Voyages of the HMSS Beagle

[johndavidanderson]

Thought I'd split this one off to avoid hijacking a previous thread.

[to recap]

Originally posted by Salar:
I'm looking at having the players as the crew of a British 80-man, converted Leander class, frigate, acting as HM Government's gunboat in the French Arm and ensuring British lines of trade are unimpeded. I'm taking the slow-travel-therefore-long-lines-of-communication theory and equating the crew's mission as similar to those during our colonial era. Delivering Govt parcels, troubleshooting, 'showing the flag' etc.

The players would take the lead roles with: Captain, Engineer, Marine Lieutenant, Merchant Corporation Rep (a la East India Company), Doctor, and scientist. Their mission..."to do all that is necessary and prudent to facilitate His Majesty's and Great Britain's economic, scientific, and military, endeavors". This could involve side-treks with players playing different members of the crew in different types of scenarios, from marine boarding actions (the asteroid station), diplomatic missions between colonies, anti-piracy etc.

I'm looking at throwing at them an asteroid-based ex-Kafir facility, guarded by a mysterious, decommissioned French frigate that jumps them, a booby-trapped asteroid base and possibly 'malfunctioning' super-soldiers left behind to be obliterated with the station. Within the asteroid is a top secret scientific facility working towards breeding genetic 'ubermensch' with which to begin colonizing new worlds and spreading. The 'big bad' would be a very powerful 'splinter cell' of a large Foundation (I was thinking Life)who aim to rule the new utopia independent of the 'interference' of contemporary human society.. Spreading is seen as the best way to ensure their survival - but will more probably bring the transhumans into conflict with Earth's powers.

[/recap]


I've purchased the PDFs of 2300 and it's providing great "history" for my planned campaign. Especially this...
"After their defeat at Eta Bootis, Kafer forces ...arrived within [the Hochbaden] system and began building a major base [on Hoffman]. Under the guidance of Triumphant Destiny, the base has been cunningly hidden.The base was constructed on the surface of the inner gas giant satellite. The ice under the structure melted by channeling the output of a small nuclear reactor into the ice, and the ice allowed to reform over the base once it had submerged to the desired depth. The base is now submerged at a depth of 10 meters, with a one-meter-thick layer of ice shielding it from view...The base is roughly the size of a large Kafer troop transport and has room and life support facilities for over 1000 Kafers (with considerably more crowding than humans would tolerate)...It includes a large fuel cracking station which has been producing and stockpiling oxygen and hydrogen from the surrounding waters of the ice-roofed sea."
(Keith, William, 'Kaffer Sourcebook', pp77-78)

So, sounds like a good base of operations for the militant Trans humanists and there's a British military base on Hochbaden. So, asteroid belt base becomes secret-base-under-frozen-planet. Not really an issue, in fact it's nice I can tie this into 'historical fact'. I'm just not sure about the trans-humanist angle. Why else would there be humans operating a secret base, converted into a scientific laboratory. And why would they take on a nosy Brit frigate to ensure its secrecy?

John

 

[johndavidanderson]

Originally posted by Colin:
A Life Foundation secret group with ties to Pro-Volution, perhaps. Some magazine article in Challenge an overly-long time ago had super-soldiers in it, so the idea isn't entirely outside canon (assuming that everything in Challenge was canonical). Throw in Pentapods to make everything really weird.

Yeah, as noted above, I'm going cold on the Trans-humanist angle. Just doesn't seem right. The Pentapods, however are definitely going to appear, even if it's simply by introducing a lot of their tech (probably on the secret facility). Whether this would be as a red herring or signaling the complicit involvement of the Pentapods is another thing.
Do you know if it's possible to get hold of Challenge magazine from all those years ago?
John