Do You Need GURPS Traveller?

[Poor Merchant]

Hi,
I have GURPS 4th Ed, Starships, First In, Far Trader, Interstellar Wars (though not that impressed by it) plus Traveller TNE, some other bits and bobs and the Far Future CD for Classic Traveller. I like the detail and professionalism of the GURPS materials (although I sometimes feel as if they expect all their readership to have a maths degree) and definately intend to get Starports and a few other books as well.

Ermm, this may sound like an odd question but just what is GURPS Traveller itself going to offer me that is not in the other books?

Thanks
Malcolm

 

[aramis]

GT is specifically an alternate setting, very close to the OTU, but

1) it uses the GURPS rules
2) It has rationalized a good bit of the setting somewhat
3) It is currently in print and further development.

CT, MT, TNE, T4 can't give you #3, and don't do #1 nor #2.
MoTrav doesn't do #1, is unlikely to do #2 (thanks to some paranoid lying to MWM), and does do #3.

T5 has been vaporware for years, and is unlikely to be on time.

 

[Trent]

Hi,
I have GURPS 4th Ed, Starships, First In, Far Trader, Interstellar Wars (though not that impressed by it) plus Traveller TNE, some other bits and bobs and the Far Future CD for Classic Traveller. I like the detail and professionalism of the GURPS materials (although I sometimes feel as if they expect all their readership to have a maths degree) and definately intend to get Starports and a few other books as well.

Ermm, this may sound like an odd question but just what is GURPS Traveller itself going to offer me that is not in the other books?

Thanks
Malcolm

GT is a solid product, and was worked on by LKW, it provided a solid base and a good nickle tour of the imperium that was and would have been barring the assassination of strephon by dulinor.

It's for people new to traveller and avoids the "reset buttons" that the assassination, VIRUS and such hit in the OTU.

As an aside, I might recommend you get GT: Interstellar wars as it updates the ship combat system, but beware that it has no gear at all, not so much as a spacesuit, let alone any traveller staples.

And whenever you get a gurps product be sure to download the latest errata for it, of course.

 

[Poor Merchant]

Thanks for your replies guys.

Aramis,
I'm sure GT is a fine stand alone product (so far, nothing I have bought from the GURPS stable has disappointed me in terms of thought or quality of production) but when I look at the other GURPS books I own they are obviously expanding and developing concepts developed in the original book - for instance I have First In and Far Trader which expand upon the Scout Service, World Creation and Trade elements of the GT book. I also have GURPS Starships which, I guess, does the same for Starship Construction and Starfaring Careers.

Now if I was a total Newbie to RPGs and Traveller I'd dive right and get the GT book but CT was the first RPG I bought way back when Kinunir was the only adventure around (I was 15 or 16 at the time). I'm kind of thinking right now that, thanks to the quality of the various "add ons" that I own or plan to buy, the only real benefit of buying GT is to get the "official" history from 1105 or so to the "present day" - and that by the time I've "ripped out" the appropriate chapters from the specialist books there may be little point to buying GT itself.

Frankly, I'm happy to use GURPS because that seems the best thought out and presented product around at the moment - but I'm not wedded to it (I'll steal ideas from anywhere if I like them).

I'm intrigued by the Mongoose "paranoid lying to MWM" reference.

Trent,
I thought GT:IW was very well presented but, frankly, I found the mental gymnnastics required to reach the "historical" result required too much for me - for one thing I would expect constant warfare to produce a result after awhile akin to Hard Times during the peacetime periods (though more a depression caused by reduction in trade and unwillingness to invest than an out and out collapse). Also, I think the author was kind of stuck between a rock and a hard place - he needed to produce something that was identifiably "Traveller" and yet not the current day Traveller - and for me that was a major problem with GT:IW. It was too Traveller (and I expected some early equipment with early problems - a bit like Star Trek Enterprise and Star Trek).

We all know that the OTU history was agglomeration of sidebars here and footnotes there that were then strung together afterwards - frankly, wherever possible, I think its a good idea to gloss over that aspect of the OTU - so unlike in real-life I tend to try and ignore the history as much as possible and just deal with the present day.

 

[Gadrin]

Hi,
I have GURPS 4th Ed, Starships, First In, Far Trader, Interstellar Wars (though not that impressed by it) plus Traveller TNE, some other bits and bobs and the Far Future CD for Classic Traveller. I like the detail and professionalism of the GURPS materials (although I sometimes feel as if they expect all their readership to have a maths degree) and definately intend to get Starports and a few other books as well.

