Monthly Archives: July 2018

State of the Frontier – End of July 2018

This month did not go as planned.  I had really hoped to get a little further along than I did.  I managed to get the three Star Frontiers posts from Death at Rosegard out that I had planned for the month but did not get as far along on the FrontierSpace Ghost Ship Osiris project as I had hoped.  I definitely made some progress but it was all behind the scenes and not anything that is in any condition to post here.  I’ve put the Sathar Assault Transport project on hold for now simply because I know that if I get started on that, it will draw in all my time and attention and I really want to get the other two projects done first.

A major part of the delay is the fact that I’m currently teaching a computer science class at the local university and that has taken up more time than I anticipated (and will continue to do so for another two weeks).  It’s the first time I’ve taught this particular class, and while I thought I was well prepared, there have just been a lot of things come up that have taken extra time to deal with and that has eaten up the spare time I had to work on these projects.

Another small part is that I’ve gotten distracted by another project that I’ve been meaning to do for a long time now – create a complete index of all the Star Frontiers articles published in the Frontier Explorer and Star Frontiersman fanzines, as well as all the original “official” article published in the likes of Dragon, Imagine, etc back in the 80’s.  Once the initial compilation is done, I’ll be posting it here.  After collecting the articles from the Frontier Explorer and up through issue 7 of the Star Frontiersman (of 25), I have nearly 450 articles.  There will probably be about 600-700 once I’m all done.  Eventually I intend to put all of that into an on-line searchable database.  But that’s a longer term project.

And finally, I’ve picked up a commission to edit an upcoming FrontierSpace module by another author and working on the first part of that has eating a small slice of my time as well.  Despite that I am making progress and we should see some new material appear this coming month.

So what’s coming up?  Well, the very next item on my docket is an alien robot for the FrontierSpace adventure.  Although in thinking about that, I realized that I probably need to flesh out the alien race that built it first.  Once that’s done, I’ll have everything I need to finish one of the 5 sections of the Ghost Ship Osiris adventure and will get that all written up and shared with my Patreon backers.  So the plans for August are:

  • Alien race description
  • Alien robot description
  • Adventure section (first draft – Patreon only)

If for some reason I finish that early, I’ll probably continue working on the FrontierSpace adventure and mapping out the next part of the adventure (literally, I need to draw a map).  That section encompasses the PCs’ interactions with the Osiris mining complex.

So that’s were things stand.  One thing that has really stood out the last few months is that there is much more involved in generating content for others to use than material just for personal use.  I’ve always known this, but the work in getting the Death at Rosegard material ready to go has really driven it home.  I’ve been converting bullet points in my personal notes into prose and formatted text and realized it’s going to take a lot of words to get it all down.  But progress is being made.

That’s it for now.  Remember to always keep exploring and expanding your frontiers!

Trey Mulden, Bounty Hunter and Breeder

This article was supposed to come out last week but work intervened and I was severely lacking in free time to get it finished and published.  Sorry about the delay.

Trey was born on Lossend in the Timeon system.  He came to Pale as part of the liberation force in the Great Sathar War.  He participated in a few skirmishes with remnants of the sathar force on the planet but primarily was involved in efforts to eradicate the sathar bio-monsters.  Like all members of the liberating forces, he was offered full citizenship if he stayed after the war.  Trey decided to accept the offer and remained on Pale.

In the post-war years, he worked a variety of jobs to assist in rebuilding Point True but quickly became disenchanted with the work in the city.  Deciding to put his wartime training to use, he joined a bounty hunting group that continued to search out and eradicate the sathar bio-monsters.  While most of those he started with either gave up the hunt or became prey to the very creatures they were hunting, Trey excelled at the work and enjoyed it.

Trey has been hunting the sathar monsters for decades now and has been quite successful making a comfortable living from the bounties collected.  However, in the last ten to fifteen years, the number of monsters has begun to dwindle, either because of successful hunting or some other process.  Either way, Trey was beginning to seen his income drop to levels that he felt was unacceptable.

Rather than embark on a new line of work, he decided on another path.  He had often joked with his companions that it would be easier to catch a few breeding pairs and raise their kids for the bounties instead of trying to hunt them in the wild.  As his income began to drop, he decided to try just that.

Setting up a remote outpost in the mountains NW of Point True, Trey captured a number of the sathar creatures and instead of killing them for the bounty, began breeding them and raising them.  Thus he could kill one of the captive creatures and collect the bounty whenever he needed additional income.  He also began offering a live capture service to those who wanted live specimens to study.  Since owning and breeding the sathar creatures was illegal, he has kept his operation in the shadows.

