Local game shop, face to face game, one night stand. Two of three players had never played Traveller, one guy had played CT back in the day. Everyone seemed to enjoy it. So I may run another mercenary based game. Any recommendations on how to engage a small player group into leadership type roles? How to keep things feeling like "science fiction" and not just a Vietnam re-run? How to keep the game fresh and not just shooting hither and yon?
I got bored and ran a game...
- Thread starter Leitz
- Start date
Puzzles, tricks, and deathtraps. And a cool villain. It does start to sound a bit like a James Bond movie, tho, doesn't it.
This might help as well.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Thirty-Six_Dramatic_Situations
Atmosphere. Give them an adventure in a truly alien environment, like a distant Kuiper-belt world inhabited by great amoeba-like liquid helium creatures, or the upper atmosphere of a gas giant inhabited by a balloon-like octopoidal sophont.
Apply Niven's rule: give them aliens that think as well as a human - but not like a human. Explore nonhuman motivations, like hive species that have no conception of individuality, no sense of individual preservation, no concern for individual welfare, who cannot understand or predict human behavior because it is so alien to them, who frequently err because they forget that humans DO care about their own personal fates.
War with such a species, triggered by some fundamental misunderstanding, would be a very interesting thing. They might have unique strategies based on their alien nature - attacking by burrowing and erupting from underground, for example. They would be intelligent: they wouldn't throw away their lives any more than you throw away your pawns in a game of chess, but they would think nothing of having a squad destroy itself in a charge if it drew your attention and allowed another squad to get behind you. They would be the kind who employed explosive vests for hand-to-hand combat, kamikaze aircraft - but they might ignore an unarmed man unless he actively tried to infiltrate their lines, reading him as a worker rather than a soldier but aware nonetheless that a worker's observations might be relayed to the queen and through her to the soldiers.
Give your players enemies who teleport for short distances. Send them to fight the Chamanx. Stage a war at the bottom of the ocean with intelligent squid on the other side. Do something different, and the difference will be the thing they remember most.
Great ideas, thanks! I'll have to think about how a human thinks to not think like that, though. :rofl:
I've been thinking about how to build up some different mercenary groups, leaders and major NPCs in the group they are in, and some ways to challenge the players. I do want personalities involved so there's more than just blasting things.
I've been thinking about how to build up some different mercenary groups, leaders and major NPCs in the group they are in, and some ways to challenge the players. I do want personalities involved so there's more than just blasting things.
LiamKerrington
SOC-12
Hi there,
would you like to consider "issues with technology"? Shooting in old-fashined space-stations might lead to hull-breaches, which in itself provides plenty of conflict about how to deal with situation before, during and after the probable mishap ...
This is, actually, what I would expect in any SF story that involves space-flight: spaceflight technology goin' astray or people not caring enough about the liveless void they live in. And when you toss in some emotional ego-trips colliding with ranks and codes of conduct/ honor/ whatever ... Hell, what tragedy lingers on the horizon with those spice ready to be stirred into the soup ...
All the best!
Liam
would you like to consider "issues with technology"? Shooting in old-fashined space-stations might lead to hull-breaches, which in itself provides plenty of conflict about how to deal with situation before, during and after the probable mishap ...
This is, actually, what I would expect in any SF story that involves space-flight: spaceflight technology goin' astray or people not caring enough about the liveless void they live in. And when you toss in some emotional ego-trips colliding with ranks and codes of conduct/ honor/ whatever ... Hell, what tragedy lingers on the horizon with those spice ready to be stirred into the soup ...
All the best!
Liam
1)Apply the technology to the society. For example, in Traveller, ALL interstellar communications takes a very long time to happen, while in-system communications happen at very fast speeds (assuming at least Early Stellar civ). How does that affect politics? News media? Crime investigation? What exactly is it like when your ship breaks 20 hours away from the nearest breathable atmosphere?
2) Take characters out of a vacuum. Give them contacts, families, communities to interact with in the campaign's home system. Mix this with #1, and now how does interstellar travel affect people? Three jumps out and everything you know about your family is AT LEAST 3 weeks out of date. What happens when your grandmother gets sick and no one knows where you are? Between them sending you the letter asking you to come and you arriving, at least 6 weeks have to pass -- certainly long enough for your kid sister to be tried and convicted of poisoning grandma.
3) Don't take Vietnam out, shove it in deep. Traveller is VERY much about Vietnam. It's about people returning from a tour in the military and discovering that they no longer fit in to regular society, no longer really have a home anyway. They have a random assortment of skills which were good for killing people, but aren't really marketable in the real world. In the "ideal" situation, they also have a mortgage on a starship. That's what the game should be about.
