A Guide to Minsk

The Minsk mainworld. Planetary data courtesy of the Solomani Ministry of Information (1099).

The Reavers led by Admiral Pranee Roydon had sacked at least eight worlds of the Terran Mercantile Community before turning spinward in -1457. When her rag-tag fleet entered the Minsk system she expected to find easy pickings. Instead, she found her doom. —The Savage Main: Dark Nebula and Magyar Sectors, 3rd Ed. Farstar Publishing (Marlheim: 1095).

Minsk (Magyar 1512 C7319BB-C). Amber Zone. High Population, Non-Agricultural, Poor. Capital of the New Slavic Solidarity, a member-state of the Solomani Confederation.

Minsk has successfully defended itself against would-be raiders and conquerors for over 3,000 years of recorded history. The inhabitants are notably stubborn, independent, and wary of outsiders—but also industrious, innovative, and fiercely loyal to their friends. The Slavs generally do not hold to the racial prejudices common within the Confederation, and non-Solomani travellers should find Solidat worlds relatively safe and accommodating destinations.

System Data

The Minsk system is located in the Minsky Cluster, an astrographic grouping of twenty-six systems located in Eery (B), New Town (F), and Voyager (G) subsectors of Magyar. The Cluster is located entirely within the borders of the Solomani Confederation.

Primary Mati. Spectral Class F2 V. Mass 1.48 M☉. Stellar Radius 1.67 R☉. 100 Diameter Limit 1.55 AU. Luminosity 6.0 L☉. Absolute Magnitude +2.793.

Minsk System Navigation Data

Orbit	Name	UWP	Remarks
Primary	Mati	F2 V
1	Pirsi	YDB0000-0	Tz
2	Zodino	YA30000-0
3	Grodno	Y901000-0
5	Minsk	C7319BB-C	Hi Na Po Cp Pz
8	Aposni	YDB5000-0
IS Form 11		Star System Data

The Minsk system has no planetoid belts or gas giants; the mainworld is the only significant source of fuel and the only inhabited planet. This allows Minsk defense forces to concentrate on defending a single world. Belters work the distant Kuiper Belt for supplemental sources of water, and fuel tankers regularly shuttle between the mainworld and the extreme outer system.

Minsk has a small, irregular moon, Kameshek, approximately 97 km in diameter with a striking red color due to the presence of sulphur on the surface. The moon has a highly eccentric orbit at approximately 27,000 km. Minsk maintains a small planetary navy base on Kameshek with a fuel depot and repair facilities.

The Minsk-Mati L4 Lagrange point, popularly known as Witness Point, serves as a grim warning to any travellers entering the system. Over the centuries the Slavs have towed the shattered hulls of all felled raiders and invaders to this location, which is now filled with ancient wrecks, swirling junk, and desiccated corpses.

Planetary Data

Mean Orbital Radius 382.97 million km (2.56 AU). Period 768 days 14h 53m. Rotation Period 16h 50m 24s. Axial Inclination 16° 19′ 12″. Diameter 10,658 km. Mass 0.60 M🜨. Density 5.7 g/cm³. Mean Surface Gravity 0.86g. Escape Velocity 9,474 m/s. Surface Atmospheric Pressure 0.345 atm. Composition Very thin oxygen nitrogen. Hydrographic Percentage 12%. Mean Surface Temperature 6.42° C.

Minsk is a cool, dry, medium-sized planet with only a very thin oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere. There is no native life and most Terran plants can only be grown in domed habitats.

The planet’s major waterbodies are all grouped in a single hemisphere. The largest waterbody, the Severny Sea, is located in the northern hemisphere while the smaller Yuzhny and Vuzki seas are in the southern hemisphere.

Most settlements are clustered around these waterbodies. Because water is relatively rare within the system, Minsk has extensive water recycling systems onworld. The dry hemisphere, known as the Minsk Outback, is largely uninhabited beyond scattered mining settlements.

World Map Grid
World Name (and UWP) Minsk C7319BB-C	Subsector and Sector Location of World New Town/Magyar
Date of Preparation 113-1102	Hexagon Scale (km) 1,005
IS Form 8-G	Size 7 World Map Grid

Socio-Political Data

Total World Population 4.43 billion. Primary Cities Tsentr, 232 million; Korolya, 159 million; Fedorov, 67 million; Kir, 53 million; Yermolai, 47 million. World Government Non-Charismatic Dictator (Minsk Implementing Committee). Law Level Extreme (rigid control of civilian movement). Tech Level Average Stellar (C). Primary Trade Goods Raw ores and crystals, processed metals, and manufactured parts, durables, and consumables.

Novislav (Language)

The official language of the New Slavic Solidarity, a descendant of several ancient Terran languages, including Russian, Polish, Hungarian, and others from the Eastern European region. Novislav is notable for preserving use of the Cyrillic alphabet, which is nearly unknown outside of the Solomani Sphere. On Solidat worlds without Slavic populations, other ethnically derived languages are common.

Terran émigrés from various Eastern European nation-states, fleeing the cultural hegemony of the Terran Confederation, first settled the Minsky Cluster during the Interstellar Wars. These unsanctioned and unsupported colonies initially struggled with harsh conditions and relatively low technology levels, but eventually stabilized and began expanding to new systems. By -2000 Minsk was colonized by the neighboring garden world of Ogorod (Magyar 1411) and soon grew into an industrial center for the Cluster.

During the Long Night, Reavers and Aslan terrorized the Cluster with threats of devastating raids. Fortunately, the worlds of the Cluster had retained a small fleet of jump-capable ships and organized themselves into a mutual defense and trade coalition. The coalition proved highly effective at staving off raiders and developed a reputation for its unwavering defense of Cluster worlds—a reputation that remains intact today.

This coalition was formalized in the landmark Minsk Treaty of -1377, which laid out the constitutional foundations of a Slavic multi-world polity. The principal architect of the Treaty, Zoya Gorodok, is widely considered the mother of the modern Solidarity.

The coalition preserved trade and cultural links that gave rise to an entirely new Neoslavic identity, an amalgamation of disparate Eastern European cultures and languages. Slavic culture exhibits an extremely high level of social cooperativeness and emphasizes self-sacrifice and civic duty.

The Slavs emerged from the Long Night as the Neoslavic Bloc, a multi-world polity strong enough to stand against the Aslan clans or other Magyar states. The Bloc, valuing its hard-won independence, spurned overtures from both the Third Imperium and the reinvigorated Old Earth Union. While the Slavic worlds never joined the Imperium, they would become signatories to the Solomani Charter of Confederation in 871: the Slavs considered the Confederation an important counterbalance to the Aslan clans to spinward and the Imperial megacorporations to trailing.

The New Slavic Solidarity was established in 892 with a constitution that preserved the independence of member worlds as well as its citizens’ civil liberties. The Solidarity has generally rejected the racial policies of the Solomani Movement and welcomes non-Slavic, non-Solomani, and even non-Humans into their communities. The Solidarity also extends protections to clones and synthetics.

The Slavic-Dootchen Wars

The Slavic and Dootchen worlds have probably launched hundreds of cross-border raids and engaged in dozens of low-intensity conflicts over the years. But they have also fought three full-blown wars since the end of the Long Night:

First Slavic-Dootchen War (337–338). Tralp opened this war with a surprise invasion of the Minsky Cluster, quickly capturing Nethery (1612), Namedih (1713), and Headley (1714) before entering the Minsk system. Tralp forces landed on the mainworld and quickly seized the city of Kir but became bogged down in a brutal nine month siege of Tsentr. Only the intervention of the Old Earth Union broke the stalemate.

Second Slavic-Dootchen War (784–787). During the Solomani Autonomous Region period the Dootchen Estates launched a lightning offensive through Nethery (1612), Roblig (1513), and Zhenya (1412), finally capturing the Slavic breadbasket of Ogorod (1411). Over the next 26 months the Slavs conducted a grinding counter-offensive that steadily drove the Dootchens back, recapturing Namedih (1713) and Headley (1714) before Tralp sued for peace.

