Traveller General--Terran Pride Galaxy Wide Edition

Traveller is a classic science fiction system first released in 1968. In its original release it was a general purpose SF system, but a setting was soon developed called The Third Imperium, based on classic space opera tropes of the 60s, 70s, and 80s, with a slight noir tint.
Though it can support a wide range of game types, the classic campaign involves a group of retired veterans tooling around in a spaceship, taking whatever jobs they can find in a desperate bid to stay in business, a la Firefly or Cowboy Bebop.

Previously on Traveller General: Library Data: Master Archive:
mega.nz/#F!lM0SDILI!ji20XD0i5GTIUzke3iv07Q


Galactic Maps:
travellermap.com/
utzig.com/traveller/iai.shtml

Resources:
1d4chan.org/wiki/Traveller
zho.berka.com/
travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/
wiki.travellerrpg.com/Main_Page
freelancetraveller.com/index.html

Music to Explosive Decompression to:
>Old Timey Space music
youtube.com/watch?v=w34fSnJNP-4&list=RD02FH8lvwXx_Y8
youtube.com/watch?v=w0cbkOm9p1k
youtube.com/watch?v=MDXfQTD_rgQ
youtube.com/watch?v=FH8lvwXx_Y8
>Slough Feg
youtube.com/watch?v=ZM7DJqiYonw&list=PL8DEC72A8939762D4
>Goldsmith - Alien Soundtrack
youtube.com/watch?v=3lAsqdFJbRc&list=PLpbcquz0Wk__J5MKi66-kr2MqEjG54_6s
>Herrmann - The Day the Earth Stood Still
youtube.com/watch?v=3ULhiVqeF5U
>Jean Michel Jarre - Oxygene
youtube.com/watch?v=nz1cEO01LLc
>Tangerine Dream - Hyberborea
youtube.com/watch?v=9LOZbdsuWSg
>Brian Bennett - Voyage
youtube.com/watch?v=1ZioqPPugEI

Other urls found in this thread:

projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/fasterlight.php#id--FTL_Communication--Quantum_Entanglement
projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/stellartrade.php
twitter.com/SFWRedditVideos

As a first question for the thread, how would anons stat out the various polities in Stellaris?

Potential Classic Referee from a little while back.
What have you found are the most useful programs or other resources?

I'm not exactly sure what you mean by this.
Personally this is the only one I use www.spacecorsair.com/wordgen.html

Nice! I like the wordgen. I was actually trying to figure out how in the heck to get across the various languages.

I mostly just use that as a name generator, since it gives words that sound like they should for the particular races.

They're polities, dude. You don't have to stat anything. If anything, you just have to figure out the TL of a planet.

Remember that a planetary TL is the TL of what they can produce right there. Off the top of my head, start at TL 5 and add +1 for every power plant, lab, and other facility on the planet. For big planets you're probably going to sail past TL 15, but the point of this is a rough measure anyway. That's really the only hard part.

No, I mean in terms of 'who gets what ethics' I'm trying to work out which group gets which ethics

Zhodani get Spiritualist Authoritarianism
Solomani get Militarist Xenophobe
Hiver's get Pacifist Xenophile
Aslan get Militarist...
Droyne get Spiritualist Pacifist
Vilani get Materialist...
Darrians get Fanatic Materialist Egalitarianism

Anyone else wanna weigh in on the ethics?

>What have you found are the most useful programs or other resources?

There's a list of resources in the thread's first post and the Freelance site has a section just for software.

As an oldfag, I tend to use software way in the background. That is, for session prep and not during the session itself. There are a lot of wordgens, sysgens, chargens, and whatnot out there. I've toyed with a lot of them and none became "must use/have" tools for me.

I used a program called TableSmith several years ago for a couple of months. It was great for mixing and matching all the various components of rumors.

Finally, COTI is a great resource - especially for classic. There is a waiting period for full membership however, primarily due to some near fatal spam attacks a couple years back.

These threads are good resources too, despite being limited to 2000 character posts. The more questions you ask, the longer this thread will stay alive.

Oh. Why the fuck would you want to do that? You'll get a more interesting galaxy from playing out a century of Stellaris than trying to apply Stellaris stats to the Third Imperium setting.

Or two hundred turns of Endless Space 2, really.

