GenCon UK is nearly here!
BITS
will be attending GenCon
UK 2007 between August 30th and
September 2nd at Reading University (http://www.genconuk.com/).
BITS Director Andy Lilly will be
bravely manning the trade stand with a wide range of
Traveller merchandise including our
own range of Little White Books, with our most recent
release Cold Dark Grave by Dom Mooney and
Universe software and a good selection of
new and second hand gaming products.
On the gaming front Richard Talbot, Neil McGurk and
Peter Trevor will be running a range of 3 new
Traveller RPG adventures during the
3 timed slots at 9am, 2pm and 8pm.
We will also have a demo table of Traveller:
Power Projection Fleet and
Escort with games timed during the
day at 9.00am and 2.00pm.
All our slots are now bookable via the GenCon website
and cost two gaming tickets per game.
BITS are also looking for a brave
volunteer to help run some of the sessions so if you
are attending GenCon or just even
thinking about it, drop an email to richardtalbotuk
at yahoo.co.uk or bits at bits.org.uk (or use the
contact form on the site here) and let us know!
GenCon do provide some benefits for
GM's depending on how many slots they run so check
out their website for more information.
TravCon 08 is coming...
The hotel is comfortable, with en-suite facilities in all rooms, has ground floor rooms for a limited number of disabled attendees and a couple of conference rooms for gaming. The hotel provides breakfast; lunch and dinner venues include an adjacent Indian restaurant, small snack shop, or take-away from nearby Sawtry.
To help people plan their days and to give everyone a chance to play in several games, we will be organizing the weekend into a morning, afternoon and evening gaming sessions, with the opportunity to play BITS scenarios or to bring your own adventures to run (preferably having notified us so that we can advertise games to the attendees well in advance of the con). We also intend to run fun competitions of both Power Projection starship battles, and At Close Quarters miniatures skirmishes, there will be the BITS trade stand and a Bring & Buy (for any roleplaying stuff you want to try to sell to other attendees) and more fun stuff as we get it organised.
We’ve organised a deal with the hotel which gets attendees an ensuite room, Friday night to Sunday afternoon, B&B, including full con entry, for just £99 for BITS members.
Watch out for further details as they appear here on the web site.
Traveller: Universe now available directly from BITS
Peter Trevor's Traveller: Universe
can now be purchased directly from BITS via our webshop on eBay.
Full details about Universe can be found here.
New BITS Newsletter Available
Mongoose to Publish Traveller [Updated]
The UK's Mongoose Publishing are going to be the new publishers of Traveller.
Mongoose Press Release in full:
Traveller Returns!
After a near 10-year gap in which only reprints of the Traveller game system have been available, Mongoose Publishing becomes the centralised resource for Traveller titles with the publication of their core rule book Traveller: Science-Fiction Adventures in the Far Future, in February 2008. On this foundation, Mongoose will produce a supporting line of supplements, adventures, and sourcebooks detailing the official and original Traveller universe of the far future.
The materials published by Mongoose will be placed in and part of the canonical Traveller universe.
It is our aim to halt the fragmentation of the Traveller game, and reintroduce one solid system (based on Classic Traveller), with one source for the official Traveller universe.
But that is not all. . .
Mongoose Publishing Science Fiction RPGs
Mongoose will also be using Traveller in its licensed science-fiction properties (each featuring a Traveller logo).
We have pioneered this concept already with Runequest, publishing a rules set and supporting adventures and sourcebooks, then using the Runequest rules as the basis for other alternative fantasy role-playing settings, such as Hawkmoon, Elric and Lankhmar.
The first licensed setting to be produced using the Traveller rules set (and available in early 2008) will be Starship Troopers, a welcome return to bug-blasting action across the galaxy! Hot on its heels will be Strontium Dogs, based on the hit 2000AD comic strip. After that, who knows. . ?
To the greatest extent possible, we intend that there be a transportability of characters, concepts, and even equipment between the various systems. So, it will be perfectly possible for your Strontium Dog Bounty Hunter to land on a planet in his Scout/Courier, only to find him battling for his life against waves of Warrior Bugs – with no conversion needed between the games!
All games and settings will therefore be able to utilise the core supplements, such as High Guard, Mercenary, and 760 Patrons, while retaining their own character.
Open Gaming License
Once the rules for Traveller appear, we plan to make them available under the Open Gaming License (OGL). At the same time, we will issue a Traveller Logo License (TLL) which makes the Traveller logo and titling available to licensees.
Far Future will Publish T5
Far Future is proceeding with plans to produce the long-heralded Traveller5, initially as an extensive CD ROM package (estimated at 1000 pages) by the end of 2007, and a distilled 350-page Traveller5 Core Rules book in the first half of 2008.
T5 will be a superset of the Mongoose Traveller rules, providing detailed coverage of rules, concepts and history not available elsewhere. There will be cross-compatibility between Traveller and Traveller5, allowing you to use rules and supplements from each.
Traveller will be faithful to Classic Traveller, with an upgraded task and combat system. Traveller5 will be a superset of those rules, providing greater detail and more insight into resolving situations in Traveller.