Third Slavic-Dootchen War (1073). The Reformed Dootchen Estates, still recovering from the Solomani Rim War, quickly grabbed Namedih (1713) and Headley (1714) but encountered stiff Solidat resistance on Nethery (1612). After nearly 6 months of intense ground fighting, Solidat Major General Iliana Mugato skillfully negotiated a cease-fire before Confederation Army forces arrived.

The Solidarity is wary of increasing interference by the Solomani Confederation government in Solidat internal affairs. While the Solidarity maintains strong relations with the Wuan Technology Association, they have clashed repeatedly with the neighboring Dootchen Estates. Despite the Solidarity’s smaller population, its higher technology level and superior organization have generally allowed it to hold its own in these conflicts. The Solidats are repelled by the Estates’ use of chattel slavery and have provided safe haven to escaped bondmen.

As of 1100 Minsk is the Solidat capital and contains approximately 60% of the Solidarity’s population. Like all Solidat worlds Minsk has an exemplary civil defense system, able to quickly respond to military invasions as well as natural disasters ranging from viral pandemics to earthquakes to asteroid strikes. General Secretary Wolfe reportedly used Minsk as his model for the Solomani Home Guard system.

Minsk civil authorities are engaged in near constant planning and drills in anticipation of various emergencies. The entire planet is honeycombed with fortified shelters said to be stocked with enough food and medical supplies to sustain the entire population for years.

The Solidats are extremely wary of electronic communication systems, and use only hardened, distributed networks that are resistant to hacking or datacaster attacks. These relatively primitive systems also limit the ability of Solomani Security to monitor Solidat citizens.

Although not classified as an industrial world, Minsk has abundant deposits of ores and crystals and remains a manufacturing center for the Solidarity. Approximately 7 million tons of cargo and 300,000 passengers pass through the Minsk starport per year; most of this traffic consists of Solidat flagged ships. The Class C highport, Lida Station, contains a Solidat museum commemorating the most storied defenders from Minsk history.

Minsk is ruled by an overwhelmingly popular Implementing Committee, which directs the agencies of the world government. The mainworld has a relatively high law level that can feel constraining to outsiders: even minor anti-social behaviors can incur civil penalties ranging from fines to incarceration. Minsk citizens are generally able to navigate these regulations without significant problems, but the mainworld has an Amber Zone travel advisory to alert unwary travellers.

The Congress of the New Slavic Sodality is located in the city of Tsentr. The current Premier of the Solidarity, Tamara Mironova, is a charismatic leader who has held the office since 1098.

Military Data

Solidat Integration

Normally, military units in the Confederation are segregated between Solomani and non-Solomani personnel. The Solidarity, however, has rejected these racial prejudices even though a substantial proportion of the Solidat population are pure strain Solomani. The Solidat military does not segregate military units by race or species, so mixed-heritage Humans serve alongside Solomani, uplifted Apes and Dolphins, and even Aslan. As such, Solidat units are rarely deployed outside New Town subsector.

The Solidarity has a long and distinguished military tradition that stretches from the Long Night to present day. As a loyal member-state of the Confederation, the Solidarity is allowed to maintain and direct the combined military forces for all sixteen Solidat worlds. The Army of the New Slavic Solidarity, with headquarters on Minsk, consists of four TL9 field armies, three TL11 field armies, and two TL13 field armies, along with approximately three times that number in Home Guard Army reserve units. These forces generally remain within Solidarity space unless activated by the Confederation. Minsk also hosts the Solidat Military Academy for Planetary Actions.

Minsk sponsors two Solidat armies as well as six Home Guard armies. With assistance from the Solidat and Confederation governments, Minsk maintains all of its military forces at TL13, the median level for regular Confederation units. The mainstays of the Solidat armies are the Bucephalus grav armored infantry fighting vehicle and the Ziska medium grav tank. In 1096 Minsk armored units began employing the TL13 Kolesnitsa light grav tank. Designed and manufactured by Roblig Military Industries, the Kolesnitsa is relatively cheap to produce at a common Solomani technology level and as such has drawn the interest of Confederation Army planners.

The Minsk Combined Arms Army includes the 404th "Double Eagle" Armored Infantry Division and 280th "White Star" Rifle (lift infantry) Division. These elite units are backed by 14 lift infantry divisions, 3 grav tank divisions, and 2 armored infantry divisions.

The Minsk Tank Army comprises the 331st "Mother Bear" Armored Infantry Division and the 176th "Blue Banner" Tank Division. These elite units are backed by 9 lift infantry divisions, 8 grav tank divisions, 2 armored infantry divisions, and 1 lift cavalry division.

The four elite Minsk divisions also double as regular Confederation Army units, with approximately half the troops drawn from across the Confederation—with many originating from the non-Solidat world of Ekar (Magyar 1018 C7839DE-8). The Confederation Army maintains its New Town subsector headquarters on Minsk.

The Solidat Navy consists of five TL13 squadrons, largely composed of Rim War-era ships. The Minsk Squadron is anchored by 4 Minsk-class heavy cruisers and 6 Tau Ceti-class destroyers, plus support ships. Although the ships are old they are extremely well maintained and each carries a long and illustrious history of service.

The Minsk Home Guard Navy consists of twenty wings of Viper-class fighters, four wings of Orekh-class 300-ton SDBs, two wings of Oplot-class 600-ton SDBs, and twenty Valiant-class 3,000-ton monitors.

Any invasion force that overcame Minsk’s naval defenses would then have to contend with the planetary Close Orbit and Airspace Control Command (COACC), which is largely controlled by the Minsk Home Guard Army. The Home Guard is divided into four lift infantry armies and two grav tank armies, with two divisions on active duty at all times.

Minsk COACC forces include four wings of Orekh-class SDBs, two wings of orbital patrol fighters, and scores of Strazh-class robotic orbital battle stations. COACC units also man Minsk’s numerous deep meson gun sites and mobile laser and plasma gun batteries, as well as the mainworld’s formidable missile defense system. The Solidats have developed deadly TL12 Strelka kinetic kill (KK) missiles that utilize kinetic rather than explosive energy, and are able to destroy even heavily armored targets in far orbit.

Copyright Information

The Traveller game in all forms is owned by Far Future Enterprises. Copyright © 1977 – 2020 Far Future Enterprises. Traveller is a registered trademark of Far Future Enterprises. Far Future permits web sites and fanzines for this game, provided it contains this notice, that Far Future is notified, and subject to a withdrawal of permission on 90 days notice. The contents of this site are for personal, non-commercial use only. Any use of Far Future Enterprises’s copyrighted material or trademarks anywhere on this web site and its files should not be viewed as a challenge to those copyrights or trademarks. In addition, any program/articles/file on this site cannot be republished or distributed without the consent of the author who contributed it.

Materials produced by Digest Group Publications (DGP) are copyright © Roger Sanger. Any use of Digest Group Publications’ copyrighted material or trademarks anywhere on this Web site and its files should not be viewed as a challenge to those copyrights. Usage is intended to follow the guidelines announced by Roger Sanger on the Traveller Mailing List for preserving the overall Traveller milieu.

The Terran Trade Authority, Traveller, and Setting Greebles

When I was a kid, one of the big retail stores near my house (maybe Kmart?) had a bargain bin for books. I was particularly drawn to the disorganized piles of large, glossy, science fiction books. I killed a lot of time there gawking at color illustrations of starships, space battles, and weird aliens. Eventually I was able to acquire a few of these titles, which were mostly from Steven Caldwell’s Galactic Encounters series.

Caldwell would use repurposed sci-fi paintings to illustrate a classic space opera setting of his own creation. I spent an enormous amount of time reading and re-reading these books, and my two favorites were probably Aliens in Space (1979) and Worlds at War (1980).

I particularly loved that the books were all written from an in-setting perspective—for example, Aliens in Space is presented as a “real” product of the Federal Data Bureau “to provide a comprehensive service for space travelers.” Even “Steven Caldwell,” as described by the dust jackets, “joined the Federation Security Force in 2393, and quickly rose to the rank of Group 1 Battleforce Commander. During his 15 years of active service he travelled to all parts of the Federation, and was awarded the Andromeda Star for his part in the settlement of the perimeter words.”

