Bank Job

[Chuck Anumia]

Bank Job
Geared towards MT/MGT and possibly even the TNE universe.

The Rebellion is in full swing in 1120. Fleets have been called to war and left the system.
Reserve fleets have been called up and many of them have also gone off to the war.
Who/what is left watching the bank?

Spread across every sector of the Imperium are well defended asteroids filled with the wealth of the Imperium.
Normally these banks are located next to the Imperial Navy Depots.
While the fleets are away what kind of secondary/obsolete forces are securing these assets?
Is it possible for a small team of hardened criminals to crack an asteroid deposit and make a substantial withdrawal and get away with it?

What system should they focus their attention on?
What kind of security are they facing?
How many people should they gather?
How many of which type of ship do they need?
All that metal will take up a lot of space and they will need to consider get away speed.
Who will be coming after them with what kind of ships?
Where could they go to cash in on their haul?
Is this even a remote possibility?

 

[Kilgs]

Absolutely! The drawing in of fleets and elements, if monitored, could easily score a number of sites that hold valuable resources. Imagine an Imperium of this size, all of the depots, bunkers, storehouses, logistical centers... then no one knows who is in charge or who they are serving.

Ever seen "Lord of War"? The Soviet Union starts to collapse and the arms dealers swoop into the satellite states and their warehouses. A great turn of events. A Marine warehouse situated on an asteroid full of Battle Dress?

Likely need some inside help... maybe an Army Logistical clerk that has been inputting shipping data for the past twenty years. Hard Times come... s/he sees their chance to make lots of money as everything falls apart. They know about a place that is soon to be forgotten or is down to a skeleton crew. They just don't have the skills so they go looking for a crew to take up the heavy lifting.

You could do the same thing with the Treasury or any valuable ore/material/resource (government/corporate). Disgruntled clerk, Hard Times a-coming, shrinking defenses or manpower.

Man, I love the Hard Times! A criminal gang in the Hard Times would be a very cool campaign idea. Stealing military hardware for would-be planetary despots, saviors and religious folks seeking a revolution. Playing Robin Hood with corporate assets to give dying planets a chance... for PROFIT!

 

[Oddball]

Hmmmm...Nice.

Perhaps you could take some inspiration in Kelly's Heroes movie,too
Change the French bank for something more suitable, transform the Shermans and Tigers to starships and translate Kelly's group to the Traveller background. For sure, they will form an interesting group of playing characters! And don't forget the "Burning Bridges" song at the end of the adventure.

 

[Travellerspud]

...Likely need some inside help... maybe an Army Logistical clerk that has been inputting shipping data for the past twenty years. Hard Times come... s/he sees their chance to make lots of money as everything falls apart. They know about a place that is soon to be forgotten or is down to a skeleton crew. They just don't have the skills so they go looking for a crew to take up the heavy lifting...

check out "The Score" for a twist to this plot (there are no Partners in crime)

 

[Enoff]

Makes me think of the Western "The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly"

Maybe the characters have to get involved with the war to reach the treasure, much like Kelly's Heros as mentioned.

 

[aramis]

Another fun twist - they get there, and find, not reserve specie, but blackmail data... on local world leadership.

 

[flykiller]

they get there, and find, not reserve specie, but blackmail data...

currency is currency.

seriously though, if you think you know where it is then that's not where it is.

 

[rancke]

Bank Job
Geared towards MT/MGT and possibly even the TNE universe.

The Rebellion is in full swing in 1120. Fleets have been called to war and left the system.
Reserve fleets have been called up and many of them have also gone off to the war.
Who/what is left watching the bank?

Umm... the 99.9999% of people who aren't manning the ships?
The subsector forces?
The planetary forces?
The mothballed ships that the shipyards start reactivating the moment the regular fleets have gone and their ships won't be availing themselves of their sheduled annual maintenances?
The ships that were being built as thet are finished?
The new ships that the shipyards gear up to produce as the worlds go on a war footing?


Hans

 

[Carlobrand]

Umm... the 99.9999% of people who aren't manning the ships? ...

:rofl:

I need to think a bit on what one would put in an asteroid that is both portable enough and valuable enough to steal, exchanged rarely enough that an out-of-the-way storage location is a good idea, and unusual enough to warrant building a defended asteroid vault to contain it rather than putting it square in the middle of an army base where the troops already defending the base can guard it. That asteroid bit sets limits: I get things the military would want in space, like a cache of nuclear devices, a cache of bioweapons, a cache of rather dangerous Ancients tech - a lot of the ideas boil down to something too dangerous to keep planetside near your troops. Rumors being rumors, I see this one starting with criminals hoping to find platinum bars and ending with criminals debating whether they should risk taking the bioweapons cache they've found - and the inevitable complications and moral questions that it would entail - or write the job off as a loss.

