I liked the book. Though it was unbelievable how much of it was devoted to weapons and guns, guns, guns.
Not every problem in Traveller can, or should be, solved by a process of simple destruction. Which is why Doctor Who's monsters were so compelling, because most of them, from Daleks and Cybermen to Sontarans and all the other, even more exotic creatures like the Axons, the Autons and Nestene Consciousness, the Slitheen of Raxacoricofallapatorius and the "Toclafane" could never be stopped by bullets: and others, like the Cats of New Earth and the Ood, were not the sort of creatures you'd call "combatant species" anyway.
I'm ever mindful of Asimov's maxim "Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent," and strive to apply some examples of this maxim in all of my campaigns, making sure that the characters use those dice to roll more than just Initiative, Melee and Gun Combat.
Now the technology rules at the start are very useful indeed, I ought to add. Tie them in with the rules for advanced Agent technology in Book 5, the equipment in Book 4: Psion and the items of sheer ingenuity from Book 6: Scoundrel, and you can see where the tech level rules from CSC can really come in to their own.
