'Playing Out In The Rocks' Cepheus Engine Rpg Session Report - Missles Away!

 This week's session goes from bad to worse & picks up right with the New England Bouys handling the space pirates. But circumstances can change & this week picks right up from our last session. 



The New England Bouys had a tangle with a group of four pirate space swimmers & their crew last night. The crew of Allard Technologies Harford sent two missiles on the space pirates bio ships & scored hits! The third hid behind the wreckage of the  remains of  two fifty year old TL11 100-TON BUCCA-CLASS PROSPECTOR ships. Space Swimmers were not equipped with weaponry per say but there was a powerfule psionic creature aboard one of the ships that was destroyed.

 The Bouys have opted to check out several of the wrecks to see if there is any technology for salvage.  The last space swimmer came out & got targetted by the missile launchers finally. And another direct hit made short work out of it!
 Major General Fuller has awakened from  cryo sleep & wants to send the marines down to the station! This will cause the loss of the bonus for the boys & Allard! 

Allard has been nice up until now about most of the major ins & outs of their dealings with the marines. But they have an ace up their sleeves in the form of a deal with Petro Chemix corporation which mapped this sector before the Fall of Man. One of our player's used that deal as leverage against the marines ham stringing them on both this mission & salvage. Now the players have decisions to make for next week's game. 
So this week I've been working on incorporating some more of 3G3 More Guns systems into the campaign & everything seems to be going smoothly. 

Several of the players are questioning if this is the real Major General Fuller or not?! The question remains on everyone's mind for next week! 

'Playing Out In The Rocks' Cepheus Engine Rpg Session Report - Surprise Attack In The Asteroids!

 Tonight's Hostile Cepheus Engine hybrid game picks up immediately after last week's session here. We find the New England Bouys not in a happy place tonight. They've sent a probot on a mission to check out the alien power station in tonight's game with a solid sensor package. 

Ron Cobb Nostromo interior concepts from here 

They have the option of sending in a manned  Horizon Survey craft ( they want to outfit the craft with a fully updated sensor suite )  before setting foot on this alien station. A new wrinkle in tonight's game is finding out that Major General Fuller from the Marines is aboard the Hartford the city ship factory vessel. Major General Fuller is in cryo sleep at the moment. The PC's seem to trust the  brand new NPC named Akachi (God's hand) from Godstar's Million Sun's Empire. 
                                                                                                                              

The New England Bouys have aceess to a psionic circle of Grey hybrids whose contract was bought by Allard Technologies. These Grey hybrids have included the PC's within their psionic clutch & its the PC's who are considering sending two of the Grey spacers in the Horizon Survey craft to check out the alien power station. In tonight's game session the PC's ran into two wrinkles. On the huge ring of meteors around the gas giant. And second was the number of wrecked space craft from before the Fall of Man  within the ring. There's very little psionic distortion around the background of the gas giant. They found the remains of  two fifty year old TL11 100-TON BUCCA-CLASS PROSPECTOR ships. These ships are not from the Talon sector at all & originate within the campaign's sector of These Stars Are Ours Uranium Fever supplement. 
Miners have been here before but there's lots of carbon scoring on the edges of the space craft's hulls.. While there's no psionic wall to fry one of the New England Bouys two psionics. Akachi (God's hand) can't penatrate psionically either the gas giant or the alien station. Some device or artifact is interfering with his abilities. 

Needless to say the bear trap so to speak is causing all kinds of caution within the players. The players want to check out the wrecks to make sure that there are no pirates lurking within them. Or within the shadow of the wrecks orbit. 
And that' when the pirates began their attack! But these are not your typical pirates! These are a couple of  space swimmers from the Dark Conspiracy rpg's Dark Tek book! These things uncouple themselves from the asteroids & make their way towards the Hartford! All hands on deck to repel the bastards! 

'Playing Out In The Rocks' Cepheus Engine Rpg Session Report - Eye of the Storm Mission - Briefing

 In game time the New England Bouys have been in stasis for over a year in hypersleep chambers. The Buckingham the Colonial Frieghter their on makes its way towards a classified destination. They arrived tonight aboard 'the Hartford'. 

The New England Bouys are aboard the Hartford a city sized industrial complex factory on  the outer edge of the Solar System. They've been in sleep now a year or better aboard Zozer Games Colonial Freighter USS Buckingham. They've just made port to the Hartford that belongs to Allard Technologies along with a brand new NPC named Akachi (God's hand) from Godstar's Million Sun's Empire. Anela is a world that suffered a serious atomic war before the Fall of Man. 

