Hooks and Plots for TNE
- Thread starter Elliot
- Start date
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
Rumour that a neat bit of 3rd Imperium tech has turned up on a world deep within the wilds. PCs have to go and get it:
1. Dangers of Vampire ships on the way, or other unfriendly spacefarers.
2. Distress calls from ships/planets along the way.
3. Damage repair/refueling/resupply means having to deal with natives on some low TL world on the way.
4. Destination involves overcoming a TED, either by diplomacy, theft, or combat.
5. Try to get home alive with the prize
For added complication have a team (or two) from a rival pocket empire after the same "treasure" who can pop up at inopportune moments to add spice to any of the encounters above
Ok, a bit more than one evening, but a fairly typical TNE plot I've used on more than one occasion.
1. Dangers of Vampire ships on the way, or other unfriendly spacefarers.
2. Distress calls from ships/planets along the way.
3. Damage repair/refueling/resupply means having to deal with natives on some low TL world on the way.
4. Destination involves overcoming a TED, either by diplomacy, theft, or combat.
5. Try to get home alive with the prize
For added complication have a team (or two) from a rival pocket empire after the same "treasure" who can pop up at inopportune moments to add spice to any of the encounters above
Ok, a bit more than one evening, but a fairly typical TNE plot I've used on more than one occasion.
From my own Banners Sector Campaign, a nation on a balkanised world has managed to reactivate the orbital component of an old starport and bring into service a number of spacecraft. How have they done this? Did they do it alone? Did they have help? If so who? etc. etc. Covert Operations can be really funny. How many subtle PC groups have you come across?
Err... a few here and there, actually. Indeed, just this past weekend, we performed a somewhat subtle smash and grab. No one got killed or even injured, even among those we smashed. Unfortunately, it was not a Traveller game we were playing...
We used up about 3 hours of real-time for planning the hit, distilling it down to 4 operations, and each of those went down smoothly, with almost no deviation from our plan, taking about 5-10 minutes apiece, without so much as a gun being fired by either side.
Basically, the setup was that we were hired to break into what amounted to a bank, steal something, and get out. Phase 1 of the operation was observation for 5 days, and we got information about key personnel guarding the place. Second step was to abduct the family of one of the key persons, giving him instructions that on the next day, when trouble started, he was to go down easy, and no one would be the wiser against him. The third step was to perform the operation, and we hit the area where our man was with a gas bomb to give him an excuse to go down easy and came in from a different, unprotected route. With gas grenades deployed and stun guns at the ready, we grabbed what we came for and were gone within 5 minutes of tossing teh first gas grenade. And the fourth step was to return his family unharmed and without anyone knowing they had been abducted, and to claim our fee from those who wanted the hit done in the first place.
In a game where the body counts are usually pretty high, we did something rather extraordinary by not even injuring anyone in a well-protected compound, and left virtually no traces for anyone to find us with. The whole thing took about 5 hours of realtime, from assignment to payoff. The GM had the building and all the important information already ready to go, and we had access to most of it due to a man on the inside working for the guy who hired us. It was very exciting to go through all these plans and decide which course of action to take, from start to finish, and to have a couple back up plans ready to go. We did have to improvise a couple times, but overall, it went without a hitch, and all in a single day of realtime.
We used up about 3 hours of real-time for planning the hit, distilling it down to 4 operations, and each of those went down smoothly, with almost no deviation from our plan, taking about 5-10 minutes apiece, without so much as a gun being fired by either side.
Basically, the setup was that we were hired to break into what amounted to a bank, steal something, and get out. Phase 1 of the operation was observation for 5 days, and we got information about key personnel guarding the place. Second step was to abduct the family of one of the key persons, giving him instructions that on the next day, when trouble started, he was to go down easy, and no one would be the wiser against him. The third step was to perform the operation, and we hit the area where our man was with a gas bomb to give him an excuse to go down easy and came in from a different, unprotected route. With gas grenades deployed and stun guns at the ready, we grabbed what we came for and were gone within 5 minutes of tossing teh first gas grenade. And the fourth step was to return his family unharmed and without anyone knowing they had been abducted, and to claim our fee from those who wanted the hit done in the first place.
In a game where the body counts are usually pretty high, we did something rather extraordinary by not even injuring anyone in a well-protected compound, and left virtually no traces for anyone to find us with. The whole thing took about 5 hours of realtime, from assignment to payoff. The GM had the building and all the important information already ready to go, and we had access to most of it due to a man on the inside working for the guy who hired us. It was very exciting to go through all these plans and decide which course of action to take, from start to finish, and to have a couple back up plans ready to go. We did have to improvise a couple times, but overall, it went without a hitch, and all in a single day of realtime.
I usually find my players generate their own hooks and plots. Just send them on their first mission and the random encounters on the way and the people they meet at the destination (or on the way) seem to constantly open new plots and hooks. Maybe I'm lucky with players like that? Also try not to leave things stagnant at place's they've been to before. If they topple a TED somewhere and return three months later, have the regime they installed fighting off a bitter insurgency...
My wiseass bunch of know-it-all players are all roleplayers, so yeah, gotta learn shorthand for the first couple of sessions when everyone decides to get overly involved with the npcs, I have to use enigmas most of the time, because they're a bunch cunning SOB's (and one plain B)!
But putting a gadget up for a prize, & a bunch of hoops in the way, has been (I found) to be the best way to an enjoyable eveing of gaming for all.
But putting a gadget up for a prize, & a bunch of hoops in the way, has been (I found) to be the best way to an enjoyable eveing of gaming for all.
Glen Allen Mcinnes
SOC-12
My fave is a "shadow recrovery" a corvet cold recovery in a potenchaly hoistale zone.
the last one I ran the groups Psion (Freddy) tracked down (through library reserch) a now de-funcked Pisonics instute centerd around a university on a world they had visited in the past so they knew the plenet was formaly high tech and had no active psoincs instutite. the player pluged it as at the leaset independet and ther for virus free data systoms and some lab equpment but posibaly an indepent data net lab equment, workshops, semi portable power unints and weapons cashes etc.(ie the mother load) she had the RC Rep and the other characters drouling (actulary it was somthing eles but it's not PG13) the party then spent five weeks (once on world)game and real time braking in to pre-collapse archives and hacking virus infected data systoms looking for old records to find out where the psions hid their goodies they where in the middle of the scouting and scanning phase when the game went on hold due to life comimints that was just over six months ago.
the last one I ran the groups Psion (Freddy) tracked down (through library reserch) a now de-funcked Pisonics instute centerd around a university on a world they had visited in the past so they knew the plenet was formaly high tech and had no active psoincs instutite. the player pluged it as at the leaset independet and ther for virus free data systoms and some lab equpment but posibaly an indepent data net lab equment, workshops, semi portable power unints and weapons cashes etc.(ie the mother load) she had the RC Rep and the other characters drouling (actulary it was somthing eles but it's not PG13) the party then spent five weeks (once on world)game and real time braking in to pre-collapse archives and hacking virus infected data systoms looking for old records to find out where the psions hid their goodies they where in the middle of the scouting and scanning phase when the game went on hold due to life comimints that was just over six months ago.
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