Player's Book: What's needed?

[robject]

This is probably one of the biggest areas to target for trimming down.

For now, then, let's replace it with a two page summary.

And let's cut the equipment list in half.

There should also probably be something for making an alien character.

The path forward for this is to provide character generation cards for the major aliens. And that's not necessary for the Player's Guide.

The vehicle and small craft lists aren't strictly needed, either, in the book itself. Especially if they're available on the web, for example.

Actually, ship combat isn't needed, either.

But what are needed are examples of personal combat, and an armor and weapons list.

Um, and let's consider putting some of the Trade chapter back in.

Front Matter .................   1    10 pp
Intro ........................  11    10 pp

Characteristics and the UPP ..  21    20 pp
Characters ...................  41    30 pp
Skills pp142-175 .............  71    34 pp
Weapons List TBD ............. 105     2 pp
Armor List TBD ............... 107     2 pp
Equipment List (ABBREV TBD) .. 109    11 pp
Experience ................... 120     2 pp
Character Examples TBD ....... 122    10 pp

Tasks ........................ 132    13 pp
Personal Combat .............. 145    26 pp
Combat Examples TBD .......... 171    10 pp

Starports .................... 181     8 pp
Starship List ................ 189     2 pp
Basic Starship Ops TBD ....... 191     2 pp
The UWP (pp432-434) .......... 193     3 pp
Interactions ................. 196     6 pp
Trade (pp477-479, 490-491) ... 202     5 pp
Vehicles (pp281-295) ......... 207    15 pp
Costs (pp48-53) .............. 222     6 pp
Money (p56) .................. 228     1 pp

Psionics ..................... 229    10 pp

Final Word ................... 239     2 pp

 

[robject]

Equipment List

Let's look at the equipment list. What does a player need, and what does he not need?

• Intro page
• One communicator, instead of a page of examples
• MOVE the page of protections into a separate ARMOR list.
• The full page of survival items
• A half-page of breathing gear
• The full page of surface gear
• One page of detectors
• The page of emitters
• The half page of containers
• One page of construction equipment
• One page of information machinery
• One page of medical (or omit)
• One page of structures
• One page of toolkits

11 pages.

 

[esampson]

. . .The path forward for this is to provide character generation cards for the major aliens. And that's not necessary for the Player's Guide. . .

Fair enough. I was only thinking of a single page (maybe even only a half page) entry for each one but as I thought about it today I realized they aren't really essential components to getting up and running. I've played plenty of games where absolutely no one was a non-human, so they can pretty safely be left out.

The vehicle and small craft lists aren't strictly needed, either, in the book itself. Especially if they're available on the web, for example.

There should probably be a smattering of small craft and vehicles. Basically those that would be received as part of a mustering out benefit (they aren't received directly but things such as an air/raft are received when one gets a scout ship).

Actually, ship combat isn't needed, either.

That might be cutting to deep, but I think we are definitely getting down to a reasonable level and we don't need 50 pages of ship combat. I will bet it can be reduced to a reasonable level.

But what are needed are examples of personal combat, and an armor and weapons list.

Um, and let's consider putting some of the Trade chapter back in.

Just my opinion but I think ship combat is more important than trade. That's not to say you absolutely need to jettison trade. If the book is down to a reasonable page count then I think putting some of the trade chapter back would be good. I just think that ship combat is of greater importance.

Of course that's my opinion. Maybe some others want to weigh in on the question? (I'm not proposing a vote on the matter. Just asking for other people's opinions)

Front Matter .................   1    10 pp
Intro ........................  11    10 pp

Characteristics and the UPP ..  21    20 pp
Characters ...................  41    30 pp
Skills pp142-175 .............  71    34 pp
Weapons List TBD ............. 105     2 pp
Armor List TBD ............... 107     2 pp
Equipment List (ABBREV TBD) .. 109    11 pp
Experience ................... 120     2 pp
Character Examples TBD ....... 122    10 pp

Tasks ........................ 132    13 pp
Personal Combat .............. 145    26 pp
Combat Examples TBD .......... 171    10 pp

Starports .................... 181     8 pp
Starship List ................ 189     2 pp
Basic Starship Ops TBD ....... 191     2 pp
The UWP (pp432-434) .......... 193     3 pp
Interactions ................. 196     6 pp
Trade (pp477-479, 490-491) ... 202     5 pp
Vehicles (pp281-295) ......... 207    15 pp
Costs (pp48-53) .............. 222     6 pp
Money (p56) .................. 228     1 pp

Psionics ..................... 229    10 pp

Final Word ................... 239     2 pp

Looking way better. Only about 1/3 the size the the Trip-B. Some of the math is off though. I'm guessing both Characteristics and the UPP and Characters are only about 10 pages a piece rather than 30 and 40. That's probably too much for the first and not enough for the second, but I think 20 pages between them probably works out fine.

