Help a Noob - bunch of rules questions (Update 2022 version)

[Raffa]

Hi there! I've been running a Traveller campaign for a few months now and although I am pretty confident in the basic aspects of the rules (Update 2022 version), there are some grey areas to me that I am still struggling with. Some of these cases might be just me misunderstanding or missing out on something while other might depend more on Referee's ruling. Glad if you can help me out with any of these.

(for context: I already watched many Traveller videos on Youtube, including Seth Skorkowski's amazing review series.)

1. HEALING​

1.1. First Aid. The book says First Aid can only be applied successfully "once", but is that "once" until the character is restored to full health or "once" per wound? Say a Jack takes part in two different combat situations, in the first one he takes a 5 points of damage and Morn applies first aid on him and restores 3 points. Hours later, Jack gets hurt again taking 7 points of damage this time. Can Morn apply another Fist Aid on him?
1.2. Medical Care. You need to roll Medic Skill for that, right? Otherwise I can't make any sense on how to apply the penalty for a higher TL implant. What happens if the roll is failed?
1.3. Medical Care. Isn't that too cheap? Why charge it monthly and not daily? I was thinking even if the Traveller has lots of characteristic points to recover more often than not, they will come out of the hospital way sooner than a month (I know that low TL hospitals can have some difficulty with high TL implants). A Medic with Skill 1 could heal 10 Characteristic points in less than 2 weeks. Should I divide the monthly cost by 28 and then multiply it for the number of days they actually spent in the hospital or should I charge at least one month?
1.4. Medical Care (Slow Drug). How does this work in terms of rules? Should I roll Medic Skill until patient is at full health (see question 2)? How's the billing for that if they just spent 1 day in hospital? Should I just charge 1 day + Slow Drug or should I charge how long they'd be in hospital plus the Slow Drug?
1.5. Fast Drug. How long can it stabilize the character that needs surgery? Does 60:1 means they can wait up to 2 months before natural healing (just the END DM)? How easy is it to apply a dose in a patient? How easy is it to obtain? Can I buy it in a pharmacy?

2. COMBAT​

2.1. Distances. The book says we should use 2m/square or 2m/hex grid but not all distances are divisible by 2, be them character movement (like 3m for rough terrain) or weapon range (5m for the Body Pistol). How do you deal with that? The easiest way I thought was using 1m squares/hexes, but then I thought maps would be to big for the weapon ranges to be meaningful. Do you "round up" the odd numbers to the next even number? i.e. 3m would be represented by 2 squares/hexes?
2.2. Laser Sight. Page 74 Common Modifier table states that the +1 laser sight bonus is only applied if you are aiming, while the laser sight description on page 135 says it provides "DM+1 to any attack made at less than 50 metres". Which one is correct?
2.3. Blast trait. Is it radius or diameter? How to represent a 9m blast on a 2m square/hex grid?

3. COMPUTERS​

3.1. Expert programs. Does the scaling make sense? If using an Expert program a Traveller may make a skill check with Bandwith-1 and if they already have the skill it just adds DM+1 to that check, then a Traveller with skill level 0 would have the same benefit if they used an Expert/1 software or Expert/2 software, right? Why would them pay Cr100,000 instead of Cr10,000 if the effect is the same?
3.2. Intelligent Weapons. What is the practical application of this?

