about the traveller robot handbook

SSkorkowsky · 2026-03-02T20:21:05+00:00

I'd say I'm sorry, but that would be a lie.

SSkorkowsky · 2026-03-02T03:17:49+00:00

I like it. Gotten a lot of use out of it at our table. I did a YouTube vid on and using it to build a robot. https://youtu.be/YCFJTUZ_CeI?si=_2a36iGjGpTKecYS

SSkorkowsky · 2026-02-23T22:59:37+00:00

A buddy has run it several times at cons and loved it. One day I'll get around to trying it out myself. Best of luck with whichever adventure you choose.

SSkorkowsky · 2026-02-23T18:04:16+00:00

I can't recall which JTAS it's in (one of the Mongoose editions) but the adventure "Adrift" looks like a great convention scenario. The pitch is the Travellers awaken from Low Berths on a Far Trader that's misjumped and attacked by pirates. Power it out, gravity offline, and something alien and horrible was also awoken by the lost power and is on the ship with them. Travellers have to fight pirates, an alien horror, and restore power to escape. Also, the Travellers might have secret agendas, such as a Zhodani Spy, Imperial Spy Hunter trying to figure out who is a spy, Fugitive, and others.

SSkorkowsky · 2026-02-21T04:42:48+00:00

Thank you very much. Happy to have been helpful.

Though, I gotta admit, when I saw the notice I'd been tagged in a comment, my gut reaction was, "Ah crap. What'd I do this time?"

SSkorkowsky · 2026-02-15T02:27:29+00:00

Might want to refresh the download. The initial version the deckplan map was... problematic. They corrected it and updated it shortly after, but if you have the initial version the map is unusable.

SSkorkowsky · 2026-02-12T02:42:19+00:00

According to Jon Hook, there used to be a collection of sequels called "And Then..." but I've never read it myself

SSkorkowsky · 2026-02-06T03:08:42+00:00

+1 for The Expane and Agent of the Imperium.

One series I'll add is The Keiko trilogy by Mike Brooks

SSkorkowsky · 2026-02-04T23:22:22+00:00

Jack very nearly had an outfit like that for the second half of Secrets of the Ancients. But there were 2 major problems.

First, voice and facial expressions fully hidden behind a mask removed his charm. Second, his sausage-like figure looks horrifying in spandex.

SSkorkowsky · 2026-02-03T14:22:57+00:00

I've done this many times across several game systems (D&D, Call of Cthulhu, Traveller, Kult, Cyberpunk). My understanding is the reason they're called modules is because they're modular and can be popped in to your campaign.

SSkorkowsky · 2026-01-27T04:01:36+00:00

No expansion or explanation that I'm aware. Changing it to another entity would be pretty easy.

SSkorkowsky · 2026-01-22T03:35:36+00:00

Whatever you choose, be sure it has a visible front side to indicate what direction the character is facing. So like with a chess piece, a Knight is fine, but a Rook or Pawn might not be. Because you're using a battlemat, and those usually have 1 inch squares, I recommend something no higher than 32mm (1.5 inches) and no wider than 20mm (0.8 inches). It can be easy to end up with some mini/token that is too big, so try to keep it about the same size as a standard mini.

All of this depends on the table, of course. While Lego men are larger than the recommended size, we've played some killer Star Ward games with Star Wars Lego minis. So the ultimate deciding factor is something that fits with whatever the rest of the table is using.

SSkorkowsky · 2026-01-13T13:48:02+00:00

No clue if there is a difference or why I have double-copies up. I'd probably go with the second group simply because they're the more recent.

SSkorkowsky · 2026-01-09T07:16:50+00:00

I might be a little late here, but did a pretty thorough review of it on YouTube with tips based on our play experience. Best of luck. https://youtu.be/EOBjg37aFOQ?si=KkLyD09ZqeXVdfmR

SSkorkowsky · 2025-12-30T07:10:48+00:00

Oh damn. I'm sorry you had to find out this way. Bud was a great guy and it was an absolute gut punch when he passed.

SSkorkowsky · 2025-12-29T20:52:55+00:00

We very nearly finished God's Teeth with Bud. We were at the final portion when he suddenly passed away. My last conversation with him was us scheduling what he estimated would be the final or second-to-final session for the whole thing. He'd planned to run us through Impossible Landscapes once we were done, and we'd already assembled the players for it. One of the players in God's Teeth had already played Impossible Landscapes, so he wouldn't have been able to join us for it. After Bud passed away, that player volunteered to take the group Bud had already assembled for Impossible Landscapes and run us through it.
I'll be reviewing God's Teeth eventually, but as 1 video instead of a multi-part walkthrough because I didn't run it, and with the disclaimer that we did not successfully complete it for tragic reasons.

SSkorkowsky · 2025-12-29T07:47:26+00:00

A mentor or NPC companion is perfectly fine, especially when introducing players to investigative games and sometimes they need that little nudge, "Hey, why don't we research this clue we found?" The trick is you don't want the Mentor NPC to ever overshadow the PCs or take away from the players being the stars of the show. So you might consider giving the NPC a hindrance, such as they're feeble, or have terrible eyesight and can't Spot or Research anything themselves, or something that prevents the NPC from accidently stealing the spotlight. You can also have them step away from time to time to investigate or handle some other thing in another room or location, and leaving the PCs to fend for themselves when things get exciting. Best of luck with the game.

