Moonstein VI: Why Classic Traveller Demands the Braunstein Treatment

Introduction 

I am not an expert on Classic Traveller. But it seems to me that playing it with conventional approaches to TTRPGs would fail miserably. 

Even if you were to run a BROSR style "open table" campaign with "two to four complete parties, each with their own starship", as Jeffro outlines on his "Running Classic Traveller in the Braunstein Style" blog; you're still ending up with "Wagon Train to the Stars" (as OG "Star Trek" was called). Slightly younger crowds could instead imagine this sort of Traveller campaign as episodes of "Firefly".

"Sounds great!" the millennials proclaim. But then they expect their poor bedraggled Referee to write them Whedon style plotlines where they get to be the special snowflake with the spotlight on them.  

Additionally, millennials and Gen X will expect their character to be written like a Whedon "Firefly" or MCU character wherein "sure my character has this crippling social problem but I'm the BEST character on screen at Guns [or Diplomacy with NPCs, or Thievery, or Hacking, etc etc]". Was Appendix N written this way? Was the Dumarest series written this way? Vancian scifi? I think not. It's unclear if Zoomers have this same demand for Whedon style PCs in their TTRPGs. Perhaps the sad state of economy, the Church, and the West as a whole has disabused them of some myth that each person is a secret savant at something or other. 

The Referee is then forced to look at each session as a scriptwriter for a normie tv show writing an A storyline for characters 1, 2, and 3 and a B storyline for characters 4 and 5 each session. This can lead to some good moments (most people of a certain age remember the "Friends" B storyline of Ross moving his couch and forgot what the A storyline was that week) but is this actually a game? Is it actually fun?

No.

At least not in the long term.

Meanwhile the Braunstein form is always fun. It's automatically fun even when it's simply thrown together. I threw "Moonstein Re-Stilled" together with no ideas or plans whatsoever. I just had Jeffro's old setting of  the planet of Moonshine which I added to as I went.

And guess what? I have SO much to work with just 2 turns into this thing that I didn't even know if I'd have time to write this blog. I'm having so much FUN with my halfbaked understanding of Classic Traveller that writing this blog for 120 people to read is chore. Not quite as much of a chore as playing conventional approaches to TTRPGs but enough that I put it off for days and days.

I'm giving you some information about below about what happened on turn 6 of the Moonstein ("A Classic Traveller Braunstein"tm) but I'm already getting in orders for Turn 8. I'm behind! There's simply too much game here! Since hardly anyone even played Classic Traveller since the BROSR came around, my guess is that can't be said about conventional approaches to playing it. That "Wagon Train to the Stars" broke an axel decades ago. 

Moonstein Turn VI

I requested at the beginning of that event that players email me their orders and include their Universal Personality Profile (UPP), current equipment, and link to their chargen blog in the body of the email. I did this because I intended to run most of the combat and skill checks and the like behind the screen. The biggest thing slowing down a Classic Traveller Referee's ability to do so is trying to find stats and skills everywhere. 

So orders came in and they were a bit better this turn after I bullied the players in my last blog about how they were turtling up and boring me. Bullying works, kids!

What you're looking for in a Classic Traveller run with the Method II approach to Braunstein play is the best convergences. What you're looking for is the moments you can set up that most align with a scene from EC Tubbs' "Dumarest" series. You're looking for moments that look like something out of Poul Anderson's "Sir Dominic Flandry" series or Vance's "Planet of Adventure". 

Last turn the players were kind of establishing their alliances. Drew (PC) ended up aligning with the Main Character of Moonstein, Roarke Garnett (PC). Roarke is famous on the planet for being quick on the trigger and bloodthirsty. I doubt Drew really wanted to align with the Bad Guy but, just like how Jeffro forced Roarke into being the Bad Guy due to Braunstein convergences, Drew ended up going along to get along.

