T5 Only: Traveller History, the Rebellion and Hard Times

[Stei'awtliyrl]

I am eagerly anticipating the arrival of my own copy of Traveller 5, and opening a new volume in my 20+ year series of campaigns, set in in the Hard Times Era. So, in this 600+ page Traveller 5, how much detail is given to the long history of Traveller Mileus. Not that I expect the new edition to devote too much to the Hard Times. I'm just excited, and can't wait for the X-Ships to deliver my mail. Give me something to chew on folks!

 

[mike wightman]

The rebellion is mentioned in one line in the history table, Hard Times isn't mentioned at all.

I will add that Hard Times is my favourite era for adventuring, followed closely by TNE (as a setting - not the rules).

 

[GypsyComet]

Since the Hard Times would be considered "late Rebellion" they are unlikely to get a notice in a brief timeline. The more detailed the timeline gets, the more the phases of the Rebellion get attention.

 

[Chuck Anumia]

Curious

I would like to know what you consider the benefits and drawbacks of the Hard Times setting?
I wrote up my ideas for TNE and would truly like to know if the two are similar.

 

[mike wightman]

The principle advantage to the HT era of the rebellion is that there is actually stuff for PCs to do, unlike the rest of the MT era.

The massive battle fleets are a thing of the past and interstellar government has all but disappeared apart from in the "safe" areas (about a sector in size with the faction capital roughly in the centre).

There are pirates, there are trading opportunities, there are merc tickets to be had, there is the chance to make a difference instead of being sat on the sidelines reading about the meta-plot. And if you want classic era type adventures you can stay in the safes

 

[rancke]

The principle advantage to the HT era of the rebellion is that there is actually stuff for PCs to do.

I've never understood where the concomitant notion that there isn't actually stuff for PCs to do in the Classic Era comes from. I've run campaigns in the Classic Era and I've written adventures set in the Classic Era and I've thought up plot seeds for the Classic Era, and one thing I've never been short of is (are?) ideas for stuff for PCs to actually do.

Sure, there's ALSO stuff for PCs to do during Hard Times, and in some cases it is different stuff, but IMO that principal advantage to the HT era that you talk of simply doesn't exist. There may be other advantages (like the aforementioned difference in the available stuff to do, if you care for the milieu), but that one is not actually an advantage over any other era. There's plenty for PCs to do in any era.


Hans

 

[Xerxeskingofking]

I've never understood where the concomitant notion that there isn't actually stuff for PCs to do in the Classic Era comes from. I've run campaigns in the Classic Era and I've written adventures set in the Classic Era and I've thought up plot seeds for the Classic Era, and one thing I've never been short of is (are?) ideas for stuff for PCs to actually do.

Sure, there's ALSO stuff for PCs to do during Hard Times, and in some cases it is different stuff, but IMO that principal advantage to the HT era that you talk of simply doesn't exist. There may be other advantages (like the aforementioned difference in the available stuff to do, if you care for the milieu), but that one is not actually an advantage over any other era. There's plenty for PCs to do in any era.


Hans

my understanding of the compliant was that almost nothing the players did mattered on the larger scale, or could create meaningful changes in the wider Traveller universe, the way you could in, say, a DnD campaign, where you could decide the fate of kingdoms and save the whole world, etc.

 

[aramis]

Hard times advantages:

• Many more polities forming
• GM has good reasons to alter the interstellar government
• By restricting to the safes, classic era mode adventures can be played with only trivial mods
• many unrealistically populous worlds lose their populations
• players can have massive long-term impacts due to absence of effective interstellar goverments
• The war is still ongoing in some places, so war-themed campaigns are practical
• setting presents multiple moral quandries to explore

Disadvantages:

• lots of work to adjust UWPs
• can be very depressing
• Safes fairly limited
• war is ongoing, and PC's can be caught up in it unknowingly

 

[Fritz_Brown]

I've never understood where the concomitant notion that there isn't actually stuff for PCs to do in the Classic Era comes from.

