Twilight of the Surreal

  Mechane, Atomo and Spatia  had a delightful little trade union going. Things improved with time. Spatia's ships improved their drives and began reaching other forgotten though populated worlds. However, when were people ever content for long?  Nottusa, the most populous, some would say advanced ,nation on Mechane was a republic. It had a well developed and politically active set of corporations, made even richer and more active by the affluence afforded by trade with Spatia. Eventually Nottusa saw a change in leadership. The new regime decided the trade agreements with Spatia were not in their best interest and they demanded a bigger cut of everything, raising the price of goods. This didn't sit well with the Spatians who soon found their trade ships boarded and further harassed by Mechane vessels built on Spatia.  It was a small ship Universe (the people living in it just called it the Universe.) Invasion options were limited. Mechane had a huge population, was already crank

 Kills what? RP hooks mainly. On various forums I have seen a never ending hunt for rules to design better and more accurate star systems, in accordance with then latest astronomical data. Let me throw cold water on this right now: your players care a lot less about this than you think.  I wrote Solar Sagas, a planetary setting in the Old Solar System where everything was (at least marginally) habitable, in the tradition of Golden Age SF. I didn't get burned in effigy (that I'm aware of).  Discussion on one forum turned to a habitable planet around a white dwarf star. The OP got little encouragement for it. I remembered some articles I read and started hunting (Perplexity really makes this job easier). Sure enough the good old space telescope found a number of planets and other objects orbiting  white dwarfs. One planet was even in the Goldilocks Zone.  To give the detractors a fair chance, the articles pointed out many problems with a habitable world. For one thing the expansi

 Stellagama Publishing is famed for Cepheus Deluxe, Terra Arisen, and their Fantasy RPG, Sword of Cepheus. I've tinkered with their house system: Quantum Engine for a few years -self publicans Lightning League (pulp SF and horror). Since going Stellagame I wrote Solar Sagas (Golden Age SF RP). I love Quantum in its various forms. One of the good things about working with Omer Golan-Joel: the Stellagama Publisher is that he has such a wealth of ideas he will often say to us associates, 'Here, do something with this.' This was the case when he asked me to write a horror RPG using the Quantum Engine, I jumped at it. Josh Peters lent his fine editing to the work, then no stranger to horror gems himself took the deep dive and became co-author (tri-author! Omer did do Quantum Engine!) A few tweaks had to be made to Quantum sensibilities regarding combat, psionics, and the nature of horror itself. Combat: combat is more lethal. Quantum combat is dangerous enough but in Quantum Da

Professor Ormsby was still awake when I finally got to the compartment we shared.He looked up from the bottom bunk as I folded mine down. He was nice enough to wait till I sat down on our chair and removed my boots. Red sand fell out of the boots and Professor Ormsby hit a switch on the wall. Suction whisked the sand into slots where the walls met the floor. I wasn't spacer enough yet to call them bulkheads and decks. "You are unwounded, Tyson?" Ormsby asked. "Your meal ticket is indeed intact , sir. Have no fear!" I got my boots off and went to the top bunk, pulling myself up onto it. The professor was quiet a moment. Then he asked, "Are you all right?" "You just asked me if I was wounded and I answered," I said rubbing my eyes. "I know. I'm not asking whether your thick hide is intact. I'm asking if you are all right?" "... Yes sir. Thank you. I made it through that search and rescue on the Artemis, and I wa

  One of the problems with a small ship universe, such as Traveller, especially one that uses realistic drives is that you can in all probability kiss any space opera style interstellar and interplanetary wars and invasions good bye. empires will grow through diplomacy, economics and technological superiority. Join our Polity and get Quantum computers or be left behind.  Now don't get me wrong, cloak and dagger stuff breeds in such an environment. Cloak and dagger is an equal opportunity employer for the naughty people we play. Sometimes though you just want ships to darken the sky, missiles to rain on the evil doers and landing ships to shake the ground (oooh I get all jumpy just thinking that!) How can we save our invasions! 1) Wormholes: A natural ftl path exists between two strategic systems, and maybe others. Any ship can transit this. Screw the one week in jump rule. You travel instantaneously. Note this sort of thing makes the wormhole itself a vital resource. If your curre

 High passengers (high as in rich first rate accommodations -not as in doped up) can be a lucrative source of income for ships. freighting returns Cr 1,000 per displacement ton. A high passenger takes 5 displacement tons but generates Cr 9,000 or Cr 1800 per ton. In addition there is the oft overlooked phenomena of tipping that can generate a further 10%-20% of a ticket. Of course, freight can't get sick or make crazy demands out of the blue (usually). The following is a list of a few things that can go wrong ship the volatile commodity known as humans. 1- Sickness     1-  Sick guest. Travel exposes a person to all manner of new diseases. Immunization is not foolproof nor universal. Some diseases strike at inopportune times. In the more severe cases a guest may have to enter cryo sleep..      2- Sick crew.  A sick crew member is worse than a sick guest. Someone will have to double up doing their job as well as the patient.      3-  Contagion. A particularly infectious disease mani

