GM Radio Rob
Apprentice Douchebag
Posts: 64
Currently Playing: Nothing yet.
Currently Running: Deathwatch
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Post by GM Radio Rob on Mar 30, 2017 3:39:04 GMT -8
I love the idea that I've been getting from listening to current and prior episodes of Happy Jack's, the idea of being a fan of your players, and it's been melding with the other main theme of developing the "adventure" up to where you have an interesting situation - or, ideally, a bunch of interesting situations - then stop and present the situations to the players to solve (or make worse). It's something that I've heard in a few places but it's only gelling now, and I think the "be a fan of your players" concept helped - each situation is a gift to your players, something you've put together for them to play with. At the end of next month I'm aiming to kick off a new campaign/podcast with some good mates. We're playing Deathwatch, the Warhammer 40,000 Space Marine RPG. Though I'm not a fan of the 40K universe, I like it, and I like the idea of my players getting to be Space Marines because (a) they're grand, exaggerated personalities and (b) their sheer stat-based oomph trends away from the very cautious, check-every-five-feet-for-traps play that bores me to tears as a GM (and player). As I'm trying to get over my own control-freakiness (I know, right? A GM who's a control freak? Unheard of!) and build my confidence with running before actually developing a plot of my own, I'm starting out with the Final Sanction adventure, part of the 2010 Free RPG Day download. The Marines are dropped into the capital city of an Imperial agri-world that's in the midst of a rebellion orchestrated by a brood of Genestealers; they have to get to the city's astropath to send for help, then seek out and kill the Genestealer Broodlord. The adventure itself is presented as four sets of encounters mostly focused on combat, and while it's about what you'd expect for Space Marines, I was hoping to give things a little more character (I want the opportunity to ham it up a bit myself). So I'm trying to think of some more flavourful situations to give my players. So far, my four players have made: - Mathias Veinglory, Ambitious Blood Angel Assault Marine
- Gladius Aurellius, Taciturn Ultramarines Apothecary
- Gedeon Khamael, (demeanour pending) Dark Angel Devastator
- Avalon, Gregarious Storm Warden Techmarine
I like that Matthias' player has decided that Matthias is very much the narcissist, and Gedeon's player has mentioned an interest between the Oath of Service to the Deathwatch and the Dark Angels' oath to hunt The Fallen, their former chapter brethren, down. Avalon's player wants to have fun hanging back and tinkering with things, seeing the character as a genderflipped Scots Tony Stark (yes, Space Marines can be female in my game and that's absolutely cool with me). Gladius' player has been a little harder to read, but given that he's made a Taciturn Marine, maybe that's the point. In the first session, I'm expecting the players to stay mostly in the district of Lordsholm they are dropped into. After they defeat the rebels at their landing location, they can liberate the nearby spaceport, the base of the Planetary Defence Force and an underground storage depot (vital if they want to keep using their bolters). I've had the following ideas for situations; some for now, some for later: - A Rebel leader uninfected by the Genestealers who comes to the Marines for aid - while he stood against the oppressive Governor for what he sees as good reason, he's realised the rebellion as a whole is tainted (probably better for later once word spreads that Space Marines have arrived in Lordsholm).
- A PDF leader who wants a rebel leader dead for personal reasons and over-extends his own troops.
- A PDF member unwilling to pull the trigger on an infected former friend - or one serving the rebellion willingly.
- An infected family member who has brought his children to be infected by a Genestealer (a good way to inroduce the real alien threat early on, I think).
The tricky bit is, of course, that the players' characters are pretty much within their authority to blow holes in anything they come across. What do you folks think? Any suggestions?
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GM Radio Rob
Apprentice Douchebag
Posts: 64
Currently Playing: Nothing yet.
