Revised CT?

[Flynn]

So long as the changes in the system promote habitable worlds, etc., over making a bunch of uninhabitable rocks, I'm cool with it.

-Flynn

 

[Ranger]

Originally posted by Bhoins:
Actually there are two methods of computing passage rates in the rules. And the paragraph that states the second method is in CT, MT and T20.

The rule that is generally accepted is that the rate is per jump regardless of distance. Cr10,000 for High Passage, Cr8,000 for MidPassage Cr1,000 For cargo and LowPassage. So if I book high passage from RHYLANOR to POROZLO I pay Cr10,000 regardless of the jump potential of the ship and the ship gets there in one week. To take this example one step further, if I book passage from RHYLANOR to Jae Tellona (2 hexes away) it costs me Cr10,000 if it is a Jump2 or higher ship and it takes one week. Now if I take a Jump-1 ship via POROZLO to Jae Tellona I have to pay Cr20,000 and it takes me two to three weeks to get there.

However the rules state that:

"Difference in starship jump drive capacity have no specific effect on passage prices. A jump-3 starship charges the same passage price as a jump-1 starship. The difference is that a jump-3 ship can reach a destination in one jump, while the jump-1 ship would take three seperate jumps (through two intermediate destinations, and requiring three seperate tickets) to reach it. Higher jump numbers also make otherwise inaccessable destinations within reach. But for two ships of differening jump numbers going to the same destination in one jump, each would charge the same cargo or passage price." (Book 2 pg. 9 also copied directly into MT and T20 rules)

Without the statements in other places, one would imply that the charge is Cr10,000 per parsec. As a Free Trader going from RHYLANOR to Jae Tellona via POROZLO would charge (because two tickets have to be purchased) Cr20,000, so a Far Trader going from RHYLANOR to Jae Tellona directly would charge the same or Cr20,000. Travelling from EFATE to REGINA would cost Cr60,000 regardless of how, or on what combinations of ships, or how many interveneing destinations there were. Whether it took one week or 11 weeks, it would still cost Cr60,000.

Now I still think that is unrealistic. After all people are more than happy to pay FedEX a premium to ship something that gets there the next day instead of taking 2-3 days. (As much as 7 times as much.) But it is a better model than paying more to get there in 6-11 weeks than you have to pay to get there in less than 6 weeks. If I do it in one hop then it only costs me Cr10,000 and only takes one week. On A SubLiner via Knorbes it takes 3 weeks and costs me Cr20,000.

For the traveller, for the manufacturer, for the guy with the cargo he needs to get to market, this is one hell of a deal, but where is the incentive to buy faster ships to the Carrier? Commerce would slow to a crawl in the real world with this kind of price fixing. Oh and how much should I charge for my goods on the other end, because I don't know what I am going to have to pay for shipping?

We would still be using Stagecoach and Steam engines to get from NYC to LA. (If we were that advanced.) Aircraft would have military and government applications only.

Now T20 states specifically that the price is regardless of distance but still copies that paragraph word for word.

BTW using the Per Parsec interpretation of that paragraph fixes passage prices. A J-2 ship that averages 3 parsecs per month makes a small profit against the expenses (including mortgage) with full loads. A J-3 ship does the same thing with 5 parsecs per month. It gives incentives to travel to those worlds not on a Main and allows banks to finance ships over a period of 40 years.

Otherwise a starship with greater than Jump-1 in CT or T20 can never make its mortgage regardless of size. Now because of the different fuel requirements in MT and other versions I am not sure where the break even point is on J-2 ships, though an MT Far Trader can't make its payments.

And major corporations can, like they do today, buy ships on credit. After all if you can put 5 ships in space for the same up front cash as one or 20 for the same up front cash as 5 then you would stimulate more trade. Which is what the Imperium is all about.

This is not a feature, this is a bug. (Because it is written differently in two places so it is something the editor missed.)

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Flynn:
Okay, assuming that an ATU were to be developed for submission to QLI, would changing the passage values be acceptable? Or would that go against the grain of using the CT/CTR/T20 rules as a basis, and changing only the setting? i.e. Do you consider the passage rates to be part of the rules or part of the setting?

-Flynn

</font>[/QUOTE]I think, in this case you may be missing the forest for the trees. I fully accept your take on the rules, but I think the big picture here is that it is a price fixed system rather than a market rate system. It's a socilological model of the universe rather than an economic one. It's also based in the real world of the late 70s when (for one example) the US government strictly regulated airline prices and limited competition between the carriers. The government even had bureaucrats passing judgement on what meals each airline could serve because offering larger meals was considered unfair competition.

