Who's got any experience with other settings?

2300AD, of which Mongoose is putting out a new version, is probably the most popular, of course, but it's also one I know precious little about (I am fairly new to Traveller, mind you). I recall there  being a race of aggressive insectoid aliens (Käfer?), and space being broken down into American, French and Russian "arms", which is the sort of thing I'd love to have in my game (maybe American, European and Chinese arms?).

I'm also very curious about third-party settings. Twilight Sector has definitely caught my eye, but I'd like to know a bit more about it; all I have are a couple of RPGnet reviews of the pre-Revised version. I know nothing about Reign of Discordia either, and I'd also love to. And I suppose there might be several other great third-party settings I might be missing.

I'd really like to hear about people's actual play experiences with non-3I settings, but all sorts of info should be helpful.

I have never actually played Traveller in the Third Imperium. We always make up homebrew settings and run them. The guys I play with tend to be against lots of different humanoid aliens running around, so homebrew works better for that. It also allows for a wider variance in tech levels.

For example, I tend to treat Sol as this transhumanist, post-singularity culture, somewhere around TL 16-18, with bands of lower technological development and more recognisable human configurations radiating out from it until you get out into the hinterlands (where most of my games are set), where tech levels are all over place and people tend to still be more or less human. I find Traveller works real well for doing this.

My experience was a different - never played Traveller in anything BUT the 3I. Closest we came to trying new stuff was a game I ran where the PCs were officers on a large, long-range Scout ship headed on a multi-year mission coreward. Guess once they got past Vargr space it became a non-3I setting, sorta.

Quote from: The Butcher;4961732300AD, of which Mongoose is putting out a new version, is probably the most popular, of course, but it's also one I know precious little about (I am fairly new to Traveller, mind you). I recall there  being a race of aggressive insectoid aliens (Käfer?), and space being broken down into American, French and Russian "arms", which is the sort of thing I'd love to have in my game (maybe American, European and Chinese arms?).

2300AD was developed by the GDW Staff using a in-house geopolitical game that started out with the situation in Twilight 2000 and played out through 300 years of history. The end result is that the Earth is still divided into nation states competing with one another.

The basic gist is that the Earth recovered and by 2100 was expanding again. FTL travel was discovered the form of the Stutterwarp drive. Stutterwarp works by using a theory based on Quantum Tunnelling that cause the ship to teleport over short distances. The drive is capable of being cycled rapidly causing a pseudo motion that can go faster than light. This has ignited a new Age of Exploration that is still on-going.

The drive is limited in two main ways. First it's efficiency decrease the deeper the drive is in a the gravity well. It can't be use to take off from a planetary surface. Second it builds up a charge that will eventually cause the drive to overload and explode. The charge can discharged in a gravity well periodically. The current limit of technology is 7.7 light years.

The 7.7 ly limit largely defines the interstellar geography around Earth. There are three main 7.7 ly routes away from Earth that are called Arms. Each Arm is named after the nation that dominated it's exploration. There is the French Arm, the American Arm, and the Chinese Arm. While there is a dominant nation in each Arm many other nations also explore and have colonies. France, Great Britain, Germany, United States, Canada, Mexico, The Inca Republic, Texas, Manchuria, Ukraine, Russia, Australia, Argentina, Brazil, are but a few. Also colonization has gone long enough that there are a few independent nations.

Aliens have been contacted, The Ebers, Xiang, the Sung, the Pentapods are some. The Kafers are a recent contact and they are a warlike race of humaniods. Their face looks vaguely insectoid. However more seriously the Kafer display a different form of intelligence that limits their ability to co-exist peacefully with other races.

The average Kafer is barely sentient, however when under stress, their adrenaline response is such that their intelligence triples. Making them a very dangerous opponent in a combat situation. Just as important that when they come out of it their intelligence doesn't fall all the way back. Instead it slightly higher than before. Kafers that survive have their base intelligence greatly increased.  Then there are a handful of Kafers that are born with human standard intelligence and also displaying the same tripling effect as the average Kafer.

