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Running traveller: Do's and Don'ts

  • Thread starter Thread starter Trent
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Trent

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As a general set of guidelines, what are the do's and don'ts of running traveller as far as you're concerned?

Just to get this ship launched, I'll drop a few here:

DO:
Keep your storylines consistent with the background.
Read good hard SF and borrow freely from it.
Make your aliens alien, and not just humans with funny bits glued on.
DON'T:
Have Ancients or ancient tech in every scenario.
Mess with the jump drive, that's the foundation of the traveller universe.
Have aliens talk like Yoda. (God that is so annoying...!)
 
DO control your players.

A common problem with Traveller is that players can get very powerful unless they're held with a tight rein.

2 cases in point.

One, there's an adventure, from a JTAS I think, where you're supposed to break in to a heavily guarded asteroid to get some data. Reward: 10,000 Cr. Nearby is a TL 5 Oligarchy.

Our team, hired on to do this task, instead landed on the planet, pooled our Mustering Out money, and sold Solar Powered Scientific Calculators for obscene profits (Can you imagine going to North American aircraft in the 40's with a cheap Casio scientific calculator, much less something like a high end HP? whoo boy). Truthfully, it was a great, clever scheme and business venture. We were gazillionaires when we were done. "Yea, no, we're not going to risk our neck for 10KCr now, sorry."

The Ref was pissed, but, to be frank, he let us do it.

In another, the Ref spent a large amount of time detailing a city and culture (he was an anthropologist) that "worshiped" a Computer. The task was to take this computer to fix our broken one on the ship. After a few struggles we realized that the computer on our Pinnace would work instead. So we fixed it. Then, "Oh, and Chris -- we're nuking your city."

Fantasy campaigns don't seem to have this much trouble, particularly with low level characters. Technology is a great enabler, so, well, just be careful out there.
 
DO
Choose a solid storyline that will get your players hooked straight away.
Tell them there is a big wide galaxy out there and they will learn about as they want to.
Find the level of SF knowledge...if it is only Star Wars/Star Trek...then you are in trouble.
Feel free to change whatever rules meet the needs of the group whilst trying to stay consistent with the Traveller feel.
Have repeat encounters to build in familiarity.
Have friendly approachable patrons.

DON'T
Tell them the history of Chartered Space.
Allow them to have explosives, lightsabers, or furry creatures from Alpha Centuri.
Overwhelm them with rules...keep things simple.
 
I have just one of each:

DON'T detail your scenarios too much - chances are your players will go off and do something completely different, anyway!

DO create a lot of multi-functional situations and settings, and be ready to pull them out of the hat at a moment's notice when your playser abandon your scenario for their own.

I used to find the difficulty of keeping players focussed a big turn-off from running Traveller games - until I learned to go with the flow and referee games by the seat of the pants, taking my cues from where the players were heading. Our best games since then have been collaborations between the referee, the players and the setting.
 
DO: Have fun, negotiate the campaign direction with your players.
DON'T: create an adversarial relationship, create too many rewards.

I'm sure I've seen a 'referee's guide' on Andy Slack's website. Sorry I don't have a link, but a few seconds googling should find it.



whartung said:
Our team, hired on to do this task, instead landed on the planet, pooled our Mustering Out money, and sold Solar Powered Scientific Calculators for obscene profits.
Click to expand...

"Suddenly, you are all bundled into a black limo. Spies from a rival company/nation have learned of your scam and want some calculators. The price? Your lives!"

In another, the Ref spent a large amount of time detailing a city and culture (he was an anthropologist) that "worshiped" a Computer. The task was to take this computer to fix our broken one on the ship. After a few struggles we realized that the computer on our Pinnace would work instead. So we fixed it. Then, "Oh, and Chris -- we're nuking your city."
Click to expand...

"Unbeknown to the party, the computer that the culture worships is an artifact that happens to be an AI. Centuries of worship has made it a megalomaniac. It has been in constant secret communication with both the computers on their ship from the moment they entered orbit. Milliseconds after they prime the nuke, a signal beams up threatening to detonate the nuke on board unless the party returns to the ground and worships the AI forever."

