level.