Field Catalogue - High-Grade Equipment for your Travellers!

MongooseMatt

Administrator
Staff member
Used everything in the Central Supply Catalogue? A new book is now available, bringing military grade equipment to your games, along with a complete weapons design system - the Field Catalogue is here!

You can grab your own copy right here: https://www.mongoosepublishing.com/products/field-catalogue

Mercenary_Field_Catalogue_Ebook_cover_762x.jpg


The Field Catalogue presents a selection of weaponry and equipment to suit all budgets and requirements, from handguns to grav tanks, from boots to starships. For those wanting something special the weapon design system puts custom firepower in the hands of your mercenaries. Balance knockdown power against armour penetration and magazine capacity; magazine capacity against the ability to get a shot on target before the opposition fires back.

This book also has rules for situations the average Traveller never encounters: chemical warfare, standoff missile attacks, artillery bombardment and manoeuvring under fire on a low-gravity planetoid. Among the force-multipliers and problem solvers in the Field Catalogue are distraction grenades, auto-hacking intrusion devices and thermal concealment coverings. Personal weaponry ranges from the ubiquitous ‘Mark 1’ handgun to top-end gauss sniping weapons.

For those with a bigger budget, the Field Catalogue presents a range of vehicles with options packages. The basic Negav 10-wheel truck is a humble logistics vehicle, but for a few thousand Credits more it can become a mobile headquarters or improvised ground assault platform. The S-series grav platform can transport troops to the battle area or provide support with its autocannon and Blackjack gun/missile system. The very richest commanders can travel in style aboard the Gravitas skiff or take command of a Shadow gunship for more direct action.
 
Page 22, Knockdown.
The rule says avoid knockdown with a Simple 2+ STR check, then lists modifiers.
The example in the second column says a Routine 6+ STR check, then runs through the modifiers from the rule paragraph.
Which difficulty is used, and did I miss something from another rule that modified the check from Simple to Routine?
 
Arkathan said:
Page 22, Knockdown.
The rule says avoid knockdown with a Simple 2+ STR check, then lists modifiers.
The example in the second column says a Routine 6+ STR check, then runs through the modifiers from the rule paragraph.
Which difficulty is used, and did I miss something from another rule that modified the check from Simple to Routine?

Is that still there? I recall that being mentioned in the Kickstarter comments when the Field Catalogue was first released.

Speaking of the Kickstarter, as the Field Catalogue is one of the stretch goals, should those of us who backed the project not have it already added to our DriveThruRPG libraries rather than having to buy it again?
 
swampslug said:
Is that still there? I recall that being mentioned in the Kickstarter comments when the Field Catalogue was first released.
So Mongoose still haven't improved their infamous editing quality? Oh dear. That is disappointing :(

Got as far as adding it to my cart, but think I'm done buying new stuff from Mongoose for now. I see no evidence of improvement.
 
swampslug said:
Speaking of the Kickstarter, as the Field Catalogue is one of the stretch goals, should those of us who backed the project not have it already added to our DriveThruRPG libraries rather than having to buy it again?

You will indeed, you should find it in your libraries on Monday morning (apologies for not doing that yesterday, I was not in the office).

As for the STR check, I don't have the books in front of me right now, but it is likely to be the Simple 2+ difficulty.
 
swampslug said:
Arkathan said:
Page 22, Knockdown.
The rule says avoid knockdown with a Simple 2+ STR check, then lists modifiers.
The example in the second column says a Routine 6+ STR check, then runs through the modifiers from the rule paragraph.
Which difficulty is used, and did I miss something from another rule that modified the check from Simple to Routine?

Is that still there? I recall that being mentioned in the Kickstarter comments when the Field Catalogue was first released.

Speaking of the Kickstarter, as the Field Catalogue is one of the stretch goals, should those of us who backed the project not have it already added to our DriveThruRPG libraries rather than having to buy it again?
In my PDF the example in the second column is updated to "Routine (2+)", so the number has been corrected but the text has not. Anyhow, I guess that Arkathan doesn't have the latest version of the PDF.

Not being able to check which version a file is, e.g. by a simple date on page 2, is annoying. MongooseMatt, I think the community would sort these things out by themselves if there was an easy way of comparing versions of PDFs and physical books. And that would save your time!
 
Varulv said:
In my PDF the example in the second column is updated to "Routine (2+)", so the number has been corrected but the text has not. Anyhow, I guess that Arkathan doesn't have the latest version of the PDF.

Not being able to check which version a file is, e.g. by a simple date on page 2, is annoying. MongooseMatt, I think the community would sort these things out by themselves if there was an easy way of comparing versions of PDFs and physical books. And that would save your time!

