Generic RPG Group Questionairre

This is a questionnaire for new players joining my group. It is intended to get an idea of what they're looking for from the group, and also to introduce them to the social contract. Feel free to use my idea or borrow from it as you see fit.

Name:

Contact information:

Availability:

1. What is your favorite RPG? (Video games and CYOAs are valid answers)

2. How long have you played tabletop RPGs? (Its ok to be new)

3. Are you willing to DM? If so, what game systems can you run?

4. Of the following 3 options, circle 1 or 2 that you feel describe what you want in a game.

• Simulationism. The game is an imaginary alternate reality for us to get lost in or escape to. It should work like a real-ish world and be internally consistent, with believable causality between action and consequence- even if the results aren't always fun, or are anticlimactic. Fun comes from the emergent experience. It doesn't need to be realistic like our reality, it can be realistic within its own terms as long as it actually follows its own rules. I like magic systems that can be explained and controlled in a consistent way. I dream of the game being made into a simulated VR world that I could visit. Combat happens because people are in conflict.

• Narrativism. The game is a process that allows us to express ourselves. We are here to create a story together, and the purpose is to make that story something worth telling. Fun comes from an interesting narrative, even if our heroes die on the way, and the rules should bend to that narrative. I like magic systems that achieve story-relevant consequences, even if the how and why of it doesn't make sense, or isn't explained at all. I dream of a transcript of our adventures being turned into a famous novel or movie series. Combat happens to carry a meaning or to achieve a narrative goal.

• Gamism. It's a game. There are clear lose conditions, and the rewards of survival are the terms of victory. We're here to win, (or at least to have fun on the way to losing). The game doesn't need to be realistic or tell a special story, that stuff is just window dressing to give a reason for the game's rules to work the way they do. We should follow the rules because that's how the game works. I like magic systems which can be used in a clear way to achieve specific in-game mechanical effects that advance our goals. I dream of playing in a huge public event or tournament and maybe gaining recognition for good play. Combat is a type of puzzle to be solved.

5. Of the following 4 options, circle 1 or 2 that you feel describes you best.

• ◇ Achiever. You want to earn points, gain levels, obtain completion percentages, get achievements, and amass treasure. You want to succeed and you want to measure that success with concrete rewards and trophies.

• ♤ Explorer. You search for hidden areas, secret lore, glitches/exploits, and optional adventures. You want to seek out and investigate everything, rummaging through the game for anything of interest.

• ♡ Socializer. You are in it for the experience with other people, you want to connect with and express yourself to others. Any game that lets you have fun with people is a good game in your books.

• ♧ Killer. You thrive on competition. Even if a game is "not competitive", all of life is a race- and you plan to come in first! You want to either defeat everyone who isn't on your team, or be the best on your team, or both if possible. Achieving a higher rank in a leaderboard is your favorite reward, even if all you get for it is a new rank.

6. Circle up to 2 of your favorite fantasy character archetypes.

• Fighter
• Wizard
• Rogue
• Cleric

7. You are playing an MMO or MOBA. Your favorite party role is...

• Tank
• DPS
• Healer
• Support

8. You would rather...

• Fight/kill an alien
• Track/study an alien
• Kiss/befriend an alien
• Run/hide from an alien
• Eat/own an alien
• Be an alien

9. From the following, check your top 3 favorite scenarios. X out any that you truly hate.

□ Combat
□ War
□ Exploration
□ Heroism
□ Anti-heroism
□ Politics & intrigue
□ Law, crime & punishment
□ Romance & drama
□ Travel
□ Survival
□ Urban adventures
□ Investigations & mysteries
□ Puzzles & riddles
□ Horror
□ Lore/storytelling
□ Building/crafting stuff
□ Leading & managing people/animals
□ Comedy
□ Mazes & traps

10. List the 3 best fantasy or sci-fi stories (any medium) of all time. Prepare to debate.

• I)
• II)
• III)

11. If the game was a movie or videogame, what rating are you willing to tolerate?

• G / E
• PG / T
• R / AO
• X+

12. Of the following topics, X off any that you are not willing to tolerate in your game. (This includes even indirect references or implications, regardless of game rating)

