Quote:
Originally Posted by David Johnston2
Because shipping large numbers of people into space with the resulting need to ship large amounts of air, water and plants is madness, even with an improved boost technology. At the same time however they simply don't have the technology to automate things all that much so we're pretty much stuck with the space opera paradigm. That's not a bad thing since space opera remains the best mode for gaming in space. Unfortunately good space opera requires a a threat and none exists.
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If we set aside the Democratic party line and view this as a science fictional utopia in the spirit of Heinlein's social-creditist
Beyond This Horizon, the characteristic conflict for a utopia is Man vs. Nature. (Obviously you don't have Man vs. Society, and utopian societies tend to minimize Man vs. Man and Man vs. Self). You could even hit the players with "The Cold Equations" (though when Heinlein presented that scenario in
Destination Moon, he had the other characters through all their surplus gear off the ship rather than have the radio operator stay behind, which is what I would expect player characters to do).