Original LBB Traveller had the four year self-improvement plan. I don’t think I ever saw the rules used, which may have been the point. (They were left out of Starter Traveller, the first set I saw.)
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I “think” I remember that, but I could just be manufacturing the memory again… I do remember looking through the Traveller books looking for how to advance my character in-game, and thoroughly not understanding the rules.
Got it!
Book 2, Starships, has two pages on “Experience”. The basic model is that you dedicate the next four years to learning a thing, and make a roll with an Intelligence bonus to see if you stick with it; blow the roll and you learn nothing. Options are:
- increase your education (Cr50 a session, 1-2 sessions a week, 50 sessions gets you +1 EDU, max +6 in a four-year period)
- once in your life, take four years off adventuring to get a specific non-weapon skill you don’t already have at +2.
- temporarily increase a skill by +1; do it a second time to make it permanent. (Weapon skill or not, separate rules sections but the same effect.)
- temporarily intrease str, dex and end by 1 each (harder roll to stick with it).
Usual GDW not terribly clear rules writing…
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Because, of course they put it in book 2:starships, not book 1: Characters. That would be too obvious!
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I suspect they had the “big” rules sections (1: characters, combat; 2: ship design, ship combat; 3: world design) and then they put in the other stuff wherever it would fit.
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Wow. Studying for your A Levels is hard in the Traveller Universe. 
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I love the randomness. It’s always playable…
Oh that has such potential. Really, can’t you see it?
Finally… experience has been in Traveller since the beginning. It’s quite workable and quite fast enough in Mongoose 1e and 2e. My group have been in game for just over a year and advanced 2-3 skills each. It’s just a matter of clocking up training in jump time.
Yes it’s capped.
I don’t see having -1 on Social as a problem for a face, that’s social status, and you can combine your fast talking skills with other stats. Traveller does not have a hard link between skill and stat.
Want to Carouse, maybe you use END to show your drinking prowess. Or use EDU to persuade a University lecturer to lend you their login details.
So, want to work out something about a gun? Use EDU with Gun Combat.
What’s the difference between EDU and INT? Education should be the mod for something you learnt from a manual, Int for something you work out with logic and insight…
Point of house ruling, in lower class company I always invert the SOC bonus. So -1 SOC would be +1 in appropriate strata for an appropriate activity.
And really finally, having 0 in a skill means you are not bad at all. Easy is 4+ and you avoid the -3
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I could see the potential fine. It was just weird and we kind of took the piss of it. The conversation I quoted was pretty much the way me and another player described it to the rest of the party.