□ Rape
□ Torture
□ Drugs
□ Drug abuse
□ Addiction / alcoholism
□ Child abuse
□ Animal abuse
□ Spousal abuse
□ Racism
□ Genocide
□ Sexuality
□ Sex
□ Sexism
□ Pedophilia
□ Religious or anti-religious themes
□ Gore
□ Dismemberment
□ Death
□ Sacrifice
□ Scat
□ Slavery
□ Social class / caste systems
□ Political corruption
□ Cannibalism
□ Cursing
□ Necrophilia
□ Poverty
□ Suicide
□ Mental illness
□ Disability
□ Pregnancy & childbirth
□ Gender identity

13. Where do you fall on the following spectrum?

• Cerebro-social. Full theater of the mind, all things described verbally with no player handouts, maps, figures, etc.
• Some player handouts or general maps are nice as decorations.
• Tactical combat with figures and grid maps. Props and handouts are frequent game centerpieces.
• Tactical play with figures and grids even for exploration; or lots and lots of handouts, props, and counters with fancy character sheets and stuff.
• Parlour roleplay with costumes and props which abstractly represent items and scenes. Players describe physical activities but play out social activities.
• Kineto-tactile. LARP and ARG. Costumes and stage sets. Actors for NPCs.

14. For the following play style elements, cross out any you do not want in your game. Circle any you really desire in your game.

• Player secrets. (The players may hold some character secrets from each other, but the DM must know these secrets)

• War room. (The players as a group may pause the game to discuss tactics away from the DM, and do not need to tell the DM what was discussed.)

• Bluebooking. (The players may keep character journals to write backstory and record downtime roleplay when away from the table. Other players and the DM can then read and contribute to these journals.)

• PvP. (The CHARACTERS may enter conflict with each other, use social skills and rolls against each other, steal from each other, lie to each other, join opposing factions or hold opposing goals, and even engage in potentially lethal combat with each other.)

• Metagaming. (The players may have their characters act on knowledge that is realistically only available to the player, not the character. Players may design their characters based on system understanding rather than narrative or roleplay purpose.)

• Avatarism. (Players may build characters to literally represent themselves in the game. Players may roleplay themselves. Players may create a recurring character that they adapt to every game they play.)

• Standing orders. (The players may declare a recurring activity or behavior under a condition and the DM will assume the character continues that activity or behavior without requiring the player to constantly restate it. Always checking dungeon doors for traps before opening them is an example. Think of it as being able to toggle continuous activities on or off.)

• MacGuyverism (The players may intuitively or improvisationally interact with the imagined environment to create or do things that are not predefined by the rules or core books. Making a spear by lashing a dagger to a staff, for example.)

• DMPC. (The DM can control their own character and participate with the group as if they were also a normal player.)

15. From the following list of themes, rate each one between 0 (hate it) and 5 (can't live without it).

□ Contemporary/Modern
□ High Fantasy (An alternate supernatural universe)
□ Low Fantasy (earth with supernatural subject matter)
□ Historical fiction (medievalism, for example)
□ Science fiction (star trek, 1984)
□ Science fantasy (star wars, John Carter)
□ Superhero (Spiderman, Batman)
□ Postapocalyptic (Fallout)
□ Steam punk
□ Fairy tale & folklore
□ Military
□ Anime (Themes and tropes from manga culture)
□ Mythology

16. Name your favorite soda and your favorite pizza topping!

17. Regarding roleplay method, you prefer...

• Everyone to speak and describe things in the first person as much as possible, with little to no out-of-character talk if possible.
• People to stay in-character, even if they only roleplay from a third person perspective.
• People to at least stay on topic as much as possible, even if they have out-of-character discussions about the game at hand.
• To be able to go off on the occasional tangential conversation.
• For the game to take a back seat to spending time with the group as real people.