Rate my houserules, Veeky Forums. I always thought Traveller could use a little support for martial arts.

Looks interesting. Which rules set is it for?

Traveller has had a coup de grace action since '77 but you needed a gun or blade. I like your additions.

Mongoose Second Edition. It's newest edition and the one my players would be most likely to read. I don't reckon it'd be too hard to adapt since MgT 2nd is basically CT but shinier.

I'm trying to work on the races for a mod, and wanted some second opinions on the subject

alignments are for sims. If that's what you want, go for it.

...

How many people are using Traveller to run their own homebrew settings? It seemed to be the default setting of CT, and it's probably the best way to go.

I suppose I can answer my own question.

I'm working on my own setting. New, different aliens, more than one major polity per race, a galactic jump point network, and ansibles.

The hard part so far is making up the aliens. I had hoped to have seven to ten alien species in my setting, but there's only so many times I can go thorough the process in GURPS Space before I start wanting to pair it down a bit.

The meta discussion on aliens in Traveller, from an early JTAS I think, is useful reading. For a setting that will just be used for stories, the aliens can be inscrutable as they need to be, want to be, or can be written, as they serve very specific plot purposes.
Aliens for games are different. Players rarely take "and he flies off without answering your question" well, and will do stupid shit with less provocation than anyone would in real life. Aliens need to be more comprehensible so the Ref can run them in unanticipated situations, players can run them, and they can be worked into adventures as more than walk on cliches.

Thus the default group of Traveller aliens: two odd human cultures, two fairly comprehensible major aliens (one of which is an old Terran lift), and two "hard mode" races.

...

A good point, made clearly and succinctly! Nice work, user.

While you've gotten good advice, here's the one I'd throw in.

The Mipedians from Chaotic
Typical bug race except they stand about 2-3 times taller than humans in the least. Most are fanatically loyal to the Queen, your typical 'hive mind'. Except they get some leeway in HOW they carry out their tasks.

In the show, the head of security, or close enough to it, would help out a Human girl by letting her look into crevices and corners for things she found interesting and would pretend to fire on her if she got caught, but she would help him out by getting him things outside the hive or thinking outside the box to cover for his mistakes.

My advice? Drastically scale back your project.

Pretty much everyone has the same reaction when they open Traveller core book(s) for the first time:

"OMG!!! I'm going to stat out an entire galaxy, thousands of systems, dozens of races, hundreds of polities, etc., etc.!!!"

No one ever accomplishes those first huge dreams because they're too damn huge.

Dial it back to a subsector or two, finish that, tackle another pair, finish those, repeat the process, and "nibble" your way to finish line. A friend of mine mapped the Zho Core Route you see at Traveller Map and that's how he managed it. If he'd tried to do it all at once, he never would have finished.

Dial things back and finish something. There's nothing sadder than a huge setting project gathering dust.

Bumper

Huh. Well it's a good reason to go look up those JTAS issues. Thanks user!

I've already got the bug people for my setting, but this sounds pretty cool. I might look up this show.

Yeah, I'm starting to get that. It's hard enough trying to restrain the ansibles in my setting so they mostly work the same way as the telegraph without worrying about goddamn near everything else. So long as there's the "frontier" for my players to play in, I suppose it'll be just fine for the moment.

Ansibles change a lot from the default Traveller approach. Information, intel, and directives are now extending from capital to frontier in short order. The only lag is now resource allocation, ie. fleets, supplies, or the right man for the job.

Right, which is why limiting the ansibles is the hard part. By default Traveller is "Age of Sail IN SPACE", whereas I'm going for "Wild West / Napoleanic Era IN SPACE".

There's a decent amount of technobabble I've made up on this topic, but in short in my setting it works like this:

-Ansibles only work point to point.
-Ansibles are crazy expensive and large.
-Ansibles are sensitive to shock and can be put out of commission for up to a week because of small earthquakes or large explosions in the vicinity.
-The bandwidth on transmissions is fairly low, with the most primitive being essentially a telegraph and the most advanced being equivalent to a 56k line.

With those restrictions it gives me something to work with. First, the Capital of a sector is clearly the place with the ansible array, and probably more than one. Planetary invasions of such places rely heavily on knocking out the ansible and taking the planet before a connection is regained, so the Navy that would otherwise respond has to fight against an entrenched position. Further, the rest of the planets in the sector can only get news to the sector capital as fast as their ship goes, just like in regular Traveller.

