About This Website

NeptuneLast Updated: 2/25/22

When I first started playing Traveller forty years ago, the possibilities seemed limitless. There was a whole galaxy to explore! The few bits of details about the Imperium and its neighbors were gold nuggets that only added to the overall setting.

In the decades since then, rather than continuing to offer new supplements to enhance a GM's game, the publishers chose to establish a fixed narrative for the physical setting. The canon for the game was established. If a GM's game did not adhere to the published record, it was outside the realm of canon and summarily dismissed by "canonistas."

There have been wars along the Imperium's frontiers, an assasination led to an Imperial Civil War, and an AI Virus destroyed the remnants of the factions that fought to the bitter end for scraps. I was generally fine with these changes. The Imperium seemed stagnant to me, and the AI Virus was a way of wiping the slate clean and restoring that open sandbox feel that the game had at its start. But if you were vested in a particular setting and the new changes destroyed the campaign you and your players were enjoying, you were out of luck. Many rebelled at these changes and opted out; others vehemently argued against their plausibility.

Once again, the publisher has chosen to put its stamp on the game and ram a new setting down GMs' throats. A book was published which retconned previously published storyline elements that, for all intents and purposes, rendered specific settings either drastically altered or outright impossible. With a click clack on the keyboard, certain canonical settings were rendered null and void.

I tried for decades to GM within the confines of the game's canon. I used to wear it as a badge of honor. I can't anymore. The publisher has dispelled the illusion of the open sandbox to promote its vision of the game, as is its right. So I've decided that this website will ignore anything published after 2010.

What does that mean for visitors to this site?

If you're a canonista, ignore me and go away.

If you're someone looking for additional gaming info outside of what's published, then use what's here at your own peril. Depending on what you're looking for and which part of Charted Space you're looking at, the retcon starts to render library data that takes place after 1105 suspect.

If you're a heretic, then you're fine. Keep reading.

This web site will be what game info I can provide for Traveller GMs to enhance their game. It's focused on Sector Data, a good deal of which can be found elsewhere on the web. Other sections are House Rules and Equipment. In 2021, a copy of the TNE fan-site BARD was provided to me to host as its previous host went offline.

The sector information that I provide is for the years circa 1120 and 1202. I'd hoped to offer 1248 info, but that's looking increasingly unlikely. The 1120 info should be usable for anyone playing CT & MT campaigns. The offsite sector links that I provide are typically to those running TNE campaigns and most, if not all, also provide pre-Collapse info as well.

T4 folks are out of luck as I'm over a thousand years in their future.

If you're playing Mongoose Traveller or GURPS, this site is mostly unusable. The GURPS storyline is completely different, as per their contract, and I have so little info for 1105 era gamers.

T20 is rules system that uses a d20 as the basis of its game mechanics. It began to publish material for the years 993-1116 before floundering. Regardless, T20 GMs should be able to use the material here. The CT material is applicable for the 993-1116 period.

The 1248 setting was to be the true New Era, the promised new open sandbox. The "old" New Era was reclassified as The Recovery Period. Avenger Enterprises, in conjunction with Comstar Games, were in charge of this milieu before their license expired.

My old in-person campaign ended in 2005. In game, it ran from 1120 - 1134. The setting was "Behind The Claw." The PCs adventured from the Trojan Reach to Provence and all points in-between. The players wanted to play during the Virus years so I started them off at 1139, not long after the Rape of Trin. They performed reconaissance for the RQS in the Denebian Wilds up through 1142.

All of my campaigns are now PBEM. Locally, with jobs and families consuming all our time, it just wasn't possible to game in-person. But it has made it possible for us to game with people all over the world.

The first PBEM campaign I ran was DGP's The Flaming Eye. It ran from 2004 to 2013. When it was done, I transitioned the group into an undercover privateer role. It's still running.

It spawned a spin off campaign called The Wandering Wolves, a vargr-centric group sniffing about for profit along the Ziru Sirkaa - Ngath Confederation border. It started in 2012 and wrapped up in 2021.

That campaign spun off one of its own, A Light in the Windhorn Rift. This campaign is set in the Wilds of Windhorn sector along the rift in the year 1202. It, too, started in 2012 and is still going.

Comments and questions may be directed .


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