A Simple Set of Agency Rules

Mission Start!

Between the M-Space campaign I'm running on Wednesdays and the hours I've sunk into XCOM 2: War of the Chosen, I've come up with a simple set of rules for my players to run their Scout agency. This is for sending out fire teams of explorers and troubleshooters to do some side missions while your team does the cool adventuring. Great for frontier exploration campaigns, but you can tweak them to be for scientific research, surveying, and even war and trade. Made with M-Space and Mythras in mind, but I want to make one for Traveller/Cepheus Engine.

The link is here. Tell me what you think.

Space Governments Musing

In its most simplistic explanation, a government and its effectiveness in maintaining security and loyalty over its citizens is dependent upon transportation and communication. As all have improved, it's been possible for nations to grow larger, keep their holdings, and maintain their borders. Once you get into space, however, geopolitical borders and control go out the window. This is especially true the slower you make transportation and communication between two star systems. If everything is done with wormholes (or any relatively short hyperdrives) and instant ansibles, then it's a lot easier to have sector-spanning star empires. It's easier to get military ships to defend your planets from pirates or enemy alien attacks. You can send supply aid quickly in case of a natural disaster. Or, you can stop those damn space Yankees from revolting and throwing your supplies of space tea into the space Boston Harbor.

But, the slower things are, the harder it is to maintain security, loyalty, and control. So, if you have something like Traveller's jump drive, it's going to be more difficult to set up the big grand empire. In a setting where travelling to a star can take a week or more
per parsec, you would need a less centralized government to keep your outworlders happy about their independence, but planetary governors to keep them loyal to your government. A standard unitary sphere couldn't work like that. So what kind of governments could you see in such a setting? Luckily, a lot of this can be seen in settings like the Third Imperium of Traveller, as well as several of the 50's to 70's sci fi that inspired it and many modern takes on the space opera genre.

A note here. I'm no political scientist. I'm just a cook that has an interest in sci fi cultures and politics. So these are just rudimentary explanations done with the intent to provide interesting ideas for sci fi games within the constraints of a slower FTL drive. They aren't meant as a treatise on why one is better than the other.

Anarchist Communes

This is one I see a lot in transhumanist RPGs and literature, such as Eclipse Phase and The Culture series. Essentially, due to the vast distances and time that transportation and communication must cross, enforcing control over a planet is difficult. So these planets have to make due on their own in a lot of cases. Now, this really can only work if either there are a lot of resources available on the planet, or they have advanced mining and nanofabrication machines that can literally print what they need. If you are lacking either of those, then the colony is entirely dependent on either their patron, trade, or neighbors. Still, it's an interesting culture to see in space, and one that can be pretty alien to many of your players.

Feudal Empire

Whether it's Dune or Traveller's Third Imperium, a feudal space empire dominated by houses is another possible government that one could see across the vast gulfs of space. One could see it as a fairly decentralized monarchy, with each planet owned by a house of nobility. There would be a great deal of tradition and honor laws to keep people loyal to the capital world, and the capital world would have to have a large space fleet to keep a good military presence. Basically replace tithes and levies with taxes and militia prospects and you've essentially got a cool and interesting space empire.

Republic Confederation/Federation

With this, much like Star Wars's Galactic Senate, you have a union of worlds that want to retain some independent government over their planet and holdings, but still have an overarching government that runs things between the members. Stuff like trade and economics, social and civil rights, law and order, military, and foreign policy. The overarching government is the federal government, while the individual worlds would be the world government. People in America are fairly familiar with the federation, while a confederation is more decentralized. This puts more power into the world government and they are more likely to be different governments from each other than in a federation. Unlike the feudal system, where the members are all subordinate to the capital, the federation/confederacy members are generally equal (at least on paper). People in these federations would be united against a major threat. Think something like the Klingons and Romulans, or the Zerg in Starcraft. Because of the remote distances and transportation times, sticking together against enemy empires is a good reason to form a federation.

Free World Alliance

Similar to the federations and confederations, an alliance is a cooperative union of planets that remain very independent and under control over their own populace, but have banded together for mutual defense or economic trade. Unlike the federation, this one is much looser and laws (usually called treaties or accords) are decided on by the members. This can be mutually beneficial, or it can lie more in the realms of realpolitik, with each trying to get the most from their relationship with the least give. An alliance is great because the worlds can be completely different governments and cultures from each other but still be together. So players can go to a monarchy one adventure and deal with social intrigue and nobles, and the next, they can deal with someone tampering with the bureaucracy of a republic's elections. Worlds would unite either for resource trading or to go against a common, but less powerful enemy. Like pirates and raiders, or other free worlds looking to exploit them. Maybe even a budding galactic empire looking to grow quickly.

Trade Empire/Cartel Plutocracy/Kleptocracy

This is a set I like. You can have a group of worlds united under several different companies, corporations, and conglomerates. Each planet is a client state under a specific corp rather than a government agency. Perhaps the government of the capital world prefers the private sector to fund colonial and trade efforts. Or, perhaps you can go full cyberpunk and the government is bought out by the different corporations at the expense of the citizens. Or maybe they simply are the government, with CEOs also holding government positions and social mobility being very limited or non-existent. Or perhaps the government retains control, but focuses less on claiming holdings for themselves and more on setting up trade agreements for either mutual or personal benefit. These could be balanced for the benefit of both parties, focused on the benefit of one, or the detriment of the other. Think Venice or Portugal during the Age of Discovery, or England and America during the 1800s with their aggressive trades with China. You can actually go a lot of ways with this beyond the usually evil megacorps you see in cyberpunk. The groups of corps in similar industries could form a cartel that controls the price of their exports. It'd have to be something not readily available or some sort of service or luxury (or even drugs). If you really want to make them the bad guys, you can have them form a kleptocracy, where they steal from their own people to supplement their own expenses. These worlds can be great for games of traders, political intrigue or, for the kleptocracy, rebels trying to overthrow their government.

