 June 12, 2011 - 9:16am | I'm going to be starting a new SF gaming group & campaign here in NJ soon, and really don't want the newbs to begin with the Volturnus modules like most of us did. I'm thinking more of a dusty, out-of-the-way sort of small spaceport or moonbase that the PCs first meet each other at, then branch out from that point. I "could" use a small space station I already drew up for a different adventure, but not sure if that would work best for newbs. Any ideas? My SF website izz: http://ragnarr.webs.com |
 June 12, 2011 - 10:15am | Anything will work for newbs as long as you keep the challenges xp appropriate. Sometimes I like Volturnus sometimes I don't. I guess I have been around it too long and played it too many times that it has gotten stale for me. You could also mod any of the sample adventure ideas in the AD books for use on a space station for example the opening adventure with the Sathar agent, you could mod that one easily. Most of the Port Lauren adventures could be adjusted in scale for space station too. |
 June 12, 2011 - 10:29am | I ran SF two weeks ago with my Bare Bones system and started the players working for a corp delivery services. The goal was to introduce the setting, not some backwards planet. Seem to work fairly well. It's a make-it-as-you go game, I'm using the Sci-Fi drama cards which sometimes gives Referee's a twist. |
June 12, 2011 - 10:49am | Another aspect to this is that I'm tempted to start off the PCs with level 1 spaceships skills, but the downside of doing that is it necessarily makes your level 1 laser battery gunner level 6 in energy weapons, or your level 1 astrogator level 6 computer specialist. I guess I can that make it work, because my alternative is to work the PCs up to that level with (sigh) like a billion small adventures at 1 - 10 xp per session. It's just that I seem to have more fun as a GM when the PCs can handle a spaceship themselves. My SF website izz: http://ragnarr.webs.com |
 June 12, 2011 - 11:18am | The idea behind rpgs is to create an exciting story. The Gamemaster does the setting and the players are the characters in the story. When starting a new group in any rpg best to find out what players want to get from the game. While Volturnus was the first module, the introductory adventure and background stories went more with Star Law and Sathar spies and Crashed spaceships and escaped monsters. Find what your group wants and go with it. Dont give them everything on a silver platter, keep the challenge dangerous but not too deadly. Sounds like a great job but where did you say we had to go? |
 June 12, 2011 - 12:25pm | I strongly recommend using the SFman article Spacer Skills Register as that solves the skill level disparity. Also consider the article A Skilled Frontier as it is a food upgrade over AD rules. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
June 12, 2011 - 12:36pm | That's Spacer Skills Revisited. Damn U autocorrect I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 June 12, 2011 - 1:12pm | Oh humans!!  We discover a galactic community filled with multiple species of aliens, and the first thing we think about is "how can we have sex with them?".~ anymoose, somewhere on the net... so... if you square a square it becomes a cube... if you square a cube does it become an octoid? |
June 12, 2011 - 1:48pm | Non standard locations for SF First-run low-level adventure locations: Maddely's Star; Human dominated politics, lots of cross species intrigue, an active multi-sided underworld, Unethical Corps but not entirely mega-oppressive ones, A roughneck/outblack region both in-system and beyond that allows for many hidden corners... Fromeltar; Vrusk dominated politics, some cross species intrigue, an active well established underworld, Oppressive Corps but not entirely mega-unethical ones, A roughneck/outblack region both in-system and beyond that allows for many hidden corners... Liberty; A full force frontier complete with self-important sheriffs, pirate bandits, and land-holding tycoons all vying to be in each others back pockets and a secret in thier closset, and everyone found wearing each others hats du l'sans-souci, et au milieu... [Fr: carefree within the mess...] In addition to Zebulon(greater system), Starmist, Araks, Athor, Prenglar, White Light, K'aken-kar, and a couple home brews, these have been my standard starting locations... Oh humans!! We discover a galactic community filled with multiple species of aliens, and the first thing we think about is "how can we have sex with them?".~ anymoose, somewhere on the net... so... if you square a square it becomes a cube... if you square a cube does it become an octoid? |
June 12, 2011 - 4:06pm | Now that I'm home at the computer: SFman issue #9 "A Skilled Frontier" byBill Logan SFman issue #10 "Spacer Skills Revisited" by Menoitios I highly recommend these two articles as house rules with the caveat that the pre-rec skills for star ship pilot skill is Pilot: Air vehicles not Technician as in AD rules. Asside from a little adaption of the Spacer skills article to work with A Skilled Frontier article I love using these (at least until the Frontier Space rules come out but since I signed a non-disclosure agreement I cant talk about those) Secondly I highly recommend that you write a 1 page document titled "What the PC knows about the Setting" since they're newbies they wont know anything about the setting and a single sided 1 page primer that they can read quick will go a long way toward bringing them up to speed. I did this in an on line game that had veteran SF players in it and many of them used details from that document to color in the player character's background. One even latched onto the political cadre/terrorist group that was obvious to play a significant role in the setting and wrote that his estranged brother was a member of that group which was just begging me to work the brother angle into the adventure. Thirdly, make every player write a secret about their PC that only they and the referee know. You'd be surprised by how this inspires you to work it into the game. You cant work all the secrets at the same time but can spread them out and create unique story share for players over