4. SHIPS​

4.1. Combat Modes. If the ships are fighting in standard ship combat range and come close enough to each other for it to become a dogfight, how does it work? What happens to Sensor Lock? Is its bonus still on? If so, then is there a way to break the lock with Electronic Warfare? Does the Beam/Pulse laser DM bonuses still apply? Does the short range DM still apply?
4.2. Boarding Action. Why is it described under regular space combat rules with six-minute rounds if it can only happen at dogfighting distance? Does the defending ship only get 1 reaction sandcaster shot against the boarding party? How long does it take for the boarding party actually enter the ship and what can be done while they are still trying to open the airlock?
4.3. Buying old ships. Are quirks like damaged hull and thrusters or chemically tainted cargo bay fixable? How to justify reduced or doubled maintenance costs? If not, what is the in-world explanation for this? If they are, isn't it extremely advantageous to buy a used ship? I mean, the least amount of discount you're gonna get is MCr2 which is a little over Cr8k monthly cost.
4.4. Selling the Traveller's ship. Should I apply the same discount amount according to the ship's age, even considering there are no quirks? Can a broker skill roll get a better price? If so, how would you rule that?
4.5. Probe Drones. Can the probe drones be layed out in a specific way that they can cover more distance being able to operate a drone further than Medium range? Can they be used to improve sensor target distance and gain more detail, like providing full details at medium distance?
4.6. Hull repair costs. 1ton of spare parts per lost hull damage is too much isn't it? 10 points of damage would cost MCr1 to fix which can be way more than fixing a critical hit to the power plant. Does it scale down with Effect like the critical hit repairs?
4.7. Critical hit costs. "The Effect of the check determines how many spare parts are required, minus the Severity of the critical hit." - what does this mean? Should I subtract the severity of the critical hit from the Effect? If so, this means that fixing a Severity 6 critical hit would apply a DM-6 to the Engineer/Mechanic roll, which kinda feels too much.
4.8. Crew Salaries. There are some discrepancies between the salaries shown on pages 154 and 182, which one should I consider? Also, if the Traveller's want to hire one of these professionals for job that will take less than 1 month, how much should they pay? Should they pay a full month salary or divide the salary per 28 and multiply by the number of days necessary? What if they would like to contract an Engineer to fix their ship after a combat?

 

[Tom B]

Hi there! I've been running a Traveller campaign for a few months now and although I am pretty confident in the basic aspects of the rules (Update 2022 version), there are some grey areas to me that I am still struggling with. Some of these cases might be just me misunderstanding or missing out on something while other might depend more on Referee's ruling. Glad if you can help me out with any of these.

(for context: I already watched many Traveller videos on Youtube, including Seth Skorkowski's amazing review series.)

1. HEALING​

1.1. First Aid. The book says First Aid can only be applied successfully "once", but is that "once" until the character is restored to full health or "once" per wound? Say a Jack takes part in two different combat situations, in the first one he takes a 5 points of damage and Morn applies first aid on him and restores 3 points. Hours later, Jack gets hurt again taking 7 points of damage this time. Can Morn apply another Fist Aid on him?
1.2. Medical Care. You need to roll Medic Skill for that, right? Otherwise I can't make any sense on how to apply the penalty for a higher TL implant. What happens if the roll is failed?
1.3. Medical Care. Isn't that too cheap? Why charge it monthly and not daily? I was thinking even if the Traveller has lots of characteristic points to recover more often than not, they will come out of the hospital way sooner than a month (I know that low TL hospitals can have some difficulty with high TL implants). A Medic with Skill 1 could heal 10 Characteristic points in less than 2 weeks. Should I divide the monthly cost by 28 and then multiply it for the number of days they actually spent in the hospital or should I charge at least one month?
1.4. Medical Care (Slow Drug). How does this work in terms of rules? Should I roll Medic Skill until patient is at full health (see question 2)? How's the billing for that if they just spent 1 day in hospital? Should I just charge 1 day + Slow Drug or should I charge how long they'd be in hospital plus the Slow Drug?
1.5. Fast Drug. How long can it stabilize the character that needs surgery? Does 60:1 means they can wait up to 2 months before natural healing (just the END DM)? How easy is it to apply a dose in a patient? How easy is it to obtain? Can I buy it in a pharmacy?

2. COMBAT​

2.1. Distances. The book says we should use 2m/square or 2m/hex grid but not all distances are divisible by 2, be them character movement (like 3m for rough terrain) or weapon range (5m for the Body Pistol). How do you deal with that? The easiest way I thought was using 1m squares/hexes, but then I thought maps would be to big for the weapon ranges to be meaningful. Do you "round up" the odd numbers to the next even number? i.e. 3m would be represented by 2 squares/hexes?
2.2. Laser Sight. Page 74 Common Modifier table states that the +1 laser sight bonus is only applied if you are aiming, while the laser sight description on page 135 says it provides "DM+1 to any attack made at less than 50 metres". Which one is correct?
2.3. Blast trait. Is it radius or diameter? How to represent a 9m blast on a 2m square/hex grid?