This commitment to the in-setting perspective helped foster an immersive experience—the Federation setting felt real and deep—while also leaving open a great deal to the imagination. Because the books were written for in-setting readers, they don’t spend a lot of time providing definitions or explanations of terms or concepts. You are just dropped into this unfamiliar milieu and have to puzzle out what these things mean.

The Galactic Encounters books helped foster my interest in science fiction at a time when the genre was still a bit niche and underrepresented in popular culture. Although science fiction has now thoroughly permeated television and the movies, once upon a time a fan had to look hard for decent science fiction material. So I was a bit surprised to realize, many years later, that the Galactic Encounters series was actually a knock-off of an earlier, much more influential series written by the very same author. Steven Caldwell, it turns out, was a pseudonym for Stewart Cowley, who was the author of the Terran Trade Authority books. 

In an interesting interview, Cowley explains how the TTA series came to be:

I was working as a graphic designer when I had the idea. I was doing work with an illustration agency [that] happened to represent a new generation of brilliant artists working in the SF arena, and I was really excited about their work. The only outlet for their illustrations at the time were paperback covers, but I felt convinced more could be done with the amazing images they were producing.

I persuaded them to loan me file transparencies of art samples and had them stuck on my lightbox for a couple of weeks. I'd look at them every day, trying to think how they could be utilised. Then one day I remembered a book I'd had seen as a child. It was Jane's Fighting Ships—a survey of the world's navies—and it hit me. Spacecraft 2000-2100 AD was born. Being a designer rather than a writer, I tried to find someone to author the project but couldn't find anyone with the same vision as I had. I wanted someone who could not only create specifications for the spacecraft shown, but set them in a believeable historic context.

I was surprised to read that Cowley and many fans consider my beloved Galactic Encounters books to be inferior to the TTA books. Both series have been out-of-print for many years and tend to be fairly expensive, but recently I was able to get my mitts on a good copy of Spacecraft 2000–2100 AD (1978), which was the first and generally considered the best of the TTA line. It’s quite good, and clearly shares plenty of genetic material with the setting described in Galactic Encounters. 

But it also seems to share a lot with the Traveller RPG.

I’ve been unable to find an interview or essay that discusses any relationship between Traveller and the TTA. Certainly both TTA and Traveller draw heavily on a common space opera framework: the TTA war with Proxima, for example, has many echoes with the Traveller Interstellar Wars. Both fictional histories are pretty standard space opera fare: Earth unites to fight off a technologically superior alien invader with determination and innovation

Similarly, if Jane’s Fighting Ships influenced Cowley it obviously influenced Traveller’s supplement 9, Fighting Ships. But I have to wonder if, given the timeframe, perhaps the TTA books had a more direct influence on Traveller designers. The T4 line, for instance, certainly used a lot of Chris Foss art for its covers.

Many Traveller books are at least partially written from an in-setting perspective. Several Traveller game constructs such as the Universal Personality Profile neatly double as in-setting artifacts as well. 

One technique used effectively by both Traveller and the TTA books is what I’ll call Setting Greebles. In modeling, a greeble “is a prominent detailing added to the surface of a larger object that makes it appear more complex, and therefore more visually interesting. It usually gives the audience an impression of increased scale.” 

Think of all the little widgets and doohickies that pepper the hull of the Nostromo or an Imperial Star Destroyer. These things don’t necessarily have a function but look cool and create an illusion of complexity.

Both Traveller and the TTA books are filled with these little setting greebles—small bits of specificity salted into the text to create a sense of verisimilitude. An effective greeble might drop a particular date, or model number, or manufacturer, or world name without any explanation. And I think the more casually and confidently these greebles are presented, the better. Of course the DeVrass Generator opened the road to the stars. Of course the Sylea-class is an Imperial 100,000 ton battleship.

The beauty of a good greeble is it forces a reader to stop in the face of an unfamiliar term and imagine what it might actually denote. The old DGP book Solomani and Aslan (1991) for example, contains an illustration of human variant races that include a “Cassilldan,” an extremely tall figure in loose garb with a sword. No other details are provided and many Traveller fans have speculated about this race over the years. Where are they from? How tall are they really? Why does he have a sword?

An awful lot of Traveller canon has sprung up from writers extrapolating or interpolating details from just a handful of greebles. Sometimes these exercises produce really interesting or innovative material, but sometimes these additional details actually give us too much of a good thing. Part of the magic of a good greeble is its ambiguity: it creates the illusion of a deep and textured setting while simultaneously remaining open and undefined. We can murder this with too much explanation, like a butterfly pinned to a board.

Any published RPG setting has to navigate an inherent tension between giving too much or too little detail. A great setting book should establish what is unique and interesting about the setting and provide tools for a referee to run their own adventures. Too little detail, and the referee may have difficulty understanding the setting well enough to use it in a game: why buy a setting if you are making up everything yourself? But too much detail may overwhelm the referee and be overly constraining.

As demonstrated by TTA, setting greebles can be a highly effective technique for Traveller and other RPG settings. Good setting greebles help readers understand the milieu and instill a sense of verisimilitude—but do not restrict the referee with data dumps of canon.

A Guide to Tralp

The Tralp mainworld. Planetary data courtesy of the Solomani Ministry of Information (1099).

Travellers should carefully weigh the risks before entering any system held by the Reformed Dootchen Estates and in particular the high population world of Tralp. The Travellers’ Aid Society urges Imperial citizens to treat any Confederation world as an Amber Zone and has issued a specific advisory bulletin for the Estates due to its racial purity policies. Non-Human sophonts and non-Solomani Humans may be subject to harassment, detention, and even violence while within its borders. —The Savage Main: Dark Nebula and Magyar Sectors, 3rd Ed. Farstar Publishing (Marlheim: 1095).

Tralp (Magyar 1913 D968998-8). Pre-Rich, High Population. Member of the Reformed Dootchen Estates, a member-state of the Solomani Confederation.

One of the most polarizing worlds in all of Charted Space, Tralp is revered by its admirers and reviled by its critics in almost equal measure. The world is the cultural heart of the Reformed Dootchen Estates, one of the few remaining polities to openly engage in chattel slavery, a practice explicitly outlawed by Article VI of the Imperial Warrant of Restoration. Militaristic and expansionistic, Tralp is championed by racial purity factions of the Solomani Party while condemned as a pariah state by the Imperium.

System Data

The Tralp system is located in the Tralp Cluster, a small astrographic grouping of five stars located in Voyager (G) subsector of Magyar. The Cluster is located only a few parsecs from the Third Imperium, within the borders of the Solomani Confederation.

Primary Moderster. Spectral Class K5 V. Mass 0.65 M☉. Stellar Radius 0.715 R☉. 100 Diameter Limit 0.67 AU. Luminosity 0.17 L☉. Absolute Magnitude +6.65.

Tralp System Navigation Data

Orbit	Name	UWP	Remarks
Primary	Moderster	K5 V
0	Skroi	YBC1000-0	Tz
1	Grood	FC55665-2	Fa Ho Tz
2	Tralp	D968998-8	Hi Pr
	Aitan	F311665-9	Sa
3	Stort	Y9A5569-8	Pe Co
4	Koe	Y000100-7
5	Roi	Size V LGG
6	Gron	Size M SGG
7	Gris	Size P IG
8	Verwerld	H101331-7	Fr
IS Form 11		Star System Data

In addition to the mainworld, the Tralp system features several notable secondary worlds. Grood is a hot, tidally-locked, high gravity farming world orbiting the primary at 0.25 AU. Tralp’s only moon, Aitan, has a Class F spaceport that actually sees more traffic than the primitive Class D downport on the mainworld surface. Stort is a cold, large world with a very thick nitrogen-helium atmosphere, orbiting at 0.77 AU. Tralp uses the world as a dreaded penal colony and Solomani Security is rumored to maintain a black site somewhere onworld.

