So how did the PC's get the ship?

[genshou]

Plane Sailing came up with good rules for letting PCs pauperize themselves (see posts 19 and 21). This would be one way to get a starship at lower levels, especially if you go with the -1 Wealth = +2 check bonus system that I proposed.

 

[Psychotic Jim]

What if the intelligent ship abducts *them* and doesn't consider itself to be their ship but instead perceives them to be its crew/pawns/ambassadors?

 

[The Lemon Merchant]

What if the intelligent ship abducts *them* and doesn't consider itself to be their ship but instead perceives them to be its crew/pawns/ambassadors?

This is sort of along the line of what I am going to do. The party is going to find an intelligent ship that needs some work. As the party isn't skilled enough to fly it (though a couple of them can fix it) they are going to be at her mercy when it comes to getting anywhere.

 

[DnDChick]

QUARK!

For you young 'uns, I'm not talking about the character from Star Trek... I'm talking about Richard Benjamin's ill-fated, but hysterical TV show from the late 1970s.

Carl

Ahh ... dim but fond memories there ... Quark, the precursor to characters like Zap Brannigan from Futurama ... the Spock-like science officer Ficus ... Gene/Jean ... the cowardly robot Andy ... funny stuff!

Ahem ... sorry ... nostalgia fit is now passing ... sorry for the thread hijack.

 

[KRT]

I have a few suggestions that may also justify why its a party of 1st levels instead of just one.
1) the characters are part of a large corporation that has just been toppled by a rival or taken over by the feds. The soon to be ex-CEO issues an order to all staff to take everything not nailed down and hide it, wreck it, or lose it. The PCs may decide to steal the beer in the fridge or head to the landing docks and "lose" a small but easily overlooked scout ship or something equivalent.
2) they are part of a salvage crew that is working in a former battle zone. All the elements are available to cobble together a working ship if they have the expertise and the time to build it and hide it from their employers.
3) A crazy old hermit has need of the party to help him get some important religious artifacts from an ancient ruin. He then takes the item and the crew into his cave to show them what it is. The cave turns out to be a cargo bay of his ship. He traps the party there and lifts off intent on taking himself, the party, the item, and his ship into the sun as he's convinced that the item is evil and it's his calling to destroy it. The party must stop the crazy hermit. Hermit is either killed by the party, (or maybe kills himself and puts the ship on autopilot). The end result of a successful session is that the PCs will have a ship.

 

[Ralts Bloodthorne]

An interesting combination/variant, is the following:

Have the PC's be on the losing side of a fight early on, and retreat to a long haul "sleeper" ship. Set the early PL level at PL 6, but allow the PC's to be "State of the Art Badasses" with PL 7 cyberwear, nanites, genetic tweaking.

Once they get on the ship, have a nice harrowing escape to the jump point. The engines run at 2.25 C max, and the ship jumps "The Wall" and away they go. Unfortunately, the ship is preprogrammed to sail over 500 light years to a colony. There's NO way to undo this autopilot, it's hardwired in and everything.

So, the only choice is the cryo-bays.

Now, unknown to the PC's, as they sleep the sleep of the dreamless, tech progresses rapidly in the next 10 years, with new FTL drives coming out, and 50 years after they have entered sleep, slavers jack the ship.

The PC's wake up, cold and confused, suffering from cryoshock and sloppy awakenings,, to discover that slavers have taken over the colony ship. But, they don't recognise what the PC's have for capabilities, and let the fight ensue.

That lets them take a ship, legitimately by most legal standards, and off they go.

Not only do they have a new ship, but a new universe to explore.

 

[Imperialus]

I must admit I like the garbage scow idea. Heck you could have a few adventures just surrounding the PC's trying to repair and equip their "baby" not to mention all the patch jobs coming apart at just the wrong moment . I mean picture a group of PC's, collectively they've managed to buy a 100+ year old freighter, the engine needs a complete overhaul and parts are hard to find since the XJ746s sublight engine hasn't been made in 50 years, there are several crutial companants missing from the FTL drive, the computer is so antiquated that it bairly serves as a calculator anymore (think the computers they landed on the moon with) and the weapon mounts (if it has any) are missing the weapon part of the equation. The frame is solid though, it does have a large cargo bay, and in a hidden compartment they find some contraband that will help them finance the repair job. Most importantly though it's theirs.

 

[Vertaxis]

An interesting combination/variant, is the following:

Have the PC's be on the losing side of a fight early on, and retreat to a long haul "sleeper" ship. Set the early PL level at PL 6, but allow the PC's to be "State of the Art Badasses" with PL 7 cyberwear, nanites, genetic tweaking.

...and the leader of the PCs is known as Khan Noonian Singh.

 

[TheNovaLord]

In my last sci fi campaign..
Ship 1 finds a second ship (looks very advanced) at the edge of spatial anomaly. Some crew from 1 go over to investigate. Ship 2 looks quite hi-tech, some kind of stealth vessel. Distress call from the original ship 1 and it is destroyed by new spatial rift. Boarding crew from ship 1 now on ship 2 are 'the party', or in fact some of them. On board ship 2 they find a previously non activated synthetic (also a party member) and a wierd ethereal / dimensional creature trapped in this realm, who is very scared and lost (another party member). Ship 2 is called The Wraith. Long range sensors pick up two groups of ships heading this way, both very hostile factions form this disputed area of space.
Begin Campaign (with already large number of obvious plot hooks) with party in very special vessel, that they have no clue about and a party thrown together by circumstance...

JohnD

 

[Jack of Shadows]

An interesting combination/variant, is the following:

Have the PC's be on the losing side of a fight early on, and retreat to a long haul "sleeper" ship. Set the early PL level at PL 6, but allow the PC's to be "State of the Art Badasses" with PL 7 cyberwear, nanites, genetic tweaking.

Once they get on the ship, have a nice harrowing escape to the jump point. The engines run at 2.25 C max, and the ship jumps "The Wall" and away they go. Unfortunately, the ship is preprogrammed to sail over 500 light years to a colony. There's NO way to undo this autopilot, it's hardwired in and everything.

So, the only choice is the cryo-bays.

Now, unknown to the PC's, as they sleep the sleep of the dreamless, tech progresses rapidly in the next 10 years, with new FTL drives coming out, and 50 years after they have entered sleep, slavers jack the ship.

The PC's wake up, cold and confused, suffering from cryoshock and sloppy awakenings,, to discover that slavers have taken over the colony ship. But, they don't recognise what the PC's have for capabilities, and let the fight ensue.

That lets them take a ship, legitimately by most legal standards, and off they go.

Not only do they have a new ship, but a new universe to explore.

Whoa,

OK did you use to live in Toronto 'cause I played in this game. We ended up selling our sleeper ship to a museum in order to purchase a more contemporary one. Was a great game but only went a couple sessions before the guy running it moved away. I can't even remember his name. Great game though.

Jack