How to make Traveller more popular with TTRPG players

[shirgall]

The '81 revised edition of CT introduced the great big number 8+ in the combat chapter. I should add that the target number was 8+ for combat in the original 77 rules, but the 81 revision made it big and obvious.

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Long before Andy Slack wrote his White Dwarf article our group adopted that as the rule for every standard situational skill saving throw, with DMs for skill level, environmental effects, tools, high or low characteristics. We still changed the target number for certain situations based on raised difficulty,

We ignored that silly DGP unified task system with its task library, and continued to ignore it when MegaTraveller made it officially the Traveller task resolution system.

I am so glad Mongoose adopted the 8+ as the default target number for most things

This is a great point. The "8AC" difficulties and basic DMs are so straightforward it should be easy to depict, explain, and understand.

 

[Micky]

This is a solid point. I used to do book reviews in the genre fiction space. If a review contained constructive criticism, the author was often very open to the feedback. The fan base usually wouldn't react well to anything less than a 5-star review. Even worse if we revisited a beloved "classic" with a modern lens.

I can report, from firsthand experience, that providing honest reviews while trying to grow your online viewers/listeners/readers is challenging, since you often need the product's existing fan base to find you if you don't already have an audience. A good reason most of the bigger online RPG reviewers cover a lot of different products, not just one product line. Seth's Traveller reviews didn't start until after he'd already established a fan base.

It would be a challenge to build a Traveller content channel that is both interesting to established players while also welcoming to new players.

Exactly the point I was trying to make but didn't. The vast majority of authors would be just like musicians were in my experiences. They want constructive criticism. They live for it. Praise is great for the ego but not exactly helpful to help them improve. Mongoose I'm sure would be no different. I'll give a shout out to MongooseChris. I found something in Singularity that was... just flat out wrong man.. a bad canon kind of wrong and felt out of respect I would bring it up privately rather than in open forum and he was extremely receptive and thankful for the input.

These authors are like artists... just with words rather than paint or instruments. They live for feedback, they really do want to put out the best they can do and reviews/feedback help them.

 

[MarcusIII]

I am so glad Mongoose adopted the 8+ as the default target number for most things

This is what I use. 8 IS the basic success number

 

[Sigtrygg]

I mostly use 8+ and 12+, I don't consider the two point gap a sufficient reason to use 10+, I would usually just apply bane instead. And only ever roll dice when I can't just say you succeed or you have no chance.

 

[MarcusIII]

And only ever roll dice when I can't just say you succeed or you have no chance.

Yes, no GM worth their salt has players roll needlessly. Rolls are for special situations

 

[shirgall]

Yes, no GM worth their salt has players roll needlessly. Rolls are for special situations

Indeed, rolls are for when there is both a chance and a consequence of failure or degree of success.

 

[Condottiere]

Boxcars should be automatic success.

 

[MarcusIII]

If a task is even remotely feasible, a natural roll of12 is always a success. If the task isn't at all possible then it fails

 

[shirgall]

Boxcars should be automatic success.

2.87% chance of automatic success? That doesn't roleplay any better than d20 "luck die" 5% rolls. Degree of success is better.

 

[Condottiere]

Drama.

Also, for those times when everything is against the character, but baby needs a pair of Jimmy Choos.

 

[actionman]

They live for feedback, they really do want to put out the best they can do and reviews/feedback help them.

Legitimate critique is so rare. There's nothing worse than "that's nice, what is it?"

 

[FreeTrav]

Recognizing that thread drift is A Thing, and trying to bring it back to the original topic - making Traveller more popular with TTRPG players - an article that I'm formatting for the upcoming issue of Freelance Traveller made mention of a thought pattern that I think is still valid, even though it seems to have fallen out of general topical discourse.

First, I'll state the obvious: Traveller is not D&D. The reason I say that, however, may not be so obvious.

Let's go back a few years, to something called GNS Theory. Under this view of ludology, in the purest forms, a TTRPG might be oriented toward achievement and "winning" ("Game-ism"), or it might be oriented toward telling stories ("Narrative-ism"), or it might be oriented toward simulating an assumed reality ("Simulation-ism"). Few TTRPGs, if any, are purely one of the three; if you draw a triangle with the three corners labelled G, N, and S, most games will be somewhere inside the triangle, not on an edge or a corner.

Traveller and its ilk pretty clearly fall fairly close to the N/S line. There's no real mechanism for character advancement within the game; there are generally no set "universal" goals, and any rewards for accomplishing something are generally fleeting. In other words, you don't "win" at Traveller. The Traveller player is typically going to be more interested in doing than in achieving, and it's likely that the Traveller player is attracted by the collaborative storytelling.

