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Anonymous
Guest
What percentage of sessions have combat? For us, not counted but I guess low single digits.
PsiTraveller
Cosmic Mongoose
Depends on the type of characters and the module, as well as what the players want. In my current game 3 of 4 characters have a military background for character generation. The fourth is not military but is 'shady'. So all 4 are willing to use violence to solve their problems. That's the kind of group they want to play, so I cater to that.
Module choice: If you run a pirate based game like Drinax you could go ship combat. I am currently running "MakerGod" and just had an ambush scene between clans. I'll have more combat tonight (playing in an hour!) when the players continue their plan and run up against more opposition.
If you are running an exploration based game they may not have to fight much, but my group are looking over the stats for their weapons and want to shoot something. So 1 in 3 sessions has some violence. Sessions tend to go travel and get broad overlay of situation, one session. Second session target key people or locations that are causing a problem. Third session is blow up the problem. Clearly this group is not strong on diplomacy.
Module choice: If you run a pirate based game like Drinax you could go ship combat. I am currently running "MakerGod" and just had an ambush scene between clans. I'll have more combat tonight (playing in an hour!) when the players continue their plan and run up against more opposition.
If you are running an exploration based game they may not have to fight much, but my group are looking over the stats for their weapons and want to shoot something. So 1 in 3 sessions has some violence. Sessions tend to go travel and get broad overlay of situation, one session. Second session target key people or locations that are causing a problem. Third session is blow up the problem. Clearly this group is not strong on diplomacy.
ShawnDriscoll
Cosmic Mongoose
Moppy said:
They have about as much combat as any horror film has in it.
PsiTraveller
Cosmic Mongoose
Blair Witch horror film or Dog Soldiers horror film? 
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Anonymous
Guest
PsiTraveller said:
Given the lethality of the combat system, do you have a high PC turnover? Do you override the dice a lot?
We had a case where a ship combat critical would TPK and we decided to go with it. If we didn’t we felt that no one would care about danger situations if they got reversed. In some systems there would be a some kind of fail forward system (Instead of failing you succeed but there is a side effect) but we don’t like those either.
My current campaign was a little low on combat for the first 6-8 sessions - several short ground combat scenes with generally low-lethality weapons and a couple of short space battles with would-be space pirates. The players were fine with that - they having fun being diplomats, making money trading, unearthing the occasional and helping building a small space station. But the danger level has been rising as the story builds to a climactic space battle - including a very lethal assassination attempt, a pitched battle inside a supposedly-deserted island-based planetary defense fortress, and a conflict on an ice-covered moon which ended in a tac nuke detonation.
Now the party has split - their best diplomat is off assisting representatives of the local system government in petitioning for Imperial naval support while the rest of the group works on preparing defenses for the upcoming battle. So still a lot of non-combat activities (albeit with some social combat) but some very intense combat on the horizon....
Now the party has split - their best diplomat is off assisting representatives of the local system government in petitioning for Imperial naval support while the rest of the group works on preparing defenses for the upcoming battle. So still a lot of non-combat activities (albeit with some social combat) but some very intense combat on the horizon....
PsiTraveller
Cosmic Mongoose
The lethality of combat depends on what tech level you allow the players to equip themselves at, and what armour they can buy and store on a ship.
One of my players has subdermal armour, +4, in a polite setting he wears a Protec Suit (+4) and if things are openly violent he has a carapace (+10) under the Protec Suit, or a cloth coverall (+4). So on the worst days he is 8 armour and most handguns are 2D, so an average roll does not get through. On those heavy combat days he is 18 armour and even some heavier weapons are rendered fairly benign.
Now when they go against enemy with gauss pistols or rifles I expect they will start to get dinged up, but at 18 armour a gauss rifle shot at AP 5 4D will only do 1 point of damage on an average shot.
The lethality level for lesser equipped characters is going to be much worse, but my group is three quarters ex-military, so they protection against things that go bang.
One of my players has subdermal armour, +4, in a polite setting he wears a Protec Suit (+4) and if things are openly violent he has a carapace (+10) under the Protec Suit, or a cloth coverall (+4). So on the worst days he is 8 armour and most handguns are 2D, so an average roll does not get through. On those heavy combat days he is 18 armour and even some heavier weapons are rendered fairly benign.
Now when they go against enemy with gauss pistols or rifles I expect they will start to get dinged up, but at 18 armour a gauss rifle shot at AP 5 4D will only do 1 point of damage on an average shot.
The lethality level for lesser equipped characters is going to be much worse, but my group is three quarters ex-military, so they protection against things that go bang.
Condottiere
Emperor Mongoose
They came looking for a fight.
I warned them about letting sleeping dragons lie.
Most dragons insist they just relate alternative facts.
I warned them about letting sleeping dragons lie.
Most dragons insist they just relate alternative facts.
My group has easy access to a Law Level 0 world which is notorious for easy availability of high-tech weaponry (for outrageous prices). To date they’ve only visited the weapons market once.
