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I originally did this as a post in Pundit's thread about families in RPG campaigns....:

QuoteINTERSTELLAR MARCO POLO


In other words - its sometime in the near future. Earth/Terra has colonies on planets as far as the Jupiter or Saturn Orbit. Humanity just became aware that there are two or three other intelligent species out there because a reply has been sent to the message that was on the Voyager Probes. (Those plaques and records)

One of these alien races has offered to take a few humans on a "Meet & Greet" journey to several other star systems, maybe more than a dozen. Because of various drive and weight restrictions this journey might take close to a couple of decades and they can only offer passage to a handful of humans - less than 10 but more than 3.

So, its decided that a family should go - several families volunteer.


The player characters would be members of this family.

The goal or 'mission' for the players is to find out as much as they can and try represent humanity and make a good impression with whoever they meet - and oh yeah if they happen to make trade deals on behalf of Earth or aliances to protect Earth from harm - then thats a goal too.

...Okay that was the basic idea. Anyone got more details ar ideas that could be added to that?


- Ed C.

I'd use Larry Niven's Draco Tavern stories as an inspiration when it comes to what could go wrong or other interesting takes on alien perspectives.

I think there would be an issue maintaining adventures in this environment.
There would be a degree of ethnographic 'fun' where PCs meet new GM designed Alien cultures but I think the seeming lack of conflict (and I don't just mean combat here but general conflict) would make this type of game quite short-lived.
Inspiration wise Try the Sparrow which is about a religions mission that travels to a newly identified populated planet.

Quote from: jibbajibbaI think there would be an issue maintaining adventures in this environment.
There would be a degree of ethnographic 'fun' where PCs meet new GM designed Alien cultures but I think the seeming lack of conflict (and I don't just mean combat here but general conflict) would make this type of game quite short-lived.

Oh, I don't see that at all.

This assumes that things go as planned. IME, the action happens when things go wrong. Very wrong.

Think of an adventure akin to (referring to Niven again) Mote in Gods Eye, where you visit a world in the palace of a ruling class as welcome guests when the palace is stormed by revolutionaries that have decided you represent a threat to their way of life. Or, when war leads to another power taking over.

Or challenge the players' morality. What will they do when a rogue alien steals their DNA because the natives find humans new and exotic and clones of you would make excellent steak.

Quote from: Caesar SlaadOr challenge the players' morality. What will they do when a rogue alien steals their DNA because the natives find humans new and exotic and clones of you would make excellent steak.

They'll take Campbell's, and like it!

Quote from: Caesar SlaadOh, I don't see that at all.

This assumes that things go as planned. IME, the action happens when things go wrong. Very wrong.

Think of an adventure akin to (referring to Niven again) Mote in Gods Eye, where you visit a world in the palace of a ruling class as welcome guests when the palace is stormed by revolutionaries that have decided you represent a threat to their way of life. Or, when war leads to another power taking over.

Or challenge the players' morality. What will they do when a rogue alien steals their DNA because the natives find humans new and exotic and clones of you would make excellent steak.

Yeah I think you get one adventure out of it. Once its happened I think its very hard to continue the adventure.
Number of reasons
i) You can't really kill the PCs. How would you replace them without ending up with an all alien team within a small time frame
ii) by definition the aliens have greater tech than the humans and that can be very difficult as you need to kludge why the other culture doesn't just wipe them out
iii) whatever event happens the core game rational 'you come here to meet with our culture' is tainted and you the humans either get taken home, or steal a space ship and become a rogue trader of some description (this might be fun but its not the premise that was set up for the game)

There are a few places where something similar to this idea has been done. Space 1999 TV show, moon flying through space (against the laws of physics obviously) meets aliens, Star Trek esp Voyager and Lost in Space all spring to mind but in each case the humans are self contained and have some technology and the 'game' isn't in the alien contact per se but in the resulting conflicts.

Read the Journeyer : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Journeyer

Hell, name the ship Journeyer :D

Regards,
David R

I see the first 2 or 3 sessions as where the player characters are learning the alien technology of the starship that they are traveling on.

By the 4th session they know enough to help out in an emergency and do some of the duties onboard the ship. (or even take a watch in the control room or bridge).

This family of player characters would also be learning the dominant language of the Interstellar communities that they are meeting.

The 4th or 5th session, something should happen where the players get more of a say in what direction the ship is heading.

Maybe they discover that one group of aliens has actually betrayed the friendly group of aliens who are providing them with the trip.

That kind of thing....


- Ed C.

Every game of Traveler I ever played seemed a little like 'Marco Polo' to me!