3. COMPUTERS​

3.1. Expert programs. Does the scaling make sense? If using an Expert program a Traveller may make a skill check with Bandwith-1 and if they already have the skill it just adds DM+1 to that check, then a Traveller with skill level 0 would have the same benefit if they used an Expert/1 software or Expert/2 software, right? Why would them pay Cr100,000 instead of Cr10,000 if the effect is the same?
3.2. Intelligent Weapons. What is the practical application of this?

4. SHIPS​

4.1. Combat Modes. If the ships are fighting in standard ship combat range and come close enough to each other for it to become a dogfight, how does it work? What happens to Sensor Lock? Is its bonus still on? If so, then is there a way to break the lock with Electronic Warfare? Does the Beam/Pulse laser DM bonuses still apply? Does the short range DM still apply?
4.2. Boarding Action. Why is it described under regular space combat rules with six-minute rounds if it can only happen at dogfighting distance? Does the defending ship only get 1 reaction sandcaster shot against the boarding party? How long does it take for the boarding party actually enter the ship and what can be done while they are still trying to open the airlock?
4.3. Buying old ships. Are quirks like damaged hull and thrusters or chemically tainted cargo bay fixable? How to justify reduced or doubled maintenance costs? If not, what is the in-world explanation for this? If they are, isn't it extremely advantageous to buy a used ship? I mean, the least amount of discount you're gonna get is MCr2 which is a little over Cr8k monthly cost.
4.4. Selling the Traveller's ship. Should I apply the same discount amount according to the ship's age, even considering there are no quirks? Can a broker skill roll get a better price? If so, how would you rule that?
4.5. Probe Drones. Can the probe drones be layed out in a specific way that they can cover more distance being able to operate a drone further than Medium range? Can they be used to improve sensor target distance and gain more detail, like providing full details at medium distance?
4.6. Hull repair costs. 1ton of spare parts per lost hull damage is too much isn't it? 10 points of damage would cost MCr1 to fix which can be way more than fixing a critical hit to the power plant. Does it scale down with Effect like the critical hit repairs?
4.7. Critical hit costs. "The Effect of the check determines how many spare parts are required, minus the Severity of the critical hit." - what does this mean? Should I subtract the severity of the critical hit from the Effect? If so, this means that fixing a Severity 6 critical hit would apply a DM-6 to the Engineer/Mechanic roll, which kinda feels too much.
4.8. Crew Salaries. There are some discrepancies between the salaries shown on pages 154 and 182, which one should I consider? Also, if the Traveller's want to hire one of these professionals for job that will take less than 1 month, how much should they pay? Should they pay a full month salary or divide the salary per 28 and multiply by the number of days necessary? What if they would like to contract an Engineer to fix their ship after a combat?

Ones I feel I can answer.

1.1 Yes new wound, new first aid roll.

2.1 I like 1 1m squares, but it can depend on the scale of the map. Just wing it if it's not.
2.2 Go with the sensible answer of you can only get the bonus for a sight if you're actually using it.
2.3 Pretty sure it's radius.

3.1 You pay more because the higher expert programs can be used for harder tasks.

4.8 Some of the people you hire may be happy with less than a full month, others may want. What I'm trying to indicate here is that everybody they try and hire may react differently to the job offer. They may even work for a lower rate if they're trying to reach the system the party is going to.

 

[Condottiere]

2.2. Laser Sight. Page 74 Common Modifier table states that the +1 laser sight bonus is only applied if you are aiming, while the laser sight description on page 135 says it provides "DM+1 to any attack made at less than 50 metres". Which one is correct?

In theory, both; I'd say it's an aimed shot within fifty metres, as long as you can see the laser beam.

In practice, plus one to any shot taken within fifty metres.