3-b) If you don't want to use the Returning Soldier theme, pick some other theme that's from a story about soldiers. Honor on the High Seas, maybe. That wiki link to 36 Dramatic Situations was really good.
4) Play up the differences. Say the PCs travel from a Industrial planet to a High Agriculture planet. Right away, the biggest difference they're going to notice is the FOOD. Three weeks of flavored nutri-soy and chemically flavored food, and the next starport they go to sells farm-fresh onions, still covered in dirt from the field planted just on the other side of the hill from the Starport-E. And as they're biting into that delicious orange, picked right off the tree, have them discover that the planetary data network charges per-minute usage fees, unlike the free network at their last planet.
5) Sci-Fi Stereotypes. The Asteroid Miner's Daughter. The Radio DJ from Fifth Element. The Tentacle Monster Working at McBurgerLand. The Actress From Planet Kansas. Reality TV Show junkies....from space! Create fantastical life situations....and then make them terribly mundane.
The first time the Asteroid Miner's Daughter comes to the PCs seeking help over Mean Old Boss McOverseer, it'll be an adventure! The third time she does it, it'll be a nuisance.
2) Take characters out of a vacuum. Give them contacts, families, communities to interact with in the campaign's home system. Mix this with #1, and now how does interstellar travel affect people? Three jumps out and everything you know about your family is AT LEAST 3 weeks out of date. What happens when your grandmother gets sick and no one knows where you are? Between them sending you the letter asking you to come and you arriving, at least 6 weeks have to pass -- certainly long enough for your kid sister to be tried and convicted of poisoning grandma.
3) Don't take Vietnam out, shove it in deep. Traveller is VERY much about Vietnam. It's about people returning from a tour in the military and discovering that they no longer fit in to regular society, no longer really have a home anyway. They have a random assortment of skills which were good for killing people, but aren't really marketable in the real world. In the "ideal" situation, they also have a mortgage on a starship. That's what the game should be about.
3-b) If you don't want to use the Returning Soldier theme, pick some other theme that's from a story about soldiers. Honor on the High Seas, maybe. That wiki link to 36 Dramatic Situations was really good.
4) Play up the differences. Say the PCs travel from a Industrial planet to a High Agriculture planet. Right away, the biggest difference they're going to notice is the FOOD. Three weeks of flavored nutri-soy and chemically flavored food, and the next starport they go to sells farm-fresh onions, still covered in dirt from the field planted just on the other side of the hill from the Starport-E. And as they're biting into that delicious orange, picked right off the tree, have them discover that the planetary data network charges per-minute usage fees, unlike the free network at their last planet.
5) Sci-Fi Stereotypes. The Asteroid Miner's Daughter. The Radio DJ from Fifth Element. The Tentacle Monster Working at McBurgerLand. The Actress From Planet Kansas. Reality TV Show junkies....from space! Create fantastical life situations....and then make them terribly mundane.
The first time the Asteroid Miner's Daughter comes to the PCs seeking help over Mean Old Boss McOverseer, it'll be an adventure! The third time she does it, it'll be a nuisance.
DangerousThing
SOC-13
What Kuros says! I'm taking notes for my next campaign.
Another thing to do once you've gotten them hooked on SF is to switch-hit on them.
I had an NPC on an old Traveller campaign who was called Merlin Ambrosius. Nobody was sure if he was a stage-magician pretending to be a sorcerer pretending to be a stage-magician or the other way around! I had a lot of fun making up some gadgets for him.
Or there was an interesting adventure in the GURPS version of JTAS. The characters were asked to go on a cattle drive on a TL 3 world. The problem was that the TL was enforced by the government so they couldn't use all their high tech guns and were forced to get all new old-fashioned equipment. It was meant to be run pretty much like a straight Western.
Or have them sent into a very low-tech world by one branch of the government to rescue a diplomat/noble/rich-guy from an actual dungeon. They could use high-tech stuff only if they weren't caught. The guy's crime might have just been accidentally using a lighter and the charge is sorcery and they only have a few days before he's burned at the stake. One complication: there are actual psionic "sorcerers" around; plus the guy's family has hired some mercenaries who were told just to blast him out. This gives at least three opponents for the characters to have to deal with.
Or maybe the characters have to trade with a higher TL culture and find something that they want/need.
SF can be fun!
Another thing to do once you've gotten them hooked on SF is to switch-hit on them.
I had an NPC on an old Traveller campaign who was called Merlin Ambrosius. Nobody was sure if he was a stage-magician pretending to be a sorcerer pretending to be a stage-magician or the other way around! I had a lot of fun making up some gadgets for him.
