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Yes, indeed - one of the reasons why I wanted to have them in my setting.

Fergio, since the creatures download is not yet in the downloads section, may I ask for your stats for the Losrandir and the Aurochs, since these could be similar to the stats I am trying to define for my setting for the Vikunja and the Yak, and therefore could give me something to compare my stat ideas with ? Thank you !

Among the animals that appear in my Enki II setting as creatures introduced into the planet's biosphere, once terraforming has begun to change the pla- net's environment, are two species from Terra, both able to live in the kind of environment Enki II will have in the campaign's future: Vikunjas at the low end of the scale of creatures that need stats, and Yaks at the high end of that scale - these two species will be the reference for all other creatures, so I should get the stats right. These are the stats I think could be about right: Vikunja STR 10 CON 10 SIZ 8 INT 4 POW 10 DEX 10 Move 10 Hit Points 9 Damage Bonus none Armor 2-point fur Attack Bite 20 % 1D3 Skills Sense 50 % A Vikunja looks like a slender Alpaka, with a length of about 1.50 m, a height of about 1 m and a weight of about 50 kg. You could compare a Vikunja to a small Antelope, I think. Yak STR m 30, f 20 CON m 20, f 15 SIZ m 40, f 30 INT 4 POW 10 DEX 10 Move 10 Hit Points m 30, f 22 Damage Bonus m + 3D6, f + 2D6 Armor 3-point fur Attacks Horn 25 % 1D3+db Ram 25 % 2D6+db Trample 25 % 2D6+db Skills Sense 50 % A male Yak has a length of about 3 m, a height of about 2 m and a weight of about 1,000 kg, female ones are considerably smaller. You could compare a Yak to a Bison, I think. (And I am looking forward to the adventure when the characters will have to transport some grumpy Yak bulls to Enki II - Space Cowboys, Yeehaah ! >:->) However, these stats are just a first attempt to get it right, and any advice or help would be most welcome. Thank You !

ORtrail, Puck, thank you both for your help to find an excellent article !

Cold, unfortunately.

Yesterday I finished the campaign's core BRP-Traveller-system. The characters will be generated with the regular Traveller "lifepath" charac- ter generation system, although we will use Careers and Event Tables adap- ted to the setting, and afterwards the attributes and skills of these charac- ters will be converted to the BRP system. For the skills we will use this table: No skill = 10 % (easy "untrained" tasks only) Skill Level 0 = 40 % Skill Level 1 = 60 % Skill Level 2 = 70 % Skill Level 3 = 80 % Skill Level 4 = 90 % For the attributes we will use this table: Trav 02 = BRP 03 Trav 03 = BRP 04 Trav 04 = BRP 06 Trav 05 = BRP 08 Trav 06 = BRP 10 Trav 07 = BRP 11 Trav 08 = BRP 13 Trav 09 = BRP 15 Trav 10 = BRP 16 Trav 11 = BRP 17 Trav 12 = BRP 18 SIZ, POW and APP, which have no Traveller counterparts, will be rolled ac- cording to the BRP rules. Once the characters have been converted, we will play them as normal BRP characters, with attribute rolls (Idea Roll, Know Roll, etc.) and all that. However, there will be no Experience Checks, because we will use Traveller's character generation system throughout the campaign. This system subdivides character generation into four year terms of service in various careers, with a possible change of careers and new skills and also events at the beginning of each new four year term. While in Traveller this "time structure" ends when the character is generated, we will use it to structure the entire campaign time: Characters will serve for four years in a certain career, and will then have the opportunity to choose a different career or to stay in the previous one, and will get the additional skills for the career they did choose. At the same time the GM will roll for a possible promotion and for events du- ring the new four year term, and will use the results as "plot elements" for the character in question during those four game time years. I am not yet sure that this system will work, but I think it is good enough for a start, and I will be able to improve it during the campaign. Apart from that BRP-Traveller-system, most other campaign elements have also been designed, at least their outlines are now there. The background universe and its technology assumptions (based on Travel- ler and GURPS, mainly) are ready, a couple of starships and of important equip- ment items have been designed, and maps have been sketched. Even the first four adventures are now more or less ready for play. The first one will be the detailed exploration / survey of the planet Enki II (using the material from Traveller's World Tamer's Handbook), the second one a mission to find valuable natural resources sufficient to finance an outpost that could grow into a viable colony with a long-term terraforming program of the planet. Adventure three deals with the discovery of a downed spaceship and the sad end of the famous scout who was the first to explore the Enki system, and adventure four with the discovery of some alien ruins, where the characters may find data that could lead to a first contact with an alien species. By the way, here is a sketch of those ruins. It is based upon the plan of a world cultural heritage site, but I am almost sure that no player will recognize where the idea came from.

I do not think so, because quite a number of issues are no longer available, so they probably just sell their stock of old originals.

Thank you very much, it seems I will have to order copies of the two issues from Different Worlds Publishing, that material is most probably good enough to spend the money. Oops, those two issues are no longer available ...

No, thank you, I really prefer to do it just for fun and without any kind of responsibilities. Besides, I "borrow" too much from all kinds of sources, so my settings could hardly be published commercially without causing serious copyright problems ...

