100-dTon TL 12 Prison Transport

[mike wightman]

I alluded to this in a previous post, now let us take a look at classic Traveller in all its glory, using two skills.

"Electronic expertise allows a character to use and operate electronic items; generally the skill is a DM applied to the throw to understand, repair, assemble, or operate. Complex items would also require a certain level of education or a very high intelligence; many devices may also require some degree of dexterity to disassemble, repair, and reassemble.

Referee: Specific throws for specific situations must be generated. Obviously, some throws will be harder than others, and many will be impossible without an accumulation of DMs based on expertise, education, dexterity, intelligence, and the availability of parts and tools. To generate a specific throw, the referee analyzes the specific circumstances and selects a number to be thrown (usually throw that number or greater to succeed). DMs allowed should be the level of electronics skill, +1 for intelligence above some level (say, 10), +1 for education above some level (say, 9), and appropriate values for lack of tools (perhaps -5) or poor conditions (maybe -3). The throw is then made, and success is determined by the result.
Such throws are restricted to one per specific time period, an hour, four hours, a day, or a week, as appropriate"

Why can't we just substitute the medical skill in place of electronic?

Medical expertise allows a character to perform medical related tasks; generally the skill is a DM applied to the throw to diagnose, provide treatment, and prescribe drugs. Complex trauma would also require a certain level of education or a very high intelligence; many surgeries may also require some degree of dexterity to disassemble, repair, and reassemble.

Referee: Specific throws for specific situations must be generated. Obviously, some throws will be harder than others, and many will be impossible without an accumulation of DMs based on expertise, education, dexterity, intelligence, and the availability of drugs and medical tools. To generate a specific throw, the referee analyzes the specific circumstances and selects a number to be thrown (usually throw that number or greater to succeed). DMs allowed should be the level of medical skill, +1 for intelligence above some level (say, 10), +1 for education above some level (say, 9), and appropriate values for lack of medical kit (perhaps -5) or poor conditions (maybe -3). The throw is then made, and success is determined by the result.
Such throws are restricted to one per specific time period, an hour, four hours, a day, or a week, as appropriate"

All I have done here is exactly what the rules as written in 77 edition tell me to do.

 

[Spinward Flow]

Why can't we just substitute the medical skill in place of electronic?

If you use the same "paradigm" of DMs for both (the basic structure of game mechanics and how to apply them) in order to sustain Intellectual Consistency across both/all cases ... except where explicitly instructed to do otherwise ... then the answer is that your SHOULD be able to apply the same "pattern of thinking" to other challenges. As a Referee, you use the same "template" in multiple ways for multiple circumstances.

Obviously, some throws will be harder than others, and many will be impossible without an accumulation of DMs based on expertise, education, dexterity, intelligence, and the availability of drugs and medical tools.

As an example of how I (as a Referee) would adjudicate this in relation to the topic of low berth transit survival would be like so:

• Medical skill/expertise applies a +DM
• INT and EDU attribute bonus DMs may apply depending on context of the circumstances (for example: unusual complications that apply -DMs to survival throw).
• Availability of drugs and/or medical tools, particularly if absent ... may apply a reduction/preclusion/prevention of +DMs enumerated above while also introducing -DMs into the mix (making success potentially "impossible" to achieve when it would otherwise be "automatic").

Best example of this type of IF-THEN approach to the complexities of possible scenarios can be summed up by Moriarity in Kelly's Heroes with regards to a mechanical breakdown of a Sherman tank.

If you don't have the right parts/tools to work with, sometimes technology is just ... dead ... no matter what your skill level or attributes (or positive thinking).



However, in circumstances where the "support needed" is readily available ... such as a starship's medical staff with low berths onboard ... only the most "off-nominal" circumstances would be so complex as to require "unusual support" (hospital, specialized tech/drug support, etc.) in order for the +DMs available of the staff to be "allowed" for low berth transit survival rolls.

You want a game mechanical system that is "flexible" enough to account for a wide variety of circumstances that Players can find themselves in. At the same time, you also want to be able to create "unusual conditions" (as a Referee) where specialized knowledge/tools/support may be necessary in some contexts in which "general" skills and/or techniques (by themselves) are NOT ENOUGH™ to resolve particular "off nominal" challenges.

 

[mike wightman]

It strikes me that you/we could re-write the skills section.

