A review of T5
- Thread starter pendragonman
- Start date
Supplement Four
SOC-14 5K
TNE was like getting a Mac for Christmas when I asked for a PC.
It took you quoting my words back at me to realise how I had weighted them. The penny has just dropped for me about how they come across.
When I say "the traditional roll-under system", I now agree with your criticism I was giving far too much weight to what I remembered as a mechanic from The Traveller Adventure and other GDW adventures from the Classic Traveller days. With the benefit of hindsight, I would re-word that sentence to something like "The central mechanic, the task system, contains echoes of 'roll under a characteristic' mechanics that could be found in adventures of the Classic Traveller era, while developing the universal task system that has been around since MegaTraveller, and is very like T4".
I have read in other discussions that roll-over and roll-under raises passions. For me, I really don't care, so long as the system is coherent but adaptable to the myriad situations that arise in a game. But I am interested in criticisms like aramis' that I read somewhere that handing a pile of dice to someone and giving them a target number to roll under breaks the flow of the game more than handing them a couple of dice with a target. I will be reflecting on this in my first T5 sessions.
I hope that clarifies my ideas. If I may be so bold, I also thought the UGM by you Supplement Four (oh Citizen of the Imperium!) contained the cleverest combination yet of a "roll under" with a "roll over" system, which in my mind contained an echo of the kind of mechanic quoted in this thread on page 28 of The Traveller Adventure.
On another note - yes, the last time I played Classic Traveller was in the mid-1980's. This was because I played MegaTraveller from the late 1980's when it was published, which I always thought of as "Traveller consolidated" at the time. I imported a lot of stuff from Classic that I liked, and a lot was pretty directly compatible. In the early 1990's I stopped being involved in RPGs because of uni and then finding a job, etc. etc - just life. But I have taken it up again more recently, this time involving my children. Does that bit of personal history change the colour of my review again?
I am now reading the rest of this thread more thoroughly, it's fascinating.
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On that we can agree. Except that for me, it would be asking for a mac and getting a dos box. Yeah, it does the same things, but not in the same way.
madmike
SOC-12
My first introduction to TNE back in the day was FFS. A friend of mine purchased this for my birthday and I sat and stared at it for quite sometime.
I mean, yeah, I am an Engineer, but this was as complicated as some of the text books I studied from during my assoc diploma course.....
I still wish I had the book now!
I mean, yeah, I am an Engineer, but this was as complicated as some of the text books I studied from during my assoc diploma course.....
I still wish I had the book now!
LOL... It was very good for continuous learning & education.
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How many of us on this board are now running games for our children? Take that, Nintendo!
Baltech Budapest
SOC-12
That's the very reason why I am here on these boards. As an '80s teenager I started introducing my kids to Traveller about 3 years ago. Now I've fallen back in love with the game of my youth.
Take that ZX Spectrum+ :rofl:
My ZX81 is tied with my WinXP computer for Traveller tools written.
Baltech Budapest
SOC-12
You're ZX81 still works? WOW!
Good old Clive Sinclair knew how to build 'em (except for the C5)
My first computer was an Acorn Electron which was only slightly more powerful than the ZX81 or the VIC 20 with a whopping 32k onboard memory.
Do you have a floppy drive plugged into your ZX81? If so is it the 5" floppy drive? Or do you load everything into your PC?
It works. I just don't have the TV anymore that it worked with. What I meant was, I've written as many Traveller programs for my XP system as I did for my old ZX81. My programs are all on cassette tape.
Okay, this is officially off topic.
HOWEVER.
I have seriously (as in, not just thought about it) considered (as in, I have the code, and it wouldn't be hard to plug in) supporting Commodore disk image input and output for my Shipyard Design tool, as an 'Easter Egg' function.
A long time ago a friend and fellow Traveller player wrote a character generation progrtam for his Sinclair. You see, we had this referee who did everything By The Book, so even though he didn't want us to hire a 1000 mercenaries, he had to let us, because the rules said we could. So to prevent that another way, he said we'd have to give him UPPs for all of them...
Tip for referees: When you roll up 900[*] random CT characters, you get some outstanding specimens. We got an NPC general with Tactics-6 and a good number of people with skill-4 and skill-5, including one with Instruction-5. So we set up a training scheme where he'd teach some of our skill-4s Instruction-4 and they could start classes to teach selected recruits skill-3.[**]
[*] I blush to confess that I actually rolled up 108 Mercenary characters by hand. 
[**] Many years later someone pointed out to me that by the RAW you can't teach Instruction skill. I swear we didn't realize that; we never deliberately deceived our referee.
[**] Many years later someone pointed out to me that by the RAW you can't teach Instruction skill. I swear we didn't realize that; we never deliberately deceived our referee.
Hans
Spaceresearcher
SOC-12
Traveller 5, likes and dislikes
So far, here are my likes and dislikes of Traveller 5 for the benefit of developers etc as a kind of fellow Traveller feedback.