Currently Running: Deathwatch
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Post by GM Radio Rob on Feb 8, 2018 12:38:19 GMT -8
Okay. After half a year, I'm kicking my Deathwatch campaign / podcast - now called Only in Death: The Secret Mission logs of Kill-team Atromitos - off again. Rather than worrying too much about broad plot for now, I'm just going with what's in the Final Sanction adventure and working from there. I'd still like a little help with giving my sessions a bit more oomph, so I'm going to go over what I have; any suggestions are welcome! We're going to be opening where we left off last year; the Space Marines of Kill-team Atromitos have just saved some children from being infected by a group of four Genestealers, three of whom the Kill-team, well, killed. The Marines captured an older boy, William, who brought the younger children to the deserted warehouse in the battle-torn city of Lordsholm to meet the Genestealers. He's infected, part of the Genestealer Cult behind the rebellion in the city. Now, I want to let the players get some interesting information out of William, bit I'm not sure what. There's the fact that there's a traitor in the midst of the officers of the Planetary Defence Force HQ that the payers will be visiting next, but part of me is wondering what other hints I could drop. Speaking of the PDF HQ, the players will be going there next. I think I've got the combat encounter (destroy a battery of siege guns before they can fire again and destroy the base's walls) but again, I want to give that traitor a little more oomph. I figure that if the players don't get anything out of William, the fact that the rebels are prepared for the Marines' approach after they exit the base and head for the siege guns will be a pretty big hint (I'm giving them a Chimera APC so they can get to the guns more quickly). The adventure is a little sparse on the whole deal, just saying that, "This only becomes apparent if the players take the time to talk to the PDF, assess their morale, and then pass a Routine (+10) Fellowship Test. If successful, the Battle-Brothers get the impression that something is ‘wrong’ with one of the regiment’s officers, although not which one. The GM can allow the players to come up with whatever means they think necessary to weed out the traitor, although he is adept at hiding (they may even need to call on Syndalla (a shapechanging assassin with the Inquisition) for aid). Killing all the PDF officers also works." At stake is the support of the PDF as the Marines fight through Lordsholm, clearing out the rebellion and tracking the Broodlord at the heart of the Genestealer Cult down; if they identify the traitor, they get more PDF at their back. So what sort of complications could I throw in as the players try and weed the traitor out?
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blydddreug
Apprentice Douchebag
BAAAAD doggie!
Posts: 69
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Post by blydddreug on Feb 10, 2018 17:57:41 GMT -8
Add some confusion - throw in some other factions with their own agenda (Chaos, Eldar, etc.)...
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Post by The Northman on Feb 12, 2018 0:33:36 GMT -8
Throw in allied factions with their own agenda. Put the characters in the position of not being sure whether the 'enemy' is actually in need of killing.
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GM Radio Rob
Apprentice Douchebag
Posts: 64
Currently Playing: Nothing yet.
Currently Running: Deathwatch
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Post by GM Radio Rob on Feb 15, 2018 5:07:25 GMT -8
Thanks, Blyddreug and Northman! Okay... Two recent happenings have had the most effect on the 117th Lordsholm, the Planetary Defence Force regiment of the planet Avalos. Firstly, the rebellion. Acting swiftly, the Genestealer Cult was able to execute most of the regiment’s experienced un-infected officers, drawing several brigades into the rebellion. Secondly, the Planetary Governor recalled the remaining loyalist forces to the walled Magistria District atop the northern cliffs of Lordsholm, leaving a battalion or so to hold the Imperial facilities (PDF base, stores, spaceport) in the Portica District. By the time the Marines of Kill-team Atromitos arrive at the PDF base, it’s already under siege. Their job is to eliminate the battery of three Medusa siege guns before they can fire another volley and breach the base’s walls, allowing the massed rebel hordes in. Their job is made harder when someone within the base lets the rebels know that the Marines are on the way, and one or two of the rebel hordes are able to take firing positions and get some aimed shots at the approaching Marines. Assuming the Marines succeed and the base stands, they encounter a mess within. In charge of the three remaining platoons of Tango Company is Commander Jocasta "Old Joe" Melton, a younger, noble-born officer. Having watched as her commanders cut and ran at the governor's order, she's been working hard with her troops since the rebellion began to shore the base's defences up, earning their grudging respect. Keen to take charge is Lt. Commander Maxil Garth, CO of 2nd Platoon. He’s one of the few off-worlders on Lordsholm, a former Guardsman of the Iaxian Tithe Guard regiment who was pensioned off to Lordsholm due to some brash, ill-planned assaults wasting a lot of men and material (the Commisar who brought him up on charges liked Garth's