 

[Condottiere]

4.3. Buying old ships. Are quirks like damaged hull and thrusters or chemically tainted cargo bay fixable? How to justify reduced or doubled maintenance costs? If not, what is the in-world explanation for this? If they are, isn't it extremely advantageous to buy a used ship? I mean, the least amount of discount you're gonna get is MCr2 which is a little over Cr8k monthly cost.
4.4. Selling the Traveller's ship. Should I apply the same discount amount according to the ship's age, even considering there are no quirks? Can a broker skill roll get a better price? If so, how would you rule that?

In terms of selling you second hand spacecraft, I'd view it pretty much the same as selling your second hand car, to an oily used car salesman.

Worse, buying one.

You have to view starships more as a convenient means of transportation, which you have to pay rent and operating costs on, with the most easiest coming with substantial baggage, that you have to deal with.

Quirks are permanent alterations of features or performance, so getting rid of them tends to be expensive, whether through major repairs, or complete replacement.

 

[Limpin Legin]

2. COMBAT​

2.1. Distances. The book says we should use 2m/square or 2m/hex grid but not all distances are divisible by 2, be them character movement (like 3m for rough terrain) or weapon range (5m for the Body Pistol). How do you deal with that? The easiest way I thought was using 1m squares/hexes, but then I thought maps would be to big for the weapon ranges to be meaningful. Do you "round up" the odd numbers to the next even number? i.e. 3m would be represented by 2 squares/hexes?
2.2. Laser Sight. Page 74 Common Modifier table states that the +1 laser sight bonus is only applied if you are aiming, while the laser sight description on page 135 says it provides "DM+1 to any attack made at less than 50 metres". Which one is correct?
2.3. Blast trait. Is it radius or diameter? How to represent a 9m blast on a 2m square/hex grid?

2.1 Pretty sure Update 2022, pg73 says 1.5 meter per hex or square? Not all combat can be conducted at that scale because of the ranges of powerful weapons. If you need to scale then declare if you round up or round down, or roll a 1d2 to determine the same.
2.2 As the other replies have said, "both": +1 and no aiming action required while less than 50m. +1 if aiming at ranges greater than 50m
2.3 A dictionary definition for a Blast is defined as "a destructive wave of highly compressed air spreading outwards from an explosion:" So take that to mean radius.

1. HEALING​

1.1. First Aid. The book says First Aid can only be applied successfully "once", but is that "once" until the character is restored to full health or "once" per wound? Say a Jack takes part in two different combat situations, in the first one he takes a 5 points of damage and Morn applies first aid on him and restores 3 points. Hours later, Jack gets hurt again taking 7 points of damage this time. Can Morn apply another Fist Aid on him?
1.2. Medical Care. You need to roll Medic Skill for that, right? Otherwise I can't make any sense on how to apply the penalty for a higher TL implant. What happens if the roll is failed?
1.3. Medical Care. Isn't that too cheap? Why charge it monthly and not daily? I was thinking even if the Traveller has lots of characteristic points to recover more often than not, they will come out of the hospital way sooner than a month (I know that low TL hospitals can have some difficulty with high TL implants). A Medic with Skill 1 could heal 10 Characteristic points in less than 2 weeks. Should I divide the monthly cost by 28 and then multiply it for the number of days they actually spent in the hospital or should I charge at least one month?
1.4. Medical Care (Slow Drug). How does this work in terms of rules? Should I roll Medic Skill until patient is at full health (see question 2)? How's the billing for that if they just spent 1 day in hospital? Should I just charge 1 day + Slow Drug or should I charge how long they'd be in hospital plus the Slow Drug?
1.5. Fast Drug. How long can it stabilize the character that needs surgery? Does 60:1 means they can wait up to 2 months before natural healing (just the END DM)? How easy is it to apply a dose in a patient? How easy is it to obtain? Can I buy it in a pharmacy?

1.1 Once per application. Traveller doesn't keep track of separate wounds. If the PC was wounded again, after the First Aid application, then you could rule that another First Aid is possible.
1.2 Yes. See page 69: "Long-term Care: Average (8+) Medic check (1 day, EDU)." If roll is failed, then patient is in care for another day ...
1.3 Are you using Cr250 per tech level?
1.4 Use at TL11+. One day equals one month's worth of healing, so cost at price of drug.
1.5 It says hibernation (fast drug) can be used as a substitute for cryoberth, which is for 1 week. Availability isn't stipulated in the rules, can be adventure specific. I take it requires at least a Medic 0 to administer, and possibly a Medic 0 to qualify for a purchase.

