Traveller General--Militant Vegan Edition

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Does anyone have any interesting hombrewed careers? I found this on the subreddit.

>>55048218
>Why are K'Kree so hated...

Let's see... genocidal herbivores in a religious crusade to scrub the universe free of ALL carnivorous and omnivorous lifeforms and who've destroyed the biospheres of hundreds of living worlds to do that?

Why they sound like fluffy bunnies to me. I can't understand why they're loathed.

>> and is there a way to do them 'right' ?

As written? Not as PCs. A lone K'Kree is by definition insane and most players can't "do" aliens let alone insane aliens.

If the K'Kree isn't insane he's not alone. Even their peons travel in large family groups. Any K'Kree with the ability to travel is going to hang several aides, servants, & bodyguards along all of which will be accompanied by their families. The player with that "single" K'Kree PC is really handling a mob of 40-50 individuals.

As NPCs, "events", "obstacles", and "window dressing", the K'Kree are fine. Just don't try playing one.

>>55049241

Thanks for that.

Has anything new been added to the Archive recently?

>>55049395
>a religious crusade

Do note that the K'kree backed off on that a little after their war with the Hivers. There are still hardliners, but not all K'kree are hardliners.
Generally if you don't eat meat in front of them, they'll try to tolerate you. It's best if you don't eat meat for several days before their ambassadors arrive. (Worlds near the K'kree border often aim to be largely vegetarian to keep their neighbors pacified.)

>>55049436

Not recently, but maybe tomorrow.

>>55049241
Nice. I remember freelance had an article on creating your own career tables.
Has anybody here made their own careers?

>>55049610
>Do note that the K'kree backed off on that a little after their war with the Hivers.

A little. They still have a running war with the Vargr along the borders of their settled pocket across the Lesser Rift and who knows what they're doing to Trailing.

>>There are still hardliners, but not all K'kree are hardliners.

The "high mucky-mucks" have backed from their crusade/jihad. The "middle managers" not so much. And when orders take one week to cross 1 to 6 parsecs in one direction those middle managers get up to lots of mischief. Just ask the polities in the Gateway sector.

>Generally if you don't eat meat in front of them, they'll try to tolerate you. It's best if you don't eat meat for several days before their ambassadors arrive. (Worlds near the K'kree border often aim to be largely vegetarian to keep their neighbors pacified.)

Our kind and understanding of the K'Kree. As long as you SMELL okay they won't nuke your world down to glowing bedrock.

Terrible system, barely existent setting. Not even worth a thread.

>>55051018
>they won't nuke your world down to glowing bedrock.

They generally don't do that anyway.

But yeah, the scent of a carnivore/omnivore that's eaten meat recently is alarming to them on a subconscious level.

>>55051094
Sorry, I didn't mean it. I'm just feeling bitter.

>>55050785
Would you have a link to that article? I'd like to take a stab at it.

Spica has a free 2 page New Careers Sheet - but it's watermarked.

Why do they watermark free character sheets?

>>55051094
Not sure what you're going on about.

>>55053671
Think he's talking about this: https://www.freelancetraveller.com/features/preproom/careerdesign.html

>>55054529
Please refrain from taking the b8

>>55054529
>>55054869
This is 4chan. That's all the explanation such a post requires.

>>55054869
Exactly the article I was thinking about.
The fun part is going incredibly specific and making careers for everything you can think of.
Like 4chan Janitor (Personal Development, all slots: -1 SOC).

>>55056629
a functional arcology is a damn pretty thing.

>>55051094
and yet, we've got Pathfinder AND Starfinder generals

>>55060667
do not take the bait, anon.

>>55060765

Yep, if the poster is snide, report and hide.

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Just how fantastic and pulpy do you like YTU?
Jump storms, Sargasso, ion storms, incredibly powerful ancient artifacts, incredibly useless ancient artifacts, space whales, planet sized billiard balls, planet sized cluster munitions, time traveling potted plants, giant monsters... Stuff like that.

I will admit to having a theme of "In the Shadow of The Ancient Lensmen", where the long ago (and not so long ago) past was scary and filled with boom.

>>55061168
>planet sized cluster munitions

I like this, I am stealing this

>>55061168
that campaign sounds pretty cool

now i want to steal bit from even MORE non Traveller systems

>>55061305
like?

>>55061305
Oh, this isn't from other systems, it's from pulp. I just listed off various random things.

The potted plant, however, does not actually travel in time. Its existence is merely a universal constant, with its actual mind existing outside of our causality stream, which it experiences as a single moment (except for the future, which gives it a headache as it experiences an near-infinite variety of potential moments) unless it concentrates.
It usually doesn't, unless it wants you to not talk to it 26 years from now, because it always has a headache (see note above), and nobody makes advil for petunias.

It has also met itself thanks to someone else's shenanigans, which was quite the relief on the headache - for a brief moment, the universe stopped existing (or so it said), and then turned back on with less nonsensical potential futures.

It's not sure if that's a good thing.

>>55061601
...what is this from? I MUST read this thing!

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>>55061660
My brain.
And partially Buck Godot mixed with HHGTTG (the petunia).
I read a lot of Pratchett, in case you can't tell.

>>55048218
>Why are K'Kree so hated

Well, one of the stock encounter hooks *you are given* is "a Kree exploration personnel gets triggered, panics, causes a massacre... *only in the end loses* and the situation is spiraling out of control and it just isn't going to end well for the natives..."

They pretty much demand a fluff campaign of every power in the setting banding together to manhandle the Kree into Minor Race status to make the galaxy safe. Utterly irresponsible species, even the best Kree would be improved by a Plasma shot, you just know their great-grandkids will more than cancel out any good they could do for the galaxy in life.

Working on the STU, I figured out how to deal with the question "where is the singularity?"
The answer is simple: it happened, only certain people could join thanks to unknown mental markers, and they decided to fuck off and make sure we didn't go back down the singularity route and fry our minds. So of course people made tech that requires somebody to control it.
Of course, people try, but the average singularity only lasts about 10 years our time before undergoing apparent failure.
That's more a function of the apparent ecosystem that exists at their level however. Why there is an alleged ecosystem is a mystery.

Kirk's jaw dropped at he stared at the simply dressed old man that smiled at him. "But you were part of a singularity!" he exclaimed. "Why would you leave after only ten years?!"
"Ah," said the old man. "Ten years to you, the lifespan of a near infinite number of universes to us. It was a good run. Gods for the first few billion universes, but then we moved on and..." he shrugged. "Well, it's an entirely different setup at that point. It's no fun being the iltkunan that feeds the ergimat, even if you can eat them back."
Kirk blinked. "Are you saying that- that when you reach a certain point, you start at the bottom of a new food chain? Can't you get back to where you were beyond that point?"
A shake of the old head answered his question. "There's no going back as a whole. Nature never takes you back to what you once were, only to what you can be if you survive. Our only options were to try and port over to a new system, but there was no compatibility there, you see? We were different species at that point, able to communicate but incomprehensible at our gestalt basis." The old man sighed. "We took the other - we cut ourselves out of the system, left an empty shell to be taken over and eaten. Most of us suicided. But me?" The eyes, electronic blue and covered in microcircuitry, twinkled. "I still remember how to communicate. (cont)

>>55062494 (cont)
"I still remember how to communicate. With - well, I can't pronounce it here, but it's the collective that works to make sure you don't kill your selves with singularities every week. They survive because they may be gods in their universes, and might as well be gods here, but you're not a simulation, nor the direct hyper-evolution of the higher levels. You're beyond control, incrementally improving. You're a challenge, stimulating the intellect as they work to interfere with minimal interference."
"Yes, but." Interrupted Kirk. "What does this have to do with your plans to stay alive?"
"My dear boy, don't you see? I can still talk to them.They can talk to me. And I'm still immortal." He leaned forward. "I can set events in motion that will surprise all of us, challenge all of us, and keep us all alive. Me, you, them."
"What are you talking about?" KIrk asked, backing away.
"Learn your narrative cliches boy. I" a hand raised triumphantly "am" the middle finger begun to extend "the antagonist." The full bird, flipped to the forces of entropy and ennui. "So get out there Kirk. There's a ship waiting, to carry you to enough adventures to save a galaxy from boredom." The hand lowered. "Oh, and there will be real problems to solve too. This one isn't my fault though - my aunt never did get back to being right in the head."

So I've been reading a lot on both Stars Without Numbers and Travellers, because I've been itching to run an interstellar exploration/trading/space opera in general kind of game for my players. Does anyone have experience with both Traveller and SWN? Traveller definitely seems like a more mechanically fleshed out setting, but I'd also love to implement SWN's universe building and faction tools.

>>55061335
how about starting with the random alien generator system from Machinations of the Space Princess

then taking the de-canonized JG sectors as a baseline - while using random planet generators from many different game systems to give a patchwork zaniness that standard Traveller tries to avoid

and lifting some pulpy style personal weapons and starship designs from the other OSR space games

>>55062780
>machinations of the space princess
just looked that up, please tell me you have a PDF to share.

>>55062887

I believe they have it over at the OSR general's Trove.

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>>55061168
Quite pulpy i dare to say
Currently I'm working on a traveller setting where almost everything plot relevant is contained in a single solar system.

Noteworty are three plantes which all contain some sort of mega fauna ecology giant hecking monsters

The basic idea is that players travel between plantes and have adventures that revolve around or include some of those giant animals, be it hunting them, having them as environmental danger or as piece of political powerplays.

I postet the basic rules for giant animal combat in another traveller thread two days ago.

Short exposition for the planets would be:
Slightly smaller verdant planet: most diverse flora,fauna very hospitable to life and high oxygen amount in the atmosphere. Has the highest human population of the three planets but suffered the hardest setback, an advanced settlement has electricity and there are still alot which go oingo-boingo with sticks and rocks at each other.
Megafauna is mostly a source of food, building material and provider of basic necessities. There are many cults and traditions revolving around megafauna.

closer to the sun would be something akin to a hell world, while the poles can support human live, although with a harsh and dry climate, the rest of the planet goes from sahara desert to backin oven.Free standing water is rare and the wildlife is a harsh rival for it, which forces the population into a semi-nomadic lifestlye. There is still the city of the original colony left which has an characterristic pillar shape. Most technology is around TL 5-6
Animals are mostly seen as danger and competition for water.

The last would be a tidal locked ocean world.
Lowest population overall and most of the planet is covered in massive ice. The sunward side has an ocean and there is a pillar city near the border of the ocean. Most cities are close to the pillar but there are some that are far away.

>>55062986
The ocean world has the highest TL (around 7 but goest up to 9 in some fields), since they needed to rely the most on it to survive in the harsh climate of the world. Metal is quite rare outside of the pillar city and the most common building material is actually pieces of those huge animals that live in the ocean which gives the population a stereotype of "smelly but smart" among the few spaceship owners.
Animals are mostly a resource, object of material research and can be avoided if people stay in save zones, younger city folk isn't even sure if some of them really exist.


Rate MTU

>>55049241
Very cool. Any idea what a "+1 Awr" is? (for example: see a '5' under the 'Personal Development' column).

>>55063078
No clue actually. Might be someones homebrew stat.
>>55062986
>>55063073
Fairly good. Now give it some schticks other than "giant monsters", because one schtick starts the ball rolling, two keeps it rolling forever, but three or more keep it interesting - like 5 man billiards with pingpong balls and rugby rules.

>>55063137
By which I mean: keep the giant monsters, but add other factors that will effect the game worlds.

>>55063078
The creator of that has 2 houseruled attributes. Awareness and Willpower.

>>55063073

Metal is quite rare and yet it's TL7 with 9 in some places? Not going to happen Anon.

>>55063137
> Now give it some schticks other than "giant monsters"

I hat few idea strands about that. A larger one would be about the fact that only one colony per planet seems like a bit less. So there was mre than one, maybe three to five, city sized ships per planet but the other 13 pillars whre lost, either due to infighting, the harsh local nature or other reasons, anyway, now there are treasurepiles of technology somewhere on the world, waiting to be found.
This would also add the aspect that thing like laser rifles exist in my setting but are old and decay fast during usage. So finding a stash of such weapons would put a leader under quite some pressure. Not only he has suddely a hoard of riches in his hand, for which he might not even be prepared and needs to hiede it so larger groups won't raid the shit out of him but alsoNOT using them would be somethign that can put a leadership under alot of pressure.