attitude and decided to put him somewhere out of the way rather than kill him). Garth is keen to restore his name by putting the rebellion down; however, he's still as bloodyminded as ever, fixated on damn-the-torpedoes frontal assaults. The biggest thorn in his side is Sergeant Jery Tosh, the seniormost NCO of 2nd Platoon. Like Garth, Tosh is smart and savvy, a fighter from the worse streets of Portica and Calistria who formed a large, tight-knit gang for survival. Jery and her gang were conscripted into the PDF; the military training, substandard thought it was, added to their street toughness to make them the iron core of 2nd Platoon. They feel they owe the Governor and Imperium little love after years of watching everyone they knew ground down and have a better-than-grudging respect for the rebels for taking action. While Garth doesn’t care who dies as long as he wins, Tosh doesn’t want her people wasted in futile gestures. Tosh has danced along the line of insubordination since the rebellion started, objecting to Garth’s demands for action several times without outright challenging them. Commander Melton’s decisions, coincidentally or not, have broken Tosh’s way, and Garth is becoming keen to see Melton, Tosh or both out of the way. Garth would be thrilled to discover that Tosh is the one who let the rebels know Kill-team Atromitos had arrived at the PDF base and were moving out to assault the Medusas. Tosh sees the rebellion as the business of the people of Lordsholm, a sort of trial-by-combat for the cause (she probably wouldn’t mind seeing Governor Thorsholt ousted, reasoning that anything is better than the cliffies of Magistria running things), and the presence of the Marines offended her sense of fairness (if the PDF were lax enough to let the rebels at the siege guns, then that’s something for the PDF to fix). She managed to get into the comms room and send a quick open transmission using a Lordsholm underworld cant, reasoning that someone amongst the rebels would understand it. What no one but Melton knows is that Tosh is Melton’s younger half-sister, born to Melton’s noble father who had a liaison with Tosh’s mother while slumming it in the Portica District. Lord Melton kept tabs on his lover and bastard daughter, and his only legitimate daughter caught on. More curious than anything, Jocasta began keeping tabs herself, and was so impressed with her sister that she pulled strings to get Tosh and her crew conscripted into the PDF when the local trouble got too rough and Lord Melton decided Tosh was too much of a bother to watch out for any more. Tosh is the reason that Melton has hesitated to deploy against the rebels, and if things escalate between Tosh and Garth, or Tosh gets outed as the traitor, Melton may well take a bullet for her. Another thing that anyone is yet to realise is that there's another traitor amongst the PDF. Garth’s adjutant, a local noble recruit named Lieutenant Harah Ford, is an infected member of the Genestealer Cult. Under guise of instruction from Lt. Cmdr. Garth to gather weapon-grade promethium supplies in readiness to move out, Lt. Ford has been distributing the promethium about the base and wired it to a hand held detonator. She is planning to immolate herself in the name of the Lord of Blood and Darkness and take at least half the PDF troopers in the base with her. Harah has the piety of a touched nun with a gleam of alien zeal in her eye that no one’s noticed yet. In summary - - Melton wants:
- To keep her sister safe.
- To acquit herself well amongst her peers.
- Garth wants:
- To get his place in the Imperial Guard back.
- To grind the rebellion into the dirt.
- Tosh wants:
- To fight the conflict in Lordsholm out.
- To protect her crew.
- Ford wants:
- To sacrifice herself to the Lord of Blood and Darkness.
- To take the Marines with her.
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GM Radio Rob
Apprentice Douchebag
Posts: 64
Currently Playing: Nothing yet.
Currently Running: Deathwatch
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Post by GM Radio Rob on Feb 26, 2018 1:35:18 GMT -8
Well, the next session went down and I completely forgot the idea of having Tosh signal the rebels about the Marines. The Kill-team wound up taking out the siege guns - well, they had one down and were pretty much all over the remaining two by the time we had to call it (one of my UK players had nodded off at her desk at one point), so in a week and a half's time they're on to the base to determine whether they get one or three PDF Support Units for later use, which depends on whether they spot the traitor. I had the crazy idea of creating the PDF base like a town from Dogs in the Vineyard as a way of giving the situation some teeth. Here's what I've put together so far: PrideLt. Maxil Garth hates his pasturing out to Lordsholm from the Imperial Guard prosecuting the Achillus Crusade. Even worse, he hates that he's been placed under the command of an unseasoned noble-born officer like Commander Jocasta Melton, who seems content to hide behind the PDF base's walls and wait for fresh orders from the Magistria District. He sees himself as truly deserving command of the PDF in the base, believing that a decisive, full frontal strike will break the back of the rebellion. InjusticeGarth starts wilfully mis-interpreting Melton's orders, allocating resources away from other platoons to 1st. Platoon, his direct command. SinEmboldened by Garth's talk of frontal assaults and desperate to prove his worth to the former Imperial Guard officer, Sgt. McGilvray, NCO in charge of 3rd. Platoon, takes his troops outside the walls of the base to get the regiment's aging battery Medusa siege tank out of the Imperial Storage facility and break the rebel advance. Demonic Attacks