3.2. Intelligent Weapons. What is the practical application of this?

The IW option usage is not given in the Core Rulebook, but it says in the Central Supply Catalogue that IW is a prerequisite for the Smart Tracker. But, if you wanted security software on the weapon, so that only authorised users could fire the weapon, then you could use it for something like that.

 

[CordwainerFish]

The book says we should use 2m/square

I just noticed that and it is so goddamned stupid, because ship maps use 1.5m grids. What the hell.

edit: [citation required]

 

[Terry Mixon]

I just noticed that and it is so goddamned stupid, because ship maps use 1.5m grids. What the hell.

Yeah, that’s a real doozy.

 

[Geir]

I just noticed that and it is so goddamned stupid, because ship maps use 1.5m grids. What the hell.

I'm not sure, other than the post, where that 2m square comes from because p. 73 clearly states:
Traveller uses a scale of 1.5 metres per map square or
hex for personal combat.

The 2020 version (p. 70) says the same thing.

Well, I guess if you round up...

 

[CordwainerFish]

I'm not sure, other than the post, where that 2m square comes from because p. 73 clearly states:
Traveller uses a scale of 1.5 metres per map square or
hex for personal combat.

The 2020 version (p. 70) says the same thing.

Well, I guess if you round up...

Huh. Yet another PDF mastering issue? (I kid, I kid.)

 

[Condottiere]

Two metres would be body length.

 

[Limpin Legin]

Two metres would be body length.

Could be advantageous when sniping or lying prone? To get head and foot in the same hex or square, I mean.

 

[Condottiere]

I forgot about the sniping part.

In physical combat, I'd say it could also have been about reach, arm's length or kick; though two metres would really be stretching that.

 

[Raffa]

2.1 Pretty sure Update 2022, pg73 says 1.5 meter per hex or square? Not all combat can be conducted at that scale because of the ranges of powerful weapons. If you need to scale then declare if you round up or round down, or roll a 1d2 to determine the same.
2.2 As the other replies have said, "both": +1 and no aiming action required while less than 50m. +1 if aiming at ranges greater than 50m
2.3 A dictionary definition for a Blast is defined as "a destructive wave of highly compressed air spreading outwards from an explosion:" So take that to mean radius.

1.1 Once per application. Traveller doesn't keep track of separate wounds. If the PC was wounded again, after the First Aid application, then you could rule that another First Aid is possible.
1.2 Yes. See page 69: "Long-term Care: Average (8+) Medic check (1 day, EDU)." If roll is failed, then patient is in care for another day ...
1.3 Are you using Cr250 per tech level?
1.4 Use at TL11+. One day equals one month's worth of healing, so cost at price of drug.
1.5 It says hibernation (fast drug) can be used as a substitute for cryoberth, which is for 1 week. Availability isn't stipulated in the rules, can be adventure specific. I take it requires at least a Medic 0 to administer, and possibly a Medic 0 to qualify for a purchase.

The IW option usage is not given in the Core Rulebook, but it says in the Central Supply Catalogue that IW is a prerequisite for the Smart Tracker. But, if you wanted security software on the weapon, so that only authorised users could fire the weapon, then you could use it for something like that.

1.1. Agreed. Follow-up question: say the first wound caused 3 damage and a second wound caused 5. Suppose the First Aid rolls effects were 2 and 6. Can the second roll recover damage for a past wound that was not healed with the first roll?
1.2. Perfect, thanks for pointing it out.
1.3. Yes, but at TL10, this would be just Cr2,500/month, which is less than Cr90 per day and considering that 10 days in the hospital could potentially heal 10 characteristic points which is a lot, Cr900 seems cheap - specially if you consider Travellers can easily make tens of thousands of credits in every trip.
1.4. So just Cr500?
1.5. But what about "a subjective day for the user is actually two months" in the Fast Drug description? But the Medic skill requirement is a good idea.