18. The game rules should be...

• Inviolable. Followed to the letter as written by the developers, even the DM must follow the books, even if the developers say the DM can change or ignore the rules.
• Followed to the letter, but the DM can alter those rules before play begins.
• Followed to the letter, but the DM can alter the rules at any time.
• Followed generally except where the DM decides to deviate for any reason.
• Ignored if the group is unhappy with the results.
• Taken as a general suggestion, and fully open to interpretation and negotiation.

19. Can your character die?

• No player character should ever die unless the entire group agrees.
• I should be able to decide if and when my character can die.
• I would like some sort of safety net to exchange deaths for a resource or for permanent injuries.
• Characters should only die if they deserve it through consequences for their actions or inactions.
• Yes. S*** happens.
• Yes, and that player must then be kicked from the group until a new campaign begins.

20. I hereby agree to fully and equally abide by the following social contract within our gaming group, and to hold the other participants to its standards:

1. I shall do unto others as I wish for them to do unto me.
2. I shall not do unto others what I do not wish for myself.
3. I shall treat others as they wish to be treated.
4. I shall not violate any one of these rules in preference for any other.

Violation of any of these rules will result in public warnings. Continued refusal to cooperate will result in immediate removal from the venue and revocation of your invitation to participate in the future.

• Agree. I will join you.
• Disagree. I will not be joining you.

Classic Traveller Starship Design

OK, SO, It's been a while since I wrote an article! A solid month and a half in fact! I'm losing ground on my article buffer! Time to push it ahead by a week, seeing as my biweekly game has been cancelled.

Recently, I've been playing Classic Traveller. I've always had a soft spot for old school games. Their goofy, half-baked rules and disorganized source books make for an interesting experience wholly unlike the polished RPGs of the 21st century. (No, seriously, game design went through a significant change right at the turn of the century, it's actually quite pronounced) The campaign I'm running is not set in the standard Traveller universe because I don't have time to read over a thousand pages of setting information just to run a 4 hour game. Instead I used the rules packaged with the original game to build my own setting. However, as part of that, I wound up building a setting with a mixed bag of conflicting interstellar governments. It didn't make sense for them all to use the same standard ship designs presented in the book, (Mainly because they suck and nobody should ever use them anyways) so I had to design a lot of starships fast.

That proved difficult. The ship design rules are complex, with many side cases and corollaries to account for. It is very easy to make a design mistake or misunderstand a design rule. To aid me in the process, I designed a spreadsheet which allows me to design dozens of starships in a matter of hours. It does all of the calculations for you and is already formatted to be printed out, so you don't even need to write the stats out yourself if you don't want to.

Here's the Starport Shipyard.

However, in doing this, I discovered something: Starship Design is not a minigame as it was billed by the designers. In fact, neither is chargen! That is a lame excuse for what can only be described as intentionally obtuse game design. Let me explain.

See, in character generation, players engage a "minigame" which decides their skills for them by writing out an abstract narrative of their career history prior to the start of the game. As part of this "minigame", it is possible for a character to die. Now, while this has been hailed by many as innovative- AND IT IS- it's also fucking stupid in practice. When I'm trying to start a game, and it takes time to do all these rolls and stuff, the last thing I want is for it to suddenly take twice as long because of a bad roll forcing me to start over from scratch! It's just an arbitrary interruption that makes the first session take longer! Happily, they included an optional rule for a death to simply be an "injury requiring hospitalization" resulting in a half term providing 1 less skill than usual. (0 for military, 1 for scouts and merchants)

But even that variant rule doesn't make character generation into a game. It just makes it a slow and elaborate process with unpredictable results. That's no more a game than just randomly rolling dice and writing the results down!

Meanwhile, starship design basically boils down to a process by which prerequisites are chosen before the vessel's needs have been determined. For example, when installing maneuvering and jump drives (the things that make the ship "go") the effectiveness of each drive class is based on the mass of the hull. That means you need to select a hull size first. However, fuel demand for jump drives is based on jump potential, which means the fuel needs often exceed the remaining mass of the hull, forcing a hull size increase... but that hull size increase then reduces drive potential, forcing a larger drive to be chosen... etc. Basically, in other words, the charts used to design ships intentionally obfuscate the actual limits of the ship design system. As a consequence, you wind up wasting a great deal of time mucking about with impossible designs.

