TEXT: C
   
  LASSIC
   T
   
  RAVELLER
  V
  1.1
   
  ◆
   
   1 
   
  ◆
  House Rules
  General house rules
   
  These house rules apply across the board to all my 
   
  Classic Traveller
   
   campaigns, except 
  where speciﬁcally noted in the particular campaign sections.
  ❖ 
  Task resolution
   
  One of the things lacking in 
   
  Classic Traveller
   
   is a uniform task resolution system. This is 
  one of the things added quickly in subsequent editions of the game. Here’s a quick and 
  simple task resolution system that borrows concepts from 
   
  MegaTraveller
   
   (mostly to 
  smooth the way for a transition to that game, if wanted).
   
  Basic throw: 8+
   
  As with combat, to succeed at any general 
  task, a character must make a basic throw 
  of eight or more on two dice. Of course, 
  the roll should get adjusted based on a 
  variety of factors.
   
  Opposing efforts
   
  There’s two ways to handle opposing 
  efforts. In some cases, it’ll be appropriate 
  to match two task rolls against one 
  another, highest total wins (after DMs). In 
  other cases, a “defender” can subtract 
  skill/stat DMs from the “attacker’s” roll.
   
  Difﬁculty of tasks
   
  Tasks vary in difﬁculty: the basic throw 
  applies only to a task of “average” difﬁ-
  culty: one in which a person who knows 
  at least a little about what they’re doing 
  can succeed about half the time under 
  pressure.
  Tasks of other difﬁculties provide DMs for 
  the throw, as in the nearby table.
   
  Stat/Skill DMs
   
  In general, when you want to attempt a 
  general task of some sort, any relevant 
  skill your character has can apply to the 
  task. If I agree, your character’s skill level 
  can get applied as a positive DM to a gen-
  eral task throw. if a character has no skill 
  relevant to the task at hand, then you 
  might be able to use a characteristic 
  instead. You can apply one ﬁfth (round 
  down) of an appropriate characteristic 
  value as a postive task DM. (In some 
  cases, you might be able to apply both a 
  skill DM 
   
  and
   
   a characteristic DM.)
  If it seems likely that a particular skill is 
  rather required for the task, and you don’t 
  have the skill (like trying to pilot a nose-
  diving ﬁghter jet), then you have to make 
  a plain roll of 8+ at one or more levels of 
  increased difﬁculty (which might make 
  the roll impossible).
  You can also get assistance to receive a 
  “one-time” zero level in a skill. See “Learn-
  ing by doing” on page 3.
  Special Tasks
  There might be some special, prede-
  ﬁned tasks for use during the game. 
  Right now, there’s at least one: the 
  Determination task.
  ❥ A Determination task is typically of 
  average difﬁculty (but might be 
  harder with sufﬁcient distractions), 
  and you can apply both your Endur-
  ance and your Intelligence DMs to 
  the task.
  Task difﬁculty table
  Difﬁculty
  DM
  Very Easy
  +4
  Simple
  +3
  Average
  +0
  Challenging
  -3
  Difﬁcult
  -5
  Formidable
  -7
  
   
  ◆
   
   2  General house rules 
   
  ◆
   
  House Rules
  Classic Traveller
  ❖ 
  Character creation
   
  The rules as read provide a decent engine for creating characters, but the random aspect 
  of the system creates a number of dangers: in the ﬁrst case, it’s easy to create a parties of 
  characters with wildly mismatched skills (this may or may not be a bad thing); in the sec-
  ond case, it’s easy to have a decent character shaping up only to watch him or her die dur-
  ing the creation process; ﬁnally, the random nature of the system makes it hard to create 
  the precise character a player might want.
   
  Fate Points
   
  Every character starts with ﬁve fate 
  points. The player can use these points 
  both during character creation, and during 
  play itself. Here’s what you can do with a 
  fate point.
   
  During character creation. 
   
  During 
  character creation you can use a fate point 
  to
   
  ❥
   
  Choose your character’s service. However, 
  you may only choose a service for which you 
  would have at least a +1DM on the enlist-
  ment roll. (This may also be a service for 
  which you’ve already been denied enlist-
  ment.)
   
  ❥
   
  Choose to reroll any die roll (in this case, you 
  can wait until the roll is made, pay the point, 
  roll again, and then choose which result you 
  want to keep).
  This expense applies to the twelve dice you 
  roll for your characteristics as well.
   
  During play. 
   
  During play you can use a 
  fate point to 
   
  ❥
   
  Choose to reroll any die roll (roll again and 
  choose the result you want).
   
  ❥
   
  Make a task easier by one level of difﬁculty.
   
  ❥
   
  Avoid death. In situations where a character 
  should by rights be dead, you can spend a 
  fate point to avoid death, as long as you can 
  make up some halfway reasonable story 
  about which the character should survive.
   
