I'm toying with the idea of making at least one of the worlds in my Alkonost setting have "non-standard" technology with an Atomic Age (i.e. 1950's/1960's speculations about future spaceflight) flavor to it. The world in question, Laana, is strongly biased against AIs and most advanced electronics (and with a good reason - they were slaves to the Incunablis Machine Empire up until recently), and having analog electronics, hydraulics and a lot of clunky machinery - not to mention bulky fission reactors - would fit them very well and also make them quite unique.
The thing is that I also want them to be a minor interstellar power, and, therefore, would like them to have jump-capable ships. But J1 drives are TL9, and Fusion is available beginning from TL8, which makes the clunky fission plants redundant.
So what I have in mind is to make Laana TL7, with several elements of TL8 (in biology, agriculture and medicine for the most part) and with a few TL9 technologies (mainly jump-drives). Alternatively, they might be importing the jump-drives as 'black boxes' from Alkonost (the TL11 major power in this subsector) and jury-rigging them into their TL7 fission-powered, analog-system, reaction-driven starships.
What do you think about this? Have you done something similar in your campaigns?
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Monday, November 1, 2010
Setting Size
I think I'll go with one subsector right now. 40 or so worlds are more than enough for interesting adventures and a great variety of locations, especially since most new (or refurbished) ships are Jump-1 (and Jump-2 is expensive).
I'll definitely develop the general outline of what goes on in the surrounding subsectors, though, with focus on the Risar subsector - the Restored Alkonost Republic's "Backyard". But even Risar is mostly Outback, with the only 'civilized' area being the Incunablis Machine Empire in its Spinward-Rimward corner and the ultra-militarist Risar Protectorate. So the most active recovery takes place in Alkonost.
I'll definitely develop the general outline of what goes on in the surrounding subsectors, though, with focus on the Risar subsector - the Restored Alkonost Republic's "Backyard". But even Risar is mostly Outback, with the only 'civilized' area being the Incunablis Machine Empire in its Spinward-Rimward corner and the ultra-militarist Risar Protectorate. So the most active recovery takes place in Alkonost.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
More points of diversion from the OTU norms
More points of diversion from the OTU norms.
First is the alien presence. The OTU and its adventures always seemed to me to be very anthropocentric, with most NPC encountered in OTU adventures being Human and most cultures dominated by the cultures of one or another Human subspecies. While Humans are still the most common species in the new Alkonost setting, there is a sizable minority of Celirans on most worlds, and a few worlds even have a Celiran majority. Celiran culture and religion has also influenced many Human cultures (and Human culture and religion have influenced many Celiran cultures). Other aliens such as the felids (temporary title) and the Inheritors - as well as others (possibly?) - are also present, but are usually a much smaller minority.
The second is the attitude towards technology in the old days of the Consortium. The Alkonost ATU was somewhat less conservative towards technology than the OTU Imperium. Genetic engineering, cybernetics, terraformation, robotics and AIs were much more common than in the OTU. Of course, at the present time, after 35 years of Second Civil War and 150 years of Dark Night, most worlds have reverted to a much lower level of technology and are, generally speaking, incapable of doing much in these fields. But high-tech relics from the Consortium era, not to mention genetically-engineered subspecies (such as heavy-world Humans and aquatic Celirans), are still present.
The third is social UWP characteristic distribution during the Consortium era. Most worlds in the Alkonost Reach (Alkonost and Risar subsectors) were settled for two centuries before the Second Civil War. Therefore, most people choose the comfortable - or profitable - worlds to live on and avoided the hellholes; the economy was also well-developed, leading a a more uniform tech-level; and the Consortium had limits about which types of government and amounts of law enforcement would be tolerated. So most Terra Prime (i.e. SIZ 5-9, ATM 5, 6 or 8, HYD 4-8) Gardens had POP 8-A, most non-Terra-Prime Gardens had POP 7-9, most marginal worlds had POP 5-8 while most hellholes had population 7 or less (with Phai Lung being the main exception - a metal-rich ice-capped world with POP 9); almost all governments were GOV 1, 3, 4, 5, 8 or 9; almost all worlds had LAW 1-9; and almost all worlds had TL 8-15 (with TL 12 being the average and 16 being a rare science-station world).
