New Paizo SF RPG: Competitor with Traveller?

[tytalan]

Why do people think Traveller was hard science fiction?
Original '77 Traveller had:
Pros - 'shotguns in space', a bit of physics thrown in to ship movement and combat
Cons - maneuver drives, jump drives, null grav modules, man portable laser weapons.

The later rules and setting introduce:
Pros - none
Cons - acceleration compensators, artificial gravity, meson guns, meson screens, nuclear dampers, black globes, man portable gauss guns, man portable plasma guns, man portable fusion guns

That's an awful lot of magi-tech for a hard science game.

And I wish people would stop bleating on about the size of ship computers.

Modern ships are not run by a laptop or desktop, nor is a nuclear power station. Every single ship computer from a module 1 to a model 9 has to be able to control the environmental systems (air, gravity water recycling etc), while controlling a multi gigawatt fusion power plan,t while crunching data for avionics and flight controls and finally being able to solve a hyperdimensional n-body problem in real time. Every single ship computer is a super-computer equivalent - go look up the size of even the smallest of those - or go look at the server racks in a nuclear power station, or onboard a nuclear sub or aircraft carrior.

I'd like to debunk some of your cons.
First let's go for the easiest man portable Gauss guns. Funny thing about this one is we already have people building early versions of these in there homes though they are little more than pellet guns it's a start. the limiting factor right now is the amount of power that can be stored in current capacitors but with capacitors storage increasing as it currently is and the size of the same capacitors shrinking at a similar rate Gauss Guns should replace the ACR in the next 20 to 30 years.

Second man portable lasers guns. The US military already uses man portable lasers for missile guidance the main issue is power levels wait I just talked about that with the Gauss Gun. Lasers should follow Gauss Guns but 5 to 10 years.

Third artificial gravity. Well many physicists think that there is a partical that they have dubbed a graviton which they believe they will discover if they can ever build a partical accelerator the size of the moon circumference. Once they can study it and not just its effects maybe they can create it. Science theory

Forth Meason Gun. We have already taken the first steps for this one we have intensional created measons in a partical accelerator. Long way to go but it's a start.

Is Traveller hard science fiction questionable but for all my 38 years of playing RPGs I have yet to find one that truly is. Mostly because if it hard Science Fiction or not depends on were your coming from.

 

[tytalan]

I wanted to also point out that Gauss Guns and Rail Guns are very different weapons.
A Gauss gun uses a series of electromagnets to pull the round, which most be at least partially ferrous, faster and faster thru the barrel. The hi end speed is about half that of a rail gun and the round must be smaller around modern machine gun size or smaller it can be made to use rapid firing options.
A Rail Gun works by passing a current from one rail through the round into the other rail. the advantages are that it is a brute force system which only limits are its slow fire rate and its power cost. The main reason for a limit is that the current must pass down both rails and through the round causing extream heat build up. But with enough power you could throw a half ton round at moch 20 turning the rounds effectively in to an energy state. E=Mass*accelation^2 anyone.

Gauss Guns make good combat rifles and machine guns.

Rail guns make nasty sniper rifles, think god from Navy Seals, Crew anti armor weapons, and cannons.

As for the original topic of this thread I've seen Orcs in space before and other than war hammer it never lasts long. No threat to Traveller.

 

[ShawnDriscoll]

Is Traveller hard science fiction questionable but for all my 38 years of playing RPGs I have yet to find one that truly is. Mostly because if it hard Science Fiction or not depends on were your coming from.

Traveller is considered Speculative Fiction these days, by most writers.

 

[tytalan]

And what will it be considered 10 or 20 years from now. It's a matter of opinion

 

[ShawnDriscoll]

And what will it be considered 10 or 20 years from now. It's a matter of opinion

Probably the same thing. Unless a super category is created just for books in the media of things to come, as movies continue on their franchise sci-fi path. Speculative Fiction has been around for some decades now. When people say hard sci-fi, they really are referring to gritty sci-fi, which is almost as meaningless.

 

[Sigtrygg]

I'd like to debunk some of your cons.

And I will happily debunk your debunk.