  Rolling characteristics
   
  While you still roll six pairs of dice to gen-
  erate your characteristics, you may now 
  roll a set of twelve dice, and match them 
  up to the six characterstics as you like, 
  although each characterstic must get two 
  dice.
   
  Non-lethal creation
   
  During character creation, failing a sur-
  vival check does not end in a character’s 
  death (unless you want it to). Instead, the 
  character washes out of the current serv-
  ice with only two terms of service and no 
  chance for promotion or skill acquisition. 
  The character still gets to muster out. You 
  can decide the circumstances of the 
  discharge–it need not be dishonorable.
   
  Zero level skills
   
  In the rules as read, player characters 
  automatically get a level of zero in all 
  weapon skills. This prevents them from 
  having to suffer unskilled penalties during 
  combat. This house rule makes this policy 
  slightly more ﬂexible. 
   
  ❥
   
  Each player can choose, as part of a back-
  ground, ﬁve zero level skills for their charac-
  ter which they should justify to me. You now 
   
  do not
   
   receive a zero level in any combat 
  skills, unless you pick them in your ﬁve.
  You may 
   
  not
   
   select Jack Of All Trades as a 
  zero-level skill.
  Complete skill list
  Here’s a list of all the skills in the game. 
  Those skills in italics are available only 
  from the expanded character creation 
  rules (Books 4 through 7).
  Basic Skills
  Administration
  Bribery
  Broker
  Carousing
  Communications
  Computer
  Demolitions
  Electronics
  Engineering
  Equestrian
  Forgery
  Forward Observer
  Gambling
  Gravitics
  Hunting
  Instruction
  Interrogation
  Jack Of All Trades
  Leader
  Legal
  Liaison
  Mechanical
  Medical
  Naval Architect
  Navigation
  Pilot
  Prospecting
  Space [Type]
  Steward
  Streetwise
  Survey
  Survival
  Tactics
  Trader
  Vacc Suit
  Combat and Weapon Skills
  Battle Dress
  Brawling
  Blade Combat [Type]
  Combat Engineering
  FA Gunnery
  Fleet Tactics
  Gun Combat [Type]
  Gunnery
  Heavy Weapons
  Recon
  Recruiting
  Ship Tactics
  Zero-G Combat
  Transport Skills
  Air/Raft
  ATV
  Ship’s Boat
  Vehicle [Type:Subtype]
  
   
  ◆
   
   General house rules  3 
   
  ◆
   
  Classic Traveller
  House Rules
  ❖ 
  Character advancement
   
  In the original 
   
  Classic Traveller
   
   game, the assumption was that characters would not 
  change substantially during play, thus character advancement was a very slow process, 
  and rather sketchy. Here’s some rules to make character advancement a little nicer.
   
  Learning by doing
   
  If you use a skill during a session to partic-
  ularly good effect, then you should 
  remember this; at the end of the session 
  you can receive an experience tick for that 
  skill. I typically will hand out only one tick 
  for each session, even if you make good 
  use of more than one skill. You can choose 
  which skill should receive the tick, but I 
  have to agree.
  If you don’t have a skill, you can be 
  tutored by someone into an immediate 
  zero level for that skill. This requires a 
  determination task on your part, and a 
  tutor to show you “how to use that vac-
  cuum suit”. Once the immediate situation 
  passes, you lose the zero level; however, if 
  you used the skill successfully, then you 
  can gain an experience tick for the skill. 
  This does not apply to the Jack Of All 
  Trades skill.
   
  Learning through practice or 
  study
   
  You can elect to be practicing a skill desir-
  ing to improve it. You have to back this up 
  during roleplaying, and it takes at least a 
  few hours of game time dedicated to prac-
  tice during each game week. At the end of 
  a game week, you can have one experi-
  ence tick to assign to a skill that you’re 
  practicing, if you pass a Determination 
  task.
  You can elect to be studying a skill desir-
  ing to improve it. As with practice you 
  have to back this up during roleplaying. if 
  you have an instructor to guide you, then 
  you can take one tick per week. If you 
  don’t, then you can take one tick per game 
  month for a studied skill. If you pass a 
  Determination task.
  You may not apply practice or study to the 
  Jack Of All Trades skill.
   
  Making your skill improve-
  ment check
   
  At the end of an adventure (not game ses-
  sion), you can elect to make one (and only 
  one) improvement check. An improve-
  ment check is of Formidable difﬁculty, 
  and you can use your DM for one appro-
  priate characteristic on the roll (which is 
  most appropriate depends on the skill 
  you’re trying to improve); you also get to 
  add the experience ticks you’ve accumu-
  lated for a skill as a positive DM to the 
  check.
   
  ❥
   
  If you make your check, then you lose all 
  your ticks for that skill, but the skill increases 
  in level by one.
  You also get to add one tick to your Educa-
  tion characteristic.
   