MWM started with a very strong, but somewhat non-specific view of the future. The narure of the Jump drive itself was specifically intended to support that view. He could have allowed instintanious communications (as in Star Trek) but he specifically chose not to because he wanted a society in which communication was limited to the speed of travel (as in the 1870s British Empire).

Any rules system is going to have embedded assumptions about the world it is modeling. Some are mechanical (world building) and some are sociological (how the economy works). Even something that looks totally mechanical (combat) has some very basic assumptions about people. Part of the reason that combat is so deadly is that it assumes everyone participates, yet there is strong evidence that (especially in military situations) only a few of the people involved in a firefight actually aim their weapons if they fire at all. There are a lot of very good reasons why rule systems don't try to model it, but if you wanted a really "realistic" game you would.

So, my take is that Traveller is a rules system that models a very sociological (MWM has an MA in Sociology after all) view of the future.

Just my thoughts...

 

[Malenfant]

MWM started with a very strong, but somewhat non-specific view of the future. The narure of the Jump drive itself was specifically intended to support that view. He could have allowed instintanious communications (as in Star Trek) but he specifically chose not to because he wanted a society in which communication was limited to the speed of travel (as in the 1870s British Empire).

This somewhat runs at odds with the oft-touted claim that CT was supposed to be a generic scifi game, doesn't it? In fact, it pretty much hammers the final nail into that claim's coffin.

This is why I've been saying that CT only allowed you to make scifi backgrounds that were like Traveller, rather than any scifi background at all (which is what a real generic scifi game should allow you to do). If you wanted a setting where jump drive was instantaneous or involved a different kind of FTL or wasn't even based on any historical model at all, then you were on your own (at least til FF&S came along).

 

[mike wightman]

Originally posted by Malenfant:
This is why I've been saying that CT only allowed you to make scifi backgrounds that were like Traveller, rather than any scifi background at all (which is what a real generic scifi game should allow you to do). If you wanted a setting where jump drive was instantaneous or involved a different kind of FTL or wasn't even based on any historical model at all, then you were on your own (at least til FF&S came along).

Absolute rubbish

The first game of Traveller I ever played in the referee had teleportation portals taking us from world to world.

The Star Wars based game I ran in 1981 ignored jump fuel, passengers payed by the parsec, and blaster pistols were based on HEAP snub pistols.

I didn't start setting games in the 3rd Imperium background until I ran Kinunir, so arguably I still hadn't started using the OTU

The only time the OTU was used was when I ran the Traveller Adventure.

We used the character generation, world generation, combat system, trading, and animal encounters pretty much straight out of the book.

It was usually the starship system that was tinkered with, and even then the construction tables were used to base things on.

Weren't we playing Traveller???

 

[Malenfant]

Nothing stops you from making up rules from scratch to do all that stuff. But if the game doesn't provide any rules or guidelines for you to do that (and CT doesn't), then you can hardly argue that it's a generic game, can you. The whole point of a generic game is to do all that hard work for you and you just pick and choose what you want from the options given, without any assumptions made by the game itself - not have to make them from scratch yourself.

And OK, I should have said that "CT only allowed you to make scifi backgrounds that were like the Charted Space Universe".

 

[BetterThanLife]

Problem with that interpretation is simple, Based on economic realities, which social engineering always has to face, under this price fixing scheme there are no Jump-2 or Jump-3 starships outside of Government service. They offer no advantage to build. Like they found out in California, when price fixing runs up against Market realities problems arise. For example, the prices that California Electric companies were allowed to charge was fixed. The price for the requirements to generate that electricity were not. (Fuel cost, etc.) Further the Electric Companies were themselves not allowed to generate Electricity and the prices that they had to pay for electricity were not fixed. As a result of rising fuel prices, rising demand for electricity and rising cost of electricity to the Electric Companies drove them bankrupt and caused rolling blackouts in California because there wasn't enough electricity to meet demand and no incentive for the electric company to purchase more. (They were losing money just to open their doors.) So much for price fixing.

Under that price fixing scheme there are no mortgages for Jump-2+ ships, because they can't make the payments even with full loads. SO there are not going to be many ships capable of higher than Jump-1. So the Systems off the mains become isolated and backwaters. (Problem is many of the high tech, shipyards, SubSector Capitals and High Pop worlds aren't located along any of the Mains.)

Originally posted by Ranger:
I think, in this case you may be missing the forest for the trees. I fully accept your take on the rules, but I think the big picture here is that it is a price fixed system rather than a market rate system. It's a socilological model of the universe rather than an economic one. It's also based in the real world of the late 70s when (for one example) the US government strictly regulated airline prices and limited competition between the carriers. The government even had bureaucrats passing judgement on what meals each airline could serve because offering larger meals was considered unfair competition.