Of course, now that the Second Civil War and the Dark Nighthave caused so much damage, death and chaos, things are A LOT more varied, with much more variance in population, technology, government and law and with TL 7, rather than TL 12, being the average.
First is the alien presence. The OTU and its adventures always seemed to me to be very anthropocentric, with most NPC encountered in OTU adventures being Human and most cultures dominated by the cultures of one or another Human subspecies. While Humans are still the most common species in the new Alkonost setting, there is a sizable minority of Celirans on most worlds, and a few worlds even have a Celiran majority. Celiran culture and religion has also influenced many Human cultures (and Human culture and religion have influenced many Celiran cultures). Other aliens such as the felids (temporary title) and the Inheritors - as well as others (possibly?) - are also present, but are usually a much smaller minority.
The second is the attitude towards technology in the old days of the Consortium. The Alkonost ATU was somewhat less conservative towards technology than the OTU Imperium. Genetic engineering, cybernetics, terraformation, robotics and AIs were much more common than in the OTU. Of course, at the present time, after 35 years of Second Civil War and 150 years of Dark Night, most worlds have reverted to a much lower level of technology and are, generally speaking, incapable of doing much in these fields. But high-tech relics from the Consortium era, not to mention genetically-engineered subspecies (such as heavy-world Humans and aquatic Celirans), are still present.
The third is social UWP characteristic distribution during the Consortium era. Most worlds in the Alkonost Reach (Alkonost and Risar subsectors) were settled for two centuries before the Second Civil War. Therefore, most people choose the comfortable - or profitable - worlds to live on and avoided the hellholes; the economy was also well-developed, leading a a more uniform tech-level; and the Consortium had limits about which types of government and amounts of law enforcement would be tolerated. So most Terra Prime (i.e. SIZ 5-9, ATM 5, 6 or 8, HYD 4-8) Gardens had POP 8-A, most non-Terra-Prime Gardens had POP 7-9, most marginal worlds had POP 5-8 while most hellholes had population 7 or less (with Phai Lung being the main exception - a metal-rich ice-capped world with POP 9); almost all governments were GOV 1, 3, 4, 5, 8 or 9; almost all worlds had LAW 1-9; and almost all worlds had TL 8-15 (with TL 12 being the average and 16 being a rare science-station world).
Of course, now that the Second Civil War and the Dark Nighthave caused so much damage, death and chaos, things are A LOT more varied, with much more variance in population, technology, government and law and with TL 7, rather than TL 12, being the average.
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Player Knowledge
I will use my own homebrew history, which will be presented to the player(s) as printed hand-outs before the game-start. Of course, these hand-outs would be biased towards what people living on their homeworld(s) should know. There will be one A4 (maybe even A5!) page of information known by anyone in the setting, another A4 page of information known only to those with EDU 8+ and a two-sided A4 page known to those with a skill in Social Sciences (History). Of course, if no one will have EDU 8+ and/or Social Sciences (History), I'll only have to create the relevant pages!
The actual setting, the Alkonost subsector and the Risar subsector, is only recovering from the Dark Night and trade is sporadic at best. Therefore, most people will not know much about other worlds and about the setting's history beyond the most basic facts. And even those basic facts will be, on many worlds, distorted into some kind of a folk-tale, in which the Consortium will be painted as a legendary golden age destroyed by a few corrupt officials; only those with higher education will know about the Consortium's stagnation and decay. And there would be the Laanese version of the story, in which greed and over-reliance on machines (and, particularly, AI) have destroyed the Consortium; the Laanese see the Consortium as technologically advanced but morally flawed.
