 November 16, 2014 - 11:27pm | Okay it is a theme in sci-fi, the crashed alien ship, or crash landing on an alien planet... (I even had a book as a child that was nothing but great sci-fi art of crashed spaceships with a story behind each one of them, I really wish I could remember the title and find a used copy today.) But they also appear in a lot of TSR's stuff... usually some poor unsuspecting fantasy setting gets crashed on. There are at least 2 crashed ships in Blackmoor, 1 possibly 2 in Grewhawk, and 1 for sure in Tale of the Comet... oh there are probably more. Ray-gun equals magic to primitives. So exploring the ideas: 1 or more planets with intelligent life (in a low tech stage of development) have had 1 or more spaceships crash with either similar or very different life forms on board. Possible ways to play it out in SF that I can see... It's your ship crashing, for example you got to deal with the issues like Blackmoor's FSS Beagle crash plus mutiny scenario, can you fix the ship, if you live? Or you could be off to City of the Gods on some mission either as primitives or as modern archaeologists. Classic something found under the rocks & dirt or frozen ice like the Thing or Expedition to Barrier Peaks... got to deal with the critter/s escaping the spaceship no one knew about... Aliens setting up colony on your world... Aliens have crashed too and need your crashed ship and will do anything to get control of it. It sort of depends how you want to play it, as a primitive people dealing with sci-fi alien stuff or as the advanced people dealing with crashing or occasionally finding a crashed ship. One perk to being the primitives in a setting is that could be part of a SF races history. There are some critters lurking in the pages of D&D that started as alien beasties too. I found this in Expedition to Barrier Peaks interesting: Plague! THE SPACESHIP Sometime else, a large exploration-colonization expedition of human origin was overtaken in the course of its journey by a deadly plague. In a vain effort to halt the spread of the virus, the modular sections of the vessel were sealed and then separated, each left to its own fate. The section concerned here was drawn through a black hole and spewed into the universe where the World of Greyhawk fantasy setting exists. Chance brought it to that very planet, and its computers and robotics brought it to an intact landing. This process, however, caused an earth tremor, and a landslide buried the ship section for several decades. Then a computer malfunction sent worker robots to a cargo hatch to discharge material, and when these robots found the hatch blocked by fallen earth and stone, they promptly cleared it and unloaded the requisite cargo - unfortunately for the inhabitants of the area, for the holds contained various alien fauna and flora, and the offloading freed these creatures from stasis. Some died immediately, some lived for a time, and a few species prospered and propagated. Recently, another earthquake uncovered an upper air lock, and the tremor caused the same computer malfunction, so the worker robots again cleared the lower cargo lock and periodically discharged more of the unwanted “goods”. Now obviously all the humans died in this scenario, and the ship was buried along enough time for no one to know about it... but this ship besides holding a host of alien critters could still harbor a plague not to mention cool dangerous technology. This could be reworked for instance into how the Blue Plague really started... an established colony is suddenly dealing with strange creatures not cataloged before, and soon a group of people is put together to investigate... Of course there are great plots from movies, Alien, The Vampire Planet, The Thing and more... Just musing on old stuff...  "Never fire a laser at a mirror." |
 August 10, 2016 - 12:10pm | So why are all these ship tucked nicely into orbit close to the brown dwarf? Well drown dwarf is obvious location to visit so most decel and that's when the klikk weapon fires and slags their engines. Although, the star wouldn't really be of all that much interest. So what if during its wanderings it grabbed and held on to a planet. The planet is really close- so that it actually habitable. It's probably tidally locked. Of course adding a planet significantly expands the adventure. What if the planet is the original home world of the heliopes? The klikk hulk then might not be a ship but a watch guard on the system. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
August 10, 2016 - 12:23pm | It's probably time for me to stop hijacking this thread and move Escape from Sarragasso to the adventure writing project. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
August 10, 2016 - 7:52pm | Good Hijack, excellent ideas. 50% of the time in sci-fi the damsel in distress is just waiting to kill her rescuers, just watched an oldy like that, sometimes to feed, sometimes to breed or a bit of both... the other 50% she really does need help. Watch an old soviet sci-fi where the space patrol finds a derelict ship of a design they do not know, so they investigate turns out to be an Earth ship from some unspecified time period (western capitalists) and they are trying to figure out how everyone died... murder (seems someone deployed a gas at the end)... but then they discover those old missiles, big as nukes really old... and they disturb them, then the race is on to get the hell out of there. In the movie the brave cosmoneaughts don't make it, and there friends a safe distance away watch them get vaporized. Anyway a who done it and why with then a need to escape or else might not be bad. "Never fire a laser at a mirror." |
August 11, 2016 - 8:00am | Maybe the damsel in distress is a literal "man eater" ;) Perhaps she was the captain of the other scout ship and ate the rest of her crew (except for the vrusk as they are an acquired taste). She started Reinhardt's crew on the cannibalism path but Reinhardt quickly decided she was not the type to play nice with others and relegated her to slave and eventually fodder status. So even if the PCs can offer her a return to the Frontier she, like one member of the Donner Party, has decided she likes the taste of human flesh. She could be a epilogic end to the adventure trying to kill a PC even while they are flying back to the Frontier. I would however drop clues on her if a PC with psych-social skill said they were evaluating her with the appropriate subskill. I also think it might be appropriate to include language in adventure where the referee had to roll d100 to see if she is a real damsel in distress or a threat 50/50. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 August 11, 2016 - 9:56am | Maybe the damsel in distress is a literal "man eater" ;) Perhaps she was the captain of the other scout ship ... Yes, the UPFS Donner... or the UPFS Hannibal Lector... Joe Cabadas |
August 11, 2016 - 9:57am | With the theme song for the adventure being Hall & Oates "Maneater." Joe Cabadas |
August 11, 2016 - 10:12am | LOL I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
August 11, 2016 - 10:39am | Thinking about using the planet called Cyclops from here. It's a dim world which matches a world orbiting a brown dwarf. Will add photosynthesis and plants are colored black. Still like the lightning rod bush idea but may change the details. Not committed to heliopes being from here but this makes sense if klikks left a defense station to watch over the system. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
August 11, 2016 - 10:48am | Added benefits are ruins on Cyclops, klikk facility, marrooned members of core four that escaped to here via escape pod. Since there is a disabled sathar cruiser in orbit there could likewise be a group of sathar here. All of these things are a plus for adventure. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
