Traveller: the iconic science fiction roleplaying game

Not DnD is a weekly show discussing tabletop roleplaying games. In September we are looking at tabletop RPGs for a sci-fi setting!

Traveller is a long-beloved science fiction roleplaying game first published in 1977. The game has had several editions published over it's almost 50 year history, including GURPS and d20. It's difficult to discuss sci-fi ttrpgs without mentioning this iconic game.

The Traveller Core Rulebook Update 2022 by Mongoose publishing provided new careers, equipment, hazards, world creation, psionics and shipbuilding. Come learn more about Mongoose Traveller 2nd Edition with Matt and Chris from Mongoose Publishing on this weeks (29th September) episode of Not DnD.


Not DnD is a weekly show discussing tabletop roleplaying games. Each week EN Publishing’s @tabletopjess interviews the creators behind different tabletop roleplaying games that aren’t D&D!

You can watch the live recording every Monday at 5pm ET / 10pm BST on YouTube or Twitch, or listen on the podcast platform of your choice.

We've had many other sci-fi TTRPGs on Not DnD over the last three years such as Salvage Union, Terminal, Orbital Blues, You're In Space and Everything is F***ed, Day Trippers, Alien, Paranoia, Blade Runner, Star Trek Adventures, and Dune.

You can watch any of these previous interviews on youtube here. Or listen to the podcast episodes here.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Oh...yeah... I kinda blocked that freight part from my mind but I know exactly what you are talking about. Not only did some of my early groups abandon any adventure as "too dangerous to risk our mortgaged ship" but figuring out caro/goods/lots/planet markets ate so much game time...

Yeah, the best version of Traveller if you enjoyed that aspect of the game was the classic videogame Sundog, where the computer handled all that stuff for you, leaving you with just having to get the cargo across space on a barely functional bucket of bolts.

 

[rgard]

I'm not saying that Classic will be different, that's why I want to dive in and give it a read.

But I've been marked for life by the rules for freight notably. I don't have the book in front of me, but I remember us going through a list of modifiers (number of parsecs, type of worlds, etc) adding that and roll 2D6 to see how many lots of freight were available. You did this three times, once for each size (major, minor, incidental). A bit tedious but it's okay. And then it suggested rolling to determine how many tons each lot were. The thing is that when we played it, the 2D6 gave us something like twenty-seven major lots available. There's no way they're asking me to roll twenty-seven times to determine the size of each lot.

I asked around, most of the answers I had from experienced players were "yep, that's it". Most told me to roll it in advance, or use some online tools. And a minority of people told me they were rolling once for all the Major cargos and it was the size of all major cargos, which seemed to be counter to what the system is trying to achieve (cargos of different sizes and having to make decisions).

Yes, lots of rolls, but how else are you going to end up selling F-16s to farmers on an airless world at a 300% mark up?

 

[overgeeked]

Yeah. Roll things ahead of time or make a spreadsheet to do it for you. You can also just not play it as a space trucker game. Lots of other ways to go.

If you're going to dig into Classic Traveller, I'd suggest the original 1977 version. It's much better and more streamlined than anything that came after. Over time they follow the typical pattern of editions in that they add mechanics for a wider and wider swath of things. The differences between even the 1977 and 1981 editions are enough to push the original 1977 version to the top, for me.

 

[Jeffzilla]

But I've been marked for life by the rules for freight notably. I don't have the book in front of me, but I remember us going through a list of modifiers (number of parsecs, type of worlds, etc) adding that and roll 2D6 to see how many lots of freight were available. You did this three times, once for each size (major, minor, incidental). A bit tedious but it's okay. And then it suggested rolling to determine how many tons each lot were. The thing is that when we played it, the 2D6 gave us something like twenty-seven major lots available. There's no way they're asking me to roll twenty-seven times to determine the size of each lot.

Oh...yeah... I kinda blocked that freight part from my mind but I know exactly what you are talking about. Not only did some of my early groups abandon any adventure as "too dangerous to risk our mortgaged ship" but figuring out caro/goods/lots/planet markets ate so much game time...

This is 100% valid and I remember it being a slog in some of my Traveller campaigns.

