College for Mongoose Traveller

[jwpacker]

I did some searching, but didn't see anything in the forums recently enough to come up in the search tool on the subject of college in the Traveller universe.

It was an option in CT, when you added in books like High Guard and Scouts and the like, and I miss it in Mongoose Traveller.

My suggestion would be to adapt the CT rules a bit as follows, and I appreciate any constructive criticism you might provide.



College:

Throw Edu 9+ to be admitted. Fail, and you may enlist in any other career or submit to the draft like nothing happened. Succeed, and you're admitted to college

Throw Int 7+ to succeed. Fail and you drop out of college, and spend the rest of the four years in the Drifter career, with a -2 DM to promotion rolls to represent the shortened term. Succeed and you increase your Edu by 1 (or raise it to 6 if it was 4 or less), -or- choose one of the Education Skills from the Background Skills list on page 6 of the Core Rules (Admin, Advocate, Art, Carouse, Comms, Computer, Drive, Engineer, Language, Medic, Science or Trade) at level 1.

Throw Edu 10+ to gain honors. Fail and there's no impact. Succeed and you increase your Edu by 1 -or- gain a second skill from the list at level 1 - whichever you didn't opt for when you rolled to succeed.

Optionally, Throw Soc 9+ for Officer's Training Cadre. Fail and there's no impact. Succeed and enter the Army, Marines or Navy at the rank of O1 without a further enlistment roll.

At the end of the four years, the character will owe (1d6 - Int DM)x5,000 credits in educational debt. Those that succeed at OTC have that debt wiped away if they make it through the first full term of duty without mishap. Those who were admitted, but failed their success roll and dropped out have a residual debt of (1d6 - Int DM)x1,000 credits.

 

[DFW]

College:

Throw Edu 9+ to be admitted. Fail, and you may enlist in any other career or submit to the draft like nothing happened. Succeed, and you're admitted to college

I would put it at 8+. This is the same level for advanced EDU in char gen.

 

[GypsyComet]

the subject of college in the Traveller universe.

While I am not opposed to the idea, I think it would need to fit into the structure of MGT. I would, for example, be more open to the idea of adding an "Academic" career. The two special rules that would be applied to it is that two terms or less would not count as a "prior career" for the penalty DMs of other careers, and (like Space Hobo) would be a career you could come back to. Otherwise the first term "stack of zeros" rule for MGT careers suits a young college goer just fine. Survival, Advancement, and Events would handle a wide variety of academic awards, achievements, side shows, and pitfalls.

College:

Throw Edu 9+ to be admitted. Fail, and you may enlist in any other career or submit to the draft like nothing happened. Succeed, and you're admitted to college

I would put it at 8+. This is the same level for advanced EDU in char gen.

You may be reading that in CT notation, which would give a mod for having EDU 9+.
This is MGT, which means this is a roll, modified by EDU, with a target of 9+.

 

[DFW]

College:

Throw Edu 9+ to be admitted. Fail, and you may enlist in any other career or submit to the draft like nothing happened. Succeed, and you're admitted to college

I would put it at 8+. This is the same level for advanced EDU in char gen.

You may be reading that in CT notation, which would give a mod for having EDU 9+.
This is MGT, which means this is a roll, modified by EDU, with a target of 9+.

Yep, My mistake. More coffee for me.

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

Spica Publishing's Career Book 2 has a University "Career" and a Graduate School "career". Both have graduation rolls, events and mishaps.

High Guard has a "Military Acadamy" term you can take.

 

[jwpacker]

While I am not opposed to the idea, I think it would need to fit into the structure of MGT. I would, for example, be more open to the idea of adding an "Academic" career. The two special rules that would be applied to it is that two terms or less would not count as a "prior career" for the penalty DMs of other careers, and (like Space Hobo) would be a career you could come back to. Otherwise the first term "stack of zeros" rule for MGT careers suits a young college goer just fine. Survival, Advancement, and Events would handle a wide variety of academic awards, achievements, side shows, and pitfalls.

Interesting. And I see from a later post that at least one third party agrees with your idea.

I will have to give the Scholar career another look as well - it might serve to simply have a single term as a Scholar serve as the kind of "post-secondary" education that I'm interested in seeing in-game, either as written, by way of third party products, or as an additional group of career paths within the framework of the existing Scholar career in the form of house rules.

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

In the Spica book, University is treated as a 1-term Career. So you have the various skill tables (for Science, Liberal Arts and Engineering Majors). You roll for Graduation and Honours, each of which gives you skills and EDU bumps.

You can also do OTS (Officer Training School) and get a military commission after graduation.

There are Mishaps if you fail to graduate and an Event table with things like "Join a Sorority/Fraternity" and "Join a Sports Team".

There are even Mustering Out tables.

 

[Egil Skallagrimsson]

Can't really see much wrong with the "scientist" specialism in the "scholar" career path as written, certainly for the more experimental scientists (if you want a philiosopher you may well have an odd set of skills for a philosopher) in a mid-high tech world.

The other alternative, if you want a science skill is to add it as one of your connections during character generation.

Egil

 

[Sturn]

My house rules character generation (I have many "Advanced", more detailed rules similar to MT) includes an Advanced Education career (Academic on second thought seems a better name). It has no basic training. My house rules include expansions on number of specialites per career (not just 3). Instead of adding all of the careers from the supplements, I just added specialties to the base careers.

Advanced Education includes specialties of:

Business College
Diplomatic Academy
Fine Arts College
Law School
Medical School
Military Academy
Science Academy
Technical College

Success gives a degree such as Bachelors or Masters (2 terms of Advanced Education career to obtain). Masters has the notoriety of a modern Doctorate.