Yes, I find that very unusual for a Traveller group too. But they are spending a lot of time on a high-law world, and they’d rather focus on non-combat activities. I’m OK with that.
Yes, I find that very unusual for a Traveller group too. But they are spending a lot of time on a high-law world, and they’d rather focus on non-combat activities. I’m OK with that.
In the one campaign I have run under MgT2 I had the group run a hypothetical bank heist scenario to get used to the combat system after rolling up their characters. The bank was at a class A starport and I kept escalating the response until the team was all down and mostly dead. They gained a healthy respect both for how deadly combat can be and how bad an idea fighting local enforcement is. For the duration of the campaign they picked their fights carefully and went in with overwhelming force from the get go. They lost 2 PCs in about 12 sessions total.
In a Twilight:2000 campaign I played in years ago with similar combat deadliness we were part of a platoon. As PCs got hit they moved to the medical tent or the cemetery and the next backup character took the field. We had (PC) personnel changes almost every session.
In a Twilight:2000 campaign I played in years ago with similar combat deadliness we were part of a platoon. As PCs got hit they moved to the medical tent or the cemetery and the next backup character took the field. We had (PC) personnel changes almost every session.
ShawnDriscoll
Cosmic Mongoose
PsiTraveller said:Blair Witch horror film or Dog Soldiers horror film?
'60s Star Trek horror.
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Anonymous
Guest
PsiTraveller said:
I assume they don't start fights in places where law enforcement can turn up with appropriate gear for the TL? Coz if they're both like that, it's just going to be a stand off until someone calls SWAT or the national guard.
I guess it's one those situations in fantasy RPG, where the city watch has to have a magic-negation item to stop one mid-tier wizard from taking over, but the villages have no such thing so you just have to pick your fights carefully.
Old School
Mongoose
My Drinax campaign has a fair amount of combat, but the players have learned to be loaded for bear - they don’t start a fight unless they have a serious tech advantage. their assault on a mining facility was pretty much all combat. There’s also been a fair amount of space combat, but always when they have the advantage, either in superior firepower, or from trickery.
The trojan Reach has plenty of more or less lawless places. High Law and High Tech level are places they avoid. No fun to be had there, at least not so far.
The trojan Reach has plenty of more or less lawless places. High Law and High Tech level are places they avoid. No fun to be had there, at least not so far.
In our last sessions, we had a lot of fights. Yet, that is 0,4 fights per session on average. Note that as a fight I consider a several rounds combat with considerable danger involved for the party. Throwing a punch at random pesky NPC is not in this count.
The group is merc group, but those who are cheap since they don't cover the standards of a normal mercenary company. Notably, things go haywire left and right, which gives me more seed for adventures than I can handle
I remember, the group planned an armed kidnapping on a cartel territory as a retribution response for an allegedly unpaid instalment for a hijacked shuttle, abusing military permission to use a civil submarine for transportation to another location than the designated. Then entered guns blazing, overwhelming the local cartel force, only to kidnap the wrong person. I mean, they didn't even research his photo over the local internet. They found a fancy dressed npc, who was in a drugged state (unresponsive) and decided he was the target. Even I as a 15+ year referee did not foresee that.
Then I remember, writing their letter for extortion, they researched the guy's name on the internet, to find out he looks completely different.
Now, cartel after them, military sanctions for an abused protocol, criminal activity on another world, zero in profits, they still keep getting in bigger and bigger shit. It started catching up to them.
The group is merc group, but those who are cheap since they don't cover the standards of a normal mercenary company. Notably, things go haywire left and right, which gives me more seed for adventures than I can handle
I remember, the group planned an armed kidnapping on a cartel territory as a retribution response for an allegedly unpaid instalment for a hijacked shuttle, abusing military permission to use a civil submarine for transportation to another location than the designated. Then entered guns blazing, overwhelming the local cartel force, only to kidnap the wrong person. I mean, they didn't even research his photo over the local internet. They found a fancy dressed npc, who was in a drugged state (unresponsive) and decided he was the target. Even I as a 15+ year referee did not foresee that.
Then I remember, writing their letter for extortion, they researched the guy's name on the internet, to find out he looks completely different.
Now, cartel after them, military sanctions for an abused protocol, criminal activity on another world, zero in profits, they still keep getting in bigger and bigger shit. It started catching up to them.
Just counting my current campaign there have been 4 combats in 8 sessions of which 3 of them were in session 8. They are currently crash landed on an unexplored alien world on the far side of a wormhole. That being said the party has taken plenty of damage from other things. The first session alone I got to throw a volcano at them then of course there was the crash landing after the wormhole. 
I don't generally shy away from combat if it's warranted but the players are good at avoiding unnecessary combat in favor of creative solutions.
I don't generally shy away from combat if it's warranted but the players are good at avoiding unnecessary combat in favor of creative solutions.
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