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Adrian George
United States
San Antonio
Texas
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I have an interest in learning more and playing Traveller, but I'm very confused about where to start. Which books should i be getting, how are the non-corebooks organized? Also, it's important to me that what is being recommended currently be in print. I don't have the time to track down old books, even if it was a better system. I do mean litterally in print, for at least corebooks I need a physical copy i can read, supplements it's less important.
I've seen aramis mention the game several times, so i suspect he'll have plenty to say.
I look forward to the groups replies.
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James Lowry
United States
Sunnyvale
California
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Insisting on 'in print' narrows the field quite a bit.
Mongoose Traveller is (as far as I understand) in print and coming out with new books. The main rules are not meant for use exclusively with the Traveller setting, but I believe tend to make assumptions based on it (in the nature of FTL drive ect). Other settings are available for it.
I've yet to pick it up, so that's all based on my understanding of the situation, and I can't point you at where to go past Traveller.
Previous versions of Traveller (as a system) are all long out of print, with the most recent version dating to the early '90s, though Marc Miller is continuing to work on 5th Edition.
Of the various translations of the Traveller universe to other systems, it seems like T20 The Traveller's Handbook (d20) and Traveller Hero are gone (last isn't in the DB; it did come out, right?). GURPS Traveller is out of print, but available in PDF form, along with many of the supplement books. GURPS Traveller: Interstellar Wars is reported as 'low stock' at SJG, but is technically 'in print', and explores a different era in the universe than had been done previously.
The upshot is, if you want it as SF-RPG system, go for the Mongoose system. It's the first one meant to be generally applicable in quite a while. If you want the setting, Mongoose is also about your only choice, but my understanding is that they are making changes that will earn the ire of older fans (so be prepared to run into that).
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Andy Leighton
England
Peterborough
Unspecified
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You just need the core rulebook.
You can download past editions of Signs & Portents which have free adventures as well as some other stuff (rules, aliens, careers, planets, ships, gear), plus the Living Traveller adventures.
This will give you more than enough to get going.
Then it depends on your players. Go for the books that suit the kind of game your players want to play. If military, then Mercenary might be helpful for example.
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Jeff Johnson
United States
Harrisonburg
Virginia
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If you get only one book... then get the "real thing".
http://www.travellerrpg.com/cgi-bin/catalog/pview.pl?action=...=
That price is a steal... and you get the original books 1-3 in an easy-to-use format. This contains really everything you need to know about the game.
I will point out the main things you need to see to appreciate this:
* The character creation system produces Firefly type charcters. But yes... you'd need the "Citizens of the Imperium" supplement to make the Doctor technically. But who'd want to play *him*?!
* You can die in char-gen, yes! But this can be a good thing if you have pitiful stats. Try going for a 6 term Scout if you hate your attributes.... Death is also a balancing factor. The guys with good stats won't necessarily push for as many terms as possible if they like their character. This prevents the entire party being made up of people in their forties...!
* The ship design and combat rules are dated and practically unusable, IMO. However... no iteration of the Traveller space combat system is worth playing anyway. If you want a real war game, go play Star Fleet Battles or CAR WARS or something. Besides... if the ship blows up, you have to roll up more characters and start over-- so focus on cinematic space threats instead of tactical ones.... (FYI, High Guard is the de factor Traveller ship design system, but playing fleet battles with it is about as much fun as watchin paint dry.)
* The world generation system is classic. Yeah yeah, you end up with garden worlds with no people and airless planets with trillions of people... and no one can really tell you what Tech Level actually means... but you can roll up a subsector in less than an hour. As with the character generation system, just a few die rolls and the sparse information just starts implying all sorts of history and setting stuff. (I let characters roll up their homeworld as we go... and then work the world into the setting afterwards... this is compelling even to non-gamers and people that are committed to other systems.)
* Finally... avoid Traveller online communities at all costs. Just pick a game and play it and make it up yourself. Due to the gigantic setting and several longstanding rules ambiguities, you will come across some confusing things once in a while. Just make something up that fits your campaign and move on. Do not ask for advice online. While there are some pretty awesome grognards that do all kinds of cool things with the game, the flame wars that a new Traveller gamer will inevitably (and accidentally) spawn are simply not worth anyone's time.
Good luck!
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Chris Tannhauser
United States
San Diego
California
Callisto 1 Mission Log, Day 3,125: I swear to god, if Logan does that spoon tapping thing again I will use it to dig his other eye out of his head. Also, the toilets stopped working sometime last month. Probably should've mentioned that first.
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Mongoose Traveller looks like it's in print & available. All you need to get started is the core rulebook:
Traveller Core Rulebook or the Pocket Edition (Amazon links).
That should give you everything you need to roll up characters, equip them, get them in a starship and roll up systems for them to find trouble in.
If you want a pre-fab sector to run around in you can get The Spinward Marches (Amazon link).
How the other books in Mongoose Traveller are grouped I don't know for sure -- in the old game Books were optional core rules while Supplements were full of helpful stuff you could really make up yourself if you were so inclined.
The core rules + Spinward Marches should be more than enough to get you going.
Hope this helps & have fun!
