Question from a Complete Traveller Newb

[RangerDan]

Hello,

I am a compulsive RPG-buyer and all the rave reviews of Mongoose Traveller have made me interested in the sytem. I am however a complete Traveller newb and was hoping someone could answer some basic questions.

For reference: I have experience with sci-fi games and settings, mostly GURPS, followed by Alternity and (some) D20 Modern. Very common for my group is to take a particular system and use it for homebrew settings.

In no particular order:
1) How crunchy is the system? I'm guessing/hoping less so than GURPS.
2) How gritty/deadly is the system? Are powerful PCs basically fearless the first few rounds of an engagement as in d20? Or one stray bullet kills anyone as in GURPS?
3) Would you consider the system "elegant"? Weird question I know but I'm hoping you get what I mean.

4) How dense/thick/difficult is the 3rd Imperium for new players/GM?
5) How tied into the setting is the system? Can the mechanics be easily divorced from the 3rd Imperium stuff?
6) How suitable would you say Traveller is for these kind of campaigns?

• 
  A) Space Opera (example Star*Drive setting) I'm guessing it's very suitable but the question stands.
  B) Space Military (example Starship Troopers or Robotech).
  C) Sci-Fi Fantasy (example Star Wars).
  D) Sci-Fi Fantasy Kitchen-sink Insanity (example Rifts).
  E) Cyberpunk/Gibsonesque.

7) What can be considered "Core Books" without which even a basic campaign would be difficult? Which books are recommended by the veterans?
8.) What's the difference between the "normal" books and the "little black books"? Which are recommended by the veterans?

Thanks in advance to anyone crazy enough to take the time to answer .

 

[hdan]

1) How crunchy is the system? I'm guessing/hoping less so than GURPS.

I thinks it's considerably less crunchy than GURPS, but I guess that depends on your personal feeling about "crunch". Creating characters is much easier (it's actually a mini-game which is a lot of fun), and if you can't stomach guided random generation, there's a point-buy system. But the point-buy system is nothing as sophisticated as GURPS.

(In the interest of full disclosure, I don't really like GURPS very much. Fantastic source material, but the system makes me unhappy.)

2) How gritty/deadly is the system? Are powerful PCs basically fearless the first few rounds of an engagement as in d20? Or one stray bullet kills anyone as in GURPS?

It's pretty deadly. If you're getting into a gun fight, you had better have some body armor. With standard "cloth armor" and side-arm type weapons, you can generally take a few rounds of damage, but there's always the "bullet with your name on it" problem.

What Traveller does that's sort of unique though, is that damage is actually applied to your physical stats (Strength, Dexterity, Endurance). Zeroing one gives you a light wound. Two is a serious wound, and all three is dead. Healing can take a while for serious wounds, though there are some ways to heal overnight if you have a medical facility (or sick bay) available.

And yes, if you go into battle with damage stats, you'll use the damaged value of the stat in combat.

3) Would you consider the system "elegant"? Weird question I know but I'm hoping you get what I mean.

Yes I would. The task system, which was abstracted from Classic Traveller's combat system, is very simple - roll 8+ on 2d6 for success. You get modifiers for skills, stats, difficulty, etc. The amount you go over 8 is your "Effect" number, which in some cases is used to measure how successful you were. For example, in combat you get to add your effect to your weapon's damage. So a highly skilled, high dexterity shooter who takes time to aim and has some equipment buffs will generally do a LOT more damage with a weapon that someone just popping off a round.

4) How dense/thick/difficult is the 3rd Imperium for new players/GM?

The full 3rd Imperium (3I, sometimes called the "OTU" for "Original/Official Traveller Universe") setting is fairly dense, but honestly most people starting off just start off in the "Spinward Marches" subsector, which is a low population frontier zone. You have high tech, high population islands surrounded by everything from asteroid mining colonies to agriculture worlds, re-contacted "lost colonies" that may or may not be happy to have the Imperials around, barren wastelands, etc.

In many people's minds (including mine), the "Marches" are sort of a "Firefly" type setting. Other envision it more like the Caribbean during the "Age of Piracy".

The good news though, is that it's quite easy to just roll up a subsector of new worlds (there are web apps that will do it for you) that you can just make up your own setting, if that appeals to you.

5) How tied into the setting is the system? Can the mechanics be easily divorced from the 3rd Imperium stuff?

Somewhat tied, but two recent products get away from the 3I in a very fun way:

One that has my attention at the moment is SPICA's "Outer Veil", which is a completely new setting, centered on Earth and only a few centuries in the future. It's a lower tech setting than the 3I, but it's still "Traveller Flavored" technology. Also because the whole setting is less than one Sector, you don't have problems like being a year away from the capital world. And because so much of the sector is unexplored and under active colonization, there are tons of opportunities for characters to be tasked with finding out what happened to lost colonies, chasing down rumors of treasures, etc.