Also note that most locals don't like the Inheritors (as many, but not all, tend to be raiders), though the felids have a somewhat better, though still checkered, reputation (especially since they were mercenaries and traders more often than pirates). There are also issues of Human supremacists, Celiran nationalists and Celiran (and Human) religious fundementalists, especially on the more isolated worlds.
The actual setting, the Alkonost subsector and the Risar subsector, is only recovering from the Dark Night and trade is sporadic at best. Therefore, most people will not know much about other worlds and about the setting's history beyond the most basic facts. And even those basic facts will be, on many worlds, distorted into some kind of a folk-tale, in which the Consortium will be painted as a legendary golden age destroyed by a few corrupt officials; only those with higher education will know about the Consortium's stagnation and decay. And there would be the Laanese version of the story, in which greed and over-reliance on machines (and, particularly, AI) have destroyed the Consortium; the Laanese see the Consortium as technologically advanced but morally flawed.
Also note that most locals don't like the Inheritors (as many, but not all, tend to be raiders), though the felids have a somewhat better, though still checkered, reputation (especially since they were mercenaries and traders more often than pirates). There are also issues of Human supremacists, Celiran nationalists and Celiran (and Human) religious fundementalists, especially on the more isolated worlds.
Monday, October 11, 2010
Divorcing Alkonost (Canopus) from the OTU
As you might have read in my posts on the Mongoose boards, I'm fed up with the OTU. That said, I still love the majority of my own stuff made up for the Alkonost (Canopus) setting, and I am firm in my decision not to abandon it - it is my favorite setting so far.
So I have decided to divorce this setting from the OTU, or, at least, re-imagine it into a non-OTU ATU.
Thinking of this, I was toying with this idea for the last month or so, even before that thread on the MGT boards has become the last straw for me in regard to the OTU. I have several reasons to remove my setting from the OTU:
1) It is hardly OTU already. Even until now, I haven't cared much about Vilani, Darrians, Grandfather, Zhodani, the Marches, Imperial Nobility or the Reformation Coalition. The only OTU-ish things I was using were the Collapse, the AI Virus and the Aslan, with some touches of Solomani. But all of these are, more or less, generic sci-fi themes: Long Nights, felinoid aliens and AI empires are present in many sci-fi works. So why not have my own Dark Night, my own felinoid alien race and my own AI empire, and get rid of the OTU bother once and for all?
2) The licensing issues. If I use the OTU, I'll have to do various things in order to conform to the Foreven license, such as publishing the Solomani ship designs as ones present in Foreven and using CT stats for the rest. In a non-OTU setting I can easily use the entire MGT SRD with no problems at all, give everything MGT stats and be perfectly legal.
3) The vast amount of canon for the OTU - although some of it is VERY GOOD AND VERY WELL-WRITTEN - has an annoying tendency to hamper my creativity and lead to writer's blocks. The artistic freedom of an ATU would be a very good thing to have. For example, I can have my own aliens without thinking "how would that fit into the OTU?".
4) The OTU history is LONG, with everything being millennia-old. I like my worlds having a shorter history, of maybe several centuries at most.
So what I have in mind is a background containing many elements from my Shattered Federation ATU with many elements of the previous version of the Alkonost setting. You'll have Zoo-Builders, Celirans, Precursors and Inheritors alongside Laana, Alkonost, Kedeshius, Garland and the Incunablis Machine Empire.
The basic concept is the following:
The Consortium was the greatest civilization in recent history, a multi-species society - though predominantly Human and Celiran - enjoying great prosperity and progress, reaching up to Tech Level 15 (16 for experimental tech) and encompassing the unimaginably huge size of almost four sectors (circa 2,000 systems). Formed after the break-up of the old Apollo Federation in the First Civil War, the Consortium, governed by the Treaty of Cera Nayen, carefully integrated the various post-Federal splinter-states into a pluralistic, democratic polity where the various cultures could interact peacefully while maintaining local and regional autonomy. Technological advancement allowed for Jump-6 Mail Couriers, self-aware AI and cheap, safe star-travel.