The effect of this is that Kafer culture is oriented towards violence. The individual Kafer is a violence junkie only truly feeling alive when under stress or combat. A Kafer superior will beat his underling BEFORE giving an order to make them intelligent enough to understand it.  Indeed Kafer culture fears the lack of violence, they have legends and myths about great civilizations that grew stupid and fell to "smart" barbarians.

The other alien races all have similar "realistic" wierdness to them. For example the Ebers have a five lobed brain. Their inner connections are such that the average Eber can only effectively use one at a time. To switch they perform specific rituals and mediations. And after the switch the Eber often displays different skills and different personalities.

The Pentapods are artificially created biological beings sent out by Pentapods "gods" to explore the universe. The Pentapods and their gods are very advanced in genetic engineering including the construction and growing of living starships.

2300 AD is a very interesting place to adventure in.

I'm probably about to give you the weirdest answer.

Most important thing though, is to know that Traveller is a toolkit kind of RPG, and the Official Traveller Universe (OTU) is the default setting created with that toolkit.

Just about half of the Traveller games I've run or played in were not in the OTU. It is just too easy to create your own setting with the tools that Traveller provides. Mongoose Traveller took this a bit further with its alternate rules that are in the Core Rulebook (things like warp drive and stargates).

Now while the base structure of all these settings are similar since they use the same rules, the way the settings differentiate themselves is what limitations are placed on those rules. It is like when you play tennis, without any limitations it is like playing tennis without a net. When you have some set limitations, like FTL travel without FTL communications, then it becomes more interesting. Traveller's toolkit nature allows you to place or remove setting limitations with ease.

So with all that said, I'd need to know more about what you are looking for in the information about non-OTU settings for Traveller before I could give you a good answer.

(Oh, and the Third Imperium is just one setting that has happened in the OTU. It came before the Fourth Imperium which was a latter part of The New Era. There is also an official Alternate Traveller Universe which avoids Virus and The New Era.)

Quote from: estar;496229...The other alien races all have similar "realistic" wierdness to them. ...2300 AD is a very interesting place to adventure in.

estar covered it well.  I just found the 2300 rules tedious.  That was during GDW's phase of trying to achieve total realism with distinguishing weapon penetration and damage, hit locations, detailing all 1000 parts of a ship's design, etc.  If you've played Twilight 2000, the rules are similar as I recall - it's been a couple of decades.
 
If Mongoose is taking the fluff and fitting it to the much simpler standard Traveller rules, it would be worth a look.

Quote from: Nicephorus;496269estar covered it well.  I just found the 2300 rules tedious.  That was during GDW's phase of trying to achieve total realism with distinguishing weapon penetration and damage, hit locations, detailing all 1000 parts of a ship's design, etc.  If you've played Twilight 2000, the rules are similar as I recall - it's been a couple of decades.
 

I agree with the comments about the rules. It will be nice to see the 2300AD Background with Traveller rules.

I think its sad how Traveller got locked-into a particular setting early on and missed an opportunity there.

In any case, I never much cared for the Imperium; and meanwhile between things like Starblazer Adventures and Stars Without Number I'm wondering if I'll ever even play Traveller again (when I did, it was always with homebrew settings).

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;496453I think its sad how Traveller got locked-into a particular setting early on and missed an opportunity there.

Mongoose Traveller has corrected that issue.

Quote from: estar;496460Mongoose Traveller has corrected that issue.

That's nice, but about 30 years too late for it to make a real difference.

RPGPundit

I've never ran Traveller (or Humanspace Empires) in any published settings; I find it far too easy and fun to make your own sector(s) & milieu.

Although I do really like the grounded feeling of 2300.

A little plug for the folks at Spica Publishing: Outer Veil is a nearish-future MGT setting with a lot more unexplored space out there. Reception has been positive so far.