Akachi is a 'far wanderer' a psionic with the ability to astrally travel vast interstellar distances. He has stumbled upon a stable  wrecked alien power station  in the grasp of a gas giant  that seems to hold Reticulan artifacts & valuable nuclear fuel. This data was shared with the Russians.  The in question  data was stolen back on Earth sparking a 'shadow war' in Earth orbit & back planet side. The corporations warred among themselves for rights & contracts.                                                                                                                      

Ron Cobb Nostromo interior concepts from here 

The PC's have been making themselves at home going over the data about the Hartford. Allard Technologies division is now equipping a team of tigers with modified G-11's & heavy weapons to accompany the bouys on a recovery mission inside the alien  power station. The alien power  station  is parked inside  the stable storm on a gas giant at the very far edge of the solar system. 

The gas giant alien power station  concept was  inspired by this artwork by the late great H.G. Giger RIP. Here's where Zozer Games Explorers comes in handy for many of the mission elements coming up. Most of the tigers & mission specialist equipment for this is from More 3G3.. 

The new NPC named Akachi (God's hand) has several empathic abilities that were directly adapted from Dark Conspiracy rpg's Empathic Handbook . And in fact some but not all of the adventure elements come from the Dark Conspiracy rpg game. Is the party walking into a bear trap adventure or a nega dungeon adventure location?!
Yes & no folks. There's a protodimenion gate laying at the heart of this power station but its not what you think. For now the player's PC's are getting ready for the mission. 

'Playing Out In The Rocks' Cepheus Engine Rpg Session Report - Bought & Paid For With a Bullet Back Up..

 
After getting out of medical the PC's are put back into general population of their underground prison. The PC's have been put to work assembling a  Martian commerical  star ship fleet &  compendents in tele VR through worker bots. The star craft are The Harbinger series of star ship  from Zozer Games Crew Expendable. 

So this session report picks up right were the last session left off with the player's PC's taken into a pychic hybrid  Reticulan clutch. The PC's have discovered some of the secrets of the fortress prison that their in.  The Martouk Experimentation & Research corporation has been trying to look into the dreams of the PC's. Their minds however have been compartmentalized with them  having a rest period inside the Gray prisoners's heads. The Martouk cyborg are taking several of the PC's through prehistoric VR simulations from encounters  using Camp Cretaceous. 

The Warden (think number two here from the classic Prisoner TV series) is trying to break the party in VR. There is psionic activity going on but why?! He brings the party into his office with the usual threats & what not. But then his superiors inform him that the party's contract & sentences have been bought by another corporation!?! 

This was not the mysterious royal from last game but Cayzee another lizardman trader from beyond the Talon sector who put up the capitol for the party's contracts. This is the clutch mate to our party's NPC friend. These traders have close ties with  the Allard Technologies  legal department. 

Cayman of the lambda zone by nightwing1975 on DeviantArt

The sentences for the hybrid Reticulan miners also held prisoner are also bought as well. A law suit for the return of  'The Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky' star craft is on going. But the PC's were to be returned for medical for a memory wipe. But this was stopped by a motion from Allard Technologies. The New England Bouys have now been assigned to a Harbringer called The Lecrischeuk near the edge of Mars. They'll be working with Dr. Allen a Grey hybrid whom Allard Technologies just aquired in buying up the sentences of the player's PC's. 

Dr. Allen is working on a revolutionary Maser technology that could give Allard Technologies the edge in outer system mining. Its actually from 'The Dragon Issue' number #91's article by Paul M. Crabaugh called Masers & Cameras from July 1981. 

The New England Bouys are now being transfered by truck to Allard Technologies & they will be given a complete work up by the medical divsion of the tigers. To make sure that the Martouk Experimentation & Research corporation has not left any cybernetic surprises on the PC's. The Martouk Experimentation & Research corporation 'Renew agents' are already gunning for the PC's so its only a matter of time before they clash. Allard is pulling tiger agents from both Maine & Europe for future missions.  Here's where corporate shadow play comes straight out of Zaibatsu From Zozer Games. 

'Playing Out In The Rocks' Cepheus Engine Rpg Session Report - Among The Population & Into The Bloodsoaked Jungles

 This session picks right up after last week's game with the prisoners erm player's PC's circulating among the general prison population. DM Steve's PC wasn't captured along with the PC's he working with  the Allard Technologies  legal department who have sued The Martouk Experimentation & Research corporation. This comes  over Allard's Technologies  loss of assets, personel, & disputed their claim on the star gate on Mercury all  of this corporate legal play comes straight out of Zaibatsu From Zozer Games. 