But in its later years, in the Third and Fourth Centuries AT (After the Treaty), the Consortium began to decay and stagnate. The high-tech, vastly wealthy Core Worlds became decadent and introverted, while the Periphery's economy declined. Bit by bit, local interests and local loyalties began to eclipse the commitment to the Consortium as a whole. As the economy lost its momentum, local leaders began to chafe under the Consortium's rule. The Core's hedonist culture saw the Periphery's worlds as backward and uncultured, while the new populist leaders in the Periphery considered the Core to be a parasite over the local economies.
In 373 AT, these rivalries came to a head. Earth, a semi-Periphery industrial world in the Rimward section of the Consortium, declared independence, formed the United Terran Republic and nationalized corporate assets owned by Core concerns. Several other Periphery and semi-Periphery worlds followed suit and broke away. The Core responded by sending the Consortium's battle-fleets against the successor states. The Second Civil War has begun.
With the collapse of the central authority, most factions tried to grab what they can from the Consortium's wreckage, turning on each other in the fight over these scraps. Untold atrocities were committed by many factions. Eventually, by the late 390's, the flames of war began to dwindle to embers as the means of production and the weapons of war were, in most part, destroyed or badly damaged.
Then, in 397, new aliens, unheard of before, came into Known Space from the Coreward: the felids (place-holder name) and the Inheritors. Opportunists in nature, these aliens seized upon the Consortium's ruin as a chance to get rich and gain worlds and political power. The nomadic Inheritors took what they wanted from the barely-defended worlds of the former Consortium. The anarchic and semi-tribal felids became mercenaries, interstellar traders, pirates, and, sometimes, also local kings. And the damage done by this invasion added up with the massive damage caused by the Second Civil War.
This is how the Dark Night came into being. Most large starships were destroyed by more than thirty-five years of intense civil war; many worlds lay in ruin; trade was vastly reduced; technology declined as the interstellar economy collapsed. Worlds became separate, each abandoned to its own fate, or, at best, left as part of a small, shaky pocket-state linking a few worlds by a handful of small remaining starships.
Now it is the end of 449 AT, and, bit by bit, a few worlds are recovering from the war. It is a time when brave adventurers can strike out against the darkness - or strike rich in salvaging precious relics from the ruins of the old Consortium. Many new opportunities and challenges await!
Some inspirations for my ATU:
Dune (mostly for Laana - the Butlerian Jihad, Mentants, and for the Incunablis Machine Empire)
Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy (terraformation; semi-habitable worlds; strange colonial cultures and spirituality)
S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadows of Chernobyl and S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Call of Pripyat (for Garland and Svoboda)
Starflight I and II (great sci-fi computer games; inspiration for the Dark Night)
System Shock I and II (for the Incunablis Machine Empire)
Terminator (for the Incunablis Machine Empire)
The Matrix (for the Incunablis Machine Empire)
Larry Niven's Known Space, especially A Gift from Earth (especially for the Dense/Low worlds)
Babylon 5 (for what is possible to do with psionics)
History Channel's Life After People (for all the ruined worlds)
TNE's Path of Tears (especially in terms of atmosphere)
So I have decided to divorce this setting from the OTU, or, at least, re-imagine it into a non-OTU ATU.
Thinking of this, I was toying with this idea for the last month or so, even before that thread on the MGT boards has become the last straw for me in regard to the OTU. I have several reasons to remove my setting from the OTU:
1) It is hardly OTU already. Even until now, I haven't cared much about Vilani, Darrians, Grandfather, Zhodani, the Marches, Imperial Nobility or the Reformation Coalition. The only OTU-ish things I was using were the Collapse, the AI Virus and the Aslan, with some touches of Solomani. But all of these are, more or less, generic sci-fi themes: Long Nights, felinoid aliens and AI empires are present in many sci-fi works. So why not have my own Dark Night, my own felinoid alien race and my own AI empire, and get rid of the OTU bother once and for all?
