Intro to Sector T-3 (Kepler 22-B: Strange New World)

Kepler 22-B is a Super-Earth that orbits within the Kepler 22 solar system's Habitable Zone (at 0.849 AU). It is one of the earliest confirmed Exoplanets located 600 light years from Earth in the Cygnus constellation. Kepler 22-B is the size of 2.4 Earths in radius. You can learn more about Kepler 22-B from NASA directly: http://kepler.nasa.gov/Mission/discoveries/kepler22b/

The Strange New World blog is coordinating a collaborative effort to map and explore Kepler 22-B as an environment suitable for table top role-playing games. If you are at all interested in getting involved in this open and ongoing project, we suggest that you start HERE. The overall Master Map shows the major biomes and keeps track of which sectors have already been claimed. There is also a handy gallery of the various Sector Maps currently being explored/developed.

Sector T-3 Map Courtesy of M. John Stater (Larger version of map available at: Strange New World)

Sector T-3 is a large region 176 hexes wide by 124 hexes high. It is a rocky, mountainous area with warm Mediterranean coasts with a few large freshwater lakes and is dominated by vast, dense forests that are book-ended by two distinctly different desert regions.

Our initial task is to generate an Event/Encounter Table and to detail at least 20 Notable Locations within this sector. So let us begin...

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Kepler 22-B: Strange New World

Sector T-3 Intro | Sector T-3 Index

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10 Short Adventures for Mutant Future PDF (2011 OSR Challenge)

Last year, Matt over at the Asshat Paladins blog hosted the 2011 OSR September of Short Adventures Challenge which featured the efforts of over 20 bloggers and generated over 300 adventures.

We did three sets of adventures, ten for Mutant Future, ten for Labyrinth Lord, and ten for Swords & Wizardry (White Box).

It was both a challenge and a lot of fun developing a set of short scenarios using Matt's minimalist 'Get Ready, Get Set, Go!' format.

Revisiting these adventures really brought home how good an idea Matt had in using a hyper-compressed format. It really forced us to focus on things with a sense of immediacy that often gets lost in longer, more convoluted scenarios. There is something magic about this sort of format, and we're in the process of coming up with our own alternative approach that we'll be unveiling shortly. In the meantime, the first Ten Short Adventures (for Mutant Future) that we did as part of the 2011 OSR Challenge have now been revised and compiled into a PDF that you can download for free by either clicking on the cover-image below, or use this link to our Free Stuff folder at BOX. We'll also set-up a widget in the right-hand side-bar, but it'll probably slide around the page a bit for the next couple of days until we find a spot we like, and we'll add a link to the Free Stuff folder on the Downloads page as well.

We plan to eventually revise and re-post the two other sets of our 2011 September Short Adventures in another few weeks.

It Came From You Tube

Recently we were contacted by Andy Haynes. He's part of a group of gamers who are now creating some really funny web shorts explaining various aspects of playing Dungeons & Dragons. Now we're big fans of Bill Cavalier and his Dungeon Bastard series at You Tube, so we were curious about what Andy's group might be doing. The first video we watched was one called 'Attacks of Opportunity and You.' It made both of us laugh quite a bit. Yes, it's about D&D 3.5 mechanics, but it's still really funny and very well done. The group behind this, an up-and-coming outfit named Penfound Productions, have also uploaded a short & silly bit on Alignment, and they have also done an 'Episode 0," as a tentative pilot for a possible series called Rolling High. The Zero Episode looks at Character Creation. It manages to skewer a few sacred cows pretty well...

Here's the Attacks of Opportunity and You video...

We wish Andy and his friends all the best and look forward to their next webisode!
And yes, you might recognize the lead character above from A Light in the Darkness.
Small world, huh?

Maybe the Rolling High Team will do a web short dealing with some Old School faves such as Homebrew Rules, Saving Throws, or TPKs...it would also be fun to have these folks take a look at the Dungeoncrawl Classics RPG...whatever they do, it'll probably be funny, so we'll be watching.

Variant Forms of the Squick and Ickorous (Random Table, Wermspittle)

Variant Forms of the Squick and Ickorous Table
(Jellies, Slimes, Fungi, Molds and related things...)

