Deeper & Deeper Into The Station From Hell - The Red Room's Orbital Decay & Night Owl Workshop's Colonial Troopers - Session Report

 Tonight's  DM Paul's Colonial Troopers/Orbital Decay campaign and tonight's game picks right up where we were in last week's session. Our scientist Pu ar aj created a device that can disrupt the phasing ability of the alien monsters we were dealing with. 

The catch was that the device could only work from room to room. My Colonial Trooper PC and the rest of our mercs went from room to room putting Matt our engineer and psychic to work. We left two of our alien friends partially phased into a bulkhead. That was one down and more to go. Just as Matt threw up a field saving my character from two acid edged claws. 
Our PC's are looking for the artifact that the scientists took on board which seems to be holding open the dimensional gate the alien monsters are using. The aliens took one of psychics a healer named DEV by phasing her through the wall of the Science section! 

The monsters seem to be attacking in a directed pattern and our PC's laser rifles are set not to blow holds in the station's walls or floors. So it's been partially a 'cat & mouse' game with these horrors.  Our next objective is the station's engineering & reactor room. 

Read Through & First Impressions of Cepheus Universal: Player's Book By Paul Elliott For The Cepheus Universal Rpg

 So awhile back I picked up the massive Cepheus Universal Rpg rules which clock in at four hundred & forty three pages of the newest incarnation of the Zozer version of the Cepheus Engine. And then I discovered the  Cepheus Universal: Player's Book which gives even more player oprions for PC creation. 

We get term-by-term character creation, 
designed character creation,
random character creation, & 
what skill levels and characteristics really mean. Then we there's even more PC options such as: 

• Secret agendas for characters
• Career load outs
• Random name lists
• Combat and game rules
• Full equipment lists
• Point buy psionics, cybernetics and retrogenics
• Group creation suggestion
• Gadgeteering rules
  And this adds a far more nuianced feeling to the ten minute PC creation. But is this the same rpg system as Zozer Games Hostile Rpg?! 
  Well yes and no, there are definitely Hostile rpg system bones within Cepheus Universal but the system is far more designed & written for expanded 2d6 Science Fictional rpg campaigning. And the Player's Book adds to this by do a very decent job of boiling down some of the Cepheus Universal systems into a more player oriented book. This supplement makes the game more player based and easier to use in my opinion. Is it necessary?! For me as a DM? Oh yes! 
  
  
  
  Because the Player's Book adds in both optional PC systems & makes the existing material so much easier to digest for PC creation. There are more PC system  options making PC creation a breeze. And Cepheus Universal is easily used with other Cepheus Engine rpg systems so existing 2d6 campaign setting are a snap to use with this book
  As a companion supplement the  Cepheus Universal: Player's Book works very solidly to serve as both bridge point & player's guide to this incarnation of the Cepheus Engine. All in all very satified with my newest 2d6 supplement addition. 

The Next Frontier By Joseph Mohr & The Clement Sector Rpg Session Report - Wolf Attack - Session Report

 "After a long and grueling mission the travelers are relaxing at a star port tavern when they are approached by a grizzled old veteran of the Sonoran Frontier Scout Service. He is looking for crews for scouting duties beyond the borders of the Sonora sector. These areas beyond the borders are dangerous and unexplored by humans. Humans have certainly visited the edges of these sectors but none have fully been explored. In fact...most of these sectors have barely been touched by human visitors. As the human race expands outward into the stars the need for knowledge of these frontiers places becomes more imperative." 

"The Frontier Scout Service has scouted many such places. But in recent years the strain on the service’s resources has become apparent. Too many of their scouts have perished in this outer rim of the galaxy. Many scouts have gone into the wildest places of the adjacent sectors and have not returned. No trace has been recovered of most of these expeditions.

The Frontier Scout Service needs a brave team to make a survey of the nearby sub-sector which the Frontier Scout Service has designated Galakodana" 

I had a spur of the moment Clement Sector rpg session & we had already completed our first leg of the campaign already. The PC's were swept away by the money that the grizzled old veteran of the Clement  Frontier Scout Service. The Next Frontier By Jospeh Mohr is well done & well written. The Next Frontier can easily be adapted to any 2d6 Rpg Science Fiction. Note that 'aliens' in our Clement sector games are actually uplifted or modified humans who were sent on exploritory missions during the days of wormhole. The Clement sector has lost communication with this region of space. 
The PC's signed onto the patronage of Scout Charles Anderson whose service to the Clement Frontier Scout Service has been done with solid references. Those references were checked & they began in earnest. The party began to note the number of dangerous hyperspacial and subspace anomolies which played merry havoc with some of thier drives. The party made for a ball of ice & it was a pock marked Hellscape called Tormazonia. We made contact with the lizard like humanoid  Ginuk who had a small Science resarch outpost on this icy world. 

