Conversion Guidelines?

[TheDark]

Has anyone put together any rules/guidelines/ideas for converting things from the FATE version of Mindjammer to the Traveller version? I only started comparing the two recently. Some things are direct translations (a haze field is a haze field) and some are easily suggestive (a FATE ship with plasma cannon should have plasma weapons). Some of the less obviously direct things I have so far:

FATE Manouevre Skill = Gravity Engine Thrust Potential (i.e. Manouevre +2 = Gravity Engines 2)
FATE Planing Skill = Planing Engine Potential (i.e. Planing +3 = Planing Engines 3 [or Dirt Drive 3 for Venu])

Scale:
FATE +1 = Traveller Power 0 or 1 (1-95 tons)
FATE +2 = Traveller Power 2 (100-950 tons)
FATE +3 = Traveller Power 3 or 4 (1000-95000 tons)

FATE Cloaking Device = Stealth Field
FATE Extended Maneuverability (Atmospheric) = either Streamlined Hull or Variform Hull

FATE Stealth +1 = Stealth hull
FATE Stealth +2 = Superior Stealth hull or Emissions Absorption Grid
FATE Stealth +3 = Stealth hull and Emissions Absorption Grid
(I don't think anything has Stealth +4)

I haven't really looked at sensors or other gear that might be associated with particular FATE skills for ships and haven't looked at characters at all, so this is very much a rough start rather than a complete process.

 

[mike wightman]

Do you have the Traveller version of Mindjammer as well as the FATE version?

 

[TheDark]

Do you have the Traveller version of Mindjammer as well as the FATE version?

Yes. It would be rather difficult for me to compare the two, as I mentioned in the first post, without having both of them.

 

[mike wightman]

Ok, good luck with your project. I have both also and the full conversion from FATE to MgT appears to have been done for us in the book, so I am not sure what you are after.
An insight into how the author carried out the conversion?

 

[TheDark]

Ok, good luck with your project. I have both also and the full conversion from FATE to MgT appears to have been done for us in the book, so I am not sure what you are after.
An insight into how the author carried out the conversion?

Yes, since not everything from the FATE core book was converted. Just looking at ships, only about half the ships in the FATE version made it into the Traveller version. The Commonality is missing the Customs Boat, Friedman-class, Divergence-class, Gentility Base, Homesteader, Morpheus-class, Slowship, Thor-class, Venture-class, and Waggon Ship. All of the alien ships are missing (Chembu Bioship, Javawayn Star City, Outremer Chevalier-class, and Lowhigh Lightjammer), while the Venu are missing the Ancestral Voice-class Capital Ship, Beachhead-class Drop Ship, and Starfighter.

It would also be useful for the books that only exist in FATE versions (Children of Orion, The Core Worlds, Blue, Hearts and Minds, The City People, and The Far Havens), since nothing from those has Traveller stats. Children of Orion has twenty Venu starships that never made it into Traveller, while The Far Havens has nine for that polity.

 

[mike wightman]

Ok now I understand.

There is a lot in the FATE books, so a conversion of them to Traveller is a good idea.

 

[TheDark]

Yes, and I'm still waiting for some FATE books that I bought online to arrive - Modiphius had a sale recently that I took advantage of to get the books I didn't already have. I received copies of the PDFs as part of the purchase, but I often prefer working from hardcopy so I'm not trying to toggle between different windows to take notes.

With that said, I do think I've figured out a guideline that mostly holds true (there are some exceptions*) for weapons. A ship with Ranged Combat +1 only has turret weapons, +2 has barbettes as their largest weapon, +3 has small bay or medium bay, +4 has large bay, and +5 has spinal weapons. All ships can have weapons smaller than the largest ones they carry.