[WARNING: Spoilers, if you havn't checked out your own copy of T5 yet and want to enjoy the surprises in store, then stop reading now].
First let's get the dislikes out of the road.
Dislikes: Exactly 4 things.
1. I HATE the word Sophonts, which is a word that was made up by Poul Anderson's wife Karen, in 1966 (Seriously). I never have and still don't have a problem with the word 'Aliens'. (It was good enough for classic Traveller till TNE and beyond and it's still good now as far as I'm concerned). If I have one petty hate it's that word and I was tempted to go through and cross out every mention of the word and just put 'Aliens'.
2. The character sheet example was lack luster and dull at best.(Never the less a great opportunity for a character sheet pack to emerge). On this however, if that's the worst feature of an RPG rule book, then it's seriously a great rule book as this is just personal taste.
3. I've said you can do without an index but as many fellow gamers believe there should be an index, there should be for a book this size. (this can be rectified by a simple print out effort that gamers could stick in the back of there book).
4. The Vargr are given the distinction in this edition of being 'Wolves (Canis Lupus)" (Correct me if I am mistaken here). To me, the Vargr have always been K9 in origin. Perhaps there could be many strains and races of Vargr, I think this can finally be explored in the T5 Vargr book when it comes out.(Please do bring out an updated races book or set of races books FFE) To me, throughout my exposure to Traveller, the Vargr have always been portrayed as Dog men in the great artworks that have come out over time. With T5, it seems to want to foster the Mongoose look, which was essentially a bunch of intelligent werewolves. I believe this is flawed and that Vargr would be attracted to humans and become even best friends like K9 dogs become. Even the artwork of the D20 Traveller system showed this. Personally I liked it and I don't like the werewolf idea as that's just not the Vargr to me. (It also opens up a can of worms for the White Wolf crowd).
Right so there it is up front and my own personal take on the things I disliked. Now for the main things I absolutely love about this edition and why I plan to make it THE rule system to game all Traveller games I referee.
Overall, I am really liking this edition of Traveller, fellow Travellers.
Firstly the inclusion of all these new career paths is BRILLIANT. For many editions, most Solomani and Vilani where limited to military start out careers. With T5, there's a plethora of new career paths which can essentially cover most bases you could think of.(Also it's very handy for the upcoming circus campaign by Greg Lee), you get citizens, entertainers etc. Not everyone wants a military life(in fact most people I know, wouldn't want a military career), it's not everyone's cup of tea and the T5 rules really do accommodate differences in people for your characters.
The next amazing inclusion was for hybrid species (hmmm half Droyne, half Vargr, now that could be one strange character to play, but very VERY interesting
).
The clone rules are a terrific boost to the overall game.
The thorough dice rules and the new inclusion of 'Flux' is excellent. I'm feeling confident that I'll be able to run my next adventure with these rules and stick to them to avoid 'what about using the alternate rule from such and such, so we can get away with task x etc'.
The starships information was nice and I loved the beautiful colour section with the Starship recognition guide(great to see a Droyne spacecraft).
That 'Thing Maker' that Marc mentioned on the Kickstarter campaign, is fabulous. Also for the weapon nuts, there's a nice gun maker set of rules.
There is so much goodness in this volume I would be very surprised if even the most die hard Traveller fan could do without it. Seriously, it's like years of Traveller research, feedback and play testing have been lovingly poured in generous amounts all over this book.
The detail and inclusion of even rules often left for other rules books(eg robots for example) are all included here. It seriously has aimed and for the most part succeeded in capturing most of the rules into a single volume.
With that in mind and considering the sheer pain staking attention to detail, it's no wonder that all involved where keen to get this into a printed form and into the hands of Traveller players around the world. It' mind blowingly good and in my mind is THE definite new rules set that Traveller players have wanted for a very long time.
There's something in here for absolutely everyone. Seriously, I'm convinced that when most Traveller players get there hands on this rule book, there going to love it and throw out most of the other spin off rule books such as Mongoose and Gurps, because actual REAL Traveller is back and it's T5. You get the best bits of most systems all roled into one amazing new rule book of goodness.
So there's my initial outlay and thoughts on T5 and going by the terrific Number 1. imprinted on the spine inside the Imperium logo, I'm really looking forward to further books that may very well be in the pipeline for the greatest edition of Traveller ever published.
Here's to more T5 material to come and many thanks to all involved for this terrific and much needed new rule book for the greatest Science Fiction RPG of them all.
Spaceresearcher
So far, here are my likes and dislikes of Traveller 5 for the benefit of developers etc as a kind of fellow Traveller feedback.
[WARNING: Spoilers, if you havn't checked out your own copy of T5 yet and want to enjoy the surprises in store, then stop reading now].
First let's get the dislikes out of the road.
Dislikes: Exactly 4 things.
