 April 18, 2010 - 10:14pm | As a sometime fan of "House" and a non fan of other medical drama's I've been pondering the possibility of a medical based adventure. (Also influence by the presence of the MSO in the setting- Medical Services Org from Zebs) its always great fodder for drama on TV, not so much on the silver screen. Could a medical crisis work for a SF or any other sci fi adventure? Probably the easiest answer is to just make it a part of the over all adventure or just one encounter but could a whole adventure be a "medical drama"? and still be playable. Most adventures have combat and combat boils down to a series of dice rolls so why wouldn't a medical emergency that would boil down to a series of dice rolls? It seems like a uphill battle to do this but I just wanted to kick the question around and brainstorm. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
April 19, 2010 - 1:33pm | I remembered seeing some covers of sci-fi novels that I thought had been written by James White but had not read them. Probably should run these down: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=sector+general&x=0&y=0 I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 April 19, 2010 - 8:13am | That is a great idea Jedion. I have been intrigued by the medical side of SF. I believe that desease pathogens would be one of the biggest threats when exploring a new planet. If the chracters are not used to a particular pathogen then they would be quite vulnerable. I usually incorporate some sort of desease threat to my adventures. At least I got to scare an alien rabbit thingy...... |
April 19, 2010 - 1:03pm | That is a great idea Jedion. I have been intrigued by the medical side of SF. I believe that desease pathogens would be one of the biggest threats when exploring a new planet. If the chracters are not used to a particular pathogen then they would be quite vulnerable. I usually incorporate some sort of desease threat to my adventures. Disease, infection, poison- all possibilities but are generally resolved with 1 dice roll which isn't very exciting. However, I'm not interested in a D&D 3.5 skill check where its and endless series of rolls: first roll pass "OK you manage to swin 10' across the river." next roll pass "Another 10" next roll fail the river carries you down stream X amount. and after a repetitive series of rolls you're across. I suppose you could set up a start up colony/terraforming project with the players as the emergency response team: Encounter 1: environmentalist has fallen over a cliff and hurt his self- team must rescue him (straight forward) but then the evil GM complicates it with he fell in a river - now they must search for him. There is hungry beasties about, and poisonous plants. its simple but the complications make for a challenge. Encounter #2: Mysterious infection of one member of the project- fairly easily cured under the standard AD rules (more on the mysterious infection latter- evil GM plans more with this) Encounter #3: shuttle full of colonist and air car collide while shuttle is taxing down the runway. the challenge here is that there is fire and its spreading by a predetermined rate and there are numerous casualties. rescue team must deal with fire and rescue the wounded on a timed basis. EXp determined by how many NPCs are saved. Encounter #4: its that mysterious infection again and this time its a little harder to cure. Each subsequent mysterious infection becomes stronger and harder to cure. The mysterious infection can be treated as per the subskill for treating infections but this is little more than treating a symptom not the cause. by interspersing the infection encounters which can be done in 15-20 minutes time with bigger more active encounters it builds up to a serious threat. and unravelling that becomes the climatic adventure of this campaign. The mysterious infection also works with a classic shootem up campaign- inbetween the shoot em up encounters you do the gradually more difficult infection scenarios. Trick here is to make it seem un-important but the average player may just treat the first or second infection as a major deal right off. So maybe the infected person was the one injured in the prior encounter- that way they may just write it off at first as oh the infections set in because of the injury. I would create a list of random medical emergencies that would be whats happening day to day- construction worker slips with laser power torch and severed the end of his foot; project member out for a jog and hit/grazed by a heavy duty robot, off duty yazirians mix it up in a drunken brawl- various cuts and contussions; etc. These little emergencies would be just for flavor and a semblence of color for the setting but could help to prevent PCs from guessing that the Mysterious infection was the big deal right away. You just throw out 1-2 of the 10-20 minute minor med encounters before the big stuff like the lost and injured environmentalist and the shuttle collision. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
