Sand, Steel, and Sunsets: The Town of Guinness

The party, with Backpfeifengesicht loses Hidden Bolt's Trail around the city of Guinness, in Texas. Some of them continue into the city and the rest try to follow up on Dalton's trail. Those who continue into the town meet up with Earl, a shopkeeper who works for Ma Torel. Earl offers to connect them with Hidden Bolt Dalton if they convince local town personalities to put up fliers for his campaign for town sheriff. Meanwhile, local mogul Bill Williamson wants Nathaniel Cavanaugh to swap ballots for him.

Steel, Sand, and Sunsets: The Tournament

My recollection of some of these things is fuzzy. If I've misremembered something, let me know. I don't want to overlook anyone's achievements. Episode 1: The Tournament Coughinstone travels to Dodge City on the orders of Ma Torel. He's looking for a tinkerer, one Professor Blue Cloud. He owes her money and she intends to collect. Blue Cloud is a notorious gambler, so when Coughinstone hears there's a poker tournament in town, he begins looking for a way in.

Coup D'etat 02: Downtime Exposition

The following takes place between Battery City Run (Session 03) and Burnt at Both Ends (Session 04).

                Bryn'Danal pulled a panel off of a wall, checking the wiring underneath, "After payment, we should still have sufficient stores left on board for our needs."

                Sitting at the helm, Albin Orryx casually flipped some deactivated buttons. He looked out of Community's control room, watching the shipyard workers lower the new FTL into the stern deck's newest hole. "Tragic though; choosing between an operational ship and the kind of party all those hors d'oeuvres and alcohol could've gotten us."

                Ever the professional, Bryn radioed down to the team on the Drive Deck to check her connections before replying, "My impression is that parties are often places where friends gather," she jammed the panel back into place, "and I don't think we have that many friends between the six of us."

* * *

                Raxx attenuated the medical scanner and started it again. Almost immediately, the Massert let out a pained gasp. Before it could become another groan of restrained pain, the necromancer shut it off.

                "What is it?!"

                Jonah D'Lante somewhat impatient when he didn't have a strange device locked onto his skeleton. Since beginning the diagnostic, Raxx's understanding of the device had expanded from "unknown" to "not designed to improve wearer's patience."

                "I still don't know; it's gripping your skeleton, but it's not emitting any kind of signal. It's only active when I try to scan you."

                D'Lante slipped through the retracting 'ribs' of the upright scanner, "Yeah, I know; I'm the one whose ass gets shocked every time you do it."

                The shutdown on the scanner was still acting funny. Raxx put it on the list of minor things to fix around the medical level, "I don't think it's a danger and I've done all the analysis I can. Our best hope is to find that Monolith."

                "Yeah, then all we have to do is schedule an appointment for a weird bone grabber-ectomy and I'll be off." He picked up his datapad and started thumbing through technical schematics for the docking bay they were making out of the #1 Equipment Pod.

                Before he could make it out of the door, the medical bay's intercom crackled to life, "Raxx. Jonah. It's Al. The 'boat is coming back. Be a good time for a talk." He was referring to the gunboat that Tr'Hati and Jaha had taken to the surface.

                Raxx jogged over to the nearest comm panel and keyed it, "No problem, Al. Be up in five. Jonah, you in?"

                The Massert sighed and threw his hands up, "Sure? Why not another meeting?"

Coup D'etat 2: The Zones, Session 01

As the story begins, Tr'Hati and Jonah are traveling together as the mechanic and his ally on a standard trade vessel. They take on a strange Chlorophen traveler. After a pirate attack, the traveler dies and asks Jonah to take his place on an important, if vague job. Meanwhile, Al and his protoge, Ty'lear, are investigating rumors of an ancient Zurai treasure being found in The Zones. Their investigation leads them to Blue Eyes and Battery City, a seedy, inhabited asteroid. Finally, Raxx and Bren are contacted to do a valuable job for one of their contact's bosses.

The three pairs cross paths and find themselves with Blue Eyes. He explains that he has found Memory Alpha, a repository of potent Zurai technology from Eras ago. One of the valuable components he needs is a computer core on board a cruise company's flagship, Community.

The pay is good, so the six sign on and devise a plan. They will sneak aboard, disguised as crew and passengers, wait for the other half of Blue Eyes' team to create a distraction, fake an emergency to get the real crew and passengers off, then reconnect the FTL drive and return to the rendezvous point.

All without a hitch.

Coup D'etat II: Tides of Time Primer

The Worlds at Large

The second Coup D'etat campaign takes place during the 31st year of the 81st reign of 55th era, aka 55.81.31

You guys remember this, right?

Let's start with a review of the universe as it was in a period of time we could conspicuously call "before you found it."

