			    TRAVELLER Digest 141

Topics covered in this issue include:

  1) Digest 139	by Hugh Foster <100326.446@compuserve.com>
  2) TRAVELLER digest 139	by jeff.zeitlin@execnet.com (JEFF ZEITLIN)
  3) Grav ball and other fun	by nicklaw@cix.compulink.co.uk (Nicholas Law)

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Date: 23 Dec 94 15:42:02 EST
From: Hugh Foster <100326.446@compuserve.com>
To: <traveller@MPGN.COM>
Subject: Digest 139
Message-ID: <941223204202_100326.446_BHG38-1@CompuServe.COM>

(Does anyone here read Dragon?)
Yeah, off and on. So ?
 
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Date: Thu, 22 Dec 94 19:30:00 -0500
From: jeff.zeitlin@execnet.com (JEFF ZEITLIN)
To: TRAVELLER@MPGN.COM
Subject: TRAVELLER digest 139
Message-ID: <8A02492.010003C5BF.uuout@execnet.com>


T::>This being the season for fun and merrymaking, what games and amusements have
 ::>been created for Traveller?

T::>I remember reading about grav ball, but can't remember where (references
 ::>please!).

T::>The Vilani card game gilkhu is described in High Passage #4.  The complete
 ::>rules are given, as well as an illustration of Vilani playing cards (done by
 ::>W. Keith) and a 'fast' system using Gambling skill.

 I'd _love_ to get a copy of this article...

T::>What else is out there?

 Well, I don't recall _seeing_ anything out there, but here's a few 
 ideas that you can use to simulate other games:

 (1)  Chess, in one form or another, always recognizable, has been 
 a part of Solomani existance since possibly two thousand 
 standard years before the zero date of the Solomani calendar.  
 Go look at a book on Chess and its variants and relatives (Xiang 
 Qi, Shogi, Chaturanga), and combine some of the features of 
 several of them into a new game.  I like doing this kind of thing; 
 I'd be glad to help out if anyone would like...

 (2)  Card games of some sort are also ubiquitous through history.  
 Different societies had different designs for the cards, different 
 rules, and perhaps different organizations for the deck (I 
 remember one SF game which adopted the Terran deck, but added at 
 least four additional suits).  Again, do a little homework, and 
 come up with your own.  Don't feel compelled to stick to "western" 
 cards, with numbered cards that have a fixed rank order - check 
 out the Japanese game of hanafuta, or the card game that is part 
 of the computer game called "Heaven and Earth".  If you want to 
 cheat, somewhere around I even have the complete rules for Fizzbin 
 (you _do_ remember Fizzbin, don't you?) which I'd be willing to 
 try to dig out and post here...

 (3)  Look for some games that are "off the beaten track" and "pass 
 them off" as alien games.  If they're really simple games, like 
 mancala games or the old "Morris" games, feel free to revise the 
 rules or imbue them with some sort of religious or cultural 
 significance that the players/PCs are likely to miss or 
 misinterpret (that's always a good way to complicate the 
 scenario).  Again, I have a few that I can dig out if anyone's 
 interested.

 (4)  Consider other fundamental aims for games - instead of trying 
 to achieve captures to win, try scoring points based on patterns 
 established on the board by the playing pieces.

 (5)  If you're _really_ a game nut (and I do mean _nut_), try 
 translating word games, such as Scrabble, into an alien language 
 (High Vilani?  Trokh?  Zhodani?).  Or perhaps simpler word games, 
 such as the Jumbles that appear in many newspapers, or Jotto 
 (which is really MasterMind, with letters instead of colored 
 pegs).

 (6)  Games with simple rules will probably have wide appeal.  
 Think about which games from the other categories above are 
 simple, and justify their spread.  Some Solomani games that should 
 qualify, since it is actually possible to teach them to someone 
 that doesn't speak your language, would be MasterMind, Backgammon, 
 Parchisi, Go, Go-Moku, Checkers, Al-Qirks, War (the card game), 
 ... I'm sure you get the idea.

 I guess what I'm saying is that you shouldn't depend on what comes 
 from "official" sources - it's not reasonable to expect GDW to 
 come up with _everything_, and it's not possible for them to do 
 it.  Come up with your own, and share them here.  _I_ think that 
 that would be more fun...

 (Hmm... Maybe I have a few more RICE Papers cooking here...)
==========================================================================
Jeff Zeitlin                                      jeff.zeitlin@execnet.com
---
  QMPro 1.53  Chief Archivist, Regency Institute for Cultural Education

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Date: Sat, 24 Dec 94 17:53 GMT
From: nicklaw@cix.compulink.co.uk (Nicholas Law)
To: traveller@MPGN.COM
Cc: nicklaw@cix.compulink.co.uk
Subject: Grav ball and other fun
Message-ID: <memo.633601@cix.compulink.co.uk>

> I remember reading about grav ball, but can't remember where
> (referencesplease!).

Hi Rob,

You might be thinking of my article and rules which were published 
as a supplement to the fanzine Starport, circa late 1991. In 
Starport 16 of that year, Kevin Parry wrote: *Grav Ball - This has 
been sent to Rob Prior and David Schneider [so] Nick Law can 
legitimately say that it is being played on three continents....*  

If you like, I could mail it to you (or anyone else who would like 
a copy) although it might be a rather large file, especially as 
the counters and board were done on Excel spreadsheets; that is 
assuming I could find it all  -- I haven't seen that floppy disk 
for quite a while...

In Challenge 49, Mike Mikesh, in his article on the Julian 
Protectorate mentions three sports: kuspar, floater and saliball. 
After reading Mike's article, I devised rules for one of them, 
that had elements of baseball, sumo and real tennis, as well as 
formalised Vargr infighting. Again, this is stuff from a long time 
ago, but if you want, I can dredge it up from the deep.

Merry Chistmas,
Nick Law


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End of TRAVELLER Digest 141
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