I think after reviewing recent events we should set the quorum at 4 players. Less than that and scaling encounters on the fly etc doesnt seem to be a good idea.

If we have fewer than 4 I would suggest easy games of traveller:

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Its episodic, a change of pace, and a hoot.

"This is Free Trader Beowulf,
calling anyone...
Mayday, Mayday...we are under
attack...main drive is gone...
turret number one not responding...
Mayday...losing cabin pressure
fast...calling anyone...please help...
This is Free Trader Beowulf...
                          Mayday..."

Here here, one-off games can be mighty entertaining.  Plus I don't like dying.

I've never played Traveller, but I'd be happy to do that if we lack a quorum.

(My recollection is that we're not playing next Saturday, quorum or no, because people are doing holiday things -- is that right?)

You are correct.

Traveller background if folks like that kind of stuff.

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I glanced over that wikipedia article that you posted on traveler, it sounds like a really cool game and I'd love to play a sci-fi based game, even on a regular basis. The wikipedia article did mention that there are numerous publishers and versions of Traveler.  What version should we be prepared to play and are there any books that you can suggest we purchase or at least read through to prepare for the game?  Should we create characters for it?

Cool history, I do dig that sort of thing. Gives a good perspective on the general world (universe?) we'd be dealing with.

Well creating characters is a "game within a game" as it were. I would play episodic style i think with each session an independent story. For ship combat I'm leaning towards starmada. For any land vehicle combat i think carwars. Everything else the original traveller does well enough i think. 

I dont have my original stuff anymore so I ordered this one
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but any of the classic Traveller stuff works. My inspiration was the LBB (little black books) 0-8.

Trying to work out how to do ship combat though. One player is driving and another gunning and then third? the fourth? got to come up with a system that allows each character to meaningfully perform actions beyond just rolling a  couple of dice. Maybe dynamic shielding or some such....

How about multiple gun ports and/or a standing damage control crew?

Yeah but its tough to keep that intresting as an rp oppurtunity while maintaing the flow of the "starship" combat... Will have to work it out.

Maybe depending on the scenarios have multiple encounters going at once??!! Hmmm...

Not that I think I would ever have time to run a game...


but I was looking at starmada as a way to do space combat too.

In answer to your question, you have one guy piloting and the rest take up gunner slots.   (You ship needs multiple gun turrets of course.)  When you are short on people one gunner controls all the guns in tandem or the computer does it but when you have multiple people, each one can sit at a gun and fire on his side of the ship.  (Think of the falcon in Star Wars.)

You can also have a person doing the calculations for the hyperspace jump and/or people on damage control depending on how long the battle takes and how damage works.  Or you could have fighters for a few people but I don't think Traveler has those too often.

The problem isnt really having tasks assigned to each character, rather its making those tasks meaningful and significant from both an Roleplay perspective and from a mechanics perspective.  Sure you can be a gunner but if there is no meaningful choice in the scope of your actions, then its not really all that exciting. 

Having damage control teams would be useful in RL but making those engadging roleplay encounters on par with piloting the ship on a game board takes some doing. It essentially be like running seperate encounters for each character. It could happen...

I've been doing a "Savage Worlds" Eberron game with my other group.  It's a rules-light system, easily flexible for a variety of settings.  Many people have created and posted settings around the internet.  One site showing conversions is here: Multimedia File Viewing and Clickable Links are available for Registered Members only!!  You need to or

and another massive list of conversions is here (including some Traveller conversions, an example at Multimedia File Viewing and Clickable Links are available for Registered Members only!!  You need to or ):
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Also, the book is only $10.

One benefit of savage worlds is that tom could use a whole lot more of his d12's!

Par of the appeal of Traveller for me is partly nostalgic another is that its d6. The game itself is fairly simple. On par with basic D&D. It also allows for easy expansions and home-rules etc. 

Well that and making star charts is at least as fun as making dungeons!