Mercenary Careers

[atpollard]

Careers:
Nice find was the Air Force and Wet Navy Careers. I liked them from Sup 4.
The expanded Mishap and Events tables are a nice touch, even having them for the original Army and Marines careers.
The Wartime events table should definitely add some "Character" to your Merc!
I also like how they have rules for adding the new skills to the core careers tables, good thinking.

Would you describe the Air Force/Wet Navy careers as generally useful for Traveller?

I find that the CONCEPT of the wet navy bothers me in Traveller. Starting at TL 8, vehicles fly and would seem to become more dominant at each additional TL. Who would build a TL 10 wet Navy? TL 15? These low tech careers always seemed of too limited a usefulness to be practical - like a Mounted Cavalry for Traveller.

The early attempts at the COACC (atmosphere/space fighters) seemed an interesting concept, but MegaTraveller had some issues of compatibility with the core rules. How does the Mercenary Air Force compare? Will my ex-Airforce character be qualified to become a redshirt - shot down in my F-14 by some hopelessly superior space fighter from TL 10? Or will he have something to contribute to a group of TL 9-13 travelers with a Free Trader and an up-gunned 'launch'?

 

[rust]

Would you describe the Air Force/Wet Navy careers as generally useful for Traveller?

Almost all Traveller universes have lots of water worlds, and I would
find it very difficult to imagine a plausible water world without a sur-
face and submarine navy.

 

[Klaus Kipling]

I see them as a Brucie Bonus - they were in COTI and fairly useful for npc characters, if not all ya PCs.

I will note that it's generally difficult to get the Flyer skill in regular careers, so a term in the Air Force would be worthwhile to some characters.

 

[RandyT0001]

Having air force/wet navy careers could be useful in a TU where a planet is just starting to explore space and there is no standard and/or formal 'space navy/space merchant' school/university/academy yet built. Might require some modifivcations to use it as such.

 

[simonh]

Almost all Traveller universes have lots of water worlds, and I would find it very difficult to imagine a plausible water world without a sur-
face and submarine navy.

What advantages would submerged or surface craft have over grav gunships armed with densitometers and a few torpedoes to round out the weapons load?

I'd agree that you would need some submersible craft for reconnaisance, boarding and assault operations, but it would very much be a support force rather than an independently operating service. But in fact the submersibles may well have gravitics and be independently flight capable anyway.

Simon Hibbs

 

[rust]

What advantages would submerged or surface craft have over grav gunships armed with densitometers and a few torpedoes to round out the weapons load?

On a true water world the grav vehicles would need a base, and this base
should be mobile, which would make it a ship. In order to defend that ba-
se, as well as other installations and settlements, one would probably like
to have some mobile weapon platforms, which would also be ships.

Unless you move away from the planet entirely, and keep all your armed
forces up in the air or in orbit all the time, ships simply are the best and
least expensive way to provide an infrastructure on a water world.

 

[collins355]

I suspect that surface ships would be a military liability from the moment control of near orbit is lost. With all due respect to naval types, we are approaching that point today. 'Rods from god' dropped from orbit or MaRVed ballistic missiles will make life increasingly tricky for surface vessels.

I have a lot more time for submarines, having long been a fan of the meson submarine instead of the deep-site meson. Give it a maneuver drive and its an SDB.

 

[rust]

I suspect that surface ships would be a military liability from the moment control of near orbit is lost.

True, but everything on every surface, ground or sea, becomes a mi-
litary liability once air superiority is lost.

 

[Mithras]

How many worlds in the Spinward Marches are TL 7 or less and Hydro 7+. Lots! There are two or three in my campaign subsector, and I have significant maritime traffic in others (it is Vilis, a frontier district with lots of wet navies).

Its where you go ...

 

[SnowDog]

I don't know how useful a wet navy career would be in a "normal" Traveller game. Sure, if you base it to one colony world with lots of water then it would be viable. Ditto with aviator but on the other hand my copy of the Mercenary has not yet arrived

In principle who says that wet navy would and should stay a low-tech branch of armed forces in space travel capable culture? To my knowledge Navy is one of the most hi-tech branch in US military, for example.

Add supercavitating submarines and huge antigrav aircraft carriers etc. to your wet navy and even ortillery might not be that decisive.

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

Also, I don't know that a grav vehicle will be a good substitute for a submarine in transporting people and equipment to that underwater city. Many of the water worlds seem to have them and grav vehicles might not be the most efficient means of bulk transportation to them.

BUT, as for player characters, I agree that most of the time Wet Navy will not be the best career choice.

 

[GamerDude]

How's this...

The world has a TL that justifies an AF/Wet Navy (WN) but has an imperial starport, thus letting people leave the planet once they've left the service of that AF/WN.

Collace (from the CT adventure "Divine Intervention") is a theocracy which intentionally keeps the populace at TL6 but has an Imperial Starport on the planet. If someone were to get through the security and request that they be taken off the planet, why not?

Of course this is just a quick example off the top of my head.

 

[Sir Brad]

FASA and Judges Guild did some fantastic Wet Navy & Interface Forces source metieral and adventuers, Yes it works but the campain would be set around the spechlists, but IF Pilots (and Ground Crew) have more to offer a generic campain, but more than once our partys have bean sunk for want of a SCUBA qualified character or a Sub Driver.