One of the most obnoxious aspects of ship design however, is the bridge mass requirement. 20% of hull mass, with a minimum of 20 tons, must be dedicated to the ship's bridge. That's equivalent to 40 squares when you draw the deck plan. Given that each square is 1.5m wide, that means the smallest possible bridge is 90 square meters. Now, you might be thinking, "yeah, like the bridge from Star Trek, right?" except you'd be wrong. Most ships require no more than a staff of 2: a pilot and a navigator. They don't need a captain to tell them what to do, they already know their jobs. Communications software, as in reality, just works the way it's supposed to. Metrical information is important to the operations of the ship, so they can also operate all of the ship's sensors and other instrumentation. Operating a starship is their job. So why do they need over 90 square meters to walk around?!

Now, maybe that'd be kind of a fun learning experience for, like, the first time the players try to have a ship built. But after that first time, or if you're a referee trying to design a whole military fleet, it's just fucking annoying! I'm busy! I have over 20 ship classes to design in one system alone, and these intentionally dysfunctional design rules are really getting in the god damn way!

Anyways, uh... Yeah. Guess I just wanted to bitch about that for a bit.

Just because you can lose at something doesn't make it a game, it just makes it annoying.

15 Things Wrong With the Aarakocra Race

So, you've probably heard at least a few conversations about the aarakocra race for 5th edition D&D over the last couple of years. Basically, it boils down to 2 groups.

Group A: Players who think aarakocra are awesome because they can fly and that's unique and fun. Some DMs who defend the player's personal, immediate, and unrestricted fun as the sole purpose of play.

Group B: DMs who list the mechanical consequences of a race with at-will flight.

Neither group really seems to fully appreciate all of what is wrong with the aarakocra race, however. Invariably, the discussion just boils down to "flying is good/bad, m'kay?" There's more at play in this race than what's written on paper, boys. Let's dig in a little deeper.

First off, the elephant everybody fixates on: is at-will flight at first level overpowered? Yes and no.

If you present the players with environmental challenges, travel expenses, logistics concerns, active pursuant threats, grid-based tactical combat, and assume that flying things other than common birds are extremely abnormal and rare, yes. In a thoroughly medievalist, low-magic setting, with supernatural creatures a rarity in the extreme, and spellcasters an absurd near-myth, where archers exist only in the army for warfare, or as non-military hunters, YES. If you build your adventures as gauntlets if price-walls in action/health/spell currencies to whittle your players down over time, YES. If your party contains morally ambiguous characters, or if your campaign lacks any real-life moral restrictions, YES.

If you play a fluffy social game in which people go for weeks of game time role playing in the same couple of buildings, not engaging in the economy or combat, no. If your campaign setting is highly supernatural, where the skies are filled with as much life and diversity as the ground, where flying wizards and flying machines are commonplace, and where archers are included in any logical group of soldiers because wyverns are a routine problem, no. If your players all agree to be PG-13 heroes, no.

Basically, if your players don't do anything mechanical, then this problem won't come up. It also won't be as big of an issue if you run a low combat game and don't present the players with tactical situations. So, like, theater of the mind games often won't suffer by it as much. Games where overland travel is skipped or handwaived also won't see many issues. Games which don't make use of exploration/puzzle encounters probably won't have problems. Basically, if all you guys do is sit around chatting in the tavern, you'll be fine.

So, that's the basic answer, now let's run down the list of problems.

1. Nobody else can fly until 5th level. That's a 2nd tier mechanic. It'd be a little different if there was a weak flight cantrip or 1st level spell, but there isn't. Not even in later publications, as of 2018.

2. Flight at 5th level is accessible via a spell. That spell has a limited duration and limited resource. Aarakocra do it non-stop for free.

3. Not only do aaracokra fly at 1st level for free, their fly speed is 50ft, almost as fast as a horse. That is the highest racial speed in the game. This means that they have no reason to need a mount on or off the battlefield. It also means they have no reason not to fly. Purchasing and maintaining mounts is a standard expense for gameplay, and gives players something to work for and care about. Not aarakocra. Aarakocra don't give a damn for nothing and no one.

