Tell us about the Worlds you have Built!

[MongooseMatt]

Greetings, you absolute gods of universes!

The World Builder's Handbook has been out for a short while now, so... what interesting, unusual, downright weird worlds have you all been creating thus far?

Tell us about the star systems they occupy, the civilisations that have sprung up on them, and the glorious vistas Travellers will see when they walk upon their surface. What makes them essential tourist locations?

Bonus points if you also post planetary maps

 

[ProfGrizzlyJon]

How serious do you want us to get?

 

[Shardan13]

Oh well I might as well give the ball a push if not rolling.

I haven't given the world or system a name yet and am still fiddling with the numbers but the system is a binary F3 V with a G3 V far companion.

I got some details of a contra-orbit moon that orbit's a habital zone small gas giant. The moon is not the main planet in the system.

Moon F888XXX-X. Still working on the social aspects but is intended to have a low population and balkanised government, The main features of this world is that it's cold 4.75 degree Celsius high and a -2.4 degree Celsius low with islands (no continents) on the planet surface with 100 meter tides. So yeah stay off this world's beaches. It has a 24 hour day and it whips around the gas giant in 12 days. I imagine (probably incorrectly) the weather is terrible.

So why in the universe would any traveller go there? Apart from plenty of opportunity for winter sports the islands make a great place to hide out. I also imagine that it would be a place for travellers to set up a legitimate base for pirate hunting or setting up a mercenary company.

Edit: Damn sprawling spreadsheets. I notice an error in my calculations. Wave height approximately 3m not 100m.

 

[Galadrion]

I haven't really got it set up yet, but I'm planning on creating essentially a new campaign area. The idea is based around a misjumped Second Imperium colony ship from shortly before the Long Night, dumped out on the rimward edge of the Local Spur Arm and somewhat trailing from Known Space, probably on the order of thirty sectors away - much too far for any colony ship of the era to have any real hope of returning within the projected lifetime of the ship. In any case, the overall region is extremely sparse, perhaps enough to be considered a rift... if it wasn't located on the border of one of the inter-arm gaps. So, not a place where a great abundance of habitable systems would be expected... except for the presence of an open star cluster.

I'm currently cobbling together a procedure for generating system presence in such a grouping, but I'm planning on the cluster being a roughly circular place on the star map about fifteen to twenty hexes in radius - a bit large for an open cluster in reality, but then, this is a two-dimensional mapping rather than three. I'm figuring that the borderline between an open and a globular cluster under this procedure should be around a thirty hex radius - roughly twice what it is in reality, but far, far fewer stars.

In any case, I'm looking at generating a star map for seven hundred to twelve hundred hexes (maybe about two sectors, or a little more if I include some of the bordering low-density region). I already know that there will be a long-marooned Rule of Man colony (plus any subsidiary colonies) and probably some low number of local pocket empires, with maybe a few pre-spaceflight/interstellar flight sophonts. Even after more than two thousand years, I expect that there will still be un- or little-explored backwaters and lots of possible adventuring hooks. Plus, there's always the chance of a Deepnight Revelation-style exploration trek to find a way to recontact the Second Imperium...

 

[Sigtrygg]

I will wait for the final error free version...

 

[MongooseMatt]

How serious do you want us to get?

If you think other people are going to be interested, there is a space for it here whatever it is

 

[ColinD]

I have created a few worlds with the book! My players have already come upon a Rogue Gas Giant in an empty Sector that can act as a way for Jump 2 ships to make a connection between a preindustrial agricultural world and a high population, poor planet that has a Class A Starport and is a crossroads of trade. This had been used by smugglers for a long time but the Travellers uncovered it. Before this only corporation and government Jump 4 ships (primarily Subsidized Traders) could directly connect these two planets. This left Jump 2 ships having to make a circuitous route with other planets, one of which was an Amber Zone planet.

This Rogue Gas Giant has a Leviathan like life form (size of a small continent), a smugglers base and more than a few moons. One of these moons has a stranded ship that is hiding from the smugglers and needs the Travellers' assistance.

I've also created a circumbinary planet that takes advantage of the double star information. I'd go into it further but don't want to make too long a post.


The book has great writing, great editing and great artwork. As I've said before it has just enough instruction so that it leaves room for your inspiration to take over.