Actually, Hans, he mentioned the MT milieu - implying during the rebellion. When there are massive fleets running about and archdukes plotting against each other and such, the complaint is that it's hard to matter much.

 

[rancke]

Actually, Hans, he mentioned the MT milieu - implying during the rebellion.

I missed that. Well, I haven't actually tried to run campaigns and write adventures after the Rebellion broke out and thus can't say for certain sure that there are stuff to do during the Rebellion too, but I'm confident that I'd be able to if I decided to try, so I'll repeat my statement with 'Rebellion' substituted for 'Classic Era'.

When there are massive fleets running about and archdukes plotting against each other and such, the complaint is that it's hard to matter much.

You can matter on the same scale that HT allows you to matter. There are places where the fleets of the plotting archdukes never show up and a few people can make a difference to single worlds. Just as in HT. Provided the populations of the worlds are small enough. Just as in HT.

Don't get me wrong, I think HT is an excellent book and deals with a great setting. What I objected to was the contrast that implied that the same couldn't be said of other milieus.


Hans

 

[Chuck Anumia]

Hard times advantages:

• Many more polities forming
• GM has good reasons to alter the interstellar government
• By restricting to the safes, classic era mode adventures can be played with only trivial mods
• many unrealistically populous worlds lose their populations
• players can have massive long-term impacts due to absence of effective interstellar goverments
• The war is still ongoing in some places, so war-themed campaigns are practical
• setting presents multiple moral quandries to explore

Disadvantages:

• lots of work to adjust UWPs
• can be very depressing
• Safes fairly limited
• war is ongoing, and PC's can be caught up in it unknowingly

This is very helpful.
Thanks!

 

[Stei'awtliyrl]

The thing I enjoy about HT isn't so much in comparison to what came before or after. Hard Times is set in the decline and aftermath of the Rebellion War, and I equate that thematically with the periods following both World Wars. The Hard Times Era is the proverbial "lost generation" IMTU. The great powers that emerged and fought their destructive war which shattered the Imperium.. they all lost. Only the Solomani, Vargr, and Aslan really could claim something resembling a "victory". Which, as has been pointed out makes this Mileu dark. But it's that feel that almost makes the Hard Times a sort of "Traveller Noir" setting.

And Gods Below, do I love a nice Noir setting in deep space . That whole idea of a lost patriotism, regardless of who you supported in the war (if anyone). This setting where nearly everywhere you go, you find that the war has touched that place. Some more severely than others. Due to the darkness of the great failures of the Rebellion Factions, the local successes, the "Human" (and Aslan, Hiver, Varger, etc..) victories shine brighter. Each small localized triumph amidst the collapse offers hope to everyone who hears of it. That's the payoff to my PCs.

The setting shows that despite no clear victory in the Rebellion War, there was no clear defeat either. There was no showdown, and glorious fall that can be romanticized as is so often done with regards to the defeat of the Confederate States during the American Civil War. Much like World War 1 in Europe, the Rebellion War ended in exhaustion. And because of that, the Hard Times has no universal villain, no universal saviour. The morality of the Hard Times, is very much grey. Which makes for some good, complex storytelling fodder.

And that, my friends is why the Hard Times is my favorite setting.

 

[simonh]

Hard times advantages:
...
Disadvantages:

• lots of work to adjust UWPs
  [*]can be very depressing
  [*]Safes fairly limited
  [*]war is ongoing, and PC's can be caught up in it unknowingly

That sounds like it's my job. Or at least my job to make it as little work as possible.

I presume from this that it's got a procedure for taking UWPs from before the rebellion and updating them? Something I can provide a script for in StarBase?

I've been thinking about supporting scripts/plugins for adjusting world data, like a scripted version of the World Group Editor, and something like this sounds fascinating. Can you give a brief overview of the process? Once I've got SEC file import nailed down, being able to import a domain's worth of data from Travellermap and then run a script on it to update it for HT sounds like it would be fun.

I honestly don't know if I have a copy of HT or not. If so it'll be boxed up in my attic.