1. A discolored patch of writhing wetness that tries to stay out of bright light and prefers to cling to the undersides of rotting leaves, old wooden buckets, and exceptionally unsanitary areas. (1 HD, Attack 1d2, 60% chance of amoebic infection: Save or suffer dysentery for 1d4 days.)
2. Blue granular masses roughly arranged into crude hexagonal structures grow along vertical surfaces. The colony moves slowly as it develops. It generates a noticeable drop in temperature wherever it takes root. When exposed to blood the primary ridges along the edges of each hexagon rapidly extrude sharp fronds that in time harden into ferrous blades.
3. Scabrous yellow pus-like matter ringed with olive and black. The whole thing looks like a mass of gangrenous flesh or a free-standing tumorous mass. It gives off a sickly sweet scent that only grows increasingly more nauseating whenever it becomes immobilized or dormant for any length of time. The fluids contained within the central vaguely bulbous mass cause any flesh exposed to it to rot away. Assassins have been known to use glass knives filled with this fluid; when snapped off inside a wound, the fluid causes rapid gangrene deep inside the victim's body, often killing them before anyone can do anything to stop it.
4. A more viscous and yellowish puddle of slime that wriggles and grows towards the nearest source of bacteria, fungi or yeast. Does 1d2/day to untreated wood, otherwise stats are as above. Upon reaching 8 or more HD, there's a 50% chance that the creature will erupt into a cloud of spores or spatter gobs of wet spore-clumps within a 30' radius when struck.
5. Pinkish-yellow clots of goo floating within a protoplasmic envelope. (Attack is a form of externalized digestion, no flagella.) This stage of development is much sought after by vivilatrists and others as the 'goo' within the protoplasmic sac is extremely plastic and can be used to adapt, alter or develop myriads of subsidiary life forms, including some of the more common manufactured jellies.
6. Gray paste that tends to accumulate along ceiling edges. It produces a rancid smelling oily fluid that promotes wood-rot.
7. Greenish-yellow slime-mold slowly crawling along any surface, usually out of sight. Very wet, often drips or dribbles small bits that will eventually become fully autonomous versions of itself. Prefers drains, clogged eaves, refuse piles, and especially cess-pits. Inflicts double damage on Grouts by way of cellular infiltration.
8. Faintly luminous pink syrup. Close inspection shows vacuoles and dark little masses suspended in the fluid. The outer membrane is extremely pliable and selectively permeable. Contact with the internal fluids results in 1pt of damage per minute of exposure. Water or milk neutralizes the fluid's harmful properties. Alcohol tends to dissolve the membrane, rendering the organism a toxic, flammable mess.
9. Brownish clumps. This specimen is inert.
10. A drizzly yellow-brown collective mass is forming a stalk that will produce a fruiting body within 1d4 days. The fruiting body will explode for 3d6 damage within a 30' radius, spraying spores everywhere. Save or suffer infection.
11. Rusty curdled lumpy mess covered with a fuzzy coating of thin hair-like tendrils. It looks a little like a caterpillar, and often gets over-looked as such unless carefully examined. The tendrils deliver a virulent nerve toxin and the central mass secretes a dull phlegmy-green poison whenever the slime-mold is allowed to adhere to bronze, which it corrodes and dissolves over time.
12. Blue-spotted egg-shaped nodules projecting from a frothy mass of undifferentiated protoplasm. Each 'egg' is in fact a glistening mass of tightly packed needle-fine hair-like cilia that will instantly shoot out and skewer warm-blooded hosts that brush up against them or get too close. The cilia-strike is incredibly rapid and the intended victim must make a Save at -4 penalty of be surprised. Failure means that they've been skewered, requiring a second Save (normal) to determine whether or not the spores forcibly driven into their flesh have become active. These spores can remain embedded and inert for decades before conditions are right and they finally begin to devour their host from within.
13. Green-yellow blobs of mucous-like slime roll around like strange slugs that flatten-out and envelope fungi, mold, or rotting things. Some produce very colorful umbrellas of slime, others look more like squished flowers built up from layers of still-wet oil paint. At least 50% of the time they are poisonous (Save +1).
14. Lurid blue ooze that numbs all exposed flesh it touches. Exposure for more than a full minute tends to render a limb useless for up to an hour. Prolonged exposure will cause the victim to stop breathing, which is helpful to the ooze which then enters the body via any/all available orifices to hasten its digestion of their prey.
15. Ochre and tan smears, sometimes they overlap, other times they appear parallel. A crude slime-mold that gives off an odor like stale cheese. It is one of the few truly carnivorous slime-molds in that it envelopes small animals and compresses them so as to suffocate them even as it digests them. There are rumors of large specimens that have grown-up around Distilleries and dump-sites where Spectral Brine and other, similar toxic waste has been allowed to accumulate.
16. This specimen has achieved a low-order form of sentience and has learned a number of simple tricks. It shows clear signs of fear as it attempts to flee from salt-boxes, other jellies, or fire.
17. A rancid patch of virulent brown slime. Contact with this thing will discolor exposed flesh/leather, and inflict 2d6 damage. It doesn't move much, but it can emit a puff of toxic spores every 1d6 minutes for an additional 2d4 damage. It is highly flammable, but the resulting smoke will cause 6d4 damage within a 30' radius and linger for 1d4 hours.
18. Black, tarry slime that is attracted to silver, which it tarnishes by simple proximity as a result of the heavy haze of complex chemistry surrounding the thing. It is feared by members of upper class household staff who are charged with maintaining the heirloom silver in particular. Large specimens have been known to ooze along the outside of pipes used for water distribution or other forms of plumbing in order to gain access to locations where quantities of silver can be found. No one knows how this amorphous slime knows where to go, but it probably has more to do with chemistry than anything psychic.
19. Amorphous, colorless and incredibly translucent, this gelatinous pest swims along in fresh water hunting small fish, insect larvae, bacterial colonies, and the like. When ingested, it infiltrates its host's body by quickly transferring itself into the bloodstream. The host suffers debilitating pain in the course of this process, but once the parasitical mass has integrated itself into the bloodstream, the fever passes and the host resumes life as normal. Only now their blood quickly becomes a transparent, viscous fluid that progressively transforms their flesh from the inside-out into a translucent, increasingly amorphous matter that bleeds across other forms of space and time than what the host may have ever imagined existed.
20. Thin (under 1" at thickest), but wide-spread patch of slime-mold has formed a mockery of a vaguely human face. It has randomly determined INT, WIS and CHAR, and will trade information for instruction in spell-casting techniques. It wishes to become a sorcerer. It knows 3d6 Random Rumors.

