[Mothership] Help me flesh out a simple adventure idea

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I was hoping to run an intro game of Mothership over the holidays, but given that it's the holidays, I will likely only have one or two players available, and will probably want to put running The Haunting of Ypsilon 14 on hold for now and instead just test the new Mothership app's built in VTT with a very simple adventure. I'd love some help making this into a complete, if short, scenario for whomever shows up:

The player characters are passengers on the MNR colony ship Doherty, which is heading to Scargill-84 to set up a new mining colony.

The PCs awake from cryosleep months early and realize that they're not the first to do so: Others have woken up before them and have starved to death, some of them trapped inside locked cryotubes, while others have died from other cryotube malfunctions. Most of the passengers are still fine, though, and the ones who have died, as well as the PCs themselves, had all been secretly organizing unionization efforts before they left. Someone clearly found out and attempted to murder as many organizers as possible.

A more immediate danger is that food supplies are extremely limited, as colonists will be woken up in waves upon arrival at Scargill-84, with the first colonists setting up farming facilities to feed the rest of the miners. Player characters will need to either feed themselves, put themselves back to sleep without the benefit of cryosleep technicians or escape the ship to safety.

Any suggestions on when elements I should add to the ship to give players a chance? At the moment, I'm not worrying about putting any monsters aboard -- evil corporations and a ticking clock to dehydration and starvation seem like enough danger.

I'm mostly using this scenario to have PCs move around the map and see it appear on their Mothership app and make sure we all understand how to join games via the app, etc., but it'd be nice to have this little practice run function as a proper adventure and it'd be nice for the players whose characters survive and have a tiny reward for helping playtest.

 

[Richards]

I'll just point that given limited food aboard the ship (given the passengers weren't supposed to be awakened until the ship arrived), cannibalization is always an option - perhaps not for the PCs, but it may have occurred to those who were inadvertently awakened along with the PCs, and who don't want to chance it with trying to re-enter cryosleep without the experts available to ensure their safety. That would add an unexpected wrinkle in the PCs' stay aboard the ship, while they decide their next actions.

Johnathan

 

[Reynard]

Maybe there IS enough food, except that the bulk is located in a cargo bay that has suffered a breach (maybe it was sabotage, maybe just a natural impact). "Saving the food" as an optional goal might offer an interesting choice with some real feeling consequences, that doesn't necessarily overwhelm the entire rest of the adventure. There may or may not be hunger-mad previously released colonists guarding it. Or anti-union pinkertons ready to jettison it. Depending on how bad you want the bad guys to be.

Also, remember that hunger works as control only to a certain point, when desperation takes over.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I'm thinking there should be at least one NPC on board to interact with:

Sherman, an android cryosleep engineer who appears to be dormant for the voyage when he's first encountered, but there should be some sort of clues that he's been up and moving around -- and is responsible for the killings.

Not sure what the clues should be and the players would need to figure out how to use his knowledge to safely put them back into cryosleep without being worried that he'll just kill them once they're under. This isn't Alien: Romulus, where disc drives can be popped into an android's head and give them skills they wouldn't otherwise have.

 

[Reynard]

I'm thinking there should be at least one NPC on board to interact with:

Sherman, an android cryosleep engineer who appears to be dormant for the voyage when he's first encountered, but there should be some sort of clues that he's been up and moving around -- and is responsible for the killings.

Not sure what the clues should be and the players would need to figure out how to use his knowledge to safely put them back into cryosleep without being worried that he'll just kill them once they're under. This isn't Alien: Romulus, where disc drives can be popped into an android's head and give them skills they wouldn't otherwise have.

That's not "one MPC to interact with" -- that's the plot.

As to clues: maybe the crypsleep chambers are in areas completely inhospitable to human life until official waking procedures are engaged. Investigation will show that someone walked in, opened pods and murdered sleepers without turning on the broader life support systems.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

As to clues: maybe the crypsleep chambers are in areas completely inhospitable to human life until official waking procedures are engaged. Investigation will show that someone walked in, opened pods and murdered sleepers without turning on the broader life support systems.

So as opposed to the movie Passengers, the Doherty doesn't waste resources on making things habitable until necessary. That feels plausible enough for Mothership.

Maybe there's also a log of encrypted communications coming in periodically, when the union-busters back home identify more people who Sherman needs to kill.

 

[Reynard]

Maybe there's also a log of encrypted communications coming in periodically, when the union-busters back home identify more people who Sherman needs to kill.

Nice. I hadn't considered it as an ongoing thing but that makes sense:

Flight leaves. Company begins internal investigations. Pro union leaders are discovered. Assassinations ordered. More investigation. Ad nauseum.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Yeah, I need to have a reason why these union organizers aren't dead yet and getting periodic communications (one of the few good ideas in the mostly dopey Passengers) explains it.

 

[Reynard]

Yeah, I need to have a reason why these union organizers aren't dead yet and getting periodic communications (one of the few good ideas in the mostly dopey Passengers) explains it.

Light delay plus minimum wage investigation probably explains it well enough.

The other fun potential element is that the thugs doing the dirty work KNOW they are light years away and might get ideas on their own. The bosses said "eliminate" but maybe some would-be Capo thinks "slaves."

 

[overgeeked]

The thing I'm struggling with is the idea that there's enough food to feed a team of farmers for the months it would take to build a farm, plant crops, grow them, and harvest them...but there's somehow not enough food when the PCs wake up. Unless there's a whole lot of passengers awake or this is decades after when they should have woken up, that just doesn't add up.

I'd add something like intentional sabotage as something the PCs have to solve as part of your Survive, Solve, Save. Pick one. Sorting out what happened to the food could point to where it is now or why it's missing. This could also point to NPCs to interact with.

As mentioned above, cannibalism is always an option. Some of the other passengers that have already awoken could still be alive and onboard, eating the passengers they wake from cryo as the need arises. That would be monster enough.

Though generally it sounds like something of a slow burn. I'd crank that up. Like wake up from cryo with a cannibal on your throat. Maybe sacrifice an NPC for the visual as the PCs are waking up. Something went wrong and too many passengers were woken up at once instead of one-at-a-time for ease of dinner.

The PCs are immediately in the rough and need to solve something right now. Give them a little reprieve after the shock opener and let them gather their wits before properly digging in to the mystery of it all.

Could always be that the ship was boarded while they slept, that's why the food's gone. Or there are pro-union folks hiding in pockets of the ship and they've got the food. So there's a standoff between the union busters and the workers. The union busters have control of the cyro area and are using the sleepers as bargaining chips for food.

There are a lot of different ways to go. I'd suggest focusing on one or two things and building them out rather than trying to dog pile a lot of different things. Especially is this is mostly a partial group introductory one-shot game rather than a full group campaign starter.