Traveller tech stuck in the 70's?

[phavoc]

Something got me thinking that much of the traveller tech is still based upon the 1970s when it was first envisioned. Starship technology, weapons, computer technology, artificial intelligence, etc. It all seems to be based upon extrapolations from the 70's and its never really been updated.

Does anyone else feel the same? I'm not looking to start a flame war of book rules vs. your own universe. Just looking for others opinions.

 

[IanBruntlett]

Something got me thinking that much of the traveller tech is still based upon the 1970s when it was first envisioned. Starship technology, weapons, computer technology, artificial intelligence, etc. It all seems to be based upon extrapolations from the 70's and its never really been updated.

Does anyone else feel the same? I'm not looking to start a flame war of book rules vs. your own universe. Just looking for others opinions.

Well, I run Traveller games at tech levels from 0 up to 11 or 12. That's just enough to be in Jump 2/3 territory. I haven't got any complaints about the tech at that level. However, if I did, I'd make a decision as and when it came up during play.

As for Traveller in higher tech levels, I would steal heavily from Iain M. Bank's Culture novels. If you haven't read any of his stuff, take a look at Excession for an example of a culture of ship based AIs.

I'd like to know a bit about your Traveller game - TLs and ideas. Who knows, you might get some interesting ideas

 

[BP]

MGT is based on CT and maintains a high degree of compatibility with designs and settings... so, yes, and under those constraints it has to be!

However, options and rule changes do support modernized tech. And for many things which are entirely fiction - gravitics, jump, etc. - there really is no modern variant - since it is still fiction all the way.

The computer stuff has been advanced (think storage and size and no mention of jump 'tapes') and really doesn't require much change since the '70's since AI is the ultimate and CT supported that. MGT has several rule changes that allow for complete AI control of a ship, etc.

The main area of lack of growth is nano-tech. And we do see a little bit of that in the rules, but nothing substantial. MGT doesn't have a cyberpunk feel - but a few rules are included to cover this as well.

If a young player newly exposed to MGT were queried - I doubt they would see it as a '70's feel (well, ignoring the fact that they weren't alive then either).

 

[rust]

Does anyone else feel the same? I'm not looking to start a flame war of book rules vs. your own universe. Just looking for others opinions.

This has been discussed quite often, and more than a few people would
agree with you.

In fact, it probably was one of the reasons why someone who also visits
this forum has written and published a supplement with more modern
technology, Audace ad Gloriam:
http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=68841&filters=0_0_40050_0

 

[phavoc]

Does anyone else feel the same? I'm not looking to start a flame war of book rules vs. your own universe. Just looking for others opinions.

This has been discussed quite often, and more than a few people would
agree with you.

In fact, it probably was one of the reasons why someone who also visits
this forum has written and published a supplement with more modern
technology, Audace ad Gloriam:
http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=68841&filters=0_0_40050_0

I think I've seen that before, but not the whole document. I might pick up a copy just to see what its like.

Personally I'm more into weapons. I'm a former artillery guy (MLRS) and I just about fell down when I saw Mercenary come out with their laughably stupid ranges on their "frag" cannons. Didn't anybody actually crack open a book before they came up with those rules?? Today a modernized 155 can easily put a shell 50+km downrange, and the Russians have tac missiles that, well, you get the idea.

I wanna see things like hyper-velocity missiles, reflec-coated artillery shells to defeat anti-artillery lasers, VLS missile systems, things that weren't quite thought of in 1970. I realize that MGT was based upon the original Traveller, but hell, if you are going to re-release a gaming platform, why not improve it while you are at it?

Anyway, /end bitch.

 

[phavoc]

Something got me thinking that much of the traveller tech is still based upon the 1970s when it was first envisioned. Starship technology, weapons, computer technology, artificial intelligence, etc. It all seems to be based upon extrapolations from the 70's and its never really been updated.

Does anyone else feel the same? I'm not looking to start a flame war of book rules vs. your own universe. Just looking for others opinions.

Well, I run Traveller games at tech levels from 0 up to 11 or 12. That's just enough to be in Jump 2/3 territory. I haven't got any complaints about the tech at that level. However, if I did, I'd make a decision as and when it came up during play.

As for Traveller in higher tech levels, I would steal heavily from Iain M. Bank's Culture novels. If you haven't read any of his stuff, take a look at Excession for an example of a culture of ship based AIs.