Since it requires a high tech base, and I also assume my setting has a galaxy-spanning wormhole network, this allows a more Wild West feel to the galaxy. To get from Earth to the Frontier, you get on a liner through the wormhole, arrive at some far-flung Sector Capital, then hop on a ship and fly out to the unknown. Kind of like getting on a train in New York, riding it to San Francisco, then getting on a horse to find some place in the middle of nowhere in California to call your own. Except, of course, the order of magnitude difference in scale means the frontier will remain the frontier for millenea to come.

Like I said, the hard part is coming up with aliens to populate the galaxy with.

Doing the same within my own game, but with a dark age twist. Warp Gate structures that maintained worm holes allowed for several galactic empires, and were maintained by an enigmatic group who used their knowledge of building gates to rise to power. Eventually leading to a war that left most either destroyed or disabled.

This becomes the catalyst for the collapse of these empires and a seemingly endless dark age as the group maintaining them went further into self exile. Now the working Gates are a source of feudal power struggles within sectors that only have a few, while others are completely cut off with no access to all the resources needed to maintain a galactic presence.

The empires themselves are shells of their former glory, stuck with a few off shoots from still working gates and their core worlds.

I'm sensing a theme. Which is cool because H. Beam Piper was the man.

Go Piper!

So during chargen, if one of the events gives you "you are automatically promoted", do you still roll for advancement afterwards so you can get 2 ranks in a single 4 years period?

Which edition? Parsing rules is hard when we don't know which ones to parse.
And in general, sure, I don't see why not.

>It's hard enough trying to restrain the ansibles

You can nerf them in various ways or, even better, by a combination of ways. While the cost/tech limits are good, the earthquake/shock is less so because you can simply place the equipment in space.

The 100D limit can be another issue. Say that ansible tech is somehow related to jump and wormholes, so any installation has to be beyond any planetary or stellar jump limit. This means that jump masking and shadows would effect the ansible too.

Masking/shadows could also limit the length of any given ansible link. Having to build more intermediate "relay' stations will further limit the number of systems linked together.

This really makes me think of Battletech and Comstar.

I know dick fuck all about Battletech. What's similar about it?

I don't think I've ever played Trav in the default setting.

>So during chargen, if one of the events gives you "you are automatically promoted", do you still roll for advancement afterwards so you can get 2 ranks in a single 4 years period?
We always took it to mean that.

Battletech has a very limited form of FTL communication called Hyperwave Pulse Generators. They're mega-structures that consume continent's worth of power that are built with tech barely anybody knows how to make anymore. The HPGs are operated and maintained by the asshole phone company of the future/cult named Comstar. HPGs have limited bandwidth and ~30 l.y. range.

Huh. I might look it up and raid it for ideas.

In my setting they're just called Subspace Lines. The limitations I made up were mostly inspired by the Atomic Rockets entry on why Quantum Entanglement doesn't quite work as a communication medium: projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/fasterlight.php#id--FTL_Communication--Quantum_Entanglement

The problem in short is that you can send the message, but its in so much static that you can't tell what is and what isn't the signal. So my solution is that there's a timer on the duplicate machines at both ends that time which beats are actual signal as opposed to noise. The timer is the only thing that makes the line work, and it's stupid sensitive because of relativistic effects and the tracking required of the cloud of entangled particles at the heart of the machine. Anything that causes the timers to lose synch causes both machines to stop all transmissions and go through the handshake process, which takes a week minimum. The only two ways to increase bandwidth is to install more machines in parallel, or increase compression of data, both of which have their problems.

There is, at least, serious money to be made in delivering one of the machines from Point A to Point B. A Subspace Line machine is about 2 dTons and looks like an old mainframe computer. The problem is that they want the ship moved on a very specific course to hit a predictable window of time dialation to minimize down time. But hey, who'd want to attack a ship carrying a Capital World's main communication line, clearly flying on a predictable course?

I think damn few people have played the setting AS WRITTEN. For example, I know my groups scrapped CT's original low berth date rates very early on.

