GURPS Traveller: The Interstellar Wars

Many people loved GURPS Traveller, and the line for the 3rd edition of the game was complete - with some books written by the game's original designers. To many, this is when Traveller 'felt real,' and they really felt immersed in the setting and stars. The GURPS rules 'felt more real' than the 2d6 game, and people got lost in this universe with an intense immersion.

You can get all the books in PDF these days, but the best 4th Edition book (with character creation support in GURPS Character Assistant) is the epic GURPS Traveller: The Interstellar Wars. This is a combination 4th Edition GURPS Traveller update with complete rules for exploration, creating ships, characters, starship combat, and the complete Traveller experience for GURPS in one book. It is like the final hurrah to the GURPS Traveller line and the only update we got for the combined games in the 4th Edition.

This is a Terra-focused book set in 2,170 in the Empty Peace before the 4th Frontier War. All future events are off the table; the universe's future is yours to shape. The official Traveller game is set thousands of years into the future, about 3,453 years until we get to the current Mongoose Traveller 2nd Edition game.

And I have never really realized that until now.

Comparatively, Interstellar Wars is only about 147 years from today's date, so all the current pop culture, music, and movies are still around. This is a huge difference, and if you want to be cruising around in your scout ship listening to Snoop Dogg, Interstellar Wars is the place to do it. You will be playing as Terrans, so wreck history, blast heavy metal music, recite movie quotes, and conquer the stars.

Granted, all that high-tech stuff in current-day Traveller is science-fiction compared to this setting. The limit is tech-level 10, and TL 11 is still 70 years away, but it comes as fast as the players can influence events and push things along. Jump-2 is the limit, so some stars are off-limits, and travel is slow. You are also mostly getting the classic projectile and backpack laser weapons; there are no fusion guns or crazy weapons here.

Again, the future is not set in stone. If you want to use the Bio-Tech book, go ahead. Supers? Why not? Develop tech along the lines of Ultra-Tech instead of the Traveller timeline? Go ahead! Use the Psis book, Martial Arts, or Horror. Use the Furries book for aliens. Put new aliens in the universe! Make a third evil empire attack!  Let the players invent Jump-3! The next big war does not have to happen, but the setting gets the ball rolling with a closed border between stars, lots of intrigue, and the secret buildup of military forces on the Imperial side.

Whatever happens is up to you.

This is your game.

The fantastic thing about this setting is it still feels like Traveller, but it is a more approachable, Earth-oriented, modern-day sort of setting. The overall "space" is small, focusing just on Earth and the surrounding systems, yet still ample enough that you can declare every side of the map as "uncharted space" to have room to randomly generate star systems and explore instead of jetting around the central conflict. You can even bend history a bit and say the core Imperial worlds have a lot of unexplored distance between here and there, and establish a single arm of stars as the transit point for the Imperium and make all the surrounding space unexplored.

So both sides can do exploration if they want and ignore everything.

You don't need all the high-tech TL15 stuff to have a great game with infinite possibilities. This setting feels very close to how we envisioned things in 1977 when we first picked the game up, sort of a blend of 1950s sci-fi, retro-future, Earth-focused, guns in space, Outland and Alien sort of experience.

The book has a few omissions, such as using GURPS Basic Set for weapons and no vehicles or conversion notes. The equipment section feels light. The system generation system is missing gas giants. The book goes the distance but falls a few steps short where it matters. If you have the PDFs for the original GURPS Traveller, you already have much of this stuff (but for the 3rd Edition).

The ship design and combat system feel strong and are great material for a TL 10 campaign - and could even serve as the starship rules for any TL 10 science fiction game using GURPS. This could be lifted and used in a GURPS Star Frontier game as-is.

Don't ignore this setting because it isn't mainline Traveller and doesn't have all the high-tech stuff. Enjoy it for the near-future Earth we could be heading towards and all the unique possibilities you can explore from there. Or play a more intimate trading and exploration game and ignore all the politics and could-be stuff. You may make first contact with a race nobody ever knew about, ones you invent or pull from other games. You can fight or be space pirates against any side you wish. You can just play a scientist on one planet full of ancient ruins.

The micro-adventure in this game is impressive, especially when combined with GURPS.

And the future is all yours.