 

[locarno24]

High Guard has a "Military Acadamy" term you can take.

True, but they're all fleet. Wouldn't be too hard to create a 'battle school' (possibly with floating stars) for the marines, though.

 

[Melbourne Accords]

Thanks to all for a very helpful thread. It is timely as the issue has just come up in our campaign.

The MGT approach to higher education does not foreground tertiary study. This may suit some campaigns, but will not meet the needs of others. Fortunately, one of the great traditions of Traveller is playing with the rules.

The following approach rests on two distinctions. First, enrolling in an undergraduate degree is not the same as the first term of a career as an academic. Second, an undergraduate degree is not a career. Instead, a career begins after graduation (hence basic training occurs in the first term after graduation).

College

Admission: EDU 9+ (as per CT High Guard / MT / jwpacker) - Failure has no negative effects.
Success: INT 7+ (as per CT High Guard / MT / jwpacker) – Increase EDU to 7 (our campaign setting assumes high levels of participation in tertiary education) or +1 to EDU or choose an Education skill from the background skills list.
Events: As per Spica Career Book 2 (thanks Rikki Tikki Traveller)
Honours: INT 10+ (as per MT / jwpacker) +1 EDU or choose an Education skill from background skills list.
Optional: OTC or NOTC SOC 8+ (as per CT High Guard)

Completion of an undergraduate degree is a pre-requisite for graduate schools (as per Sturn).

 

[Sturn]

Melbourne is your College above supposed to be a 4 year term or something going on during another career?

Most people going to "college" do so for 4 years (unless they drop out). Yes there are lots of free time (summer off, vacations), but I have no problem making it a 4year "career" even if you can only take it for 2 terms max.

In other versions of Traveller, there have been special schools that can grant skills. A.i. while in Navy you complete Flight School during a term for a bonus Pilot-1 skill. But, I wouldn't treat "College" the same way since that means a heck of a lot more time.

Mongoose grants one or two skills per term depending on advancement. I think the idea that is some of those skills may be granted due to schools, they are just not named. A.i. while in Navy I learn Computers 1 and Pilot 1 during a single term. For added detail I could say I worked as a computer operator on a battleship during that term but also got accepted and left for a year to attend Flight School.

 

[Melbourne Accords]

Yes, Sturm - I should have stated this. Our views are similar. This College is a four year term. Most characters would take it in the first four years after school. It does not include a basic training package. It is not intended to represent the first term of work as a scholar / academic / lecturer. It is a pre-requisite for graduate education (such as Medicine, Law etc). Such graduate schools would take up a subsequent term. This model is not intended to represent Flight School or similar (I agree that these are readily dealt with as unnamed aspects of a standard term in a career). The position here is that college / university education is significant and warrants detailed treatment.

 

[jwpacker]

College

Admission: EDU 9+ (as per CT High Guard / MT / jwpacker) - Failure has no negative effects.
Success: INT 7+ (as per CT High Guard / MT / jwpacker) – Increase EDU to 7 (our campaign setting assumes high levels of participation in tertiary education) or +1 to EDU or choose an Education skill from the background skills list.
Events: As per Spica Career Book 2 (thanks Rikki Tikki Traveller)
Honours: INT 10+ (as per MT / jwpacker) +1 EDU or choose an Education skill from background skills list.
Optional: OTC or NOTC SOC 8+ (as per CT High Guard)

Completion of an undergraduate degree is a pre-requisite for graduate schools (as per Sturn).

Nicely summed up. Would graduate school be the same in terms of mechanics, and act as a "second term" of college?

 

[Melbourne Accords]

Thanks. Yes, this would be a very good approach.

 

[jwpacker]

As I don't have access to the Spica career books, I adapted an event table from the Scholar career path, and present it here as an option for others interested in adding College to their TUs

2d6 Events
2 Disaster! Roll on the Injury table, but you are not forced to leave College early.
3 You are called upon to perform work that goes against your conscience. Accept, and you gain a level in any one skill appropriate to your area of study, a grant to pay off 5,000 credits of your educational debt, and an Enemy. Refuse, and gain a Rival.
4 You are assigned to work on a secret project for your University mentor. Gain Investigate 1 or Admin 1.
5 College is a time of social development as well as book learning. You make many interesting friends during your time at school. Gain one of Carouse 1, Streetwise 1, Deception 1 or Melee (Unarmed) 1, and a Contact.
6 You are given one-on-one training in your chosen field. Throw Education 8+ to gain any one skill appropriate to your area of study at level 1.
7 Life Event. Roll on the Life Events table (page 34).
8 You have the opportunity to cheat on a project or test. If you refuse, you gain nothing. If you accept, roll Deception 8+ or Admin 8+. If you succeed, you gain a +2 DM to your Honors roll and may increase any skill by one level, but you also gain an Enemy. If you fail, you gain an Enemy, may not qualify for Honors, and if this is your first term in College you may not continue on to Graduate School.
9 Your work with colleagues leads to a breakthrough in your field. Gain a +2 DM to your Honors roll.
10 Paperwork and red tape distracts you from your schooling, forcing you to spend valuable time sorting through it all. Gain one of Admin 1, Advocate 1, Persuade 1 or Diplomat 1.
11 You are a social butterfly, gadabout, class clown or big man on campus. Roll three times on the Life Event table on page 34.
12 Your work is uniformly exceptional, head and shoulders above your peers. You achieve Honors automatically.