Episode 12: Entertainment in the Core - The Business of Distraction

Episode 12: Entertainment in the Core - The Business of Distraction

What does the Core do for fun? We explore how people across the sector consume entertainment, from bootleg holo-vids and immersive VR to luxury tourism, gladitorial bloodsports, and noble safaris. Get tips on turning ordinary hobbies into extraordinary circumstances. Plus, System Spotlights on Dudin and Alekvadin, and a review of Core Adventure 1: Invasive Species by Christopher Griffen.  As always, send your signals to coresignalsmail@gmail.com or find us wherever you are on social media: https://linktr.ee/signalsfromthecore [https://linktr.ee/signalsfromthecore] If you enjoy the show, please consider rating and reviewing it on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

Episode 11: Signals to the Core – From Communications to Corruption

In this episode of Signals from the Core, we open the mailbag for a round of CORE-espondence: listener questions, messages, and ideas that sent me down new routes for thinking about the Traveller roleplaying game and the Core Sector. We talk interstellar mail and communication lag, the darker side of the Imperial Core, Perpetual Traveller, useful JTAS articles for Core campaigns, and a possible new direction for the show as an audio ‘zine touring the worlds of the Core one stop at a time. As always, follow along on Bluesky at signalsfromthecore.bsky.social  Send your signals to coresignalsmail@gmail.com or find us wherever you are on social media: https://linktr.ee/signalsfromthecore [https://linktr.ee/signalsfromthecore] Find more on Perpetual Traveller here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/149834066407611 [https://www.facebook.com/groups/149834066407611] Pick up the Journal of the Traveller’s Aid Society here: https://www.mongoosepublishing.com/collections/jtas [https://www.mongoosepublishing.com/collections/jtas]

Episode 10: Celebrity & Fame in the Core – Stardom at the Speed of Jump

In the Mongoose Traveller 2nd Edition roleplaying game, news crawls across the stars at the speed of jump, and fame travels the same way.  In this episode of Signals from the Core, we look at how celebrity works in the Third Imperium, with a special focus on what happens when all of it gets amplified in the Core Sector.  As always, send your signals to coresignalsmail@gmail.com or find us wherever you are on social media: ⁠https://linktr.ee/signalsfromthecore⁠ [https://linktr.ee/signalsfromthecore] If you enjoy the show, please consider rating and reviewing it on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Also in this episode: we look at what published Mongoose Publishing source materials give us on celebrity and fame in the Third Imperium Sourcebook, the Singularity campaign materials, the new Infinity Suite campaign, and Mongoose Traveller 1E's Book 8: Dilettante to trace how a reputation gets made, sponsored, and sustained. We talk the business of spectacle, the Ministry of Information, and sort celebrity into four working types Referees can put straight to use.  Plus, we profile a new NPC patron, Ansel Drevane, celebrity chef, cultural envoy, and unwitting Imperial mouthpiece, along with an adventure hook that drops your Travellers between his appetite for danger and an Amber Zone world that bites back!

Episode 9: Capital of the Core – The Throne World, City by City

In this episode of Signals from the Core, we take our first deep dive into Capital, throne world of the Third Imperium. Twenty billion people. A Grand floating palace, Cleon, the Moot Spire … These are the things we always hear about Capital and learn from sourcebooks that tend to cover the whole planet in just a handful of pages. We dive into the Third Imperium Sourcebook by Christopher Griffen and how you can interpret a few fixed points provided in it to turn one spot on the subsector map into a vibrant, textured setting of many diverse locations where Travellers can find work, trouble, and adventure, meeting new contacts, enemies and allies. We tackle the population puzzle, compare the Traveller Wiki information to what Mongoose provides, and explore the throne world city by city across the municipalities marked on the published world map. Plus, how I learned to stop fretting and love the vague nature of Traveller's UWP and the scant info provided in many of its sourcebooks. Send your signals to coresignalsmail@gmail.com, or find us wherever you are: https://linktr.ee/signalsfromthecore [https://linktr.ee/signalsfromthecore]

Episode 8: Launching a Traveller Campaign in the Core Pt. 2 - Old Crew Blues

In the Mongoose Traveller 2nd Edition roleplaying game, an established crew brings something a fresh group can't. Shared history. A ship. A reputation. Patrons, contacts, rivals, and a running storyline the players that should continue even with a new campaign on the table. In this episode of Signals from the Core, we look at how Referees can launch Christopher Griffen's Singularity campaign for a veteran team. We walk through a three-beat recruitment escalation built for crews who already know the score. Then, for groups that need a sharper push, we dig into the design logic for misfortune-based hooks. Group-level pressure on shared assets designed to shift the status quo. We explore ways to balance collective motives with personal ones and the emergent storytelling opportunities in the gaps between. As always, send your signals to coresignalsmail@gmail.com or find us wherever you are on social media: https://linktr.ee/signalsfromthecore [https://linktr.ee/signalsfromthecore]