MWM started with a very strong, but somewhat non-specific view of the future. The narure of the Jump drive itself was specifically intended to support that view. He could have allowed instintanious communications (as in Star Trek) but he specifically chose not to because he wanted a society in which communication was limited to the speed of travel (as in the 1870s British Empire).

Any rules system is going to have embedded assumptions about the world it is modeling. Some are mechanical (world building) and some are sociological (how the economy works). Even something that looks totally mechanical (combat) has some very basic assumptions about people. Part of the reason that combat is so deadly is that it assumes everyone participates, yet there is strong evidence that (especially in military situations) only a few of the people involved in a firefight actually aim their weapons if they fire at all. There are a lot of very good reasons why rule systems don't try to model it, but if you wanted a really "realistic" game you would.

So, my take is that Traveller is a rules system that models a very sociological (MWM has an MA in Sociology after all) view of the future.

Just my thoughts...

 

[daryen]

Not that anyone likely cares, but I am going to weigh in here:

- I agree with Malenfant. Traveller was designed to model a particular vision of the far future. That vision was fairly wide open and NOT initially tied to the OTU. But it was tied to jump, A/G, guns/swords in space, varying TLs, etc. Not that you can't modify the system to do what you want, but the base system was designed to support a specific type of science fiction.

- Bhoins is absolutely correct. The "per jump" economic model doesn't work. It should be completely replaced with a "per parsec" model. Or just save ink and use GT:FT.

I understand that the reason it was originally done that way was to force the players into speculative cargo. But the nature of the game has changed enough to no longer justify this.

The economic system in Traveller needs to move to a "per parsec" model. Or just delete economics altogether. The current system is just farcical.

 

[mike wightman]

Traveller covers a unique facet of future society: the concept that expanding technology will enable man to reach the stars, and to populate the worlds which orbit them. Nontheless, communication will be reduced to the level of the 18th century, reduced to the speed of transportation. The result will be a large (bordering ultimately on the infinite) universe, ripe for the bold adventurer's travels. Using this three book set, players are capable of playing single scenarios or entire campaigns set in virtually any science fiction theme.

 

[Malenfant]

a) Nonetheless, communication will be reduced to the level of the 18th century, reduced to the speed of transportation

Given that FTL travel and communication capability is one of the most important things that defines an interstellar scifi game, this is a pretty major limitation. The lack of any other options in the books forces people to play using the 18th century model unless they want to make their own system from scratch, and they have no support for that in CT.


b) "...entire campaigns set in virtually any science fiction theme"

Well, "virtually" suggests that not every scifi theme can be covered in CT. Therefore it isn't a truly generic system.

 

[mike wightman]

Traveller is necessarily a framework, describing the barest of essentials for an infinite universe. A group involved in playing a scenario or a campaign can make their adventures more elaborate, more detailed, more interesting with the input of a great deal of imagination.
The greatest burden, of course, falls on the referee, who must create entire worlds and societies through which the player-characters will roam. One very interesting source of assistance for this task is the existing science fiction literature. Virtually anything mentioned in a story or in an article can be transferred to the Traveller environment. Orbital cities, nuclear war, alien societies, puzzles, enigmas, anything can occur, with immagination being the only limit.

 

[mike wightman]

Originally posted by Malenfant:
Well, "virtually" suggests that not every scifi theme can be covered in CT. Therefore it isn't a truly generic system.

Neither, therefore, is GURPS generic, despite its name, because it doesn't yet have rules for every possible fantasy, horror, or sci-fi game

Traveller, as published in 1977 without the baggage of the OTU, was intended to be as generic as possible. Limited only by the creativity and imagination of the players and referee.

I would like to see CTR have the same intentions.

 

[mike wightman]

Originally posted by Malenfant:
Given that FTL travel and communication capability is one of the most important things that defines an interstellar scifi game, this is a pretty major limitation. The lack of any other options in the books forces people to play using the 18th century model unless they want to make their own system from scratch, and they have no support for that in CT.

It needn't be, if you do what it suggests, and use other sci-fi sources for inspiration you can have FTL comms if you want.
How will it affect the setting???
However you want it to, it's your game

 

[Malenfant]

Originally posted by Sigg Oddra:
Neither, therefore, is GURPS generic, despite its name, because it doesn't yet have rules for every possible fantasy, horror, or sci-fi game

True, but GURPS Space is a damn sight more generic that CT, because it allows you to create universes with a much wider range of technological and social options than CT did.

