Book listed as available! YES!!!
- Thread starter El Cid
- Start date
lastbesthope
Mongoose
Excellent, shall pick it up at Salute or Dragonmeet!
LBH
LBH
Shane_Mclean
Mongoose
xenophage said:
My UofB5 book arrived today, so yours should be there soon. A month too late for the game we were going to play, but hey. It still looks good, tho.
Shane
Babylon 5 Aide
Mongoose
So what are everyone's opinion???
Babylon 5 Aide
Mongoose
I guess that is a do not buy? lol
Terrible Tim
Mongoose
Maybe not many people have had a look at it.
Daddy Dragon
Mongoose
After handing a crushing defeat to the Red Hordes with my German Panzerkompanie at our local FLGS this afternoon, I did a victory lap through the store and found this on the shelf. Despite the rebuke that I knew I would receive from the High Command when I got home, I purchased it immediately. To the victor must go the spoils, after all.
I'm only about half way through it thus far and I'm satisfied with the treatment. It seems functional and playable, and doesn't appear (on the surface at least) to suffer from a case of being shoe-horned into the Traveller system.
Based on what I've seen so far, it was money well spent. My only question is, will there be any further books? There are tables included that you'll use in place of others in the core book(s) during ship design to create your own, but will a book of the familiar series capital ships be released?
I'm only about half way through it thus far and I'm satisfied with the treatment. It seems functional and playable, and doesn't appear (on the surface at least) to suffer from a case of being shoe-horned into the Traveller system.
Based on what I've seen so far, it was money well spent. My only question is, will there be any further books? There are tables included that you'll use in place of others in the core book(s) during ship design to create your own, but will a book of the familiar series capital ships be released?
Greg Smith
Mongoose
There is a big book of ships and a scenario 'The Trouble with Drazi' coming. There is currently a 14-part scenario monthly in S&P.
Babylon 5 Aide
Mongoose
I'm surprised at how quiet the board has became... I do not know anything about the new book, have not seen a review or seen it in stores... I have my 2ed stuff here so I guess I will stick with it...
I do wonder where the community went though!
I do wonder where the community went though!
lastbesthope
Mongoose
Babylon 5 Aide said:
(Sigh, the second obvious setup for a line I've seen tonight)
[Kosh]
We have always been here....
[/Kosh]
:lol:
LBH
Babylon 5 Aide
Mongoose
LOL! Glad to see you are here LBH. Just seems fairly quiet of late and I sort of expected some hoopla talking about the new stuff... I started watching my DVDs again last night (down sick and it seemed to be a good time) and really just love the game and the story so much that I wanted to do something creative but kind of choked...
I'll give you my take on it so far.
The material in the book is pretty good. The functional elements for running a B5 game in Traveller are there. The jump gates and jump point generators, basic weapons, big characters, races, and backstory. It assumes your game is set some time after Sheridan takes over, but info for running a game later is there, too. I'm starting my game between the pilot and first season, so I have to make some deltas for my setting.
The psionics are fleshed out from the Trav main book and given a B5 feel based on specific show events. I have some differences with how some of it is done based on my take from the show, though. Nothing huge, but I'm going to make changes.
The amount of verbage spent on backstory is, to me, excessive. Instead of the space being spent on overly detailed backstory (e.g. the step by step development of PsiCorps predecessor agency) I would have liked to see more basic functional information on B5, a basic map of B5's layout and a couple of "unrolled" maps laying out the general plans for blue, green, and red sector. Or at least a detailed section of each. Anyway, more basic campaign starter stuff by contrast. I'm familiar with B5 but don't have any of the prior RPGs. I'm having to put together a lot of basic play info from The Lurker's Guide that I expected to find in this book.
The ships are a sort of odd neither fish nor fowl mix between Traveller and not-Traveller. Even without jump drives as in Traveller, Trav's system hydrogen fuel based power system is still there for the other system This makes it easier to intermix Trav-designed ships with B5 craft, but it results in some odd design interpretations from trying to put enough volume of fuel in a craft to work the Traveller way, rather than positing other power sources more in line with what B5's ships appear to be designed around. The system pretty well appears to work (I haven't really had a chance to work with it in detail), but it produces strange looking results, as can be seen with the B5 ships in the book.
Edit: There is a good set of world descriptions included, and the information on the show's characters is quite good and useful.
Finally, there's the physical book itself. The pages have a gray image background that has a very deleterious effect on readability. The sidebars/inset boxes are especially hard to read. This should have been caught on a press check of the book at the latest. Also, the ink is so heavy on the pages that any friction causes black streaks on the page that blot out whatever is underneath. It's hard to read the book for any length of time, and picking out info quick during play is a pain.
The errata pdf includes the same gray image backgrounds on all but the first page, having the same effect on the readability of hardcopy while using up my toner cartridge that much faster.
Edit: The PDF version of the book on DriveThruRG clears away the background. It also includes the errata (though not the free adventure in the errata PDF). This makes the book far nicer!
So, the info is good but not great, and the book itself is an abomination, IMO. I'll appreciate the info for my campaign, but I'll have to transcribe what I use onto a readable medium. Edit: Fixed thanks to the PDF.
The material in the book is pretty good. The functional elements for running a B5 game in Traveller are there. The jump gates and jump point generators, basic weapons, big characters, races, and backstory. It assumes your game is set some time after Sheridan takes over, but info for running a game later is there, too. I'm starting my game between the pilot and first season, so I have to make some deltas for my setting.