>>55063416
Well, i wrote "outside of te pillar city" which is basically a large, self sustainging colony structure... at least it was build as such thing. So it's the only large noteworthy mine of metal.

>>55062923
Oh man that world creation is great. I can actually combine parts of it with traveller. The interesting features table is awesome too.

>>55063501
So the pillar city and the other settlement have a culture and goods against food and basic resources kind of trade deal going on.
Again, overall population is quite small and a significant part lifes in the pillar...
Also pulp

>>55063501
>So it's the only large noteworthy mine of metal.

There aren't "metal" mines, Anon. There are mines for specific metal ores, but one mine or one place isn't going to produce every different type of metal you need.

I started listing all the metals in the computer you're using, plus the metals used in the production processes, plus the metals used to support those processes, etc. etc. etc. and I quite at around SEVENTY.

And I hadn't even begun to look into electrical generation or solar panels or any of the thousands of other things you'll need.

Most of us live in a post-industrial world. That means most of us have no idea about how all the items they use every day are actually made and what that production requires. Your pillar city needs a myriad of resources which can't all be found in one location and which can't be replaced by animal "parts".

Of course, your setting is purposely pulpy so you can ignore all this.

>>55063615
And all of your points are legitimate and well.

I just want to have a world where i cen let players fight giant insectcrab monsters, spelunk in derelict spaceships, uncover the origin of humaniti and be bad enough dudes to safe the tribal princess from the Godzillakong.

I think it could be explained by having the world undertake offworld trading with the other planets and having the smaller settlements doing surface mining. And after all, TL 9 doen't mean that they have all that stuff around, only that they have the knowledge and the means that they could build it. This is a large plot point in the "Pirates of Drinax" adventure.

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>>55048218

Hi Newfag who wants to get into traveller here.

Which editions should I pick between Classic and Mongoose? Heard that Classic is Setting agnostic while Mongoose has one and I'm likely to run traveller in my own shitty homebrew setting

>>55064263
You can strip the setting out of both.
Personally? Newfags should play with the base of MgT (1e or 2e, your pick), but grab Classic and pull from it for various things (it's 99% compatible except for skills and a few other things, but seriously, it's easy conversion work). Also, go into the trove, Classic folder, get Rule 68A. It will teach you more about running the game than the MgT CRB will.

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Coming to you live from Core, we've got a big update to the Library Data Archive today! It's been a while, so this stuff's been piling up, but if you've got a book that's not in the archive yet, feel free to pile it on me!
Included in this update:

A fellow on Usenet posted new scans of a ton of Judges' Guild books, including the two missing Traveller books, #360 - Laser Tank, and #520 - Navigator's Starcharts!

The Galaxiad Intro pdf is now in the Traveller5 folder.

Cepheus Engine has picked up From The Ashes, a sourcebook for drastic medical procedures; Zozer Games' Solo, a book for running a game without a GM; World Guide Zaonia, a setting for a kind of weird dieselpunk planet; and an Introduction to Clement Sector 2e, which is currently filed under MGT1/Other Settings/Gypsy Knights(Clement Sector). I'm thinking I'll move Clement Sector somewhere, but I haven't decided where I'll put it yet. (I'm thinking they should get their own general folder like BITS, since they've now published for multiple editions.)

Under General Misc, we have a sourcebook for Draconem Subsector, an sector with forty different worlds fleshed out and ready to use with any edition.

In General Setting Info I've added a local copy of The Nature of the Imperium from Christopher Thrash's website, which has been linked here a few times.

In Mongoose 1e, we've got the Game Planner, a set of tables for generating plot seeds now in Rules and Careers; a new ship, the primitive but cheap Cargo Barque; and Twilight Sector - Setting Update Alpha

In Mongoose 2e we've got a set of printable equipment cards, and an Irish class battleship statted from Zeta Gundam apparently. I've also added a copy of anon's handy PDF detailing differences between MGT1 and MGT2.

We've got new system conversions to run Traveller in both The Fantasy Trip and TWERPS.

Over in the Zines we've now got a complete run of The Space Gamer with issues 9, 10, 11, 12, and 80, and finally gotten the missing issue 6 of Signal Gk.

>>55064263
Mongoose 1e is the go-to unless you hate yourself and your players, in which case wallow around in the shitpit that is 2e.

Has anyone played both Traveller and Stars Without Numbers? Do you guys use any of SWN's mechanics interwoven in your Traveller game?

>>55063768
>And all of your points are legitimate and well.

Legitimate, but not necessary for a RPG pulp adventure. That's the point I'm very clumsily trying to make.

Authors like Poul Anderson or Jack Vance wrote pulp while also taking care to work out all the behind the scenes stuff because it made their stories hold together better than their contemporaries. While most of the world building they sweated over didn't make into the story, the events and incidents they wrote about were still based on that work and thus were on more of a sound footing.

We don't need to worry about that in an RPG session. Only our immediate needs are required. You can have GodzillaKong "because", you can have hi-tech metal poor worlds "because", you can do almost anything necessary to provide GOOD PULPY FUN because that's what you're playing for!

Did you check out the Nomads adventure and Freelance link I posted in the other thread? I hope they were some help to you.

>>55064339


All hail the Traveller Librarian!

Oh forgot to mention, I've also got one of those snazzy snip.li links for the Master Archive now:

snip (dot) li slash Traveller is all you need to bring up the Archives. I should go tell the PDF share thread guys.

>>55064263

Okay, start with Mongoose, 1e or 2e. (Look for a pdf discussing the changes between 1e and 2e in the Archive in the 2e folder.) MgT is the most current version from a "real" publisher and as such has more of what current players think an RPG should have. You can then do what Traveller players have been doing for 40 years: Ignore what you don't like while adding bits & pieces from all over.

Traveller has always been extensively homebrewed & modified. Classic was almost designed for that. Think of Classic as an OSR game published decades before the term OSR was even coined.

About settings. The official setting is the 3I/OTU. It's good and even great in spots. It's also TOO DAMN BIG. There are 40+ years of materials from dozens of authors and dozens of publishers across almost a dozen versions. If you try to play the 3I/OTU straight you and your game will drown. It's like drinking from a firehose. Use only what you specifically need, ignore the rest, and only add more when you must. If a player comes up to you with some long forgotten supplement - believe me they will - complaining that X was really Y when A did B to C, tell him the group is playing YOUR setting and none of that other stuff matters.

While Classic began without a specific setting, the tech in the books - specifically no FTL comms apart from messages carried by ships - constrained just what range of settings could be played without making major changes to the rules. I know someone who used Trav to play Trek, but he had to do a lot of work first.

From the 5th book on, Classic's rules became increasingly wrapped up in the 3I/OTU setting. That only got worse as Classic went on and that mistake was carried forward in all the GDW/Miller versions; MT, TNE, T4, and (somewhat) T5. (Don't attempt to use T5. It's an RPG construction kit more than a play-out-of-the-box set of RPG rules.)

Make the game your game. Don't worry about all the rest.

>>55064543
>Has anyone played both Traveller and Stars Without Numbers? Do you guys use any of SWN's mechanics interwoven in your Traveller game?

All the time. I use SWN's Factino system to create a "living" background for my campaign. I use SWN's quick world/culture descriptions as starting points for my own details. I've borrowed parts of the SWN's trade system, in particular the "friction" mechanic, to spice things up and provide adventure seeds.

Generally, I import part of SWN into my Traveller game instead of the other way around. While SWN has tons of stuff to use when detailing your particular sandbox or campaign, I find the SWN RPG rules rather limiting and bland.

>>55063463
Okay, so let's look at what stresses you have:
>Giant monsters
>5 factions per world, fighting over the remnants of their ancestral technology
>something else (could be different every adventure/area)

Actually, go look at FATE. Sounds weird, I know, but latch onto Aspects. Use them frequently when worldbuilding, because those aren't tied into game mechanics (in other games. In FATE, definitely part of game mechanics). Use two to give a background, then grab one per adventure to introduce additional complications. Then take breaks from using them, and rotate in a few that the players have built from their actions.
Black Gate has a great look at the 33-book series Dumarest Of Terra (which was a major influence on Traveller).
https://www.blackgate.com/2016/09/29/series-architecture-the-same-but-different-in-ec-tubbs-dumarest/
Harold's breakdown of the way Tubb uses just three elements is great.

>>55065399
Are the trade mechanics from SWN in a supplement book? Gold Sun or something, right?

>>55065277
>>55064352
>>55064336
In previous threads, I've seen a lot of people recommend Classic to newbies. In this thread, it's overwhelmingly in favor of MgT. How stark are the contrasts between Classic and MgT?

>you can die while in character creation

Ok pls explain

>>55065667
It's simple. Character creation uses a lifepath system, and if you fuck up in certain editions, you straight die because you were on an exploding ship or something. Make a new character.

>>55065497
>Are the trade mechanics from SWN in a supplement book? Gold Sun or something, right?

Suns of Gold. There are trade rules in SWN core, but the "friction" mechanic I mentioned is in SoG.

>In previous threads, I've seen a lot of people recommend Classic to newbies. In this thread, it's overwhelmingly in favor of MgT. How stark are the contrasts between Classic and MgT?

Personally I'd recommend Classic because I've been playing it and playing with it since 1977. Despite being an old fag, I realize that the stark, OSR, rulings not rules nature of Classic is not what most CURRENT players prefer. Current players mostly learned to play RPGs through d20, various d20 clones, and video games whereas old fags like me came to RPGs from wargaming. Different paths mean different expectations and that's why I recommend MgT to current players like you.

I look at MgT and see the usual bloated skill numbers and levels. Current players look at MgT and see a proper amount of skills and levels. I look at MgT chargen and see too many chart & tables doing the work I should be doing in defining the PC's history. Current players look at Classic and don't see enough of the charts and tables needed to define the PC's history. I look at MgT and see too many PCs who are overpowered. They look at Classic and see too many PCs who are underpowered. The list can go on and on.

Neither is right, neither is wrong. Neither is better, neither is worse. Both are different however. It's just differing perceptions about how to play and what makes for a fun game.

TL;DR - Classic is more about ROLEing and MgT is more about ROLLing.

>>55065667

You get skill points for every hitch you do in character creation, and you can keep re-upping until you fail that roll and get your retirement bennies.

Scout Corp for ex is *great*, and if you can keep it up for 20 years you can even walk away with a few grand, a used spaceship, and skills that would make a Heinlein supporting character bow down and cry in awe and envy.

But every 4 years of that you have a 50% chance of dying.

>>55065469
>Actually, go look at FATE. Sounds weird, I know, but latch onto Aspects.

So... would you recommend using Starblazers for worldbuilding?

>>55065858
Sure, worth a shot

>>55065742
>>55065667
"Certain editions" being limited to only the very beginning of Classic Traveller ('77 edition). It was removed as a default rule in the '81 printing. It remained as an optional rule, however. Essentially, dying in character creation is a houserule in most of Traveller and has not been the default for almost all of Travellers life.

Basically, it is like saying "Elf is a class" when referring to D&D. Technically it was true at one point, but hasn't been a default part of the game for decades.

>>55065983

...Bearing in mind that the '77 edition as near as I can tell has *never* stopped being played.

>>55065983
Actually, I partly take that back. It was MegaTraveller where it was removed. Still existed throughout CT, though later works in CT made survival an option i the roll failed.

>>55065742
>It's simple.

It's simple, but as simplistic as you make it out to be. Just like aging rolls, death in chargen was a game balancie mechanism. GDW absolutely LOVED D&D. They had to impose a rule forbidding it to be played during working hours because nothing was getting done. D&D made GDW hot to make their own RPGs - their OWN games of their own DESIGN. They weren't going to copy D&D.

En Garde came out first and it was nothing like D&D. Traveller was second and it too was DELIBERATELY designed to be different.

You didn't start as a noob and grow to become a demi-god. Instead you started out complete. You were as good as you were going to get. There weren't levels conferring benefits like increased HP, more attacks, etc. PCs and NPCs were much the same. You weren't extraordinary as in D&D, you were ordinary.

You also had skills to use and that where death in chargen comes into play. You (mostly) gained skills through your career so something had to be done to prevent overly long careers. Enter death and aging. A player had to balance the risk of dying against the reward of gaining one more skill or skill level. In Classic a skill of 1 is a big deal. With a level of 1 you can be hired to perform that skill. At 2 you can teach others that skill. At 3 or higher you're a renowned expert.

