12-31-2018, 10:06 AM | #81 | |
Join Date: Jun 2017
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Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds
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EDIT: But that's just throwing out random personal preferences. |
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01-13-2019, 02:19 AM | #82 |
Join Date: Jan 2019
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Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds
Not the most original idea I know but I've been thinking about it a lot lately. This is a version that tries to merge Space with Infinite Worlds.
UNIC = United Federation of Planets Infinity Patrol = Starfleet ISWAT = Section 31 Centrum = Romulan Empire Timeline The exact timeline is still up in the air. I don't know what but something happened between 2020 and 2070 that effectively made the UN the world government in all but name. When Van Zandt gave them conveyor tech it was a small step to have UNIC become like the Federation. Homeline and Centrum current year is 2100 but dimensional travel was still discovered 30 years ago. They are TL8 with TL9^ shiftships. One year ago the interdimensional cold war turned hot when Centrum launched a massive sneak attack. Now fleets of the Patrol and Interworld duke it out in Hyperspace. Fighters and missiles are useful but are not the ultimate weapons. Infinity Unlimited doesn’t exist, all the corporation parts are handled by White Star Trading. This version of Homeline doesn’t have the same fear of psionics because early on they made contact with a peaceful parallel of near human psis (basically Vulcans). Conveyor Module When activating a Conveyor Module the shiftship vanishes from the world and reappears in Hyperspace. Hyperspace is a (mostly) empty void dimension that connects every world on a given Quantum. Getting to another timeline requires flying through Hyperspace to get to the correct hyperspace window then activating the Conveyor again. Traveling to different Quantums still requires a Projector. Projector A Projector is a large ring shaped station built in hyperspace that allows travel to another Quantum level. When charged it opens a portal. After a shiftship enters the portal it is surrounded a swirling bubble of energy. The portal closes behind it and the shiftship vanishes from that Quantum. Travel while inside this bubble takes time. I havn't nailed down how much time but for now changing one Quantum takes two weeks. Changing two Quantum takes four weeks. During the duration of the trip the shiftship is cut off from the rest of the multiverse. Being retrieved by a Projector works in a similar way. A shiftship waits at the coordinates and at the appointed time a portal opens. So far Projectors only function inside the hyperspace windows of Homeline and Centrum. Hyperspace Window Each world has a corresponding region in hyperspace where ships can enter and exit. Most have an average size with few larger or smaller. Homeline, and presumably Centrum, have an exceptionally large hyperspace window. Large enough to build many stations and Projectors inside them. Some worlds have tiny windows that makes getting to or from them like threading a needle. Superscience Homeline and Centrum are (mostly) Safetech cultures. Ships have force screens, artificial gravity, fusion power, the usual scifi weapons, and limited AI. There isn’t any FTL radio. EM communications work within short range but beyond that they are distorted and lost in the unique geometry of hyperspace. Fleets communicate with each other through fast courier ships. There are no transporters or replicators. Other Powers Transhuman is the Q3 timeline that replaces Shikaku-Mon as the current year world Homeline is afraid Projectors might function on. Caliph doesn’t have FTL travel but is building a machine beyond Neptune that looks like a Projector. The Cabal is still neutral and aloof. Reich-5 travels through dimensional airways instead of highways which are similar but located in the sky (like the bermuda triangle cloud tunnel). They have a unique gravity control technology. Their vehicles are all flying saucer or bell shaped. They are so far unaware of the war and Homeline desperately doesn’t wish to open a new front. Non-human shiftships exist but are limited to the same Quantum. Some are neutral or friendly. Some are hostile. Due to their difficulty in interacting with humans most are restricted in which worlds they can visit. Crossover (thanks David_Johnston2) is a group of supers that have some way to reach hyperspace and survive the vacuum. Could be Jumper, a power ring, a magic spell, or maybe a surfboard. Their base of operations is a giant shiftship called The Carrier. Crossovers main goal is to protect I.S.T. from outtime threats. So far they have not taken a side in the war. Anomalous Hyperspace Region These are areas where hyperspace behaves differently. Most crewmen call them nebula because they resemble false color images of nebula. Unlike the rest of hyperspace they have a Normal mana level or higher. Once inside them the anomalous effects impair ship system in various ways. Some possible effects are:
In most nebula spelljammers of the Cabal operate. Here their ships are on a level playing field with Patrol ships. Most nebula contain hyperspace windows that lead to fantasy worlds. A few nebula have a quantum sargasso effect. A shiftship that enters them has an almost impossible time leaving. The nebula that contains Yrth is an example of this. Living creatures as big as shiftships make their home in some nebula. Usually referred to as beasts, very little is known about them and they appear docile but there have been a few incidents where patrol ships were attacked. Campaign Frames There are multiple layers to the war.