In the previous Turn Count Zane (PC) had aligned with Baron Columbue (NPC) with some nefarious plan to take over Moonshine. Was Zane just leading the Evil Baron on? It's possible because he challenged the Baron to a show duel during the NIN concert the next day. Assuring the Baron it's all in good fun. 

Meanwhile Team Roarke had some convoluted plan to kidnap Baroness Luva (NPC) from the NIN concert. Their plan involved placing explosives on the steering wheel of her car and blowing it off after she ran out of the concern due to them sending my PC "Old Man" O'Gradey in on a spree shooting against the methhead tweakers that robbed him in chargen. Well O'Gradey loved the idea of the spree shooting but the "explode just the steering wheel" idea seemed very boring and frankly stupid to me.

So with all these orders I had:

-NIN concert at the "Twin Peaks" Roadhouse

-"duel for fun" between the Count and Evil Baron wherein the Count presses the advantage and forces the Evil Baron to publicly swear Fealty to the Count

-O'Gradey spree shooting at same.

-Roarke (who the player had essentially turned into "The Joker" [including exact quotes from every Batman film with the character]) and his dumb plan for a pinpoint explosion on the car.

-kidnap the Baroness during the confusion

I decided to make the whole event public facing by adjudicating it live on twitter in a thread with the #moonstein hashtag. You can read the whole thing here but I'll give you a quick rundown of what went down. 

Well the concert itself was just flavor. The duel went easily in Count Zane's way since he had 3 ranks in his sword skill and the Baron (though strong as an ox) had none. Round one of the Count Zane's combat lead to the Baron taking Strength damage which made his next round of melee combat worse. I like this aspect of Classic Traveller damaging ability scores in the UPP. It's an elegant and fast way to show combat wearing down a character's ability to fight on.

O'Gradey then ran into the concert hall blasting his SMG and beating up the NPC punks who robbed him in chargen. But this didn't last long before Team Roarke's explosives went off and blew the Baroness's pink cadillac to smithereens on the street in front of the Roadhouse.

The crowd fled the venue as one of its walls was collapsing from the nearby carbomb.

The PCs who have become the Good Guys of Moonstein Re-Stilled were nearby enough doing something I'll keep as fog of war for now to possibly hear the explosion. The dice decided they heard. Upon looking over at the problem they realized that their Paton's car had been blown up. At this point they've been too busy to even realize the Baroness intended to attend the concert so, worried about their payoff and/or being Big Damned Heroes, they shot over there in their Airboat.

Why airboat? It became obvious to myself and many of the players early on that, due to the planet being 90% water, it would be swampy and airboats would be needed for some longer distance traveling. 

Team Good (which included Blaine and Krieger in a sort of accidental echoing of "Winds of Gath"'s Dumarest and Megan) rode over and Blaine put down auto rifle shots on Roarke and Drew (the latter of which was firing into the crowd stampeding out of the venue). Drew wanted to off Baroness Luva's 3 guards who were carrying her out of the venue due to her injuries. Roarke took one guard down but Drew only manage to injure or kill civilians. 

can you really afford not to 
follow this?

All of this was done pretty quickly in 2 rounds of Classic Traveller combat. I just needed general distances and the weapons and armors of everyone. 

Team Roarke decided to cut their losses and flee in their ATV when Blaine got a clean shot on Roarke. Roarke's player was dealing with some IRL stuff so Drew had to make the call about fight or flight. He informed me, had he been able to focus more during the adjudication, he may have done some different actions.

This is one thing to keep in mind with the Method II approach. Players will need to hold onto their characters loosely and let the Referee do what needs done to get things adjudicated. Players can sometimes pick minute to minute actions but it will be rare. I believe having players send in orders via email helps establish that it's going to be more hands off for them.

O'Gradey showed up and took some shots (hitting Krieger) before running from Team Good back into the venue. It's unclear where he ended up since Team Good didn't take chase. 

Blaine and 2 of the Baroness's guards were the only good guys standing so they pulled the Baroness up into the airboat and zipped off into the swamp and towards the Baroness's estate. 