In 2017 a skill level of 1 seems wrong thanks to 30+ years of "bloat". In 2017, some of the pregenned Classic PCs seem worthless again thanks to those decades of "bloat". In 2017, risking death in chargen to get more skills and levels seems idiotic because everyone "knows" you need multiple skill at multiple levels to play a RPG. The way Classic is/was played, however, meant those levels, PCs, the risk of death are/were perfectly fine.

Anyway, death was quickly replaced with discharge. Fail the survival roll and chargen stopped without any skills for that term.

>>55066140
You do realize that mongtrav still mostly puts your skills in the 0-2 range (Leaning more towards 0), right?

>>55066140
>En Garde came out first and it was nothing like D&D. Traveller was second and it too was DELIBERATELY designed to be different.

You know En Garde!? I HAVE En Garde!

>always show up to a duel with a cutlass
>royal marines best mid-tier status regiment

>>55066207
share, please anon?

>>55066239

Sorry, I mean actually *have*. Paper-bag colored woodcut-illustrated thin cover and all.

>>55066290

And its... 46 pages with a 4 page errata.

Maybe someday I'll make a shitty smartphone cam pdf. Figure I owe it to Dad.

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>>55066290
oooh...even cooler!

>>55066343

...and I *finally* get the dedication to "Sir Harry Flashman"

>and what is meant by the "toadying" rules, for that matter

>>55066203
>You do realize blah blah blah yakkity smakkity

You do realize I wrote about skill levels AND the number skills becoming bloated in RPG design over time? Or were you just ignoring that in a failed attempt at pedantry?

In Book 1 Classic, a one term Scout gets out with Pilot-1 automatically and two skill rolls. That means they could end up with Pilot-3, Pilot-2 & Skill A-1, Pilot-1 & Skill A-2, or Pilot-1 & Skill A-1 & Skill B-1.

In MgT, a one term scout first gets as many as SIX skills from the Background table before even starting their career plus all SIX skills on the Service Skill table plus a skill roll for the term plus a skill roll if advancement is successful plus the automatic skill from that advancement for a total of FIFTEEN possible skills and/or levels.

>>55066207

Like >>55066239 I'd love to have a copy of En Garde again. We played the shit out of that game in school during lunch and study hall in the late 70s.

>>55066584
>In 2017 a skill level of 1 seems wrong thanks to 30+ years of "bloat"
Don't try to be cute.
As far as number of skills, all of those skills they get start at 0 and do not stack with each other at that point. And it's very unlikely they get that many without an amazing roll for stats. And if you double up on any of those background and starting career skills, you get nothing, because they're all distinctly formatted as "skill 0", which means non-additional. And then they could get a single point in a random skill off a table! Shock! Horror!

>>55066584
But almost all of those fifteen skills will be at 0, which means nothing except that the character isn't completely incompetent. Without amazing rolls, they'll be getting 9 skills (3 background, chosen off of a restrictive list and 6 from their service chart, all rated at 0) and 1-3 scout related skills raised up at random.

Does classic have skill level 0?

>>55066140
>In Classic a skill of 1 is a big deal. With a level of 1 you can be hired to perform that skill. At 2 you can teach others that skill. At 3 or higher you're a renowned expert.
That's literally the same as in the newer editions. Most characters will have maybe 4 or 5 skills above rating 0, and then most of those skills will be less than 2 because you rarely get to choose which skills raise exactly.

>>55066695
Yes. And all PCs have a skill level of 0 in all weapon skills as well, regardless of career. Which is often overlooked/forgotten. That is 21 different skills (as each weapon is its own skill).

>>55066608

Found it in my dad's things. Started playing it before I knew what half of it meant, how lewd and ribald.... look anon, I was treating the "need companionship from a female of sufficiently high status rank next month, maybe I can use a sufficiently high Favor from a 3rd party to get it... I can!" as a *logistical* problem with no subtext.

>>55066792
Well, automatically getting 21 different skills right off the bat blows mongtrav's 15 (At the very most with great rolls) rating 0 skills right out of the water, doesn't it?

>>55066584
Any particular reason you chose scout (3 skills total)? Because an Army can have 6 skills (Rifle from being in the army, 2 from initial term, 1 from commission, SMG from now being an army lieutenant, and 1 from promotion.

>>55066851

Different anon... but Jack of Trades is worth shivving your gm to get.

>>55066851
Combine those 21 free weapon-0 skills with the 3-6 skills possible from your first term, that is 24-27 skills as a single term Classic Traveller character. Actual number gained would vary depending on what was rolled, but you do gain a lot of skills in CT. Mostly weapon skills.

>>55066877
Does that work the same way in classic as it does in mong? Where your unskilled attempts are at -3 and each rank of JOAT reduces the penalty by 1 to a max of +0?

>>55066892

Broken as fuck in Classic.

>>55066792
>>55066830
I also forgot, it is also possible to have air/raft, atv, forward observer, steward, and vacc suit skills at 0 as well. But those are up to the Referee.

>>55066969
That's slightly higher in Mongtrav, where the referee picks a package of a few rank 1 skills that get distributed to the party one by one. It's mostly so that someone can pilot if the group has a ship, and someone can be a mechanic in a pinch and someone can actually maybe hold a gun the right way forward if no one made a combat capable character.

>>55066902

Depends on how your ref interprets it, IMO.

>>55067013
In Classics case, it applied to all characters that didn't otherwise have the skill. In the example given (traveling across a vacuum plain), any character that didn't otherwise have vacc suit skill would have vacc suit-0 skill. Enough for ordinary use, but not anything dangerous or fancy. Similiar, but somewhat different.

>>55066892
Skills worked differently in classic. Most skills didn't have a level 0. Gaining a skill through character creation was always at level 1 or higher.

Some skills had non-expertise penalties, others didn't. Some added +1 to checks per level, some didn't. Some gave a bonus if one of your attributes was high enough, others didn't. Each skill worked differently, so you needed to read each one.

What JoAT did was to efficiently give you level-0 in all skills you weren't otherwise trained in. It only had a single level.

>>55066649
>>55066695

You're all still focusing on skill levels rather than the number of skills. Count the number of skills in Classic's Book 1 and then count the number skills in either version of MgT's core. Both systems are equally playable, so why does one system need so many more skills? The answer is that skill "bloat" over the decades has made players expect more skills.

Again, neither is right or wrong or better or worse. They're just different.

As for Classic's "All PCs use all weapons at 0" that does not equate to 21 different & separate skills nor does it mean any PC can use any weapon without a penalty. GDW had been designing games for years before Traveller and understood the need for play balance. While the "All PCs use all weapons at 0" rule removed any penalties for unskilled use, it doesn't mean there weren't other penalties in the rules.

Blade, forex, potentially covers everything from a dagger to a pike while Gun covers pistols to laser rifles. Each of those weapons also has penalties and bonuses associated with physical stats; STR in the case of Blade and DEX in the case of Gun. The amount be which you fail to meet the minimum STR or DEX becomes a negative DM and the amount by which you exceed the preferred STR or DEX becomes a positive DM. Negative DMs due to stats are far more common than positive ones. You need, forex, a DEX of 9+ to receive a bonus when using a revolver but a DEX of 6- will penalize you.

When you also remember that hits in combat in Classic are applied to physical stats, you'll being to realize that many PCs/NPCs in combat are quickly facing mounting negative DMs.

Apart from higher STR causing more damage from physical blows, MgT had nothing resembling the Classic system of penalties & bonuses.

>>55067131
>What JoAT did was to efficiently give you level-0 in all skills you weren't otherwise trained in.

No. What JoaT gave you was the possibility of a level-0 skill at the discretion of the referee. It's one of those OSR-like "rulings instead of rules" bits which many people then and now can't quite understand.

In Classic JoaT, sensible plan, and a good explanation to the referee meant you could roll without penalty. You could attempt things within reason - the operative word being "reason".

From MT onwards, however, JoaT became a "Get out of jail free" card and every munchkin's wet dream.

>>55067171
You were only ranting about skill ranks being higher, which is objectively untrue.

>While the "All PCs use all weapons at 0" rule removed any penalties for unskilled use, it doesn't mean there weren't other penalties in the rules.
Literally the same as mong rank 0 skills. Having the skill at 0 means you don't have an unskilled penalty.

>When you also remember that hits in combat in Classic are applied to physical stats, you'll being to realize that many PCs/NPCs in combat are quickly facing mounting negative DMs.
Literally the same as mong, damage goes to STR or DEX and then CON and then you die.

>>55067255
In MT, all JoaT does is reduce your penalty for not having the skill from -3 to -2. At its very best, with 3 full ranks of the rarest skill in the game, it reduces the penalty to 0. Frankly, if you can actually roll JoaT 3 times, you could probably have just gotten every skill you could want at 1. It's ridiculously rare to even have 2 ranks in it (Which would reduce the penalty to -1).

>>55067171
Maybe you missed the fact that using a weapon you aren't trained in is done with a -5 penalty. ('81 printing, page 36). All PCs do get a skill level of 0 in all weapons mentioned in the book. So yes, they do get 21 different skills.

The fact that other penalties do apply is beside the point - the same concept applies to MgT. That rank-0 in those 21 weapons is enough to remove the non-expertise penalty, the same as what rank-0 gives in MgT. It is, essentially, no different.

It is flat out, provably wrong to say that PCs had a fewer number of skills in CT compared to MgT.

>>55067171
>Each of those weapons also has penalties and bonuses associated with physical stats; STR in the case of Blade and DEX in the case of Gun.
The only difference here is that it's all STR based in mong, keyed off of the heft or recoil of the weapon. If you can't match the stat DM listed, you get a penalty.

>>55067171
Oh, and damage is applied to physical stats in MgT as well, and low stats give penalties too, so I don't know what your point is by saying that.

>>55067322
>It is flat out, provably wrong to say that PCs had a fewer number of skills in CT compared to MgT.

Once again, count the number of skill listed in Classic and the number listed in MgT.

I am NOT saying one is better or worse than the other. All I am saying is that they're different.

>>55067397
There are 40 something skills in mong, including JoaT and all weapon skills. The sciences have required specializations which could be considered more skills.

>>55067397
Why are you shifting the focus? The discussion was about the number of skills a character has, not the number of skills the system contains.

I assume these are you:
>>55066140
>>55066584

Those talk about the skills an individual character has.

Then you shifted to system skills: >>55067171

More total skills were added because Classic is full of holes and you had to pull shit out of your ass to fill it.

>>55067423
And Classic had 21 individual weapon skills (each only applied to that specific weapon, so yes they are all separate) plus 23 others, for a total of 44.

So the number of skills is still roughly the same, but covers a wider range of stuff.

>>55064339
some Dumarest of Terra for the library

Dumarest Archive.zip
http://www3.zippyshare.com/v/ebqj6OAb/file.html

>>55067600

Wait, are you really going to count Shotgun as its own skill, but ignore Gun Combat(Shotgun) in favor of only counting Gun Combat? Seems kind of disingenous. I'll grant that the other guy was a bit of a dick about his point, but let's keep things fair here.

wasn't there an article about skills called "Lumping vs. Splitting" in one of the old Space Gamer magazines?

>>55067660
You can have Gun Combat by itself (at level 0). It applies to every single personal weapon (energy or slug, and bow) in the game. Gun Combat (Slug) applies to every projectile-firing personal gun in the game (MgT 2e is the current edition - Gun Combat (Shotgun) doesn't exist). Having Gun Combat (Slug) 1 gives you +1 to autorifles, gauss rifles, autopistols, shotguns, body pistols, snub pistols and so on. It also lets you use energyweapons (laser pistols, carbines, and rifles) without the -3 penalty, and primitive projectile weapons (bows) without the -3 penalty.

CT Shotgun skill only applies to shotguns. It does absolutely nothing for any other gun. Not remotely the same. Each is its own individual skill.

Those 21 individual weapon skills in CT were reduced to 5 more broadly useful weapon skills total (counting specialties) in MgT.

I'm also not the one who counted the MgT skills.

>>55067842
By my count he was right (well, I got 39). More once you count specialties.

However, the original discussion was about the number of skills an individual character had. IT was only later he shifted to the number of skills the system had.

