After Some Thought On MGT...

[Jame Rowe]

After some thought on MGT, I've come to the following opinions:

I think that my thing about MgT is that they seem to have missed an essential bit of flavor that CT had (and I agree, JG did get that bit of flavor juuuuuuust right - and I wish I'd been old enough to get it when it was out!), and I think that there's something of a misunderstanding in how to actually write for Traveller, even when trying to make it a generic sci-fi rules set. No doubt MJD did a good job with MGT:SM, but ... I'd rather have the CT Spinward Marches supplement (no, I don't have it; I was barely-a-newborn-yes-literally when it was published, and haven't seen a copy of the supplements book) first; it seems necessary for MGT:SM to be useful for me. Also, I dislike the modifications to damage and armor that they made; if they altered it, they should have increased rifle damage by 1d.

That said, they have nevertheless managed to take what they've done and make bits of it fun and usable--I like the small-ship building (less so High Guard) and most of the character generation (less so Mercenary, and to an extent HG) that I've seen.

I just think that MGT HG did some things wrong, though: for example, capital ships begin at 3,000 tons instead of 5,000 tons or better yet 10,000; core computers seem a bit like overkill.

High Guard and Mercenary's chargen are the same thing as TMB, but IMO they again did stuff wrong (for Merc, Guerillas are less Viet Cong or Al Qaeda than hired killers, and for some reason High Guard's chargen just doesn't click for me), and Merc's ironmongery has even more of a tech discrepancy than TMB's--and with that there are some issues like a bioscanner which is introduced at TL-15 (hence my rewrite elsewhere on this forum).

My final thing about MGT is that the tech scale is even more off than it was in CT; I have issues in the way that the first three TLs are compressed. That and the weapon damage and armor rating are fairly silly; I'd rather that they did pistols doing 3d minus zero damage and rifles doing 3d+3 damage, and armor being buffed up by 3-5 points in response (and that's if they continue with it that way). After all, jack may only be equivalent to a hard-leather jacket for a motorcyclist, but

I will buy more stuff from MGT, but not all of it. Indeed, I just sent my copy of Mercenary and High Guard to swap for the new ones and a copy of Scouts (if it doesn't go through, though, I want to know to whom I must complain).

 

[captainjack23]

Interesting and reasonable post, Jame. Me, I don't agree about the whole flavor issue, but I am interested in your ideas as to why this is.

I'm curious as to what about the old JG was flavor for you. For me, I loved lots of their D&D stuff, but was much less thrilled (or interested in) their traveller stuff. It seemed to have less of the quirkiness and random obsessive detail that the the D&D items had. Is it this barebones approach that was (IMO) even more stark than the CT supplements what you prefered ?

I do know that more florid prose has become more the norm in gaming, as well as .... I dunno, standard levels of detail, sometimes stiflingly so.

I suppose that the current style really requires that one buys into the writers vision, wheras the lack of such in the Olde Stuffe can be much cleaner. Its also possible that the need for more prose and detail does somewhat dilute the effectiveness of many of the behind the curtain discussions -when one only fouces on what one loves, such as, say rifle effects, one may well present it more effectively -wheras needing to fill in the details for everything -such as military hardware- makes it far more likely to do a mediocre job.

For the record, I didn't like Merc now or then. Then because of the dry technical gunporn style of play it promoted; now for....well, perhaps the politest description is over emphasis on form or style over content and detail. And I never liked the extended chargen, then or now. Yes, I'm a mutant.

 

[drnuncheon]

No doubt MJD did a good job with MGT:SM, but ... I'd rather have the CT Spinward Marches supplement (no, I don't have it; I was barely-a-newborn-yes-literally when it was published, and haven't seen a copy of the supplements book) first; it seems necessary for MGT:SM to be useful for me.

Er…why do you think that? The CT Marches book has basically two pages on each subsector: one map and one with the world data and a couple of paragraphs on the subsector. The Mongoose book has all of that plus background on the Imperium as a whole, the Marches specifically, and more detailed descriptions of a couple of worlds per subsector to boot.

Also, I dislike the modifications to damage and armor that they made; if they altered it, they should have increased rifle damage by 1d.

I took a look at CT and it reminded me of 1e AD&D - and not in a good way. Weapon vs AC table? No thanks. Armor as DR works just fine.

My final thing about MGT is that the tech scale is even more off than it was in CT; I have issues in the way that the first three TLs are compressed.

The first three tech levels look practically identical to me. If anything CT is the one that's a little skewed (no sailing ships or water wheels until TL3 - flintlock & rapier time?)

J

 

[Infojunky]

I'm gonna step in here as there are some valid points to discuss here.

I'm curious as to what about the old JG was flavor for you.

