Pre-Draw Maps To Speed Up Gameplay

One thing I’ve done that really speeds up game play is pre-drawing the maps. I own several
battlemats, so I tried it using those, but sometimes marker lines left on for a long time are hard to get
off. So I started using Gaming Paper.

At $4 for a 12′ long roll I was able to pre-make all the anticipated maps, covering unexplored areas
with gaming books until that area is revealed.

This greatly speeds up play and ensures the battle map is correct. I’ve also experimented with cutting
out small sections of gaming paper to overlay on top of previous maps so I can re-use them for
different areas.

[Comment from Johnn: I purchased a box of Gaming Paper awhile ago and it’s great. You can cut the
paper with scissors easily, yet the paper is hard to tear. I especially enjoy using it for frequent
locations the PCs visit – we just grab the map we drew last time for the place.]

Mind Map Session Notes

From Dan

After having a lot of frustration with keeping track of lots of ideas and world details with various wiki
sites, and not losing the ideas by the time I opened the browser and logged in to whatever host, found
the page to edit, and then wait for the editing page to load… Finally, this summer, I found the trick:
mind map software.

With a mind map you can quickly add a thought and then add details and connect it with other
thoughts. Though many of these programs try to focus on fancy graphical connections and clouds,
there are some like FreeMind which are simple and clean, and free. The best mind map program I’ve
found, with a decent html export, is TheBrain, though they think they can charge an arm and a leg for
it by adding in corporate business templates, it’s worthy of $20, but not $220 they ask, unless you’re
rich.

But FreeMind is a great free organizing tool, though html export could be better. Which is where the
trial of TheBrain can be handy, once your topics are set and exported, you and any player can edit the
html pages for each thought. I quickly built over 10,000 pages of organization notes in a few days, and
using it for everything in my life now, not just gaming/writing but my photography and groceries lists
attached to recipes.

[Comment from Johnn: I have not tried session logging with mind map software before – I might give
that a try. I like iThoughts HD as my mind mapper of choice. Also, Google Drive has several free
graphic add-ons you can use for mind mapping.

• The Brain

• iThoughts HD (Mac/iOS only)

• Freemind (Tony and I built the Faster Combat GM course with this!)

Thanks for the tip Dan.]

Fun Dice Games In Sessions?

Chris Smith asks: “Does anyone have any pointers/examples/rules for simple dice games that can be
incorporated into a session?

Gabe Tanenhaus: Ship, Captain, Crew is one I’ve used with some success.

Andrew Murphy:

We used to play a simple dice game in our rpg game. You need:

• A pool of 6 sided dice

• A cup each

• Some gold (or silver if you’re slumming it)

Each player takes their cup and puts in 1-6 gold.

Then everyone reveals their coins, puts them in the middle, and takes a number of dice equal to their
gold coins contributed.

Then each player rolls all of their dice and places them together, keeping the rolled sides up.

Ideally you want no duplicates.

Then, one player rolls the decider die.

If the die matches no one’s number then it is rerolled.

If it matches the number of just one player, that player wins the pot.

If it matches the number of multiple players, the player with the least number of dice wins.

If there is draw after the above, the two players split the money as evenly as possible, and the
remainder stays in the pot for the next round (or tipped to local barkeep – by leaving on table) if it is
the last game.

Milton Murphy: How to Play Bar Dice Here’s a page with a couple of other simple dice games as well.

I’ve also played a variation on Tally Hold where the number of rolls are part of the process.

Everyone puts in a gp.

First person rolls 5 dice, attempting to assemble matching dice as high as possible. Max 3 rolls.

Next person attempts to beat them in the same number of rolls a the previous person.

So for example, I roll five dice and get two sixes. I can choose to stop and the next person has to get
three or more sixes to beat me in one roll. If I choose to roll again, and let’s say I do and I get another
six and stop there, then the next person has to get four or more sixes in two rolls. Whoever holds the
top spot when it goes all the way around the group gets the pot.

Beating the previous player is pretty straightforward. Two threes beats two twos, three fives beat two
fives, etc.
Andrew Y.: Shut the box is a great one.

Holger Müller: Pig Dice is a nice one.

Use The Uncanny Valley To Make Undead Scary

From Alexander T. Greene

I came in to this a bit late. People have already made their comments on encounters with undead.
None of them really touched on the main theme of being undead.

The undead are not walking slabs of mindless meat, a rich source of consequence-free XP. They are
dead people.