That's all I have. I'm actually using a lot of these ideas for my current sci fi game that I'm running on Wednesdays. I like being able to add different types of planets and governments to make them feel like the players are entire a different world. I've actually had a lot of fun making the Trade Empires and Cartels in my game. What are some other empires and governments one could see in a sci fi setting of slower FTL ?

Styles of Aliens

So in the last post I talked about aliens and how many I wanted and such. I think the important part about aliens is how strange should we make them. There are all kinds of alien types out in science fiction, some made to be more familiar to us humans and some meant to be mind boggling strange. In M-Space, they have a Strangeness meter about them that shows how different an alien is from the baseline of an Earthling. It goes from 1 to 100, where 1 is practically a human, 50 is some where in the middle, and 100 is really really strange. I've actually used that in many of my games since, including Stars Without Number and Cepheus Engine. It's a really handy tool to gauge your aliens. So I made up a little silly scale for people to use when making their aliens, based mostly on Hollywood special effects

Stage One: Big Ears/Ridged Foreheads (BERF)

Strangeness: 1-25

SFX: Makeup and a mask

This is a common one to see in a lot of media. It's familiar to the players since the aliens look so much like humans, and easy on the budget both for Hollywood and the GM. Sometimes it's something really low key, like different markings on the skin, or something more like pointed ears or antennae on the forehead. I've always liked blue aliens, so the Andorrans were always pretty cool to me. Star Trek is big on this obviously, as are many of the aliens from Stargate, Eldar from WH40K, and some of the aliens from Defiance.

Stage Two: Actor in a Rubber Suit (ARS)

Strangeness: 26-50

SFX: Rubber Suit, Some Prosthetics and Make Up, A little CGI

This is the sweet spot for me in terms of xeno sophonts. The ARS still have a mostly humanoid body, but are different looking enough to make them feel alien. Most of the Mass Effect aliens are like this, as are some of the Star Wars aliens.

Stage Three: Complex Alien Puppetry (CAP)

Strangeness: 51-75

SFX: Complex Puppets, Some CGI, Stop Animation, two or more people operating it

The CAP is where things get pretty strange for the aliens. This is where you get quadrupeds (or hexapeds or more [or less]), strange alien limbs and heads, and other unusual, but recognizable shapes. A lot of the original trilogy Star Wars aliens are like this, as are some of the Xenomorph from Aliens, and Farscape. God I loved Farscape. While not strictly alien, many of the monsters in Ray Harryhausen's Dynamation films could also be under this.

Stage Four: Undeterminable Sapient Lifeform (USL)

Strangeness: 76-100

SFX: CGI, Film Tricks, Animation

This is the weird stuff. USLs are aliens that don't look like anything we as humans would identify as life. Clouds of intelligent plasma, sapient suns, living techno-organic metals, creatures of living energy, or shadow monsters can definitely fit the bill. What's important is that the alien is truly alien, Some good examples are The Blob from the original 50's movie, the shapeshifter alien from John Carpenter's The Thing, the Shadow Aliens and Sun Alien from Doctor Who, the C'Tan from WH40K, and the ELS from Gundam 00 Awakening of Trailblazer.

This post marks the 30th and last post in my 30 Days of Blogging Till I'm 30. It's was an interesting and fun thing to do, though I'm kinda glad it's over now. So now I'm going to take a break and enjoy my 30th birthday tomorrow.

Twenty Parsecs: Aliens

I've been rummaging around in between my two long weekend shifts. Stayed too late at work and woke up too late to blog about anything substantial. Tomorrow is the end of my thirty day challenge, and I promise to have something longer and with more meat in it. So aliens.

I'm wondering how many aliens I want in the game. I'd like the scope to feel a bit more personal, so I kind of want to do what Starcraft did and have just two aliens, or even just one. Keeps the setting more tightly knit I feel, and allows me to really sit down and detail more about the aliens. Much easier when there is only one or two, rather than ten or twelve like your standard space opera.

Twenty Parsecs: The Commonwealth

Korhal, the capital of the Terran Dominion in Starcraft

One thing that I've been rummaging through my head is how I want the Commonwealth of Free Planets to feel like. I definitely want to keep a frontier feel about it, but at the same time, I do want points of human and alien civilization so that I can have interesting urban and political adventures. For this I've found a great deal of inspiration with Starcraft, the implied setting for D&D 4e, and the TTRPG Clement Sector.

Both are settings that take place out in a frontier area and have their fair share of worlds to explore and colonies to meet with. But they also have that 'points of light' style of campaign where you can have large capital worlds that the players can run through for fun. So using Starcraft's Terran Confederacy/Dominion as an example, for every Korhal capital planet out there, you'll have plenty of Mar Sara backwaters out there for 'lawless adventuring'. Which to me, is the core of exploration. Lawlessness and lack of social rules and etiquette so the players can (and many times have to) use their wits to overcome difficult obstacles. While the points of civilization are mostly safe havens until trouble happens (or they go looking for it). Then they have to use the same wit and canny but with the limitations of the social center they are in. Which to me, can bring about the most innovation and ingenuity from players. Conflict + limitations = ingenuity.

So the Commonwealth have been there for centuries. With a decent enough population growth, I see most of the Core Worlds with a population in the tens to hundreds of millions. Most would be centered around the first colony of the planet, with many of the later ones acting as satellite cities. You'd probably have the occasional colony far away for reasons unknown (resources, religious, or simply tired of the main colony's shit). Leaves plenty of undiscovered wilderness on the planets for intrepid players to explore, while still having cities for other adventures. I'm thinking five main core worlds would be good enough, with the oldest being the most populated and probably the capital. Soon I'll have to give these planets names and maps, but for now, it's a bit up in the air.

