Earth 2 (2300AD)

[JBRocky]

if you haven't seen it before Earth 2 is a show back from the mid 90's that takes place where the cast has crash landed on an Alien planet, and since it just came out on Netflix I have been watching it again.

It has also given me the idea of doing roughly the same to my group and have it similar to the old adventure Energy Curve. Since I am not a big fan of the Klaxun I want something different and have a few ideas running around in my head. Do I want to place over off the French Arm and just replace the Klaxun with my ideas. I have also though about using tug tech to go explore a cluster outside the 7.7 ly limit but need some ideas.

Simply put need some brainstorming ideas so any help would be great.

 

[AndrewW]

Well, travel is a bit different in Earth 2 since it's mostly cold sleep.

 

[Hopeless]

As I recall they narrowly avoided being blown up upon leaving, but yes they did spend quite a few years in suspended animation before being revived and discovering someone sabotaged their ship forcing them to eject down on the planet below...

Also has Tim Curry...

 

[JBRocky]

Yup they use Cold Sleep and they did almost get blown up when they left Earth. I don't think that will make to much of a difference in what I am thinking of since it should take place on a planet instead of a ship. I am thinking of using http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/us/rpgs/traveller/2300ad/tools-for-frontier-living.html since Colin did a pretty good job with it on starting up a Colony so that itself has given me some ideas.

Oh and yes Tim Currey is on the show and is very enjoyable so if you have Netflix go watch it.

 

[enderra]

Ah, Earth 2. I remember it - such a cool premise, and so little was done with it. A real pity.

The scenario should lend itself exceptionally well to an RPG game, especially if you want to go down the colony building or the simple survival and exploration roads. My suggestion would be to spend a lot of time thinking about what gear your characters have available, and enforce strict book keeping - if you run out of ammo, then you run out of ammo until you can make some locally.

Definitely work out the world in as much detail as you can - if you assume a pre-terraformed world you can get away with a lot of earth flora and fauna but alien biology will make it more interesting.

Decide if your players are completely cut off or if there is any influx of material or people. Both could arrive later - one way colony missions - or could be found as capsules that crashed elsewhere.

In the actual 2300AD universe, the required isolation might be a problem. If I were to set this up I'd probably simply use a custom setting, or the early colonial era. Just assume stutter warp is way less effective, and you won't have rescue missions coming your way.

Alternatively, if you want to fit it into the "current" 2300AD setting, the best way to wrangle it is perhaps to assume that this is a colony mission intended to really push the boundary of human space - there's a lot of secrecy involved because a) you don't want anybody else to get to the garden world you found and claim the best spots before you set up your colony and b) well, the Kafers may be dumb animals, but you are surely better off if they can't find you, and the best way to ensure this is to tell nobody who could get caputred and blurt it out under torture.

Further sources of inspiration suggested: The Bayern module (you can perhaps re-use the ship, NPCs, etc), and the Terra Nova TV show. I know, I know, the show wasn't exactly awesome but it did have some great visuals and the colony setup was fairly neat.

For a very space opera approach, check out the Volturnus modules of Star Frontiers. They won't fit 2300AD, but may provide you with some ideas. I think they are "legally" available on-line, as TSR used to give away a lot of old stuff and I seem to recall that some die-hard Star Frontiers fans kept the flame alight, so to speak. But I may be wrong.

 

[JBRocky]

Mentioning Volturnus gives me the idea of having a few sentient races floating about that the PC's can interact with. Probably just need to limit to a single species or two at first but leave clues to there are more. Hmmm even more ideas plus it gives me a reason to go diggeing through my old SF stuff.

But I do have a good idea on how to cut them off well two to be exact. One is just put them over in the boonies off the French Arm out past Auroue and the Kaefer War can cut them off. Or have the system only accessable by Tug and have one of the tugs get destroyed and maroone them. I like the idea for a Tug but have to come up with a good cluster of stars to place them in. With both I can also add some stellar exploreation or not just depends on what direction I want to take things.

Oh and I liked Terra Nova, it is also on Netflix. Guess it is a good time to plug both it and Earth 2 for a good reason to subscribe.