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Review of The Chamax Plague and Horde


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Double Adventure #5, "The Chamax Plague" and "Horde" are a double-adventure produced in the standard classic Traveller format of a B4 booklet. The two scenarios are designed to run sequentially (The Chamax Plague first) which makes the publication format, with the second adventure printed "upside down" to the first even more annoying than usual - especially if one wants to use some of the recommended pre-generated characters. Artwork in the adventure is average standard, and the scale of one of the most important maps is quite dubious and will probably need to reworked by the Referee.

Without giving too much away the two adventures are bug hunts and indeed the hostile alien lifeform in question combines some of the features of the Aliens from the classic movies of the same name but also many of the features of the bugs from Starship Troopers. This isn't too surprising given that the novel for Troopers had been in publication for many years and of course the original Alien movie was released two years prior to publication of the adventure pack. In both cases the travellers will start off in secluded parts of the universe, far from immediate help with a number of thoroughly reasonable plot devices invoked to ensure their necessary participation.

What is very surprising is the ability of the two adventures to capture the feeling of the two aforementioned movies, especially given that Aliens was not released until 1986 and Starship Troopers 1997. The first adventure primarily involves a search and destroy mission on a deserted spacecraft. The second, a running battle over several weeks on a planetary peninsula. The aliens in question are not as tough as the beasties from either of the two movies and nor are they as damaging, but they more than make up the difference in their numbers. Essentially, expect the PC travellers to able to engage in magnificant bug-splattering attacks until they realise they are about to be overwhelmed by sheer numbers and eaten.

There are only a few instances where the text could have been a little clearer, making it even possible to run both adventures straight from the book, as long as the Referee has an intuitive capacity to generate a couple of location maps on the fly and engage in some random die rolls which Traveller seems unusually fond of; the better option in most of these cases will be to pick the average. Referees who attempt to run the scenarios with minimal preparation may find themselves delighted and surprised following the carnage to discover a relatively sophisticated backstory which is revealed at the conclusion of the adventure along with some very interesting further leads.

I am normally not a great fun of the "bug hunt" subgenre of science fiction RPGs, but this product is an exception. Naturally enough, it is a largely a combination of stealth and combat, but there are a great number of instances where a multitude of other skills are called for, and even political and diplomatic debates are indicated at a strategic level. With little work there is more than enough material here for several sessions and even without it, three to four would be the expected. An excellent product and highly recommended.

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Journal of the Travellers' Aid Society. Issue No. 17

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