2.1. You are correct, I think I confused that with the 2m melee range - which gets my point across. I would say that one square away is in melee range and two squares away is not. Why not say melee range is 1.5m away and make every range and movement divisible by 1.5 then? I mean, of all the 6 alien animals examples, only one has a movement score that converts nicely into 1.5m squares, while the others have speeds like 13m (8.6 squares), 5m (3.3 squares) and 2m (1.3 squares). I know this is an easy fix, but bugs me how something so basic can get through a revision and update process - unless there is something I'm missing here.
2.2. Makes perfect sense. Thank you.
2.3. So 6 squares in each direction, counting the square the grenade fell into, right?

3.2. Did not know that, thanks!

 

[rinku]

I think part of the problem is that Mongoose does not require any particular grid system. CT was fairly tied to 1.5m squares when not using range bands, at least until Striker came out and things moved a bit to measured range wargaming. TNE went a bit nuts and gave us gridded up explosions

But it's still a convenient way to run combat on a starship, where most spaces are rectangular.

But if you're out in the field, you may as well think in terms of base contact and measure distances in a convenient standard for the scale used. 25-28mm minis and inches pretty much scales to 1 inch = 1.5m anyway.

Edit:
Okay, I just double checked myself. MGT2e22 p73 (11-12-2024 version) says:
"Traveller uses a scale of 1.5 metres per map square or
hex for personal combat."

Sooo... where is this two metres thing coming from? An older version? HERO (which uses 2 m per hex)? GURPS uses one yard hexes.
(Edit: I missed the previous reply that answered that)

Yeah, you need to be within 2m to engage in close combat... if you're not using a grid that's just measured. If you are using a grid, that means an adjacent square or hex.

I think THIS section is probably the most relevant:

"The referee may prepare detailed maps or even
models of battlefields and encounter areas or just use
sketch maps or descriptions. However, in most simple
firefights, you should find this is not necessary."

Stressing may. The default is pretty much descriptive, with play aids used to help visualise things. You need to know range, not hexes or squares. To be honest, I find that hexes or squares usually get in the way a bit. Just move and measure. The vast majority of the time everyone is in short range for the entire fight, or mostly engages at medium range. People operate in terms of whether that cover is close enough, or if that open space is a killing field. Gridding up anything larger than medium sized ship is a chore.

Having said that, I fully understand that many people like their chessboards and hexmaps. Just use what suits and read that "2m is close combat" to be "one grid unit distance is close combat if you're not just freely measuring ranges.".

 

[rinku]

Also, for all of the above, it's all an abstraction. People don't act in 6 second chunks. Melee range is variable depending on weapons. But for the purposes of a turn based system, it's sufficent to peg a maximum distance where close combat happens.

 

[rinku]

As far as treating wounds goes... I have to say as written it's one application of first aid between any injury and medical care. BUT, keep in mind that if a character is restored to full health from first aid, they're effectively reset anyway. But I don't have any strong objection to a series of treatments to separate scratches and bruises.

i.e. Joss takes 6 points in a fight, no characteristic reduced to zero. First aid happens to heal all of the damage - they're good to go, and can have first aid applied after the next fight. If some of the damage was not restored, they're still in decent shape, but will need medical care to fix that up as their health has exceeded the limits of first aid. If they get wounded again, outside of the context of the initial incident and the immediate treatment, first aid definitely cannot restore the damage from the previous fight. But if they're still just taking END damage the new damage could be treatable (not strictly rules as written, but it passes the pub test)

On the other hand, if the character has had their END reduced to zero and still has damage left after first aid on another stat, I'd say they really have reached the limits of what's on offer and further first aid may not help. But that may be my old CT instincts talking.

 

[rinku]

Without the extra software out of the Central Catalogue a computerised gun is mostly just an alternative to a hand computer. Get the Bandwidth/1 version and add an Intelligent Interface so you can talk to your weapon. A bit sad, but I'm sure some would like it.