"Twilight Sector" is a fabulously well crafted and presented non-OTU setting as well, but it's less "Traveller Flavored" in many ways, with AIs, mutants and a similar but not the same FTL system. TS is a much larger setting than OV, and considerably more "Space Opera" in feel. You owe it to yourself to check out their products on RPGNow. Their "Mirador" book should be used as the benchmark for what a spaceship sourcebook should be.

6) How suitable would you say Traveller is for these kind of campaigns?

• 
  A) Space Opera (example Star*Drive setting) I'm guessing it's very suitable but the question stands.
  B) Space Military (example Starship Troopers or Robotech).
  C) Sci-Fi Fantasy (example Star Wars).
  D) Sci-Fi Fantasy Kitchen-sink Insanity (example Rifts).
  E) Cyberpunk/Gibsonesque.

A and B for sure. Traveller was designed for such settings.

C and D would not work as well, though you could get a gritty version of (C) to work if you focused on high tech levels and psionics. The main problem is the lethality of the system. Getting hurt actually hurts. You could easily just have everyone running around in combat armor though. If its good enough for "Mass Effect"...

E would work fine as well. You could use a lot of ideas from Twilight Sector, just throw out the higher tech stuff that doesn't fit.

7) What can be considered "Core Books" without which even a basic campaign would be difficult? Which books are recommended by the veterans?

You can run a basic campaign with just the main rule book.

If you're going for the 3I setting

8.) What's the difference between the "normal" books and the "little black books"? Which are recommended by the veterans?

The "LBBs" are just smaller printed versions of the normal book from what I can tell. They exist for nostalgia reasons. The original Traveller was published only as the smaller format books, stapled together. The new books are too long for such simple binding, but the form factor still makes old grognards happy. (Though not those of us who have trouble reading tiny print...)

Hope this helps some. I'm sure others will chime in with contradictory advice. 'tis the nature of Traveller.

 

[rust]

1) How crunchy is the system? I'm guessing/hoping less so than GURPS.

The system is much less crunchy than GURPS.

2) How gritty/deadly is the system? Are powerful PCs basically fearless the first few rounds of an engagement as in d20? Or one stray bullet kills anyone as in GURPS?

The combat system is rather deadly.

3) Would you consider the system "elegant"?

This is a matter of taste, I do not consider it as elegant as,
for example, the d100 system of BRP.

4) How dense/thick/difficult is the 3rd Imperium for new players/GM?

With thirty years of history and the lots and lots of material
added to the original setting over this time, it is rather dense.

5) How tied into the setting is the system? Can the mechanics be easily divorced from the 3rd Imperium stuff?

Most of the system can be used for similar settings without any
problems, things only become difficult when a setting uses ve-
ry different technology assumptions.

6) How suitable would you say Traveller is for these kind of campaigns?

• 
  A) Space Opera (example Star*Drive setting) I'm guessing it's very suitable but the question stands.
  B) Space Military (example Starship Troopers or Robotech).
  C) Sci-Fi Fantasy (example Star Wars).
  D) Sci-Fi Fantasy Kitchen-sink Insanity (example Rifts).
  E) Cyberpunk/Gibsonesque.

Again, a matter of taste. I would not use the Traveller system
for cyberpunk or transhumanism or for any setting with a very
advanced technology, because its basic technology assumptions
are still those of the 1970s.

7) What can be considered "Core Books" without which even a basic campaign would be difficult? Which books are recommended by the veterans?

The main rules are a necessity, otherwise it depends entirely on
your concept of your setting.

8.) What's the difference between the "normal" books and the "little black books"? Which are recommended by the veterans?

The "little ones" miss some footnotes, otherwise the content is
identical, so it depends on which size you prefer.

 

[Vargrz]

I think the beauty of Traveller, and particularly this iteration from Mongoose, is that it is a platform where any TL and Genre is possible.

Our group base several Referees and we each have tried variations and they all come out great!

 

[GamerDude]

NOTE: Not *all* LBBs are just reduced sized versions of the original full-sized book.

Full-Sized Supplement Book 9: Robots became the LBB Supplement Book 9 "Library Data"

But otherwise, yes the LBB's can be an excellent space saver.

I actually mostly get the PDFs anymore and read them on one of my laptops or my Android Honeycomb tablet.

 

[Golan2072]

1) How crunchy is the system? I'm guessing/hoping less so than GURPS.