Just thought I'd throw in a couple of examples. There are as many ways of handling these situations as there are referees. :)
 
Do:
Generate a good subsector for play. Make it interesting, and varied even if you have to hand generate or hand wave the UPPS. Not all size 7, atmo 5, Hydro 3 worlds. Make them cool and interesting, and not just numbers.

Do use some kind of book like Grand Survey or WBH to Add details and flavor to a half dozen places. Good maps help.

Make many of the worlds "Challenging." not all Class A ports where characters can simply buy everything they need.

Keep control of how much money the character group has, availability of tech, and operating costs.

Encourage Players to draw out the interior designs of ships, quarters, etc to personalize their ships, and staterooms. It will only add to your game.

Have fun.

Don't:
Try to roll out a whole sector worth of worlds, in full detail. Waste of time.

Allow any beginning PC to start out with "Battledress." Big no no.

Let players who have only played D&D to "Wade in" and get smoked. Traveller combat is deadly, and should be rare, in many or most campaigns unless it revolves around military or mercenary work.

Fall so in love with your setting that you are not open to cool ideas by players that might somehow, somewhere, fit. The universe is vast, and contains all things with a non-zero probability within it.
 
Do:

Make player characters work for their rewards
Let the rewards slip through their fingers *sometimes* ;)

Don't:

Over-power (i.e. equip wiht BD + FGMP-15s) or over pay your player characters
Blame the Hivers for everything ;)
 
Icosahedron said:
DO: Have fun, negotiate the campaign direction with your players.
DON'T: create an adversarial relationship, create too many rewards.

I'm sure I've seen a 'referee's guide' on Andy Slack's website. Sorry I don't have a link, but a few seconds googling should find it.





"Suddenly, you are all bundled into a black limo. Spies from a rival company/nation have learned of your scam and want some calculators. The price? Your lives!"



"Unbeknown to the party, the computer that the culture worships is an artifact that happens to be an AI. Centuries of worship has made it a megalomaniac. It has been in constant secret communication with both the computers on their ship from the moment they entered orbit. Milliseconds after they prime the nuke, a signal beams up threatening to detonate the nuke on board unless the party returns to the ground and worships the AI forever."

Just thought I'd throw in a couple of examples. There are as many ways of handling these situations as there are referees. :)
Click to expand...


Wow. :rofl:
I must say, I am now impressed and enlightened.

Do: Atleast know the rules and attempt at providing a constant stable environment.

Don't: Decide the characters fate/actions without at least a die roll.
 
tewhill said:
Don't:
Allow misjump to happen too often.
Click to expand...

Well, I'd say a good part of this one is up to the players - when they get cheap and do frontier refueling at every port even though refined is available, their chances of misjumps goes way up.
 
DO... insist on random character generation, it stops players making bland Johnny One Man Adventuring Party guys.

DON'T ask anything on the Traveller Mailing List, you're just inviting a bunch of guys who haven't played for twenty years to hassle you :smirk:
 
Do: Be a cleverer, faster thinker than your players.

Don't: Sweat the small stuff.

Do: Use NPCs to inform players.

Don't: Backstab players from trusted NPCs. Well, maybe once, but only after they've established good working relationships with other NPCs as well.
 
Do: Try to pick a few planets and have some nice verbal detaill. You don't need to drill into every tiny thing, but some nice overall image creation detail makes each planet unique in it's own way.

Do: try to make other skills important.


Don't: have guns to be the only solution out of a problem... in fact make it *the* problem in many cases

Don't: be afraid to kill characters

Don't: hand wave life support and fuel malfunctions... it creates tension and stress and all it takes is the GM to ask a question when they enter jump like "what's your engineering skill again?" and roll some dice to get players to sweat...
 
pendragonman said:
The biggest single failing of most GMs is the fear of killing characters. Like the players will then leave and not play again.
Click to expand...

Spectrum, the Rhand, then the Phoenix Command Combat System, definitely breaks you of the fear of killing characters. It's damned near impossbile not to when folks start shooting at them.

I once ran a game where a player had their character with their arm in a sling for 3 months game time, which broke into about 6 game sessions.

I also created a PCCS~Traveller hybrid system :-)
 
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