Note: this random table was extracted and revised from the original which appeared as part of the Brewer's Bane post. We removed it and gave it a post of its own because it is too useful to leave buried under the Myxogastrians.

Bujilli: Episode 43

Previously...
Bujilli and Leeja followed Bortho down a sloping passage. They were able to catch up to the young barbarian just before he ran into a group of Grunters. Then the Grunters came after all three of them. Javelins flew. Bortho ran. Bujilli looked at Leeja. She smiled. Then she ran headlong right into the Grunters, slashing and hacking like a mad woman. Four Grunters died before they really knew what was happening, their heads lopped off and left sitting in the muck. Then Bujilli realized things weren't quite right. The Grunters were infected with a terrible fungi. One that he knew from previous experience as a bad, bad thing. They ran back to the Domed Chamber only to find Bortho was lowering one of the portcullises...

"I'm going to kill Bortho." Leeja hissed. Her white hair lashed and slashed about her like the tails of a dozen angry cats.

"Run!" barked Bujilli--they had to get past the threshold before the heavy portcullis dropped or else they'd be locked out of Idvard's Keep.

They ran through the mud, the blood and the muck. They raced one another to the Portcullis Station. They arrived just in time to watch the ponderous portal descend past the half-way point.

Bujilli gauged the distance and his chances of getting past the thing before it crushed him.

Leeja stopped.

She cast a spell.