There is something called Uncanny Valley. Everybody gets that feeling. Something looks kind of
human, but they’re not quite right. A prosthetic hand, a glass eye, a CGI face. There’s a natural
revulsion from looking at something that is not human, but looks like it wants to be human.

635 Mori Uncanny Valley

Every undead characters encounter should be a person they once knew, heard of, even just met
briefly during some casual encounter somewhere. Play on the memories of the character interacting
with the person. Maybe get some names – Mandana the innkeeper’s comely daughter; Old Granny
Candlewax who used to make such lovely decorative candles for people’s houses come the Solstice;
maybe that rancid Stephos Mindin who used to make the character’s life a living hell back when they
were ten years old, and who grew up to be a bit of a loser.

Then bring them back as undead, and have the characters realise what they are looking at is lacking
something behind the eyes. Mandana’s idiot Joker grin is a stretched-out parody of the warm,
welcoming smile she always had for the character, and her rosy cheeks are pallid and bloodless.
Granny Candlewax now looks young and gorgeous, but her voice is hollow and she leaves no shadow
or footprints where she walks. Stephos is ragged and lop-sided, his neck canted at an odd angle from
the broken spine which had killed him, but the smell of his sickly cologne is fresh – and always will be.

Remember the scene in the Donald Sutherland movie Invasion of the Body Snatchers, when the aliens
hybridized the banjo player and his pug, and the pug came along with a human face, making random
banjo noises as it moved? The final scene, where Sutherland turned and squealed like that? Or every
scene in John Carpenter’s The Thing? That’s the feeling you should be reaching for as a DM.

When the characters first bump into undead, have them roll Int or Wis to realise what they are seeing.
And when they succeed, they suffer total shock and paralysis, the first time. If the character meets
undead on a recurring basis, the shock diminishes into a penalty on all combat actions. It is not total
paralysis from fear like the first time, but the deathly chill of dread in the soul never entirely goes
away.

And then tell them this is not some magical effect or “Aura of Dread” power. Dispel Magic and divine
spells to disperse sorcery won’t work, because there is no magical effect for them to work on. This is a
normal expression of fear, and it cuts through all of their magical shields and defences.
Then make the next undead they meet someone they knew closely and loved. A parent, sibling, lover,
old flame. Someone they only just said goodbye to half an hour before. Perhaps a former team
member. Even a former character the player once ran. People the players would never expect to see
turning up as undead.

Make it clear to the players these undead aren’t just some faceless, nameless hordes to grind for XP.
Make them horrifying and uncanny by emphasizing how they are former people. The world’s always
diminished by the loss of people one knows and loves. But undeath is a sick, dreadful perversion of
that, stabbing the characters with cruel mockery in the heart of their shock and unexpected grief.

However powerful they get, show them they should never get over their fear of undeath.

What Rule Sets

There are several rule sets, two or three of which are current.

Mongoose Traveller

• The most straightforward rules and closest to the original Traveller.

• Has a huge wealth of support material from Mongoose Publishing and a wide variety of third
parties.

• Is available in German, French and Spanish.

• For a beginner this is probably the best place to start.

Traveller5

• Pretty much brand new with only one or two items of support thus far.

• Has a doorstop sized core rulebook that brings together construction (and other) rules for just
about everything in one volume.
 • Introduces several concepts new to Traveller to widen its appeal and extend the science fiction
possibilities and variations.

• As yet, there are no setting details for what’s often called T5, although a couple of adventures
have been published.

GURPS Traveller

• Could be considered still current although there are no new books being published (The Journal
of the Travellers’ Aid Society continues, however, as a fortnightly online subscription magazine
edited by Loren Wiseman one of the original creators).

• Has high quality background books.

• A huge amount of compatible GURPS material can be used in conjunction with GURPS Traveller.

• The general rules (GURPS core rules – or GURPS Lite) are additionally required and are least like
classic Traveller.

• Some rules also struggle with the non-metric units usage.

It’s still possible to buy original Traveller material, often called Classic Traveller, as individual PDFs from
the likes of DriveThruRPG, or on CD-ROM collections from Far Future Enterprises, or on the second-hand
market.

Much of MegaTraveller, the second edition, can still be bought electronically. And all of Traveller: The
New Era which followed into a darker setting and Marc Miller’s Traveller (or T4) that returned to the
start of the Third Imperium can also still be purchased.

At The Table

Much of the advice for any role-playing games are applicable to Traveller – turn up on time, be
respectful of others around the table, don’t allow distractions to spoil the game, etc – but a few things
might help newbie Travellers.

