"What is Traveller?" by Rob

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What This Post Is. This is an attempt to summarize what "Traveller" is. What makes Traveller Traveller. What underpins Traveller. What the guys who created Traveller were thinking.


UPDATE. A better definition of Traveller's fundamental concepts can be found in T5 Book 1 pp14-17.




THE FIVE POINTS OF TRAVELLER

I. Travel. Travellers travel via jump, high fuel usage (includes wilderness refueling), and gravitics.

II. Open Limits. Every world and starport is different, including niches, anachronism and atavism.

III. Material. Characters advance through gaining friends, equipment, wealth, and influence, rather than leveling up.

IV. Self-Reliance. The speed of communication is limited to the speed of travel. The players make their own decisions and act.

V. Sociology. People are still human. The typical game shows how being a traveller crosses classes and breaks stratification.


LONG-WINDED VERSION

Travellers travel.

There are design assumptions underlying Traveller which were used to create a corpus of rules.

Traveller is all about a base set of assumptions... Violate these, and you lose the "Traveller"... Keep these, and setting probably doesn't matter.

I. Foundational Assumptions

This is a modified version of Daryen's list.

• The Jump Drive (100+ tons, one week's time) is the key to interstellar communication and travel.
• No two bases are alike. Starports, Naval bases, and Scout bases are like Deep Water Ports.
• Wilderness refueling is worth the risk.
• The universe is cosmopolitan, understandable, and consistent.
• No two worlds are alike. There is high-tech, atavism, and anachronism (shotguns and cutlasses) that defies SF conventions.
• Mercenaries and Tickets.
• Social Stratification (High Passage, Mid Passage, Low Berths) -- but player characters break stratification almost by definition.
• Patrons mediate between the setting and players' goals via Push, Pull, Enigma, and Gimmicks.

II. Foundational Mechanics

• Chargen and Toolsets as modular mini-games.
• Six Characteristics per person.
• Physical characteristics take the damage from combat.
• Combat is deadly.
• Material rewards. No "experience points" or leveling up.
• The careers and design systems define limits on reality. 2D hex maps, empty hexes.

III. Typical Game Tropes in Traveller

• Death during chargen.
• Visiting a starport.
• Gambling in the TAS hostel bar.
• Jump travel; High and Low Passage.
• EVA in a vacc suit.
• Piloting a ship.
• Wilderness refueling.
• Doing space combat.
• Shotguns and cutlasses alongside monomolecular axes and Laser Rifles, together in combat.
• Fighting alien creatures.
• Solving a cosmic enigma.

 

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UPDATE. A better definition of Traveller's fundamental concepts can be found in T5 Book 1 pp14-17.