Classic Traveller: Returning to the ETU-A1215 Subsector

Wow, I cannot believe two years have passed since I took my first crack at running a game of Classic Traveller (link to private community but I'll let you in if your curious).

It would have continued to languish I'm sure, but Calvin & Hobbs, I mean Gobs & Hoblins, no that's not right; +Jason Hobbs of Hobbs & Friends of the OSR started whining like a teen about wanting to try more OSR games he never played before, including Traveller. Perfect, he would never know if I'm running it wrong. Seriously though, I once knew how he feels. I had my experience. Here was an opportunity to pass it on.

The initial adventure arc finished with a single survivor from a party of four experienced Traveller grognards. I asked this lone survivor if he was down for continuing and like all CT junkies  he was in. Hobbs is dragging some other OSR devotees along and it is now time to pick up where The Monolith from Beyond Space & Time last left us. 

So I start to hyperventilate a bit. The setting felt nice and containable two years ago because I knew what I was going to do; sci-fi horror. Players encounter a dangerous anomaly and let the carnage flow. No need to think about greater campaign implications cause most likely everyone will die. See that label "Ahenti" in the upper left of the subsector map? I have know idea what that means. I just wrote it cause I liked it when it popped into my mind two years ago. 

But now the chickens are coming home to roost. Now I have to maintain the weird horror science fiction role play with the same level of coolness that tMfBS&T infused. Can I still rely on the LBB's of CT to fuel another satisfying adventure arc filled with close, personal action against the backdrop of a galactic setting?

The Traveller Out of the Box series over at the Tales to Astound blog got me straight on Classic Traveller is not the Third Imperium. Classic Traveller is not an implied setting. Classic Traveller is about making the action where the PC's are and be about what they are doing. Those attractive thin black books sit mutely promising... what? The LBB's deliver on a core OSR concepts which TSR summed up nicely; "Tools for the Imagination!" Don't let us do your imagining for you I think they also said. This is your deal. This is your show. You have to bring it. I have a couple of days now to marinade my mind with all my favorite messed up sci-fi stuff. Then I have to laser focus all the star-spanning ideas into a tightly packaged shit show. 

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