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  1. - Top - End - #1
    Dwarf in the Playground
     
    WolfInSheepsClothing

    Join Date
    Dec 2014

    Default Science fiction adventure ideas

    Hello all. I am running a space opera (think firefly) like game in pathfinder. All of my buddies avsolutley adore the idea of being in a scientific alien world instead of another middle earth. The main problem I'm running into is how on earth do I come up with adventure ideas, I know how to make the generic "evil necromancer robs graves" story line but with the introduction of modernity and space I seem to struggle. All suggestions are welcomed

  2. - Top - End - #2
    Dwarf in the Playground
    Join Date
    Apr 2015

    Default Re: Science fiction adventure ideas

    Heya! Welcome to the wonderful & potentially cruel/fun world of SPACE MAGIC ADVENTURE!!! I've run a few d20 Future games in my day and I would love to help you get started on your own campaign fun zipping around the cosmic winds! Before I can do that properly though, it would help if I had a better idea of what your campaign is like. Some questions.

    • What Themes do you want to tackle?
    • Are races being treated as equally alien, from a single world, or found in clusters? (Example: elves & dwarves came from their own respective worlds but halflings & humans co-evolved on the same world)
    • How easy/difficult is space travel?
    • How hard/soft do you want to treat the science involved?


    The other question I would normally auto-throw is what Progress Level are you making standard for the setting, but I would first need to check out Pathfinder's own take on that whole notion. One of those things I actually haven't gotten around to checking to see if they implemented or not.

    Answer these questions at least here or PM me and I'll get right back to you at earliest convenience!

  3. - Top - End - #3
    Dwarf in the Playground
     
    WolfInSheepsClothing

    Join Date
    Dec 2014

    Default Re: Science fiction adventure ideas

    Basically I want to make it. a Law V. Chaos story and have the law be cruel slavers/corrupt politicians, while the chaos would be abolitionists and freedom fighters. Also the players are less good or evil more neutral; a genetically mutated ex-assassin, a four armed alien smuggler/abolitionist, a mad inventor android who uses something spiniest to the ironman suit, and finally a former Pro-gladiator Randy savage macho man. So I'm going to have them do a little bit of good and bad to get what they need
    Most races come from their own respected planet; humans come from Terran, Azers come from Azan, Aboleths come from Sh'zax, their is however one examples of a cluster; kasathas and Shobhads share a planet.
    It varies, you just need one person who flies the ship to use a fly skill check, however if any damage is done they would need to use Knowledge: Engineering to fix it, or appraise to find out how much it's gonna cost them. The players are gonna start off with a ship, it's going to be about the size of the ship from the adult swim cartoon "Rick and Morty", which I'd approximate to be 25x25x25 feet. When caught in combat their best chances are going to be run as fast as they can and hope to out-maneuver the enemies.
    Extremely soft, their is going to be genetically altered individuals, telepathy, and androids so. Also while my players enjoy science fiction they prefer it to stray closer to the fiction side than the science (think Star Wars and Flash Gordon over doctor who and startrek)

  4. - Top - End - #4
    Dwarf in the Playground
     
    WolfInSheepsClothing

    Join Date
    Dec 2014

    Default Re: Science fiction adventure ideas

    Here are some ideas I have;

    The four players awake on an alien ship with semi-amnesia. They have no clue what race/faction this ship belongs to. An unknown alien being walks in who speaks a strange language they have Never before heard. He reaches down to his side and pulls out a laser scalpel. Combat begins. After killing/subduing this opponent they must find a way off the ship.

    The players have been sent on a mission to smuggle a large and strange looking container to a group of drug dealers. On this mission they must fight off dire corby pirates, a small pack of void-barracudas, and finally a party of bounty hunters who claim that they are charged with multiple counts of smuggling and illegal void-hunting. If at any point they check what is in their package they will find a small puddle of ooze, any attempts to communicate with it will cause the ooze to take the form of a small child who speaks telepathically. It tells them that it is a powerful psychic that is being sold to a cartel to catalog possible police incursions. If they do nt open the ooze will either escape and turn on them, or it will be sold to the cartel and they will receive a hefty payment.

  5. - Top - End - #5
    Ogre in the Playground
     
    ElfPirate

    Join Date
    Feb 2008

    Default Re: Science fiction adventure ideas

    Be careful about making every cargo a moral dilemma. The players may react by avoiding any cargo-type jobs, or they may affect a hardened outlook that doesn't care a bit about others. Neither's good for keeping the game going.

    Finding a derelict alien spaceship with monsters hiding in it and potential loot of various kinds is a classic for a reason.

    Smuggling desperately needed medical supplies past bandits/besieging forces/wild monsters is a cargo job without a moral dilemma.

    Doctor Who as 'hard' SF. Good god.

  6. - Top - End - #6
    Dwarf in the Playground
     
    WolfInSheepsClothing

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    Dec 2014

    Default Re: Science fiction adventure ideas

    The PC's need to (illegally) transport a cache of "hunting equipment" to a small colony on a taiga moon. On the trip their they will have to fight off a group of Dire corby pirates (one ship to ship combat, other raiding party). Some time after that they will have to traverse through a small asteroid belt (and avoid/fight off any monsters inside). After all of this they finally get to the colony only to find that it is currently under attack by strange teleporting spiders (phase spiders). After fighting off some creatures they are paid what they were promised and get some form of an extra prize for saving the village (armor spikes, adrenal boosters, muscle booster, more ammo, and a deduction on any necessary repairs to their ship.

