Traveller 5: System Generation Iomaria Part 6 the Viscount

Lady Shana Lerisnarii Akrashash of Iomaria, Baroness of Gald

88879e age 33

World Knowledge (Iomaria)-3, Grav-1, Tactics-1, Counsellor-1, Ship's Boat-1, Athletics (Endurance-1), Medic-1, Advocate-1, Leader-1, Wheeled-1.

A "working" noble her whole life, Shana has worked her way up the ranks with thoughtful and deliberate choices. Her few times exiled from the glory of the Imperial center was usually to Iomaria, and deciding to take a post there, she is the official host for the world when the Imperium comes to visit, as well as the final legal guide. Her vast estates (24 terrain hexes on Iomaria, and 6 on Gald (baronet 2 + 4 for barony) gives her an income of Cr720,000 from her interests on Iomaria, and Cr120,000 for Gald, an ice-capped non-industrial world 2 parsecs from Iomaria. She has a large staff at the port but is rarely there herself. Her primary goal is keeping Iomaria's population stable and growing, and while not as jovial or overly self-confident as Sir Flynn, the Lady Shana does throw a more elegant soiree than our brash Marquis.

Some notes

In going through the noble career again, I think I messed up the Marquis a bit, but not enough to worry. I did have to cut his income in half - misread the table as a Marquis gets 8 hexes, not 16 (though I also did not add his 4 hexes from his elevation, so back to another edit!) Shana is also not highly skilled in the T5 sense - the only major skill or knowledge she has is due to that roll 1d6 for world knowledge. 

Shana also got a baronet and baron ranks, and they each some with land. I decided to stick them on a neighboring world and rolled up a random world from page 56 of T5 Book 1, just swapping out the Spinward Marches name for a MTU name (not that these worlds exist anywhere outside of these blog notes, though perhaps I'll add them to the D'Arlee sector sometime)

Rolling up the character

I'll admit it took quite a few random rolls to get a noble (and yes, I could have just made it up, but for me creating NPCs whole-clothe via the same way PCs are created just seems better to me. Otherwise, I fear my NPCs would all end up pretty much the same as the others. Plus, it gives me a chance to roll dice and re-read the rules. As I seem to keep interpreting the T5 differently every time I read them!)

Starting with 77878B, our future viscount starts as a knight (and if I don't end up with any elevations, will be the knight as I am going through character creation writing this post).

With average intelligence and education, our knight is going to just go through the noble career, a working woman who takes the Imperial role perhaps more seriously than Sir Flynn, our Marquis. Of course, with these stats it is more difficult to get an elevation. Perhaps I should have taken Sir Flynn a bit further!

Sadly, she is exiled in year 1 (and in re-re-reading, it looks like elevation was NOT calculated as I thought, that was only for the exile roll. I think. The elevation roll is social class with the DM being a flux roll, so it is a bit more random than I thought. Regardless, in exile I rolled on the personal and interestingly a 6 is a +1 to social class! Our knightess is now a Baronet, though in the Imperial hinterlands somewhere. This also gives her 2 terrain hexes somewhere, probably not Iomaria. Her full title shall be interesting when we get there.

Year 2, she does return from exile and rolling the travel table, picks up Driver. Going with Grav-1 as I always wanted a flying car! 

Year 3 she fully makes her intrigue (exile: 1, intrigue: 1) with a 12. Even with flux though, she does not get elevated. And in reading a bit further in the book, there is a table of random intrigues! The <element> Affair...hmm, there are +100 elements so just rolling d100 we get The Iron Affair. She picks up a Councellor-1 skill

Despite that intrigue success, she is exiled again (just barely). The Iron Affair, while initially successful, had some elements (see what I did there?) that backfired. She picks up Leader-1. Exile: 2, intrigue: 1

For her 2nd term as a working noble, she returns again for exile. And in reading the text, it actually implies she can do intrigue: assuming that failure: continued exile; may not attempt intrigue implies that if you succeed, you can attempt intrigue. With that reading in mind, she navigates Araskii's Exile but is not elevated. Apparently, she applied some Tactics-1 skills. Exile: 2, intrigue: 2

Year 2, she barely misses exile and again is not elevated. This year Riston's Palace, a place full of political backstabbing. She escaped the tedium by picking up a starship skill. I was thinking that was the traditional pilot skills (ship's boat, pilot) but is actually a broader choice. Think I'll stick with my original Ship's Boat-1 skill as that was her escape from the political shenanigans. Exile: 2, intrigue: 3

Year 3, she is at Shakabaii Palace. Rather than flitting about, she takes up running and gains Athletics-1. And did not make her elevation - looking like it is going to be hard to get her elevated to Viscount! Exile: 2, intrigue: 4

Year 4, she is exiled again. Deciding to get stronger in a physical sense, she gains strength +1, giving her a 87878c UPP so far. Yep, small C as the ranks are expanded a bit. Exile: 3, intrigue: 4

3rd term she is out of exile (9 -3 [exile] +4 = 10 which is > the 8 she needed. She does not make her intrigue roll, so this was a year and the back halls and not accomplishing much of anything. Picking up another starship skill, she gains Medic-1 as a starship skill. And I realized I missed that she gets an extra 2 skills when elevated! I don't know if the personal skill gaining a social counts, but I am going with yes, yes it does. Hoping for another shot that way, rolling both of those on the personal skill table. And yes, now she is a big C Baroness and gains a dexterity for a UPP of 88878C. That also helps with intrigue a bit. Exile: 3, intrigue: 4

Year 2, and turning 28, she barely avoids exile (that +1 from the intrigue helped!) She has no intrigue this year and rolling on the vocation table I get Capital. She picks up World Knowledge-3 of the world she is a baron on. Let us be optimistic and say Iomaria - she is an expert there (well, okay, the skill levels in T5 are a lot different than Classic but she still knows a fair amount of this world).  Exile: 3, intrigue: 4.

Year 3 and flies through intrigue, the Titanium Affair. She does not make the elevation but gets Advocate-1 to handle rudimentary legal processes. Exile: 3, intrigue: 5

Year 4 and scrapes by exile and goes through the Judgement of Otakir Dvorak. She is not elevated and decides to take up driving and gains Wheeled-1. Exile: 3, intrigue: 6. This gives her a +3 on at least checking for exile and elevation, so that helps our rolls a bit. 

4th term and I still need to gain 2 more ranks! and she starts having to worry about aging rolls I think. Year 1, at age 31, she finally makes an elevation (thank you flux roll!) and is now 88878D. Getting two rolls, I am going to roll on the personal & hope I get a 6! I do not...apparently she went to Marquis school and worked on her dexterity: 89879D. Exile: 3, intrigue: 7

Year 2 (age 32) she makes the intrigue (Johannes' Exile) but no elevation. Hoping for the personal roll to make it, I do, so we now officially have our viscountess with 88879e (lower-case e). 

Year 3 she makes the intrigue roll (the Platinum Affair) and does not make elevation (which is actually good...she picks up the Political-1 skill, and I think we'll plop our still youthful viscount on Iomaria.

Traveller 5: System Generation Iomaria Part 6, the Marquis

End Result

Marquis Sir Flynn D'Oric, age 34, Noble 7899CC

Admin-2, Philosophy-2, History-2, Psychology-1, Pilot-2, Counsellor-1, Liason-1, Leader-1, Comms-1

The primary Imperial noble of Iomaria, Sir Flynn is a somewhat brash young man, confident in himself and his ability to guide Iomaria towards a better future. 

The Process

 As we need some nobles, I thought I'd try to use T5 to generate a noble. Oddly it only took me 2 rolls (and I roll straight as rolled!) to get 6799BC. Starting off as a baron, so we only need 1 promotion, err, elevation, to get to the Marquis level we need.

