Not everyone earns their keep in the spacelanes... and even those of you who do may have done something else before venturing into the black. This supplement looks at the 'emergency services' and at the sort of roles needed for disaster recovery and rescue operations - useful skills and talents, and who knows, maybe your crew will be the first on the scene at some accident or incident and need to step in to render aid.

First up, there are two complete careers that may be used during character generation: Healer and Rescuer. The Healer provides a broad overview of the core medical professions of doctor and nurse, although the only distinction between the two is one's EDU stat, if it's 12+ you are a doctor - no requirement to attend medical or nursing school! The various events and mishaps available for use as you roll up your character are drafted with a good eye to the sort of things that someone in the medical trades might encounter.

The Rescuer is a general purpose and practical career that models the life of a member of a 'Fire and Rescue' service of the far future. It includes a specialisation in space rescue that could be a useful precursor to a spacing/adventuring career - indeed, it's easy to imagine a whole campaign being developed around the exploits of a space rescue team! Those specialising in ground rescue are indeed firefighters, more hi-tech perhaps but similar to the brave men and women who perform that service today. Again the events and mishaps are thoughtful and well-matched to the career.

The careers are followed by a discussion of rescue operations in general, and should provide plenty of background and ideas - for the 'war stories' your character might tell about his past or adventure ideas to include in your game. The author is himself a retired firefighter so as you can imagine the commentry on fire fighting is accurate and realistic, yet as a Traveller writer he also makes appropriate remarks about how future technology might make rescue work different from what it is today. Space accidents, natural disasters, contagions - plenty of situations here where rescue workers (and healers) may well be needed.

And that's before we get to the section on rescue adventures and campaigns! For example, how about setting up an emergency management company? Operating in a manner akin to a mercenary company, this outfit could travel around offering advice and training - and of course, showing off their own skills in appropriate situations - to those worlds or settlements who are struggling to organise and provide for themselves. As noted above, either Healer or Rescuer careers could provide a useful precursor to a standard Traveller adventuring career, or with small modification, either career could be treated as part of a military service - the military generally have their own medics and some form of rescue service, just about all you need to do is change the rank names to suit your chosen branch of the armed forces.

Next comes the tools of the trade, including a form of Battle Dress modified for firefighting, assorted drones and more. This finishes with some emergency vehicles suited to various situations.

A useful addition to the game, with interesting concepts that ought to come in useful.

Return to Special Supplement 4: Rescue Ops page.

Reviewed: 14 March 2014