April 19, 2010 - 1:33pm | Did a little research on ebay today and it seems that the James White, Sector General novels were a fairly long running series, as high as 17 books, so I bought 2 that were listed for a dollar to do a little research in this area. I did see a criticism of one being that the characters talked, thought and acted like they were from the 1950s but the review continued to praise that particular book anyway for what was good in it. Ultimately they dont have to be a good read but have ideas I can steal. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 April 19, 2010 - 4:23pm | I actually designed a campaign around the MSO, called MedLab, focused around the characters all serving on a ship called a MedLab, each ship labeled "MedLab1", "MedLab2", etc. I even developed a full back story about how Gretl Grohn rose to become the head of the MSO aboard one of these vessels. The MedLab ships would carry a full complement of medical and emergency rescue personnel (explorers), who travel specific sectors helping out emergencies on various planets, like natural disasters, alien diseases, corporate conflicts, and other reasons for displaced civilians. They would even have a small security contengient. Unfortunately, I've decided to save it for development as a campaign setting for the FrontierSpace game. There might be stuff I can part with to contribute; maybe the Gretl Grohn drama I timelined. View my profile for a list of articles I have written, am writing, will write. "It's yo' mama!" —Wicket W. Warrick, Star Wars Ep. VI: Return of the Jedi "That guy's wise." —Logray, Star Wars Ep.VI: Return of the Jedi Do You Wanna Date My Avatar? - Felicia Day (The Guild) |
 April 20, 2010 - 5:37pm | I’m not sure if this is what you are looking for, but I had an idea the other day when I was grocery shopping. A few isolated deaths show up (in the news? Or whatever) in a particular low population local. Be it an outpost world or a station. The deaths are mysterious at first. No signs of physical trauma. As the many tests are being ran, rumors of many more deaths originate from an entirely different local. This one, more heavily populated. Results are in. The deaths appear to be due to some strange new neurotoxin. Who would be doing this? Was the station just a test run? Before long there are many deaths (by the hundreds) from many different locations. In short, the party would have to track the common element of these victims as being a new fruit introduced to the frontier from a recent planet survey. The fruit is perfectly fine. The neurotoxin occurs only when a particular type of fruit fly (not native to the fruits original world) excretes a particular enzyme during its larval stage in the fruit. The combination of the enzyme and the (insert scientific-y sounding stuff here) combine. Of course, I was picking out from fresh produce and wondering how much extra protein I was getting in the form of larva. This idea hit me more as a detour rather than a campaign type thing. It could be stretched out if players are convinced it is a terrorist group or a sathar plot. They could hunt down sleeper cells or look for agents trying to get another lead only for it to not exist. Just before they get mad and tear up their character sheets or pelt you with dice, you could drop the clue about the fruit. That is of course, if they are stuck in the rut of hack n’ blast SF and aren’t expecting the antagonist to be a naturally occurring phenomenon. |
April 20, 2010 - 6:44pm | ...combination of the enzyme and the (insert scientific-y sounding stuff here) combine. that reminds me of how the STar trek TNG was famous for lines in the scripts reading "insert techno babble here"
This would work well with a city campaign based on the Octopus Principle: http://www.treasuretables.org/2006/10/the-octopus-a-model-for-urban-campaigns where you could allow for the PCs to pursue multiple lines of investigation though having an NPC to review and comment on their results would help to keep them on track, "Great! You uncovered the sathar agents but their plot was to steal X technology not poison people with a neuro toxin. The source of the toxin is still out there." I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 April 20, 2010 - 6:59pm | Humm... A medical drama in SPACE... space... space... I know one player who would love to play Gregory House, another one who love to play Leonard "Bones McCoy, and another one who is a big fan of Abigail "Abby" Sciuto and Donald "Ducky" Mallard from NCIS. I would personally go for a physician who plays out like the 4th Doctor (Tom Baker) from Doctor Who. |