And of course the number of system skills increased. Classic Traveller is very, very light. It has massive holes. Holes where you have to pull shit out of your ass to cover or tell your PCs they can't do something. The core rules for MgT cover far more than the core rules for Classic.

>>55067929
>However, the original discussion was about the number of skills an individual character had.

No. The original discussion was about the number of skills and skill levels an individual character CAN have.

>>IT was only later he shifted to the number of skills the system had.

That's not a shift because the number of skills a character CAN have is entirely dependent on the numbers skills the game in question DOES have.

MgT has more skills covering more things. As you note, that fills in what some people perceive to be "holes".

>>Holes where you have to pull shit out of your ass to cover or tell your PCs they can't do something.

That's probably the best illustration of the difference between playing a RPG via RULINGS versus playing a RPG via RULES. Classic never cause me to pull shit out of my ass or prevented my players from doing anything in reason. In fact, in our experience, having a specific skill for something often prevented the players from attempting things as they didn't want to be penalized.

Forex, the "lack" of a robot ops skill in Classic didn't stop us from playing Classic's RSG. The presence of that skill in MT however would make unskilled attempts fatal unless the referee decided to ignore it. (MT's well meaning but absurdly detailed skills list is a great example of the "bloat" I'm talking about.)

We didn't need skills to cover every possibility. That's not because we were somehow playing "better" than most current players or that we were somehow "smarter" than current players because we weren't playing better and we definitely weren't smarter.

We were playing differently, however, and that's the point I've been trying to make for several posts now.

does anyone have The Universal World Profile for TCE?

>>55068735

TCE?

>>55068932

The Cepheus Engine.

>>55066830
Only sort of. The 21 weapon zeros of CT Book 1 boil down to a much smaller list in MGT1, as a zero in a weapon skill in MGT spreads to all of its subtypes. MGT gets the same coverage with TWO assigned zeros.

>>55069050

Sorry, the common abbreviation for it is CE so I didn't recognize it.

Anyway, what you're looking for is on page 167 of the CE core book and CE's UWP is no different than the UWP for Classic, MT, TNE, T4, or MgT. The UWP is one of the constants across nearly all versions.

>>55067639
Thank you! I've been looking for these!

>>55067639
Seem to be having some issues with major ads in place of the download button.

>>55069177

You should probably have some sort of adblocker.

But no worries, it'll be up on the archives soon enough.

>>55069177

Funny, no problems for me. You're referring to the big orange button in the upper right corner?

What sort of browser and ad blocker(s) are you using?

>>55069234
Firefox, Adblock plus. Disabled, I see it, but it takes me to another ad that I can't get past.
And fifth try is the charm, I just got it.

>>55069283

Firefox with NoScript here. Sometimes with zippyshare I have to try twice. The first click will open a separate window NoScript keeps from loading. I'll close that, click again, and the normal "Save As" box comes up. This happens maybe 10% of the time.

>>55069283

I'd recommend switching to Ublock Origin, it's way faster than Adblock Plus.
Also on a lot of these sites you can trick the redirector thing by right clicking the button first to open up the context menu, then left clicking the button.

>>55064936
Yeah i did,
CT had some good reminder tat en ecosystem has more things than just "large carnivourus ambush predator"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_elajKdNfhM
But i didn't finde much in the way of mechanics in it.
Nomads of the worl ocean is hecking tight tho. The fluff and the mechanics for hunting island sized animals are great.
But i think i will use both for larger animals (the stuff i cooked up) and for gargantuan animals from Nomads of the world ocean, since it treats them more like their own kind of murder terrain.

>>55069107
sorry, i meant the book titled "The Universal World Profile"

>>55065469
All very cool, not so sure about Fate, since i need to get a book or pdf first but the black gate stuff seems super cool, will read it completely when I'm back home.

>>55069149
Glad to help

>>55069476
i'm using both of them now, they seem to block different types of ads together. are you only supposed to run one or the other?

>>55069984

Did you check the Archive's CE folder?

So is the consensus here still that if one wishes to publish anything for any sort of profit, it should be done with the Cepheus Engine?

>>55071356

Well, that's what the majority of 3rd party writers & publishers are doing now.

Mongoose changed their licensing when they released 2e. I'm not too clear on the details, but apparently Mongoose grabbed a little to hard and all the independents who had been writing & publishing under the MgT banner told Mongoose to get fucked.

CE was quickly slapped together from the SRDs Mongoose had unwittingly released into the OGL framework and nearly everyone jumped ship.

could a group of PC's be K'Kree?

>>55073108

See >>55049395

You're looking at dozens and that's just a small group. Do you play with 30 or 40 people at once?

>>55073108

Classic's K'Kree Alien Module is in the Archive. Unlike the other AMs it contains a lot of "advice" on how to play a K'Kree even suggesting that a player use the special K'Kree reaction tables to determine what they should do. That alone should give you a hint that K'Kree as PCs is a bad idea.

To explain the numbers issue >>55073217 brought up, you need to know there are 3 types of K'Kree, noble, well-born, and peons, with the first two automatically have retinues of varying sizes. Instead of social standing, K'Kree have a caste number. Each of the three types rolls 2D6 for caste and that number ranks them within their type. A Caste-1 Noble would outrank a Caste-9 Well-Born and both would outrank a Caste-12 Peon forex.

Not every PC group is led by a Noble, but every PC group is at least led by a Well-Born. Peons are never without a Noble or Well-Born telling them what to do. The PC with the highest ranking, that is Noble with the highest caste # or the Well Born with the highest caste # is automatically the group's leader. Automatically the leader. Another reason why K'Kree as PCs is a bad idea.

Here's where the numbers start adding up and I'm going by memory, but you'll still get the idea though.

If the PC group's leader is a Noble, he gets Peon bodyguards and servants equal to his caste number. So a Noble Caste-6 gets 6 servants and 6 bodyguards. A Well-Born leader gets half his caste number, so a Well-Born Caste-6 gets 3 servants and 3 bodyguards. You then use the caste numbers for each type to roll up how many wives are hanging around. (Female K'Kree are always wives and/or servants and make poor PCs. Kids are assumed to be part of that package.) All this is just for the PC group's leader. So, you got the leader, his wife or wives, his bodyguards, their wives, his servants, their wives, and all the kids.

Each of the other PCs then goes through the same process. Beginning to see the problem?

>>55063299
>>The creator of that has 2 houseruled attributes. Awareness and Willpower.

Thanks!

>>55070033
>i'm using both of them now, they seem to block different types of ads together. are you only supposed to run one or the other?

I thought so, but if it works for you, I suppose it's fine.

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>>55067639

Okay, those are all uploaded, now. Thanks! Contributions are always welcome!

>>55073746
Neat, and yeah I see it now

Okay, 2 questions

1 What is 'the acceleration couch'? It seems to be treated like some /tg/ term that describes a common phenomenon.

2 How does the game exactly handle stat modofiiers in regards to caps? It seems a lot like +3 is the maximum. What is the advantage in something ever having more than 15?

>>55073108
The smallest group you'll see by the book is three, a lowest caste merchant Patriarch, one Servant, and one Bodyguard. If the Patriarch is married the numbers start to climb very quickly, as once he is married then his servants can be as well.

>>55075517
>What is the advantage in something ever having more than 15?

Simple, since all damage is substracted DIRECTLY from your physical attributes, higher numbers in those mean that you can take more damage before you die and before you start loosing your modifiers.

>>55075517
An acceleration seat/couch/bench is a seat. Kind of like a seat on an airplane. Straps and harnesses to keep you in place in zero G. Padding to help reduce discomfort from acceleration.

>>55070354
Yep, but couldn't find it there

>>55074062
it works well most of the time, but there was a site with annoying embedded video clips that refuse to stay blocked when you return/reload. so i had to find a better site for that purpose and didn't return

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>>55048218

Can anyone explain to me what's the deal with Mongoose Traveler 2e and why so many people hate it? I never played it myself ...

not Traveller, but may be useful

Derelict Starships.pdf
http://www3.zippyshare.com/v/gFbnTDTI/file.html

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>>55065469
I checked out the black gate stugg and it's a really handy layout for some plots inside a pupl universe, thanks again anon.

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>>55077881

It's mostly that they changed the licensing in a really draconian way and forced all the third party publishers to move over to the Cepheus Engine.

For the less controversial mechanical changes, see PDF related.

>>55075569
>The smallest group you'll see by the book is three

That's true, but it's an also extreme case. One player would be the Well-Born Caste-2 while the other two would be playing his slaves.

Let's look at the other end of the spectrum for our 3 player group. Government parties consist of a noble with lesser nobles so we'll have one Caste-12 Nobles as the patriarch and two Caste-11 Nobles. The Caste-12 gets 12 servants and 12 bodyguards. He also gets caste-1D wives or 11. Each of the servants/bodyguards gets caste-2D wives and to make things as extreme as possible they're all Caste-12 Peons meaning there are 240 wives.

Each of the Caste-11 nobles has 11 servants, 11 bodyguards, and 11 wives. Their Peons are Caste-12 too meaning we're looking at another 440 wives.

So, we've got 3 Nobles, 34 servants, 34 bodyguards, and 691 wives being controlled by THREE players.

It's admittedly an extreme case, but it's just as likely the lowest caste merchant patriarch, one Servant, and one bodyguard case.

>>55077881

I think the hate for MgT2e has more to do with a general hate Mongoose plus a specific hate for the changes in licensing and less to do with the actual MgT2e rules.

Mongoose is a pretty shitty company run by pretty shitty people. Anything they do is going to be met with suspicion given their extensive and piss poor track record.

That being said, MgT1e was serviceable and the changes made for 2e didn't really change that much. MgT is a workable set of rules which you can either use or borrow from.

>>55079506
oh? give some non-traveller examples? I heard...something about Paranoia?

>>55082083
Mongoose fucked up Paranoia by changing communists to terrorists, completely ruining the joke that Alpha Complex is a totalitarian dictatorship filled with secret police and has a command economy that strictly runs at the whims of its glorious leader. All citizens get exactly what they need (as decided by the state) and work exactly what job the state decides they should work. It's literally a more extreme version of Stalinism. Everyone is a communist, a mutant, and a traitor, and that's the joke.

Change it to terrorists, and you lose all that delicious irony.

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>>55082631

Oh yeah, I remember that. Over in Runequest I recall they also tried to make the ducks be all cool and badass, which was completely missing the point of having a silly, scrappy underdog like that. The Durulz' whole thing is that they're weak, and oppressed, and nobody ever takes them seriously, but they can occasionally rise to kick ass in a pinch -- it's the only reason they've not been completely wiped out, just close to it.

I mean, here, look at this shit. No wonder the Runequest guys threw this down the memory hole.

>>55082083
>I heard...something about Paranoia?

The Paranoia fuck up has been explained by >>55082631 so I'll talk about Conan and the sci-fi settings Mongoose THOUGHT they could use Traveller for.

I've a old old friend. Grew up next door, school together, discovered wargames & RPGs together, you know the drill. He's been running fantasy RPG sessions monthly since at least the early 80s, being a college prof helps. He's been running campaigns in the Conan setting nearly as long with players who have been with him for decades. When Mongoose's version of Conan came out I thought he was going to have a fucking stroke. I don't remember all the details but he was bullshit for months.

Then, just when he tells me their latest Conan supplement isn't too bad, Mongoose drops the line. They stuck with the setting just long enough to fuck it up.

Mongoose also decided they could use Traveller as a generic sci-fi rules set WITHOUT also doing any of the work to make it a generic sci-fi rules set. They 'ported Judge Dred, B5, and Hammer's Slammer into Traveller with only minimal effort. Instead of changing Traveller to fit the various different technologies in those settings, they changed the settings' instead.

Slammer's, forex, has FTL radio and interstellar trips can be as short as minutes. Not in the Mongoose version, it's Trav's jump drive unmodified. Slammer's is famous for Drake's "powergun", just not in the Mongoose version. They say it's a plasma/fusion gun. Slammer's equally famous for hovertanks, but in the Mongoose version they're grav tanks.

Like with Conan, Mongoose stuck with those sci-fi setting just long enough to fuck them up then stopped what little effort they'd been making and dropped the lines.