First let's go for the easiest man portable Gauss guns. Funny thing about this one is we already have people building early versions of these in there homes though they are little more than pellet guns it's a start. the limiting factor right now is the amount of power that can be stored in current capacitors but with capacitors storage increasing as it currently is and the size of the same capacitors shrinking at a similar rate Gauss Guns should replace the ACR in the next 20 to 30 years.

I don't even need debunking this one.
There is not a single prototype of a weapon that is man portable that can get anywhere near the performance of the gauss rifle - energy storage is not up to the task and your speculation is based on wishful thinking rather than real science.
By the way we haven't even got to the ACR in the real world yet.

Second man portable lasers guns. The US military already uses man portable lasers for missile guidance the main issue is power levels wait I just talked about that with the Gauss Gun. Lasers should follow Gauss Guns but 5 to 10 years.

Nope - power storage tech is unlikely to be up to the job in the near future, and then there is the little matter of how you stop your man-portable lethal laser weapon from melting.

Third artificial gravity. Well many physicists think that there is a partical that they have dubbed a graviton which they believe they will discover if they can ever build a partical accelerator the size of the moon circumference. Once they can study it and not just its effects maybe they can create it. Science theory

And just as many physicists argue the is no such thing as a graviton and that we are barking up the wrong tree trying to explain quantized general relativity using string theory - go look up loop quantum gravity.

Forth Meason Gun. We have already taken the first steps for this one we have intensional created measons in a partical accelerator. Long way to go but it's a start.

In the real world mesons do not behave the way they do in Traveller, or at least not the way Traveller describes their manufacture and use.

Is Traveller hard science fiction questionable but for all my 38 years of playing RPGs I have yet to find one that truly is. Mostly because if it hard Science Fiction or not depends on were your coming from.

I agree with you completely.

Traveller is consistent sci-fi - most of the super science has rules within the setting rather than being technology of the week like in Star Trek or just total handwavium like in Star Wars.

There are two reasons I will not be getting this new Pathfinder in Space game - levels and magic.

 

[tytalan]

Sigtrygg I have to disagree with you on energy storage since I happen to know people who are doing research on high density capacitors. As for laser melting you know nothing about laser if your talking about that. The biggest issue with heat lasers every had was the blumming effect. Since you know all about this maybe you can explain to everyone else what that is.

 

[Sigtrygg]

I'm going to edit this post to publically apologise to you with regards to energy storage.
I have spent the entire afternoon researching this topic, and while current lithium ion and even near future stuff will not approach the capabilities of Traveller I think you are right to suggest that developments will make the energy storage possible in the belt packs and back packs that Traveller originally envisaged.

Laser weapons melting, or at least causing serious injury to the firer is an inescapable problem though.
A power rating of between 10 to 100 kW - and let's assume for the sake of argument we can make the laser 60% efficient.
A10kW laser will have to dissipate the heat of a 4 bar electric fire while it is operating - the 100kW rifle has to deal with the equivalent of 40 bars.

By the way I know what blooming is lol.

 

[tytalan]

I thought I'd try to get this thread back on target. So is starfinder going to be a competitor to Traveller well let me ask a question has Dark Heresy been a major competitor? Has Prime Directives been? Veriuos version of Starwars or Star Trek? Traveller is a very established RPG that has a varied fan base because you can adapted it to many different settings. It also has a core setting that not only has passed the test of time but has had not one but two of the best know , and one is in my opinion the most versatile system I.e. Hero, generic RPG systems adapted to play in it.
When think of all of that and the fact that most space type sci-fi RPG's that have included magic have either failed or have problems in keeping a large enough fan base to keep going I.e. Fading suns.
Also every time I think about Starfinder I still hear in the back of my head "Orc's In Space" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHsr7Chmff8

 

[ShawnDriscoll]

I thought I'd try to get this thread back on target. So is starfinder going to be a competitor to Traveller

It will just be yet another sci-fi RPG to choose from is all. Those that like its die mechanic and product branding will flock to it, if looking for a sci-fi game. As far as being a competitor to Traveller... yes, in the way that Mongoose is a competitor to other versions of Traveller out there.