There are 2 ways to do this. A bit geeky but doable.

1. Find out the number of bytes in the file. You can do it in Linux by using the command ls -l and, I think, the DIR command in Windows.

2. In Linux use the sha256sum command to generate a number that reflects the content of the file in question.

HTH,



Ian
 
MongooseMatt said:
swampslug said:
Speaking of the Kickstarter, as the Field Catalogue is one of the stretch goals, should those of us who backed the project not have it already added to our DriveThruRPG libraries rather than having to buy it again?

You will indeed, you should find it in your libraries on Monday morning (apologies for not doing that yesterday, I was not in the office).

As for the STR check, I don't have the books in front of me right now, but it is likely to be the Simple 2+ difficulty.

And my dad said that my history degree would never be good for anything….

Primary sources: I just happen to have a draft document and my comments on it, which may shed light or cast further shadows on this issue. (Caution: unauthorized partial sausage-making exposed – I may be sanctioned later)

So I had issue with the big bad merc having the same chance of being knocked down as, shall we say, a person of limited physique. I kind of understand why the maximum species value was used, because you don’t need detailed stats on the target – but if you’re going to cause wounds to the target, you’d better know what value to use for END (and STR, and DEX… but never mind).

Originally the text was for the roll to be Average (8+) to ‘achieve’ – not prevent – a knockdown, with an adjustment to Easy (4+) for ‘pellet’ and Very Difficult (12) for ‘armour piercing’ and DM for any damage done above the species max (15).
I had suggested using a Simple (2+) roll with a DM- excess damage over (base) END value for the target to ‘avoid’ a knockdown – with adjustments (not specified in comments) for wearing powered armour.

Somebody else may have made other suggestions (missing data on my end - imperfect access to historical records)

This was changed in the final product to a Simple (2+) STR check (this addresses the big bad merc vs waif issue and the powered amour issue more elegantly than my idea) and adds Low Pen and AP modifiers plus or minus.

So, let’s look at the example from the perspective of the original text and the final:
16 points damage of shotgun pellet - Low Pen (3) - damage versus human with 5 points of flak jacket. One point gets through.

Original text: (not exactly, but I’m translating another change) check to achieve knockdown is a straight Easy(4+) – because it’s pellet – +1 for excess damage above 15. Result is an 8 – unclear if the was 7+1 or not, but it hardly matters since the test was a 4+ - so knockdown happens.

Final text: Raw damage 16 is more than 15 species max, so we check for knockdown. Now it’s the target trying to prevent knockdown. STR DM provides +1, damage provides -1, Low Pen (3) provides -3, so net is -3, roll an 8 and subtract 3 to get 5, which is less than 6, so knockdown happens 0 if the check was Routine (6+).

If it were Simple, knockdown wouldn’t happen in this scenario. Only a roll of 4 or less on 2D would cause a knockdown. Therefore, I would suggest that the intent is to make it be Routine (6+) STR check throughout.

Once again, I may be clarifying or muddying and it’s up to Matthew to decide which way it should be edited.
 
What ships are detailed in this book? are they available elsewhere like in the up coming high guard 2022 where there is a write-up for a rider class.
-names
-write-up
-deck plans

Thanks
 
Subzero001 said:
What ships are detailed in this book? are they available elsewhere like in the up coming high guard 2022 where there is a write-up for a rider class.

They are only in the Field Catalogue:

Gravitas Diplomatic Skiff (200t)
Shadow Gunship (400t)
Deyst Assault Ship (600t)
Borwen Transport (1,000t)
 
Can you reverse engineer the advanced combat rifle with the design sequence?

Or have features and/or options been omitted from the final draft?
 
I certainly have recreated some weapons and they mostly came out very similar. The only oddity that I found was the lack of range in the enhanced gauss receiver.
 
Page 22, Knockdown.
The rule says avoid knockdown with a Simple 2+ STR check, then lists modifiers.
The example in the second column says a Routine 6+ STR check, then runs through the modifiers from the rule paragraph.
Which difficulty is used, and did I miss something from another rule that modified the check from Simple to Routine?
Yes I spotted this and have come up with an alternative. How about making the difficulty related to the range at which the weapon is firing?

Short (1/4x) = Routine (6+)
Normal (1x) = Easy (4+)
Long (2x) = Routine (2+)
Extreme (4x) = no knockdown possible
 
Yes I spotted this and have come up with an alternative. How about making the difficulty related to the range at which the weapon is firing?

Short (1/4x) = Routine (6+)
Normal (1x) = Easy (4+)
Long (2x) = Routine (2+)
Extreme (4x) = no knockdown possible
.50 cal sniper rifle will still have knockdown at Extreme range... That is one big ass bullet.
 
Back
Top