I happen to love toying around with nonhuman alien ideas, I've been working on a few for my traveller (orbital) homebrew setting. I'll post a couple and you can hit me up if you want more exposition. I try to keep them internally consistent, but still Weird.

A parasitic fungus, it has a consciousness that spans all of its parts. Gained sapience after infecting intelligent sophonts that were emerging on its world from its prey species. Eventually carpeted its world and flung spores into space to explore, can only communicate through infected (bunch of shit here I am leaving out for brevity). It's curious, benevolent and tries to be pacifist.

An amphibian pseudoshark that's a colony of three macro-cells with various specialized parts, and triangular radial symmetry. Evolved from bottom feeders on a death world that moved to land to get away from oceanic predators. They communicate through biological radio, which is stronger in groups and forms a benevolent collective subconscious. They developed space travel to follow the music of the stars (much mythology involved) and are very social.

I have some humanoids as well, but those are less interesting (to me) but I can do a writeup for the ones I like if you are curious.

Stupid question: how does aiming work with ambushes in mongoose traveller? I mean players can stack up unlimited aimings in combat, one could argue you have time to aim as much as you want when ambushing someone and thus automatically hit them.

...

Just some thoughts:
- Generally, I do agree that melee 'tricks' or talents or whatever are a good addition to the system, especially as ranged combat is so much deadlier/easier. It's not so much for balance as it provides for flavor.
- Multi-attack is redundant, as the mechanics for Dual Weapons (2e core p. 75) cover for that, although I suppose you're just making it explicit (the text implies but does not explicitly specify that the two weapons have to be different).
- Coup de grace: Finisher is not beneficial if you don't have positive bonuses in both STR and DEX. Lowered task difficulty would be more useful here (as extra Effect translates to higher damage anyway). Or you could make Boon explicit or something in this situation.

- Rapid Ready needs to be worded better. Readying/Drawing a weapon, as a minor action, is already less than the smallest timeframe (p. 60). Is it now a free action? If so, does it stack with point shooting for always-on DM+1 aiming? That seems a bit silly
- Point shooting needs to be better written. As it is, one can aim as a minor action and then shoot or draw and shoot. Is point shooting the equivalent of allowing one to aim in the same minor action as drawing?
- Burst attack is overpowered simply because it doubles the action economy of gun users.
- Coup de grace: Reaction shot needs successive DM penalties, else a Traveller will just PGMP everyone in a room one after another.

Otherwise, it's pretty good. I like your take on Duelist using grapple benefits.

Presumably 2e, but p. 72. Maximum of DM+6 to attack for aiming for 6 consecutive minor actions (2 turns if doing nothing else).

You can't aim at a target you cannot see, for one. So they can't just sit there in the bushes collecting Aim.

Also in Mong 2nd Ed at least it says you can only build up to DM+6 by aiming via multiple minor action expenditure.

Speaking of homebrewing, here's some bullshit no one will care about: a (relatively) rules-lite splat for the tabletop Infinity setting (a near-future manga-aesthetic inspired cyberpunk made by Spaniards) using MgT 2e rules.

Seeing as the official Infinity RPG is in production limbo, and that Mophidius essentially just used a converted MgT career path, I thought of doing something similar, but a bit less intrusive.

So essentially I ported over the Special Skills from the tabletop into RPG format as Talents, which are gained via:
1) giving up a benefit roll when mustering out in order to take a Talent (thus you start with less cash/stuff, but with better personal ability)
2) or, meeting more stringent requirements as demanded by specific faction careers.

It's designed to be minimally intrusive, so the rules could be used in different settings and stuff. I've tried to maintain the flavor of the talents, if not their mechanical attributes, but it's a work in (slow) progress.

This is a pretty fun setting, a sort of inverse Shadowrun, where instead of playing as rebels in a vast conspiratorial system, you play (in the tabletop) as the black-ops teams of respective governments keeping the 'peace' by waging shadow wars against everyone.

Also, the AI that controls the politics and economy of Humanity's two greatest powers is basically a doting mother and has a thing for cute robot girls.

Finally! Real input!

I'll have to re-write these and post them after I get off work, but I can give you some idea where I was coming from.

Gun Combat is indeed pretty deadly, and in a system/setting that assumes that when you board a ship there's at least one guy with a sword, it always seemed weird that the rules make this an astonishingly bad idea.

