Traveller: Creating the Badlands

When I created Hunter for Traveller last week, using the 1977 edition of the game, his background notes mentioned something called the “Badlands”. This week I’ve spent some time working up what that region of space contains.

This post is about the outcomes I’ve achieved (so far) using the rules for “star mapping” and “world creation” found in the 1977 edition Traveller Book 3 (yes, that’s my copy in the photo on the right).

It’s a work in progress but it does seem an opportune moment to share the journey so far. In short, I’ve discovered a subsector of space and uncovered some more about where Hunter originates from. I’ve also remembered why I loved this system so much back in the early 1980s.

Star-Mapping

The first process in generating some space in which to play Traveller involves following a simple die-rolling exercise:

“Systematically check each hex, throwing one die and marking the hex with a circle if the result is a 4, 5, or 6. This indicates that a world is present; otherwise, leave the hex blank.” – Traveller Book 3, page 1 (1977)

The first map I produced using this was a little too busy for my tastes, so I applied some modifiers to the rules-as-written… which is ok because the rules themselves tell you it’s ok:

“The referee may elect to alter the normal chances of worlds, making them more frequent or less frequent to correspond to specific regions of the galaxy. This is easily accomplished by imposing a DM of +1 or –1 on the whole subsector, or on broad areas within a subsector.” – Traveller Book 3, page 1 (1977)

The Badlands sub-sector, then, was born from applying a -1 DM (die modifier) to all the rolls. The product was mapped out onto a subsector record sheet found in the later Supplement 12: Forms & Charts.

From there, I was able to work through the second process:

“Each world must be checked for its starport type; throw two dice for each world in the subsector, and mark the world with the letter indicated on the starports table…” – Traveller Book 3, page 1 (1977)

I decided to apply a simple +1 DM to the rolls, counting 12+ as a 12. This would mean fewer Type-A starports and more chance of a Type-X. Taken together, the modifiers I applied were intended to create a random subsector geared to a more frontier feeling.

Just so I didn’t forget, I chose to roll all the Type-A through to Type-D starports to check for Naval and Scout Bases (as per page 5).

At the end of the process, things looked like this:

Trade Routes

Trade Routes were something that didn’t survive past the 1977 edition of Traveller. As the setting of the Third Imperium overtook the open-setting approach of these original rules, this was an element that got replaced in the 1981 edition. That said, it’s an awesome element that really helped me to get some idea on how to structure the setting under construction. See if you can see what I mean…

The process is quite simple:

“For each world, note the starport type for it and for its neighbors. Consult the jump routes table, throwing one die… At the intersection of the distance column and the world pair row, a number is stated. If the one die throw is equal to, or greater than the number, a space lane exists. Draw a line connecting the two worlds on the map.” – Traveller Book 3, page 2 (1977)

It took a while but nowhere near as long as I feared. At the end of the process, the map looked like this:

I loved this process because, at the end, I had laid out before me some relationships between worlds. All I needed to know now was something about the nature of those worlds.

World Creation

For each world on the map, the Traveller system provides a process to detail the nature of that world:

“The seven basic planetary characteristics are generated using two dice throws, with DMs applied based on other characteristics. After these seven are established, a technological index is created from the information they contain. In addition to these eight characteristics, any number of other descriptive characteristics are possible, and should be generated to more fully describe the specific world.” – Traveller Book 3, page 2 (1977)

That kicked up a whole load of world data which, once collated on the form from Supplement 12, gave a long list from which to add those “descriptive” elements.

For example, the first world I detailed was generated thus:

0308       A4453359             Navy      Scouts

The first number is the hex reference on the map, the string of hexadecimal data is the world “UPP” data, and the rest are notes. With some thought, I turned this into some more detailed (but still lightly-sketched) Referee notes:

BASTION     0308       A4453359             Navy      Scouts

Starport:             Class A

Diameter:           4522 miles

Atmosphere:     Thin, tainted (pollutants)

Hydrographics: 50% water

Population:        8000

Technology:       Level 9

Bastion is the strategic military hub for the Hegemony at the edge of the Badlands. A council of military advisors offers support to an appointed President who holds absolute power on behalf of the Hegemony. Most of the population work at either of the Hegemony naval or scout bases. Moderate restrictions are placed on weaponry and personal concealable firearms are prohibited, as are light assault weapons and heavier. The shipyard present primarily services Hegemony military traffic, although the President does subsidise merchant vessels serving local worlds.

Understand that these notes were written for me as the Referee, not as “Library Data” for player consumption. I tend to think that making the “game data” the same as the “setting information” was one of the larger mistakes made as Traveller became tied to the Third Imperium setting. Thus, while I’ve referenced the “UPP data” in my notes, I’d never give that raw game data to the players.

Working Up A Referee’s Map

I’ve spent several days on-and-off working my way through the data and turning it into useful Referee notes. Along the way, I’ve created a Referee’s Map of the subsector. It’s a work-in-progress that looks like this:

I’ve discovered that the Hegemony dominates that lower left-hand chunk of the subsector. That’s where new characters will start, most likely mustering out of the Services onto Bastion.

There is a determined antagonist to Hegemony expansion in the subsector based around the Nashira and Nushaba worlds. This is known locally as the Nusukan (“The Two Arrays”) Alliance. They even have their own starship navy and have at least one pretty high-tech world.

There are several worlds which have interesting elements and/or generated some intriguing ideas. Those ideas are going into the one thing I’m definitely porting over from the later Traveller game – the Rumour Table. But more on that another time.

For now, it’s time to finish working through the world data and seeing what the final Referee Map ends up looking like.

Game on!