MT Only: Running Arrival Vengeance: Any suggestions?

[kazrak]

While reading through the 1248 sourcebooks, it became clear that reading through Arrival Vengeance would be necessary for background. And after reading it, it looked really tempting to run. My family agreed, so we're setting up characters this weekend.

I'm looking at 4 players, 2 characters each - one on the diplomatic/command staff and one marine, with roles spread around so everybody's in charge of something. (One player's the captain, one's her XO, one's head of the diplomatic mission, and one's squad leader for the marines.) I figure that if somebody doesn't have a relevant character for something, they can pick up one of the nameless extras on the bridge or wherever.

Any particular suggestions on how to run it that aren't covered in the book itself? Any gotchas I should look out for?

 

[jcrocker]

I bought it, back in the day, wanted to run it, never got a chance. Best of luck!

 

[Supplement Four]

I bought it too, BitD. Heck, I bought everything I found with "Traveller" in the title.

From what I remember, it's basically an outline of a campaign that needs a ton of GM work.

"Tell Norris I'm sorry."

 

[Nathan Brazil]

Look at MT Astrogator's Guide To Diaspora Sector for some more accurate borders and UWP, if you decide on travelling thru there. The Rebellion era maps on travellermap reflect pre-Hard Times borders.

History-wise the only real change or new detail in the 1248 books is the Solomani Confederation has been driving the fleeing Vegans towards Duke Craig and that the Duke fully and openly repeals the Psionic Suppression laws in his realm in 1129. Arrival Vengeance takes place before, true, but perhaps there is covert psionc research before 1129.

Keep track of the ship and its assets as if it is a character. The ship is not likely to replace crew (are you SURE one replacement is not a spy for a faction?) or lost equipment/assets like fighters.

 

[kazrak]

The Vegan situation is actually mentioned as part of the visit to Daibei in the book. (Along with various other races that don't want to live under the Solomani, like Dolphins.)

Keeping track of resources is a good point, although there is a "frozen watch" on board for replacing casualties. Still, in a way, that's just another finite resource, and it's not like you have infinite numbers of any one type of crew. Figure the major finite resources are the 20 fighters, 4 GCarriers, and 4 fuel shuttles (one of which is destroyed in a scripted event). Possibly things like the Marines' battle dress and FGMPs - they may not have lots of spares for those, even if there are Marines in the frozen watch.

I never bought it back in the day - I was in college at the time, with little money and a lack of access to a good gaming store. Looking at prices for used copies...I prefer working off of hardcopy, but I think if I want to do that I'm going to need to print the PDF.

Thanks! We'll see how it goes - I'll give updates if people are interested.

 

[Major B]

I'll give updates if people are interested.

Please do!

 

[kazrak]

Please do!

I've started a log of what happened in the Lone Star part of the forum, for those who want to follow along.

 

[GypsyComet]

As the book itself suggests, you and your players may want to decide early on if the campaign is going to run as "day in the life" with occasional gloss for travel, or if it will run as stations with connective narrative. The second is shorter, but runs the risk of invoking the old Traveller curse: "It has a map! It must be important!"