I'm contemplating running Traveller (Mongoose). I had some questions about it though. If anyone could provide their opinion on one or more of these it would be very helpful for my cogitation:

- What are some of the hidden pitfalls of re-engineering some of the careers to better suit my tastes (I want to put the risk of death back in, but not as harsh as "iron man")?

- I want to create my own aliens instead of using the standard array. Are there danger zones in this process I'm likely to overlook that you've learned about from your own experience?

- Are the ship management and construction rules really as impenetrable as they look, or do they get easier through practice for less tech-headed players?

- How would you implement more trans-human ideas (genetic engineering, elective bodily modification) without accidentally breaking rule-assumptions?

- Are there peculiarities with the combat sysem I should be aware of (Mongoose specific)?

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646088I'm contemplating running Traveller (Mongoose). I had some questions about it though. If anyone could provide their opinion on one or more of these it would be very helpful for my cogitation:

I am called to action!

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646088- What are some of the hidden pitfalls of re-engineering some of the careers to better suit my tastes (I want to put the risk of death back in, but not as harsh as "iron man")?

None really. The Mongoose Traveller character generation system goes into detail on the danger of creating older powerful characters. There is a happy medium that can be achieved set to your preferences. The default system allows for career ending injuries instead of death.

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646088- I want to create my own aliens instead of using the standard array. Are there danger zones in this process I'm likely to overlook that you've learned about from your own experience?

As long as you treat the aliens you create as an actual non-monolithic race that thinks as well as a human, but not like a human, then you should be OK. Take a look at the old articles from JTAS on aliens, like the Bwaps, Vargr, or Aslan. They all have profiles based on psychology and sociology of the races. Treat aliens seriously and you can hardly ever go wrong.

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646088- Are the ship management and construction rules really as impenetrable as they look, or do they get easier through practice for less tech-headed players?

No, they are not. If you want impenetrable, take a look at the ship construction rules for Megatraveller, Traveller: The New Era, and T4. They do take a bit of getting used to, but they become easier to deal with in time. There is an inherant use of accounting that goes along with ship management, but it actually is more of springboard for Referee adventure ideas than anything else.

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646088- How would you implement more trans-human ideas (genetic engineering, elective bodily modification) without accidentally breaking rule-assumptions?

They are already included in the Core Rulebook as an introduction. You should get Supplement 8: Cybernetics if you want to go full on Alaistair Reynolds or William Gibson with your Mongoose Traveller. Maybe Book 9: Robots as well, but not necessarily so.

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646088- Are there peculiarities with the combat sysem I should be aware of (Mongoose specific)?

The system is based on hitting your target and then penetrating the target's armor before doing damage. The initiative system took a little getting used to, but that was about it.

My best advice for you is to buy or download the Mongoose Traveller Core Rulebook and start with that. It should be all that you need to begin with. If you like how the game plays and what it offers, then expand on that. Take it for a test drive first, don't buy a ton of stuff to start out with because you will most likely get overwhelmed and lose interest.

(Come to think of it, I could make a pretty close approximation of Major Motoko Kusanagi using just the Mongoose Traveller Core Rulebook. Transhuman enough for you? )

Thank you for your enthusiastic response Jeff. Can I ask for the following elaborations? Oh, and just for clarity I do have the core book (nothing else).

- If you were to put death back into the careers, how would you do it? I'm thinking of ditching the Mishap tables, turning the lowest results on the Events tables into mishaps, and turning a result of 2 into death, thus getting a 1/36 chance per career term. Is this ill-advised?

- Are there particular points of ship building or character construction that are especially dodgy for new players? I would want to be prepared.

- I like the transhuman options in the main book. What do you think would happen if I reduced their credit costs?

- How are really bizarre aliens like hivers in actual play? More trouble than they're worth?

- I've heard some complaints about the initiative system you've mentioned. Have you house ruled it in any way?

Quote from: jeff37923;646104(Come to think of it, I could make a pretty close approximation of Major Motoko Kusanagi using just the Mongoose Traveller Core Rulebook. Transhuman enough for you? )

I'd like to see that.

