Yeah. I’m pretty terrible about actually commenting on this puppy. I’ve had blogs in the past and invariably forgot about them for entirely too long.
Anyway, looks like the GURPS: Monster Hunters game is temporarily delayed as the Friday night GM (currently running Aces & Eights which is an … interesting system if a little flawed and half-baked in some places), and it currently looks like The Verge is back on deck. Because of course it is. So I’m back to doing what I can to get into that mindset, albeit with an intent to (ideally) be a bit more sandbox. The first adventure will be a little more railroady than I’d like, but there’s some setup required and I’m likely going to warn everyone beforehand. Beyond that, though, I’m going to be making a conscious effort to not be my usual GM self as I’ve got that storyteller approach which, sadly, trends toward railroad plots.
That said, I also like to have at least one subplot for each PC that I can touch on in sequence … but naturally, there’s one PC who is really tough to actually plan for. The best option is probably the last one – Embroiled in Legal Trouble – which looks like he used Admin to get around which, per RAW, “covers bureaucracies and administration of all sort, including the navigation of bureaucratic obstacles or disasters.” Hmm. Although looking at the original notes, I see that he owned 25% of a free trader and was thus getting Cr1000/year because of that … I suppose I could tie that in with the legal trouble somehow, like the ship was impounded or something and now he’s being pursued to pay it off? But that’s fricking boring, especially when compared to the other subplots I have in mind:
- Anya – might actually be a clone ala Portia Lin/Two from Dark Matter. Also, she just spent several years adventuring with the equivalent of a renegade Time Lord, even if her memory is all weirded out.
- Baefre – comes back from the otherside of the wormhole … different. He’s basically a Pariah from 40K so that makes him anti-psi. Also, he might have actually died over there and what they think is Baefre is actually a shapechanging alien who also thinks its Baefre.
- Ilik – might be the Prophet of the Shrike as it sometimes appears where he’s gone. He’s also now aware that his half-sister is one of the High Ladies of the Twelve Families.
- Korbin – might have been recruited by the duke’s daughter to secretly pave the way / act as recon for a system-wide equivalent of the Pirates of Drinax adventure. He might also have been chosen by her (for weird reasons) to eventually be her consort down the road.
- Rostya – is now aware that the SpaceFarer’s Collective seriously messed up his brain and everything he thinks he knew about his past is probably a lie. Or he’s going crazy. Six of one, half dozen of another.
So with those in mind, having Alexei’s subplot be “I’m being sued for crap that happened during character generation” kind of blows chunks. I suppose that I can be forgiven for not having worked him in as well as would like since the player joined us very late in the game, but it’s still really freaking irritating to not be able to easily come up with something. Although … stream of consciousness here, Alexei has a SOC of 11 (or B), which puts him pretty darned high in the social structure. In generic Traveller, that’s Knight level, which isn’t appropriate for the SpaceFarer’s Collective … however, he could theoretically be like the second or third son of a very prominent corporation within the SFC. Heck, he could be a cousin of the “ruling” family of that corp, not a direct family member! I’ve established the following about the corps that make up the Collective:
- Maas Industries Corporation (MIC) (21.5%)
- Columbia Aerospace (CAe) (16.375)
- Amalgamated Biotronics (AmBio) (13.01)
- Vosper-Babbage (VosBab) (12.72)
- Corone Mining (CMC) (10.36%)
- Tenzan Heavy Industries (8.09%)
- Kozmovot Tenno Tanjo, LTD (KTT) (7.915)
- System Technologies AG (STAG) (5.44)
- Iskellan Technology Solutions (IskTS) (4.59)
Presuming his family is in charge of one of these – let’s go with … System Technologies AG (STAG) since the name is pretty generic – what then? I’m planning on reintroducing elements from the Traveller Adventure, specifically the crashing of a starship owned by Akerut Lines which I can easily establish as being a subsidiary of STAG, with the A in the name standing for Akerut. So that right away should pique the character’s interest even if, like all the other PCs, he was actively abandoned to the gulag by his faction. And then I could theoretically have a member of his family discreetly reach out to him for some off-the-books assistance that inevitably leads to more mayhem and shenanigans. Hmm … I might finally have a subplot for him…