"Oh, forget those starships - who needs them ?"
- Thread starter rust
- Start date
Captain Jonah
Mongoose
Sadly for you the Illudium Q-36 Space Modulator seems to work on planets only.
Since you are on a planet and we are up here in space with a fleet of ships I fear it will be of limited use. However thanks for bringing it to our attention. Our researchers will study this item carefully for possible use on the next planet of heretics we need to deal with.
You could flee you fate but you seem to have given up all your ships.
Oh well.
Since you are on a planet and we are up here in space with a fleet of ships I fear it will be of limited use. However thanks for bringing it to our attention. Our researchers will study this item carefully for possible use on the next planet of heretics we need to deal with.
You could flee you fate but you seem to have given up all your ships.
Oh well.
GamerDude
Cosmic Mongoose
Y'know the original poster got me thinking (oops, danger sign there) and so I was re-reading this entire thread.
What's wrong with scenarios and even entire campaigns using the Traveller system but never needing a starship, a starship is not central to the plot? Companies publish these modules all the time.
GDW - CT - Divine Intervention. In reality this covert op could be on the same planet the characters are hired on to begin with, the floating 'temple' (lack of better term) is in another country... Kind of like a EU company sending a merc crew into Iran (just an example).
T/S Games - MGT - Somnius Munde. Get railroaded by the cops, forced to raid a warehouse as agents of the police but without a legal warrent. Maybe you rode in an air/raft but they aren't mentioned, heck you don't even go NEAR a star port.
Now there are two examples, one Traveller canon the other recent third party license. If we,as the fan community were to demand that "ALL" Traveller scenarios involve starships in a significant way, wouldn't we be telling these two publishers, and every other publisher of similar scenarios, that they are 'wrong'
There are many types of scenarios that can be well run using the Traveller system, even in the 3I setting... but demanding that everyone feature starships prominently is like demanding every single D&D scenario must be in a dungeon and feature some fearsome dragon.
To me that doesn't make sense, and is very very limiting.
What's wrong with scenarios and even entire campaigns using the Traveller system but never needing a starship, a starship is not central to the plot? Companies publish these modules all the time.
GDW - CT - Divine Intervention. In reality this covert op could be on the same planet the characters are hired on to begin with, the floating 'temple' (lack of better term) is in another country... Kind of like a EU company sending a merc crew into Iran (just an example).
T/S Games - MGT - Somnius Munde. Get railroaded by the cops, forced to raid a warehouse as agents of the police but without a legal warrent. Maybe you rode in an air/raft but they aren't mentioned, heck you don't even go NEAR a star port.
Now there are two examples, one Traveller canon the other recent third party license. If we,as the fan community were to demand that "ALL" Traveller scenarios involve starships in a significant way, wouldn't we be telling these two publishers, and every other publisher of similar scenarios, that they are 'wrong'
There are many types of scenarios that can be well run using the Traveller system, even in the 3I setting... but demanding that everyone feature starships prominently is like demanding every single D&D scenario must be in a dungeon and feature some fearsome dragon.
To me that doesn't make sense, and is very very limiting.
Captain Jonah
Mongoose
It is possible to run entire sub light campaigns in a well developed system.
Consider earth/terra. We have earth, the luna cities and ship yeards. The 100d transfer points for jump traffic. Then we have the mars colonies. The asteroid mines and the big industrial stations out there to use the ores the miners bring in. The gas giants with the chemicals and fuel industries out there. The science bases over mercury and out at pluto and the gas giant moons. The terraforming at venus.
Ramp up the food tech to the point where you can easily support 15 billion in the system. Half a billion on the moon (the low gravity makes it a perfect retirement zone), the same on mars. Ten million or so spread across the asteroids since there will be a sizeable support population grown up around the industry. Another few tens of millions at the gas giant.
This is the Firefly campagin, no FTL needed just a decently fast sub light ship. 4-6G and lots of cargo space.
No one here is forcing people to have ships. A fair number of us simply think that Traveller is about ships and traveling. There are plenty of ways to have ships that are unusual enough to be interesting.
