Over the past few weeks I went on a bit of a spending spree with regards to roleplaying game (RPG) materials. So far in March I took in 56 (!) new RPG products, all save one, in digital format. I discussed the first group of acquisitions at “TTRPG Roll 25-7 ~ Cepheus Engine hard vacuum, moons, ships, missions, Vandal Traveller, and the pirate life.” Here I will discuss two Traveller RPG acquisitions since.
Cargo Lifter INCL-01 is written by Don Headrick and is a nine-page product produced under the Travellers’ Aid Society (TAS) community content license that usually retails for $3.50. Headrick is up-front about drawing inspiration from the cargo loader driven by Ripley in the movie ALIENS but is also quick to point out how the Mongoose details for a Cargo Lifter are lacking (I must assume the reference is to the latest Mongoose Traveller 2nd Edition Traveller rules as those are the only rules allowable in TAS).
Headrick provides an expansive set of House Rules for determining the lifting ability and other in-game factors of the Cargo Lifter which in itself is an excellent lesson for any Traveller GameMaster on how to reason through rules which simply make little sense as written and adjust/create a new version to reach a playable state.
Book 9: Pirates is written by Robert Eaglestone, Thomas Jones-Low, Matthew Kerwin, and James Kundert and sold by Mongoose Publishing for $8.99. Though published by Mongoose, this is the never-before-published Book 9 of the (now) Classic Traveller series. As the publisher’s blurb explains:
The first new release for Classic Traveller is here!
Embark on daring exploits and leave your mark on the stars! Whether leading a crew of daring corsairs or battling ruthless raiders, this book provides new rules and tools for pirate campaigns:
• Advanced character generation for creating infamous pirate crews.
• New corsair starship designs and acquisition rules.
• Privateering mechanics covering the economics of piracy.
• A ready-to-play border subsector ripe for plunder and adventure.For Classic Traveller, the term Books has a special meaning, presenting additional rules on specific subjects, expanding on Traveller’s basic concepts. Books run 48 to 56 pages and may be used independently or together, but all require the basic rules sets.
Book 9: Pirates is laid out just like the original 48-page Little Black Books (LBB) of the first edition of Traveller back in the late 1970’s. Well, almost exactly like the LBBs but with the (annoying?) exception of using green instead of red lines and text in keeping with Mongoose Publishing’s Traveller line branding (sigh). After a short introduction, character generation rules for “Pirates Characters” in introduced followed by a “Skills” section with special applicability to Pirates. This is followed by a section on “Pirate Organisations” and a discussion of “The Practice of Piracy.” New ships are in the “Corsairs” section and Pirate-relevant “Ironmongery” is included. Finally, a unique area of the Third Imperium, “Khukish Subsector,” is provided that is Pirate-ready for players.
Not only is Book 9: Pirates laid out (almost) just like a LBB, the interior artwork used is the same black & white format as found in the original LBBs. The ships look hand drawn and even the deckplans look like they could have been lifted from a Traveller sourcebook in the 1970’s or early 1980’s. Book 9: Pirates is, however, not simply a wistful homage but a full new product to fit the original Traveller rules set and formally bring pirates to your adventuring.
Feature image courtesy WordPress Feature Image AI generator based on text of post
The opinions and views expressed in this blog are those of the author alone and are presented in a personal capacity. They do not necessarily represent the views of U.S. Navy or any other U.S. government Department, Agency, Office, or employer.
RockyMountainNavy.com © 2007-2025 by Ian B is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0
Rocky Mountain Navy Gamer 