Why M-Space over other games?

[PoppySeed45]

Specifically, why choose M-Space over, say, Traveller, or Diaspora, or even a generic that you can shoehorn hardish science fiction into? 

I ask because there's a chance I could run a game of it soon, and I'm wondering whether to choose M-Space or Traveller or something else (basically, it's a one-shot that might turn into a campaign, but in any case, it's a chance for me to try to GM something new that I haven't GMed before and M-Space (and Mythras in general) is on that list). 

Folks?

[Ian Absentia]

When choosing one system over another, it boils down to a matter of which one you're most comfortable with.  M-Space successfully marries d100/BRP-ish mechanics with the game ethos of old school Traveller.  It recognisably does the kind of game that Trav does, but with different mechanics.

Adding to that, though, is the modular adaptability of M-Space.  It's built on a simplified and pared-down Mythras chassis, but all of the things that are notably omitted (such as expanded, detailed combat options) are easily ported in.  I imagine options exist for Traveller/Cepheus, but that'd be up to individual familiarity.  M-Space at its core is very simple and easy to run.

So, it's like white wine or red with fish.  Which one do you actually like?

!i!

[AndreJarosch]

I get this question a lot (for the german language edition). 
My answer is: 

M-SPACE does nothing better than Traveller, or other SciFi RPGs, but it does it with D100!
And D100 is always better IMHO. 

[rsanford]

Subscribed. I have been thinking about running a hard sci-fi game soon and since I love BRP (and also because I’m too lazy to learn Traveller), I had planned to use M-Space or maybe Stars Without Number since my group already knows those rule sets. However as I read well regarded sci-fi scenarios (which are frequently for Traveller), I am more and more tempted to use Traveller. Two reasons, first is that some of the best Traveller scenarios I have read seems to rely on a kind of ship design / ship construction mini-game that I think might be hard to emulate in other systems. M-Space has something like that (it’s super cool) but it’s not sufficiently compatible with Traveller that you could easily reverse engineer and leverage the ships found in many Traveller supplements (feel free to correct me if I have it wrong). Which brings me to to my second reason. There is a gigantic, whopping, absolutely insane amount of material available for Traveller. And I am not just talking about adventures / scenarios but also things like ship designs, settings, fanzines and even forums and blogs with mountains of usable ideas and data. With all these riches I might never need to design a Traveller ship again. Last night I spent 3 hours sorting through more than 130 pages of post from Traveller enthusiasts that were trying to reverse engineer the Traveller ship Annic Nova in order to ascertain its backstory. I haven’t seen any other sci-fi game yet that generates that level of fan commitment, game ideas and hooks that I can leverage. It’s very compelling. Now don’t misunderstand, I love BRP and M-Space, but man, there are definitely a lot of reasons to choose Traveller for hardish sci-fi gaming.. 

 

 

Edited April 12, 2023 by rsanford

[PoppySeed45]

Well, some interesting things around this topic - one of my players is STRONGLY convinced that M-Space might be better because he'd read it might be more "tactical" than Mongoose Traveller rules (which I think is true). He likes tactical games a little, which means maybe this will be better for him?

On a side note (which I also posted in the Design Mechanism forums), I found some form fillable sheets on FB's site, but the sheets have a problem - if you try to type something in the Gear or Background sections, the line goes on forever and doesn't fit in the box. if you press Enter or Tab you come out of the box.

I know nothing about PDFs so I don't know if anyone's done it, but are there form-fillable sheets for M-Space that don't have this problem? Better, any that are just form-fillable versions of the originals? I ask because my players will want them (they tend to go electronic) though I can print out sheets I suppose.

[g33k]

15 hours ago, rsanford said:

