The World Builder's Handbook - It Is Here!

[MongooseMatt]

The long, long, long-awaited World Builder's Handbook is now here, giving all the tools Referees need to construct their own star systems and the worlds around them.

You can grab your own copy right here: https://www.mongoosepublishing.com/products/world-builders-handbook



The World Builder’s Handbook provides a complete toolset for expanding a world or star system into a fully realised place to know and explore. It includes procedures for determining the type and location of a system’s significant stars and worlds, an expansion of mainworld generation, and rules for determining the physical and social characteristics of the star system’s other worlds.

This handbook is both comprehensive and modular, with procedures designed to allow the Referee to focus on the important aspects of a world or system’s characteristics. The World Builder’s Handbook includes knowledge gained from the thousands of exoplanetary systems discovered, and covers habitable and hostile worlds, moons, gas giants, twilight worlds and guidelines for the Referee to describe what Travellers can see in the skies above these worlds. It allows a Referee to create star systems from scratch or expand existing profiles to refine a world’s character.

Also included are checklists, forms, examples, and the procedures and equipment used by the Imperial Interstellar Scout Service to survey and record information in the Charted Space universe, with a glossary of astronomical terms.

 

[alex_greene]

Getting warm fuzzies right now. Well worth the wait.

 

[Reisender]

The cover art looks different compared to other Mongoose Traveller publications. Don't get me wrong, it is looking good. Is it a new artist or just a different style?

Getting warm fuzzies right now. Well worth the wait.

Unfortunately another 6 month till the hard copy, so the wait continues.

 

[Farqs]

Well. I've been holding off and holding off on Mongoose purchases but this was always going to tip me over the edge. Part of the fun will be seeing how much it will have changed from last century's Digest Group Publication's WBH and Grand Census (1989 and 1987 respectively - oh my!).

Reminds me of the Wife's excuse about seemingly new clothes - "No, bought this ages ago!" I've used that many many times before with Mongoose hard copy and indeed am bracing myself to do so when Bayern finally hoves into port from what I can only assume is a container ship journey via the Pleiades.

 

[Haseri]

Oh, the social section is a thing of beauty. Compliments to the author

 

[CordwainerFish]

"Special Circumstances" - nice one.

 

[AlanMN]

Just bought it. Now I no longer have an excuse to not fill out the Foreven Sector.

 

[Galadrion]

Alas, I had to wait until I got home from work before I bought it. But the wait is over!

 

[Albion UK]

Just got it along with the new supply book, can't wait to get my teeth into it.

 

[Geir]

"Special Circumstances" - nice one.

Either people will find it hilarious or it will go above their heads. This section does mention Orbitals.

 

[Geir]

The cover art looks different compared to other Mongoose Traveller publications. Don't get me wrong, it is looking good. Is it a new artist or just a different style?

Shane (S.C.) Watson. Really good stuff. There's Alien Suns 001 on Drivethru and he did the critter art for the updated Safari World adventure. I think he's still working on his version of 567-908. And of course, there's a Patreon.

 

[ColinD]

I have just bought the book and am looking at the PDF. Too much to comment on all of it but Geir Lanesskog's writing is very clear and has conversational style that I think works best with game books. For me the sections on "Economic Law", "Factions" and the whole chapter on "Special Circumstances" act as both inspirational and instructional for a Referee. Sandrine Thirache's layout is easy on the eye, with the Primary Star illustration sitting right above the text and across the page (pgs 15-16) and the System Worlds and Orbits (63-68) being examples I loved. Can't wait to see it in print. The illustrations are very cool with, again the System Worlds and Orbits being a favorite and the cover setting a mood for exploration and the Scouts. Kudos to the proofing/editing! (Charlotte Law, Matthew Sprange) It couldn't have been easy with the scientific jargon, Traveller Tech Terms and the many other eyes that weighed in (and will weigh in) on this!

 

[Geir]

The graphical overview is is borrowed (stolen) from something us geezers - I mean the prime demographic - may recognize: Handbook for Space Pioneers from the late 70's. They used a logarithmic scale, which Orbit#s sort of fits. Though the two extra rows on WBH p 66 and 68 aren't really necessary - but they could be used as blanks.

 

[Peleliu]

Love the new cutter module. I am a big fan of small craft and sub-1k ton ships.

 

[harunmushod]

Bought, and I have some queries on the content.

1. In the table on p. 15 is BD a brown dwarf and D a white dwarf? If not, what do those letters mean, and how does one generate brown or white dwarfs?

2. On pp.15-16 there’s a reference to “a K-type Class IV star” but I’m not clear how that was generated from the table on p.15. would on reroll on Type if the first Type result is 2 (“Special”)before rolling on Special or Unusual? It’s not clear to me from the text.

3. Trying this out and rolled a 12 for Type then rolled a 6 on Hot, and another 6 on the Numeric column of the Star subtype table (which gives a result of 7). Does that mean the star is an A7 Class V and that’s all I need to do to determine the primary star for this system?

 

[Geir]

Bought, and I have some queries on the content.

1. In the table on p. 15 is BD a brown dwarf and D a white dwarf? If not, what do those letters mean, and how does one generate brown or white dwarfs?

Yes, BD is Brown dwarf and D is white dwarf.
A result of 2 on the Type column roll, is Special. In the text it says that the Special result can use either the Special or the Unusual column for the follow-up roll. Because Charted Space doesn't generally contain Brown or White dwarfs as the primary star, for similar environments, the Referee can use Special column, and BD and D (or other oddity) primaries are relegated to the Special Circumstances chapter as residents of 'Empty' hexes.

Or the Referee can choose to use the Unusual column for the follow-up roll. (I had originally called these columns Special1 and Special2 and what is now the Peculiar column was once called the Unusual column, but that was not cool - so far the only artifact of the rewrite I've seen is the misspelling of peculiar in a section heading... but there may be others.)

Brown and White Dwarfs can also be generated as Non-Primary stars with the 'Other' result. on the table on page 29. And if you wanted to, on a result of Random and a subsequent result of 2 on the Type column on page 15, you can use the Unusual instead of Special column. Up to you.

2. On pp.15-16 there’s a reference to “a K-type Class IV star” but I’m not clear how that was generated from the table on p.15. would on reroll on Type if the first Type result is 2 (“Special”)before rolling on Special or Unusual? It’s not clear to me from the text.

Yes. So, an initial roll of 2 on Type column cause a roll on the Special column and a result of 6, 7, or 8 results in a Class IV star
On page 16:
Any result starting with Class requires a second roll on
the Type column with DM+1
So reroll on the Type column with DM+1, where a result of 7 or 8 (after the +1) would get you K.

3. Trying this out and rolled a 12 for Type then rolled a 6 on Hot, and another 6 on the Numeric column of the Star subtype table (which gives a result of 7). Does that mean the star is an A7 Class V and that’s all I need to do to determine the primary star for this system?

Yes, that's correct.

 

[Annatar Giftbringer]

So, if I’d possessed the mythical skill called patience i could have gotten me two books for one shipping fee…

Oh well. A question before I take the plunge: is there personal/ship/vehicle equipment in this book?

 

[CordwainerFish]

A question before I take the plunge: is there personal/ship/vehicle equipment in this book?

A handful of each, and a few robots and spacecraft as well. Nine pages all told.

 

[AlanMN]

Anyone else having problems with the interior artwork displaying? I see several pages that have a large blank spot where the wording goes around it. Almost all the equipment illustrations are greyed out shadows, just as in other book releases from Mongoose.

 

[AlanMN]

I should have said I'm using Preview on an iMac and iPad with the latest OS updates.