Real-Time Traveller

No game player with commitments to school or work ever has enough gaming opportunities. Large blocks of free time are rare. Congenial opponents with matching schedules are even rarer, especially for campaigns, which require several players to show up regularly. Too many games end before they are properly resolved.

The boardless nature of Traveller, however, permits greater flexibility. With some small adjustments, a satisfying solitaire Traveller campaign can be conducted on the basis of a few minutes each day, by playing the game in "real-time" terms. Make one day in your life match one day in the game. After breaking down Traveller events into daily steps, most actions (a patron search, selling cargo) can be handled in the few minutes it takes to throw dice, consult a table, and note the result in a continuing log.

Such a procedure can do more than just add flavor to your coffee-break, however. Both referees and players can gain empathy with their characters by experiencing their lives in real-time terms; long days in hyperspace, the excitement of planetfall, anticipation of that next encounter with the unknown.

The real-time player soon learns that time hangs heavy while in vacuum. Maritime sailors took up scrimshaw and the hornpipe for good reason; space travellers will do the same. Some obvious shipboard pastimes include music, crafts, the martial arts, gambling, and language study (an as-yet untapped feature of the Traveller universe). Some of these mesh easily with existing skills (gambling, brawling), others imply new ones, perhaps minstrelsy as a career, or as a source of casual work. Something like twenty in-flight weeks of successful practice seems reasonable per level of expertise, success achieved by a die-roll measured against the UPP (throw dexterity or less for musical skill, for example, intelligence for languages, and so on). One might similarly generate existing skills on mustering out, one throw per service term.

Days spent planetside will be just as long, especially for the action-oriented ersonalities assumed in Traveller. In addition to self-improvement, characters without patrons will soon turn to gambling, money-making schemes and even crime to pass the time. One could even assume that a character without work will ship out after two to three weeks in a prospectless backwater; the real-time player will certainly be ready to leave. Obviously, the points made have implications for regular Traveller as well.

Real-time play also offers the opportunity for as much attention as the player wishes. There is ample time to generate planetary descriptions and maps of upcoming ports. Incorporate necessary bookkeeping into the game by drawing up landing papers, bills of lading, registration forms, and so on. These can lend flavor as well as provide clear records as playing aids. One can also fully develop non-player characters met as encounters, passengers, or crew.

Some attention to detail becomes necessary in real-time play, in particular the day-to-day sequence of starship operations and commerce. The following chart covers the typical two-week travel cycle, broken down into daily actions, and suggests activities for both passengers and crew:

Day 1: Pre-launch actions. Passenger boarding. Lift-off and begin flight to jump-point (this may take several days depending upon the system's geometry). Check for possible hi-jacking attempts.

Day 2-5: Jump to hyperspace (whatever day it occurs). Work out crew and passenger UPPs as needed, resolve any possible encounters and misjumps.

Day 6: Throw for self improvement.

Day 7: Seek possible patron among crew or passengers.

Day 8: Leave hyperspace. Resolve any ship encounters, hi-jack attempts, and so on.

Day 9: Flight to port (may take several days). Prepare landing papers.

Day 10-12: Land, debark, pay crew, maintenance work, and other costs. Sell cargo, deliver any messages. Ship's masters assess cargo awaiting shipment, contract as carriers and accept fees. Crew to starport bars, hotels, etc. Resolve possible encounters.

Day 13: Ship's masters seek passengers to next port of call. Load cargo. Pick up possible messages for delivery.

Day 14: Buy or generate navigation tapes. Buy and load fuel. Buy cargo for speculation, if any space left. Last visit to bars for possible encounters.

Day 1: Cycle repeats.

Real-time adaptation of Traveller works best where the player most carefully controls his own actions; a foot-loose wanderer, or the operator of a starship. It is less suitable for static situations, or those in which a character is merely a subordinate, for example, in a mercenary campaign played at an abstract level. Of course, such situations could also be broken down into daily events, if desired.

Sometime in the third week or so, the new real-time player may experience an overwhelming urge to accelerate the pace, perhaps to skip over five days in flight to reach the next port. Resist this temptation. You began this whole thing with the idea of experiencing real-time play, stick it out.

Real-time play may not be suitable for all Traveller players, but for the solitaire player, or the player with no time to engage in a regular campaign, it can provide an insight and appreciation of the size and complexity of the universe that few games can.

- Steven Sowards Journal of the Traveller Aid Society #13