DMDM's Last Fleet (Inactive)

Game Master Douglas Muir 406

Some worldbuilding thoughts. Note: these are preliminary, not final! If players say "no I really don't want it to be our future", then we can change that.

-- I'm thinking this will be ~300 years in our future, as opposed to the Galactica's vaguely "far far away" setting. There was Earth and a bunch of colony worlds. Now they're gone, subsumed by the Corax. -- This is a fairly large diversion from the BG original, so discussion is welcome.

-- There was war among the colony worlds, culminating in a big one that ended ~30 years ago. (That's why there are still warships.) The war ended with general peace, the creation of a Federation, and rapid economic expansion as interstellar trade exploded.

-- The Corax showed up about 15 years ago. At first they were spotted in the distance, observing. This was the first nonhuman intelligence humanity had met. Everyone got very excited! But they showed no interest in communicating... and then suddenly, they attacked with overwhelming force.

-- A Corax Basic looks like an armored gorilla with a mushroom for a head. The good news is they're slow, clumsy, and extremely nearsighted. (There are a bunch of tiny eyes around the rim of the mushroom, like on a scallop. They can't focus beyond a few meters.) The less good news is they're horrifically strong and very hard to kill. Also, they have incredibly acute senses of smell, vibration and hearing along with something like a shark's electrodetection sense, except they can also use it actively to manipulate electronics nearby. They seem to share a group intelligence. One Basic is kind of dumb and easily fooled, but a squad of them is as smart as humans -- and better coordinated and utterly fearless.

Don't close to short range with them, don't fight them at night, and never ever engage them in hand to hand combat -- see below.

-- The mushroom-head gained them the nickname "shrooms" but it turns out that, at a cellular level, they actually are kind of fungus-y. Instead of blobby lumps like animal cells, or little blocks like plant cells, their default cell type is an elongated fiber or network. (For biologists: they are syncytial, generate hyphae, and have something like a Spitzenkorper.) Also they produce spores. At close range a Basic can puff out spores that have a variety of unpleasant effects. At very close range, if a Corax grabs you, it can produce hyphae that penetrate your skin and permeate your body. That's game over. Don't let them get that close.

A bit more:

-- Most Earthlike planets have life, and that life is always DNA based and chemically similar to Earth's. Either parallel evolution just loves a system of twenty-odd amino acids generated by three-base sugar codons, or life somehow got spread around a lot of the galaxy a few billion years ago.

-- However, while most Earthlike planets have life, it's usually pretty primitive life. The typical planet has scummy seas filled with algae where the cutting edge of evolution is some crude equivalents to jellyfish and sponges. A few planets have reached something like a Paleozoic level of development. Intelligent life doesn't seem to exist except for humans... and now the Corax.

Humans being humans, we've seeded the colony planets with Earth life. So the galaxy got lots of wheat fields and apple trees and crabgrass and cockroaches and stray cats and goldfish. This generally resulted in mass extinction events as the local ecosystems collapsed catastrophically, but nobody beyond a few biologists ever got too upset about the loss of alien algae and sponges.

Jump drives:

-- Require time to charge. Military ships are built with the capacity to double jump, allowing them to jump into battle and jump out again if need be. Civilian ships don't have this capability -- once they jump, they're stuck for a little while.

-- Jump drives work most efficiently in the curved space of a gravity well. Jumping is easiest and safest in a hard vacuum. Jumping in or out of crowded space (like the atmosphere of a planet) is difficult and dangerous. So, jumps tend to be from orbit around a planet or star. Except for the very occasional scientific expedition, deep interstellar space has mostly been left alone.

-- Getting close to a massive star allows longer jumps. Military vehicles tend to be hardened against heat and radiation anyway, so they can dive close to stars if need be.

-- Small dense stars work best of all. The ideal starting point for really long-range jumps is a white dwarf. So, white dwarfs tend to be strategically important.

-- Jump drives produce gravity waves. Lots of them! Whenever you Jump, spacetime basically goes BONGGGG. Even a modest tabletop gravity wave detector can pick it up. So, stealth Jumping is not an option. Also, rapid repeated Jumping isn't very healthy -- the spacetime distortion messes with your biochemistry down at a quantum level. The brain being the most complex and delicate organ, this tends to show up as cognitive issues first. "Jump-happy" and "Jump-nuts" are expressions in use. Some military (especially engineers for some reason) lean into this stereotype, using it to explain or excuse eccentricity.

-- The Corax don't strictly follow these rules! They do have Jump drives like human ships. But the Corax are also, somehow, able to open rifts or gates to the Tenebrium, allowing whole fleets to show up very quickly. This is an unknown technology; if humanity wasn't running for its life, it would be extremely interesting. The opening of a rift is always signalled by the appearance of a unique type of Corax ship, a Harbinger. It's possible that destroying the Harbinger might abort the creation of the rift. Or maybe not. Nobody's managed it yet, so it's impossible to say.

Fuel:

-- Fuel is the superheavy element Flerovium-298, which powers the reactions that allow starships to zoom around as they do. The good news is, this isotope occurs naturally. The bad news is, it is only formed by supernovae or colliding neutron stars and then has a geologically short half-life. So, you need to mine it in a system that has survived one of these events.

-- There are only a few such systems and right now they're all occupied by the Corax.

From the notebooks of Dr. Alice Wing (unpublished)

...cells are large, typically 100 μm in diameter and up to several mm long, and syncytial, with as many as 200 nuclei in a single cell. At superficial glance the cells bear a resemblance to standard eukaryotes, with well defined nuclei and multiple organelles. DNA analysis shows it is using the standard DNA model, with the same four base pairs and a three-base codon system. However, upon closer examination...

...similar to mitochondria, but quite different in detail. Never seen cellular biology so derived. Sykes estimates that they are about half an order of magnitude more efficient, very close to the theoretical limits imposed by chemistry and physics. Furthermore, they appear to be tunable (Sykes uses the phrase "programmable"). These cells can dramatically vary their energy output, from burning much hotter than any known biology to complete shutdown at a cellular level. This may explain why Basics are able to survive protracted periods of exposure to hard vacuum and temperature extremes in space...

