Re: And Straight On 'Til Morning... i
Straight On... Character Construction
The player characters in Straight On 'Til Morning are all crewmembers on board a sanctioned trade-ship sent out to neighboring star systems (and beyond) by the Harmonious Empire of Ojin-Jingu. Their mission is to make contact, see what's out there, and to periodically report back to the Empire with their findings.
Characters should have good intentions at all times. This means the PC should be willing to go out on a limb if it is the "right thing to do" even if it means some self sacrifice. This does NOT mean PC must have chiseled features and be named "Dirk Daring". PC can be rough and have quite twisted backgrounds. They can even be greedy and self-centered to a limited degree. The key is that they are not ruthless killers, heartless mercenaries, or loners. If I think there is a problem with your PC the GM will talk with you about it. Remember this is a game for a team of players not just one.
In addition, the character should have a clearly defined motive for being on a member of the ship's crew.
All characters should possess skills appropriate to the running of a small merchant starship that has been tasked to travel the stars trading and making contact with the other lost human colonies. Specifically, characters should be designed to fulfill the following positions on the ship's roster:
Ship's Captain/Trading Master:
Ship's Doctor/Science Officer:
Astrogator/Pilot
Operations Officer
Two Security/Tactical Personnel
Engineer/Technicians
Diplomat/Ambassador At Large
As "Trading Master", the Captain is responsible for all economic negotiations with local populations outside of the Harmonious Empire, and is authorized to make temporary trade treaties, pending approval by the Imperial Senate. The ship's operations officer is responsible for operating the ship's communications, sensors, and library systems while the ship is in flight. The security personnel also operate the ship's defensive weaponry when the time comes. The Ambassador At Large is responsible for all political negotiations, and is the government's direct representation on the ship.
In terms of the campaign, the player characters are Standard Heroic level, and must adhere to the following guidelines:
Base Points: 100
Maximum Disadvantages: 50
Maximum Points From Psychological Limitations: 25
Special Rules:
1. All characters are assumed to take the Normal Characteristics Maxima limitation for 0 points. As always, a character can exceed the Maxima of a particular Characteristic at double cost. Package bonuses that cause a characteristic to exceed the Maxima do not cost double.
2. Characters can be from any of the seven planets that make up the Harmonious Empire of Ojin-Jingu (Ayaka, Barak'allah, Jingu, Nuliajuk, Ojin, Sisu, and Thibbideau's World). The character's world of origin will dictate the purchase of certain Homeworld Packages:
Ayaka This "planet" is more properly the largest moon of a gas giant in the Amaterasu System. It is not an independent world, but rather is a colony governed directly from Ojin. Since the moon has an atmosphere too thin to breathe, the people of Ayaka live in domed cities. Ayaka, like its mother world, is a Light World.
Barak'allah This planet was originally colonized by transportees from Palestine. Governed by a moderate theocracy, Islam is the state religion of the planet and the culture of Barak'allah is colored by its influences.
Jingu Jingu was one of the two original planets colonized by Japanese settlers. It is a hot jungle planet with abundant life (both animal and plant) and near constant rainfall.
Nuliajuk Nuliajuk is an ice-world forcibly settled by Inuits and other Eskimo tribes during the Second Diaspora. In addition, the planet has a surface gravity of 1.87.
Ojin Ojin was the other of the original planets colonized by Japanese settlers. Ojin is earthlike, for the most part, though it tends to be cooler year-round. Ojin has a surface gravity of 0.72.
Sisu Sisu was originally colonized by Finnish and Indian deportees during the Second Diaspora. Sisu is a rocky, barren world with an axial tilt of 87º; quite literally, Sisu rotates "on its side". Unfortunately for its inhabitants, this causes the planet to experience constant hurricane-strength storms over its entire surface. The inhabitants live in cave systems underground.
Thibbideau's World This temperate world was originally colonized by the Seekers of Perfection, a cult that has sought to use eugenics to produce "the perfect person". After five hundred years of carefully controlled breeding, they tend to believe they've succeeded.