Ermm, this may sound like an odd question but just what is GURPS Traveller itself going to offer me that is not in the other books?

Thanks
Malcolm

Mostly just an updated take on Traveller, probably lots of details, such as character and vehicle related, (meaning you can give your characters all sorts of advantages/disadvantages, quirks in a "formal manner" whereas it was more up in the air in CT; with vehicles you can get downright nitty-gritty).

Good Price + PDFs -- is another answer. A few of the GURPS Traveller items are on PDFs and downloadable from their e23 site. The other thing is most of their Traveller products are $9.95 too.

I think the GURPS version is just a nice addition to all the other Traveller items, since it's a "detail oriented" system (GURPS that is) you can really get into it and supplement it with non-Traveller books like ULTRA TECH, SPACE, OGRE and BLUE PLANET and several others. Most of those should be reasonably priced too.

They also offer a computer program character builder, which should make life much, much easier for the GM and players. I don't have 4e but
have the 3e version.

They also offer a computer Vehicle builder which is pretty much a must-have for GURPS. It's for 3e.

They have a BBS for support and help for both products.

They have the JTAS website/subscription. Which has lots and lots of pre-made GURPS Traveller items on it.

The BITS site used to have 101 Starships, which are all pre-made GURPS designs, some have deckplans too; in a free PDF.


Even if you're not a PHD in math, the GURPS system/books will simply enrich your Traveller experience. I tend to be rules-lite myself, but the books and pre-made equipment, make life much easier to start a GURPS Traveller campaign.

>

 

[Jeffr0]

3) It is currently in print and further development.

I thought it as deadish. Apart from JTAS articles, there's no support for the line currently planned?

 

[Jeffr0]

GT has a big section of Library data that is mostly lifted from CT materials you already have. It also has several sidebars to justify the setting to non-seventies sci-fi nerds.

It has details for converting Traveller characters and (I think) worlds to GURPS. Very useful.

It has a lame "simplified" trade system that makes no sense.

It has a pretty good equipment list.

It has a space combat system that makes a lot of assumptions about Traveller tech that aren't necessarily in other Traveller systems. GURPS Starships adds a lot more options and gadjets, but only 2 or 3 more pages of combat rules. (You already have a revised version of the system in GTIW.)

 

[aramis]

If you want the "Official History", GT by definition isn't it (It is an alternate universe).

Someone (I know not who) emailed Marc and made bogus claims of severe revisionism about Mongoose's approach (Well, MJD's Approach) to the Spinward Marches book. So the needed level of revision (Andor vs Adory, etc) was disallowed, and so certain canonista hot buttons got carried forth.

If you want a CT-ish ruleset, MWM still sells CT, and Mongoose's Traveller is very similar (but mechanically updated).

Jeffr0: I don't keep up with the GURPS line, but I know SJG is the only exception to the "No Renewals other than Mongoose" clause.

 

[Gadrin]

Jeffr0: I don't keep up with the GURPS line, but I know SJG is the only exception to the "No Renewals other than Mongoose" clause.

Probably because of Loren Wiseman.

I think the thing I liked most about GURPS Traveller was most of the grognards over there are CT fans. And to get from the GTU to the CTU isn't much work. There's differences for sure, prices of things work differently, they also have slightly different technology path, but the books lend themselves to being able to tool things to your own likings/beliefs, which means you can go home, so to speak.

>

 

[wolf90]

To echo earlier thoughts, it would be nice to see some new GURPS Traveller material come out... (or at least be announced).

It may not be dead, but it sure seems to be travelling in a low berth...

Drew

 

[Jeffr0]

I think the thing I liked most about GURPS Traveller was most of the grognards over there are CT fans. And to get from the GTU to the CTU isn't much work. There's differences for sure, prices of things work differently, they also have slightly different technology path, but the books lend themselves to being able to tool things to your own likings/beliefs, which means you can go home, so to speak.>

Yeah... the GURPS books are to books 4-8 as books 4-8 are to 1-3. (I see the GT line as being a great supplement for CT... it's more of an extension of CT than it is a standalone game-- mostly because of its "mega-game carcinoma meets genericity" philosophy.)

 

[mbrinkhues]

Hi,
I have GURPS 4th Ed, Starships, First In, Far Trader, Interstellar Wars (though not that impressed by it) plus Traveller TNE, some other bits and bobs and the Far Future CD for Classic Traveller. I like the detail and professionalism of the GURPS materials (although I sometimes feel as if they expect all their readership to have a maths degree) and definately intend to get Starports and a few other books as well.

