Just Got Civvy Vehicles

[alex_greene]

Today's weather was quite sucky, but I managed to make it into Manchester to secure a copy of Civilian Vehicles.

For me, some of the more interesting highlights include the Steam Car and Steam Train, the liner at the start, the cargo lifter that came straight out of James Cameron's 1986 movie Aliens ("Get away from her, you BITCH!") and, most of all, the covered wagon on p.49.

Hell, I can even find a use for the grav train - if the characters aren't driving it, they can be heisting something from it a la "The Train Job" episode of Firefly.

Oh, so many scenarios present themselves in which these vehicles are central: exploration of uninhabited and unexplored continents in a dirigible, G/Runner and G/Bike racing, solving a murder mystery on board a steam train out in the middle of nowhere, whether we are running "Murder on the Orient Express" or "Horror Express," and even romance in confined quarters.

Not to mention the joy of slow exploration of some big, empty steppe on a world somewhere out in the uncharted wilds of the universe from the inside of a covered wagon, minding the herd kians at night and sleeping under the stars.

I can use this. The scenarios I could generate from this book, it'd almost be like you were there.

Anyone else got any favourite highlights from this book?

 

[BP]

Does it cover garbage trucks, G/Trucks?

 

[AndrewW]

Does it cover garbage trucks, G/Trucks?

Afraid not.

 

[smiths121]

Mine came through the post this morning. Ordered it some 4+ months ago on pre-order so great to finally get it.

I like the Steam Train as well, but my brain saw a comedy filler adventure idea (you know something light between 2 series adventures in a campaign).

When I saw the steam train, I though mix a few TLs together, bring in an exceptionally cool and talented NPC from outside the Imperium (trying to be politically correct here), a mad scientist and some mean one dimensional Vagr and what you have is not entirely steam punk, but should be very funny.

Now can I make a spider walker.....

 

[BP]

Does it cover garbage trucks, G/Trucks?

Afraid not.

Well - I'm sure the rules allow you to create one! (right?)

 

[Border Reiver]

Be advised that though the Design Sequence appears to be very nice (simple but with sufficient options to keep the average gearhead happy) both Civilian Vehicles and Military Vehicles have identical design rules.

I mean that the first third of each book is identical in layout and wording. This is not a case of get Civilian Vehicles to get your design rules and then buy Military Vehicles to get additional options. If you just want design rules you only need to buy one of the two. Not quite the "Upgrading the vehicle creation system from Civilian Vehicles" as promised on Military Vehicles' product page.

Saying that there appears to be a fair list of interesting vehicles in there so get both and support your FLGS and your Mongoose friends. It's absolutely packed with Traveller goodness.

 

[aspqrz]

Does it cover garbage trucks, G/Trucks?

Afraid not.

Well - I'm sure the rules allow you to create one! (right?)

Well, possibly. As long as you don't want both a) a realistic price or b) realistic physical stats.

You simply cannot design a Model T Ford, for example, and get a realistic price for the performance stats, and, likewise, you can't design a Hummer and get a realistic price either (the Model T costs far too much and the Hummer costs far too little).

There are a lot of fairly obvious conceptual flaws, I believe, that make it unusable for its intended purpose as a cross TL design system ... but, of course, if you use a little common sense and simply ignore the costs that the system generates and use it only to generate game relevant performance and physical stats, it works well enough.

Phil

 

[BP]

I can live with that - costs are relative anyway... (for instance - it just now cost me two beers to have something done that normally would cost $30-50 - a pretty good deal, except I really couldn't celebrate - they were my last 2 beers!)

 

[Dave Chase]

aspqrz,

A question on your Model T example;

Does the figures that you used as a price comparison (actual RW cost to MGT design cost) count or figure in the difference of what $1 back then could buy to what that same item would cost today?

I ask because with some RW (Real World) items you hear about how much X item cost in 1940 but today that same amount would be equal to (or cost) 10x that amount.

Could that possibly be one of the reasons the MGT design system does not work? That it might not take into account economic differences inhert to TL differences or levels?

Dave Chase

 

[aspqrz]

aspqrz,

A question on your Model T example;

Does the figures that you used as a price comparison (actual RW cost to MGT design cost) count or figure in the difference of what $1 back then could buy to what that same item would cost today?

Yes. In absolute and in relative terms, based on US Government figures, no less, as well as real world examples.

Could that possibly be one of the reasons the MGT design system does not work? That it might not take into account economic differences inhert to TL differences or levels?

Dave Chase

I'd go as far as to say it is actually meaningless to attempt to do it at all - as, indeed, would economic historians (and probably economists, too) - and I could explain why, but it would take some space ... simply put, it's to do with relative productivity.

Forex, Mail armour, or Mail and Plate armour, in the 14th century was the cutting edge and cost (depending on a whole slew of factors) something like a year's income for a landed knight (upwards). It was so expensive it was often passed down from father to son when money was short.

But in the 15th century, Plate armour replaces it and, relatively, the price goes down.