If you run a gaming group, have players generate characters with you so you can help guide a workable
array of character types and builds that suit the campaign concept and adventures you have in mind.
And encourage players to form connections between their PCs each other.

At a convention you’ll want to use pre-gens suitable for the adventure. Point out to players the salient
features of who they’re playing: characteristics (UPP), skills, and equipment.

Encourage players to be open-minded about what gender, race or kind of character they’re given.

Let players swap PCs if they want to. And let them change minor details that don’t affect the adventure
of stats.

Design pre-gens appropriate to the adventure and ensure they’ll have opportunities to make their mark.

Write character names on name cards or badges, as Traveller names can be hard to get grips with on
occasion and it helps players stay in character. It’s not a bad idea to add player names as well to help
everyone get to know each other.
Find free cheat sheet online per the system you’re using and print them out for players to help you with
the rules. Or consider making your own to help learn the rules and remember them.

Keep obsession with exact rules to a minimum. Traveller is supposed to be fun, so have a relaxed
attitude to just how closely the rules are followed. Given there are so many rule sets with variations,
players with wide varieties of experience, different GM approaches, and various home grown rules,
there are many ideas of what constitutes Traveller. There are few situations where everything will be
exactly as your book says.

Ask players to pay attention to the set up of adventures. Let them know, as Traveller is science fiction
gaming, they can simply assume real world normality. And give hints about what’s coming and clearly
state what’s different in this game to either the real world or the standard setting. For example, perhaps
in your adventure Jump drive hasn’t been invented yet or perhaps psionics are widely accepted in the
Imperium.

Use handouts throughout the game. Traveller is known for lots of great possibilities to create real life
objects to help focus the attention. World maps, starship deckplans (or even models), Library Data
entries, mocked up photographs, perhaps even a ‘found’ diary or log entry. Add information,
atmosphere, and clues through the use of such game aids.

Be sensitive to the ‘edges’ of the universe. This is true for any role-playing game, but given the far-
reaching nature of Traveller, it’s particularly pertinent. You won’t have generated every possible
outcome of player actions beforehand, and can’t be expected to have an answer for everything that
might come up.

Try to ensure players get a fair share of your attention and their characters get a fair share of the action.
And don’t get so wrapped up in telling your story that you don’t give them breaks when required.

Be wary of introducing some new technology or feature of the universe as a way of saving players or
bringing the adventure to a climax. It’s a no-no in science fiction writing, and it’s equally poor form in a
Traveller adventure. If you are going to introduce something out of the ordinary, make sure the players
and their characters have the chance to know about it or experience it – perhaps in a lesser form –
earlier in the adventure.

At the end of the game, ask for feedback. Be prepared to receive honest but fair feedback, and don’t
take criticism aimed at you personally – player sometimes don’t know how to distinguish between the
game and the person when giving feedback.

Between Games

A lot of Traveller can be enjoyed as stand alone, solo gaming material. Whether it is creating a character,
designing a weapon or a starship, or handcrafting an entire planet with lovely crinkly coastal zones,
there’s much that can be enjoyed between gaming sessions.

There are even a few solo adventures or small sub-systems for adventuring or trading without a referee
to manage affairs. And there are a lot of online opportunities for discussions about Traveller, mailing
lists, play-by-email gaming, or games run via chat.
It’s a fair bet that if you’re interested in Traveller, you’re probably interested in science fiction. Between
fixes of actual gaming, reading SF can give you a greater appreciation of Traveller adventures and the SF
genre. Sub-genres and tropes crop up often, and the more you are familiar with them, the more
comfortable you’ll be in the fictional universe and the better your GMing of NPCs and situations.

Consider The Future

Isn’t Traveller already about the future? Yes, but what about real life? If you’ve enjoyed playing Traveller
– perhaps as a one off game – you may find you want to go further.

One way is considering writing something for publication. There are several outlets for doing so from
fanzines to the more formal publications; from those that pay for contributions to those where you’re
writing for the love of it. Freelance Traveller is always looking for submissions.

Another strength of Traveller is the shared universe anyone can contribute to. It’s easy to start small and
try writing up a character you think is interesting or an adventure seed of just a couple of paragraphs.
Combining several elements may allow you to write at more length. Or perhaps you have an artistic bent
and can draw futuristic scenes, map alien worlds, or model 3D starships. Editors are often crying out for
good quality material.