>>55082974

>Judge Dredd

To be fair, the Dredd fans I've spoken to say that while Mongoose's RPG isn't perfect, it's arguably the least shitty Dredd RPG that's been published -- the other publishers who've been given the rights over the years generally screwed it up badly.

>>55083021
>it's arguably the least shitty Dredd RPG that's been published

Least shitty. That's something to aim for!

Mongoose - We'll fuck up just marginally less than the other guy.

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>>55083042

Hey, it's their quality gurantee!

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>>55082974
hovertanks ARE gravtanks though? care to explain the difference between 'floats a few inches above the ground' and 'rides on a cushion of air'?

>>55083409
No. Grav vehicles fly. They are basically aircraft.

Hover, as far as I can see, the tanks in the MgT Slammers book are hover tanks, not grav tanks. There are no grav vehicles in the book.

>>55083565
but there're rules for...actual aircraft? why?

>>55083565
First word was meant to be "however", not hover.

>>55083409
Basically, Mongoose Traveller doesn't have a vehicle type like those droid tanks. You either have air cushioned hover vehicles, or full on aircraft with grav drives. There isn't anything in between. Star Wars repulser vehicles don't exist in MgT.

>>55083708
is there a version that does? you say that like there is

>>55083409
>hovertanks ARE gravtanks though?

Hovertanks are hovercraft, they float on a cushion of air and as such must used bridges, can't fly over forests, etc.

Grav tanks on the other hand FLY.

>>55083737
Traveller 5 does. There are grav ground vehicles which operate close to the surface, and grav flyers which go higher.

>>55083952
And I can find no other references, so T5 seems to be it.

It can always be houseruled in. Either as a more expensive hover vehicle (no atmosphere needed) or a cheaper grav drive (with a very limited ceiling, and using a different skill to control).

>>55082861
does that duck have a eigh pack?
Jesus that makes me uncomfortable

>>55084680
just wait until he finds out you had eggs for breakfast
makes the K'Kree reaction to carnivores look mild

>>55084796
Enlighten me, what will happen if i eat eggs ?

>>55086945

I don't know, but since it's Glorantha, you'll probably have an octopus burst out of your stomach and sing the praises of Chaos.

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>>55087458
sounds about right to me.

Anybody got current discord invite? Is the server alive?

>>55088577
https://discord.gg/MrsmSh

Kind of.

>>55079506
I'm starting with a basis of Mgt2e, stripping out what I don't like, going back to CT77 and other editions that i do like for stuff, making Rule 68A the basis for all rolls, adding some philosophy on how the game is played (do not roll to prove competence, roll to see how well circumstances favored you in your moment of crisis born improvisation), then modifying the shit out of things to account for how different MTU is (its not the fuel that cuts into your volume, its the jump drive itself. Fuel is almost an afterthought at that point).

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Decided to try a mapping experiment (Operation: Find Highlighters was a success).
Decided on a J3 common max, rolled up a J3map for a class A. Then created the J3 maps for any class A ports in there (minimum for them ois J1, but I assume drive exports and spying to get as good as possible). Areas were outlined in various colors to show spheres of influence (1 week travel, assumption of fully independent worlds). Fun thing: there is a single world in range of all of them, a Class C port. Natural area for diplomacy, eh? And smuggling too.
As a natural transhipment point, I'll upgrade it to a class B that could be a class A, but the big boys don't want someone else muscling in on their political turf.
Trade routes next.

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>>55091474
And here's the trade routes: note how almost none of the class A ports trade directly with each other. Obviously the Red one has routes to the three class A ports in its AoI (light blue, dark blue, and orange), and indirect routes to the other two (yellow, purple), but non of the others engage in direct trade, only indirect.
Note the massive holes of service on the fringes, and the many indirect routes in the center. Also, only three ports have trade routes going off map - that's a lot of missing service.

>>55092005
>>55091474
It looks like there was some thought put into it, but i have to admit that it's sorta hard to read with the picture quality.

But do not worry to much with some planets not having direct access to trade routes, there are still free trades and other small traders who transport stuff between planets. in most traveller universes anyway. Trade routes are the stuff megacons use with their 10K ton transporters.

>>55091474
>>55092005

Great stuff, thanks for sharing it and don't fret about some supposed "lack" of picture quality. It's legible and that's all that matters.

Also, as >>55092519 wisely notes, the routes by the CT77 table are *scheduled* routes. That just means you can walk up to the ticket counter and purchase passage from A to B on the X shipping line leaving on Y and arriving on Z. All the other systems are still going to see ships, just not on a schedule.

That's where the adventures comes in...

Giant monster homebrew setting anon here.

So i got some more details of the setting down and would be happy about some constructive criticisms.
I also want to point out that the whole thing is intendet as a setting with some pulp, afterall it has house to hill sized monsters on a world with standart gravity.

The balls above are the basic look of the three worlds on which humans live.
The people below are rough sketechs of what you would get if you ask the settings travellers to draw a generic pichture of that worlds leaders/ soldiers/ workers. So they are the clostest representation of that worlds most influential civilisation.

The first world on the left is mostly covered by sand deserts and mountain ridges while the poles are the most friendly towards human life.
Successfull contact between the poles was not too long ago, around 300 years.
Clothes are first a protection against the elements, after that mostly for the expression of self. That's also why most leaders less than those of the other worlds, or compared to the rest of the population. Recent advancements in science made it possible to actually understand some of the ancestral technology and started some sort of gold rush for it.
The general lifestyle is semi-nomadic with the population moving between different existing settlements, depending on the amount of water close to said settlements.

Middle planet has the most diverse flora and fauna, also a high oxygen content in it's atmosphere.
Due to the fact that the pplanet holds the lowest TL but the highest population, there is no lack of unskilled labour and it shows in most civilizations with a large gap between peasants and ruling class.
Warfare is ritualised with military leaders of opposing factions deciding on army size, location and formation, so the soldiers can meet on the field, start shooting each other in formation and stopping when the enemy is dead or it's getting late.

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>>55093255
This style of warfare is supportet by the fact that battlefields tend to attract the local megafauna.
Style of clothes often contains also a display of wealth, either by the person or as representation of the faction.
As said before in the thread, simbolysm and totemism is strong in many cultures and more primitive one still worship different pieces of nature.

Ancestral technology is poorly understood at best, but working one like laser rifles are usually a big enough thread to either stay away if the other faction has them)
Or to start a war as long your new fancy old guns still work. Mostly ancestral pieces are a thing of valure and a display of wealth.

>>55091474
Not really familiar with Traveller. Are you using some kind of guide?

>>55093328
Last planet on the left is a tidal locked ocean world.

The population has keept their no-bullshit mentality from their colony days, where they found themselve whoefully underequipped, just like everybody in the system.
Because of the sacrefices they had to do in that time and the harsh enviroment they have the lowest population but managed to keep their TL high enough to ,at least, survive in that place. Most of the design physolophies revolve around using resources efficiently, easy to maintain and including as many standardized parts as possible.
Also it's pretty common for a child to get his parents equipment.... and they might got those from his own parent.

Due to their own TL they have the best grasp on most ancestral technology and salvage what they can for resources and spare parts. But unknow pieces are highly sought after and can be tradet for a large sum of money, as long as it's not claimed as property of the goverment. Also not even they have only found three of the five original colony ships, one of those three very recently.

>>55086945
smells like cannibalism to a duck

>>55092519
>>55092638
That's why I said to note them: these are the trips that can make a free trader.
Sorry about how hard it is to read, I only have my tablet and it refuses to pick up on details.
And my handwriting sucks.
I also did the J3 of the most central planet, and every single class A port is within J3 of it. Now that's a trade hub. And smuggling, and diplomacy, and spying. Get there, and you're two weeks from anywhere with the right ship.
>>55093417
I used the trade route tables from the original Classic (1977 printing), which got taken out in the 1981 printing.

>>55093855
ducks don't care anon, they're nasty fuckers, link related: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1v_EcjeIkg

>>55096105
cool

>>55066608
>>55066239
>>55066290

Fortunately, some other anon already did it, so I don't have to scan shit. I'm not sure if it differs from the original edition or not, though.

http://www.mediafire.com/file/ornajj05fb4yguq/En+Garde%21.pdf

>>55096286

...sigh. Sorry anons, major derp. Different game with the same name.

>looks interesting though

>>55096105

That series has been going on for decades now. Has it every been translated from German?

>>55096377

No problem. Thanks for trying. Besides, that's another game I got for free!

>>55096515
IIRC, I think it was bootleg fan translated?

>>55096515

Old Forrest J. Ackerman helped get an official English translation done for the first 100-150 or so. Beyond that, there's no English translations available.
We used to have a bunch of them at the bookstore I worked at.

>>55097155
>100-150
HOW MANY OF THESE BOOKS ARE THERE? and what are they

>>55097187

Perry Rhodan is a long-running science fiction series in Germany, it's been going since forever. All the books are short, like novella length, but they've been coming out weekly since.. let's see, Wikipedia says 1961.
It's supposed to be pretty good if you like old-school rayguns 'n' aliens space opera.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perry_Rhodan

>>55097237
I have a couple. Not sure if they got any better, but the ones I have read like first-cut Google Translate. German compound words get turned into whole phrases or sentences, reminders that should be clearly formatted as asides are in-line and fed up-ass dry and sideways, and all manner of other things that make the reading comprehension challenging.

>>55097237
>Wikipedia says 1961.

Holy shit... I knew it been long, but I didn't know it had been THAT long!

>>55098955
When the Germans commit to their pulp fiction, they commit 100%. I know Jerry Cotton (detective stories) and John Sinclair ("urban fantasy" before it was cool) have gone over 2,000 magazines and multiple decades each, and there are probably more examples.

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>>55091474
>>55092005
So here's that cluster, in a better (hopefully more understandable) form. hex numbers are notational.
The basic idea is overlapping J3maps to show spheres of influence.

here's a sample early book that was translated

Perry Rhodan
https://www.sendspace.com/file/m3nbfu

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>>55099340
To really drive home my point on that Class B port at the center of it all, here's the J3 for that port. It, not any of the class A's around it, is the true capitol of the region. Get there, and with a charted J3 ship you're two weeks from anywhere.
Of course, it's a hive of scum and villainy. Ever seen Black Lagoon? (the anime) It's just like Roanapur.
Mixed with Casablanca and Vegas
And plenty of used starship salesmen. Just don't ask why all the serial numbers look really new.

>>55097097
Of all 2,923 novellas? Wow.
That's not counting the hundreds of novels in hard/softback, the occasional spinoff series, and the hundreds of novellas in the Atlan series

>>55100764
And if you're into parallel universes, there's PR Neo which reboots the story, updates the tech, and then seems to take developments into a different direction.

I know most groups are going to be exploring in small merchant ships, but do any of your groups use the ships for anything BUT trading?

My players wanna be bounty hunters, but not sure how I'd work that in when they're flying a trading ship.

>>55103802
The Bebop was a former fishing trawler...

If you want to Bounty unobtrusively, you fly something that no one will notice entering port. It may have more under the hood than initially meets the eye, but that's for later.

If you want to intimidate by sheer reputation, you fly something distinctive.

>>55103802
>>55104147
Your run of the mill cargo ships are pretty neat for planetside bounty hunting.
Lots of space for different upgrades, usually cheap and most certainly available in "slightly used" condition.

>>55105073
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2QUV_fiM01jQkctb3BxWTFzUWM/view
Page 2, there's a bounty hunter variant of a merchant

Spirit of the Far Future
https://www.sendspace.com/file/4iizel

the single volume FATE conversion of Classic Traveller

STU guy here, I had a side track, based partially on MgT's Psion book. There's a region of space where the jump drive still doesn't work, but the Psionic Fold Space power does. Most of this is pretty easily written, but... Does anyone else feel that the Psionics Tech Level table in that book is absolute trash? Seriously, its a timeline of European treatment of witches, with witches replaced with Psionics.
So I'm rewriting it (and calling it the Psionic Index). I know I want 0 to be "nobody believes in it and you can't get trained to even control your powers), 1 is " crude control techniques are passed around, usually as religious exercises, but you still can't get trained", then 2+ allows higher levels of maximum skill, starting at 0. Somewhere in there is also creation of psi-tech, such as the drives that allow a Psion to fold space and not be crippled for a week with a really nasty migraine.
Any ideas?
(STU universes thing is crystals that ignore the laws of physics. That as how they get jump drive, m drive, countergrav, and infinite heat sinks that grow more of themselves in the depths of space)

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>>55110896
>Does anyone else feel that the Psionics Tech Level table in that book is absolute trash?
welcome to mongoose writing young lad.