Having a decent intelligence and already a great education, of course we go through the university system! It is unlikely with his 11 education to fail any of rolls, and of course, he does not. We end up graduating with Administration-4, Philosophy-2. Continuing education, hie easily makes his master's degree, gaining History-2 and Psychology-1. This is assuming I followed the education rules correctly: sometimes T5 is vague and is written from the perspective of someone who has it all in his head and this is merely the cheat sheet. I really wish he had gotten some professional editors as pretty sure it was just the core group doing this. 

The noble career in T5 is really a game of intrigue. The 4 stats for the risk/reward are C2 C3 C4 C5, or for Sir Flynn 7-9-9-11, so pretty good odds. Rolling along, he fails the risk and is exiled to someplace at the outskirts of the Imperium for a year (exile count = 1) in his very 1st year of his 1st term. He does make his reward, and apparently exercised regularly as he picked up +1 strength. Flynn's UPP is currently 7799BC. The 2nd year he makes his return, so no intrigue or elevation is possible. He picks up Pilot-1, perhaps piloting back from his exile. Year 3 he makes the intrigue (intrigue count = 1), and somehow, I actually rolled 12, which is what he needed for his elevation to Marquis (the exiles count against the roll, the successful intrigues count for. Without a lot of successful intrigues it is very difficult to get elevated the higher your nobility rank as you need to roll your current rank + exiles - intrigues. So being a 12, I needed to roll 12 + 1 - 1, or 12. And I did. This is an interesting mechanic as it does make elevations increasingly difficult unless you are really successful in the intrigue rolls. He also succeeded in the reward and gains the Counsellor-1 skill. Year 4 we have another successful intrigue (exile: 1, intrigue: 2) and gain the Liason-1 skill. Needing a 12 to get elevated (current noble rank 13 + 1 (exile) - 2 (intrigue) = 12 or better to roll) my rolls return to normal with a 6.

His 2nd term he is again exiled (that 7 dex/C2 stat bites him each time!) He also managed to fail the reward roll and being exiled cannot roll for elevation (exile: 2, intrigue: 2). Year 2 he returns, gaining the Leader-1 skill. I am thinking that returning does not allow you to roll for intrigue (and even mention that above. Silly stream of inconsistent consciousness!)  Year 3 wins the intrigue (exile: 2, intrigue: 3) but no elevation. We do add to our dexterity this year. Year 4 he is again exiled to the hinterlands, though does pick up Comms-1.

Being a young man of 34, he has been "exiled" to the far-off world of Iomaria. Granted 8 terrain hexes, he will have a yearly income of Cr240,000 per year, and he is kept away from the further intrigues closer to the Imperial Court. He has been tasked with keeping the population in line with the Imperial standards and seeing if he can make them a more enthusiastic Imperial system. He has the Navy and Scout bases as needed.

Having gone through this process, I now need a bit more personality. Very highly educated with few actually practical skills, and having been exiled 3 times in 8 years, I believe Sir Flynn, despite his above average intelligence, is also overly confident. There is no imposter syndrome for the Marquis!  Despite this, he does have some innate leadership skills that have helped him to return in triumph and has a small coterie of sycophants at his beck and call on his estates on Iomaria. 

He will often be at starport, where he has extensive offices. Knowing that he also needs to help the native population to enjoy the fruits of being Imperial citizens, he also throws several lavish parties yearly. While some are aimed more at the government bureaucrats and trying to get the laws to ease up for Imperial trade, he also throws galas for "the common folk" that are more like vast street parties.

His sealed grav limo is one of the few gravity vehicles on-world, and is often seen flying across the vast estates he has. The tainted dense atmosphere does mean filter masks are required outside of buildings. Behind the scenes, Sir Flynn has been working on attempts to remove the deadly pollens from the air, and has hired at his own expense a couple of scientists who work out of the starport (which is one of the reasons he spends a fair amount of time there).

Adroit at administering his duties, Sir Flynn does have some grudging respect for the various departments of the government in how they can be both extremely organized and yet so inefficient. To date, his attempts to influence them to remove layers of red tape have failed. 

Traveller 5: System Generation Iomaria Part 5

The End Result

Iomaria A99889A-8 {1} (B7K-1) [7F08] BDe Im NS G NIL

Trade codes: PH, PA, PI. Naval and Scout bases, Imperial Knight, Marquis and Viscount representatives are present. Travel code Green, and there is a native intelligent lifeform present.

Iomaria orbits Tusog, a big planet in orbit 2 with a 248-day year, orbiting every 4 hours. Being tidally locked, one side rarely gets much in the way of sunlight. The dark side is the side facing Tusog, and most of the population lives on the other half of Isomaria. The class A port is located in the Imperial Viscount's land holdings. The port is small by normal standards. Adjacent to the port are both the Naval and Scout bases, each with their own fuel and maintenance facilities. Imperial-owned warehousing facilities are available in the port, though many regulations generally require cargo going to Iomaria to be stored in Wareburg, the startown outside the port lines. Cargo from Iomaria to the rest of the universe also are required to be stored in these warehouses.

There are 2 gas giants in the system, a smaller gas giant in orbit 0 and a large gas giant out in orbit 9. There are 3 ice worlds and 2 radiation worlds in the system, each with 0 or more satellites. 

Transit times for jump are generally higher due to Tusog's presence. Iomaria is well within its jump shadow.

The inhabitants of Iomaria seem to be fairly dour: their architecture assumes a brutalist functional style, clothing is generally pretty bland, and sadly even their hats tend to be similar to everyone else's. Lines are a constant in the daily life of the citizens, and even for those visiting. Perhaps it is the slightly heavier gravity that causes people to drag their feet both literally and figuratively. The dense atmosphere is taxing for most outdoor activities as well. There is significant red-tape for any endeavor, and doubly so for outsiders. Merchants can expect up to 3 times longer for unloading and loading cargoes, hiring or anything else that has to deal with the very impersonal bureaucracy that is Iomaria's government. Guilds and unions layer on additional rules and regulations. The government has tests to enter the bureaucracy, as well as more tests to move up. Dealing with anything outside the starport means dealing with a bureaucrat. 

The Process

 Found the hexes that the nobility are supposed to get, and it is in terrain hexes, NOT world hexes! Our viscount gets 16 terrain hexes, each being 100km in diameter, and each trade classification gives Cr10K. 16x3x10 = Cr480,000 per year. As a Viscount is based on the pre-high population trade code, I'm going with she runs lavish parties and tries to showcase Imperial social sensibilities. Keept the population in-synch with the Imperium's ideals. This is not a particularly hard task on Iomaria other than fighting some social inertia. Our Knight has Cr30,000 per year with the one hex, and the Marquis with 8 gets Cr240,000 per year. A lot of this revenue may go back into the system, trying to improve technology and keep Iomaria in the Imperial fold. The knight is probably not doing a whole lot honestly for the Imperium - they get a terrain hex and a bit of income. The Marquis, a result of being pre-industrial, seems to imply that they will be wanting to increase production, and bump this world up to industrial. As such, the Marquis may be trying to subvert the castes, guilds and unions, as well as remove some of the red tape that makes this world have such a horrible efficiency.