Remove all the examples baked in with the skill and all you are left with is a description of what the skill is for.

You/we could then use examples like I did with the electronic/medical skill to show the referee how to manage situational skill use.

This would likely save space in the book... and provide a bit more consistency. But then you/we are at risk of just reinventing some variant of the DGP task system.

What I like about the classic Traveller situation resolution is that it is open to referee interpretation and ruling on the fly

 

[kilemall]

It took me a while - decades in fact - but I finally realised that the skill examples in the skill descriptions are one off examples, they may be used that way, but as the text in 77 said the referee can and should make stuff up (paraphrasing).


It is explained in the Traveller Adventure - it is whatever the referee decides it is, The problem is is you are using a situation for which the actual game gives the procedure, which it does for low berth survival. So you have to use those rules as written as the basis, but you can change them to suit your game situation. Add +1 for an advance medical kit, add +1 for a low berth survival drug.

It only applies to combat skills and a few of the skills listed. There are many skills where the bonus is +2 per skill level, some even +4. Some give -1, -2 or -4, then there is the mechanical skill for which there is no skill DM... Take away the combat skills and you get a very different default assumption.

The End of the patient also matters, but that is not mentioned in the skill.

The rules explicitly state how you stack combat DMs, some get a bonus of +2 with no +1 threshold while others are limited to +1. If you have the characteristic you get the bonus, no more, no less.

What if you have a Dex of 15, do you get a +2 or +4? No.

That's not what the rules say though. The rules say you get skill, characteristic, sight, stock, etc...

No, it is a wild attempt to misquote and misuse the actual rules as written with your own views.

What difference to shooting a gun does Dex 15 make?

Yes, because Traveller pre task system was designed that way. As the referee I can decide what to allow as a DM to a situation throw. My decision is guided by the skill example, equipment descriptions etc.

You are not using the rules as written in those examples, you are just making stuff up.
Computer skill requires a complex interplay between computer skill and the skill required for the program you are trying to write
Forward Observer actually grants +4 per level of skill
Mechanical grants no DM per skill level...

I am in the strange superposition of almost agreeing and almost disagreeing with your arguments.

Schroedinger’s rules?

 

[Spinward Flow]

Schroedinger’s rules?

Who can say?

So if I may summarize ...

• RAW applies when it's convenient
• RAW doesn't apply when it's NOT convenient

Which in discussions like this only swings the door (WIDE!) open to the "RAW for me, but not for thee!" arguments being put forward by both sides. Needless to say, the two perspectives are fundamentally INCOMPATIBLE with each other.

 

[Vargr Breath]

Hi all,

I worked with Robert Pearce (of Yet Another Traveller Blog) on a location called the Underground Prison Facility (available here):

[https://travellerrpgblog.blogspot.com/2025/07/underground-prison-facility.html]

The upper level of the prison included a starship for moving prisoners between facilities. I have written a description and specs to go with Robert's ship.

Please enjoy

- Kerry

I can see that these ships could sell like hotcakes when they would become surplus. They could be customized for other uses like the Scout Ships/Type S. I could see them running around like the old police cars here in the states a lot still with the Black and White paint jobs.

 

[Spinward Flow]

I could see them running around like the old police cars here in the states a lot still with the Black and White paint jobs.

 

[Enoki]

per the rules as written

no medic - 5+
medic 1 - still 5+
medic 2 - 4+

I could be persuaded that medic 4 would drop this to 3+

It's similar to other skills where the bonus is skill level/2 round down.

You know that gives just shy of a 1 in 3 chance (27.7%) of dying with less than medic 2 and a 17% chance with one on 2D6. I would say those odds would have gotten low berth usage banned almost entirely by any sane government.

 

[Spinward Flow]

I would say those odds would have gotten low berth usage banned almost entirely by any sane government.

• Regulatory authority
• Consumer advocacy group
• Military personnel retention organization (see: Frozen Watch)
• etc. etc. etc. etc. etc.

When the odds of DEATH are (predictably!) higher than 1 in 4 or even 1 in 6 ...

 

[Black Vulmea]

You know that gives just shy of a 1 in 3 chance (27.7%) of dying with less than medic 2 and a 17% chance with one on 2D6.

Those odds are incorrect.

5+ survival is the same as 4- failure, and 4- is 16.66% on 2D.