-Marco

Quote from: jibbajibbaYeah I think you get one adventure out of it. Once its happened I think its very hard to continue the adventure.
(...)
There are a few places where something similar to this idea has been done. Space 1999 TV show, moon flying through space (against the laws of physics obviously) meets aliens, Star Trek esp Voyager and Lost in Space all spring to mind

Series which have had multiple seasons out of an idea that you say we can only get an adventure or two out of...

Quotebut in each case the humans are self contained and have some technology and the 'game' isn't in the alien contact per se but in the resulting conflicts.

I don't see how it would be so very different. Indeed, you might have more possibilities. Your "host" obviously has some interest in keeping you alive and showing you around. But how far is the host willing to push it? Does the host have an ulterior motive? Does the host race that is showing you around have FACTIONS that might disagree about the nature of this grand tour project? Are there other races that want to somehow exploit, harm, or hinder the guests?

I rather think its rife with possibilities.

What Ceasar S. said......

...also I said in that one post that by the 3rd or 4th session the player characters start to know enough about the technology of the hosting/tourguide aliens so that they can help out onboard ship and even have more say in their direction and fate.

It could also be that something about humanity is refreshingly unique or 'strange' in a good way that the friendly group of aliens are hoping for a fesh set of eyes on a problem - just the player characters wouldn't realize that till the 4th or 5th session of the campaign.  

At that point friendship and trust should be growing between the hosting friendly aliens and the human PCs.

I could almost see this idea lasting at least 15 game sessions - MORE if the players are enjoying it.


- Ed C.

Hmmm...

Still not convinced I think you have a number of issues round motivation, continued character development etc... You could loose the humans in the new galaxy and go for the now do whatever you do idea that would work but you would need to get them independent of their hosts and lost. This would become very Voyager (not a bad or good thing) .

Have you ever read any of the 2000AD PEST short stories (future shocks ) . Pest is the Planatary Exploration and Survey Trust. A  PEST scout wanders through the galaxy surveying new planets for minerals, polulations etc. He is far from home and has very limited resourse. The stories have him as a lone explorer but you could take this and apply it to a small crew. If it gets too big it turns into star trek again. The 2000 Ad stories are comic with a wry twist and you could play it that way or go full on action/space opera hard Science whatever.

Nope.

 I don't think they have to get 'Lost' for this campaign idea to work . (but its alright if you disagree. )

There is nothing wrong with an exploration and diplomatic difficulties game for a few sessions...then 3rd or 4th game session there combat or confklict scenes possible.

Heck , even the first game session or two - there might be human radical groups who think that the aliens are dangerous asnd try to kill the player characters or stall the mission launch  /rendezvous.


By around the 5th or 6th game session, the good guy aliens that are the crew of the starship the players are on  trust the PCs enough to let them operate stuff and have a vote in big decisions.


...unless the platers decided to act like major jerks. (I don't tend to have those kind of players.....)

- Ed C.

Quote from: KoltarBy around the 5th or 6th game session, the good guy aliens that are the crew of the starship the players are on  trust the PCs enough to let them operate stuff and have a vote in big decisions.


...unless the platers decided to act like major jerks. (I don't tend to have those kind of players.....)

Surely there would be some kind of racial/cultural misunderstandings between these two species - which would make one look like jerks in the others eyes (if they have any). Being cooped up in a space ship with an alien race on a long tense journey esp for humans who are not familiar with space travel (and operating strange tech) would certainly create some problems, right?

Regards,
David R

Quote from: David RSurely there would be some kind of racial/cultural misunderstandings between these two species - which would make one look like jerks in the others eyes (if they have any). Being cooped up in a space ship with an alien race on a long tense journey esp for humans who are not familiar with space travel (and operating strange tech) would certainly create some problems, right?

Regards,
David R

It could happen......


Also the "friendly" aliens might have an agenda of their own where they desperately WANT the humans/Terra to be allies within the next 30 to 50 years game time.
 Could be that their leaders have a very long view politically speaking - and something about "us" has intrigued them.

- Ed C.

Its been almost a year since I thought of this idea.

I haven't GM-ed in a while...I'm getting antsy and I don't want to get rusty at it.

Also, 1 or 2 of my players from recent TRAVELLER campaign are making noises like they want me to run a game again.

Anyone new to the forum think the Marco Polo family in space idea is workable?  

New Ideas?


- Ed C.

The really interesting part of Marco Polo's travels was not his actual journey to China, but when he stayed there at the court of the Khan. He was learning all about Chinese culture.