How all this could impact the players is as always, up to how you play. There are a few built-in hooks here from what I can see:

1. emergency cargo - fighting the bureaucracy (sort of the Escape from Efate (Arden?) module that was published in a couple places. It had a flowchart that relied heavily on administrative skills to get past the bureaucracy. Think bribery was also a given and noting that higher law levels generally correspond to higher graft and corruption, bribery could well be a very useful skill.
2. Welcome to the Imperial Gala. As there are few ships that come through here, you can help represent the Imperium at the Marquis' party! Are there people in the population that really don't want to be in the Imperium? Is there a guerrilla movement behind the dour faces of some of the crowd? Or are you secretly in the Ine Givar yourself?
3. the SOLO rule sets give better prices if you get cargo outside the confines of the starport (a way to get you outside the port basically). You need to exit the port to look for cargo, maybe a bit of sight-seeing. Just how hard is it to get out of the port, and how hard to get back into the port?
4. You've been hired to find someone who was going to Iomaria. Does this person want to be found or are they captive? Are they on the dark side of the planet?
5. There is something unique and valuable over on the dark side of the planet. In perpetual darkness, the weather, flora and fauna are all strange. Also, I would think that the transition area, the twilight bands, would have turbulent weather due to the temperature differences.
6. Heavy storms as you arrive cause your ship to land in the dark side and enough damage so that take off is going to be a bit as the engineer does their engineering thing. Creatures in the permanent night!

My math is probably off, and the jump shadow obviously not to scale but just trying to get the general gist of things, and unless you have a mathematician of Traveller grognard, close enough for game use. Which is generally what we need at the table. While it is certainly a lot of fun to read those discussions over on COTI a lot are mostly "how many angels can dance on the head of a pin" - interesting, but ultimately not really useful if you just want to have fun with a bunch of players are not going to double-check all the math and just play. But that is a discussion I've had here a few too many times perhaps! 

Finally, trying to figure out the day/night cycle is beyond me at the moment! A tidally locked planet that orbits in a few hours will do something like the image below, so while on the far side of the big planet, everything is really dark, transitioning in the orbit means that the side facing Tudor will get some light, so it is not in perpetual darkness as I was thinking. And when Iomaria is between the big planet and the sun, daylight of course. And the sunny side is not in perpetual light - it has a true day night sequence but will be a lot fast than Earth. I imagine light bulbs are in high demand!

Part 1 here

Part 2 here

Part 3

Part 4

Dangerous Destinations - Watch Tower

My bog book for Dangerous Destinations arrived, and I decided a quick roll-through to see what sort of thing shows up. The book is not exactly what I thought it would be, though it is exactly what it said it would be: "The definitive guide to creating intriguing and dynamic destinations for storytelling and fantasy roleplaying games". Think of it as a very complete generation system that lets you procedurally create a destination. So more of a random place generator that I was thinking, but in re-reading the campaign, that is what it said it was.

To begin with, we start with the prelude which is something evocative to flavor the end result, and help with fleshing out the results with a story. In reading some of the sample destinations generated by the rules, this prelude can make a dramatic difference in interpretation of the final results. 

Prelude: Fear - feeling that something threatening or dangerous is near. We'll have to figure out what this can be as we move along the process.

Previous Presence: Dumping ground. Area used to get rid of something: refuse, bodies, bad magic experiments...this was not a happy place before whatever ends up as our destination is present. 

Continued Presence: apparent - what was there has been replaced but there are obvious signs of the dumping grounds. So - whatever was getting dumped is not hidden or buried. Not a secret anyone is trying to keep.

Finally, the first big step - just what is our destination?

Destination Type: Watch Tower. Ahh, so this location will be a watch tower. Build on, over or nearby whatever was being dumped. And there is a sense of fear at this destination. Sadly, I am doing this post-Halloween!

• Watch Tower type: visual signal tower. Signal flags, or torches, or something. This also means that there should be similar watch towers in visual range. Depending on the terrain and height, that can be quite a variable distance.
• Height: 10-20'. Going with 10 + d10 I get a 17' tower. 
• Top Floor: 25x25 feet
• Construction: stand-alone tower. This is a sole tower: no support buildings or anything like that. I would assume there are barracks and facilities in the lower level.
• Condition: Dangerous - in serious disrepair. The tower is falling apart and not maintained. Never a good sign!
• Current effectiveness: effective, works as it should. Despite appearances, the signals are still getting through.
• Control - original people. That is, whoever is supposed to be here is still here.

Next, just where is this watch tower?

Environment - Plains

• Danger: environmental danger - intelligent monster. We'll have to roll on the plains intelligent monster table to see what that means.
• destination locality - deep plains, close to the heart of the plains. We'll have some travelling to get there.
• notable environmental feature: plateau, 390' high, 560 acres. Big plateau! And the watch tower is built on this big plateau in the middle of the plains. Meaning that if we stick the 17' tall watch tower near the edge of this plateau, it would be visible for several days journey at least in one direction.
• terrain feature: burrows of small animals. Could be they ar ethe ones that are causing the tower to be in such bad repair. Buit watch your foot - gopher holes are everywhere!
• Recent weather has been mild.
• Current weather (assume this really means when the players get there) is also mild. We could have had all sorts of bad weather: heavy snows, heavy rains, gale force winds. Oddly I rolled nice weather twice.
• Local fauna - no additional wildlife. Just those burrowing animals and that intelligent monster. Not that the players know any of this yet!
• Now we roll for our intelligent monster: an 18 yields a Pegasus! Just why is this intelligent Pegasus dangerous? Fortunately, I actually have a Pegasus mini. I think. Unfortunately, I don't get to play face to face much anymore!

And there we have the bare rolls. Putting this altogether, we can create our dangerous destination.

Years before, gnolls hunted the few Pegasus (Pegasi? Pegasuses?) for ritual sacrifice atop the Charn Plateau, near the heart of the Stratgeo Plains. A great pit was dug where the bodies were burned alive, great metal netting preventing flight and escape. Unfortunately for the gnolls, Tric, a wind god of the plains, took umbrage at this and destroyed most of the gnolls. The few that were left have been since hunted down by the remaining few Pegasus. These Pegasus have been driven mad by the experience and will not react normally. Years later. Gerth the Great of the Strageo Plains wanted to expand his tribe's territories. He established a watchtower on the edge of the Charn Plateau, armed with fire and smoke, to give alerts for other tribes who were not so happy about territorial expansion. Unfortunately, not realizing that gophers had no natural enemies on the plateau, the watchtower over the years has started to list somewhat alarmingly to one side.

Why are the players going there? Perhaps a neighboring tribe wants the tower destroyed but wants outsiders to do the deed so as to not start a plains war. Or Gerth's daughter Gertha, now tribe leader, has not heard from her crew at the tower, and needs someone to go and find out what is happening. The flying Pegasus is terrifying her tribe, and none will return there. Or the travelers just wander by, seeking shelter from this crazed Pegasus that seems intent on doing bodily harm to all bipeds on Charn Plateau.

via ArtStation

I do have at least one more post for Iomaria, and still need to heavily re-work my random table post as it was, well, too random!

Traveller 5: System Generation: Iomaria, Part 4

The End Result

Iomaria A99889A-8 {1} (B7K-1) [7F08] BDe Im NS G NIL

Trade codes: PH, PA, PI. Naval and Scout bases, Imperial Knight, Marquis and Viscount representatives are present. Travel code Green, and there is a native intelligent lifeform present.

Orbits Tusog, a big planet in orbit 2 with a 248-day year, orbiting every 4 hours. There are 2 gas giants in the system, a smaller gas giant in orbit 0 and a large gas giant out in orbit 9. There are 3 ice worlds and 2 radiation worlds in the system.

Transit times for jump are generally higher due to Tusog's presence. Being tidally locked, one side rarely gets much in the way of sunlight. The dark side is the side facing Tusog, and most of the population lives on the other half of Isomaria. 

