Star Hero Demo?

[starblaze]

Hi,

I am planning on running a Star Hero campaign using the Terran Empire universe. However I have never really done anything but Superheroes with Hero and I would like to try something else. I am however stuck on an idea about what first adventure to run. So I was just wondering if you hero guys were planning on coming out with an introductory adventure for people new to genre. It would be very helpful to me as I haven't run Sci-fi since my Traveller days as a teenager.

[BobGreenwade]

I'm about a third of the way through planning my first adventure, but it'll be a big epic and probably not suited for a GM not familiar with the genre.

 

I'm sure there can be plenty of people with ideas for you here. I'll see if I can't come by in the morning and share a few of my own, including some of my later plans.

[Monolith]

Digital Hero #11 has an 8-9 page Terran Empire adventure in it written by Allen Thomas. It looked very interesting, though I never had the chance to play it, and it also introduces Marco Redd, an interesting NPC for any TE game.

[Aroooo]

There are lots of things you can do for an introductory (one session) game. If you give us some details about your players (characters) I'm sure someone here can give you some specific ideas. For example, do all your characters already know each other or not? Are they planet bound or do they have a ship? Etc...

 

Aroooo

[Steve Long]

We don't have any immediate plans for SH adventures at this point.

 

When running SH demos myself, I've used the example adventure on page 269 of STAR HERO -- the one that illustrates how to use the random plot generator. It's a great little adventure, easy to expand or contract as necessary to fill your time slot.

[BlackSword]

I've had an idea bouncing inside my head for a demo Star Hero game, so here it the outline. Sometime I will probably write it out in more detail, but I haven't gotten around to it yet.

 

Background: Typical Space Opera, the story centers around the crew of a free trader. A small ship with a crew of about 8 (ones not used are just generic NPCs that happen to be elsewhere when something happens). I choose the 8 crew members so that people would have some options, or have a larger demo. All built as 100-125 pt chars (maybe less, haven't decided).

 

Ship loads up on fairly advanced planet. One of the packages is a bit mysterious, but hey, it doesn't seem illegal and the shipper paid good money*. Ship takes off makes the jump to hyperspace...

...and crashes on a primitive planet. Navigation officer tries to figure out where they are, the engineer/mechanics try to find any damage. Communications hears an emergency beacon nearby. Engineering reports that there are some parts damage.

 

If anyone goes into cargo hold, the mysterious package is shredded like something was trying to get out. Doctor notes package looks like it held something in suspended animation, the crash must have caused a malfunction and woken up the merchandise**.

 

If crew ventures out to goto other emergency beacon, get attacked by natives on the way. I was thinking of using the Rakasha from the bestiary, except changing some stats to make them a primitive race, lower int, etc. Crew reaches second ship. Its a military vessel, in particular mercenaries. They talk with the leader, their crash was much worse (pilot botched his roll ) and most of the crew are dead. They lack engineers, but would be more then willing to help get your ship running for the price of passage off the planet.

 

Return to ship with needed parts, begin repairs. Primitives attack but fortunataly the A-Team you brought back with you holds them off. Then the real fun begins. Pirates attack. It seems the pirates used some magical, er, psuedoscientifical device to capture ships passing through this region, crash them on the planet, then pick up the cargo at a later date.

 

This is where I have stopped working on it, so no clean conclusion just yet. Some stuff may need to be trimmed for time.

 

*Most demo games I have been too have a combat early on to demonstate the system. In this case there could be a shoot out on the dock. Smugglers or mobsters think the PCs have wronged(or want something off the ship, see **) them so try to ambush them before they take off. Combat ensues, captain orders crew into ship for lift-off.

**Merchandise is feral Xenovore being transferred to gladiator type arena on another planet. Depending on the time around the ship. The chars may make random encounter rolls to accidently come upon the Xenovore.

[BobGreenwade]

I was about to post some of my ideas (like an encounter with a Psychovore from the Hero System Bestiary) when I saw Aroooo's post. He has a point; a lot of what would work for one group might not for another, depending on the nature of the PCs. Besides planetbound versus spacefaring, a very helpful thing to know would be their motivation for adventuring -- whether they work for the government, for the rebellion, or for profit. And there can be a big difference between what would work for the TES and what would work for the TIC.

[Rigel]

Originally posted by Monolith

Digital Hero #11 has an 8-9 page Terran Empire adventure in it written by Allen Thomas. It looked very interesting, though I never had the chance to play it, and it also introduces Marco Redd, an interesting NPC for any TE game.

To add to that thought, Digital HERO #9 has some leftover bits from the TE book that ended up on the cutting room floor. There are some very good suggestions in there for TE campaigns and how to GM them.