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646184Thank you for your enthusiastic response Jeff. Can I ask for the following elaborations? Oh, and just for clarity I do have the core book (nothing else).

OK, I just got home. Sorry for the delay in response.

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646184- If you were to put death back into the careers, how would you do it? I'm thinking of ditching the Mishap tables, turning the lowest results on the Events tables into mishaps, and turning a result of 2 into death, thus getting a 1/36 chance per career term. Is this ill-advised?

The way that we did it in my games in which we brought in the "Half-Ironman" death rules was thus. We did not change the Mishap tables since all of them have the result of Roll on Injury Table as the first result. We did however make every result on the injury table move down one number so that the "Lightly injured. No permanent effect." no longer exists and result number 1 is replaced with "Death". The incidence of occurance is about the same as what you suggest, but it just felt more in line with the rules for our groups.

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646184- Are there particular points of ship building or character construction that are especially dodgy for new players? I would want to be prepared.

Character construction, the Aging Effects, Medical Care for Injuries, and Traveller Skill Packages get overlooked. So definitely read over them as well.

For ship construction, before starting please read the sections on Spacecraft Operations and Space Combat. There are some important considerations that are presented in those sections which will effect your design decisions. The big one for me was that sandcasters could be used offensively at Close or Adjacent ranges in space (They only do 1 point of damage, but that is a radical departure from previous versions in which the sandcaster was purely defensive).

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646184- I like the transhuman options in the main book. What do you think would happen if I reduced their credit costs?

I'd keep the costs where they are. If you reduce the cost of cybernetics, especially augmentations, then those will become more commonly available. A person who gets augmented is a large investment of money and usually only top percentile individuals would be chosen for this. To use the Ghost in the Shell analogy, a special team like Section 9 funded by a government is possible at the current costs, but when those costs are reduced then superpowered persons become not just for governments, but for corporations and organized crime as well.

There will also be safeguards in place to counter the illegal use of cybernetics or cyborg crime.

(Although, you know, lowering the cost by a factor of ten for augmentations would lead to an environment like that shown often in Bubblegum Crisis or Cyberpunk 2020. Might be fun to do!)

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646184- How are really bizarre aliens like hivers in actual play? More trouble than they're worth?

In the past, really alien aliens like the Hivers were like spices, best used sparingly to add flavor to the game. The provide a bit of extra work, but were usually worth it to show that the game universe was huge and capable of holding things that were incredibly strange but still did not strain credibility.

In all things that you do with Traveller, the key is to pull on the Player's disbelief suspenders but not to snap them. Some things, like the near impossibility of controlled gravity, are found acceptable because Players are used to seeing that in science fiction TV and movies as a common convention. As long as what you do maintains the Player's suspension of disbelief, then everything should be OK.

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646184- I've heard some complaints about the initiative system you've mentioned. Have you house ruled it in any way?

We did not houserule the initiative system, it just became a kind of "poker game" when going against another Player as to what the character would do and how the Tactics roll or a Hasten would affect the Initiative for that round. The only thing we found was that usually, "The one who acts first, controls the combat."

Quote from: The Butcher;646200I'd like to see that.

I'll look for it when I wake up in the morning. I did it when I first got the playtest files as a test run of the system. I'd do her differently now, but hindsight is 20/20. I'm sure she is still in my notes somewhere.

Other thoughts:

If anything, adding char-gen death back in helps balance high term characters.  I'm used to running with term limits in the 3 to 5 range to avoid janitors alongside admirals in the party, but the higher you go with mortality risk the more you can remove any limits on number of terms and let players take their chances.  So I don't see anything game breaking about iron man, except that 1 in 36 may be too rare to be meaningful.

Although the core book stands alone, and I really appreciate that in a game, to the extent you know you're going there anyway, I would go ahead and get Cybernetics by the time you start, and plug that in from the beginning.

One thing I experienced, first with the equipment customization options in the core book, then with Central Supply Catalog, was that when we had some players working those options and others only looking at the core stock list, we got a pretty wide power imbalance just in gear.  Which actually Traveller handles better than, say, 3rd or 4th edition D&D, but this was wide enough it was still frustrating for certain of the players and to run for.  I don't myself have Cybernetics so this may be unwarranted, but I'm guessing the same dynamic could happen there.