The Process

Next, we create the gas giants. As this system has 2 from the PBG (402) from part 1 we have 2 gas giants. Interestingly we have 2 planets in orbit 2: Iomaria and the planet it orbits. Looking at the rules, we place a "BigWorld" in orbit 2. Interestingly, the gas giant table indicates 2 dice, but has a range of 1-13, indicating there is some sort of DM somewhere I can't immediately find. Going with straight 2d6, our first gas giant is a small gas giant (rolled another paid of snake eyes!). This is the size of Neptune, size L. There is a note about fuel skimming needing GG size / 10, so a ship will need at least 2.1G. Apparently in T5, you need at least a M3 to fuel skim. Though honestly, couldn't you just slingshot and use gravity to dip into the atmosphere & get flung back out? Pretty sure that ship from 2010 did not have M3. Of course, it also was not pulling in hydrogen to convert to fuel.

But I digress: we have a size M SGG. Placement is relative to the HZ, which for our KV star is orbit 2. I again roll low, so somehow, we have a small gas giant in orbit 0 around this dwarf orange star. Of course, hot Jupiters have been recently discovered, so we have a hot Neptune-size gas giant in close orbit about the system's main star. Our inner system gas giant has 5 moons.

Our 2nd gas giant is just under Saturn-size, size Q (24). This time I roll box cars - our large gas giant is way out in orbit 9, our about 5 light hours from the sun. This distant GG as 2 moons, but being so far away, probably no one ever visits. Especially at TL 8 which is early interplanetary pretty much.

At this point, we have:

1. Orbit 0 - small gas giant with 5 moons. 
2. Orbit 2 - a big world that is orbited by Iomaria, our main world.
3. Orbit 9 - the large gas giant. 

Total worlds = MW (main world) + GG (gas giants) + Belts + 2D. Apparently then we roll 2D for the remainder of the planets, and there are stereotyped world definitions depending on where the planet ends up. Roll a right in the middle 7, we have 7 additional planets. Going for our 7 additional planets in the order rolled up:

1. rolled a duplicate orbit, so it becomes adjacent to the LGG in orbit 8. Being outside of the habitable zone, rolling on the outer worlds table we have an ice world. Rather than rolling for the space port first, let's roll the stats as that really determines the ports. Especially for an ice planet light hours away from the main world. 768000. We have a standard atmosphere in terms of oxygen and nitrogen, but being an ice planet, without warmers you will die. That 80% hydrosphere is ice-covered oceans. Miles of ice over liquid water heated by the geothermal process. It has no moons. Our end UWP is Y768000-0
2. Orbit 5. a rad world. Assuming radiation everywhere. Y670000-0. Some of the other worlds have fixed stats, and a valid assumption is no one is going to live on a rad world. It has 2 moons. 
3. Orbit 6, another ice world. Y110000-0. A small ice world with a trace of an atmosphere. There are no moons.
4. Orbit 4, yet another ice world. Of course, being outside the habitable zone it is pretty much expected. Y100000-0. Nothing but ice! Maybe frozen methane. Two very tiny moons orbit this munchkin ice world.
5. Orbit 7, another (you guessed it!) ice world. Y456000-0. A slightly larger ice world with a thin atmosphere and no moons.
6. Orbit 10, outside the large gas giant, we have another rad world. Y445000-0. A thin atmosphere tainted with quite a lot of radiation this world boasts 3 moons. Perhaps captured from the large gas giant?
7. the last world rolls on a different column, and we end up with an ice world way out in orbit 12. Y89A000-0 and no moons. 

And we should also roll up our big world, that has a size of 2D + 7 vs the normal 2D - 2. Rolling a 7, we get a size E (14) world. With that size, the flux roll for atmosphere is insidious. Giving environment effects of C2 and P1. With that atmosphere, the surface is liquid, but what sort of liquid? With an insidious atmosphere, and being in the habitable zone, could be something like chlorine. Which - hey, I do have that atmosphere supplement:

The most dangerous of all atmospheric types encountered by Traveller adventurers is the insidious atmosphere, defined as an atmosphere similar in nature to corrosive, but capable of defeating any personal protective measures in 2 to 12 hours.

Going with a chlorine-disulphur atmosphere with chlorine-based seas covering the entire planet. This gives us YECA000-0 as the UWP.

Bringing this all together:

1. Orbit 0 - SGG M with 5 moons
2. Orbit 1 - empty
3. Orbit 2 - Big World Tusog and Iomaria in the habitable zone
4. Orbit 3 - empty
5. Orbit 4 - ice world Y100000-0 with 2 small moons
6. Orbit 5 - rad world Y670000-0
7. Orbit 6 - empty
8. Orbit 7 - empty
9. Orbit 8 - ice world Y768000-0
10. Orbit 9 - LGG Q with 2 moons
11. Orbit 10 - rad world Y445000-0
12. Orbit 11 - empty
13. Orbit 12 - Y89A000-0

Most of the system is only mapped as far as TL-8 can map it, which is actually pretty good. The jump shadow is right inside the 2nd orbit, so Iomaria is not within it's stellar jump shadow. However, Tusog, the big planet it orbits, of course has a larger jump orbit at 100x14k miles or 1,400,000 miles / 2,240,000 km. This is roughly 6 times further than the moon is to Earth! Travel time form jump is going to be longer than most systems. Quick guide for the G drive:

1. M1 8 hours
2. M2 6 hours
3. M3 4.8 hours
4. M4 4 hours
5. M5 3.7 hours
6. M6 3.4 hours

Of course, it may depend on where you precipitate out of jump. And of course, I've not figured the orbit of Iomaria around Tusog. Using Heaven & Earth to input the UWP & information it shows up as orbit 5. I am good with that. I could have just used H&E to do all the work (and for animal encounter tables, yes, I will as I tried in an as-yet unpublished post to create some random tables for the encounter tables. Lots of rolling and flipping through pages - no wonder people prefer to automat a lot of Traveller rule sets!) Using the info from that as well, we now have the following information on our system:

Tusog orbits the sun every 234.8 days, so Iomaria's year is the same. It does orbit Tusog every few hours (according to H&E its roation is 0.022 days which seems...awfully fast). 

Assuming an orbit that the rest of the system mostly adheres to, this also means that Iomaria has false nights: they are behind the big world so in its shadow. It is also tidally locked to Tusog, so people on that side of the planet always have a giant planet visible even in daylight. Which is dim due to the main star being a K0-V star.

And if you got this far - congratulations! There will be 1 more post for Iomaria to wrap it all up in an ISS style document or two. T5 has some forms I should be able to use. I also found the and grant information in the noble character generation in Book 1. I may see if I can roll up our nobles for this planet as well. 

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Traveller 5: System Generation Iomaria Part 3

The End Result

Iomaria A99889A-8 {1} (B7K-1) [7F08] BDe Im NS G NIL

Trade codes: PH, PA, PI. Naval and Scout bases, Imperial Knight, Marquis and Viscount are present. Travel code Green, and there is a native intelligent lifeform present.

The Process

The next and final part of the main world generation is the NABZ NIL info. Nobility, allegiance, bases, travel zones and native intelligent life. Of course, the NABZ part of this is very OTU specific, though you can abstract those to be your universe's political groups.

First, nobility. Any system has a knight apparently. And I am not entirely sure if you get one per matching trade code, but let's assume you only get the highest. There may be others, but this one is the primary Imperial contact. Our three trade codes have two matches, and the PH, pre-high population, indicates we get a Viscount. We'll have to generate our noble later when we wrap up this system generation. And in re-reading the 1st part, there can be more than one. We'll have to add the ever-present knight, as well as a Marquis due to the pre-industrial nature of Iomaria. I think the Imperium wants to lead the world to produce for the Imperium and the Marquis is there to lend a "guiding" hand. The knight I think is closer to the general population and a general troubleshooter for the Imperium. The Viscount is more of a grand social director, seeing as that role is based on the pre-high population trade code.

