Preparing for Travellercon 2017

Because of hearing loss, I basically put an end to all conventions for 2017 except Travellercon that will take place this weekend (September 29th through October 1st) at the Lancaster Host Resort & Conference Center in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.

I will be only attending Saturday, September 30th, but the time will be well spent, but before I share my schedule, first a description of what Traveller is:

Traveller is a science fiction role playing game created in 1977 by Marc Miller and originally published by Game Designer's Workshop. One player would represent the GM (game master) who led the rest of the players through one or more adventures. Sometimes, the game would become a campaign that would scan multiple adventures and in the late 70s, I participated in one that ran for two years led by the late James "Jay" Forrest.

The Traveller universe takes place in a specific game setting in what is known as the Official Traveller Universe where the Third Imperium, made mostly of humans, is slowly expanding into unknown territory.

Since then, Traveller has gone through 11 incarnations being picked up and dropped by several gaming companies, each having its own interpretation. I own three: Traveller, Traveller 2300, and Mongoose Traveller, 2nd edition.

My coauthor, Ken Pick, and I have created several short fictional works loosely based on Traveller, but unfortunately, many of them are currently out of print: Mask of the Ferret and Dyads, published in the anthologies Infinite Space, Infinite God, and Infinite Space, Infinite God II respectively.

On Saturday, I will be attending a lecture by Marc Miller at 1 pm and at 8 pm, Marc will be running a seminar entitled, Can You Survive Character Generation, an interesting look into creating a Traveller character that becomes your persona as you explore the universe. A unique aspect of Traveller is that while creating a character, your persona can actually die forcing you to start over again from scratch.

In the morning, I will be observing a number of GMs as they run players through their pre-scripted scenarios, but I will not be playing myself. As I said, I am slightly hearing impaired and to have one player constantly asking, "Sorry...what did you say?" can only result in irritation. Best to just observe.

Nonetheless, Travellercon is not a huge convention. If you find yourself attending, just look me up. I'd be delighted to meet up and talk.

I'm packed and ready to go!