Supplement Four
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It seems that many Traveller players tend to ignore Book 8: Robots. I'm not sure why this is...maybe the work necessary for the design sequences turn them off?
I'm here to tell ya that Book 8 is a very, very useful book for a GM to use when governing his campaign. The rules can be used in more than one way.
First off, the book can be used to do what it was designed to do: that is, give GMs a tool to use in populating their Traveller universes with robots.
Make a couple of robots, and always keep your designs. Re-use them. It's understandable that the PCs will run into the same type of robot during their travels (just as there are several types of R2 units in Star Wars). You can always take a design you've made in the past and change it a bit (just as an R2 unit is a bit different than an R4 unit). Small work for a big gain. And, the detail is exceptional for a campaign.
Read the section of Book 8 entitled Robots In Future Society. That will help you place and create and describe robots that "fit" into the universe.
Designing robots can either be a fun task or a chore. Many aspects of Traveller involve building things, and many players enjoy this aspect. Many GMs find it fun to tinker, build, and create things for their games. Book 8 gives you all the tools you need to create robots, from tin cans that roll around on wheels to bots that are more like Blade Runner replicants. You can also use the design system to build things like robotic probes that shoot out of the combat air/raft, fly around on a grav field, and report back sensor information from up ahead. You can stretch the system, think "out of the box", and even combine the system with the vehicle design system provided in Striker.
One of the benefits to designing your own robots came flying into my face one day when I decided to design a Zhodani combat probe bot. I had an idea in mind. I wanted triangular body, squashed into a flat disc shape, that was about 2 meters from tip to stern, that flew around on a grav drive. The flat triangles would be painted forest green for their duty in the forested region where I was going to put them. They'd travel around in threes, and there was to be no real "front" or "back" to them. Each of the "points" (flattened, like a flat head screwdriver) would always point in the direction of motion, though.
I thought it'd be neat to describe these things, floating about a meter and a half off the ground. They'd be dormant. Just hovering there. When their proximity sensors picked you up, they'd spring to life, seemingly out of nowhere. When they turned, they'd swivel on their grav axis, but they didn't need to do a 180. They'd just rotate on axis to the next triangle point, and then speed off in the direction to which it pointed.
I wanted the skin of these probes to be smooth. Weapons would lift up out of the probe via hull conformed hatches.
In many rpg's, my design of these probes would be near complete. I'd just have to make up how they acted in combat--what weapons they used--and how well their sensors worked. I'd play them just like another NPC, except these would be robot-brain guided probes.
This is where the design system taught me something. You can't always have what you want. My design, although neat and visual in my imagination, was too small to include everything I wanted to include within that hull. There just wasn't enough volume!
Rather than altering what I had set in my mind's eye, I went about using Book 8 to design a combat probe bot that was a close to what I imagined without altering it. I couldn't fit near the weapons and sensors that I wanted to fit on the probe. There just wasn't enough room for the brain, propulsion, weapons, computer, and sensors.
My design ended up being a remote controlled probe. I took the brain out, to make space, and replaced it with a comm/control unit. These probe bots would not really be bots at all--but remote controlled probes not unlike our real life Predators.
Most of my design housed power plant, grav system, and sensors, although I didn't get as many sensors in that thing as I wanted to.
I was able to squeeze in a weapon. But, rather than having a laser weapon plus miniature rockets and a slugthrower and flamethrower (not to mention some defensive devices I had in mind, like a smoke field and mine dropper and a flare gun launch tube), I had to settle for just having a slug thrower raise up out of the chassis.
And, I only had room for one slug thrower, too, which meant that my neat turning idea would be scratch, because the probe would, indeed have to turn 180 degrees to bring the weapon's muzzle around to fire at something behind it. Well, I thought that, at least, until I came up with the idea of having the gun be able to swing on an axis, too. It would rise up out of the center of the finished probe and be able to swing in any direction around the circumference of the probe.
See...by designing my combat probe using the Book 8 rules, the design sequence forced me to keep my design realistic in terms of the universe. The Traveller universe ain't the Star Wars universe (because I doubt that all those functions could be incorporated into an R2 unit, if it were designed using Book 8).
I thought that was pretty cool. My super-neat, but non-realistic combat probe bot became a remote controlled grav fl yer with limited ammo.
The probes were still scary to the PCs, but they weren't insurmountable. I found a weakness in my design....they'd run out of ammo fairly quickly.