4. Aarakocra ability score increases target the monk class. A monk aarakocra not only has no need for a mount, they have no need for weapons or armor either. If they do carry a weapon, it will be a bow- a bow which will deal impressive damage at higher levels. Woe be to the DM who doesn't track ammunition in this situation.

5. Flight has no minimum altitude. Flight takes up no additional room beyond the occupied space. Squeezing through a space has no impact on flight. This all together means aarakocra can fly at all times, no matter where they are, even through a 2.5ft wide hallway.

6. Because flight is normally accessed via spellcasting, this means aarakocra spellcasters essentially get a free spell effect, freeing up spell slots and spells known for other effects. At level 5, an aarakocra wizard is strictly more powerful than any other wizard.

7. While many people would argue that you can work around the aarakocra's flight, this really just illustrates how broken they are. See, if you need to shoehorn in unusually specific challenges to keep just one player under control or to give them something to do, then something is wrong with that player character. It's such a problem it has a name: balance by giant fire lizard. Won't it get rather suspicious when every other encounter has an archer, caster, or flyer just to give the aarakocra some kind of challenge? Isn't it weird that the DM would need to do that for one player but not for any other type of character? Why should the DM have to put in extra work just because one player wants to be their pet budgee?

8. Aarakocra can defy territorial claims with impunity. Toll road? Border crossing? Gate guards? Private property? Imperial stop check? These things mean nothing to an aarakocra player. If they get caught flouting the rules, they just fly away. Unless someone was preparing for a hunt or a siege, why would anyone be carrying bows? Who would stop them? Worse, this same problem makes aarakocra master thieves. They can enter buildings through upper story windows without climbing kits. They can flee a scene without risking detection on the streets. They can safely escape a city or country with ease even if they do get caught. All the threats walk on the ground.

9. Does anyone hex crawl any more? No? Well if you do, aarakocra ruin it. Unless the encounter includes a flying creature or an archer, they can ignore every single encounter. They are unaffected by terrain. Rivers, crevasses, fallen trees, forest fires, marauding orcs, highwaymen, none of this stuff matters to them. They can fly around almost as fast as a horse, and set down to rest in the most remote and hard to threaten locations imaginable. All they need is food for the trip and clear skies. All the challenge of the logistics puzzle that is travel is eliminated. Any chance of fun from encountering things and exploring the world is also eliminated. Aarakocra basically handwaive their own travel.

10. While airborne, they can't really be surprised. They don't leave footprints so nothing can track them. They can see in all directions for miles. Even if something like a dragon was coming for them, they'd see it and have time to land and hide. This makes them the de facto scout of any party. Set up camp, scout the surroundings, go where the aarakocra directs. Why risk wandering ahead when you can prep yourself for anything that might come up?

11. The biggest drawback to flight is fall damage. If anything goes wrong, the aarakocra becomes an artillery shell. The problem is that until they reach higher level, fall damage can easily kill them, or at least make them an easy kill, especially if they're really high up. Fall rate is 500ft per round, so it'd take an aarakocra at least 10 turns flying straight up before they can risk falling for one round.

12. Escaping, fleeing, or retreating from combat is generally a convoluted experience. The enemy gives chase, and you have to run and hide to get away. It's a different type of challenge. Not aarakocra. 10 turns of vertical flight puts them out of most attack ranges.

13. And worst of all, the role-playing information. The text directs them to fear indoor spaces (Like dungeons and houses) and to have no understanding of personal property. They're basically flying kender who refuse to talk to the quest giver unless he comes outside, then go off on their own anyways because they can ignore 90% of the game and don't need some lame ground creature to help them. I quote:

"The idea of ownership baffles most aarakocra. After all, who owns the sky? Even when explained to them, they initially find the notion of ownership mystifying. As a result, aarakocra who have little interaction with other people might be a nuisance as they drop from the sky to snatch livestock or plunder harvests for fruits and grains. Shiny, glittering objects catch their eyes.

They find it hard not to pluck the treasure and bring it back to their settlement to beautify it. An aarakocra who spends years among other races can learn to inhibit these impulses.