Traveller, as published in 1977 without the baggage of the OTU, was intended to be as generic as possible.

And it failed on that count, by deliberately restricting the choices that GMs could make in designing their settings using the CT rules.

I would like to see CTR have the same intentions.

I wouldn't . I'd like to see a CTR that was more like GURPS Space - giving as wide a range of options as possible and not delieberately limiting what GMs could create using those rules.

 

[Malenfant]

Originally posted by Sigg Oddra:
It needn't be, if you do what it suggests, and use other sci-fi sources for inspiration you can have FTL comms if you want.
How will it affect the setting???
However you want it to, it's your game

Why should I have to resort to using other scifi resources when those options should have been provided by the supposedly generic game I'm holding in my hands?

 

[mike wightman]

Originally posted by Malenfant:

True, but GURPS Space is a damn sight more generic that CT, because it allows you to create universes with a much wider range of technological and social options than CT did.

I disagree, because GURPS Space doesn't cover every aspect of FTL travel or communication from literature or film - at least with CT it was easy to adapt the simple rules to a different paradigm.
Don't like jump drives, call them warp drives, and make the jump number the number of light years travelled in a given time period etc.

Traveller, as published in 1977 without the baggage of the OTU, was intended to be as generic as possible.
And it failed on that count, by deliberately restricting the choices that GMs could make in designing their settings using the CT rules.

How did it fail???
How many Traveller Universes are there out there that were designed without any slavish following of the rules?
All rpg's impose restrictions based on their rules, I would argue that the simplicity of CT allowed for those rules to be adapted to an almost infinite degree (well not infinite - but you know what I mean )

I'd like to see a CTR that was more like GURPS Space - giving as wide a range of options as possible and not delieberately limiting what GMs could create using those rules.

Like FF&S, the universe options bit rather than the design sequences?
I still think this is possible for CTR - by encouraging the referee and players to think of alternative description for how things work, but within a simple framework.
Maybe give a few examples of variant explanations for how maneuver and FTL drives work, whether to have articicial gravity and acceleration compensators or not etc.

 

[mike wightman]

Originally posted by Malenfant:
Why should I have to resort to using other scifi resources when those options should have been provided by the supposedly generic game I'm holding in my hands?

If you want a truely generic game, with every possible sci-fi option, I doubt very much if you could:
hold it in your hands
or,
be bothered to wade through it in the first place to pick the options you want

How much effort does it really take to adapt CT in some way? Especially if your reason is to make it more like your favoured sci-fi setting.

 

[mike wightman]

Generic doesn't mean it has to provide detailed rules for every conceivable setting, but the rules presented should be easily adaptable.

IMHO of course

 

[Malenfant]

Originally posted by Sigg Oddra:
Generic doesn't mean it has to provide detailed rules for every conceivable setting, but the rules presented should be easily adaptable.

Right. But CT as it stands doesn't do that, because it doesn't include any options for other styles of games apart from what MWM had in mind.

 

[Malenfant]

Originally posted by Sigg Oddra:
I disagree, because GURPS Space doesn't cover every aspect of FTL travel or communication from literature or film - at least with CT it was easy to adapt the simple rules to a different paradigm.
Don't like jump drives, call them warp drives, and make the jump number the number of light years travelled in a given time period etc.

It pretty much does actually. GURPS Space includes rules for Jump Drives, Hyperdrives, and Warp Drives, and also includes guidelines for various different types of interstellar government. Plus 25 pages on how to actually put all the stuff in the book together to create your own setting - help that CT doesn't provide at all.

How many Traveller Universes are there out there that were designed without any slavish following of the rules?

From the sound of it - not many. I've asked how many people use Traveller to make their own universes that don't bear the slightest resemblance to Charted Space at all, and it doesn't sound like many people do. There are, however, many people who use Traveller to make a setting that is pretty similar to the OTU.

Like FF&S, the universe options bit rather than the design sequences?

FF&S was about 15 years overdue . Something like that should have been in CT in the first place.

I still think this is possible for CTR - by encouraging the referee and players to think of alternative description for how things work, but within a simple framework.
Maybe give a few examples of variant explanations for how maneuver and FTL drives work, whether to have articicial gravity and acceleration compensators or not etc.

And the good thing is that you don't really need to start from scratch in writing this, since it's all been done in FF&S anyway.

 

[mike wightman]

Did you ever read Alternity?
It gave more options for FTL drives than GURPS Space, but then limited which ones were used in its official campaign setting.

I like the idea of CTR being as generic as possible, with as many variant technology explanations as possible. Put the stutterwarp etc. in and give referees and players choice