Meanwhile the PC's have been getting a real education among the prison's population about   the Martouk Experimentation & Research deep connections to the 'Renew movement' that's sweeping some of the lower teir colonies on Mars, Earthside, & parts of central North America. The idea of the Renew movement is simple A.I. clone driven serial immortality for the rich & powerful recording not only the minds of the clients. But also their whole sale souls through a combination of psionics & clone driven organ replacement. Certain prisoners are being sent off world to work in the mines of Mars & the Renew movement's cyborgs are freezing other prisoners for disection. Martouk is trying to isolate the psionic compodent in the human mind. 

 Renew  also has a very dangerous eco terrorist driven cult aspect to their cybernetic & gene punk cyborg programs that the Martouk Experimentation & Research corporation has picked up from their purchase of  Mental  corporation assets. 

The PC's squared off in several nasty VR simulation encounters  using Camp Cretaceous to find out what the party knew of the stargate or some of the information from  the  'The Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky' ship because the Martouk doesn't have access to the star ship. The corporate world courts & the space authority decides the fate of the  'The Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky'.  The players believe that there's an A.I. controlling the vast underground prison that their in. They have no idea where it is though. 

The PC's ran into a group of half Grays among the prison population & then it a thousand questions about their crashed ship in the desert.But they have no idea where the prison is but they did bring the player's PC's into their psionic clutch. The players were able to root out a 'wide awake' NPC  agent among the prisoners that were trying to get close to them. 

The PC's were yanked back into the VR tanks & subject to a bit more 'adventure' simulations & encounters but this time were able to resist with the hybrids help. The 'Warden' wasn't amused & yanked the two players PC's into a prehistoric survival encounter! The PC's were eventually taken out of the VR simulation by a strange looking well dressed royal of some sort. He addressed the 'Warden' got the PC's into medical for a complete work up after two days (game time) of running for their lives. 

We ended the night with the PC's in medical getting patched up & with some new friends. The royal NPC is well connected in the corporate world apparently & was generated using issue #73 of Dragon (May 1983), entitled "Relief for Traveller Nobility" by Paul Montgomery Crabaugh. This is a great article for both players & DM's who want to add a bit of original Traveller royalty to their PC's. It can easily be used for the Cepheus Engine rpg for adding a bit more royal blood to the mix. 

Happy Ninety third birthday to William F. Nolan co author of Logan's Run. 

'Playing Out In The Rocks' Cepheus Engine Rpg Session Report Seven - A Deep Hole In The Ground & Deeper Circumstances

 Its been all wine & roses with the Allard Technologies corporation until they tried to lay claim on another corporation's property. The PC's came face to face with the another corporation's marines cum security forces and it wasn't pretty. 

And this week we totally pulled the rug out from under the player's PC's on Mercury as the Allard Technologies put in a claim for the alien star gate. Well, the player's PC's were captured by the Martouk Experimentation & Research corporate forces. This session picks up where the last on left off.  The Martouk Experimentation & Research corporate forces buttoned the PC's up for Earth side. And then stuck into a hole in the ground.  The hole in this case is a private underground prison/Fortress, the inmates are computer controlled with CCTV, dream readers and devices that can cause pain or death. Yup that's right we're now using the 1992 sci fi prison film Fortress. Fortress (1992)  Christopher Lambert, Loryn Locklin, Kurtwood Smith is a film tt's been on our radar for years. Its been used in rpgs at our table for everything from Cyberpunk to Superhero campaigns. The Fortress facility was sold to Martouk after the events  of the film or Martouk was behind the Mental corporation the details are unimportant as the time. 

The Martouk Experimentation & Research corporation is interested in cornering the market on psionic abilities coupled with cybernetics. Since the forces of These Stars Are Ours have appeared this has thrown Martouk into high gear. The stargate on Mercury represents full on access to other planes or dimensions. Something Martouk is willing to murder for. Martouk does not want the PC's dead per say but compliant instead. They know about Michael Brown's Cold War: Containment events & they'd like to prevent a rehash of those events. 

The PC's are being studied while the corporate world courts & the space authority decides the fate of the  'The Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky'. The space craft sits in dry dock while the PC's are dissected in their hole out in the middle of the Mexican desert. Apollo the A.I.  has slipped a synthetic into their midst named Michael who  was created using Cepheus Engine rpg book Synethics from Zozer games. 