But...that became "cool" in the game, too. The players learned the design when they say it again, and they knew it's weakness. I caught one player even schooling a new player who had come to the campaign when they ran into my probes again, "These suckers don't carry a lot of ammo, so keep your head down. That's the good news. The bad news is that they're remote controlled by live pilots, which means there's a Zho base somewhere around here where the probe operators are housed--and they know we're here."
As the campaign progressed, I tinkered around with my design. I made one that carried extra ammo. I changed weapons on them. I changed their paint schemes. I made one that laid mines. I made a sentry unit with a flare gun launcher. One time, I changed the type of sensors the probe had.
(The original design only had visual, computer enhanced and infra-red, but nothing more lavish than that. The operators would see what the probes see on their monitors, and if the scene was to be recorded, that would have to be done at the pilot's base, not on the probe itself. The players successfully kept that record from happening when they jammed the probe's signal during a game.)
See my point here? Look at all this detail that I was able to bring to my game. It didn't come from me making it up on the spot. It came from having to do the work and understand what it would take to make such a unit. Had I not created the probe using the Book 8 design system, then they would have probably not as cool in my game. They'd be unrealistic, much more powerful, and I wouldn't know them as well as I do.
Besides, I find it very fun to tinker with stuff like this. I love the missile design system in Special Supplement 3 for the same reason.
But, let's say you don't like working through Traveller design systems (or, let's say you just don't have the time). Book 8 will accommodate you as well as the design sequence grognard. Look at pg. 51 of the book. There you will find a Quick Design System. In just a few dice throws (that you can do right in the middle of a game, making a robot up on the spot, if you need to), you'll have a robot designed at your fingertips.
If you like the quick robot you threw together using those tables, you can later take that info that you generated quickly and go through the full design sequence to flesh out the details. The quick system was designed to be 100% compatible with the full design system. So, all of your robots that you slapped together in under a minute can, indeed, be fleshed out using the full design sequence.
There's plenty of notes in Book 8 to cover most aspects of having robots in your game. There's notes on robot random encounters. There's notes on using robots as patrons. There's notes using a robot as a player character. And, there's an entire chapter on using robots in combat, complete with hit location tables.
Book 8: Robots is a fantastic Traveller resource. It's a quick and easy read, like all of the LBBs. And, I am truly amazed at how much it covers in those few 56 pages.
I'm here to tell ya that Book 8 is a very, very useful book for a GM to use when governing his campaign. The rules can be used in more than one way.
First off, the book can be used to do what it was designed to do: that is, give GMs a tool to use in populating their Traveller universes with robots.
Make a couple of robots, and always keep your designs. Re-use them. It's understandable that the PCs will run into the same type of robot during their travels (just as there are several types of R2 units in Star Wars). You can always take a design you've made in the past and change it a bit (just as an R2 unit is a bit different than an R4 unit). Small work for a big gain. And, the detail is exceptional for a campaign.
Read the section of Book 8 entitled Robots In Future Society. That will help you place and create and describe robots that "fit" into the universe.
Designing robots can either be a fun task or a chore. Many aspects of Traveller involve building things, and many players enjoy this aspect. Many GMs find it fun to tinker, build, and create things for their games. Book 8 gives you all the tools you need to create robots, from tin cans that roll around on wheels to bots that are more like Blade Runner replicants. You can also use the design system to build things like robotic probes that shoot out of the combat air/raft, fly around on a grav field, and report back sensor information from up ahead. You can stretch the system, think "out of the box", and even combine the system with the vehicle design system provided in Striker.
One of the benefits to designing your own robots came flying into my face one day when I decided to design a Zhodani combat probe bot. I had an idea in mind. I wanted triangular body, squashed into a flat disc shape, that was about 2 meters from tip to stern, that flew around on a grav drive. The flat triangles would be painted forest green for their duty in the forested region where I was going to put them. They'd travel around in threes, and there was to be no real "front" or "back" to them. Each of the "points" (flattened, like a flat head screwdriver) would always point in the direction of motion, though.
I thought it'd be neat to describe these things, floating about a meter and a half off the ground. They'd be dormant. Just hovering there. When their proximity sensors picked you up, they'd spring to life, seemingly out of nowhere. When they turned, they'd swivel on their grav axis, but they didn't need to do a 180. They'd just rotate on axis to the next triangle point, and then speed off in the direction to which it pointed.
I wanted the skin of these probes to be smooth. Weapons would lift up out of the probe via hull conformed hatches.
