What would you like to see in a new Traveller Adventure?

[kaladorn]

Originally posted by Despasian Cruesa:
Whoa!!!
Did someone mention Morrow Project??!

I usually get blank stares when I mention that classic.

You must run with the wrong crowd!

Morrow Project, T2K, Gamma World (cring), Aftermath from FGU, Car Wars... ah those were the good old days, where men were men and anything else was a post-nuclear mutant.

The idea of a team starting out from a quickstart cache after the fall of civilization would be very Aftermath/Morrow Project ish.

 

[Despasian]

The crowd's a good one, really.

Attrition and moves have just seperated me from the most of the other 'long in the tooth' gamers I played with through the 70's/80's.
So the "crowd" has just gotten younger on average. But I'm 'edu-ma-catin' them as best I can.
Already ran them through some Morrow. Even pulled out 'OGRE' for them a few weeks ago.

Despasian

 

[plop101]

Keklas Rekobah writes:

1) "SF Noire" - The characters are ordinary beings with ordinary skills who must face extra-ordinary stuations while dealing with their own inner fears and doubts.

I am intrigued with this "SF Noire."
Elaborate and expound.
More please!

 

[Drakon]

The way I see it is thus:

You have exploration type adventures, essentially of the tourist kind, but of worlds and sophonts never before visited by, well us, whoever and whatever us is.

You have merchanting, taking a bill of goods from one port to the next, hoping to stay ahead of creditors, and pirates, and unscrupulous brokers.

And you have combat, as in war and all that.

Obviously you can mix and match. Who is fighting whom, for what, and how are each side doing? Does this side need that system explored? Does it need a "special cargo" delivered? Will the other side object, pointedly, and with extreme prejudice?

 

[signless]

I realize I'm probably in the minority here...but I'd frankly LOVE to see a couple of well-put-together "dungeon crawls" for Traveller.
Great examples from the CT past include Annic Nova, Shadows, and Twilight's Peak. Include detailed maps, and a decent backstory, and you've got a happy bunch of campers who are frankly getting tired of playing "Space Trader". Since most of my merry little band have grown up and moved into adulthood, the last thing they want to worry about is making a starship loan payment on time.
Give me a good abandoned base/science ship/ruins of a vast ancient city...
Make the maps nice and detailed, and pack it full of neat stuff to discover and explore.
I've always loved Traveller, but the busier I get with life, the less time I have to go into the detail I want out of an adventure module.
Calgon, take me away!

 

[ACK!!]

Originally posted by signless:
I realize I'm probably in the minority here...but I'd frankly LOVE to see a couple of well-put-together "dungeon crawls" for Traveller.
Great examples from the CT past include Annic Nova, Shadows, and Twilight's Peak. Include detailed maps, and a decent backstory, and you've got a happy bunch of campers who are frankly getting tired of playing "Space Trader".

I am doing something like this in the second adventure of my upcoming (hopefully) campaign. The hint that in the ruins of an old research station is the key to a horrible weapon. The players have to get to the data before the terroists.

Somewhere in the ruins lurks something even more sinister than the terroists ...

blah.. blah .. blah. Fun stuff.

 

[savage]

I've always loved Traveller, but the busier I get with life, the less time I have to go into the detail I want out of an adventure module.

Yep. I know the feeling.

However, there appears to be a strong desire to make more complexity instead of "easier" ref environments. I think its called progress.


Savage

 

[ACK!!]

Originally posted by Savage:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> I've always loved Traveller, but the busier I get with life, the less time I have to go into the detail I want out of an adventure module.

Yep. I know the feeling.

However, there appears to be a strong desire to make more complexity instead of "easier" ref environments. I think its called progress.


Savage </font>[/QUOTE]Excuse me I about to get up on my soap box. Where is that thing? Oh right here...

CT, CT advanced and MT all appealed to me for their simplicity of role-play while yet giving enough detail for the creation of complex environments for the ref with time to play.

The deal is that there are a more than a few easy to ref systems out there. However, most of them are built like crap.

They are generally termed the story-telling genre of role-playing games. The old White Wolf system was the typical example of this. They do not burden the ref with a zillion maps and charts. However, the nasty little world the Vampire and White Wolf freakies have built around that system kind of clouded this bit of revelation in the gaming world.

The failure of those systems were that those systems ignore an imaginative refs needs for tools to create other environments without everything necessarily pulled out of their ass.

From a real Traveller role-playing experience point of view:

You take a person through the difficult task of creating a character.

You introduce him to your milleu and your Traveller Universe. Preferably your printed him out some background info ahead of time.

You tell him your house rule on experience and advancement of skill tasks.

Then you take a deep breath and smile.

That is when you explain to the player -- Everything is a task. I tell you how difficult the task is and what you have to roll on a 2d6 to make the task. That is it. The rest I worry about. I know what your hits are and I will let you know what to do when you are wounded and how bad it is. Don't get into needless fire fights. Use your skills in creative ways. Role-play your character. Play the game.