3. All characters begin with the following Everyman Skills (at 8 or less unless otherwise noted) for no cost: AK: Home Planet 11 or less, Acting, Climbing, Concealment, Conversation, Deduction, LS: Native Language, Paramedics, Persuasion, PS: Use Computer, PS: Any One Profession Or Hobby 11 or less, Shadowing, Stealth, and TF (Small Motorized Ground Vehicles).
4. Characters should take a package appropriate to the position in the ship's crew they wish to fill.
5. Only a single person from Thibbideau's World will be accepted at the beginning of the campaign.
6. Characters who are members of the Empire's nobility must be negotiated with the GM and approved of beforehand. Given the nature of Ojin-Jingu society, characters with noble title should only be submitted for the Ship's Captain/Trade Master, Ship's Doctor/Science Officer, and Ambassador at Large.
7. All characters begin with a bank account (tracked by the ship's computer and covered by very serious security software) of 350 * 4d6 Ojin-Jingu yen. Note that the yen isn't legal tender outside of the Harmonious Empire. Characters who take the Wealth perk multiply this amount by the number of points they put into the perk to determine starting funds.
8. Each character begins the campaign with his own pressure suit and his own personal computer card. Characters are free to purchase a "equipment list" of other personal items, as long as those items are pre-approved by the GM. In general, however, this will be unnecessary (see Group Dynamics). Any item judged "Hegemony tech" by the GM is unavailable to the players at the beginning of the campaign (examples of "Hegemony tech" include things like most major cybernetic implants (and wetware implants), nanotechnology, Star Trek style universal translators, matter replication, and so on).
9. Writing fiction pieces featuring your character is worth 1 experience point per story. Likewise, writing a journal that covers everything important that happens to your character is worth 1 experience point per written page. Fiction and journal entries you wish to collect experience points on should be forwarded to Jack so he can put them on the website. Particularly artistic writing can earn an extra point.
10. Creating background elements for the game-world is worth 1 experience point per three items. These background elements could be new societies, historical elements, interesting pieces of geography, characters, alien animals, legends, stories, or what-have-you.
Group Dynamics
Character Names: When naming your characters, remember that the dominant cultural base of the Harmonious Empire of Ojin-Jingu is Japanese (being the primary culture of three of the seven planets). The secondary cultural influences present are based on Arabic, Finnish, Inuit, and French cultures. Character names thus tend to be a melange of the five cultures; a black man whose full name was Auguste al-Abdwala ibn Sato (with a name that combines French, Arabic, and Japanese) would not be considered unusual at all.
Personal Computers: As noted above, each crewmember begins with a personal computer card. These hand-held computers are the size of a credit card and can be used as a PDA, calculator, clock, GPS locater (on worlds which have functioning GPS systems), news readers, web browsers, and email clients.
Pressure Suits: As the saying goes, a man's pressure suit is closer to him than his wife. Each character's pressure suit is specifically fitted to his or her own body and thus cannot be used by another character without risking a loss of pressure. Each character's pressure suit is stenciled with a chest-and-back design registered as unique to each character. These designs are used to identify one character from another at a distance when in use.
Ship's TO&E: As they are part of a ship's crew, the greater majority of the characters equipment lists will tend to be "ship's issue" rather than personally owned. The exact nature of the "ship's issue" equipment will be negotiated once the campaign lineup has been determined, but it will include the following:
Vehicles: The ship carries a single Fujitsu Motors Daring Pioneer-model all-wheel-drive, all-terrain ground car, a single Aritomi Engineering Dancing Eagle-model helicopter, and a Katajamäki Watersports Porpoise-model inflatable boat.
Weapons: The ship will have an arms locker containing a single pistol for each player character, along with three spare pistols and five thousand rounds of appropriate ammunition. In addition, the ship's arms locker will contain one assault rifle for each security officer, plus one spare assault rifle and five thousand rounds of appropriate ammunition. Only the ship's captain and the security officers know the codes to open the arms locker.
Trade Goods: The ship will begin with a cargo of trade goods, the specifics of which will be negotiated once the campaign lineup has been determined.
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