Campaign Space Ship: NECI Sigrun

This here is the spaceship that my players have been using for their game of M-Space. While it's mostly just been a plot device to get to the planet from the Ark, this time around, it'll get put through its paces in actual space combat. For those more knowledgeable of M-Space, you'll notice that the speed, engine power, and armor is low. This is to represent a lower tech ship on the cusp of achieving fusion drive, somewhere between Traveller and Orbital 2100. Many of the added stats like tonnage were mathematical formulas I used to convert Traveller stuff to M-Space.

I plan on working with either Blender or Unity to combine the 3D models of the ships and planets to make cool landscapes with them. It's something my players certainly will like. 

NECI Sigrun (created using the Galactic Civilization III Ship Builder)

New Earth Colonial Initiative's Sigrun

Pathfinder-Class

Size: 58 (290 Tons, 52 meters/170' 7" long)

Armor: 2 AP
Speed: 5 (Delta V: 80 km/s)
Handling: 3
Distance per Month Traveled: 200 Mkm
Fuel per Month Traveled: 3 tons
Fuel Capacity: 10 tons

Name	d% chance	HP
Cockpit	1-4	2
Engines, Thrusters	5-13	5
Engines, Maneuver	14-22	5
Sickbay	23-30	4
Crew Quarters	31-40	9
Cargo Hold	41-45	5
Railgun	46-47	1
Railgun	48-49	1
Engineering Lab	50-51	1
Crew Common Area	52-66	8
Hanger, Rover	67-74	4
Hanger, Shuttle	75-92	10
Sensors	93-100	3

The NECI Sigrun is the premier spaceship for the Initiative Scouts. It is outfitted with two railguns for defense, a standard nuclear thermal rocket, and a life support system to last a crew for six months. The Sigrun has a connection to the ark AI, Noah, for information and orders from the higher echelons of the NECI. Able to traverse 1.3 AU in a single month and scan for all kinds of minerals and chemicals to locate important resources for the survival of humanity. The Sigrun can fit a standard crew of 9, including pilots, surveyors, and an engineer, all of which crossed trained to be survivalists, scientists, and security for the planetside away team.

M-Space Campaign

This coming Wednesday, I'm continuing my M-Space colonial campaign by using the above module with some changes to the adventure here and there. The main focus isn't going to be on the alien, though it will play a large part in harrying the players. The focus will be on the ship itself and a crew member cryogenically asleep in there.

While my game has been more of a episodic sandbox of exploring a hostile planet with a lethal atmosphere, there has been a sort of metaplot that the players have found. Some context. The players were on an ark leaving a dying Earth for a new planet through a wormhole. The plan was to set them there, set up shop, then bring resources back to Earth to help everyone survive. However, the ark stayed in the wormhole for 86 years before letting the players out, then closing forever, leaving them stranded away from a now dead Earth. As the players explored the planet, they found a crashed human ship called the FEI Icarus, despite the fact that the PCs were the first to make planetfall. Whats more, is that the spaceship has a more advanced power plant and an unusual engine in it that is more advanced than anything the player's or their colonial initiative has. 

So the question is, who are these humans and where did they come from?

In the next session, the players are going to the second planet of the star system to investigate an unusual radio signal. What it'll end up being is the sister ship of the Icarus, the FEI Iapyx. Inside will be the discovery of a lifetime for them. Evil hydrocarbon aliens, a rogue AI protecting the Iapyx, and the only living crewmember of the Iapyx, trapped in cryostasis.

The discoveries the players make will be this:

• Earth and humanity still live on! Though in a much different state than they left it.
• The Iapyx and Icarus were ships testing an Alcubierre warp drive that sort of worked, but left the Icarus marooned on the planet the players were on, while the Iapyx simply got lost.
• The warp drive and the fusion power plant can be retrofitted by the player's engineering after some time.
• The players are on the other side of the galaxy.

This will advance the metaplot by a great deal, and it will give the players a chance to upgrade their spaceship to take them beyond the confines of the stellar system. Just gotta do some more stuff for the module Wednesday and I should be a-ok. I plan on having the crewmember in stasis for a time due to health reasons, before revealing more about the state of Earth. But in the distant future, I do plan on having the colonies encounter Earthlings. And it won't be pretty.

The Great Kitbashed Campaign

From the game Offworld Trading Company

The current game I'm running is an M-Space/Mythras game, where the players are colonists, explorers, and security for the last of humanity aboard a giant ark ship. It's been a fun game with a new system for all of us. We're still getting used to how Mythras does things and keeping track of things like special effects, hit location, luck points, and action points. But I feel it's made a much more meaning game with how it does combat. And I really enjoy the more skill based system as opposed to class and levels.

One of the things I like is the way they do spaceships. Everything is bought in modules and most of the actual cosmetic design is left up to the GM and players. I personally made the ships similar to Traveller with a bit of tweaking and math here and there, but kept it lower tech. Like something from Orbital 2100. No fusion drives, no FTL, no artificial gravity. It means travelling to the different planets in the new star system can take a little longer in game, but it gives the players some time for their characters to do their own things. One is building battle droids and researching a fusion drive they found. Another is focused on making their weapons better. And now that their colony is close to up and running, there can be more human interaction for them (since near everyone is in cryo stasis).

The game is a huge kit bash of sci fi rules systems (and one fantasy!). The base is M-Space and Mythras, with more and more from Mythras coming into play as we learn the rules more. For the creation of solar systems and planets, I ended up using Mindjammer and Traveller, with an extended table for creating gas dwarfs, ice giants, and gas giants. Much of that comes from Freelance Traveller's article about gas giants, because so much has changed since Book 6: Scouts was published. Mindjammer has some extended stats for planets, like temperature, gravity, and radius that I honestly like for flavor and world-building.

With the colony coming close to running, I've turned to the OSR for this. Stars Without Number has a supplement called Suns of Gold, which details a cool systems for running colonial holdings. In addition, there is Adventurer, Conqueror, King, which has a very robust set of rules for domain holdings, population growth, armies, and taxes. I've done a bit of massaging between the two and have a system that does the best of both systems. It's a bit simpler than ACKS, but unlike SoG, it has more of the land holdings and resource harvesting to get more raw materials for the colony. The colony starts with 5000 people, and the goal is to hit 100,000 citizens so that it can become self-sustaining. This is more of a side game, played in-between sessions throughout the week. And really, only for those interested in that style of game.

