Looking for ideas for "space navy pilots" game

[darni]

Hi! I'm drafting a campaign which is quite different to what I'm used to build and I could use some ideas on encounters/scenes that I thought I could find here. I've built a homebrew system which has a lot of focus on starfighter battles (each player piloting a fighter or bomber in tactical combat), and I wanted to test it rebuilding a war campaign from an old space-combat videogame which has a nice story (Freespace, for those familiar with it, but doesn't matter much for this thread). So the big picture of the campaign (who's the enemy, which milestones the player should achieve to defeat them, and some major events/battles) is set, although most of that are space battles. I am looking for color/events that I can add to the lives of the PCs while they are *not* in the cockpit flying missions.

The PCs are all human military pilots, and operate mainly from a large space carrier (something like the battlestar Galactica, or the Star Wars big rebel cruisers or imperial star destroyers). The setting is humanity in 24th century, which after expanding to less than a dozen star systems found out some aliens and war started (eventually a third species show up, and humans ally with their initial enemies). There's no magic/psionics/mutations, mostly plain humans (again, the newer BSG show is a good approximation of the style). My main problem is that there aren't a lot of reasons to get outside these carrier, and the carrier is supposed to be friendly territory, so I've lost many of the usual sources of conflict I'm used to draw on when planning campaigns :)

This is a list of things that I've thought about (to give you examples of what I'm looking for), but I would like to expand this significantly:
* Coming across some allied officer that is actually an enemy spy/collaborator in the carrier, and are trying to steal information/sabotage.
* Their carrier is destroyed/jumps out of range and they have to temporarily land their fighters on an uninhabited planet with ancient ruins (which clues for the main story); they can explore until they can be rescued
* Resolving some diplomatic conflicts when the new alien allies come aboard and have to collaborate with the human pilots
* It's weird to think about pilots participating in some boarding operation, but possibly some ship they're on being boarded?

I'm happy to hear what ideas are around in the playground. Thanks!

[Easy e]

I think this can be a pretty great setting and very interesting. Good source material is a lot of "Mecha Piloting" anime or even old TV shows like Battlestar Galactica (old school), Buck Rogers, and Space: Above and Beyond. You might also want to check out the "Wing Commander" video game plots for inspiration too.

Now, that being said here are some ideas:
- Of course, you all ready mentioned the MOLE but as an added twist, the players themselves are thought to BE the MOLE, so not only do they have to catch the MOLE they have to clear themselves of suspicion as well.

- Scouting and Recon. These types of missions can take them deep behind enemy lines where stealth and subterfuge are more important than blowing stuff up. They have to find the location of something, infiltrate it, and escape to tell about it.

- Rival pilots and commanders that do not like the PCs are always a favorite for military tension. Does the rivalry cross-the-line? Does the enmity get too dangerous?

- Having to interact with civilians, and make moral choices is key. How do these PCs handle situations where civilians are in danger? What about when they have to decide how to deal with enemy combatants who surrender? What about when they come across an enemy rescue ship? How do they deal with civilian collaborators? What about civilians subject to enemy raids, how do they protect them?

- How do they deal with the relationships outside of the military chain of command? Paper pushers, diplomats, and NGO workers, refugees, etc.

Much of the campaign HAS to deal with out of cockpit action and danger. Otherwise, it will get stale really fast.

[Pauly]

For spy missions/interactions the Biggles series of WW1 fighter pilots has a lot of stories that can provide inspiration. Biggles s the grandfather of all the “combat pilots get caught up in spying” stories.

For rivalry missions, Biggles also has a number. They can include chasing a maguffin (pre-war whiskey in Biggles), pranking the other squadron, see who’s better at pranking the top brass, stealing the other squadron’s mascot, looking for a Christmas Goose (with all the real ones strictly rationed and therfore unavailable to combat personnel) and so on.

Love interest. In WW1 and WW2 based literature, where the pilots are all male, chasing nurses was a common trope. In the future military this probably means a complete ban on relationships between unit members, so any romantic or just casual fun has to pursued off ship. It is also a trope for the love interest to be tied into a spy drama.

You can also include missions that are not strictly combat related. Propaganda leaflet drops, with a prize for the squadron that drops the leaflets furtherest behind enemy lines. Trying to capture a highly sophisticated camera being carried by an unarmed enemy spy plane, inter service training, revenge! (an enemy pilot has committed a warcrime so within the context of their normal duties they are seeking revenge against a particular enemy pilot), search and rescue for downed squadron members.

Other sources to mine include The Dawn Patrol starring David Niven and Errol Flynn and the MacAuslan stories by George MacDonald Fraser. The MacAuslan stories are about shenanigans in the immediately post war British Army, but it has some stories that can be mined such as a haunted enemy base, competitive guard duty, bringing in soldiers on leave in a city because if a pandemic infection, sports and sports betting.

