weasel fierce
SOC-10
So does T4 have any overarching plot lines or expansions of the setting, compared to whats been presented before in the previous three games ?
Which books would I be looking for ?
Which books would I be looking for ?
Plot/story stuff in T4 ?
- Thread starter weasel fierce
- Start date
Milieu 0 & Psionic Institutes would be the ones to look out for. Milieu 0 does go into depth with what the Traveller's Digest articles did in a cursory way and provides you with a broad overview. Psionic Institutes does contain some gems about the looming fight over psionics that is coming in the future. Similarly, the mega adventure Anomalies does have some insights far between a haphazardly written plot lines.
However, having said all that, if you really know the Traveller Universe history, then only Milieu 0 would be your best bet, as it was largely a fan effort and was when Marc regained the reins. Other products are interesting but simply not the Traveller that you might be familiar with given the three incarnations that proceeded it.
However, having said all that, if you really know the Traveller Universe history, then only Milieu 0 would be your best bet, as it was largely a fan effort and was when Marc regained the reins. Other products are interesting but simply not the Traveller that you might be familiar with given the three incarnations that proceeded it.
Pocket Empires, like Emperor's Squadrons are games onto themselves almost. The first one deals with players acquiring enough resources to rival, complement, the nanscent Third Imperium. The second, like Trillion Credit Squadrons is building fleets. So there are scattered references to the things that are happening in M:0 but nothing really meaty.
What other T4 books would you recommend...?
I've got Milieu 0 and find it would be a nice setting to run a Traveller game...
Now that they are available in pdf for cheap...
Have they come out in PDF ? !!!
GDW at RPGNow... but it will eventually be cheaper to get the whole collection once Mr Miller does the compilation T4 CD...
GDW at RPGNow... but it will eventually be cheaper to get the whole collection once Mr Miller does the compilation T4 CD...
Ah, that's what I meant, the entire T4 CD.
I have the books I want, T4 main book, Central Supply Catalog and a few others, but I'd like the whole collection in one place.
Can you turn back time? The Interstellar Confederacy...
I'm not sure there are any "overarching plot lines" per se in the T4 books. What few ideas are presented, are presented in very broad strokes. But there are a few nuggets that might be mined if you start to read between the lines.
Here's an example of something I've been toying with...
In the books they talk about "The Interstellar Confederacy," a pocket empire the Sylean Federation first made contact with in -301, before the founding of the Third Imperium. If you don't mind setting the clock back, I have been considering just how interesting a setting this might be for a group of adventurers, perhaps as the members of the original scout team, that makes this first contact. For several reasons...
The Traveller Wiki describes the Interstellar Confederacy as such:
"The Interstellar Confederacy was an interstellar, multi-system government located in the Core Sector. It was a loosely allied collection of 32 star systems in a Confederation within the Bunkeria and Cemplas subsectors of Core Sector. The Interstellar Confederacy was the largest interstellar government to oppose the Sylean Federation during their 650 year ascendance in the Core Sector."
The First Survey supplement, in particular, only lists 19 worlds as members of the "Sylean Federation." My idea centers around scouts making contact with the Interstellar Confederacy in these early years when the Federation is still at this nascent, and fragile, point in their existence. While I haven't seen anything that specifically lists which worlds constituted the Interstellar Confederacy, you can go along the Core sector's main trading routes, and choose 32 systems that are close to one another. The thirty-two I chose, turned out to have some interesting characteristics in comparison to the early Sylean Federation, according to First Survey.
First of all, obviously, there are 32 worlds in comparison to 19. Secondly, there are four worlds in the Interstellar Confederacy that have a tech level of 12, while only one world in the Sylean Federation, (Sylea itself, actually,) that has this high a tech level. So when the scouts make first contact, they may be in for something of a shock.
This is a pocket empire that is bigger, and more technologically advanced, than the Sylean Federation! Assuming the scouts are tasked with the mission of finding worlds that could add to the advancement of the Sylean Federation, they certainly hit paydirt. But what's to keep the Confederacy from absorbing the Federation instead? Or worse yet, conquering it? It would seem to me, therefore, the scouts are going to have to measure their words and actions carefully, lest the Confederacy start getting ideas. Because if they did, the Sylean Federation would be out-manned, out-gunned, and over-matched in a serious conflict.
I find these ideas intriguing because turn-about is fair play. Usually it's the Imperium that is the big kid on the block. But at this earlier juncture, it's the other way around. How can Sylea "overcome" such an overpowering potential adversary? The books talk about how the Sylean Federation, and later the Third Imperium, tended to avoid these conflicts by "surrounding" and "engulfing" these pocket empires as they expanded. But that may be easier said than done! Could player characters working for the Sylean Scout Service explore the rim of the Interstellar Confederacy, perhaps finding out where, politically, their neighbors stand? Could scouts, or agents, of Sylea start making trade deals, or do favors, for those outlying powers? Could player characters be given the task to spreading descent among the worlds of the Interstellar Confederacy?
To say nothing of the irony that they would be undermining the very form of government that the Third Imperium is destined to become. The Confederacy is not a tight-knit community with once central Confederacy-wide government. But, instead, it is a loose alliance of worlds, whose internal affairs are governed locally. The very thing Cleon stove for with the formation of the Third Imperium.
