Brainstorming a “Kitchen Sink“ Sci-Fi campaign

[Dannyalcatraz]

Some things are starting to coalesce.

1) I’m going to have at least one mechanical species. They will look a LOT like the spheres from the Phantasm movies. Behavior TBD.

2) There will be an organization of freelance “paladins” with lost tech (like monofilament swords), not innate powers.

3) Psi will be a thing, but mostly low-moderate strength. Truly powerful psi will be rare.

4) there will be some kind of lawless “badlands”

5) Gates will be the main mode of rapid long distance travel (which will contribute to #4 above)

 

[Eltab]

The "paladins" swear an oath similar to the IRL Hippocratic Oath: obsolete gods fill in for "the greater good" and "all persons". One of their legacy inspiring documents is "Keep the Flame" from Traveller's Regency Sourcebook. Pull from IRL George Washington's Rules of Civility for day-to-day rules of conduct, and the IRL Benedictine Code for their (at least in theory) organization.

A "fallen paladin" - which should be rare but known to happen - can be confronted personally, via his proclaimed moral code, and/or with organizational discipline.

Unfallen paladins are favored troubleshooters for overstretched law officers in / near the Badlands Sector. They do not function the same in well-ordered society.

 

[dragoner]

Takes Notes

A lot of good info in here.

We did kitchen sink sci-fi in the past by having multiple universes, and a fallen multi-universe empire. I think though basically doing a lot of planets such as from the Gaen Reach or Dumarest, can work as well.

 

[Zardnaar]

How familar with the game Stellaris are you? It's sandbox but there's ancient ruins, wormholes, star gates etc. There's 3 ascension paths.

1. Bio adaption.
2. Psionic
3. Synthetic

It pays tribute to a lot of sci fi from Trek, Dune, Star Wars, Mass Effect, Stargate etc.

The old D6 engine from Star Wars went open source years ago. You could overhaul that rather than build from the ground up.

Mass Effect has 3 basic classes.

Biotics.
Think psionics.

Soldier
Combat wombat

Tech Specialist
Basically an expert.

The other classes are essentially multiclass versions of the above 3.

Mass Effect Wiki

 

[Zardnaar]

I used this briefly for some small games. Layouts not great.
DriveThruRPG.com

I didn't put to much though into it but they landed on a planet best described as tank world and basically played World of Tanks the RPG.

 

[Zardnaar]

Some things are starting to coalesce.

1) I’m going to have at least one mechanical species. They will look a LOT like the spheres from the Phantasm movies. Behavior TBD.

2) There will be an organization of freelance “paladins” with lost tech (like monofilament swords), not innate powers.

3) Psi will be a thing, but mostly low-moderate strength. Truly powerful psi will be rare.

4) there will be some kind of lawless “badlands”

5) Gates will be the main mode of rapid long distance travel (which will contribute to #4 above)

Maybe the gates are starting to break.

D6 septimus kind of does this but the campaign is in a Dyson sphere.

 

[MarkB]

If you want a bit of fantasy/horror in your setting, the old Tom Baker era Doctor Who episode State of Decay had a unique take on vampires. The Great Vampires who were the progenitors of the curse of vampirism that was inflicted on the peoples of many worlds were not themselves humanoid, but were massive bat-like creatures with biological spaceflight capabilities who invaded our universe millions of years ago. They had immense regenerative capabilities making them all but invulnerable unless their heart was completely destroyed, shrugging off the energy weapons that most species used in space combat at the time.

The Time Lords battled them in what was known as the Eternal War, only defeating them once Rassilon developed the specialised vessels known as Bowships which could fire massive physical projectiles capable of destroying a Great Vampire's heart in a single direct hit.

So basically you have massive vampiric beasts spreading their curse on a planetary scale in order to harvest the blood of entire populations, and you still need to kill them with a stake to the heart, but in this case the stake needs to be about the size of a skyscraper.

 

[Fenris-77]

I would almost certainly add some form of religion to the mix. Maybe with a nod to Warhammer 40K or the apocalyptic cults in the Alien franchise. It's a pretty predictable human response to aliens and certain kinds of tech, and it opens up a huge range of hooks and story arcs, plus it can add some useful frisson to a party.

 

[Nobby-W]

I would almost certainly add some form of religion to the mix. Maybe with a nod to Warhammer 40K or the apocalyptic cults in the Alien franchise. It's a pretty predictable human response to aliens and certain kinds of tech, and it opens up a huge range of hooks and story arcs, plus it can add some useful frisson to a party.

I have a soft spot for A Canticle for Leibowitz (read if if you haven't - it's aged quite well) and have often put old-school Terran religions into 'verses - space Catholicism, space Islam, space Buddhism etc. Actually hanging out in a Catholic country (Italy, Malta, Ireland) puts it in your face with Catholic imagery all over the show. Islam is like that as well - In Jakarta at sunset the bats come out and the mosques all start up and you know you're not in Tunbridge Wells anymore. There's also a lot of Islamic imagery in the popular culture of Indonesia, although they're way more liberal about it than Middle Eastern countries.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

How familar with the game Stellaris are you? It's sandbox but there's ancient ruins, wormholes, star gates etc. There's 3 ascension paths.

1. Bio adaption.
2. Psionic
3. Synthetic

It pays tribute to a lot of sci fi from Trek, Dune, Star Wars, Mass Effect, Stargate etc.

The old D6 engine from Star Wars went open source years ago. You could overhaul that rather than build from the ground up.

Mass Effect has 3 basic classes.

Biotics.
Think psionics.

Soldier
Combat wombat

Tech Specialist
Basically an expert.

The other classes are essentially multiclass versions of the above 3.

Mass Effect Wiki

I don’t know Stellaris...or, for the record, any other major sci-fi CRPG of the past 20 years.