 

[Albion UK]

Lol, I'm only on page 68 after buying it on day one, and I'm now doubting my maths so I'm reworking my system from scratch.
This is a seriously good product from Mongoose btw

 

[Geir]

Lol, I'm only on page 68 after buying it on day one, and I'm now doubting my maths so I'm reworking my system from scratch.
This is a seriously good product from Mongoose btw

Sorry, I know it can be a lot of math to do a whole system from scratch. Some will be really complicated like the Zed example, others hopefully much more straightforward. And though I've said it in the book, don't feel like you need to do everything for every or even any system, you can just use sections that are relevant to you (I say this as by definition being the worst offender yet, because I did more than a whole sector worth)

 

[Albion UK]

Sorry, I know it can be a lot of math to do a whole system from scratch. Some will be really complicated like the Zed example, others hopefully much more straightforward. And though I've said it in the book, don't feel like you need to do everything for every or even any system, you can just use sections that are relevant to you (I say this as by definition being the worst offender yet, because I did more than a whole sector worth)

I like the challenge. Great work on this old bean, very impressive title. The campaign I'm scheming is going deep into a handful of systems, this product is perfect to help me flesh out credible star systems. Love it, and very well done

 

[Albion UK]

I have created a few worlds with the book! My players have already come upon a Rogue Gas Giant in an empty Sector that can act as a way for Jump 2 ships to make a connection between a preindustrial agricultural world and a high population, poor planet that has a Class A Starport and is a crossroads of trade. This had been used by smugglers for a long time but the Travellers uncovered it. Before this only corporation and government Jump 4 ships (primarily Subsidized Traders) could directly connect these two planets. This left Jump 2 ships having to make a circuitous route with other planets, one of which was an Amber Zone planet.

This Rogue Gas Giant has a Leviathan like life form (size of a small continent), a smugglers base and more than a few moons. One of these moons has a stranded ship that is hiding from the smugglers and needs the Travellers' assistance.

I've also created a circumbinary planet that takes advantage of the double star information. I'd go into it further but don't want to make too long a post.


The book has great writing, great editing and great artwork. As I've said before it has just enough instruction so that it leaves room for your inspiration to take over.

Nice. Love the local silk road route idea, very credible and full of adventure potential

 

[Galadrion]

Nice. Love the local silk road route idea, very credible and full of adventure potential

*Nods* The other big (game master's) advantage of these multi-stage jump routes is that you've effectively created a longer "locked room" circumstance for your games, allowing for better Murder on the Orient Express-type plots. After all, getting off the ship in the empty hex isn't going to look terribly inviting...

 

[ProfGrizzlyJon]

I love the idea of a patron hiring the players to chart empty hexes for off-the-beaten-path jump routes. It makes a two-ship adventure plausible (leapfrogging the exploration to be supportive, or one providing base camp while the other searches)

 

[alex_greene]

Ahrain and Inahrain, The Big Sister And The Little Brother Trailing Behind
Star: Sobari Type G3 Class V
Outer Gas Giants 3, all spectacularly ringed
Asteroid Belts 1
Kuiper Belt 1
Oort Cloud 1
Terrestrial Planets 2
Orbit# 3
Period 360 days
Day length Ahrain: 20 hours; Inahrain: 32 hours
Ahrain A-866???-?
Inahrain F-868???-?
Moons: Ahrain 1
Inahrain 3
Temperatures: Ahrain - Temperate; Inahrain - Temperate
Signs of life on both worlds. No indication of sentience, technological civilisation and so on.
Ahrain and Inahrain are two worlds, roughly Terra-sized, travelling in the same orbit in a system with three ringed gas giants and one planetoid belt. There are no other terrestrial worlds detected. Ahrain leads. It has a single moon, Sem; Inahrain boasts three small moons, called Arma, Leges, Scientia.
Both worlds look like they could be habitable. It's up to your Scout characters to determine if either, or both, have life - let alone sentient, civilised, technologically-developed, life.