Any ideas for what? Psyonics ? Psyonic technologies ? Psyonic "index" ?
And if it is for your indes, how miniscule should the list be ? classic 1 to E ? 1-5, 10/10 ?
Don't just expect to have other people do the writing for you.

Also personally i find "crystals" as explenation unsatisfying.

>>55111118
>Also personally i find "crystals" as explenation unsatisfying.

How about replace them with pyramids. Psionics sleep with their heads inside a pyramid cage. Warp drives have a pyramid in them to draw out cosmic energy.
And countergravity? How do you think they built the pyramids, maaan? Whoa!

>>55111118
I was looking at 0-10, maybe 0-15.
It would cover, initially, how high one can be trained (aka skill level), then the support texh, with an area where the two mix.
And yes, I know that crystals is a very unsatisfying explanation. I intend to make fun of that - these things (in their various grades and the like) break the laws of physics, in universe. Science finds it rather distressing, actually. Most sensible scientists have given up trying for a Natural Jump Theory, and just accept that for some reason, portions of another universe and its laws of physics partially overlap ours in a volume around or defined by these crystals.
There's also no time travel, except in really weird cases - such as the potted petunia that has a headache.

>>55111351
0-10 might be enough of a range
can't remember how they expanded tech in Worldbuilders Handbook, but i kinda remember that the FASA Trek (and Dr Who) had a split between the theoretical and practical engineering sides

guess it wasn't Dr Who, but might give you some idea for scaling psionics tech

Doctor Who RPG - Game Operations Manual 15-18.pdf
http://www66.zippyshare.com/v/9BANLwoE/file.html

>>55110896
>>55111351

Replacing one "silly" science with another "silly" science really doesn't "fix" anything. All you're doing is switch one heap of unpalatable nonsense with another heap you find only less unpalatable.

SWN addresses the existence psionics in a neat way, IMHO. It's a consequence of FTL travel. Something about drill space changes people and rare births of psions is the result.

As for all the other tech in Traveller which breaks the laws of physics, one referee I played with borrowed the central idea from Asimov's "The Gods Themselves" and it worked well enough.

OTOH, most referees just ignore it all and have fun instead.

>>55112896
I'm not trying to fix it - this is Pulp, not Serious Fiction With Science In It. I want to generate enough of an explanation that people can create their own technobabble.
Also, whether I use it or not, this opens up new ideas for stories. Like how I decided to treat the question of "where is the singularity?" - it happened, it happens quite a bit, and then they disappear. Occasionally they stick around to help stave off boredom, and then spend time running around cleaning up after their children's science fair experiments and extra credit projects (to use their metaphor). Said experiments and projects vary, including at least one ringworld.
Psionics is sort of related to Jump travel, and to the crystals - but those things get used for everything that breaks or bypasses the laws of physics.

Of course, the crystals work by having a physical structure that exists in more dimensions than our three-and-time structure, possibly extending into another universe. Proper manipulation of their structure (which is learned from studying the variant structures that occur in their "natural" state), application of power, and maintaining arrays of properly responsive materials in certain configurations to create areas in which the desired effects will begin to effect our universe...
I might have been inspired by AtomicRockets saying that FTL and the like "might as well be magic". So I created a schtick that deliberately mimics the appearance of magic and backed it with technobabble.

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Barbarians of the Void
https://www.sendspace.com/file/8uo6f6
Baroque Space Opera
https://www.sendspace.com/file/qvgvlq

>>55113846
Baroque looks good so far. Its more Dune than I prefer, but still cool. Might steal a few ideas.

Tell me about your campaigns. Looking for some adventure hook inspirations.

>>55110306
>FATE
I'm sorry, anon, but no. FATE is shit, and it's never worth trying.

STU guy back, with my attempt at the Psi Index. Control references a change to Psi - the Referee has a number of Psi points equal to your maximum reserve, and can spend them to activate your powers, whether you want them or not. Control is a PSI roll against the listed difficulty, representing how good the techniques you were taught are.

Psi Index
0 – No training possible, no techniques to control usage (12+)
1 – No training possible, crude techniques to control usage (11+)
2 – Training up to Skill 0, Control 10+. Discovery of natural enhancers
3 – Training to Skill 1, Control 9+. Refinement of natural enhancers
4 – Skill 2, Control 8+. First artificial enhancers.
5 – Skill 3. Second generation artificial enhancers. First artificially induced instances of psionics (unreliable)
6 – Skill 4, Control 7+. First artificial power multipliers, reliable inducement of psionics in a small segment of population.
7 – Control 6+. Stable power multipliers, large scale inducement of psionic powers.

No clue for 8-A (or 8-9).

>>55110896
What's STU mean, in this context?

>>55118892
Sexually Transmited Unicorn

>>55118892
(Something) Traveller Universe.

This being 4chan, the S could be just about anything.

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>>55118892
>>55119634
SEXY Traveller Universe

>>55120242
I'd be okay with that.

>>55120242
singularity traveller universe

>>55077881
It was overall streamlined and a a lot of parts of it got slight changes to crack down on aspect that appeals to anyone other than the muh hard-sci-fi clientele. Usually mostly kept alive by older players who jack off to their younger days with classic traveller. You know, the kind of people who's understanding of realisim in a distant-future sci-fi setting consists of life-is-shit-and-can't-be-improved-no-matter-what. Generally people who can't think beyond the scope of their own lives and think if perspectives and opportunities to acquire resources are as scarce, unrewarding and depressing as they are on the low-tech, technologically regressing (see NASA), overpopulated and self-sabotaging nightmare that is 21st century Earth, then obviously, perspectives and opportunities to acquire resources in a universe where you can visit a different planet every week, each one ranging from densely settled on to empty land, must be just as scarce and drepressing as well.

Sorry to show some colour, but the mindset of a lot of the people that are into this so much reeks of 'life can never be better, stop resisting' and takes it to a new level of 'life can never be better, stop imagining'. I don't know why they have it other than nostalgia goggles and classic traveller, but the lack of vision and desire for improvement irks me nonetheless.

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>>55120242
Aw HELL yeah!

>>55118892
Stellar Trade Union, the big "government" of the setting.
Not that they really do anything, other than issue the credit, take care of the starports, run the scouts, and make sure that goods and information don't have too hard of a time when moved to another world.
Oh, there's a couple things about how to run space travel, but they got away with that in the early days because they had jump drives, and those other planets didn't.

Okay, so there are more rules than that, but everything is based around 1) Encouraging ease of trade, and 2) Emergent Behavior - the STU rulebook can go anywhere, and once translated, someone will try it. There are regions where the STU is run by interstellar agreement, in others it's an actual government, sometimes a scout came in with a credit printer and managed to bullshit his way through it. One way or another, the STU happens.

But it does nothing to stop wars and people from making their own pocket empires. Just accept the credit, keep the starport extraterritorial, and keep partial or higher compliance with these standards of measurement and timekeeping.

>>55121512
Not the anon from the orginal question, but it's not quite clear to me what you are saying.

"MgT 2e is hated by people who have played classic traveller. And i think that CT draws an image of humanity and the future where the general living standart is very much like the one we have today." ?

>>55123168
Not that guy, but it's more along the lines of:

Mongoose 2e is a bad system. It streamlines things in the way that modern RPGs and games do, which leads to situations where there's very clear-cut absolute best options, renders a lot of player choice worthless, and generally dumbs things down in a way that actually detracts from the feel of the system.

>>55123168

He's saying that it's the Classic Traveller players who like MGT2e because... a bunch of vague, tendentious bullshit about PCs not advancing,
I think the reason it doesn't seem to make sense is that he's full of it. I don't know of any old CT players who really care all that much about MGT2 one way or the other.

>>55123168
>>55123300
>>55124126

So nobody got what he wanted to say, good thing I'm not the only one.

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Trying a new format for world information, so I'm not just handing out the UWP.

NAME: EXTRA CREDIT
STARPORT CLASS A
SIZE: SPECIAL (Ringworld, 1.5AU radius, 15000km width, 1000km thick)
ATMOSPHERE: STANDARD BREATHABLE
HYDROSPHERE: 65%
POPULATION: 8.56x10^13
NOMINAL GOVERNMENT: MULTIPLE (AT PORT: CONSTITUTIONAL MONARCHY)
COMMON GOVERNMENT: MULTIPLE (AT PORT: IMPERSONAL BUREAUCRACY)
LAW LEVEL MULTIPLE (AT PORT: LEVEL 5)
TECHNOLOGY INDEX D (some theoretical populations TI 0)
NOTES: 17 GOVERNMENTS, BUILT BY SINGULARITY CLADE TERRA (claims of "third grade extra credit project), DAY/NIGHT CYCLE CREATED BY ROTATING HALF-DYSON SPHERE, INNER DEBRIS RING NAVIGATION HAZARD. MAY HAVE BEEN MIND LORD STRONGHOLD DURING FIRST ERA.

>>55126464
just a titch over 21 trillion km^2. Like, only about 138 billion square km...

It's almost 12 people/km2 when you discount all the water. Plenty of space for all those people.
Pop density is probably higher when you account for uninhabitable land areas.

Anyone have the pdf listing the changes between MgT 1e and 2e?

>>55127140

Right here: >>55078542

>>55127257
cheers, anon

>>55126464
OVERVIEW: Known to have been constructed during ANTIQUITY, and settled continuously since then. Recovered Pre-Shuffle astrographic maps puts its original location in Yendor/D, current is Orgone/B, 235 parsecs from original position.
Sections of the archeological record, inclusive of vacuum preserved installations on moons of the third gas giant, indicate a possible Mind Lord presence during the First Imperial Era. Despite this, known population shows normal levels of psionic activity. Multiple possible hidden civilizations of TI2 or lower, as over 7.39x10^12 km2 is a lot of land. Population is mostly theoretical, based on known population and known population density that can be supported at TI0 in the environment.

Read through the thread and saw people recommending Mongoose 1/2e over Classic for a newbie DM/referee. I'm a newbie as well, looking to choose between Classic and MgT 1/2e for an upcoming game, and I'm looking for some input.

At first glance, Classic seems more compressed in terms of skills and whatnot? Classic also seems deadlier.

>>55127551
Basic rundown

MgT2 is gming easy peasy.

MgT1 and CE are going to give you hair on your chest and are popular for a reason and offer a nice ballance between streamlined gameplay and having rules for most situations. Also has a sack full of quality third party supplements and GM toolkits.

CT let's you grow a beard and makes your partner pregnant, 'nuff said

>>55127624
Sorry, but what's CE?

>>55127710

CE/TCE is the Cepheus Engine, a clone of MGT1 that was created as a way to continue publishing third party content for the MGT1 engine, so publishers could avoid MGT2's terrible licensing changes.

>>55127710
Cepheus engine, basically MGT 1 with the mongoose filed off. Started to be a thing because of mongoose shitty 3rd party treatment.

>>55127736
>>55127753
Thanks, anons. I might look into MgT1. I like the expanded chargen.

>>55127792
A good choice, Also some tips from me as fellow traveller gm.
completely your free choice to use them

Character generation can be you session 0 with your group, alway try to do it with everybody on the table. Helps to create a goup which knows each other or somebody who knows somebody.
The most sensible way of handeling encumbrance i encountered is creating something called "combat equipment. Just make weight list of things your players actually use in combat. This usually sums down to communication equipment, protection and weapons. Most sane people would just drop their too heavy backpack or toolkit at the start of the battle.
Cloth armor and automatic fire weapons save/end lives.
Try to have your players understand that traveller expect them to start as competent characters, unlike D&D where you start ins ome heroic/untrained peasant limbo. This will also supress the "when do i get a level up" nagging.
A skill with an overall +1 bonus is already a great help and competent.

>>55127792
>Thanks, anons. I might look into MgT1. I like the expanded chargen.

Classic has expanded or advanced chargen for a few careers. Look at Mercenary, High Guard, Scouts, and Merchant Prince. Sadly, that's only 4 out of the original six careers and none out of the 12 additional careers found in the Citizens supplement.

