760 Patrons - Wow

N

Nickbergquist

Mongoose
<rave>
Just had to rave about this book. It actually stole the thunder from Conan (I picked up the 2nd edition reprint, Skelos, and Bestiary at the same time) but I can't get over how damned useful and interesting this book is. It's like...the last giant plot book I'll ever need....

And the art inside is surprisingly good....no, not surprisingly, I guess, but I'm continuing to be blown away by what a great job the Mongeese are doing with Traveller. Guys, stay away from any update of Fire, Fusion & Steel for a few years if that's what it takes to keep this amazing record of quality books going! :wink:

I hate feeling like some gushing fanboi....damn you all! Especially you Bryan Steele....having the audacity to write something so...so....useful, and accessible.....gah!

</rave>
 
Just got it today and I'm quite impressed. Between this and the Spinward Marches book (supplemented by BtC) I'll not need to plan my next campaign - I'll just ask the player where he wants to start and then wing it.

Really good for fleshing out a character's contacts and rivals and stuff.

Nickbergquist said:
And the art inside is surprisingly good....no, not surprisingly, I guess, but I'm continuing to be blown away by what a great job the Mongeese are doing with Traveller.
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Some of I like, but some of the art horrified me: some images look to be crude photshop hack-jobs. The weird thing is that it looks like other images by the same artist are pretty good.

There's also stuff of a style that I recognise from TMB (and have defended) but here look more of an old skool fanzine quality than a modern official product.

Bring back crisp line art! :)
 
These offerings ahave all been very good; I'm quite pleased. As someone who loathes continual revamps of rules in RPGs, it takes a good product to get my Seal of Approval. Star Wars Saga is one; Mongoose Traveller is another. Great stuff.
KK: I see your comment about Line Art. not sure what that means, but I'll admit I'm not massively keen on the interior illustrations for the books and miss the Old Style from Traveller's first days. Seemed like they were all the same artist, and a great style.
Reminds me: man, there was an eBay auction about a year ago for a whole buttload of original Traveller art from FASA! Too much for me, though - even a humble lil' one. What a great opportunity - for a rich fan!
 
When I say line art I mean clean illustrations in b/w done with pen or brush (and with the pencil fully rubbed out), maybe with dot tones - it looks best on the kind of paper MGT is printed on. The nice fully painted stuff in TMB isn't served so well on this paper. (Be nice to get Brian Bolland, but I'm guessing he's far, far, far too expensive!:) - some other 2000AD artists might be more affordable, though.)

I do rather like some of the scratchy stuff, and the 'airbrush' style bits have a nice retro feel too them.

Photoshop filters need to be used sparingly and are not a substitute for imagination or craft. There is a somewhat hasty feel to some of the new Traveller illustrations, IMO.
 
Lemme hijack this thread briefly.
Being a nOOb (albeit an old, experienced one), can I post illustrations or links to illos on these boards? And if so, by what means - direct link? ImageShack?
 
I don't actually get what 760 Patrons is... is it literally a list of 760 patrons? Or is it a bunch of tables that you can use to generate up to 760 different combinations of patrons?
 
It's basically a list of 760 persons and missions they have for you, along with possible several options for "the Real Deal" of the mission. Sometimes it's as presented... sometimes it ain't.
Great encounter filler on short notice; clever GMs can parlay a single patron into an evening's play.
 
EDG said:
I don't actually get what 760 Patrons is... is it literally a list of 760 patrons? Or is it a bunch of tables that you can use to generate up to 760 different combinations of patrons?
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Each Patron has a short paragraph describing it, with a D6 roll to add between 3 and 6 details or twists to the paragraph. Each provides the basis for a mini adventure (IIRC this is whats described as a ticket in previous editions?).

Patrons are grouped by 'most likely character career to interact with' and hence style of ticket - around 20-30 per grouping. Within each grouping there are roughly half listed as Antagonists and half as Protagonists to indicate their rough disposition. A series of random roll tables are provided to generate the patron that crops up.

To be fair this is one book gagging for a preview...One page would do it, if there is one that shows a table and a few patrons. It would explain it so quickly
 
EDG said:
I don't actually get what 760 Patrons is... is it literally a list of 760 patrons? Or is it a bunch of tables that you can use to generate up to 760 different combinations of patrons?
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Yes, basically it's 760 separate possible patron encounters, and each of those has a couple paragraphs setting up the encounter followed by several (roll D6 style) choices on what the actual encounter is all about.

The way I'm using it is like this: before each game, I prep, oh, a dozen or so NPC patrons from this book and take a few minutes to flesh out specifics. Then I work those NPCs in to the course of the plot, and see which "hooks" get bitten by the players. Then I go from there.

The other thing I'm using it for is on-the-spot stuff: PC s decide to blow off the current contract for some reason and wander off to a random star system, to a random space port, to a random bar. They want a new job: 760 patrons provides it pretty quickly.

I think at this point Traveller is one of the few games where a GM could technically arrive at the table with nothing more than MT and 760 Patrons,a fist full of dice, some blank paper, and his wits and start a game. I like that!
 
Another thing I'm apparently not clear on is whether it's a generic rulebook or if the patrons are specifically OTU - i.e. are the races or places generic, or are Aslan, Hivers, Imperium etc mentioned?
 
Oh its pretty much generic. I think even nonhumans are generally described as 'An Alien' with no further details....there may be one that mentions a specific alien race but I can't find any in aquick flick through while writing this reply.
 
EDG said:
Another thing I'm apparently not clear on is whether it's a generic rulebook or if the patrons are specifically OTU - i.e. are the races or places generic, or are Aslan, Hivers, Imperium etc mentioned?
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If a Traveller book is in a black cover, you can assume it is a core book that can be used with any setting.
 
Hello, I have since yesterday the 760 patrons book and I think that we all thought it was going to be an extension of the Patrons chapter in the Core Book.

Instead of use the word "Patrons", I would name it "Characters" because it's what it is, description of a character and his/her goals...but there isn't any hook for the characters, the referee has to make up the hole story... I will have to use the Tables of Stories in the Core Book with the Protagonis/Antagonis of "760 Patrons" book.

I do know that in the prologue of "760" says that the book is not a simply 760 plots, but I would have preferred only 76 extended patrons that 760 light patrons.
 
It might have been better if the book had been called "760 Encounters" than the title it has.

Nevertheless, it is an excellent book with a lot of potential. Yes, it's somewhat more work for the GM...but that's what GMs do right?

A book with 760 patron encounters (or adventure seeds, as other games call them) would have taken a lot longer to put together and probably been a lot bigger.

Allen
 
Brought it, read it, reviewed it, and will be submitting the review to JTAS online.

Basically it's not 760 Patrons for Traveller, it's 760 generic NPCs for any generic Si-Fi RPG.

As 760 generic NPCs for any generic Si-Fi RPG, it's very good, I liked it.

As 760 Patrons for Traveller, it's a little disappointing.

Regards,

Ewan
 
As 760 generic NPCs for any generic Si-Fi RPG, it's very good, I liked it.

As 760 Patrons for Traveller, it's a little disappointing.
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If I may quickly point out one thing; our Traveller is a generic Sci-Fi RPG system. If this was a Third Imperium product it would have been dramatically different.

All things said and done, I hoped to create a book that ALL fans could make use of with a few quick dice rolls and some ingenuity. I believe that I did just that, but I can understand if someone was looking for something else.

-Bry
 
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