Traveller vs. Star Frontiers

Oh, now it is getting personal. How dare you compare these?

And I speak with someone who had a Star Frontiers campaign world go on for 30 years, I know which one won in our hearts. But the game never lasted long, got a silly remake with the color-coded "Marvel Super Heroes" results table and some awful 1980s Macintosh vector art with Zebulon's Guide to Frontier Space, and the game was left to die.

Wizards resurrected the corpse with d20 Future, and I hope they never touch this game again with the D&D rules, or they will most certainly ruin it and desecrate the fond memories I have. After what they did to Spelljammer, I do not trust them with science fiction. The game outsold Traveller in the 1980s, but we received no follow-up from TSR. We had a handful of adventures, no true second edition, no hardcovers (unless you count the PoD today, thank you, Wizards), and the game died by the 1990s and was a dead game.

Our love for Star Frontiers went on for decades. The system broke down due to skills and abilities that exceeded 100%, and the game struggled to handle higher-level play. We ended up replacing the rules systems with other ones, and that is where we left it.

Today, the spirit of Star Frontiers lives on in the excellent Frontier Space game, picking up where the original left off, and it has a much better action economy and system of rules in place. I would still use the Star Frontiers Universe and the Knight Hawks ship combat game, but Frontier Space is essentially Star Frontiers these days. There's no reason to play that game when we have far better options available, plus an open, community license. But none of these are 2d6 games!

Traveller is.

Compared to Star Frontiers, Traveller is massive. The game only went out of print a few times, and we had various versions reincarnated over the decades. Today, it is in excellent hands, with the first edition of the Mongoose game having an open license, and the second has a partner license, but the first-party support from Mongoose is phenomenal. The first-party support for Mongoose Traveller, second edition, is better than Wizards and D&D.

Traveller survived and thrived, and it is a robust game. This is the best and largest science fiction role-playing game out there these days. Compared to Star Frontiers, Traveller won the war. I still have a massive soft spot for Star Frontiers, though.

If I were starting a science fiction game today, what would I do?

Traveller would be the one. While Frontier Space is a fantastic emulation of the original comic-book-like game, and it improves on the rules in every way, I could do the same or better in a 2d6 game these days. I know, it is heresy, but the support in Traveller for so many campaign types, and the number and quality of adventures, means I have decades of things to do, and there is still more coming.

There are thousands of systems, numerous starship types, varied campaign types, a trading game, mercenary adventures, mass combat, ship combat, capital ships, a war campaign, science missions, and much more. You can run diplomats, spies, cyber-hackers, criminals, space pirates, freedom fighters, space law enforcement, bounty hunters, navy campaigns, scouts, entertainers, reporters, or any other modern profession-style campaign, but "in space."

Frontier Space is still here and supported. But not to the level of Traveller. Not to the depth of information, campaigns, one-off adventures, ships, and stars to explore, plus infinite universe generation. To be fair, Frontier Space does have random mission, installation, villain, system, sector, and planetary generation - so it is no slouch in this regard either. Both are far better than the original Star Frontiers. And the Frontier Space tables are entirely usable with Traveller, too.

Traveller wins on starship design, combat, and the wealth of designed and fully mapped starships. You can go heavy metal war-game with Traveller and have capital ship battles, and not just simulate them in narrative. What you design can be battled and tested. You can fight the premade ships. The space combat in Traveller is one of the best systems out there. High Guard even has fleet battle rules. It goes there, and you get a lot with this game.

And Traveller gives you an entire sector to create yourself. If you really loved the Frontier setting, you could recreate it there with a handful of stars on that map and still have plenty of room to explore. Of course, there will be neighbors around, or you could use the sector as a standalone place without the Imperium. 

So, who wins the Traveller versus Star Frontiers comparison?

Frontier Space needs to be in the discussion. Each game does something excellently. Traveller excels at both the macro game and the focused campaign games, and it has the best setting in science fiction gaming. Frontier Space excels at pulp space adventure comic-book science fiction. Star Frontiers has its classic setting.

 But, the winner?

The game you love.