April 20, 2010 - 7:13pm | Humm... A medical drama in SPACE... space... space... I know one player who would love to play Gregory House, another one who love to play Leonard "Bones McCoy, and another one who is a big fan of Abigail "Abby" Sciuto and Donald "Ducky" Mallard from NCIS. I would personally go for a physician who plays out like the 4th Doctor (Tom Baker) from Doctor Who. sounds like too much ego in one game!! I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
April 21, 2010 - 4:27pm | sounds like too much ego in one game!! Yep, and thats the fun part!  |
 April 22, 2010 - 10:06am | Getting in on this too late but there is a lot of adventure to be had along these lines. Besides the obvious life saving, rescue, diagnosis, plague crisis stories you could also have several adventures along the "Medicine Man" lines. The characters could be part of MSO or a private concern that are out in the frontier trying to find new medicines on aliens worlds. Perhaps they are contracted by a Vrusk concern to find a cure for the common molt. Dralasites might need somebody to find a cure for late onset calcification. Yazirians could use a cure for chronic disassociative rage syndrome. You could have lots of fun coming up with malodies and the searches for their cures. -Eli |
April 22, 2010 - 4:22pm | I suppose you could set up a start up colony/terraforming project with the players as the emergency response team: Encounter 1: environmentalist has fallen over a cliff and hurt his self- team must rescue him (straight forward) but then the evil GM complicates it with he fell in a river - now they must search for him. There is hungry beasties about, and poisonous plants. its simple but the complications make for a challenge. Encounter #2: Mysterious infection of one member of the project- fairly easily cured under the standard AD rules (more on the mysterious infection latter- evil GM plans more with this) Encounter #3: shuttle full of colonist and air car collide while shuttle is taxing down the runway. the challenge here is that there is fire and its spreading by a predetermined rate and there are numerous casualties. rescue team must deal with fire and rescue the wounded on a timed basis. EXp determined by how many NPCs are saved. Encounter #4: its that mysterious infection again and this time its a little harder to cure. Each subsequent mysterious infection becomes stronger and harder to cure. The mysterious infection can be treated as per the subskill for treating infections but this is little more than treating a symptom not the cause. by interspersing the infection encounters which can be done in 15-20 minutes time with bigger more active encounters it builds up to a serious threat. and unravelling that becomes the climatic adventure of this campaign. The mysterious infection also works with a classic shootem up campaign- inbetween the shoot em up encounters you do the gradually more difficult infection scenarios. Trick here is to make it seem un-important but the average player may just treat the first or second infection as a major deal right off. So maybe the infected person was the one injured in the prior encounter- that way they may just write it off at first as oh the infections set in because of the injury. I would create a list of random medical emergencies that would be whats happening day to day- construction worker slips with laser power torch and severed the end of his foot; project member out for a jog and hit/grazed by a heavy duty robot, off duty yazirians mix it up in a drunken brawl- various cuts and contussions; etc. These little emergencies would be just for flavor and a semblence of color for the setting but could help to prevent PCs from guessing that the Mysterious infection was the big deal right away. You just throw out 1-2 of the 10-20 minute minor med encounters before the big stuff like the lost and injured environmentalist and the shuttle collision. This is some brilliant brainstorming. I say run with it. A similar situation as you describe at the bottom there occurs in the book "Stardoc" by S. L. Viehl. In fact, all of S. L. Viehl's works from the Stardoc or Bio Rescue series' would be brialliant for space medical malladies, adventure hooks, and encounter/challenge plotting. Here's a list of his books: STARDOC
BIO RESCUE
View my profile for a list of articles I have written, am writing, will write. "It's yo' mama!" —Wicket W. Warrick, Star Wars Ep. VI: Return of the Jedi "That guy's wise." —Logray, Star Wars Ep.VI: Return of the Jedi Do You Wanna Date My Avatar? - Felicia Day (The Guild) |
April 22, 2010 - 5:53pm | Emu, you forgot the race to cure Yazirian male patterned baldness. |