The way Polo painted it, he was an important adviser to the Khan, was offered governorship of a province, and so on. The way Chinese accounts paint it, "Marco who? never heard of that guy." He might have had an ego problem :)

So that's another way to do a "Marco Polo" campaign - the PCs enter the court of the alien Khan -

(http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/photos/uncategorized/2009/01/14/khan_on_star_trek.jpg)

- no, not that guy! Or maybe yes. Anyway, they enter the court of the alien Khan, and become his lackeys, "go investigate this world for me, I want to know what's happening there." And then over time they gain Khan's favour, which makes other favourites jealous, and they get involved in the politics of the court, and so on.

I ran this idea with a few modifications (and did give you full inspirational credit Koltar) and it worked out pretty well.  The primary modifications I made were to change the date to current day, make it a number of families with up to 12 people total, and set the away time at ten years maximum.

Some of the additions that were made included the pcs having the additional duties of being "ambassadors" for Earth (but not having any real power to make treaties or anything, more like Chamber of Commerce), there being possible small internal conflict within the party due to the families being from different countries.

I'll write more later, but it was a sucessful campaign.

Thats REALLY cool - this idea inspired a canpaign, and it sounds like a fairly successful one too!

- Ed C.

Is the political universe as screwed up as it is on Earth?  If so, this peaceful meet and greet, could be a lot of fun.

I mean, lets say your guides are the equivalent of Tibetan Monks, thinking that all Tibet's and the world's problems could be solved by praying with the world's leaders.  (There was such a mission in the early 60s).

In many cases, they were politely accepted, given 10 minutes, and shuffled on.  In other places they were refused harshly. In others, they were deported.  

So they are a somewhat new race and naively think they can impact galactice events.

So your guides naively think that humans are a new race. Other races have known you existed for centuries but for various reasons decided that humans need to stay on their planet. (Maybe Humans are descendents of The Destroyers, and we all know what a mess of the universe they made.) Our planets astrographic position might mean we are in a no-beings land between two great empires. Any number of reasons could complicate things

So your guides thinking they are doing you a favor and thinking they can make the universe a better place will find themselves "in the wrong places at the wrong times" or in places that their presence will "make things complicated".  

It could work, but the pacing of this campaign is the tricky part... how to keep things interesting and dramatic enough over time.

Quote from: Koltar;294995Thats REALLY cool - this idea inspired a canpaign, and it sounds like a fairly successful one too!

- Ed C.

It worked pretty well, though there were a few things that I could have done better.

Some suggestions if you don't mind (based on this experience YMMV).

Decide on what ship you want the players to be on and use deck plans if possible.  I didn't do this and it hurt.  The players all wanted details and not having even rough deck plans kept me from being able to have boarding actions, a player favorite!  I did decide to use a civilian ship that had gotten lost rather than a government ship.  I did want the ship to be fairly large with room on it but not too large a crew (I went with 15 for the crew, all controlled by one player).  I'm sure that you have access to deck plans though.

Draw up plenty of planets and systems for them to visit.  Again, something I didn't do before hand but I know that you have a number of suppliments and modules available.

Decide on a general tech level.  I went with GURPS 9 to 10 in general, and threw out a fair number of items and processes (most portable energy weapons, brain tapping, AI computers easily available were high on the list).  I wanted the aliens to be generally  ahead but not so far that the characters just sit back in amazement and feel like barbarians all the time.

Limit their luggage, I went with 25 cubic feet and 200 kilos for their personal luggage, and then allowed room for samples/gifts/etc. from Earth for them to give out and show to the various planets and such that they met.  This also allowed for room for souvenirs for them to bring back.  There was fun with the players making their lists and the ships crew looking the stuff over and making comments (if you're nice the crew can make helpful suggestions).  You may want to think about weaponry.  I went with slug throwers still being in heavy use and certainly the crew generally had sidearms on (I wanted somewhat of a Firefly/Serenity feel there).  Players controlling 5 characters (two families) didn't even think about firearms, but the players of the other family (7 members) did.  The crew kept the passenger weapons locked away for a while of course.

Which brings up something important - money.  How are the players going to make purchases out there amongst the stars?  I decided to make it easy on the players (sort of) and make various precious metals be used as currency.  What I can remember at the moment was that 30 grams of gold had the buying power of $20, and 30 grams of silver $1.  Yes, their respective governments, if not the UN would certainly provide funds, but it comes out of the luggage allowance.  Now smart players would make deals with various news/media/studios/etc. before they left for their stories.

More if you're interested.  And if I haven't said it, lots of thanks from myself and my players for the idea.