Core Rules book - wished it removed Psionics and added missing Pre-Career and Aliens

[ericwood8]

Core Rules book - wished it:
1) removed Psionics section (rarely used, about 10 pages) and put this in its own book (Edit: or placed in the Companion book)
2) added missing Pre-Career options (that are in Traveller Companion 2024 book) and others such as trade school, graduate program, PhD program, med school, or law school
3) added missing Training and Experience section (that is in Traveller Companion 2024 book)
4) added the +/- stats and skills of missing Aliens (found in Aliens books 1 to 4 and probably others).

Thoughts? Other things you wish were in Core rules book or willing to remove to put something more important in?

 

[Vormaerin]

1) Rarely used by whom?

2) Those are optional rules. I don't have any problem with them, but they are kind of unnecessary. You can duplicate Law School, Med School, or the like with University. Nothing says that "University" means a current style baccalaureate degree where you spend 2 years learning about Vilani poets and remedial education in maths, science, and writing before you actually get to study your area of interest. That 4 years of University could easily be straight to your graduate degree. And, personally, I'd say that PhD & Residency are "basic training" of the appropriate scholar career.

3) The training rules in the companion are replacements for the rules in the core rulebook, not "missing". I don't particularly care about these rules specifically, but you should be clear that you are asking for a rules change, not missing rules to be included.

4) That's a pretty big page count ask and including them without the write ups on how to play them doesn't seem every helpful. Much as I love the Virushi and the Ael Yael, even a page on each of the races is a huge amount of page count. Especially if you start including the various human variants.

 

[mavikfelna]

As much as I like psionics, it should probably be in the Companion. I don't think there is enough material for it to be its own book unless it is combined with a Psionic races book. I do think some of the talents for Droyne and Zhodani need to be integrated with the other talents or perhaps break up all the talents into more groups but make them open to everyone and have the super specialized stuff like Droyne invisibility be its own racial talent.

See my Careers in MgT 2e thread for some extra pre career takes.

 

[Sigtrygg]

Psionics is common in the sci fi Traveller was based on, never mind the Third Imperium at al setting.

Foundation, Dune, Dumarest, Know Space, Lensmen

It is also part of the two largest sci fi franchises in Star Wars and Star Trek.

 

[Vormaerin]

There's issues with the rules that we have being a bit of a mess, but I don't see any particular reason why you would want to exclude them from the game. Or shuffle them off to the "significantly less commonly purchased book of even more optional than everything else rules" companion

 

[ericwood8]

>1) Rarely used by whom?
I was just stating my own campaign, I hardly ever use psionics except when Zhodani show up when the party is in the Spinward Marches. I assumed that might be others as well.

>As much as I like psionics, it should probably be in the Companion. I don't think there is enough material for it to be its own book unless it is combined with a Psionic races book.
I really like this suggestion.

 

[MarcusIII]

removed Psionics section

I've ripped out psionics (magic) in every Traveller game I've run. No loss at all.

 

[agentwigggles]

1) I love psionics. I greatly appreciate why its part of sci fi, though I understand why it doesnt feel like sci fi anymore. I find it an interesting foil to throw at players, in terms of other sophonts and animals. Though sometime for animals, it can get frustrating. Recently played through Skandersvik as a psionic space viking. Good time. I flew at the last adventure, mostly because it was the last adventure, but it was fun.

2) Not missing. Its literally in a book. It cant be missing if its somewhere.

3) CRB has the conventional traveller skill raising system. This makes the the stuff in the companion, optional. Though so it happens in my games and in games I play, we do end up playing with xp system.

4) Those stats and skills for playing in those polities and culture groups or playing as immigrants from those culture and polities. While unstated, the CRB defaults to the 3I. So the Aslan skill for males not to kill a random person for insulting them, doesnt make sense for an Imperial Aslan, an Aslan that grew up in the Imperium, as an example.

 

[Limpin Legin]

I don't think there is enough material for it to be its own book unless it is combined with a Psionic races book.

Humans of the Far Future are a potential psionic race? The humans races book is the Core Rulebook, so no need to change anything.

 

[Vormaerin]

>1) Rarely used by whom?
I was just stating my own campaign, I hardly ever use psionics except when Zhodani show up when the party is in the Spinward Marches. I assumed that might be others as well.