 

[robject]

There should probably be a smattering of small craft and vehicles. Basically those that would be received as part of a mustering out benefit (they aren't received directly but things such as an air/raft are received when one gets a scout ship).

Fair enough.

That might be cutting to deep, but I think we are definitely getting down to a reasonable level and we don't need 50 pages of ship combat.

Ship combat is 14 pages.

I'm guessing both Characteristics and the UPP and Characters are only about 10 pages a piece rather than 30 and 40.

Huh, yeah, the Characteristics chapter is just 10 pages. Thanks for that.

Chargen is actually 32 pages, once you cut out the random events tables.

It is barely possible that the Personal Combat chapter will shrink in size. I'm going to ping a couple people and see where it's at.

I can EASILY see the Weapons and Armor lists' page counts growing. Let's talk about that.

Front Matter .................   1    10 pp
Intro ........................  11    10 pp

Characteristics and the UPP ..  21    10 pp
Characters ...................  31    32 pp
Skills pp142-175 .............  63    34 pp
Experience ...................  97     2 pp
Character Examples TBD .......  99    10 pp

Weapons List TBD ............. 109     2 pp
Armor List TBD ............... 111     2 pp
Equipment List (ABBREV TBD) .. 113    11 pp
Vehicles and Small Craft ..... 124     2 pp
Starship List ................ 126     2 pp

Tasks ........................ 128    13 pp
Personal Combat .............. 141    26 pp
Combat Examples TBD .......... 167    10 pp
Starship Combat .............. 177    14 pp

Starports .................... 191     8 pp
Basic Starship Ops TBD ....... 199     2 pp
The UWP (pp432-434) .......... 201     3 pp
Interactions ................. 204     6 pp
Vehicle Ops (pp290-295) ...... 210     6 pp
Trade (pp477-479, 490-491) ... 216     5 pp
Costs (pp48-53) .............. 221     6 pp
Money (p56) .................. 227     1 pp

Psionics ..................... 228    10 pp

Final Word ................... 238     2 pp

INDEX (p240-)

 

[Daddicus]

Let's look at the equipment list. What does a player need, and what does he not need?

• Intro page
• One communicator, instead of a page of examples
• MOVE the page of protections into a separate ARMOR list.
• The full page of survival items
• A half-page of breathing gear
• The full page of surface gear
• One page of detectors
• The page of emitters
• The half page of containers
• One page of construction equipment
• One page of information machinery
• One page of medical (or omit)
• One page of structures
• One page of toolkits

11 pages.

I'ld be totally behind this.

To choose what stuff to include, how about saying the player's guide (PG)covers up to Tech Level something. Save higher tech stuff for a supplement. For instance, the CT LBBs capped it at 15. At the time, it was a hard limit, but we know better now.

The key will be to not eliminate the stuff, but rather put it into a supplement. A basic campaign requires only the PG, but there are other things if one is interested.

Ideally, both could be released at the same time. However, from a practical perspective, that's not feasible. The team just isn't big enough.

 

[Daddicus]

I'm in favor of slimming down ship combat and trade, but not all the way to zero. There should be enough information and examples that a player would know what his broker and navigation skills are good for.

Also needed is enough detail to realize that owning a ship is complicated, expensive, and fraught with both risk and reward. But, the details can be left to the ref's guide or a supplement.

Regarding armor, I would say keep it to a small number of pieces, but with enough variety to know what it's useful for. AND, to whet their appetite. Supplements might be mostly for refs, but it would be really good if we could salt the PG with teases so that players also want to buy them.

 

[Ulsyus]

The thing needs a decent, well detailed index. Please.

 

[robject]

The thing needs a decent, well detailed index. Please.

Nice catch!

 

[Ulsyus]

What about something about the setting? Anything on 3I? Would it need something to put the careers into context?

 

[robject]

What about something about the setting? Anything on 3I? Would it need something to put the careers into context?

I don't know. You may be right. But, perhaps it depends on what that "something" is?

 

[rancke]

What about something about the setting? Anything on 3I? Would it need something to put the careers into context?

Some rules for modifying the generic rules for specific settings would be more useful (though they would belong in a referee manual, not a player manual).

I think Traveller could benefit enormously from a greater conciousness of the difference between generic setting rules and specific setting rules. Things like e.g. having ten officer ranks in the generic character generation rules and then having setting rules that said things like "because the Imperium covers so much territory and its forces are so big, the Imperial Army has two more ranks and the Imperial Navy has four more ranks" and "because the Vinorian System Defense Force is so small, it doesn't use ranks 7 and 9; captains are promoted directly to Rear Admiral and Rear Admirals directly to Admiral. However, promotion rolls for O8 and O10 have a -2 modifier".