For me a lot of Traveller has been in the secondary market, not specifically the JG products. But in all the stuff produced. if one looks at the Traveller Bibliography we see the true mass of the material. It is from this mass I pulled many of the Ideas that I have run games from over the years.

Is it this barebones approach that was (IMO) even more stark than the CT supplements what you prefered ?

JG products where thing but they frequently gave my a frame to build off of. 50 Starports is one of the best books they ever released. As for their more verbose product there usually a idea or two in each that was worth while. And at the price that was enough to justify the purchase.

I do know that more florid prose has become more the norm in gaming, as well as .... I dunno, standard levels of detail, sometimes stiflingly so.

I suppose that the current style really requires that one buys into the writers vision, wheras the lack of such in the Olde Stuffe can be much cleaner.

I have to agree many modern Games and their supplements demand a single vision of the setting they are portraying, while Traveller has always, or at least to me been much more plastic in that the sparse style and granular arrangement have allowed much more flexibility in play/game styles.

Its also possible that the need for more prose and detail does somewhat dilute the effectiveness of many of the behind the curtain discussions -when one only focused on what one loves, such as, say rifle effects, one may well present it more effectively -wheras needing to fill in the details for everything -such as military hardware- makes it far more likely to do a mediocre job.

This is one of the reasons I treat Traveller as a set of closely related Monographs, where one take the best aspects of each and not worry about the failings in other areas of said work. Traveller is a toolkit, how many of you use every section of the rules? Unmodified?

For the record, I didn't like Merc now or then. Then because of the dry technical gunporn style of play it promoted; now for....well, perhaps the politest description is over emphasis on form or style over content and detail.

My issue is that Mercenary was done and all further development stopped, where is the street level stuff? Where is the hardware for the non-fully militarized group of adventures. Geeze, the number of times I have heard a player ask if they could buy battledress.

In a lot of ways Cyberpunk and Shadowrun both provide more support for this level of play than Traveller/mercenary....

I run games of agents not grunts.....

And I never liked the extended chargen, then or now. Yes, I'm a mutant.

Yes. I am glad I am not the only one. I believe MgT has struck the best balance I have yet to see.

 

[EDG]

The idea that MGT is doing something "wrong" baffles me.

MGT defines Traveller now. CT defined Traveller back in the day. The fact that they're different doesn't necessarily mean that either is "wrong".

I think people are mistaken to assume that there must be some kind of continuity between editions, and I think this is the primary reason behind all the edition hate that's happened over the years. CT isn't MT, which isn't TNE, which isn't T4, which isn't GT or T20, which isn't MGT, which isn't T5.

 

[Gruffty the Hiver]

An interesting read so far, people - but can I get clarification that "JG" means "Judges Guild"? :shock: :?

 

[Stainless]

An interesting read so far, people - but can I get clarification that "JG" means "Judges Guild"? :shock: :?

Perhaps he meant Digest Group?

 

[rust]

An interesting read so far, people - but can I get clarification that "JG" means "Judges Guild"? :shock: :?

The first post is at least partially a cross post from another forum where
another user had praised the Judges Guild in a previous post, so ... yep,
JG must be Judges Guild. :shock:

 

[Gruffty the Hiver]

The first post is at least partially a cross post from another forum where another user had praised the Judges Guild in a previous post, so ... yep, JG must be Judges Guild. :shock:

Thanks for that rust - I just wanted to be sure what was being referred to.

 

[RockViper]

The only place I see that MGT needs improvement is the editing dept, other than that I have been really pleased with this version of Traveller.

 

[Supplement Four]

I took a look at CT and it reminded me of 1e AD&D - and not in a good way. Weapon vs AC table? No thanks.

It's a throw to hit AND penetrate.

For those who don't like it, there's the AHL option. Many CT players use it.

 

[Supplement Four]

MGT defines Traveller now.

Not really.

I'd wager that there are at least as many people playing CT as there are MGT. CT, despite its age, consistently racks up high numbers in polls when people are asked which version of Traveller they prefer.

Even if MGT has superceded CT in that preference (I don't think it has), that hardly supports a statement like "MGT defines Traveller now."

And, that statement will especially not be accurate if/when T5 is published.

 

[EDG]

CT hasn't had anything new published specifically for it for decades. I think the only reason it would supposedly "racks up high numbers in polls" (whatever those polls may be) is that the people who think that it defines Traveller and that care enough to vote in a poll are the ones who aren't willing to move beyond CT. And polls really don't matter anyway - you'll never get a remotely accurate sample of the total population who play Traveller to vote on those to draw any meaningful conclusion about it. Not to mention the fact that the fanbase voting on each board invariably has its own biases that skew the results.

