Androsynth
SOC-1
Hey all, first post here.
I've gotten back into ttrpgs after a long absence, initially at the request of my brother and nephew to run an online game during Covid. Long story short, I had a blast and have now dived back into rpgs again as a full hobby. I'd forgotten how fun these were, mainly defecting to board/war games for the last decade or two.
After awhile, I decided to look for a good sci fi rpg. My current group wants to play Star Wars, which I'll probably end up running for them, but don't particularly care for. So I started looking. Ended up landing on Coriolis... but also stumbled across T5. I had MegaTraveller back in the day, and the original 3 core books. I loved them but never got to play them, my gaming group adamantly refusing to play anything but DnD and the older d6 Star Wars. Sigh. Don't remember much. Never rolled up a character even.
I impulse bought T5. Figured if nothing else, I could have fun with it solo. Then I read the reviews. Hmm. Had I made a big mistake?
What I got in the three volume set was ... surprising. I expected your typical space rpg with a Azimov/Foundation kinda setting, which is what I remember from MT.
What I actually had in my hands was the craziest, most comprehensive, most detailed collection of sci fi gaming tools any developer has ever committed to paper, even if it was organized by a nest of deranged squirrels.
I kinda love it.
I don't remember much about the old games, just that I owned them and could never convince anyone to play them. While T5 has some of the most mystifying organization I've ever seen in a rule book, once I wrapped my head around where things were (which took some wrapping, let me tell ya), it's pretty amazing in parts. Not all of it is useful at the table, I think, but it's a bottomless pit of depth. The world/char/ship/etc generation tools are basically a game themselves.
I rolled up a character last night. Every other rpg I have played you basically decide what you want, choose skills and roll stats, and make that character. It relies solely on your character vision, and due to this, mostly people land on generic stuff like 'ranger who is a loner' and 'dashing space pirate'. Not here. It seemed ridiculously complicated in T5 at first, until I actually made a character.
First... it wasn't that hard at all, more of a 'where do I find that table' problem than anything. I decided to roll up a marine. That didn't happen. What I ended up with was a navy pilot who was a war hero, an expert pilot and astrogator, who had survived an incredible battle and in the process, increased his social standing by rather a lot, due to the fame. This led me to come up with a battle, what he did in it, why he was famous, how that fame affected him and his reputation, what medal he got and why, personality traits like bravery and recklessness...
This guy... he felt like a real person, more like a character I'd create for a written story than a typical ttrpg character. I was only partially in control of his creation too, and the parts that the system generated acted like 'story prompts' for creating who he was. I ended up with a far, far more interesting character than I'd planned to do for a test roll up.
Which is kind of brilliant. I see why this system is still so loved 40 years on. I've never had this experience with a ttrpg. Had I known, I would have fought harder to bring this to the table back in the day.
Sure, there is a lot of stuff in T5 I'll never use, some parts that seem dodgy or unnecessary (ground combat, genetics), and some that I'll just bypass because they're too much work... but there is a lot here to love, maybe less as a cohesive game system and more as a vast resource of tools. I've printed up the pdfs of Classic Traveller to use as well, and will likely combine elements of T5 with the simpler to bring to the table aspects of classic.
Any tips on how to run this, or (most likely) how to combine aspects of it with other versions of Traveller would be welcome. Guess I'm part of the fan club now!
I've gotten back into ttrpgs after a long absence, initially at the request of my brother and nephew to run an online game during Covid. Long story short, I had a blast and have now dived back into rpgs again as a full hobby. I'd forgotten how fun these were, mainly defecting to board/war games for the last decade or two.
After awhile, I decided to look for a good sci fi rpg. My current group wants to play Star Wars, which I'll probably end up running for them, but don't particularly care for. So I started looking. Ended up landing on Coriolis... but also stumbled across T5. I had MegaTraveller back in the day, and the original 3 core books. I loved them but never got to play them, my gaming group adamantly refusing to play anything but DnD and the older d6 Star Wars. Sigh. Don't remember much. Never rolled up a character even.
I impulse bought T5. Figured if nothing else, I could have fun with it solo. Then I read the reviews. Hmm. Had I made a big mistake?
What I got in the three volume set was ... surprising. I expected your typical space rpg with a Azimov/Foundation kinda setting, which is what I remember from MT.
What I actually had in my hands was the craziest, most comprehensive, most detailed collection of sci fi gaming tools any developer has ever committed to paper, even if it was organized by a nest of deranged squirrels.
I kinda love it.
I don't remember much about the old games, just that I owned them and could never convince anyone to play them. While T5 has some of the most mystifying organization I've ever seen in a rule book, once I wrapped my head around where things were (which took some wrapping, let me tell ya), it's pretty amazing in parts. Not all of it is useful at the table, I think, but it's a bottomless pit of depth. The world/char/ship/etc generation tools are basically a game themselves.
I rolled up a character last night. Every other rpg I have played you basically decide what you want, choose skills and roll stats, and make that character. It relies solely on your character vision, and due to this, mostly people land on generic stuff like 'ranger who is a loner' and 'dashing space pirate'. Not here. It seemed ridiculously complicated in T5 at first, until I actually made a character.
First... it wasn't that hard at all, more of a 'where do I find that table' problem than anything. I decided to roll up a marine. That didn't happen. What I ended up with was a navy pilot who was a war hero, an expert pilot and astrogator, who had survived an incredible battle and in the process, increased his social standing by rather a lot, due to the fame. This led me to come up with a battle, what he did in it, why he was famous, how that fame affected him and his reputation, what medal he got and why, personality traits like bravery and recklessness...
This guy... he felt like a real person, more like a character I'd create for a written story than a typical ttrpg character. I was only partially in control of his creation too, and the parts that the system generated acted like 'story prompts' for creating who he was. I ended up with a far, far more interesting character than I'd planned to do for a test roll up.
Which is kind of brilliant. I see why this system is still so loved 40 years on. I've never had this experience with a ttrpg. Had I known, I would have fought harder to bring this to the table back in the day.
Sure, there is a lot of stuff in T5 I'll never use, some parts that seem dodgy or unnecessary (ground combat, genetics), and some that I'll just bypass because they're too much work... but there is a lot here to love, maybe less as a cohesive game system and more as a vast resource of tools. I've printed up the pdfs of Classic Traveller to use as well, and will likely combine elements of T5 with the simpler to bring to the table aspects of classic.
Any tips on how to run this, or (most likely) how to combine aspects of it with other versions of Traveller would be welcome. Guess I'm part of the fan club now!
