What's Traveller5 like?

[Anonymous]

I don't have experience of the paper RPG industry so this opinion is unqualified, but I feel that setting would be more important to Traveller than rules.

A rule system does emphasise certain parts of the setting (for example: a very deadly combat system changes greatly how a game is played, or specific rules designed for the setting like blood resevoir points for Vampires defines how your settings works) but Traveller seems like it doesn't really need these specific thematic rules like blood points. It could use almost any generic RPG system (so just pick one that works instead of re-inventing every time), and it really just needs some good adventures and detailed source material to get it going.

I think this is the approach Mongoose is taking with books like Drinax and Element, and it's opposite to the route FFE is taking. I'm not sure why Mongoose doesn't have Traveller fiction and maybe that's licensing.

The one complex and detailed ruleset Traveller does need is starship design. edit: And I think you probably need the 777-777 profile codes as well.

I don't mind game engines and game ideas (which is basically what MegaTraveller was or T5 seems to be) but they should be marketed as such.

If I buy an RPG I expect to be able to play it out of the box - which all the major systems (D&D etc) allow.

If I buy an RPG and universe contsruction kit, I expect it to market itself as that.

Anyway maybe this is unrealistic. I don't produce or sell paper RPGs so I don't know how the market works.

 

[Sigtrygg]

Traveller was originally intended as a generic GURPS like toolkit for designing your own universe for science fiction adventure - see numerous interviews and forewords by MWM, FC et al.
The fan base wanted adventures and a setting so the Third Imperium was detailed to a greater and greater amount. At some point Traveller and the Third Imperium became synonymous which is a great shame because that was not the original intent and a lot is lost by rigidly detailing a static setting - see GT.

I use CT based rules to run a variety of settings, with stuff stolen from just about every edition of Traveller. T5 offers the most coherent version of the technology of the setting, while still allowing you to go your own way.

Mongoose can not decide if it wants Traveller to be the Third Imperium or Star Wars - if the licence is ever pulled Mongoose still has a core set of rules and setting tropes that would allow for their version of the game to continue. They may be up against CE in this regard though.

 

[Sigtrygg]

Double post - and we can not delete posts

But I can add a question.

Is there a reason Mongoose is not promoting the T5 (revised) kickstarter and yet every Mongoose kickstarter is promoted as a headline post on CotI?

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Double post - and we can not delete posts

I can delete my own recent posts?

 

[Sigtrygg]

I always try to delete using the edit post then delete option - which gives me the error message you do not have permission to delete posts.

After all this time thanks to you I have just noticed the delete option.

I feel a little bit silly now

 

[ShawnDriscoll]

Anyway maybe this is unrealistic. I don't produce or sell paper RPGs so I don't know how the market works.

In the last 40+ years, we have seen:
War games
Adventure games
Role-Playing games
Story games

Most "RPG" games have some overlapping in them. After discovering which game mechanic you favor using, buy games that have it. I only game using Mongoose Traveller 2nd Edition's mechanic (it's the only game that has its mechanic, which is fine). I've used it for all kinds of settings. Not just for the 3rd Imperium.

Is there a reason Mongoose is not promoting the T5 (revised) kickstarter and yet every Mongoose kickstarter is promoted as a headline post on CotI?

That's the same as asking why everyone is not on Facebook or Discord to get their Traveller info.

 

[Sigtrygg]

I would have thought there was some sort of reciprocal arrangement between MWM and MS - MS can tout his wares on CotI and MWM can do likewise on here.

Considering Traveller and the OTU are defined by MWM and T5 I would have thought it a good idea to have a link or two on this forum.

 

[ShawnDriscoll]

I would have thought there was some sort of reciprocal arrangement between MWM and MS - MS can tout his wares on CotI and MWM can do likewise on here.

Considering Traveller and the OTU are defined by MWM and T5 I would have thought it a good idea to have a link or two on this forum.

Marc doesn't post on BBSs like these while Matt does.

 

[Reynard]

Having a license doesn't mean you're joined at the hip. Marc has an income while able to work on his life project.

 

[Condottiere]

Rules give structure to game play.

Milieus and settings sell games.

 

[WingedCat]

What we need is a version of Traveller that has a recovered 4th Imperium at about TL 18, about 1350 or so. And BIG, really big.

http://wiki.travellerrpg.com/Fourth_Imperium

I don't know if it gets to TL 18 (I suspect it gets no further than TL 16 at most), but the article says it exists 1221-1476.

