No. Let's talk about Traveller Editions!
We're playing Mongoose Traveller, 2nd Edition. Make sure it says Second Edition, because they're still selling 1st edition stuff.
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There were eight major versions of the Traveller role-playing game.
What follows below is a short history of the game and my own comments on each edition.
Classic Traveller (CT)(1977-1986). The original Traveller game, now referred to as Classic Traveller or (CT), was created in 1977 by Marc Miller and his company Game Designer's Workshop (GDW) and was one of the very first roleplaying games. It was originally printed in three small black books, known ever since to Traveller fans as the Little Black Books (LBB's). Dozens of supplements followed and several companies were licensed to create Traveller material. This was the game famous for killing most characters during character generation.
Traveller was nearly as groundbreaking as Dungeons and Dragons had been three years earlier, and garnered a legion of fans. It contained all the quirks and shaky game mechanics of any game in those days, but was a lot of fun. Although the original game contained no specific setting, that was soon rectified with the introduction of the Traveller Universe with the Third Imperium at its center. The implied setting within the Traveller Universe were the years 1105-1115 of the Imperial Calendar, leading up to the events of the Fifth Frontier War in the Spinward Marches.
Eventually, some fans began to criticize the game both for its aging mechanics and the Third Imperium setting. The Imperium was so huge, so monolithic, that no player actions could ever really matter. Games were almost invariably set on the frontiers or beyond the Imperium entirely (an entire cottage industry grew up detailing sectors well beyond the Imperium for just that reason.
Megatraveller (MT)(1986-1991). In 1986, Game Designers' Workshop (no longer associated with Marc Miller) published the second major edition of Traveller, known as Megatraveller (MT). Although published by GDW, the game was designed by Digest Group Publications (DGP) which published the Travellers' Digest (later the MegaTraveller Journal) Traveller support magazine. The game system used revised versions of the Classic Traveller mechanics with ideas first developed in the raveller's Digest (and later also adapted to Traveller: 2300).
The game was set during the Rebellion era which shattered the Imperium (1116-1128). Supplements and magazines produced during this era detailed the progression of the Rebellion from the initial assassination of the Emperor in 1116 to the collapse of large-scale interstellar trade in roughly 1124.
The critical reception of Megatraveller was mixed, splitting the fan base between those who wanted to see the Traveller setting shaken up and those who wanted the old version of the Third Imperium intact. As a game, it was a mixed bag, with some groundbreaking (for the time) mechanics, but also plenty of what has turned out to be Traveller's Achilles' Heel: terrible organization and indifferent editing. This was the only major edition of Traveller which I never personally played or GMed.
Traveller: The New Era (TNE)(1992-1995). In 1991, GDW decided to create a third edition of Traveller and to sweep away both the Rebellion and the Third Imperium, leaving players without the perceived restrictions of the monolithic empires of Classic Traveller. That in itself was a highly-controversial decision compounded by the method the designers chose. An intelligent computer super-virus spread throughout Charted Space and beyond, leaving chaos, death and destruction in its wake. This sharply divided the fanbase in ways that make the D&D edition wars look mild by comparison. As a result, this new edition, called Traveller: The New Era (TNE) is often voted the fans' least-favorite edition of Traveller. However, for many others, myself included, it is the defining edition of Traveller, having introduced something almost wholly absent in previous editions: the possibility of change.
TNE had three possible settings. The first, the Regency, was the area previously known as the Domain of Deneb. The Regency had managed to remain Virus-free and represented the Third Imperium in microcosm, a place where fans of Classic Traveller could continue to play much as they always had (The Domain of Deneb included the Spinward Marches, setting of most previous adventures in Traveller.) The second was any number of tiny "pocket empires" which had managed to avoid complete collapse and where the Referee could create his or her own story. But the implied setting of TNE was the Reformation Coalition, an area where the light of civilization just barely avoided being extinguished.
TNE also garnered much controversy among Traveller fans for abandoning the game mechanics of CT and converting to GDW's "House Rules", used in other GDW products like Twilight: 2000 and Dark Conspiracy. In 1994, Traveller: The New Era won the Origins award for Best Roleplaying Game of 1993. A variety of economic factors, including the rise of collectible card games, forced GDW to cease operations in 1995 and the license to create Traveller reverted to its creator, Marc Miller.
Marc Miller's Traveller (T4)(1996-1998). When Marc Miller reacquired the rights to publish Traveller, he produced a heavily modified version of the original rules set in the earliest days of the Third Imperium (Imperial Year 0, also known as Milieu 0), 1100 years earlier than the time of CT. Because the rule set was the fourth edition of Traveller, "Marc Miller's Traveller" is usually referred to as T4. This short-lived edition was best noted for gorgeous cover art and extremely poor writing and editing, which required the subsequent printing of 25 pages worth of errata. The general fan reception was very poor.