For me, the death during chargen has a very important pro: it turns chargen into a gambling game of sorts. So, will you risk another term to tryand get some additional skills? You risk injury or death.
If you don't have that check, the logic step is to try to run for as much terms as possible. With death in chargen, if you get a lucky streak and get several promotions and extra skills, you will do well retiring young, and enjoy your luck.

Quote from: Imperator;646335For me, the death during chargen has a very important pro: it turns chargen into a gambling game of sorts. So, will you risk another term to tryand get some additional skills? You risk injury or death.
If you don't have that check, the logic step is to try to run for as much terms as possible. With death in chargen, if you get a lucky streak and get several promotions and extra skills, you will do well retiring young, and enjoy your luck.

This is exactly why I would reinstate it. I rationalize it as "Your character has adventures BEFORE she has adventures, and they carry risks of their own."

Regarding what Saladman said, yeah I guess I'm leaning more into transhumanist territory than Traveller usually does, so I should just get the book already. I'm leery of adding splatbooks for the reasons you stated, so I will use it selectively. If anyone can give me warnings about broken specific stuff in cybernetics that would helpful.

Jeff, thank ou for the responses again. Further queries:

- So have you had players portray unusual aliens?

- When you say the higher initiative "controls the combat" do you mean they have an advantage or a dominating advantage?

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646401Jeff, thank ou for the responses again.

Anytime. I'm happy to help.

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646401Further queries:

- So have you had players portray unusual aliens?

Rarely. Usually they were NPCs run by me. Unusual aliens fit into campaigns because they are unusual, they are definitely not the norm. They can be trying to fit in, but the psychology of the alien gets in the way. Case in point, with Hivers, they let their progeny run wild and treat them almost as vermin until they become old enough to start showing signs of sentience - which is radically different from the majority of sentient species, so when child-rearing comes up you get a really contrarian alien viewpoint from the Hivers that can be a disconnect.

Thinkof what you want the alien for in your campaign, then decide on how to integrate it. For the sake of this discussion, I'd consider Artificial Intelligence to be unusual alien as well.

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646401- When you say the higher initiative "controls the combat" do you mean they have an advantage or a dominating advantage?

They have an advantage, not a dominating one, but never understimate the power of letting the other guy go first while you hold your action waiting in response to his.

Quote from: jeff37923;646405Thinkof what you want the alien for in your campaign, then decide on how to integrate it.

Well, I basically want two to five races, all of which will be possible for players to select. I want them all to be pretty darn non-human in biology and basic outlook, but some will be easier to get to grips with than others.

I'm really not fond of plot-device or background color aliens. To me, fully fleshed out aliens with cultures within cultures is one of the joys of scifi.

Anyway, more questions:

- At what level of detail do players' eyes usually glaze over when it comes to an alien description?

- Do I really need to get the supplement to tell me how smaller ships are built or is there a work-around that can be done with just the core book?

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646733Well, I basically want two to five races, all of which will be possible for players to select. I want them all to be pretty darn non-human in biology and basic outlook, but some will be easier to get to grips with than others.

I'm really not fond of plot-device or background color aliens. To me, fully fleshed out aliens with cultures within cultures is one of the joys of scifi.

OK, cool. That gives me a better handle on best to frame my answers so that they are helpful.

Anyway, more questions:

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646733- At what level of detail do players' eyes usually glaze over when it comes to an alien description?

Depends entirely on the Player in question. I've had Players tell me they are overwhelmed with a single page handout on the alien race while others have gotten irate that I didn't detail the cellular biology of the alien. Go to a level of detail that you feel comfortable with, but remember that all of that information may not be common knowledge for people in the setting - so you can go ahead and make your Player handouts as simple or detailed as you choose to suit your Players. Personally, I think a half-page or a single page handout of information is plenty for use.

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646733- Do I really need to get the supplement to tell me how smaller ships are built or is there a work-around that can be done with just the core book?

You can just use the standard designs for small craft from the Core Book with little to no problem. I'd suggest getting High Guard only if you plan on building a lot of small craft for your setting. If you are not, just use the components from the shipbuiding chapter in the Core Book to modify the small craft therin.

