Help designing a Space Opera campaign via RPGs and Jungian Archetypes?

Way back in college (1981) I daydreamed the idea for a novel (that I never wrote) of a planet used for refuse - very much like what the world of H.O.L. is represented to be, but a serious world, not darkly humorous as is H.O.L. In many ways the movie Soldier with Kurt Russell fits this motif well as well. This was a habitable world, that had some flaw that made it less than ideal for settlement, so it became both a garbage world and a prison for the worst dregs of society. An orbiting station, along with armed satellites constantly watch the surface for any attempts to leave the planet or escape the atmosphere, then fighter craft are sent to disable or destroy the approaching escape craft. Prisoners are ferried in from various parts of the local star systems, processed aboard the orbiting station, then shuttled down to the planet's surface where they are "let go" to survive on their own on planet. The only vehicles on the planet are large earth-moving vehicles (for moving trash around) and ornithopters that cannot escape the atmosphere and very much resemble mechanical bot flies.

The premise for my novel was that some starfaring nation doing experimental research discovered a single cell lifeform, that when split through cellular reproduction, releases massive amounts of energy, like the splitting of an atom. The lifeform is very stable and difficult to create the circumstances that cause it to try to reproduce naturally, as they tend to stay in their unreproductive stage for years on end. The researchers were trying to find a way to weaponize such a lifeform, but it proved that the release of energy was too much to contain safely, so the experiments ceased and the specimens were sent to the garbage world for permanent disposal. Inadvertantly, another monocellular lifeform already deposited on planet is attracted to the high energy lifeform, surrounding it and able to contain the energy released. One of the researchers was close to discovering this other unique lifeform's capabilities when the project ended. Because senior members of the research facility had some grudge against this young researcher, they implicated him in a crime he did not commit, and was sentenced to the garbage planet.

The planet's inmate population exist on planet with no aid, nor control by the prison authorities - as long as they don't try to leave planet, they are left alone. Thus the population is divided into thousands of combat crime gangs, in a semi-feudal state. There is constant warring between these factions. The researcher inmate from the bio-weapons project has to survive on planet by joining one of the smaller combat gangs and make himself a part of that society. While on a scavenging mission, the researcher finds the container holding the energy lifeform, and with some years researching it again on planet, he discovers the other lifeform that naturally contains the energy form - and begins to experiment on weaponizing it, and even powering a starship built from the scrap found on planet. The researcher would first elevate his combat gang to be the most powerful, since they have the best weapons (as a result of his research). Eventually building a ship to attempt to escape and destroy the orbiting station.

I think I had just read Frank Herbert's Dune, and is where much of the inspiration for this premise - the creation of a new galactic army of prisoners under the researcher as emperor, with a bio-weapon and bio-engines to rule the galaxy.

I've thought about making this into a home game proposition.

At this time, I'm considering doing a map of an area of the garbage planet...

Thoughts?

Your bio-energy germ sounds like the Invid flower of life from Robotech. You should take a peek at that series for further inspiration. This sounds like a great setting, very gritty. Start writing the story, I recommend not shooting for a novel at first, just get the plot taken care of and set up the background. Then it can grow into something bigger. Any xenomorphs or supernatural phenomena in the setting? Maybe your energy germ can bestow psionic powers on people who get infected with it during one stage of the germ's development. The energy stimulates the brain, which can then transmit and amplify the energy to alter reality. Lots of possibilities in this setting...

fireinthedust said:

Jedi-centric vs. Cinematic: I don't understand how these are mutually exclusive. Wouldn't Jedi by default involve things like jumping from (space) trains, or (space) car chases, or (space) sword fights?

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I think I was referring to less the content itself, or role of the content, and more to the resolution in play. Savage Worlds very much assumes the use of miniatures and tactical tabletop combat, though it's nowhere near as rules-heavy and precise about it as D&D 3 / PF or 4e. I'd say Savage Worlds is about 1/3 as complicated in play as those systems, but still fantastically supports combat-driven narratives, while providing good to very good out-of-combat mechanics.

Fate, on the other hand, is very much more about theater of the mind resolution, abstract combat, and with deep support for social conflict. In both systems you can have Jedi wandering about ancient ruins, flying around in spaceships, walking tightrope across narrow steel girders, etc., it's just that in Savage Worlds the focus will be more on the player tactical choices, and expressed through playing an encounter on the grid, while in Fate it'll be more focused on the inherent character motivations and how they fit into the world.