Subscribed. I have been thinking about running a hard sci-fi game soon and since I love BRP (and also because I’m too lazy to learn Traveller), I had planned to use M-Space or maybe Stars Without Number since my group already knows those rule sets. However as I read well regarded sci-fi scenarios (which are frequently for Traveller), I am more and more tempted to use Traveller. Two reasons, first is that some of the best Traveller scenarios I have read seems to rely on a kind of ship design / ship construction mini-game that I think might be hard to emulate in other systems. M-Space has something like that (it’s super cool) but it’s not sufficiently compatible with Traveller that you could easily reverse engineer and leverage the ships found in many Traveller supplements (feel free to correct me if I have it wrong). Which brings me to to my second reason. There is a gigantic, whopping, absolutely insane amount of material available for Traveller. And I am not just talking about adventures / scenarios but also things like ship designs, settings, fanzines and even forums and blogs with mountains of usable ideas and data. With all these riches I might never need to design a Traveller ship again. Last night I spent 3 hours sorting through more than 130 pages of post from Traveller enthusiasts that were trying to reverse engineer the Traveller ship Annic Nova in order to ascertain its backstory. I haven’t seen any other sci-fi game yet that generates that level of fan commitment, game ideas and hooks that I can leverage. It’s very compelling. Now don’t misunderstand, I love BRP and M-Space, but man, there are definitely a lot of reasons to choose Traveller for hardish sci-fi gaming.. 

I'll throw a monkey-wrench into your Helical Phase Converter, and advise you to also look into Eclipse Phase.
It has an absolutely stunning amount of high-quality world-building & fan-engagement.

Plus, the good folks at Posthuman Studios have put the whole damned thing under CreativeCommons license!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eclipse_Phase#Creative_Commons_License 
https://robboyle.info/#eclipse-phase-pdfs
It would be remarkably-easy to create a custom "setting" book for your own game, just cutting & pasting elements of Posthuman publications into your own book... and you could legitimately give it to your players... even print copies of it!

Nothing in the sci-fi realm can match the several decades' lead-time of Traveller, of course; but Trav (afaik) remains burdened with some very 1970's sensibilities, tech assumptions, etc.  EP just "feels" more up-to-date.

Edited April 12, 2023 by g33k

[Baron Wulfraed]

23 hours ago, rsanford said:

Two reasons, first is that some of the best Traveller scenarios I have read seems to rely on a kind of ship design / ship construction mini-game that I think might be hard to emulate in other systems. M-Space has something like that (it’s super cool) but it’s not sufficiently compatible with Traveller that you could easily reverse engineer and leverage the ships found in many Traveller supplements (feel free to correct me if I have it wrong).

Which Traveller variant? I've not kept up with the market (I have the hardcover version based on the original 3 black booklets with many of the black add-on volumes, MegaTraveller, Traveller: the New ErrorEra, and what was sold as "Marc Miller's Traveller"). Ship design rules varied between all of them (and getting a usable ship out of MM'sT was probably very difficult as it went back in time to before the original mileau, so tech levels were lower -- even a TL10 scout ship in MegaTraveller could barely move out of its own way). Heck, original Traveller's lower-model ship computers sound like a perverse hybrid of a TRS-80 and an Atari 2600 (having to swap cartridges to go from course plotting to piloting modes?! I'm surprised they didn't use Apollo era flight computers: wherein the programming was literally hard-wired [wires that went through or around magnetic rings; the bit value depended on if it went through or around the ring] and the only crew access was providing parameters for the fixed program)

Didn't like T:tNE -- my mind just balks at some of the explanations for "Virus" (like -- it physically infects computers using biological components, yet is transmitted via radio!)

Character generation is almost as complex as RuneQuest -- especially when using the service tables that have per-year events for each four-year tour of duty. I think I actually had more fun creating characters and ships than in playing.

Just for giggles (if my R-Pi web-server is reachable):

http://baronwulfraed.microdiversity.freeddns.org/unicorn.htm

http://baronwulfraed.microdiversity.freeddns.org/wr_biog.htm

Edited April 13, 2023 by Baron Wulfraed

[rsanford]

28 minutes ago, Baron Wulfraed said:

Which Traveller variant? I've not kept up with the market (I have the hardcover version based on the original 3 black booklets with many of the black add-on volumes, MegaTraveller, Traveller: the New ErrorEra, and what was sold as "Marc Miller's Traveller"). Ship design rules varied between all of them (and getting a usable ship out of MM'sT was probably very difficult as it went back in time to before the original mileau, so tech levels were lower -- even a TL10 scout ship in MegaTraveller could barely move out of its own way). Heck, original Traveller's lower-model ship computers sound like a perverse hybrid of a TRS-80 and an Atari 2600 (having to swap cartridges to go from course plotting to piloting modes?! I'm surprised they didn't use Apollo era flight computers: wherein the programming was literally hard-wired [wires that went through or around magnetic rings; the bit value depended on if it went through or around the ring] and the only crew access was providing parameters for the fixed program)

Didn't like T:tNE -- my mind just balks at some of the explanations for "Virus" (like -- it physically infects computers using biological components, yet is transmitted via radio!)