Allegiance is something we can choose. For this particular system, we'll default to an Imperial planet. From part 2, I see this world almost as a Soviet block-style world: boring or brutal architecture, a cog in the Imperial machinery. People are, at least on the surface, bland Imperial citizens, not expecting too much, and with the efficiency rating, not giving a whole lot either. Quiet quitting on a global scale.

Bases are based on the starport type. And can affect our importance. Having an A port gives us almost a 50% chance of having a Naval base. Rolling a 4, we now have a Naval base on Iomaria. Inversely, far less likely to get a Scout base. Yet I roll snake eyes, so we also have a Scout base. I am a perpetual low roller...except when the game mechanics make low rolling good. The dice gods hate me in RPGs. The Way Station and Naval Depot are based on a much larger view of the surrounding systems, effectively referee fiat. However - these 2 bases actually boost our importance from 0 to 1. Still not important (that is a 4 or higher) but at least of vague importance relative to local systems. 

The Travel Zone, our classic green/amber/red is also by fiat, unless the government + law level is a certain level. At 19, we just miss the 20 cut-off to become an Amber Zone. This would also add the Da, Dangerous, Trade Code. Those definitions are both new I believe. And note that 22+ is automatically set as a Red Zone and a Fo (forbidden) travel code. 

Native intelligent life is all new. Apparently with our 8 populatiom and our type 9 atmosphere, as well as having a TL above 0, there is some sort of natives still living here. I am leaning to not liking this to be automatically a yes based on the world stats. I'd rather make this wither referee fiat or some sort of roll. Not EVERY planet will have (or have had) native intelligent life. Although honestly, we have no idea. If the world has a breathable atmosphere there is life, but intelligent life each and every time? Pretty sure Earth has not had intelligent life except for the last tiny part of its long life. Countering that, supposing dinosaurs had some sort of civilization, would anything be left that we could determine was an aspect of intelligent life? I am going to ignore this part and let it be even/odd for native intelligent life as it meets the other criteria. And yes, there is some sort of intelligent life on Iomaria. 

We now know that this world has three Imperial representative, a Vilani Viscount, The Lady Shana Lerisnarsii Akrashash. We also have a knight and a Marquis. The Knight Lady Bethany Quatori, and the Marquis Sir Flynn D'Oric. Somewhere there is a definition of how many hexes the nobility gets based on the social rank. Not there yet - that will be yet another part of my exploration of Traveller 5 system generation. I've yet to do the rest of the system (which at initial glance looks to be similar to Classic Book 6, Scouts.

There is both a Naval and Scout base present. The Naval base may have Imperial Naval engineers and their own stockpile of high-tech parts for repairs and building. The Scouts, being Scouts, will have some sort of local bureaucracy to handle repairs, though probably not as extensive as the Navy. 

Green Travel code, meaning nothing much to worry about in general. Though it is borderline amber due to the impersonal bureaucracy and the high law level of A. 

Finally, we have some sort of native intelligent life. How intelligent, and is it land based, or ocean based? Yet another post waiting to happen!

Part 1

Part 2

And another view of the world.

Traveller 5: System Generation. Iomaria, Part 2

The End Result

Iomaria A99889A-8 {0} (B7K-1) [7F08]

Trade codes: PH, PA, PI.

The Process

Where T5 starts to really differ is the in the extensions, native intelligent life (NIL), nobility and all that. Chunks of this are really Traveller 3rd Imperium specific, though abstract enough that you could use or ignore as necessary for other SF game universes. 

There are three extensions: Importance (relative to some region, so I suppose this can be scaled up or down depending on the size of your universe you are playing in). Looking at the mods, we get +1 for the port, -1 for our TL 8, and that appears to be that, giving us an importance of 0, or unimportant. Based on the expected ship traffic, that gives is maybe 2 ships a week, maybe up to one per day. Despite having a type A port! Being in brackets this looks like {0}

The Economic extension is the strength of the world's economy. It is a bit more involved than the importance extension. For resources, 2D and I roll a 9. Then because we squeak by with TL8, we can add the belts & gas giant count. No belts but 2 gas giants, so Iomaria's resource value is 11. Our labor is population -1, or 7. The infrastructure is 2D + lx, which I am having to assume is the labor value. 12 + 7 = 19, which really seems to me to be a really high infrastructure value! However, efficiency is via flux, and -1: apparently, we take advantage of the amazing infrastructure and make it up in volume. Efficiency takes into account legal procedures, tariffs, customs and the like. I think the impersonal bureaucracy, along with the very high law level, has a LOT of red tape! Using these numbers, we can also calculate the resource units, and in Iomaria's case will be negative. R (11) * L (7) * I (19) * E (-1) = -1463. Probably due to having to import all those jump drives as Iomaria cannot support much by itself. In the end, assuming that we use the pseudo-hex, this looks like (B7K-1).

The final extension is the cultural extension. There are 4 parts to this. Heterogeneity is social diversity. Population + flux, so 8 - 1 or 7. A high value indicates a spectrum of differences. With the rolls, looks like it is close to a 2d6 curve, so 7 is right in the middle. This is another of those cases where there are some assumptions for the rules but no explanations, such as what is a high value? I am only assuming that a 2d roll + a flux roll will basically give us something similar to a 2d roll by itself. But hey - I can do math! Assuming a population of 1, the lowest you can get is 1 - 5, or -4. The highest you can get, is a population of 15 (quadrillions of people!), so 15 + 5 or 20. Ergo, the range is -4 to 20. 7 is actually on the lower side, so moderately diverse but not too crazy. Acceptance is population + labor, 8 + 7 = 15. This range is 1 (pop 1 + 0 = labor) to 29 (15 + 14). 15 puts us about in the middle. People accept off-worlders, no big deal one way or the other. Finally, strangeness is the degree of difference from the "norms" of interstellar society. This again assumes a norm for interstellar society. Flux + 5, so 0. With a range of 0 to 10, Iomaria is stock standard whatever the interstellar norms are. Nothing surprising here other than the sheer amount of red tape. Finally, we have symbos used by the culture. Flux + TL, or 0 + 8 = 8. With a range of -5 to 20+, 8 puts us on the low end, more concrete than abstract. The cultural extensions are square brackets, so [7F08]

So, what does all this additional information give us? We now know that Iomaria is not too important in the local region, and with such a high negative RU, is probably importing a lot and is a possible financial drain in the stellar community. Despite that or perhaps because of that, Iomaria has an immense infrastructure in place, but one that is fairly inefficient. Between tariffs, customs and red tape, it takes forever to get things done. Probably a lot of union jobs that are clearly delineated and rules that must be followed. With its class A starport, it is also importing a lot of high-tech stuff for ship repairs (one of those interesting discussions about ship repairs, starport levels and tech levels). Iomaria indifferent to visitors. It is a socially diverse culture that is plain vanilla in terms of its culture. Which probably does not help with visitors as basically it is like Wal-Mart - the same wherever you go. Visit far off Iomaria, just like home. Exactly like home. In fact, I get an almost state-run society that just does not innovate much. 

This information is similar to classic character generation: you can read a lot into these numbers to help give the world a bit more character. In this case, Iomaria needs all the help it can get!

This could play into how the players interact with Iomaria: off-worlders are not big deal, but buying and selling cargo is going to take a bit longer. Heck - even after you buy or sell, getting it loaded or off-loaded is going to be an arduous task. While you would think that bribery might help, I seem to recall there is some correlation between success and law level (i.e., a higher law level is even easier to bribe). And huh - T5 no longer has the bribery skill! But looking back at Classic Book 1, I was right:

Note that the roll for accepting a bribe varies inversely with the law level of a world; the more stringent the laws, the greater the corruption.

