CT Only: Barbarian

[Lapthorn]

Mucking about with CT basic chargen on a work trip...

I rolled up A88642. With a UPP like that, I thought it has to be a Barbarian. How did he end up?

Barbarian Warrior A8A642 3 Terms
Blade-1, Brawling-1, Broadsword-4, Mechanical-1, Streetwise-1, Sword-1, Survival-1

(High Passage)

The Broadsword skill came partly from rolling Blade on the benefits table 3 times.

I can just see him stomping onto a liner to use his high passage, broadsword sheathed, fellow passengers agape.

I reckon he comes from Victoria. He helped some off-worlders, but for some reason that meant he had to get offworld himself, and ended up at Lanth with a high passage in his pocket as a reward.

I want to play this guy in a game now!

 

[robject]

Steward: "Welcome to Adak Lines. Does Sir prefer a beverage and hors d'oeuvres? Perhaps a hot towel?"


... a few hours later, Krunk is sitting in the lounge, still wearing the animal hides he tanned himself, holding a colorful drink with a little umbrella and a crazy straw, watching a holovid shopping channel in utter perplexity.

 

[Timerover51]

Mucking about with CT basic chargen on a work trip...

I rolled up A88642. With a UPP like that, I thought it has to be a Barbarian. How did he end up?

Barbarian Warrior A8A642 3 Terms
Blade-1, Brawling-1, Broadsword-4, Mechanical-1, Streetwise-1, Sword-1, Survival-1

(High Passage)

The Broadsword skill came partly from rolling Blade on the benefits table 3 times.

I can just see him stomping onto a liner to use his high passage, broadsword sheathed, fellow passengers agape.

I reckon he comes from Victoria. He helped some off-worlders, but for some reason that meant he had to get offworld himself, and ended up at Lanth with a high passage in his pocket as a reward.

I want to play this guy in a game now!

Given that Victoria is metal-poor, and this guy has a fair amount of metal on him, I suspect he departed Victoria under a bit of duress.

At Robject: Not sure if Victoria is quite that backward. He might be wearing the Kudebeck's gazelle equivalent of buckskin though.

 

[robject]

At Robject: Not sure if Victoria is quite that backward. He might be wearing the Kudebeck's gazelle equivalent of buckskin though.

More at Davy Crockett / Jim Bowie, then?

 

[Timerover51]

More at Davy Crockett / Jim Bowie, then?

Hmm, maybe more Daniel Boone, but those would work, when equipped with swords instead of guns, although Bowie by all accounts was quite deadly with his knife.

I keep playing around with fleshing out Victoria a bit more, but am very reluctant to post anything as it was developed by Marc.

 

[Jame]

Hmm, maybe more Daniel Boone, but those would work, when equipped with swords instead of guns, although Bowie by all accounts was quite deadly with his knife.

This is a cool concept, though it shows that Traveller hasn't quite done enough to flesh out its barbarians - not that it hasn't room for them, but thinks of them all as only tribal warriors like Scythians or Native Americans.

I keep playing around with fleshing out Victoria a bit more, but am very reluctant to post anything as it was developed by Marc.

Don't let that stop you. Heck, write it up and submit it to him! Maybe he'll like it! And either way, you can still present it as an alternative version of it.

 

[Timerover51]

This is a cool concept, though it shows that Traveller hasn't quite done enough to flesh out its barbarians - not that it hasn't room for them, but thinks of them all as only tribal warriors like Scythians or Native Americans.

Well, the Greeks viewed anyone that did not speak Greek as a Barbarian, regardless of how advanced their civilization might be, so the Egyptians were Barbarians to a Greek. The Romans tended to view anyone that was not under Roman rule as Barbarians, again regardless of technological advancement.

If you assume the Imperium views as Barbarians any group that is not one of the major races, and not in the Imperium or another established interstellar grouping, you could greatly increase the possibility of more advanced Barbarians. I suspect that most of the Imperium would view the Vargr as Barbarians, given their tendency to fragmentation into smaller groups and problems in cooperating on a large scale.

 

[aramis]

It's been repeatedly claimed that Barbarian starts off as an onomatopoeia because the thracians sounded like they were saying "Bar Bar Bar" to some Greek....

Generally, it's taken to mean armed savages now, but there is nothing actually preventing you from, in CT, taking even such oddities as Laser Rifle with a barbarian. (MT says to limit to weapons in your homeworld tech bracket or lower.)

But always, in CT, the Ref has the final say.

 

[sabredog]

It all depends on the definition of barbarian. Is it someone who comes from a relatively (relatively) low-tech world well outside the more "civilized" environs of Empire?

Maybe they are more like someone from the Third World than outright aborigines. To someone from a TL-13+ world a guy driving a gasoline ground car with actual wheels on it and wearing a leather jacket and snakeskin cowboy boots on some TL-6 world might be pretty barbarous. What about someone from the 1700's?