*the six exceptions are the Commonality Heavy Fighter (Ranged Combat +3, turret-size weapon), Icarus-class Scout (Ranged Combat +1, no weapons), Prospector-class Mining Vessel (no Ranged Combat, turret weapons), Serpent Strike System Defender (Ranged Combat +3, barbette weapon), Alpha Wolf-class Insertion Ship (Ranged Combat +1, barbette weapon), and Warhawk-class Strike Ship (Ranged Combat +3, barbette weapon). Most of these are one position away from where they "should" be, with only the Heavy Fighter being 2 weapon sizes off. I think it might be getting a 1-point boost for scale and another 1-point boost for the torsion cannon being a very powerful (if short-ranged) turret weapon; the other fighters (Venu and Far Havens Stargull) are Ranged Combat +2.

 

[mike wightman]

By the way thank you for mentioning the sale - I have now purchased the stuff I was missing.

Which means I will try my best to help out with conversions I come up with since I prefer Traveller to FATE.

(I've also toyed with the whole of charted space being a quarantined area that is being studied...)

 

[Spinward Flow]

(I've also toyed with the whole of charted space being a quarantined area that is being studied...)

Ooooooooh ...

 

[TheDark]

By the way thank you for mentioning the sale - I have now purchased the stuff I was missing.

Which means I will try my best to help out with conversions I come up with since I prefer Traveller to FATE.

(I've also toyed with the whole of charted space being a quarantined area that is being studied...)

One of my difficulties is I'm not all that comfortable with FATE as a system, so I'm less confident in translating things like stress boxes or consequences into Traveller equivalents, or some of the Stunts and Extras. For characters my first impression is that skills can actually translate over on a pretty much 1-to-1 basis, but again I'm not sure of some of the other mechanical stuff - using an example I just ran across in Children of Orion, Structural Reinforcement is a cybernetic enhancement that costs 1 stunt and allows the bearer to sustain 1 additional mild consequence. I have no feel for how much tougher that makes the average character.

This weekend I'll probably sit down and do a Venu ship or two from Children of Orion. The Bloodhawk seems to be a modified Warhawk (which has Traveller stats to work from), sacrificing the marines and missiles for more beam weapons, and I might try tackling another ship as well.

 

[mike wightman]

For my Culture campaign, which I stole a lot from Mindjammer for, I found myself using the Traveller rules for drugs and psionics as character augments...
drugs are the product of bioengineering glands, while the Awareness talent can also be adapted to a gland augment.

 

[TheDark]

Compared to the Warhawk, the Bloodhawk drops Manouevre from 4 to 3, has a couple other skill changes, and swaps Boarding Actions, Charge, Formation Leader, and Zero Point Torpedoes for Called Shot and On Your Tail. It also has Deadly Gunship and Massive Stopping Power aspects, so part of my idea for the design was upgrading the Disruptor Cannon from a Barbette to a Small Bay. Since bays are inaccurate against small targets, it swaps the Warhawk's missile turrets for a pair of double disruptor turrets. The other options I considered were double barbettes and a single turret or triple barbettes, but since I could squeeze in a bay I decided to do that instead to try to reflect the FATE version's aspects. It actually comes out slightly cheaper than a Warhawk, in large part from the smaller gravity engines.

Unit​	Details​	Tons​	Cost (Mcr)​	Power​
Hull​	300 tons, Streamlined​	-​	18​	-60​
Armor​	Plasteel Armor 6​	22.5​	6.75​	​
Gravity Engines​	Gravity Engines-3​	27​	27​	-135​
Planing Engines​	Venu Dirt Drive-2​	90​	180​	-2700​
Power Plant​	Venu ZIP Plant​	50​	30​	3000​
Bridge​	​	20​	1.5​	​
Brainjack​	Venu Brainjack Couch​	1​	1​	​
Sensors​	Military Grade​	2​	4​	​
Weapons​	Venu Disruptor Small Bay​	50​	10​	-40​
​	Double Venu Disruptor Cannon Turret x2​	2​	5​	-26​
Shields​	Venu Disruptor Shield​	8​	3​	-8​
Staterooms​	Standard x6​	24​	2​	​
Cargo​	​	3.5​	​	​
​	​	​	​	​
​	Totals​	300​	288.25​	31​