Or there was an interesting adventure in the GURPS version of JTAS. The characters were asked to go on a cattle drive on a TL 3 world. The problem was that the TL was enforced by the government so they couldn't use all their high tech guns and were forced to get all new old-fashioned equipment. It was meant to be run pretty much like a straight Western.
Or have them sent into a very low-tech world by one branch of the government to rescue a diplomat/noble/rich-guy from an actual dungeon. They could use high-tech stuff only if they weren't caught. The guy's crime might have just been accidentally using a lighter and the charge is sorcery and they only have a few days before he's burned at the stake. One complication: there are actual psionic "sorcerers" around; plus the guy's family has hired some mercenaries who were told just to blast him out. This gives at least three opponents for the characters to have to deal with.
Or maybe the characters have to trade with a higher TL culture and find something that they want/need.
SF can be fun!
shadowcat20
SOC-12
Run em through double adventure 5 Chimax/plague.
Each player can be a platoon leader and the whole group can be a cut off company trying to shoot there way back to the lines. Lots of cannon fodder and targets this way.
Each player can be a platoon leader and the whole group can be a cut off company trying to shoot there way back to the lines. Lots of cannon fodder and targets this way.
Also: obscene uses for planetary levels of real estate. We all know the whole trope about Endor being an Ice Moon and other planets consisting entirely of a single geography or usage. Make it happen!
Have your Travellers visit a Resort Planet, and then give them a glimpse of the social underbelly that keeps it all afloat. After all, so much cheaper to create resources locally, especially food and souvenirs.
Library Planet! With downcast citizens living among the massive data trunks.
City Planet -- which died of starvation during a blockade.
Have your Travellers visit a Resort Planet, and then give them a glimpse of the social underbelly that keeps it all afloat. After all, so much cheaper to create resources locally, especially food and souvenirs.
Library Planet! With downcast citizens living among the massive data trunks.
City Planet -- which died of starvation during a blockade.
/me makes lots of notes...
Actually, the current mental debate is MgT, CT w/Striker, or T5. I have the last one, the core book for the first one, and prefer the simplicity of the middle one. If they become team leads Striker is definately the way to go. The FFE license on materials seems better than the MgT one, though that could easily be my lack of understanding.
Actually, the current mental debate is MgT, CT w/Striker, or T5. I have the last one, the core book for the first one, and prefer the simplicity of the middle one. If they become team leads Striker is definately the way to go. The FFE license on materials seems better than the MgT one, though that could easily be my lack of understanding.
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DangerousThing
SOC-13
I'd go with T5 or CT. I like T5 more the more I use it. YMMV
DangerousThing
SOC-13
How do you have copies of T5 already?!?
Edit: Corrected punctuation
Back in the day one could buy the T5 alpha CD and be in on the beta testing. Marc is real close to release.
Those with the alpha release also just recently got a beta.
The example in the Military Leadership FM was Col Chamberlain leading the 20th Maine at Little Round Top:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Round_Top
It's a good place to start and Joshua Chamberlain is an 100% awesome example of good leadership.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Round_Top
It's a good place to start and Joshua Chamberlain is an 100% awesome example of good leadership.
FM 6-22 is full of good advice for the potential leader. I wonder if any of the local crew would want to go that far? I'd certainly love to set the stage for them. If not, when classes slow down a bit I may take the campaign on-line. I hate doing a lot of background work for a game and then not using it.
I remember back in the 70's the boys from DGP before they were DGP ran a two part adventure at a local convention that started with a misjump and getting off the ship to a primitive and "uninhabited" planet. The second part was surviving on planet and all the personalities of the fellow passengers and remaining crew. :devil:
Timerover51
SOC-14 5K
That must have been an interesting adventure. A bit like some of Andre Norton's stories.
Edit Note: The ones that I am thinking of are Sargasso of Space, where the Solar Queen's crew discovers a planet full of wrecked space ships and some other nasty surprises, Star Hunter, where an uninhabited planet turns out not to be so "uninhabited", and Star Rangers, which has a really fantastic twist near the ending.
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Ship FASA's Star Class liner
Misjump = random direction, distance & deformed jump field
How do you deal with an Aslan mercenary unit commander trying to rescue an honor brother, clan member and have honor yourself?
Sr. surviving crew chief Engineer (trapped) & Purser.
and that was just to get started.
Misjump = random direction, distance & deformed jump field
How do you deal with an Aslan mercenary unit commander trying to rescue an honor brother, clan member and have honor yourself?
Sr. surviving crew chief Engineer (trapped) & Purser.
and that was just to get started.