We are very close to beginning that, and I think one of the best things I like about the colonial game is that the players can see real, tangible results in a world with little law and order set up. And I think that's why they've really enjoyed the game so far. It's been a real pleasure.

Twenty Parsecs: The Setting in Broad Strokes

Was thinking a bit more on yesterday's article a bit more. I feel I should amend something. I guess while I love just about all sci-fi, it's space opera that really does it for me, alongside spacefaring hard sci fi. Military sci fi doesn't do it for me much anymore, but I partially blame its overabundance. It is a common theme since in many ways, that would be the future equivalent of the D&D adventurer. Can't really blame it honestly, since it really works. And, any time I say the word 'space marine', I get a litany of Warhammer 40k quotes about burning heretics and never suffering xenos. Gets old hat quickly. Cyberpunk is a mixed bag for me, though I love some of its tropes appearing in some Transhuman fiction. 

So, Twenty Parsecs. How do I imagine it? I'd like to subvert a lot of the expected tropes used in sci fi. First thing, no colonies vs homeworld. At least, not at the beginning and not as the main focus. I've seen enough Expanse and Gundam to last a lifetime, so I don't feel the need to do a spacer revolution for this. Rather, I want this to be about two cultures, separated by the vast gulfs of space and time for centuries, reconnecting and the trials and tribulations that come from it.

The first is the Commonwealth of Free Planets, a confederation of five core human worlds that exist 20+parsecs away from Earth. Each one was part of a generation ship many centuries ago, though most of the common folk have long forgotten that past. The planets have been united under a common lineage but have, over the years, changed enemies and allies alike, like squabbling siblings. Still, they get along enough with themselves and their alien neighbors these days. Many of the survival protocols set from the onset of the colonization program almost a millennium ago have become almost doctrine. Survive, reproduce, build, adapt. The planets have, until recently, looked inwards to ensure their own survival, but the last couple of decades have seen them finally branching out beyond their cluster.

Then there is the Republic of the Earth Cluster. Like the Commonwealth, the Republic is made up of several core worlds in the Local Star Cluster, but much more united under a representative democracy. With their own history has been several eras of war, peace, and a futile attempt at keeping an interstellar empire centered on Earth. Now, Earth keeps a light touch on its outer colonies, though still remains the capital and in charge of their Republic. Unlike the Commonwealth, Earth has yet to find sapient life forms. In many ways, this gives them a more humanocentric view on the galaxy when compared to the Free Planets, who regularly trade with, befriend, and make war (or love) with aliens. 

There will definitely be more culture shock differences as I flesh them out, but I think the key adventures would lean more on social intrigue and on planet adventures. I'm not too keen on wilderness exploration as a major focus, only because my current game is already all about exploration. Plenty of room for city and spaceport adventures for the players. Of course, I'd like to have a main conflict in the setting, as a sort of metaplot I can fall back on when the more episodic adventures run their course. Maybe most or all the players are all Earthlings that are the first to enter Free Planet space. This would allow them to rub shoulders with the leadership of the Free Planets while still able to have adventures with the common folk. I'll have to think about it a lot more.

Sci Fi Setting Idea

For as long as I can remember, I've always loved sci fi. Books, movies, video games, and RPGs. While my desire to play or run in a fantasy, superhero, or other RPG game has always waxed and waned over the months, I'm always in the mood to run or play some sci fi. There's just something about exploring new worlds, encountering new aliens, and dealing with new technologies and cultures that has always spurred my imagination.

I'm currently running an M-Space colonial game, where the players are on an ark colonizing a hostile new world to ensure the survival of humanity. It's been a fun and interesting ride, and I've been blessed by some of the best players a GM could ask for. Still, I always like to brainstorm new ideas for future campaigns, especially with the Microscope game I wish to do, and this is one that I've thought about a bit. Here is one.

Twenty Parsecs

Humanity has, through the use of slow generation ship, colonized many of the planets outside of the Local Interstellar Cloud. Through long gulfs of space and time, they have lost contact with Earth, their homeworld simply becoming the place of legends and folklore. That is, until recently, when a space exploration vessel has crashed on the rim world Morning. The locals have discovered a real, bona-fide Earthling in their midst. What happens to Morning and the other colonies when this discovery is made? And is this the only Earthling that made it, or simply the vanguard of a larger force?

The name comes from Asimov, who calculated that at 20 parsecs, you can no long see the Sun in the night sky. The idea behind this is a political and locale adventure where the world as the players know it is being turned upside down. Earth, the fabled cradle of humanity, is real, and this is something that can shake the very foundation of the Union of Free Planets. Some may accept them with a cautious curiosity, while others may see the explorer(s) as a threat to their identity and independence. Whether or not the Earthlings come in peace, I haven't decided. I like the idea of keeping them mysterious and different, as it will have been several centuries since humans left Earth. I prefer a bit more of an optimistic theme for this campaign, but with the lingering fear of an unknown friend or enemy. I haven't decided on whether there are aliens here or not, but if there are, I prefer them to be crazy lifeforms, not humans with different ears and foreheads. I'd probably stick with M-Space/Mythras combined, with some elements of Traveller/Cepheus Engine thrown in there. Though I have been tempted to go back to Traveller for nostalgia sake.

There are other ideas I have for settings that would be fun, but I'll detail them another time.

Map of Mars: Dying or In Progress Terraforming

A couple of weeks ago, I made up a map of Mars after terraforming. Recently, I was inspired by +Michael Gibbons and his B/X Mars collection to do up a different sort of Mars. One in the veins of a dying Barsoom, or, a futuristic Mars in the midst of terraforming. With this, I went back to Grand Designer, tweaked some things a bit, then ran it through G Projector and GIMP for some touch up. Hope you all enjoy!