For decades he had been in contempt of the creatures as aberrations and was more than happy to hunt and kill them.  That attitude persisted for the first few years of his captive breeding program.  It was just a source of income.  He even continued to hunt wild creatures in addition to collecting the bounties on his bred creatures.  However, about six to seven years ago, his attitude toward the creatures changed.  He no longer saw them as aberrations or with contempt but rather as amazing creatures with positive qualities.  While he still bred the creatures and killed some for their bounties, he no longer hunted wild creatures and began to increase the number he raised, releasing those he didn’t kill for bounties into the wild.

Always fairly reclusive, he has become even more so since he started his breeding program and especially so since he started releasing the sathar creatures into the wild.  He has had little direct, personal contact with anyone in several years beyond delivering proof when needed of his kills to collect the bounty income that supports him.

Trey Munden

Human, male, age 63

STR/STA: 55/45
DEX/RS: 55/55
INT/LOG: 45/50
PER/LDR: 30/30
PS: +3, IM: +6, Ranged: Beam 70%, Projectile 50%, Melee: 53%

PSA: Military
Skills: Projectile weapons 5, Melee weapons 2, Beam weapons 2, Technician 2, Environmental 3, Medic 2

Equipment: Military Skeinsuit, Auto pistol w/ 4 clips, autorifle w/ 4 clips, sonic sword w/ 2 clips, chronocom, toxy-rad guage, sungoggles.

 

GM Notes

Trey Munden’s change of attitude toward the sathar creatures is not an artifact of his close association with them through his breeding program.  Rather it is due to an encounter he had with an actual sathar during one of his hunting expeditions.  The sathar caught him unaware and successfully hypnotized him.  Upon learning of his already existent breeding program, the sathar shifted his mindset about the creatures and set him on a path of breeding more and releasing them into the wild.  Trey has no recollection of this encounter and firmly believes that the ideas and actions he has taken over the past few years are completely his own.

He is directly responsible for the creation of the lesser quickdeath.  It was partially intentional, and partially a side effect of the selection of quickdeath to kill and turn in for bounties.  Each year he would select the largest of the quickdeaths to kill as the size of the quickdeaths for which he collected the bounties figured somewhat into his reputation.  Because of this, he was often breeding smaller and smaller specimens.  After his encounter with the sathar, this became even more deliberate and focused.  The larger pack behavior of the lesser quickdeath is due to the fact that they were raised together and naturally formed those bonds.

Encountering Munden

As part of the Death at Rosegard adventure, the PCs will not directly encounter Trey.  However, they will have an opportunity to search his breeding compound, recently deserted, and learn about his activities.  If the Referee wants to add additional encounters or the PCs want to chase him down, he provides an additional side adventure that they can engage in.

 

The Lesser Quickdeath

Here’s another critter that the PCs are going to have a run-in with while investigating at Rosegard.  It’s a variation on a Star Frontiers classic.

Image showing head, neck, and tentacles of the quickdeath
Quickdeath by Don Freeman
Lesser Quickdeath
Type: Medium Carnivore
Number: 2-4
Move: Very Fast (120 m/turn)
IM/RS: 8/75
STA: 100
Attack: 60
Damage: 4d10 bite, claws
Special Attack: Poison dart S10/T3, (RW 60, 10/20/30/40/50), attacks extra creature with maw (10 points damage)
Special Defense: Immune to needler weapons; ½ damage from laser or projectile weapons, 70% chance will remain unseen until within 100m
Native World: Sathar attack monster bred on Pale – all terrains

Description

The lesser quickdeath is a smaller version of the full-size quickdeaths which were originally released on Pale during the Sathar War and encountered on Volturnus.  Where the full-sized quickdeath is about 5m long, the lesser quickdeaths are only about 3m in length.  While individually smaller and less powerful, the lesser quickdeaths hunt in packs of 3-4 creatures instead of the solitary or breeding pair nature of the full-sized creatures.

While not as fast as the full-sized version (max speed is only 72 kph instead of 100 kph) they otherwise resemble their larger ancestors.  Its great legs resemble those of a jaguar.  They maintain the claws on their legs, keeping them razor sharp.  These claws are used to attack prey and for climbing.  Three sets of smaller, tentacle-like limbs which end in suction cups grow from the quickdeath’s sides.  These limbs are used to catch unwary prey and stuff the victims into the quickdeath’s digestive maw.  Any creature in the maw takes 10 points of damage until it frees itself (as if breaking free from a hold).

The quickdeath has a long, flexible neck that ends in a snout and large mouth.  It has four eyes which are mounted on retractable stalks near the top of its head.  The creature’s brain is located at the base of its neck.  When the quickdeath strikes, it retracts its eye stalks making it nearly blind.  With a successful attack, there is a 50% chance it will actually strike something other than its intended target if that object is roughly the same size as the target and within 2 meters of the target’s position.

The quickdeath also has a long, whip-like tail that can fling a poisonous dart once every four hours. It typically uses this dart as it first engages in melee to strike a secondary, more distant target if one exists.