He could feel the aethyric vibrations of the thing as it swooped past him. Then he jumped for all he was worth and prayed that his legs didn't get mangled behind him.

The Portcullis stopped.

Bortho grunted in frustration.

Bujilli got back up on his feet and drew his tulwar.

Bortho was stuck. Sticky strands of dimly luminous fibers held him to the wheel-like control mechanism for the Portcullis.

Leeja hissed. She had caught-up to Bujilli.

It was time for some answers.

Bortho struggled against the glutinous strands of Leeja's spell. His nose was running with blood. His eyes were wild with terror.

Bujilli looked at Leeja. They both turned back to the struggling youth caught in the act of trying to lock them out. The Web held him as securely as it fouled up the control mechanism. The wheel would not turn.

"Was this all part of Idvard's plan? Some scheme to eliminate us now that we know too much?" Leeja flexed her claws and began walking towards Bortho.

"Bortho!" Shouted Bujilli.

No response.

The boy continued to struggle against the Web. His fingers were bleeding. He made strange gurgling noises as he tried to tear himself free. No. Not free. He wasn't trying to escape; he was hell-bent to bring the Portcullis down.

Bujilli closed his eyes. There. Almost immediately he could sense the aethyric current flowing past him towards Bortho. It was powerful, but diffuse enough so as not to arouse immediate suspicion. But it was unmistakable. Someone, or something, was exerting a strong sorcerous influence Bortho.

He considered using the Voorish Sign...but that would hurt Leeja and for that alone he preferred to find an alternative. Then it occurred to him. The Gem once taught him a spell that it said was an Essential Protection for those seeking to venture unto some plane or place called Zalchis. It was a spell that blocked all aethyric intrusions.

"Wait." He jogged up to Leeja and touched her arm. Her eyes were slits of smoldering gold-green malice. She intended to carry through, to kill Bortho for what she saw as a clear case of cowardice-motivated treachery and betrayal. She didn't handle betrayal very well.

"There's something back there," He gestured to the sloping passage they had just returned from, "Something that is manipulating the boy. I can stop it, but I need you to keep watch. The spell I need to use is not as fast to cast as your Web."

She glared at him. Her lip quivered oh so slightly. For an absurd moment it looked as though she might actually pout.

Leeja sighed and turned back to keep an eye on whatever was out there past the Portcullis.

Bujilli nodded, if only to himself. It could not have been easy for Leeja to turn aside from her deeply ingrained instincts. She was only partly human, like himself. Part of her was driven by a rawer, ferocious nature that scared her almost as much as it terrified her opponents. It would be so very easy to just give in to such a thing. To become something other. It was a path to power. Liberation. Free of rules, devoid of conscience, outside the bounds of civilization...to abandon one's humanity...to become some sort of monster or demon.

Bujilli had faced just such a temptation himself.

It was a difficult thing to reject.

But growing up in the yurt of a sorcerer Bujilli learned early-on the truth about such creatures. They were never ever truly free. If anything they were slaves to their own desires and those of others. For a brief instant the scar over his heart throbbed with the memory of a final, bittersweet kiss.

He scowled. He took a deep breath. He centered himself and cast Auric Sheath over Bortho. Tiny violet streaks of lightning crackled across the floor from Bujilli to the young boy caught in Leeja's Web. The little lightnings swirled and criss-crossed and formed a flickering egg-shaped shell of bioelectrical energy around Bortho. Bujilli tightened the spell's area of effect. The shell hardened, closed-up all the gaps, became a solid violet ovoid glow surrounding the boy.

------------------------------SNAP!

The connection was severed.

Bortho sagged in the Web, disoriented and confused.

Then the current of will splashed across Bujilli. The impact upon his aura was heavy, dense, viscous. He knew that Auric Sheath would not be enough. He began to cast the Protection spell.

The spell conformed to the space of the Portcullis Station. The embedded wards shaped it like soft wax. Something within the place reinforced the spell. The current of will was completely cut off. Blocked.

"Good." Bujilli released the spell. It would persist for a considerable time with the benefit of whatever it was that was reinforcing it. Not only was this place hardened, it was set up to boost any defensive efforts the long gone guardians were likely to use.