It was unclear to all at this time if she was still alive and that has become a story point for subsequent turns since the local news has reported her dead but Krieger made a public pronouncement she's alive. Who knows!

Conclusion to Turn VI

Besides the Baroness stuff, and most of the current players revealing their hand a bit about whose side their on, there are other story threads running through the game. I've based these on Vance, Tubbs, "Twin Peaks", Jeffro's previous game and pop culture I enjoy:

-Poisoned whiskey from the weird planet of Madriguera

-Baron Colombue seemingly in league with the Lord High Crab of Madriguera to import said poison. Poison implied to be Ad (or adren0chrome) from dark rituals happening on Madriguera. This ties in very well with "Twin Peaks" subtext and the evil Baron from "Dune" being a disgusting weirdo.

-Ivy Rae Tiller (NPC) as a plucky hillbilly reporter on the ground trying to find and report The Truth but held back by sponsors and the seeming ownership of her stations and affiliates by the Evil Baron

-Phung (a terrifying monster from Vance's "Planet of Adventure") in and around the planet which are a great threat in the swamp. 

-Archbishop Harold Holmes (NPC) of the Universal Brotherhood arrived to put on a snake (phungkin actually)  handling tent revival as penance for the townsfolk celebrating NIN's dark industrial metal music. Implying phung and phungkin have psionic power of some sort.

-and much much more!

If you want to keep up with all the news reports from Moonshine I have dubbed my twitter account the "Moonstein News Network" during the event. Following the #Moonstein hashtag would also be a great idea to keep up.

But what you'll see is the fact that this play is much more dynamic than being a "Wagon Train to the Stars". You won't have your lesser players whining that they didn't get in on the A plotline this episode. They will instead compete to be part of the best convergences. They will instead arm and equip themselves with the realization they might be throwing down any Turn with the other players in PVP. 

They will instead realize the Braunstein approach to Classic Traveller is simply better. Just as I did.

RIP?

Moonstein V: A Traveller Braunstein

Why did I decide to do this?

I need to read this. Do you?

Who knows. I probably have too much downtime on my hands. Perhaps it's because Dubzaron is on hiatus. But I truly think it's because I love Traveller and the worldbuilding it implies. I love that its world is one of characters whose most impactful actions and skills came from their character generation. There is no "get the ruby" style adventuring for Referee controlled locales or dungeons full of treasure and XP for the Players. They are forced to make their own goals and reasons for doing much of anything at all.

I love that characters can show up as super rich Counts and such from character generation. And it's not unbalancing to the other PCs because they're not adventuring together. There's no "balance" to speak of. Just the game. And considering the lethality of combat, even the weaker PCs have a chance to get lucky and shoot down an 8 Term Marine who retired at the top. 

So is that what happened in this Braunstein on Turn 5? 

The World

Moonshine: Starport C, Scout Base, 8,000-mile Diameter, Standard/Tainted atmosphere, Hydrographics 90%, Population in the thousands, NO GOVERNMENT, Law Level 1, Tech Level 6. Non-industrial.

Pop 2,499

This information implies a swampy world. The "no government" roll implies these Barons of Moonshine are vying for control with their own little militias of modern day (not futuristic) tech. Jeffro dreamed it up as a sort of Appalachia in space and I push that further as we move forward. 

The Characters

Let's discuss the characters who were available and sent in orders for Turn 5. 

Firstly there is Drew Montague a former Marine who is a master with a blade and knows big gunnery. In his chargen he had a bad random encounter with a Baron Columbue who had his men beat him up and leave him in the street.

Then we have Blaine Cooper a former Marine Captain who also mastered the cutlass but loves laser rifles. A real tyrannosaurus of a man. His chargen backstory was much more positive than Drew's and acquired an NPC Patron in Baroness Luva who hired him on as security for an upcoming soirée. 

