No, my Traveller universe does not have time travel. I have a group of players that had never played Traveller and I decided to introduce them to the game by doing something I had only really done once before... use the OTU.
The only other time I had ever used the Imperium setting was when we played TNE bak in high school. We had a lot of fun with it, but I like to allow my players wide latitude in world creation so I usually do not use pre-made settings at all.
I decided to go with an idea that I had been kicking around for several years. I wanted to have them hit some of the moments in the history of Traveller. I had read some of the Traveller Universe stuff and liked a lot of it (especially MegaTraveller, and TNE). As I began working on it, I decided I wanted to break the game into short 4-6 session segments with the players jumping forward in time and taking on new characters each time. I decided to start with a near future game and work forward. I also decided that, in keeping with my game style, I would allow the players to have a large impact on history. I prefer this feel because I get to be surprised at how things turn out. Of course I do cheat a bit on this and drop a few future determinative things in every once in a while.
Also in keeping with my style I decided that I was going to have to change things up a lot, especially in the early years of Traveller history, to get my players interested and to offer plenty of chance for foreshadowing and allowing the players to feel they had an impact. One of the major things I wanted to address was the Virus from TNE. I like the idea of the interstellar post apocolyptic game, I was just never totally satisfied with the justification for it. I decided to foreshadow it way in the past.
My campaign begins with an interplanetary war between Earth and its solar system colonies. The jump drive has not been invented yet and as far as almost everyone knows there has been no contact with aliens. This was a military/political campaign with the players taking on the roles of high ranking UN Space Marines on a space station that is neutral territory. I decided it actually did not matter to me which side won the war because in the long historical view it would not matter. I made the war very much a brother against brother situation similar to the US Civil War where most of the generals on both sides had served together before the war. There were plenty of chances and justifications for switching sides if the players chose to. They did not switch sides and the Earth forces won the war.
The next phase was a generation ship. It is still pre-jump and Earth decides to send out a long term exploration vessel to a recently discovered habitable planet. The trip will take 200 years so I decided that cold sleep had been invented but it would not be possible for a large number of colonists to be put in cold sleep. Instead, Earth constructs a generation ship, The Prometheus. The crew goes in and out of cold sleep throughout the journey with some of the crew always awake. The colonists themselves will go through several generations on the ship, they have agreed to a structured breeding program and controlled population growth while on board. The players are members of the crew and the game centered around a murder mystery that they deal with for the whole journey. During the trip they encounter an ancient alien race that has been in contact with small groups of humans for the entire length of human history. The aliens attempt to convince them to turn back and when they refuse place a computer virus on the generation ship.
When the ship finally arrives in the destination system they are greated by jump capable Earth ships. Earth humans have beaten them there and are in the midst of their struggles with the Imperium. When the players communicate with the Earth ships the computer virus infects the other ships and causes their destruction. The players realize that while their ship is not sophisticated enough for the virus to control that it is sentient and they cannot destroy it. They put themselves into cold sleep and set a course for deep space.
The next section actually jumps back in time from the end of the generation ship section to a StarLeaper ship performing early exploration of the areas around Sol. I have decided that instead of playing the captain of the ship the players will each play a representative of one of the many factions that help fund the ship (corporate, military, union, research science etc.). They will attempt to persuade the crew of the ship to deal with things met on the journey in a way that best aids their faction.
After that I think I will move onto a merchant campaign in the early years of Sol/Imperium interaction. Then, of course, on to the Interstellar Wars. I am thinking of doing a low ranking military section and perhaps a journalism or spy section. At least for now I am using GURPS 4th edition and the Interstellar Wars book.
So what are some other exciting points to hit throughout the history of Traveller? I want to try to vary the campaign types as much as possible over the course of the game
The only other time I had ever used the Imperium setting was when we played TNE bak in high school. We had a lot of fun with it, but I like to allow my players wide latitude in world creation so I usually do not use pre-made settings at all.
I decided to go with an idea that I had been kicking around for several years. I wanted to have them hit some of the moments in the history of Traveller. I had read some of the Traveller Universe stuff and liked a lot of it (especially MegaTraveller, and TNE). As I began working on it, I decided I wanted to break the game into short 4-6 session segments with the players jumping forward in time and taking on new characters each time. I decided to start with a near future game and work forward. I also decided that, in keeping with my game style, I would allow the players to have a large impact on history. I prefer this feel because I get to be surprised at how things turn out. Of course I do cheat a bit on this and drop a few future determinative things in every once in a while.
Also in keeping with my style I decided that I was going to have to change things up a lot, especially in the early years of Traveller history, to get my players interested and to offer plenty of chance for foreshadowing and allowing the players to feel they had an impact. One of the major things I wanted to address was the Virus from TNE. I like the idea of the interstellar post apocolyptic game, I was just never totally satisfied with the justification for it. I decided to foreshadow it way in the past.
My campaign begins with an interplanetary war between Earth and its solar system colonies. The jump drive has not been invented yet and as far as almost everyone knows there has been no contact with aliens. This was a military/political campaign with the players taking on the roles of high ranking UN Space Marines on a space station that is neutral territory. I decided it actually did not matter to me which side won the war because in the long historical view it would not matter. I made the war very much a brother against brother situation similar to the US Civil War where most of the generals on both sides had served together before the war. There were plenty of chances and justifications for switching sides if the players chose to. They did not switch sides and the Earth forces won the war.
The next phase was a generation ship. It is still pre-jump and Earth decides to send out a long term exploration vessel to a recently discovered habitable planet. The trip will take 200 years so I decided that cold sleep had been invented but it would not be possible for a large number of colonists to be put in cold sleep. Instead, Earth constructs a generation ship, The Prometheus. The crew goes in and out of cold sleep throughout the journey with some of the crew always awake. The colonists themselves will go through several generations on the ship, they have agreed to a structured breeding program and controlled population growth while on board. The players are members of the crew and the game centered around a murder mystery that they deal with for the whole journey. During the trip they encounter an ancient alien race that has been in contact with small groups of humans for the entire length of human history. The aliens attempt to convince them to turn back and when they refuse place a computer virus on the generation ship.
When the ship finally arrives in the destination system they are greated by jump capable Earth ships. Earth humans have beaten them there and are in the midst of their struggles with the Imperium. When the players communicate with the Earth ships the computer virus infects the other ships and causes their destruction. The players realize that while their ship is not sophisticated enough for the virus to control that it is sentient and they cannot destroy it. They put themselves into cold sleep and set a course for deep space.
The next section actually jumps back in time from the end of the generation ship section to a StarLeaper ship performing early exploration of the areas around Sol. I have decided that instead of playing the captain of the ship the players will each play a representative of one of the many factions that help fund the ship (corporate, military, union, research science etc.). They will attempt to persuade the crew of the ship to deal with things met on the journey in a way that best aids their faction.
After that I think I will move onto a merchant campaign in the early years of Sol/Imperium interaction. Then, of course, on to the Interstellar Wars. I am thinking of doing a low ranking military section and perhaps a journalism or spy section. At least for now I am using GURPS 4th edition and the Interstellar Wars book.
So what are some other exciting points to hit throughout the history of Traveller? I want to try to vary the campaign types as much as possible over the course of the game