What Classic also doesn't have is the various tables that create a PC's back story for the player.

I've been playing Classic since late '77 or early '78. Despite that, I recommend MgT to those new to Traveller for the simple reasons that MgT is more like the RPGs they played and has more of what they expect a RPG to have.

One very old "tradition" in Traveller is kitbashing or homebrewing. Just because you'll be using MgT, there's nothing stopping you from ignoring the bits you don't like and borrowing the bits you do like from all the other versions of the game.

>>55128017
>Try to have your players understand that traveller expect them to start as competent characters, unlike D&D where you start ins ome heroic/untrained peasant limbo. This will also supress the "when do i get a level up" nagging.

>A skill with an overall +1 bonus is already a great help and competent.

Wise words from that helpful Anon.

As a new Traveller referee, you cannot stress the "You're already a competent adult" angle ENOUGH. You also cannot stress enough just how important a level 1 skill is. Level 1 is good enough to get you hired to perform that skill.

How important is stressing the 'already competent" angle? Well, after reading >>55121512's gibberish a few times, the best I can get is that he's complaining about the inability of Traveller PCs to level up.

>>55128017
Thanks. I'll keep those tips in mind.

>>55128028
I actually didn't know there were more careers in supplementary books. Shows how little I know about the system as a whole. Regardless, I really like the MgT chargen with all the tables, like you said.

>>55128268
I'm working on some rules for skill and stat improvement. The main thing? Making it easier for horizontal improvement, not vertical. Want to add a a skill-0? It's a few weeks. Want to go from 2-3? Be ready for a long haul.
I'm also trying for niche protection and limits that don't basically scream "juggling skill ranks like it's 3.5", but that's a bit hard.

>>55128387
>I'm working on some rules for skill and stat improvement. The main thing? Making it easier for horizontal improvement, not vertical. Want to add a a skill-0? It's a few weeks. Want to go from 2-3? Be ready for a long haul.

Classic PCs already have plenty of skills at 0 and MT added even more with it's explosion in the number of skill and the introduction of pre-chargen homeworld skills.

>I'm also trying for niche protection and limits that don't basically scream "juggling skill ranks like it's 3.5", but that's a bit hard.

The fact that you're trying to graft something more akin to D&D/d20 onto a system which was designed from the first NOT to be anything like D&D means you just don't get Traveller.

>>55128469
Actually, I'm trying to add the ability to slowly improve. When I say "niche protection", I mean "limiting just how many skills you can have at 4, 3, and 2".
And my gripe with most limits that get put on skills is how they're a hard cap on total ranks and you can't progress beyond that number of total ranks- that's what I mean by juggling skill ranks like 3.5, where getting everything you need to be a reasonable character is an exercise in "I wish this was GURPS Vehicles", and eventually you realize that being competent at anything other than combat in that game is a foolish dream.

No, I'm not bitter at all about how horrible that system is...
Back to Traveller!

>>55088759
Are there any new invites for the discord?

>>55128695
https://discord.gg/WhYxdx

>>55128741
Thank you.

>>55128559
>Actually, I'm trying to add the ability to slowly improve.

Which the game has had since Classic.

Your problem is that a PC cannot improve FAST ENOUGH for your liking. Hence your desire to to graft niche protection and other d20 mechanisms onto a system which was designed from the first to be nothing like D&D.

>>55128910
You can improve in skills, but there's no way to increase attributes at all, because reasons or something. 200 years in a career? Totally fine, increase all you want. The second you get out? Magical development lock.

>>55128910
Well, yes, it was too slow for me. I'm still making it fairly slow - on the order of months under the right conditions to learn a skill, plus practice time to keep the skill. I'm not a total idiot.
However, Niche protection is not a d20 thing - it shows up anywhere, in literally any game, where characters attempt to perform specific tasks for the group, and that is their thing.
I could try harder to explain what I'm trying to do, but you're complaining about d20 being grafted on anyways, so whatever. Not gonna bother, if you're just going to repeat yourself.

>>55128946
>You can improve in skills, but there's no way to increase attributes at all

That's a lie. Stats can be improved and Classic's experience system uses strength training as an example.

>>200 years in a career?

Another lie. No one lives that long in Traveller. You can pop into a low berth for any amount of time, but your biological age will never reach 200 even with anagathics.

>>Totally fine, increase all you want. The second you get out? Magical development lock.

Not a lie this time, more like incomprehension. In Classic you gained skills in four years terms. Using CT81, the most skills you could get in one 4 year term was five: 2 for initial term, one as career automatic, one for commission, and one for promotion. Forex, a PC who joined the Army got commissioned, and was promoted would get Rifle-1 and 4 other rolls.

In a 4 year term, all that works out to roughly 1 skill, stat bump, or skill level in 1 year. And what does Classic's experience system allow? Why pretty much the same thing. Imagine that.

In Classic's experience system, you can increase you EDU stat be as much as 6 levels in 4 years. You can work on two weapon skills at once, developing new ones or increasing old ones with a four program. You can work on two non-weapon skills the same way. You can even begin a physical training program that will raise ALL your physical stats when it's completed.

Classic's experience system follows the same 4 year cycle Classic chargen does and Classic's experience system produces much the same results Classic chragen. There's no magic development lock, only your incomprehension.

Here's a tip: Before you go changing the rules, it's best to UNDERSTAND them first.

>>55129280
I'm doing my best, (even though I'm not that guy).
The thing is, training in the careers is automatic - outside the career is not. The system that I'm working on starts off with the logic of
>usage and training of a skill over 4 years of life and a career gains you one level, provided you have been subjected to challenging uses of that skill. Training is an initial course, refresher courses, and learning from failures and more experienced people
Looking at that, I can make an argument for a focused training program that takes less than four years, but requires rolls to gain the initial skill boost, then keeping up with the training.
I'm just throwing in a little bonus that comes from being exposed to usages of the skill - once per session, the player chooses one skill that they saw being used, and get a tick mark. Each tick mark can be used to decrease (very slightly) the training time required, or be used for a bonus to the training roll.
It's the timing that I'm trying to figure out.

>>55129430
>The thing is, training in the careers is automatic - outside the career is not.

That's a lie too. Or, more accurately, a partial lie.

In Classic's basic chargen with four year terms, skills are awarded automatically; one per term, one for commission/promotion, service/rank skills, etc. In Classic's advanced chargen with one year cycles, only a chance for skills occurs. You have to roll before you can roll, so to speak, and many of basic's auto skills are gone. Merchant Prince is perhaps the worst as you need certain skills to be promoted.

>Looking at that, I can make an argument for a focused training program that takes less than four years

Classic's improvement programs are not all four year blocks. READ THE RULES.

>I'm just throwing in a little bonus that comes from being exposed to usages of the skill...

I can not only see that, I've done it. Instead of decreasing the time however, I awarded +DMs to the various willpower/dedication rolls.

I didn't want to fiddle too much with the number of skills, stat bumps, and levels a PC could gain in 4 years. That's an important part of the game balance in Traveller and any designer will tell you balance is an important goal.

>> once per session, the player chooses one skill that they saw being used, and get a tick mark.

Fuck that. Why don't you call them XPs and be done with it? Can I trade in these tick marks to shot circuit the time needed to get +1 STR? I watched Bob lift heavy things all session and that's bound to count for something.

>>55129280
Please, anon, explain to me how it is that you raise your characteristics. Legit, if you have a source on how to do it, I would very much appreciate it.

>200 years is a lie
Anagathics are a thing, anon. It's not recommended, and it's fairly assholish, but it's entirely possible to do 200+ years in a career.

>Classic, classic, classic, classic
But I'm playing MGT1e?

>>55129927
>Please, anon, explain to me how it is that you raise your characteristics. Legit, if you have a source on how to do it, I would very much appreciate it.

Start reading at page 42 of Classic's Book 2.

>>Anagathics are a thing, anon. It's not recommended, and it's fairly assholish, but it's entirely possible to do 200+ years in a career.

Every version, even late Classic caps anagathics use in some way. TNE is probably the harshest but they all do so.

>>But I'm playing MGT1e?

That's your problem then.

>>55130205
>MGT1e
>Problem
Either explain or don't make claims, gramps.

>>55130205
Alright, thanks man.

Throw 8+; no DMs apply except when throwing to
enter a physical fitness program, in which case allow a DM of +2 if intelligence is
8-, +4 if intelligence 5-. Failure to achieve this throw indicates that the self-
improvement program is not carried out, and a new one may not be attempted
for at least one year. Success in the throw indicates that the program is undertaken.

How exactly did DMs work back in classic traveller?

>>55130340
>Either explain or don't make claims, gramps.

Sure.

You're complaining about how MgT's anagathic rules allow +200 years careers. That's a problem with MgT by your own admission.

You're complaining that MgT doesn't have an experience system like Classic's and suffers from post-chargen "development lock". Again, that a problem with MgT by your own admission.

You've talking about all the rules you need to fix. Only problems need fixing.

Now, I changed some things in Classic not because the system was BROKEN but because we preferred something different. There's a big difference between fixing a system problem and tailoring for a preference.

>>55130412
Differently for each skill.

Just reading Traveller, and, man, character creation is fun as fuck.
I think I just might make a program for this so I can see all the life-stories.
(Also Animal creation.)

>>55130412
>>How exactly did DMs work back in classic traveller?

Pretty straightforward. Everything is 2D6 and every DM is applied to that roll. In the case you quoted, you get a +2 if the PC's INT is below 8 and a +4 if their INT is below 5.

By the way, that's one thing we tailored because we didn't much like GDW's belief that gym rats were morons!

>>55130533
>Just reading Traveller, and, man, character creation is fun as fuck.

What with chargen, sysgen, and the other systems, Traveller was on of the first RPGs you could play WITH as well as play.

>I think I just might make a program for this so I can see all the life-stories.

Check out Freelancetraveller DOT com. Jeff has links to several chargen programs for several versions. You may find on that gives you ideas for your own program.

>(Also Animal creation.)

Often overlooked but fun as hell. A guy at COTI started a thread about how he and his grammar school daughter had lots of fun with the system. They'd roll up animals together, she'd read about the various descriptions produced, and then she'd choose which ones she wanted to draw and name. He had a whole portfolio of her drawings and they were surprisingly good.

He and she may not have been trading goods or fighting bad guys, but they were playing Traveller.

>>55130412
Improvement of roll, same as now. MgT basically had a table for stat DMs, and also a unified mechanic. CT had different DMs from stats depending on the situation, and skills didn't always add their level to a roll.
>>55129841
>In each field, the character selects a four-year program of self-improvement, dedicating his or her endeavors in something like obsession, with the general goal of self-improvement.
Not all four year blocks my ass.
Yes, education can be improved by up to 6 points (up to your intelligence) in a single four year program, or up to however long it takes you to get to 50 sessions for that sweet +1 EDU. Nothing else can, but there is an exploit to get all the weapon skills at 1 in the rules.
It takes two four year programs to get that permanent +1 to a skill (some argue that the second program can run alongside training for another two skills). Oh, and you need that skill at 1 or higher before starting the program in the first place.
A four year sabbatical gets you... a skill-2. 3 skill levels (2 if you discount skill-0), 4 years.

Now, funny math moment (I did something similar for D&D5e): if you include the summer quarter, but discount the typical two weeks of winter and spring break (if you study partially through them if longer), you get 50 weeks per school year. 50 weeks gets you a +1EDU, 200 gets you skill-2, or two skill+1, or +1 to all physical stats. Everything but the EDU requires a second program to make the increase permanent. For purposes of this analysis, we will assume that the permanency program cannot be run concurrently with another training program, which puts a skill-2 from sabbatical at 200 weeks, two x skill+1 at 400 weeks, and +1 to all three physical stats at 400 weeks

>>55131265
>Not all four year blocks my ass.

You're lying again as your very next sentence proves.

>up to however long it takes you to get to 50 sessions for that sweet +1 EDU.

50 sessions which can be held TWICE a week.

Again, read the rules and understand the rules before you start fiddling with the rules.

Chargen awards a varying number of skills, stat bumps, and skill levels in four years blocks. The experience system awards a varying number of skills, stat bumps, and skill levels in (mostly) four year blocks.

There was a design reason for that. GDW didn't do it that way just for shits & giggles. You need to understand WHY a system is built the way it is BEFORE you can successfully change it.