"You've ruined everything." Muttered Bortho.

A black-iron javelin arced into the room from the direction of the sloping passage. It clattered across the floor.

"We have company." whispered Leeja.

"You not know..." growled the en-webbed boy.

"Drop your spell." Bujilli went to the wheel of the obstructed control mechanism.

Leeja glared at him for a moment. She made a curt gesture. The Web dissolved back into so much diffuse and indistinct aethyrial matter just on the verge of materialization where it would drift until it finally dissipated back into the interplanar stratum her spell had pulled it from.

Bujilli reached out to the wheel.

Bortho grabbed his hand.

"No. Don't. We dead if you do."

"What?!" Bujilli shrugged off the boy's bloody hand. His heavy suede and coiled-bronze vambrace was freshly stained with more red that'd turn to flaky brown.

"Grunters she killed--they scouts. Coming back..."

"You mean that those things were on their way back here? Why?" Bujilli quickly looked around for some sort of cover, an exit, anything that might be useful. He spotted the smaller wheel-shaped control mechanism that appeared to control a smaller valve-like door. It hadn't been very interesting before. One more distraction or time-wasting tangent. Now it might come in handy.

"They come back. To others. Rest of Grunters. Many Grunters." Bortho struggled to articulate what he knew. Bujilli wondered how the boy knew any of this--

"To rejoin the main force." Leeja whirled around. She'd been watching the wrong direction. Maybe.

From behind them. Past the Domed Chamber. Someone was rhythmically beating heavy tubular bells with random bits of scrap-metal. It was a horrible racket. Incredibly loud.

It vibrated through the floor.

The sound was jarring, unsettling, discordant and disturbing.

It was also familiar.

Bujilli had last heard it deep within the Blade Maze of Kalkendru.

War Bells.

Another javelin flew out of the sloping passage. This time it struck Bortho. He crumpled.

Bujilli knelt to examine the boy. He was already bloodied from fighting against the current of will and Leeja's Web. The javelin was lodged in his left leg. Bujilli began to help the boy only to be pushed away.

"You go. Kill Grunters. I fix this--" he jerked the javelin free and threw it across the floor. Blood gushed from the jagged wound. Bujilli drew out a wad of clean wool and some rags and placed it over the wound. He had it all bound into place and the bleeding stopped in short order. But the boy had fainted.

Bujilli propped the boy against the side of the Control Mechanism's pedestal.

Leeja was standing next to him looking down at his impromptu handiwork.

She dropped something heavy that spattered blood where it landed.

Another Grunter head.

"While you were busy with the boy here. I took care of the last scout. this one..." She nudged the snouted head with the toe of her filthy boot, "...was not infected by the fungus. I believe he was trying to get back and warn his people."

Bujilli rose. He stretched his arms and nodded. It made sense. They had picked the wrong passage.

"Idiot here took us down the wrong way." Leeja flexed her claws. Her hair shimmered like white hot flames.

"Or maybe he chose better than he knew."

"What do you mean?"

"We know that there is a larger force of these things down here. We also know that they are scouting down the lateral passages. We also know that there is a Fungal Tyrant down this particular passage. One that fears the Grunters."

"How do you know this?"

"The fungus that oozed off of the dead Grunter back along the passage. I've seen that before. It might only be a small opportunistic growth or it could be a massive cluster of the things. They infect or enslave anyone they can capture and convert them into their puppets. Like what they did to Bortho--he was vulnerable and close enough for the thing to dominate him. The fungi saw its chance and it took it. I bet it was counting on sending back those scouts to spread spores all through the Grunter horde. If it could do so so without anyone spotting it or noticing until it was too late...well...it wouldn't be the first time a would be conquering host found itself conquered instead."

"And this thing fears the Grunters? How are you so sure about that?"

"I was watching Bortho when I cast Auric Sheath over him. He was struggling against being taken-over and dominated by the fungi. The terror that was driving him to drop the portcullis wasn't his, but that of the thing controlling him. I knows that a large group of soldiers is a real threat to it--there's no way it can infect or enslave enough of them quickly enough before they burn it out or destroy it. These things need to work from stealth, attacking from ambush or infiltrating from within.They're not built for face-to-face confrontation, not with an entire army... "

"So do we drop the portcullis? Head back upstairs and warn Idvard that there's pigs in the pantry? What do we do now?" Leeja kicked the Grunter-head in disgust.