In many rpg's, my design of these probes would be near complete. I'd just have to make up how they acted in combat--what weapons they used--and how well their sensors worked. I'd play them just like another NPC, except these would be robot-brain guided probes.
This is where the design system taught me something. You can't always have what you want. My design, although neat and visual in my imagination, was too small to include everything I wanted to include within that hull. There just wasn't enough volume!
Rather than altering what I had set in my mind's eye, I went about using Book 8 to design a combat probe bot that was a close to what I imagined without altering it. I couldn't fit near the weapons and sensors that I wanted to fit on the probe. There just wasn't enough room for the brain, propulsion, weapons, computer, and sensors.
My design ended up being a remote controlled probe. I took the brain out, to make space, and replaced it with a comm/control unit. These probe bots would not really be bots at all--but remote controlled probes not unlike our real life Predators.
Most of my design housed power plant, grav system, and sensors, although I didn't get as many sensors in that thing as I wanted to.
I was able to squeeze in a weapon. But, rather than having a laser weapon plus miniature rockets and a slugthrower and flamethrower (not to mention some defensive devices I had in mind, like a smoke field and mine dropper and a flare gun launch tube), I had to settle for just having a slug thrower raise up out of the chassis.
And, I only had room for one slug thrower, too, which meant that my neat turning idea would be scratch, because the probe would, indeed have to turn 180 degrees to bring the weapon's muzzle around to fire at something behind it. Well, I thought that, at least, until I came up with the idea of having the gun be able to swing on an axis, too. It would rise up out of the center of the finished probe and be able to swing in any direction around the circumference of the probe.
See...by designing my combat probe using the Book 8 rules, the design sequence forced me to keep my design realistic in terms of the universe. The Traveller universe ain't the Star Wars universe (because I doubt that all those functions could be incorporated into an R2 unit, if it were designed using Book 8).
I thought that was pretty cool. My super-neat, but non-realistic combat probe bot became a remote controlled grav fl yer with limited ammo.
The probes were still scary to the PCs, but they weren't insurmountable. I found a weakness in my design....they'd run out of ammo fairly quickly.
But...that became "cool" in the game, too. The players learned the design when they say it again, and they knew it's weakness. I caught one player even schooling a new player who had come to the campaign when they ran into my probes again, "These suckers don't carry a lot of ammo, so keep your head down. That's the good news. The bad news is that they're remote controlled by live pilots, which means there's a Zho base somewhere around here where the probe operators are housed--and they know we're here."
As the campaign progressed, I tinkered around with my design. I made one that carried extra ammo. I changed weapons on them. I changed their paint schemes. I made one that laid mines. I made a sentry unit with a flare gun launcher. One time, I changed the type of sensors the probe had.
(The original design only had visual, computer enhanced and infra-red, but nothing more lavish than that. The operators would see what the probes see on their monitors, and if the scene was to be recorded, that would have to be done at the pilot's base, not on the probe itself. The players successfully kept that record from happening when they jammed the probe's signal during a game.)
See my point here? Look at all this detail that I was able to bring to my game. It didn't come from me making it up on the spot. It came from having to do the work and understand what it would take to make such a unit. Had I not created the probe using the Book 8 design system, then they would have probably not as cool in my game. They'd be unrealistic, much more powerful, and I wouldn't know them as well as I do.
Besides, I find it very fun to tinker with stuff like this. I love the missile design system in Special Supplement 3 for the same reason.
But, let's say you don't like working through Traveller design systems (or, let's say you just don't have the time). Book 8 will accommodate you as well as the design sequence grognard. Look at pg. 51 of the book. There you will find a Quick Design System. In just a few dice throws (that you can do right in the middle of a game, making a robot up on the spot, if you need to), you'll have a robot designed at your fingertips.
If you like the quick robot you threw together using those tables, you can later take that info that you generated quickly and go through the full design sequence to flesh out the details. The quick system was designed to be 100% compatible with the full design system. So, all of your robots that you slapped together in under a minute can, indeed, be fleshed out using the full design sequence.
There's plenty of notes in Book 8 to cover most aspects of having robots in your game. There's notes on robot random encounters. There's notes on using robots as patrons. There's notes using a robot as a player character. And, there's an entire chapter on using robots in combat, complete with hit location tables.
Book 8: Robots is a fantastic Traveller resource. It's a quick and easy read, like all of the LBBs. And, I am truly amazed at how much it covers in those few 56 pages.
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