solo stints
Hi,
Casting my mind back to the early 1980s, I can recall 3 scenarios where I was a solo player in Traveller. I do not know if these adventures were published or originals (I suppose I could ask my ref):
1) I was wrongfully incarcerated on a prison planet. To earn my freedom, I had to accrue a certain number of creds by completing menial labour - not an insurmountable problem, however a) these creds were issued as physical objects which the prisoners effectively had to carry at all times and b) other prisoners wanted your creds so they could get off-planet, too. The beefiest bastard in the place had been set an astronomical sum by the wardens to earn his freedom and he was determined to get those creds by any means possible. I ended up serving 4 or 5 times my expected duration because he kept beating me up and taking my creds - I have never EVER made a worse string of die rolls in any RPG. Learned lots about the combat mechanics and stretched my brain to come up with ways to defeat that miserable sod...
2) I was drawn into a mystery while between gainful employments. When I was dirtside on a more than 50% water planet, locals repeatedly reported a vehicle (of some notable vintage) appearing suddenly at a remote location, driving at high speed for a moderate distance, then disappearing again. I spent an inordinate amount of time figuring out how to predict where this vehicle would appear and try to catch it. The machine proved faster and more manoeuvrable (despite it being long out of production) than anything I could easily get hold of to chase it. When I finally caught it, I discovered that it was a fully pressurized, "reverse-submersible" disguised as an old car of local manufacture (an example having long ago sunk to the bottom of the waters through mishap), being used by members of a heretofore unknown aquatic race on the planet to explore the land surfaces the same way we stick ourselves in a tin sausage to go undersea. The sudden death of the vehicle's pilot was unfortunate, and caused somewhat of an uproar in both the scientific and diplomatic communities...
3) While travelling between distant cities on a high-speed luxury train, I was involved in an homage scenario entitled by my referee, "Murder on the Orion Express". I have few specific remembrances of this adventure, except the large number of well fleshed-out NPCs whom I met and interacted with during the somewhat campy sendup of the classic Poirot mystery. There was a mix of fisticuffs and/or blades, plus quite a bit of sleuthing and roleplay.
cheers,
Chris