2) The licensing issues. If I use the OTU, I'll have to do various things in order to conform to the Foreven license, such as publishing the Solomani ship designs as ones present in Foreven and using CT stats for the rest. In a non-OTU setting I can easily use the entire MGT SRD with no problems at all, give everything MGT stats and be perfectly legal.
3) The vast amount of canon for the OTU - although some of it is VERY GOOD AND VERY WELL-WRITTEN - has an annoying tendency to hamper my creativity and lead to writer's blocks. The artistic freedom of an ATU would be a very good thing to have. For example, I can have my own aliens without thinking "how would that fit into the OTU?".
4) The OTU history is LONG, with everything being millennia-old. I like my worlds having a shorter history, of maybe several centuries at most.
So what I have in mind is a background containing many elements from my Shattered Federation ATU with many elements of the previous version of the Alkonost setting. You'll have Zoo-Builders, Celirans, Precursors and Inheritors alongside Laana, Alkonost, Kedeshius, Garland and the Incunablis Machine Empire.
The basic concept is the following:
The Consortium was the greatest civilization in recent history, a multi-species society - though predominantly Human and Celiran - enjoying great prosperity and progress, reaching up to Tech Level 15 (16 for experimental tech) and encompassing the unimaginably huge size of almost four sectors (circa 2,000 systems). Formed after the break-up of the old Apollo Federation in the First Civil War, the Consortium, governed by the Treaty of Cera Nayen, carefully integrated the various post-Federal splinter-states into a pluralistic, democratic polity where the various cultures could interact peacefully while maintaining local and regional autonomy. Technological advancement allowed for Jump-6 Mail Couriers, self-aware AI and cheap, safe star-travel.
But in its later years, in the Third and Fourth Centuries AT (After the Treaty), the Consortium began to decay and stagnate. The high-tech, vastly wealthy Core Worlds became decadent and introverted, while the Periphery's economy declined. Bit by bit, local interests and local loyalties began to eclipse the commitment to the Consortium as a whole. As the economy lost its momentum, local leaders began to chafe under the Consortium's rule. The Core's hedonist culture saw the Periphery's worlds as backward and uncultured, while the new populist leaders in the Periphery considered the Core to be a parasite over the local economies.
In 373 AT, these rivalries came to a head. Earth, a semi-Periphery industrial world in the Rimward section of the Consortium, declared independence, formed the United Terran Republic and nationalized corporate assets owned by Core concerns. Several other Periphery and semi-Periphery worlds followed suit and broke away. The Core responded by sending the Consortium's battle-fleets against the successor states. The Second Civil War has begun.
With the collapse of the central authority, most factions tried to grab what they can from the Consortium's wreckage, turning on each other in the fight over these scraps. Untold atrocities were committed by many factions. Eventually, by the late 390's, the flames of war began to dwindle to embers as the means of production and the weapons of war were, in most part, destroyed or badly damaged.
Then, in 397, new aliens, unheard of before, came into Known Space from the Coreward: the felids (place-holder name) and the Inheritors. Opportunists in nature, these aliens seized upon the Consortium's ruin as a chance to get rich and gain worlds and political power. The nomadic Inheritors took what they wanted from the barely-defended worlds of the former Consortium. The anarchic and semi-tribal felids became mercenaries, interstellar traders, pirates, and, sometimes, also local kings. And the damage done by this invasion added up with the massive damage caused by the Second Civil War.
This is how the Dark Night came into being. Most large starships were destroyed by more than thirty-five years of intense civil war; many worlds lay in ruin; trade was vastly reduced; technology declined as the interstellar economy collapsed. Worlds became separate, each abandoned to its own fate, or, at best, left as part of a small, shaky pocket-state linking a few worlds by a handful of small remaining starships.