Iomaria is ripe for greasing palms to get things done! This also implies that Iomaria potentially is very corrupt. With the government not directly associated with with people it governs, and married to that inefficiency, I see a lot of black-market deals and off-the-books deals. And probably a lot of things fall off the backs of those trucks...

Added a globe at least, though thinking I may want to make a few from different angles.

And a gif in case you want to see it spinning around!

Part 1 here

Part 2 here

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Traveller 5: System Generation. Iomaria, Part 1

The End Result

Iomaria A99889A-8 Trade codes: PH, PA, PI.

A satellite of a larger planet in orbit 2 of a dwarf orange sun, Iomaria has a tainted dense atmosphere requiring filter masks for outdoor activity. Almost 80% of this temperate world is covered by ocean. It's class A port sits on the edge of the one of the many oceans giving it easy access to water for both raw and refined fuel.

The process

I've had these books for how long and have yet never tried the system generation there. Figured I'd give it a shot as I'll be running a Traveller game probably early next year. Or another SF game, but as Traveller is not just an RPG but a toolbox of Makers that really transcend any specific game rule set. 

As always when reading the T5 rules, it takes me a few times to figure out what they are actually trying to do. A lot of text before the main process starts and things seem oddly placed sometimes. Reminds me of Microsoft documentation on their site: technically correct but you have to find it, and it is not always what you really need to get the job done.

We start with the World Gen Checklist and section A. There are up to 10 steps in this process, each taking a page or more of tables and text. The very first step is to pick the sector name, hex location and main world name. As I am not sure where I am going to stick this, there is no sector name nor hex location. If I recall correctly, originally you grabbed a sub-sector map, and started rolling for a planet per hex. And that was based on how dense the system was. A hex crawl of stellar proportions! Skipping the location and name, we should have a name. As usual for name, I turn to a random name generator and found this site which is cool and one I've not visited before. We'll pick Iomaria as our planet's name.

Starport type is next. This seems me to be really in the wrong place: the starport type really should be determined after we have a population and tech level. This is why we get type A ports on empty planets in Classic. Though we'll see - hoping that they port type creates DMs for the population and tech level. Rolling a 4, I get a starport type A - the biggest and best. Rolling on the space ports table, we have at least a type F, a good quality space port.

Using the flux roll for the home star, I get a 2, giving me a K class star. I think I roll again for the size on the same table as there is a column for the stellar types, so we end up with a KV star. Looking into what that means: it is an orange dwarf star. This is in-between a red dwarf and a star like our own. 

And where does Iomaria orbit our orange dwarf sun? A flux roll of -2 gives this the habitable zone, so Iomaria is a temperate world. And is our garden world (well, so far!) a planet of a satellite? A -4 roll gives the interesting far satellite. And oddly, we're a satellite around another world, in the Vee orbit. Which at the moment I have no idea what that means.

Next, we have the PBG rolls for population digit, planetoid belts and gas giants. The population digit lets us know within the population code what it is. A random 1-9, but no indication of how to roll a random number between 1 and 9. Grabbing one off the internet, we get a 4. 0 planetoid belt. Rolling for gas giants, we have 2 gas giants in our system. Our PBG is 402.

Now on to our actual planet! Size is 2D-2, which really gives us small planets. Yet I roll an 11, for a size 9 planet. A tad larger than Earth. And yet it orbits yet another planet! Atmosphere is flux + size, and having a 0 flux, we have a type 9 atmosphere, dense and tainted. So much for my garden world.  There is a P1 note in the environmental effects. I looked around and could not find a table or other reference nearby in the book so at the moment I am clueless (this is the main issue with T5: things are not well formatted and linked to find what you need easily. A simple page reference would have helped!)

Hydrosphere is Flux + atmosphere + mods. At least the mods are listed in the table, and we have no mods. A -1 plus our 9 gives us 80% water, so again, a tad more than Earth. Of course, this is really 75-84% water the way I use it generally, so about the same as Earth.

Population is 2D-2, rolling a 10 gives us 8, for hundreds of millions. With our previously rolled PBG of 402, the 4 gives us 400 million inhabitants. Our population is a modifier for government. Another flux roll of 0, and we have a type 9 government: an impersonal bureaucracy. Impersonal agencies isolated from the population. Having done early voting today, I sometimes feel like that is what we have at times! Finally, government is the modifier for law level. 1 + 9 gives us law level A - extreme law. 

The final part of our planet is the technological level. 1D plus 6 (for starport A) and...that is all the mods. 1 + 6 is 7, circa 1970's really. Wait - missed my space port F, another +1 for TL 8. Which originally was early grav technology, but I think got bumped to TL-9 later.

Our planet is A98989A-8. 

Checking for trade classes, which is a bit more extended than Classic, we have no planetary trade classes, we are a pre-high population (PH), pre-agricultural (PA), pre-industrial (PI) world. 

Checking the inner system reference, with our KV star and being in the habitable zone, we are in orbit 2.

I'll do the rest of this in a follow-up post. This is basically where Classic Book 3 ended, and there are really only minor changes to the system generation. 

But fun with planetary image generation!

Via the fractal generation program, this one looks interesting. 

Via PlanetGen, these two could work:

And finally, I also have Fractal Terrains. Let me see if I can set the parameters to have an 84% water world. And while the others are 1600x1200, this one is, err, larger.

The advantage of the fractal planet generator is that it can generate all sorts of projections. PlanetGen is a bit more limited, and Fractal Terrain has a lot more options I've yet to experiment with. It also has all the projections and then some, such as this Equal Earth projection, and showing the climate map:

I may go with the Fractal Terrain this time, as much as I like old-school command-line driven software. It allows me to dig much further in for details and close-ups.

Part 2 here

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

A Sunday Post - Killed Off A PC

We were playing the 1 on 1 OSE game, and the player was having a good time. I actually had some NPC personalities going (which is hard for me to do more than 1 at a time and there were 2). We had a brief tavern encounter where they added Pinsmiss Jappet, a Gnome thief. to help break into Pen Caravann's house. He was a tad grumpy, though not as bad as my current Goblin character. Being an older Gnome, his beard was white and his cheerful face hid a larcenous soul.

Pinsmiss Jappet, 3rd Level Gnome Thief

And it is a bit difficult to find a thief Gnome. Regardless, I figured as Gnome in OSE tend to be tinkerers and good with their hands, Pinsmiss took his dexterous talents in a different direction.

They managed to break into the house - I was rolling pretty well for Pinsmiss to pick the lock. They did manage to sneak most of the way up to the 4th floor when they encountered their first guard. Dynin, the player's assassin, missed his roll to assassinate the guard, but actually survived that fight, killing the guard with a single stroke of his dagger (he rolled a 4, and that guard only had 4 hit points). The crew continued up the stairs, and then actually managed to make the hear noise roll (well, one did and that was enough!). There was a guard upstairs outside Penn's door. While waiting, a rat made some noise down in the kitchen. Seeing the light flicker in the stairwell, Dynin tried to hide in the shadows to make another assassin's strike. Sadly, a 1st level assassin only has a 10% chance or so. He failed, and the guard also made a higher initiative. He did manage to kill this guard as well.

Continuing to the 4th floor, Pinsmiss failed the trap check but fortunately, the lock was not trapped. He also barely made the pick lock roll (he is a 3rd level thief so not entirely incompetent). Dynin failed the move silent roll (see - I am not the only one who has bad rolls!) but I gave him an advantage of +2 as the guy was wrapped up in sheets and blankets. A brief fight ensued, and our fledgling assassin managed to terminate his target. 

While Pinsmiss was working on the lock to the upstairs vault where the big treasures were near and dear to the now dead merchant's heart, another guard, hearing the noises, was coming to investigate. Dyunin, flush with his recent victories, tried to hide to strike and kill the guard. Pinsmiss and Jafari held back as this was Dynin's job. He failed to hide, and the guard rolled a better initiative.