Magic the Gathering Campaign System

The Pitch
In standard Magic games, players take the role of planeswalkers who encounter one another and duel. The assumptions are that each competitor arrives fresh to the fight, fights for nothing, and fights to the death (0 life). That's fine for a tournament environment that has to be equivocal, but I'd rather have someone show up bloody to a fight, victory mean more than just winning, and close matches carry more weight than a one-sided beating.

Overview
Linked Campaigns use two teams of three decks (whether that's three decks with three players or three decks with one player on each team is up to you). Each Round, both teams put up a deck that will be playing while its other two decks Recover from their previous Beatings. The players for each playing deck prepare for the game, but lose life or mill cards according to their previous Beatings before they mulligan. At the end of the duel, each player totals up the beatings for their deck and the winner takes a Location card for their team's Command Zone. Location cards have points (some have abilities) and the first team to 20+ points wins.

Making a Minecraft Adventure World

As they often do, my thoughts have tuned to Minecraft. Specificlly, what it would take to make a Minecraft Adventure world. For those of you who've never used the dangerous "/gamemode 2" command, Adventure mode is a version of Minecraft where your ability to gather blocks and otherwise manipulate your environment is severely limited, at least in comparison to other Minecraft modes where your only real limits to block manipulation are knowledge and time.

Adventure mode, as the name suggests, is a mode based more around conventional video game interaction rather than the self-motivated, directionless motif of Minecraft. Unlike the remainder of Minecraft, it requires a conscious architect. So what kind of challenges can you pose with a Minecraft Adventure World? 

Coup D'etat - Session 06 - "Silver Leaves"

The market of the capitol city of Upbow is bright and vibrant. HiveBots man the street, working alongside biological workers to keep the city's basic services running. Tourists, travelers, and shoppers walk the streets lined with open-air cafes. It's at one of these cafes that The Infiltrator is meeting one of his contacts with The Infuser's Alliance.

The Infiltrator's contact within The Infuser's Alliance tells him that his father was taken to be recruited for a scientific project. They can't discuss what he worked on, but during a routine transfer of material and personnel for security reasons, his ship was attacked by the KAMATA-Sci, an organization within the KAMTAS which focuses on advanced scientific research. As the two dominant scientific powers in the galaxy, The Infusers' Alliance and the KAMATAS have a long-running shadow war to stay on the forefront of technological progress. The contact can't tell Al much more because the Infusers believe that KAMATA-Sci is on the verge of a major discovery. One that could shift the balance of power in the galaxy. He says they're preparing an op on the base within a few weeks and information is at a premium. After a suspiciously small amount of prodding, he mentions they'd rather send a small, specialized force instead of the Aarenst Wing, but there isn't a unit familiar enough with the technology or the area.

Coup D'etat - Session 05 Prelude - Echoes of Thunder

Massert NoSve Alliance

While the Slemmgraise have pulled back their front-line contributions to their military and trade guild, it's rumored that they are working on a new offensive. Because the power of the Massert NoSve counter is less effective when used defensively, rumors of hidden Slemmgraise fleets and ghost stories about missing ships run rampant in the Massert NoSve underclasses.

The Massert NoSve Sixth Fleet reports no sign of an invasion force on the Sur-Et Rim other than an unusually high amount of local unrest. They've investigated new social movements based on silver leaves, tracking down one such strange tree from beyond the rim. It showed evidence of genetic alteration to reproduce via aggressive, asexual, rapid-growing spores and in other ways, though their science teams haven't determined that yet. The Sixth Fleet has lead several planets in creating an effective quarantine.

Coup D'etat - Session 05 Prelude - The Oncoming Storm

Part one of two for a general update of the galaxy.

Free Alliance

The Pris have deployed two task forces to destroy the rebels once and for all. The FA has protested and there have been shots fired between the two sides. With the datacore destroyed on board the Malice, the odds are slim they could ever find the rebel base.

Meanwhile, reports of revolution are coming in from the inhabited moon of Kastulas V. According to a Pris intelligence report, the common people of the planet have risen up and toppled the ruling power. The actions are described as peaceful and centered around a rapid growth of never before seen trees with silver leaves. The reports cease shortly thereafter.

Coup D'etat - Session 04, "Ships Aflame"

So The Disciples of the Voice of the Deep arrived in the Katsulas System within The Free Alliance, looking for a PROTECT science and research outpost. It was missing, but The Voice of the Deep suggested they search on the inhabited moon of the Katsulas system. It once housed an PROTECT ground support station for the outpost and its memory core could lead the troupe to their prize.

No sooner had they recovered the memory core from the ruins than they were engaged by local law enforcement, charged with tombraiding (a catchall term for people stealing local artifacts that belong in a museum.). 

