One Damn Thing After Another (Play Reports)

[AlHazred]

Warning: Spoilers abound below for several published adventures, including several new ones from Mongoose.
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So I like to name my campaigns. Sometimes I pick the element that speaks to me, and then that later turns out not to be what really grabbed the players. That's okay, the naming is more so I have a "feel" for how I want the campaign to go -- it gives me a marker, where I can say, "This is where I'm running this campaign from."

Because of the birth of my daughter in 2023, my weekends have become complicated and the game I had been running then is now on hiatus. But I still wanted to see my gaming friends, so I decided to do a Tuesday game. I was thinking about what to run when I watched Seth Skorkowski's video on the Flatlined adventure and he mentioned the idea of running Death Station afterwards.

I got to thinking about what a one-two punch that would be for the group, and then I got an image in my head of a group that's in the meaner parts of the Spinward Marches. Not the shiny, chrome parts, but the smoke-filled factory planets and the dirty, hardscrabble frontier worlds, and all that less-glamorous part, where opportunists flock because there are people they can take advantage of. And the image formed in my head of the scenarios I'd place in such a campaign, and I realized the perfect name for it is "One Damn Thing After Another."

 

[AlHazred]

So, Flatlined starts off with the players having been kidnapped from where they were going; they've been picked up by a Skilljacking ring that kidnaps Low Passengers mid-transit, and then traffics them to frontier worlds where their skills are in demand. Death Station has the laboratory ship experimenting on human test subjects outside the Imperium; they work really well together if you assume the ring is just expanding its market base for its product.

I moved both adventures to Ator (0729 Spinward Marches) in the Darrian subsector. It's just outside the Imperium, so a great place to do human experimentation without oversight. And it's the interface of three polities -- Darrian, Sword Worlds, and the Imperium -- so your Skilljacking ring can fly under the radar.

I'm not fond of the element in Flatlined, where the ship carrying the PCs crashes due to an EMP bomb placed by a rival corporation, mainly because it's a gimmick used in, like, three of four scenarios I intend to use; I believe Seth Skorkowsky mentioned his dislike of it in his review for similar reasons. As it is, it was easy to gloss over the exact reasons for the ship crashing, and the players decided that the ship must have collided with a radio antenna on takeoff, causing the issues that start the action in the module. It worked really well in practice, and the module definitely had an Aliens vibe.

At the end, the PCs, along with four surviving NPCs (fellow kidnappee Anson Kobleinz, Proving Site workers Corey Shiro and Katriona Starvni, and baddie Sayelle Mikolos), managed to escape to the starport, with nothing except the low berth jumpsuits they had on when they woke up, a very few guns they managed to recover, and some vials of some sort of substance they were apparently injected with. They left Sayelle in lockup with the heavily-overworked port warden, whom I played something like Dr. Marian Lazarus, Frances Sternhagen's character from Outland (1981).

 

[AlHazred]

At the starport with no money or other resources at hand, they were hired by the Bwap Dalglee Hahsh to repair a communications issue on his laboratory ship for a modest amount of cash; this is the opening for Death Station. Now, I had actually run the Classic Traveller version of Death Station for several of these players twelve or so years ago in a previous Traveller campaign. But this time, I had the benefit of using some excellent ideas from Seth Skorkowski's review, and also the party was much less well-off; when I ran it before, that group was much richer in resources that this group is now, and it makes a huge difference.

They did not end up exploring and clearing the whole of the Calendula laboratory ship. Instead they hightailed it back to Ator once they got some incredibly incriminating evidence against the owning corporation and their patron, including security camera footage showing human experimentation; when they reached the communications array, they found the message buffer, and the last message was from Dalglee after dispatching the PCs there: "Found your lost cargo, have sent it back to you."

They did not appreciate that. At all.

They brought back Haris Slocombe, the navigator; a TL12 computer and medikit; and a bunch of vials of various compounds the corporation was experimenting with. The laptop had security camera footage, and full information on the drugs they were using: formulas, experimental data, test results, etc. They found Dalglee in a local watering hole, in the middle of some sort of tense conversation with locals. I decided, for the locals, to use the Darsh, from Jack Vance's novel The Face, the fourth of the Demon Princes novels. I figured Dalglee was the representative of Lysani Laboratories who purchased Pedersen's creepers from the Darsh for the use by the Calendula crew; the lab uses them to manufacture the amnesia-inducing drug they use to pacify their test subjects, and they sell the excess to the Skilljacking ring for use on their "products." Darsh, in the Vance novel, are a fairly unpleasant group, mildly xenophobic; so the situation with Dalglee in the bar seemed tense, as I decided the Darsh didn't much like the Bwap and only tolerated him for his money. The PCs didn't know what was going on with the locals, and the locals didn't know what was going on with the PCs, and Dalglee was feeling very exposed being with both groups. So he paid off the PCs and they left as soon as they could, deferring any further revenge for later.

