Hello out there!
I know it's a bit late but here are a few of things (a hundred lines)
I don't like about the TNE character generation and some of Traveller's
basic concepts.
1) I think that the idea of characters simply retiring or "leaving their
carreer" should be clarified/expanded. A great deal of things can make
you leave a career, for example shortage of work, being fired, work
accident... You can also take a leave from your career temporarily,
take sabbaticals, spend a couple of years raising your clones, etc. :)
I think that rules should be provided for these situations, for
example when the character doesn't manage to re-enlist, you roll on a
table with DMs to find out the reason for it. The "survival roll" would
automatically cause a work accident and grant some social security
payment. The nice thing about the "advanced character generation" rules
was that you got a detailed past history of your caracter's carreer...
Expanding the end-of-career rule would replace this in some way, or at
least provide a bit more character background.
2) "If the character meets these minimum requirements, enlistment is
automatic".
I don't like that. No one is guaranteed entry in any school whatsoever.
The chance that you can get into the Marines would (normally) depend on
the proximity of a Marine college, your aptitudes and the number of
other applicants. Thus I think that enlistment should never be
automatic.
The homeworld should do more than limit a character's career choices,
it should encourage some instead. For example, the presence of a
Navy,Scout base or a research station in the sector should give a DM to
enlistment in Navy, Scout or Scientist careers.
4) Anglic/Galanglic?
According to the "World Builder" book, Galanglic was devellopped by
the first space-bound Solomani and that it's composed mainly of
English because most "technicaly superior" countries were
English-speaking.
The Vilani learned Galanglic from the Solomani when the Solos conquered
them.
Come on, do you really think the Vilani would learn some form of
english? Even if the Solomani ruled over the empire for quite a long
time, there is a much higher probability that
1- Galanglic contains much more Vilani than Solomani words,
Vilani traditions being much harder to break than teaching a new
langage to a Solomani.
2- English wouldn't be the language spoken by most Solomani,
it would probably be a Bladerunnerish smattering of Mandarin,
Russian, French and English. NASA's technology is certainly not
very superior over ESA's, Russia's or most eastern countries.
So please review that definition of Anglic/Galanglic... Maybe it
would be called Anglic because of the way the letters are drawn?
(all in angles :) The Anglic problem is rather moot but it detracts
some credibility from the game.
5) Now, the big sucker: HEREDITARY TITLES.
Ack! <spit!>
Okay, here's the problem. The Third Imperium has crumbled just a little
while ago (relatively) because of a problem of title heredity.
Do you really think the billions of huddled masses would go for
hereditary grants of nobility again?
The citizen of the Imperiums aren't ignorant and they don't believe
in the divinity of their leaders anymore...
Would they let themselves be run by nobles or their children?
Smuggling weapons to most planet is so easy, don't you think that
spontaneous revolutions would happen just about everywhere?
Okay, so I suppose that the Vilani would go back to the 'good ole ways',
but not most of the other sentient races of the Imperium.
From another point of view, Nobles are an interesting part of the
game... So we shouldn't remove them entirely.
So let's have Noble character generation with Land Grants or
Governing Power (i.e. can request taxes or slaves or somesuch :)
as mustering-out benefits but Nobles can only come from homeworlds
with Feudal or Autocratic government. How does that sound to you all?
6) Aging Crisis and Initiative:
The new initiative rule doesn't take into account the reflexes of
old and decrepit military men, just their amount of experience...
I think that the Aging rules should be applied to Initiative too.
7) My biologist friends tells me that Strenght (muscle mass) will influence
body weight for 20% AT MOST. The TNE weight rules make that influence
about 50%. (But there's no reason to complicate a rule of such
secondary effects)
8) There are a couple of interesting careers missing, like Entertainer
(a form of Artisan), Spy, and Theocrat, careers that, after all,
make you travel a lot.
9) "Stone" Mason? I suppose one would be a mason of whatever matter
buildings are made of at his/her tech level.
Anyways. I think that's enough ramblings for now. :)
Feel free to agree/disagree with all or parts of the above. :)
Pierre-Louis Constantin, [email removed] //
"Hardware: The part of a computer that can be kicked." \X/