Space... Horrrrooooooor!

[kiznit]

Hey folks!

So we'll probably be finishing up the Red Hand of Doom campaign that I've been DMing in a month or two, and then we've agreed to do a few round-robin one- or two-shots before starting up the new campaign. I'm excited to play in the games that my players are bringing to the table, but I'm also excited about the one-shot I get to run. After some pondering, I've decided it's all about the Space Horror.

Rulesets:

• D20 Modern
• D20 Future
• D20 Future Tech
• D20 Cyberscape

Inspirations:

• Aliens (of course)
• Metroid
• Doom
• The Thing
• Event Horizon
• Solaris
• StarCraft

Some basic ideas of where I'm coming from. PCs are a military-trained group of soldiers that's part of a free mercenary company, probably. I like the idea of them drop-shipping onto a freezing ice moon or asteroid. Bad conditions, limited visibility, possibly blizzard-damaged landing craft, etc.

[imager]http://img238.imageshack.us/img238/9516/84770wv6.jpg[/imager]PCs explore some complex/cave/mine/installation or something because of unusual heat signatures and perhaps missing miners/colonists/macguffin. Freezing ice and snow give way to massive fungal growth and bubbling organic ooze.

Fight some monsters. Find some clues. Venture deeper. I like the idea of the skulking cyst from Libris Mortis - definitely want to get that in there:

It's a one-shot. So I need some initial clues/ambience/encounter, some looser middle exploration/traps/plot development, then finish up with something big, bad, sinister and gross. Any ideas and help? What's the macguffin? Should I go alien or supernatural (I'm learning toward a little of the former but ultimately concluding with the latter)?

 

[Committed Hero]

Have the thing be a technoorganic creature, that has infiiltrated the computer systems of the place. So when the facility's computer is booted up, it starts to mess with the team - anything from venting areas to vacuum to using the traditional noises and ghost lights of a haunted house. The Maguffin can even be data stored in the computer - the location of some magnetic monopoles to extract or something.

 

[Johnny Angel]

Those 12-to-Midnight horror adventures look like they'd adapt well to science fiction (except where there's just a ghost, I believe), but since they also come in Savage Worlds versions, I thought I'd probably want to give the guy around here running Deadlands Reloaded first crack at them. So, I haven't got them to look into. But I'm thinking you might find something there to suit you.

 

[kiznit]

Thanks for the tips, guys!

So... we have an ice base located in a frigid moon/asteroid. The macguffin... let's call it some data in the central core computers. Either that or the PCs are bounty hunters and are chasing someone who is chasing the data, perhaps.

This individual or the base has been infected with a xenovirus that mutates like the alien out of "The Thing". It has been pulling spores and other organics out of the canned air in the abandoned base and turning them into a biomass that is slowly taking over the station, its core centered around the warm radiation bleeding from the dead reactor, generating its own bioheat in the process.

That's the alien part.

The supernatural part? I really like Hero's idea of that being something based in the technology. A "Ghost in the Machine" sort of thing, "The Dark heart of space". Maybe come up with some clues for why the HAL-like AI computer has flipped out and is essentially attempting to create necrotic "negative energy" life forms.

I also need archetypes for the PreGen PCs. What works for a good, diverse, commando squad?

Maybe something like:

• "Tank" Burly guy in heavy armor and plasma weaponry
• Xenobiologist and medic
• Melee fighter
• Charismatic Leadership Role
• Technosavant and Engineer
• Sniper/Weapons specialist

Any others people could think of?

 

[Johnny Angel]

Play System Shock 2. That ought to give you ideas. It's got the rogue AI, cybernetic zombies, psionic monkeys, mutated beasts. If you can't get ahold of a copy, you can simulate the experience. Put one hand on your keyboard and the other on your mouse. Now start crapping your pants.

If nothing else, you may wish to look online for tunes from the System Shock 2 soundtrack. Just the kind of atmosphere you're looking for.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Some ideas for potential refinements:

So... we have an ice base located in a frigid moon/asteroid. The macguffin... let's call it some data in the central core computers. Either that or the PCs are bounty hunters and are chasing someone who is chasing the data, perhaps.