 

[Kilgs]

Umm... the 99.9999% of people who aren't manning the ships?
The subsector forces?
The planetary forces?
The mothballed ships that the shipyards start reactivating the moment the regular fleets have gone and their ships won't be availing themselves of their sheduled annual maintenances?
The ships that were being built as thet are finished?
The new ships that the shipyards gear up to produce as the worlds go on a war footing?


Hans

Now, now... this counts as raining.

 

[Chris Barlow]

Bank job - the sequel

:rofl:

see this one starting with criminals hoping to find platinum bars and ending with criminals debating whether they should risk taking the bioweapons cache they've found - and the inevitable complications and moral questions that it would entail - or write the job off as a loss.

"Moral questions", I am sorry but are are talking about criminals here.:rofl: The main question they will be asking, is who do we know that (a) wants and knows how to assess the quality and usability of bio weapons (b) Will actually pay us for the bio weapons rather than killing us for them. This would make a perfect sequel to the original robbery scenario.

 

[Carlobrand]

"Moral questions", I am sorry but are are talking about criminals here.:rofl: The main question they will be asking, is who do we know that (a) wants and knows how to assess the quality and usability of bio weapons (b) Will actually pay us for the bio weapons rather than killing us for them. This would make a perfect sequel to the original robbery scenario.

Even criminals have ethics of a sort. Well, the kind of skilled ones that could pull off this level of organizational effort would. The need to be able to plan and organize with others and to build the kind of reputation that would make someone trust you beside them on an operation of this magnitude implies someone a cut or two above the usual impulsive idiot, someone who can delay gratification, anticipate consequences and so forth. Their morals may be self-serving, but they'll have them.

For that reason their first question will not be, "Who do we know that will want this?" Their first question will be, "How fiercely will they hunt us if we take this?" Any criminal, especially experienced professional criminals, know that there are acts that up the ante. Steal a master painting from the Louvre, and you'll have the world's police on the lookout for you. Steal a master painting from a top Mafia boss, you know you're going to be dealing with a different order of hunters. Steal a tactical nuke from the Russians, and you'll have the world's espionage agencies looking for you. Criminals know police - police have rules, and those rules can be exploited. Drawing the attention of the spymasters, that takes the game up a lotta notches - they don't tend to think the rules apply to them, and they have very impressive resources. You take a good hard look at your own resources and ask whether you're going to be able to stay free long enough to enjoy your payoff.

And, sometimes criminals have odd limits or motivations. Mobster Meyer Lansky found a patriotic bone in his body during WW-II.

 

[McPerth]

Bank Job
Geared towards MT/MGT and possibly even the TNE universe.

The Rebellion is in full swing in 1120. Fleets have been called to war and left the system.
Reserve fleets have been called up and many of them have also gone off to the war.
Who/what is left watching the bank?

I'd say the SDBs not worth to be taken to full fleet opperations, but that are still enough to scare most pirates .

They would be no match for even an escort, but most pirates have smaller ships (after all, that's why those SDBs are built for).

 

[Orr]

I like this. It reminds me of that very sketchy plot in "The Spinward Marches Campaign"; a clerk manages to "lose" a shipment of battledress in the hopes they can sell it later only to have someone else "find" the shipment first.

Chuck should write this up and post it in the files section. Better yet, we all should write amber zones using this one seed and then post them here. Break is running an amber zone contest at his site, why don't we have one too?

 

[Magnus von Thornwood]

Asteroids?

Well, about the only reason I put something on an asteroid is that I can fit it with Jump & Maneuver Drives, Power plants And of course weapons and armor. That way they can fight and if needed Jump out system or even in system. So much better than a fixed location, plus I can move about to keep dirtbags from getting the goods.

 

[tinker123]

The fleet may be carrying it

Do we believe the credit is nailed to the gold standard (or equivalent)? I would expect most modern / future money to be essentially a "paper" construct, backed by the government's ability to borrow or print more money to pay it back. The big exception is in time of war, when payment has to be backed with real, hard resources.

So I expect the fleet to carry significant metal (or whatever the other tangible valuable stuff might be) to pay for raw materials and repairs at independent / neutral / frontier yards. And if the reserves are thin compared to the paper economy, they may all be loaded aboard capital ships to buy supplies.

Of course there are still the "mints" that stamp out the credit notes or coins, and it may be easy to grab a couple of dT of cash in that form. Assuming it's the form that they use on the criminals' side of the border

 

[rancke]

Do we believe the credit is nailed to the gold standard (or equivalent)? I would expect most modern / future money to be essentially a "paper" construct, backed by the government's ability to borrow or print more money to pay it back.

I believe that the Imperial credit is backed by the combined economies of 11,000 member worlds.

The big exception is in time of war, when payment has to be backed with real, hard resources.

Imperial credit notes have the name of the sector mint that created (the process isn't printing) them embedded. In an emergency that could be used to distinguish between good CrImps from your side from bad CrImps from the other side.


Hans