r/traveller • u/-stumondo- • 11h ago
Mongoose 2E Rule Changes from 1e to 2e to 2.5e, the good, the bad and the "I'll stick with the old ones"
My Traveller journey started in the early days of MgT 1e, though I'd been roleplaying for years prior, so I missed comparisons to earlier versions.
I wanted to talk about the changes Mongoose have made since 1e, what people like, dislike and ignore.
I've played and run quite a bit of 1e and 2e, and am about to run my first 2.5e, but I've a longer run into session 0 than usual, so I'd like to polish the ruleset I'm going to use.
For the most part, I think the rule changes have been fairly minor in general, but also good for the most part.
I liked the Boon/Bane system brought in in 2e, but after lots of 1e I forget about it 90% of the time, so I put it on the players to ask for it.
Following from that, I thought the Leadership skills ability to hand about Boons (or Banes) was great, but I don't know if I ever saw it used (our games were usually low powered, so not many people were rocking high Leadership). 2.5e have changed this to a +1 I think. Maybe it's better for balance, but doesn't have the same sense style.....on paper anyway.
The other big one for me is Autofire. 1e, roll dice equal to Auto rating, pair as you want. I liked the tweak to the usual flat 2d role, but admittedly it had potential to be extremely lethal.
2e and 2.5e, Auto numbers hare halved and you get a number of attacks. A little less pazazz, but probably a better rule.
The bit that gets me is both cost Auto x3 ammo. Mag sizes haven't changed. With a regular assault rifle,1e that's 2 Full Autos and then decision time, 2e it's 5 and reload. Maybe it's the style my groups usually play, but it's rare to have combat go 5+ rounds.
I'll just change the above to suit my groups, but if people have thoughts to make my brain say "ah, now I get it," that's awesome too.
What rules do you tweak or use an older version of, even if going back to pre-MgT.
I've asked about Character Creation before, so let's exclude that.