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Art Gorski
United States
Prescott
Arizona
Get my Mac software for Classic Traveller at http://naasirka.weebly.com/
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Marc Miller, the original developer of Traveller, soldiers on as:
http://www.farfuture.net/
There are hard copy reprints of the original books as well as a CD-ROM of PDFs, which is nice if you can put them on a laptop and search for terms during play as you need them.
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Chris Tannhauser
United States
San Diego
California
Callisto 1 Mission Log, Day 3,125: I swear to god, if Logan does that spoon tapping thing again I will use it to dig his other eye out of his head. Also, the toilets stopped working sometime last month. Probably should've mentioned that first.
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agorski wrote: Marc Miller, the original developer of Traveller, soldiers on as: http://www.farfuture.net/There are hard copy reprints of the original books as well as a CD-ROM of PDFs, which is nice if you can put them on a laptop and search for terms during play as you need them.
Wow! Yeah -- this would be the way to go:
http://www.farfuture.net/hardcopy.html
Get The Books 0-8 and The Supplements 1-13 (in two volumes for $28 & $35) and you're good to go.
Wow. Had no idea this was out there.
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Jason Smith
United States
Capitola
California
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Rindis wrote: Insisting on 'in print' narrows the field quite a bit. Mongoose Traveller is (as far as I understand) in print and coming out with new books. The main rules are not meant for use exclusively with the Traveller setting, but I believe tend to make assumptions based on it (in the nature of FTL drive ect). Other settings are available for it. I've yet to pick it up, so that's all based on my understanding of the situation, and I can't point you at where to go past Traveller. Previous versions of Traveller (as a system) are all long out of print, with the most recent version dating to the early '90s, though Marc Miller is continuing to work on 5th Edition. Of the various translations of the Traveller universe to other systems, it seems like T20 The Traveller's Handbook (d20) and Traveller Hero are gone (last isn't in the DB; it did come out, right?). GURPS Traveller is out of print, but available in PDF form, along with many of the supplement books. GURPS Traveller: Interstellar Wars is reported as 'low stock' at SJG, but is technically 'in print', and explores a different era in the universe than had been done previously. The upshot is, if you want it as SF-RPG system, go for the Mongoose system. It's the first one meant to be generally applicable in quite a while. If you want the setting, Mongoose is also about your only choice, but my understanding is that they are making changes that will earn the ire of older fans (so be prepared to run into that).
Mongoose Traveller is very much in print. There are currently 54 Traveller books available from Mongoose with more on the way. Many are hard back. So far, settings include Third Imperium, Judge Dread, Strontium Dog, and Hammers Slammers. The website is mongoosepublishing.com
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Andy Leighton
England
Peterborough
Unspecified
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atilla66 wrote:
Mongoose Traveller is very much in print. There are currently 54 Traveller books available from Mongoose with more on the way. Many are hard back. So far, settings include Third Imperium, Judge Dread, Strontium Dog, and Hammers Slammers. The website is mongoosepublishing.com
And Reign of Discordia (Traveller)
But even though 54 books sounds like a lot - you don't need them.
Just go for the core rules. Maybe get some setting books. Then just get the books that suit the type of game your players want to play in.
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Adrian George
United States
San Antonio
Texas
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What are the differences between Mongoose and Classic?
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Micki Pool
United States
Tennessee
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I expect you have probably made your decision by now. But just in case....
Actually, with the Mongoose system, if you want to run it, unless you have a sector system written up, you need the core rulebook and whatever book they put the world-creation rules in. I tried to roll up a character using the Mongoose system and ran into several problems (some of which were typos--I was using the 1st edition book, which have supposedly been fixed in later editions); the main problem is that characters must have a home-world (complete with a Universal World Profile) in order to make up a character. Of course, you can skip this step, but the characters won't have as many skills as other characters created with the Mongoose random system.
"What are the differences between Mongoose and Classic?"
A friend of mine, in answer to that question from me, replied, "It's Traveller [Classic] light." In the original Traveller system (CT), characters could die in the creation process--useful, as someone earlier pointed out, if you had a character with awful stats. But CT also suggested having a failed 'survival' roll indicate the character was injured rather than killed. I actually did that with one of my characters--he was injured in a zero-G training class and his time in the hospital got him interesting in the medical-branch of the service he was in (navy, I think). CT left a lot up to the GM's discretion. IMHO, the Mongoose system character-creation/generation system is overly-complicated, but not much different except that characters don't die in the creation process. The other is that the 'aging' roll doesn't affect the character stats as much as in the old system.
The other changes I've noticed don't seem to stream-line anything, but I haven't actually play-tested the system. It looks as though Mongoose tried to update it a little bit (when CT was written, a small computer took up a room, and programs were itty-bitty compared to today's programs; there were no personal computers). So far, I prefer the old character-creation system and the old merchant ship-savings program (sorry, a 30-year note on a 40-year-old Free Trader seems silly to me), although I do like the idea that a used ship might have updates or problems, and the events-table helps out players who don't have tons of imagination.
Whichever system you choose, the important thing is to have fun, and don't let the rules get in the way of that.
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