[OCC] Strange Neighbors

[ericthered]

Welcome to Strange Neighbors, a space campaign.
Yes, we are still recruiting!

Strange Neighbors will follow humanity's first FTL vessel to leave the solar system, as it embarks on its voyage of discovery.

Players in Strange Neighbors do not play only one character: They play two main characters. This is because the commanders of ships shouldn't be part of landing parties, and because scientists usually make terrible soldiers. The characters should be separated in three ways:

one is 200 points, the other is 150.
one is a leader and decision maker, while the other is on "the front lines". This could simply mean they are the ship's drive actual engineer, and have no time to boss idiots around.
they should be in two different departments. Don't be the Military chief and one of the soldiers.

additional minor characters may be assumed.
the disadvantage cap is functionality on the ship. Thats my call. You need to be reasonably able-bodied and sane. Of course, Scientists and diplomats can push able-bodied, and soldiers can push sane.

I am making the following promises:

The campaign should have the following:

• Moderate TL9/10. Somewhat safetech: cybernetics and genetic manipulation are a big deal, and nanotech requires sensitive conditions. There is no AI, and hooking your brain to electronics is beyond a career choice.
• Aliens are promised! These will be quite alien, and will require both diplomacy and combat.
• No psionics, nor magic other than a FTL warp drive. sorry. there is one other aspect of "superscience" out there, but its not game-changing or magical.
• Lots of time in space. Teams will only rarely land on planets, though astroid and comet landings may be common
• Lots of Space Junk: this version of space is full of stuff we can't see. There will be a lot of that.

While I own UltraTech and BioTech, these are not primary sources for the campaign, and not necessary (We'll be using tech with finer detail in one spot). Space is nice, and some characters ought to have spaceships, but all that is really needed is The basic set.

Players can be any Character that would be found on the ship. The following are suggestions and character that will exist, PC or not:

Chief Navigator
Military Chief (they have one separate from the captain, fluff him as you will)
Outpost director (leads those who will be establishing a post at alpha centari)
Chief of Mining (associated with the outpost)
Resident Full Cyborg (essentially no body, can use drones to "act" and can quickly acquire temporary skills. Only a few on board).
Head FTL Scientist.

List of Characters:
samd6: Von Galbiso, Hydroponics Boss
samd6: Kendal Ojeda, Pilot
Poonbahbah: Dewey C. Howe,Head Mechanic
Poonbahbah: Lieutenant Qwendolyn "Qwen" McKay,Space Infantry
Dorin Thera: Captain Nathanael Crewey
Dorin Thera: Linguist Dr. Abigail Crewey
Lamech: Andrew Blackwing, Warp drive engineer
momothefiddler: Charles Henry Adair, Outpost directory
momothefiddler: Dmitri Khaslik, Ice prospector

Lamech has promised me a doctor.

[ericthered]

Basic Setting: History

In 2098, Robert Wood either invented or stole the engine that the world would come to know as the "Wood Drive". It was essentially a primitive Alcubierre drive. While the technique technically allowed FTL travel, the wood drive was limited to about .01c. Which while not practical to travel the stars, turned the world of humanity on its head. Wood managed to keep the drive secrete for long enough to build an economic empire by "happening" to discover blacked out asteroid after blacked out asteroid. By the time the rest of the world figured out what Wood had, he could sustain himself in space without assistance from earth.

When The governments on earth (the big ones today are still around) discovered what Wood had, they declared it state property in the name of national defense. Wood, who was prepared for this, demonstrated his absolute tactical superiority in space and denied the governments of earth the plans to his drive. He seized the orbital stations and their valuable nanofactories (which only work in free fall). And proceeded to blackmail earth into some very one-sided trade agreements. Immigration was one way only, and a very intentional brain drain on earth.

By the time earth finally figured out how the drive worked, Wood had built a civilization on the asteroids and comets of Sol. He had programs piloting cybernetics and human genetic engineering. If the nations had come at him with only the drive, they would have failed. Instead, they had a variant on the drive that forced conventional engines to be used, but was much slower itself. They began a bloody war, and in the end Wood was dead, and his empire scattered. Many of the "spacers" had maintained fairly earthly lifestyles, and where welcomed into the fold of humanity.