The fight was brutal and fast - while Dynin actually hit the guard, the armor deflected the blow (he actually missed and missing someone standing right in front of you - well, anyway, the mechanics of most RPG fights are an abstraction anyway). The 2nd round, the guard killed Dynin with his short sword. Jafari, the other assassin, and Pinsmiss both attacked the guard, and the Gnome made the final strike to kill the guard.

Sadly, out game for that character was all of 2 sessions. And it was a bit difficult for me running as I've not run OSE before. I do like the old-school mechanics, and the fact that it is a pretty lethal game for low-level characters who have no hit point cushion! The player took it in stride though. Our next game will probably be Death Test as we're both familiar with the Fantasy Trip, and that solo game, which I've run by myself a few times, is good for playing without a GM. 

I actually started another post, one for fleshing out the Traveller animal encounters. As normal with me, it kinda went all over the place. Think I'll try and rework that into something a bit less stream of consciousness. 

And hey - I have 20 followers! Thanks for those who follow me (and more thanks for those who comment. I do read the comments, and in fact, that disorganized post is a direct result of some comments (who, when I checked, is either not following or uses a different name). Regardless - thanks. I know I tend to be all over the place for what started as a Traveller blog for my trade software I started (and restarted, and restarted yet again!) decades ago. Figure most gamers tend to play a wide swath of games, so feel that's okay. Though I do notice that the Traveller-centric posts get the most reads. Probably because where others have linked my blog are mostly other Traveller blogs. And I will be doing some Traveller world building even if the next SF game is not Traveller: Traveller is such a great toolbox, and its various tools can be used for any game really.

Jafari, 3rd Level Assassin

End Credit Scene

And post-game, Jafari & Pinsmiss did raid that vault and make a daring escape with several hundred GP. Jafari admitted to the Assassin's Guild leader that Dynin, while making his target, failed in getting out. However, a signal was given to the Cult of Perfection that their days may be numbered. So, the wheels are still in motion as politics are literally cut-throat in my fantasy game!

Treasure! Which only had to be split 2 ways instead of 3!

Goblin Cult

Playing a game of Delve, and I've a Goblin. The way the referee plays this game is a fun variation on the regular introduction to this system: we have no idea who we are, and only roll up our stats when we do something that would use that stat. Same with the starting skills and all that. And, similar to Traveller, it is entirely random so we play something we may not normally do. In fact, I don't think I've ever played a goblin before.

Turns out he also has 2 snake tattoos on the backs of his little green hands. And three cats (the referee knows I am a cat person who actually does happen to have 3 cats). My Goblin, like the last time I played this game with this referee, did not do well on his learning roll (the L in Delve). Took him 2 sessions to finally remember who he was (first time we played it took 3 sessions I want to say. I do have bad rolls!)

Fugh Srebnalk is a magic-wielding Goblin apparently: he can take 30-60 foot jumps and can talk with his 3 cats. Digging into various books and zines, I came up with this cult. Books used were Gobsmack!, the Ultimate Bestiary: Revenge of the Horde, Remarkable Cults and Their Followers, Fairyland, Rackham Vale and probably a few others. At least I am using the things I get!

Forest Goblins are a type of Goblin, and I decided that I liked the idea of a forest Goblin. A bit more fey than your typical D&D monster-Goblin, with ties going back to the Goblin King and Fey. But having turned their backs on the Goblin King, tired of being cannon fodder, the Forest Goblins, at least this bunch, want to get back to the land of the Fairy. From that arises the following cult, mostly rolled up though with some discretion added.

Druidic Circle:

  Druidic circles are usually composed of those who revere and draw their power from nature.

  Circles exist outside the laws of civilization

  Wilder, more brutal code: may harvest blood of trespassers to fertilize groves

  Bloodshed and cruelty are part of nature

 Size and Wealth:

   Goblin cult - various factions of Goblin shamans. No wealth, no buildings

 Resources:

   depends of the band. 

 Origin:

   Founded by banished exiles

 Founded:

  seeks to discover or obtain some lost form of magic: an artifact, relic, or a specific collection of spells

Power Source:

  drawn from a portal to another plane of existence (land of the Fey)

Focus: 

  cult kills people in power and replaces them. Not really sure how that works out as Goblins without a glamor would have a difficult time replacing someone. Going with some of the more powerful shamans can either cast a glamor or manage to give a Goblin the power of a glamor. 

Weakness:

  dependent on exotic resource. And I've yet to figure what that resource is, but it is probably why he was in that war band: while the rest may have been fighting for something, Fugh (and his now dead female companion) were actually closer to spies. They were using the warband as a cover to recover whatever artifact or relic. I'll be talking with the GM and we'll flesh this out. 

Symbols:

   winding snakes (this was the one I picked rather than rolled based on the original random roll for my character's brand)

Name: Keepers of the Powerful Creed

Revering Maeve, Queen of the Unseelie, the Keepers have portals to the land of Fairie. 

These portals require the blood of strangers to keep functioning. They also look for

crystals of power: these are used with blood in dark rituals performed by the shamans.

Most Goblins that are part of this cult help trap & kill strangers in their forests.

They think Elves' blood is an even more powerful agent in the rituals. The shaman has

not said one way or the other.

As they move up in the cult, they get tattooed:

• Novice: no tattoo, but a leather thong necklace with a crudely carved snake.  Generally just attend the ceremonies, hoping for some magic or something
• Hunter: single snake tattoo. Part of the crew that catches strangers in their area. They get closer to the portals but are not allowed to cross.
• Hunt Master: two snale tattoos. Lead the huning groups, and on particularly good catches (Elves) and are allowed to cross back to the land of Fairy for a period of time
• Shaman: leads the rituals, and has several tattoos

Traveller Bestiary

While doing some mini painting, I was thinking about how various creatures or monsters are common throughout multiple fantasy game systems. Take for instance, the fire elemental.

(and yes, I am actually pretty happy with how this one turned out!). I have a few fantasy RPGs, and at least for OSE & the Fantasy Trip, there are some consistencies with this one. Cannot be hurt by non-magical weapons, cold magic affects it, and so on.

Traveller, on the other hand, has thousands of worlds, thousands of biomes, and a near infinite number of creatures. What you encounter on one world is not going to show up on another. There are some exceptions, creatures that have been transported around and on many worlds. The JTAS had a bestiary section in most issues, and most of the creatures were native to a specific world. Some, such as the tree kraken, seemed to get on to other low gravity worlds (which in Traveller, most worlds tend to be low gravity worlds I'd really make that curve more likely to yield normal gravity worlds...well, that is a post for another day!) Some, like the beaked monkey, are more or less pets, and so available everywhere.

Each planet, using book 3, can generate a plethora of creatures rapidly (see my post on random encounters, which is what sparked this post of rambling thoughts). The same idea for creatures as for random encounters struck me, but in a different way. 

Traveller breaks down creatures into a set of reactions: Flee, Attack or pretty much ignore. Those rolls are dependent on the type of creature, and the entire animal creation rules in Traveller are pretty well thought out.

What they lack though, at least for me, is the chrome, the flash. While that is the purview of the referee really, we just don't have a bestiary in Traveller simply because it deals with many worlds. Not just a few planes of existence as per several fantasy games, but literally millions of potential worlds. Each world would have its own bestiary, and it is extremely unlikely that you would encounter a creature from Regina on Glisten. One being a garden world, the other being an asteroid belt.

I've backed two bestiaries recently, both really for OSE. And I do have the Fantasy Trip's Old School Monsters. And while Mongoose is republishing a lot of old JTAS with a bit of the new (and FINALLY going back to top-down deck plans versus the entirely useless isometric ones) and have a bestiary section as well. But in Traveller, you have to adapt those to fit your universe. 