The Gun Combat tricks I'll admit were designed with pistols in mind and nothing else. Having a sword and pistol is an iconic look in a lot of settings and it's only a marginally good idea in Traveller. I didn't even picture anyone using a rifle with these because using a rifle is already fucking awesome, much less a PGMP. Burst Attack in particular was meant to be "I fan the hammer on my revolver" or "I can Mozambique Drill with a pistol"

As a sidenote, I'd also houserule that you can only Aim up to a DM+ (Gun Combat Skill x 2), Minimum DM+1. Nobody with Gun Combat 0 should be able to overcome making a rifle shot at Extreme range. That's just silly.

Those are sweet.
I too love nonhuman aliens.

One I was working on is a little similar to your fungus, but rather than a fungus it functions similar to both a microbe and cancer. So it's less pacifist, but mainly because it just keeps growing.

That pseudoshark species is wicked. I love the music of the stars/spheres concept, particularly when applied to a groups' mythologies and legends.

This user would like moar.

>designed with pistols in mind
Although the MgT 2e weapon traits don't distinguish between rifles and pistols, thankfully the Central Supply Catalog does (p. 108), so I suppose we could limit it to that. Still, I strongly suggest that there be a downside to allowing multiple actions (as per dual wielding), since that's what most strongly breaks the action economy. Traveller already very strongly favors whomever goes first in combat, if someone gets to fire a gauss pistol twice in a round, that can be pretty nasty.

But yeah, you're right, some rules to prop up pistols and melee weapons are sorely needed if the fluff is to match the mechanics.

Then moar I shall dump.

The fungus is still struggling with the concept of a species being multiple individuals. It also affects their neurochemistry such that people it inhabits strongly feel whatever it feels, and try to convey that to their peers using their own language, etc. But that does come with a sublime sense of being a part of something meaningful.

The pseudosharks are tube dwelling and colonial, and a third of their nervous system is 'asleep' at any given time. This sleeping part contributes to the aforementioned collective unconscious, which is a potentially self aware entity in its own right. It's what got them out of the deep water, accelerated their industrial revolution (which happened largely without fire, or wood, since they have no woody plants... but plenty of radioactives) and drove them into the stars. I can't find my notes on their mythology, but it started out as a sun cult that could predict periodic droughts, and went from there.
Also worth noting there's very little argument among them socially, it's very easy for them to bow to the majority because of how they are wired. There's potential for problems once you get out of radio range of the home planet, however...
Reproduction is.... complicated, and social structure is simple majority democracy which is of course influenced by the gestalt. They grow most of their technology out of carefully bred metal-depositing coral like microbes. It's only really feasible to communicate with them through radio, if you can encode it properly and keep up with the frequency shifts.

I always like hiveminds & shit. I like it when they aren't just some "super evull alla tiem" type deal, so I appreciate the sort of insidious way in which your fungus affects the host.

These pseudosharks are sweet. Do you have much in the way of tech examples? Even if it's description or some such. That whole radioactives & coralish based stuff sounds awesome. I also like having aquatic/amphibious sophonts worship the sun.

I am on a bus on my phone now, but I will try to oblige.
I also like taking the hivemind concept and subverting it to be less simplistic. one of my other races grows into trees when they reach a certain age and are planted properly, who form a subspace network. Can dump info for them as well if you like.

As for the coral metal tech, basically there's no plant life on their world. It's all bacterial colonies, some of which build corals out of metals based on. Their species and what's available around them. Primitive psudosharks (or Stargazers) began using these as tools, then making molds and lattices to make better tools. Mostly for agriculture and digging in the tidal mud flats they now inhabit.

They suffer no ill effects from radiation, and used radioactives for heating for a long time before discovering fission. In their mythology it's shards of the sun, and they managed to go from iron age straight to an atomic industrial revolution.

So imagine technology that has used 3d printing for as long as we've had pottery, and atomic power with very few drawbacks for hundreds of years.
And all they really want out of life is to listen to (and preach) the chorus of the Galaxy, and eat pseudoclam trivalves.

Drop that info on me user. I like this a lot.

I too have a race which suffers little to no ill effects of radiation, but they're a sorta spacefaring plant which feeds off of radiation, like all species of their (long-lost) homeworld.