 

[Hakkonen]

Mongoose can not decide if it wants Traveller to be the Third Imperium or Star Wars

What do you mean?

 

[Anonymous]

Mongoose can not decide if it wants Traveller to be the Third Imperium or Star Wars

What do you mean?

I suspect it's a reference to them setting their adventures outside of the Imperium where it's similar to the "scum and villany" parts of Star Wars.

Star Wars has 3 common paths which most RPG or MMO go down - the jedi v sith force campaign, the soldier/agent war campaign (you're a Stormtrooper or Spy), and the outer rim smuggler campaign where you will almost never see a capital ship or a light saber. They aren't the only ways to play it, but will cover the majority of games between them. Mongoose Trojan Reach and Drinax stuff feels a lot like the 3rd option.

edit: Most older 3rd Imperium adventures managed to fit into their own style within the imperium without stepping on Star Wars toes. I never got a Star Wars feel from them, like I get from Trojan Reaches.

 

[NOLATrav]

I think Siggtrygg may also be referring to a lot of the “magic” tech/rules in MgT, like arc-field weapons, zoomy space dogfights and tachyon weapons, as opposed to Classic Trav’s shotguns and daggers in space, vector movement and plain old lasers and missiles...

Yes, yes I know, gravity manipulation, Jump, M-drives, etc etc are also magic. But that’s old school magic I guess

I’m starting to have higher hopes for the newest T5, as a recently released teaser PDF indicates a top to bottom reorganization, a per-volume index and appendices, along with rules fixes/adjustments based on errata and play testing. But the question still remains if the systems actually work: char gen, personal and space combat, the Makers, etc etc.

 

[phavoc]

Since .09 backers receive an updated version I will wait to look at my PDF copy. If I like the setup and think it's worth the money I'll look to see about purchasing the new set of books. But I won't do it sight unseen because I did that with .09 T5 and got a unplayable hot mess.

Because this is a kickstarter that means it may not be available to me, which I'm also ok with. I've got a large collection of Traveller material and many options/variations to choose from. I'll be fine if I don't get the latest.

 

[Sigtrygg]

NOLATrav nailed it. MgT introduces a lot of space opera and space fantasy, misuses real science words and has cinematic dogfighting :evil:

Don't get me wrong, I actually like that these are there as options, I have used a lot of them in my Culture campaign (I have changed the names of a few things for example the ion weapons become electromagnetic pulse projectors), but I think a lot more care needs to be taken to showcase what is and isn't permitted within the Third Imperium setting.

Some of the stuff they have written into their ATU Third Imperium has massive effects on the setting if you consider the logical applications of these technologies. But then, MWM pretty much turned the setting on its head with Agent of the Imperium 8)

 

[Anonymous]

IMO Traveller has always been science fantasy. Even in classic there was the Ancients & their artifacts.

 

[Sigtrygg]

IMO Traveller has always been science fantasy. Even in classic there was the Ancients & their artifacts.

I would argue the only truly science fantasy element in the CT version of the Third Imperium is psionics - and I now have a technologically based handwave for even that

The Ancients are just Clarke TL within the setting... the TL15 Third Imperium is Clarke tech to us.

 

[Anonymous]

IMO Traveller has always been science fantasy. Even in classic there was the Ancients & their artifacts.

I would argue the only truly science fantasy element in the CT version of the Third Imperium is psionics - and I now have a technologically based handwave for even that

The Ancients are just Clarke TL within the setting... the TL15 Third Imperium is Clarke tech to us.

If sufficiently advanced technology be indistinguishable from magic, and if magic be fantasy, then I not be seeing a difference.

If any "law" for physics is wrong, the framework becomes invalid, and then there's no framework and it's all magic.

So what we're really arguing about isn't "is there magic?" but "how much magic is too much magic?"

 

[Reynard]

If your Traveller Universe postulates there are forces in your universe's physics that regularly bend and break what we 'know' as physics and physical constants by the means of supernatural rather than natural forces then you have magic and science fantasy. If your universe produces results that are dictated to be natural such as jump physics, gravitic drives, man portable fusion weapons, very efficient fusion power and intelligent life on every tenth planet and our science today can't prove otherwise then you have science speculation. If you have a story that uses actual known and working concepts that could be possible if applied to a plot such as in The Martian then you have hard science fiction.

That Clarke definition of magic is fanciful but silly unless you realize he meant perception and point of view rather than some supernatural element to the construction of the real world. If a culture had no word or concept of magic they would see phenomenon as natural and straight foreword and just haven't learned enough to fully understand what they were observing. A bit like Vulcans.