...not a ribosome. This is truly astonishing! Every living cell in the galaxy has ribosomes; they're the basic protein factory. And they're incredibly highly conserved. Eukaryote ribosomes are just prokaryote ribosomes with a bunch of extra modules added. The reactive core is billions of years old, identical across all known forms of life. For students of life's origins, it's also the ultimate chicken-and-egg problem: all proteins are made by ribosomes, and ribosomes themselves are made of protein, so how did ribosomes evolve?

The Corax have dodged the question. Their ribosome-equivalents are completely different, and -- once again -- more efficient. Taken together with the high-energy mitochondria, this means that these cells can grow or divide with astonishing speed, or can literally rebuild themselves into something completely different in real time...

...two new organelles inside the nucleus. The "lumpy" organelle appears to use small peptides to transfer information back and forth; it then stores the information in braided chains of polysaccharides. The "hairy" organelle is moving charges along a network of protein fibers. It's eerily reminiscent of a small neural network, with the lumpy organelles for memory storage. Except that a neural network is made of cells and this is inside the cell itself. Smart cells?

...like a cross between standard biology and something... more. Like the old apocalyptic dreams of nanotechnology and "grey goo".

Sykes has been speculating about the conditions under which such divergent biology could have evolved. I think he has the wrong idea altogether. I don't think this evolved at all. I think it was designed...

...Corax Basics are terrifying, but I now realize they're much less terrifying than they should be Starting with cells like this, and then using them to grow a super-soldier, is like... taking an advanced smart rifle with laser sighting and programmable heat-seeking bullets, and then swinging it as a club.

It's an uncomfortable thought: what more is this biology capable of?

Humans being humans, we've seeded the colony planets with Earth life. So the galaxy got lots of wheat fields and apple trees and crabgrass and cockroaches and stray cats and goldfish. This generally resulted in mass extinction events as the local ecosystems collapsed catastrophically

Reading this made me *hurt* even thouhg I know it's just made up (yes, I'm a biologist)

Re your other thoughts - I'm not tied to BSG at all, so changing up timelines and so on doesn't bother me a bit. I think my main quesiton with changes from BSG is about the bad guys. IIRC - tell me if I'm wrong - it got obvious quite fast that the Cylens were very much *not* a united front, they had factions and so on and disagreed with each other. The Corax don't seem to be like that, at least from the rulebook. Are you planning to play them that way?

IIRC - tell me if I'm wrong - it got obvious quite fast that the Cylens were very much *not* a united front, they had factions and so on and disagreed with each other. The Corax don't seem to be like that, at least from the rulebook. Are you planning to play them that way?

Mmmmmmaybe.

But it's early days right now.

One last bit of world-building:

-- The civilian public is not yet aware of the existence of Corax duplicates -- "skin jobs". That information is restricted to a handful of military and civilian leaders.

-- Enough weird stuff has happened that there are rumors. The most popular one is that the Corax have some sort of mind control.

Your ship: the Cerberus.

Cerberus is an unusual design. The entire ship is built around a gigantic, three-barreled railgun capable of firing projectiles at high relativistic velocities. On a clean hit, this will destroy pretty much anything -- fortified bases, enemy battlecruisers, whatever. It can blow a good-sized asteroid into incandescent gas and gravel. It would one-shot destroy a city if anyone were insane enough to aim it at a planetary surface. And since its projectiles are arriving very close to the speed of light, dodging is not generally an option.

Naturally, this offensive punch comes at a price. Cerberus' main battery has a recharge time, during which the ship is dangerously vulnerable. So it carries squadrons of fighters, but not as many as a proper fleet carrier. In effect it's a weird hybrid of light fleet carrier and siege howitzer. Also, that big gun is a power hog; when it's charging, the ship's reactor can't support high-G maneuvering or prepare for Jump. In sum, the ship is a classic glass cannon -- crazy high damage output, but low AC and few hp.

So, while the Cerberus-class ships -- Cerberus, Garm, Fenris, and Jack Russell -- racked up some impressive combat records, they also tended to die rather quickly. Cerberus is the last of them. Cerberus' crew refer to the ship as the Big Dog. The crews of other ships have less complimentary names.

Officially Cerberus is the second ship in the fleet, after Agamemnon, meaning her Captain is the third ranking officer, after the Admiral and the Fleet XO. We may fill in some details on Captain Bauer later...

I believe each Pilot PC will command one of Cerberus' three squadrons, if that works for you.

Starting position

Everyone has three (3) Pressure.

The Fleet has -1 Momentum and 2 Attrition. There is a Doom Clock: Fuel Shortage with 2 ticks on it.

Starting questions

From page 86. These are to be answered cooperatively, before we start narrating or rolling dice. That's why this is in Discussion, not Gameplay.

-- You’ve just escaped from a crisis. What threat were you facing? Was it an attack by the enemy fleet? Sabotage? An assassination attempt?

-- What went terribly wrong during the crisis that made it even worse?

-- Whose quick-thinking actions got you out of it?

-- Who was hurt during the crisis?

-- What was the cost you paid to resolve the crisis?

These questions are suggestions, not set in stone. The key point here is you just got out of a serious crisis; now you're in the relative downtime (before the next crisis strikes, heh heh) where you can deal with the aftermath, pick up the pieces, whatever. Once collectively we've answered the questions, play begins!

How are we handling the rank structure, there are two options listed in the book or are we going to do our own thing?

Oops. Just saw the Cerberus post. Will adjust my background points to reflect the new ship.

DMDM: I'd dropped Thea out of squad leader following the hangar incident. Based on your comment to have PCs be SLs, I can have her do something heroic or mission critical during the last fiasco to get her back in the CAGs good graces. Of course she'll still have to pull her extra duty. Any preference? I figure, either way Nathan will continue to be athorn in her side.

Q1 Proposed Idea: It was supposed to be a no brainer. The NN Serpentis refinery wasn't on the charts and was well outside the known jump routes. That's why the military built an automated refinery and fuel depot out here. It was a secret safety valve in case something went wrong within the Commonwealth during the last war. The Admiral knew about it and thought it a good place to refuel. But apprently it wasn't so secret. The Corax left us a surprise.

