Pirates of Drinax - GMs thread

[AliTanwir]

Here is my mostly complete campaign map for all the adventures in PoD, PoD Companion & Third Party PoD suitable adventures.
I built this so I could visualize the various trips and planets involved in all of the (30+?) PoD adventures.
If you notice any omissions please let me know!

Hi,
The map is just amazing, downloaded your previous version in reddit. I would just ask for one thing, could you upload it with better resolution? It is kinda hard to read some of the adventures right now.

As i am Running the Pirates of Drinax Campaign for my group the matter of stealing ships
came up quickly Here's how i have handled it in my campaign sharing in case someone
can use it

Thankfully the Drinax Companion has some rules for doing such a job

This kind of things are so helpful for people that are just starting the campaign, thanks for sharing it! I love this thread.

For anyone looking for a quick mini-game mechanic to deal with the Travellers' Fleet ship encounters w/o dealing with the random encounter tables...basically the ships your Travellers sent out on independent piracy routes while they assume the main campaign missions...

I was searching for something like this, thanks for sharing!

 

[adzling]

link to higher res map added to original post, cheers!

 

[ruhalla]

link to higher res map added to original post, cheers!

Hey Adzling great to see more Fantasy Grounds people around ! cheers Ramid/Ruhalla

So My group just finished the first part of the Shadows of Sindal the they ended up leaving most of the goods
for the locals and struck a deal with them for a secret haven on Paal as well as some made to order industrial goods
In return tech blue prints from Drinax, and Raw materials that the travellers would import.

On the Travellers suggestion the locals are focusing their industry on equipment that can help them scavenge
the city for more raw materials

They then made plans to return to Drinax with the Meager treasure they had. But As they took off one of the
Travellers noticed a transponder code of a ship Jumping to Hilfer a 400 ton Vulture Class salvage vessel callsign
Greyes Goose. The ship of a borderline pirate crew of salvagers responsible for the loss of his families starship.

Ready to hoist the Skull and bones they Jumped after them to hilfer...

 

[PsiTraveller]

Unrelated question to the map (which is awesome btw!!)

In the PoD campaign, when your players discovered the bioweapons. Did any of them look at the information on the Tlaiowaha sector and point out that if they bio-bombed Tyohk and its population of 20 billion they would remove half the Aslan population of the Sector in one hit? (Or is it just my players that are genocidal maniacs?)

 

[MongooseMatt]

(Or is it just my players that are genocidal maniacs?)

They are, but I cannot say that makes them different from many other groups.

The first thing that strikes me on this action is that it may be the very best way of triggering war...

 

[adzling]

Unrelated question to the map (which is awesome btw!!)

In the PoD campaign, when your players discovered the bioweapons. Did any of them look at the information on the Tlaiowaha sector and point out that if they bio-bombed Tyohk and its population of 20 billion they would remove half the Aslan population of the Sector in one hit? (Or is it just my players that are genocidal maniacs?)

nice observation PsiTraveller...

Our table is about to *start* PoD (currently finishing up bt-sht365) so that map doesn't reflect their travels but rather where the PoD adventures might take them.

Here's a map of their travels (in order- HighNdry, Last Flight of the Amuar, Bt-Sht365)

https://www.dropbox.com/s/uxeoa7y8k3sfwv9/voidskipper%27s%20travels.png?dl=0

 

[ruhalla]

Unrelated question to the map (which is awesome btw!!)

In the PoD campaign, when your players discovered the bioweapons. Did any of them look at the information on the Tlaiowaha sector and point out that if they bio-bombed Tyohk and its population of 20 billion they would remove half the Aslan population of the Sector in one hit? (Or is it just my players that are genocidal maniacs?)

Its not come up yet I played up the dying birds and had them encounter some other infected animals but who know's once they hit Ihatei their view might change

 

[PsiTraveller]

Mongoose Matt: Only if the Aslan figure out who sent the bioweapons to a biosphere. My players nuked the ihatei camp clandestinely and never took credit for it. They ran a misinformation campaign against rival camps to stir up confusion, and in the midst of things ** boom ** .


The bioweapons from the Treasure of Sindal were reverse engineered to make more of them, and became a deterrent, never used.

The bioweapon from Shadows of Sindal could well become a fence to prevent Aslan expansion. If ihatei attack a world, the world infects itself and and Aslan go 28 days later on themselves. Not an honorable end for the Aslan warrior. Reminds me of the show 'V' where the humans released the bioweapon from balloons.

 

[ruhalla]

am
Mongoose Matt: Only if the Aslan figure out who sent the bioweapons to a biosphere. My players nuked the ihatei camp clandestinely and never took credit for it. They ran a misinformation campaign against rival camps to stir up confusion, and in the midst of things ** boom ** .