GURPS Traveller (GT)(1998-2006). GURPS Traveller was published by Steve Jackson Games and used the GURPS rules to play in an alternate Traveller Universe where the Rebellion and the New Era never happened. The year is 1120. The books are well-written and are often used as source material even by players of other versions of Traveller. Traveller 20 (T20)(2002-2008)
Traveller 20 (T20) was published by QuickLink Interactive. It used the d20 rules for Traveller and set the game about a century before Classic Traveller (the year 1000), with its default setting in the Gateway Domain, the other side of the Third Imperium from where most games had been previously set. T20 received good critical reviews and produced quality materials, but the version was unpopular with most Traveller fans (whom I suspect did not want Traveller to be seen as "D&D in Space".)
Traveller: The New Era: 1248 (2006-2008). Published by Avenger Games, "1248" is a rules-free update of the TNE timeline from 1202 to 1248 and includes the birth of the Fourth Imperium and the end of the Star Vikings. 1248 is clever and well-written, with good art and editing. It is not truly an edition of the rules, but an updated setting.
Traveller Hero (TH)(2006-2008). A version of Traveller using the Hero Games' Star Hero rules and covering several previous milieus including Milieu 0, the T20 milieu 1000, and the New Era.
Mongoose Traveller (MgT)(2006-Present) Published as "Traveller" by Mongoose Games, this version is universally known as "Mongoose Traveller". MgT cleans up and streamlines the original CT rules in its Core Rulebook and produces a wide variety of supplements for play in the CT era.
Although there was some criticism of the early Mongoose supplements for poor editing and organization, the general opinion of Traveller fandom seems to be that the MgT rules are solid and that later supplements have overcome the problems of the earlier products. I appreciate the simple mechanics and setting-free rulebook of MgT and recommend this edition for anyone looking to get into Traveller now.
Note: Mongoose Traveller has moved into a second edition, which is really only an update of the first edition, but the updates are good ones.
Traveller5 (T5)(2012 - ?). In 2012, Marc Miller, creator of Traveller, ran a Kickstarter campaign that garnered more than $300,000 for a new "definitive" edition of Traveller. Miller called it T5, ignoring GURPS Traveller, Hero Traveller and the popular Mongoose Traveller in his numbering. T5 was available in print as of July 2013.
Weighing in a a massive 648 pages and no index, T5 managed to garner a fan reaction highly similar to that of T4. Some were ecstatic at the sheer volume of materials while others were put off by its poor editing (a concerted effort by T5 fans is/was underway to collect all errata) and its "Thingmaker" concept which, while it supposedly allows you to do everything yourself, also requires you to do everything yourself. The book is full of charts (again, no index) and a fairly stiff amount of necessary math.
THIS REVIEW isn't entirely fair, but it is hilarious.
I have a crazy busy weekend coming up and will be unable to get a post in. Should be back to normal posting Monday.
Thanks!
Wow that's quite a history, and that review is very funny.
Ladies and Gentlemen:
I'm really sorry for how slow this has been. Those of you who know me know that until November I posted almost every day, often more.
So much has happened in my life since then, including the loss of my mother, the overwhelming responsibilities of settling her estate, and picking up TEN new jury trials between now and September. I'm sort of swamped just now.
I will get back to the old posting rate, but it may be a bit. Thank you for hanging in with me.
Take care of yourself. Life does that sometimes. You do what you need to do. I'll be here.
Take as long as you need.
I'm attending a PowWow today. I won't have a chance to post until tomorrow.
Thanks!
Are you dancing?
Nope, just attending. My daughter danced her little heart out in the Intertribal, though. Just for fun. She doesn't own regalia or have training.
Also, my kids are both sick. I'm not sure I'll have a chance to post tomorrow.
How much do we want to keep track of expenses and income?
I ask, in part, because one month of game time passed while we were in transit between Paal and Tech World, so we need to pay the crew wages and ship maintenance costs.
So far, we have only sold 12,000 credits of loot.
I have been wondering that. I am not sure we have the funds to keep this ship moving much longer which is why I was pointing towards doing a lot of raids in fast succession.
I also think we need to avoid buying fuel if at all possible until we are much better off.
I had 90,000 credits to start with. I know I paid for some of the gear for the crew before we took off. I'm willing to use the rest of what I have to pay for what we need.
I'll get it back at some point I'm sure. I'll need to look back and see exactly what I bought. I can't find where I kept track of it.
Daneel doesn't have much - 14800 credits - but will chip in all of it for whatever we need.
Yeah, I have 15 credits. Sorry. I'd chip in if I had any money. I didn't realize I should have saved so much, and Ray's more of a 'stuff' over 'credits' kind of girl.
I have a mighty 50cr left to toss in the pot. Go poor marines!
As I see it, we have a couple options.
1) We have 8 ship shares remaining that we never used for upgrades to the ship. We could put a cash value on those and use it as starting capital.
2) Together, we have 128,352 CR between the characters ... most of that is Steph's estimate of 90,000 CR. We could pool that and use it as starting capital.
3) We could ret-con securing an operating loan before departing from Drinax (or Paal).
The first two options have the difficulty of each character putting in different amounts, although that could be said to reflect the differing shares of the captain and crew.
Okay ... I think it boils down to two choices.
1) Steph & Jerry loan their cash as starting capital - giving us ~127,620 CR to start with. We repay Steph ASAP, or whatever terms she wants.
