Well, a lot of it was in the 70's actually.... I think I literally bought the first printing of the LBBs. I recall getting a map of the Spinward Marches from someplace eventually, but we were honestly never super big on the whole Third Imperium as a thing. It was more "random walk" sort of play.
I got it in the late 70s - I think I'm a second printing (I don't think first printings made it to Australia). But I didn't play it until the 80s.
The Third Imperium is of zero interest to me. What's the point of playing a system that is so strong on just-in-time setting and setting element generation, if you're going to go with a pre-packaged setting?
For me, at least, a real strength of Classic Traveller is its variety of systems for creating content during the course of play - starship encounters, on-world encounters, new worlds, patrons, presence (or not) of the Pisonics Institute - and integrating these into the unfolding situation.
Gotcha, Traveller certainly gives you tools for creating content. I like the Third Imperium because it provides a skeleton, which I need, because im not very good at making a whole world from scratch.
Yeah, though I think @werecorpse (interesting moniker) has a good point. Those systems, and the core rules in general, are really designed around the whole "long established society" and other elements that are present in the Third Imperium setting. So, for instance if you were to posit a de novo expansion into unexplored space, you would pretty much need to strip away (or not get to use) the portions related to civilization and such (IE there would only be virgin worlds, you could generate their physical elements with the world generation system, but the social/political elements wouldn't apply). It would be a bit harder to swallow the 'pseudo feudal' social milieu as well, though I suppose it would be more a matter of spinning it a certain way vs it being unusable. Likewise character generation might need to be at least reflavored a bit.
Yeah, though I think @werecorpse (interesting moniker) has a good point. Those systems, and the core rules in general, are really designed around the whole "long established society" and other elements that are present in the Third Imperium setting. So, for instance if you were to posit a de novo expansion into unexplored space, you would pretty much need to strip away (or not get to use) the portions related to civilization and such (IE there would only be virgin worlds, you could generate their physical elements with the world generation system, but the social/political elements wouldn't apply). It would be a bit harder to swallow the 'pseudo feudal' social milieu as well, though I suppose it would be more a matter of spinning it a certain way vs it being unusable. Likewise character generation might need to be at least reflavored a bit.
That's cool. I think its a system that is perfectly capable of being adapted to various milieu, though I think some will work better than others. I would have thought the 6th Century might even be a more parallel scenario to the Game's standard setting and genre.