This individual or the base has been infected with a xenovirus that mutates like the alien out of "The Thing". It has been pulling spores and other organics out of the canned air in the abandoned base and turning them into a biomass that is slowly taking over the station, its core centered around the warm radiation bleeding from the dead reactor, generating its own bioheat in the process.

Make the setting a hollowed out asteroid generation/sleeper ship headed for a distant star that was knocked off course by a collision with another asteroid...or better yet, a biotech alien probe. (It could even be a cosmic-ray induced mutant stowaway/livestock/science experiment that escaped into the deeper workings of the ship.)

Like the Star Trek Nomad/VGER storyline, the alien probe tries to repair itself with what resources are on hand...and what is on hand are the ship's conscious crew and the colonists in deep freeze. Why is this better? Because you have the potential to have an ultimate opponent that could be reasoned with...if it listens, of course.

The PCs could be internal security that gets thawed out, the conscious (non-frozen) crew of the ship, or even military or salvagers who find the ship 1000's of years after it would have reached its intended destination, billions of miles off course, and an utter mystery...

The supernatural part? I really like Hero's idea of that being something based in the technology. A "Ghost in the Machine" sort of thing, "The Dark heart of space". Maybe come up with some clues for why the HAL-like AI computer has flipped out and is essentially attempting to create necrotic "negative energy" life forms.

The race that sent the bioprobe out could be devotees of The Old Ones.

The biotech chould have reality or perception warping effects.

What works for a good, diverse, commando squad?

Maybe something like:

* "Tank" Burly guy in heavy armor and plasma weaponry
* Xenobiologist and medic
* Melee fighter
* Charismatic Leadership Role
* Technosavant and Engineer
* Sniper/Weapons specialist

* An esper/precog (Bester from Bab5, Gil Hamilton from Niven's Known World stories, many, many others) If you really want supernatural, this is the archetype most likely to be able to perceive the normally unperceivable.
* A cyborg
* A chemically enhanced or genetically enhanced warrior (RIFTS Juicers, Gordon Dickson's Dorsai)
* A sentient robot or AI
* A company/government rat (could be any of the guys)
* A big-game hunter
* A Pilot
* An Outlaw who conned his way onto the mission or the ship
* A stowaway

 

[wedgeski]

I don't really have anything constructive to add at this point but let me just say I have seriously considered a Space Horror campaign heavily ripped o-- I mean, heavily inspired by Metroid Prime and Metroid Prime Echoes. Hell, *any* Metroid game from the original onwards. They're all so fantastically atmospheric, and have a bit of just about everything: bounty-hunters, organo-tech super-armour, space pirates (SPACE! PIRATES!), ancient civilizations, macro-biotic aliens... all against mysterious backdrops of ruinous decline and long-sought redemption.

In terms of archetypes the Company Man (Burke from Aliens) is essential IMO. How great would it be for a one shot if the group found out one of them was an insider right near the beginning, but didn't know who it was? How much greater if it was randomly assigned at the start - i.e. after choosing PC's, everyone pulls a card at random, one of which says: "You're a company man. Your prime directive is to bring back something alive."

Dannyalcatraz has hit the nail on the head with his list of archetypes: just go and spend a pleasurable couple of hours watching Aliens and your answers are right there.

 

[philreed]

So... we have an ice base located in a frigid moon/asteroid.

Have you seen Future: Installation 1 that I published? It's an ice base in an asteroid.


You may also find the Future: Datastream handy. 174-pages of expansion. And, if you prefer hardcover, there's one available.

 

[Piratecat]

Play System Shock 2. That ought to give you ideas. It's got the rogue AI, cybernetic zombies, psionic monkeys, mutated beasts. If you can't get ahold of a copy, you can simulate the experience. Put one hand on your keyboard and the other on your mouse. Now start crapping your pants.

I game with the designers; they'll be tickled you said this.

 

[wedgeski]

I game with the designers; they'll be tickled you said this.

All this serves to do is remind me that I can't get the damn thing to work on XP, despite months of trying the various solutions posted on-line.

C'mon Bioshock... c'mon Bioshock... c'mon Bioshock...

(Speaking of which, anyone for a campaign set in a collapsed, Art Deco undersea utopia?)