Mongoose 2300AD Progress Report

[tauther]

Any idea on when Mongoose 2300AD could possibly reach the shelves?

[silburnl]

I did have a soft spot for a more radical solution to the astrography problem - which was to drop the 'maximum stutterwarp' threshold to a lower value (5 ly or something) and then paint in the 'old' arms by dropping in conveniently positioned brown dwarfs to recreate the canonical star-to-star links.

That's creative, but I would still be concerned over what that would do with the 2300AD-verse. You would suddenly have a ton of brown dwarf waystations plopped down along the Arms. Many players won't realize at all that the starmap is obsolete in someways. Others won't care even if they were told so. But, if you are a referee with players who are very astronomy centered, then that sounds like a nice plan.

Would the location of the brown dwarfs be pretty much speculation? If so, you might be replacing an out-of-date starmap with a purely speculated one?

Purely speculative - you'd look at how the arms shape up with your lower stutterwarp threshold distance, identify those links required to re-establish the canonical arms and then make up sufficient brown-dwarfs in the crucial places to get the arms back. This has the added advantage that you get a slightly more plausible (IMO) story for early stutterwarp tech - instead of having ESA devise 'multiple stutterwarp ops' for their initial probe to Alpha Centauri and then have the idea forgotten until the Bayern expedition, you restrict the initial extrasolar expansion to the Alpha Centauri/Proxima Centauri systems until brown dwarfs are discovered that open up the various arms.

I agree with your concerns about the potential impact on the canonical setting and, given that it's a bunch of work combined with the speed at which our knowledge is moving WRT brown-dwarfs and near star astrography etc means you'd still end up with an outdated map in a few years time, I can see why Colin decided to stick with the canonical starmap.

I also like the idea hinted at above about tweeking the gravity well requirements from canon. A.i. you need a star's gravity, not just a planet's, to discharge.

I don't like this idea however - it is quite a departure from the previously established 'fact' about stutterwarp, which is that there's nothing special about the gravity well you use for the purposes of discharge; all you need is for it to be deep enough to generate >0.1G. The 'official rule' makes the outer system interesting and useful to those with mischief in their hearts, especially given that light lag means that you can be in, do a quick and dirty stutterwarp discharge* at an outer system body and then be away before the authorities downwell in the inner system can respond effectively. I think this assumption has been stitched in to the backstory in too many places for this to be a clean change to make.

Regards
Luke

FN1:
I had a houserule to the effect that stutterwarp discharge was an exponential decay function (similar to radioactive half-life). A consequence of this is that even a quick dip into a 0.1G field means you can drop a significant chunk of your acquired charge. But even with a simple reading of the RAW, you can do a fair amount of discharging if the downwell responders aren't close to the superluminal stutterwarp shelf.

[middenface]

SSV-21 with Spaceplanes...

http://biomassart.wordpress.com/2011/09 ... eplanes-a/

http://biomassart.wordpress.com/2011/09 ... eplanes-b/

[aelius]

In my email to Matt, yes...

There will be adventures, and sourcebooks for each of the Arms and for the Core. Sourcebooks will include worlds, starships, unique vehicles and technologies, adventure seeds, bestiaries, and other fun stuff.

Campaign guides, perhaps, for the major campaign types (Ground Military, Space Military, Troubleshooting, Exploring, Merchant and Illegal)

A books of equipment, weapons, and vehicles.

Likely other stuff....

Sounds like I will be spending a lot on 2300. Oh well, I did when it first came out as well
Will the sourcebooks include maps of the various colony worlds like you had in 2320?

[Colin]

That's certainly what i'd like to see. Seeing as all i have to do is re-render them, it's quite likely.

[aelius]

That's certainly what i'd like to see. Seeing as all i have to do is re-render them, it's quite likely.

Great. That was the one thing I wished the original Colonial Atlas had included. And if you have a separate sourcebook for each of the arms you should be able to include a lot of detail about each colony as well as events in the arm.
This just keeps getting better and better. I think I may have said that upthread, but its worth repeating.

[Colin]

The plan so far is to have consistent information on each world. Say, 250-500 words on the system and any other worlds of note, another 500-750 on the geography of the mainworld, 500-750 words on each colony, and another 250-500 words on the world's biology, including a bestiary. This will build on the information from the old colonial atlas.
Each Arm book will also include notable outposts, common starships, and anything unique to that Arm. They won't cover aliens, aside from brief mentions.

[Colin]

2300AD is set for a November release, with French Arm Adventures to follow in February.

[Pentapod earplug]

It seems Santa is coming early this year. Perfect!

[Ewan]

That is excellent news, counting down the days already.

[FreeTrav]

I said this over on CotI, I'll say it here... this edition of 2300AD really truly needs to go back to the very first name it had: Traveller: 2300. The reason that GDW had to change the name was because of the outcry that "it's not Traveller"; it didn't use EITHER the system OR the setting that was current at the time.

This one uses the current Traveller system. 'Nuff said.

[middenface]

4 hours work mebbe more...

http://biomassart.wordpress.com/2011/09 ... dy-wip-ii/

[middenface]

The Ronnie..

[Mark A. Siefert]

The Ronnie..

I've always wanted to see miniatures of 2300 AD starships.

[Pentapod earplug]

I wonder how much work is involved in adapting a graphic model into one suitable for 3D printing? If there is ever going to be an updated star cruiser game, I would very much like minis this time

[middenface]

I wonder how much work is involved in adapting a graphic model into one suitable for 3D printing? If there is ever going to be an updated star cruiser game, I would very much like minis this time

Well my stuff is in Sketchup - I beleive it can port to STL which 3d printers can read - however alot of my detail is flat so it'd dispear on a print - I am trying to alleviate that.
However, the software of choice for 3D printing is rhino, so I'm slowly learning it... beside SU has some limitations any way.

Edit: Aconit and Kennedy

[Colin]

I wonder how much work is involved in adapting a graphic model into one suitable for 3D printing? If there is ever going to be an updated star cruiser game, I would very much like minis this time

Oh, me too. Minis of 2300AD ships would absolutely make my day. I would like to work on an updated Star Cruiser, only, you know, fun. I have some ideas in that direction, maybe explore them next year or so.

[Pentapod earplug]

Sounds interesting, albeit a bit time consuming and difficult. A gamer friend just got access to a printer, hence my recently acquired fascination.

[Joi Sourcebook]

Sounds interesting, albeit a bit time consuming and difficult. A gamer friend just got access to a printer, hence my recently acquired fascination.

Like this http://www.shapeways.com/model/188731/s ... tml?gid=mg you mean?

Jonathan

[nats]

I don't see how this can be called Traveller at all. IMO its completely different game and should be in its own forum. It will get extremely confusing if things about this game are being discussed alongside Traveller stuff here.