The military machine of Robert Wood had made heavy use of genetically engineered soldiers and cybernetics. They where all hooked up to a network from birth, and could be taken over by the heads of their divisions at any time. As IAH forces uncovered labs where the breakthroughs were achieved, they became more and more convinced their opponents where no longer human. The title of "Humanity" made as a gesture to invite Robert and his followers to join, became a mark of rejection, of what they were not.

The others migrated out, gained many of the weapons used against them, and became much more miltary in outlook, surviving to fight the IAH to a stand still.

The IAH is no longer as strong as it once was. The enemy has been driven back to areas that were unobservable a hundred years ago. The great nations have been kept from space, unable to expand, as many of the habitats and colonies joined as allies. Earth his crowded, and despite the unlimited energy offered by Hydrogen Fusion, crowded and facing social issues. Their best and brightest are on habitats in space, or at worst, no longer human.

[ericthered]

The Ship

The Honor of the Earth

The Honor of the Earth is the first full size FTL vessel built by humanity. It is over 2,000 feet long, though it is also quite thin in most places. Its SM is +14

There are 15,000 passengers who intend to stake an outpost on the star, a military force of around 1,500 who are sent to protect them, and a crew of around 1,000. You are the Leaders and heroes of this crew.

The Honor of the Earth Belongs to the IAH, and is crewed by its agents. Loyalty to your home nationality is expected. Official Languages of the Ship include English, Mandarin, Spanish, Hindi, and French. Unofficially, everyone but the French speak English. Military Units are attached to specific nations, rather than the IAH, and use their local language.

The purpose of The Honor of the Earth's mission is to reestablish space superiority in the eyes of its members, by being the first to explore and establish an outpost on another colony.

[Dorin Thorha]

I'm thinking of making both a linguist/diplomat type and a grizzled military type. However, I'm not sure which of these should be my front-liner. A few questions:

Is the front-liner the 150 point character, while the leader is the 200-point character? Or the other way around? Or do we get to choose?

What cinematic advantages are available? Daredevil? Wild Talent? Danger Sense?

What does IAH stand for?

[Poonbahbah]

I've decided I'm interested and have the working of a pretty darn good chief engineer up and running at 150

Could you please give us a better idea of what tech is at what TL, as well as main TL. I assume 9 with 10 in a few areas but would like more description please.

Also what kind of gear should frontline troops expect to have? I was kind of hoping to make a battlesuit trooper/space marine.

Edit: I'm going to guess it means something like interstellar alliance of humans.

[Talosian]

Thinking full cyborg so far.

Following Dorin Thorha's questions, are Wildcard! skills kosher? (I'm fond of using them to avoid ridiculously long skill lists.)

[Lamech]

This looks really cool, so good job! I think I'm getting in too many games as it is... although one of them might be about to fail so I might throw a character up.

If I do is gadgeteer kosher? (And more generally how would inventing work with the safe tech/split TL?)

[ericthered]

You can choose which one gets the 200 points and which one gets the 150.

The IAH stands for the International Alliance of Humanity. It claims to represent humanity, mostly by claiming that those outside of its jurisdiction aren't human. (and for the most part, those people are cyborgs, genetically engineered, or both, and are a little fuzzy on this "human rights" concept. and aliens, but you haven't met them yet).

The game isn't too cinematic. Wildcard! skills shouldn't be needed because you have your buddy for the odd problem, so no, sorry. Danger sense is fine, and daredevil is tolerable. Gadgeteer (25 point version) is perrmissable, but you need to have the other science skills to back it up. In all honesty, It will mostly be used to reverse engineer alien tech. It could also be used to combine existing tech to create new stuff that is useful for specific missions.

Technology: this is a funky situation.
First off: battlesuit trooper is the standard infantry of the setting. I am not using UT armor. The battle suits are as follows:

name core/limbs ST
Flexible (no skill required) 18/6 as user
Light 45/15 user+5
Heavy 60/20 25
Full (-1 to all DX) 75/25 30

you can harden the armor by dropping the armor to 2/3,1/2,or 1/3 full DR.
forget the cost, your patron covers that. The Suits have actual muscles built into them and electric ATP regenerators.