Unfortunately, I posted a couple replies in recruitment before I read that we are moving to discussion, for that I apologize.

Hey Gunny, can you add your Playbook and Moves to your alias?

Yes, I will add in what I can. I'm absolutely new to this game's mechanics and kind of learning as we go. That said, I have read through what info the basic rule book offers and think I have an understanding of what we are doing. After I update the profile, if I need to add something else, please let me know.

Also, my vision of Deigon's personality is that he is a disgruntled, old, retired CAG. He is a bit rough around the edges. Seeing everything I read about this game is that it falls more in the (R) rating of content, I don't think this will be an issue. That said, if he rubs someone the wrong way, I apologize in advance and please let me know.

Oscar Hallward wrote:

Well, I'm not sure how that would work, then. If you have classified information, what is Oscar doing to antagonize you? I don't see Oscar wasting time pestering a source that isn't going to say anything. We could twist it to say that Oscar has enough evidence to feel fairly certain about things, and Deigon knows that Oscar knows, but he doesn't understand why Oscar isn't acting on the information. Or we could drop the connection if that's too convoluted.

It kind of works. Deigon has become an extreme alcoholic since the mission. This is in response to the public's brow bashing, guilt from watching his squad die, and being exposed to the harbinger's gravity wave weapon. In short, after a few drinks, he talks about things he shouldn't. I'm guessing you stick around, providing a few drinks,...

Okay, that makes sense. I don't see Oscar as underhanded, though. It makes sense that Gunny doesn't like him, but Oscar isn't always appearing out of nowhere asking if Gunny wants to get a drink with a big lascivious smile on his face. Maybe they drank together one or two times, and it was enough to make the impression that it did on Gunny, but Oscar thinks he left it with a, "If you ever want to talk more, I'm always willing to listen."

Oscar Hallward wrote:

Hey Gunny, can you add your Playbook and Moves to your alias?

Yes, I will add in what I can. I'm absolutely new to this game's mechanics and kind of learning as we go. That said, I have read through what info the basic rule book offers and think I have an understanding of what we are doing. After I update the profile, if I need to add something else, please let me know.

No worries, it looks good. I can tell you put some effort into it. I may swipe some of that formatting for my alias.

Who am I in love with? Why haven’t I told them yet?

Ashley Wagner, a newly minted Ensign in the Medical Corps, she is the younger sister of his best friend and fellow Marine who was killed while they were evacuating planet-side civilians when the Corax attacked.

Whose plans have I got in the way of? How?

Lt. Commander Rowan Acker, I diverted resources to saving the civilians instead of blowing up military buildings to prevent sensitive information and tech falling into enemy hands. While I managed to blow up the builds it is impossible to know what if any info the Corax managed to transmit before being pulverized. This resulted in a loss in opportunity for promotion to Captain and 30 days confined to the brig and loss of pay during such confinement.

And I have these open if anyone wants to jump on them.
Whose life have I saved? How?
Who have I sacrificed greatly for? What did I give up for them?

So I'm still playing catch up, here. I've read all of our posts in Recruitment and Discussion, but there's been so much tweaking that I don't really have a handle on everyone's backstories, yet. Apologies. I also need to finish reading most of the lore in the rulebook.

Here's a few more bits to round out Oscar:

- He's the de facto senior editor of a loose conglomeration of surviving journalists and like-minded people who publish articles on the fleet's civilian intranet. It's moderately popular since it gives people a sense of connection with the rest of the fleet, and for many, it's a source of entertainment, which can be hard to find. I need to come up with a good name for it, but for now, let's say that many refer to it as "the News Feed." It posts things like births, obituaries, ship malfunctions and repairs, military and civilian appointments and promotions, and anything newsworthy that people should know about (unrest on any of the ships, work stoppages, riots, unexplained events, etc.) Editorials and Corax speculation are also popular parts of the News Feed.

- Oscar's main journalistic concerns involve the aftermath of Corax attacks (or the beforemath if he's in the right place at the right time)), questioning leadership regarding the fleet's next moves, and anything that the leadership is particularly close-lipped about.

- Oscar is also the mentor of another journalist named Olivia Marriott. She has the same interest that Oscar does, and Oscar sees in her the same drive that gets results, but that comes at a cost to those she cares about. He's trying to temper her single-mindedness by honing her skills so that she doesn't need give so much of herself to get what she needs. This is important to Oscar, because...

- Oscar used to be married, but his wife divorced him because of this single-minded focus on getting the story, even if it meant neglecting his family. They had a daughter named Joann who would be an adult now. Oscar hasn't tried to discover if his ex-wife survived to be a part of the fleet, because he doesn't know what he wants the answer to be. He also doesn't know what last name Joann might be using, but he has checked and has not found a person using that name with either his last name or his ex-wife's last name.

- Finally, Oscar has a drug habit! He also drinks, but not so much that he considers his wits dulled. The drug that he is most likely to use is called "whiteout," and it provides a sustained period of manic clarity with a healthy side effect of psychedelic hallucinations. Oscar tried the drug a few times when he felt like he needed an edge in his job, but he didn't anticipate how addictive it could become. They are little unassuming white pills, and they're not that hard to manufacture.

Deigon Black "Gunny" wrote:

Oscar Hallward wrote:

Well, I'm not sure how that would work, then. If you have classified information, what is Oscar doing to antagonize you? I don't see Oscar wasting time pestering a source that isn't going to say anything. We could twist it to say that Oscar has enough evidence to feel fairly certain about things, and Deigon knows that Oscar knows, but he doesn't understand why Oscar isn't acting on the information. Or we could drop the connection if that's too convoluted.

It kind of works. Deigon has become an extreme alcoholic since the mission. This is in response to the public's brow bashing, guilt from watching his squad die, and being exposed to the harbinger's gravity wave weapon. In short, after a few drinks, he talks about things he shouldn't. I'm guessing you stick around, providing a few drinks,...

Okay, that makes sense. I don't see Oscar as underhanded, though. It makes sense that Gunny doesn't like him, but Oscar isn't always appearing out of nowhere asking if Gunny wants to get a drink with a big lascivious smile on his face. Maybe they drank together one or two times, and it was enough to make the impression that it did on Gunny, but Oscar thinks he left it with a, "If you ever want to talk more, I'm always willing to listen."