The bioweapons from the Treasure of Sindal were reverse engineered to make more of them, and became a deterrent, never used.

The bioweapon from Shadows of Sindal could well become a fence to prevent Aslan expansion. If ihatei attack a world, the world infects itself and and Aslan go 28 days later on themselves. Not an honorable end for the Aslan warrior. Reminds me of the show 'V' where the humans released the bioweapon from balloons.

I would Argue that the Aslan response to such an act would be to glass the world in question. The Conquest of Territory and the Ihatei seem to be such an integral part of their identity that someone deploying a weapon like that or threatening them with a weapon like that would cause a major overreaction on their part.

Also once the Aslan get their hands on a sample there's a question how long would it take them to inoculate their people against something like this.

Having said that i could definitively see desperate people use something like this

 

[PsiTraveller]

An arms race for a variant of vaccine resistant 28 Day Later virus. Any world with 'illegal' Aslan ihatei have to worry about becoming degenerate and feral Aslan. Seems a little more benign than the Glorious Empire genetically modifying the human stock on the planet Fantasy to be strong and stupid to make better slaves.

As for the genetic imperative to conquer new territory (Pod Book 1 pg 78). That makes for poor neighbours and treaty signers. The whole PoD campaign is set against the idea that Aslan expansion will conquer the Trojan Reach, that it is inevitable. The anti Aslan groups of the Reach may be at the point where they see little difference between starting a war that will glass worlds, or having worlds of humans being slaves to the ever expanding Aslan. At least that's how I set things up in my campaign.

This is all pre Shadows of SIndal thinking. My players have not run that yet. But the campaign had the Aslan as the ever looming threat, and when they discovered the GeDeCo plot they started trying to think of alternatives to having the Reach become a massive graveyard to slow down the advance. Shadows of Sindal would offer a chance at that.

And yes it could also be smuggled into the Hierate and Glorious Empire to start zombie plagues behind the lines to weaken the Aslan, and open up territory within the Hierate to fight over.

 

[Condottiere]

That makes it an existential question.

If the conquered populace is incorporated into the culture, with more or less similar rights, they can compete on a level playing field and do some free style homesteading themselves.

If not, they might have an agreed upon ceasefire, on the expiry of which, they have a form of ritual warfare, loser evacuates the planet.

 

[paltrysum]

Come to think of it, widespread use of the bioweapon could invoke a response from the Imperium. A great deal of wealth is generated by the trade generated on the Hierate route. So much that corporate entities within the Imperium might not take too kindly to '28 Days Later' happening to their trade partners. Heck, dustspice trade alone is probably a trillion-Credit industry. Corporations and nobles who have shares in these corporations might pressure the Imperial Navy to get involved, seeking out the 'terrorists' who propagated this weapon.

 

[PsiTraveller]

On the other hand Paltrysum the use of a bioweapon by a third party that weakens the Aslan Hierate may delay the inevitable war. There will be an economic loss of trade, but the coming war is pushed back, or the war is waged on someone else (the users of the bioweapons). Proxy wars are a useful tool. Wikipedia has a list of all the Proxy wars for the last 140 years.

The Treaty of Fhaharl is supposed to keep Aslan 30 Parsecs from Imperial Borders (PoD Book 1 pg 53), but there are Ihatei on Arunisiir, just a few Jumps from the Imperial Border. (Profile Arunisiir, page 4). If the Empire notices this officially war could trigger, but if 'terrorists' start wiping out Aslan enclaves, or unleash doom on a major population center that sends the Hierate into a civil war? Well the high level planners may think that is worth the loss in trade.

This is the sort of meta game tabletop that has everyone geeking out with ideas. My players were looking at the Sindalian bioweapons that wiped out everything. A couple of major strikes could topple the Hierate power structure. That's the risk of planets with different tech levels. If only a few have the advanced tech, losing them results in a Sector of planets that will have a hard time maintaining the tech they have.

 

[paltrysum]

That's a great point. Such are the things of which great campaigns are made! When the players are on the razor's edge. Whatever they do, I hope you come back and tell us how it went.

Funny that you mention the Arunisiir situation. A friend of mine playing in a different PoD campaign is in a group that's doing the patron encounter adventure with the old Arunisiiri Aslan who wants to take over the planet. His "army" has arrived and the players' group is expected to help them get to the planet to claim their land. I pointed out that the Imperium might not take kindly to a large, militarized group of Aslan settling so close to the Imperial border, but perhaps there's some delicate balance that their presence there might serve. It really depends on the ref, the players and how they make it happen, I suppose.