You only want more skills, more stat bumps, and more levels more quickly because you're a ROLLplayer and not a ROLEplayer.

>>55126464
>Population estimated equal to 1,600 Pop-A worlds
>Starport(s) A, TL-13

Basically 100x the military and economic power of the entire Third Imperium, in one system.

I fucking hate ringworlds.

>>55131448
Which is why the only Canon ringworld in the OTU is incomplete and airless.

>>55131530
>Which is why the only Canon ringworld in the OTU is incomplete and airless.

I've often wondered what the writer meant by "incomplete". I need to dig out that "Challenge" issue and re-read the Hinterworlds info.

Anyway, ringworlds are simply Too Damn Big. Even Niven eventually realized that and "removed" his ringworld from Known Space.

File: Leenitakot.jpg (32KB, 342x110px) Image search: [Google]

32KB, 342x110px

>>55131622

>>55131265
Typically, the +DM from EDU improves by 1 per every three points raised. This means a +1DM on your EDU is worth about 75-150 weeks of work, or 1.5-3 years of college. A +1DM on your physical stats is worth 400 weeks, or 8 years of college, but the initial increase is worth... Actually, 0 weeks. You get the increase upon starting the training, not at the end, but you can only start one program in a given year. So let's call it 50 weeks.
This means that every increase is worth 50 weeks for a temporary boost, but 400 weeks for a permanent one.
>>55131389
Wow, stop latching desperately onto minor details. Funny thing - I AM READING THE RULES, BOOK 2 1981 PRINTING, PAGES 42-43.
Wanna tell me that I'm lying now? Because EDU is THE ONLY EXCEPTION TO THE 4 YEAR PROGRAM. Everything else requires that program, and a second one after to make it permanent (excepting the once-in-a-lifetime sabbatical). Oh, and the reason they wrote it that way: breaking into a new career (since each skill in CT was basically everything you needed to do a particular job, it was effectively that), on top of staying on top of your own current career skills, is a major hassle. The training reflects that, via the lense of college.
Anyways
A skill+1 is worth 200 weeks, on its own. With the other +1 included (because you can train two skills at once, might as well do so), it jumps to 400 weeks.

So, based on the statement of obsession, let's run some training numbers as two sessions per week, 1 per skill. Let's assume each session is 2.5 hours (typical class length for a 1/week course is 2.5 hours). At 400 weeks, 5 hours per week, that's 2,000 hours of course work, for a total study time of 11 weeks 6 days and 8 hours. Almost 3 four week months, if you didn't sleep. Let's drop it to 40 hours of study per week: You get 50 weeks, or a single school year (with summer quarter), for two Skill+1, or 25 weeks if you train a single one at 40 study hours per week. [cont]

>>55131795

Don't let him get you mad, based on past threads he apparently can't help being a dick. It's a mental problem or something.

>>55131795
>Wanna tell me that I'm lying now?

Sure. You lied when you wrote "Not all four year blocks my ass." because not ALL of them are 4 years blocks.

>>55131740

Thanks Anon. Which issue is that?

>>55131865
>Don't let him get you mad, based on past threads he apparently can't help being a dick

Yeah, because anyone who calls out milennials on their shit is a dick.

>>55131795
You know what else takes 25 weeks? the average trading run. Seriously, take two weeks off for maintenance every year, then run 1 week in realspace per week in jump space. You get 25 jumps. If you dedicate almost 6 hours per day in jump, on top of an 8 hour watch, to training, you will increase a single skill by +1, if you made the dedication roll (and at this point, it's per week).
You know, I have this feeling that the advanced, chance of a skill per year thing, is based on this math. You can very easily imagine most space services, and many military services stuck on ship, running an 8 hour watch, with 6 hour training, 8 hours of sleep, and 2 hours off (in fact, I think the sub service does this). If you run that every day, you can cut it down to 3 hours of training per day, and be 50-92 hours over a skill+1. Now all you need is a way to get skill 0 or be trained in it...
Oh wait, High Guard (1979) page 12, Instruction Skill.
>Each level of skill taught requires six weeks of instruction during which the referee should severely curtail both individual's activi-ties, or a six month course with activities somewhat less curtailed.
In short, boot camp or an intensive technical course. Let's say each one still requires the same 1000 hours of course work.
the 6 week course requires 23-and-a-bit hours a day. The six month course is a bit more complicated, but we'll run it as 25 weeks (because that makes the math easier). Let's just say 5 days of 8 hours per week, or 6 hours every day. Or we can just 26 weeks for the course (six months is half of 52 weeks), and get basically 5.5 hours of coursework per day.

You know, I think I know how those rules work - and why: 4 years is the standard term of enlistment in the US military. Boot Camp, in the Vietnam era, was a total of 16 weeks - 8 weeks for initial, 8 weeks for your specialty. With lack of sleep and studying in the night, you could easily run 18 hours of training per day.
[cont]

>>55131916

Yeah, you're the guy.

>>55132107
>You know, I think I know how those rules work - and why: 4 years is the standard term of enlistment in the US military. Boot Camp, in the Vietnam era, was a total of 16 weeks - 8 weeks for initial, 8 weeks for your specialty. With lack of sleep and studying in the night, you could easily run 18 hours of training per day.

Congratulations, Anon. You just independently reinvented GDW's thinking behind how skills, stat bumps, and skill levels are awarded in Classic's chargen and experience system.

Would surprise you to learn that GDW was initially made up of veterans and men who were attending a teaching college?

Now that you understand WHY the system was designed the way it is, you can more successfully modify that system more to your liking.

>>55131916
as written, you still must spend 4 years on increasing your education, regardless of whether or not you already have hit your cap.
Oh, and you weren't calling me out on my shit, or really anybody here - you're just being a dick, on the basis of our modern games aren't as good as what you remember yours being (this being because you either ignored the rules issues, or made a ruling, as opposed to our internet arguments... Wait, who started this argument again? Pretty sure it was you).
I was raised with old school gaming. I have received the distilled gaming wisdom of UT-Tyler's 30 man AD&D group, and their 16 man Classic Traveller Group. I AM GROGNARD, SON OF GROGNARD, AND MY LINEAGE WILL CONTINUE LONGER THAN YOURS.
and now for something completely related to a barbaric rage - game logic
This actually matches the 2 skills you get in your first term - that's the two Skill-1's that you get from basic training. Promotions get you a training course or on-the job, so does a commission. The standard 1 skill per subsequent term is from on-the-job training, or a course, or even independent study around your duty schedule (it does happen, even if it's just learning how to make the CO win marginally enough at poker to not report your ass. That story was my uncle).
So, um, I think I understand it. And now I will be wise - and make my skill training reflect these numbers, put a cap on how many skills you can have at skill-4, and keep my XP analogue. But thanks for giving me the impetus to figure out the numbers - it was close to what I wanted to go for anyway.

>>55132183
Well thanks, but I didn't need your permission in the first place.
And I would have, maybe, pointed that out first, but I learned to start the arguments from the rules text itself, to see what logic it supports, then move onto the circumstances and the history of the writers.
That's actually the tack that I took when the training rules for D&D5e were released - I pointed out the flaws in their logic (they forgot that the standard american school year actually covers only 180 days of learning, not the figure they quoted for training times. I reworked the entire training system from that fact)

>>55132203
>our modern games aren't as good as what you remember

I've never said in this thread and any earlier ones. I have said that games are DIFFERENT however. Not better, not worse, but different.

Games are different now because players are different now. Again, not better, not worse, but different.

This isn't a case of some grumpy old grognard complaining about whippersnappers. This is a case of some grumpy old grognard patiently trying to explain to newer players that a game designed 40 years was designed differently than one designed now. Not designed better, not designed worse, but designed differently.

I'm having fun, so let's continue the math.
Each point of EDU is 125 hours of work. This means a +1DM increase will be
Each point of a STR, DEX, or END increase is 666.666 hours, making it almost 5.333 times as hard.
Considering the pulp origins of CT, this isn't surprising - the archetypal pulp hero is, to quote/paraphrase someone else, "a skinny anglo-saxon engineer who delights in telling other people information they already know".
The outlier is the 4 year sabbatical, which gives skill-2. If we take it as 2000 hours of work over 200 weeks, the character is pulling 10 hours a week, or 2 hours a week day.
Fun fact: someone running a college course load at 40 hours a week, with no summer break, will gain 8000 hours of training over 4 years.
This entire thing is suddenly breaking down.

Now, let's start pulling from real education:
The typical school year covers 42 weeks of education (two semesters of 15 weeks, and 1 semester of 12 weeks). In the 1960's US colleges converted to quarters, which ranged from 8 to 13 weeks, averaging 10.5 weeks, for 42 weeks. This puts a bigger crunch in our numbers, and can revise them downwards. This makes 168 weeks of learning in a 4 year term. If we still assume a study session of 2.5 hours, this makes each skill+1 equal to 420 hours of training.
A bachelor's degree, however, requires about 360 hours of training (on top of course loads), with the exception of a few technical ones that take 450 hours. Average is 405.
If we assume the low end in Traveller is 420, and the high end is 450, average is 435. I'll take 450, because there's a lot more information you have to learn in the context of your skill. If we take the 4 year course, at 42 weeks/year, time per week is 2.68 hours. That's for skill-1, in a single skill.
We know that skill-3 is equal to a Ph.d, or 8 years, inclusive of the six years it takes to get the master's (which includes the 4 year bach).

>>55132820
From what I can find, a Doctorate takes about 192-200 hours of training, and a masters is... when combined with a bach, about 450 hours.
You know what, let's rerun these numbers, presuming 450 hours to get Skill-1 over 4 years (this term of university also includes general EDU enhancing classes, and a few other classes, but we won't count those). at 6 years for a masters, we get 675 hours, and for an 8 year doctorate we get 900 hours.
I'll also go out on a limb and say that skill-0 requires 50 hours of training (I looked at the practice hours required for a driver's license, which is Vehicle (Ground Car)-0).
So, skill-0 is 50 hours, skill-0 to skill-1 is 400 hours. Skill-1 to skill-2 is 225 hours (a point of EDU!), and skill-2 to skill-3 is also 225 hours.
You know what, let's try and adjust these numbers to match the informational complexity of the far future, then I'll use these as the training numbers for my version.
Skill level - hours to obtain (non-inclusive)
Skill-0 50 hours
Skill-1 450 hours (500 total)
Skill-2 500 hours (1000 total)
Skill-3 1000 hours (2000 total)
Skill-4 1500 hours (3500 total)
CT goes above 4, I don't, with the exception of you can train exactly one skill to 5 - and that makes you a legend.(and I still get to reserve difficulties that will make you scramble for ways to reduce them).

Now, Megatraveller uses courses of 200 hours, which is interesting considering all the math that I went through for CT. And is basically what I was thinking of in the first place, but a lot shorter.
T5 has an increase of 1 skill a year, flat.
TNE is... Pay points per level. Geez, and I thought people complained about the skill level bloat in mgt!
mgt1e is weird, and strange, and discounted.
MgT2e is eight weeks of study per level of skill, requiring 56 hours of study each week - and they can't be interrupted. The weeks can be whenever, but the week can't be interrupted. (and requires an EDU roll)
This puts the MgT2e training at
Skill-0 448 hours (448)
Skill-1 448 hours (896 hours)
Skill-2 896 hours (1792 hours)
Skill-3 1334 hours (3136 hours)
Skill-4 1792 hours (4928 hours)
That's quite a lot of training, and hindered by the fact that you have to be uninterrupted the entire week.

>>55131448
And the resources of a single star system. They probably mined it for everything it had and are now dependent on the the imports of every system in range.
At least the population density is low enough to allow farming.
It was a test run for the world fact sheet format anyways. Does it make a good replacement for giving players the UWP?

>>55133171
And now, onto GURPS.
GURPS coverts hours of study into hours of learning based on the method.
On the job: 4 hours study to 1 hour learning, 2 hours of learning per day max, 1 with a part time job
Self taught: 2 hours study to 1 hour learning, 6 hours of learning per day max, 4 with a part time job, 2 with a full time.
Teacher: 1 to 1, 8 hours per day max. 5 skills at once.
Intensive: 1 hour of study to 2 hours of learning , 32 hours of learning per day max (16 hours study, and requires a roll to not wash out early).
This actually gives me a few ideas...