Deigon Black "Gunny" wrote:

Oscar Hallward wrote:

Hey Gunny, can you add your Playbook and Moves to your alias?

Yes, I will add in what I can. I'm absolutely new to this game's mechanics and kind of learning as we go. That said, I have read through what info the basic rule book offers and think I have an understanding of what we are doing. After I update the profile, if I need to add something else, please let me know.

No worries, it looks good. I can tell you put some effort into it. I may swipe some of that formatting for my alias.

Shouldn't have any problem finding Gunny well slushed. He drinks continually. That and he really doesn't like command much. The only hesitation he has for not blowing the lid on the whole cover up is the fact that humanity is on the verge of destruction, and he still sees the value in trying to keep up moral and maintaining some resemblance of order. That said, both sentiments seem to only apply to everyone but him.

I should now have a solid profile. I also took the time to transfer the basic moves over for easy access. If anyone else wishes to use them, they are welcome to do so.

Q1 Proposed Idea: It was supposed to be a no brainer. The NN Serpentis refinery wasn't on the charts and was well outside the known jump routes. That's why the military built an automated refinery and fuel depot out here. It was a secret safety valve in case something went wrong within the Commonwealth during the last war. The Admiral knew about it and thought it a good place to refuel. But apprently it wasn't so secret. The Corax left us a surprise.

I like that, let's run with it.

Q3 Who saved things? I think Oscar did. After the war ended, Serpents was declassified before being reclassified 25 years ago - long enough that it's "always" been classified. Oscar realised that the base location wasn't as secure as everyone thought but who listens to a civilian, right? So he's waving around documents he's not supposed to have and trying to get someone to listen, which gets him an interview with Intelligence (they still need a better name). Thankfully Commander Hooke - who is meltingly competent - immediately realised Oscar is in fact right. Too late to stop things going wrong but enough that not everyone dies.

Q4 Sasha was injured - I've spent too much of the last 12+ months in hospital I may as wel get some RP from it. Fuel is Supply,vwhich is the Quartermaster's responsibility anyway. Sasha and two of her command Pfc Starr and Pfc Buck were outside the Cerberus supervising the pipeline hookup with Serpentis. When the explosion happened - it's *never* lupus and it's *always* an explosion - Starr and Buck were killed instantly and Sasha was impaled by a piece of rebar through her midriff, puncturing her EVA - as the alarms sounded in her ear and her lifeline to Cerberus snapped, sending her drifting helpless into space and making it a race between blood loss and asphyxiation, she briefly envied them both.

So I'm still playing catch up, here. I've read all of our posts in Recruitment and Discussion, but there's been so much tweaking that I don't really have a handle on everyone's backstories, yet. Apologies. I also need to finish reading most of the lore in the rulebook.

No worries. It's a lot!

- Oscar is also the mentor of another journalist named Olivia Marriott. She has the same interest that Oscar does, and Oscar sees in her the same drive that gets results, but that comes at a cost to those she cares about. He's trying to temper her single-mindedness by honing her skills so that she doesn't need give so much of herself to get what she needs. This is important to Oscar, because...

- Oscar used to be married, but his wife divorced him because of this single-minded focus on getting the story, even if it meant neglecting his family. They had a daughter named Joann who would be an adult now. Oscar hasn't tried to discover if his ex-wife survived...

Mm hmm, good, good.

Q1 Proposed Idea: It was supposed to be a no brainer. The NN Serpentis refinery wasn't on the charts and was well outside the known jump routes. That's why the military built an automated refinery and fuel depot out here. It was a secret safety valve in case something went wrong within the Commonwealth during the last war. The Admiral knew about it and thought it a good place to refuel. But apprently it wasn't so secret. The Corax left us a surprise.

Mm hm, good, good. The surprise -- a bomb? An ambush? [reads below] A big explosion, okay.

Who saved things? I think Oscar did. After the war ended, Serpents was declassified before being reclassified 25 years ago - long enough that it's "always" been classified. Oscar realised that the base location wasn't as secure as everyone thought but who listens to a civilian, right? So he's waving around documents he's not supposed to have and trying to get someone to listen, which gets him an interview with Intelligence (they still need a better name). Thankfully Commander Hooke - who is meltingly competent - realised Oscar is in fact right. Too late to stop things going wrong but enough that not everyone dies.

So Hooke now watches Oscar, too. Because he's useful, but he could also be a problem.

Sasha was injured - I've spent too much of the last 12+ months in hospital I may as wel get some RP from it. Fuel is Supply,vwhich is the Quartermaster's responsibility anyway. Sasha and two of her command Pfc Starr and Pfc Buck were outside the Cerberus supervising the pipeline hookup with Serpentis. When the explosion happened - it's *never* lupus and it's *always* an explosion - Starr and Buck were killed instantly and Sasha was impaled by a piece of rebar through her midriff, puncturing her EVA - as the alarms sounded in her ear and her lifeline to Cerberus snapped, sending her drifting helpless into space and making it a race between blood loss and asphyxiation, she briefly envied them both.

Ugh.

Fl-298, aka "Juice", is a very dense metal that's liquid at STP. Like mercury, but heavier, and also mildly radioactive. It's not as toxic as some heavy metals but it's not stuff you want to interact with too directly. Also, it's totally fissionable!

So the explosion wasn't just a simple chemical bomb. Someone booby-trapped the refinery with fission triggers, basically turning it into a gigaton nuke. Because reasons -- dumb luck? someone was very careful? -- instead of a full chain reaction you got a subcritical "squib" detonation. Still equivalent to tons of TNT. The refinery totally destroyed, two shuttles lost, a dozen dead. And thousands of tons of Juice vaporized, or erupting into vacuum out of shattered tanks, geysers of writhing liquid metal flowing across the stars.

Does anyone want to answer "What went terribly wrong during the crisis that made it even worse?" and/or "What was the cost you paid to resolve the crisis?" I'd call those optional but fun.

Does anyone want to answer "What went terribly wrong during the crisis that made it even worse?" and/or "What was the cost you paid to resolve the crisis?" I'd call those optional but fun.

I'll take a stab at it.

