For once I am actually on the fence about a Traveller Kickstarter to republish the book, this time in a 3 volume set reminiscent of the original books but just really, really large. While I do like many aspects of T5, I just don't see playing or running it. And $100 for the books (and I'll admit it, should I back it, it will be at the $150 level) seems high. Yet I've spent more than that on the Fantasy Trip stuff. I just feel I am getting more for my money with TFT: the game play is the same as it was, just really nicely updated components. And a lot of components it is indeed!
The rolls so many dice under the target roll just does not suit me for Traveller. I played the 2D6 for years and that is part of the Traveller charm. And the fact that I would be paying again for something I already bought, with no real guarantee that it is actually better this time around (the PDF for the table of contents has spelling issues. It is only 3 pages and I found issues there already) does not help.
I will get the PDF - that is free at least as I did back the last one. I'd rather get the PDF first to be able to see if I want to actually get the hardbacks.
Some of the add-ons I've already got - the book and the, to me, disappointing deck plans. Hence not the owner on board level. The cards are somewhat meh to me. Too generic, not enough of the Traveller vibe. Perhaps I am just too nostalgic for the old days.
For me, the cards would be a lot more useful if they did an entire deck for weapons, and armor, and miscellaneous things. There have been several people who have made weapons cards over the years, and those are very useful. One of the reasons I backed the card game was hoping to get some useful cards that could be used as play aids. Alas, that did not really happen.
I bought the Paladin deck of spells for my D&D game. I don't have a players guide or anything, and spells are one of the more complicated parts of D&D. The cards are a great idea to make it easier to play: I just put out the spells I have in front of me, no need to borrow a books, spend 15 minutes trying to find the spell, and breaking the game flow. The Fantasy Trip's latest kickstarter is going down that path in large part. I don't think the spells are there per se, but weapons, armor and NPCs, beasties and other game things are. So the games should flow a lot easier as well.
For Traveller, it needs to have a nice set of weapons cards that have the image on one side, and the stats and info on the other. I keep thinking I'll get to that (the ones I have from COTI are classic, and my combat is more damage soaking / Mongoose style than Classic). Cards for vacc suits, vehicles, things like that. The world cards are pretty nice.
Actually - I just picked up the few cards I do have, such as the staple gun. Assuming I could figure out combat in T5 (supposedly they have fixed in in 5.10) those would be the cards that would be useful. There just needs to be a much wider range. Heck - just a PDF so we could print it ourselves would be okay. I think there are only about 12 or so weapon cards: there needs to be an entire deck of them. A smart choice would be to make them 2 sided: 1 side for T5 stats, the other Mongoose or, dare I say it, Classic. But Mongoose would work as it is actually in print, and having dual use cards would be useful I would think.
So maybe I need to get crafty beyond the ID cards I already did, and see about some weapons cards. And vacc suits - after all, we are in space!
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