The data that they retrieved from their ship is still with them as their hacker's mind  wasn't searched  yet. The Russians provided them with some very dangerous intel. To really mess with the  players we went back to 'The Dragon' issue#35 which has an article for original Traveller by James  Hopkins titled Black Holes. 

There's indications that the sinister Malmori Empire has been messing with an alien stable black hole power generator that the corporations want to get their hands on. The Russians know something about it but it the Reticulin's seem to have own it at one point. There's lots of intrigue going on here. And Dr. Hans Reinhardt's name came up during game play over the weekend. One of the inmates having been the mad genius's research assistant in general population in the prison. 

Next week the player's PC's start circulating into general population. They are unaware of  the cyborgs guarding their hole in the ground of a holding facility. The specter of Dr. Hans Reinhardt continues to haunt the campaign. 

'Playing Out In The Rocks' Cepheus Engine Rpg Session Report Seven - Secrets of Mercury & Tricks of 'The Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky'

 Today's session was solid investigative work & picks up right where the last session left off. With the player's PC's getting the  'The Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky' into dry dock at the local station. Then it was a full going over the ship for alien life forms or worse. Trust me this was a straight up investigation from the ground up. 

Once aboard Allard Technologies section of the station, the party's hacker & cracker got to work on the ins & outs of the computer downloading what happened to the crew, Mercury mining secrets, & more. The party found not only some very valuable mineral data but an alien artifact! An ancient alien stargate on the dark side of Mercury. There was an extensive data list & dump from the ship. There's also alien remains below the surface of the planet Mercury. The crew it seems exited into the stargate 125 years ago before the psychic storms flared up. But to where?! 

The New England Buoys's hacker Hector called into an old favor to an A.I. friend of his name Apollo whose actually an organic computer made from cloned genuis fetal brain tissues. Apollo was created using Cepheus Engine rpg book Synethics from Zozer games. 

But that stargate really bothers the players in spades. There's something about it that doesn't seem to ring true for them. So their hacker Hector has put in a call to bring in a Synthetic belonging to Apollo to help the party with the exploration as Allard Technologies has put in a full claim to this section of Mercury. Allard Technologies has brought in Tiger security forces under the umbrella of security liasons. The shake down of the 'The Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky' mean resupply & full going over. There was quite a bit of wear & tear totaling about  120 million in damage which meant that Allard's corporate backer is stepping in. The players think that these could be a clutch of Ronin freelancers or veterans kicked out of a corp who have been bank rolling Allard. 

A bit of background on the star gate itself. The star gate isn't simply a stargate ala 2001 A Space Odyssey. Instead I went back to The Dragon magazine Dragon issue 27 released in July of 1979 with the article Tesseracts: A Traveller Artifact by Gary Jordon.  

This is artifact that's far more then it seems & very dangerous in its own right. This artifact comes straight outta of my uncle's 86 campaign of original Traveller that's being adapted to our current game. And there are eyes from afar watching with some dangerous interest at the events on Mercury. 

'Playing Out In The Rocks' Cepheus Engine Rpg Session Report Six - Tagging & Claiming 'The Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky'

 This session report picks up right where the PC's  were having to deal with a killer alien robot who took over the station's life support & full functions of the station. The player's solution find the damn thing by using the Allard Technologies ship sensors & then crawling across the surface of the station. Then blowing the thing up with a carefully placed shot up the tail pipe of the bot. One failed roll later & one of the PC's almost died if not for the quick thinking of a fellow miner. 

The New England Bouys had to do a quick dust up & reboot on the station which took several hours (not really a series of rolls & some DM exposition). The PC's got back a report from the science outpost orbiting Mercury. They found what they were looking for 'The Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky' which has been sitting in a decaying orbit near Mercury for a very long time. This was the green light for the PC's Then it was off to freezer for a quick nap & slow tug over to Mercury. 

The player's PC's were awakened in the shadow of Mercury & one of its many little asteroids.  Mercury is dangerous as all Hell. In a decaying orbit near Mercury is the Tsiolkovsky. Its been missing for over 175 years. After the fall of the Talon sector & its rise after the psionic storms its been a 'Flying Dutchman' of the inner solar system. 

  
 The PC's rental tug parted its arse in orbit around the asteroid.  They scanned the ship for any life signs, brought two probe bots on line, & began going over the ship for any sign of weirdness. They found it! The main hatches were open & the ship was subjected to full vacuum. 'The Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky'  is a pre fall ship in the same line as the Leonov from  Arthur C. Clarke’s 2010: Odyssey Two and 1984 film adaption.

