Where I explain what I feel about CT

[Poppyseed45]

So, up until recently, I've been a big MgT fan, and ran it twice (about two years ago) for two short campaigns, which worked out quite well. So don't take what I'm about to say as an anti-MgT rant or something; it isn't. MgT works just fine, and the only reason those games didn't go further than a couple of sessions was that the groups imploded due to internal dynamics.

That said, a few days ago I picked up my FFE Reprints (Books 0-8) and started reading through the first three, and I realized that I was excited; I felt like something there just said "Hey, let's go play!" Now, I KNOW CT has many, many warts, and indeed here on these very boards those warts are discussed in painstaking detail.

Despite that, I feel simply...what, more interested in CT that MgT? For example, I know my current group would appreciate the "wider" choice in MgT in terms of career (I know, I'm already budgeting some cash for the Supplement Reprints to get Supp 4), but I'm just not interested in it. Heck, I even liked the non-unified nature of the skill roll descriptions in CT. And the "make your own story about these stats and rolls" thing (whereas MgT sort of helps you with that by the event and mishap tables).

So, not sure how to pin it down. I have several books for MgT and they're okay. CT Reprints are a little unwieldy and rules are maybe wonky, and yet, yet...something is there. And it wants me to run my next campaign with CT. Our current game finishes in two or three months. Maybe I'll have my books by then...

 

[snapshotbygdw]

Hey Classic Traveller: can't live with it can't live without it !

 

[Dragoner]

The CT disks are a good deal and have a huge amount of material. I was thinking of making a later campaign, after TNE timeline just to get beyond it, but then I came back to CT because of the huge amount of material you lose going away from it and the limited scope of both Megatraveller and TNE.

 

[Cryton]

I run a lot of MgT. Its the most current rules set, and the one my players can go out and easily buy (and have bought). That being said, I do however keep them on their toes by using almost EVERYTHING I own from CT. Its where I get the adventures my players love, (especially the Amber Zones from my issued of JTAS and the double adventures) and I plan to keep on using them as I still love them, my players have NEVER seen them and conversion to MgT is so simple that , well, I can do it on the fly. So yeah, Enjoy playing and digging around in the CT stuff. Its well worth having regardless of what edition you play.

 

[Poppyseed45]

The CT disks are a good deal and have a huge amount of material. I was thinking of making a later campaign, after TNE timeline just to get beyond it, but then I came back to CT because of the huge amount of material you lose going away from it and the limited scope of both Megatraveller and TNE.

One of the reasons I'm looking for the Supplement Reprints (I like deadtree versions of things); there's just so much material there, that even if I create MTU, I can still mine the thing. And I understand 76 Patrons is pure, unalloyed gold.

 

[Poppyseed45]

I run a lot of MgT. Its the most current rules set, and the one my players can go out and easily buy (and have bought). That being said, I do however keep them on their toes by using almost EVERYTHING I own from CT. Its where I get the adventures my players love, (especially the Amber Zones from my issued of JTAS and the double adventures) and I plan to keep on using them as I still love them, my players have NEVER seen them and conversion to MgT is so simple that , well, I can do it on the fly. So yeah, Enjoy playing and digging around in the CT stuff. Its well worth having regardless of what edition you play.

See, this is what I thought too, but I discovered I sort of like to go all or nothing; either I use a ruleset and its pieces or I don't use it at all. I know there are folks who dig the GURPS Traveller setting and mesh it with their CT games but that all feels odd to me. So the same here - if I use CT, then I'll use CT whole hog and damn the torpedoes!

 

[Dragoner]

One of the reasons I'm looking for the Supplement Reprints (I like deadtree versions of things); there's just so much material there, that even if I create MTU, I can still mine the thing. And I understand 76 Patrons is pure, unalloyed gold.

Much of it is gold, however I don't think you can get as much material in the reprints as the disks. The reprints sound very nice, having a written book over a disk, much better. CT is the best written of all the versions I have seen, more career paths than all other versions put together, scope of where to play larger with most complete storyline.

 

[aramis]

The reprint series is $40 per vol.
Books (1-3 & 5 are 1981 editions)
Supplements
Adventures
Double Adventures
Games
Alien Modules

The current CD, for $35, includes all the above, plus the boxed sets (Tarsus, Beltstrike) plus the alternate CT rulesets (TTB, Starter Traveller), the campaigns (SMC and TTA), plus I'm told it includes Bk1-3 1977 and Bk5 1979.


The JTAS big floppy volumes are 1-12 and 13-24, at $40 each; the CD is $35, and includes JTAS issues 1-24, plus several articles extracted from challenge, plus all 4 best of JTAS volumes.

So CD is $70 for more comprehensive content than big floppies which total $320 in dead tree... and can be printed out into little books if you know what you're doing. I found the BFB to be a royal pain to use. On the table, it takes up 8.5x20". Getting the CD and an inexpensive ebook device STILL saves you money.

 

[whartung]

So CD is $70 for more comprehensive content than big floppies which total $320 in dead tree... and can be printed out into little books if you know what you're doing. I found the BFB to be a royal pain to use. On the table, it takes up 8.5x20". Getting the CD and an inexpensive ebook device STILL saves you money.

To be blunt, this is the distinguishing element between something like MgT and CT. For $70, you get a LOT, a whoie LOT of stuff. Toss in another $70 for the MT and TNE CDs, and you pretty much "have it all". (Yes, it's not quite complete, but it's really "complete enough".)

You will simply be OVERWHELMED by source material, plus all of the tools you'd ever want to create your own material. You can play it rules heavy or rules light. If you play rules light, then the info from the "other" Travellers will be just as useful as raw source material. Being an RPG, you don't have to worry about balance, or stats, or whatever. Just wing it. Make it feel right and it will be right.