April 22, 2010 - 7:37pm | That is a great idea Jedion. I have been intrigued by the medical side of SF. I believe that desease pathogens would be one of the biggest threats when exploring a new planet. If the chracters are not used to a particular pathogen then they would be quite vulnerable. I usually incorporate some sort of desease threat to my adventures. Disease, infection, poison- all possibilities but are generally resolved with 1 dice roll which isn't very exciting. However, I'm not interested in a D&D 3.5 skill check where its and endless series of rolls: first roll pass "OK you manage to swin 10' across the river." next roll pass "Another 10" next roll fail the river carries you down stream X amount. and after a repetitive series of rolls you're across. You insult me Jedi with your off handled dismissal of my unpatronising support of your idea. Of course you could boil down any encounter to a success or failure die roll. Furthermore I do not play 3.5 nor do I intend to. I have ran two campaigns and an adventure that have a medical theme. Or to be more exact a pathalogical theme. 1. A team is hired to check out a quaranteened settlement on a mining planet. Some people have some family members that are stuck in the quarantined city. They suspect foul play. The players must make their way to the city to find out what is happening. It turns out a group of doctors, backed by a megacorp, is using a mutated strain of virus, that is indigeonous to the planet, to boost psionic abilities. They are trying to create super corporate spies and assasins. The corp has quaranteend the settlement to use the citizens as lab rats. 2. A rogue Streel CEO is outfitting a ship to deliver a designer version of the Blue plague to all the planets in the Frontier. He has the only serum. The players stuble upon the plot. 3. The players investigate an old abandonded star port. It is inhabited with canopus virus zombies. The characters soon become infected. The environmentalist and med characters have to work together to analyze the virus and come up with a cure before they themselves become zombies. So you see these daventures where not resolved with a simple die roll. All of them were enjoyed by all. It took much thought and creativity for the characters to survive them. At least I got to scare an alien rabbit thingy...... |
April 22, 2010 - 8:57pm | Oh My Umungus what I typed did not come out right I was merely brain storming on the challenge of a medical "challenge" and immediately 3.5 came to mind since I do play it (grudgingly play it only because I like the guys I play it with not for any love of the game). I certainly meant no causual dismissal of your comments - Please chock that up to a total brain fart on my part. Your response illustrates the point that was nagging at my brain when I wrote that poor post- that the standard medical problems under the AD rules as is are quickly resolved with one or two rolls and for this to work you need it to be more involved to solve or the problem requires more creative solutions. the canopic zombie problem is great because the stakes are about the highest they can be for the players. @ Cosmic_Emu: way too funny dude! BTW I just wrote 2 classifieds based off your suggestions and submitted them for the next zine! @ Ascent: Thanks for the heads up on that author! Gonna have to read a couple from that series too, any particular recommendations? I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
April 22, 2010 - 11:53pm | Another thought of a campaign setting would be a remote, relatively isolated UPF medical station. This would make the setting a medical one where you could have all manner of adventures with the characters not all being combat types. The medical station would be out there to assist on the very limits of the frontier, offering routine outreach services to the various colonies and prospectors as well as aiding vessels, with disasters and other medical emergencies. This basicly takes the hospital drama and puts it into a setting where reduced resources and stretched personnel really make the players stand out. -Eli P.S. Excellent Jedion! |
April 23, 2010 - 5:58pm | Another thought of a campaign setting would be a remote, relatively isolated UPF medical station. This would make the setting a medical one where you could have all manner of adventures with the characters not all being combat types. The medical station would be out there to assist on the very limits of the frontier, offering routine outreach services to the various colonies and prospectors as well as aiding vessels, with disasters and other medical emergencies. This basicly takes the hospital drama and puts it into a setting where reduced resources and stretched personnel really make the players stand out. -Eli P.S. Excellent Jedion! Nice idea could even work in a system with a weak, limited or even none existent militia but lots of industry out in the outer system- asteroid mining, gas giant ram scoop mining etc- a small med station with a rescue ship "ambulance in space" I seriously like this and have another iron in the fire that this compliments- need to do some more thinking. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 April 25, 2010 - 8:14pm | Removed to not spoil future submission. :-) |