Why? Well, over the course of the intervening century there were a number of technological fixes applied to smelting and ironworking (and mining as well) that increased productivity ... making iron, as a whole, cheaper.

You literally cannot compare the price of 14th century Mail and 15th Century Mail because they basically stopped making it ... the mail joint protection and coifs in Plate Armour are mostly (and increasingly) recycled Mail from now obsolete suits of same.

The whole problem is that there are several cut points in history where economic productivity increases massively ... the development of Agriculture from around 8-12000 or so years ago is the first, the massive improvement in agricultural techniques at the end of the Classical period (doubling productivity), the above mentioned increases in industrial productivity in the 13th/14th centuries, the Agricultural Revolution beginning in the 16th/17th centuries, the Industrial Revolution of the 18th century, Mass Production and the Production Line, Computerisation etc. etc. And they're just the ones I can think of off the top of my head.

Each one is a breakpoint and makes comparing prices across the point meaningless in any real term.

That's the core of the problem.

Apart from that, it's the lack of developmental sequence in the materials table ... sorry, but no one is going to use Bonded Superdense to make a civilian ground car. They're going to use something superadvanced, but it won't be spaceship armourplate.

That's like having the Germans make their VWs from steel battleship belt armour in 1938 ... silly.

Fire, Fusion and Steel, for all its flaws (and it had many) did a better job of it (and I mean the TNE version, not the T4 version).

Personally, I reckon that CORPS VDS (Vehicle Design System) or EABA Stuff! ... both from BTRC ... do a better job and give more realistic relative prices, but still are flawed because of the problem with cross-TL economics noted above.

Also, R Talsorian Games' Maximum Metal, though designed for a different system, has a much more usable system to fiddle with, involving (really) modifying standard chassis types. Even the Mekton/Mekton Zeta rules work pretty well, within their limitations.

GURPS Vehicles, but only the 1st Edition (the second is unusable without writing your own Spreadsheet, and maybe even then) is pretty reasonable ... and they've been threatening to do an update for 4th Ed for the last 2-3 years or so ... so don't hold your breath.

All of the above have limitations, but they aren't quite as obvious ... you can design a Model T and a Hummer in all of them and have relative prices and/or performance stats work out reasonably well, or with minimal tweaking ... I'm not certain you can do that with Civilian Vehicles.

Phil

 

[Treebore]

Hey! I own your Farm, Forge, and Steel and Orbis Mundi PDF's! No wonder you "get" the economic stuff!

 

[Ishvar]

How are the pictures? I don't care about the rules and not too much about the stats but I like to show the players what they are getting into or what they have in front of them.

I don't need another book with bland or useless pictures. Is it worth the cost?

 

[aspqrz]

How are the pictures? I don't care about the rules and not too much about the stats but I like to show the players what they are getting into or what they have in front of them.

I don't need another book with bland or useless pictures. Is it worth the cost?

I never thought of it in those terms :shock:

The artwork - well, it doesn't suck completely.

Yes, that's damning with faint praise.

It's rendered 3D, I think, and the vehicles look - unreal(istic) to my eye. I prefer a well drawn line drawing, personally.

If your only reason for buying, or even the main reason, is for the artwork - don't - is my summation.

That said, despite the flaws, I think its probably worth getting.

Phil

 

[Border Reiver]

The pics are fine, just pretty plain 3d renders using for the most stock or cheap models. I hope Mongoose didn't pay more than 20 quid for the lot of them cause I would have knocked out the same for free.

They would have had more impact in their original coloured render than the grayscale seen in the book. Not too bad.

I've had some practice with the design system and though there are a couple of points (which seem to have been raised elsewhere) it's a pretty robust system that with some common sense tinkering works out fine. Not as much fun as the Megatraveller design sequence (nor a buggy) nor as detailed as FF&S but still good fun. Got some ideas for a S&P article now.

The vehicles in the book are quite fun too, some real atypical of the "OTU" stuff in there but very good despite that (just because it's never been mentioned in 30 plus years of Traveller doesn't mean it's not out there, space is BIG, y'know?)

 

[Treebore]

Yeah, the art is overwhelmingly bland, IMO, but I would not say its terrible. It definitely could have been made to be much more inspiring. Lets just say for my pics I will be pulling out my older materials to show my players.

 

[Dave Chase]

Thanks aspqrz for the reply.

I thought you might have considered but was not positive.

I agree that those other systems are fine ones. I own at least one each of each one

Dave Chase

 

[Gee4orce]

I still have a great idea for a scenario based around the Tiamat mining crawler in GDW's 101 Vehicles - and that was YEARS ago. It would have been a very 'Outland'ish adventure set on a Venus like world…..

 

[Ishvar]

Thank you for your feedback about the art. As it has been suggested, I should rather pull out my good old 101 vehicles DGP book from the shelves.

 

[alex_greene]

Okay, never mind the art. What are your favourite vehicles from the book? Mine include the Steam Cars and the Landship.