Deepnight Revelation - GMs Thread

[Tea Rex]

I'm still interested in this as well, but I don't have time to organize it right now. I'm not even sure what format I think it should take. I'll note that Mongoose accepted a DNR specific article from me for JTAS so that might be another way to get some of your great ideas out there.

Do you have any specific thoughts on how the project could be structured or what content could be included?

Congratulations on the acceptance of your article! Let me know as soon as it is published. And thank you for the assumption that I would have great ideas.
But time is always an issue it seems for all of us. But I will keep your suggestion in mind and think about if any of my half-baked ideas might be worth to develop it into a worthy contribution for JTAS. We'll see (or we won't )

And the answer to your question is no: no concepts and no structure yet.

 

[shammond42]

And the answer to your question is no: no concepts and no structure yet.

OK, I needed something to occupy the back of mind and give me something to do with the campaign as I had a few minutes here or there, without being too much work. So, I've started some DNR specific d66 lists. I've got.

• d66 Crew Personality Quirks (1/2 done)
• d66 Weird Things Crew-members Brought With Them (done)
• d66 Icky Places to Find Entity Creepers & Spores (started)

If anybody wants to pick a new topic and make a list (looking at you Tea Rex ), I'll package them into some sort of collection to share.

 

[QuinZ33]

I have just started Refereeing Deepnight Revelation.

My players are into crunchy rules and they were delighted that the Deepnight Revelation has an org chart (All of my players are managers IRL. Two are senior project managers for large companies).

They started off small, focusing heavily on trade rather than the plot hooks. They are very averse to "idiot traps", even at the expense of just letting the mission go unsolved. I punished them for this when they refused to get anywhere near the Deepnight Endeavour. They took some scans, reported it back to the Navy, warned the Navy that the head scientist was acting weird, and then left it at that. Well, the Navy rescued the mission team, including the (infected) chief mission officer, because they wanted information about the cure.

The rescued officer then introduced The Entity to the billion-strong homeworld of one of our Travellers. It has now been red-zoned and any refugee ships jumping out of the system are being blown up. Anyone with their transponder off to hide where they came from is getting blown up. It's only a matter of time before a refugee ship successfully modifies its transponder with false information and spreads The Entity to another world in the subsector. The Navy will eventually go in and burn the whole planet.

They also encountered the Entity in the Deepnight Legacy adventure. They had to leave the subsector for a few months after murdering a "Legitimate Businessman" (read: psionic crime boss who had turned into a billionaire investor), went into the rift, and stumbled upon the disaster at Candling Station.

At this point, they were convinced that there was nothing that could be done to stop the infection from sweeping across the Imperium, and they wanted to just start jumping deep into the interior of the Imperium to put some distance. I gave them another alternative, and they were recruited to the Deepnight Revelation mission, as Chief Mission Officer, Chief Operations Officer, Power Plant Officer, and Mission Expert Officer.

So far, they are still in Charted Space. They started in the custom subsector I had in the Verge, looped up to the Islands in the Reft, where they will cross to Tobia and then head out of Charted Space. While in the Reft, they stopped at a resort where they ran into the Calixcuel incident. The planet needed a power plant engineer, and they were offering to resupply the Revelation for free in exchange for their Power Plant Engineer to take a look (which happened to be a PC).

Most of the crew is not aware of the Entity. Additionally, IMTU, psionics are largely believed to be superstition. The "mission expert" science team is comprised of people with experience with psionics as well as people with experience with the Entity. The rest of the crew (save some high-ranking officers) is just excited to explore further than any human has ever explored. The mission's true goal, as well as the truth about psionics, will be interesting conversations to have with the rest of the crew.

 

[Old School]

Gotta love it when your players just pass on the adventure. Rescue the ship? Nope. No thanks. Leave that one for the Navy.

Probably wise that none of them are Mission Commander or Ship Captain. Boldly going where no man has gone before requires boldness, which they may be lacking.

 

[Tea Rex]

If anybody wants to pick a new topic and make a list (looking at you Tea Rex ), I'll package them into some sort of collection to share.

Who? Me? *looks around frantically*
Sorry for this late reply. I like the idea, but what list could I add?
Well, I already started a list with things that can occur on board of a spaceship.
I also thought about a list of holidays and festivals, that are celebrated on the home worlds of the crew and that these people want also to celebrate on board.
Other lists: Pets that people smuggle on board. Leisure activities (on board or on planet). Strange intergalactic dishes the cook loves to introduce to his victims... er guests. Religions or superstitions of the crew.

And your idea was to open a new thread to fill these lists? Or one after the other? What would be your favorite one? Or something completely different?

 

[Tea Rex]

I have just started Refereeing Deepnight Revelation.

My players are into crunchy rules and they were delighted that the Deepnight Revelation has an org chart (All of my players are managers IRL. Two are senior project managers for large companies).

Every group of players is different, so the campaign will be different for every group and I think this is great! There are options for all possibilities.
My players are more into accumulating loot and trading. It has already happend that one cited the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition at an appropiate moment.

Are your players aware that they are not running away from the Entity but rushing into the lion's den?