4+ survival is the same as 3- failure, and 3- is 8.33% on 2D.


For me, this whole discussion comes down to this:

Does medical skill of the attending crew "matter" to low berth survival rates?

I mean ... it should.

No.

It COULD.

There is nothing about the explicit setting in CT that says the personal skill of the attending medic matters beyond that +1 for Medical-2+.

If you want low berth technology to improve, or an attending medic's skill to make a greater difference, or advanced computer diagnostics in robotic low berths to make revival trivial, then you can certainly make it so if you wish, but that's a choice, not an imperative. IMTU, it's an avenue of research, like ansibles and teleporters.

I can't speak to GDW's MT rules but "Suspended Animation" in Travellers' Digest 21, which is contemporaneous with MT, talks at some length about technological advantages in cold sleep: the advances to low berth tech are in time to suspend and time to revive, not survival; at all tech levels, the task remains Difficult, with modifiers for skill level and Edu (TD 21, p. 44). A Difficult task in CT is 11+ (Challenge 29, p. 12); I don't know if that's different in MT or not.

In any case, two things are evident in TD 21: (1) advanced technology doesn't change survival and (2) revival remains perilous; if the task requires 11+, then Medical-4 and Edu A requires [drum roll please] 5+ on 2D to revive.

You could indeed choose to handwave this. I don't.

Either way, there is no "should" about it.

 

[Rupert]

I can't speak to GDW's MT rules but "Suspended Animation" in Travellers' Digest 21, which is contemporaneous with MT, talks at some length about technological advantages in cold sleep: the advances to low berth tech are in time to suspend and time to revive, not survival; at all tech levels, the task remains Difficult, with modifiers for skill level and Edu (TD 21, p. 44). A Difficult task in CT is 11+ (Challenge 29, p. 12); I don't know if that's different in MT or not.

It's the same - the task system of MT is the same as the task system presented in Challenge 29 (it's pp 23-26, by the way, not p.12), and is the final version of the one originally presented in Traveller's Digest. As an aside, the T2300/2300AD task system is a closely related version using a d10 rather than 2d6.

 

[Spinward Flow]

It COULD.

There is nothing about the explicit setting in CT that says the personal skill of the attending medic matters beyond that +1 for Medical-2+.

So you'll accept the explicit exception, while rejecting the implicit "default" that underlies everything outside of that explicit exception.
Am I understanding both the text and the subtext of what you are writing here correctly?

If you want low berth technology to improve, or an attending medic's skill to make a greater difference, or advanced computer diagnostics in robotic low berths to make revival trivial, then you can certainly make it so if you wish, but that's a choice, not an imperative.

Let me make sure that I'm understanding your perspective here.

Medical skill, beyond "level 2" (which isn't "doctor level" but more like "nurse level" skill) is COMPLETELY IRRELEVANT to the survival rate of a COMMONLY USED technology that RANDOMLY KILLS PEOPLE when used ... and any Referee who tries to make Medical skill relevant to the survival rates of that "task" ... is doing it wrong according to your interpretation of RAW, because that's a YTU interpretation.

Are you SURE that's the hill low berth you want to die on in, as a matter of principle?
I mean, on the scale of a major interstellar polity such as the Third Imperium (or equivalent) ... that would mean that MILLIONS of people would be dying EACH YEAR using an inherently unsafe technology that cannot be "perfected" to the point of reliable survival (absent complicating factors) when attended by trained medical personnel.



I mean, in a different game ... the term Killer Dungeon Master existed for a reason.
Do we really need to make the term Killer Referee applicable to Traveller as well?

 

[mike wightman]

The death rate of the low berth is a direct rip off from the Dumarest universe. In that universe it was explained that the low berths were intended for livestock transport and were not rated for human use hence the risk of death.

Within the Third Imperium setting there are indicators that human rated low berths do exist - you don't take an immediate crew hit in High Guard when you resurrect your frozen watch which you would since a sizable percentage would die, not to mention where do you get the volunteers for that duty? By MT it was very unlikely to die in low...

So if in your/my universe you/I want to have medic 4+ provide a further +1, an advanced high tech low berth or medkit that grants another +1 you can stack the DMs such that only a natural 2 carries a risk of death (why can't the medic attempt to resuscitate the dead passenger?) or even do away with it entirely.