 'Days Are Short But Years are Long...' was the first code phrase used by immortals (really long lived cusses) in Methuselah's Children by Robert A. Heinlien. The immortals (longers?) were the result of a breeding program. Their method of achieving their longevity was not available to just anyone. You had to be related! They wisely kept their existence a secret. In fact people did not believe they were the result of a long range program and were ready to adapt extreme measures to find their secret. There, lies the tale.  Immortality or the next best thing is attainable in most 2d6 systems, indeed a great many games across the genres. In general it requires big bucks or other measures. Here are a few ideas for the source of immortality. Note that I mean extreme longevity. You may not live until the stars go out, but living through a few dozen generations makes you immortal for my purposes. A Process  Saying this process will be expensive is the understatement of your lifetim

 This blog uses Quantum Starfarer tech levels. The three levels in particular are Mechanical Age, Atomic Age, and Space Age. Mechanical age is WW1 to middle of WW2. Atomic Age is From the end of WW1 to about now. Space Age is the near Future with extensive interplanetary and Basic FTL. Let's take three planets Mechane, Atomo, and Spatia. Guess what tech levels they are! I'll wait.  The three worlds are in close proximity. Spatia's free traders and corporations are eager for trade. Spatia figures it can bring nearly anything it produces to trade, as it can make superior versions of everything. Atomus in particular has little heavy industry, is sparsely settled and needs vehicles for explorations, settling, and internal security due to revolutionaries in remote locations. Mechanus has a large population and heavy industry, already trading between its several nations. It also builds vehicles for the various militaries to defend the splintered nations. Spatia as noted has an es

First of all Classic Traveller is a work of brilliance. As Marc W. Miller said he started the game design by reading through sf, and nowhere did anyone tell how much fuel it took to get to Alpha Centauri. He made all that stuff up and he was first!  Second, it gave you the ground rules for a Universe, in three little black books (LBBB) or The Traveller Book . The price then was not high enough to bankrupt anyone.  Third, the rules themselves had and have their fans. In fact, many Traveller games to this day are run are run as Proto Traveller -they use the LLBs and maybe Supplement Four - Citizens of the Imperium (SS4). Okay I use snub pistols and a couple weapons from Book Four - Mercenary . But for the purpose of this discussion let's say just the LBBs and SS4. There's no Third Imperium. what do the rules and equipment say about this Universe?  You can interpret it a lot of different ways. My take away was always that high technology gadgetry was fairly conservative. The onl

  Lago (A343965-9) is a populous and prosperous world that is subtly controlled by off world interests buying its elections and officials. In the past few years a number of local movements have agitated for reform. The latest was led by a local baron Orson Haut-Lee. After several years on the run and causing unrest and disruption, Haut-Lee was captured alive. As a member of the nobility, Haut-Lee's execution would have grave repercussions. Instead it was decided to transport him on a series of Lagese vessels on missions to other systems. He would remain alive, but out of touch. He would never be able to communicate directly with his followers though censored videos were released to prove he was alive.  It worked well enough, until several life support systems failed on the escort carrying him. The failures were troubling in that they'd require several days to repair -ideally on a habitable planet. The escort will miss its assigned rendezvous with the next ship to transport Ha

 A stunner is a remarkable weapon. It does what no other weapon does,  rendering a person unconscious or at least incompetent without causing lethal damage. Usually in an RPG this means it will put a person down without cutting through all those hit points. Cutting or shooting through hit points is usually a hassle because others are trying to do the same to you. In Cepheus Deluxe, stunners are described as firing a precise electromagnetic pulse that disrupts the target's nervous system, putting them down safely. It has to be precise. It knows whether a function controls a trigger finger or breathing for one thing. For that matter, is it possible to cause a stunner to inflict lethal damage on a person, say paralyzing their lungs or heart? Perhaps it is a matter of timing your exposure. A .01 second pulse will numb a person. A one second exposure can kill them. Do stunners affect the higher functions of the brain instead of the muscular-nervous system? If this is the case then stunn

 Note that I said 'sensible' not easy. While some (most) will say there is no such thing as sensible monster hunting, I beg to disagree. Once you decide to stalk the creature of the week, sensible means avoiding unnecessary risks and balancing risks against possible gain. Here are some mistakes for the rookie van Helsings to  avoid: 1) Hunting by night. Why? You can't see shit. You're not doing a fucking cable show and don't need to establish an atmosphere. Humans depend on vision. It is our primary sense. operate by day whenever you can. Consider, the Scooby gang could have done their investigations by day, found the same clues and probably never encountered those creepy old men in costumes (who are buying up properties in the real estate office). So operate by day when you can or at least do a walk through in daylight. By the way, why didn't they start their investigations at the realtor's office, ask what the deal was  on that abandoned Air Force base etc

 Omer Golan-Joel gave me the fantastic opportunity to write for him and his marketing skills and connections to advertise my books. My first major book is Solar Sagas , using the Quantum Starfarer rules. You see I grew up on the cusp of a new age. As a child people could talk about life on Mars -possible human-like. Venus had dinosaurs or lizard people. The Solar System was populated before this space probes were sent out and we started to learn about how terrible the real estate rally was around Earth.  Solar Sagas introduces a living Solar System. I've populated it out to Jupiter with various aliens. Jump in your rocket, strap in and blast off for adventure, trade and exploration!  Terrans are very much the new guys in town. The Martians, the Ganymedans and possibly others explored before them and eventually turned inward for various reasons. The humans may lack experience but they also lack baggage. They can be the go between sparking trade between rivals. they are uniquely suit