Greetings,
People on the list were looking for some plot ideas / modules which GM's
had used. The following is a description of an adventure I had drawn up
for my first game using the TNE rules. I have played and GMed CT and MT
since 1979, mainly CT since I didn't see a copy of MT until 2 years ago.
Were I live (Darwin, in the Northern Territory of Australia) got it's
first gamimg supplies store about 2 years ago. It can be hard to keep
track of changes when living in the middle of nowhere. Anyway adescription
of the adventure.
The adventure plot:
It is based on a planet in an expanded system which is not the primary
planet. The characters are being offered the job to investigate the
planet for the RCES. All the details known about the planet is that any
ship reported as going there have never be sighted again.
The details I used to make the characters accept the mission is a promise
to waiver the mortage fees on their ship for the duration, and a cut on
any goods found. The RCES also reminded them that the government owned
a portion of the lease and the mortage.
The trip to the planet was fairly uneventful, mainly because I didn't want
to do space combat until I had Brillant Lances.
The situation on the planet was a team of psionic rebels had siezed control
about 70 years ago. Once in control they had set them selves up as gods and
had psionic priests in control. These priest ran the planet through the power
of psionics. Any member of the planet's population with psionic abilities
was immediately inducted into the priesthood. Mean while the original psionic
rebels where using the low berths in their grounded ship to extended their
lives.
The need to keep the low berths going meant they need spares. To obtain these
spare they where luring ships to land and capturing them. The method used
was similar to a virus attack. The people below would welcome the starship
and transmitt the coordinates in binary. A psionic using computer empathy
would enter the ships computer during the link and attempt to disable the
ships enviromental controls.
People on the planet are either rich, powerful psionic priests or peasants.
Some people amongst the lower class are staging a rebellion, and need off-world
assistance. Also the priests speak normal Galanglic while the peasants speak
a dialect of galanglic. To understand a peasant a character needs to make
a difficult skill check against linguistics.
The adventure was for the characters to land at the starport, be meet by the
High Priest, and invited to dinner. At the dinner a rebel waiter drops a
contact note on a napkin to the Off-world(character) leader. The note
is writen the local dialect. From this point the PC's should contact the
rebels and try to overthrow the priests.
I am little bit sketchy at this point as the adventure didn't quite get
this far. This is how the adventure ran. When the characters equipped them
selves they all brought comabt armour with psionic shields. The people I
play with are a little bit paranoid. Also the RCES assigned to them a Hiver
computer specialist.
When the PC's made contact with the planet they feared a virus attack. They
used a hand computer to receive the coordinates. During the
transfer they noticed the virus like attempt and broke the connection.
The PC's decided to land at the starport anyway and did it without to many
problems.
After meeting the High Priest they decide to send some people to the dinner
and leave some to guard the ship. They also noticed the other captured
ships at the starport. There where many plans made to steal one of these
ships.
At the dinner everything was going fine until the rebel waiter dropped the
note. The PC leader failed his linguistics role and couldn't read it. He
then gave the note to the High Priest and asked for an interpretation. The
High Priest claimed the note was for a meeting of a sexual nature with the
waiter.
Mean while the PC's on the ship went investigating the other ships. They
dodged the guards left to keep an them safe. (Some of the population was
xenophobic). All of the ships they looked at where gutted of vital
components, making them unspaceworthy. As they where leaving a hanger, in
which one of the ships was stored, they encounter some natives. The natives
where disabled with tranq rounds and hand-to-hand combat.
Unfortuately they attracted the guards attention, who come over to investigate.
The PCs tried to bluff there way out, (I can't remember the extact
unbelievable line they used). The guards where looking for an excuse to bring
more equipment and personnel into the area to attack the PC's ship. So they
lied and agreed to the PCs story.
Back at the dinner the PC's were asked to stay for the night in the palace
for discussions on trade in the morning. After entering their room the PCs
decide to leave and had called up the ship's air raft to pick them up.
Just before the air raft arrived a rebel entered their room. The rebel was
in the middle of telling his story when his was killed by a psionic assault
attack. A psionic priest then burst into the room, just as the air raft
arrived. All the PC's in the room except one ran for the air raft.
The one remaining PC tried to take on the psionic priest, missing. The priest
then stunned the PC. The others opened fire from the air raft using a
7mm Rotary Gun. The stunned PC was in the burst area but the others didn't
care. The player on the gun fired five fifty round bursts at the priest.
The priest disappeared under about 60 to 100 dice of damage. The stunned PC
took about 10 stray rounds but his comabt armour saved him from any serious
damage.
We didn't continue after this as one of the players went away for about 3
months, and I haven't had the time to continue since he got back.
- --
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* David Hoey * Computer Science, Northern Territory University *
* [email removed] * Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia *
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