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Criminal Masterminds

E

Easterner9504

SOC-13
Criminal Masterminds needed; evil plots that my straight arrow mind can not conceive.

I need a plot that is morally wrong but not illegal in the Imperium, it may be illegal elsewhere. It should promise high reward, low to moderate risk.

I plan on having it be an Arkesh Spacers scheme. So Outrim Void area or Dist 268.

Examples of 3 previous schemes:

Running illegal drug to pocket empire, the drug not being illegal at its point of origin.

Sell uplifted animals as slaves as uplifts have no human rights with the govt. in power. Collapsed when it was shown a girl had a baby by a human, making them humans ex post facto.

With megacorp backing and a purchased title as Baron a privateer fleet was organized outside his govt's border to intervene in a local war between two other powers. Collapsed when privateer commander attacked Imperial Shipping causing IN intervention.
 
Gun running to a world just out of, or not yet in interdiction. Possibly in exchange for native art.

Safari ship offering big game hunting expeditions and selling pelts/ivory.

I forget the term, 'gangmasters' taking refugees from high pop or high law or low tech worlds and selling them into labour contracts.

Selling 'fiefdoms' on low tech worlds to megalomaniacs/neo-extremists.

Organlegging from impoverished 'volunteers'.

Negotiating hazchem dumping rights with impoverished independent world.

Need any more? :smirk:

<carefully adjusts smiling mask that seems to have slipped a little>
 
More

Icosahedron said:
Gun running to a world just out of, or not yet in interdiction. Possibly in exchange for native art.

Safari ship offering big game hunting expeditions and selling pelts/ivory.

I forget the term, 'gangmasters' taking refugees from high pop or high law or low tech worlds and selling them into labour contracts.

Selling 'fiefdoms' on low tech worlds to megalomaniacs/neo-extremists.

Organlegging from impoverished 'volunteers'.

Negotiating hazchem dumping rights with impoverished independent world.

Need any more? :smirk:

<carefully adjusts smiling mask that seems to have slipped a little>
Click to expand...

YEAH!!! Lots of good stuff here, more always better.
 
Offer to take care of orphans from a poor society. Transport them to a world in the Outrim. Turn them over to an adoption agency for a hefty "handling fee". So far you've done nothing illegal. How were you to know that the "adoption" agency sold them on as slaves on a world further into the Outrim?


Hans
 
You trasport little gesha dolls with giant heads that wobble...

[Ok, it's an obscure Firefly reference, but i couldn't resist]
 
On the "adoption" angle, only the low tech "producers" are set up at off-world facilities for maximum production, based on a "company store" type contract. The contracts are all legit, but the effect is no way out for the mothers until they have "produced" 5 children.
 
Easterner9504 said:
I need a plot that is morally wrong but not illegal in the Imperium, it may be illegal elsewhere. It should promise high reward, low to moderate risk.

I plan on having it be an Arkesh Spacers scheme. So Outrim Void area or Dist 268.
Click to expand...

Possibly counterfeiting currency of powers beyond the Imperium ? Every Aslan clan has it's own script/currency which is probably worthless within the Imperium. I think the Aslan are in the vicinity of the Outrim Void IIRC.

I had a scheme where Aslan males whose eyes go TILT when told stories of land and battle might "borrow" money from an Aslan's starship's safe if they had intention of paying it back. Aslan males have no concept of money so it might be easy into talking them to "grab the funny colored paper" without the possible consequences.

Cloning or organ legging might be another. Getting down and out people to
sell their bodily ____ in exchange for a modest sum of credits ?

>
 
Gadrin said:
Possibly counterfeiting currency of powers beyond the Imperium ? Every Aslan clan has it's own script/currency which is probably worthless within the Imperium. I think the Aslan are in the vicinity of the Outrim Void IIRC.
Click to expand...

The Aslan border on the Solomani Confederation and the Domain of Sol, and the "J5-route" connects to an enclave adjacent to the Spinward Marches.
 
samuelvss said:
On the "adoption" angle, only the low tech "producers" are set up at off-world facilities for maximum production, based on a "company store" type contract. The contracts are all legit, but the effect is no way out for the mothers until they have "produced" 5 children.
Click to expand...

As above, but unfortunately you have no reliable artificial insemination setup, so you invite wealthy volunteers to 'donate' in person.
 
rancke said:
Offer to take care of orphans from a poor society. Transport them to a world in the Outrim. Turn them over to an adoption agency for a hefty "handling fee". So far you've done nothing illegal. How were you to know that the "adoption" agency sold them on as slaves on a world further into the Outrim?
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Or to the above-posited organ-farm scheme... Or to a food processing facility supplying asteroid mining stations that don't otherwise see meat.
 
rancke said:
Offer to take care of orphans from a poor society. Transport them to a world in the Outrim. Turn them over to an adoption agency for a hefty "handling fee". So far you've done nothing illegal. How were you to know that the "adoption" agency sold them on as slaves on a world further into the Outrim?


Hans
Click to expand...

For a case study how this might legally happen. The British Government sent large numbers of orphans to a "better life" in Australia. From the end of WW2 up to 1967 they sent 10,000. A lot of the time they weren't too bothered with making sure they actually were orphans or to keep siblings together.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/1999/03/24/60II/main40269.shtml

http://www.murdoch.edu.au/elaw/issues/v9n4/buti94_text.html

http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/extract/314/7097/1781/f
 
Easterner9504 said:
No Petty criminals.