Now it is the end of 449 AT, and, bit by bit, a few worlds are recovering from the war. It is a time when brave adventurers can strike out against the darkness - or strike rich in salvaging precious relics from the ruins of the old Consortium. Many new opportunities and challenges await!
Some inspirations for my ATU:
Dune (mostly for Laana - the Butlerian Jihad, Mentants, and for the Incunablis Machine Empire)
Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy (terraformation; semi-habitable worlds; strange colonial cultures and spirituality)
S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadows of Chernobyl and S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Call of Pripyat (for Garland and Svoboda)
Starflight I and II (great sci-fi computer games; inspiration for the Dark Night)
System Shock I and II (for the Incunablis Machine Empire)
Terminator (for the Incunablis Machine Empire)
The Matrix (for the Incunablis Machine Empire)
Larry Niven's Known Space, especially A Gift from Earth (especially for the Dense/Low worlds)
Babylon 5 (for what is possible to do with psionics)
History Channel's Life After People (for all the ruined worlds)
TNE's Path of Tears (especially in terms of atmosphere)
Saturday, September 25, 2010
The Death's Head Regiment
I've finished painting the miniatures representing a platoon of the Kedeshian Death's Head Regiment; they are a force known for high-tech relic equipment and gross overconfidence. As long as they fight against lightly-armed irregulars like the Altheans, they strike fear into the hearts of their enemies; but they aren't likely to fare well against a well-trained, highly-motivated real military force, such as the Laanese (who back the Althean resistance and might sooner or later be drawn into this conflict themselves). The minis are Eureka Miniatures 15mm Sci-Fi Stormtroopers:
Sunday, June 6, 2010
Revised post-Collapse Starmap
I've revised the post-Collapse starmap to make things more interesting. I've also moved the focus to a single subsector at a time with map legend to make things easier to print and use.
Saturday, June 5, 2010
Revised pre-Collapse Starmap
I've revised the pre-Collapse starmap to make the setting more interesting. A few uninteresting 'filler' worlds were replaced by more interesting places for the PCs to visit.
Saturday, May 8, 2010
Planning the Campaign
I'm slowly but surely building my next Traveller campaign, based in Canopus in the (Imperial) year 1201. This will be a single-player campaign, with me as the Referee and my spouse as the player. The original idea was to make this a highly-political campaign with relatively little on-screen action; but following some thought I've given this, as well as a few thorough discussions with my spouse, we've decided to make things more varied.
This will be, at the baseline, a trader campaign. She'll play a female Aslan purser (and factor-on-board) of a trading ship, tasked by her clan with establishing new trade routes within the Alkonost subsector of Canopus and beyond. In addition to making formal deals with potential trade partners (and setting up local factors on various worlds), she'll also have to make a profit in the meanwhile, using her ship for speculative trade and/or passenger traffic and even certain mercenary contracts. This is, in a sense, similar to the A4: Leviathan scenario, involving exploratory trade with a ship, which, in essence belongs to a corporation (an Aslan clan, in this case). She'll have a free hand in running this operation, as long as she caters to the long-term goal of building her clan's interstellar commercial empire.
I talked with her about this and she wants a mixture of trading, adventuring, politics and action/combat, up to and including mercenary actions. For the latter part, I think I'll make her character married, with her husband being the ship's captain/pilot and also (naturally, as he's the highest-ranking male in the ship's pecking order) lead the ship's troops. I'll let my spouse play the husband and/or his retainers in tactical combat as a mini-game.
To make things easier and more varied, the character will come from Iele (Canopus/1916), also called "Aralaa" by the Aslan. This world was originally a Solomani world settled by Aslan ihatei - who founded their own new clans - shortly after the Collapse, so it is a mixture of Human and Aslan states. There is a lot of trade (and war!) going on between the Human and the Aslan states, so the PC will be familiar with Humans and be able to work with them (I'll give her a good Tolerance skill). Her ship's crew will be a mixture of Aslan clan-members and Human hirelings, and I'll possible add a single Droyne or even Hiver to make things interesting.
