Traveller Rules As Written

[robject]

Time spent discussing stuff with Marc strongly suggest to me that interpreting Traveller RAW -- Rules As Written -- is unreliable at best. Traveller was Gee-Whiz 1970s Pulp Science Fiction Gaming in the Far Future, not Lawyers in Space.

Marc's comment on the Heavy Laser* solidified this in my mind just this month. It brought all the rules-breakers into focus as tests and features, not bugs.

Rules are guidelines whose boundaries were regularly tested (bent or broken) by most or all of GDW at some point. Alternative rules sprung up; some of them did so without invalidating old rules, even though they mismatched. This happened with setting and mechanics both. You know them yourself: ANNIC NOVA, mass versus volume, fusion rockets versus maneuver drive, High Guard, the AHL + Merc cruiser and orthogonal-to-thrust decks, advanced chargen, the Original Imperium, the Gazelle, every game module, Striker, and the beat goes on.

I might make the case that MegaTraveller is proof of the malleability of Traveller rules. It didn't start over: it mashed Classic Traveller together in a specific way, but certainly not the only way. You might say that Traveller4 is a different mashing together of Classic Traveller (and T5 after it). TNE was GDW saying that Traveller's core needs to be Twilight:2000, and it didn't cause them pain, because they continually invented ways of doing things as a company. I'm going on a tangent here, but you get my drift. That suggests, maybe, that even Traveller: 2300 didn't start out as a marketing ploy.

I suggest that this casual use and abuse of the rules included corner cases they didn't include in the rules, perhaps because they hadn't thought of it, or perhaps because they were fine with whatever. For example, I suggest that they either didn't think about empty hexes, or (more likely) they just hadn't thought through all the angles and so left it unsaid (e.g. calibration points and deep-space things in general.). I've seen this in Marc: he knows there's a topic that will require a book of thinking, and he doesn't have the time to think it all through, so he defers it. I bet he had to do this back when this was his job. That's part of the reason why nowadays he takes YEARS to finish something: he wants to chase some thoughts down more thoroughly. Oh yes and he's retired, but you know.

The movement to claim Traveller should only be ruled one way is an artifact of fans on the TML of the 1990s, not a mandate from GDW, DGP, or GURPS. We split mainly into Classic versus TNE and glared at each other, porting the term "canon" to Traveller and quoting what we thought of it as we went. Don McKinney was a moderating voice, saying that we all benefit when we admit that Traveller is much bigger than our comfort levels allow.

I'm in a constant tension of rebelling against it and joining it. Obviously, creative chaos is way more fun, and yet. Five years ago I was a lot more hardline about this is the way it's done and that's that. I blame everything except my own fascist leanings.

 

[Spinward Flow]

The trick is the common frame of reference, where the Rules As Written need to be used as a touchstone to orient perspectives in a congruent direction so we're all looking at the same thing and "working from the same pages" so that we can share stuff in common with each other.

The flipside to that is that the Rules As Written are demonstrably "incomplete" as far as these things go ... ala Gödel's incompleteness theorems in mathematics.

What's desirable is consistency, so the rules don't vary (too wildly) as additional materials get added and the setting (and rules for the setting) grow. The rules don't need to be "perfect" but they do need to be consistent enough to extrapolate from and make inferences to cover edge cases. Rather than being a box that everything needs to be kept inside of, the rules need to be a framework that can be built onto ... because that building aspect is where the FUN begins!

 

[whartung]

It's an RPG, and rules are optional. The referee has to balance the enjoyment of the players with the story that he wants to tell. The referees thumb is always on the scale. Traveller is rife with foot guns that can derail a campaign if the referee lets the "rules" take over unhindered for too long.

It's all based on the relationship between the referee and the players. When it gets antagonistic and hostile, the "spirit" goes out and the "rules" kick in. Who hasn't had that discussion about how someone is standing at just the right angle and hidden just behind the door to give them that ultimate, unnoticeable, +4 advantage, or whatever.

"I'm crouched and I have my gun out, it's loaded, it's in my right hand, I have just the tip of the barrel rested against the door jam, while I'm in the shadows, my foam wrapped gear is light pressed, SILENTLY, against the wall, and the 3/10th of my iris necessary for sighting is behind the pistol and I'm also checking for traps and secret doors while holding my breath."

"Yea, the guard notices you and dives for cover. He's just discovered he's a latent telepath."

When it should be room blasting, grog swilling, door kicking fun.

 

[mike wightman]

Just read my sig.

 

[mike wightman]

But as Spinward Flow says the rules as written provide a common point of reference from which our discussions proceed.

The fact that we are still having these discussions after all these years is not a bug, it is a feature

It's also noticeable that CT gets a lot more discussion than any other iteration of Traveller.

 

[robject]

* My paraphrase of Marc: "I didn't know what the heavy laser was, and I still don't. It was all gee whiz stuff back then."

 

[robject]

It's also noticeable that CT gets a lot more discussion than any other iteration of Traveller.

With the exception of 1994-1997 or so, when much of the fan discussions seemed to orbit around TNE.

Flash in the pan.