Quote from: The Butcher;646200I'd like to see that.

Off hand you could use the Total Body Replacement from the Equipment Supplement, though that is both incredibly simple and not terribly satisfying if you want to capture the FEEL.

To capture the FEEL of Kusanagi, I'd go with the Robots book and the full cyborg option. You just wind up building an entire robot body, run by a human mind, essentially.

I personally felt they glossed over 'regular biped movement' in the design phase, I'm still not entirely sure that 'two conventional legs' are assumed or are missing from design, but that is actually a minor oversight (and the only one I recall from my own efforts to design robots when I got the book...).

Even if you went through the Total Body Replacement method (to save time and energy), I'd still use Robots to help gel up the setting across the board.

A major point I have in regards to prices is to view them individually on each world, depending on law level, population, tech level and closeness to other worlds.

Let's say you have a Tech 12 world with no other Tech 10-12 world within 6 jumps. They could charge a premium to offworlders because they don't have any local competition.

On the flipside, what about a Tech 14 world with 8 billion people? There are so many customers and the Tech 12 goody is actually 2 steps behind in technology, so it might be cheap and accessible.

In the US, the government supplies vaccines, even to the poorest citizens. A homeless person at any hospital will have a cast put on for free, probably even get a MRI for free. I imagine that a Tech 12 non-psycho government would provide the best of Tech 10 medical to every citizen.

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646088I'm contemplating running Traveller (Mongoose).

With 30 years of Traveller experience, I highly recommend getting Stars Without Number as a GM resource to mine for ideas. The PDF is free.
http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/86467/Stars-Without-Number%3A-Free-Edition

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646088- I want to create my own aliens instead of using the standard array. Are there danger zones in this process I'm likely to overlook that you've learned about from your own experience?

Default Traveller is humanocentric, but if you prefer the cantina from Star Wars, you can do that just fine.

Do you want "aliens of the week" or do you want Babylon 5 where aliens have their own significant power blocks?

The big question is how integrated are these new races in the Imperium, or are they isolated on particular worlds?

When I make a new species, I pay a lot of attention to their homeworld and decide on key racial traits. Where do they stand versus a human? What does their dominant culture value? Do they even have a dominant culture?

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646088- Are the ship management and construction rules really as impenetrable as they look, or do they get easier through practice for less tech-headed players?

Yes and yes, but be thankful that MongTrav has learned from previous editions where the math became a joke meme even before the internet.

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646088- How would you implement more trans-human ideas (genetic engineering, elective bodily modification) without accidentally breaking rule-assumptions?

My problem with trans-human ideas is that PCs interpret them to be "how I make my character more badass" instead of how these ideas would affect society as a whole.

Also, how does it affect the balance of Imperial society?

In my games, gene sculpting and nigh-immortality drugs is the domain of nobles only...and the very rich go for illegal options.  

When adding supertech, don't just imagine how the players will use it. Imagine it from the point of view of governments, mega-corps and wealthy individuals.

Quote from: Imperator;646335For me, the death during chargen has a very important pro: it turns chargen into a gambling game of sorts.

Agreed. Roll 'em up Iron Man style!

Also, death in chargen = Traveller. It's such a major schtick for the game, akin to color coded security in Paranoia and "mages can't use swords" in D&D.

The gamble chargen is a lot of fun at the table too. Our group always has a blast with the dice gambles.

Several years ago, I "won" our chargen by getting a dude with 12 terms who was so laughable. His skills rocked so hard, his stats were just one step from death and in our very first adventure in our very first combat, "Grandpa" got hit by a shotgun for 8 times his stats!

Quote from: Vegetable Protein;646401- So have you had players portray unusual aliens?

I have done the Cantina Campaign with Vargr, Aslan and even a Virushi. It was space opera and we had fun.

Thanks for chiming in Spinachcat! I'll add your input to the salad.

- Should I be careful about adding a large alien to the player options? What about a flying alien? These are things that D&D traditionally does poorly and I've always wanted to explore. What should I look out for?

- What would happen if I tried to emphasize laser weaponry over conventional bullet weapons?