I was just re-reading (classic) Traveller Book 1, page 31, The Effects of Characteristics, when I came across the bit about Endurance and how a character can only make a number of blows in combat equal to his Endurance score, excepting surprise blows, and then must rest for at least 30 minutes or else they get a negative die modifier. I know I knew this in the back of my mind but I don't think I've ever applied this rule. Anybody playing Traveller adhere to this rule? I think I'm going to have to try it out and see how it affects things; I'm sure it will make players more likely to avoid a fight that may be prolonged and rely more on sneak/surprise attacks or quick actions to take out an opponent quickly.

Edit: page 31, not 26. Is there a way to change the thread title?

Edit: Thanks for fixing that, Estar.

The rules for this go on a little bit more...

"Weakened blows and swings are those attacks made after the combat blow allowance has been used up. Each weakened blow or swing is subject to the nega-tive DM indicated in the weapons table. Any number of weakened blows and swings may be made. To conserve strength, a character may elect to make any blow or swing weakened, and thus not have it counted against his endurance allowance."

So you can keep fighting while winded, but at a penalty.

And the number of blows is determined by value of your Endurance before you go into a fight. So if your Endurance is down from 7 to 4 because of a wound taken in a previous fight, you'll have only 4 blows to make before you are winded.

This is one more point where healing, and thus time, really comes into play in Classic Traveller.

Yeah, it sounds good; I just can't remember ever using it. I expect it will put a real spin on when, why, and how PCs get into fights.

Quote from: Dumarest;994966I expect it will put a real spin on when, why, and how PCs get into fights.

Exactly.

Also, if you use it against an opponent if you have surprise -- if you sneak up one someone and take him out before he knows you are there -- it doesn't count against the Endurance limit.

All sorts of tactics some into play in different ways.

Quote from: Dumarest;994961I was just re-reading (classic) Traveller Book 1, page 31, The Effects of Characteristics, when I came across the bit about Endurance and how a character can only make a number of blows in combat equal to his Endurance score, excepting surprise blows, and then must rest for at least 30 minutes or else they get a negative die modifier. I know I knew this in the back of my mind but I don't think I've ever applied this rule. Anybody playing Traveller adhere to this rule? I think I'm going to have to try it out and see how it affects things; I'm sure it will make players more likely to avoid a fight that may be prolonged and rely more on sneak/surprise attacks or quick actions to take out an opponent quickly.

Edit: page 31, not 26. Is there a way to change the thread title?

I've used it, but except for bar fights it was pretty rare we hade a melee combat go on long enough for someone to get winded.

The criticism, generally, of the Classic Traveller rules are that they tended to hinge on a lot of individual case applications rather than universal rules. The game itself is a marvel of game history innovation and certainly does work, but there are a fair amount of moving cogs like the Endurance rules, that a referee and players have to remember. Later editions have their own set of criticisms too, but the major developments was in creating a universal set of mechanics, that are more intuitive in play. The exception being T5, however.

I don't know if I've ever used this rule in Traveller (I'm not truly sure how much combat I ran by Traveller's rules, I do know I did run at least some), but I've used fatigue rules in other games. I have a 1/2" counter labeled "turn" that I would move down a number track written on the edge of my Battlemat to keep track. Since I have an intent to run my Classic Traveller game using the rules as presented, I will be using this rule in my games.

Frank

Quote from: TrippyHippy;994985The criticism, generally, of the Classic Traveller rules are that they tended to hinge on a lot of individual case applications rather than universal rules. The game itself is a marvel of game history innovation and certainly does work, but there are a fair amount of moving cogs like the Endurance rules, that a referee and players have to remember. Later editions have their own set of criticisms too, but the major developments was in creating a universal set of mechanics, that are more intuitive in play. The exception being T5, however.

I don't know that I consider universal mechanics to be an improvement. For me it depends more on whether the mechanic makes sense and does what it should. I've seen many games where the mechanics are the same for everything but the unintended consequence was that everything felt the same when we played them. I've found that I, and most players I've played with, don't mind and/or possibly enjoy little subsets of rules that make things feel different.

It's among the many rules I ignore!

My players were always so shotgun / autofire happy (and thus, much splatter) that I didn't worry about fatigue.

I've used it before, in the current game in which I'm a player it's not been an issue, as the fights are all 2-3 rounds at most. Walk up to someone in a vacuum and slit open his suit... well, that was a short fight.

I think the rule is mostly for dueling -- back when dueling was a thing in SF. (Though it is an issue for brawling as well.)

Any blade weapon skill can be applied as -DM if you're fighting someone using a blade weapon against you. So if you have two people who know how to sword fight they will each have penalties as they roll to hit from their opponents parring skill. This extends contests... which means the Endurance rules might come into play. (And, again, Brawling provides a similar Defensive penalty on the attacker if the defender as a Defensive expertise in Brawling.)

Most people play Traveller in the uniformly high-tech setting of the Third Imperium. But the rules are there to handle worlds like those found in Jack Vance's Planet of Adventure series, the fisticuff action of The Demon Princes books, or even a planetary romance setting like A Princess of Mars. In those tales the the protagonists often end up without firearms -- either because they run out of ammo, their weapons have been taken, or their are not many firearms available.

Any specific setting detail will obviously impact how many, if any, Blows or Swings are regularly made in a game session.

I remember the rule, and discussing it with my players and quibbling about the values in the table etc., and we agreed to try them as written to see the effects, but that it didn't really become a factor because (I didn't run Traveller for very long and) the personal combats were mostly with guns etc and didn't last long enough for someone making swings or blows to do that for more than a few turns.

I didn't even remember this rule existed! Though I know I'd read it once before. I almost immediately almost unconsciously chose to ignore it.

Quote from: RPGPundit;995626I didn't even remember this rule existed! Though I know I'd read it once before. I almost immediately almost unconsciously chose to ignore it.

I suppose that is what I did. When I came across it, it didn't seem new to me but rather seemed like something I just didn't ever use. If I get a Traveller game up and running, I think I will try to use the rules in the book.

Well, most melee combat in Classic Traveller never lasts long enough for them to come into play. The only times I've ever had a chance to use that rule is when there was a bar brawl which tend to last long enough for the rule to come into play.