Screenshot of a dying Mars, slowly gaining its reddish hue

A Mercator map of a dying Mars for a more gameable experience.

Sci Fi Planetscape: NESS 02

Planet created using Grand Designer

Above is the second planet in the solar system of my M-Space game, but this can be useful for any game out there that needs an airless, volcanic hell hole. The planet's geologic activity is beginning to slow down and many of its volcanoes are now simply dormant. The mountain peaks etch around the surface, with darker basalt mares stretching between them. Several micrometeor impacts dot the surface, with a couple of larger impacts from the past here and there. 

Landmark Tags

"Continent Sized Basalt Mares"

"Long Volcanic Chains"

"Massive Impact Crater at Equator"

Possible Adventures Here

In orbit lies a sort of elephant graveyard with ship-sized corpses of alien space whale. Their bones have a lot of helium 3 stored away that could make a killing.

One of the mountains has an ancient volcanic base inside. Alien origin, what wonders could be held here?

Water is found deep in the equatorial crater. Could there be basic life here? Or maybe pirates are hiding out here, waiting for an unsuspecting miner.

The planet is designated NESS 02 in my game as a way to keep it a blank slate for my players to name it. All of the planets have this designation for that reason, with NESS meaning New Earth Sky Survey. While it may sound boring, that's mostly the point. To encourage my scouts to make some cool names for their new system.

Below are some more maps. One more gameable, and the rest more for looks and decoration. I'm still looking for a method to make the texture map a dymaxion hex map like you see in Traveller/Cepheus Engine. I think that might simply not be possible without some severe editing skills in GIMP.

A mercator option that's more useful for a game

A normal and holographic orthographicl map of NESS 02

Stocking a Solar System's Sum of Stunts and Stories

My current game is a science fiction exploration game, where the players are scouts surveying their new home and getting it ready for colonization. One of the things I've done is that right from the get go, the players have a spaceship that can take them anywhere in the new solar system. Here, there are seven celestial bodies that the players can blast off to. Many of those are either jovian or ice giants with tons of moons to look at. Add in all kinds of asteroids, comets, and other stuff floating out there, and you have a great deal of sites for adventures and discovery.

Of course the difficult part for this is how do we stock all of these for adventure? Much like a standard hexcrawl, you have all kinds of adventure, ruins, and obstacles that are keyed up and ready for the players to stumble upon. However, things get a bit more difficult because now we are dealing with the planetary scale. Planets, moons, hell, even asteroids are much bigger than your standard hexcrawl map. Stocking an entire planet of adventure like that simply isn't viable, let alone an entire solar system. Luckily, I have my way of taking care of that.

First thing I like to do is end a session asking what the players want to do next. It doesn't always happen, as sometimes I like to through stuff at them to react to next session as a cliffhanger, but it's nice to know where your players are going to next. That way you can simply prep for where they are going. So if my space scouts want to travel to Chicken Island next session, then I know that I can prep stuff specific to that area and I won't be wasting any time when I do it. Pretty basic stuff. Still, it's nice to have some stuff ready to roll when things happen in the middle of a session, so we turn to my rule of threes.

For each celestial body, I have three landmarks and three possible adventures, made from three words (a verb, adjective, and noun). We can usually describe planets with 2-3 landmarks or interesting things easily, especially if they aren't Earth like worlds. For example, Mars has red sand, Olympus Mons, and several canals across it. Jupiter has the Great Red Spot, intense radiation, and a great deal of gravity to contend with. I generally write these as tags like you'd see in FATE or DW. All of these can be the source of adventure, or simply add complications to another adventure on the same planet. Imagine trying to rescue a hydrogen freighter in Jupiter, but you have to save them without getting caught in the gravity well yourself. And the good thing about being in a sci fi genre is that thanks to future tech, players can scan for a lot of the potential sites of adventure from their CIC in orbit. So these landmarks can be made readily apparent and easy to spot. It does tend to simplify each planet a bit, but luckily, that's where the 'three words' come in.

So for me, three words are just me generating a verb, adjective, and noun. So for example, I simply will have 'Destroy Large Generator' as an adventure seed. From there, I flesh it out as I see fit. Get creative with how you interpret the seed. For example, your generator could be the fusion power plant on a space ship, a solar generator on an asteroid base, or even the wide leaves of an alien plant that feeds and powers a hive of plant-bugs. It's sci fi so go crazy with it! What I like to use are these verb, adjective, and noun generators for free. But sometimes that gets you some weird combinations that are hard to work with (Quoit Micrococcal Tracheitis?). One thing I use a lot of for developing adventures on the fly are Ennead Games's Adventure Generator Sci Fi and the GM's Apprentice Sci Fi deck. But, as great as those are, you can still keep it free. And you don't even have to use three words. Images are a great way to get some vague icons and interpret them how you wish. I know I've seen a lot of good stuff about Rory's Story Cubes, but if you don't have the scratch, I like using Tangent Zero's Dice for that. I like to roll three or four and have that as my main adventure. Hell, I'll even use a set of tarot cards I have to give me a good set of twists. The important part is, you have a good improv generator that will give you just enough structure and inspiration to craft a good adventure, but vague enough to allow for your creativity to kick in.

Putting this all into use, in my game, I have an extremely hot planet close to the sun. For its three landmark tags, I have "Large basins and mares", "Huge chains of volcanoes", and "One massive crater at the equator". The first landmark is almost like a safe zone for players to land at, but can also house future adventures (things hidden under the basalt flats? a colony appears there and stuff happens?). The second adds the danger, but can have a high reward. There's lava and high temperature everywhere, but there's also a hidden ancient alien facility in the volcano with secrets and mysteries inside. The third is a definite adventure site. What caused the crater? Was it an impact or an explosion? A landmark that makes the players ask questions about it will hook them line and sinker.