Ermm, this may sound like an odd question but just what is GURPS Traveller itself going to offer me that is not in the other books?

Thanks
Malcolm

Basically in the GT Base Book you will find:

+ The stats of the classic "adventure class ships" (Typ A, A2, etc)

+ Some more character Templates (Basic templates, the ones in the specialised books are normaly more detailed, i.e the basic book gives you a Noble template. The "Nobles" book gives you 3-4 Templates + Customizing)

+ Some equipment lists with the GURPS stats, useful at least for the weapons

+ Library data fixed to the GURPS ATU (i.e the Impi still lives etc)

 

[Poor Merchant]

Thanks for the responses, chaps. I picked up the four GURPS Tech books yesterday and have flicked through them. Oddly the one I took most pleasure in was LowTech as it took a real bottom up look at basic technology - allowing you to follow the authors' methodology. I'm not sure where this will ever fit in a Traveller campaign but good stuff nevertheless.

The GURPS books I'd most like to get are both out of print, GURPS Mars and GT: Starports (you'd think with modern DTP methods it would be relatively easy to convert the files used to print these books into PDFs for download but I guess not).

Blue Planet - is that a seaborne campaign? Also are there elements of the Transhuman Space campaigns that would be useful? I was thinking of High Frontiers and In The Well.

 

[Gadrin]

Thanks for the responses, chaps. I picked up the four GURPS Tech books yesterday and have flicked through them. Oddly the one I took most pleasure in was LowTech as it took a real bottom up look at basic technology - allowing you to follow the authors' methodology. I'm not sure where this will ever fit in a Traveller campaign but good stuff nevertheless.

The GURPS books I'd most like to get are both out of print, GURPS Mars and GT: Starports (you'd think with modern DTP methods it would be relatively easy to convert the files used to print these books into PDFs for download but I guess not).

Blue Planet - is that a seaborne campaign? Also are there elements of the Transhuman Space campaigns that would be useful? I was thinking of High Frontiers and In The Well.

Sometimes you can get great deals on used books here:

www.abebooks.com

use the advanced search for GURPS and Steve Jackson Games, not to mention other traveller stuff.

I saw Starports but it was $36

GURPS Blue Planet is a TL9 water world, so it could be adapted for use the GT campaign.

Another goody is GURPS Ogre, which you should be able to find used/cheap. It's another TL9 setting that's in the basic Traveller uni, which again you can mold to fit what you want.

Other goodies on the GURPS e23 site are the Space Atlas series. Those are PDFs which describe ~20 to ~25 planets and the local interstellar region, businesses and so on, if you need some quick worlds.

http://e23.sjgames.com/item.html?id=SJG30-6199
http://e23.sjgames.com/item.html?id=SJG30-6500
http://e23.sjgames.com/item.html?id=SJG30-6501
http://e23.sjgames.com/item.html?id=SJG30-6502




>

 

[Poor Merchant]

Again, thanks for the responses. I've bought copies of GURPS Mars and Blue Planet from Ebay (I seem to be sucking up large amounts of peripheral material in the last couple of months) so that's two items ticked off my wants list.

I've also been reading an old, old copy of Gerard K O'Neil's "High Frontier" from 1978 - which is one reason I'd like to have a look at the THS High Frontier book. It's very sad for me - I was 16 or 17 when the O'Neil book came out (I suspect I picked up Traveller at about the same time) and was keen to see it all happen - 30 years later and I'm still waiting. I think at heart I'm a fairly "hard" sci-fi kind of guy which is why I favour the GURPS materials - they hang together well; ie they are constructed in a rational and logical manner with a minimum of handwavium.

But having said that, if something else pops up that fits the bill I'm more than happy to import it. After all, it is one of the nice things about the Imperium that it is big enough (and in many respects vague enough) that this isn't a problem.

By the way, I've been building trade tables for Mirriam (in the Spinward Marches) using G:FT and once you actually get out the dice it isn't as hard as it looks. Can I take it that the base price for different cargoes is given in GT since as far as I can see G:FT seems to tell you how much you will be paid to ship the goods, or what percentage of the price you will be buy or sell them for with speculative trade but it doesn't give you the price of aluminium per ton (or perhaps I'm being stupid).

 

[mbrinkhues]

For europeans:

www.fanen.com

might have some GURPS stuff in store, including Traveller stuff.

(I am not associatet to the shop, it's my FLGS)