The psionics are fleshed out from the Trav main book and given a B5 feel based on specific show events. I have some differences with how some of it is done based on my take from the show, though. Nothing huge, but I'm going to make changes.
The amount of verbage spent on backstory is, to me, excessive. Instead of the space being spent on overly detailed backstory (e.g. the step by step development of PsiCorps predecessor agency) I would have liked to see more basic functional information on B5, a basic map of B5's layout and a couple of "unrolled" maps laying out the general plans for blue, green, and red sector. Or at least a detailed section of each. Anyway, more basic campaign starter stuff by contrast. I'm familiar with B5 but don't have any of the prior RPGs. I'm having to put together a lot of basic play info from The Lurker's Guide that I expected to find in this book.
The ships are a sort of odd neither fish nor fowl mix between Traveller and not-Traveller. Even without jump drives as in Traveller, Trav's system hydrogen fuel based power system is still there for the other system This makes it easier to intermix Trav-designed ships with B5 craft, but it results in some odd design interpretations from trying to put enough volume of fuel in a craft to work the Traveller way, rather than positing other power sources more in line with what B5's ships appear to be designed around. The system pretty well appears to work (I haven't really had a chance to work with it in detail), but it produces strange looking results, as can be seen with the B5 ships in the book.
Edit: There is a good set of world descriptions included, and the information on the show's characters is quite good and useful.
Finally, there's the physical book itself. The pages have a gray image background that has a very deleterious effect on readability. The sidebars/inset boxes are especially hard to read. This should have been caught on a press check of the book at the latest. Also, the ink is so heavy on the pages that any friction causes black streaks on the page that blot out whatever is underneath. It's hard to read the book for any length of time, and picking out info quick during play is a pain.
The errata pdf includes the same gray image backgrounds on all but the first page, having the same effect on the readability of hardcopy while using up my toner cartridge that much faster.
Edit: The PDF version of the book on DriveThruRG clears away the background. It also includes the errata (though not the free adventure in the errata PDF). This makes the book far nicer!
So, the info is good but not great, and the book itself is an abomination, IMO. I'll appreciate the info for my campaign, but I'll have to transcribe what I use onto a readable medium. Edit: Fixed thanks to the PDF.
qstor
Banded Mongoose
saundby said:
Do the ships have the Jump 6 maximum like in Traveller? That doesn't seem to fit B5. Mongoose has mapped out the B5 universe on a Traveller style map. I don't mind that but the B5 ships seem to go a lot farther than Jump 6 maximum on little fuel. Particularly like the White star.
Mike
B5 ships don't use Traveller-style J-1 through J-6 drives. They use B-5-style jump point generators when they aren't just built to use jumpgates for entering and leaving hyperspace. Travel times are B-5 short, too. Just a few hours between most points on established routes, rather than weeks.
The tradeoffs between Traveller design standards and B-5 standards were well made, IMO. There's no one right answer, and the choices they made in the UofB5 allow easy, almost brainless on-the-fly, conversion of Traveller ships for use in a B5 campaign. They just look weird at first.
I'm going to change the power sources IMC, but for the published books it's nice to be able to mix and match between different settings.
Aside from the way the book was printed, my strong complaints are the lack of an overview of the B5 station layout (one page with a cutaway/sector map and another with a basic example "unrolled" map of one level across the rotating section would have served), a weak equipment section (e.g., rope, length given--what's the load capacity???), and the low information density throughout.
I think more general info could have been included in this book without jeopardizing sales of other products like the B5 station guide and the other sourcebooks. As it is, I found a copy of the old B5 RPG The Babylon Project at the used book store last week. It gives me the B5 cutaway I want along with enough detail for "color text" when moving through the station, and some more alien race info I can use with Traveller B5 (TB5?)
The tradeoffs between Traveller design standards and B-5 standards were well made, IMO. There's no one right answer, and the choices they made in the UofB5 allow easy, almost brainless on-the-fly, conversion of Traveller ships for use in a B5 campaign. They just look weird at first.
I'm going to change the power sources IMC, but for the published books it's nice to be able to mix and match between different settings.
Aside from the way the book was printed, my strong complaints are the lack of an overview of the B5 station layout (one page with a cutaway/sector map and another with a basic example "unrolled" map of one level across the rotating section would have served), a weak equipment section (e.g., rope, length given--what's the load capacity???), and the low information density throughout.
I think more general info could have been included in this book without jeopardizing sales of other products like the B5 station guide and the other sourcebooks. As it is, I found a copy of the old B5 RPG The Babylon Project at the used book store last week. It gives me the B5 cutaway I want along with enough detail for "color text" when moving through the station, and some more alien race info I can use with Traveller B5 (TB5?)
Rikki Tikki Traveller
Cosmic Mongoose
I intend to buy several of the B5 D20 sourcebooks to fill in the info gap from the UB5 book.
The book is good for establishing the B5 tech in Traveller terms and the D20 sourcebooks will fill in the fluff.
Then again, I may just have a White Star show up in the Third Imperium!
The book is good for establishing the B5 tech in Traveller terms and the D20 sourcebooks will fill in the fluff.
Then again, I may just have a White Star show up in the Third Imperium!
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