How is pic related? It seems really fun, but I know Traveller fits into the same niche and probably has more players

I played quite a few games with with and its pretty good.
Its not as expansive as gurps but its not as simple as DnD either.

I think that Traveller emphasizes characters with a professional niche, while SWN is more about space opera type action where high technology is a background element to an action oriented adventure story.

Both are pretty good. If I wanted to run a gritty heinlein-esque adventure tale about a bunch of competent rogues, I'd use Traveller. If I wanted Barbarella or Star Wars, I'd use SWN.

The world-building tools are pretty nifty, even if the D&D-like system is rather uninspired.

I found it really interesting that the designer Kevin Crawford has admitted several time that he specifically designs his supplements so they can be ripped out and used for another system. And, moreover, the reason the base system coheres so closely to AD&D is so that a DM can grab existing modules and run them with minimal homebrewing-- you could plop Tomb of Horrors down on a planet and just refluff the demilich as an unbraked AI and such.

In particular, I've appreciated the Faction system from the CRB + Starvation Cheap to run a 40k game where PC's are generals throwing Imperial Guard regiments at a newly discovered star cluster in need of some good ol' fashioned purging.

Wow, the Suns of Gold book has a lot of great stuff in it. Never really thought mercantile missions could be fun but it's giving me a lot of ideas.

Yup, the designer is a cool guy. The sups are awesome, like holy shit they burst with ideas.

If you think he's cool now, wait until you see his kickstarters. Sane goals, stretch goals to release artwork for other people to use, regularly finishing up before the deadline...

And yeah, dude occasionally does style guides (how to make your product look like X-era TSR!) and that's not enough, they have to be free, and well why not make them actual good modules or entire fucking games while he's at it?

Crawford's really good.

Do you guys just use the sector generator? It seems really useful since you have a nice organized map of the whole thing.

I'm just looking at the planet tags it generated to get a feel what each one might be like and what potential adventures they could have. Is that the right way to do this? I know it's a sandbox game so I want to avoid the traditional kind of prep.

I kind of want them to just point their ship in a direction and go.

The sector generator is nuts. With a fast roll and perhaps touching the position of a few systems (I use traveller system caped at tech12, so jumps over three are rare) you have very cool pulp style world than only need a bit of fluffing to use. For example, the system than conects all the other parts Orthinya, (Circe)is habitated be a failed colony of edgy cultist and evildoers wtih automated defense than shot any space ship. So to get between the worlds you have to pass a gauntlet of crazies than hate any outsider because they are very vulnerable to outsider disaes, controlled be an hominous entity than wants to protect a relic of earth.
You barely have to do anything, only to concrete things and conect some dots for the style of game you want and start playing.

I really want to try implementing a few things I'm SWN:

-D&D 5e's advantage/disadvantage system in SWN

-Some perks or "feats", or at least a way for characters to be able to do a bit more diversity. Nothing too horrible like 3.x/Pathfinder.

- I really find the Expert class to be a bit too broad; maybe also use 5e's archetype shtick?

Got the PDF, generated a sector and sent my players some info. Getting hyped!

I love the flavor and feel of Traveller, but the rules are a little clunky for me (as well as being spread through dozens of splats).

I also kinda feel like the aliens are a bit uninspired.

Conversely, with SWN, everything sounds awesome, but I found charger creation and the three classes a bit underwhelming.

Is it worth it? Are there any other alternatives to Traveller if I want a functional, integrated trading system?

Why not play Traveller with SWN's trading rules?

Weird Frankenstein abominations agent that attractive most of the time. And a trade system, where you're allegedly giving PCs control and responsibility over there own finances, should be written stone. At least, mostly, the stuff that comes up regularly.

I don't rule it out, just, not first choice.

As has been mentioned above, it is perfectly possible to rip out the rules from SWN you like and slap them onto a character generation/task resolution mechanic you enjoy. Kevin Crawford has meticulously made his system a cannibal's delight.

I have plans to hack together a 5e game set in a fantasy 17th century equivalent, using the Starvation Cheap rules to run the armies and the Skyward Steel ones to run the naval battles.

Good God that sounds amazing.

Well, you can use the Cepheus engine for a OSR kinda traveller game and play with the addons than Mister Crawford made.

Bamp. What have you all used it for? What's your favorite piece of the system?

Might as well ask here, does anyone have copies of Starvation Cheap and the Mandate Archive that they're willing to share?

They are in the PDF share thread.
Look a bit, I think they have them in the OSR trove.

I went into the trove, they have some of the mandates by themselves but they don't have Starvation Cheap

>What's your favorite piece of the system?

Tough question. I've used several bits and pieces.

The Faction system in the core book is superb. I've always hated static settings, stuff should be happening all around while the players are doing their thing. I've always tried making coherent changes, keeping track of them, having them interact, etc. but I'd never had any system to help me do that until I saw SWN's Factions. I can't praise it enough.

As with the Factions system, I'll be using Starvation Cheap soon to handle the big picture of a planetary world war while the players are involved in one small corner of it.

The trade system is great too. Most trade systems are 'spreadsheets" - plug in A, adjust by B & C, and return D. A referee has to figure out how to :insert" the players into the process and results. SWN's system "organically" produces adventure seeds as a consequence of trade.

It's in the inbox.

I use the Dead Names book for making terrain encounters and alien/monster cultures for a scifantasy hex crawl.

I looked at Suns Of Gold and there's all kinds of cool shit for making political groups and trade lines regardless of it being in space or not. Would work just as well for an archipelago or making different guilds and powerblocks in a city that I will now use if the players get it together enough.

Yeah, I found it, thanks for pointing me at it.

Any actual plays? I know of the Swan Song one.

Bump of +2 interest