Weapons: You'll be using lasers and conventional bullets, the artillery will include x-ray lasers that are non standard (1/5 laser damage, armor divisor 100). Any TL9 conventional guns are legal. For Lasers....

weapon damage acc range
light pistol 1d 3 200/600
heavy pistol 2d 4 400/1200
carbine 3d 6 1400/4200
standard 4d 6 1600/4800
Heavy 5d 6 1800/5400
Massive 6d 6 2000/6000
Emplacement 10d 6 3000/9000

Rcl is 1, ROF is 2, armor divisor is 2
a fast weapon does half damage per shot but shoots 3 times as fast
a heavy weapon does double damage, has +2 accuracy, double range, and shoots a third as fast.
a Crystal based laser shoots ammo twice as fast for -1 accuracy. its usually used.
you can also use traditional firearms with this table, which have half the short range and double the long one, a ROF of 3, recoil and do double damage.
I hope that wasn't painful.

[ericthered]

Might as well post Cybernetics publicly. This is not neccessary for anyone other than cyborg characters, who are divided pretty cleanly into light and full cyborgs. Cyborg Characters should probably take social stigma, especially the light cyborgs.

The following attributes are the common cyborg additions. Anything other than these should be an artificial limb or discussed with me before hand.

all traits have two numbers given, one where electrical is considered a temporary disadvantage, 
and another where it is considered to be calculated elsewhere.

Complete Radio Connection [12/10] 
This connection represents not just a radio connection, but the ability to receive and send
 extreme amounts of information without distraction. Link Formats are considered languages, 
and must be learned.
Tellink (radio, racial (those with same link format)-20%, video+40%) 

Possession [70/54]. (full only, not alone)
This represents the ability to use a drone. The ability to use a specific drone is by skill, 
and the character does not necessarily own the drone. Any given drone has its own piloting skill, 
and physical skills are usually unique to drones.
Possession (digital -40%, mindlink only -40%, telecontrol +50%).

Commputer access [15/12]
This is an extremely common modification, found in almost all cyborgs. 
It is one almost instinctively developed, and is the result of having 
instant, constant computer access. 
Intuitive Mathematician 
Photographic Memory 

Skill chips:
These chips allow the use of skills that would not otherwise be usable. The points paid for are not
 the physical chip, but rather the ability to use the skill. The skill on the chip can be changed quite quickly
 through downloads, but familiarizing a mind with the skill takes time, although it is still a massive time saver. 
Modular Ability (preparation time 1hour -50%, skills only-5%, based on chip) 
4 points = [8/11]
8 points = [14/19]
12 points=[20/27]
16 points=[26/35]

Cyber-Simulator: [-140/-120] (full)
This represents the disadvantages of entering the cybernetic world. They are not 
simply limited to one's own body being stationary, but involves a complete rewiring 
of most of the body's systems. Many cyborgs never leave this state, remaining on
 life support from the moment they enter the  digital world. Those who return to their 
walking selves often retain quirks from the two types of life they are able to maintain. 
It has been noted that the cyber simulator is the ultimate torture machine, if placed 
under the control of another, almost every aspect of a person's senses may be manipulated. 
Sessile (mitigated) [-50]
No Fine Manipulators (mitigated)[-50]
Increased Life Support (massive)[-10]
Restricted Diet (saline solution)[-10]
Electrical  (switch that may be turned on) [-20]

Cybernetic Hookup: [105/81] (full, not alone)
This represents the ability to master drones and the basics augments of a cybernetic society.
Possession [70/54]
tellink [12/10]
computer Access [15/12]
Skill chip 4 [8/11]

Machine-Bound Operator: [-35] (full)
This describes Cybernetic persons who live their entire lives on life support, never learning to walk or feeling the breeze.
CyberSimulator [-140]
Cybernetic Hookup [104]

Plugable Operator [42]:(full)
This describes a person who, while able to enter the digital world, can still walk and talk.
Possession(temporary dissads: sessile, No manipulators) [20]
tellink [12/10]
computer access [15/12]

[Dorin Thorha]

Ok, initial character concepts to check compatibility with the GM and other players: I'm thinking of playing a husband-and-wife team (or maybe brother-sister if the difference in their skillsets strains credibility). One will be an academic with linguistic and diplomatic abilities, ideal for making contact with and learning about new races, and the other will be a military character, who will be more "leader" than "space marine" (he will have combat skills, but more important will be his tactics and leadership abilities). I'm still not sure which of these will be the front line and which will be the decision maker. Both characters could fit both roles quite well with minor tweaking, but right now it's looking like it will be better for the military guy to be the captain as that role is still empty, so I will probably build the other as more of the "run after the artifact and get the away team into trouble" type rather than the lab scientist type.