You can also fit any amount of Bandwidth/0 programs on it. Agent/0 can do routine database searches on your targets while you're aiming, for example. Maybe translate your command to freeze and drop weapons into Zdant.

Someone's already mentioned adding security software, but anything you can reasonably automate on a gun should pretty much be possible. Get a customer pistol made up where the computer can pull the trigger on your command, or which can act as an extra safely. Voice commands, especially if it can switch ammo types (one of the reasons for the Snub pistol being a revolver was this). I'd think some of this stuff would be standard at the tech levels involved.

 

[Limpin Legin]

1.1. Agreed. Follow-up question: say the first wound caused 3 damage and a second wound caused 5. Suppose the First Aid rolls effects were 2 and 6. Can the second roll recover damage for a past wound that was not healed with the first roll?

Given that Traveller does not keep track of separate wounds, then you could do that. Maybe you could explain that the second wound reopened the first wound, and that is why the first wound receives a second healing.

1.3. Yes, but at TL10, this would be just Cr2,500/month, which is less than Cr90 per day and considering that 10 days in the hospital could potentially heal 10 characteristic points which is a lot, Cr900 seems cheap - specially if you consider Travellers can easily make tens of thousands of credits in every trip.

Well, there are two ways of looking at those costs. Firstly, in many other games (including D&D) you just need a long rest to recover hit points - and that healing is totally free of charge. In Traveller, there is a cost to the healing, so cheap maybe, but more expensive than in other game systems.
Secondly, you don't want to burden Travellers with the costs of medical care to the point it breaks the game. Just enough to grant permission, yet not steep enough that the Travellers become the casualties of the game, and not the heroes.

1.5. But what about "a subjective day for the user is actually two months" in the Fast Drug description? But the Medic skill requirement is a good idea.

Well, the fast drug is saving you two months by being quicker and more effective, so manufacturers of that drug can profit more by undercutting the prices of the competition.

2.1. You are correct, I think I confused that with the 2m melee range - which gets my point across. I would say that one square away is in melee range and two squares away is not. Why not say melee range is 1.5m away and make every range and movement divisible by 1.5 then? I mean, of all the 6 alien animals examples, only one has a movement score that converts nicely into 1.5m squares, while the others have speeds like 13m (8.6 squares), 5m (3.3 squares) and 2m (1.3 squares). I know this is an easy fix, but bugs me how something so basic can get through a revision and update process - unless there is something I'm missing here.

Well, the purest view would be that you don't need a grid. You can just use a tape measure, and move units according to their movement rate. That can get time consuming, so that is why a grid is preferred, as it is easier to count the squares/hexes.
Secondly, original "classic" GDW Traveller counted moves in range bands, and not grid squares. The original range bands were:

• Close: in physical contact; touching.
• Short: at sword or polearm point; approximately 1 to 5 meters.
• Medium: at pistol range; from 6 to 50 meters.
• Long: at rifle range; from 51 to 250 meters.
• Very Long: at extreme range; from 251 to 500 meters.

while compact and neat, this system was useless in identifying terrain, line-of-sight and cover, etc.

Thirdly, you also need to factor in that difficult terrain will half the movement score, and being prone will quarter the score. So, you will always have to deal with rounding up or rounding down the funny numbers these effects have on movement scores.

2.3. So 6 squares in each direction, counting the square the grenade fell into, right?

Yes, that is correct.

 

[agentwigggles]

4.1 Besides the stipulated changes, space combat works the same as at distance space combat. Yea, this makes dog fighting more vicious then what combat already is. Yea, it means that if fighter can close the distance, then Capital ships are in for a bad time. Though in HG, which more expansive rules, Capital ships do get some reprieve. The PC ship can do all the same actions, some actions may take multiple dog fighting combat rounds to get done.