Dungeons & Dragons and its ilk, on the other hand, focus on achieving rather than doing. The mechanism for character advancement is "baked in" to the system; when your character vanquishes an opponent, you get "experience points", and you "gain levels" when you accumulate enough "experience points". Your character faces more powerful opponents the more powerful s/he is; the game is focussed more on the character progression than it is on the collaborative storytelling. Admittedly, this is somewhat tempered now as compared to the earliest days of the game, making this class of games more G/N than pure G.

The two games appeal to two kinds of players that are fundamentally different. If we want to increase the uptake on Traveller, we need to do one of two things:

1. Get Traveller out into the perception of players that are more interested in the collaborative storytelling than in "winning", but who don't know about Traveller already, or
2. Make Traveller attractive to the players that are more interested in "winning" than in the collaborative storytelling.

#2 has been tried (Traveller²⁰), but with less marketing than needed, and it really couldn't be considered a success. It's being tried again, as (working name) Traveller 5E. Perhaps the marketing will be better this time around. BUT...

Is it reasonable? Can one fit a game designed for Narrative-ism and Simulation-ism into a framework that has strong Game-ism elements? More to the point, do you still have Traveller, or do you end up with Starships & Slugfests? How do you make a NS game attractive to a G or GN player? Alternatively, how do we find and attract more NS players to Traveller, or to the hobby at all?

 

[MarcusIII]

The Traveller player is typically going to be more interested in doing than in achieving, and it's likely that the Traveller player is attracted by the collaborative storytelling.

In my 40+ years of playing Trav I've never seen story telling. I've seen story told about games after they were played but NEVER people sitting around telling each other stories rather than role playing their PCs and a Ref telling the players what happens in the world

 

[FreeTrav]

In my 40+ years of playing Trav I've never seen story telling. I've seen story told about games after they were played but NEVER people sitting around telling each other stories rather than role playing their PCs and a Ref telling the players what happens in the world

The role-playing is the collaborative storytelling. The player-characters (along with the referee) are working together to describe/portray events, conflicts, personalities, et cetera, following a plot that the referee (or the author of the pregenerated module the referee is running) has worked out - everything that happens in a story, but instead of it being written entirely by a single author/playwright, the characters/actors also have a hand in the creation.

 

[MarcusIII]

The role-playing is the collaborative storytelling.

Story telling is relating something that HAS happened, Not something this is happening. If I tell you what I am DOING that isn't a story. Wrong definition. "Role-playing isn't storytelling. If the dungeon master is directing it, it's not a game," G. Gygax

 

[Condottiere]

I thought it was trying to simulate that science fiction movie that I saw last week.

 

[FreeTrav]

Story telling is relating something that HAS happened, Not something this is happening. If I tell you what I am DOING that isn't a story. Wrong definition. "Role-playing isn't storytelling. If the dungeon master is directing it, it's not a game," G. Gygax

So a novel that is written in the first person present tense isn't a story? Plays and musicals and movies don't tell stories? I think you and Mr Gygax need to check your definitions.

 

[Limpin Legin]

In my 40+ years of playing Trav I've never seen story telling. I've seen story told about games after they were played but NEVER people sitting around telling each other stories rather than role playing their PCs and a Ref telling the players what happens in the world

Gaming narrative can be like interactive storytelling. How convincing that becomes depends on how well the GM understands the mechanics of "storytelling." With interactive storytelling there is plot development, and there is also the opportunity for participants to interact with what is happening, and change the course of events.
I know some people who prefer gaming that way, opposed to being in games that are reduced to crunchy dice throws and rule lookups. Personally, I like balance and a mix of both.
I also know one GM who writes songs for his game. He can play guitar and he drops in songs with lyrics that act as game narrative. Ok, that is rare but it can illustrate the point.

 

[Anstett]

This is why I refer to our game as Cooperative Storytelling. We have a very sandbox style game. I leave breadcrumbs, the players decide where to go, what to do. Everyone writes; I write for the significant NPCs players can write in the background NPCs as they contribute to the ongoing story.

Dragonslayer Space | Main / 1105-024-WagesOfSin

 

[rinku]

I'm good with this GNS idea. But the key point, which I've realised for a while now, is that there IS a sharp divide between the G and everything else. As soon as the main reason for playing is getting better at playing, it dominates the play. People can't help that.

The other effect is usually characters need to keep parity with each other (levels). Traveller avoids that; you could say that skill levels take that role... but the fact that the gunner is Gunner-3 doesn't mean the Pilot has to be Pilot-3 for space combat to work. Or for that matter, what the various characters skill levels are in a firefight.

D&D party with a Level 1 fighter, Level 10 Bard, Level 5 wizard is tricky to set up a fight for, but you pretty much have to try because fighting for experience is baked in. Traveller doesn't need any kind of fight set up anyway, but if you have one, it won't matter if there's a one term Army grunt, 8 term Navy pilot and a 5 term Merchant trader.