From there, I have three 3-word sentences that I generated. "Survey Massive Graveyard", "Destroy Alien Facility", and "Aid Strange Rival". For the first one, I decided to have an orbital graveyard filled with the corpses of large, spaceborn aliens. The second one has that alien facility in the volcanoes. The third one was a bit vague, so I added more using Tangent Zero's dice and created an adventure where the players and a rival scout group go through an old space hulk looking for stuff before the others do. But, things go wrong and it becomes a fight for survival as something vicious lurks in the hulk. Or, thanks to a little Kessler Syndrome, the players and rivals are separated from their shuttle and now have to try and escape the space hulk as it careens into the planet. I like to keep it flexible for this one, as either can be fun. 

There we go. That planet has a decent amount of adventure for a good while, and if they ever want to go back, I can always add more to it. As for the rest of the solar system, it can still be a bit daunting. I generally prep a cache of landmarks and sentences for each body, and then detail it at a later date. Luckily, limits in space travel in my game make it to where the players will generally eyeball the closer planets rather than the far off ones. But with PCs, you never know what they'll do! I also really add specific tags to important bodies. So planets, some moons, and asteroids that are big enough to be interesting (like your Juno and Vesta). But it's good to have some generic sentences and landmarks in case they land on some random Trojan asteroid in Jupiter's orbit.

There's a bit more I do inspired by ACKS, but I think I'll save that for another time. For those that run any sci-fi space-faring sandboxes, how do you set up your adventures for your players? 

Adventures on Chicken Island (First Draft)

Currently, I'm running a sci fi game using M-Space, a version of Mythras set as a sci fi game akin to Traveller. You can see a lot of Traveller/CE DNA in the game, so I'm able to, with some conversion and elbow grease, add aspects of Traveller/CE into it. But that's not what this is about. This is about the map I made for my players of an island affectionately called Chicken Island by my players.

Because it looks like a chicken, I guess.

This is the rough draft coloring of Chicken Island, one anyone can use for their sci fi or fantasy game. The hexes are 10 km but can easily be converted to 6 mi for those playing OSR games like ACKS. I drew the original by hand and scanned it with my crappy HP 2-in-1. After running it through Inkscape and then GIMP to make the lines smooth and bold, as well as the back ground transparent, I overlay the hex map on it and began coloring. It was a quick job sadly since I didn't have a lot of time to really get it done. But so far, I am happy with the way it looks. My players are currently adventuring on it, now that they have their first planetary colony making its foundation. I think I may have to do a bit of an explanation of the setting and maybe an adventure recap for them. I'd love to do some solo gaming with this, but for whatever reason, I can't seem to keep my focus on it for more than 20 minutes at a time.

I have a lot of bread to make for the restaurant party on the 4th, so that's it for tonight. I may have to post pictures of the hot dog buns at another time. Below is the larger scale map for anyone that wants to look at it.

WIP: Terraformed Mars Planet and Map

A quick post to start off my July, here's something I've been working on in Grand Designer, a planet generator program on Steam I got on the Sale. I imported a NASA height map of Mars, did some editing in GD, then exported it in G-Projector and GIMP for alternative maps. That's a lot of Gs. Enjoy!

A full in-space render of New Mars (courtesy of Grand Designer)

The texture map I made in GD, which can be used to create all kinds of maps

Orthographic map created by G Projector with above texture map.

A hologram version edited in GIMP to make it seem more like something from Star Wars or XCOM's hologlobe

This was an exercise to something I want to do in my Sci Fi TTRPG. I want to make pictures of all of the planets in my setting's solar system for my players. It makes for a really cool play aide and really gets them immersed into the game. I plan on posting more of these in the future. What I'm trying to find is a way to convert my texture map into one of the dymaxion maps you see in Traveller/CE. G-Projector doesn't do that sadly.

In addition, I'm setting forth a challenge to myself. I want to do thirty posts for every day this week, ending on the 31st, when I turn thirty. I think it'll be a good challenge and I look forward to trying it out. Thirty to thirty!

Stellar System Orbit Chart

So recently I've been running an M Space/SWN mashup (don't ask how), and since it is going to eventually open up to multiple star systems, I decided that I should have a worksheet that can help me visualize the system being visited.

Here is a small version of the worksheet

After 40 minutes in GIMP, I created something useful. So here is the link to my Stellar System Worksheet. This is a system neutral chart I made to help GMs and players keep track of the celestial bodies in any given system that they visit. They can plot out the planets or asteroids out on the orbit bands and write in whatever information they have for it in the lines below. The orbital bands are somewhat based on Mindjammer's orbital bands, but I've found good usage in Traveller and M-Space. You have Starward (like a torch orbit with Mercury orbit), Habitable Zone (Earth, Mars), and Rimward (Gas Giants and TNO). The last area is for things you may find out in the heliopause/Oort Cloud/Kuiper Belt areas of a system if you choose that they have one.

I'm currently using it in my M Space game, but I can see it used in anything from Stars Without Number, Traveller/Cepheus Engine, Mindjammer, White Star... give it a try and tell me how it works for you! Share it with your friends! Go crazy with it.

Sci Fi Game Starting Sunday

So for the last couple of months, I've been building a sci fi game that I have been wanting to run eventually. I was waffling around with different gaming systems and have finally settled on what I want to use. I recently picked up M-Space, which looks to be a really cool system for doing some science fiction gaming. So this Sunday, I will be running my first M-Space game with my girlfriend and some mutual friends. Should be interesting.

The Game

So for this, the game is going to start fairly simply. The players are all crew members aboard a bulk freighter that runs cargo between Earth and its colonies on Mars, Luna, Venus, Ceres & Vesta, and the various orbital habitats. There is a cold war brewing that is pushing everything to the brink. The Earth is still a fragmented group of nations that all are trying desperately to hold onto their colonial outposts, while the colonies are trying to wring free from their distant masters. Things are getting heated and the players will get drawn into a terrible and dangerous conspiracy.

