PDA

View Full Version : DM Help Last Minute SF Adventure Help?



Freelance GM
2016-12-09, 03:32 AM
I'm playtesting an original SF system with my group this weekend. I spent the last month prepping an adventure, only to wake up this morning and realize it sucked.

I've spent most of today (well, yesterday now, 12/8) slamming my head into a wall trying to salvage the original adventure or brainstorm something new, but I'm not coming up with any ideas I like. Playground, can you help me think of something better? I don't need a whole outline, just some fresh ideas.

In a nutshell, the setting is in the spirit of Firefly or Borderlands, set in a hard(er) SF universe like Ender's Game or Elite: Dangerous. The urban parts of the setting have a bit of Ghost in the Shell thrown in, while the rural areas are more in tune with Mad Max.

The players are trying to make a mostly-legal living on the bizarre, wondrous, and dangerous worlds of the Colonies, while humanity takes its first steps towards establishing an interstellar community.


For anyone who needs more context, here's some bullet points on the setting...


Harder SF. I've put a lot of time and research into making everything in the setting on the harder, more believable side of Sci-fi. There are only three major exceptions: FTL travel exists, there are several "habitable enough" planets with Earth-like atmospheres within a few hundred lightyears of each other, and there is alien life on those planets. There are no psychic powers or space magic, no ancient aliens, no time travel, no teleportation, and no true artificial super-intelligences. (A.I exist in the setting, but the best ones are only slightly more intelligent than a well-trained dog.)

FTL is slow. Even with faster-than-light travel, trips to nearby star systems can still take weeks, months, or years. Earth is 40 years away. Also, humanity has faster-than-light travel, but not faster-than-light communication. The players are Couriers, independent spacers who form a sort of interstellar pony express, delivering messages to other solar systems, and performing some other odd jobs along the way.

Humanity isn't quite alone. There is no evidence of advanced or intelligent alien life, but the planets humanity has colonized are full of bizarre alien plants and wildlife. Learning to adapt on these utterly primeval worlds has been one of the Colonists' greatest challenges.

Corporations rule the worlds. Earth mysteriously dropped out of contact almost a century ago. The Corporations that funded the expeditions to the Colonies have assumed control. Different planets had different reactions to this. Some fell into revolution and anarchy, becoming "technologically regressed." There, ruthless warlords rule from the crashed hulks of colony ships, hoarding technology, medicine, and weapons for their loyal servants. On most worlds, the Corporations took control through their monopoly on all production. If you work for the Corporation, the Corporation will take care of you. If not, you're effectively a second-class citizen, whose only value is as a labor force to exploit and a market to sell to.

There is no Internet The Colonies are simply too new and too unstable to have a world wide web - most worlds lack the necessary infrastructure. Computer hardware is more advanced, but communication between computers is limited to LAN connections, and sometimes city-wide "Intranets."

Technology is a Privilege The major cities are pretty Cyberpunky. Holograms everywhere, prefabricated buildings, sleek cars, solar power, etc. This was made possible by Foundries- colossal machines brought from Earth to churn out entire buildings and vehicles piece by modular piece. The farther you get from a city's foundry, the more anachronistic things get. You can escape Corporate rule on the rugged frontier of an alien world, but you have to settle for living in a village of mudbrick huts with a single communal tablet computer, and satellite uplink.




Here are the adventure parameters:

Low power. The players are just starting their career as Couriers, effectively interstellar delivery people. The adventure should be some mundane job made difficult by 1) the alien conditions of the planet or 2) human factors like gangs, law enforcement, or the agents of a sinister Corporation. No ancient artifacts, stomping around in Power Armor, or evil alien empires invading.

It should be playable in 4 to 6 hours. This is going to be a monthly game, so I'd like the adventure to be playable in one single self-contained session.

Preferably, no space travel. The premise of this adventure is that the players are proving their worth to a sponsor who can get them a spaceship.

At least partially set in a major city. The adventure has to introduce them to the factions and technology of the setting, and that requires the adventure to be at least partially set somewhere where the factions are in close proximity and the technology is abundant.


I've got until Sunday afternoon. Any help you all can give would be appreciated!

Herobizkit
2016-12-09, 05:09 AM
The Couriers are hired by [Construction Conglomerate 616] to deliver a set of building permits to an outlier construction site [across the Red Plains].

The travel is complicated by [flash electrical storms], forcing the Couriers to take shelter [in their snazzy Solar Tents]. Once the storm passes, the party later encounters [a Wagon Hover-Train coming from said construction site], who advises the Couriers that some of the workers [have gone rogue due to lack of pay/work progress].

Once the Couriers arrive, they see the workers fighting one another [fisticuffs and wrestling, but if the players take too long/can't get the fight under control, the pit boss pulls a vibroblade on someone and kills the head of the opposing 'faction']. "We got our papers, boys, now get back to work!"

Couriers leave having witnessed a murder. What next? :)

Freed
2016-12-09, 08:37 AM
Have them compete with a different team of couriers to race to deliver two mysterious packages. The other team doesn't quite play fair, though.....

Segev
2016-12-09, 12:12 PM
Delivery of an encrypted set of messages destined for the Board of Directors of the corporation that rules the colony to which they're delivering is complicated when no less than 3 different groups claim to be the legitimate recipients.

In the months or years since the last communique, the colony underwent some political shifts, and the corporation broke into two factions, each with its own Board and each claiming to be the legitimate representatives of the stockholders. Worse, the fallout led to the formation of a rebel faction that has established a republic-style government with a senate and a President, and, due to the document being for "the ruling corporation," any of the three could claim legitimacy (either as the corporation, or as the ruling body).

Oh, and the only person with the decryption key is an obviously corrupt, villainous tyrant who's been forced out into the hinterlands with a small squad of loyal (mainly due to what awaits them if they acknowledge any other power as legitimate enough to arrest them) "corporate guards" that are now just mercenaries, who was the only surviving C*O level officer when all this started. Possibly due to him attempting a coup.

The information is something that all three factions know would be critical to establishing their legitimacy to offworld powers, and possibly could be used to access resources that would secure their claims over the colony itself. But the simple couriers may not know that...until they discover how rabid the powers-that-be here are to get the encrypted files.

Bribery and threats and deception are only the BEGINNING of what they'll resort to to get it.