"What went terribly wrong during the crisis that made it even worse?"
The sabotage was a precursor to an all-out ambush. A moderate size Corax fleet was posted up close enough to take advantage of the situation, but fare enough not to be detected. As soon as the neutrons from the sabotage device triggered, it alerted the Corax fleet about our presence.

"What was the cost you paid to resolve the crisis?"
Once the Corax began their advance, our fleet’s sensors picked up their presence and initiated a full-scale emergency jump. Because of the explosion, the fleet only gained half of its intended fuel. Thank God there was no chain reaction!

"What was the cost you paid to resolve the crisis?"
Once the Corax began their advance, our fleet’s sensors picked up their presence and initiated a full-scale emergency jump. Because of the explosion, the fleet only gained half of its intended fuel. Thank God there was no chain reaction!

I think you got *no* fuel, making the entire thing a complete waste. That's why you now have two ticks on the Doom Clock.

STP is 273 Kelvin which is a *lot* warmer than deep space. Keeping it at that temperature for decades means the fuel depot must have had a fusion* generator to power the heating elements. Tamper with the generator and you have a ready-made trigger. What avoided complete catastrophe was Commander Hooke sending out his warning with enough time for the engineer - in this case, Hannah - to shut the reactor down and prevent the chain reaction. Still a vast explosion with many casualties but better than complete annihilation.

That leaves Thea, Deigon and Devin with nothing to do - feel free to suggest something. Someone brought Sasha in before the fleet went into emergency jump, yeah?

*any day now, they tell us ;)

Thea was stuck piloting one of the bulky PBR-Hunchback shuttles. Another bit of disciplinary duty from the CAG and XO. Unlike most civilian shuttles and the longer range scout craft, the Hunchback is armed with a single twin barrelled autocannon useful for repelling ground assaults and at least a chance of hitting back against fighters. It is also jump capable, although shorter distances than the big drives on the Cerberus and other fleet ships.

True to her nature Thea stayed until the last possible moment. This was fortunate for Sasha because she and Devlin (who just happened to be the unlucky gunner assigned to her for this particular mission, having also earned the ire of the XO) managed to pick up Sasha's emergency beacon just before they were to jump with the rest of the Fleet. Ignoring orders to just get out, Thea and Devlin were able to make an emergency pickup just before the Corax fleet swept into the area. It was a hot jump out, extra uncomfortable, and the shuttle took some pretty nasty damage so it's out of commission until Engineering can give it a major set of repairs. The second jump needed to actually reach the rendezvous point wasn't much help. With no time to wait for the drive to resettle due to Sasha's need for a full medical suite, they broke all the safety regs and jumped again as soon as Thea had the coordinates calculated. It was hard on everyone, but Devlin's marine emergency medical training managed to keep Sasha alive just long enough and despite severe jump sickness and a few days in the infirmary herself, Thea managed to get them home and land safely without destroying another hanger.

STP is 273 Kelvin which is a *lot* warmer than deep space. Keeping it at that temperature for decades means the fuel depot must have had a fusion* generator to power the heating elements.

So Flerovium is a real element. But since it's a deep transuranic, we've never had a remotely stable isotope of it to play with, and no more than a dozen atoms of it have existed at one time. Nevertheless, there's a huge amount of surprisingly based speculation about its physical and chemical properties. Current thinking is, probably not very reactive, and either a liquid or a gas (!) at STP. "A noble metal with melting and boiling points around 200 and 400 K respectively" is probably within the current error bars.

*any day now, they tell us ;)

I tell my kids, I may live to see a sustained exothermic fusion reaction. I'll be surprised if I live to see a sustained exothermic fusion /generator/. I absolutely don't expect any of us to see commercial fusion power.

Meanwhile, Deigon and Devin can chip in if they like. I think we're nearly ready to start play!

Who am I in love with? Why haven’t I told them yet?

Ashley Wagner, a newly minted Ensign in the Medical Corps, she is the younger sister of his best friend and fellow Marine who was killed while they were evacuating planet-side civilians when the Corax attacked.

Whose plans have I got in the way of? How?

Lt. Commander Rowan Acker, I diverted resources to saving the civilians instead of blowing up military buildings to prevent sensitive information and tech falling into enemy hands. While I managed to blow up the builds it is impossible to know what if any info the Corax managed to transmit before being pulverized. This resulted in a loss in opportunity for promotion to Captain and 30 days confined to the brig and loss of pay during such confinement.

And I have these open if anyone wants to jump on them.
Whose life have I saved? How?
Who have I sacrificed greatly for? What did I give up for them?

Devin: I posted this in recruitment, so you may have missed it. No worries if this doesn't work for you.

@Devin: Here's a possible answer to your relationship question number 2. You didn't exactly save her life, but you certainly saved Thea's career when you were the first marine to arrive on the scene of the hanger accident caused by the two rogue researchers. It was clear to you that the two had been drinking way too much and shouldn't have been anywhere near their test equipment. But instead of reporting them as drunk, you took a bit of pity on the two, knowing the ship couldn't afford to lose any more pilots or engineers at this point. So you kept their blood tox levels out of your final witness statement and just reported it all as an accident. Sure Thea got busted down notch, but some price had to be paid. Hopefully she's learned something and this way she's still able to fly and bolster the ships fighter cover when it counts.

And apologies for misspelling your name earlier. For some reason my brain wanted to add that 'l' in there.

Also mercury is ~14x denser than water - and Juice is heavier?! That's some fuel you choose. Maybe with FTL jumps the tyranny of the rocket equations doesn't matter as much.

@Diegon and Devin - I'm dyslexic so at some pint I'm *am* going to mix you both up. Sorry in advance!

<Sigh> I'm fighting to get my head around the rules and playstyle, but the start suggestions so far all sound fine with me. At least I've almost finished getting my information into Hannah's profile.

Also mercury is ~14x denser than water - and Juice is heavier?! That's some fuel you choose. Maybe with FTL jumps the tyranny of the rocket equations doesn't matter as much.

Oh, that f$+~ing rocket equation.

So Flerovium is tentatively expected to have a density of around 22 g/cm^3, about 50% heavier than mercury. I mean, it's a transuranic. It has an atomic weight of around 300!