Planetary Data

Mean Orbital Radius 64.3 million km (0.43 AU). Period 195 days. Rotation Period 35h 47m 24s. Axial Inclination 14° 51′ 66″. Diameter 14,011 km. Mass 1.41 M🜨. Density 5.9 g/cm³. Mean Surface Gravity 1.17g. Escape Velocity 12.722 km/s. Surface Atmospheric Pressure 1.19 atm. Composition standard oxygen-nitrogen. Hydrographic Percentage 84%. Mean Surface Temperature 21.56° C.

The Tralp mainworld is sometimes described as superhabitable: slightly older, larger, wetter, and warmer than Terra, the planet supports a vibrant native ecosystem that is broadly compatible with Terran life. Most of Tralp’s landmass is concentrated in a single supercontinent divided into four distinct subcontinents: Ooslin, Hartlan, and Weslin are generally located in the northern hemisphere, while Berglan is primarily located in the southern hemisphere. Two large islands in the southern hemisphere are often classed as small continents: Dane, located south of Osslin, and Laurika, located south of Weslin. The great, deep Gevarlik Ocean stretches from pole to pole and touches all six continents. The smaller, shallow Hawin Sea lies along the eastern coasts of Hartlan and Berglan and the western coasts of Ooslin and Dane.

All native life on Tralp is water-based, dominated by a diverse and abundant range of plant-like forms that occupy ecological niches similar to Terran plants. Most of these plants utilize a form of photosynthesis and are notable for the vibrant red and purple coloration of their leaves, which give Tralp its distinct appearance. The fertile plains of Hartlan have a variety of grasses, including the iconic savannas of tralpstalk. The equatorial canopy jungles of Dane and western Berglan teem with life.

Tralp has only one phylum of animal life, viervoetia, strange four limbed creatures most closely resembling the Terran starfish. They have hydrostatic skeletons and relatively simple anatomies; many utilize defensive neurotoxins and so are inedible to Terran life. The phylum has proven astonishingly adaptable, producing entire families of burrowers, crawlers, and swimmers. And while Tralp does not appear to have evolved any true fliers, some viervoetia are gliders, able to soar through forested areas.

World Map Grid
World Name (and UWP) Tralp D968998-8	Subsector and Sector Location of World Voyager/Magyar
Date of Preparation 223-1102	Hexagon Scale (km) 1,005
IS Form 8-J	Size 9 World Map Grid

History

Timeline

Year	Event
-2408	The Interstellar Wars begin between Terra and the First Imperium.
-2348	Terrans survey Tralp system.
-2323	Terran Confederation émigrés establish a colony on Tralp.
-2219	End of Interstellar Wars era and defeat of First Imperium.
-2204	Military coup replaces Terran Confederation with the Rule of Man.
-2000	Scattered Terran colonies now well-established throughout Magyar.
-1850	Long Night begins in Magyar as contact is lost with Rule of Man capital.
-1700	Aslan explorers out of Dark Nebula venture into Magyar.
-1690	Terran Mercantile Community established on Terra.
-1500	Long Night deepens. Reaver and Aslan fleets raid throughout Magyar. Tralp seizes Giiri Cluster.
-1400	Tralp institutes racial caste system on its occupied worlds.
-1200	Terran Mercantile Community withdraws from Magyar.
-1120	Aslan Border Wars begin.
-1100	Reaver activity slows and eventually stops.
-500	Tralp establishes a pocket empire. Aslan begin seizing spinward Magyar worlds.
-242	Aslan expansion is checked by Tralp and other Magyar states.
0	Foundation of the Third Imperium.
150	Imperial scouts reach the coreward regions of Magyar.
180	Old Earth Union recontacts Magyar worlds.
212	Magyar states drive many Aslan clans out of the sector. Treaty of Dark Nebula is signed.
374	Four major and 16 minor Aslan clans declare war on Old Earth Union, Tralp, and additional Magyar states.
378	Third Imperium signs Peace of Ftahalr with major Aslan clans, ending Aslan Border Wars.
400	Many worlds in Magyar are abosorbed by expanding Third Imperium. Tralp resists pressure to join.
704	Solomani Autonomous Region formed.
850	Solomani political theory becomes increasingly racist and chauvinistic. Tralp’s influence grows.
871	Solomani Confederation founded with its capital on Terra.
920	Tralp pocket empire reorganizes as the Dootchen Estates.
990	Solomani Rim War begins.
1001	Imperial forces raid Estates and sack Tralp. Estates collapse.
1002	Solomani Rim War ends with defeat of the Confederation. An armed insurgency emerges on Tralp.
1007	Dootchen Estates reform.
1016	Tralp security forces crush onworld insurgency.
1065	Estates seize Last Pine but withdraw after Imperial Navy captures Tralp. Estates capital moved to Dreesen.

Tralp was first colonized during the Interstellar Wars by cultural dissidents who refused to assimilate into the Terran Confederation. The initial settlers, consisting of some 500 families, envisioned Tralp as an agricultural world: they divided the planet into separate estates. The colonists employed a crude slash-and-burn technique to clear land for Terran crops, which had difficulty competing with native Tralpean plants. Combating the native flora created an incessant economic drive for additional land and labor as well as regular chemical supplements and pesticides.

As the Rule of Man collapsed and technology levels crashed, the population of the Tralp exploded and the world began preying on neighboring systems, seizing technological resources and laying claim to entire worlds. The first worlds to fall were located in the Girii Cluster, nine systems centered on the high-population Vilani world of Girii, now known as Ownes (Magyar 1917). By -1400 the Tralpean occupiers had stripped the Vilani inhabitants of their property and instituted a cruel racially-based class structure that grew only more stratified as the Long Night deepened.

By -500 Tralp and its subject worlds formed a pocket empire strong enough to push back against the Aslan and the neighboring Neoslavic Bloc. While never a true naval power, Tralp maintained formidable ground armies to seize and hold new worlds. The fabled Azlaantroepe were elite armored units said to have been specifically created to combat Aslan raiders.

The arrival of the Third Imperium represented a significant threat to Tralp as surrounding worlds clamored for Imperial protection. The case for intervention was strengthened by the Tralp’s brazen use of chattel slavery, anathema to Imperial sensibilities. By 400 most of the surrounding worlds joined the Imperium while Tralp stood alone.

Tralp was encouraged by the creation of the Solomani Autonomous Sphere in 704 and became a strong advocate for formation of the Solomani Confederation in 871. This new government allowed Tralp and its subject worlds to join the Confederation as a powerful member-state. Tralp’s unsavory racial politics and enthusiasm for military intervention soon made the Estates the darling of more radical elements within the Solomani Party, and the Estates enjoyed an unusual degree of influence within the larger Confederation.

During the Solomani Rim War the Dootchen Estates were specifically singled out as an example to other Confederation worlds. The Imperial 9th Provisional Battle Fleet destroyed Tralp’s Class B starport and left the capital city of Tralpstad a smoldering ruin. After razing Tralp the 9th Fleet then harassed other Dootchen worlds until the Estates collapsed at the end of 1001. The Estates reformed in 1007, but were much diminished.

Tralp spent the next decade combating a tenacious onworld insurgency that had been initially encouraged by the Imperium. However, by 1016 the Imperium had abandoned the remaining insurgents, who were ruthlessly crushed by Tralpean security forces.

Over the next 50 years the Estates rebuilt and slowly regained influence within the Confederation, but not before one final setback. In 1065 the Estates invaded and occupied the Imperial system of Last Pine (Magyar 2312). In retaliation the Imperials dispatched the 413th BatRon and 105th AssaultRon to Tralp. The Imperial force quickly overcame system defenses, destroyed the newly rebuilt Class B starport, and stood off in high orbit above the mainworld. The Confederation was unusually slow to mount a response: within a month the Estates withdrew from Last Pine and the Imperials pulled out of Tralp. Shortly thereafter the capital of the Estates was moved to Dreesen (Magyar 1916).

