Software?

[redbeard]

Hi folks,

Digging into Mongoose Traveller. Always wanted to play Traveller, never did. Anyway, tired of no-one else running the damn game I've been picking it up.

I'm having trouble finding Mongoose-compatible software for ship/vehicle creation, world-building and trading.

I'm not sure how different ships in MT are from other versions so whether another version's ship building program would work.

Also, are there any programs that would let me enter a sector's worth of world data and then facilitate trading?

thanks for any info.

 

[Infojunky]

I'm having trouble finding Mongoose-compatible software for ship/vehicle creation, world-building and trading.

Because there isn't much if any.

I'm not sure how different ships in MT are from other versions so whether another version's ship building program would work.

1st off a quick list of TLA's in regarding editions.

CT = Classic Traveller
Mt = MegaTraveller
TNE = Traveller the New Era
T4 = Traveller 4th edition
MgT = Mongoose Traveller
T5 = Traveller 5th Edition

With that there are spreadsheets kicking around for every edition and asking here is a good start. Most of the editions are fairly discrete in the specifics of ship design. With that Basic ship design for CT (also commonly referred to as Book2 or LBB2) is closest to MgT, and T5 has a direct relation thematically as well (but the current form of T5 is a mess, as such I would advise some one new to Traveller to wait a bit, it also use different game mechanics to add a level of complexity to the question).

Also, are there any programs that would let me enter a sector's worth of world data and then facilitate trading?

I know someone was working on it with some public examples, so hopefully some kind soul will point you at it. There is an old DOS program called Galactic v2.4 that supported a lot of trade and mapping, if you aren't afraid of dos (Dosbox a dos emulator, has distributions for most OSs) and some tinkering would probably work for you as well. The is a Yahoo group that supports it and I believe hosts the files, and is monitored by the programs author.

With all that Welcome aboard, you will find Traveller fandom to be loud, opinionated and fractionated. Don't be surprised if you ask a question and get 5 different answers and then have the results veer off into a debate about some topic that is only tangentially related to the question, some of the best weird fan sourced Traveller Memes where born in that space. Always, always also remember this is supposed to be fun.

 

[redbeard]

Thanks, Evyn. MgT, got it.

I've been looking at CotI for stuffs.

I've gotten Heaven and Earth to work and it can spit out a lot of data. I thought Heaven and Earth followed on Galactic. I've used DOSbox before, so maybe I'll take a look at Galactic if it can do more than Heaven and Earth. I'm not sure how to easily edit Heaven and Earth files (the .hes) other than by hand.

There's a guy making something more user friendly (and hopefully, portable) with Starbase. It's pretty slick, but lacks a lot of world and system data.

There's a trade program called TrampTrader, but it seems to only use 3I data. First time out and I already want my own TU.

But nothing for ships, eh? Hmmm.

 

[rust]

But nothing for ships, eh? Hmmm.

There almost certainly is something, most probably there are several
ones. However, for licensing reasons it is impossible to publish any
programs of that kind, even for free, so the programs that exist are
"for personal use only" and accordingly not mentioned very often on
any forum. Still, you have a good chance that someone who wrote
a program for Mongoose Traveller will read your thread and perhaps
decide to contact you and share his software.

 

[phavoc]

There are some spreadsheets out there (search through the forum for links by the authors) that can help you with ship designs using the core book rules. But if you want to do anything using high guard, I've yet to find anything.

 

[Infojunky]

Thanks, Evyn. MgT, got it.

I've been looking at CotI for stuffs.

I've gotten Heaven and Earth to work and it can spit out a lot of data. I thought Heaven and Earth followed on Galactic. I've used DOSbox before, so maybe I'll take a look at Galactic if it can do more than Heaven and Earth. I'm not sure how to easily edit Heaven and Earth files (the .hes) other than by hand.

In a weird way Galactic, Heaven and Earth, Universe, and mercator are all interrelated beyond being software for Traveller. As they all were written by members of the Traveller Mailing List and incorporate ideas discussed there. Galactic uses plan old vanilla text files for a lot resources so there is some flexibility there. Note there is a Distribution of Dosbox for Android and I have been pondering a hardware purchase of an appropriate device such that I could have a tablet running Galactic at the table.