[darni]

As I mentioned, the "actual missions" part is more or less covered and there is definitely more than "go and blow stuff up" (including recon, escort, capture, people changing sides during a fight, stealing a ship, flying a stolen ship behind enemy lines, and more ...). I definitely know that just cockpit action will get stale, that's why I came here :)

I like the "you are suspicious of being a spy" plot, so I'll explore that. I also was considering "You are sent as a spy to infiltrate this rebel faction" (that's actually on one of the game sequels). The interaction with civilians sounds a great opportunity, I am having trouble to find situations for that to happen (because most of their non-flying time is spent in the carrier, which I assume is 100% military personnel)...

I've never managed to do love interests successfully in a RPG campaign, so I'm steering clear of that. But that's some literature I wasn't aware of and I can explore, thanks for those! Keep the ideas coming :)

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by darni
…because most of their non-flying time is spent in the carrier, which I assume is 100% military personnel….

This doesn’t have to be the case. Remember that in the later seasons of BSG, a lot of civilians were living on Galactica, and it shouldn’t be difficult to find a rationale for a similar situation. Encountering a disabled ship should supply plenty—especially if the carrier is following an enemy force that’s disabling civilian vessels as it proceeds on a strike vector. That can be a source of tension as well as civilians, since each rendezvous to pick up survivors loses time in the pursuit, yet abandoning civilians to die on a damaged ship is an ethical dilemma.

[Saintheart]

- Bring the fight to where they live. Or rather, where their families live. The enemy stages a lightning terror raid on the PCs' homeworld (or home space station, if you're going with space-bred people) and the PCs have to make some really awkward choices when they find out it's not just a terror raid against civilians, the planet has been used as essentially a secret military base with the civilians being used as human shields or similar.

- Ye olde Starship Troopers gambits: what looks like an investigation into a forward station that's stopped transmitting turns into a trap, the enemy drops its new experimental gravitational inhibitor in on the PCs' squadron, meaning they can't leave until that big blinking machine in the sky is destroyed.

- Variant on ye olde Starship Troopers: nutty remote research base has been doing nasty experiments on aliens, but the aliens have got loose and now control the base, and again, set a trap for our hapless heroes.

[Mutazoia]

Track down and watch "Space: Above and Beyond." This is pretty much your campaign idea.

[Pauly]

I like the "you are suspicious of being a spy" plot, so I'll explore that. I also was considering "You are sent as a spy to infiltrate this rebel faction" (that's actually on one of the game sequels).


There is a really good Biggles story that involves a captured plane, a pilot with a strange accent who claims to be the brother of a lost pilot and the possibility that the pilot is a spy. Without trying to spoil a 90 year old story the resolution of whether the plane/pilot is an enemy pilot or a friendly is kept in doubt right until the resolution of the story. There is a real moral dilemma of whether or not to shoot down the suspected spy. Which made it a much more interesting story than the well worn dastardly enemy tricks unwitting good guys to their death story.

[farothel]

* It's weird to think about pilots participating in some boarding operation, but possibly some ship they're on being boarded?

I'm happy to hear what ideas are around in the playground. Thanks!

There is a shortage of pilots to fly a type of drop pod to do these boarding actions, so the PCs who can fly, are drafted, put through a few hours of simulator exercises to get to know the new ships and are dropped in the thick of things. And are they going to stay alone in their pod when all soldiers have gone?

For more general ideas, look at the Wraith Squadron books/comics from the Star Wars expanded universe. That was a squadron of pilot/commandos. Something like that can make for loads of interesting missions.

[Easy e]

In many modern military forces, civilians are essentially the logistics trail. For your carrier, they will have to meet-up or be escorted by supply ships. These can be "civilian" ships or ships that are "outside the Chain-of-Command". This gives your pilots a place to go and meet up with civies, or have to protect civies.

I could see a certain ship running a clandestine card game, booze hutch, or similar R&R, off-book place. This could be introduced when they are trying to ferret out the spy, a place to deal with rival pilots "off book", etc.

Alternatively, a Carrier does need to "rotate back" to civilization to re-supply and re-fit frequently, or the pilots need to go to a nearby space colony to pick up more fighter craft and ferry them back to the carrier. While off carrier and on planet, they can get into some local shenanigans.

For a campaign like this, I think you need a couple "pre-war" episodes where the stakes are about dealing with rival squadrons, pulling pranks, "life on base", and some laying the political ground work for the war. The stakes are lower, but seem really important and relating to the squads rankings and future career.

Then, the big enemy reveal happens and the stakes get turned up to 11. NPCs are killed, base destroyed, rivals wiped out, etc. The future is the war, winning it, and surviving. Here the pilots go off on the carrier and try to strike back.

The final few sessions are then about "securing the Peace" and here you put in more espionage, diplomacy, and dealing with civilian governments and the grey areas of warfare. The pilots have gone up in rank and prestige and their leadership is needed more than their ability to blow things up.

[DivineOnTheMind]

The Space Bosuns Mates are banging around during your Space Flight Crew's mandatory Space Rest Hours, and it's building toward a turf war.

Your dirtbag Space Crewman got arrested in Space Port because he robbed a prostitute and there's no Space Extradition, and it's going to be a whole Space International Incident if you don't work it out.