time. Fourthly, make each player create an NPC contact that is someone they can turn to for help or advice in setting. Its a player created but referee controlled NPC. Hey you have a lot to manage in bringing the game and in some cases inventing whole planets and settings so let the players shoulder the burden by creating NPCs for you they will create interesting one that will inspire you to use as plot hooks or give you a natural in toward redirecting the group if they are seriously going off script. Fifth: Offer 1 exp for a 2-3 paragraph background, 1 EXp for creating an NPC contact, and 1 EXP for coming up with a character portrait. Its an easy 3 EXP bonus in the beginning to get procrastinating players to do what they should do but might not do without a carrot. They'll have fun doing it and the character will be more memorable to them and they will feel more connected to it for having done this. Consider these ideas from D&D 4.0: Vignette Encounters: Play out an encounter/conflict in the PC's past, other players take the role of the significant NPCs in the PC's life, dont need dice for this or if you do just do a 50/50 chance for good and bad results. Player will set up the encounter and specify who the characters are. Adventure Companion_ D&D 4.0 put in place some detailed rules on creating adventure companions which are DM created NPCs that are player controlled. They could be an intelligent wolf rescued from a trap, an halfling archer that has chosen to accompany the PC for some reason, (there is a whole list of monster manual creatures that were suggested). There should be a reason the companion is tagging along and it usually is story based. This idea does not need to be used in the first few sessions but since its story dependant its good to plan it ahead of time. In some ways you could veiw R2D2 and C3PO as adventure companions. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
June 12, 2011 - 5:03pm | @Captain Rags - Just make the KH skills Level 1 - 6 work like AD skills. PSA: Military = Level 1 gunner or Level 1 pilot. PSA: Tech = Level 1 astrogator. Or use Jedi's suggestion. |
June 12, 2011 - 5:34pm | This is a specific idea for kicking off a campaign, as it sounded like you were also looking for ideas on where to base it. This will give the PCs a reason for grouping together and doing the adventure. All the PCs are on a Star Liner travelling from point X to point Y and the ship miss jumps, not only does it miss jumps but it suffers an accident either right after the jump or while its sorting out its position- cometary fragments strike the ship or some other mishap. The adventure can be laid out as a series of crisis that the PCs must handle- day 1 at hour 9 Crisis A happens; day 1 hour 13 crisis B happens; etc. These crisises can be pregnant yazirian going into labor (this is not good as she could battle rage during the event- did I say could? strike that GM fiat says she will), panic spreads and their is a riot at the life boats and passengers trying to leave the ship (not a good idea as this is a seemingly un-inhabited system) The Alarm program goes off warning of an imbalance in the engines (bad becasue if the engine slags you dont go home or if it blows so does the ship) Naturally you'd want the system to have a marginally inhabitable planet and that could be visited, but why would you visit it when the frist order of business it to locate where they are and jump back to the Frontier? When those chuckle-headed fools that took one of the life boats are calling from the planet and they begging to be rescued. Oh know there is a vital part that not turns out to be broken and without a replacement the ship cant leave. Hhmm the idots in the life boat are reporting that there is a derelict ship from the frontier on the planet. or is that a derelict alien craft? GM's choice. Maybe the system is not so unknown? Perhaps pirates or sathar have a secret base here. You could run a whole mini campaign just centered around getting the star liner back to the Frontier. I kind of like this- I may have to use it. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 June 30, 2011 - 4:19pm | When I started working on the revamp of Star Frontiers for a new generation I had to decide on how to integrate new players into the revamped Star Frontiers universe, and though I was temped to do vulturnus I decided against it because Vulturnous is an enclosed setting that wouldn't really allow players to learn about the frontier, so I turned to the mini Adventures in the core books, and decided to flesh them out into a set of introductory Adventures two which ended up becoming the Rise of the Sathar module and eventually I'll put out the next module which will include the Alien "monster" escape from the zoo and the ship crash mini adventures. I think that starting the characters as low level agents or freelancers working for Star Law or the PGC is definately the way to go because it allows the Refrerree to serve as a patron for the fledgeling characters and can help integrate them into the Frontier. As for starting characters at higher skill levels. in our own game we have always had a house rule where characters who started at higher skill levels would have to pay back the bank for these levels. In other words if you started a character with 3rd level beam weapons, any experience he got from an adventure was cut in half with half those points going towards repaying the experience points that he would have needed to spend to buy the high level beam skills to begin with. the character can still advance of course with the remaining points, but he still has to pay back the experience points "loaned" to him to buy that higher skill in the beginning. "Hey guys I wonder what this does"-Famous last words "Hey guys, I think it's friendly." -Famous last words "You go on ahead, I'll catch up." -Famous last words "Did you here that?" -Famous last words |