April 24, 2010 - 7:36pm | I've been thinking about this: make it a medical ship not a station. Assign it in a area where it would respond to emergencies over a wide number of systems. In particular the chain of jumps from Kisk-Kar to K'tsa-Kar is a dark and lonely set of jumps on the back side of the frontier with lightly populated and out post planets- This would be a good region to assign a medical ship to handle and respond to problems, natural disasters and other emergencies. It should have Ion engines- no overhauls at least 2 shuttles (to act as ambulances) a large and small launch, a full up lab, isolation ward, a special environment ward- one that allows for environmental parameters to be controlled or changed to meet an unusual life form, other wards, surgery, triage, stasis/freeze field chambers, morge, robot brain to control a troop of robots to handle basic services: laundry, cooking, cleaning, even some "robotic orderly" bots. Robotic menials frees up the crew and lets you get by with a smaller more highly trained crew. The ship usually hangs in Kisk-Kar system which is a Moderate population with lots of activity going on in the outer sytem but responds to dire emergencies and natural disasters all along the jump chain to White Light. I can dispatch the HS 2 shuttles which have atomic drives and can land. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
April 24, 2010 - 9:00pm | I've been thinking about this: make it a medical ship not a station. Assign it in a area where it would respond to emergencies over a wide number of systems. In particular the chain of jumps from Kisk-Kar to K'tsa-Kar is a dark and lonely set of jumps on the back side of the frontier with lightly populated and out post planets- This would be a good region to assign a medical ship to handle and respond to problems, natural disasters and other emergencies. It should have Ion engines- no overhauls at least 2 shuttles (to act as ambulances) a large and small launch, a full up lab, isolation ward, a special environment ward- one that allows for environmental parameters to be controlled or changed to meet an unusual life form, other wards, surgery, triage, stasis/freeze field chambers, morge, robot brain to control a troop of robots to handle basic services: laundry, cooking, cleaning, even some "robotic orderly" bots. Robotic menials frees up the crew and lets you get by with a smaller more highly trained crew. The ship usually hangs in Kisk-Kar system which is a Moderate population with lots of activity going on in the outer sytem but responds to dire emergencies and natural disasters all along the jump chain to White Light. I can dispatch the HS 2 shuttles which have atomic drives and can land. A smaller detachable ship might be needed for faster response times, imo (of course I could be tainted by STNG where the Enterprise "leapt" to medical rescues. :-/) Who owns the MedShip? If it's a government body maybe they have joint ventures with medical universities where interns have to complete a tour of duty. Or it's part of the militia and the same applies; military medics need to complete a tour of duty. A corporation would charge to service a well-defined-area of space. (Like a modern day security firm) Miner guilds, government bodies, other corps, the UPF might all chip-in for such a service. |
April 24, 2010 - 10:38pm | Who owns the MedShip? If it's a government body maybe they have joint ventures with medical universities where interns have to complete a tour of duty. Or it's part of the militia and the same applies; military medics need to complete a tour of duty. A corporation would charge to service a well-defined-area of space. (Like a modern day security firm) Miner guilds, government bodies, other corps, the UPF might all chip-in for such a service. I would say the MSO- it's government owned and yeah you can rotate in interns (from universities) and even militia and space fleet officers to run the ship's systems. having 2 HS 2 shuttles gives you detachable ships for fast response (atomic engines of course). Can even have None intern Doctors taking a tour on the ship- My senior year of high school was at Lakenheath AFB in England and my Science teacher was a college professor from Berkley who, to the horror of his fellow professors, took a sabatical and walked into the DOD and vollunteered to teach for a year. Personally I think he was a little off but it was an interesting science class. I could see a vrusk doctor who specialized in cosmetic carapace surgery taking a sabatical to do something "real" for a year. with so many different personalities on the ship from so many different origens and organizations (many just on loan) you weaken the top down authority that would be norm and open the door for the ship to function as a typical party of PC's would. (of course you could just make the captain or surgeon general an NPC to guide the adventure) I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