 

[Low-G Vagabond]

I would like to see the introduction of a new alien race...perhaps a well organized, exotic, humanoid type of race...that poses a threat to the Gateway.

tmondragon

 

[pennshome723]

I would like to see a collective listing resource book on some Corporations within the Imperium. I would like to see a number of them worked out with some details, plus I would like a check list of sorts defining how to set up your own ingame. Remember Corps. can be fun to play within games, as they can add alot of details and plots to a game for a GM.

 

[ACK!!]

Originally posted by Penn Eckert:
I would like to see a collective listing resource book on some Corporations within the Imperium. I would like to see a number of them worked out with some details, plus I would like a check list of sorts defining how to set up your own ingame. Remember Corps. can be fun to play within games, as they can add alot of details and plots to a game for a GM.

I did a whole corporate intrigue/espionage campaign surrounding a group working both sides of a corporate struggle between SuSAG and some other company.

That was a rocking campaign. The whole key to the campaign was painting the Imperium and its structure as tools of the corporate structure with the corporations having nearly as much influence sometimes more than the Imperial nobility.

It was MT rules in CT timespan set in the Spinward Marches.

It started out with an exploratory game where the lab went silent and the group was supposed to save the corporate scientists. It was a bug hunt, dungeon crawl kind of thing.

It was a good intro for the players. Basically an inspiration for the adventure I mentioned above.

 

[alanb]

Originally posted by ACK:
That was a rocking campaign. The whole key to the campaign was painting the Imperium and its structure as tools of the corporate structure with the corporations having nearly as much influence sometimes more than the Imperial nobility.

The way I handle this thing is very simple: the corporate executives _are_ Imperial nobles. Every Duke has cousins, if not siblings, who are megacorporate executives, in exactly the same way that they have cousins who are senior figures in the military, the bureaucracy, and, of course, planetary governments.

In other words, IMTU, the Imperium is the intersection between the Megacorporations, major planetary governments, and the bureaucracy/military.

Of course, "smaller" corporations (which can be quite immense!) and less important planetary governments can have an impact too in particular areas.

The bureaucracy/military bloc is really only an independent factor because of the sheer size of the Imperium. In any local area, they will tend to become captured by the other interests, but the Imperium is big enough that there will always be other areas where these specific interests will not hold sway. In other words, there is a balancing act, where no single faction can destroy or capture the whole structure, or stand against the remainder of it.

Usually.

Attempts to do this are called "Civil Wars" if successful, or "Revolts" (see Ilelish) if unsuccessful.

The Emperor is mainly the guy sitting on the back of this bucking bronco, trying not to fall off. Fortunately, he has a number of localised support bases himself, hopefully making him strong enough to win any particular intrigue.

Yes, it's a mess.

Anyway: a corporate power struggle game... LSP versus Sternmetal Horizons is fairly traditional in mercenary settings. Tukera versus Oberlindes (or anybody else) is common too. Then there's the Vilani versus Solomani thing...

But I think to get truly nasty, you would have to go with SuSAG versus Tukera.

Just thinking about it scares me. All I need is a reason for them to fight.

Alan B

 

[eiladayn]

How about one where the players and their crippled ship give rise to a UFO encounter on a primitive and xenophobic world?

Pappy

 

[ACK!!]

Originally posted by eiladayn:
How about one where the players and their crippled ship give rise to a UFO encounter on a primitive and xenophobic world?

Pappy

OMG, yes, that is a classic.

The looks on the players faces when grandpa in the backwoods goes out chasing them with the shotguns.

"I'd love this place" he screams, "if it wasn't for all the damn aliens!"

Boom! Boom! goes the shotgun.

I can hear the whines now. "But I was wearing Cloth Ballistic armor!"

Me saying back, "Yep, and you took both barrels at close range right in the chest. You are still flat on your ass."

I want another Ancient's quest too. The great mystery of the Traveller world and such incredible possibility for adventure.

It is worth another look.

 

[savage]

The failure of those systems were that those systems ignore an imaginative refs needs for tools to create other environments without everything necessarily pulled out of their ass.

ACK

Exactly my point. A lack of tools to simplify implemention. Heavily detailed background material on adventurers were one of the best parts of CT.
You get the ship, enemy ships, local systems,
rumors, and crew...cann't get better than that.

However, Automated tools like galactic made the
universe more manageable.


By all means, lets have more "your aliens adventures...". We need a good roswell fallback.
And the Ancients, never even got in deep with them...could easily come up with sever scenarios.

Savage

 

[ACK!!]

Originally posted by Savage:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> The failure of those systems were that those systems ignore an imaginative refs needs for tools to create other environments without everything necessarily pulled out of their ass.

ACK

Exactly my point. A lack of tools to simplify implemention. Heavily detailed background material on adventurers were one of the best parts of CT.
You get the ship, enemy ships, local systems,
rumors, and crew...cann't get better than that.