Hans

 

[Daddicus]

The thing needs a decent, well detailed index. Please.

The more I think about this, the more I feel that the full index should be on-line. That way there could be a lot more items listed, and cross-references could exist as well.

It needs to also be in the printed book, but an additional on-line version could be extended as supplements were added.

Perhaps a wiki-type format, although not a full wiki, as that might cause people to not buy the book.

 

[Ulsyus]

Some rules for modifying the generic rules for specific settings would be more useful (though they would belong in a referee manual, not a player manual).

That's a great idea. It needs to build on something solid though, which is where a setting primer needs to be included. That could be built upon by the couple of well-written run-on-rails scenarios that would help beginners by teaching them how to play in one setting.

Traveller doesn't rate in the popular consciousness the way ST or SW do, so it needs more to illustrate it to beginners. When you ask a random person in the street about light sabres, they will likely know what you're talking about (well, in a 1st world western nation anyway...). Ask them about marine Battle Dress and it's all over. So, the setting needs to be illustrated (words as well as pictures) for new players to be able to visualise and imagine during play.

 

[esampson]

What about something about the setting? Anything on 3I? Would it need something to put the careers into context?

Some rules for modifying the generic rules for specific settings would be more useful (though they would belong in a referee manual, not a player manual).

I think Traveller could benefit enormously from a greater conciousness of the difference between generic setting rules and specific setting rules. Things like e.g. having ten officer ranks in the generic character generation rules and then having setting rules that said things like "because the Imperium covers so much territory and its forces are so big, the Imperial Army has two more ranks and the Imperial Navy has four more ranks" and "because the Vinorian System Defense Force is so small, it doesn't use ranks 7 and 9; captains are promoted directly to Rear Admiral and Rear Admirals directly to Admiral. However, promotion rolls for O8 and O10 have a -2 modifier".


Hans

I don't think that much information about the setting is really necessary. To use a fairly familiar analogy, the Players Handbook for D&D doesn't really provide much in the way of setting detail in any of it's editions. You are told 'these are the abilities for a paladin' and that's it. There's no in depth discussion of the deities that the paladin might follow, the place of paladins in society, upbringing of paladins, yadda, yadda, yadda. In some editions there might be a few small blurbs giving some names and some extremely generalized information but that was about it.

I think similarly a player's handbook for Traveller should probably provide just the briefest overview of the career paths (Navy refers to the guys flying and maintaining space ships. Scouts are divided into Exploration, Survey, and Communications, etc.) with more detail being provided either in an Imperium handbook or something similar.

In a similar vein any information about possibly tweaking around the setting, modifying skill choices, ranks, etc. would all be handled in a referee's handbook. Those simply aren't decisions that would be made by players (they might be suggested by players but ultimately it is the referee who would make those decisions) and so I don't think they have a place in a book where the primary goal is to streamline and remove as much extraneous information as possible.

 

[robject]

Thread resurrect. Pulling in some content from the other thread:


"Before Play"

* Traveller basics.

* "How to create a character" walkthrough paired with the character generation content. The more examples, the better.

* Extensive sidebars walking a player through these various systems - creating a character, mustering out, interacting with an NPC using personals, and working through a simple firefight.

* Sophont and Robot cards, ready to generate characters from.

"Shopping Lists"

* Pre-made and useful guns, armor, vehicles, equipment.

* Starships, ready to use - mainly the mustering out benefits.

"During Play"

* Reference materials and mechanics (technology, tasks, skills, knowledges, how they're used together, flux, DM's and mods). Include basic tasks and personals, and the various modifiers which may apply.

* Charts, benchmarks, combat, tasks. How to survive in space, on exotic worlds, etc.

 

[whulorigan]

In general, using CT: The Traveller Book or the T4 Core Rulebook as a template for a T5 Player's Guide would (I think) be a generally good place to start.

Thread resurrect. Pulling in some content from the other thread:

* Extensive sidebars walking a player through these various systems - creating a character, mustering out, interacting with an NPC using personals, and working through a simple firefight.

Make sure the personal combat walkthru is a complete firefight example from beginning to end, highlighting several different examples of armor penetration (or lack thereof) and how armor reduces damage, how damage taken after armor affects the character in terms of stats, health and abilities, etc. Try and make the combat sequence cover as many of the various results that occur in a combat situation as possible.

"Shopping Lists"

* Pre-made and useful guns, armor, vehicles, equipment.

* Starships, ready to use - mainly the mustering out benefits.

