"Special Delivery" by William H. Keith

[AlHazred]

I'm considering using the scenario "Special Delivery" for my table when my players hit the Sword Worlds. It's a scenario Keith published in Far & Away issue #01, in 1990. I liked it enough it stuck with my when I originally read it, and on rereading it, it's not bad at all. It has some nice stuff for the players to figure out, and some interesting ideas for how it could develop.

One element that I would like help with is the "package." Obviously from the name, it's about the player delivering a package, and obviously the nature of the package should mess with the player characters -- it's a trope in Traveller gaming! In this case, the package is "Percy," an alien creature that's the pet of a noble on the destination planet. The destination planet (Gallerin, which I believe occurs nowhere else in Traveller) has strict import controls on livestock, and so a smuggling needs to be arranged. "Percy" is described as a one-meter tall vaguely humanoid creature weighing about 50kg, with short legs and very long arms, with no head but two eyestalks; when initially encountered, he's wearing a Hawaiian shirt.

There's a tiny image of Percy in the article, but for a creature that could, depending on the course of events, become a ship mascot, I feel like something larger and more detailed would be needed. Has anyone done a larger image of Percy? If so, can anybody share what they used?

 

[King Midas]

Congratulations! I think you found a really obscure one. I can find almost nothing on this magazine. The only "Special Delivery" in my database is a T20 robot scenario in - where else -
T20 Robot Adventures.

I'm waiting with baited breath to find out what people with more expansive libraries have to say.

 

[AlHazred]

Oh, yeah, I feel like the magazines that should have been obscure, like the Traveller-devoted fanzines, have a good representation here. But one-offs from short-run but larger-distribution magazines, that weren't exclusively devoted to Traveller, those are really obscure! I'm trying to capture them here, but it's slow going!

 

[AlHazred]

Also, thanks for pushing me to check the details of the magazine. There's an image of him on the credits page! I completely missed it the first time around! Perfect!

 

[Vargr Breath]

Congratulations! I think you found a really obscure one. I can find almost nothing on this magazine. The only "Special Delivery" in my database is a T20 robot scenario in - where else -
T20 Robot Adventures.

I'm waiting with baited breath to find out what people with more expansive libraries have to say.

Here's one for sale

https://www.amazon.com/Magazine-Speculative-Gaming-Number-April/dp/B001BEHDJA

 

[Garnfellow]

Does the adventure suggest where Gallerin might be found?

 

[AlHazred]

Does the adventure suggest where Gallerin might be found?

No, it's meant to be a stand-in for the GM to replace with another system.

The adventure starts on Cantrip and ends on Gallerin "two or three jumps away". Much like many similar scenarios at the time, they never showed up anywhere else ever again.

 

[Dulinor]

When I ran it, I replaced Gallerin with L'Oeul d'Dieu.

 

[AlHazred]

When I ran it, I replaced Gallerin with L'Oeul d'Dieu.

Rereading it, I think a good choice for Gallerin is Alell. It's a resort planet, and you can start on Regina -- a very typical CT course for adventure.

 

[coliver988]

Years ago I did a diagram of my version of Alell https://traveller-ct.blogspot.com/2010/01/allell-system-diagram.html and a world map https://traveller-ct.blogspot.com/2017/11/alell-world-map.html even a fairly large document: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1909KpvTgts3FSlluh8_nTSxCQxCIeks8trmPi5qzl38/edit?usp=sharing

 

[AlHazred]

Years ago I did a diagram of my version of Alell https://traveller-ct.blogspot.com/2010/01/allell-system-diagram.html and a world map https://traveller-ct.blogspot.com/2017/11/alell-world-map.html even a fairly large document: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1909KpvTgts3FSlluh8_nTSxCQxCIeks8trmPi5qzl38/edit?usp=sharing

Looks like the large document is not publicly shared.

 

[coliver988]

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1909KpvTgts3FSlluh8_nTSxCQxCIeks8trmPi5qzl38/edit?usp=sharing

okay, think I turned the sharing on this time

 

[punkrabbitt]

The new link works

 

[pzmcgwire]

Noble Knight also has a copy of issue #1 for sale. https://www.nobleknight.com/Products/Far-and-Away---The-Magazine-of-Speculative-Gaming

 

[AlHazred]

There's a copy of two of the articles from this issue, "The Compleat Starport" and the "Special Delivery" adventure, on eBay from a seller called Chapbooks Express. I know from Call of Cthulhu fandom that this guy sells pirated works; copied from originals, perhaps, but still unauthorized copies. Buyer beware.

 

[Dulinor]

This adventure was freely downloadable several decades ago. Can't remember where, though.