Great Rift Adventure 2: Deepnight Endeavour

[MongooseMatt]

The next episode in the Great Rift adventures is now here, and this time we are going deep into the rift! Great Rift Adventure 2: Deepnight Endeavour is here, and you can grab your own copy here: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/229483/Great-Rift-Adventure-2-Deepnight-Endeavour?affiliate_id=7242

Alternatively, you can pre-order the printed version here, which will be released in the next couple of months: http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/rpgs/traveller-1/great-rift-adventure-2-deepnight-endeavour.html

A terrifying struggle against a truly alien force in the depths of the Great Rift…

Great Rift Adventure 2: Deepnight Endeavour takes place aboard a derelict exploration vessel which the Travellers must enter to locate fuel. With no way to get home, they discover there are survivors, and that the ship has taken aboard a malevolent entity seeking to reach an inhabited planet. The Travellers might simply try to escape or they could attempt to destroy the entity, but they will face opposition from the original crew as well as the entity itself.

This adventure includes full deck plans and descriptions of the massive exploration ship, the Deepnight Endeavour, along with factions of surviving crew members, and the horrifying alien presence that has infected the vessel…

 

[Reynard]

Wait, are you saying we have sci-fi monster movie to play out?! Be still my heart!

 

[ochd]

Great cover! Hats off to the artist.

Dan.

 

[Annatar Giftbringer]

Wait, are you saying we have sci-fi monster movie to play out?! Be still my heart!

We have indeed

(Spoilers for the adventure below)

And what a monster! This marvelous blend of Flood (Halo) and the fungal infestation from “the last of us” is a perfect antagonist and a great source for zombie-like cannon fodder opposition, as well as horror sessions with something lurking in the shadows, ready to infect you all and turn your allies against you...

Hopefully, we will see it again in future publications? It feels like it has even more to give and there are several questions left to answer, such as:

Where is it from?
What is it? (Weapon, natural lifeform, lab accident..?)
Are there more than one?
Will it eventually evolve into a Gravemind (like the Flood, from Halo)?
The unique connection it had to the chief scientist, was that accidental, or part of the plan (I’m thinking the Queen if Blades here, or the Lich King/Arthas. Both were created as “avatars” for their immobile masters, perhaps the entity too sought a means to communicate with other lifeforms?)?

And so on, and on, and... just reading about the entity sparks my imagination, it can be used in so many ways, a great referee tool, well done on creating it



On to the ship. Did you guys go through all the trouble of designing, detailing and fine-tuning this behemoth just to blow it up so it could serve as backdrop to the adventure?

Or did it start with a quest to create a battleship-sized research vessel, which coincidentally happened to work perfectly as “dungeon map” for a survival horror adventure?

Either way, you managed to squeeze in nearly every item from the deep space explorer’s handbook, impressive! And the way it utilizes breakaway sections, creative!

Nice touch to have some of the cargo and common areas placed on the shuttles. Might not be perfect from a design point (a single accessible cargo hold would be more efficient, and as said in the book the current setup means critical gear can be half a system away), but it gives the ship character.

Are the shuttles really supposed to have 240 dtons common space each? In the deck plan it looks more like 24, but the description does say there’s a generous amount of living space aboard them. It does make for fun story element too if they’re indeed intended to have 240 dton: “hey, shuttle 3 is back from refueling, that means the bowling alley is open again, wanna come?”



The deckplan itself just begs to be explored, played with and used! You’ve managed to make the ship feel “alive and real”, interesting and characterful!

Only downside I can think of is that the captain of this mighty ship didn’t get a high class stateroom, but they’ll manage I’m sure

Oh, and as an added bonus, we’re given two new weapons! This is a very nice trend I’ve seen in the adventures lately, there are often new equipment, weapons, vehicles or ships - thanks and please keep adding those!

 

[MongooseMatt]

On to the ship. Did you guys go through all the trouble of designing, detailing and fine-tuning this behemoth just to blow it up so it could serve as backdrop to the adventure?

Yup, yes we did Consider that a benefit of doing these larger projects through Kickstarter. We can have awesome sets!

Feel free to use it for other things though.

The deckplan itself just begs to be explored, played with and used! You’ve managed to make the ship feel “alive and real”, interesting and characterful!

You think that is good, you should see what we are planning for the next Kickstarter campaign

Oh, and as an added bonus, we’re given two new weapons! This is a very nice trend I’ve seen in the adventures lately, there are often new equipment, weapons, vehicles or ships - thanks and please keep adding those!

We always try to - keep your eye out for Mission to Mithril (hopefully this time next week-ish for the ebook), which adds more, including the Sword Worlds idea of an ATV!

 

[AndrewW]

Either way, you managed to squeeze in nearly every item from the deep space explorer’s handbook, impressive! And the way it utilizes breakaway sections, creative!

Was modified to include breakaway sections to get around a limit of the original design.

 

[tdsharkey]

Each map square is five dtons of space. What dimensions does each square equate to if I want to map the areas in greater detail?

 

[AndrewW]

Each map square is five dtons of space. What dimensions does each square equate to if I want to map the areas in greater detail?

Deck plans for smaller ships are usually 1 dton = 2 spaces. (1.5m per square)

 

[tdsharkey]

Yeah, that is is smudge awkward, but turning each 5dton block into a 3X3 1.5m block should be close enough.. I'm thinking about running this as part of a Roll20 campaign.

 

[Annatar Giftbringer]

Yup, yes we did Consider that a benefit of doing these larger projects through Kickstarter. We can have awesome sets!