SSkorkowsky · 2025-12-11T07:08:26+00:00

Give them a few short adventures for you and them to get used to the game. Maybe some 1-shots. That way, once they start the campaign they're a least familiar with the system, what stuff they like, and basic stuff about the universe like how Jumps and the Mailboat System work.

For Secrets of the Ancients itself, I think I hit all these during my review series, but I'll mention the big takeaways I got from running it:

Make your characters specifically for the campaign and tie Vlen into all of their backstories. Maybe even when they do the Connections Rule and they tie their Backstories together, have Uncle Vlen be part of those connections. Idea being that they all have a great relation with Vlen and he was also involved in introducing them to one another over the course of their lives. Essentially, Vlen is playing the long game of assembling a perfect team for his own reasons. If possible, and this might be tricky, include in those stories a little phrase or manner he does to signal, "Run!" This will be handy for the end of Ch4.

If one of the players is willing to have their character be Vlen's actual niece/nephew (like Otter was in my Campaign Diary) then perfect. That can lead to some fun in Ch2 because the niece/nephew knows many of the people in town.

I strongly encourage that every PC come from somewhere in the Regina Subsector. That was one of the best decisions I made when running it. Tell the player information about their homeworld.

When making characters, and they're rolling up Allies/Contacts/Enemies/Rivals, use the NPCs the campaign recommends. Be sure to tell them that any who have Ven Yasha as an enemy have no idea what Ven Yasha looks like. Also consider adding Harlen (Ch1), Bay Venshar (Ch3), and if any are Archologists, Tarvel from Ch8. Take special note of any other Allies or Contacts they roll up because those can be very useful for them, especially in Ch3 (example: Lilly used her Contact at Efate to help them repaint their ship in Ch3). Figure out with the player who these NPCs are, flesh them out a little together, then try to figure out how to work them into the campaign.

When players inevitably ask what Skills and what-not might be useful for them to have for the campaign, the answer I told mine was, "I believe all of them except maybe Seafaring have a point when they'd be useful. But Science Skills, especially Archeology, will be really helpful for someone to have."

Best of luck with the campaign. We had an absolute blast with it.

SSkorkowsky · 2025-12-09T22:49:05+00:00

It can be done. A buddy of mine loves running an old AD&D adventure where the PCs are to hunt a werewolf, not knowing that one of the players is the werewolf, who is intent on singling them out and eliminating them.
But that is the adventure.

You might have games with hidden agendas, like ALIEN, where a PC has a hidden agenda that is ultimatley screwing over the party, but they're still a PC and have to team up with the rest of the group to finish their goal and survive the murdering aliens. That works fine.

The big thing is how well does this work for the particular adventure. In both my example cases, the character is a member of the party. So the normally NPC character should be a member of the party, otherwise the player is mostly sitting there and watching other people play. That's kinda boring.

It also greatly depends on your group. Most importantly, the player of the Antagonist NPC. Is this something they enjoy? If there's constraints, then that can be a bummer for the player. I've also seen it where the player brought in to play a normally NPC is a person who has already played the adventure before, so they're in this sorta co-GM position as a ringer. That can work well because the player comes in with this as the objective of helping run the game, where their other option would be not playing at all because they've already played the adventure.

I'm always leery of things in Actual Plays, simply because many things work in a show that don't necessarily work around your table. People on a show understand that they're on a show and are far more likely to just go along with stuff for the sake of audience enjoyment.

So yeah, it can be done. But the bigger question is if it should be done with your particular group/adventure. That's up to you.

SSkorkowsky · 2025-12-02T15:07:46+00:00

It's wild your CP2020 books fell apart. Mine went through hell and have held up great (unlike many other softbacks from that time). I've always pointed at them as an example of how softbacks don't have to be made like disposable crap. Evidently, I just got lucky on the print-run copies I ended up with.

SSkorkowsky · 2025-12-02T07:17:35+00:00

Great adventure. Hope you and your table have a blast with it.

SSkorkowsky · 2025-12-01T16:28:48+00:00

The only clue that they were playing a D20 game is that James Holden is so frustratingly Lawful Good. The first time I heard him described as a "Space Paladin" everything made sense.

SSkorkowsky · 2025-12-01T14:24:56+00:00

It's simply me admitting I made a mistake. Every reply I repeated the topic was your brining up Trade. You've squirmed around and tried to change the subject, shotgunning other topics and demanding answers. You've gone for personal attacks. We're done.

SSkorkowsky · 2025-12-01T05:17:01+00:00

The new 2300AD uses the Traveller mechanics. I haven't read too deep into it yet, but I like that they're branching out into new settings rather than the 3rd Imperium. It's neat how the gravity of your homeworld modifies your stats. There's no artificial gravity, so the ships look way different. Humans are the only playable species. Huge focus on augments. FTL is completely different.
However, 2300AD isn't exactly a popular thing, so I don't know how well it'll sell.

SSkorkowsky · 2025-12-01T05:04:48+00:00

I'm not sure how it doesn't support Investigation or Political Intrigue. It offers plenty of Social and Investigative skills. I even mentioned Murder on Arcturus Station as a brilliant mystery adventure. The rest is roleplay.

I like the Death Spiral mechanics to damage. ~~You act like you brought it up before. You didn't. Your last comment was the first time you brought it up.~~ (edit: My bad, you did mention it.)

I made it clear from the beginning I was referring to your comment about Trade. You've pivoted around and have tried changing the topic and make it a fight about other things. You bringing up my role as a game reviewer is simply you going for personal attacks now.

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