Stellar Reaches

Good morning, All,

The following is a public service announcement of sorts:

The deadline for submissions for Stellar Reaches Issue #3, Summer 2005, approaches. Articles and the like are due by midnight, July 31st, Central Time.

We already have a growing number of articles submitted, making my job both easier and more difficult in putting together the next issue. Indeed, selecting which articles to include will be difficult, based on the high quality of what has been submitted, but I am pleased to have those choices. We are still open to your submissions, though, so please feel free to submit something if you are interested.

With Warm Regards,
Jason “Flynn” Kemp
Editor, Stellar Reaches

Good morning, All,

I’ve mentioned this contest as a possibility in the past, but now I think I’d like to make it official.

Stellar Reaches, a free PDF fanzine for CT and T20, is holding a contest entitled 76 Ethical Patrons. For this contest, I am asking contributors to send me patron encounters in the style of the old CT Supplement 6, 76 Patrons. Enter as many times as you like. The basic stipulations are as follows:

1) The patron encounter should take up at least half a page, but no more than a full page (~800 words).

2) Each patron encounter should offer six different options. It’s the editor’s opinion that giving less than six different options isn’t exploring the possibilities of a given scenario to their fullest extent. (Besides, six options in a patron encounter give effectively six different adventures, which in turn give the reader more for their money’s worth, so to speak.)

3) The patron encounter must provide adventure opportunities that do not involve the characters having to break the law. (I’d prefer to see at least three out of the six options be perfectly legit variations on the main theme, more if you can.)

4) Each entry should also contain a brief title and a byline with the author’s name, for identification and accreditation purposes.

5) Enter as many times as you like (by June 30th, that is), but make sure the work is yours. Please do not submit someone else’s work or work that has already been published.

Please send your entries in either text or RTF format to:
jason.flynn.kemp~AT~gmail.com

Contest ends: 30 June 2005.

Winners will be announced in Issue #3 of the Stellar Reaches fanzine, and the top five entries will be included in that issue.

Also, if we actually hit the magic number of 76 different patron encounters, I’ll put together a special Stellar Reaches supplement issue in PDF called 76 Ethical Patrons to post in the file library. All contributors will be given credit for their work, of course, and will retain the copyright on their contributions.

Happy Travellin’,
Jason “Flynn” Kemp
Editor, Stellar Reaches fanzine

Good morning, All,

Thanks to the kind generosity of Greg and the rest of the NWGamers crew, we’ve moved to a much better site, capable of supporting the bandwidth required to host a fanzine like Stellar Reaches. They’ve implemented a blog-style interface, and created this wonderful site you see here today. Thank you, guys! It looks fantastic!

In addition, the new banner across the top of the page was created for us by none other than Andrew Boulton, who has been working feverishly on a Traveller CGI movie. His progress is well documented over on the COTI Boards, under Another Traveller Mini-Movie. We are very thankful for his contribution, and look forward to seeing some of his work in both future issues and in the form of Traveller CGI mini-movies.

Happy Travellin’,
Jason “Flynn” Kemp
Editor, Stellar Reaches Fanzine

Greeting, Fellow Sophonts!

It’s midnight, and our second issue, Issue #2, Spring 2005, is now available for downloading. Please visit our archives page to find prior issues and other releases, as they are prepared and released.

Welcome to the second issue of Stellar Reaches, a free PDF-based fanzine dedicated to Traveller T20 and Classic Traveller. Despite a few technical issues, we still managed to produce this issue within our schedule (or pretty close, anyway), releasing it in late Spring of 2005. Our next issue will be released in August 2005, before the end of the summer, assuming Gen Con Indianapolis 2005 does not overly interfere with its preparations or release date.

As you can tell from our cover page, the Spring 2005 issue has actual art contributions. We are particularly thankful to both artists that submitted work for inclusion in this release: Bryan Gibson and Chuck Shaw.

Bryan Gibson has provided exceptional artwork for Traveller products for every edition of Traveller, from CT and MT to TNE, T4 and T20. His interior art is fantastic as always, and we are greatly honored and appreciative of his contributions here. (Please bear in mind, friends, that he does retain copyright on the images found herein, so if you want to use them elsewhere, please contact him for permission.)

Further examples of Bryan’s work can be found at on the web at:
http://groups.msn.com/ImagesStudio

Known as Baron Saarthuran von Gushiddan on the Citizens of the Imperium boards, Chuck Shaw is an up-and-coming graphics artist, actively involved in the Theater industry. His creation, entitled “Insidious Atmospheres”, serves as this issue’s front cover. For more of Chuck’s work, please check out his website:
http://groups.msn.com/SidurHaskiDesignConsortium

In addition to art, this issue offers some contributed content as well. From one of our Classic Traveller fans, Benjamin “Jame” Pew, comes a short article on light task forces set in Golden Age Spinward Marches, complete with two military vessels designed under CT Book 2 specifications. On the T20 side of things, Daniel “Liam Devlin” Hammersley provides us with an article that expands on the information found within the T20 Traveller’s Handbook on RNA Implants. Special thanks to each of our contributors for their efforts.