Confinement terrifies the aarakocra. To be grounded, trapped underground, or imprisoned by the cold, unyielding earth is a torment few aarakocra can withstand. Even when perched on a high branch or at rest in their mountaintop homes, they appear alert, with eyes moving and bodies ready to take flight."

Gee, that guy sure sounds like a riot to adventure with.

14. The apparent counterbalance to their flight feature is a reduced walk speed and no other features. This actually just makes them more lopsided, because it encourages them to play in annoying ways that focus on maximizing the benefits of flight. Any time flight is not beneficial to them, (which is rare) they become a useless burden and usually get killed.

15. They have little to no reason to adventure at all. They have no connection to the material plane, it isn't their native realm of existence. As flying creatures, they are free to live in the world as they wish. They don't need your strict, walled-in civilization, so why should they care about it? They don't need a group of adventurers to help them. They don't need money if they're good thieves or even halfway decent survivalists. There is just nothing worthwhile for them to engage in the game for. Aarakocra are so inhuman, they're basically playing a different game.

So, let's talk about how to fix them. All of the following are possible solutions to the various problems presented by this race. Use the solutions to the problems that actually manifest in play.

1. First and foremost we need to discourage obnoxious play. Make them native to the material plane and give them an organized society that values ownership. There are no real-life animals that value possessions without territorial tendencies. Make them comfortable on the ground. Claustrophobia should not be a racial quality. Give them a culture that has been affected by and affects surrounding cultures. Give them a people to defend and represent. Give their culture ties to other civilizations so they have a reason to interact with the world at large.

2. Establish that they can only be used in highly supernatural campaigns in which the skies are far more interesting than a highly mundane campaign. This gives reason for there to be more aerial encounters and a reason for ranged combatants to be commonplace.

3. Reduce their flying speed to 30ft. If they want to travel faster, they'd still need a horse, or they could cast the flight spell. It reduces their need for alternative movement resources without eliminating their value completely. It gives more options rather than making them obsolete.

4. Make taking off take an action. Special movement should be gated by the action economy. Be universal with this ruling: even dragons need to do it. Action surge now has real meaning for aarakocra.

5. Give their flight a duration. 1 minute per character level seems reasonable. That way the flight spell gives a longer duration until level 10, and the racial feature gives a longer duration thereafter. It's good enough to fly for a whole fight 90% of the time, and limiting enough that they can't just fly all day; they have to regularly set down. You know, like real birds do.

6. Add a weak 1st level flight spell. Something like "hover" or "air walk" or something. A spell just good enough to avoid pitfall traps and fall damage, but not good enough for air travel. You might also supplement that with an even weaker flight cantrip, something that gives you like 10ft flying speed for 1 minute maybe?

7. Make flight with wings take space. Specifically, a creature that uses wings to fly should require one size class larger in space in order to fly, but does not count as one size class larger itself for any other purposes. Thus, a medium creature needs 10ft of space to fly and can squeeze through a 5ft opening while flying, but still counts as a medium creature.

Dwarven Numeracy

So, I'm working on a language for the dwarves in my campaign setting. One of the most important things to my dwarves is the dimension, quantity, or value of a thing. They are architects, engineers, and merchants. As such, having a highly efficient numeric system seemed key to their culture.

I created a synthetic structure which allows a numeric value to be encoded in a series of phonemes. In essence, each number has a name, and that name is a phonetic code representing its value.

To test it out, I made a program which would output every value from 1 to 1 million in dwarven. The result is the largest PDF file on my computer. Take a look if you like; only the first few pages should be good enough to get the idea. The first page explains the encoding. I checked for duplicates too, there are none. Every number has its own name.

Here's the PDF.

Classic Traveller Module Guide

The following is a practical guide to the original Traveller product line, intended for use by those who would like to run the original game. For anyone who is wondering why one would rather play the original game from the 70s rather than the latest edition by Mongoose publishing, (which is an excellent game, to be fair) the answer is content. The original edition ran for much longer than the later editions, and so had much more material released for it. While it is possible to update content to new editions, this is a tremendous amount of work, and since there's very little new content in any given newer edition, it is much easier to actually downgrade those bells and whistles to be original-edition compatible instead. The following covers all of the main officially published materials that I can get my hands on and explains their relevance to the game and who/how/when to use them.