MGT on the other hand is currently being published, and what's more it has a very full schedule and a lot of support from the company that is publishing it. And regardless of your own (well-known) personal opinion about it (or anyone else's), that very much means that it does for all intents and purposes define Traveller now.

T5 is irrelevant to the general gaming public, and always has been, and has if anything been made even more irrelevant since MGT has been released. I think the only people who are going to buy it have already (pre-)bought it - and even if anyone else does pick it up, it won't be anywhere near comparable to the numbers that MGT has sold (and to new people, as well) . And yes yes, Marc Miller owns Traveller so he technically "defines traveller", yadda yadda... but so far he's been content to let Mongoose publish all their stuff without complaint and he ain't about to stop that - and any release of T5 (if ever it is finally released) is going to be a really small fish compared to MGT.

Of course just because MGT defines Traveller now for all practical purposes, that doesn't mean that anyone should stop playing another edition if that's what they prefer. But I think it's unrealistic to think that any of the older editions of the game define what Traveller is now.

 

[PoppySeed45]

The only place I see that MGT needs improvement is the editing dept, other than that I have been really pleased with this version of Traveller.

That I agree with quite strongly. Just did the first character generation last night and my players had a blast (6 players, plus me as GM). What really made it fun were those little extra touches that MGT adds.

For example, everyone got excited with the event tables, and having to make those decisions based on it. Other players would whisper advice to others about what should happen next, or laugh as evil (or good) choices were made, like the Rogue Pirate who refused to backstab his mates, or the Doctor who happily did evil experiments because, and I quote her, "It's only 1d3 Enemies, right?"

Great times. I'm very happy with Mongoose overall. I'll report again after we actually play a game session...

 

[Bygoneyrs]

I bought and played CT, and have bought it all since then till now. I own everthing the MGT has put out so far and will continue to buy it all regardless. Now you might ask what are my feelings about weather MGT has gotten right the character and flavor of CT...I would say they are right on target. Actually they are more on traget than any other prevous version has been since CT. I just hope they keep going and redo all the former books and more. They have it right and will get better with their error corrections. They have my support and thus I will keep buying it all.

Penn

 

[captainjack23]

An interesting read so far, people - but can I get clarification that "JG" means "Judges Guild"? :shock: :?

Yes indeedy. Sorry 'bout that.

 

[Gruffty the Hiver]

An interesting read so far, people - but can I get clarification that "JG" means "Judges Guild"? :shock: :?

Yes indeedy. Sorry 'bout that.

Thanks for the clarification :mrgreen:

 

[rust]

In a lot of ways Cyberpunk and Shadowrun both provide more support for this level of play than Traveller/mercenary....

This touches upon one of my main problems with the OTU and with Travel-
ler in all of its incarnations: It is an excellent game when one focusses a
campaign on the activities and events "between" a number of worlds, but
it is much less well suited to a setting that has its focus on events and acti-
vities on a single planet and the small region surrounding it.

This is the main reason why I use Traveller mainly as a toolbox, and use
ideas and material from roleplaying games like Blue Planet, Shadowrun or
some GURPS sourcebooks to fill in the many gaps that Traveller leaves
when it comes to the description of a single specific planet (politics, socie-
ty, economy, culture, religions ... - and their development during a cam-
paign).

I very much hope that Mongoose Traveller will one day include a supple-
ment able to deal with that level of play, something like an improved and
expanded version of the World Tamer's Handbook, Pocket Empires and
other previous Traveller supplements that tried to deal with it, but never
really managed to integrate their sub-systems with the other, "planet-hop-
ping"-oriented Traveller material.

 

[drnuncheon]

I took a look at CT and it reminded me of 1e AD&D - and not in a good way. Weapon vs AC table? No thanks.

It's a throw to hit AND penetrate.

Yes, just like AD&D - your point?

What I don't like is the mechanics of having a table lookup as part of the combat sequence.

 

[Jame Rowe]

I'm curious as to what about the old JG was flavor for you. For me, I loved lots of their D&D stuff, but was much less thrilled (or interested in) their traveller stuff. It seemed to have less of the quirkiness and random obsessive detail that the the D&D items had. Is it this barebones approach that was (IMO) even more stark than the CT supplements what you prefered ?

Hard to say. Part of it is that barebones approach (though not all, since at times the barebones approach is frustrating as a would-be GM - whenever I try to come up with something using their stuff I'm not sure where I should begin!).

An interesting read so far, people - but can I get clarification that "JG" means "Judges Guild"? :shock: :?

Perhaps he meant Digest Group?

No, Judges Guild. To my knowledge I've never seen DG (Digest Group) stuff, and I oughtta know.