My slightly handwavey assumption is that if you nudge it just so, Flerovium can be provoked into a very, very exothermic fission reaction. Like, way more joules/gram than anything you'd get from plutonium or uranium -- more like fusion than fission. In fact, it can be used to catalyze some very high-energy fusion reactions. It can be used to power reaction drives with ISP off the scales, which is how you can zoom around in space without having mass-payload ratios of 100s to 1.

DMDM: So a few quick world building questions. I see there's a short blurb on this in the book, but I'm still a bit fuzzy on the general tech 'levels' or types? For instance, I'm assuming we are steering clear of blasters/lasers (per TOS) and keeping the new BSG projectile/nukes type weaponry. And steering clear of Star Trek levels of tech (teleporters, phasers, etc) What about comms? Do we have FTL comm capability or are we limited to lightspeed? I can't recall what they exactly did in either BSG series.

It doesn't look like we've got to worry about BSG's 'computer networks are very bad' unless we are worried about internal spies/factions hacking systems etc. So I'm assuming there is a public type Internet, but do the military and some factions have their own sealed systems? Can limbs be regrown in medical bays or is that more of a LosTech given the destruction of civilization? If no, what about rudimentary (or more advanced) cybernetics? What about robotics and/or simple early AI (more like what we have now vs. HAL 9000, we've got enough problems in this fleet already)?

Is it way too soon to ask all these questions. I'm certainly okay answering this type of thing as we actually go along. :)

I'm just curious because I've already been adding a few things (Shuttle type, Starfighter type) and don't want to cross any red lines. Plus, it can just help flesh out character and NPC backgrounds, thoughts, skills, personalities, etc. Ie. Is Thea getting orders on her beatup Goopple Smart Tablet via Fleet HQ Intranet, that constantly seems to crash whenever she tries to login OR is she getting orders on a dot matrix print out run into her shared squad quarters by the frantic, overworked ensign who is the CAG's chief lackey?

DMDM: So a few quick world building questions. I see there's a short blurb on this in the book, but I'm still a bit fuzzy on the general tech 'levels' or types? For instance, I'm assuming we are steering clear of blasters/lasers (per TOS) and keeping the new BSG projectile/nukes type weaponry. And steering clear of Star Trek levels of tech (teleporters, phasers, etc) What about comms? Do we have FTL comm capability or are we limited to lightspeed? I can't recall what they exactly did in either BSG series.

-- Comms are lightspeed only.

-- Personal and infantry weapons are projectiles, not too different from what we have now.

-- WRT tech generally, you're going to find me kind of bimodal -- meaning, either I will write paragraphs on the physics and chemistry of Flerovium, or I will handwave it until the narrative forces otherwise.

Put another way: the stuff I wrote above provides a few hooks or starting points. But everything else is still TBD, and we may work it out as the narrative requires. If the question is "what tech level do we have here," the very general rule is "what technology would make for a more interesting narrative?"

It doesn't look like we've got to worry about BSG's 'computer networks are very bad' unless we are worried about internal spies/factions hacking systems etc.

On BSG, information technology got knocked back to about 1980 levels everywhere "because the Cylons could hack anything more advanced". This was a stroke of goddamn brilliance in about five different ways, and it led to a fully realized world with FTL travel and also Ikea clocks and Bakelite phone handsets. I seriously considered using it. But it's /so/ specific to BSG that I decided not to.

Or, mostly not. The Corax do show an uncanny ability to penetrate and corrupt electronics. I mentioned the Basics have an electric sense, like sharks and rays? And some sort of active electrokinetic ability with it, that allows them to manipulate electrical and electronic systems? Well, bigger Corax biosystems can do that even more so. So, there's been a retrenchment. It's not as bad as in BSG but it does mean there's no magic IT stuff available.

Can limbs be regrown in medical bays or is that more of a LosTech given the destruction of civilization? If no, what about rudimentary (or more advanced) cybernetics? What about robotics and/or simple early AI (more like what we have now vs. HAL 9000, we've got enough problems in this fleet already)?

See above. So (for instance) if you put a gun to my head right now I'd say no regeneration of limbs. But if you can convince the group that it would make a more interesting story, then go for it. So, maybe that tech exists, but the Fleet only has one machine that can do it. And you have to be hooked up several hours a day, like dialysis, so it can only help a few people at a time. And the civilian leadership wants to use it for, you know, /orphans/. While the military wants to use it for key personnel! So that we can all survive, one-legged orphans and all!

@Thea, that sounds good

@DMDM: Cool. Thanks. I figured a lot of this would be 'decide as we go' but wanted to check. Helpful to have a few more starting points.

@Devin: Great. Added the snippet and +1 to Thea's profile page.

I think we're almost ready to start play. So, EVERYONE: Please check out the example of play on pages 117-126!

We're starting in downtime, post-crisis. Everyone has 3 Pressure, so reducing Pressure is probably a priority. The two ways you do that are Reach Out and Let Loose, so those will be on the menu. Of course, you don't have to immediately go and do those things. (If you don't care about Pressure, you don't have to do them at all.) Other common downtime activities include Call Someone On Their Shit, Seek Out, and Pull Strings. Some non-combat playbook moves may be useful too. And don't forget that you can Support or Interfere with other PC rolls (though it costs you a Pressure to do so...).

If you have +1 Warm, Reaching Out is a good move to reduce Pressure; you'll probably Hit and have a decent chance of a clean success. If you have +1 Raw, Let Loose is strong. However, even if you don't have any helpful bonuses, you probably want to try at least one of these at some point.

Which leads to another point: for these social actions, don't get too hung up on the chances of failure. Yes, your PC may do something regrettable or embarrassing. That's part of the fiction. Throw yourself into it.

Okay, I'll ring the bell to start play in the morning, European time, 8 or 10 hours from now. Post any final thoughts here!

@DMDM - pleas could you put a link to the spreadsheet up at the top of the game? It would make it easire for me to find it.

Deigon Black "Gunny" wrote:

"What was the cost you paid to resolve the crisis?"
Once the Corax began their advance, our fleet’s sensors picked up their presence and initiated a full-scale emergency jump. Because of the explosion, the fleet only gained half of its intended fuel. Thank God there was no chain reaction!