The Players

So far, I have my girlfriend playing a fist fighting space engineer, one friend playing the pilot, and a third friend who hasn't quite decided yet. I made a character just to get a good feel for the system. He's an ex Army combat medic that now is the crew's doctor/body guard. 

M-Space looks like a lot of fun. Took a little reading to grok it, but I think it's a fairly intuitive system so far. We're doing the simplified combat for now, though I'm sure once we are used to the system, we can graduate to the more advanced stuff.

I'm curious to see what other's opinions and experiences with M-Space and Mythras have been. Especially when it comes to designing encounters for players, since this will be my first ever d100 GMing experience.

Science Fiction and Monocultures

Despite my constant fantasy gaming, I've always had a special place in my heart for science fiction. A lot of it stems from watching and reading about Star Trek as a kid, and from there, I've read different science fiction books. However, there has always been something I was never a fan of in sci fi. Monocultures. Mostly found in space operas, it tends to take an alien race and oversimplify them to a couple of traits. Klingons are the honorable warrior race. Vulcans are the logical scientist race. Romulans are super imperialistic and machiavellian. Ferengi are space merchants. And so on.

The diverse cast of Deep Space 9

In a way, it simplifies the races for the viewer to be able to understand and makes it easier to differentiate between them. And when you have 5+ alien species in your universe, it can be tiring to consistently add different factions and nations for every single alien race. However, I've always felt a disconnect in monolithic world governments with a single culture. I feels like it pigeonholes an alien group into a certain niche and can make it difficult or even jarring to add differing characteristics to someone of the same race. Try imagining a pacifist Klingon. It's a bit weird. It also doesn't feel very realistic. If you look at humanity, there are so many different governments and idiosyncrasies between different nations that it can be weird just to have everyone on one planet the same.

In the game I'm going to run with Stars Without Number, I am endeavoring to have at least 3 factions for each alien race to give the races more depth and complexity. This will make first contact and continued diplomacy more nuanced with the players. Here is how I want to do the different cultures. Much of it is inspired by rudimentary knowledge of politics as well as the video game Stellaris, a grand strategy sci fi game which I have really enjoyed. Since this blog is talking about politics, I'd like to stress that nothing down below is meant to push any agenda or offend anyone of a particular political bloc. This is just for entertainment purposes only.

Nature and Nurture

Since I'm working with aliens, the first thing I start with is their biology. Making aliens mean you can really go crazy with how their biology works. Looking at Earth creatures is a great way to make some truly alien-feeling sophonts. How do your aliens eat? Are they carnivores, herbivores or omnivores? How do they reproduce? Are they like humans, with XY chromosomes? Is it something more akin to asexual reproduction, or something like parthenogenesis? Can their genders shift, like some amphibians? Do they have more than four limbs, or multiple eyes? Maybe they have alternate ways of certain biological functions, like using antennae for smell and hearing, or spiracles down their sides for breathing, or organs that can sense bioelectricity. How are their family units set up? Or communities? These are all good questions to ask yourself when developing an alien race for your setting. What I generally do is pick an animal and do some light research on their biology. Then, I use that to extrapolate how a society of sapient creatures of that biology would function.

I was always a huge fan of the 2005 War of the World aliens (Credit to Adam O'Donnell)

Of course, biology is only part of the equation here. A creature's surroundings play a huge part in their cultural ethics. Terrain and climate are two of the largest factors in this. If their surroundings are harsh with terrible weather, you can bet that their communities would be smaller and more insular. They may be nomadic, moving to better areas. They could also be raiders, attacking other civilizations that have more resources to supply their own tribes. Aliens living in arable land would be able to support larger cities and boast walls and armies to protect them from raids. Religion and culture can be affected by one's surroundings. A nation of peoples that live in pastures and steppes may revere a god of the great sky, while those living in mountainous areas would venerate the peaks themselves as gods. People living along the oceans would have festivals celebrating fish caught, or those living on pastures would have harvest festivals come autumn. Just look at Earth cultures to see different cultures and try and work them with the biology of the creature.

Surroundings don't just include the terrain and climate. Look at the people and animals that your race has around it. Are their neighbors fairly friendly, or is there a sort of rivalry going on? Is warfare endemic or more structured? What about the animals? Are there any animals that the race hate and fear? Or hunt and revere? Or keep as pets or livestock? The relationships with other creatures can go a long way to making your aliens feel real.

Ethics

Ethics are the core principles and beliefs of the alien race. Whenever I describe a government, settlement, or faction, I like to use a set of ethic tags to describe the organization. I find that doing so can organize and show what the different ethics are for a group of people or aliens. I have a set of seven categories, each with two opposite tags to describe a group of sapient creatures. They are purposefully vague to incorporate a variety of sub-ethics under one tag. Just remember that there is a wide spectrum of beliefs that could fit under one tag. They are inspired by the ethics of Stellaris, with some more added or renamed for more clarity and depth.