>As much as I like psionics, it should probably be in the Companion. I don't think there is enough material for it to be its own book unless it is combined with a Psionic races book.
I really like this suggestion.

What I personally like doesn't seem like a good basis for what is in the core rulebook of game designed to cover the breadth of available sci fi. There are people on this forum who have invested vast amounts of time into areas of the rules I couldn't care less about. So it's good that those rules are there for them. It doesn't hurt me that they exist, but it would hurt them if they don't.

And I would argue that psionics are not particularly obscure or unpopular as an inclusion in sci fi. As mentioned, lots and lots of very popular Sci Fi has psionics. And even if you aren't interested in duplicating Star Trek, Star Wars, or Firefly, it's pretty heavily baked into most common Traveller setting with the Droyne and the Zhodani. So if the core rulebook doesn't have that, then you can't duplicate those very popular settings.

 

[rinku]

Well, this is clearly going to be a matter of opinion as to what pages are core and what pages are optional rules that belong in another volume.

Given that Psionics ARE a part of Charted Space (the default setting), but also exist in some form in most popular SF franchises (Star Wars, Star Trek, 40K, Dr Who, Babylon 5, Blake's Seven, Marvel, DC), I see them as better belonging in the CRB.

Also... Mongoose have a responsibility (and maybe a legal requirement, or at least an agreement with Marc Miller) to honour what has gone before. Psionics were, and have remained, a part of Traveller's core rules since 1977. EVERY edition has them, just like every edition has Jump Drive and Fast Drug.

 

[Vormaerin]

Honestly, I think it is harder to find big popular sci fi properties that don't have psi in it. The Expanse?

 

[rinku]

You might count Ghostbusters too.

It's pretty much baked into 60's science fiction, thanks to Astounding editor John W Campbell (who even coined the term psionics for the scientific study of mind powers and ESP). It's always been a staple of Pulp era and superheroes fare, too.

But Psi powers weren't really properly debunked until the 80's. There were still a lot of people researching it in the 70's, whose research was the final nail in the coffin for real world psionics.

And it's remained a popular thing to give to aliens. Earth research that proves humans don't have ESP doesn't apply to space aliens, right?

 

[Vormaerin]

I don't consider ghostbusters to be in the same category as space opera, personally.

Earth research as debunked FTL travel too

 

[rinku]

Most science fiction allows for One Big Lie. That's very often some form of FTL, but can simply be unjustified technology ("I can't actually tell you how this works, just suspend disbelief on that point, okay?"). Asimov's positronic brains are a good example.

Traveller at least goes with a form of interstellar travel that technically obeys the speed of light limit, and takes pain to impose that limit otherwise... well, at least until the Empress Wave business. Although that also seems to have an extradimensional angle.

And sure... psionics could come back, just as some more convenient means of space travel might be developed, as we expand our understanding of the universe.

 

[ResslynHalvik]

You can duplicate Law School, Med School, or the like with University. Nothing says that "University" means a current style baccalaureate degree where you spend 2 years learning about Vilani poets and remedial education in maths, science, and writing before you actually get to study your area of interest. That 4 years of University could easily be straight to your graduate degree. And, personally, I'd say that PhD & Residency are "basic training" of the appropriate scholar career.

I was long wanting specialist schools and post-graduate training, but I am increasingly of the view that it's an 80% overlap with what we have. I keep meaning to rough up some rules for them to see if that's the case.

 

[ResslynHalvik]

I hated the idea of psionics until I heard it used in the second series of the Voyagers of the Jump podcast.

 

[agentwigggles]

I was long wanting specialist schools and post-graduate training, but I am increasingly of the view that it's an 80% overlap with what we have. I keep meaning to rough up some rules for them to see if that's the case.

Thats what the scholar career represents. Or it what can represent, working toward a master, then doctorate.
There may be some merit, in splitting doctor, and researching/engineer but the science skills, arent great really to invest to. They're plot exposition skills, and most gm will give the required information even if your party doesnt have it.

 

[ResslynHalvik]

Yes, Scholar is the 80% overlap I was thinking of. As I say at some point I want to rough out some rules for postgraduate study, and see just how small the gap is between what I'm thinking of what scholar already gives.