Back at the starport, they left Haris Slocombe with the poor port warden. They didn't even really explain what was going on with him. I have to figure out where best to use his reappearance; he will definitely show up again in the campaign, possibly as a very successful serial killer...

 

[AlHazred]

When the PCs shook down Dalglee, they got him to spring for Middle Passages off of Ator, to Flammarion (0930 Spinward Marches), which is just jump-2 away. One thing I plan to do differently this time around, is describe other merchant crews more, to give a feeling of the ecology of trade in the Marches. Last campaign, the PCs basically ignored almost every other merchant crew and I suspect it made it too easy -- rivalry between crews should be fierce in the Marches, with razor-thin profit margins.

This comes from the scenario "High and Dry," from The Marches Adventures 1-5 by Mongoose. (Yes, Seth Skorkowsky did a video on this one as well.) I've made some substantial changes to this one.

At Flammarion, they met with Anders Casarii, a Scout who used to crew with one of the PCs and had a job for them; they had taken passage to Flammarion to meet him when they got kidnapped in the first place. Anders explains that he works for the Intelligence Branch; this is one of the two Branches that make up the Detached Duty office. He suspects a plot against Imperial interests going on in the Sword Worlds, but he has been unable to convince any of his Imperial Navy contacts to investigate. He's getting frustrated, and he has a plan he hopes will get him the intelligence he is looking for.

He told them about the Highndry, a Detached Duty scout that is apparently broken down on Walston, and that he has been informed the previous crew has been arrested. He wants to PCs to get the ship and bring it back to Flammarion; the IISS will perform needed maintenance and repairs (which they do anyway to Detached Duty ships), and then he will give it to them to use, with the understanding that they'll head into the Sword Worlds "conducting trade" and secretly getting him intelligence from the various systems.

I made a few changes to the adventure structure. I decided the crew had not been actually arrested, but made up that story to cover their tracks when they stripped the ship of everything salable and made off, knowing that they were going to be found in default of their contract with the IISS. I will be giving the PCs a brief dossier on what the locals of Walston knows about the previous crew, and they will definitely show up again; by the time they finished the action bits (just yesterday evening) they hated those jerks even more than the locals did!

I also am using the @Grav_Moped modifications for the Type S3 Far Scout/Courier. Effectively, the previous crew had changed out the Jump Drive, Power Plant, and Computer for refurbished, heavily-used TL12 versions at one point, and then modified the fuel tankage so that 10 dtons of the fuel tankage could be converted into additional cargo space instead; it works because the higher-TL drives require far less fuel. So they could do a jump-3 and have 3 dtons of cargo, or a jump-2 and have 13 dtons of cargo.

This whole rigamarole of getting this particular ship is because, IMTU, the previous crew did a lot of trading in the Sword Worlds for several years. The ship is already in the registry in many worlds there, and should be able to fly around with somewhat less fanfare than other Imperial ships might. And, also, Anders Casarii has reason to believe the previous crew was involved in some way with the shady espionage stuff he wants to find out about. In which case, the PCs are basically going to be bait...

But first they have to get back. With their rolls, the ship is currently only capable of jump-1, which means its going to be 4 weeks getting back to Flammarion for service at the Way Station there. Now I have to figure out what trouble they can get into on the way there, because it's always One Damn Thing After Another.

 

[AlHazred]

Since the players finally have access to a Library data program, I'm going to provide them a Tiddlywiki file I've been building with campaign-specific information. Looking at the map, it looks like I have some great opportunities here, as Bowman was the subject of a mini-campaign book by Mongoose.

 

[Diveguy]

Like the work you put into all this, thank you for sharing! You do a good job of "how to link these separate elements/modules" without turning it into a railroad.

 

[AlHazred]

I picked up Murphy's Law - Adventures in the Bowman Belt from DTRPG, as I was casting about for adventures to occupy them on their trip back to Flammarion.

