New Sci Fi Setting Seeds

[Astromancer]

Cut Lex Luther a Check!

Well back when I was starting out. I just got my green and orange Jack O Lantern outfit, I was always fighting this guy with a freeze gun. I'd always use my combination of teleportation, illusion projection, telepathy, invisibility, and super luck, to flummox him. After a while, I got him to talk and found out he was actually a descent guy, just misguided.

So I started working on him. I'd rather reform a crook than bash them any day. I got him to see that there was more money in his invention than in crime any day.

He's married to a society girl now. Which is why I never say his old name. His mother-in-law hates being reminded of his past. Except when she needs the two of us to put on a show at a charity gala.

Basically, back in 1939, Jack O Lantern convinced King Cold to market his cold centered inventions. Half a dozen major tech villains followed suit in the next year.

This led to the USA having flying saucers in 1941. Both Tokyo and Berlin were being bombed from America by May of 1942.

After the war ended in early 1943, there was a rush to the patten office by both heroes and villains. It's 1945 and America has moonbases and is planning an exploration of Mars. Meanwhile, leftover dictators are desperately sending out spies to steal supertech secrets.

Basically, a very pulpy superhero setting with the actions of the heroes changing the world, or destroying it.

[jason taylor]

From the Traveller Universe

Operation Imperial Trust:

During the Russian Civil War on ancient Terra, the Reds formed a supposed conspiracy against itself to lure White sympathisers to be eliminated at the proper time. This elaborate operation was called The Trust.

Flash to "present" day (Emperor Strephon's reign). Outworld Corporation Import, Export, and Shipping advertises itself as a venture for trading beyond the borders of the Imperium. In fact that is what a number of customers, shareholders, and workers know it as. It's Black Account however features it as a company to support pirates. They provide underground chandlery to raiders. More importantly they are used to launder spoil including slaves into Vargr space.

However the Imperium has discovered this operation by tracing money and illegal activities back to the president of Outworld. At the suggestion of Imperial Naval Intelligence, the president is not to be arrested. Instead, inspired by the story of The Trust, Imperial Naval Intelligence arranges to "persuade" the directors to act as Imperial puppets. While this happens captains and sometimes crew of vessels involved with pirates are disappeared and replaced by friendly agents. The same happens to shore factors until the entire corporation is a zombie. At the same time ships commanded and often crewed by Imperial agents are sent to Outworld's former contacts in Vargr space. They are to spy out the land until it is satisfied that enough information is gathered. At that point the second phase, Operation Scourge, a series of punitive actions is to be launched. Whereupon the members of the Black Account are to be either disposed of or recycled into protection depending on their degree of cooperation.

The PCs are the crew of a tramp ship. What is not known to your customers is that they are also Imperial clandestine agents. Your job is to go to places where are recorded markets for illegal goods. In the process you are to bring back "samples" for intelligence evaluation. For this purpose you are authorized to purchase and manumit slaves (which brings the possibility of damsel-in-distress adventures). But you are to gather as much information while convincing contacts that you are in fact ethics deprived traders. You are armed for self-defense but are not to initiate hostilities until the trigger is pulled on Operation Scourge. You will of course be able to tell because of the number of Imperial battlefleets rampaging around with marines to sack corsair strongholds. In the event that Imperial forces have not arrived you will receive a signal from a courier whereupon you may plunder to your heart's content (goods with provenance shall be returned to the owners with a finder's fee, property of corsairs and their allies is simply forfeit and will be adjudicated as such in a prize court). If you miss the signal it does not matter. Intelligence is what the Imperium wants to support the fleets carrying out the Scourging.

[Astromancer]

The King was in his Counting House

We created a new Age of Chivalry and look what happens. The peasants have become Shirefolk, respectful to the king and all, but they have no respect for us nobles. Out of nowhere we've grown a new merchant class, and if they are grudgingly literate they are keenly numerate and quick to demand payment up front. And our witches and wizards are demanding to be called "Psions." Because "they get their own power, they don't consort with demons."

Now the king is setting up standards for " Accounting!"

I say we team up with the dragons and giants and stop things before we have democracy and modernity!

Basically, a colony of cultural recreationists is going through growing pains. Living your life as somebody else's fantasy of a Merrie England that never was, but should have been, can be a bore. Besides, that was great-great-great-great-great-grandfather's dream. You have your own dreams to live out.

Problem, even with an invented tradition, you can still get traditionalists. Many of these traditionalists want a civil war!

The PCs are a group of progressive nobles, merchants, church people, and Psions (witches and wizards) who seek both peace and free choice for all.

Meanwhile, the king is an idiot greed head who has sold the kingdom out to (your preferred threat here). So you find yourself fighting on two fronts.

Assume that groups like giants, gnomes, merfolk, dragons, etc, are products of TL12 biotechnology. Reread "Flight of Dragons" to figure how the dragons fly.

