Traveller is one of the oldest and most popular science fiction role-playing games, first published in 1977 and, I believe, has been in nearly continuous publication in some version or another since. This review is about the original (or classic) Traveller.
The battered box above was my boxed set that I purchased probably in 1980 or thereabouts. I know it was not too far ahead of a revision published in 1981 that added some graphics and illustrations not in the 1977 edition. For instance, the original game set had but single illustration--a man who I presume is supposed to represent a merchant prince of some sort--and a handful of graphics emphasizing particular formulas or a planetary template. The revised version drops the illustration of the merchant prince but adds illustrations of some of the common vehicles and additional graphics. The photographs below show some of the additional graphics and illustrations from the 1981 update not present in the original set I owned as a kid.
There is no specific setting in the basic rule set although there are certain aspects that can be deducted from the rules. First, the character creation assumes a human. In fact there are no aliens mentioned in the original books.
Second, one of the basic attributes of a character is that of "social standing" with includes nobles on the upper end such as knights/dames, barons/baroness, marquis/marchioness, count/countess, and duke/duchess. It is implied that there are other ranks above that, but that is just the highest levels which a character could achieve. Thus, there is the implication (borne out by references in the book) to one or more interstellar governments.
Third, although there is faster than light travel via jump drives, the range of and speed is limited. It takes one week for a ship to make a jump, and the farthest a ship could possible jump is 6 parsecs with the most powerful jump drives. Most ships will only be able to manage a jump of 1 or 2 parsecs. And the fuel required for jumps are tremendous. Ships should mostly be viewed as flying gas cans because it is easy for a third or more of the ship be devoted to carrying fuel.
Moreover, there is no FTL communications other than ships--no "subspace radio" like in Star Trek. Thus, even if there is an overarching government, the individual planets could vary considerably in the types of laws or technology available to them.
Fourth, a lot of the aspects of science fiction we are used to are missing from this game. Although there are computers, these are what would the game designers would have been used to in the 1970s: mainframes and "mini" computers. The most common computer a character will interact with will be a ship's computer on a starship. There are no robots or rules for robots (although this would be corrected in later supplements). Although there are directed energy weapons (e.g., lasers) those are, again, primarily a shipboard weapon. Man portable laser weapons require large power packs; the most common weapons are firearms (pistols, rifles and submachine guns); but, surprisingly, swords, cutlasses, and other melee weapons are also common.
But there is artificial gravity which shows up as gravity aboard starships and speeders like you would have seen in Star Wars.
I've seen speculation that the primary creator of the game, Marc Miller, was heavily influenced by science fiction writer, H. Beam Piper and, in particular, his novel Space Viking. I tend to agree as there is a lot of similarity to Piper's setting and technology, particularly after the fall of the Federation in his Terro-Human Future History. Many aspects are similar: the lack of robots, the human-centric setting (Piper had a few intelligent alien species but none that were as technologically advanced as humans), the continued use and dominance of firearms, and, after the fall of the Federation, the rise of a feudal system to eventually lead to successive galactic empires. But I also see the influence of some of Andre Norton's works, particularly her Solar Queen series that follows the adventures of the crew of a free trader. But I'm sure that Miller was influenced by much of the adventure science fiction of the 1950s and '60s.
But that is just for the basic set. Over time, as supplements and adventures for the game were published, there developed a fairly detailed setting for Traveller based around a human dominated interstellar empire thousands of years in the future with other intelligent alien species including a few that have comparable technology to humans. But my friends and I didn't have those supplements when we played the games. We drew in elements from favorite science fiction books and tried to fit them into our settings. Thus, we had adventures where we encountered Thranx (from Alan Dean Foster's Humanx Commonwealth setting), Kzin (from Larry Niven's Known Space setting) and others.
The basic set consisted of three main core rule books: Book 1 - Characters and Combat; Book 2 - Starships; and Book 3 - Worlds and Adventures. The 1981 edition apparently also included a Book 0 - An Introduction to Traveller.
Book 1, as the title suggests, provides a brief introduction, then moves into character creation and skills, before moving to individual combat. Characters roll 2d6 for each attribute: Strength, Dexterity, Endurance, Intelligence, Education, and Social Standing. The character creation process used what is now termed a "life path" method where you start as a young human (there were no rules concerning aliens in the original game) just starting a career or advanced educational path--essentially a high school graduate--and then try to get into one of several career paths: Navy, Marines, Army, Scouts, Merchants, and "Other". It is by going through these careers that the character acquires skills and other advancements. But unlike many other games that assign skills based on your career, nothing is automatic in Traveller. You have to roll dice to get accepted into a career, then roll again to see what happens for each 4-year term of service. You could advance further in your career, be discharged, or, something for which Traveller is infamous, have a chance of your character dying!
The basic game mechanics involve rolling 2d6 and adding (or subtracting) modifiers. If the final number is equal or greater than a target number, the character succeeds. For instance, in combat, the player is required to get an 8 or better.
Book 2 is all about starships: buying (and financing), design and construction, combat, and trade and commerce.
Book 3 covers mapping of star systems, world creation, including technology level, basic laws regarding weapons, the number and quality of star ports, etc. Then it moves into basic equipment and vehicles. It also includes rules for encounters (meeting with and dealing with people), animal encounters (and a way to create new animals for alien worlds), and rules on psionics.
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| My collection of rules and supplements. |
As I mentioned above, there were many supplements and additional (advanced) rules. For instance, several advanced rules books:
- Book 4 - Mercenary: Advanced character creation for ground combat troops (including additional skills), more detailed combat rules, mass combat, more weapons (including science fiction energy weapons), etc.
- Book 5 - High Guard. Advanced character creation for naval characters, more detailed starship construction and space combat rules, advanced weapons, and even an energy shield.
- Book 6 - Scouts. Advanced character creation for scout characters as well as more detailed rules on generating star systems.
- Book 7 - Merchant Prince. Advanced rules for creating merchant characters as well as more detailed rules on trading, commerce, cargoes, and merchant lines.
- Book 8 - Robots. And finally, after many years, they came out with rules for creating robots, types of robots, and even using robots as characters.
Another useful supplement is the Supplement 4 - Citizens of the Imperium which adds additional careers-- pirates, belters, sailors (surface ships), diplomats, doctors, flyers (aircraft pilots), barbarians, bureaucrats, rogues, nobles, scientists, and hunters (professional). And for the benefit of the barbarian characters, it includes rules for bows and arrows. However, I would note that the careers in the basic rules and Supplement 4 do not work well with characters created with the advanced rules--the advanced rules tend to produce more powerful characters.
Of course, like other games, the game went through other editions and versions and moved on from the classic rules. Periodically, reprints will be issued, though. In 2000, Marc Miller released a run of book that collected all the rule books together in one volume. That is no longer in print, unfortunately, but you can order through Drive-Thru RPG a book that collects the first three books in a single volume (below).
The first half of the video below briefly covers the various versions of Traveller that have been released, including the latest version of Traveller from Mongoose Publishing which updates the technology significantly. Hopefully I can cover it at some future date.
VIDEO: "The BEST 🛸Sci-Fi 🛸Tabletop RPG Ever?: Classic Traveller RPG History - A Short Overview" -- RPG Elite (13 min.)
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