Socio-Political Data

Total World Population 2.69 billion. Primary Cities Rodolph, 6.6 million; Magdalena, 3.9 million; Tralpstad, 2.3 million; Koen, 1.6 million; Mirte, 1.3 million. World Government Impersonal Bureaucracy (Tralpean Assembly). Law Level High (blade weapons controlled, no open display). Tech Level Pre-Stellar (8). Primary Trade Goods Agricultural, Minerals, Manufactured Goods.

Dootchen (Language)

The primary language of Tralp, where it originated, Dootchen is a distant variant of ancient Terran German with many Anglic loanwords. Dootchen is the official language of the Estates, where all other languages beyond Rim Anglic are strictly prohibited. Dootchen is common within Voyager subsector but rarely spoken outside it.

Low Dootchen is a spoken dialect used exclusively by bondmen, marked by syntactic fluidity as well as the preservation of numerous ancient Vilani words.

As of 1100, Tralp clings to its odious caste system despite intense criticism from outside the Estates. Tralpean society is divided into three hereditary classes, with virtually no upward movement and only occasional downward movement between the classes.

Approximately 60% of Tralp’s population are bondmen (slaf), who are considered the personal property of their owners. Bondmen, primarily descended from Vilani, lack the fundamental rights normally accrued to sophonts and can be bought, sold, or traded. Bondmen are generally used for menial labor, typically on vast agricultural estates.

Approximately 30% of Tralp’s population are freeman (vriman), who have rudimentary rights but do not own land and thus have no political representation. Most Freemen are found in urban areas, often employed by industrial or mercantile concerns.

Finally, some 10% of Tralp’s population belongs to the landowner (grondinar) class, who are exclusively of pure Solomani ancestry. Land is the fundamental measure of wealth and influence on Tralp: only landowners are able to own land and bondmen; only landowners are entitled to participate in Tralp’s government. Tralpean culture is not simply racist, but also deeply sexist: land can only be passed to male heirs and distinct gender roles are strongly enforced.

Tralp is governed by an Assembly of Landholders, which is headed by Secretary-General Henrik Peerts. The Secretary-General oversees the ministries and also appoints planetary representatives to the Dootchen Estates Senate on Dreesen.

Tralp also has an independent court system, expressly designed to validate, enforce, and perpetuate the caste system. As the landowner class lives in constant fear of a violent uprising from the bondmen, Tralp law gives considerable deference to landowners but imposes strict limits on bondmen and freemen. Only landowners, for example, are allowed to own personal firearms and enjoy freedom of movement between different provinces.

Although offworld activists have long dreamt of rekindling an insurgency on Tralp, the Ghenzi, the Dootchen Secret Police, are a highly effective internal security force with a counterintelligence program that rivals Solomani Security. Ghenzi agents are feared for both their ruthlessness and brutal interrogation techniques.

Despite the oppressive law levels imposed upon its own citizens, the Estates openly flout interstellar law. Technologies, products, and practices outlawed by neighboring systems can often be purchased at the starports of the Estates, which are rumored to be havens for pirates operating in Imperial space. The Estates mint their own currency, the Dootchen Stater: platinum coins worth approximately Cr1200. Although illegal in the Imperium, the stater is favored by criminals on both sides of the border due to its portability and easy conversion.

Tralp’s extremist racial policies draw sympathetic tourists from throughout the Solomani Sphere, including disaffected Imperials. All are drawn to a romanticized world that defied the Imperium and has embraced a destiny of racial purity. Tralp and the Solomani Party actively encourage these travellers if they are genetically pure Solomani.

Although not classified as an agricultural world, Tralp’s identity and primary economic products are closely associated with agriculture. Tralp settlers required centuries to domesticate any of the native plants, but the primary crops now are a native sugar grass (sukregrass) and starchy tuber (gronbeet). Other important agricultural products are the rundlebeast, a Terran beef cattle bred for Tralp, and Tralpean shiraz, a highly regarded wine.

The mountains of central Berglan contain significant mineral resources and the mines, some of which have been worked for hundreds of years, continue to produce tremendous wealth for the landowners. Large factory complexes ring all of the large cities and towns of Tralp, churning out inexpensive and relatively low quality consumer goods.

Tralp has only a high pre-stellar tech level but the state-owned Koenwapen corporation is renowned for its personal slug-throwers and combat armor. Koenwapen products such as the EON heavy assault shotgun or the KW-8 bullpup SMG are favored by mercenaries throughout Magyar sector.

Miltary Data

Dootchen Armored Units

A mainstay of the Estates’ ground units are Renoster V heavy grav tanks, TL14 monstrosities manufactured by Cloete Systems on Dreesen. This model, introduced in 1088, is a little heavier and better armored than the Sartorius, the standard heavy grav tank of the Solomani Confederation Army. A Renoster V is equipped with a rapid-pulse 74 MJ fusion gun and is expected to stand up against the new Imperial main battle tank, rumored to be entering service some time before 1110. Renoster Vs are direct descendants of the famed Renosters used in the Solomani Rim War and said to share the same resilience and reliability as their predecessors.

Under the supervision of the Solomani Confederation, the Estates control the combined Home Guard forces of all member worlds. Frequently activated for call-ups, Solomani Party propaganda touts the fearsome reputation of the Army of the Reformed Dootchen Estates. Most sons of the landowner class are sent to Dootchen military academies at age seven for ten rigorous years of education. Some of these academies, such as the Mirte Institute, are so prestigious that Party members from across the Confederation pay dearly to have their own sons attend. All male landowners are expected to provide at least five years of military service before their 30th birthday, and many volunteer for even longer terms.

In reality, Tralp is severely constrained by its low technology level: a punishing amount of the planetary economy is diverted to the support of its military aspirations. Tralp also depends heavily upon subsidies from the rest of the Estates as well as the Confederation in order to field units that could compete with Imperial forces.

The Estates and Confederation navies provide most naval support to Tralp. The closest Confederation base, at nearby Namedih (Magyar 1713 B300430-D), hosts the 231st FleetRon and the 456th PatRon. The Estates Navy stations the Dootchen AssaultRon in-system at a small naval base in orbit around Aitan. The AssaultRon can quickly transport an entire division of ground forces to hot spots across the Confederation. The base also supports Tralp’s wing of system defense boats, made up of venerable TL9, 500-ton Skild-class SDBs.

The Tralp planetary defense forces include ten TL11 lift infantry armies not suitable for off-world deployment as well as three TL13 lift infantry armies and two TL13 grav tank armies. The most frequently deployed ground force unit is the Tralpkorps, a TL14 armored infantry corps.

The Estates stations on Aitan the storied Eerste regiment of the Azlaantroepe. This elite TL14 unit includes three lift infantry battalions and one grav tank battalion. During the Rim War the Eerste regiment fought in several major engagements in the Solomani Rim but was recalled just prior to the Battle of Terra.

The infamous Gidea Kommandos are a “foreign legion” military unit consisting of three battalions of assault infantry. Any genetically pure Solomani volunteer may join the Kommandos and receive a full pardon for any crime as well as freeman status upon discharge. The regiment is reserved for the most dangerous and desperate actions, such as the 1001 defense of Sinott.

Dootchen mercenary units are notorious for their no-questions-asked willingness to take on the dirtiest, most difficult tickets—missions no other unit would accept. Such units are sometimes encountered in Imperial space working for criminal organizations, unscrupulous nobles, or corporations. Mullen Security is a successful TL12 company-sized unit composed largely of veterans from the Gidea Kommandos. In 1097 contractors from Mullen were accused of participating in a massacre during a brushfire war on Higdon (Magyar 1818 C999775-9). To date no charges have been filed in the matter.

Copyright Information

The Traveller game in all forms is owned by Far Future Enterprises. Copyright © 1977 – 2020 Far Future Enterprises. Traveller is a registered trademark of Far Future Enterprises. Far Future permits web sites and fanzines for this game, provided it contains this notice, that Far Future is notified, and subject to a withdrawal of permission on 90 days notice. The contents of this site are for personal, non-commercial use only. Any use of Far Future Enterprises’s copyrighted material or trademarks anywhere on this web site and its files should not be viewed as a challenge to those copyrights or trademarks. In addition, any program/articles/file on this site cannot be republished or distributed without the consent of the author who contributed it.

