Step Into the Traveller Universe with Fate of the Kinunir

Step Into the Traveller Universe with Fate of the Kinunir

Fate of the KinunirbyIf, like me, you have fond memories of mustering out after a few tours of duty and becoming a ship captain plying the Spinward Marches, guided only by a trio of slim black volumes with the Traveller logo, then you’ll be very pleased to hear that there’s a line of promising tie-in novels headed your way.

The first one, Robert E. Vardeman’s Fate of the Kinunir, was published in multiple e-book formats on August 1. Vardeman is the author of the Cenotaph Road series, as well as the Swords of Raemllyn books and the Demon Crown Trilogy, among many others.

The books are being packaged by Athans & Associates Creative Consulting, under license from Marc Miller’s Far Future Enterprises, who have overseen the Traveller product line for the last decade or so — including the superb First Edition reprints, and the entire 5th Edition line.

Personally, I’m very pleased to see some fiction set in the Traveller universe. I was never a very serious Traveller player; but for that brief period I did play, I had a great deal of fun running my little merchant ship between outlying systems, selling whatever I could find to trade. Traveller was the only role playing game I knew that had a complete little economic mini-game buried in its trading charts, and for years after we played, I still daydreamed about being a merchant in the stars.

According to Athans & Associates, Fate of the Kinunir will be followed by a new book every month for the next year, including novels by Tim Waggoner, Erik Scott de Bie, Martin J. Dougherty, Darrin Drader, and others. The fiction line will be managed by Philip Athans, the founding partner of Athans & Associates, who was the senior managing editor at Wizards of the Coast, overseeing the novel lines for the Dungeons & Dragons settings Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, and many others.

Fate of the Kinunir was published by Far Future Enterprises on August 1st. It is 212 pages, priced at $5.99 for the Kindle edition.

[Thanks to John DeNardo at SF Signal for the tip].

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Joe H.

Double bonus credit for keeping the classic layout for the cover.

Glenn

Wow I feel like this came out of nowhere. Traveller has always intrigued me but I’ve never had a chance to play a game of it. That’s a pretty good list of authors there. Phil Athans, Tim Waggoner, and Erik Scott de Bie all have some pretty good novels out there already.

I ll be keeping an eye out for these.

Glenn

Are all of these going to be ebooks? Or will we see some print material.

Oliver.Klages

What would be those “three slim black volumes”? A collegue gave me two german traveler rulebooks(labeled Traveler I and Traveller II: mercenaries and merchant princes) from the early 80s as a present but i wouldn’t describe those as slim at 160 and 190 pages.

eeknight

Props to a game that kills you during character gen.

Joe H.

The “three slim black volumes” would have been the English language first edition. Traveller was first published as a small box containing three slim digest-sized (5.5″ x 8.5″ or thereabouts) rulebooks, a format they stuck with for the next several years before shifting over to full-sized volumes.

http://www.waynesbooks.com/CTLittleBlackBooks.html

John Hocking

I played only one game of Traveller, way back in the day.
The gamemaster led a handful of friends and myself through the opening phases of the Judge’s Guild module Drakn’e Station.
I will never forget it, and have no idea why we never played again.

John H

chrislatray

One of my all-time favorite classic metal bands, SLOUGH FEG, dig a concept album called Traveler as well. It’s suitably awesome.

http://www.metalblade.com/us/releases/the-lord-weird-slough-feg-traveller/

chrislatray

I should also point out that Erol Otus did the album art on a couple of Slough Feg’s records as well. Heh.

Joe H.

I never did a lot of actual playing (story of my life) but I spent hours and hours making ships using the High Guard rules.

Glenn

I m five chapter in today. It’s good so far, but I think it hurts that I have almost no knowledge of traveller. I have the T4 core rulebook. I need to dig it out and look up some stuff.

Joe H.

John — Never had AHL (it was just too expensive back when I was in high school) but a friend did, so I did get to drool over the deck plans and the supplement. Occasionally I look for copies online (or alternately, copies of Snapshot, the predecessor to AHL) but haven’t been willing or able to spend the money on those rare occasions when I do see something listed.

And I had pretty much a complete collection of the Traveller LBBs once upon a time. Before the water came into the basement in the summer of 1993. Sigh. I did get the big reprints from FFE, but they’re not quite the same.

sfdespatch

I will end up with AZHANTI HIGH LIGHTNING some day, even if it is just to get the Supplement 5 Little Black Book. The Judges Guild Traveller booklets are really low production values but some of them have decent content. The new e-books triggered my Ebay purchase this week of Issues 2 through 10 of Journal of the Travellers’ Aid Society. I’m gradually filling out my classic Traveller collection explaining to my wife that I will eventually get around to playing again. She is usually sighing and shaking her head at that point.

Rich


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