Feel free to use it for other things though.

Awesome!

Kickstarter seems to be the way to do things, if projects keep evolving like this one did

And thank you, I do intend to use it for other things
I'm thinking it could be fun to use it for a large-scale exploration adventure, either as flagship for a flotilla or on its own. I think I'd want a Randall Hostile Explorer among the carried ships in case of less hospitable finds, and perhaps a Safari ship or a Waka Ama long range scout (depending on mission, of course, but they can all be useful, and thanks to the docking clamps the Deepnight it can be tailored for various missions, yay!)

You think that is good, you should see what we are planning for the next Kickstarter campaign

The Ghalalk (or Element family, as they're apparantly called, I did not know that)?
I know! I've been occasionally jumping with joy since I first heard about it in the Kickstarter preview! Can barely wait for the campaign to start, already started compiling a wishlist/suggestion list - really thrilled about this one!

And I saw the preview image earlier today, it looks incredible!

We always try to - keep your eye out for Mission to Mithril (hopefully this time next week-ish for the ebook), which adds more, including the Sword Worlds idea of an ATV!

Ooh, sounds exciting! The name sounds familiar, is it a new version of an old adventure?

Was modified to include breakaway sections to get around a limit of the original design.

Huh, interesting. Could work as both in-universe and real-world explaination. Kinda makes the whole thing even more impressive, I imagine it'd be a tricky enough project if breakaway hull was part of the original design, but improvising it during the design process.... well done!

turning each 5dton block into a 3X3 1.5m block should be close enough

That's what I'm planning to do, if I decide that level of detail is needed... Might be able to pull it off with more generic and broad descriptions... Remains to be seen

 

[tdsharkey]

turning each 5dton block into a 3X3 1.5m block should be close enough

That's what I'm planning to do, if I decide that level of detail is needed... Might be able to pull it off with more generic and broad descriptions... Remains to be seen

I'll probably run it on Roll20, so it ends up being very map oriented. But yes, otherwise I'd go narrative and just toss maps out as needed.

 

[MongooseMatt]

The Ghalalk (or Element family, as they're apparantly called, I did not know that)?

Ah, a new bit of Traveller lore, straight from Mr Miller! The Ghalalk-class Armoured Cruiser that you have all known and loved for years is actually the mid-ship of three based upon the same design. Once we heard about that, we knew it was the right ship to feature in the set as we can actually give you three ships (with a lot of variation on each too, but I'll save that for the Kickstarter page next month!) rather than just one.

Ooh, sounds exciting! The name sounds familiar, is it a new version of an old adventure?

It is indeed, a classic Double Adventure and one included in the original starter set.

 

[sburchett]

Is there any way we can get non-isometric deck plans for this ship? I, too, plan to run this in Roll20 and I like having top-down maps.

Granted, I could re-create them from scratch, but if you have them somewhere, that would save me loads of time.

Thanks!

sTiVo

 

[MongooseMatt]

I'll talk to the graphics girls and see what they have got!

 

[Annatar Giftbringer]

I’m actually surprised no one’s asked for classic 2D maps for all the Rift ships yet, that usually pops up

I guess people are getting used to the isometric views, and also (at least in my case) I’ve noticed that newer deckplans have much more info on them than the early iso ones.

One important difference between High Guard and rulebook ships in iso vs 2D plans was the amount of info on the plans. 2D were much more detailed, with deckplan keys in the 10’s or 20’s while the iso mps usually only had a couple. That has changed in the newer plans, and that’s a good thing imho

Still there are, of course, times when a 2D map is clearer and easier to read - even if isometric plans look better!

 

[sburchett]

I definitely agree that the isometric plans look better-- the lines between ceiling and floor hatches are invaluable in determining where they go. I refer back to them frequently. But I would like the option of having the 2D maps as well.

The standard Subsidized Merchant was available in 2D and I went through and did the modifications for the Perfect Stranger, but that was trivial compared to the task ahead for the Deepnight Endeavour.

I will understand if you don't have them, but the Illustrator (or whatever) files from which the isos were generated-- or even higher resolution files of the isos-- would help out enormously. The detail is non-existent on the plans from the books, as it is pixelated in the extreme. I'm guessing it is no more than 600 dpi, which is fine for photos, but not for the work I need to do.

Thanks for listening! Let's hope the Graphics Girls (they deserve capital letters!) have something.

sTiVo

 

[phavoc]

I find the isometric plans in the books to be fuzzy as well. I'm find with the 2D plans. It's easy enough to put in a legend to indicate where between deck access is. They need not be as spartan as the original plans from CT. Campaign Cartographer has some really snazzy options you can use - once you are comfortable with the layering. Whenever I want details for my own I use Visio, but it's not terribly starship-y...

 

[sburchett]

You can tell I'm old, as I said "only 600 dpi". There was even a time that 300 dpi was pretty good. But not for this type of thing.

Mind, I understand that the PDF can't be full of 2400 dpi illustrations or it would be huge. (I wouldn't mind; I would hardly notice the delay in downloading.)

Vector is even better, by the way: no image degradation when you zoom in. I generally use Adobe Illustrator, but Roll20 will only accept image files, so I have to export to JPG or PNG.

 

[steve98052]

I have a fair number of top down vectors in Inkscape SVG format, a version back. They'll work with any SVG editor, though not necessarily without scaling. (But vectors scale without loss of quality.) I'll retrieve them from my backup server when I get a chance.

 

[sburchett]

Nice!

I, for one, would be interested in anything you might have.

sTiVo