Character generation is almost as complex as RuneQuest -- especially when using the service tables that have per-year events for each four-year tour of duty. I think I actually had more fun creating characters and ships than in playing.

Just for giggles (if my R-Pi web-server is reachable):

http://baronwulfraed.microdiversity.freeddns.org/unicorn.htm

http://baronwulfraed.microdiversity.freeddns.org/wr_biog.htm

Well, since I have been “mostly” reading scenarios / adventures that I plan to run in M-Space, they could be for any variant of Traveller, however 90% of the stuff I’m reading (particularly ship design stuff) is for classic Traveller (3,black books). Mongoose has a good bit of stuff out there for thru version but classic Traveller has way more. Note I am thinking of buying Pirates of Drinax from Mongoose though. Sounds to good to pass up!

[Bilharzia]

I don't think you have a choice. If there's interest from your players in M-Space and you want to try something new then it seems like a no-brainer to me .... run it! I don't get the relevance of other people's preferences. If it works for you and your group, great, if you you all hate it, great, there are a million other rpgs to try out. Outside of concrete game design principles like "I only play rpgs with classes and levels" or "I hate narrative dice" there is not a lot other people can meaningfully say about choices between rpgs, it's very much by feeling and tastes of the players.

I am not sure Traveller's vast quantity of material is necessarily an asset if that material is not of interest to the group. Mothership has practically nothing but people want to play it because it evokes the mood they are interested it (SF horror?). When I look at Traveller's stuff I feel about the same as I do looking at Harn - I'm sure there's a lot there, and it's a lot of "stuff" that I have no interest in.

[PoppySeed45]

1 hour ago, Bilharzia said:

Outside of concrete game design principles like "I only play rpgs with classes and levels" or "I hate narrative dice" there is not a lot other people can meaningfully say about choices between rpgs, it's very much by feeling and tastes of the players.

Well, I must disagree here, if only because, as I person describes what they like or don't, they might describe something for me to think about, or to care about, or to realize will happen (for example, I love Burning Wheel to pieces, but character generation isn't short; even an experienced "burner" takes at least 30 minutes or more to do a character, and that's only if you have a strong idea about the character; it often takes an entire 4-hour sitting to do one, at least the last three times I did it in groups of 3-4 people, even when 2 of them where already experienced with BW. Contrast with something like BRP in most incarnations or even Mythras). So, if I had a person asking about BW, I'd say it's awesome, but character generation can be long (and fun, as my last one was two months ago) but there's no way it's short and pithy, which is the sort of thing and experienced player/GM might know before one jumps in.

Anyway, the group and I talked and they've already decided to give it a try, so we are! Which is why I'm hunting for form-fillable character sheets, though the one which is on Frostbyte's site is actually bad (to wit, the Gear and Background boxes start in the middle for me, and I can't go to other lines; I tried on my phone in Adobe Reader and that was okay for some reason, but not on my computer).

[Ian Absentia]

Just to complicate the discussion...

"Traveller" is defined by:
A) a set of game mechanics
B) a published setting
C) a conceptual style of gaming
D) A and C
E) other

M-Space will comfortably handle B and C for you, convert from A and D with minimal fuss, and quite possibly manage E depending on where you're taking it.  I'm glad to hear that you and your group decided to go with it.  Enjoix!

!i!

Edited April 13, 2023 by Ian Absentia

[PoppySeed45]

27 minutes ago, Ian Absentia said:

Just to complicate the discussion...

"Traveller" is defined by:
A) a set of game mechanics
B) a published setting
C) a conceptual style of gaming
D) A and C
E) other

M-Space will comfortably handle B and C for you, convert from A and D with minimal fuss, and quite possibly manage E depending on where you're taking it.  I'm glad to hear that you and your group decided to go with it.  Enjoix!

!i!

True! It's mostly B and C we need anyway; it's the mechanics that are "lacking" for my players that's the issue (also, I completely forgot about Circles; that'll fit well with our initial idea, though I plan to do a Fate style Game/Setting Creation, so that will focus us as we head into the game).

