In April 2025 we continued our Traveller Week celebration by resurrecting two offers featuring 1980s Classic Traveller supplements from two of the game’s earliest third-party publishers: the May 2022 Gamelords Traveller Bundle and, from May 2023, FASA Traveller.
These primordial indies published many sourcebooks and scenarios by two of Traveller‘s most prolific designers: J. Andrew Keith and William H. Keith. Though later known for Traveller landmarks like Murder on Arcturus Station, Nomads of the World Ocean, the Alien Modules, and much more, the prolific Keith brothers started by self-publishing their own short “Folio” mini-scenarios (1981-82), followed by ten impressive booklets through Gamelords Ltd and six from FASA Corporation. These titles date from the era of dot-matrix printers, yet this timeless material can still freshen any space-opera roleplaying campaign.
The Traveller community still holds Andrew, who died in 1999, in high regard; check this J. Andrew Keith Memorial hosted on Freelance Traveller. Old School blogger James Maliszewski lists several Keith titles in his December 2021 two-part blog post, “My Top 10 Classic Traveller Adventures.” William H. Keith went on to become a prolific novelist, first for BattleTech and other game lines, and later with his own geopolitical thrillers including the Warstrider series. Traveller designer Marc W. Miller proposed William Keith for the Adventure Gaming Hall of Fame, saying “his words and images creatively shaped players’ perceptions of their games and the hobby.”
(All these adventures and sourcebooks require one or another version of the Classic Traveller rules.)
GAMELORDS TRAVELLER [from May 2022]
This revived May 2022 Gamelords Traveller Bundleonce again presented all ten published Traveller titles from 1982-84 plus seventeen more “Lost Supplements.” There were ten titles in this revived offer’s Gamelords Collection (retail value $60) as DRM-free .PDF ebooks:
- A Pilot’s Guide to the Drexilthar Subsector
- Three terrain survival guides: The Desert Environment, The Mountain Environment, and The Undersea Environment
- Three adventures keyed to the three Environment guides: Ascent to Anekthor, The Drenslaar Quest, and Duneraiders
- Three collections of short adventures and scenario hooks: Lee’s Guide to Interstellar Adventure, Startown Liberty, and Wanted: Adventurers
Those who paid more than this revival’s threshold (average) price also got this offer’s entire Lost Supplements collection with seventeen more titles worth an additional $84, including eight of the Keiths’ early Marischal Folio mini-scenarios along with nine titles that lay neglected until 2000, when Traveller fan Paul Sanders founded a company called Cargonauts specifically to publish them. These “Lost Supplements” sold out their 500-copy run almost immediately – but this revival gave fans a new chance to get them in .PDF for a bargain price.
FASA TRAVELLER [May 2023]
Later known for BattleTech and Shadowrun, FASA started in 1980 as a Traveller licensee publishing starship deck plans by young founders Jordan Weisman and Ross Babcock. Weisman soon recruited the Keith brothers, who wrote many FASA adventures still well regarded 40+ years later.
In a 2021 blog post, “My Top 10 Classic Traveller Adventures,” James Maliszewski gave top honors to the Keiths’ Sky Raider trilogy: “The central conceit of these adventures is the mystery of the eponymous Sky Raiders, an ancient civilization of interstellar marauders who ravaged multiple worlds in a remote sector to spinward of the Third Imperium in the ancient past.” (This was the tumultuous Far Frontiers sector, the main playground for FASA’s Traveller adventures.) “Throughout the three adventures, the characters uncover details about the history of the Sky Raiders, leading them on an Indiana Jones-esque chase across many planets, with rivals also intent on learning these secrets hot on their heels. It’s brilliant pulp sf of the most engaging sort and, in my view, represents Traveller at its best.”
This May 2023 FASA Traveller offer once again presented almost the entire line for an unbeatable bargain price. There were eight titles in this revived offer’s FASA Starter Collection (retail value $60), including 15mm-scale deck plans for the luxury spaceliner King Richard, along with its accompanying module Action Aboard: Adventures on the King Richard; five Classic Traveller adventures – Harrensa Project, Ordeal By Eshaar, Rescue On Galatea, Stazhlekh Report, and Uragyad’n of the Seven Pillars; and the large map set for a towering (and vacuum-proof) Starport Hotel Complex.
This offer’s FASA Bonus Collection added twelve more titles worth an additional $104, including the much-admired Sky Raiders module trilogy; the FCI Consumer Guide equipment book; four sets of starship deck plans – Leander, Fenris and Valkyrie, Tethys, and Vlezhdatl; and four collections of ship plans in FASA’s FASA Adventure Class Ships series.
These two returning offers piloted us to the halfway point of Traveller Week 2025, a sequence of six Bundle of Holding revivals showcasing the many eras of Traveller. This week-long event centers on Traveller Day, celebrated each year on May 1 in recognition of the cover copy on the 1977 First Edition of Traveller: “This is Free Trader Beowulf, calling anyone… Mayday, Mayday…” From nearly two dozen past Bundle of Holding offers we’ve chosen six that showcase the many eras of Traveller. In addition to Gamelords Traveller and FASA Traveller, we also brought back the Classic Traveller Imperium Tour, Mongoose Traveller 2E and Traveller Pirates of Drinax, and Traveller5. Whether you’re a newly mustered recruit or a six-term veteran, you’ll find much to explore in these Traveller revivals.