 

[QuinZ33]

Are your players aware that they are not running away from the Entity but rushing into the lion's den?

Yes, though I think they're happy that their characters will be in a more controlled environment where they (perhaps falsely) think that they can engage the Entity on their own terms. I think they were worried about constantly looking over their shoulder for mushroom-brained people trying to sabotage them. Right now, their number 1 priority is inventing some psionic shielding.

 

[Baldo]

Sorry for this late reply. I like the idea, but what list could I add?

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/288946/Mothership-Hive-Mind-Issue-01?manufacturers_id=13232

Just in case, do you know of Hive Mind? 35 pages of lists, and it's free!

 

[shammond42]

Who? Me? *looks around frantically*
Sorry for this late reply. I like the idea, but what list could I add?
Well, I already started a list with things that can occur on board of a spaceship.
I also thought about a list of holidays and festivals, that are celebrated on the home worlds of the crew and that these people want also to celebrate on board.
Other lists: Pets that people smuggle on board. Leisure activities (on board or on planet). Strange intergalactic dishes the cook loves to introduce to his victims... er guests. Religions or superstitions of the crew.

And your idea was to open a new thread to fill these lists? Or one after the other? What would be your favorite one? Or something completely different?

Tea Rex,
I think a list of minor good events (birthdays, chef cooks something special, etc.) and a list of minor incidents would be really useful. I know I want to sprinkle those in my campaign becuase I think they'll help make the ship come alive.

As for how to distribute, I haven't figured that out yet. A website, a TAS resource or just a thread here all have their pros and cons. I'm not seeing other interest in participating in this thread. Private message me if you want to discuss further so we don't pollute this thread. If anybody else is interested you can PM me as well.

 

[shammond42]

"Andy Bigwood" of the Traveller Facebook group, made a 3D model of the Deepnight Revelation that people here might be interested in. It's really awesome.

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4814425

 

[Old School]

Thanks for sharing, Shammond42. That's pretty sweet. Proof that your starship looking awesome and looking like a vacuum cleaner are not mutually exclusive.

 

[AndrewW]

Thanks for sharing, Shammond42. That's pretty sweet. Proof that your starship looking awesome and looking like a vacuum cleaner are not mutually exclusive.

But can it transform into a Mega Maid?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWQAvMUUJr4

 

[ochd]

The isometric maps for DNR give a scale of one square to 8 tons. What does that translate to in length, width and height?

Dan.

 

[Ursus Maior]

One displacement tonne (ton?) is defined in Traveller as either 13.5 or 14 m³. Depending on your ceiling height (z-axis) your width and length vary. I would argue for a true ceiling height of 3 metres with about 0.5 m used four cables, pipes etc. and a usable ceiling height in cabins of 2.5 m. But that's my personal referee's fiat.

So, if you use 13.5 m³ of volume and divide by 3 metres ceiling, you'll be left with 4.5 m² of room. That would be the lower limit of the calculation. If you use 14 m³ and divide by only 2.5 metres that would get you 5.6 m². This about the range we're speaking of.

I reckon, a standard displacement tonne would assume an even distribution of the x- and y-axis. So, we'd be looking at rooms between 2.25 and 2.8 metres in width and length. At 4 dton per regular stateroom, we'd be talking about 20.25 m². Though about 4 m² might be deducted for doorways etc. This leaves a regular passenger with around 16 m² for themselves, of which 1.5-4 m² would be consumed by a shower and toilette. That's for the lower end calculation and actually quite close to regular cabins in ferries and steamers.

 

[shammond42]

My recollection from classic Traveller is that 1 dton is 2 1.5 meter squares. That gives you 3 meter ceilings, which is roughly 10 feet -- all game ceilings were 10' back then
This aligns with the calculation above (1.5 * 3 * 3 = 13.5 = 1 d ton).

So, 8 d tons would be 16 classic Traveller squares, or a 4x4 block of CT squares. That block would be 4*1.5 or 6 meters on a side. I think I double checked this against the ECC plans and it seemed about right.

 

[ochd]

That's helpful, thanks. So, if I have counted right, the DNR is about 750 metres long, about 300m wide at the stern and around 12 metres high. Just trying to visualise the scale of it.

 

[shammond42]

These are the dimensions I pulled off the ECC plans.

Length: 742.5 Meters

Width: 166 meters (bow section)
154.5 meters (across pods)
297 meters (aft section)

Height: 45 meters (aft section)

And a size comparison image from the ECC kickstarter page.

 

[Condottiere]

1. Mega Maids would suck.

2. I tend to view three metres by one and half metres by one and a half metres as more of a guide.

 

[ochd]

Thanks shammond. The length and widths I get, but how do the ECC plan explain 45m height for just four decks?

 

[shammond42]

Thanks shammond. The length and widths I get, but how do the ECC plan explain 45m height for just four decks?

Well, it is possible I'm wrong. The rear elevation in the plans is a different scale than the floor plans, and there doesn't seem to be a scale specified for it. So, I had to calculate the height indirectly. Looking at the scale diagram above, it seems quite thick relative to its length. In the end, 45 meters doesn't seem too unreasonable given that you need room for fuel and you can land multiple 200 ton ships inside.