REALLY looking forward to this! I've had M-Space a long time and never played the damn thing. now it's time...

[Atgxtg]

1 hour ago, Ian Absentia said:

Just to complicate the discussion...

"Traveller" is defined by:
A) a set of game mechanics
B) a published setting
C) a conceptual style of gaming
D) A and C
E) other

M-Space will comfortably handle B and C for you, convert from A and D with minimal fuss, and quite possibly manage E depending on where you're taking it.  I'm glad to hear that you and your group decided to go with it.  Enjoix!

!i!

Not to mention which version of Traveller:  Original Traveller, MegaTraveller, Traveller: 2300, Mongoose Traveller, T5, Mongoose Traveller 2nd Edition, Mongoose Traveller 2300 AD, Cepheus, etc.

 

[Atgxtg]

1 hour ago, PoppySeed45 said:

REALLY looking forward to this! I've had M-Space a long time and never played the damn thing. now it's time...

Well then that's the thing and the rest doesn't really matter. 

All RPGs have various features that can appeal to someone or discourage someone from playing, and those features vary from person to person. The important thing is to find one that you want to play, and this is especially true if you are the one who is going to have to GM. The GM needs to be enthusiastic about the game or it will fail. So if you got your heart set on running M-SPACE go with it.

 

Now as to why I think someone would prefer to run M-SPACE over Traveller:

• M-SPACE is BRP realted and migh be preferable to someone who likes BRP
• M-SPACE gives characters more skills in chargen as well as more control over chargern (which might be critical for a small group-imagine a Traveller game where no one can pilot a ship).
• M-SPACE is more open ended as far as setting goes, which might appeal to a GM who wants to do thier own thing (although a GM isn't forced to use the Traveller setting and Cephus is more open ended, but then the setting is part of Traveller's appeal.

Edited April 13, 2023 by Atgxtg

[DreadDomain]

19 minutes ago, Atgxtg said:

Not to mention which version of Traveller:  Original Traveller, MegaTraveller, Traveller: 2300, Mongoose Traveller, T5, Mongoose Traveller 2nd Edition, Mongoose Traveller 2300 AD, Cepheus, etc.

 

Not to mention GURPS Traveller for wish an impressive amount of material has been published if the setting is of interest. 

[Atgxtg]

23 minutes ago, DreadDomain said:

Not to mention GURPS Traveller for wish an impressive amount of material has been published if the setting is of interest. 

Eeek! I missed one! 😁

Well, more than one, as I also forgot Traveller :The New Era, GURPS Traveller: Interstellar Wars, and and Hero Traveller.

I glossed over the whole original 3 book Traveller vs. Traveller with expanded Chargen which was a thing back in the day. Not to mention with and without Snapshot., which was also a big thing way back. The game system has a lot of variations. 

 

 

Edited April 13, 2023 by Atgxtg

[Ian Absentia]

2 hours ago, PoppySeed45 said:

True! It's mostly B and C we need anyway; it's the mechanics that are "lacking" for my players that's the issue...

If converting from existing Traveller resources is a concern (depending on the brand of "Traveller" as noted above) here are some notes from someone who went the M-Space route with The Pirates of Drinax campaign:

https://elruneblog.blogspot.com/2020/03/converting-pirates-of-drinax-to-m-space.html

!i!

[PoppySeed45]

6 hours ago, Ian Absentia said:

If converting from existing Traveller resources is a concern (depending on the brand of "Traveller" as noted above) here are some notes from someone who went the M-Space route with The Pirates of Drinax campaign:

https://elruneblog.blogspot.com/2020/03/converting-pirates-of-drinax-to-m-space.html

!i!

I read that one! Very interesting. I also downloaded the ship conversion, just to have something on hand (that's the one advantage of Mongoose Traveller HG; lots of premade ships and deckplans, which are useful for players visualizing things).

[Baron Wulfraed]

7 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

Eeek! I missed one! 😁

Well, more than one, as I also forgot Traveller :The New Era, GURPS Traveller: Interstellar Wars, and and Hero Traveller.

Also one I thought I mentioned Marc Miller's Traveller.

Even GDW dropped "Traveller" from the 2300 franchise, renaming it to just 2300 AD as it was just too different. (Stutterwarp,  or whatever it was called, anybody?)

