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[CLOSED-TENTATIVE] Capitalism, Ho! - A Trading Ship's Tale

So, where should the story begin?

  • Total voters
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  • Poll closed .

Seems legit. Money concerns are, if nothing else, a good way of reeling kill-crazy PCs back in and grounding their concerns a little more in reality.

Hello explosive decompression, meet fragile goods.
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Would need to be premeditated, but yeah. Explosive decompression was what I was talking about when saying it's a dick move, as in, you can't really fight back against it easily. I'm pretty sure they both have airlocks on them anyway, they just need some method of (magnetically?) sealing themselves onto random surfaces. I'll leave it as food for thought for now, just a suggestion.


Depends where you want to take things, really. I'm taking it that characters from anywhere in Nepleslian space are fine (since you did mention Freespacers), but other than that, I'd probably wait on seeing some NPCs of yours to let you set the tone, before just jumping in and creating some random space loser. It's important that you enjoy this thing too, obviously.
 

Quirky is fine. Drama is fine. Realism is appreciated, but not required in full. At the finalisation of the casting, I will be asking the players of the "Difficulty Settings" they wish to play in. Here are some examples.
  1. Easy Modo: Full-on FUN! game, will be locked into the Open RP section. Go wild, unleash your Mary Sues and Marty Stus onto my poor, poor RP. Eveyone, EVERYONE, is Rambo incarnate.
  1. Loose: Easiest logical Open RP, can eventually be upgraded into a Canon Independent RP. I will run the game on "lobotomized" settings, most of my OCDs and nitpicking will be disabled. PCs are still pretty fearsome, only significant enemies will not be autokills. Think regular FPS story missions, they're still one-man-armies but can die if they're stupid. Fiat and unrealistic RPing will be frowned upon, but I won't stop it.
  1. Normal: Number-crunching time. I will try to be realistic but playable at the same time, I'll work to have you all use your brains in this. Rule of Cool is weak here, though suitably epic stunts may be given a pass. Enemies won't go down so easily, but they're still quite simple. Combat will be on a smaller scale. Unrealistic RPing is heavily frowned upon, I might even step in and say "It doesn't work that way" in particularly egregious cases.
  1. It's XCOM, Baby: Oh joy. This setting isn't fun for me either, I'll be accounting for almost everything humanly possible whie in combat. Helpless traders sometimes have the guts to shoot back, mercenaries actually use squad tactics and military forces start calling saturation bombardments. I'll be actively playing against you to the best of my ability, putting myself in the shoes of the enemy and acting accordingly. Marty Stus will be drawn out, trapped in a situation where they have to cheat to survive, and I'll kill them anyway. As the name implies, you're all XCOM rookies with their signature mortality rate.
My own personal recommendation is the Normal setting, my OCD will not survive Easy Modo for long and I don't want to cement my reputation as a Killer GM just yet.
 
I'd almost definitely prefer the "normal" option as well, right off the bat. Murder-pirates don't really make storytelling sense other than faceless goons, or psycho-sue PCs.

Got a little carried away with considering offensive options, but keeping this thing at least somewhat civilian would be my vote. Petty criminals at best, with the occasional daring scheme that may or may not work out.
 
I saw in the shoutbox there was some discussion of the merits of operating in Nepleslia and Yamatai. I want to point out that while Yamatai has high security around core worlds, it also has huge frontier areas that are the "boonies" which are only low to moderate security, and Yamatai also has some really cool independent star systems in the middle of its space, like Valaad (The Inferno Wind would make a great starting point and there's also a Bravemart there) and Halna (home of The Black Moon, one of SARP's best pirate/indie hubs).
 
Erm... Given that places such as the Black moon are apparently full of ex-reds and general independents anyway, perhaps there is a possibility that both plots could effectively be done in one?... Kinda mindful of the fact that there are already salvage plots that are Nepleslian centralized. The Black Vipers are an example of a pirate plot, too, as far as I'm aware. Having one start in Yamatai space does at least give some new interesting options as to character backgrounds, and a couple of smuggling routes that I don't think other people have thought of.