Now, this all only matters if you care about using published material. If you're the kind of DM who just strips the system from the game and then makes all their own content and setting whole-cloth, then by all means stick to Mongoose Traveller, it absolutely has the better system. It is important to note though, that most editions of Traveller are actually pretty similar, (except for T20) the major difference being in how well-executed the rule books are. The original edition books are just as much of a mess as the OD&D books, making it an overwhelming and impenetrably complex game for beginners to learn or play, it has a steep learning curb, and an unfriendly user experience. In other words: It's for grognards.

The Books

Understanding Traveller: A marketing pamphlet disguised as an information guide packaged with the original books. Encourages players to buy additional modules and expansions. Neither necessary or useful.

B00: Garbage. Its basically just an RPGs101 intro to gaming. It contains absolutely no game information whatsoever. Not necessary, as the rules were cleaned up and improved, as well as being collected and streamlined in a single work, The Traveller Book.

B01: Mandatory. This is the corebook. Not necessary in its own right, as the rules were cleaned up and improved, as well as being collected and streamlined in a single work, The Traveller Book.

B02: Mandatory. Without this, the DM must make up all starship information, and players cannot participate in starship operation or ownership. Not necessary in its own right, as the rules were cleaned up and improved, as well as being collected and streamlined in a single work, The Traveller Book.

B03: Mandatory. Without this, the DM has no material to work with when building campaigns, adventures, or encounters. Not necessary in its own right, as the rules were cleaned up and improved, as well as being collected and streamlined in a single work, The Traveller Book.

Starter Edition: Combines 00 and 01 into a chargen book, and combines 02 and 03 into a play rules book, and delivers the two in a boxed set. Illustrated. Does not include the 04-07 chargen expansion.

The Traveller Book: Combines the starter edition boxed set into a single book. New illustrations. Does not include the 04-07 chargen expansion.

B04: Preferred, but only in combination with B05, 06, & 07. Together, they represent a chargen expansion for military personas.

B05: Part of the 04, 05, 06, 07 chargen expansion.

B06: Part of the 04, 05, 06, 07 chargen expansion.

B07: Part of the 04, 05, 06, 07 chargen expansion.

B08: A nice bonus, but totally unnecessary. Allows the creation of robotic personas, but is most useful in creating NPCs. Nice to play with, but totally an extra.

S01: DM utility. Heap of playable pregens.

S02: DM utility. Expansion to B03. Provides encounter charts.

S03: Spinward Marches campaign setting.

S04: Preferred. Chargen expansion for the other category. Should be used in tandem with the 04-07 chargen expansion.

S05: Crap. Its an expansion for a specific adventure that was published as a standalone supplement to try and encourage sales for that adventure.

S06: DM utility. Provides a heap of pregen questgivers.

S07: DM utility. Pregen starships.

S08: Campaign setting expansion for S03.

S09: DM utility. Pregen starships.

S10: Solomani Rim Campaign Setting.

S11: Campaign setting expansion for S03.

S12: Utility. Premade charsheets.

S13: DM utility. Pergen mercenary type characters.

Striker: Miniatures combat rules expansion.

Snapshot: Close quarters grid combat rules expansion.

Beltstrike Belter's Handbook: A rules expansion that came with the Beltstrike adventure module. It contains rule systems for mining in asteroid belts.

AM1-9: All chargen expansions applying alien races to the chargen system.

Book Groupings

B00-03: Corebook. Interchangeable with Starter Set and Traveller Book. Traveller Book is preferred.

Striker + Snapshot + Beltstrike: Rules expansion

B04-07 + S04: Career Path Expansion

B08 + AM01-09: Race Expansion

S01, S02, S06, S07, S09, S12, S13: DM Resources

S03, S08, S10, S11 + Spinward Marches Campaign + AM01-09: Campaign Setting and AP kit.