Freelance Traveller

Vang’s Traveller Bestiary: Volume 1

reviewed by Timothy Collinson

This article originally appeared in the September/October 2025 issue.

Vang’s Traveller Bestiary: Volume 1. Alex Treacher.
Space Weasel Productions https://www.facebook.com/people/Space-Weasel-Productions/61577569437663/
PDF, 38pp
US$7.99/UK£5.94

FULL DISCLOSURE: I play in Alex’s online game The Troubled Dark along with his partner Kez; I had some hand in helping proof-read the book.

Following on from Drama at the Starport, Alex Treacher returns with a second volume from his nascent Space Weasel Productions in support of harried Referees.  This time he’s offering eight new critters for those who like their beasts and like them fresh and raw.

These vary from a 40g cirrik to a 2500kg axtail and are built with Mongoose 2nd Edition stats.  Alex notes that he has carefully examined published Mongoose animals (some 400 critters!) in an effort to keep these consistent with what’s gone before.  He’s avoided adding new rules or traits – and I certainly know the temptation to the latter in my own animal creation.  I’m not absolutely sure this is necessarily a good thing however, as, within reason, a fresh creative mind can bring new perspectives to what animals might be like or how they might behave.  Still, it’s an admirable self-discipline.

The descriptions of each animal are a good length and read like serious Library Data entries with good focus on role playing significance rather than ‘mere’ biological detail for the sake of it.  Lightness is provided by the framing of the book as by a Vargr naturalist (as well as field researcher, broadcast and author) by the name of Vang Fourzza.  He’s a cheery soul who has some interesting and less formal observations about each of the entries.  There’s a half page biography giving some background to him, an attractive illustration and two new words of Gvegh vocabulary which he uses in his descriptions.  This framing really brings the book alive and it would be easy – perhaps even irresistible – to introduce Vang as an NPC for the PCs to meet or even a patron for them to be employed by.

One of the slight frustrations of the current Mongoose animal rules is that there’s no place on the stat block for the weight of an animal.  This can be useful in terms of giving an idea of size, or more specifically mass, and also lets the Referee know what might be reasonable in terms of food for PCs living off the land.  Yes, it can be kind of derived from the number of Hits of a creature, but it doesn’t seem too much to ask to include an approximate figure for Referees looking up details in a hurry.  Fortunately, that problem is resolved in Vang’s bestiary by the inclusion of such weights in the descriptive text for all of the creatures bar the Koral trapper (named for the xenologist Antonin Koral “whose study of these dangerous creatures is considered the primary reference material”).

A useful addition to the bestiary which isn’t so usual, is the inclusion of stat cards for each of the animals in the supplement.  The author notes that on 3”×5” cards they help with sorting into initiative order should the characters get into a combat situation with any of the critters.  Heaven forfend!  (Presumably Alex has similar stat cards for the PCs as well).  At that size they’d also fit perfectly into my antinet.  I wonder if he can be persuaded to produce these cards for sale?  (Though of course, what I really want is all Traveller creatures in that format <sigh>).  Irritatingly, my printer has stopped feeding things at that size for no discernible reason.

Another subtle addition to the text is the appearance of an asterisk (e.g. for the Koral Trapper: Speed 1m *) in some stat block entries.  This signifies there’s further explanation in the descriptive text and I thought was an interesting addition.

Throughout the book there are illustrations of the animals (and Vang).  These benefit from all being by the same artist, Kez Herbert, so the bestiary feels like a coherent whole.  They are in colour and offer a charming, perhaps even quirky look at the creatures which may not be the anatomically exact images in the style of William H. Keith, but arguably they have more character and this might encourage the Referee to use the animals not just as PC weapon fodder – something the text aims to do as well.  The arrasnake image is perhaps my favourite and the dishmakhu makes me glad I go sea swimming in salt water. 

There is one exception to the animal pictures and that’s an Ian Stead ‘ship in orbit’ picture of the kind that will be familiar to many.  It’s not labelled and might have appeared somewhat out of place in the book except that it’s clearly a Type K Safari ship with its ship’s boat either departing for a hunt on the world below or just returning.  Again, you can see it has been chosen for the inspiration it offers in gaming rather than merely as ‘bling’.  Given the arguments over the use of AI art depriving artists of income, it’s great to see this book making use of real people’s creative efforts.  The author also notes that no AI has been used in the text either.

Along with the aforementioned stat cards, there’s also a glossary of twenty entries from which I learned several new words.  That does not imply, however, that the entries for the animals are hard to read, merely that the author has chosen the correct word to describe any particular biological feature; something to be applauded.  It’s also worth noting that the book has been designed to read as if it’s an in-universe publication and it works at that level.

The PDF is released under the TAS licence and the author’s ‘Space Weasel Productions’ imprint and says in an afterword that there may be more bestiaries to come which I would welcome – though I might fear what turn up in future games.  It costs $7.99 which isn’t the cheapest of PDFs under the TAS licence but reflects the fact that is not just a handful of animals.  There is a lot of useful gaming material here which can extend any adventure in all sorts of directions or even become the subject of one.  Vang himself could easily become a major NPC whether ‘seen on holovid’ or encountered in person.  I’d recommend it if your PCs are ever likely to be offship or out of habitats.