Lastly, according to the Traveller Wiki, the major turning point in the downfall of the Intersteller Confederacy, was when (in -239) a civil war broke out among their members as a charismatic leader, Baron Rolf von Toerbach, tried to seize power. Sound familiar? :devil:
I'm not sure there are any "overarching plot lines" per se in the T4 books. What few ideas are presented, are presented in very broad strokes. But there are a few nuggets that might be mined if you start to read between the lines.
Here's an example of something I've been toying with...
In the books they talk about "The Interstellar Confederacy," a pocket empire the Sylean Federation first made contact with in -301, before the founding of the Third Imperium. If you don't mind setting the clock back, I have been considering just how interesting a setting this might be for a group of adventurers, perhaps as the members of the original scout team, that makes this first contact. For several reasons...
The Traveller Wiki describes the Interstellar Confederacy as such:
"The Interstellar Confederacy was an interstellar, multi-system government located in the Core Sector. It was a loosely allied collection of 32 star systems in a Confederation within the Bunkeria and Cemplas subsectors of Core Sector. The Interstellar Confederacy was the largest interstellar government to oppose the Sylean Federation during their 650 year ascendance in the Core Sector."
The First Survey supplement, in particular, only lists 19 worlds as members of the "Sylean Federation." My idea centers around scouts making contact with the Interstellar Confederacy in these early years when the Federation is still at this nascent, and fragile, point in their existence. While I haven't seen anything that specifically lists which worlds constituted the Interstellar Confederacy, you can go along the Core sector's main trading routes, and choose 32 systems that are close to one another. The thirty-two I chose, turned out to have some interesting characteristics in comparison to the early Sylean Federation, according to First Survey.
First of all, obviously, there are 32 worlds in comparison to 19. Secondly, there are four worlds in the Interstellar Confederacy that have a tech level of 12, while only one world in the Sylean Federation, (Sylea itself, actually,) that has this high a tech level. So when the scouts make first contact, they may be in for something of a shock.
This is a pocket empire that is bigger, and more technologically advanced, than the Sylean Federation! Assuming the scouts are tasked with the mission of finding worlds that could add to the advancement of the Sylean Federation, they certainly hit paydirt. But what's to keep the Confederacy from absorbing the Federation instead? Or worse yet, conquering it? It would seem to me, therefore, the scouts are going to have to measure their words and actions carefully, lest the Confederacy start getting ideas. Because if they did, the Sylean Federation would be out-manned, out-gunned, and over-matched in a serious conflict.
I find these ideas intriguing because turn-about is fair play. Usually it's the Imperium that is the big kid on the block. But at this earlier juncture, it's the other way around. How can Sylea "overcome" such an overpowering potential adversary? The books talk about how the Sylean Federation, and later the Third Imperium, tended to avoid these conflicts by "surrounding" and "engulfing" these pocket empires as they expanded. But that may be easier said than done! Could player characters working for the Sylean Scout Service explore the rim of the Interstellar Confederacy, perhaps finding out where, politically, their neighbors stand? Could scouts, or agents, of Sylea start making trade deals, or do favors, for those outlying powers? Could player characters be given the task to spreading descent among the worlds of the Interstellar Confederacy?
To say nothing of the irony that they would be undermining the very form of government that the Third Imperium is destined to become. The Confederacy is not a tight-knit community with once central Confederacy-wide government. But, instead, it is a loose alliance of worlds, whose internal affairs are governed locally. The very thing Cleon stove for with the formation of the Third Imperium.
Lastly, according to the Traveller Wiki, the major turning point in the downfall of the Intersteller Confederacy, was when (in -239) a civil war broke out among their members as a charismatic leader, Baron Rolf von Toerbach, tried to seize power. Sound familiar? :devil:
What I've tried to do in T4 is roll back the setting to pre contact Terra, with the first J-1 ships designed with Fire Fusion and Steel, however limiting the technologies available. The first ships get J-1, built in orbit, with an ion maneuver drive and chemical rockets to get landed then back into orbit, 1 time. These are the first Terran Jump capable ships, no gravetics, the crew must use some sort of spun quarters that fold back down for landing and launch. The biggest are somewhere around 200 Dt, and carry enough fuel tankage to support 4 J-1 jumps. Later after first contact with the Valani, the Terrans report some of the near magical tech the Valani have, and our engineers and scientists start trying to figure out how these things might be done. The campaign is the initial scouts and their adventures, then it moves into first contact, and the rush to colonize the marginal nearby systems. New ships with experimental tech need to be test flown, Colonies need to be delivered then more people and equipment sent. Dissidents rounded up and sent to exile on Ember. Part of the campaign can be involving the players through post mission debriefings with the guiding of future ship designs. It's an exciting and vibrant time as Humanity finally can get off of Terra and start expanding into the universe.
The initial characters will be military test pilots with some civilian "mission specialists", so will be more guided and limited, no 7 term admirals will be flying on these missions. I told my group a list of skills and skill levels they needed to cover, and a 2nd, smaller list of optional but nice to have skills. They then created their characters comparing notes with each other to make sure they had the needed skills covered. Military were no older than 34, and mission specialists no older than 42, but needed a doctoral degree or two.