There's a guy making something more user friendly (and hopefully, portable) with Starbase. It's pretty slick, but lacks a lot of world and system data.

Hum, hadn't heard of that one.

But nothing for ships, eh? Hmmm.

The only specific program for ship's was for CT's Book 5 High Guard. Spreadsheet programs are the major tool used by the Starship crowd. And to be blunt I write a new one every time I have a Starship to figure out, but I tend to truncate the process in that I pretty much use ships as literary devices with only the grossest game useful issue figured out.

 

[simonh]

Creators of StarBase here.

StarBase does have an OGL rules file based on the Mongoose developers pack for generating world data and there's currently an experimental build with SEC file import capability, though there are lot of SEC files out there it's not been tested with.

There's no trade implementation as that isn't in the OGL material and im not prepared to breach copyright. The LBB system is apparently ok to implement in software though so I may put that in at some point but no promises when. SB is open source and written in Python though so if anyone would like to have a go, or help out with any aspect of the app I'd be very grateful.

Here's a link to the experimental version with SEC fie support.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/1182463/StarBase/Starbase_25.zip

If you could try it out I'd be very grateful as I'd like to know how well it copes with SEC files out in the wild, and if there are any issues I'd like to get them fixed.

More information and links to the documentation, source code on GitHub and 'stable' release binaries for windows are available through the link in my signature line.

Best regards,

Simon Hibbs

 

[Infojunky]

Creators of StarBase here.

StarBase does have an OGL rules file based on the Mongoose developers pack for generating world data and there's currently an experimental build with SEC file import capability, though there are lot of SEC files out there it's not been tested with.

There's no trade implementation as that isn't in the OGL material and im not prepared to breach copyright. The LBB system is apparently ok to implement in software though so I may put that in at some point but no promises when. SB is open source and written in Python though so if anyone would like to have a go, or help out with any aspect of the app I'd be very grateful.

Check. Yes the byzantine and conflicted requirements of the Mongoose license kinda strike again, though to be honest those rules have fluctuated over the years, so bashing up your own specific ones isn't a huge problem from my point of view. I have considered doing a Cargo Pdf for a whiles now, but that is something more along the lines of jTas's Small Cargos and BITS 101 Cargos,but and alternate trade/cargo generation for small traders might be an idea.....

Here's a link to the experimental version with SEC fie support.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/1182463/StarBase/Starbase_25.zip

For some reason the link doesn't like me.....

If you could try it out I'd be very grateful as I'd like to know how well it copes with SEC files out in the wild, and if there are any issues I'd like to get them fixed.

More information and links to the documentation, source code on GitHub and 'stable' release binaries for windows are available through the link in my signature line.

I yanked the Zip file from you website and I will give it a whirl.

 

[simonh]

Sorry about that, I accidentally broke the link. It should work ok now.

Simon Hibbs

 

[F33D]

But nothing for ships, eh? Hmmm.

There almost certainly is something, most probably there are several
ones. However, for licensing reasons it is impossible to publish any
programs of that kind, even for free, so the programs that exist are
"for personal use only" and accordingly not mentioned very often on
any forum. Still, you have a good chance that someone who wrote
a program for Mongoose Traveller will read your thread and perhaps
decide to contact you and share his software.

Someone could make one using the SRD's. I think that would cover most stuff needed for ships.

 

[simonh]

But nothing for ships, eh? Hmmm.

There almost certainly is something, most probably there are several
ones. However, for licensing reasons it is impossible to publish any
programs of that kind, even for free, so the programs that exist are
"for personal use only" and accordingly not mentioned very often on
any forum. Still, you have a good chance that someone who wrote
a program for Mongoose Traveller will read your thread and perhaps
decide to contact you and share his software.

Someone could make one using the SRD's. I think that would cover most stuff needed for ships.

Yep, I don't see any problem here even for commercial apps. The OGL is explicitly a license to allow for commercial uses as well as non-commercial ones. After all if you are explicitly allowed to use the SRD to produce commercial games, why not commercial apps? You just can't call it 7r@v£||£r.

Simon Hibbs