The game will be more-or-less a sandbox. She'll be in charge of the ship, and be able to travel anywhere within the Alkonost (and even Risar) subsectors. I'll try to set up each and every planet as a unique location with its own NPCs and adventure possibilities, so that visiting worlds will be interesting. There should be several possibilities to establish a factor's presence on each world, sometimes involving messing with local politics, sometimes involving exploration and sometimes involving combat (or doing 'favors' for someone). Smuggling and/or cutting deals with oppositional factions might also be an option.
I'm not sure about the scale of the ship I'll give her. At the lowest end of the spectrum we can have a 400-ton Solomani Trader (of pre-war manufacture and with several Aslan modifications); on one hand such a small ship will be pretty easy to handle, but it will have only limited versatility especially if we'll want to try a more varied game (with some small-scale mercenary actions added in). At the highest end of the spectrum is a 1,000-ton ship (probably a new Solomani design I'll make) which could carry a lot of cargo and passengers and maybe even a small platoon of mercenary troops; but this may be a little overwhelming for a single-PC game. However, I'm currently leaning towards the middle-ground of a 600-800-ton Wilds-modified trader, possibly carrying a squad (circa 10 troopers) of ship's troops in addition to crew and passengers; this way I can still involve the PC herself in planetside action AND send in the troops for heavier action and a tactical mini-game (with miniatures and terrain to boot!). Advice on this matter will be welcome.
This will be, at the baseline, a trader campaign. She'll play a female Aslan purser (and factor-on-board) of a trading ship, tasked by her clan with establishing new trade routes within the Alkonost subsector of Canopus and beyond. In addition to making formal deals with potential trade partners (and setting up local factors on various worlds), she'll also have to make a profit in the meanwhile, using her ship for speculative trade and/or passenger traffic and even certain mercenary contracts. This is, in a sense, similar to the A4: Leviathan scenario, involving exploratory trade with a ship, which, in essence belongs to a corporation (an Aslan clan, in this case). She'll have a free hand in running this operation, as long as she caters to the long-term goal of building her clan's interstellar commercial empire.
I talked with her about this and she wants a mixture of trading, adventuring, politics and action/combat, up to and including mercenary actions. For the latter part, I think I'll make her character married, with her husband being the ship's captain/pilot and also (naturally, as he's the highest-ranking male in the ship's pecking order) lead the ship's troops. I'll let my spouse play the husband and/or his retainers in tactical combat as a mini-game.
To make things easier and more varied, the character will come from Iele (Canopus/1916), also called "Aralaa" by the Aslan. This world was originally a Solomani world settled by Aslan ihatei - who founded their own new clans - shortly after the Collapse, so it is a mixture of Human and Aslan states. There is a lot of trade (and war!) going on between the Human and the Aslan states, so the PC will be familiar with Humans and be able to work with them (I'll give her a good Tolerance skill). Her ship's crew will be a mixture of Aslan clan-members and Human hirelings, and I'll possible add a single Droyne or even Hiver to make things interesting.
The game will be more-or-less a sandbox. She'll be in charge of the ship, and be able to travel anywhere within the Alkonost (and even Risar) subsectors. I'll try to set up each and every planet as a unique location with its own NPCs and adventure possibilities, so that visiting worlds will be interesting. There should be several possibilities to establish a factor's presence on each world, sometimes involving messing with local politics, sometimes involving exploration and sometimes involving combat (or doing 'favors' for someone). Smuggling and/or cutting deals with oppositional factions might also be an option.