Materials produced by Digest Group Publications (DGP) are copyright © Roger Sanger. Any use of Digest Group Publications’ copyrighted material or trademarks anywhere on this Web site and its files should not be viewed as a challenge to those copyrights. Usage is intended to follow the guidelines announced by Roger Sanger on the Traveller Mailing List for preserving the overall Traveller milieu.

Superhabitable Worlds and Traveller

The superhabitable world of Hesselgrave (Magyar 2939 CA98696-8).

A recent article in the journal Astrobiology has reignited interest in superhabitable worlds: exoplanets that might represent the best opportunity for harboring extraterrestrial life. While many researchers have assumed that alien life would be most likely found on planets most closely resembling Earth, others have proposed that slightly older, larger, and warmer worlds would be even better candidates for extraterrestrial life.

Following this logic, a K dwarf star might be more likely to support the development of extraterrestrial life than our own G-dwarf type star. Although cooler, less massive, and less luminous, an orange K dwarf star has a much longer lifespan and may have a wider habitable zone.

Translating the superhabitable parameters into Traveller⁵ terms, we get a set of criteria something like this: 

• K-dwarf primary
• Orbit 2
• Size 89A
• Atm 6789
• Hydro 678

A few other superhabitable parameters—for example, the presence of a slightly larger or nearer moon than Luna—are not detailed in standard Traveller world generation, but can be determined during extended system generation.

[There] is life everywhere. Worlds naturally spawn their own life forms, and many produce intelligent species —MT Referee’s Manual 7.

The Third Imperium setting assumes that extraterrestrial life is fairly common within Charted Space, though no one game mechanic has been consistently used across editions to determine the presence or absence of native life. 

DGP’s World Builder’s Handbook (1989) has a nice, simple system for indicating native life: a 2D roll of 10+, modified by primary type, orbit, atmosphere, and hydrosphere. A garden world (Size 678, Atmosphere 568, Hydrosphere 567) orbiting in the habitable zone of a G or K dwarf could have a total DM of +6, meaning native life would have developed on 83% to 92% of the worlds meeting those criteria. In contrast, a desert world (Atmosphere 23456789, Hydrosphere 0) orbiting a type F star would have DMs ranging from -4 to +1, with odds of native life ranging from 0% to 28%. That’s quite high for my personal tastes, but seems roughly consistent with the published OTU. 

GURPS Traveller: First In (1999) provides a different determination method in which the age of the primary star is a fairly large variable. If we assume a K dwarf system might be anywhere from 1 to 12 billion years old, the modifier could range from +1 to a whopping +24! An ocean world (in this context, a world with some surface water and oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere) orbiting a 6-billion-year-old K dwarf star in the habitable zone would have a +14 modifier. Such a world has a 100% chance of harboring native life, the nature of which which breaks down to a 2.77% chance for protozoa, 5.55% for metazoa, 8.33% for simple animals, and a 83.33% of complex animals. A desert world would have no chance for harboring native life.

Traveller⁵, surprisingly, does not have an analogous mechanism—perhaps because that edition seemingly assumes any planet with an atmosphere of 2+ and a population of 7+ in the habitable zone has not just native life, but Intelligent Native Life. That's way too much for me. I'm not looking to Traveller for super hard sci fi, but not the Star Wars cantina either.

In any case, superhabitable worlds as we defined them above should be very strong contenders for native life in the OTU, if not total locks. In Magyar sector, three worlds meet the superhabitable criteria:

• Nosret (2807 A897477-D). This world was within the Vilani Ziru Sirka, so has potentially been inhabited for thousands of years. It's got a class A starport, is on the Xboat route, but only a population of 4. Perhaps it has native life, but that life is incompatible or inimical to Humans. Maybe the dense atmosphere is tainted with microbes or spores.
• Tralp (1913 D968998-8). This world has some canonical history: beyond the Ziru Sirka, it was settled by Terran emigres by -2204 and grew into the Reformed Dootchen Estates. Probably the native life was compatible with Terran life.
• Hesselgrave (2939 CA98696-8). Also beyond the Ziru Sirka, this world may have been incorporated into the Terran Confederation and/or the Rule of Man, but might not have been settled until after the Long Night. Like Nosret, the native life may not have been really compatible with Terran life.

Copyright Information

The Traveller game in all forms is owned by Far Future Enterprises. Copyright © 1977 – 2020 Far Future Enterprises. Traveller is a registered trademark of Far Future Enterprises. Far Future permits web sites and fanzines for this game, provided it contains this notice, that Far Future is notified, and subject to a withdrawal of permission on 90 days notice. The contents of this site are for personal, non-commercial use only. Any use of Far Future Enterprises’s copyrighted material or trademarks anywhere on this web site and its files should not be viewed as a challenge to those copyrights or trademarks. In addition, any program/articles/file on this site cannot be republished or distributed without the consent of the author who contributed it.

Materials produced by Digest Group Publications (DGP) are copyright © Roger Sanger. Any use of Digest Group Publications' copyrighted material or trademarks anywhere on this Web site and its files should not be viewed as a challenge to those copyrights. Usage is intended to follow the guidelines announced by Roger Sanger on the Traveller Mailing List for preserving the overall Traveller milieu.

The Age of Worms has Passed!

In 2013 I had not run a regular, ongoing D&D campaign for a few years. I was a player in a pretty fun monthly game, and DMing some kids through a mini-campaign, and running semi-regular installments of the Great Dungeon. But no real campaign as such.

It was a weird time: although I had played a ton of Third Edition, I was a little adrift. Fourth Edition had been out for five years, but I had been so turned off by WotC’s handling of the edition switch that I had admittedly never given it a chance. Fifth Edition was coming, they said, but I really didn’t have much interest. Instead, I’d just kept running 3.5e with occasional forays into Swords and Wizardry and Pathfinder. The latter seemed fine, but I had never completely embraced it, even though I had high regard for the Paizo team.

Several of my regular players were hankering for a new campaign, but everyone seemed really busy. And we were scattered across the state. I was hesitant to commit.

But part of me was missing a regular game, and even more so, my gamer friends. I was also hearing good things about the Roll20 virtual tabletop. So on May 2, I sent out a faithful email with five different campaign pitches, including Red Hand of Doom and the Savage Tides adventure path. The players chose my first pitch:

Age of Worms develops from a small town of Diamond Lake, leads to intrigue in the Free City of Greyhawk, and then on to a mysterious cult that serves as a front to bring about the events leading up to the Age of Worms. As the players encounter the various architects of the plot, they uncover the nature of the coming age, and battle the ultimate masterminds behind it.

AoW was only the second Paizo adventure path, published in twelve monthly installments of Dungeon magazine from July 2005 to June 2006 and covering a classic zero to hero arc: characters could go from 1st all the way to 20th level, and maybe further. Although written for 3.5e, I adopted it to Pathfinder, where it provided my first (and as it turned out, last) stress test of the system.

We convened a weekly Roll20 group later that May, the Tuesday Night Casual Encounterists, but not before I gave them all fair warning: “This campaign,” I wrote, “is supposed to be a real motherfucker.” We had five PCs: Braan Amher, a half-orc ranger, Greylen Stahl, a human cleric, Garrett Moore, a human fighter, Melvin the Helvin, a human half-elf rogue, and Fingolfin the elvish enchanter. The players were a good mix of role-players and min-maxers, and all of us had played together in several different games over the years.

Roll20 was a huge revelation: not very fancy and occasionally clunky, but serviceable and easy to use, making it convenient to meet a weekly 3-hour commitment every Tuesday night. You get a pleasant rhythm in a weekly game that you never quite achieve in a monthly or even bi-weekly one. And we did pretty well playing most weeks.