Your Space Flightcrew is signing off on their Space Maintenance suspiciously quickly. You suspect they're cutting corners to beat the Space Auxiliaries Gang to the Space Chow Line.

Your Space Carrier missed replenishment because your Space Helmsman was having trouble maintaining course and speed for the transfer due to Space Weather. Resources are dwindling. You suspect an uprising if the crew isn't satiated with more cases of Space Monster Energy Beverage and Space Tobacco Dip.

The Space Bosun is storing his Space And Rescue Gear in your storage locker and you think he was the one who ditched your Color-Coded Space Jackets in the passageways, You both dive into the Spaceship Technical Manuals to find who the locker is supposed to belong to, and find out it's actually for the Space Damage Control Officer. He can never find out.

Your Space Qualifications are going to expire unless you stop doing your actual mission and land fourty times on a moving spaceship in the dark instead.

The Space Sewage is backflowing. It's everywhere. The Space Damage Control Officer says he's fixing it, and that's just going to happen on old ships, so what are you going to do. Meanwhile, sewage is starting to seep into your locker. Space sewage.

[Ninja Bear]

Who is qualified to be Space Pilots in your setting? Do you have specific player archetypes to choose from, or are they coming up with backgrounds? Are they Space Nobility, Space Knights, Space 21st Century US Naval Officers, Genetic Mutant Abominations, or Space Enlisted? If they have clear non-pilot identities then it's easier to think of non-pilot things to do with them. If the setting runs on Space Bushido then maybe they have poetry classes; if they are Scheming Space Nobles from the Mirror Universe then maybe they want to get working on poisoning their chain of command to move up the ranks.

Even if they are just "generic enlisted" with no external baggage at all that would be pertinent to the goings-on aboard ship, there's always the possibility of things like secret societies arising on the ship itself, from the benign (the local chapter of the Shire of Curragh Mor is recruiting) to the less benign (it's rumored the captain is starting a cult, he's been murmuring something about dirty boots/crisp white sheets and he's ordered an unplanned course adjustment toward the capital of your temporary ally) to make them a Pilot And Also A _____.

Also, what's the spacecraft complement of the carrier? If there are shuttlecraft or whatever else that's intended for atmospheric flight, presumably there could be situations where you need elite pilots to get to the area in the first place and then also groundpound ("only someone as skilled as you can fly through the disabled engines and passageways on this space hulk to reach the pressurized areas / fly through this lava-hurricane on the death planet / whatever else so we can retrieve the McGuffin"), so that the missions aren't entirely about piloting and are broken up a little bit.

[Pauly]

The heist. There is a new experimental weapon/ammunition/fighter, but the squadron isn’t on the list to test it. They want it. Badly.

Contraband. The making and/or smuggling of stuff that you can’t get normally. This can stuff the squadron wants or stuff to sell for profit. Examples from aviation history include hooch, ice cream, fake battle souvenirs, parachute silk and fur coats.

The visitor. Captured enemy fighter pilot is treated as an honored guest. Possible threads from there include: pumping him for information; he spreads false information about the enemy’s plans and the squadron has to find and correct the misinformation; preventing an escape; helping him escape.

[LibraryOgre]

Borrowing from Robotech... death in combat of a fellow pilot. PC or NPC. Make it someone connected to the players, and let them deal with that death.

Alternatively, if you want a bit more actiony... death in surprise attack. Half your squad is dead, and you've still got to complete a mission that assumed you'd have five more people.

[Slipjig]

Throw in some politics between factions on the same side. You JUST stopped fighting alien species A, there's probably still a lot of hard feelings even if they are your allies now. Inter-service rivalry between the pilots and marines. Civilian factions that really want to open dialog with alien species B. Scientists who want to aliens or alien artifacts to sample. The marines who are on the front lines resent the glory-boy pilots who go home to a hot shower after every mission. The pilots resenting the REMFs who stay on the carrier while they are out there risking sucking vacuum. The REMFs resenting the flag officers constantly demanding they figure out how to do more without proper resupply. EVERYBODY resenting the politicians who show up for a photo with people in uniform (though nowhere near the ACTUAL front lines), and the officers who insist on a dog and pony show.

For a lot of these conflicts, the people on the other side don't need to be villains, they can just be clueless: the politician probably really DOES think he's honoring the troops (while also having a good photo op) and has no idea the degree that his presence disrupts operations.

[Slipjig]

For a real world example of pilots getting stuck in on the ground, WWII glider pilots were part of airborne units, but they were expected to land their birds and then fight as infantry afterwards until the unit was withdrawn pending another glider insertion.

You could get something similar in space with boarding torpedoes.

[Mutazoia]

In Robotech, the Veritech pilots were the elite of the elite, and they and to go through all of the training of the other armed forces to qualify for Veritech Pilot status.

In "Space: Above and Beyond" the main characters are Special Forces. They fly fighters when the mission calls for it, and they take part in groups Ops when the mission calls for it.

So just because your PCs are "pilots" doesn't mean that they have to be only pilots.