I'm not sure about the scale of the ship I'll give her. At the lowest end of the spectrum we can have a 400-ton Solomani Trader (of pre-war manufacture and with several Aslan modifications); on one hand such a small ship will be pretty easy to handle, but it will have only limited versatility especially if we'll want to try a more varied game (with some small-scale mercenary actions added in). At the highest end of the spectrum is a 1,000-ton ship (probably a new Solomani design I'll make) which could carry a lot of cargo and passengers and maybe even a small platoon of mercenary troops; but this may be a little overwhelming for a single-PC game. However, I'm currently leaning towards the middle-ground of a 600-800-ton Wilds-modified trader, possibly carrying a squad (circa 10 troopers) of ship's troops in addition to crew and passengers; this way I can still involve the PC herself in planetside action AND send in the troops for heavier action and a tactical mini-game (with miniatures and terrain to boot!). Advice on this matter will be welcome.
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Canopus Trader Map
I've created a variant of the Canopus starmap, based on what is known to the Traders' Cooperative Network, a non-affiliated information source which will be available to the PCs.
Note the vast prevalence of Amber zones in the quadrant; most worlds outside the Restored Canopus Republic are marked as Amber zones due to problematic governments, unstable trade with the outside universe and other Wilds conditions. Using the Mongoose Traveller rules, this will mean that selling weapons will be quite profitable in the majority of the quadrant; also, there will be quite a hefty passenger flow from the Wilds into the safer worlds of the Restored Canopus Republic.
Note the vast prevalence of Amber zones in the quadrant; most worlds outside the Restored Canopus Republic are marked as Amber zones due to problematic governments, unstable trade with the outside universe and other Wilds conditions. Using the Mongoose Traveller rules, this will mean that selling weapons will be quite profitable in the majority of the quadrant; also, there will be quite a hefty passenger flow from the Wilds into the safer worlds of the Restored Canopus Republic.
Friday, April 9, 2010
Moving to Canopus
I've decided to change the campaign's setting to the Coreward-Trailing quadrant of the Canopus sector, set in the New Era in 1201 (Imperial date). The Collapse would provide the game with ample opportunities for adventure, exploration and commercial empire-building.
Here is a star-map of this quadrant in 1201:
Here is a star-map of this quadrant in 1201:
Saturday, March 6, 2010
Aslan Miniatures
I've finished painting a bunch of Aslan miniatures ("Bear Men" by Stan Johansen Miniatures). These would be used for this game. I've chosen a reddish fur color inspired by some illustrations of Larry Niven's Kzinti I've seen some time ago. So here's the result:
Monday, February 22, 2010
Possible Changes
I'm thinking about a change in direction.
I have some problems with the Trojan Reach setting, especially the fact that it feels too under-populated and under-developed for a decent commercial campaign.
I might want to move this campaign from the Outer Rim Void in 1105 to the Coreward-Trailing corner of Canopus in 1201, which is a background I've been developing for some time now. Not only is the TNE background more comfortable to me (with its lack of uber-powerful, omnipresent Imperium), but I find myself easier to "connect" to it than to the Trojan Reach.
I also tend to love the TNE background more than the Classic Era OTU one...
And, of course, an Aslan noble with a trading ship will find her paws full of work developing new trade routes in the collapsed, war-torn Canopus Sector.
Maybe this will allow me to overcome my writer's block...
What do you think?
I have some problems with the Trojan Reach setting, especially the fact that it feels too under-populated and under-developed for a decent commercial campaign.
I might want to move this campaign from the Outer Rim Void in 1105 to the Coreward-Trailing corner of Canopus in 1201, which is a background I've been developing for some time now. Not only is the TNE background more comfortable to me (with its lack of uber-powerful, omnipresent Imperium), but I find myself easier to "connect" to it than to the Trojan Reach.
I also tend to love the TNE background more than the Classic Era OTU one...
And, of course, an Aslan noble with a trading ship will find her paws full of work developing new trade routes in the collapsed, war-torn Canopus Sector.
Maybe this will allow me to overcome my writer's block...
What do you think?
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