Enthusiastic but under-equipped, 3rd. Platoon is overrun while trying to set the Medusas up, barely making it back to the base alive. Blaming their ineptitude, Garth puts McGilvray in the base's brig pending court martial. The rebels turn the Medusas on the base's walls. False DoctrineSgt. Jery Tosh, NCO in charge of 2nd. Platoon, has been watching Lt. Garth game the system and secure resources for 1st. Platoon. While Tosh has little love for the noble-born officers of the PDF, she's become more sick of the interference of offworlders, in the person of Garth. Tosh believes that the rebellion is a matter for Avalos to sort out for itself, semi-secretly hoping that the overthrow of the "cliffies" in the Magistria District. Corrupt WorshipBefore she was conscripted into the PDF, Tosh led a group of vigilantes within the Calistria District, trying to eke out a better life for their neighbourhood. Many of Tosh's former gang-mates were conscripted with her, and two of them, Cpl. Vassky and Cpl. Renton, are her squad leaders of 2nd. Platoon. They're on board with Tosh's dislike of the offworld Lieutenant. False PriesthoodTosh, Vassky and Renton are the core of a community of discontent within the PDF base, better known as 2nd. Platoon. They're quietly gathering resources where they can, stealing material back from 1st. Platoon and preparing to break the remnants of 3rd. Platoon out of the brig before departing the base and hitting the rebels from behind. Sorcery
2nd. Platoon has found a surprising ally: 2nd. Lt. Hannah Ford, Lt. Garth's very adjutant. She has been keeping Garth busy while 2nd. Platoon conduct their pilfering. Unbeknownst to all, Ford is also an infected member of the Genestealer Cult that has taken root in Lordsholm, and has also been redistributing some of the base's stocks of Promethium to strategic locations. Yet to come:- What does everyone want from Kill-team Atromitos?
- What if the Kill-team never arrived?
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GM Radio Rob
Apprentice Douchebag
Posts: 64
Currently Playing: Nothing yet.
Currently Running: Deathwatch
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Post by GM Radio Rob on Mar 1, 2018 12:42:34 GMT -8
Right then. I just revised some of my older posts as I got a better handle on the NPCs' personalities.
What does everyone want from Kill-team Atromitos?
- Commander Melton wants her PDF troopers kept safe; she's come to regard them as more of a family than her own over the past week. She wants the Marines to move out from the base and prosecute the rebellion with as little assistance from her PDF as possible. She'd also like them to find out who's been responsible for the pilfering from the armoury.
- Lt. Garth wants the Marines to get Melton out of the way and install him as leader of the PDF so that he can take the fight to the rebels.
- Sgt. Tosh wants the Marines gone so that she and 2nd. Platoon can leave the base, rally the local PDF and settle the rebellion between locals. If they can take Garth with them, so much the better.
- Sgt. McGilvray wants the Marines to administer Emperor's justice for his blunder.
- Lt. Ford wants the Marines to side with Garth so she can get them all in one place when she detonates the promethium stores, taking them, Garth, 1st. and 3rd. platoons out in one fell swoop.
What if Kill-team Atromitos never arrived?
If the Marines had simply pushed on elsewhere after destroying the Medusas, Ford would have "accidentally" let slip to Melton about Garth's redistribution of the base's resources, forcing a confrontation between Garth and Melton. In the confusion, Tosh and 2nd. Platoon would slip out of the base with their pilfered gear.
Regardless of whether Garth successfully mutinies and has 1st. Platoon gear up or whether Melton locks him in the brig and confines 1st. Platoon confined quarters, Ford would detonate the promethium about the barracks and brig, wiping out 1st. and 3rd. Platoons.
Regardless of how well equipped they are, 2nd. Platoon would be overwhelmed and wiped out by the rebels in the city.
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One tricky thing about using Dogs in the Vineyard's town creation rules is that they're geared around the PCs judging a town full of people with all sorts of complex things going on, from scarcity of food to sex to familial relationships. Not only that, the PCs' roles are geared around being travelling community heads; they're empowered to solemnise marriages, interpret scripture and write new doctrine. While both the Dogs and the Marines have an outsider / naif quality, with the Dogs being young folks fresh out of training and sent to minister to towns they've never been to and the Marines being superhumans with ultimate standing but little experience of the everyday lives of normal humans, it's a little harder to throw Dogs-style scenarios at the Marines (especially when the Dogs are potentially related to people in the towns and the Marines most likely aren't).
Or maybe I just need to get a little better at it. Perhaps the noble villas of the Magistria District could make for some juicier situations...
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