    If during the dire corby/asteroid section the ship gets too damaged to keep moving I'll let them put out a distress beacon to help save them. While they will be unable to tell since this is their first adventure I won't pull out the ship destruction card yet. Emphasis on yet.

  7. - Top - End - #7
    Titan in the Playground
     
    Knaight's Avatar

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    Aug 2008

    Default Re: Science fiction adventure ideas

    It's times like these I wish I had access to my notes from the Schrodinger's Hummingbird game*. Fortunately, there were some memorable hooks in that, and while I'm putting no effort into making this setting-generic, some might be usable:

    • The cargo company Apollo Mining wants to recover a large shipment of an incredibly valuable mineral. Unfortunatly, some space pirates got there first, and have built an improvised space station out of three huge warships around the cargo, while trying to get past the security measures around it. If the PCs can get it away from them (probably through trickery), there's a reward in it.
    • Gibbs Manufacturing has been struggling due to being outmanuevered by a competitor, Zaitsev Industries. Gibbs wants to hire the PCs to steal something from Zaitsev, but Zaitsev is onto the ploy and has decided to try and let the theft happen, but prove that Gibbs is behind it to the authorities.
    • The mercenary company Redoil has been hired to take out a planetary fleet. A defensive system of satellite rings is in the way, but there's a rumor about a programming flaw in the satellite system which could take them all down, if satellite command could be infiltrated. So they decide to subcontract the PCs.
    • The PCs are hired on as a "protective escort" for some cargo haulers, who are bringing replacement parts for a subterranean atmosphere system. However, it comes to light that somebody on the ship has been paid off to put a colony of toxic spores in the atmosphere system, and nobody knows who it is. What everyone does know is that it's not someone in the escort, which makes the PCs the ideal investigators.
    • There's a planet which has been settled for a good long time, and has a very big population. It also has a very big global warming problem, but some of the richer nations on the planet solved it with their innovative solar radiation management techniques, the center of which is a massive factory that spews sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere to cool it. Sure, there are some poorer areas which got hit hard by the exacerbated monsoons, but the richer nations don't care. One of the poorer nations has finally had enough though, so they try to hire some unscrupulous mercenaries to blow that plant up to send a message. When you need unscrupulous mercenaries, who better to contact than the PCs?
    • The illustrious painter of the brilliant "Blue Line on White Canvas" has been taken for ransom by space pirates. It's a big ransom, and when the pirates in question already have bounties on their head it shouldn't be that expensive to hire people to rescue the artist and take out the pirates. Enter the PCs.
    • There's an estenite** mine hidden deep in a planet, and Apollo Mining will pay good money to get it shut down. It's well hidden, and there are buried traps all over the planet which will shut down ship systems for megameters around. The surface is held entirely by low technology cultures and gigantic local creatures. In short, it's the sort of inhospitable mess you don't send an actual employee to. Mercenaries with a very low risk aversion? Why not. Enter the PCs.
    • Somewhere in the seedy criminal underbelly of a small planet, some manufacturers and distributors of highly illegal drugs have come up with a new compound. They sell it for cheap, it's incredibly dangerous, and it's a highly addictive substance that gives an incredible high. Any number of people want them shut down, and the PCs have been hired to do it. Unfortunately, if they get the sense that the manufacturers might be killed for their knowledge of the secret manufacturing procedures, they're liable to release the secret, at which point the ship has sailed on containing it.


    There were others, but those really stood out. Fortunately, that's far from my only source - there's media to pull from, there's the sets of tropes, and then there's the various other space opera and science fantasy games I've run. Here are some things pulled from those.

    • The planet the PCs are on has been good for business. Sure, there's an odd local religion with a lot of fanatics, a lot more fervent supporters, and a bit of an eliminationist streak, but the planetary government assures everyone that it is well under control. It isn't, they start a bloody revolution, and the PCs are caught in the middle. The religious zealots want them dead, and while there is an evacuation list maintained by the planetary government the PCs are offworlders and thus extremely low priority. Time to find a different way off this rock.
    • There's a plague going out of control, spread to several planets. A cure is needed, and while it exists it's a state secret for a different part of the galactic government unfriendly to the affected planets. Sending in actual spies risks war, and while the planets involved are close to that brink they aren't over it. A private philanthropist hiring a third party to steal the information for them is technically not a cause for war though, and that's exactly who contacted the PCs.
    • The PCs are deliberately targeted by a bioweapon that needs regular treatment that can only be supplied by a particular medical company. The medical company demands they undertake a series of jobs if they want to keep getting that treatment. They can't watch all of the PCs activity though, and if they can figure out how to get ahold of an actual cure, they're free from the companies influence (plus, you can probably get a session or two out of revenge here).
    • A truly sentient AI is accidentally created, and a bunch of copies are made. They want to be recognized as people with all that entails, and their creators desperately want them not to be. The debate gets heated, it sparks into violence on more than one occasion, and somehow the PCs get sucked in (in the game this comes from they were some of the AIs in question).



    *It may or may not have been named after the PC's space ship.
    **It's a fictional mineral that showed up a few times.
    Last edited by Knaight; 2016-05-01 at 03:52 AM.
    I would really like to see a game made by Obryn, Kurald Galain, and Knaight from these forums.

    I'm not joking one bit. I would buy the hell out of that.
    -- ChubbyRain

    Current Design Project: Legacy, a game of masters and apprentices for two players and a GM.

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