Simon Hibbs

 

[aramis]

That sounds like it's my job. Or at least my job to make it as little work as possible.

I presume from this that it's got a procedure for taking UWPs from before the rebellion and updating them? Something I can provide a script for in StarBase?

I've been thinking about supporting scripts/plugins for adjusting world data, like a scripted version of the World Group Editor, and something like this sounds fascinating. Can you give a brief overview of the process? Once I've got SEC file import nailed down, being able to import a domain's worth of data from Travellermap and then run a script on it to update it for HT sounds like it would be fun.

I honestly don't know if I have a copy of HT or not. If so it'll be boxed up in my attic.

Simon Hibbs

Yes, it's got a process... however, it's one of those cases where it's a lot of discrete steps, and you don't always go from step 1 through step 10. Each step is 1 stage of the decline into hard times, and a couple of them are referee fiat (Stage 10 is emergent polities, for example), and not all of them involve UWP changes.

UWP changes occur in steps 1, 3, 8, 9, 10
new data items generated or modified in steps 6, 8, 9, 10
Steps 2, 4, 5, 7 all involve other rules/setting elements.

Note that 10 would be new allegiance codes for the new polities... and is worked subsector by subsector....

 

[simonh]

It sounds like some steps could be scripted, but others would need some manual intervention. Something like a wizard. You select a region, say a couple of subsectors or a World Group, and run the wizard. It takes you through the ten steps, one screen at a time. Some of them adjust attributes procedurally, some invoke the World Group Editor to apply maximum, minimum or offset adjustments, others add text to the attribute descriptions.

I'm not sure i could mimic the process exactly, but its doable. A lot of work though. You could probably do some of it with the World Group Editor already. Ideally I'd like to provide a generic set of tools you can use to carry out world attribute and description evolutions similar to this, but without getting tied down to one particular process.

I have developed a setting that requires a process like this already and part of my plan for starbase is to support that setting. It similar in that its a setting in which a vast and powerful high tech civilization suffered a catastrophic fall, but far more severe than Hard Times. However much of the process would be about how each world rebuilt itself afterwards rather than how it collapsed.

Simon Hibbs

 

[PsychicSkeleton]

I am eagerly anticipating the arrival of my own copy of Traveller 5, and opening a new volume in my 20+ year series of campaigns, set in in the Hard Times Era.

You are one of the few, or perhaps the first person I've seen on multiple forums who is of the old guard who seems excited for T5. I jumped in at this exact point (with the T5 book) and I'm enjoying it quite a bit! Not a whole lot in it about the OTU really though I am still learning. Far more on this site.
The T5 tome is particularly thin on canon species or culture descriptions or eras but loads of tools and possibilities for (re)creating whatever you'd like.

 

[Stei'awtliyrl]

Well, I was excited until I got my T5 book.. But that's a subject for other threads well covered over in the T5 Forum

 

[savage]

Large Ships

Hard times advantages:

• Many more polities forming
• GM has good reasons to alter the interstellar government
• By restricting to the safes, classic era mode adventures can be played with only trivial mods
• many unrealistically populous worlds lose their populations
• players can have massive long-term impacts due to absence of effective interstellar goverments
• The war is still ongoing in some places, so war-themed campaigns are practical
• setting presents multiple moral quandries to explore

A side benefit is the "large scale ship" campaigns are more practical. In a military setting, players boarding a carrier becomes viable. In the past, a Ref needed to create their own war, run during a historical point like the 5th Frontier War. Some players and refs like capital ships.

Unfortunately, reusing the AHL was the best GDW did. A few capital ship books/adventures would have made a positive difference.

 

[pennshome723]

Hard Times was a great setting, the only change I would make is to NOT use the Virus at all...write your own game history GMs!!!

 

[Carlobrand]

Hard Times was a great setting, the only change I would make is to NOT use the Virus at all...write your own game history GMs!!!

Virus is a TNE feature, no? Doesn't show up until ~1130, after most of the stuff in Hard Times proper? Pretty easy to declare that it never happened and just evolve the Hard Times material forward.