Poul Anderson's definition of barbarian in the Flandry novels was some young, expanding race with an honor/shame hypermasculine culture that if they got a hold of some spaceships would be the terror of the galaxy. But they are often peoples who were educated by the Empire and know how technology works - they usually just lack the industrial and scientific infrastructure to support it on their own.

Yeah, they tended to turn out in practice to be a bunch of sword-waving Gorzuni but they still were still technologically proficient. Poul called them "neo-barbarians".

 

[McPerth]

It all depends on the definition of barbarian.

Accordin to MT CharGern, for a character to be a barbarian he must come from a world with PreInd tech (TL3-, acording to MT errata). So, even people of Revolutionary War or Napoleonic ages would be seen as barbarians, not only the broadsword armed Conan-like.

 

[Jame]

Well, the Greeks viewed anyone that did not speak Greek as a Barbarian, regardless of how advanced their civilization might be, so the Egyptians were Barbarians to a Greek. The Romans tended to view anyone that was not under Roman rule as Barbarians, again regardless of technological advancement.

If you assume the Imperium views as Barbarians any group that is not one of the major races, and not in the Imperium or another established interstellar grouping, you could greatly increase the possibility of more advanced Barbarians. I suspect that most of the Imperium would view the Vargr as Barbarians, given their tendency to fragmentation into smaller groups and problems in cooperating on a large scale.

This is true, though my commentary is more directed towards the Barbarian Career of various iterations of the roleplaying game.

I did write up some non-barbarian, low-tech careers for Mongoose Traveller. They never did get published, and Mongoose didn't want them for being out-of-type. But my point was to have them as low-tech alternates to simple tribal life.

 

[sabredog]

I have to admit, it is kind of hard to imagine a lot of barbarian worlds that fit the definition within the OTU. Wouldn't you think that after being around for as long as the Imperium has been around there would have been more trickle-down on technology and information? Enough to have eliminated a lot, if not all, of the barbarian cultures?

Granted, there will be worlds with a low enough TL, but does that really mean they have to be barbarians as so defined? What about some colonists on a world they are working on? They have been there for a few generations, but haven't built up an industrial infrastructure to support more than TL-3 or so on their own devices. They have fancy gear brought in from the Free Traders that show up once every couple of months or so, but they obviously couldn't manufacture it on their own. They might be only a grav module away from muscle-power until a replacement shows up.

Would that world be considered barbarian? Or does the definition imply you have to have a standing culture that lives that way even in something like the Imperium?

 

[mike wightman]

Afghan mountain warriors and native Americans make a nice model for barbarians IMTU - pretty low TL but give them a gun and you will be stuck fighting them for years. Just ask the British Empire and the US cavalry...

 

[Timerover51]

Accordin to MT CharGern, for a character to be a barbarian he must come from a world with PreInd tech (TL3-, acording to MT errata). So, even people of Revolutionary War or Napoleonic ages would be seen as barbarians, not only the broadsword armed Conan-like.

Hmm, might have to get out my little-used MegaTraveller books and take a look. However, the Tech Level 3 and lower, say pre-Steam technology would work pretty well for the culture at large. Those with some contact with other worlds may have some higher technology, but not a lot and with limited ability to support and/or repair it.

This world from Harry Harrison's The Ethical Engineer, part of his Deathworld series, probably would qualify as Barbarian. It can be found on Project Gutenberg.

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/30964/30964-h/30964-h.htm

 

[sabredog]

Afghan mountain warriors and native Americans make a nice model for barbarians IMTU - pretty low TL but give them a gun and you will be stuck fighting them for years. Just ask the British Empire and the US cavalry...

LOL...and the Soviets, er, Russians.

That's the thing about barbarians..they can easily sustain a low-tech lifestyle and live on air compared to the long supply train and supports systems for the more advanced societies. If some EMP bomb goes off it would send a First World country into the stone age and that would likely pull down quite a few of its neighbors and trade partners...barbarian cultures? No big deal - actually, their stock has just gone up in the world.

Your air/raft quits on you its like the end of the world - how do you carry all the stuff you need to just barely survive in a hostile land? The barbarian answer is that you don't need any of that stuff.

 

[rancke]

Your air/raft quits on you its like the end of the world - how do you carry all the stuff you need to just barely survive in a hostile land? The barbarian answer is that you don't need any of that stuff.

Provided he managed to roll Survival skill. Otherwise he's as helpless as anyone.


Hans

 

[sabredog]

Provided he managed to roll Survival skill. Otherwise he's as helpless as anyone.


Hans

So survival skill is like JoAT for camping? Roll it and food/water/shelter appears no matter what the background of the person rolling it?

 

[Carlobrand]

So survival skill is like JoAT for camping? Roll it and food/water/shelter appears no matter what the background of the person rolling it?

Making one's survival skill roll.

http://www.schlockmercenary.com/2006-11-12

 

[mike wightman]

Provided he managed to roll Survival skill. Otherwise he's as helpless as anyone.


Hans

He's got survival 0 by default - any competent ref would grant that

 

[McPerth]

IMHO, a good example of alien barbarians would be the Ewoks of SW VI Return of the Jedi