 

[robject]

The trick is the common frame of reference, where the Rules As Written need to be used as a touchstone to orient perspectives in a congruent direction so we're all looking at the same thing and "working from the same pages" so that we can share stuff in common with each other.

I completely understand and relate to your sentiment. However, "touchstone" seems to be the wrong term.

What's desirable is consistency, so the rules don't vary (too wildly) as additional materials get added and the setting (and rules for the setting) grow. The rules don't need to be "perfect" but they do need to be consistent enough to extrapolate from and make inferences to cover edge cases.

This applies to publishers, but to a much lesser degree than we might like.

 

[robject]

But as Spinward Flow says the rules as written provide a common point of reference from which our discussions proceed.

Actually, Spinward used "touchstone" which means standard canon. But pinpointing canon doesn't go that far, and it's often shades of gray.

VALID shades of gray: I don't allow jump torpedos in published material. But it is there, somewhere.

The fact that we are still having these discussions after all these years is not a bug, it is a feature

Only when we don't use rules as a bludgeon. Remember the canon wars of 1994-1997?

It's also noticeable that CT gets a lot more discussion than any other iteration of Traveller.

Partly because it left rules ambiguous, and broke other of its own rules, more than any other rule system. And this might be a feature, not a bug.

 

[infojunky]

The movement to claim Traveller should only be ruled one way is an artifact of fans on the TML of the 1990s, not a mandate from GDW, DGP, or GURPS. We split mainly into Classic versus TNE and glared at each other, porting the term "canon" to Traveller and quoting what we thought of it as we went. Don McKinney was a moderating voice, saying that we all benefit when we admit that Traveller is much bigger than our comfort levels allow.

Note it wasn’t just the TML, there a more civil disagreement on GEine as well. The great split between CT/MT and TNE real became two lists with mostly the same memberships.

 

[Condottiere]

I do believe that the Nineties was the birth of Collectable Card Games, where the precise wording of rules was essential.

 

[whartung]

But as Spinward Flow says the rules as written provide a common point of reference from which our discussions proceed.

Well from evidence, those common points of reference don't appear to be very common!

 

[robject]

I do believe that the Nineties was the birth of Collectable Card Games, where the precise wording of rules was essential.

And the internet, which allowed all of us to bludgeon each other all together on a popular level.

There obviously were precedents, but the TML showed up somewhere around 1989, but didn't reach mainstream Travellers until 1994ish.

 

[robject]

Well from evidence, those common points of reference don't appear to be very common!

Right.

I have my picture of Traveller.

It disturbs me that your picture is different.

And I am chagrined that Marc Miller's view is wrong on several important points.

 

[whartung]

Note it wasn’t just the TML, there a more civil disagreement on GEine as well.

Would TNE have been so controversial if it didn't include HePLAR? To be fair, that was the only really "universe changing" change, going form unlimited M-Drive to coasting in on fumes M-Drive. Everything was essentially the same. Everyone quibbles about combat systems, that's just a given, but they don't alter the "universe". And, of course, Virus, but that's not a "rules" thing, that's a background thing.

 

[Condottiere]

Also, I don't know when this started, but also Warhammer tabletop battles, when interpreting rules became a matter of life and death.

The difference, is that after the initial dispute, you can get official rulings on those interpretations.

 

[robject]

Would TNE have been so controversial if it didn't include HePLAR? To be fair, that was the only really "universe changing" change, going form unlimited M-Drive to coasting in on fumes M-Drive. Everything was essentially the same. Everyone quibbles about combat systems, that's just a given, but they don't alter the "universe". And, of course, Virus, but that's not a "rules" thing, that's a background thing.

Actually you could say that it hearkened back to 1977, or perhaps HG1, where ships were assumed to be using fusion rocket like things.

Right?

Maybe that was a Frank Chadwick initial concept. Striker allowed Frank to follow his path in an alternate way. Traveller:2300 let him try to pull Twlight:2000 and Traveller both back in that direction, which led to TNE.

Integration began with T4 and continued with T5. Advantages and disadvantages. But synthesis is a completely different idea from both older ideas.

 

[Condottiere]

When you limit a resource, fuel and endurance, you raise the stakes, and start calculating maximum efficiency of getting something done; a sense of immediacy.

Speaking of immediacy, this would be where the Internet comes in.

 

[robject]

Also, I don't know when this started, but also Warhammer tabletop battles, when interpreting rules became a matter of life and death.

The difference, is that after the initial dispute, you can get official rulings on those interpretations.

This is embedded in the Human. Gamers bring it out.

"Canon" is embedded in the genome of the fan. Think Star Trek and Star Wars, or Conan books.

 

[robject]

Now with the Original Post as context, note that Traveller has central concepts, and you might call them canon. Some of those concepts are rules, and some of them are about the OTU setting... and sometimes the OTU seems to contradict those rules, which should make you wonder how easy it is to nail things down.

Nailing things down is what we do, so this is a legitimate exercise.

And it's worth calling out publications that have consistency problems. That amounts to a public service announcement to fans.

But we need to understand that things are much less certain than each of us thinks.

And that each of us has embedded personal heresies.

And that's okay.

Just remember that we often do go in circles.