The biggest question was why?! The PC's began looking at everything about Tormazonia. And found out that the little world has naturally occuring cold fusion & this got the PC's excited. 
Everything was going well until some uplifted pirates showed up! And of course it's Wolf time thanks to Ian Stead's artwork. 

The edges of the Clement Sector map are slowly being reclaimed from the Blackness in our campaign. These areas are being claimed back by the Scout Service and the Cascadia Colonization Authority which keeps close tabs on the Scouts.. 

Violent Mechanisms of the Second American Civil War - Cities Without Number & Zozer Games Earth Sourcebook for The Hostile Rpg

 What if the newest face of the American Civil War wasn't what everyone thinks it's about?! This is the question that I asked myself when I was reading through Cities Without Number and Zozer Games Earth setting book by Paul Elliot for the Hostile Rpg 

Earth's setting book has written into her timeline the American Civil War II which is not about North Vs South American forces. Instead, it's about the erroiding of individual rights in the face of the mega corporations of Earth. 
One of the flash points for this new American Civil War is the front of Texas which is pretty much in the cross hairs of the mega corporations over stepping thier bounds onto states rights. 
Cities Without Number has something similar with the mega corporations overstepping thier bounds much earlier and then things kick off. 
This isn't the start of the new Civil War but instead merely a series of brushfire wars that leads into the situation becoming much worse later on. 
Texas becomes the Casablanca of the West where agents, corporate forces, state armies, the American Police forces, and the operators all meet. 
Because of the fact that Cities Without Numbers uses the Cepheus Engine skill system as it's base. We've got a readily available campaign setting that we can port over. 

What would a cyberpunk style second American Civil War look like? The Civil War  would be a series of brush fire conflicts, terrororist actions, and pitched battles set together with operator parties, brutal Cold War style esponisage, high tech gadgets, and more. 

 What if I told you that the actual cause of the conflict was something far different?! Suppose that Earth actually harbors sinister alien intelligences. And these alien intelligences are totally unseen. Far fetched?! Not really in a world where evil clones & androids are hunted down there's plenty of room for rogue A.I.'s . The Kosmo's 60's blog has an entry on 'Violent Mechanisms,' which are exactly as they sound rogue murderous retrofuturistic A.I.'s. Russia and America of the Earth sourcebook used to be partners in space exploration. That partnership dissolved under unknown circumstances. What if the A.I.'s sewed the seeds of distrust?! An accident here, an untraceable murder there, and the break down of an international partnership. 
Now imagine if a few of those rogue A.I.'s wanted to set the mega corporations & the pesky humans of the United States at each other's throats. A few well timed disasters and infrastructure breakdowns with the mega corporation's finger prints on them?! The perfect cover for an A.I. implied American Civil War II & a bleeding ground for violent experimentation under the fog of war. 

Tides In The Void - The Red Room's Orbital Decay & Night Owl Workshop's Colonial Troopers - Session Report

 Over the weeekend, I got a chance to play in DM Paul's Colonial Troopers/Orbital Decay . This is a pick up on a gam that we played back in Febuary. Here's the session report from that on game!  Here we find ourselves back in the Orrt Cloud investigating Science station that's gone off line. 

We had a mixed party of adventurers who had been in the service. I however was playing a pure colonial trooper mercenary with a wealthy patron who was bank rolling my armor. We had a mixed party of mercenaries, explorers, and spacers. We dived closer to the Eclipse station D.E.E.P. asteroid monitoring & Science station. 
 The station was a complete mess when we got there. Solar arrays and power was fragmented across the top of the station. Not good. 

We were working for the American Federation and things were going from bad to worse. Power was completely off in the station. So we had to connect power from our ship. We did the manual locks and our fourth level psionic psionic and engineer scanned the place. 
The impressions weren't good at all. And as we entered we found body parts floating in the void of the station. We got the computer back on line and found out that the Science station had taken on an artifact of unknown origin. And then all Hell broke loose. 

Karl my character came in and started scanning the outer interior of the of the Science station. Immediately, I was attacked by two nasty alien things. Thier claws were acid edged. And I quickly brought my laser pistol to bare. The thing had been programmed so that I didn't blow a hole in the station. 
Packing deeper into the station I found two of the scientists partially phased into the wall. This was bad news. 
Matt our engineer joined me and threw up a psychic shield just as one of the monsters launched himself at our party. Scott our spacer threw two multi dimensional foam grenades!  And really screwed with the phasing abilities of the aliens. The aliens were stuck for the moment. 
Communication seemed to be off the table. And we really wanted to save the station if possible. More to come. 

