Originally posted by SgtHulka:
Everyone talks about communication being slow in the TU, and I agree, but I seldom see it highlighted in an adventure...it's more of a background thing.
So how about an adventure where the player(s) are hired by a multi-sector megacorp to travel to a system and deliver a message to the offices on that planet. The message is that one of the employees is a traitor working for another corp. But when the PC's arrive no one believes they're really working for the MegaCorp and the PC's have to survive an assassination attempt from the traitor and unmask him before the regular X-boat arrives with confirmation that the PC's are legit.
Or some variation of the above involving something other than corporations.
For a simpler version of this I thought of the following:
THE GREAT XBOAT RACE
A Patron hires the PC's to intercept an Xboat message before it arrives at its destination. The PC's are to arrive in-system before the Xboat does, jam the Xboat relay station, and board the Xboat to delete its data before it can be recovered by the Tender.
This scenario would be ideal for a Scout, but if using T20 Light you could use a merchant who received an Empress Marava instead of a Free Trader on mustering out.
Find a suitable xboat route that has an "elbow". I'm not familiar with the Ley Sector but by way of example The Trin's Veil subsector in the Spinward Marches would work well. Characters start on Chamois. The message has been sent to Trin. That's three jumps for a 2-jump ship, and it requires passing through both an amber and red zone. For the X-boat it's a five jump trip.
You can show the players the map of the subsector and they can decide their route. There will probably only be one obvious route, but the advantage here is demonstrating how travel between wolds works, with Parsecs and Jump drives. You can show how planetary profiles work, since they will need to refuel between jumps and need to find a system with a gas giant or an ocean. You can even show how interplanetary travel works, since the Xboat jumps, transfers and leaves, passing through all five jumps in a mere five weeks, while the PC's need time to maneuver to a planet or gas giant to refuel. This all helps the players get the feel of Traveller.
Then let them go on their way. Secretly, the Patron has hired one or more other "racers" to hedge his bets. Only one crew gets the prize. Maybe as the players are coming out of their first gas giant they're attacked by a Scout ship that is their rival. This lets you demonstrate starship combat.
Then let them arrive ahead of the Xboat. They have to board the Xboat and overpower the pilot in order to erase the messages. This demonstrates personal combat. Meanwhile, there is a ticking clock because they have to fight off the approaching X-boat Tender. Adventure ends with their success.
You can make the patron "a good guy" -- its Naval Intelligence trying to prevent the unmasking of a friendly spy. Or you could make the patron "a bad guy" -- it's a representative of a criminal organization who doesn't want to be unmasked.
In both cases, the reward can be a "fake ID" -- false Transponder data for the PC's ship. They'll have to use this when attacking the Xboat since otherwise their ship would be branded criminal. And it would be useful in future adventures if the characters ever want to pass an interdiction satellite or escape from an official SBD seeking customs inspection, etc.