Different Worlds once was Chaosium's roleplaying magazine. As far as I know, it is no longer published, although Different Worlds Publishing still exists, and still sells copies of the old issues.

Thank you ! I am holding my breath ...

While working on my new science fiction setting, which has the colonization and terraforming of a barren desert world as its background, I have been told that Different Worlds once included an interesting article on terraforming that might prove useful for me. This article, written by Doug Houseman, appeared in two parts in the Diffe- rent Worlds issues 22 and 23. Unfortunately this article is quite dated, and not necessarily useful anymore, and ordering copies of Different Worlds is possible, but rather complicated and not exactly cheap from over here. Perhaps someone who has the issues 22 and 23 of Different Worlds could be so kind to take a look at the article, and tell me whether it would be worth trying to get a copy ? Thank you very much !

Thank you ! And here we have a first sketch of the Sapal Sector of the Solar Federation, where Enki II is located. As you see, I have decided that this time space will not be flat: The coor- dinates under the planet symbols give the "height" of the system within the galactic disk, in this case all of them at "-" or below the height of Sol, which is used as a reference. It took me a while to do all the square root handling to calculate the distan- ces in the sector in a three-dimensional space (I hate math ...), but I think that the little additional "realism" was worth the trouble. And from now on the players of the astrogators among the characters will have some real math to do in order to arrive at the right system ... >:->

A nice idea, I will put in on my list - thank you ! By the way, this is a first sketch of what Enki II will look like ...

However you intend to use it, it is just great ! (... and I am looking forward to seeing the new material on vehicles ...)

Chaosium has a very long tradition of Companion volumes, so a "The Green Companion" is almost a must do for you... Besides, from what I have seen until now, and with all the work you put into it, The Green will definitely not be lousy.

While "hard" SF does not require to give a player a plausible explanation whenever a character asks for one, such a plausible explanation should always be possible (no contradictions with the basic laws of the setting universe), and the GM should have at least an idea of the explanation (to avoid such contradictions), I think. So, if the player's character asks why that river is flowing upwards, the GM can just shrug and tell the player to let his character attempt to do some research and find the explanation. However, the GM should be prepared to come up with a plausible expla- nation in the case that the character really does the research ...

Yep, I think now I understand it, and agree. By the way, Traveller can be played as "hard" SF, too, especially the GURPS and New Era versions are well suited for that kind of game, although I have to admit that psionics do not fit in well. The "maximum psionics level" I ever used in one of my settings was the em- pathy and telepathy ability of the Treecats from David Weber's Honor Har- rington novels, and I regarded even that as a "borderline case".

Ah, well, I would not really want to call that an explanation ... Otherwise, while I do see your point, I think you are missing one of the basic differences between (at least "hard") science fiction and fantasy: In my opinion Science Fiction does require details, explanations and plau- sibility, because this is the "science" part of it, if you neglect this you have just average fiction.

Once again, it depends ... In a science fiction game you may well have a character with geology, pla- netology or seismology skill, and this character's player may well ask for a plausible explanation of the events in more or less scientific terms, because this is what his character would look for. In a fantasy game, none of the characters is expected to think in scientific terms and ask such questions. A fantasy character may attempt to explain the events in his world in religious or magical terms, which are much easier to handwave than science, I think, because religions and magic often con- tain contradictions that would ruin the suspension of disbelief if they would appear in science.

Yep, thank you again for an interesting link !

I think all you would have to do would be a minor change in the name to avoid a confusion, as Green is definitely not an in any way protected term. Using "Into The Green", "Dangers Of The Green", "Life In The Green" or any other such combination as the title of your work should be fully sufficient to solve the problem. An easy way to find out whether a change of the title is necessary at all (and I am not convinced that it is, as there are several cases of identical titles of RPG materials) could be to ask Chaosium, as they will publish the monograph. Don't worry, I do not think that The Green is dead or in danger to die.

Thank you very much for the interesting links !

Well, it depends somewhat on what kind of complexity one is looking for. For my science fiction settings I want a high level of complexity / plausibi- lity / "realism" when it comes to the astronomy (world building), the tech- nology (equipment, vehicles) and even the economy (trade rules). This is why I use GURPS material, although equally good material could doubtless be written for BRP, too. On the other hand, I want a smooth (easy to learn, easy to play), charac- ter-oriented roleplaying system with a high flexibility, one that I can easily adapt to any of my settings, and here in my opinion nothing beats BRP. So, complexity for the setting, because there (at least in "hard" science fiction settings) complexity gives colour and depth to the setting, makes the suspension of disbelief easier, and gives more choices to the players. But not "complexity" when it comes to the roleplaying rules themselves, be- cause there complexity usually means that the system gets in the way of the roleplaying, and this often ruins the suspension of disbelief. In my opinion, BRP has the (almost) perfect roleplaying mechanics and ru- les, it just lacks some good genre supplements for genres like "hard" SF.

The players had a namegiving debate, and the result is: The second planet of the star Enki in the Sapal Sector of the Rim Region will be named Tashara by the colonists.