June 30, 2011 - 9:36pm | Interesting Deryn. The PC agent approach works well for the reasons you've stated. I guess what I'm thinking for the set up is an intentional neutral setting; 'neutral' meaning neither 'good PCs' or 'evil PCs'. A neutral setting will let the players decide right from the start if their future will be as 'good doers' (working for Star Law) or evil doers (working for pirates or criminal bosses). I don't want the setting to force their career choice in the Frontier. Knowing these friends as I do, my guess is that they'll be leaning toward the rogues life. I like your PCs borrowing their higher skills setup, although I'm not sure how to justify it in in game terms. One way would be a campaign where the PCs start off with complete amnesia. The PCs are actually higher skilled characters than they realize initially. The group starts off waking up 100 km or so from a small, crappy spaceport on some obscure, dusty planet. They wake up lying on the ground, not knowing anything about who they are, where they're at, or what happened. They have no equipment to speak of (well okay, maybe a few small miscellaneous items), no food, no water, no ID cards or Chronocoms, but all seem to be wearing the same jumpsuit type of uniform. The campaign would be like a Borne Identity type of plot with the characters slowly learning information bit by bit about who they are and what happened previously that stranded them on this dusty little rock. They're not trapped like they would be starting on Volturnus; the little spaceport does have small scoutships visiting from time to time afterall. And they will slowly learn what skills they already have as situations happen and the character gets the feeling "he's done this sort of thing before". My SF website izz: http://ragnarr.webs.com |
June 30, 2011 - 10:45pm | The skill loan is something I've done when new players are joining an adventure with players who have been in the game a while and built up their characters ow when a player has had his character "die" and needs a new character to enter the game and rejoin the adventure. having the player start a new character at a low skill level when the others are higher level is unfair specially if the player joining the game is bringing in a new character because his old one died, so letting him borrow exp to bring his new character up to the level of the other character seems a fair way to do it rather than gift him with levels he never worked towards. The game also allows for characters to start with high level skills on a per mission basis if they are mind taught these higher skills, but most times this skill boost is temporary and the player forgets this information after the adventure. I remember reading that somewhere, but I can't think straight enough to quote chapter and verse right now. As for the neutral approach, the Referee Patron could always be some low level crime boss that the characters work for if the players are allergic to tin badges on their uniforms. In a mini campaign I'm writing the low level characters are in a spaceport town called Freeport on a shadow world and the referee Patron is an Ifsnit named Rennel Tibbs who is a small time gun runner who wants to make a big score and gets his chance when he spots a damaged ship making a crash landing somewhere in the wilds and hires the players to help him locate it so they can split the salvage rights. It becomes a chase because other groups also saw the ship go down are trying to get to it first..and the Pirates who shot the ship down are also looking for it. Oh and then there's the survivors of the crash, and the Primative natives that the heroes will have to contend with as the campaign builds towards its climax. "Hey guys I wonder what this does"-Famous last words "Hey guys, I think it's friendly." -Famous last words "You go on ahead, I'll catch up." -Famous last words "Did you here that?" -Famous last words |
July 1, 2011 - 7:35am | Ah! Mind Boost! That would work AND justify the immediate higher skills (although temporary) in an in game sense. The race to the crashed ship sounds like a hoot, and Rennel Tibbs seems like a bastard fer sher! Just one question; what's a "shadow world"?  My SF website izz: http://ragnarr.webs.com |
July 1, 2011 - 7:45am | Shadow worlds are planets that are not affiliated with the Rim or UPF, and tend to be the haven for pirates, and other intergalactic riff raff. These usually backwater planets are where you go if you're looking to buy that sonic devastator or military grade white noise broadcaster for your souped up freighter with no questions asked. Think Mos Eisley in Star Wars. "Hey guys I wonder what this does"-Famous last words "Hey guys, I think it's friendly." -Famous last words "You go on ahead, I'll catch up." -Famous last words "Did you here that?" -Famous last words |
 July 1, 2011 - 12:30pm | I like your PCs borrowing their higher skills setup, although I'm not sure how to justify it in in game terms. One way would be a campaign where the PCs start off with complete amnesia. The PCs are actually higher skilled characters than they realize initially. I can help justify it. In Game terms. And it is really quite easy... Corporation A, B, or whatever or maybe Star Law paid for your skills in a school type setting. They gave you a college scholarship in return for a period of service. Kinda like a Police Academy or maybe the military ROTC program. Sooo... They Trained your character and gave him/her the needed skill levels without experience points. Which is why your character only gains half in game session. In other words, your character is only book smart on the subject so has to retroactively pay back experience points when they learn practical application in the field. Just an idea to explain it away. What do you think? The bombing starts in five minutes. |
July 1, 2011 - 9:16pm | Me likes me the shadow worlds now! Me likes them a lot me does! Yes, I can see the PCs waking up on that type of planet. I was originally thinking an dusty outpost, but the shadow works for me too. My SF website izz: http://ragnarr.webs.com |
July 10, 2011 - 11:17pm | @dmoffett: Sorry for the lag. Yes I can see that working, but I'll likely have to go with the corporation route instead of Star Law. The friends in the new gaming group are kind of good-natured rogues in real life; can't imagine any of their PCs with a badge and electro-billy club. My SF website izz: http://ragnarr.webs.com |
I like drama cards, they be kewl... OT has anyone tried a GM-less Star Frontiers run?