Traveller - Some Guidance, please?

[Wik]

I've got a copy of Traveller - The New Era, and it seems like a really neat little setting. I love the careers-based character creation system, the group-based ship creation system, and all that. However, the core task resolution system seems, um, crappy.

Apparently TNE was one of the worst iterations of traveller, although I kind of like the Firefly-esque tone of the setting.

So, could someone provide a basic layout of what the various versions of traveller do well, and how their mechanics work in play? Which ones, in particular, are useful for a "Firefly" game? And, of course, it has to have the career mechanic.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Haltherrion]

So, could someone provide a basic layout of what the various versions of traveller do well, and how their mechanics work in play?

Traveller: a game system of three decades of promise and zero of delivery




Sorry, couldn't resist. I always loved the system, bought most of the material through 1985 or so. But in the end, I had more fun designing ships and creating characters than actually playing the game.

I think the game suffers from "realism-itis" which is a hard problem for science fiction settings that demand a higher verisimilitude. The problem is that in the end, advanced sci-fi settings often don't allow for only mildly lethal weapons, starfighters, and such With a heavy-RP emphasis it can work well but if folks approach it from "lets shoot up lots of stuff" then they need a more forgiving system than Taveller.

Fire-fly is a good setting though that provides lots of possibilities. From what you described of your interests, you could try traveller with a skill resolution system stolen from some other setting. The d20 sci-fi settings (including the Firefly one) aren't going to meet your career track interests.

 

[Nagol]

T20 Traveler is a decent conversion of the clunky classic Traveler into a d20 system. The career implementation is quite interesting as characters start with diverging experience levels that auto-corrects during play.

It keeps the clunky feel of the original as a feature not a bug.



TravellerRPG.com - Citizens of the Imperium

 

[amerigoV]

Traveller: a game system of three decades of promise and zero of delivery


Sorry, couldn't resist. I always loved the system, bought most of the material through 1985 or so. But in the end, I had more fun designing ships and creating characters than actually playing the game.

I've never played, but that is all I have ever read or heard about Traveller - all the fun is in making characters but a campaign never seems to every play out. I really need to roll up a character and not play - you know, for Gamer Cred.

 

[Treebore]

I never found Travellers 2d6 +/- modifiers to be clunky. I have always liked it. I do think Mongooses current version is the most clearly set up iteration, so since you just now getting into Traveller I strongly recommend you start with it.

Older Traveller is "clunky" in that rules could be better explained, and how to use and decide upon modifiers and time increments could be much better explained, but I found that just going with what makes the most sense works fine the vast majority of the time.

Another thing Mongoose's version does that many seemed to hate in older versions, characters no longer die during character creation. Now they can receive serious injuries that lower attributes, by a lot, and have a number of other results, such as being forced out of the service.

Or you can do what I have always done, ignored such results, I am only interested in characters that finish their service successfully.

 

[Wik]

Thanks Treebore. I'm actually curious about Mongoose Traveller - is it just mechanics, or does it go into the setting a bit?

From my understanding, the core imperium setting was rather high tech, but then Traveller: The New Era sort of blew the setting up, and turned it into a sort of post-apocalyptic western? Where does Mongoose Traveller fall on that scale?

I ask because, ideally, I'd like to try a game that is a good cross of Firefly, Shadowrun, and Mad Max. Because that game would be awesome.

A few other questions on Mongoose Traveller. How does it handle the PCs' starting ship? Is it similar to TNE's method (where each PC gets ship points, and these are combined to figure out what sort of ship the group starts with)? Or is it more of a GM fiat sort of thing? Also, how does Mongoose's version handle non-human PCs? Cybernetics? Psionics?

 

[Wik]

Must spread more XP, apparently!

Traveller: a game system of three decades of promise and zero of delivery

Unfortunately, that's sort of how I'm looking at TNE right now. I can't possibly see how the core mechanic in that version could be fun (roll under the skill on a d20 - after multiplying the skill based on difficulty).

Sorry, couldn't resist. I always loved the system, bought most of the material through 1985 or so. But in the end, I had more fun designing ships and creating characters than actually playing the game.

Again, that's sort of how TNE strikes me. No ship design rules that I can see, though - maybe I haven't really leafed through the book enough.

Fire-fly is a good setting though that provides lots of possibilities. From what you described of your interests, you could try traveller with a skill resolution system stolen from some other setting. The d20 sci-fi settings (including the Firefly one) aren't going to meet your career track interests.

I have the Firefly setting (it isn't d20, but uses the cortex system) and while I do enjoy it, I really like the idea of the career track, as it sort of forces the player to think about his character, and discourages the idea of the "build" that I generally hate in many RPGs.

Somehow doing traveller using Shadowrun's core mechanic would be fun, but I imagine it would take a BUTTLOAD of work.

 

[Wik]

I've never played, but that is all I have ever read or heard about Traveller - all the fun is in making characters but a campaign never seems to every play out. I really need to roll up a character and not play - you know, for Gamer Cred.

Yeah, making characters is a doozy. As is making up homeworlds. Just flipping through TNE has really got my creative juices flowing... although the two included adventures leave something to be desired (super railroady, not well thought out, and violent in a bad way)

 

[darjr]

Mongoose also has a group character creation mechanic that can tie your party together in really great ways.

The last time I was in group party character generation we ended up with a pirate that was a washed up marine, his buddy marine whom he met in boot camp and eventually saved his life when the marines raided his pirate 'cove', a navy lawyer that defended the pirate and cleared him in court using less than squeaky clean means and lost his license because of it. The commander of the previously mentioned marines unit joined our party as well.

 

[billd91]

Again, that's sort of how TNE strikes me. No ship design rules that I can see, though - maybe I haven't really leafed through the book enough.

You probably need the Fire, Fusion, and Steel sourcebook for that. I think that's where the TNE equipment design rules ended up for the most part.

TNE was the edition of Traveller that, for me, took the wind out of the sails. The mechanical change to Twilight 2000's system and the overall setting change pretty much killed my interest for a while. I stuck with MegaTraveller. And then GDW died casting Traveller adrift on the seas of mechanical changes leading to T4, GURPS, d20, and finally Mongoose.