OSR Commentary - The Original Dungeons & Dragons Threat of The Warriors of Pan Tang

 “. Now he asked: “And who is this mighty sorcerer, Master Pilarmo?” “His name is Theleb K’aarna,” Pilarmo answered nervously. Elric’s scarlet eyes narrowed. “The sorcerer of Pan Tang?” “Aye—he comes from that island.” Elric put his cup down upon the table and rose, fingering his blade of black iron, the runesword Stormbringer. He said with conviction: “I will help you, gentlemen.” He had made up his mind not to rob them, after all. A new and more important plan was forming in his brain. Theleb K’aarna, he thought. So you have made Bakshaan your bolt-hole, eh?”
― Michael Moorcock, Elric: The Stealer of Souls

I've covered my interactions with the Stormbringer rpg's version of the Pan Tangians on this blog back in 2020  here. In the 80's I had a Games Workshop Pan Tangian Chaos army including tigers and more. My love of the Pan Tangians stretches back too original Dungeons & Dragons Kuntz & Ward's Gods, Demigods, and Heroes's Michael Moorcock Elric Mythos. The Pan Tangian warriors of OD&D are deadly; "PAN TANG WARRIORS Move etc. as men An army of fighters all able to fight with the ability of a 10th level fighter. These humans never check moral and ride a 6 legged reptile which stands 15 feet tall and moves 20" per turn." What made them deadly was two fold, one is that these warriors could show up anywhere and they were deadly tenth level fighters! 

During the Eighties in my uncle's original Dungeons & Dragons game campaigns we crossed swords with the Pan Tangians numerous times. And died at least three or more times. 

And one of the things that made the Pan Tangian armies so deadly was thier trained and Chaos tainted tigers. These tigers were always accompanying the warriors of Pan Tang; " FIGHTING TIGERS OF TANG Armor Class — 4 Fighter Ability: As Tigers Move: 19" Psionic Ability: Class 6 Hit Points These are 10 feet tall tigers able to bite for 4 (8-sided) dice of damage and claw for 3 (8-sided). They always appear beside the Pan Tang warriors, one to a mount."  My uncle's own 15 MM Pan Tangian army was our adventurer's bane through out or campaign and beyond. It wasn't until the 90's that we learnt that it was actually a Pan Tangian agent with his own private army of mercenaries who dogged our heels. In fact, in part three of   'The Madcap Laughs' were introduced to a hunch backed Pan Tangian sorcerer Ylastraraa Taar who has an agenda all of his own for the PC's. This NPC managed to survive the events of 'The Madcap Laughs' & then plague the PC's for more then a year of play.

That twisted little S.O.B. followed us from the Young Kingdoms to Greyhawk then across the Million Spheres! That slight could be traced back to our original Dungeons & Dragons Greyhawk folio campaign when we were doing guard duty for a trade caravan to Pan Tang.. That's right one NPC dogged our party for a whole two  year span from '89 through '91.  

OSR Commentary - Further Readings Into Raiders of The Lost Artifacts Rpg By Night Owl Workshop

 Over the last two days, I've been incredibly busy with work and familial stuff. However, I did manage to pull in a discussion with another friend of mine about Raiders of the Lost Artifacts rpg by Night Owl Workshop. I've used RoA as a game and campaign fller for Wretched Interbellum in the past especially with the Scientist class being able to be used a stand in for a mage. 

 And using Raiders for filling in PC classes is especially handy. The OSR library site has a ton of new classes for RoA  that David Baymiller did.    These are perfect to add into a party going on exploring jaunts. This means that the party is far more or less modernly handled. 
So whose actually maintaining the traps and ancient ruins?! The short answer is cults are and this is because these dungeons & ruins are psychic batteries of occult power and misery that the optional occultist class channels into thier machinations. Cults using thier sacred ruins & dungeons gain the ability to charm & influence once every new moon. 
The occultist when casting ritual magic within the dungeon or ruin casts at one level higher. Traps and tricks within a dungeon or ruin are there to further the pot of supernatural power. This power allows the occultists to have access to more dangerous rituals that might seem outta of reach. Magick and the supernatural is all about power and domination. 
For our own game campaigns, dungeons & ruins allow occultists to have access to the Beyond. The Beyond comes from the Wretched Rpg and allows the occultist to have access to the power hungry entities. Entities who want to cut deals and further thier own agendas. 
The Beyond comes with it's own agenda however and the supernatural energies of that universe are terryifying unto themselves. Those exposed to & channeling the occult energies are subject to horrific mutations. 
And at higher levels within our games occultists can become quisi demonic lords immune to many mundane & physical hazards. The price for these immunies is high as the occultist becomes more and more a creature of the Beyond. They slip further and further away from our own dimensions.