We played a little over two years—through almost 10 of the 12 installments—when the wheels finally fell off. It was a combination of different life events all at once, some really good and some really not. Most games end like this, with a whimper: you start skipping more and more weeks until finally you just sort of stop.

In 2018 we ran a face-to-face session to finish up the 11th AoW installment, “Kings of the Rift,” in an attempt to bring some closure to a campaign I think we had all enjoyed.

But this spring we were all sidelined with COVID-19. I had dusted off my Roll20 account and was running some Traveller and 5e games. But a couple of players suggested we finish off Age of Worms.

And so we did.

All told, it took 94 sessions and maybe something like 240 hours of Roll20. All of the players stuck with the whole campaign. At about the halfway point, Fingolfin retired and the same player introduced Herr Hexenmeister von Formen, an evoker. A few of the player characters were killed but restored with resurrections or wishes. In the end, AoW didn’t prove nearly as lethal as billed—though I did my level best!—but the adventure path was fairly entertaining. A high level Pathfinder game came with a pretty steep learning curve both for myself as well as the players, but by the end I think we did fairly well contending with artifacts, deities, and 9th level spells. (Roll20 macros and character sheets were probably a godsend here.)

For me, the promise of Age of Worms was the opportunity to finally use many iconic D&D elements that I’d never had a chance to use before. During the course of the adventure path the PCs were expected to visit the City of Greyhawk and collect several classic artifacts, some of which go all the way back to the Eldritch Wizardry supplement (1976), such as the Rod of Seven Parts and the Hand of Vecna. The central villain, Kyuss, goes all the way back to the original Fiend Folio (1981) and the loathsome Sons of Kyuss, a creation of Michael MacDonald: “Truly horrible creatures in appearance, these ghastly undead appear as animated putrid corpses with fat green worms crawling in and out of all their skull orifices.” Another major antagonist of the Age of Worms is Dragotha the Undead Dragon, who originated in a memorable Erol Otus map from the revised Module S2, White Plume Mountain (1981). In some ways, the Age of Worms reads like a D&D bucket list.

The execution of the adventure path, though, is a bit uneven. Some of this was likely due to Paizo’s relative inexperience coordinating such a large and complex adventure on a monthly deadline, working with different authors, and fitting it all into a limited page count. More than once you can see some slips that likely arose from the frenetic development pace: a continuity error here, a bum statblock there. Nifty ideas are raised but never really developed: for example, in “Kings of the Rift” the PCs are charged with finding Dragotha’s phylactery, with many hints that this fell item might prove a useful bargaining chip with the dracolich. But “Into the Wormcrawl Fissure” does nothing with this premise: the phylactery has no real benefit, and the PCs might as well destroy it as soon as they get their mitts on it. (Which is what my group did anyway.)

Similarly, the adventure path introduces some new mechanics like Fate Points or authority points but then does relatively little with them. Also, in the course of the early adventures the PCs can find some minor items that seemingly play no part until the very last adventure.

Some of the problems with Age of Worms, though, are fundamental problems with Third Edition, particularly high level play. Back in 2008 Merric Blackman wrote a tough assessment of the adventure path: How Paizo Made Me Hate 3e. Although the title is a bit tongue-in-cheek, many of his criticisms are dead on. Particularly at higher levels, 3e suffers from a huge disparity between classes, enormous modifiers to attacks and saves, and overly complicated mechanics. Each PC has multiple different actions each round that allow them to swamp many solo monsters just with action economy. 

The infamous 15 minute day, in which high level PCs can go nova in one encounter and then retreat to safety to recharge, is endemic to the later installments. Some of this might have been remediated through tighter adventure design: “Into the Wormcrawl Fissure,” for example, is supposed to be a harrowing race to confront Dragotha before Kyuss can emerge from his prison and unleash the Age of Worms. But there’s no real sense of urgency: in fact, the adventure encourages the PCs to complete a series of fetch quests before they face the dracolich.

One critique that Blackman had is somewhat ameliorated by the Pathfinder system. The adventure path relies too heavily on undead monsters, which are immune to sneak attacks in 3e, greatly limiting the rogue class. In Pathfinder, though, rogues can sneak attack undead, allowing our Melvin to shine in combat—particularly when he and Garrett could get into flanking position. But while the Pathfinder system makes a few of these problems better, it also makes many problems worse by adding new layers of complexity. High level play still remains a chore to run.

The most frustrating problems with Age of Worms, though, were ones completely out of the hands of Paizo: here I mean interference from Wizards of the Coast, which had to review and approve all of Paizo’s licensed work. One can occasionally spot WotC’s hand in the insertion of game elements pulled straight from the newest WotC books. Perhaps the most awkward example was a derro warlock riding a wyvern with levels in some weird aerialist prestige class, something that really didn’t make much sense within the context of the adventure. When I ran that encounter I simply substituted the halfling vampire that appears to have been the author’s original intent.

I mentioned earlier that the adventure path clearly suffers from a frantic pace of development. The original plan was for Paizo to release a hardcover “director’s cut” compilation edition that could have smoothed out some of these rough edges and added material that landing on the cutting room floor. Instead, WotC denied Paizo the opportunity.

But my biggest critique of WotC here was how they hamstrung the use of the Greyhawk setting. So many of the iconic D&D elements I wanted to see used in Age of Worms originated in Greyhawk and are tightly connected to that world. Many of the Paizo principals were unabashed Gryhawk fanatics: I first “met” Erik Mona on the old AOL Greyhawk boards back in the early 90s.

But despite this, for some inexplicable reason WotC severely curtailed the ability of Paizo to utilize the Greyhawk setting for Age of Worms. For example, WotC insisted that instead of using Tenser the Archmage, Paizo was forced to use an ersatz Tenser named “Manzorian.” Likewise, Greyhawk City becomes just “the Free City.” The result is a very unsatisfying, uncanny valley version of Greyhawk. It is a great credit to the Paizo team that they got as much authentic Greyhawk content (including several nifty Easter eggs) into the adventure path as they did, but overall this was a tremendous wasted opportunity.

These weaknesses aside, this is a damned good adventure path that could have easily been made great in a compilation edition. And if a few of the early installments are forgettable, the back six adventures are suitably epic and really pick up a load of steam. These final adventures feature some fantastic set pieces: the haunted jungle city of Kuluth-Mar, the Lost Island of Tindalos, the besieged giant city of Kongen-Thulnir, the Tabernacle of Worms, and the Spire of Shadows. As promised, I finally got to see the Hand of Vecna, the Rod of Seven Parts, even a sphere of annihilation in play! To say nothing of Dragotha or Kyuss himself.

I had never run a group all the way to 20th level in any edition, and had never had PCs fight a god, or even a demi-god. In the end, my players prevailed. They played smart, got a little lucky, and pulled out all the stops for the final confrontation with Kyuss. The Wormgod really didn’t know what hit him.

I’ve been blessed to have a few very fun, long-running campaigns that we were able to run to completion. But I’ve probably had just as many campaigns that either never took off or sputtered out well before their time. You don’t often get a chance to finish an abandoned campaign, and I’m so glad we had a chance to do so with Age of Worms. Well done, Braan, Garrett, Greylen, Hexenmeister, and Melvin!

Hexenmeister, Greylen, Braan, Garrett, and Melvin round on Kyuss.

The Abyssal Gorer

I have written previously about action economy and monster design. Essentially, a group of PCs can easily overwhelm a single, more powerful monster simply because they get so many more actions per round than the monster. Although the fundamental issue was more-or-less understood much earlier, the term “economy of actions” may have been coined by Wizards of the Coast designer Rodney Thompson in an influential, but long lost Gleemax post from 2007 or 2008. 4e tried a few different mechanisms with varying levels of success to address this problem, most notably creating minion, normal, elite, and solo categories for monsters.

The 5e solution is the legendary action mechanic, which gives powerful monsters bonus actions each round that can be taken on the players’ turns. This solution actually harkens all the way back to the 2003 Miniatures Handbook, which introduced the mechanic of swift and immediate actions to 3.5e. These actions also allow monsters to take extra actions each round—even outside their own turn.