From a fast scan, I'm thinking, assuming the PCs go to Bowman next, I will probably run "Archaeology," from the Beltstrike box set. It ties in very nicely to the Sword Worlds, and it familiarizes them with some archaeological spots relevant to the Sword Worlds-Darrian conflicts, which they might revisit later.

Murphy's Law is strongly tied to the outbreak of the Fifth Frontier War, and I've set my campaign in 1100, so that's years away. Some good ideas here, though, and I like how much math was done to work up time tables and vectors. Feels like something out of The Expanse!

Spinward Marches 1: The Bowman Arm is disappointing for this. Bowman gets some extemely generic adventure seeds. Frankly, most of the same territory was covered by the GDW Beltstrike book, but in more detail and with more character. On the other hand, if the PCs want to stay at Walston longer, there's some more scenarios for that world in the book so it'll come in handy in that case.

 

[Spinward Flow]

I like how much math was done to work up time tables and vectors.

Interplanetary Travel Distance by Time and Acceleration

 

[AlHazred]

Interplanetary Travel Distance by Time and Acceleration

Nice!

I was just saying, the Scout Administrator presents the party with a detailed itinerary of travel times and assumptions prior to the mission; it's very good, and should clear up misconceptions on how long it's going to take to get to the job site.

 

[AlHazred]

So, I've gone through my various PDFs from buying many of Marc Miller's CDROMs, and from various Bundles I've picked up. As far as I can tell, Asteltine has never been the setting of an official adventure. I may need to go to the Mongoose forums, where they have a separate subforum for their Travellers Aid Society program on DTRPG, and see if anyone's written on and published it on there.

567-908 has, of course, one very famous adventure -- Classic Traveller Adventure 10: Safari Ship. It's been reprinted by MGP, I believe

And now I'm torn. I was hoping to run "Search & Rescue" from The Marches Adventures 1-5, with my PCs as contractors sent to 875-496. The original scenario sends them to Gorram, but they'd be, like, 8 weeks minimum in-transit, and that doesn't make any sense. Instead, I've redefined 875-496 as a Red Zone instead of Amber, and decided the Scouts have interdicted it to protect the native culture (descended from a crashed generation starship headed for the Sword Worlds region). The adventure is great for introducing players to a variety of Imperial regulations regarding interdiction, and it has some nice twists in it, and the chance for players to be Big Damn Heroes.

On the other hand, Safari Ship has a First Contact situation. On the other other hand, it also pays extremely well. Too well. They're still supposed to be living hand-to-mouth at this point in the campaign.

So, their current trip to 567-908, I think I need to just emphasize how little the planet is used. The Mongoose books have a small research outpost there. Maybe I can do some sort of short thing with scientists.

 

[King Midas]

So, I've gone through my various PDFs from buying many of Marc Miller's CDROMs, and from various Bundles I've picked up. As far as I can tell, Asteltine has never been the setting of an official adventure. I may need to go to the Mongoose forums, where they have a separate subforum for their Travellers Aid Society program on DTRPG, and see if anyone's written on and published it on there.

AFAICT, agreed there are no campaigns set there. Here are my notes on Asteltine:
Asteline/District 268: B 7A7402 A
⦁ JTAS Piracy: Potential pirate base
⦁ T5 Bowman Arm: Paragraph write up:
⦁ Mongoose SM 1 Bowman Arm: Paragraph write up:
⦁ High & Dry - Mongoose: Paragraph write up.
⦁ Skandarvik some background in write up.
⦁ Mire Run: Three to four line background.
Since I have it open, here is what Mire Run (Freelance Traveller) has to say:

Asteline : District 268 0931 B7A7402-A 210​

From Squallia we head to Asteltine, site of several ground engagements during the recent Frontier War. A veteran of the Asteltine Landings will be available to guide a tour in sealed ATVs of a site of fighting between elements of the Sword World Confederation Marines and the Asteline Volunteers. Passengers should note that Asteltine is a world with a low level of social control, even by frontier standards.

While Asteline’s belt does not compare with Glisten or even the nearby Bowman system for mineral richness, it does have a number of working claims, and subject to local security conditions at the time of visit, the Company may be able to arrange a visit to a genuine working belter colony.

 

[Spinward Flow]

JTAS Piracy: Potential pirate base

Type B starport
Government type zero
Law Level 2
Tech Level A

That means there aren't a lot of rules/regs to worry about and there aren't a lot of "inspectors" around to check up on paperwork. There's no centralized (or even decentralized) world government to deal with ... but you've got TL=A and a type B starport, which can provide annual overhauls, maintenance and repairs to starships that are TL=9-A.

