Payn's Ponderings Traveller Settings

[Eyes of Nine]

The changes are documents in this book: Classic Traveller-CT-SS4- The Lost Rules Special Supplement - Game Designers' Workshop (GDW) | Classic Traveller | DriveThruRPG.com

Ah, got this recently in a Humble Bundle or Bundle of Holding, but haven't read it yet.

 

[pemerton]

Ah, got this recently in a Humble Bundle or Bundle of Holding, but haven't read it yet.

I got that bundle, mostly for the Alien modules - which I've been curious about for decades but have never read before.

 

[cowpie]

I typically use the Spinward Marches circa 1110 as a go to setting, because:
a) I like it -- it's got variety (hi tech developed worlds, low tech backwaters, military and political intrigue, a frontier to explore, and the spinward main.
b) It's easy for one-shots -- Traveller is an alternate game to "try out" for most people I game with, so the ready made setting is convenient
c) I know it well -- this makes it easy to improvise things, like travelling to worlds I have little or no prep for during one-shots.

I have made original settings though. These include a future earth setting, where a Terran Empire has splintered, and numerous successor states are reforming. I set mine in a no-man's land between two larger states, filled with independent worlds, and many client states, including some alien races, who are playing to the two powers off each other, while attempting to maintain their independence.

I've also done a lot of mini-campaigns in limited settings, including: a short campaign on a prison planet, a campaign centered on marooned colonists trying to escape from a "death world", TL9-10 traders plying the sublight spaceways in a Jovian system, a star trek style exploration mission "beyond the frontier", a military wargame where the players made naval crew running a cruiser, and military crew to play when conducting a landing operation, and PCs on a 21st century earth exploration ship to Alpha Centauri waking up centuries past their arrival date, and exploring strange 2001 A Space Odyssey type phenomena.

 

[payn]

I've also done a lot of mini-campaigns in limited settings, including: a short campaign on a prison planet, a campaign centered on marooned colonists trying to escape from a "death world", TL9-10 traders plying the sublight spaceways in a Jovian system, a star trek style exploration mission "beyond the frontier", a military wargame where the players made naval crew running a cruiser, and military crew to play when conducting a landing operation, and PCs on a 21st century earth exploration ship to Alpha Centauri waking up centuries past their arrival date, and exploring strange 2001 A Space Odyssey type phenomena.

I've done most of these, but not any military campaign. Not sure why, but armies and navies dont seem to speak to me as something I want to run/play. I am interested in the merc stuff that Mongoose is dropping soon. So, maybe im ready to take a step in that direction.

 

[cowpie]

In my military game, it was kind of a structured RP "Kriegspiel" which I modeled after the way more complicated RPG "Burning Empires". The PCs were conducting an operation against an enemy forces that functioned as "fronts" from Apocalypse World. The players had scouts they could send out to gather intelligence, play out scenes, then make military moves over the course of operational turns. The enemy had a plan which could react to the players' decisions. RP adventures took place during key events, and the results would affect the success or failure of the overall military campaign. It was hard to run, but fun.
I have done some mercenary one-shots, but those were novelty one-off sessions that put the PCs in situations with unusual sci-fi encounters -- the military operations weren't always the main focus of play. Kind of like a game of Aliens, the PCs are marines, but it's really about the horror/alien situation they're in.

 

[payn]

In my military game, it was kind of a structured RP "Kriegspiel" which I modeled after the way more complicated RPG "Burning Empires". The PCs were conducting an operation against an enemy forces that functioned as "fronts" from Apocalypse World. The players had scouts they could send out to gather intelligence, play out scenes, then make military moves over the course of operational turns. The enemy had a plan which could react to the players' decisions. RP adventures took place during key events, and the results would affect the success or failure of the overall military campaign. It was hard to run, but fun.
I have done some mercenary one-shots, but those were novelty one-off sessions that put the PCs in situations with unusual sci-fi encounters -- the military operations weren't always the main focus of play. Kind of like a game of Aliens, the PCs are marines, but it's really about the horror/alien situation they're in.

Nice. Starship battle is not my strongest piece of Traveller referee space. So, I have not gotten into anything more than a trader or two, maybe a few harriers. Usually, frontier SDBs and pirate craft mostly. I like spaceship combat because its a team game for the players, but I dont want to bog down the session for it either.

 

[cowpie]

Yeah, Traveller Mercenary combat can divert the focus of play more into wargaming that RPing, esp. some of Frank Chadwick's rules sets like Twilight 2000 did, or trying to use Striker to play Traveller miniatures combats. My game had some simplified combat rules that interacted more with the RPing "scenes" that played out, because the players were there for RPing over playing a military simulation (though some were wargamers).

 

[dragoner]

Classic's Mercenary Book 4, has abstract rules for large unit combat. When I was young, we raised a mercenary company, and the ref had us roll up all the 250 troops by hand at the table, the four of us players became very good at rolling up characters.

 

[cowpie]

Well, character generation was kind of a dice mini game . That's 250 times the fun!

 

[aramis erak]

I used the Traveller wiki for my breakdowns.

The Wiki has issues with a bad actor editing. There are still efforts ongoing to undo said person's damage...

The changes are documents in this book: Classic Traveller-CT-SS4- The Lost Rules Special Supplement - Game Designers' Workshop (GDW) | Classic Traveller | DriveThruRPG.com

Lost Rules only lists the major items. there are many changes not in it.

Nice. Starship battle is not my strongest piece of Traveller referee space. So, I have not gotten into anything more than a trader or two, maybe a few harriers. Usually, frontier SDBs and pirate craft mostly. I like spaceship combat because its a team game for the players, but I dont want to bog down the session for it either.

I recommend using Mayday for ship combat if you want anything vaguely realistic and yet playable on a typical dining table...