• Insular/Cosmopolitan: This category is how well a group of aliens deals with outsiders and foreign ideas. An insular group tends to not trust outsiders and will shun beliefs that are different from their own. Some are friendly but want outsiders to assimilate into their beliefs to maintain a tightly-knit community. Others can be cruel and petty and will drive deviants out by force if necessary. A cosmopolitan group has a wide variety of cultures and differing beliefs are simply a way of life. Most places tend to be large cities or trade hubs that see different aliens. While there is a general integration and acceptance of different peoples, sometimes cultural friction can happen between two or more groups. This can make it hard to let go of old grudges.
• Authoritarian/Libertarian: This is the category on how a species may prefer to be ruled. Some may want a more decisive rule by a singular autocracy or a group of elite oligarchs. Others may prefer a bottom-up democratic or anarchist rule where everyone has a say. Some may want the government to intervene and regulate things, while others want the bureaucracy to stay out of their way of life.
• Spiritual/Secular: This is how much religion and spiritualism affects the every day lives of an alien. Spiritual aliens may place an importance on religion and worship in their personal lives, or perhaps they make it more of a part of the government and culture (like a theocracy). Secular aliens may simply have some spiritual beliefs but leave it in private, keeping it away from their public lives and society. Others may believe spirituality to be harmful to the individual and to society and will outright shun religion.
• Militaristic/Pacifist: This is how aliens approach warfare and peace. Militaristic aliens may be imperialistic hawks that wish to spread their control over other countries for their resources. Or, they may instead be more casual with warfare as a good option against enemies, but remain relatively peaceful with allies. Pacifists tend more towards diplomatic solutions, but may still have a good military for defensive wars only, or may only engage in wars of liberation. On the extreme end, they may simply eschew a military, both formal or paramilitary, and instead focus on peaceful and diplomatic solutions.
• Collectivist/Individualist: This is how sophonts view themselves as a part of a whole. Collectivists see themselves as a cog in the machine, or their society as a sum of its parts. Many can focus on the greater good and can vary in limited individual freedoms (or outright ban them). Individualists place an importance on individual rights and abilities. They see it as something to be celebrated and use individual talents to better the community. They can vary on altruism to their peers, or simply focus on their own goals and happiness (sometimes at the expense of others).
• Isolationist/Expansionist: This is how aliens view themselves in the Great Game of interstate diplomacy. Isolationist species want to be left alone. They generally do a policy of unilateralism, keeping a safe distance even from their allies. Some may simply close their borders to some or all trade and immigration. Expansionists keep up with the political scene and remain big players in it. Some may expand via more diplomatic and economic means, saving military action for proxy wars. Others may go full military imperialist, ruling over entire planets.
• Ascetic/Materialist: This is how much importance a race places on material things and wealth. An ascetic race of aliens believe that life is fleeting and 'stuff' isn't as important as people. Many eschew material goods for a lifestyle of self-improvement, or for community bonding. Materialists love their wealth and living the good life. Many see wealth as a way of improving living standards and technology for the betterment of their society. Some may also have a love of seemingly trite things, like lifestyles of celebrities.

From these ethics, you can start building a culture based on them. How would a race of spiritual materialists work out? Or militaristic isolationists? Mix and match two or more of them and try and build how a culture would form around those tenets.

Government

Star Wars Galactic Senate

Once you get ethics, you can look at the styles of government. I use the Wikipedia listing here to look at what could fit for a race. Governments vary a great deal, so it's hard to really categorize them. Below is a super simplified list for the sake of RPGs, not for actual political discourse. Generally I look at the following categories (again, credit to Stellaris for this)

• Who rules the state: This is probably the first question I ask. Is it a rule by an elite class of people (aristocracy), or ruled by a singular group or person (despotism)?
• Who empowers the leader: This is the second question. Who empowers the mantle of leadership for a state? Is is a democracy, where the leader is elected? Is it authoritarian, where the leader claims the title through might? Is it oligarchic, where a select group of people choose to run things?
• The power structure: How is power distributed? Is it a highly centralized unitary state, a more open federation, a decentralized confederation, or a casual alliance of like-minded states? Maybe they are fragmented nation-states in a never-ending cold war. Is it a republic, where political matters are public, or are legislative and executive matters private? 
• How the state handle certain processes: There are categories that a civilization has under control. Things like economics, social issues, class stratification, foreign and domestic policies, citizenship, immigration and emigration, military and security, law enforcement, jobs, resources, and means of production are all good examples of what a state needs to handle. Using the ethics from above, you can figure much of this out. 
• Control of the state: How much authority does the state have over the above processes? Is it anarchy, where the authority is light and comes directly from the people? A minarchy with minimal control? A lighter, more libertarian touch? Is is more centralized like a unitary state, or more decentralized like a federation or confederation? Is it authoritarian, where the people have few individual freedoms, or totalitarian, where the government have full control of every aspect of their peoples' lives? Does the government only handle matters of security and defense, or do they also control economics and social policies?
• Relations with other: No state exists in a vacuum. What do other governments think about your alien race? Are they seen as true friends, allies of convenience, or enemies? What do your alien government's own people think of their masters? Do they see them as a benevolent force, or a coercive and malevolent entity?

Those are the questions I ask myself when building an alien society. When making governments, it's always good to have conflict that can add story ideas for your adventure. One thing I stress for making a believable government that is foreign to one's beliefs is to try and look up both the positive and negative aspects of it, then apply it. It's really easy to insert your own political bias when coming up with a group. Remember that these are aliens with their own way of think. Of course, if you want your aliens to be the bad guys, or you are just tired of politics in general, then you can certainly simplify their government. Sometimes you just want to topple an evil military dictatorship and free their people. That's fine for an adventure I feel.

Deviants

Of course, even with everything above, there are always bound to be those that do not conform to ethics based on anything from above. Just by looking at humans, there is a huge variety of cultures, sub-cultures, governments, ethics, philosophies, and communities. This is where making an alien species can get really hard. Generally, after I've done the above, I then treat sub-cultures as a sort of spectrum of the above beliefs. For example, if I've made a race of aliens that lived in colonies not unlike ants, I would have them tend to more autocratic or oligarchic societies. This represents their collective community ruled by a queen or a group of breeding drones. However, I could have sub cultures and factions that want to enact change. Maybe they desire less authoritative rule and want a more republic government with individual freedoms. Or alternatively, maybe they want to centralize their government more to an autocratic rule with a focus on the greater good and stratification. Some may want a less insular society while others demand to remain isolationists. Really, I'll take the above ethics and see how I can fit the opposite with a society. So if a culture is more secular, I try and see what would make some more spiritual while sticking to several of the factors that made their culture who they are.

That's my thought process when I'm fleshing out alien races. While it seems like a lot to do, once you get used to it, it's a fairly intuitive process. Everything leads to the next, and the more that you detail your creatures, the more life you truly breath into them. Next post, I want to show and example or two that puts this method into practice.