I really like Stargazers as a name. That's pretty fucking nifty.

Well I am glad you like what I made, at least. I was thinking of making the Stargazers at least partially chemosynthetic, but I think I dropped that.

As for the other thing:
They are a plant based species, their mature form is a semi-intelligent tree. All the trees of a particular family line are networked into an intelligent, ravenously curious and aggressively territorial entity.
They periodically bear fruit in a large batch, which sprouts into a pod of subordinate bipedal critters that vaguely resemble deer. They send these out as a group to explore, conquer and gather info, when and if any of them return they can be planted to add to the tree network and upload their collective experience to it.

Their technology is all bioengineered plant and animal life from their home planet, and they are slowly expanding as they completely terraform the surrounding systems and don't move ahead until their network of trees is firmly entrenched. Also, they use a stutter drive to travel since jumpspace and such cut the pod off from the network, which messes them up badly.

Thanks and yes, I'm trying to run a game of 2nd edition Mongoose. I've found that I sometimes have to make up rules because the stuff in the book is very bare bones. Is it a bad idea to look up stuff in the 1st edition if I feel like I need some in-depth explanations on things? If I recall correctly the 1st edition rulebook was a lot thicker.

For example medikits, I have no idea if they need to be refilled somehow or if they have unlimited uses. The old potion juggler in me is slightly uncomfortable with a healing item that doesn't get used up after use.

>Is it a bad idea to look up stuff in the 1st edition
generally the rules are backwards compatible unless explicitly otherwise.

>medikits
You could reasonably rule that they're easily replenished and you shouldn't have to worry about it (the expended material is in lower TL first aid kits, CSC p.82, which are fairly cheap). Not that it really matters.

Remember, First Aid can only be attempted once (it really needs to be made much more explicit). Travellers with damaged characteristics after that either heal naturally or require medical care or surgery. That can get expensive quick.

>I've found that I sometimes have to make up rules because the stuff in the book is very bare bones.

There's nothing wring with applying Rule 0. Whatever you choose to do, just keep doing it the same way. Consistency makes up for a lot things.

>Is it a bad idea to look up stuff in the 1st edition if I feel like I need some in-depth explanations on things?

Wrong? Not at all. The only risk is chance that whatever you look up sucks and, given Mongoose, that's a pretty good chance!

>For example medikits, I have no idea if they need to be refilled somehow or if they have unlimited uses.

How about applying Rule 0 plus a little common sense? Medikits do need refills but just a single (non-emergency) use doesn't deplete them. Tell your players they're good for 6 uses and then need to be restocked.

You've used potions in other games and you've winged it in other games,so why do you suddenly have a problem with potions/medikits and winging it with Traveller?

Yo know already what to do. Just do it.

>Finally! Real input!

Here's some more: Your various "coup de grace" actions misuse the term while also misspelling it.

Coup de grace refers to killing an unconscious, incapacitated, or non-resisting foe of which you are in proximity to. It's snapping a neck, slitting a throat, or a bullet to the back of the head. It's automatic, cannot fail, and "costs" nothing more than time.

Coup de grace does not refer to some mythical martial arts "death punch", a blade weapon's "murderstroke", a perfect "kill" shot from a gun, or any other d20-inpsired "feat" or "technique" which dispatches an ACTIVE opponent while also somehow giving the character further advantages in the turn.

You need to relabel these d20-inspired actions for what the are: Finisher, Murder Stroke, and Kill Shot, and then add a true "coup de grace" action.

Traveller combat is simple (not simplistic) and deadly because actual combat is simple and deadly. Traveller combat rewards planning and tactical thinking because actual combat rewards planning and tactical thinking. Traveller combat is meant to err on the side of realism, hence the first blood rules, use of morale, importance on ambushes, and the like.

Traveller combat was designed in the way it was because it's designers were both veterans and wargamers and not d20/video players who think feats, boons, and other such twee nonsense are in anyway realistic.

A kind user in an earlier thread posted this document listing the major differences between MgT1e and MgT2e.

...

...

>patiently waiting for MgT 2e's take on the Drinaxian Harrier.

Speaking of unnecessarily luxurious space wagons, one of the interesting aspects of the Vehicles 2e handbook is an easy (if not always exactly precise) conversion of masses (CSC sidebar) to spaces and then up to dtonnage. Is it a bit ridiculous to mish-mash very different uses of measurements? Sure, but I'll be over here adding a 4-person hot tub to my ship for just 1 dton of space.