Edit: One thing I forgot to mention about the Boxxers. They are not spies but sci-fi treasure hunters. Homeline has found a disturbing amount of timelines where humans have gone extinct in the 21st century. With the exception of Homeline, Centrum, and Transhuman there are no worlds where humans survive past the year 2075. Many of these now Hell Parallels were quite advanced before they burned out. It is in these dangerous ruins that Boxxers ply their trade of robbing dead worlds of whatever secrets they can. Last edited by Starship777; 01-13-2019 at 02:44 AM. Reason: additional details |
01-13-2019, 07:21 AM | #83 |
Join Date: Jun 2017
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Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds
Huh, is it just me, or do a lot of people want to keep as much of the original IW setting as they can?
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01-13-2019, 07:43 AM | #84 |
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
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Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds
There's a lot of useful and entertaining detail. It's flexibly enough designed that you can change a lot of the crunch without the fluff becoming implausible.
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01-13-2019, 12:50 PM | #85 |
Untagged
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Forest Grove, Beaverton, Oregon
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Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds
How can you create an alternate version of IW without keeping large amounts of IW?
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01-13-2019, 01:09 PM | #86 | |
Join Date: Jun 2017
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Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds
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Whereas if you read any of mine I do things like do away with parachronic tech altogether or dramatically alter the social structure. I thought the core concept of Infinite Worlds was all the different timelines/weird worlds, not Homeline. |
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01-13-2019, 01:59 PM | #87 |
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Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Forest Grove, Beaverton, Oregon
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Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds
I guess that's really an issue of what one considers the foundation of the setting and what are the secondary features. Those judgments would naturally vary.
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01-14-2019, 09:04 PM | #88 | |
Join Date: Jan 2019
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Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds
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Night Hunters Characters are the local guardians of a present day city. Through being chosen or some other process they have made it their mission to protect people. At night when the PCs go to sleep they are mentally projected to the Astral Plane. Here they watch over their fellow citizens on the lookout for Darkness. Darkness is a kind of spiritual sickness. A malaise of the soul. Once they find a victim they dive into that persons soul. Each persons soul contains an entire world. Sometimes the worlds are very much like our own. Sometimes they are vastly different. Historical worlds, fantasy worlds, sci-fi worlds, they are all unique to each individual person. These are not dream worlds like Inception or something. They are real and everyone living in them is real. When the characters first enter the world they materialize an appropriate body and equipment. Then they get to work. Somewhere nearby is a monster that is the cause of the Darkness. Either with detective work, magic, or psi they track down the monster and try to kill it. In the morning they wake up back in their own bodies. If the mission was successful the Darkness infecting the victim is gone. The PCs find themselves in the possession of a Crystal Shard. Sages know how to use these gems to make the Hunters more powerful. If they failed, either by being defeated, giving up, or running out of time that victim soon grows worse. The victim manifests mental or sometimes physical illnesses. In the worst cases they could die. Diving into the victims Soul World again gives the PCs a second chance but the monsters are now stronger and/or more numerous. This is an episodic Monster Hunters game with a rapidly changing backdrop. Each mission starts similar to a IW scouting mission as the characters try to get their bearings in an unfamiliar parallel world. Because MH is cinematic I would hand-wave some stuff like languages. I would try to make each game session last one in-game night. There are a few reasons for the separation between worlds.
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01-15-2019, 03:40 AM | #89 |
Join Date: Jun 2017
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Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds
That's interesting. It really does a good job of justifying IW adventures but also provides a secondary setting in the form of the outside world. And you could certainly adapt it into something like, say, a kitchen-sink superhero setting.
Last edited by SilvercatMoonpaw; 01-15-2019 at 03:45 AM. |
01-15-2019, 06:56 AM | #90 | |
Hero of Democracy
Join Date: Mar 2012
Location: far from the ocean
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Re: Alternate Versions of Inifinite Worlds
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Infinity is a very popular target for people to tweak. The mechanics are very solid, and the world remains familiar. But I think many people who run it feel like it lacks just a couple of changes, and this is the appropriate thread for that. A lot of my alternates were already discussed in the additional factions thread. One technology change I've recently been thinking about including in infinite worlds is making "jump windows": limiting the times when conveyors or even projectors can travel between one world an another.
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