I think you got *no* fuel, making the entire thing a complete waste. That's why you now have two ticks on the Doom Clock.

LoL, you can’t be mad at a guy for trying.

@Diegon and Devin - I'm dyslexic so at some pint I'm *am* going to mix you both up. Sorry in advance!

You are dyslexic or Sasha is? Anyway, you can call me what you like as long as the liquor keeps on poring.

DO play leading with your heart or organ of choice. This system requires you to make bad choices for your character, it's not for "power gamers" who have to "win"

Well, my head may be spinning from trying to figure out how to use the many various Moves, but I will at least have this going for me. I've always loved having my characters make bad choices. I have a couple of Pathfinder characters that are almost addicted to them. I play one of them with her liver, and the other with her spleen. (None that you've met though Sasha)

Sasha Maran wrote:

DO play leading with your heart or organ of choice. This system requires you to make bad choices for your character, it's not for "power gamers" who have to "win"

Well, my head may be spinning from trying to figure out how to use the many various Moves, but I will at least have this going for me. I've always loved having my characters make bad choices. I have a couple of Pathfinder characters that are almost addicted to them. I play one of them with her liver, and the other with her spleen. (None that you've met though Sasha)

I might have to pass on an introduction to the one using their spleen.

Fair enough. She'd probably just cuss you out anyway.

Frist, I realy hope this is helpful - it's is meant to be advice, not a You Must Play the game like this. It's based on my experience and things I wish someone had said to me before I strated playing Please feel free to ignored - I won't be offended.

Hell no. This stuff is great! Thank you for it! I'm just going to add a couple of notes.

DO play leading with your heart or organ of choice. This system requires you to make bad choices for your character, it's not for "power gamers" who have to "win"

YES. Someone said that you should play a Blades in the Dark PC like you're driving a stolen car. This is a bit like that, but with less "what the hell, I jump off the roof, even if I roll badly something interesting will probably happen" and more "my character cares /so much/ about this that they will jump off the roof even though I may DIE".

IDK if I'm articulating this well, but anyway... yeah it's definitely not a game for D&D / PF style powergaming.

DON'T roll teh dice unless you mean it. This isn't Pathfinder where you roll Perception or Sense Motive or Diplomacy "just in case" - every dice roll here has a chance to f@!~ up your character'd day completely.

ALSO YES. This is a big problem with D&D / PF players coming to Blades in the Dark type games, and I think it's probably an issue here too. Roll the dice when you're ready for something important to happen -- good, bad, or mixed. As a general rule, when you fail rolls in this game, bad stuff happens. It's never "you rolled low on Perception, but nbd, there was nothing to see there anyway". That literally can't happen here. Instead, if you roll low, bad stuff happens! Imagine if, in D&D / PF, whenever you rolled a Perception check and failed, the system automatically opened a trap door under your feet, dropping you into a pit with a CR+3 monster at the bottom. You'd be a little more thoughtful, right?

The flip side is, while you shouldn't be rolling the dice for small stuff, sometimes you /have/ to roll, and also sometimes you /want/ to roll -- even if you don't have to. Rolls advance the narrative! Even bad rolls tell a story!

So, go ahead and roll. Just, don't do it reflexively; think about it first, maybe discuss it with the other players or at least announce it in advance. And be ready to eat the consequences if you roll low.

OK, before I get started on an entry post, I have a quick gameplay question regarding relationships. What does a relationship's level impact and how do you tell what level your current relationship is.

For example, Deigon is acquainted with Sasha do to frequenting her place and doing business / drinking with her. I fell she would be considered a friend seeing Deigon doesn't have very many connections at this point. Would that make her a level (1) relationship? Also, if you have a poor repour with someone, is there such a thing as a negative level relationship?

Lastly, Deigon's backstory has him as a retired CAG, making him a civilian. Most posts thus fare have simply referred to him as pilot. So, I'm a bit torn between the two. I would like to clarify his current position. Has he been reinstated due to the circumstances? Has he been cleared to fly and fight as a civilian? Or is he still considered a civilian with no clearance to fly?

Sory for the questions, I just feel a bit confused on this and thought I would ask.

OK, before I get started on an entry post, I have a quick gameplay question regarding relationships. What does a relationship's level impact and how do you tell what level your current relationship is.

Excellent question, no worries. Relationships are represented by a number from 1 (you care about this person, and vice versa) to 4 (this is probably the most important person in the world to you, and vice versa). They're always two-way, so if you have a Relationship with a person, they have one with you.

In narrative terms, Relationship usually means friendship or love. Those aren't the only options, though. You could have a Relationship based on a strong sense of mutual duty, or mutual respect, or mutual rivalry. The thing is that both of you care, and you would both be upset if the other person were to die or otherwise end the relationship.

In mechanical terms, when you have a Relaonship with another character -- whether NPC or PC -- you can substitute the Relationship number for your usual stat whenever you make one of the following Moves:

-- Support them
-- Interfere with them
-- Call Them on their Sh!t, or
-- Pull Strings to ask them for help (NPCs only)

These are from page 33 of the book, which explains Relationships.

If you're a powergamer, a strong (+3 or +4) Relationship with another PC means you can burn one Pressure on the Support move and you'll usually get two Hold for it. And, since Support is a cardinal move (marked in the book with an asterisk*) you'll also earn an XP. Mechanically, you're buying two Holds and an xp for a cost of one Pressure. That's pretty good! Similarly, from a purely mechanical POV, high Relationships with NPCs mean you can use CTOTS and Pull Strings on them to get stuff from them and to get them to do stuff.

The mechanical drawback is that if the Relationship ends (because they die, or for any other reason) you immediately eat Pressure equal to the level of the Relationship. And people dying (or hitting a breaking point and breaking off with you) is totally a thing that happens.

Would that make her a level (1) relationship? Also, if you have a poor repour with someone, is there such a thing as a negative level relationship?

1) PC Relationships are what any two PCs agree them to be. Mind, if it's +3 or +4, you're probably parent/child, married, or Frodo/Sam or at least Holmes/Watson.