  ❥
   
  If you fail your check, then you lose half 
  your ticks (round in your favour, so if you 
  started with three you end up with two ticks) 
  for that skill, and you get no increase.
   
  Improving characteristics
   
  ❥
   
  Your Education improves naturally over time 
  as your skill levels increase. 
   
  ❥
   
  Your Intelligence is innate and doesn’t 
  improve. 
   
  ❥
   
  Your Social Standing can improve through 
  roleplaying. 
   
  ❥
   
  Your physical characteristics can all improve 
  by +1 by undergoing a conditioning regi-
  men. 
  The bonus takes effect after a month of this 
  regimen, and you must account for the regi-
  men during roleplay. This regimen essen-
  tially uses a lot of the time you’d otherwise 
  devote to practice or study, so it’s a bit difﬁ-
  cult to do both at once (although some physi-
  cal skills can be practiced in conjunction 
  with a physical regimen).
  If you skip the regimen for more than a 
  month, you lose the beneﬁt to your physical 
  characteristics.
  
   
  ◆
   
   4  The Traveller Adventure 
   
  ◆
   
  House Rules
  Classic Traveller
  The Traveller Adventure
   
  Initial players in 
   
  The Traveller Adventure
   
   campaign are recently hired hands on the 
   
  March 
  Harrier
   
   subsidized merchant. All of the rules in “General house rules” on page 1 apply to 
  this campaign. Additionally, here’s more guidelines for this campaign.
  ❖ 
  Cbaracter creation
   
  All initial characters use the basic character creation system. You may choose any service 
  from Book 1, 
   
  except
   
   for the Other service. Use the basic careers from Supplement 4 in 
  place of the Other service from Book 1.
   
  Pregenerated characters
   
  Instead of randomly generating a charac-
  ter, you may pay a fate point and choose 
  one of these pregenerated characters:
   
  ❥
   
  Captain of March Harrier
   
  Retired Merchant Captain   5A7B9B   Age 44
  6 Terms                             Cr 13,000
  Admin 2, Bribery 2, Computer 3, Navigation 3, 
  Pilot 1, Vacc Suit 2, Auto Rifle 1, Auto Pistol 0
  Add four zero level skills
   
  ❥
   
  Pilot of March Harrier
   
  ex-Scout                   9B7955   Age 31
  3 Terms                             Cr 10,000
  Air/Raft 1, Jack Of All Trades 1, Pilot 2, Vacc 
  Suit 1, Laser Carbine 1
  Add five zero level skills
   
  ❥
   
  Engineer of March Harrier
   
  Retired Naval Non-Comm     876785   Age 51
  8 Terms                             Cr 12,000
  Electronic 2, Engineering 3, Mechanical 2, Ship's 
  Boat 1, Vacc Suit 1, Auto Pistol 0
  Add four zero level skills
   
  Notice that these characters can also be 
  assumed to have an advantage with back-
  ground knowledge about the 
   
  Harrier
   
  , her 
  operation, and her trade route.
   
  Generated characters
   
  The 
   
  March Harrier
   
   has recently employed 
  the rest of the player characters for these 
  positions: Medic, Gunner, Steward, Deck-
  hand. If you decide to generate a new 
  character, then you should do so with an 
  eye to one of these positions.
  Notice that all the characters, except the 
  Deckhand, are required to operate the 
   
  Harrier
   
  , and so if the roles aren’t assumed 
  by the PCs, then NPCs will occupy those 
  roles. If no-one plays the Deckhand, then 
  the Harrier can do without the Deckhand.
  With that in mind, these services are par-
  ticularly useful: Navy, Merchant, Scout, 
  Belter, Doctor.
  With some creative background, these 
  services could ﬁt in well with the party: 
  Pirate, Rogue, Noble.
  Services not recommended for play at all: 
  Sailor, Diplomat, Flyer, Barbarian, Bureau-
  crat, Scientist, Hunter.
  Starting ﬁnancial situation
  The Harrier’s current operating fund 
  has Cr112,816 in it. The monthly sala-
  ries, docking fees, and maintenance 
  fees for her annual maintenance have 
  all been paid.
  Immediate fees to pay will be fuel costs, 
  life support fees, and payment into the 
  maintenance pool.
  This campaign is based on the opera-
  tion of a merchant vessel, and there-
  fore, you as a group will have to take 
  careful notice of the ship’s ﬁnances.
  The lease on the ship is currently held 
  by the three pregenerated characters; 
  therefore, at least one or two of these 
  characters should be played by you, to 
  direct the overall plans of the ship.
  
SOURCE: textdata/thevault/Traveller/01 - Classic Traveller/Third Party Materials - CT/Homebrew and Houserules/Traveller - House Rules (v1.1).pdf