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

Assume that groups like giants, gnomes, merfolk, dragons, etc, are products of TL12 biotechnology. Reread "Flight of Dragons" to figure how the dragons fly.

You could also assume they're ultra-tech robots with synthflesh skin. Explains why they don't devastate the food-web.

[Astromancer]

Originally Posted by SilvercatMoonpaw

You could also assume they're ultra-tech robots with synthflesh skin. Explains why they don't devastate the food-web.

Agreed. There are so many ways to play it. But it always remains people tired of one game looking for another. Change is eternal, and often fun. Scary as hell, but now and then fun.

But the "Flight of Dragons" dragons, since they are living hydrogen balloons, have interesting properties. You might get a bang out of them.

[tshiggins]

Originally Posted by jason taylor

From the Traveller Universe

Operation Imperial Trust:


(SNIP)

I'd play in this one. :)

[Astromancer]

Utopia:some assembly required

We got to the new planet. The terraforming robots did a great job. All the tech performed to specs. The nanostasis systems were perfect. The problem is the jerks the brass sent us into deep space to colonize a planet with.

I get that every enjoys having a scapegoat, but do they ever ask themselves what it's like to be stuck in that role all your life, plus being the only people asked to act like adults?

Basically, this is a political game. You are part of a highly successful colonial project. Or it has been to this point. Now the participants demand that society be set up to their satisfaction.

Although many people have strongly suggested that the group has the numbers and resources to split up, and made arguments for diversity of communities, the majority want to establish a formal code and customs in a unified society. The conflict is that no one ideal has anything like a majority backing it.

The PCs must work for their choices and prevent violence and social breakdown.

[Astromancer]

The Tale of the Whip and the Bell

Society collapsed a couple of decades after the terraforming process was done. The colony's government had become authoritarian and rigid. They needed resources to build up the security forces to keep everyone in line. So they cut way back on education. That was dumb. They also made raising a family desperately hard. Mainly by accident. At one point people over sixty outnumbered everybody else and very few young people had technological skills.

That's when it all fell apart. We divided into several different groups. Some tech types, a small group, started teaching their skills. Remnants of the security forces built a dictatorship.

Now we have a military dictatorship facing off against a Technocracy. Normally I'd bet on the soldiers, but the technos do have drones and machine guns.

Basically, it's a war on a colony world. Most of the world is TL5 (Think 1790). But there are enclaves with up to TL9 and remnant TL12 items. This world is poor and badly organized.

The PCs could be from any of the sides. The war lords ( the Whip, for violent coercion), the Technos (the Bell, for regamintation and coercion through economic means), or any of the Anarchist or Social Democratic factions.

There has been no outside contact since the colony was founded. So help isn't likely to come.

[Astromancer]

The Merchants of Dawn

After the Plague Wars came the famines and poverty. Live started be something like predictable again. But all that could be predicted was drudgery, petty brutal wars, hunger, illness, and early death.

The men of religion said it was the will of God. That technology was a snare of the devil. The people remembered how the men of religion took money from the powerful to adjust the Word of God to the wishes of the powerful and didn't care to hear the Men of Religion talk.

Now news comes from the West. They say the Americans are back. More importantly, they've brought wonders with them. They've brought back electricity, medicines that work, and crops that don't need fertilizer and still grow vigorously, they even have flowers that drive away the insects that eat the crops.

The men of Religion say these are the snares of the devil. But the Men of Religion are paid to talk all day.

Society collapsed. The remnants of the power elites blamed things like technology, free speech, education, and human rights. That's to say, anything that weakened their control.

Now merchants from America are showing up with fabulous trade goods. Magnificent cloth, spices, medicines, and useful instruments like binoculars and miter boards. They also bring books, books that teach math, geometry, basic mechanics, and similar useful things. They have elegant comprehensive works on agriculture and medicine.

The American Merchants proclaim that America has fusion power generation, robots, and advanced biotechnology. That a new dawn of worldwide prosperity is possible. The people listen in hope, the elites listen in terror.

Basically, the PCs are American Merchants whose job is to announce that America is back and the world will change. Most of Eurasia and Africa are ruled by petty tyrants who look on the revival of civilization with terror and disgust. After all if life gets better who would put up with them?

The PCs want to spread knowledge and hope, their antagonists are mafiosos calling themselves kings who want to hold power.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

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Basically, the PCs are American Merchants whose job is to announce that America is back and the world will change. Most of Eurasia and Africa are ruled by petty tyrants who look on the revival of civilization with terror and disgust. After all if life gets better who would put up with them?

The PCs want to spread knowledge and hope, their antagonists are mafiosos calling themselves kings who want to hold power.

Or, and hear me out, those dictators will eagerly grab those products using them to both upgrade their military and secure the loyalty of their power base by improving their lives while denying the benefits to the disloyal.