Game Idea 10-26-2005
10-26-2005
Shuttlecraft Delta
In Jay-Trek you'll see small groups of Starfleet People taking off in Shuttlecraft, aiming at destinations that are far, far out of shuttle range
But a quick cut scene later they'll be in their destination system. How? Hitchhiking.
In Jay-Trek it is customary for ships travelling in any given direction to go ahead and pick up shuttles heading that way as well.
Starfleet ships do not charge for this, but it's considered an invitation to be scanned and generally curioused at.
Most Civilian ships will cheerfully give Starfleet Shuttles a ride - It is customary for Starfleet Officers to help civilian ships and they represent some form of defense against marauders (The theory from both marauders and victims being that a shuttle full of Starfleet people disappearing will draw a quicker, larger respnse than a civilian ship.) Basically like having a cop ride along in your car when you're in a bad area of town.
This also represents a chance to expose civilian technicians and crew to the
latest in Starfleet training, which Starfleet Officers are usually good about
sharing.
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There is an old saying that goes "If you wait long enough, you'll see everything."
The Planet LeninShKod is proof of this. Founded in the early 22nd century by dissidents from Earth, LeninShkod is a communist workers paradise.
Taking from 1920s and 1930s propaganda about the Soviet Union, the people of Leninshkod have worked long and hard to create a replica of a Socialist Nation the way the Soviet Union *saw itself* in the pre-war period.
Styles and architecture are straight from old movies and pictures.
In Political terms the people speak a confusing babble of old slogans and communist theorizing. They tend to do so with their tongues in their cheeks. Adult people on Leninshkod view their world as a goofy but good humored homage to a utopian vision and play it out.
But... not everyone approaches it as a comic opera socialism.
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The Red Army Starship Red October is a vessel nominally of the Leninshkod defense force - the Red Army. She is an old Miranda class starship handed down to the people of Leninshkod to help with their defenses.
However Captain Ivan Kruschoff is mad. Insane.
He has taken his ship on an open ended patrol to confront the enemies of the People and the Federation, to extend the hand of Socialism in Rescue and to aid the cause of Workers everywhere.
Krushoff is a tactical genius. Taking his ship to communications silence he altered the warp signature of the ship so that she is not recognizable on long range scans (She looks like a freighter, or a scout, or some other ship, but never herself)
He travels the space ways doing a twisted and occasionally incoherent take on the Starfleet mission. He responds to distress calls, and then lectures the people saved on the value of socialism. He confronts enemies and usually confuses them with ideologically driven speeches and propaganda.
He encounters weird things, and manages, somehow to escape or resolve them.
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Captain - Ivan Kruschoff - a madman, he retains enough sanity to keep his ship going. His crew will follow him anywhere - some because they believe he is a true genius and hero. Some because they are waiting with baited breath to see what insanity will turn up next, others because they're lost and don't know where else to go.
In person, he is charismatic and personable. But he deeply and truly believes in A) The Socialist Worker's Paradise And B) that the Federation is it
When provoked he is prone to launch into complex diatribes about socialism and its relative value to any other form of social organiztion. He reads a lot of Philosophy, and while it's all viewed through his socialist lens, his eye for detail is amazing.
the XO
Valirie Kopenov - a Harried man, a natural talent for organizing and motivating people. He is locked into a deeply odd co-dependant relationship with the Captain. He believes that Kruschoff is a Genius and a True Hero, a point of view that has been reinforced many times.
Science Officer
T'Zema - a Monk of T'Zal. She is an acting science officer, having graciously
turned down numerous attempts to commission her an officer in the Red Army.
She acts as a voice of science and fact on the Bridge of the Red October and in the councils of the Captain.
One may wonder why she isn't also the voice of reason, and within certain carefully constricted boundaries she is.
However T'Zema sees the Red October as one very large joke (Although the situations they encounter, and the people they try to help are serious and real). The Universe is telling her a very complex and almost unbelievably broad joke.
T'Zema has resolved to observe the ship and it's crew through to its end, watching to see just what and how it will happen and trying to map out what this means about how the Universe is thinking.
So T'Zema stays carefully neutral on any of Captain Kruschoff's schemes and plans, or any objections to Kruschoffs attitude or actions based on common sense and reason.
If Common sense and Reason were to be factors in the events surrounding the Red October - they would have made themselves known by now.
Although reserved and very Vulcan, T'Zema is also very out front with her curiousity and her willingness to try things and see what they are. She has been seen drunk and table dancing.
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Gtraska - a Tellarite Engineer. Well Sort of. He was picked up from a wrecked trader and stayed.
Gtraska is a savant with machines. He can touch them and with a few smooth, assured, mysterious motions fix them or utterly dismantle them.
Gtraska doesn't speak well. He mumbles and grumbles. He stalks the halls of the Red October mumling to himself, glassy eyed and thinking. He becomes angry and loud when interupted.
Gtraska has to work hard to explain to the engineering crew of the Red October what he wants done, and usually there's shouting involved at some point.
Gtraska was a normal Tellarite commercial starship engineer. In the accident from which he was rescued - he suffered an injury. A pulse of energy from the warp drive of his ship affected his brain. He is suffering from a sort of dementia which mimics schizophrenia and given him his savant technological abilities.
Curing him would be difficult but it would return him to normal and allow him to move on with life.
He is the one who is able to disguise the Red October as so many different ships.
He simply moved into the engineering deck and started doing things. The Engieering crew let him work and liked what they saw, so they keep letting him go.
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Isaac Karlson - Chief of the "Action team" a group of enlisted commandos
and technicians who are charged with actually beaming down to planets and into
situations and then dealing with them as directed by the bridge of the Red October.
Karlson and his people are tough, ingenious, disillusioned, poorly disciplined and thery tend to be drunk much of the time.
They are the ones usually doing the hands on rescuing, fighting or coping with weirdness. They are very good at these things, too.
Karlson himself is a huge man with black hair, a black beard and a bellowing laugh that carries. he is very strong and creative about preserving his own ass and those of the people under his command.
He specializes in brewing moonshine in a variety of hidden stills all over the ship.
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The Game/Story is this - a group of young Starfleet officers hitchiking to a
distant duty port are picked up by the Red October.
Because it's a defense unit of an independant world, they cannot simply take it over - they can only offer advice.
The PCs are the voice of reason on a ship of madness as it careens from one adventure to the next.
If they can offer advice without patronizing the people (Not as well trained as Starfleet they do have the edge in experience) If they can avoid becoming shrill and demanding and perhaps being thrown in the brig,
Then maybe they can help the Captain see that things turn out in a suitably "Star Trek" manner.
Maybe they can detour the ship away from a seriously bad encounter or two.
Maybe they can stick with the Commandos and learn how to drink and do run and gun at the right time, and learn how to step forward and prevent the violence at the right time.
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I can imagine all sorts of fun to be had with this sort of format - but the Players would have to understand it clearly - the crew of the Red October NEEDS the voice of reason - opinions expressed by the Red October crew are not necessarily shared by the Game world or the GM.
And the GM would have to carefully gauge the Players' tolerance for insanity and silliness as they went.
I have one player that would be frustrated to the point of pulling his hair by this sort of game - and another who'd throw off her Starfleet uniform, slam as much moonshine as she could and never look back.
Ahhhh, but in some moderation - perhaps the PCs don't realize early on how nutty the Red October really is, maybe this is revealed slowly over time.
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Disclaimer: Paramount owns all things Trek. I claim original characters and situations in this material for me.