Different Continuities

[Havard]

Hi guys,
from what I understand the now discontinued GURPS Traveller was set in a different continuity than the Traveller New Era line. How many different conituinities are there?

-Havard

[The Dark]

Going chronologically:

GURPS Traveller Interstellar Wars covers the First and Second Imperium. AFAIK, nothing in it contradicts anything later.
Marc Miller's Traveller (Milieu 0) covers the collapse of the Second Imperium and the Long Night, plus the founding of the Third Imperium.
Traveller20 covers the Imperial/Solomani Rim War, about 900 years after the founding of the Third Imperium.
Classic Traveller is at the height of the Third Imperium.
The split comes with MegaTraveller and GURPS Traveller, which have a divergent timeline after 1117. In Mega, there's a Rebellion that leads to the fall of the Third Imperium. GURPS doesn't have the events that cause the Rebellion.
The New Era takes place after Mega (1190-1200), and involves the rump states reforming in the face of Virus.
1248 is slightly post-New Era and has the start of the Fourth Imperium.
I haven't read T5, but my understanding is that it's set around 1900.

Basically, GURPS Traveller is in its own continuity that conflicts with Mega, TNE, 1248, and T5, but everything pre-1117 can be used by either timeline.

[BlackBat242]

Classic Traveller is set 1105+, with "news releases" in the Journal of the Travellers' Aid Society (official Traveller magazine published quarterly from 1979 on) starting with JTAS #2 (and dated 097-1105 and later), with the news updates and so on progressing at roughly the same rate as real-time (the news reports in JTAS #24 (1985) were dated 1111).

In JTAS #29 (by then a supplemental Traveller section within Challenge Magazine - which now covered all GDW games, and which started with issue #25 to keep pace with the JTAS numbering) the following news release is given:

CAPITAL/CORE (0508 A586A98 F) Date: 132 1116

Emperor Strephon Aella Alkhalikoi was assassinated at 1517 hours local time, 132 1116, in the Grand Reception Hall of the Imperial Palace above Capital/Core. In the ensuing firefight, the Empress lolanthe and the Grand Princess lphegenia were also killed, along with the Aslan Yerlyaruiwo ambassador, twelve Imperial Guards, and a number of bystanders.

This was the starting point for MegaTraveller, and the divergent point with GURPS Traveller.

[Big Mac]

Is this new Campaign 2: Pirates of Drinax thing a different continuity, or one of the other existing continuities?

[Havard]

Is this new Campaign 2: Pirates of Drinax thing a different continuity, or one of the other existing continuities?

Going with what TheDark posted earlier, I guess it is only GURPS Traveller that exists in a separate continuity from the rest, splitting in 1197 (MegaTraveller and beyond), so I'm guessing this campaign will be set in the main continuity.

Looks like most of the Mongoose Material is set in the Third Imperium, so I suppose that this campaign will be set in that period as well?

-Havard

[BlackBat242]

I found this in the Traveller Wiki: http://wiki.travellerrpg.com/Setting

Mongoose Traveller returns to the "Classic" era and location, i.e., 1105 and the Spinward Marches. Although the Basic Rule Book has little setting background, the first supplement released was The Spinward Marches by Martin Dougherty.

Thus it is within the CT time-frame and setting, before the MT/GT split.