The usual suspects for Stellar Reaches are still present, as well. The Spring 2005 issue contains an in-depth article on the Delta Quadrant of the Empty Quarter sector, as well as an adventure related to that little corner of the Third Imperium. This issue’s starship datasheet article addresses Deep Space Stations, those “stepping stone” space stations used to bridge the gap across the vacant reaches of rifts. To round things out, we’ve included a wildlife encounter and a patron encounter as additional material for use in your Traveller campaigns.

Please remember that this work is an act of love on the part of those that have helped make it what it is. Stellar Reaches can not continue to exist without support from Traveller fans, so please consider contributing either articles or artwork to this fanzine. Submission guidelines are available on our website, and all contributions will be considered!

Now, without any further adieu, it’s time to stop scanning this editorial and jump directly into the actual Spring 2005 issue of Stellar Reaches. We hope you enjoy our efforts.

Preparing for Jump,
Jason “Flynn” Kemp
Editor, Stellar Reaches fanzine

Stellar Reaches, Issue #2, Spring 2005, is complete and should be posted on the site tonight. Our apologies for the delays, but we elected to aim for quality in production, even if it cost us a few weeks in delivery. More news tonight, fellow Travellers!

The wait is almost over! The next issue of Stellar Reaches, Issue #2, Spring 2005, is expected to be completed and released by Monday, 23 May 2005.

After more feedback, we have updated our premiere issue, Issue #1, Winter 2005, to correct some additional errors discovered by our peers. The updated file is now available for downloading. Please visit our archives page to find prior issues and other releases, as they are prepared and released.

We have updated our premiere issue, Issue #1, Winter 2005, to correct errors discovered by our peers. The updated file is now available for downloading. Please visit our archives page to find prior issues and other releases, as they are prepared and released

We’ve just uploaded a newer version of the file, fixing a few format/layout issues that had been reported. Enjoy!

Our premiere issue, Issue #1, Winter 2005, is now available for downloading. Please visit our archives page to find prior issues and other releases, as they are prepared and released.

We’ve also just added a Submission Guidelines page which also contains a list of the kinds of things we are interested in for future issues of Stellar Reaches.

Greeting, Fellow Sophonts!

Welcome to Stellar Reaches, a free PDF-based fanzine dedicated to Traveller T20 and Classic Traveller. During the 1980s and ’90s, fans of Traveller supported their game through such fanzines as High Passage, Far Traveller, Third Imperium and Security Leak, among others. However, in recent years, such fan-based support has been primarily relegated to websites. Stellar Reaches, a free fanzine for Traveller T20 and Classic Traveller, attempts to provide the same level of support that fanzines of the past generated for Traveller, in an electronic format.

In each issue, readers will find details for one quadrant of a featured sector (the first four issues focus on the Empty Quarter sector), as well as an adventure based in that region of space, to help introduce players to the region. Supporting articles, such as starship and vehicles designs, background information or new game mechanics, typically lend support to the adventure or setting depicted in the issue.

It is our goal to release a new issue of Stellar Reaches quarterly, with 20 to 40 pages of content in each issue, depending on submissions. While Stellar Reaches primarily supports Traveller T20 and Classic Traveller, articles from other systems will definitely be considered. While the primary focus of content is expected to be on the Gateway Era and Classic Traveller time frames at first (with the intention to support TNE 1248 as well, once that core book is released), other eras may also come into focus as other authors submit articles, and new products become available on the market.

Submissions are simple. Each draft document should be anything between one and eight pages in length (assuming approximately 800 words to the page). If possible, articles should be submitted in RTF, TXT or Word format, as those are the easiest to convert. Please be mindful of your grammar and spelling, if you can.

We are also in dire need of artwork, ranging from scanned drawings to rendered graphics of starships, vehicles and robots. All contributions will be considered!

This is a non-profit operation, run totally based on our love for the game. The only payment we receive is the recognition of Traveller fans for our work. We sincerely hope you enjoy our efforts, but if you do not, we ask that you bear in mind that it didn’t cost you anything, either.

Thank you for joining us on our maiden voyage, and we hope you enjoy the ride!

Preparing for Jump,
Jason “Flynn” Kemp
Editor, Stellar Reaches fanzine