>I'll be over here adding a 4-person hot tub to my ship for just 1 dton of space.
Eh, the tub itself may only take up that much space, but that'll be a really low ceiling.

I think I'm finally getting the hang of MgT. Each session runs a bit smoother, and most of my cross-referencing is just for tables now.

Now I'm trying to grasp how to run the setting. The players don't really have goals aside from "make a reasonable amount of money for no particular cause," so it's tough to know what motivates their characters. Right now they're just hopping along from one system to another following whatever plot I give them, but never deving deeper into things. I feel like this could be run by a computer that just simulates the trade aspect. How do I make the setting more cohesive and engaging if the players are constantly moving around? How do I make them stay in one place to tie them to the setting without interfering with their trade?

The first thing that comes to mind is you need to give them a reason to stay and trade. Let them get wind of a high value cargo that no one else has exploited yet, which will lead to more adventures in the sector.

>I feel like this could be run by a computer that just simulates the trade aspect. How do I make the setting more cohesive and engaging if the players are constantly moving around? How do I make them stay in one place to tie them to the setting without interfering with their trade?

"Suns of Gold" for SWN has a lot of suggestions for making trade more than just a "roll on the table/fill in the spreadsheet" exercise. Most of what SWN does is INSERT NPCs into the various steps in the trade process.

Your players need a broker? You don't let them pick one off the table, pay the % fee, and roll. Instead, you make them deal with an NPC broker. Your players are looking for freight? You don't let them roll on a table and pick likely lots. Instead, they've got to deal with NPC shippers. Your players are looking for spec goods? Again, you don't let them roll on a table and make them deal with NPCs.

Take the tables out of their hands. Instead you roll on the tables to get some idea what the NPCs can offer them. Make them ROLE play instead of ROLL play. Present them with cargoes as rewards from patrons: "I'll let you have X dTons of Y of you do Z."

By turning the table into NPCs with whom the players must interact, you personalize the setting. Instead of just rolling dice and applying the results, it becomes:
>"Joe the Shipper at Regina said he's got freight for us anytime we ask..."
>"Bob the Broker at Ruie did a good job last time..."
>"No way! Chuck the Exporter at Mora screwed us last time with than machine tools deal..."
>"Adam says he can scare up a full load of freight for us IF we also take his 5dTons to Efate..."

You make the setting come to life be having the players deal with the same NPCs in the same places, giving the players reasons to keep returning the same places, and turning those rolled table results into NPCs.

You're not "interfering" with their trade by doing this, you're making that trade more realistic.

Running a Mongoose 2e game with a custom setting

Players are about to get involved in a precursor event of the Second House War in which a new race will be formally introduced by invading lel

I usually work on stuff between sessions.
Add some background lore there, decide what might be in the neighbor subsectors, etc.

Just take a luxury passenger suite, there's plenty of leftover dtonnage to squeeze in some headroom.

Single GF player user here.
Last week we had a moment to play and she finished some ship management issues and went to Bowman belt on a mission from a corporate, to check out a dead executive case. Although reading a lot of crime books she struggled greatly to find out anything, despite me putting 4 seperate clues which she could pursue. I blame that partly on the fact that she is new to RP not exactly knowing how to pursue objectives (High and Dry pretty much handhold the players throughout the whole adventure), and partly on me being a shitty Ref. I hope that we'll get to finish that adventure, I'll try to be more explicit and descriptive about the clues.
How are your games going anons?

My band of autists are unruly, we got one player that wants to start a cult around Andrew Jackson despite little info on him in the game world and another who's reaction is to try to stab everyone

>you came to the wrong neighbourhood, motherfucker

>Although reading a lot of crime books she struggled greatly to find out anything, despite me putting 4 seperate clues which she could pursue.

Did she find the clues? Or did she have trouble putting the clues together?

I used to have all sorts of trouble with my players not finding the clues I'd seeded about. What seemed obvious to me, often wasn't obvious to them. Then I read the "Gumshoe" system.