The main character of the first Moonstein even in 2024, Roare Garnett, is back! He's an ex-marine force commander who is brutal with and quick to pull his revolver. His backstory since last summer is he's been "hiding in the swamp" and now "gives swamp tours". I'm sure it's fine the guy who offed like 4 PCs last year will be a great tour guide in the wilderness. Have fun!

Count Zane Valstrom is a PC who rolled insanely high on the social standing stat so founds himself with a very nice title indeed. A count! He didn't write a blog but told me he recently arrived on the planet intending to "lay low" (yeah right, enjoy your crazy convergences and forced PVP, Pal!) He's looking for ambitious Barons who might find mutual benefit in his big fancy title and the social connections he has off world. 

Lastly we have Malcolm Krieger. A former Army Lieutenant who was pushed out of the service after one term onto the backwater swamp planet of Moonshine. His chargen action included hearing rumors of poisoned whiskey. Being so lazy, Kreiger intends to try and sell the information somehow. 

Initial Orders

I had players send me their orders in email. I printed them out and made notes trying to find a way to Converge their ideas. Most of the orders I received were variations on "I try to look around and see what's happening" but I was able to find enough convergence to get the PCs together for stuff. 

One important thing to keep in mind for a Braunstein, including a Method II Braunstein, is to find ways to keep players from turtling up. To find ways to make them be on a team or at odds. To give them things they want that only one player can have. 

Blaine's new job with the Baroness keeping her estate safe during a big party worked well with Krieger's claim to want to look for "big parties to meet patrons at" (paraphrase) so I had him go to the party Blaine was guarding. Krieger wasn't presenting hostile particularly so I just informed both players of them both being on site and told them to talk out whatever they wanted. Blaine found Krieger's rumor interesting and they convinced the Baroness to let Krieger come on to work with Blaine to investigate the rumor directly for a prize should it turn out well for the Baroness.

Count Zane said he wanted to check out bars and stuff so I decided to have the Baron from Drew's backstory encounter be at a bar I dubbed The Roadhouse (after the bar in "Twin Peaks"). The Baron has a bunch of info to run by the Count but Count Zane's player was busy irl so all that is still up in the air. Big plans! If you want it...

Drew's orders were that "Count Zane interested him" so I ran an encounter to see if he learned anything about the Count. He learned some (or all?) of what the NPC Baron was telling and asking of the Count. But what could it be?!

Roarke is a big of a wild card. His orders were humorous in that he wanted to drive into town "to resupply" and "advertise jungle tours and safaris" into the jungle-swamp. He was weirdly famous on this lawless swamp-rock so him coming back into town became a rumor in and of itself. Some other players may or may not be acting on this information looking for a friend!

How I Abducted Them

I answered some of that above. The term "abductive reasoning" is from Alexander Macris's book "Arbiter of Worlds". It's kind of backwards reasoning wherein you take surprising or strange information then explain backwards why it must be so. This sort of reasoning is done ALL THE TIME in real TTRPG play. It is what running a Method II Braunstein is all about.

I've already done a ton of this. You can follow me doing it in real time on my Twitter account under the #Moonstein hashtag. 

I made up the concept of Garmonbozia brand whiskey based on Krieger's "poisoned whiskey" rumor. That implied "Bob's Bottle Shop". Both are "Twin Peaks" references that hint at weirding things to those who get the reference. It's also being "imported from Madriguera" which is another planet in the same solar system that Jeffro's original Traveler Braunstein 

I made up that the Count bought out "The Roadhouse" for the night to chat with the Baron Columbue(sp) because the player was too busy to get back to me. So he's just going to spend the Turn getting drunk and partying. This also means the other PCs kind of know where and in what situation one important NPC and PC are for at least part of Turn 6. Will it matter?

Knock On Effects and Plans

I actually can't tell you all the Second Order Effects and in Turn actions the players took. Because fog of war! Lets just say that a "sour mash facility" (whatever that is) got burned down. And there may or may not be a hit out on multiple NPCs or PCs.

You'll just have to wait a little longer!