April 25, 2010 - 10:13am | Hrm... you right it would be Military to maintain structure. I'm in the medical field and dealing with Doctors is like, *not fun*. I doubt they could get along on a ship.  |
April 25, 2010 - 2:39pm | I like the idea of a ships rather than a station. I imagine something biggish that has plenty of room for casualties and can hold a couple of smaller FTL capable ships. Additional aid for major issues such as natural disaster, outbreak, and other situations requiring evacuation of whole populations could be supported by authority to commandeer and mobilize local civilian vessels. |
April 25, 2010 - 3:49pm | @Cosmic - I put game effects to your suggestions. :-) PM me if you want to collaborate. |
 April 26, 2010 - 7:09pm | Hrm... you right it would be Military to maintain structure. I'm in the medical field and dealing with Doctors is like, *not fun*. I doubt they could get along on a ship. I was a paramedic for three years, based in an ER. My expereince was that the more specialized the doctor, the harder they are to work with. Thus cardiologists, neurologists, and surgeons were, generally speaking, the worst to interact with. ER docs, however, were universally the best to work with. I think this phenomana is similar to connection soldiers in combat share. The experience of working together in life and death situations builds a powerful bond. I think that a rescue ship's crew would be more like an ER. As for the ships, I have two in mind. One would be a hospital ship, HS 9+ and ion drives and shuttles. It would not be an immediate responder but more of a mobile laboratory responding to plagues and major catastrophes. The second would be smaller, perhaps a version of the Corvette, with atomic drives. This would be the immediate responder. The ship would be partially automated to enable travel at high accelerations to shorten response times. The crew would be in automated freeze fields to protect them from the effects of sustained 4+ gee acceleration. Both ships would require high level astrogators to enable risk jumping as needed. The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of
the strong. * Attributed to Mahatma Gandhi |
April 26, 2010 - 7:14pm | Oh, I forgot to add that the smaller ship would be equipped for rescue operations, planet side as well as 0 gee operations. The rescue crew would include various technicians and security staff in addition to the medics. The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of
the strong. * Attributed to Mahatma Gandhi |
April 26, 2010 - 9:27pm | Hey jedion - this would be a great starship, equipment, crew and shuttle submission. Use your new "phenomenal community interface powers" granted by the Star Frontiersman Artifact of Staff'ness and have someone whip it up. :-) |
April 27, 2010 - 8:50am | I agree there is likely at least half an issue's worth of materials here, if not more. Maybe a special medical edition of Starfrontiersman is in order. -Eli |
 April 27, 2010 - 11:53am | Many of the medical staff could be volunteers like doctors without boarders and other such groups where the doctors take time off from their practices to do "humanitarian" work. -iggy |
April 27, 2010 - 4:21pm | @ Ascent: Thanks for the heads up on that author! Gonna have to read a couple from that series too, any particular recommendations? Unfortunately, I haven't had the money to buy the series (though I'll look for it at the used book store), I read the first one. I quite liked it. It blows Star Wars: Battle Surgeons out of the water in my opinion, because Star Doc focused on the medical situation and the expertise of the medical staff with a strong plot and interesting subplot, rather than a poor plot around which medical stuff and Jedi magic healing is tossed together with droll writing as in the Battle Surgeons books.View my profile for a list of articles I have written, am writing, will write. "It's yo' mama!" —Wicket W. Warrick, Star Wars Ep. VI: Return of the Jedi "That guy's wise." —Logray, Star Wars Ep.VI: Return of the Jedi Do You Wanna Date My Avatar? - Felicia Day (The Guild) |