So, for $340 you can have: CT, MT, TNE, and a new Kindle Fire to gorge with it all (as well as room for the Baen free CD library if you want some more Sci-Fi to read...). Then you have a svelte, handy package that you can use to take the Traveller material (ALL the Traveller material...) anywhere you want. The gaming table, the living room, the bathroom, your office for some lunch time reading, in the tank bag of your motorcycle, stuffed in the back pouch of an airline seat while you doze (remember to take all personal belongings with you when you depart the aircraft, kthx). Now your pile of Traveller books is about a 1/4" high instead of measured in feet and weighing 10's of pounds.

Also, we all have too many books on our bookcases. You know you do too (ask your wife if you have one, she'll tell you). Which books do you plan on getting rid of to make room for these new ones?

I'm a paper book guy as much as the next, but I'm getting over it. I have more issues with the DRM stuff and questions of "who owns" the material than I do with the medium. With the CT CD stuff, it's in my possession just like a book is versus in some nebulous cloud, out of reach. And having all of that stuff, LITERALLY at your finger tips, it's a marvel. Finally what more appropriate things to have on an e-Reader than Traveller.

 

[Dragoner]

For me, being a poor student again (which I am getting mighty sick of) the CD's are the only way to go.

 

[Poppyseed45]

Well, gotta BUY that e-reader first...which won't be anytime soon, prices in Hungary what they are. I am looking forward to either getting the supplements separately or the FFE Supplement Book; I really do like it hardcopy, even when it's inconvenient.

 

[aramis]

And lets not forget: 3 CD's of 3rd party stuff rereleased through FFE, and a 4th coming eventually: Apochrypha 1 & 2, TNE2, and eventually T20 (If I understand Hunter correctly, at least).

 

[hunter]

And lets not forget: 3 CD's of 3rd party stuff rereleased through FFE, and a 4th coming eventually: Apochrypha 1 & 2, TNE2, and eventually T20 (If I understand Hunter correctly, at least).

You do. He's got copies of all the T20 material to do the CD with and my permission.

 

[nats]

I cant help thinking that if your group imploded playing MgT it wont be much better with CT. MgT is far more relaxed and far easier to run and play as a game. The main downside about CT is the many, many rules and different rolls you need to remember plus all the tables you need to constantly look in. Its an old game and it shows. Don't get me wrong I prefer CT over MgT in many ways, but I cannot imagine running a game with it when you have MgT to use instead.

Most games these days are going the other way - more relaxed rules that encourage flowing gameplay and Dungeon Master flexibility/imagination. MgT works very well if you have a good Referee who knows the rules (there arent that many compared to CT) backwards and lets the players role play and the game to flow.

If you want to look at a great DM at work take a look at the Chris Perkins videos on Youtube you will love the MgT format after watching how he DMs D&D (which is very similar to the revised Mongoose Traveller mechanics).

 

[ian54]

Just a quick note that reprinting an A5 LBB (without the cover, unless you like buying ink cartridges, so it's really a LWB) is a cinch using the PDF from the CD and Adobe Reader, a few minutes folding and you have a usable dead tree replica !

Also, the Classic Adventures BFB is out of print and virtually impossible to get for under $100. Some of the individual LBB Adventures are quite rare and can be expensive (I've seen Trillion Credit Squadron for over $50). I believe the Short Adventures (Double Adventures) BFB is also out of print now.

Finally if you want to recreate the entire LBB Supplements, good luck getting #5 ;-)

 

[saundby]

Yup, it's easy to print booklet.

For stapling, I used to open up a regular stapler and staple flat through the pages into a double layer of cardboard. Then I'd close the staples by hand using needle-nose pliers.

These days I have a "deep throat" stapler (hey, that's what they're called, don't look at me like that. ) It does the job with one quick kerchunk.

I've also got a heavy-duty stapler to side stitch my own electronic component data books, since hardly anyone gives out free ones any more.

Unfortunately I only get black and white on my laser, but I have several sizes of paper drawer for it. I still wish I'd gotten a color laser from work when they were chucking the extras because they didn't want to buy toner for so many any more.

Going back to the OP, I think there are several things about CT that make it stand out compared to MgT. The information density is far higher. So ideas get popped into your head faster. As do whole ranges of possibilities. To me, MgT is algrebra, CT is differential equations. If you use DE (rather than just get subjected to it at uni), you'll know what I mean. It's a higher level. CT is a matrix for ideas. It gets me the same way. I still go back and re-read it just for pleasure, like a favorite novel.

 

[Poppyseed45]

I cant help thinking that if your group imploded playing MgT it wont be much better with CT.

As I said, the group imploded for personal reasons, nothing having to do with the game at all (to wit, it was a 7 person group where only 3 people showed up at any one time, there were several strong personality clashes and 2 of the guys couldn't maturely handle the fact that there were two pretty girls in the group, even though everyone was over 25). Lots of weird stuff in that group, which is why I don't game with them (I should mention that we formed as a group to play Traveller as the initial game; I'd just gotten MgT at the time and wanted to try it out).

Fast forward a few months and, with the new, smaller group, we tried it again, but I apparently hadn't weeded out the rest of the nasties from the group. So there were two more guys I needed to boot, which I did. That left two of us, and we recruited a few more guys, and now we're up to five but playing FATE based stuff.

My plan, of course, is in a few months, when the FATE game winds down (should be 2-3 months) I'll switch them over to Classic Traveller. One guy, who likes sci-fi MUCH more than fantasy (which we are currently playing) is very interested in what he's read about Traveller (and mind you, this guy is totally new to tabletop gaming; he's played exactly two sessions so far).