And in the end, unless you are playing a low-tech adventure in Traveller, creatures have an entirely different purpose in my opinion for Traveller. They add chrome to the world, but unless you go out of your way, you are not going to interact with native fauna. And for those well-armed adventurers, few creatures pose any sort of a threat.

While I really like using Heaven And Earth to help me flesh out my worlds, and it generates the multitude of animal encounter tables, unless you are running a game like Across the Bright Face, how often do those tables get used?

I did manage to use those in a Traveller game I ran a few years ago at the gaming club. But it was forced: the system was a post-apocalyptic world that at one time had a TL-17 level of computers: the AI took over basically. Fortunately, space-wise they never got above a jump 1. Anyway - technically the world was under a red zone from the Imperium as it still had a thriving nanobot culture what would wipe out any Imperial tech in 2-12 hours. The Pax Stellar game forced the animal encounter tables as I removed the ability to have them use grav vehicles by referee fiat. I took away player agency in one sense, though there were "real" reasons to do so. 

But other than forcing things like that (your shuttle crashes in the jungle) I can't see really using those animal encounter tables all too much. Exceptions do apply: playing a science/exploration game, a hunting scenario, and I am sure there are a few other cases. And perhaps I've just not managed to get the right group for that. Traveller is a very broad SF RPG, and while it does have a defined setting you can use, it is a really, really BIG setting that few people (other than my 19 readers, well, 18 as my wife subscribes but she is not into gaming, just fishing - and musky fishing at the moment) really get into. Heck - I've played Traveller off & on for over 40 years and I am not that much into the setting. Why I mostly lurk about on COTI as there are people who seem to live and know every corner of the OTU.

But you can see where those tables came from: an extension of the random encounter tables but for animals. and both have their DNA firmly based in fantasy games that came before. GDW just extended those basic ideas into the Traveller universe, using the 2d6 process and limits.

To try and wrap up this rambling post: I don't think Traveller lends itself to having a universal bestiary. You have to develop one per world. Fortunately, there are tools to automate that. I have Heaven And Earth, and there are probably on-line tools (I thought the TravellerMap's Generate World Map did that, but I can't find encounters there. But wow - that is a great resource! There have been a lot of updates since I last looked at that. Though I like making my own maps, for those who don't want to, this does it all for you Traveller style)

A Universal Bestiary in Traveller, if not an electronic system, would be like the old Encyclopedia Britannica - a huge set of large volumes, 1 book per world. Fortunately for Traveller, and players and referees, computers have caught up and so we can have those tables automatically generated for us (and now wondering if I could try & do that as well. As I've never gone back to my old trade program. Maybe when I retire, I'll return to my hobby software development. Currently I do way too much of that for work and don't much feel like doing it even more in what little free time I have!)

World Building - Cities, Settlements, and all that

 We've seen how I've been using the Spectacular Settlements book to create a town (Windemere and Fort Covenant). While I love building these things, they are a lot like using High Guard to build starships in Traveller: how much of what is built is actually used?

While I've heard the quote that ships are just "boxes to get from one planet to another", I grew up with Star Trek and Battlestar Galactica - those ships were more than just boxes. They were effectively characters in their own right. Which is something I've also heard about ships in SF games.

Same for various settlements that are going to be more than just a one-night layover. I've built up these places, with maps, characters and even rumors and things. Yet I never really seem to use them in the way I want to use them. At least that is how it feels to me. 

So what do I do: buy more books on city building! Good thing it really is something I enjoy doing and is my entertainment. Similar to building worlds and ships for Traveller, building settlements for fantasy games is equally enjoyable.

I've got the final PDF for the Organic Towns, which I am hoping will help me to make the towns live. They do become characters with a changing character sheet and changes. I've yet to read much of it - I really prefer actual books for my initial read, then I use the PDF when I am at the computer alongside the book. And then I also realized I backed another town book, Campaign Towns (and at the limited-edition pledge just to see what a very expensive book will look like). The core of Organic Towns seems to be a point system, similar to Traveller's resource units per planet which in some versions of Traveller allow you to build up a planet. I never got into that level of playing as we played a lot more feet on the ground. Which is my preference for gaming in general: I don't want to be in charge of anything in real life or the gaming world! Because with power comes responsibility, and I also do not deal well with stress.

Anyway - back to world building for fantasy worlds. To quote from the PDF:

Settlement Points (SPs) are the foundation of Organic Towns. Settlement points are a representation of laborers, raw materials, and gold. To determine a settlement’s baseline monthly Settlement Point allowance, divide the population by 10 and round up to the nearest whole number. For instance, a small village with 257 residents would get 26 SPs each month. Settlement Points reset each month, and unspent Settlement Points do not carry over to next month.Settlement Points can be spent to construct buildings or take Settlement Actions.

Basically, I get to play mayor or ruler of that city. Each month I do things. Going back to Windemere, the town I've developed the most (and the players quit playing before they got there! Not sure what that says about me, but young teenagers don't always want to play with old people! At least their dad is still playing with me). Wait, I've digressed. Back to Windemere: it has a population of, well, I never said. And in re-reading older posts, turns out it is actually named Windemere Crossing. My players do make fun of me as I rarely get the names right. Part of that is that we are playing on Skype so I am missing a lot of visual cues: we do voice only as no-one wants to do video. Which I think is a mistake, but it is what it is. With 70+ buildings, and several outlying locations and smaller sub-settlements, going with a permanent population of 350 or so. There is a transient population as well from being on the caravan route. Which yes, I did add random tables to as well, I think. I really need to re-read the actual document I was generating back when I thought we'd be using this. I think I just like making documents. One of these days I may do something with them!

Organic Towns brings in a few more attributes to our settlements: moral (how the town's general mood is), affects a few things. Random rolls, specific buildings, and a few other things can affect the town mood. Hopefully Windemere Crossing won't spiral into despair! 

We also have resources, which is a bit more abstracted in Settlements, which can also affect moral. Windemere Crossing, while near a desert, is also at the foothills of mountains, so while it does not get the rain from the south, there are rivers and wells readily available. Windemere Crossing is not lacking in local resources, and being on a major trade route, has access to remote resources as well. 

With our local population of 350, we have 35 settlement points. With which we can build things and all that. Or upgrade existing buildings. In looking at the book, it is almost a Catan-like (or an 4X board game) experience but bundled into role-playing. There is even a SP (Settlement Points) conversion to gold pieces for a few games. Shades of Traveller: converting between an abstract resource concept to actual credits or gold: never a good idea in my opinion (some things are just too abstract to convert. Then you have the whole debacle of Star Wars introducing midochlorians...just leave some things to the imagination so we can fill them how we want!)

There are upgrade paths. For instance, from a trail to a dirt road to a cobblestone road requires SP, resources and all that. And of course, these also require SP to maintain, but can bring about trade bonuses and other benefits. 

Sorry, distracted again. I'll try and do a better overview of the book when it shows up. I may take the Settlements work sheets, and add aspects of Organic Towns (and then add more elements from the other City Building book). What would be interesting is seeing about tracking the towns as the players stay there. Building improvements will have construction going on, work crews, possibly artisans depending on the building. Reminds me of the Blue Ridge Parkway, near where I live. The bridges were made by Italian stone masons, and all are very pretty. Things like that ("Yes, we hired the master Dwarf mason Thunderrock to build the bridge into town") has potential impact to how the players perceive the town. 

And again - all this goes on in my head and rarely seems to see the light of game play. Think I need to write things down ahead of time: the couple times I did that in the Cowboy game I did manage to cover at least some of the things I wanted to cover.