Which means that they'll "service" corsairs with few (if any) questions asked ... so long as you've got the credits (and/or the goods ).

 

[AlHazred]

I had noticed the potential for piracy, and intend to lay a little groundwork there, so the players can think of it if they need to track down pirates later.

I find it intriguing that no scenarios have been placed there. It's got a high TL for such a low-pop world, with no government and few laws. And it's got fluid non-water oceans -- a great opportunity to have some sort of weird chemical biome. Maybe it supports methane-based lifeforms (shades of Hal Clement's Mission of Gravity!) for a chance at something really strange. But as far as I can tell, no official publication has specified what fluid the oceans are made of.

 

[King Midas]

Odd, S3 lists Debarre as having a B starport, but my Mongoose map says D. I guess it was downgraded somewhere along the line.
I bring this up because the ancient original JTAS19 article on piracy listed Asteline and Debarre (along with Thanber, Tremous Dex, and Trexalon) as potential pirate ports. Sadly, it doesn't say much more, except that they all have low enough law levels, high enough port and tech ratings, a good selection of reachable targets, and are out of range of easy retaliation.

 

[AlHazred]

I'm using the original designations with minor modifications (such as making 875-496 a Red Zone), so I have it as class B.

 

[Spinward Flow]

Odd, S3 lists Debarre as having a B starport, but my Mongoose map says D. I guess it was downgraded somewhere along the line.

Typos in later publications can do that.

There's also the listing on Travellermap dated 1105 to refer to.

Considering that @AlHazred is running everything a few years prior to 1105, I think we can safely discount whatever is printed on the Mongoose map in this instance.

 

[AlHazred]

I appreciate Mongoose a lot for reprinting some classics and some great new things, and giving Traveller a shot in the arm. And the TAS program promises to allow the publishing of some amazing stuff! But they do have typos...

 

[RogerMC]

There are multiple worlds which have had UPPs changed from those in the original Spinward Marches CT book - generally I just ignore those changes even if they have somehow been carried over to the Traveller map (awesome as it is).

Another example is Faldor which had Tech Level 2 in the SM book on the basis of which the Keith Brothers wrote a whole scenario featuring barbarian nomad tribes etc (which should be in one of the CD-ROMs? and is worth a look given it is also in the Bowman arm) but which was mysteriously up-teched to 5 at some point.

 

[King Midas]

Typos in later publications can do that.

There's also the listing on Travellermap dated 1105 to refer to.

Considering that @AlHazred is running everything a few years prior to 1105, I think we can safely discount whatever is printed on the Mongoose map in this instance.

Me too.

I appreciate Mongoose a lot for reprinting some classics and some great new things, and giving Traveller a shot in the arm. And the TAS program promises to allow the publishing of some amazing stuff! But they do have typos...

Considering their usual level of proof reading, I'll give them a pass: Or we could just say "Mongoose, thy name is Typos."

There are multiple worlds which have had UPPs changed from those in the original Spinward Marches CT book - generally I just ignore those changes even if they have somehow been carried over to the Traveller map (awesome as it is).

Another example is Faldor which had Tech Level 2 in the SM book on the basis of which the Keith Brothers wrote a whole scenario featuring barbarian nomad tribes etc (which should be in one of the CD-ROMs? and is worth a look given it is also in the Bowman arm) but which was mysteriously up-teched to 5 at some point.

I like the Faldor campaign.
MTU is based on LBB77, anything (inc '81) is considered a valid optional addition. Also set in 1100 to give the Travellers a few years to prevent the 5FW.
BTW, Not trying to threadjack, I've just gone through most of the published material and have notes on every planet in The SW. This is why I have been posting MTU stuff on Alhazred's thread.

 

[AlHazred]

It's all good.

So, I don't want to distract too much from the current thrust of the campaign: to get back to Flammarion to get the ship repaired. So I'll be doing the first part of Archarology, where the PCs meet the Imperial scientists, and fly a few back to their base.

I figure, one of my players was really into the Darrians last game, so he'll be interested. I can lay the groundwork for them reaching out the next time the players are on Bpwman -- it's a major hub of the area, so they'll probably be back. I can run the rest of Archeology later on, since they will probably try to claim the ship!