Yes to all of the above. With both statistics and narrative details for ready use in play.

"During Play"

* Charts, benchmarks, combat, tasks. How to survive in space, on exotic worlds, etc.

For combat, see above.

Highlighting alien environments is an excellent addition. Perhaps combining how an alien environment (including both atmosphere and gravity) affects a combat situation.

 

[robject]

My Summary the Thread So Far

LBB1 is truly the place to start, even though careers are "advanced" compared to LBB1, plus there is useful content from LBB2 and LBB3 that players need to know. However, none of this rules out "quickstart" docs which could, for instance, let someone generate a Marine character and give a short list of weapons Marines use.

I'll round each section to the nearest 5 pages (there's no sense in making it more granular anyway at this point).

currently 230 pages estimated


Intro ........................   5 pp

If you think 5 pages is too long, consider what
might go into the front matter.  You might end
up with something closer to 10 pages.  For now
I'll be radical and go with a short intro.

Character Generation .........  40 pp  (after updated in the Core Rules)

There are 13 careers after all. The chargen section 
tells us about the human characteristics, what each 
means and how to use them, how to generate characters, 
checklists, and how to specialize and gain experience.

Character Examples TBD .......  10 pp
Skills pp142-175 .............  35 pp  (abbreviated from the Core Rules)
EQUIPMENT ....................  20 pp  (some Core Rules + new content)

Short, useful descriptions of weapons, career-related gear, armor, 
vehicles, small craft, and starships, and summary tables with prices 
et al.  Only the mustering-out starships are included -- but they're filled
out and ready to use in combat.

Tasks & Examples..............  15 pp  (abbreviated from the Core Rules)
Personal Combat ..............  25 pp  (after updated in the Core Rules)
Combat Examples TBD ..........  10 pp
Starship Combat ..............  15 pp  (after updated in the Core Rules)
TRAVELLING ...................  35 pp  (after updated in the Core Rules)

This has world ranges (1p), costs (7pp), UWP (3pp),
interactions (6pp), starports (2-8pp), operations (2pp),
explains tech levels, environmental effects (2pp), 
trade (5pp).

Psionics .....................  10 pp
Final Word ...................   2 pp
INDEX ........................   5 pp

Equipment List, abbreviated (11pp):

Intro page
One communicator, instead of a page of examples
MOVE the page of protections into a separate ARMOR list.
The full page of survival items
A half-page of breathing gear
The full page of surface gear
One page of detectors
The page of emitters
The half page of containers
One page of construction equipment
One page of information machinery
One page of medical (or omit)
One page of structures
One page of toolkits

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[Timerover51]

Two hundred and thirty pages for a players guide is way too long. You have pretty much another Big Black Book. Break it into 3 books, Characters, Starships and Worlds, and Equipment.

Cut the characters done to 6 basic ones, and have only the skills needed for those.

The thing with Classic Traveller is you have 3 relatively short books for everything. The Big Black Book is the antithesis of that.

 

[Magnus von Thornwood]

Go BBB!

Two hundred and thirty pages for a players guide is way too long. You have pretty much another Big Black Book. Break it into 3 books, Characters, Starships and Worlds, and Equipment.

Cut the characters done to 6 basic ones, and have only the skills needed for those.

The thing with Classic Traveller is you have 3 relatively short books for everything. The Big Black Book is the antithesis of that.

Lords of Space, no! Do not cut all the cool new advanced CharGen! That is some of the stuff that makes it cool. Not every one wants to join a para/military or merchant service so those other seven Careers are awesome.

See, the thing is that T5 is not CT and all that juicy detail is why it is so cool. On the other hand even though I prefer one book to bind them all, I can see breaking them down for the noobs but don't cut it back to CT+. Too many cuts and most of the good new stuff will get lost.

EDIT: Also, 230 pages is not way too long unless you are illiterate, dyslexic, or lazy and even normally lazy/dyslexic (me being one, it is terrible but true) gamers seem to have no problem devoting hours if not days reading a game system. Of course, I do game with some straight up Timmiis who are in fact hunting for mini-max or other exploits so they may be more motivated than the normal gamer. Still, 230 pages is not way too much for players' guide.

Complexity is not our enemy.

 

[SpaceBadger]

Make sure the personal combat walkthru is a complete firefight example from beginning to end, highlighting several different examples of armor penetration (or lack thereof) and how armor reduces damage, how damage taken after armor affects the character in terms of stats, health and abilities, etc. Try and make the combat sequence cover as many of the various results that occur in a combat situation as possible.

THIS! I agree with most of the other suggestions as well, but every version of Traveller with which I am familiar has been lacking in these multi-variable combat examples!