Alternate Versions of Twilight 2000

[Targan]

When I used Gunmaster for T2K I used Guns, Guns, Guns (3G3) by BTRC to do all my firearms calcs. I started with 100 or so ammunition types and then built families of firearms based on those.

[StainlessSteelCynic]

I think the important thing with all of this, is that the rules developed for T2k were given a lot of thought in terms of providing the right "feel" to the game world. As much as the setting itself conveys that feel, the rules can also enhance or detract from that.
GDW got it right - it may not be perfect, but it's close enough.

I tend to disagree with the notion that "T2k can be played with any rules system because the setting defines the game". I believe the rules work hand in hand with the setting to create that feel.
A system with wonderful world building is ruined by bad rules and the world's greatest rules system is next to useless if the world setting is so dull and lifeless that you don't want to play it.
Again I'll say, GDW got it right and again, not perfect, but close enough.

It's for these reasons that I have not found rules systems such as Savage Worlds to be particularly satisfying for T2k, nor the Gumshoe system, Year Zero and definitely not any variation of D&D rules (such as D20 Modern - I mean, really I need a Feat to be able to fire full auto)
None of them cover such things as disease, radiation, scavenging, resource management and so on, in a manner that satisfactorily enhances the world building.
Sure they may cover "some" of those aspects, but usually not the entirety and often not with the same depth or they feel like an afterthought, tacked on after the main rules were created. Any of these can break the immersion for some people.
I think most gamers will happily suspend their disbelief but it requires the game to pull them in. The world building and the rules need to create that feel so that players do get immersed.

I think there's only a few rules systems around that could do the same as the GDW system and unsurprisingly, they are typically anchored in the same sort of approach to the game world i.e. not super-heroic, not pulp action and so on but grounded in the "real world". Most definitely some of them can allow those elements but it's not their foundation.
Aftermath, Cyberpunk 2020, the 2013 rules, Call of Cthulhu, GURPS even early edition ShadowRun to an extent - all of them either already cover many elements found in the T2k rules or they can be easily tweaked to allow those aspects without breaking rules and/or setting.

[Targan]

Well said.

[Vespers War]

The key is that the T2K rules work for any type of game involving gunpowder weapons. If you know how the designers came up with the stats for various weapons and vehicles...

It can work for games that don't explicitly have gunpowder weapons as well, particularly if one has the TNE rules for creature generation. I have a set of rough guidelines for converting D&D 3.x or Pathfinder 1e to GDW stats. I still need to polish them and put them up somewhere, but roughly:

1. Include the shield block combat maneuver from Franklin's Traveller Pages. D&D/PF shields modify the skill roll by their AC bonus minus 2 (this is so a heavy shield is the default, a buckler is slightly worse, and a tower shield is better).

2. For melee weapons, anything with a D&D/PF max damage of 4 or less becomes 1d6, 5-6 is 1d6 + 1/2 Str, 7-8 is 2d6 + 1/2 Str, 9-10 is 2d6 + Str, and 11-12 is 3d6 + Str. Ranged weapons are generally 6 or less is 1d6 and 7 or higher is 2d6, treating armor like melee weapons do. Magic weapons add +1 to effective skill, do +1 damage, and ignore a point of AV for each plus (so a weapon +3 adds +3 to skill, does +3 damage, and ignores 3 AV).

3. D&D/PF normal armor gets halved as parenthetical armor, so Leather (AC +2) is AV (1) in GDW, while Full Plate (AC +8) is AV (4). Magic armor gets its full value as regular armor, so Leather +2 is AV 2(1). This is explicitly to make low-level magic armor valuable and someone with high-level magic armor pretty scary to go up against.

4. Humanoids get half their hits from size and half from average stats. I have a spreadsheet to do this and will need to explain it thoroughly when I write up the article.

5. Non-humanoids get their hits based on size, with tweaking based on a Dragon article on how to create monsters in D&D 3 - for example, Beasts get a 25% boost because of their hit die type, and Dragons get heavily modified, with their actual size being half of what their hit die would imply, and getting a boost to hits above that, so that a 10 HD animal is about 8 tons and 82 hits, while a 10 HD beast is the same mass but 103 hits, and a 10 HD dragon is about 3 tons and 144 hits.

6. Natural armor converts to AV like armor (+2 AC is AV (1)), while Damage Reduction converts to AV at DR 5 = AV 1. Messing with an Iron Golem and its AV 3 (11) is a bad idea unless you have very heavy weaponry.

It's very far afield from canon T2K, but I started working on it for a few reasons: to see if the House Rules could handle fantasy, as a way of using the vast number of D20-era sourcebooks as ways to create more aliens for Traveller, and as a tribute to the very early magazine article about WW2 Germans encountering a Necromancer's army of orcs.

[pmulcahy11b]

Here's an interesting question...I realize that this is way outside of the T2K timeline, but did the COVID-19 pandemic occur in the future of the T2K timeline in 2020

[Raellus]

Going Viral

Here's an interesting question...I realize that this is way outside of the T2K timeline, but did the COVID-19 pandemic occur in the future of the T2K timeline in 2020

Probably not. Trade links with Asia wouldn't be as strong as they are in our world, and population densities, especially in China, would much lower. So even if the virus hopped from a bat at a wet market to a human in Wuhan, or whatever, it probably wouldn't spread around the world like it has.

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[pmulcahy11b]

Probably not. Trade links with Asia wouldn't be as strong as they are in our world, and population densities, especially in China, would much lower. So even if the virus hopped from a bat at a wet market to a human in Wuhan, or whatever, it probably wouldn't spread around the world like it has.

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I'm inclined to agree with you for the same reason, but wouldn't make a great double-T2K super-campaign

[Raellus]

Nukes & Corona

I'm inclined to agree with you for the same reason, but wouldn't make a great double-T2K super-campaign

Indeed.

Humanity in the T2kU: "Things couldn't get any worse than the last 25 years, right"

Coronavirus: "Hold my beer."

Even without it, though, mankind would still have plenty of diseases to deal with.

[Legbreaker]

Here's an interesting question...I realize that this is way outside of the T2K timeline, but did the COVID-19 pandemic occur in the future of the T2K timeline in 2020

No.
It'd be worse given the USSR's widespread use of biological weapons during the war (not much mentioned in the game, but IRL it is a core part of their total war doctrine). Probably wouldn't be covid, but there'd absolutely be something very, very nasty in it's place, possibly something different in each region based on what was thrown at them previously.

[Matt Wiser]

My alternate version: no Soviet invasion of Alaska, and no Mexican invasion of the Southwest and Texas. I know, we've discussed these ad nauseaum in the past, but to each his own.

[Targan]

Have the Mexicans invade Alaska and really confuse everyone

[StainlessSteelCynic]

Have the Mexicans invade Alaska and really confuse everyone

I think that would confuse even the Mexicans!