1. I HATE the word Sophonts, which is a word that was made up by Poul Anderson's wife Karen, in 1966 (Seriously). I never have and still don't have a problem with the word 'Aliens'. (It was good enough for classic Traveller till TNE and beyond and it's still good now as far as I'm concerned). If I have one petty hate it's that word and I was tempted to go through and cross out every mention of the word and just put 'Aliens'.
2. The character sheet example was lack luster and dull at best.(Never the less a great opportunity for a character sheet pack to emerge). On this however, if that's the worst feature of an RPG rule book, then it's seriously a great rule book as this is just personal taste.
3. I've said you can do without an index but as many fellow gamers believe there should be an index, there should be for a book this size. (this can be rectified by a simple print out effort that gamers could stick in the back of there book).
4. The Vargr are given the distinction in this edition of being 'Wolves (Canis Lupus)" (Correct me if I am mistaken here). To me, the Vargr have always been K9 in origin. Perhaps there could be many strains and races of Vargr, I think this can finally be explored in the T5 Vargr book when it comes out.(Please do bring out an updated races book or set of races books FFE) To me, throughout my exposure to Traveller, the Vargr have always been portrayed as Dog men in the great artworks that have come out over time. With T5, it seems to want to foster the Mongoose look, which was essentially a bunch of intelligent werewolves. I believe this is flawed and that Vargr would be attracted to humans and become even best friends like K9 dogs become. Even the artwork of the D20 Traveller system showed this. Personally I liked it and I don't like the werewolf idea as that's just not the Vargr to me. (It also opens up a can of worms for the White Wolf crowd).
Right so there it is up front and my own personal take on the things I disliked. Now for the main things I absolutely love about this edition and why I plan to make it THE rule system to game all Traveller games I referee.
Overall, I am really liking this edition of Traveller, fellow Travellers.
Firstly the inclusion of all these new career paths is BRILLIANT. For many editions, most Solomani and Vilani where limited to military start out careers. With T5, there's a plethora of new career paths which can essentially cover most bases you could think of.(Also it's very handy for the upcoming circus campaign by Greg Lee), you get citizens, entertainers etc. Not everyone wants a military life(in fact most people I know, wouldn't want a military career), it's not everyone's cup of tea and the T5 rules really do accommodate differences in people for your characters.
The next amazing inclusion was for hybrid species (hmmm half Droyne, half Vargr, now that could be one strange character to play, but very VERY interesting
).The clone rules are a terrific boost to the overall game.
The thorough dice rules and the new inclusion of 'Flux' is excellent. I'm feeling confident that I'll be able to run my next adventure with these rules and stick to them to avoid 'what about using the alternate rule from such and such, so we can get away with task x etc'.
The starships information was nice and I loved the beautiful colour section with the Starship recognition guide(great to see a Droyne spacecraft).
That 'Thing Maker' that Marc mentioned on the Kickstarter campaign, is fabulous. Also for the weapon nuts, there's a nice gun maker set of rules.
There is so much goodness in this volume I would be very surprised if even the most die hard Traveller fan could do without it. Seriously, it's like years of Traveller research, feedback and play testing have been lovingly poured in generous amounts all over this book.
The detail and inclusion of even rules often left for other rules books(eg robots for example) are all included here. It seriously has aimed and for the most part succeeded in capturing most of the rules into a single volume.
With that in mind and considering the sheer pain staking attention to detail, it's no wonder that all involved where keen to get this into a printed form and into the hands of Traveller players around the world. It' mind blowingly good and in my mind is THE definite new rules set that Traveller players have wanted for a very long time.
There's something in here for absolutely everyone. Seriously, I'm convinced that when most Traveller players get there hands on this rule book, there going to love it and throw out most of the other spin off rule books such as Mongoose and Gurps, because actual REAL Traveller is back and it's T5. You get the best bits of most systems all roled into one amazing new rule book of goodness.
So there's my initial outlay and thoughts on T5 and going by the terrific Number 1. imprinted on the spine inside the Imperium logo, I'm really looking forward to further books that may very well be in the pipeline for the greatest edition of Traveller ever published.
Here's to more T5 material to come and many thanks to all involved for this terrific and much needed new rule book for the greatest Science Fiction RPG of them all.
Spaceresearcher
Supplement Four
SOC-14 5K
I hope that I'm as enthusiastic about it when I finally receive my copy (which, hopefully, will be in the next week or three). From what I've read, I'm really worried about the combat system--the core of any rpg.
What are your thoughts on combat?
My thoughts on combat:
I don't view combat systems as being the "core of any rpg".
I tend to avoid MILOPS. My group averages 1 combat session a year.
Traveller combat is deadly for everyone, not just the red shirts - just like it should be.
If you are running MILOPS campaigns, you are either replacing characters on a regular basis, or you are running munchkins. Either way, it doesn't sound like fun to me.
Now that I think about it, everyone in my gaming group is ex-military, which may have some impact on how my group views combat.