However, Automated tools like galactic made the
universe more manageable.


By all means, lets have more "your aliens adventures...". We need a good roswell fallback.
And the Ancients, never even got in deep with them...could easily come up with sever scenarios.

Savage </font>[/QUOTE]Yes, there has to be a balance for any game system to keep the rules simple for the players (Digest Task System is a good example of this) but complex enough for the referee to flesh out the universe.

The old White Wolf rules for example took that idea probably way too far. But, I look at the combat system for say TNE and it is just way too detailed and hairy for the referee to keep a handle on.

The key is balance. I always liked the characterization of role-playing as a story-telling game and the rules are there to further the process of telling the story.

I remember being amazed when I first got Megatraveller (my first Traveller like exper) and being introduced to the task system after being an old-time D&D player.

Everything is a task. No clunky non-weapon proficiences and attribute checks and totally seperate combat rules. Its a task and the ref decides how hard that task is. Elegant and simple for the resolution of just about everything.

I remember also being impressed by the idea of pen/atten stuff to armor in the combat system. CT folks note I understand that AHL/Striker rules were there first. I just never had access to them.

Of course, I never designed starships and some of the MT rules were supposed to have changed things from the Book 2 and Book 5 systems in ways CT fans did not like.

This leads to the point I am not saying any genre of Traveller or any game system is the best. I am just saying that there needs to be a good balance between the playability of the system and the openness of the system to allow a good ref to expand and create their own universes.

Here is an old-school neat idea for a campaign. A good old-fashioned exploration campaign for a group led by a scout or mostly scout characters would be neat. Space the final frontier ... we take our shotguns and snub pistols on a five year journey to explore new worlds, meet new exciting sophonts and to kill them if they get too close to vargr's feed dish.

 

[eiladayn]

Might be fun to design a D20 Modern campaign and turn it around after the fact to have the group of players investigate Roswell etc. then have a UFO crash with the crew being , say Aslan and one of the crew captured by the group's government organization whatever and the ship being held by the "ENEMY". The group would have to retreive the ship (or the crewman if the roles were reversed) and then try to wrangle answers from the crewman about the ship. Such a campaign would drag the players and their world right into a Traveller campaign as their techs retro-discover the technology involved in constructing the ship etc. Depending on how they handle the crewman they could have enemies or friends waiting out there when they go.

Could use the safari ship (400T lifting body) for the UFO it even looks like one in the right light and with the right angle. It's also just harmless enough to get the players in trouble if they've stepped on the wrong toes

Pappy

 

[ACK!!]

Ok, the players are approached by an Imperial Scientist who needs help in going out to a possible ancients site in some hell-hole part of a frontier space of your choosing.

They get there and find out some low-tech locals dirtside have already found the site and consider it holy.

They consider it holy because that is the ship their great god came down in.

Their great god is not a Droyne but instead a long-lived race of little bitty fuzzy yellow creatures called the Jeebus.

Save me Jeebus, save me!!

Anyway, they are very relunctant to let the group going trouncing around their holy site in search of artifacts and Jeebus does not seem to like them anyway. It twitched or something when they entered the room.

The creature is the last of its kind. When they found the ship they had a few mating pairs but now there is the one and only great and holy Jeebus left.

How to get the locals or bypass the locals to get into the Ancients site and muck around in it is the real adventure but Jeebus in all his poke-creature like cartoonish glory is the gimmick to the idea.

What do you think?

If you don't know who Jeebus is:

Homer makes a huge pledge to PBS, but he doesn't have the money. The pledge cops come after him, and he seeks sanctuary at the church. Rev. Lovejoy puts Homer on a plane ... to a South Pacific Island, where he'll replace some missionaries.

His first response to this news is, "But I don't even believe in Jeebus."

 

[savage]

Of course, I never designed starships and some of the MT rules were supposed to have changed things from the Book 2 and Book 5 systems in ways CT fans did not like.

-ACK
Starship design had nice additions but was very painful. Both MT and TNE really needed spreadsheets with the system. They also needed some standard suites in electronics and other parts of the ship. There were other things but those two bothered me.

Could use the safari ship (400T lifting body) for the UFO it even looks like one in the right light and with the right angle. It's also just harmless enough to get the players in trouble if they've stepped on the wrong toes

-eiladayn
There is a disk design on the net..deckplans etc.
http://www.dragonspace.com/trav/explorer.htm
You could also use Peters' bullet-like scout.
http://www.sff.net/people/kitsune/traveller/peter/starships.html

Savage

 

[eiladayn]

Thanks Mr. Savage (just Savage sounded a bit short, Sir Savage seems silly, and Savage person a bit insulting), I liked the saucer design a great deal . Reminded me of a design I did long ago for the Millenium Falcon from Star Wars (it was 150T and based upon my son's toy ship that I measured and used as a prototype for 25mm figures) worked pretty well.

Pappy