[rsanford]

16 hours ago, Ian Absentia said:

If converting from existing Traveller resources is a concern (depending on the brand of "Traveller" as noted above) here are some notes from someone who went the M-Space route with The Pirates of Drinax campaign:

https://elruneblog.blogspot.com/2020/03/converting-pirates-of-drinax-to-m-space.html

!i!

Thanks Ian, for that link. It was a great article and though it led to me making a three hour deep dive on things related to Traveller, it was all very useful. I’m going to check out Pirates if Drinax today and will likely buy it to run in M-Space.

[Atgxtg]

9 hours ago, Baron Wulfraed said:

Also one I thought I mentioned Marc Miller's Traveller.

 

Wasn't that the same as T5? Or did Marc do multiple games?

9 hours ago, Baron Wulfraed said:

Even GDW dropped "Traveller" from the 2300 franchise, renaming it to just 2300 AD as it was just too different. (Stutterwarp,  or whatever it was called, anybody?)

I thought they changed the nameto prevent people from confusing it with Traveller, or thinking that it was a supplement for Traveller, or comtible with Traveller the way Mongosse's Traveller 2300 AD is today.. The Humans in 2300AD were not Traveller's Solomani, there was no Imperium, and the basic game mechanics were not compatible although similar. Stutterwarp (yup, that was the term) was basically a Jump-2 drive (well, Jump 2.362 to be precise). 

2300 was sort of the black sheep of the Traveller line. Mechanically it think it was one of the better games, and it was a real hard Sci-Fi setting, which is a rarity, but it was distict from GDW's other stuff. It also appeared to suffer a bit of condusion over what it was supposed to be. Orginally it was a sort of a exploration/proto-Traveller game, then it turned into a war against the Kafer, ala Starship Troppers, then it got a bit like Aliens with the Marine and their gear, and towards the end it was going Cyberpunk. 

 

 

Anyway back to the main topic, it really comes down to what people want to play and why. Assuming the players want and expect the same things from a game then that is the one to go with. So how the players feel about each game, and what they expect from it is the key thing. 

[Ian Absentia]

22 hours ago, Ian Absentia said:

If converting from existing Traveller resources is a concern (depending on the brand of "Traveller" as noted above) here are some notes from someone who went the M-Space route with The Pirates of Drinax campaign...

Ha.  I just realised that there's a whole thread about this right here in the Mythras forum:

Pictures and everything!

!i!

[Baron Wulfraed]

13 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

Wasn't that the same as T5? Or did Marc do multiple games?

I always counted that as #4 in the sequence: Traveller, MegaTraveller, Traveller: the New Era, ... So does Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traveller_(role-playing_game)#Editions and predates the GURPS version

 

[ThornPlutonius]

Traveller 2300 and 2300AD are not actually Traveller.  They are future follow-ups to GDW's Twilight 2000 game.  2300AD was released to both include errata and explicitly remove the implied association with Traveller.

Traveller 5 is a successor/evolution of Marc Miller's Traveller 4.  Traveller 5 is the current Far Future Enterprise's version of Traveller.  It is my understanding that Mongoose Traveller was supposed to be a slimmed-down edition of T5, but Miller took so long to bring T5 out that Mongoose went with an update/interpretation of Classic Traveller to make use of their license.

[Baron Wulfraed]

Non sequitur: This entire thread is dangerous... I've just dumped $240 into four of the Mongoose volumes (core, high guard, both aliens) and suspect I'll want to add a few others (3rd Imperium -- since a quick glance indicates the core is rather setting neutral, equipment catalog, and maybe one basic scenario as I'm not up to creating a campaign [I've always been a player, not GM] and try to get family into it).

Character generation looks somewhat confusing (in comparison to the tables in original Traveller with the career specific expansion volumes/MegaTraveller). And some confusion in ship computers too (page 161 first mentions "computer/5bis" for basic type-S scout, but next paragraph refers to a "Model 1/bis". The smallest computer listed on page 181 is the "computer/5" -- leaving this one to assume that "model 1" is a typo carried over from original Traveller or that one should take the computer/# and divide # by 5 to get equivalent "model").

My apologies for the Traveller focus in an M-Space thread: I'm at least familiar with T1-T4, and Mongoose fits the earlier ones in that series better. Wonder how badly I'd have to stretch things to recreate the type-SN Elusive Unicorn 🥴