2) We pool all / some of our cash as starting capital - giving us ~128,000 CR to start. Everyone gets shares in the venture, rangin from 3 shares for Ray to 18,000 for Steph.
Either way, ship shares get saved for upgrades later.
Which way do you want to go?
Allright I figured it out I have 32,767 that I can loan the ship for the pay.
That's not enough for the monthly costs of 42,630 in addition to the fuel and docking costs.
If Jerry and Steph pool their cash, we have 71,119 CR which is sufficient for this first month.
I am leaning towards treating this as loans.
We need to get several cargos in the coming month to keep going.
Daneel prefers the idea of treating it as a loan, but ultimately, since it is Jerry's and Steph's money, feels like they have the right to set the terms of the financial agreement. He will agree to either option.
So let's get to playing!
Assuming that we do not need to buy fuel, we can just barely pay maintenance and crew salaries for the first month.
After shore leave (and intelligence gathering), we head to a system where we can re-fuel from a gas giant and then start taking cargos.
You need to buy fuel. There are no gas giants at Tech-World. Maybe you guys need to take on a job?
The pool of money from Jerry and Steph amounted to 71,119 CR.
Pay for the crew totalled 14,000 CR, leaving us with 32,619 CR. After paying maintenance, the remainder would be 3,989 CR.
We sold the liquor for 12,000 CR. After the king's share, each share amounts to 600 CR. Paying out the crew required 3,600 CR. We have 7,200 CR in the pool for captain and officers (us).
The officers' shares and balance in ship account total to 11,189 CR.
If I understand this correctly, we need to purchase 40 tons of refined fuel to jump 2 hexes, which amount to 20,000 CR.
We can risk skimping on maintenance ... which will probably bite us. Or try to get an advance on any job.
Since that math didn't add up, we also spent 22,000 CR on port & fuel charges on Hilfer and 2500 CR on port charges on Paal.
Fuel is expensive to haul this ship between stars!
Math hurts Ray's brain.
Space sho' 'nuff is expensive. So what's the plan?
So we had 11,189 + the 11,250 (25% of 45,000).
We have JUST enough to not take on any passengers and just buy the fuel, but we won't have any extra for maintenance, or paying the crew until we get paid for the cargo.
I really hate letting people on our ship, but that's an extra 20,300 for taking the basic passengers and 5,200 for the Low Passage group.
Low passage might not get a great look at our ship, but I don't think 5,200 is worth just taking them aboard.
The Basic passage would help cover crew costs and maintenance at EXE.
What do you all think?
Yeah, I'm not into letting people on our ship. It raises a lot of questions, and we'd have to hide a lot of things from them, which I don't know if we can do in such a timeframe.
If majority wants to take on the passengers I'm fine with that, but I'd vote not to.
I don't want to make a habit of it, but given our bankroll, I vote take them this time.
Accounting
Starting balance .... 32,619 CR
Upkeep .............. 28,630 CR
Balance ............. 3,989 CR
Passenger Fares ..... 25,500 CR
Balance ............. 29,489 CR
Fuel (40t @ 500 CR) . 20,000 CR
Balance ............. 9,489 CR
I'll be away from good computer access May 24-27 (Paizo Con) and with no computer access May 30 - June 3 (family visiting). Feel free to bot me as necessary.
I'm jealous of the Paizo Con, run. Maybe some day.
GenCon remains my only con. I've been going since 1980.
Gen Con is on my bucket list, but right now that looks like a no go for the foreseeable future. I live 12 miles from the PaizoCon hotel so I commute back and forth.
A quick point about adventures. "Pirates of Drinax" has ten main stories, some of them sequential, others not. But Mongoose has made sure that there are adventures all over this part of the Trojan Reach so that it feels very much lived in and "real". We could spend years of real time before ever getting to the first "Pirates of Drinax" story.
I'm okay with that. If you're okay with that, I'll say nothing more. If you want to "get on with it", then you should knock about and do a little piracy and then return to Drinax where the first adventure hook will reach out and grab you.
I like the more organic path we're on now. Besides, most of those side adventures are pretty cool. But if time is an important thing to you, now you know.
I am good with drifting around as it leads us. I feel like we have to do some side stuff just to make the ends meet for now anyway.
I'm feeling that myself. We show up with not much to show for our efforts the King may replace us with a new crew.
I'm really sick. Not going to be online for a few more days.
Thanks.
Get better, Meloriel!
Get better, Mel!
I hope that you got out today, though.
Thanks. I did get out today actually, just in time for my sister's grade twelve graduation ceremony. I am absolutely exhausted. But, still kicking, so I'm trying to check in online. Haha.
Glad you're with us, Mel!
For a bit! Haha. I'm already starting to get sick again, so I've got to head back to the doctor. Should be able to keep posting, but at a slower pace than typical.
Happy July 4th!
<to the folks south of the border>
Here, it's my daughter's birthday.
Happy Fourth, and Happy Belated Canada Day to our northern friends.
Thanks, my family and I had a great Canada Day! My ten year wedding anniversary was yesterday, and my sister just had her high school graduation, so we've had a hectic week. Haha.
Happy Birthday to your daughter!
And Happy July 4th to those of you who celebrate it!