This is how tonight's gaming went. I was meant to be running traveller. One player got a bad cold and had to cry off. One had rehearsals and couldn't join in. 1 suggested a board game. I really haven't worked out how to do spaceship combat in traveller in an interesting fashion. One-player said he'd rather watch a movie. I went out with my son and had 2 pints of beer. The session was postponed. I thought I know I'll go and do some preparation and understand how to do starship combat. I got home. I decided I couldn't be arsed. So instead of running playing or planning traveller I decided to watch it. I turned on Babylon 5.
Tonight's Traveller
- Thread starter tzunder
- Start date
Arkathan
Emperor Mongoose
My group has been playing Star Fleet: A Call to Arms, so they are used to putting ships on a board and measuring distances.
Facing is irrelevant other than to indicate the general direction you are going. Any weapon that can reach can fire.
Since MTG2 uses thrust points and not vector mechanics, I convert thrust to range, and fudge it a bit to make ranges easy to remember.
Depending on the size of your table, you can use cm or inches.
The numbers below are close, but not always exact to the rules, but again, easier to remember
Adjacent = 0-<1
Close = 1 - <2
Short = 2 - <5
Medium = 5 - <10
Long = 10 - <20
Very Long = 20 - <50 (you can use 45 to comply with the core rulebook)
Distant = 50 - <100 (45 - <95)
Seth Skorkowsky has YouTube videos that go over the rules.
Facing is irrelevant other than to indicate the general direction you are going. Any weapon that can reach can fire.
Since MTG2 uses thrust points and not vector mechanics, I convert thrust to range, and fudge it a bit to make ranges easy to remember.
Depending on the size of your table, you can use cm or inches.
The numbers below are close, but not always exact to the rules, but again, easier to remember
Adjacent = 0-<1
Close = 1 - <2
Short = 2 - <5
Medium = 5 - <10
Long = 10 - <20
Very Long = 20 - <50 (you can use 45 to comply with the core rulebook)
Distant = 50 - <100 (45 - <95)
Seth Skorkowsky has YouTube videos that go over the rules.
Arkathan
Emperor Mongoose
Traveller: Part 6 Space Combat
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUoXPfaXO6g&list=PL25p5gPY6qKVUg6ys5N1oRlsBI7DTByyI&index=6&t=2s
I don't know about the water based naval battle version, but the Star Fleet Battles Version is current, and can be found on DTRPG or Amarillo Design Bureau.
http://www.starfleetgames.com/Call-To-Arms.shtml
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUoXPfaXO6g&list=PL25p5gPY6qKVUg6ys5N1oRlsBI7DTByyI&index=6&t=2s
I don't know about the water based naval battle version, but the Star Fleet Battles Version is current, and can be found on DTRPG or Amarillo Design Bureau.
http://www.starfleetgames.com/Call-To-Arms.shtml
IanBruntlett
Emperor Mongoose
tzunder said:
I'm using the 2016 Mongoose Traveller rules and have taken to reading the Core Rule Book at night to make it easier to either ad lib in future games or concentrate on the adventure in them (things like plot, running multiple NPCs). I am also adding cross-references to the CRB, suitably armed with a pencil and that is helping me have a stronger grasp of the game.
As I've recently re-read the starship combat chapter and I now have a rough idea how I could have a 2 ship combat work. However, anything more complicated than that and I am stuck.
The errata I have downloaded for HG is 91 pages long. It is good that the errata has been made available. There is a HG Update 2022 due for PDF release in July and as a book in September. Given that Traveller is science fiction and space based, I'd really appreciate it if 1) there were fewer errors in the new HG2022 and 2) someone could produce a good, detailed review of it.
Core spaceship combat can't work with more than two sides that always stay together, so both sides have the same relative range. Once you have more than two sides then it breaks. The solution is the combat table in HG, page 90, and associated movement text.
This is still an approximation but it's ok.
One could adopt a major detailed vector based ruleset like POWER PROJECTION from BITS UK but that is for larger ships than typical RPG games of Traveller.
Or one could adopt a very abstracted positioning system like Cepheus Deluxe, which is more cinematic.
The other issue we needed to resolve was to use fixed and averaged damage for lasers and missiles, and to adopt a static armour defence value for sand subject to a single successful Gunnery roll per opponent ship. At the Battle of EXE in PoD we had 6-7 ships on the table and the dice rolling was as voluminous as it was pointless.
It's odd no-one mentions this about a game that conceivably could have quite big fleets in combat sometimes....
This is still an approximation but it's ok.
One could adopt a major detailed vector based ruleset like POWER PROJECTION from BITS UK but that is for larger ships than typical RPG games of Traveller.
Or one could adopt a very abstracted positioning system like Cepheus Deluxe, which is more cinematic.
The other issue we needed to resolve was to use fixed and averaged damage for lasers and missiles, and to adopt a static armour defence value for sand subject to a single successful Gunnery roll per opponent ship. At the Battle of EXE in PoD we had 6-7 ships on the table and the dice rolling was as voluminous as it was pointless.
It's odd no-one mentions this about a game that conceivably could have quite big fleets in combat sometimes....
MasterGwydion
Cosmic Mongoose
tzunder said:Core spaceship combat can't work with more than two sides that always stay together, so both sides have the same relative range. Once you have more than two sides then it breaks. The solution is the combat table in HG, page 90, and associated movement text.
This is still an approximation but it's ok.
One could adopt a major detailed vector based ruleset like POWER PROJECTION from BITS UK but that is for larger ships than typical RPG games of Traveller.
Or one could adopt a very abstracted positioning system like Cepheus Deluxe, which is more cinematic.
The other issue we needed to resolve was to use fixed and averaged damage for lasers and missiles, and to adopt a static armour defence value for sand subject to a single successful Gunnery roll per opponent ship. At the Battle of EXE in PoD we had 6-7 ships on the table and the dice rolling was as voluminous as it was pointless.
It's odd no-one mentions this about a game that conceivably could have quite big fleets in combat sometimes....
I handle this with hex maps. More than one actually. Space combat map and dogfighting map. Change the scale to 1 hex per x number of Thrust points. That way you have a way to track it and they can move based on their maining Thrust. Once 2 ships are in dogfighting range, we change to the "zoomed in" map with a different scale, but that functions in exactly the same way. This allows ships at multiple ranges to be visually calculated without having to actually do math...lol...