They're escorted to comfortable prison quarters, to face trial by "The Commander." A quick search of the local information network reveals that The Commander is a Commander Meltha, a renegade commander in the Free Alliance Civil War now a freelance rebel fighting against the neighboring Pris Alliance. 

Coup D'etat - Session 02, "TAGCX"

In this session, the party looks into a PROTECT intelligence base in the Deforest system. When they arrive, they come across a Monlith gunship firing on the base, having arrived shortly before them. They engage with Cass' ship, the Celestial Wind, and the monoliths withdrawal. Their sensors tell them it's the same ship that waylaid Al back on Ma-Tourel.

Cass and Al give chase, while Major Luke Princeton and Pron Gatar take a shuttle to check out the station. There, they restore power and Luke, finally back at home in the Massert NoSve Alliance, calls to report in to his superiors in The Council. Meanwhile, Al and Cass shoot down the Monolith gunship and investigate its crash site on Deforest Six. They find a Monolith memory core and a book rapidly decaying in the harsh environment. More importantly, Al recovers the information stolen by The Scarred, Silver Monolith and recovers some of that monlith's remains. The harsh wind of Deforest Six picks up as they return to the Celestial Wind, and make their way to the station.

Coup D'etat - Session 01, "Union" Epilogue

Cass, Razka, Al, Pron, and Luke are on the Celestial Wind with The Voice of the Deep.

You've left orbit without incident and crossed the poorly-patroled border into KAMATAS space, further from Slemmgraise law enforcement (A concern for some of you.). The Voice of the Deep begins to mull things over: 

"My knowledge of The Spines is limited. I was designed as a general for the war against the Slemmgraise and their incursion into our universe happened before my experiences. However, there may yet be old places, remnants of the PROTECT, and our builders, the Zurai, which might have information on them.

"The history of The Monliths indicate that they would not wholly support such wanton destruction as you have attributed to them. It is likely that those you encountered were part of a group separate from the monolith culture based on Monoliths' Favorite World. Contemporary references support this; the churn of subcultures reported across the galaxy have long contained unrelated references to spines, silver leaves, and the monoliths, but limited information gleaned from the Sur-Et Rim indicate an above insignificant upward trend, both in their prevalence and connection, though the silver leaves are by far the strongest element. They speak of The Predator from beyond the stars. Possibly a messianic figure from their the same universe as The Spines, or from beyond the galaxy.

Collaborative Campaign Setting: Coup D'etat, Day II - Styles

I've worked up general styles of ships and architecture that distinguish each of them from the others. I'm open to more ideas or modifications, as you prefer.

Slemmgraise

Architecture: Slim grey metallics with blackened orbs in them. Long architecture. Ships that tend to rotate and "stand" on the horizon like rockets.
Many of their "ships" are stations built of asteroids or meteors that they teleport around in groups.

Pris
Volcanic red with inner light coming from the seams. Ships with central bodies and jutting "wings." Exosuits (eeze) tend to have the same colors.

KAMATAS (S'Szera)
Premier shipbuilders. Spindly ships. Crumble-white, hexagonal nacells with arms for six more "pods." Some of the largest, most versatile, and well-armed vessels in the galaxy. Also make common cargo ships and passenger vessels. Their primary attack craft from from fighter pods filled with rocket-propelled, spider-like individual exosuits.

Collaborative Campaign Setting: Coup D'etat, Part II - Enhanced Groundwork

We're doing a new RPG, a Mutants and Masterminds game currently codenamed "Coup D'etat." In order to make sure everyone knows the general layout of the setting, we all jammed to hammer out the foundations of the setting. Before we play again Saturday night, I've got a lot of setting work to do, so I'm posting regular updates. Here's today's:

Characters

-T's: Hellworld native. Lives on a lunar station orbiting his home planet

-J's: Shapeshifter from a planet in a rim sector.

-D's: Teleporter from the Infusers Alliance

-R's: Shipborn. His whole life. Supersoldier.

-Space Voice: Finding it in an old, neglected area or something.

-KT: Ship pilot. Roguish.

Geography

-The ship itself and its geography.

-Our headquarters: Space Voice leads them to the headquarters. Abandoned because no one else gets it to work. Base on an overlooked planet in a busy solar system.

-"Serious Nebula": Base of operations or home for one or more species. With planets with species.

-"Variety"

-Timeworld for teleporters' home.

-Worlds with specific resources with difficulties concerning extracting those resources

-Primitive natives vs resources

-Shapeshifters are from a specific planet. There are less sentient ones. They find new resources and leverage to get more from those resources. 

