Thread: Merc 2000
View Single Post
  #4  
Old 03-25-2021, 01:56 AM
Southernap's Avatar
Southernap Southernap is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: May 2020
Location: Washington State, USA
Posts: 83
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by StainlessSteelCynic View Post

If the T2k series had not included Merc, I might very well have missed Dark Conspiracy and Cadillacs & Dinosaurs. My T2k books would have ended up sitting on a shelf with me wistfully staring at them wishing I could get a group to play it

Does it deserve a reboot?
I think a reprint with updates to T2k 2.2/Traveller: TNE rules would work fine. I think there's still enough interest in small scale/tactical combat rpgs and mercenary/PMC type games.
I would hesitate to ask for a reboot because I generally don't think reboots do much for the original game. Often they change too many aspects and it becomes a totally new game.
As an example of what I mean, I have always loved the X-Com video games since I was first introduced to them on the NES. When the 2010 remake titled XCOM was announced I was initially very interested, then when I saw gameplay footage and borrowed a friend's copy to actually play, I was left bitterly disappointed - it was nothing like X-Com and should have been called something totally different as it missed almost every single thing that made X-Com great.
I feel the same way about the reboot of Twilight: 2000 by Free League (and enough has been said about that, so I'll leave it at that).
Generally, I don't think reboots work (with some exceptions in movies/novels)
I will admit that Cadallics & Dinos is one of those games that I saw the ads for in the back of GDWs products or in the catalogs when I bought a couple of boxed sets. I never saw it live and its probably one of my products that I most lust for out of GDWs RPG line, just to give it a go for all its pulp like fun.
As to Dark Conspiracy, I never had a chance to play again saw the ads in all of my T2K books and the few times I got a catalog in the mail.
Yet, I can see how one would progress from T2k -> Merc 2k -> DC or C&D.

Since the GDW made an effort to standardize the game engine across all their major games. Except for a couple of them before the company went out of business.

I totally agree the new rules they introduced and some of the new equipment they introduced in Merc2k would have worked well into the T2k game. Since they gave a some expansion to an already robust set of rules and equipment lists.

As to the reboot idea. I was thinking more along the lines of a maybe a soft reboot. Where the manual and rules gets tweaked based on the released errata, maybe do some editing so the rules flow a little better. Heck, maybe even just call it a V1.x release of the rules.

I also just wish I had the writing skills, I would try and craft a supplement like the recent Pac NW released for T2K or the Korean supplement. If not a good scenario like the Rook's Gambit.

I know the Gazetteer gave us ten spots including:
  • Chinese Warlords
  • China vs Vietnam
  • Indonesia vs Australia
  • Philippines civil war
  • Angola vs Zaire/Congo
  • Indian Subcontinent unrest - both internal to India and issues in the Kashmir
  • Nigeria vs Biafra
  • Mali vs Burkina Faso
  • Guatemala vs Belize
  • Peru rebellion

Thinking through to the more modern era. I could potentially see the obvious of combat zones in the Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria.
Yet, I could also see maybe something like the narco-terror groups in Central and South America. Going to anyplace in North Africa/Sahara Africa and the unrest there. Some industrial sabotage or even espionage against multi-national corps by other multi-nationals or NGOs.

Maybe even creating a new supplement book on how to create your own merc company with rules on how to become your own version of Blackwater or Aegis Defense or some other PMC for hire.

Like I said in the opening, Merc 2k offers up some interesting ideas on where the game engine could go and could provide ways as SSC mentions for folks that don't want the bleakness of post-apocalypse world to maybe something as harsh, but you still have TV that works with 3 hots and a soft fluffy bed to sleep in.
__________________
Hey, Law and Order's a team, man. He finds the bombs, I drive the car. We tried the other way, but it didn't work.
Reply With Quote