Note that under the 77 rules as written referees are encouraged to do such things.

 

[Vargr Breath]

I could see a chart with DMs for Endurance, Medic, and maybe the time spent in Low Passage, or the number of times you have taken Low Passage.
Someone with high END would have a better chance with a Medic-1
Someone with low END would have a better chance with a higher Medic number
If you have been in Low for more than one Jump your odds go down, or if all you have ever done is use Low the odds go down. For both of these high DMs for END and MED would really help you.

 

[Enoki]

Those odds are incorrect.

5+ survival is the same as 4- failure, and 4- is 16.66% on 2D.

4+ survival is the same as 3- failure, and 3- is 8.33% on 2D.


For me, this whole discussion comes down to this:


No.

It COULD.

There is nothing about the explicit setting in CT that says the personal skill of the attending medic matters beyond that +1 for Medical-2+.

If you want low berth technology to improve, or an attending medic's skill to make a greater difference, or advanced computer diagnostics in robotic low berths to make revival trivial, then you can certainly make it so if you wish, but that's a choice, not an imperative. IMTU, it's an avenue of research, like ansibles and teleporters.

I can't speak to GDW's MT rules but "Suspended Animation" in Travellers' Digest 21, which is contemporaneous with MT, talks at some length about technological advantages in cold sleep: the advances to low berth tech are in time to suspend and time to revive, not survival; at all tech levels, the task remains Difficult, with modifiers for skill level and Edu (TD 21, p. 44). A Difficult task in CT is 11+ (Challenge 29, p. 12); I don't know if that's different in MT or not.

In any case, two things are evident in TD 21: (1) advanced technology doesn't change survival and (2) revival remains perilous; if the task requires 11+, then Medical-4 and Edu A requires [drum roll please] 5+ on 2D to revive.

You could indeed choose to handwave this. I don't.

Either way, there is no "should" about it.

Either way, those odds are unacceptable or should be to society. The technology would be considered unsafe--horribly unsafe--and defective. When there is a chance in normal usage that more than 1 in 10 persons using something will die in the process, that's unsafe.

Yes, I do handwave this, along with many other task checks. The cumulative rolls for a routine jump in MT make it something like 1 in 3 or 4 jumps (without looking it up) that you will get a misjump. That's with skill level 1 and 2 crew on a maintained ship with refined fuel. Again, horribly unsafe technology in use. Imagine that you use your car each day and that once or more a month there is a serious malfunction of its drive train that potentially could kill you. No sane society would accept that for a second.

 

[Black Vulmea]

So you'll accept the explicit exception, while rejecting the implicit "default" that underlies everything outside of that explicit exception.

CT before the UTP makes skills highly variable in their benefits, as we already discussed multiple times in this thread; you seem to be assuming that the rules are incomplete when it comes to low berth survival because they don't produce the results you think they "should," when in fact at least two editions make it an explicit setting conceit that they're dangerous as - in fact they're arguably MORE dangerous in MT than in CT, where Medic-4 and Edu A only get you to the same 5+ that CT begins with.

I mean, on the scale of a major interstellar polity such as the Third Imperium (or equivalent) ... that would mean that MILLIONS of people would be dying EACH YEAR using an inherently unsafe technology that cannot be "perfected" to the point of reliable survival (absent complicating factors) when attended by trained medical personnel.

The Third Imperium allows people to live on hellhole worlds in absolute squalor (Na Ni Po). It allows people to live in complete anarchy (law level 0) or under brutal theocratic dominion (government code D, law level C). It allows merchant starships and pleasure yachts alike to arm themselves with the same weapons carried by patrol cruisers.

In short, the Third Imperium doesn't have a Consumer Products Safety Commission.

Why do people accept such an inherently dangerous form of transportation? Because if you can save up, or steal, 8 KCr, you can book middle passage for a single jump, or you can book eight jumps via low berth. Moving labor to markets is more important to the Third Imperium than making sure the means of getting there is perfectly safe - eight deaths per hundred is an acceptable cost.

The Third Imperium is not a 21st century Terran democracy. If your name doesn't have a hault in there somewhere, you're grist for the mill.

 

[jec10]

I house rule:
no doc = roll 2D6, snake eyes and you don't wake up.
with doc = roll 3d6, three ones and you don't wake up