Pathfinder Battles horned demon miniature.

Although later 3.5e monsters occasionally incorporated swift and immediate actions, the implementation was inconsistent. Other designers tried other mechanics to address the action economy problem, and the “horned demon” from Paizo’s Dark Elf Sanctum (2005) is a good example. Sanctum was part of Paizo’s short-lived Compleat Encounter line: each installment contained a short, stand-alone encounter along with cardboard map tiles and unpainted miniatures. Sanctum was written by Mike Mearls with art by Wayne Reynolds. The miniatures were sculpted by Neil McKenzie.

The horned demon is a tough, physical brute with one very interesting trick: it wears a magical belt containing the souls of trapped evil spellcasters. (Is that metal or what?) While the demon engages in melee the belt casts spells, essentially given the monster bonus actions each round. This is a classic Mearls design, featuring an elegant, flavorful solution to a knotty mechanical problem.

But the horned demon has a few classic Mearls quirks, as well—such as a profound disinterest in setting logic or mechanical consistency. The demon, for example, has none of the special features of the demon subtype. And in a game system that quantifies everything, there’s no indication what happens to the belt once the demon is killed, how much such a belt is worth, or how one is created.

Paizo brought the horned demon into the Pathfinder game as the Kalavakus demon in the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Bestiary 2 (2010). But this is a rather different monster, now a conventional demon without its signature belt and sporting a new enslave ability: a much more mechanically complete—but also much less interesting—monster. (Fortunately, the WizKids miniature of the demon included the three-faced belt.)

For this conversion, I’ve gone back to the original design and embraced the problematic belt. The following text is Open Game Content.

Abyssal Gorer

This hulking, muscled beast has four long, fierce horns sweeping back from its skull and similar bone structures along its forearms. It wears a leather belt and loincloth set with three metal disks, each with a humanoid face carved upon it.

Fell Advisors. Each abyssal gorer wears a belt of the coven, a demonskin belt imbued with the souls of three evil spellcasters. These villains speak to the gorer and provide counsel in battle.

A Bloodthirsty Abandon. In combat an abyssal gorer lunges toward the nearest target. The coven trapped within the belt lend their arcane power to its efforts, blasting its foes with spells or enhancing its efforts with support spells.

0e

Abyssal Gorer CL 11 (1,700 XP)

The belt of the coven worn by an abyssal gorer acts as an intelligent sword and can cast spells as a 6th level magic-user (4/2/2). A common spell list is: level 1: hold portal, magic missile x2, shield; level 2: strength, web; level 3: lightning bolt x2.

HD 9; AC 4 [15]; Atk 2 claws (1d6), gore (2d6); Move 12; Save 6; AL C; Special: Spells.

3.5e

Abyssal Gorer CR 11

Always CE Medium outsider (chaotic, evil, extraplanar)

Init +1; Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Listen +18, Spot +18

Languages Abyssal, Common

Defense

AC 25, touch 11, flat-footed 24 (+1 Dex, +14 natural)

hp 126 (12d8+72 HD); DR 10/good

Fort +14, Ref +9, Will +11

SR 22

Offense

Spd 30 ft.

Melee 2 claws +16 (1d8+4), bite +14 (1d6+2), gore +14 (1d6+2)

Space 5 ft.; Reach 5 ft.

Special Attacks aligned strike (chaos, evil), horns, powerful charge 2d6+6

Typical Sorcerer Spells Known (CL 6th)

3rd (3/day)—lightning bolt (DC 15)

2nd (6/day)—bull’s strength, spider climb

1st (7/day)—jump, mage armor, magic missile, shield

0 (6/day)—acid splash (+13 ranged touch), arcane mark, daze (DC 12), detect magic, ghost sound, resistance, touch of fatigue (+16 melee touch)

Statistics

Str 19, Dex 13, Con 22, Int 15, Wis 17, Cha 15

Base Atk +12; Grp +16

Feats Combat Expertise, Improved Bull Rush, Improved Disarm, Multiattack, Power Attack

Skills Climb +19, Intimidate +17, Jump +19, Knowledge (arcana) +17, Knowledge (the planes) +17, Listen +18, Search +17, Spellcraft +17, Spot +18, Tumble +16

SQ belt of the coven

Ecology

Environment any

Organization solitary or patrol (2–9)

Treasure standard

Advancement 13–18 HD (Large); 19–24 HD (Huge)

Level Adjustment +6

Special Abilities

Belt of the Coven (Su) The three souls bound within the belt are spellcasters charged with directing the gorer and providing it magical support. In addition to the abyssal gorer’s normal actions, each of these faces is an intelligent creature. An abyssal gorer somehow separated from its belt has Intelligence 6, Wisdom 8, and Charisma 5. 

Each round, one of the three faces can cast a single spell as a swift action. The spell must be cast with a standard, move, or free action for the belt to use it in this manner. The belt has the casting ability of a sorcerer with half the abyssal gorer’s HD as its caster level (typically resulting in caster level 6th). The belt uses the gorer’s attributes, attack bonus, and all other relevant data when using its spells, such as touch attack bonus. The gorer acts as the spell’s caster for purposes of determining line of effect, targets, and so forth. Using spells in this manner does not provoke attacks of opportunity.

Horns (Ex) The long, sharp horns that run along the gorer’s arm allow it to disarm its opponents with greater ease. It catches a weapon in the gap between its arm and the horn and yanks the weapon away from its opponent. It gains a +2 bonus on all attack rolls made to disarm an opponent.

Powerful Charge (Ex) When an abyssal gorer charges, its gore attack deals 2d6+6 points of damage.

Typically, a coven uses shield and mage armor to leave the gorer invulnerable to most attacks. It then either follows up with bull's strength if the gorer faces a tough foe, or picks off the gorer's opponents with magic missile and lightning bolt.

5e

Abyssal Gorer

Medium fiend, chaotic evil
Armor Class 13 (natural armor)
Hit Points 142 (15d8 + 75 HD)
Speed 30 ft.
Str	Dex	Con	Int	Wis	Cha
19 (+4)	13 (+1)	20 (+5)	15 (+2)	15 (+2)	16 (+3)
Damage Resistances cold, fire, lightning; bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing from nonmagical attacks
Damage Immunities poison
Condition Immunities poisoned
Senses darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 12
Languages Abyssal, Common
Challenge 10 (5,900 XP)
Spellcasting. The abyssal gorer is a 6th-level spellcaster. Its spellcasting ability is Charisma (spell save DC 15, +7 to hit with spell attacks). It requires no material components to cast its spells. The abyssal gorer has the following sorcerer spells prepared: Cantrips (at will): acid splash, chill touch, mage hand, minor illusion, prestidigitation, shocking grasp, true strike 1st level (4 slots): jump, mage armor, magic missile, shield 2nd level (3 slots): enhance ability, spider climb 3rd level (3 slots): lightning bolt
Magic Resistance. The abyssal gorer has advantage on saving throws against spells and other magical effects.
Actions
Multiattack. The abyssal gorer makes three attacks: one with its gore and two with its claws.
Gore. Melee Weapon Attack: +8 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 13 (2d8 + 4) piercing damage.
Claw. Melee Weapon Attack: +8 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 8 (1d8 + 4) slashing damage.
Charge. If the abyssal gorer moves at least 10 feet straight toward a target and then hits it with a gore attack on the same turn, the target takes an extra 9 (2d8) piercing damage. If the target is a creature, it must succeed on a DC 16 Strength saving throw or be pushed up to 10 feet away and knocked prone.
Legendary Actions
The abyssal gorer can take 3 legendary actions, choosing from the options below. Only one legendary action option can be used at a time and only at the end of another creature’s turn. The abyssal gorer regains spent legendary actions at the start of its turn.
Claw attack. The abyssal gorer makes one claw attack.
Gore attack (Costs 2 Actions). The abyssal gorer makes one gore attack.
Cast a Spell (Costs 3 Actions). The abyssal gorer casts a spell from its list of prepared spells, using a spell slot as normal.

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