I'd like to know a bit about your Traveller game - TLs and ideas. Who knows, you might get some interesting ideas

I'm trying to get a new one started. In the past we had used higher-level tech to play. We happen to like the higher-tech gadgets.

 

[PrinceYyrkoon]

I happen to fall on the side that supposes these decisions were made, not in ignorance, but entirely for game play.

Traveller is the most playable sfrpg around. It isnt by accident, its by design. There are high tech items such as grav plates and jump drives, but the tech has been held back or stunted on computers, robots and weaponry so that these things dont eclipse the role playing element of the game.

Sure, it could be ruled that computers can handle all aspects of your jump, that your crew is entirely composed of nano robots and that you are mostly composed of minute memory banks, your blood is machine fluid and you are encased in miraculum ceramic only penetrated by someones disintegrator finger.

Where, then, would be the game?

Traveller places the story exactly and expertly on the the shoulders of ordinary human beings like ourselves. The frontier is a recognisable wild and wooly West where there are stage magicians with mind powers, ninja lions and bipedal wolves in leather. The planets and societies you visit in your taped-together space wagon are often snapshots (pun intended) of our past and present full of other ordinary, recognisible human beings. Youre never going to rule any of these environments armed only with an SMG. You have to use your cunning not your deus ex machina. These same planets get their post every week from the Pony Express too.

No, its not by accident. Thats what makes Traveller so special.

 

[cjs65]

What he said +1.

 

[Vargr]

I was looking for an appropriate emoticon for Prince Yyrkoon's post but there does not seem to be one.

So I will just make do with faux sound effects:

*clap*clap*clap*

(As in "hands clapping)


You know, the position of Traveller in the SF gaming scene kind of reminds me of USA's on the international scene. Namely, it has its qualities and its flaws, but for some reason it has to answer to much higher standards than everyone else and gets chastised heavily when it doesn't abide to them.
When was the last time you heard someone bitching about how Star Wars RPG or Star Trek RPG do not represent a plausible representation of the future development of technology? Traveller is more rooted in "hard" SF than your average game, I will grant that, but I don't remember ever reading that it was supposed to be a scientific guidebook for futurism.

I do agree with phavoc, that if any game incorporates current-day technology then its not much to expect the designers get the damn numbers straight. But then again, Traveller is hardly the sole RPG at fault in that matter. Actually, in that prespective it gets things right more often than not, which really can't be said by about...I don't know, maybe 80% of the games out there? Maybe more?

 

[The Chef]

btw if you are looking for more way to disassemble people, get the central supply catelogue

 

[alex_greene]

This is what I just thought I'd read ...

The frontier is a recognisable wild and woolly West where there are stage magicians with mind powers, ninja lions and bisexual wolves in leather.

:shock: Damn my eyes ...

 

[alex_greene]

Within the setting, you could reason that the characters have to go with what works. And the most reliable technology, the stuff that won't fail on them in a crisis, is all the lower tech level stuff. Sure, it's crude. But it's solid, and for the most part when things go wrong you don't have to import the parts.

If you want to dig a ditch, don't drag out the disintegrator: get out those shovels and work it, or pull a solid favour from a Citizen Ally and rent out some heavy plant and machinery from the nearby construction yard.

If you need a weapon that will kill your opponent, and you're stuck in some tiresome, rain-soaked jungle with mud and bugs up to your topknots, you'll want an assault rifle that is easily cleaned, reliable, deadly at any range and repairable with the cheapest local materials, as low as TL 3 if need be.

As for why high tech societies still need people to operate the controls of drones, where the tech exists to make them completely autonomous units - you can blame health & safety regulations and pressure from the local spacers' unions for that. There's always something.

 

[rust]

What I miss most with Traveller's technology is biotechnology. This entire
field of technology is rather invisible in Traveller, except for some hints at
genetic engineering. Even 2300 AD covered it better, for example with the
various Pentapod products in the equipment list.

 

[Vargr]

"Almost invisible"?

Traveller is missing biotechnology? :shock:

Really?

Are we talking about the same game here?

Because something that has magical medical drugs, cold berths, cloned organ and limbs, cyber implants, artificial silicon lifeforms, uplifted animals, transgenic human races, genetic body modification for easthetic purposes and frakkin' drugs that make you nearly immune to ageing seems to scream "BIOTECH!!!" to me.

