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Your ideal Traveller scenario

L

l_c_jackson

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Mongoose will soon be publishing my Traveller Scenario "Derelict", my small homage to Ridley Scott's "Alien". As I'm lazy and uninspired, I thought I would do some market research!

What types of Traveller scenario would you like to buy, trading/mercenary/exploratory/investigatory/other?

Are there certain careers ("Citizen" for example) that result in characters who don't have enough to do in the scenarios available?

What is your favourite existing commercial scenario and why?

What do you look for in a good Traveller scenario (apart from the words "by Gareth Hanrahan" of course)?

All suggestions gratefully received.

Thanks, Lindsay Jackson.
 
I plan on buying Mongoose Traveller products after the cleanup and I have some more money, right now I'm still playing CT.

However, my favorite of the CT Adventures were the Twilight's Peak and Expedition to Zhodane types because not only did they have the adventure, but they had resource stuff in the back, such as Droyne and Zhodani profiles.
 
I prefer my "adventures" to be combined adventure, and either sourcebook (setting expansion) or supplement (rules expansion).

1/3 to 1/2 adventure, and the remainder either sourcebook or supplement, or an even split between them. Without the sourcebook/supplement element, it's not worth the money for me.

My favorite CT adventures back in the day were Adv 3 Twilight's Peak (for the Droyne CGen), and TTA (Vargr CGen)... with the side note that both products had a pretty high sourcebook value, too.
 
I always thought there was a need for a Detached Duty Scout campaign book. The Traders had/have The Traveller Adventure, the Mercs had Broadsword. There wasn't much of the 'hey, I'm retired (sort of) but still have a Scout/Courier ship' linked adventures. As you can imagine, I've got ideas, if you'd like to hear/read them...

A Noble scenario/campaign would go over well, too, I'm sure.
 
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Lots of good descriptive illustrations, characters/alien drawings, maps and ship plans first and foremost that inspire my imagination.

A well thought out and planned book secondly, that encourages me to read through it and not get bored reading long waffling text.

My favourite scenario of all time is Marooned Alone. I loved the sense of desolation, the emphasis on survival and being tested to the limit of your endurance, and the illustrations and map of course.

And my favourite supplement is Traders and Gunboats - mainly for the superb illustrations and deck plans (especially the scout I love that ship) as well as those great little people and the keyplan about the different hatches and the deck cross-section. That keyplan alone got me thinking exactly what a ship would be like inside.

Its funny that the best traveller scenarios for me are ones I can relate to - those about people with guns or swords, placed in real life situations like exploration or survival against animals etc. The scifi adds to the setting and fantasy but for me Traveller has always been about gritty real life.

Its something Mongoose have got completely wrong IMO. They have concentrated purely on expanding the scifi aspects and as such MGT has lost its way completely. Traveller was never about ultra fantastic futurism.

For example the great thing about Chamax Plague was that it immediately brought to mind to me Zulu - a small rag tag high tech group holding out against an uncivilised mass of enemies. Although Starship Troopers is more similar setting to the one in that book (its probably a Starship Troopers rip-off actually), it has always been Zulu (Rorke's Drift) that has been the more inspiring image in my mind when I read that adventure, or Custer's last stand. We are humans after all the best adventures are ones we can relate to from our past. Its how Star Wars was so popular as well I think we can directly relate to Skywalker's dream of getting away from the drudgery and into the stars.
 
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i aggree with nats,. to a degree. one of my favourite parts of the whole traveller setting was the often wildly divergent techonolgy on display.

I fell in love with images i saw of characters on horse back fireing laser rifles at 1st world war bi-planes. or 18th century sailing ships being moored next to a Free trader that had landed in water. Of images of squad a of alsan warriors in Battle Dress facing off agianst a horde of screaming savages. Of a caveman in rags doing selling skins he'd hunted to a megacoporate trader in a sharp suit.

that interation of low and high techology wsa what i found so intresting. a world where your battle ship might have steam boilers but be armed with imported anti-starship missles. or your flying city was defended by muzzle loading cannon.
 
Spinward Scout said:
I always thought there was a need for a Detached Duty Scout campaign book. The Traders had/have The Traveller Adventure, the Mercs had Broadsword. There wasn't much of the 'hey, I'm retired (sort of) but still have a Scout/Courier ship' linked adventures. As you can imagine, I've got ideas, if you'd like to hear/read them...
Click to expand...

Oh yes, I'd love a Scout campaign in the same detail as The Traveller Adventure, or Tarsus. Or even a whole bunch of short Amber Zone type scout plot outlines. Time to make the characters earn their Scout/Couriers.

I'd also like something about STL colony ships from the pre-FTL days. There must be a few still about, in the spaces between the stars. There's a huge scope there, from Heinlein Universe-type stuff to Al Reynolds grim.
 
aramis said:
I prefer my "adventures" to be combined adventure, and either sourcebook (setting expansion) or supplement (rules expansion).

1/3 to 1/2 adventure, and the remainder either sourcebook or supplement, or an even split between them. Without the sourcebook/supplement element, it's not worth the money for me.

My favorite CT adventures back in the day were Adv 3 Twilight's Peak (for the Droyne CGen), and TTA (Vargr CGen)... with the side note that both products had a pretty high sourcebook value, too.
Click to expand...

I heartily agree. One of my favourite scenarios, Safari Ship, encouraged me to look beyond a simple ship plan and consider how the ship would actually be used (hunting launches and the like) and how hunting can be carried out in Traveller. That scenario was worth its weight in gold to me. And I loved the illustrations.

And Marooned again is useful beyond the actual adventure - the book can form the basis for any wilderness survival setting. So its value to a ref exceeds the one off adventure material.
 
Spinward Scout said:
I always thought there was a need for a Detached Duty Scout campaign book. The Traders had/have The Traveller Adventure, the Mercs had Broadsword. There wasn't much of the 'hey, I'm retired (sort of) but still have a Scout/Courier ship' linked adventures. As you can imagine, I've got ideas, if you'd like to hear/read them...
Click to expand...

I really like this idea--I tend to lean more toward Scouts than military/merc or trading campaigns, so I'd love to see something like this.

I fell in love with images i saw of characters on horse back fireing laser rifles at 1st world war bi-planes. or 18th century sailing ships being moored next to a Free trader that had landed in water.
Click to expand...

:) The first scenario I've been prepping for some future Traveller game -- if I ever find players -- will involve a small planetary colony that's dependent on stuff that falls from an orbital junkyard and that gets around in cobbled-together airships.
 
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Love the idea of the Alien-esque derelict. Done that, too.


Twilight's Peak - loved it - good for all character types.

Safari Ship - loved it - reasonably adaptable for most character types.

Chamax Plague - loved it - somewhat better for combat thinkers, but then again quite adaptable for most character types.
 
This is probably more specific than you are asking for. I always thought the scout crew from Double Adventure 1 was a better match than the merchant crew used. More likely to be following obscure clues to find a mystery ship in an unlikey to be visited part of a system than the merchant who would be more likely to be at the mainworld or the larger gas giant.

The Annic Nova is full of unexplained mysteries, origin, a missing boat, missing crewmembers, possible links to earth as well as Victoria on who's moon an ancient base is located, technological inconsistancies, and a mission also unexplained.

There should be enough there for a Traveller Adventure sized book with new races, new starships, new equipment, multiple worlds to search for ancient artifacts, and possibly an In Search of the Castaways scenario as well.

Trouble
 
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