I am writing a scenario at the moment. The short of it is that the players have left their previous carriers for whatever various reasons, and have decided to meet up on a particular world to look for a ship to go off and have adventures in.
Assuming none of the players rolled a ship in chargen, it is not likely they will be able to afford one of their own.
So, the scenario is that an old smuggler will hire players for a job, 'one last haul' as it were to make a fortune. A job that is high stakes, high reward.
Here, I hit a wall.
What is the cargo? It has to be special/rare/sensitive/dangerous/illegal to be justified as being high risk and high reward.
Assuming the cargo is one of the above, then why would the smuggler hire strangers to help him with something like this?
If the reward is good, will the players even have enough to afford a ship?
Furthermore, how much of a cut would strangers (players) have on the score?
Does the smuggler captain still have his old crew, or are they too old, retired, or dead?
Would the Captain gift them with the ship at the end of the hob? Or should he die on the way home, promoting one of the PCs to Captain, his dying wish to be that his cut gets delivered to his grand daughter?
Should I kill the rest of the crew and captain off and let the players take the ship and do what they want? What would the ramifications of this be?
Should the plot be as simple as high risk, high reward with a mysterious hirer, or should there be a twist in the plot, a betrayal at the end, or have something happen halfway through that turns the game on its head? If so, where to go from here?
I have grown a little tired of writing straight forward, formulaic scenarios that turn out to be a little bit of investigating and a lot of combat. I want a game that requires a lot of character interaction, players getting into character, some fights yes, but multiple approaches and solutions to problems. I've been GM for some time, but not often enough, and I am the only one who runs RPGs for my group, and I think my style is deteriorating somewhat. I would really, really, really appreciate some support and inspiration form the community. Thanks.
Basically, the players will start out with a bit of money and equipment on a 'frontier world'. They won't have an awful lot. If anyone is familiar with the plot of the Anime Outlaw Star, it will start off small with the players being in a city for the first few sessions, and then eventually getting access to a ship to go off and do all sorts of things.
Things to note:
(1) I don't want to screw around with costs of things, ships should be expensive
(2) I have my heart set on the basic layout/concept of the story, and would appreciate help in reaching a solution to the above questions, rather than someone say 'What are you trying to do. Yes... I know a different better way to do that.'
Assuming none of the players rolled a ship in chargen, it is not likely they will be able to afford one of their own.
So, the scenario is that an old smuggler will hire players for a job, 'one last haul' as it were to make a fortune. A job that is high stakes, high reward.
Here, I hit a wall.
What is the cargo? It has to be special/rare/sensitive/dangerous/illegal to be justified as being high risk and high reward.
Assuming the cargo is one of the above, then why would the smuggler hire strangers to help him with something like this?
If the reward is good, will the players even have enough to afford a ship?
Furthermore, how much of a cut would strangers (players) have on the score?
Does the smuggler captain still have his old crew, or are they too old, retired, or dead?
Would the Captain gift them with the ship at the end of the hob? Or should he die on the way home, promoting one of the PCs to Captain, his dying wish to be that his cut gets delivered to his grand daughter?
Should I kill the rest of the crew and captain off and let the players take the ship and do what they want? What would the ramifications of this be?
Should the plot be as simple as high risk, high reward with a mysterious hirer, or should there be a twist in the plot, a betrayal at the end, or have something happen halfway through that turns the game on its head? If so, where to go from here?
I have grown a little tired of writing straight forward, formulaic scenarios that turn out to be a little bit of investigating and a lot of combat. I want a game that requires a lot of character interaction, players getting into character, some fights yes, but multiple approaches and solutions to problems. I've been GM for some time, but not often enough, and I am the only one who runs RPGs for my group, and I think my style is deteriorating somewhat. I would really, really, really appreciate some support and inspiration form the community. Thanks.
Basically, the players will start out with a bit of money and equipment on a 'frontier world'. They won't have an awful lot. If anyone is familiar with the plot of the Anime Outlaw Star, it will start off small with the players being in a city for the first few sessions, and then eventually getting access to a ship to go off and do all sorts of things.
Things to note:
(1) I don't want to screw around with costs of things, ships should be expensive
(2) I have my heart set on the basic layout/concept of the story, and would appreciate help in reaching a solution to the above questions, rather than someone say 'What are you trying to do. Yes... I know a different better way to do that.'