Cripes man! What more do you want? :lol:

Maybe you should check GURPS: Transhuman Space...hear it's got too much of the stuff for most folks, so it might just be enough to satisfy you. :wink:


Edit: Rust, I already own "Central Supply Catalogue" and I quite enjoy it. Can you sell me idea why I should spend 10 bucks on "Audace Ad Gloriam"?
This is not a challenge, I am genuinely interested on the why of your very positive opinion on it

 

[rust]

Traveller's biotech is the biotech idea of ca. 1970, it lacks almost all of
the new ideas developed afterwards and continues some of the ideas
that have meanwhile been discarded as implausible (e.g. cryoberths).

To give an example: The Central Supply Catalogue describes a TL 10
Powered Plate Armour as made of metallic plates. True, this is possible
- but it is far more likely that it would be made of something like synthe-
tic chitin, which is far lighter than any metal.

Maybe you should check GURPS: Transhuman Space...

It happens to be one of my favourite games, exactly because it has a
technology that does not only include what was deemed possible thirty
years ago, but also what is considered possible today. :wink:

Can you sell me idea why I should spend 10 bucks on "Audace Ad Gloriam"?

It depends on what you want for your setting. Audace ad Gloriam descri-
bes the kind of future technology that is extrapolated from today's tech-
nology, for example 3D printers, memory metals and lots of other inter-
esting and useful stuff the authors of the original Traveller setting could
not know at the time they wrote Traveller's technology assumptions.

And I like that the supplement describes in comprehensible terms how the
various pieces of equipment work, not only what they do.
The information "X enables you to Y" could just as well be used for a fan-
tasy magic item, in my view only the additional information "... by doing
Z" makes the item science fiction.
So, if the "pushing button A to do B" way to handle technology in the ga-
me is all you want, you do probably not need the supplement. If you want
to know what happens once you push button A and how this results in B,
you may well like it.

In the end, it comes down to a matter of taste, whether one leans more
towards science fiction or towards science fiction.
And like all matters of taste, one can exchange opinions, but a discussion
is bound to lead nowhere.

 

[Vargr]

like all matters of taste, one can exchange opinions, but a discussion is bound to lead nowhere.

Huh...ok. I kind of assumed that was the point of these blogs, but suit yourself. :?

It's a shame, because I don't understand some of what you wrote, and some of it I disagree with. Not on account of preference but on account of logic.

 

[rust]

It's a shame, because I don't understand some of what you wrote, and some of it I disagree with. Not on account of preference but on account of logic.

Sorry, but there have already been many threads on this subject, here as
well as on other forums, and I have grown a bit tired of the repetition. :wink:

 

[Jame Rowe]

However, options and rule changes do support modernized tech. And for many things which are entirely fiction - gravitics, jump, etc. - there really is no modern variant - since it is still fiction all the way.

The computer stuff has been advanced (think storage and size and no mention of jump 'tapes') and really doesn't require much change since the '70's since AI is the ultimate and CT supported that. MGT has several rule changes that allow for complete AI control of a ship, etc.

The main area of lack of growth is nano-tech. And we do see a little bit of that in the rules, but nothing substantial. MGT doesn't have a cyberpunk feel - but a few rules are included to cover this as well.

I would add to this that MGT's attempt at Augments doesn't progress as fast as *I* think it should, and that a number of its electronics don't advance that quickly, or are introduced at a too-high TL.

But it's good that they included them; their versions provide a place to start from.

 

[phavoc]

It's a shame, because I don't understand some of what you wrote, and some of it I disagree with. Not on account of preference but on account of logic.

Sorry, but there have already been many threads on this subject, here as
well as on other forums, and I have grown a bit tired of the repetition. :wink:

Forums like this tend to have multiple threads on the same subject at times. Once something gets pushed off the front page it kind of becomes old news.

While in theory it woudl be smart to search for stuff prior to starting a new thread... who wants to live in theory???

Besides, if you just "add" to someone else's original post, you never get the joy of authorship. :lol:

 

[rust]

While in theory it woudl be smart to search for stuff prior to starting a new thread... who wants to live in theory???

Oh, I did not want to complain about the thread in any way, I think it is
good you started it - I just do not want to repeat myself too often in the
same kind of discussion, it makes me feel old ... :lol: