What's Next for 4e GT?

[Mgellis]

In case people are interested (i.e., wish to offer comments, suggestions, requests, threats, etc.), this is what I'm working on for 4e GT (i.e., JTAS articles)...

(Mind you, I know what I'm doing is not "canon," but right now no one else is writing very much for 4e GT. When an official e-book comes out, I'm sure a lot of what I come up with will be replaced, and then I'll happily use that as the basis for whatever articles I write thereafter, but until then, as long as Loren will buy them, I'll keep writing my articles.)

* A more complete article on ranks and salaries, providing a revised table for the Navy (correcting a few errors I made...ouch!), a more complete table for Merchants (up to CEOs), and Army, Scout, Marine, and Government ranks. For the Army and Marines, I'm relying on GT: Ground Forces, for the Scouts, I'm relying on GT:First In. For the Merchants and for Government ranks, I'm drawing on various sources, including GT:IW and GT: Far Trader and GT: Starports, but these don't agree entirely so I'm trying to create a hybrid that draws the best from all of these sources.

* Scout Ships. If I'd known how many ships were in GT: First In that deserve to be updated to 4e GT rules, I would have downloaded it sooner. Now, of course, it will pay for itself. :)

* Small Boats. Cutters. Pinnaces. Etc.

* Medium-sized merchants. Liners. Frontier freighters. Most of these will be original designs, as there are only a few ships over 1,000 dtons in Far Trader to update.

* Cruisers and Carriers. Updating several vessels from Fighting Ships of the Third Imperium for 4e GT.

* Capital Ships. Ditto. The big guns. Tigress. Plankwell. Cleon. Etc.

* Light Warships. Smaller fleet escorts like the Fer-de-lance and the T-type Patrol Cruiser.

* Troop Ships. Updating designs from GT: Ground Forces. Keith-class transport. Caen-class dropship. Etc.

* Yachts. Private craft of the rich and shameless. This may include updates to a couple of designs from GT: Nobles.

* Vargr and Aslan Raiders. This may include updates to designs from GT:AR1 and GT:AR2.

* Various articles featuring designs for ships from TL 9 and TL 10 planetary navies.

* Zhodani ships

* Solomani ships

Suffice that my goal is to leave the GURPS Traveller community with enough 4e ships that they can download my articles, print up the designs, and run anything from a free trader campaign to the Sixth Frontier War.

Mark

[thrash]

Originally Posted by Mgellis

Medium-sized merchants. Liners. Frontier freighters. Most of these will be original designs, as there are only a few ships over 1,000 dtons in Far Trader to update.

I did a couple of the classic designs (Type R and Type M) already. Many of the designs in Far Trader are based on originals from The Traveller Adventure; you may want to go back to the source instead.

Cruisers and Carriers. Updating several vessels from Fighting Ships of the Third Imperium for 4e GT.

Capital Ships. Ditto. The big guns. Tigress. Plankwell. Cleon. Etc.

Do you mean CT's Supplement 9: Fighting Ships, or Fighting Ships of the Shattered Imperium for MT? If it's the latter, be aware that several (many?) of the designs are famously broken. There's probably a list floating around the 'Net somewhere.

Light Warships. Smaller fleet escorts like the Fer-de-lance and the T-type Patrol Cruiser.

Gashidda (ISW, p. 211) was supposed to be a Type T replacement.

[Mgellis]

Originally Posted by thrash

I did a couple of the classic designs (Type R and Type M) already. Many of the designs in Far Trader are based on originals from The Traveller Adventure; you may want to go back to the source instead.

Do you mean CT's Supplement 9: Fighting Ships, or Fighting Ships of the Shattered Imperium for MT? If it's the latter, be aware that several (many?) of the designs are famously broken. There's probably a list floating around the 'Net somewhere.

Gashidda (ISW, p. 211) was supposed to be a Type T replacement.

I knew about the R-type and the M-type. I did a "fat trader," too, but I based it more on the version in the GURPS Traveller book.

I didn't know about the MT ships book having problems. Thanks. Actually, I'm relying heavily on the CT book because it includes class names and other tidbits that give a sense of what the ship is known for, etc. With all of these updates, as I'm sure you know, the two systems (CT/MT and GT) are so different in some ways that often what you're going for is "the spirit of the thing." :) That's especially true with some of the bigger warships.

The Gashidda is interesting. I like it as a ship design, but it also puzzles me. I'm sure there are some perfectly good reasons in the Traveller universe's version of physics why it makes sense to build a ship that looks like a fat, squat turning fork and then fly it with the two big stubby ends up front. (It look likes a giant lobster and a legless mecha had a love child or something.) Or was this just one of those situations where the writer and the artist didn't talk to each other until it was too late? :)

Anyway, thanks for the information.

Mark

[rasimus]

Originally Posted by Mgellis

(It look likes a giant lobster and a legless mecha had a love child or something.)

*blink.blink* Okay, thank you. :-( Now I'm gonna have Traveller/Lexx crossovers in my head for weeks. I wonder where I can get wholesale quantities of brain bleach.

[walkir]

Thanks for linking to this tread, I hadn't considered it for my wishes of planetbounf vehicles, because it's all spaceships and related stuff.

But to repeat my wish from the other tread: I could use some updated civilian vehicles, from a grav bike to a grav caravan, as one of my char has some K$ for free usage and I'm running out of stuff to buy except for a boring "put it into the spaceship". ;)

[hcobb]

Originally Posted by Mgellis

The Gashidda is interesting. I like it as a ship design, but it also puzzles me. I'm sure there are some perfectly good reasons in the Traveller universe's version of physics why it makes sense to build a ship that looks like a fat, squat turning fork and then fly it with the two big stubby ends up front. (It look likes a giant lobster and a legless mecha had a love child or something.) Or was this just one of those situations where the writer and the artist didn't talk to each other until it was too late? :)

Anybody else think that 12 - Common area ought to be renamed "Ten Forward"?