 

[adzling]

i think the idea of using the bioweapons to inoculate planets against aslan invasion is brilliant and hard to argue against.

the only (very weak) argument i can see being made is on planets that already have an ongoing ihatei invasion happening (arunisir etc) because the aslan already on planet would die/ be affected.

from the perspective of the (human) planetary population they are just protecting themselves against their land being stolen by aslan, that's hard to argue against.

if there's currently no aslan settlements on the planet then there's literally nothing to argue against, the planet has just taken an aslan settlement vaccine and there's nothing even the aslan can argue against ("we are unhappy because we can't steal their planet" doesn't make sense even to aslan i'd wager).

if i was playing PoD (sadly just gming) i'd do exactly this...

...Offer to innoculate all the planets that join Drinax against the ihatei invasion!

That could get the entire sector to rally behind Drinax's banner very easily i'd imagine...

 

[ruhalla]

The way i see it the bio weapon would definitely be an escalation and one that the Aslan wouldn't ignore

From how they seem depicted i suspect their first response would be to glass any world were the weapon
was deployed.
They would also probably try and find a cure AND would probably respond with trying to come up with a
bio weapon of their own as a deterrent.

Human Terrorists might go on to deploy it on already settle Aslan worlds or seeding it on worlds under threat from the
Aslan sparking of the Great Ihatei almost a decade early.

The Imperium would get dragged into it both trying to stop human worlds in the Reach from deploying the weapon
and trying to stop the Aslan from going berserk right at a time when the 5th frontier kicks off The Zhodani would
love this and probably fuel the fire to distract the Imps. An alternative were the Aslan Invasion comes early before
the Imperium is to weak to resist

 

[adzling]

From how they seem depicted i suspect their first response would be to glass any world were the weapon
was deployed.

why would they glass a world that had no aslan on it?
i can't see any way they could justify it, no aslan were harmed, no aslan lived there, so they had no claim to the planet in the first place...

 

[ruhalla]

why would they glass a world that had no aslan on it?
i can't see any way they could justify it, no aslan were harmed, no aslan lived there, so they had no claim to the planet in the first place...

No i meant if the Bio-Weapon was used to clear out Ihatei bands or attack their existing settlements they would probably over-react
(much as they did when the old kingdom of drinax started attacking trade between the aslan and Empire which the Aslan responded to
with an open war destroying Drinaxian fleets and bombing planets loyal to Drinax with Nukes bioweapons and kinetic strikes, The kitties
seem to feel its fine when they are doing the invading but start breaking all the toys when they get the short end of the stick)

As for justification the Aslan don't seem to have much in the way of an understanding of claims. If they can take land from you they
seem to feel they are in the right, if you are strong enough to defend it then its yours to keep until stronger Aslan show up to take it
from you and they would consider it honorable. Using the Bio-Weapon would be in their eyes unfair and Dishonorable.

It all ties into the Aslan ideas of war and the Ihatei. In their eyes Ihatei isn't war its simply landless males going heroically forth to either
settle land that no one owns or to conquer land from those to weak to honorably defend what they have against the Ihatei.

Drive of the ihatei or defeat them in Normal Combat would to the Aslan be similar to a strictly limited or Limited war and if you win honorably
then the Clans really can't object.

But to the Aslan the use of a bio-weapon against ihatei would in their eyes be an open or total war.

This being said. My players have just finished their first meeting with Richard Grehai and they find his ideas of a mutual defense net very
enticing . They have also started discussing the Bio-Weapon they only have the very degraded samples they found on Paal and noted that
at least the strain there seems to be very localized and not spread by contact between Aslan.

They have discussed turning what they have over to the scholars tower on Drinax for potential reverse engineering I love how morally
ambiguous the bio weapon makes things

 

[adzling]

iHatei can only stake their claim via their physical presence.

If they cannot stake that claim then they have no ability to claim the land/ planet as theirs.

So while I agree they would be upset if you start bio-plaguing ihatei, I don't see a rational for glassing a planet just because you can't settle there/ steal land.

If they acted that way then they would be glassing planets without atmospheres just to spite them for not having atmospheres...

Now if they figured out that some faction was dropping anti-aslan bio-plagues all over the dustbelt i'm sure they'd try to find and skin them but if they can't find 'em & don't know who they are then i don't see a rational for glassing infected planets.

Well, i guess if the infection can spread from human to aslan then maybe they would glass an infected planet to stop the contagion spreading...

 

[ruhalla]

I had not even considered if it could be spread by contact... Having just finished the first part of sindal i had only loosely read pt 2-3 so i thought the weapon was just a bomb that affected those hit. But yeah your right if its transmitable thats a while other level of horror