That's not to say you couldn't just start with the original Nepleslian plan and have us exploit the more lawless potions of the Yamatai empire later anyway, through.
 
I thought the IWL was defunct, but by all means if you wish to do GAO related things, you know where to find me.

(The dumpster behind the Shattered Shell)
 
I was thinking about this thread, had a dream which inspired a premise I submit before those more knowledgeable:

You are a [insert occupation]. Your ship is heavily damaged from an pirate attack, your weapons unusable, but your remaining holds that have survived are full from your previous cargo plus salvage from the pirate vessel. You find that most of your crew is dead upon your return, the rest severely injured or in terminal condition. It appears that the few in as good condition as yourself will have to take charge.

You need to sell your cargo, get repairs, resupply and restaff. Where do you go? Shall you take the safety of Yamatai and suffer its lesser profits, or the risks of Nepleslian space with its higher rewards?

Would this sort of idea work for you, @Grey Library ? This way, the faction is left indefinite for the players to decide as they go and experience the attitudes of either side. We'd start off as humble spacefarers and merchants, but where we could take it is from there is open to consideration.
 
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That might work for a purely unaligned crew, but it must have its origins somewhere in the Kikyo Sector. If the current Captain got where he was through the death of the original Captain and was elected to replace him, that might work. I might be able to fudge naval laws a bit to legalise such a "takeover".

Restaffing at an independent "freeport" will open up vacancies to crew of all nationalities, too.

For this premise, I'll give you:
  • A larger starting ship, better quality but heavily damaged. Probably something from Origin Industries.
  • Inherited debt (old Captain's debt and bereavement payouts to the families of the deceased, flat sum) and sizable taxes for registration matters, credit status clean and loans available.
  • Two to three "founding member" NPCs.
  • Clean slate, no reputation to speak of. Law enforcement is indifferent to you, no pursuers. No patron protection though.
  • Open to all sorts of applicants, be they Yamataian or Nepleslian, rich or poor, experienced combatants or hapless civilians.
Well then, time to look up freeports along the Yamatai-Nepleslia border.
 
Paying off debt? No one to protect us legally? Sounds like fun- but what do the others think? It'd be their game to, after all...
 
Who would be technically be accountable for the debt, through? A private shipping company that the old captain headed, the sole asset being the ship? Wouldn't the bank or interested parties just repossess everything? You can't just charge employees or crew members of a ship for the captain's screw ups, you charge the representative company itself.

I actually do like the idea, but the only way I could see it making sense is if they had some shady corporate backing right off the bat. Somebody who doesn't own the ship technically speaking, if only because the crew members now owe them quite a few off the record favors. Presumably, the crew are people who would really rather be off the record themselves, due to their own troubled pasts.

In other words, they really need a guardian devil to be fudging all the paperwork for them, it would be unwise to do it themselves. Otherwise they really are just a bunch of wanted criminals with a stolen ship.

When it gets really hairy is when the devil comes knocking.
 
What if the entire crew owned a share of the ship before it had gotten damaged? Would that work as well? I know some fishing crews of fishing schooners had shared ownership of their vessel back in the day before my time. Hurrah for Maritime Heritage!
 
Depends who is actually responsible for managing said bereavement payouts in this world, but I'm pretty sure that company would be seriously breathing down their necks if they don't immediately get a loan to pay up. Then they'll have the bank on their asses, of course, but not right away.

Third, illegal option; Pay somebody a fraction of the amount for some dodgy new papers, deny everything, and pretend it's a different ship.
 
"What are you talking about? This ship isn't 'The Destitute', obviously. It's called 'The Once Destitute'. Look, Here's our papers!"

"Alright, you can go." Aide whispers: "Sir are we really letting them go?!"

"Of course not, we're going to track them to find bigger fish to fry!"
 
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