"I have an idea..."

What should they do now?

Flee back to the surface and warn Idvard?

Drop one or the other (or both) Portcullises?

Track down the Fungal Tyrant?

Maybe try to strike up some sort of a deal with it?

Go examine that side-passage?

Sit and have a pleasant picnic?

Wait for the Grunters to send another scouting party?

Set up some sort of an ambush?

Go hunting some Grunters?

You Decide!

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Previous                                                    Next

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Series Indexes

One | Two | Three | Four | Five | Six

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Starting Page  |  Central Index

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About Bujilli (What is This?) | Who is Bujilli? | How to Play

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Bujilli's Character Sheet | Leeja's Character Sheet | Cast of Characters

Bujilli's Spells | Little Brown Journals | Loot Tally | House Rules

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Episode Guides
Series One (Episodes 1-19)

Series Two (Episode 20-36)

Series Three (Episodes 37-49)

Series Four (Episodes 50-68)

Series Five (Episodes 69-99)
Series Six(Episodes 100-ongoing)

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Labyrinth Lord   |   Advanced Edition Companion

Guide to Lithus Sector

New installments are posted on Tuesdays

Lithus Sector is an ongoing series exploring the mysteries and perils scattered across the Dark Interstellar Frontier of this ancient, once densely populated region of space where Humanity is in the minority and alien megastructures are far too common for anyone's comfort.

The Lithus Sector series was originally inspired by the FREE Rogue Space RPG, but can easily be adapted to any other Space Operatic RPG. In act one of our readers have adapted Lithus Sector to Diaspora.

We may adapt this material for use in a Space W.a.R.P. sort of game one of these days...

Lithus Sector Links

• Introduction to Lithus Sector (Sector/System/Planet)
• Lithus Sector Map
• Kazix (02.01)
• Mov (05.00)
• Balajang (02.00)
• Xokav Incursion (01.03)
• Telajan (06.01) Telajan Sub-Index: Part 1: Overview, Part 2: Inner Zone, Part Three: Habitable Zone, 2-A: Aldrin, 2-B: Mattigar, 2-C: Shelg, 2-D1: Ju Hai, 2-D2: Molat, 2-E: Saxo-Mara, Part Four: Outer Zone, Part Five
• Ashlek (01.05)
• Tregio (00.03)
• Donthir (07.02)
• Triang D'mar (01.04)
• Panj (04.05)
• Yanda (04.07)
• TRADA (05.08)
• Kaaldu (03.04)
• Orb2 (04.03)
• Achernarian Expatritat (07.07)

Adventures in Lithus Sector

• Six-Sentence Scenarios: Aldrin (Lithus Sector)  Any System
• Scenario Seeds: The Hartley Bequest  Any System
• Scenario Seeds: Lithusian Mega-Sharks (Rogue Space)
• Quick Score on Xudriss II Any System/RS
• Have A Nice Day
• Fishing Trip
• Slogging Through Abbadis III
• Pyramids of Balajang
• N-Pits of Unonde
• Domes of Parlassa
• Mission to Sphere III

Guide to Lithus Sector (Links)  |  Intro to Lithus Sector  |   Map of Lithus Sector

Rogue Space Resources  |  Space Operatic RPG Resources

Rogue Space Links

Here is a list of all the blogs we know about that are currently posting materials for the Rogue Space RPG...