MUCH less crunchy than GURPS; you get all the rules you need to play the game within a single 180-page hardcover book. Ship design is MUCH simpler than GURPS, and so is character design. In fact, it's quite a rules-light system.

2) How gritty/deadly is the system? Are powerful PCs basically fearless the first few rounds of an engagement as in d20? Or one stray bullet kills anyone as in GURPS?

Relatively lethal. Powerful PCs can still be killed by newbs with guns, but usually you don't die from stray bullets. Far more deadly than the typical D20 game. Note that some previous versions of Traveller - such as some of the combat systems of Classic Traveller - where even more deadly. For example, Azhanti High Lightning - a supplement for Classic Traveller - allowed people to be killed with one shot (one lucky shot from a punk with a pistol could kill an unarmoured veteran).

3) Would you consider the system "elegant"? Weird question I know but I'm hoping you get what I mean.

Quite elegant. Almost everything is rolled by a 2d6 task roll - throw 2d6+skill+ability modifier minus difficulty, if the result is 8 and more, you succeed. This works for skill rolls, attack rolls and even psionics.

5) How tied into the setting is the system? Can the mechanics be easily divorced from the 3rd Imperium stuff?

Not so tied to the system - in fact, several alternative, non-3I, settings are available for Mongoose Traveller, such as Cthonian Stars, Outer Veil (of which I'm the proud author), and Twilight Sector. You could also very easily write up your own setting.

6) How suitable would you say Traveller is for these kind of campaigns?
A) Space Opera (example Star*Drive setting) I'm guessing it's very suitable but the question stands.

Quite suitable - as long as it is relatively realistic/gritty space opera.

B) Space Military (example Starship Troopers or Robotech).

Perfect match.

C) Sci-Fi Fantasy (example Star Wars).

Relatively unsuitable - too lethal/gritty for the genre and not enough fantasy elements.

D) Sci-Fi Fantasy Kitchen-sink Insanity (example Rifts).

See above.

E) Cyberpunk/Gibsonesque.

As this is 90% attitude and 10% gear, this would probably work well with Traveller, as long as you add some new house-rules about hacking and a few more kinds of cyberware.

7) What can be considered "Core Books" without which even a basic campaign would be difficult?

Just but the main Mongoose Traveller rulebook. It contains EVERYTHING you need for playing the game.

 

[GypsyComet]

5) How tied into the setting is the system? Can the mechanics be easily divorced from the 3rd Imperium stuff?

The books are either rules books or setting books. While the technological and cultural assumptions of the setting flavor the rules books, they are not set in stone.

6) How suitable would you say Traveller is for these kind of campaigns?

• 
  A) Space Opera (example Star*Drive setting) I'm guessing it's very suitable but the question stands.
  B) Space Military (example Starship Troopers or Robotech).
  C) Sci-Fi Fantasy (example Star Wars).
  D) Sci-Fi Fantasy Kitchen-sink Insanity (example Rifts).
  E) Cyberpunk/Gibsonesque.

Star*Drive was pretty much a re-skinned Traveller setting to begin with.

Starship Troopers is one of the inspirations behind Traveller, though not a direct one. Active Service games are quite possible in Traveller, as the concept of the Patron is easily handled as "Orders from High Command". A Starship Troopers game ala the book is actually pretty easy, while the lack of a good mass combat system in this edition might hamper a movies version.

Robotech is similar, but the technology might be a challenge.

Star Wars is easy with one character change: Psionics would need to be rarer, but easier to use once you were on that track. Traveller Psionics assume that the potential is a bit more common but not easy to use. Other than that, the key that makes it work is that the rules won't get in the way of moving a game along at a good clip. Your lack of caffeine might, though.

Rifts could be done, but the insanity might need toning down a bit. There are fan projects out there for low tech and fantasy uses of the Traveller mechanics, but they are, like the psionics of base Traveller, built on the assumption that supernormal resources are scarce and expensive. Rifts makes no such assumption; power is everywhere. Rifts is also a setting for which the slow experience system of Traveller would need to be modified; Rifts is a "grow or die" setting.

Traveller was doing Cyberpunk before the term existed. Graft a "humanity/empathy" mechanic in to slow down the mad scramble for more metal, and you're fine. The Cyberpunk/magic mixture that is Shadowrun might actually work better under Traveller than Shadowrun itself, as Traveller psionics would help tone down the abuses of magic that SR is known for.

7) What can be considered "Core Books" without which even a basic campaign would be difficult? Which books are recommended by the veterans?

Core beyond the main rulebook really depends on the type of game you want to run. Given the usual predilection of gamers, I'd consider Scoundrel a short-list book with its chapters on, as Firefly puts it, "misbehaving", but the rest are really context driven.