But then I had other groups of players who seized on the cargo mechanic and had fun tracking it the same way that some D&D players enjoy managing copper and silver pieces and calculating encumbrance.

I think it kind of depends-- if you have players who are willing to embrace the trade aspect of the game and manage that piece themselves, it can be okay. I was never that guy but thankfully in a few of our games I had players who were eager to step up and run that minigame themselves so that I never had to.

 

[payn]

This is 100% valid and I remember it being a slog in some of my Traveller campaigns.

But then I had other groups of players who seized on the cargo mechanic and had fun tracking it the same way that some D&D players enjoy managing copper and silver pieces and calculating encumbrance.

I think it kind of depends-- if you have players who are willing to embrace the trade aspect of the game and manage that piece themselves, it can be okay. I was never that guy but thankfully in a few of our games I had players who were eager to step up and run that minigame themselves so that I never had to.

Yeap, I knew a few that loved that granular aspect. I just felt it was too distracting from what I wanted to do which was adventure. Though, I see some silmilar lines forming like the old school survival sim vs modern adventure plot style of gaming. I think some of the rub here might be that Mongoose didnt do much with the trading aspect from classic Traveller and focused more on PC gen and ship combat as their clean up.

 

[Eyes of Nine]

Good episode @tabletopjess. Really interested in Pioneer - Traveller system seems like it would be a good fit. And I've got a mate who was in our MegaTraveller game who loved Dark Conspiracy. She's not so into ttRPGs anymore - maybe this'll be the work that brings her back!

Does Enemy Within ever have a happy ending? Or is it more like - least sad?

 

[Parmandur]

I spent many, many hours playing Traveller with friends in the late 80s and early 90s. It's hard to understand why Traveller's popularity hasn't persisted and grown the way that D&D's popularity did. I always suspected that it was more than the chance of character death during character creation and that younger characters by default were pretty green and nearly unplayable. When I was a 17-year-old running the game, a 40-something-year-old ex-scout character seemed so old. Now that I'm (mumble, mumble) years old myself, being 40-something doesn't sound half-bad, but the lifeblood of this hobby lies with new gamers, not grognards like me.

Genre alone is a major part: Fantasy in general is way more popular than science fiction, particularly the gritty Hard approach Traveller embraces.

 

[Mongoose_Matt]

Does Enemy Within ever have a happy ending? Or is it more like - least sad?

When we were teenagers, the whole party turned to Chaos and doomed the Empire...

Hoping this time round it goes better!

 

[pemerton]

I'm not saying that Classic will be different, that's why I want to dive in and give it a read.

But I've been marked for life by the rules for freight notably. I don't have the book in front of me, but I remember us going through a list of modifiers (number of parsecs, type of worlds, etc) adding that and roll 2D6 to see how many lots of freight were available. You did this three times, once for each size (major, minor, incidental). A bit tedious but it's okay. And then it suggested rolling to determine how many tons each lot were. The thing is that when we played it, the 2D6 gave us something like twenty-seven major lots available. There's no way they're asking me to roll twenty-seven times to determine the size of each lot.

I asked around, most of the answers I had from experienced players were "yep, that's it". Most told me to roll it in advance, or use some online tools. And a minority of people told me they were rolling once for all the Major cargos and it was the size of all major cargos, which seemed to be counter to what the system is trying to achieve (cargos of different sizes and having to make decisions).

This is pretty similar (not identical) in Classic Traveller.

The player of the ship owner/captain in my Classic game has complained about the accounting aspect - and he's a pretty experienced RPGer/wargmaer/Civilization player. I (as GM) have a spreadsheet to keep track of his crew salary payments.

But I think that Traveller would really benefit from a more abstract wealth/resources system. Counting credits isn't that much fun.

 

[zarionofarabel]

Counting credits isn't that much fun.

I beg to differ! Whilst I do understand the reason why folks like abstract wealth systems, and appreciate their user friendly applications, I have kind of always preferred actual bean counting. I love knowing that I have exactly 1,236,432 beans! Their my beans! It's just not the same when I have [insert statistical range] of beans. It just doesn't have the same ring to it!