Rusts colony campaign for example has a clipper and subs for exploring the new world. Which is an interesting twist on a 1970s sci fi RPG using 1950s tech set in an 18th century universe and now sailing the oceans in a fine old clipper
He is still a heretic but he's a nice Heretic :twisted:
Consider earth/terra. We have earth, the luna cities and ship yeards. The 100d transfer points for jump traffic. Then we have the mars colonies. The asteroid mines and the big industrial stations out there to use the ores the miners bring in. The gas giants with the chemicals and fuel industries out there. The science bases over mercury and out at pluto and the gas giant moons. The terraforming at venus.
Ramp up the food tech to the point where you can easily support 15 billion in the system. Half a billion on the moon (the low gravity makes it a perfect retirement zone), the same on mars. Ten million or so spread across the asteroids since there will be a sizeable support population grown up around the industry. Another few tens of millions at the gas giant.
This is the Firefly campagin, no FTL needed just a decently fast sub light ship. 4-6G and lots of cargo space.
No one here is forcing people to have ships. A fair number of us simply think that Traveller is about ships and traveling. There are plenty of ways to have ships that are unusual enough to be interesting.
Rusts colony campaign for example has a clipper and subs for exploring the new world. Which is an interesting twist on a 1970s sci fi RPG using 1950s tech set in an 18th century universe and now sailing the oceans in a fine old clipper
He is still a heretic but he's a nice Heretic :twisted:
I actually think this is more likely to be an interesting campaign than a ship based one.
A ship is a very useful thing to have, for sure, but there's also the responsibly and pressure of keeping it running and profitable. I mean, Traveller is probably the only RPG in which characters have a mortgage !
A 'realistic' ship based campaign would probably only see the characters actively adventuring a couple of times a year - the rest of it would be spent hauling cargo and passengers. This in itself is a pretty neat feeling for a game setting, so long as your players are happy with long 'off screen' periods of downtime between adventures. But it's very different from a traditional adventure game.
Players without a ship will be much freer, ironically, to go places at short notice (so long as there's a commercial service, or a charter available). It's a bit like people who go off travelling today - those of us with jobs and responsibilities (and mortgages) probably eye them enviously for their freedom !
A ship is a very useful thing to have, for sure, but there's also the responsibly and pressure of keeping it running and profitable. I mean, Traveller is probably the only RPG in which characters have a mortgage !
A 'realistic' ship based campaign would probably only see the characters actively adventuring a couple of times a year - the rest of it would be spent hauling cargo and passengers. This in itself is a pretty neat feeling for a game setting, so long as your players are happy with long 'off screen' periods of downtime between adventures. But it's very different from a traditional adventure game.
Players without a ship will be much freer, ironically, to go places at short notice (so long as there's a commercial service, or a charter available). It's a bit like people who go off travelling today - those of us with jobs and responsibilities (and mortgages) probably eye them enviously for their freedom !
^ I could see a Scout campaign where the players are still working for the organisation in Scout ships loaned to them dependant on the mission as working well whilst getting rid of the accounty freight-running aspect.
Also Captain Jonah raises a fine point about STL campaigns, whilst Firefly has for me the feel of a FTL campaign (planet of the week thing), when the Chthonian Stars pdf is released soon, then we'll be able to play a STL campaign set purely in the Sol System with all its trappings.
Aside from that, a Dune campaign would be awesome I even have said that on a player's desert homeworld with zero hydrographics that the villages survive due to stillsuits :wink:
Also Captain Jonah raises a fine point about STL campaigns, whilst Firefly has for me the feel of a FTL campaign (planet of the week thing), when the Chthonian Stars pdf is released soon, then we'll be able to play a STL campaign set purely in the Sol System with all its trappings.
Aside from that, a Dune campaign would be awesome
I even have said that on a player's desert homeworld with zero hydrographics that the villages survive due to stillsuits :wink:Captain Jonah said:
Yes this so true, I and several other people have discussed the suitability of the GURPS setting Transhuman Space as a Traveller setting. In a lot of ways it is right on. The only sticking point is the Whole AI issue, which is mostly a non-starter depending on your point of view. The other issue is the drive speeds, Traveller tends to have pretty speedy drives for normal space.
The other non-jump setting I have considered is in a complex multi-star system with multiple habitual planets and moons. A micro cluster so to speak.