4.2 You've misunderstood the Boarding Action rules. Its just two 2d6 rolls using the same DM table. And whoever, wins, wins. What happens with sandcasters or at the airlock, is all within the Boarding Action result table. I think this got added as there a sizeable portion of folks that got stumped with boarding actions, and a desire for some kinda of mechanical thing. Board Actions, even stated on that page, that it is just ground combat. Its round structure, is ground combat rounds structure. You the gm have to fiddle with some stuff. As the ship combat rules, assume the ship, able to more or less freely rotate to gain the best firing angle whenever they do take a shot, while still going at thousand of km/s. Even in dogfighting, the ships are dancing and rolling around each other, that every facing, gets to face everyone. Its a needed abstracted that any firing weapon can fire at the opponent dogfighters. What happen with the sandcaster. Are the would be boarders in line of sight of it? Maybe. Depends on the circumstances. Which case, they get to fire, every round they can see the boarders, or until it runs out of ammo. Person are very tiny, and sandcasters paste them like a bug on windshield. What do boarders do at the airlock. They use tools. They hack it open, cut it open, explode it open. MTU is that exterior airlock doors for civilian vessels dont lock. In case of emergency, it allows anyone doing an EVA to get back in and get under pressure. Where are the rules for doing that to the airlock. There explosives. In the bad Merc books, there tools for that in there.

4.3 Its a roleplaying game. Anything within the conceit of the game is possible. For Traveller, this often means, money and time. Is it advantageous to buy busted ships? The Doylist answer is yes. The bad things only matter when we remember they're there. The Watsonian answer, is this isnt a box truck, that you use for some hours for work. Its what you're gonna be spending a lot of time in. Most of the year, 24 fours a day, 7 days a week. And for an active ship, 2 weeks out of every month, you're totally isolated from everything, except whats on that ship. It can be difficult, and frustrating. Embarrassing. Brokers should deny you contracts because of the cargo hold. Customers should be wary of the thrusters.

4.4 Never ever, never ever, ever ever never ever never ever ever never sell the starting ship. Until the PC want to want to upgrade to get a bigger mortgage and maintenance cost. Which cast, the easiest thing to do, is to just apply what they paid for the old ship, to the new ship. And the mortgage for the old ship is given to someone else. Though if you're interested I happen to have written some ship brokering rules.

4.5 Eh. Sure. Why not. Its your traveller universe. RAW as written and probably even RAI, no. Why? MTU. I would go with lag. At 10k km that 0.03 seconds of lag. Which in terms of something more real, is like having 33ping. It wont take too many before. Can they be used in combat. I guess. As long as you arent moving. Probes are slower than ships. Can they scout and provide more detail? Yea. WHen not used for surveying, that is the other primary use of probe drones. Go out and check that weird thing over there. As long as its within 10km.

4.6 I dont quite know how to judge, if its too much. Its RAW. Thats how much it costs. Dont bang up your spaceship. No one wants to bang their ship up.

4.7 Repairing critical hits. Roll 2d6+edu/int vs 8. All rolls that dont stipulate a target number, default to 8. Then subtract the Severity of the critical hit, from the result. And The measure of effect is how many hull points you need to repair it. There is a helpful chart on the same page. If you got a Measure of Effect of 6. Then you dont need any space parts to repair the critical. This, isnt often going to happen. As that means on 2d6 you need to roll 15. Target Number of 8. So if you rolled an an 8. Thats a measure of effect 0. So you need to get 6 MoE. So 8+6 is 14. Severity 1, is DM-1. So you need to a a total of 15.

Lets say, you're an engineer 0 and they have EDU DM+1. The sensor have a Severity 3 crit. So they roll. Get an 8. Minus 3. Means they got a 5. Five is a MoE -3. This isnt a MoE greater than 1. So you get to use a full spare part.
Though I think its reasonable if being a hardass to say that such a bumble, may mean you can need to use 1.6 space parts. I am probably not incline to do that at my table.

4.8 182. Its what High Guard went with. The chart on the other page is newer to this edition and flubbed. How much should PC pay an NPC. These figures, arent immutable. They're typical. Or standard. NPC want to get paid as much as possible in accordance to their ability, in accordance to demand of their time, and circumstances. More skilled NPC should charge more. They should charge more, the more inconvenience they are with the request. They should charge more, if they arent hurting for work. They can also charge less, if they really need work, or if they're green and still learning.