 

[MongooseMatt]

I have spent the entire afternoon researching this topic,

Now that is a true Traveller player

 

[tytalan]

I thought I'd try to get this thread back on target. So is starfinder going to be a competitor to Traveller

It will just be yet another sci-fi RPG to choose from is all. Those that like its die mechanic and product branding will flock to it, if looking for a sci-fi game. As far as being a competitor to Traveller... yes, in the way that Mongoose is a competitor to other versions of Traveller out there.

I don't agree Mongoose is more of a direct competitor to T5. I would say more like Starwars is a competitor to Traveller would be a better example.

 

[ShawnDriscoll]

I thought I'd try to get this thread back on target. So is starfinder going to be a competitor to Traveller

It will just be yet another sci-fi RPG to choose from is all. Those that like its die mechanic and product branding will flock to it, if looking for a sci-fi game. As far as being a competitor to Traveller... yes, in the way that Mongoose is a competitor to other versions of Traveller out there.

I don't agree Mongoose is more of a direct competitor to T5. I would say more like Starwars is a competitor to Traveller would be a better example.

I use Mongoose and T5 rules together. Starwars and Traveller are like apples and oranges. Do they compete with each other? I'd say RPG collectors have both games.

 

[xnet445]

If I ran a Starfinder game my local group would play. Traveller I can't get any traction with because a couple of the grognards have PTSD from CT character gen and are very vocal about it.

It's frustrating.

 

[ShawnDriscoll]

If I ran a Starfinder game my local group would play. Traveller I can't get any traction with because a couple of the grognards have PTSD from CT character gen and are very vocal about it.

It's frustrating.

Ha! I know how that goes. That's one reason I made videos, to get PTSD types to think outside the box.

 

[Reynard]

"If I ran a Starfinder game my local group would play."

Probably because they see D&D with a science fiction veneer like they did with Dragonstar.

 

[Reynard]

Finally got back around to looking for Starfinder. Read a summary on their site. I'm sure it's different from Spelljammer and Dragonstar. Ruminating what was described, I'd say Starfinder is more a rival to Shadowrun.

 

[dmccoy1693]

is starfinder going to be a competitor to Traveller

IMO (and I have been involved in the play test all year), Starfinder is aiming to be a direct competitor to Traveller. They site Firefly being one of their key influences for the game, a show that was built off the creator's Traveller game. A group of people with a ship doing odd jobs in space and delivering cargo for shady people. Both games have that default as their assumed base game.

Second, both Traveller and DnD/Pathfinder come from a tradition of GM's creating large chunks of the setting if not outright creating their own setting. Starfinder follows in this tradition by having the setting be mostly generic and keeping it to one chapter in the book. Other games like DH do not have such tradition and have the setting being integral to the core book.

Three places where I feel that Starfinder will eat Traveller's lunch is that Starfinder has more playable alien races in the core book and a whole lot more in the upcoming alien archive, due out later this year. 2) The game has more mechanics to make different classes feel different. In Traveller, being a soldier or a kid on a back water farm, if you have the same skill rank in gun combat, you're going to be firing identically. In Starfinder, soldiers do different things than operatives (the spy class). 3) Traveller has always flirted with science fantasy, having psionics and biotech, intelligent machines, but it always shied away from it. Starfinder fully embraced it. Ultimately that will be a divider between the two games, but Starfinder makes no bones about it being a game first. Mind you, I'm ignoring the fact that Pathfinder has a larger fan base than Traveller and every indication is that Starfinder will out strip the game in base sales.

Disclaimer: although I have been following this thread for months, I've been under an NDA so I couldn't say a thing about it.

 

[h1ro]

IMO (and I have been involved in the play test all year), Starfinder is aiming to be a direct competitor to Traveller.
<snip>
and every indication is that Starfinder will out strip the game in base sales.

Dale, how do you think the production quality compares between Traveller (both MgT and T5) and Starfinder?

 

[Chumbly]

One thing I am happy about StarFinder...Next Month(sept).. the miniatures are
scheduled to rollout..

Call me old fashioned but I believe that miniatures of adventurers holding laser pistols, blasters
and other scifi rifles etc that go whoosh.... buzz... boom etc and the multi-tentacled bug alien
of the month tht willl get whoosed... buzzed and boomed will prove equally useful whether traveller or starfinder is your game.....

Chumbly