Quote from: beeber;824638DGP's megatraveller stuff was far less errata-ridden than GDW's as far as i remember.

That'll be down to the computer incompatibility which meant GDW had to retranscribe all of DGP's stuff - both the GDW and DGP MegaTraveller material was largely written by DGP, except for the overarching setting stuff.

Quote from: Momotaro;824647For what was a second-edition ruleset after Twilight 2000, the game was another one with multi-hundred page errata.
The actual background was pretty cool - the PCs are rats in the walls of a collapsed high-tech civilisation, and the malevolent entities that caused the crash are still out there.  It almost certainly wasn't worth demolishing the Third Imperium universe though.  Maybe as a single collapsed sector or separate universe entirely?

I think a similar setting without the Traveller / 3rd Imperium features would have worked very well.  Perhaps even a setting where it might be the Third Imperium or it might not.  Which isn't to say Survival Margin and Arrival Vengeance aren't the greatest things ever because they are.

But I think the ideas of TNE had promise, it just needed more work, a cleaned up revision would have been nice.  I think it wound up being rushed out when the Dangerous Journeys legal action sucked all the money out of the company.  The game was borked to be sure but conceptually it was okay.  It was also clearly stated in the rules that PCs were intentionally super durable.  Because they are the main characters, and for no better reason than that.  I think it was forward looking, though I've always hated the initiative rule.

Quote from: David Johansen;824787Which isn't to say Survival Margin and Arrival Vengeance aren't the greatest things ever because they are.

Oh yeah... Path of Tears and World-Tamer's Handbook are also pretty damn great.

All traveller games are a waste of time IMO any more, just go with SWN or another favorite of mine Thousand Suns instead.

I ran a couple MT campaigns back in the late 80's early 90's. My memories were as follows, roughly:

1. It was a hard sell to get players into but once we were playing it they were hooked for a whole campaign (which back then was 1 campaign was timed to last 1 semester, usually 20ish sessions)

2. It felt signficantly more complex than CT. However, I did pick up that Bundle of Holding and was shocked to see that the game still looks more complex than current iterations (MGT and even T4).

3. It had some of the best sourcebooks of all Traveller editions, although iirc it was the first edition with a Fire, Fusion & Steel* sourcebook that was screwed over from severe errata and math errors, a tradition that continued right through T4 and (if some reviews are to be believed) T5, although Mongoose's Traveller sidestepped the entire issue in favor of ease of access.

Anyway, these days its pretty much Mongoose's Traveller for me all the way, although I'd be happy to poach some setting and scenario content from old MT. The core mechanics remain identical as identifiers go, something Traveller is great about in all editions except the Hero and GURPS adaptations, which means using that material with MGT is easy enough.




*That may have been for Traveller: The New Era though now that I think about it.

I always loved the premise of Megatraveller - Empires at war and all that but was never able to get the books. I ended up with TNE instead which had its flaws but some of my best GM memories come from running it. Back then rules were not so important. Not to my group anyway.

Quote from: nitril;824914I always loved the premise of Megatraveller - Empires at war and all that but was never able to get the books. I ended up with TNE instead which had its flaws but some of my best GM memories come from running it. Back then rules were not so important. Not to my group anyway.

Never apologise for having fun

Except maybe stuff with knives...

Quote from: flyingcircus;824899All traveller games are a waste of time IMO any more, just go with SWN or another favorite of mine Thousand Suns instead.

Take that, threadcrapper!

There is an alternate take on the metaplot events that happened in Megatraveller and Traveller:TNE called The Wounded Colossus by Bill Cameron. In it, the Third Imperium is badly hurt by Civil War, but remains an intact political entity.

The blather about the errata is rather overblown.

The two pieces of errata that matter:
1) The cost table for mercenary weapons is missing.
2) There are some glitches in the design sequence tables.

And #2 only matters if you do design sequences. I imagine that's more of a niche hobby these days, and those who are into that can spot some of the obvious inconsistencies.

I really liked the Unified Task Profile and the cinematic nugget method for building adventures.

I do think Mongoose's character generation sequence is better, though. Megatraveller character generation sequence had lots of detail, but was very uneven and inconsistent. Mongoose's chargen is probably the best of any traveller iteration for my money.

Sadly, I think Mongoose Traveller High Guard is decidedly worse, as it didn't "collapse down" weapons batteries on large starships, really making them unplayable.

Honestly, I love Traveller but I'm getting very tired of waiting.  I don't think they'll ever get there.

Quote from: jeff37923;824959There is an alternate take on the metaplot events that happened in Megatraveller and Traveller:TNE called The Wounded Colossus by Bill Cameron. In it, the Third Imperium is badly hurt by Civil War, but remains an intact political entity.

Awesome thanks for the link!

Quote from: Caesar Slaad;824998The blather about the errata is rather overblown.

The two pieces of errata that matter:
1) The cost table for mercenary weapons is missing.
2) There are some glitches in the design sequence tables.

And #2 only matters if you do design sequences. I imagine that's more of a niche hobby these days, and those who are into that can spot some of the obvious inconsistencies.

Unfortunately, you just about had to use them if you wanted any original ship designs. GDW's attempt to fill that void was a supplement called "Fighting Ships of the Shattered Imperium." It was basically an entire book of spacecraft built using the design sequences without the errata, so they were all uselessly broken. GDW couldn't even use their own design sequences properly.