In "Gumshoe", there's no rolling to "find" clues and thus no failed "searches" on the part of the player. "Gumshoe" figures if the PC has right skills or stats, the PC will find the clue regardless of whether the player can find it. Instead trying and failing the think of where and how to look, the puzzle is putting the clues together.

After all, when you're doing a jigsaw puzzle you don't hide the pieces, right?

ForEx; Someone with Admin searches the records and - Bingo - here's the clue that was in the records. Someone Navigation looks through the ship's log and - Bingo - here's the clue that was in the logs. Now it's up to the players to put those two clues together.

Little Fuzzy got scary all of a sudden.

Would traveller be a good system to run a Mass Effect campaign in? What would I need to change about the default?

Although I've used more than one RPG character gen software over the years that had obvious mistakes, the MgT 2e generator I've been using (RPGsuite, which seems to be the most Mongoose-endorsed one) does indeed allow you to get promoted "twice" if you get an automatic advancement result. The book should have probably worded it as "immediate, extra promotion" or something to avoid confusion.

>Mass Effect
Sure, it's pretty straightforward. In fact, there's already a MgT 1e conversion for it floating on the internet. It's got some good ideas in it.

>What would I need to change about the default?
Not much actually, though it will be easier using MgT 2e High Guard rules. Assuming you're ME setting is around ME1-3, firstly, restrict or get rid of any energy weapon TL13-14 or higher. ME's higher tech is hovering in the TL12-14 range, with no PGMPs or Battle Dress in sight (ME armor is essentially just Traveller combat armor or perhaps powered armor, but probably not really akin to battle dress).

Since ME2 we know that most Citadel ships have FTL drives which, while slower than transit via Mass Relays, is still quite fast. If we assume some of the cinematic shots (especially the opening to ME1 and the end sequence in ME3) involve such drives instead of stupidly fast STL drives, then you can easily represent them as Hyperdrives from MgT 2e High Guard, although you'll need to drop their TL by 8 or so (as it suggests). Ships would still need to use Mass Relays to make any substantial galaxy-wide jumps, however.

I'm familiar with Gumshoe, and the general "three clue rule" for all RPGs. She just didn't press any of them, probably waiting for something to just happen. I think I should tell her that she should be the one to make things happen, not only react to them.

Alright, thanks! I'll check 'em out.

Corrections noted.

Calling the impressive moves "Coup de Grace" was a bad idea on my part. I wanted a label that would indicate "Hey, these are the most powerful tricks here" and that was the only one that came to mind.

Believe it or not, d20 wasn't a big inspiration here. What I was mostly trying to emulate was GURPS without outright copying sections from GURPS Martial Arts or Tactical Shooting. Breaking someone's neck, using a specific sword technique to get around armor ("murder stroke" isn't a name I just made up, I just didn't want to say it in German), and replicating one scene in Collateral didn't strike me as too unrealistic for Traveller.

Translating it into game terms that make sense is a bit more difficult.

Maybe you'd be better stating the FTL drives like 2300ad's stutterwarp? They both have mandatory discharging near a star to avoid frying the crew, and if I remember correctly, ME FTL is more efficient out-of-system?

And aye, Mass Relays should be statted as the reaper space-magic plot devices they are (that is they shouldn't)

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So what else can you run from a space truck anyway?

Anything your tech level and storage space will allow.

Are there any books that cover interstellar economics? The only thing I've ever seen on the subject was that meme paper by Paul Krugman.

One of the GURPS Traveller books goes deeper, but the application to actual play is tedious.

The Suns of Gold book from Stars Without Number has some good snippets and ideas.

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>Paper on interstellar trade
>Meme

Every day the uses of that word get more and more esoteric.

Anyway, Atomic Rockets are your friend.

projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/stellartrade.php

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On the topic of shady Traveller side jobs, if there's people who do renegade plastic surgery in motel rooms with cans of tire sealant, I'm sure there's gotta be people who do body sculpting in the bay of a ship's boat on some pre-industrial world.

Somewhere, some Baroness wants to improve her marriageability with a pair of bigger tits, I'm sure of it.

If she's Imperial (or whatever your game uses) she's pretty weddible regardless, but hey, teenagers...

>SOC cybernetic implants when?

Which one is that?

I believe he's referring to Far Trader. Interstellar Wars has a bit on trade, but it's short and usable.

Maybe the planet they're on is a mammocraty?