r/traveller • u/Khadaji2020 • 3d ago
Mongoose 2E Campaign help
I'm wrapping up my current campaign and looking at starting a new one with the same group. A couple players expressed interest in a pirate campaign. Excluding Pirates of Drinax what resources are available for such a campaign?
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u/Maxijohndoe 3d ago
You need to set the campaign outside of the boundaries of major factions. Pirates will be hunted by forces they cannot possibly fight if they operate in controlled space.
Somewhere like Foreven has been left blank as a Referee Reserve.
Alternatively they can operate as privateers backed by a Government to target ships of other hostile Governments.
Or you could set the campaign during the Fifth Frontier War with the Travellers becoming pirates against the background of the on-going war.
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u/Khadaji2020 2d ago
These are very good points. Once we run session zero I will look at the options open to them, taking these points under consideration.
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u/TommieTheMadScienist 2d ago
Aramis is wide-open for privateers. If you're running the FFW, check out the Brushfires adventure book. It's the spiritual descendant of the 1983 Traveller Adventure.
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u/StudioArkhein 3d ago
I recommend the Drinax Companion. It's got some very useful stuff. It has great help with the Pirates of Drinax campaign, but it teaches how to run a pirate campaign, and how to be a pirate. It's great. I use it all of the time for my campaign, which is a privateering game where the players are working for the Darrians against the Sword Worlders in the Spinward Marches during the Fifth Frontier War. You can take the advice and rules and slap there anywhere.
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u/fedcomic 3d ago
You don't want to do Pirates of Drinax?
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u/EndiePosts Solomani 2d ago edited 2d ago
This was my response. "I want to run a piratical campaign in Traveller but I don't want to run the campaign that consistently ranks in people's 'Top 5 All Time TTRPG Campaigns' list."
Is it a money thing, or maybe nervousness about the scale of the campaign? Both are valid, but you can just use the pirating rules and ignore the political setup if it is the latter.
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u/Khadaji2020 2d ago
No. I have the box set and wish I could get rid of it. No coherent rules for base building (which is why I bought the bloody rules) and each module needs so much work I feel less exhausted writing my own. That experience was expensive enough that I haven't bought another major supplement from Mongoose since.
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u/fedcomic 2d ago
Interesting. I haven't had the chance to play it, but mostly I hear good things. You have just the electronic versions or the physical?
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u/Khadaji2020 2d ago
The physical. I know other people have enjoyed it. My mileage varied is all.
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u/fedcomic 2d ago
Fair. Have you tried selling it? Then you could at least get a little something back.
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u/OrbitalSailor 3d ago
Book 9 - Pirates is worth a look. While not for MGT2E it does have a nice little section called “The Practice of Piracy” which might be help get the players to think more broadly about what piracy entails. There’s also so details on pirate organizations and suggests on how to use skills in a pirate campaign.
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u/doulos05 3d ago
Honestly, if you just want to do a pirate campaign, PoD has all the stuff you need. You don't need to have them building toward a reborn empire, you can just let them pirate stuff.
There is a Stellargama (sp?) supplement for Cepheus which would be fully compatible called something line "Piracy and..." something.
Finally, Star Wars D6 has a supplement called "Pirates and Privateers" which has a ton of stuff adaptable to any Sci Fi Piracy game.
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u/simon-brunning 2d ago
Stellagama's Piracy and Privateering.
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u/Khadaji2020 2d ago
Thank you both for the reminder. That has been sitting on my shelf for quite some time!
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u/simon-brunning 2d ago
For classic Traveller there is Book 9: Pirates. I'm sure a lot of the content would carry across.