Things implied by the character creation rules...

[PoppySeed45]

IYTU, of course!

For me, the biggest thing I get from all the tables and charts is that The Imperium is frickin' dangerous. What, with all the missions/war/secret activities/etc, it seems the Imperium and those planets on its fringe are in a constant state of more or less war, all the time. Call them police actions or whatever, but the fact remains that there's an awful lot happening.

Even take a look at some of the survival numbers on certain careers. In peacetime they would have to be lower - or are you telling me it's really dangerous just being a Marine?

Becuase of this, I find myself slanting the entries in World Generation toward this, since it's more fun that way anyway, with constant conflict or just ending conflicts (and simmering hate).

And your impressions garnered from the way characters are generated?

 

[rust]

I got the same impression from the character generation system, which
is why I "toned it down" for my comparatively peaceful setting, where
the navy had no war to fight for more than 300 years, and other truly
dangerous engagements are extremely rare.

 

[Shiloh]

...are you telling me it's really dangerous just being a Marine?

It's pretty dangerous being a serving soldier. Even in peacetime there are a lot of injuries that preclude your continuing service. Training is pretty intense. Then again, the mishaps that occur are only 50% injuries. Even Nobles have a worse "Mishap" for injuries (along with a *much* lower chance of having to roll on it...), though why Injuries would preclude you continuing to be a noble, I'm not entirely sure.

 

[PoppySeed45]

It's pretty dangerous being a serving soldier. Even in peacetime there are a lot of injuries that preclude your continuing service. Training is pretty intense. Then again, the mishaps that occur are only 50% injuries. Even Nobles have a worse "Mishap" for injuries (along with a *much* lower chance of having to roll on it...), though why Injuries would preclude you continuing to be a noble, I'm not entirely sure.

True - not everything is an injury on the mishap tables. Just seems an awful lot, to me.

And I had always the injury to be so bad (since you lose characteristic points) that you are either out of action long enough to be replaced in your work (even as a dilette - all your pals leave you!) and you're forced to look for other things to do...I guess.

 

[Stainless]

Something I think is often forgotten in RPGs;

Character generation rules are there to make player characters and PCs are usually meant to be ADVENTURERS. i.e., exceptional people most likely with exceptional backgrounds.

For the average day person who would never dream of getting up to the shenanigans the PCs get up to, a GM should just arbitrarily make them up or use a Mook rule (be that a published game mechanic or house rule).

Thus, I personally don't view the MGT character rules as modelling the average experience in a service. Rather, it represents that part of the distribution that tends to produce ADVENTURERS. People with exceptional backgrounds, possibly from/in exceptional circumstances, with exceptional motivations, exceptional futures, etc. If it wasn't the case, we'd all be playing housewives and 9 to 5 businessmen.

 

[kristof65]

Thus, I personally don't view the MGT character rules as modelling the average experience in a service. Rather, it represents that part of the distribution that tends to produce ADVENTURERS. People with exceptional backgrounds, possibly from/in exceptional circumstances, with exceptional motivations, exceptional futures, etc.

Ditto.

As a GM, I won't even bother with the events & mishaps tables (and possibly not even the survival roll) when rolling up most of my NPCs, unless they are supposed to be in the same "Adventuring Class" as the PCs.

 

[dayriff]

When detailing out my subsector, I felt like it would be a real shame to have all these military services and no action going on. So I've made sure to include four or five "trouble spots" where violent action is occuring.

One of these is on a population A world where a sub-continent of several billion people has been in constant rebellion for a couple of generations now. Not that anybody in the rest of the subsector registers this as more than background noise as long as trade is unaffected, but it provides a convenient place for any number of small scale ground conflicts.

 

[alex_greene]

I found myself looking at the Mishap tables and thinking "Oh, so they allow characters to survive chargen nowadays, then," followed by a long, sad look at my little graveyard of Traveller characters who never made it to retirement.

I'm glad they included the Iron Man chargen option, to show you what it was like once. You wouldn't believe how lethal chargen used to be back in CT days ...

 

[Dave Chase]

When detailing out my subsector, I felt like it would be a real shame to have all these military services and no action going on. So I've made sure to include four or five "trouble spots" where violent action is occuring.

One of these is on a population A world where a sub-continent of several billion people has been in constant rebellion for a couple of generations now. Not that anybody in the rest of the subsector registers this as more than background noise as long as trade is unaffected, but it provides a convenient place for any number of small scale ground conflicts.

What a neat idea. Thanks

Dave Chase

 

[darktalon]

When detailing out my subsector, I felt like it would be a real shame to have all these military services and no action going on. So I've made sure to include four or five "trouble spots" where violent action is occuring.

One of these is on a population A world where a sub-continent of several billion people has been in constant rebellion for a couple of generations now. Not that anybody in the rest of the subsector registers this as more than background noise as long as trade is unaffected, but it provides a convenient place for any number of small scale ground conflicts.

A doubly useful idea this one. Not only does it give colour to character backgrounds ("this event/mishap happened when I was serving on that planet") it gives you a set of adventure seeds for the campaign itself. Traders can run weapons or supplies to one side of the conflict (or both!) and mercs can fight in it. If the campaign returns the party to a world where one of the PCs served, the referee can give him more detailed information on the place (with no guarantees it'll be up to date... :twisted: )

 

[alex_greene]

This is the reason why the Spinward Marches has all those Amber and Red Zones. Player characters are virtually required to go there during their adventures, because that's where all the stuff happens that only they can possibly handle.