Criminal Mastermind was Doc's title
Click to expand...
So, robbing a hospital's pharmaceutical supplies so a doctor can get his psionic sister into the 3D imaging suite? 0:)

You can always try the old standards:-

- Organlegging (transportation of viable organs extracted from unwilling donors)
- Cyberlegging (ditto, but for cybernetics and transplants, including fresh, untested cyber that may carry ... bugs)
- If this forum allows the suggestion, running a rishathra ring, with live acts and data sticks / data wafers showing edited footage
- An underground Psionic railroad
- An old Mega-City One / Strontium Dog standby: Perp Dumping: wanted criminals are taken on board an outbound vessel, purportedly on its way to a world with no extradition treaty, only to get cruelly dumped into the vacuum or even exposed to Jump space
- And, of course, there is what a criminal mastermind would consider prospecting: setting up shop on some newly established colony, in an attempt to lay claim to all the vice on that world and thereby ensure a nice, secure little earner. After all, what more lucrative goal can one seek than to have whole planets fund you for what they want, as long as you can just keep on supplying them with it? The drugs, the liquor, the females ... the males ... the humans ...
 
aramis said:
The Aslan border on the Solomani Confederation and the Domain of Sol, and the "J5-route" connects to an enclave adjacent to the Spinward Marches.
Click to expand...

No I meant in the context of the Outrim Void. I thought I'd read someplace (backed up by the names of worlds in nearby subsectors) that the Aslan had a presence in the area, just as the Zhodani do.

It might be GURPS-Traveller specific though. I'd have to go thru the sector
the Outrim Void is in and look at planetary names. I thought they looked aslan-like at least.

As for "morally-wrong but legal" in our world that usually features "exploitation" in some fashion where the exploitee is either in no position to do anything about it or goes along with it because it's easy. (How hard is it to find someplace where women disrobe in our world ? Not very).

So follow that logic and you'll find something. Just twist it into Traveller-esque. A good source is almost any Cop show on TV, especially the ones where they "put the bad guy in his place". Take out the strictly illegal element and make it palatable. Lawyer shows do it too, as they often argue points of law. Often the "good guys" are in the stance of: "We're doing the right thing, you're trying to free a criminal!" which means the other attorney is doing something legal but morally... Tons of shows where the slick, bad-guy lawyer gets his :D

So Arkesh could be showing others "how to get away with it" by exploiting loopholes in some backwater legal system, while they "ring the cash register legally" from profits of getting this done. Bring in some slick, high-falootin Arkesh mouthpiece to advise the locals (strictly legal), have them do the dirty work (exploit them) and rip off "A Piece of the Action" (as it was so nicely done in Trek).:rofl:

I use the Merchant Princes of Skull* for this, but a bit more ominous and nefarious. I'm wedding them to Arkesh in a gold theft/smuggling op in D-268 along with a uranium shipping takeover. The idea is Arkesh discovers a group of free traders moving tons of uranium (nice hauls), takes over (hostile naturally) with help of elements from the pirate haven in the D-268 (Astlestein ? next to Bowman) then proceeds to run the operation legally at that point. Eventually, the mega-corp
LSP which is big in mining, has the wherewithal to detect that the uranium market has grown significantly (meaning someone is making the millions they should ;) ) and they eventually ferret out and steamroll the Arkesh setup. The usual "dog eat dog" type of stuff.

Sorry for rambling ;)

>

* from GURPS Traveller's Behind the Claw, Skull is in the Lanth subsector.
 
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Aslan

Just rimward of the Outrim Void is the Aslan Glorious Empire it is in the process of being strangled by newer Aslan expansion. The Florian League is sworn enemy of Aslan though trying to make nice currently as relations with 3I collapsed as Solomani exiles on Halka nationalized all Imperial means of production on Halka at start of FFW.

IMTU the GE and Belgards have an 'understanding' as both are pariahs of the region.
 
So clever Arkesh plotters might be able to get land-hungry Aslans to do the dirty work and reap the bennies.

Such as getting poor Aslan males who are forced to do "women's work" to dump toxic chemicals into some watering hole, allowing Arkesh to exploit some sort of temporary sales mechanism (racket).

:devil:

>
 
One of the major evil bad guys slavers. Among their gambits is selling specially conditioned, docile techs (particularly starship personnel) to planets & transport lines in need of them. They also sell/rent fullsized, lifelike companionbots with human brains as the operating computer. Besides being toys, a certain percentage are trained killers, either as bodyguards for, or assassins of, their owners.

Easterner9504 said:
Now that's great Hans. I like it. Perfect in wake of 5FW.
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Easterner9504 said:
Just rimward of the Outrim Void is the Aslan Glorious Empire it is in the process of being strangled by newer Aslan expansion. The Florian League is sworn enemy of Aslan though trying to make nice currently as relations with 3I collapsed as Solomani exiles on Halka nationalized all Imperial means of production on Halka at start of FFW.
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Depends on when the campaign is set. After the Rebellion starts, the regular Aslans swarm over the Glorious Empire. Prior to that, however, the regular Aslan had been held in check by the Imperium for 500 years and the Glorious Empire for 200 years.


Hans
 
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