 

[Seffix]

Ashwangloor UWP-X-677000-0 is a creepy world a wee bit out from the center of it's M5 star's habitable zone.
O#3 = 0.31 (0.124AU) - Tr - Ec:0 - HZCODev = 0.24 (Temperate) Year = 134.4d
Diameter: 10,200km, Mostly rock 0.66g/cc, 0.53G, Mass: 0.339
Standard-tainted (biologic, severity 2, persistence 8) atmosphere
Biomass 9, Biocomplexity B, Biodiversity B, Biocompatibility 1
Resource Rating A

It's all very nice, and the unique biochemistry has great potential for pharmaceutical exploitation, except that the ecosphere has evolved to operate on a psionic level, with telepathic suggestions to draw prey, assaults to take enemies down long enough for the physical bodies to get to the business of eating, and occasional eddies of abrasive microorganisms whipped telekinetically through the atmosphere -- all with no sign of native sapience.
The main advantage Travellers have is local life's lack of nutritional compatibility, and a tendency to disregard non-psionic life. However at some point in the not too distant past, it appears some local life developed a few enzymes that could allow them to digest Terra-originating biochemistry, and those creatures arrive where humaniti and vargr land with inexplicable alacrity.

(This came about when I decided to combine the biocomplexity rating with the biologic taint)

 

[Geir]

Ashwangloor UWP-X-677000-0 is a creepy world a wee bit out from the center of it's M5 star's habitable zone.
O#3 = 0.31 (0.124AU) - Tr - Ec:0 - HZCODev = 0.24 (Temperate) Year = 134.4d
Diameter: 10,200km, Mostly rock 0.66g/cc, 0.53G, Mass: 0.339
Standard-tainted (biologic, severity 2, persistence 8) atmosphere
Biomass 9, Biocomplexity B, Biodiversity B, Biocompatibility 1
Resource Rating A

It's all very nice, and the unique biochemistry has great potential for pharmaceutical exploitation, except that the ecosphere has evolved to operate on a psionic level, with telepathic suggestions to draw prey, assaults to take enemies down long enough for the physical bodies to get to the business of eating, and occasional eddies of abrasive microorganisms whipped telekinetically through the atmosphere -- all with no sign of native sapience.
The main advantage Travellers have is local life's lack of nutritional compatibility, and a tendency to disregard non-psionic life. However at some point in the not too distant past, it appears some local life developed a few enzymes that could allow them to digest Terra-originating biochemistry, and those creatures arrive where humaniti and vargr land with inexplicable alacrity.

(This came about when I decided to combine the biocomplexity rating with the biologic taint)

That's cool (well, warm, technically) so I'm assuming a locked world? Or actually with the year length it's a really slow multi-year-long day?
One thing in there pokes at a rule inconsistency: I did technically cap Biocomplexity at 10 (A) at one place in the text, but not another... will have to take the out cap, not just to preserve the above world, but to be consistent. Another fix for the feedback...

 

[Seffix]

That's cool (well, warm, technically) so I'm assuming a locked world? Or actually with the year length it's a really slow multi-year-long day?
One thing in there pokes at a rule inconsistency: I did technically cap Biocomplexity at 10 (A) at one place in the text, but not another... will have to take the out cap, not just to preserve the above world, but to be consistent. Another fix for the feedback...

Hah! I'm old and better at flipping through physical books than PDFs: I thought the biodiversity was capped at A, but when I looked back, I couldn't find it, so I recalculated.
It's got a 30 degree axial tilt and a prograde rotation of 34 hours. Probably got hit a few times from the planetoid belt one orbit in.

 

[PeterDebney]

I’m in the early stages of an exploratory campaign with my players starting with The Fall of Tinath. I had created the adjacent subsectors and systems using the old Scout book 6 and a Python script, but now I’m looking forward to replacing it all with the new worlds.
It will be a lot easier once the hard copy arrives though…

 

[Seffix]

Ashwangloor UWP-E-677100-7 is a creepy world a wee bit out from the center of it's M5 star's habitable zone.
O#3 = 0.31 (0.124AU) - Tr - Ec:0 - HZCODev = 0.24 (Temperate) Year = 134.4d
Diameter: 10,200km, Mostly rock 0.66g/cc, 0.53G, Mass: 0.339
Standard-tainted (biologic, severity 2, persistence 8) atmosphere
Biomass 9, Biocomplexity B, Biodiversity B, Biocompatibility 1
Resource Rating A

Population <100 — Concentration rating 9 — No government — No legal structure — Project Gimli Base

Ashwangloor now boasts a population 1, but no government or law level... I've decided the Daryen and Sword Worlders are cooperating in the study of this peculiar biology. Nothing could possibly go wrong.

 

[Prime_Evil]

How long will it be until someone pulls together a web app / spreadsheet to automate some of the maths? It's an impressive book....but dense.