Traveller - Some Guidance, please?

[Shades of Green]

I'll second the reccomendation of Mongoose Traveller. It is essentially a streamlined, modernized version of Classic Traveller, quite rules-light (ALL the rules you need to play fit into a 180-page hardcover) and quite easy to learn and play.

And yes, the character creation rules are excellent. LOTS of options, and you can tailor them to your setting by simply re-writing the event tables and/or the rank names.

You can definitely use the TNE background with the Mongoose rules. If you intend to use the TNE setting, you should consider buying the Path of Tears sourcebook, which is (IIRC) available from DTRPG for cheap. Of course, you can also build your own background - Mongoose Traveller has all the tools you need to build a very good setting of your own.

 

[WayneLigon]

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?

Most people ignore that such a thing ever happened. The GURPS Traveller universe, for instance, is an alternate timeline where the assassination never takes place. I'm pretty sure Mongoose uses the Classic Era, 1105, as it's base.

 

[Treebore]

Mongoose Traveller goes back to just prior to the 4th Frontier War (or is it 5th? Not sure.) Anyways, no Virus, no assassinations, etc... Much truer to the Classic version.

After 25 years my Traveller has deviated so far from "canon" I don't worry about what that is anymore.

Mongoose also offers a point buy system for character creation as well. Plus they also offer another way to make sure a party is well rounded, skills wise.

As for successful campaigns, I have ran at least 8 over the last 25 years, and am currently on the 4th session of my newest one. Best of all, it is with two of my kids!

 

[Treebore]

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?

One of the cool things about the Imperium is different sectors have different tech levels, over all I think the Imperium averages TL 13, as do most fo the other races, with some notable exceptions, like the Darrians have a super weapon that destroys several systems in one explosion. Fortunately the horror of their discovering that technology has made them over all pacifists, and they guard that technology zealously.

I have also ran a campaign in a system that is still lost to the Imperium, and is at an average TL of 12. So you can also use such an idea to run any idea you have and still have it tentatively tied to the Imperium, but still completely separate to it.

One seriously lacking thing about Traveller, even though Mongoose has addressed this somewhat, is that cybernetics is not well fleshed out, but they have enough there that you can create further needed gear to make ideas from Shadowrun work.

Mongoose as probably the best, most through, Psionics system Traveller has ever had, except for maybe the Psionics Insitute resource from T4, and GURPS was awesome, because that is how GURPS works with all its universal stuff.

As for ships, characters can get ship shares as part of their retirement benefits, also depending on what career they had. Each share is worth 1% of the ships ownership, so no group will ever have 100 shares with which to outright own a ship, so they will always have a mortgage on their ship. Mongoose offers both a simplified way to track mortgages, and you can get into serious banking rules if you want.

Also, your the GM, so you can handle their having a ship however you wish.

 

[Treebore]

You will likely find a thread in the "Other RPG's" forum on Traveller books of use to you.

Plus you sound like you don't know about an offer that has been up since April, but expires on December 11th:

CT-ST-Starter Traveller - Game Designers' Workshop (GDW) | DriveThruRPG.com

 

[Bluenose]

In my opinion, the original Classic Traveller mechanics were quite clunky. While almost everything worked the same fundamental way (2d6+skill) different skills had different target numbers, modifiers, some told you to add characteristics and some didn't. DGP developed their task system which streamlined this massively, and GDW integrated it into MegaTraveller. A lot of people didn't like MT because of the setting changes, and also some very significant mechanical changes to do with vehicles and equipment. TNE changed the setting much more drastically, and for a lot of people altered the rules in ways that were unfortunate. T4 went back in some ways to the MT system, but returned the setting to the start of the 3rd Imperium, and was very badly edited. GURPS Traveller, was, welll, GURPS. T20 was Traveller with the D20 system, set aound 1000 when the Solomani Rim War was in full flow but not in that sector. Mongoose Traveller uses something very close to CT rules with the task system, takes it back to the original setting, makes character generation a little more involved, and is pretty good. And T5 is a mythical beast, which is just around the corner, or not.

Then there are the variants.

 

[Smeelbo]

Traveller T20, GURPS, alternately Diaspora

I've played a fair amount of Traveller T20 and highly recommend it. They do a very good job of re-implementing character generation, and the result is parties that vary from 4th to 11th level, and it works. There are enough skills so that one character could never master them all, or even half of them, so all characters have a role to play. And it doesn't matter what level you are if you are hit by a plasma cannon.

GURPS Traveller is a great source of reference material. Not a fan of GURPS mechanically, but there is a lot of quite useful published material.

For hard sci-fi RPG, I greatly prefer Diaspora. Just enough mechanics to work, and to flow well.

Smeelbo

 

[Treebore]

In my opinion, the original Classic Traveller mechanics were quite clunky. While almost everything worked the same fundamental way (2d6+skill) different skills had different target numbers, modifiers, some told you to add characteristics and some didn't.

That was more a presentation and explanation problem. Some skills inherently start out as easy to do. Some inherently are always difficult, and they did a poor job of explaining that.

 

[Treebore]

For hard sci-fi RPG, I greatly prefer Diaspora. Just enough mechanics to work, and to flow well.

Smeelbo

I've been considering getting the Mongoose Traveller version.

 

[The Shaman]

In my opinion, the original Classic Traveller mechanics were quite clunky. While almost everything worked the same fundamental way (2d6+skill) different skills had different target numbers, modifiers, some told you to add characteristics and some didn't. DGP developed their task system which streamlined this massively, and GDW integrated it into MegaTraveller.

I don't care for any of the 'universal' skill systems because they devalued a number of skills in order to make them all fit one rule. It reduces competence by trying to make everything in the universe one-size-fits-all.