• Rogue Space RPG Home Base
• Rogue Transmissions; the official Rogue Space RPG fanzine
• Rogue Space at Hereticwerks (Our Rogue Space RPG resources)
• Lithus Sector at Hereticwerks (An entire Sector devoted to Rogue Space Adventuring)
• M. Jared Swenson Productions: home of the New Mecha rules for Rogue Space and every Saturday Jared is also doing a regular column detailing his work in converting the old TSR Star*Drive setting over to Rogue Space. Very interesting series. Well worth checking out!
• Mik's Minis: Home of the MERS Mass Effect/Rogue Space Conversion
• Porky's Expanse: Be sure to check out Porky's Vehicle Rules expansion for Rogue Space
• Roll For Treasure has a growing selection of very handy Rogue Space Resources
• There's more Rogue Space goodies at Sam Z's Blog of Doom
• Swords and Stichery: Just about anything Needles provides at his blog could be adapted to Rogue Space...
• Trollhammer Press: Author of the Adventure included in the eBook/PDF edition.

If you know about anyone else posting materials or resources intended for the Rogue Space RPG please let us know and we'll update the list.

RogueSpace RPG Blog   |   Rogue Space RPG Downloads

Rogue Space Resources (Hereticwerks)  |  Lithus Sector  |  Rogue Space Links

Bug-Hunting Mishaps (Rogue Space)

Bug-Hunting Mishaps
A Table of Creepy-Crawly Scenario Seeds for Rogue Space

1. Those giant pseudo-insects that have been terrorizing the locals? Yeah, uh, the people who hired your team to deal with these things failed to tell you that these creatures are incredibly radioactive, much larger than you were expecting and their chitin is reinforced by some bizarre form of hyper-polymerized diamond lattice that makes them extremely difficult to injure. If you're waiting for the other shoe to drop, here it is: there's another team out there trying to capture and return a specimen of one of these bugs. These bright lads have managed to locate what appears to be a Queen Bug that they intend to ship back to their employers ASAP.
2. Swarms of tiny insects resembling an incredibly ugly mash-up of scorpions, ticks and spiders have infested the ventilation ducts of a major arcology. You've been hired to clear the things out, but quietly. No one can know about the infestation or else things will go very badly for your team, or at least that was the standard, implied threat.
3. Normally vacuum kills most bugs. Just not the mega-cockroaches that were recently released from deep within a hollow moon by a group of adventurous xeno-spelunkers. If you can escape the swarms boiling out of the crater-entrance, you might try to get word out to the Authorities. Or maybe you've got a plan for burning your way past these things to go see what else is down there? Maybe there are a few credits to be made turning over a specimen or three of these weird things to some BioScience Corp? If you can recover an intact enough specimen, of course.
4. Three months ago this planet was an airless rock that had a string of numbers and a code-prefix for a name just like any other potential hazard to navigation in this system's primary debris belt. Now there are hundreds of foamy, resinous bubbles enclosing some weird yellow-tinged sulfur-based ecology crawling with millions of insect species no one has ever encountered previously. There is something of a race between teams being sent in to collect specimens. There could be a lot more at stake here than just a new and exotic source of alien bioweapons, especially as there appears to be something, some kind of guiding intelligence behind all this...and that sort of thing tends to make certain people nervous. Like the secret cabal of high-level military advisors who have diverted a camouflaged system defense boat armed with Hellburners to sterilize what they see as a potential threat. Unfortunately, whatever is guiding these bugs considers dropping nuclear weapons on it a threat as well.
5. The crew of a tramp freighter that has been listed as missing for thirty-seven years have broken-out from quarantine. One of them was killed in the process. Thousands of tiny alien insects, no doubt some sort of hive-mind or colony consciousness, vomited forth from their body on the live newsfeed. Panic has gripped the starport. Civil order is breaking down rapidly. Riots have broken out in several different sections and mobs have taken to lynching anyone they feel are 'acting strangely.' The starport is being shut down. Only a few government officials and ultra-rich elites have been able to launch; all of them have hired-on bodyguards and private security in order to get through the chaos. In fact, anyone with a gun and little to no scruples is either fighting past the crowds surrounding the starport or the access ramps leading out of the city, or they're shooting anything that moves for fear it might be some invader-bugs out to take-over every living soul in the place. It's like the Zombie Apocalypse all over again, only with bugs, or at least that seems to be the general reaction of all those people shooting at everyone else.
6. The vibrantly-striped caterpillars only found in a single isolated valley have been determined to produce a complex organic substance in their tissues that can extend the human lifespan by multiple thousands of years. Of course the BioMed Group that discovered this game-changing property of the caterpillars has been relocated to an ultra-secure facility in some undisclosed location. Your job is to go collect as many of the things as you can and return to the pick-up point. Easy money, right? Yeah, it would have been except that some local AgrIndustrial Corp has been constructing a hydroelectric dam that will completely inundate the valley within the next three days. 