 

[RangerDan]

Thank you hdan, rust, Vargrz, Gamerdude, Golan2072 and GypsyComet for your comments.

Now how to sell a new system to my group?...

 

[alex_greene]

Now how to sell a new system to my group?...

That's where I come in. Sell it hard, sell it sharp, hook them quickly.

Traveller's the first game with an established sandbox - the 3I. You can run Traveller like the Foundation Trilogy, like Firefly, or like GTA with starships instead of cars.

Whatever style of play you want, Traveller can make it happen. Crawling through a filthy dungeon? Why settle for a measly +5 Sword of Soul Sucking and kill the foes one at a time, when you can tote a FGMP-15, the grandaddy of the BFG-9000?

Do you want a war? Traveller can give you a war. Car chases? Ditto. Starship combat? One of the highlights of the game.

Do you want characters with a past, as murky or bright as you want it to be? Chargen and pregame are just as fun as the play itself.

Trust me. You start playing Traveller and, no matter what other games you play, you'll still be playing Traveller 35 years from now.

 

[RangerDan]

The Pitch

Wow... Mongoose should pay you to write their blurbs

 

[alex_greene]

The Pitch

Wow... Mongoose should pay you to write their blurbs

A little third party testimonial straight to Matthew Sprange wouldn't go amiss. But don't tell him I sent you ...

 

[Solomani666]

In no particular order:

1) How crunchy is the system? I'm guessing/hoping less so than GURPS.

Not very.
Much less than GURPS, which in my opinion tries to do everything, but nothing well.

2) How gritty/deadly is the system? Are powerful PCs basically fearless the first few rounds of an engagement as in d20? Or one stray bullet kills anyone as in GURPS?

Very deadly.
I use a system of expendable experience points where characters can modify a die roll by one in their favor by using one experience point, sometimes even after the fact, but this costs double.
A complete re-roll or death save costs triple. Once they are used they are gone. I award experience points for good roll play, completing a mission, a spectacular success, etc.

3) Would you consider the system "elegant"? Weird question I know but I'm hoping you get what I mean.

The parts fit well.

4) How dense/thick/difficult is the 3rd Imperium for new players/GM?

Very dense.
There is a 7000+ page wiki and hundreds of magazine issues as well as many suppliments.

5) How tied into the setting is the system? Can the mechanics be easily divorced from the 3rd Imperium stuff?

Not tied to any setting at all.
The Traveller system has been adapted for Babylon 5, Hammers Slammers, Judge Dread, Strontium Dog, 2300AD, and even a setting in the Roman Empire.

6) How suitable would you say Traveller is for these kind of campaigns?

A) Space Opera (example Star*Drive setting) I'm guessing it's very suitable but the question stands.

I am not familiar with the Star*Drive setting but for a space opera type campaign, I would beef up the players stats slightly and use the experience point system mentioned earlier but award more points.

You might also want to use the alternate warp drive rules.

B) Space Military (example Starship Troopers or Robotech).

Traveller was designed for this.
Get Book 1 Mercenary, The Central Supply Catalog, and Military Vehicles.

C) Sci-Fi Fantasy (example Star Wars).

A perfect fit with a few minor modifications.
Use the optional warp drive rules.
Get Book 4 Psion and use the optional rules for multiplying psionic strength points.
Create the weapon stats for a light saber.
Start calling lasers, "blasters"

D) Sci-Fi Fantasy Kitchen-sink Insanity (example Rifts).

I wouldn't try it.

E) Cyberpunk/Gibsonesque.

Not hard to do at all.
Get Book 6 Scoundrel and Cybernetics.

7) What can be considered "Core Books" without which even a basic campaign would be difficult? Which books are recommended by the veterans?

The Main Book.
Central Supply Catalog.
Everything else depends on the type of campaign and the setting.

8.) What's the difference between the "normal" books and the "little black books"? Which are recommended by the veterans?

I think that the Mongoose version is the best by far.
The "little black books" (LBB's) refer to the original or Classic Traveller (CT) which is a great system, but with some serious limitations, one of which is creating new weapons and armor.

 

[crossmlk]

Hello,
6) How suitable would you say Traveller is for these kind of campaigns?

• 
  A) Space Opera (example Star*Drive setting) I'm guessing it's very suitable but the question stands.

• 
  
  Sorry for the lateness of my reply on this RangerDan. I had read this earlier and for some reason this sentence you wrote in your original post just hit me. I'm the author of the Twilight Sector setting, a setting which started out as my 10 year Star*Drive campaign. Check it out I think you'll find a lot of sorta familiar Star*Drive kinda stuff in the setting.