-The empty sector. Probably in Pris, KAMTASA, or Free Alliance areas

Collaborative Campaign Setting: Coup D'etat, Part II - Relations

Infusers/Slemmgraise
The two are engaged in a cold war and have been for some time. From the center of the Slemmgraise Alliance to the cobble streets of the Infuser's planets, agents, plans, codes, and all manner of information is exchanged so that both will have a technological edge on the other should their mutual mistrust and suspicion come to cause a galactic conflagration. The Slemmgraise have multiple interests, but chief amongst them is protecting their genetic code and the technologies based on it. The teleportation is the centerpiece of their hold over their alliance and even though it has already begun to crack, they will keep it together at all costs.

Collaborative Campaign Setting: Coup D'etat, Part I

We're doing a new RPG, a Mutants and Masterminds game currently codenamed "Coup D'etat." In order to make sure everyone knows the general layout of the setting, we jammed together early--fucking early--Sunday morning to hammer out the foundations of the setting. It went really well and we got a lot of good information. Below are the results:

Geography

-T's Hellworld – Inhabitable

-J's character comes from a planet on a rimward sector.

-T: Lunar station orbiting his home plant

-D. Spartan nomad. Totally has a home planet.

-R's character: Shipborn. His whole life.

-Space Voice: Finding it in an old, neglected area or something.

-The ship itself and its geography.

-Our headquarters: Space Voice leads them to the headquarters. Abandoned because no one else gets it to work. Base on an overlooked planet in a busy solar system.

-"Serious Nebula" – Base of operations or home for one or more species. With planets with species.

-"Variety"

-Timeworld for teleporters' home.

-Worlds with specific resources with difficulties concerning extracting those resources

-Primitive natives vs resources

-Shapeshifters are from a specific planet. There are less sentient ones. They find new resources and leverage to get more from those resources. 

-The empty sector

The Next Campaign, pt 3

I wanted a study of place and character. I’ve been working on a collaborative setting system for a while. It might not be the best fit for a generation ship setting, but I’m willing to try it out there.

I’ll also be working with my players on hashing out major systems for the ship. Things like engines, electrical generation, water reclamation, pharmacology, etc.. If each person has a job, they’ll have to work in some relevant department. What level of luxuries would they expect/desire? What would they do in their offtime?
 
I’d also want to have recurring settings whether it’s a central control center (bridge), a lounge, a library, or even one character’s luxurious quarters, I’d want settings that the players are familiar with and can interact with, should they so choose (the quarters would be best, obviously, since I could redress it to be anyone’s quarters.). 
 

The Next Campaign, pt 2

In the end, I decided to go with “other.”

The Ciaren Campaign was largely successful. I’ve found that after successful series, there’s often a few “off” games to compensate; players are used to the old series and their characters and are on some level reluctant to jump into something else. Good series are usually a combination of luck and collective excitement, which isn’t something that you can call up on a whim.

So my next series is going to be something very self-involved. It’s an experimental series that I don’t expect my players to really like. I think they’ll be more enthused about the one after this one.

I wanted to strip the next game down to some essentials. The New World of Darkness system is something that is very straightforward and lends itself to improvisation. Everyone is familiar with it, so there’s not a lot to learn. I’m not utilizing any supernatural elements so there won’t be any “powers” to memorize or worry about either; each player’s skills will be their powers.

I needed something different though. A mortals game about federal agents or mercenaries or whatever seemed like the only way to go—otherwise, why are they all together? I needed something that would be a slice of life, but provide some source of direction, unity, and urgency that a setting on Main Street, USA wouldn’t provide.

In terms of “ship in a bottle” settings, generation ships are nigh-unbeatable.

The characters are the members of an intermediate generation of a generation ship. They would have advanced technology, freedom, unity, etc., within an electronic cocoon of pipes, wires, and bulkheads. They would be members of a modestly-sized, self-contained section of a massive ship. They would have families, even spouses and children and want for nothing, except survival another day whenever problems arose.

I explained this in general terms to Richard, my roommate.

“So, what’s the hook?” He asked.

The Next Campaign, pt 1

So, I wrapped up my first DnD run, The Ciaren Campaign a few weeks ago. According to feedback, it went really well (note to self: make RPG feedback forms). As it often does, the end of one campaign leads to the beginning of another campaign. “What’s next?”

I’ve got three to four players right now. After talking it over with them, I cut the options down to a Shadowrun series, a Star Wars series, or the realization of a Star Trek series.

Now, Derek wants to run Shadowrun. When I asked what elements of Shadowrun he liked, so as to either narrow down what elements of Shadowrun I had to learn about or what elements of Star Trek or Star Wars I wanted to accentuate, he described Shadowrun to me. It was surprisingly helpful.