2) There are no negative level relationships. The number is about caring, and you can't care less than zero. You can have a Relationship that includes rivalry or dislike, or even one that is /based/ on rivalry or dislike, as long as it's mutual and you both care about it. Examples of such "dark" relationships might include Thor and Loki, Faith and Buffy, the 12th Doctor and Missy, or Gus Fring and Walter White. The test for caring is "if this other person either died or just decided to completely ignore you, would you be upset?". If you both answer "yes, actually" then you can have a Relationship.

Has he been reinstated due to the circumstances? Has he been cleared to fly and fight as a civilian? Or is he still considered a civilian with no clearance to fly?

It's up to you, but when in doubt ask yourself -- what would provide the most raw material for drama? I think "got busted right out of the service, but has been called back and given a new command in this desperate hour" has a lot of potential, but it's up to you.

Sory for the questions, I just feel a bit confused on this and thought I would ask.

No worries! HTH.

Thanks for the Indepth reply. That clears alot up. I think I'm going to go with your suggestion on his current status. He was retired and due to the circumstances was reinstated as a pilot. It makes the most sense to me considering the situation.

@ Sasha, Now that I have a little better understanding about the relationship mechanics, I would like to list you down as a level (1) relationship if you ok with being friend of Deigons?

I have a question as well, more about campaign progression.

It seems to me characters don't really advance much. They change, get more abilities, but it doesn't lead to a great amount of difference. For example there's a huge difference between a 1st level character and a 5th level character in Pathfinder. But, using the counterexample I know best, a beginning character in Call of Cthulhu will advance, but only get incrementally better at a few things over time. It seems to me Last Fleet is in the Call of Cthulhu camp, and possibly even more flat with advances.

Do Last Fleet campaigns (is this even the right word?) tend to get more difficult going forward, or do they tend to remain fairly flat as well?

The reason I'm asking is, in thinking about my character I like to idea of diversifying Hannah going forward. For example, maybe when I get enough xp I might put a point into Raw because it turns out with some practice she's a good shot.

Of course the normal, Pathfinder thing to do would be to raise Sharp to +2 since that's more in her track and would prepare her for more difficult challenges in her lane.

In short, does Last Fleet punish generalists in the same ways Pathfinder does?

It seems to me Last Fleet is in the Call of Cthulhu camp, and possibly even more flat with advances.

Do Last Fleet campaigns (is this even the right word?) tend to get more difficult going forward, or do they tend to remain fairly flat as well?

I would say it's closer to CoC, but not quite as flat. If you're just interested in minimaxing, then yes -- correct play is to raise your "core" stat up to +3, then start raising other stats. Bumping a stat up by +1 is pretty huge! For instance, if you have +1 in a stat, you get a clean win 28% of the time, a mixed or partial hit 42% of the time, and you fail about 28% of the time. Bump that stat to +2 and now the numbers are 42 / 42 / 16. That's a pretty big difference!

Taking new Moves can also be quite powerful -- and again, if you want to powergame, there are a bunch of playbook moves that are potentially very abusable. (Remember, when you buy new Moves, you can buy from any playbook.)

So if you want to "advance" your PC in the sense of making them tougher, more skilled, and deadlier -- the traditional RPG power curves -- then you absolutely can. A PC with half a dozen carefully selected Moves and +3 / +2 / +2 in key stats is mechanically a lot more powerful than a starter PC. Not 20th level wizard vs. 1st level wizard, no. But you would totally feel the difference in gameplay.

But -- BUT -- that would be slightly missing the point of the game. This is a narrative game. Yes, it's great to gain xp and unlock new abilities and better rolls. But this game is more about /telling cool stories/. And cool things can happen to your PC at any "level". That's what all the stuff about Relationships and interpersonal Moves is all about.

One other thing: note that sooner or later you will max out your Pressure track and hit a Breaking Point. You can probably avoid this for a long time with careful play, but (1) you can't avoid it forever and (2) that's not really the spirit of the game.

Breaking Points put a sell-by date on your PC, because when you've market off a Breaking Point action, it's gone and you can't use it again. Everyone has six Breaking Point actions: four general ones (they're on page 31), a fifth that is specific to their Playbook, and death. Yes, you can burn XP to un-mark a Breaking Point action, theoretically making your PC immortal... but, come on. Death is literally right there on your charsheet! The game anticipates that /at some point/ you're going down. So, think less about "how do I advance to 20th level" and more about "how do I gradually work towards a final scene that is fricking awesome?"

In short, does Last Fleet punish generalists in the same ways Pathfinder does?

Mechanically, a little bit, but not as much as Pathfinder. Remember, much of the time you're choosing which Moves to make. So mechanically, much of the time you can lean on your stronger stats. If you've got great Raw, you can throw yourself into combat and then reduce Pressure by Cutting Loose. If you've got great Warm, you use Warm moves to get what you want and then reduce Pressure by Reaching Out.

But again: it's a narrative game. So go where the story seems more interesting. "My PC is a postdoc in biology who, thrown into sudden post-apocalyptic chaos, decided to double down on her strengths, focusing ever more intently on her research" -- okay, that's one kind of story. Put that +1 into Sharp. "Thrown into chaos, my PC decided that she would teach herself the skills needed to survive, alien though they were to her peaceful nature" -- that's another kind of story. Put that +1 into Raw.

Phew. Does this make sense?

Thnkks for explaining the relationships bit of the game, I was sort of wonderin about that myself.

I think my relationships is something like

Thea +2 - they knew each otehr quite well anyway, and now Thea has saved her life. That counts for something.

Deigon +1 - decent relationship

Oscar +1 - ditto

Hannh +0 - they jsut don't know each other yet, hopefully that will change soon

Devin +0 - no real interatctions so far

NPCS

Sgt Ada Stuggs +2 - they know a lot of each other's secrets and Sasha has looked after her boy, making sure he got teh best possible care. Even in Stugss twisted world that counts for a lot

Ensign Morgan Kinnard +1 - he has ties to the Nexus organisation which makes him useful to Sasha.

Cpl Bodie - +1 they work together and Sasha makes sure Stugss doesn't give him too much of a hard time.

Cmdr Hooke +1 - they don't exactly get on but taht "everyone can see it" UST means theres more there than either of them would admit