RogueSpace RPG Blog   |   Rogue Space RPG Downloads

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Lithus Sector: Kazix (02.01)

Kazix (02.01)

Originally Kazix was classified as a Red Super Giant Sun, but further investigation revealed that it is in fact an autonomous Stellar Engine that was Red Shifted due to its steady acceleration along a trajectory estimated to take it into The Canopy within another century or less.

Built by a so-far unidentified KII Civilization, Kazix has become the subject of much scrutiny and dozens of probes, drones and automated surveying systems have been sent to the system in order to attempt to answer the burning questions; Who Built Kazix? How did they Do this? and Why?, but most of all everyone wants to know if it is safe to approach this incredible specimen of alien astroengineering.

What is Currently Known...
Preliminary surveys, mostly via automated probes, have ascertained that the Kazix system is composed of hundreds of overlapping Dyson Swarms coordinated and maintained by a gravitationally-synchronized rosette of four so-called 'Jupiter Brains' situated just within the inner-surface of the shell enclosing what remains of the original, inner solar system.

The outer surfaces of the composite 'swarm-shell' encompassing the Kazix System are covered at random intervals with billions of 1,000 mile tall needle-like pinnacles. Each of these pinnacles is hollow and many are host-sites for various nanological flocks of disassembly-mechanisms most of which are in static hibernation.

Recent Developments...
Probe GX-1120-K launched from Mechapublic Projected Security Cordon Authority at Mov (Coord.: 05.00) two years ago suffered a malfunction and crashed into one of the 'Needle-Nests.' Video and other data captured from the ill-fated probe revealed the presence of the nanoflocks. The probe was presumed completely disassembled down to its very molecular matrix and considered lost.

Two weeks ago an encrypted message bearing the Ident-Sequence for Probe GX-1120_K was intercepted by three different individuals off-Mov. One was a low-level AI in the Astronomical Analysis & Assaying Office at Tregio (Coord.: 00.03) that was subsequently deleted by party or parties unknown. The second was a Teaching Assistant at the University of Kaaldu's Deep Time Photoarcheology Station currently in operation in an Unclaimed Region (Coord.: 02.03). The TA is missing and presumed dead due to circumstantial evidence found at the scene (rumors concerning cellular-disruption weapons, clone-capture, or darker things have not been confirmed nor denied at this time by representatives of the University of Kaaldu). The third person to intercept the possibly spurious transmission was Mortimer J. Shalimar, a probationary member of the Hartley Bequest. The disappearance of M.J. Shalimar has brought about a full investigation by the notorious Threat/Hostility Integrated Response Defense Division of the Hartley Bequest.

Immediate Repercussions and Subsequent Events
Several dozen agents and operatives from across the Lithus Sector and beyond have converged upon Mov in order to evaluate the nature of the intercepted signal and to determine further action or reaction for their respective principals.

All mention of Kazix has been expunged from the LocalNet by rogue censorware. This is a known issue and NetIntegrity Specialists are currently doing everything they can to restore full data-access to all clients and subscribers.

A sealed and hardened nanodrive was installed in the brain of a tabby housecat named Felix, once the personal pet of now missing Mortimer J. Shalimar. The cat's enhanced brain may contain some sort of clue to what exactly happened to M. J. Shalimar, as a rather large set of files were downloaded into the cat's proxy-drive by way of a triply-bounced, ultra-encrypted and thoroughly re-directed contingency transmission. The cat's onboard systems have identified the download as coming from M. J. Shalimar.

There are no fewer than six major intelligence services currently trying to trace the data-pathway used by M. J. Shalimar's contingency transmission.

One of the PCs is watching their friend Mortimer's cat while he's off undergoing his Initial Training for Duty in the Hartley Bequest...

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