I remember a series I read in the 1980s I think that I have been trying to remember the names to.
The book was about a United Nations space mission where they sent criminals to explore other worlds under the command of a commander that had a bionic arm I think.
I believe one of the books had the word Tartarus in the title but I am not sure.
I have that series.. think it was the Expendables. Always though it would make a great RPing game.
Yes, that was it. Thank you Jill. They only have them on Kindle and I don't do that but at least I can finally have that nagging question off my mind. Not much room up there for anything after all
There was also an RPG from Stellar Games (never more than a niche company, though one whose ideas I liked a bit, especially NightLife), likely not based on that particular book, but called Expendables that featured scout teams being dropped onto nominally habitable planets (ID'ed as such from very cursory probe examinations) and asked to survive until their return ship arrived.
Cruel and unforgiving, that game was. You were given the equipment the probe told commanders to expect you'd need, and the probe was often wrong (arrived in the summer when you land in the winter, probed the small fertile belt and you're dropped in the desert, probed during the day and so missed the nocturnal all-consuming predators). Fun if tricksy stuff.
If I remember correctly hey had teleporters but not FTL so they had to send out sleeper ships with the scout team who once they proved the world habitable would set up the teleporter and start to transport in colonists.
Thanks for reminding me of these, I had all but forgotten them. I added them to my Goodreads list and it reminded me to check another series I read back then the Richard Blade books.
A side note but:
www.librarything.com (wonderful site) has an entire board devoted to people putting up brief memories of books and someone usually figures out the series/title/etc. Name that Book is a wonderful sub forum there if anyone is ever interested in giving it a looksee/helping out.