You can also find some detailed star ship plans right here,  Probe robots revealed that several of the fittings had been melted This stirred up some really emotions from the players. It was getting pretty late & the player's PC's dropped a signal buoy before Chinese exo pirates came in. 

According to John Watts, " Cepheus Engine Western, released today but also the DTRPG Traveller (and related items) sale started today! You can save 25% on many of our PDFs for the upcoming week!"

This is gonna be a in instant in the basket for me but its got to wait till pay day! You can see more stuff from Stellagama Publishing on sale that's going into my campaign.

'Playing Out In The Rocks' Cepheus Engine Rpg DM Workshop & Session Report Five - The Wreck & Tag

 This session picks right up where the other one left off as the players are become far more careful. 
Last night it started to snow fiercely & our group decided to do another phone by play session. And in this session the party tagged the wreck with a location bouy & registered it. They are getting very cagey about the campaign. And so they confronted the Russian agent NPC about what else is on that lap top?! 

There were lots of questions about what's on the intersystem starcharts because their looking for a craft for themselves. Sure Allard Technologies has craft but their looking for an independent craft. And they found a Soviet abanonded  deep space research vessel in deep  orbit around Mercury. The craft has been there for a hundred years. The craft is the  shadow of a solar power array collector station that is beaming power back to several corporate solar science stations in orbit around the Sun. 
The New England Bouys wanna call intern solar salvage rights on the craft & then haul it into an orbit where they can work on it.  Mercury is dangerous as all Hell. 

Here's where Zozer game's Orbital 2100 campaign setting is coming in handy. The big question is why was the craft abandoned & will there be rewards. The players are trying to throw me with this. And Greg has generated a Russian pilot in the employ of Allard technologies. 

The players want Allard Technologies to pay one of the science outposts to send a probot into the shadow to scout out the craft. And to keep their mouths shut about what they find. And there's several corporate interests already interested in deep solar power collection within the Talon sector. The navy officer  from the navy of TSAO: These Stars Are Ours aboard the Daniel Boone station has become rather nervous about this course of action. It became a question of spill it or else since the party had sent transmission ahead for the probot. Yuri Novaralov interceeded here & the party wasn't cleared for this yet. 
And that's when I decided to drop in a parasite robotic system Dark Tek page 35 aboard the Pioneer space station. And when systems started going wrong with life support the paranoia got cranked to the volume of eleven. 

And with that we cue dramatic music & we'll pick this up in the next couple of days! Lots of questions on the players parts but there's not many answers... yet.. 

'Playing Out In The Rocks' Cepheus Engine Rpg DM Workshop & Session Report Four - The Wreck of the Ages

 Several cargo modules from the wreck last week look strangely familiar to the players in the session  today. The wreck is over a 175 years old and yet perfectly preserved. 

Silent Running film fans will know these cargo containers. 

This game campaign session  picks up right where last session left off. The wreck in question is a pulsed fission propulsion craft from someplace else with ANSA markings on it. There were also life signs aboard... 
 


 Dark Conspiracy rpg is one of those games that haunts my players  from time to time. So this means that bringing DC into my Cepheus Engine rpg campaigns is something that's gonna be happening. The players pressed me on the fact that this wreck that followed in her hyperspace wake & is there a hyperspacial drive aboard? This drive is incredibly valuable to both the players & major corporations.. And the answer was no! This both confused & pissed off players. The second stage of the craft is partially wrecked. The players have decided to send in a probot from Hostile the Hostile rpg setting  to investigate. 

Prorobot was uncrated & launched  because the players think that an encounter could kill them & their right! The probot dodged several huge pieces of space junk & managed to find the energy source in one of the cargo. What the players didn't expect was the night gaunts clinging to the side the wreck.. They retreated to otherside of the wreck & the PC's managed to kill one of the night gaunts with a lucky head shot with their laser. But the roughneck veteran Charlie Pringle PC  went temporarily insane getting a full view of the faceless entity. 
The probot was equipped with a laser gun & the party  were using a virtual reality head set up straight out of Dark Conspiracy's Dark Tek book. 

Now the PC's want to back off the probot & investigate the wreck so we ended with them magnetically sealing the bot into place & plans to move forward coming up fast. Their Russian agent/marine NPC was there to act as a liaison for navy of TSAO: These Stars Are Ours aboard the Daniel Boone station. But Yuri Novaralov was generated using the free  Kosmos 68 rules.  There is a hidden agenda here and the players are wondering what's going on. 

Allard Electronics has some inside track on this & there's been talk among the executives of Z'ha'dum?! The players didn't catch on to this at the moment but Allard Technologies clamped down hard on the space wreck.