The quickdeath’s hide is covered by a moist, reflective armor provides excellent camouflage making it nearly invisible until it approaches within 100 meters.  Ouickdeaths are constantly on the move, seeking to appease their hearty appetites.

The female can lay hundreds of eggs each year, typically burying them deep in the sand or soil.  Egg caches can contain up to 50 eggs (4d10 + 11). The first young hatchling eats the remaining eggs as its first meal, and then sets out to begin its lifelong search for more food.

Ouickdeaths are not native to Pale. The Sathar used advanced genetic manipulation to create them from a common type of cat found throughout the universe. During the invasion of Pale, they released hundreds of these in the area around Point True to terrorize any survivors outside the city. These lesser quickdeaths have only recently been sighted in the areas north and west of Point True in the last couple of years.  Originally thought to be adolescents, examination of recently killed specimens show them to be a fully grown subspecies.

GM Notes

There are still many full-sized quickdeaths on Pale.  You can use the normal stats for those from page 19 of SF0: Crash on Volturnus for other encounters on the planet.  However, the full-sized versions do not figure into this adventure.

The lesser quickdeaths are a newly bred version of the larger creature.  They have been bred by a former bounty hunter and recently released into the wild.  He originally was simply breeding quickdeaths as a “safer” way to collect the bounties on the creatures.  However, about 10 years ago, he had an encounter with some sathar on Pale and was converted to their cause.  He has been working on this new version of the creature since then and has been releasing them into the wild for only a couple of years.  The lesser quickdeaths are currently only found in the areas around his breeding facility.

Currently there are only about 50 lesser quickdeaths on the planet but their numbers are slowly growing and their range on the planet is increasing.

Carlos Kildare (Quickdeath Bounty Hunter)

Life has been a bit crazy recently and I haven’t posted anything for a couple of weeks but progress is being made.  I should be getting several post up over the next couple of weeks.  We start this month off with an NPC that you might encounter while traveling in the outback on Pale, Carlos Kildare.  The Death at Rosegard adventure features an opportunity for the PC’s to meet and possibly work with Carlos.  That interaction will be detailed in a different post but for now, here is his description and stats.

Carlos Kildare

Quickdeath hunter

Carlos was born on Minotaur but emigrated to Pale when the planet was first colonized. He is a first-wave colonist but has become a bit of curmudgeon as he has aged. Carlos is the classic “been there, done that and got the scars to prove it” sort of character that you might meet around the Frontier.

He grew up in Point True and was present when the sathar landed at the outset of the First Sathar War. He joined the Aletheia Resistance Band and fought the alien invaders for the duration of the war. With the defeat of the sathar fleets in space and material support from the Pan Galactic Corporation, the government of Pale inducted all the resistance fighters into ad hoc army formations. Carlos attained the rank of sergeant in one of these rag tag militia formations but left the military after the sathar infantry were wiped out on Pale.

Since that time he’s done well collecting bounties on sathar attack monsters that were let loose during the war. He uses a modified Snow Panther track vehicle (stats below) to get around. For a time right after the war, there was a glut of bounty hunters seeking quick cash but the pickings have become slim and only a few hardcore hunters remain in the business. Carlos had his crew quit after a recent run of bad luck and is seeking extra hands for his team.

He has also recently been diagnosed with a nearly inoperable cancer. He could allow the doctors to attempt to treat it but the “cure” will leave him weak and change little or nothing. He would rather spend his time going after bounties and may have a bit of a death wish.

Stats

Human, Male

Age: 140
STR/STA: 45/55
DEX/RS: 60/60
INT/LOG: 35/40
PER/LDR: 35/50
PS: +3, IM: +6, Ranged: Beam 70%, Projectile 50%, Melee: 53%
PSA: Military
Skills: Beam weapons 4, Melee weapons 3, Projectile weapons 2, Technician 2
Equipment: Military Skeinsuit, Sonic Disruptor & power belt, Machete, chronocom, ID, sun goggles, and military issue parka and snow pants.
Equipment stowed in the Snow Panther:  2 holo projectors and a type 3 parabattery, a kerosene powered type 1 generator, five 5 gallon jerry cans (for kerosene), 3 electro stunners, two pikes (pole arms), 4 solvaway, 5 tangler grenades, 5 frag grenades, 1 auto rifle, a dozen 20 SEU clips and 6 auto rifle clips, survival food & water, a single wire electric fence (100 m long with 20 SEU clip- acts as a stun stick if anything touches the wire), a depleted med kit (enough Biocort and supplies to perform first aid twice as well as 4 doses of anti-tox), and a half depleted tech kit (50% chance the kit is missing the part you need for the current skill check).

The Snow Panther

Vehicle:               Snow Panther
Cost (Cr):             17,500
Top Speed:         75 kph (125m/turn)
Cruise Speed:    60 kph (100m/turn)
Acceleration:     40m/turn
Deceleration:    30m/turn
Turn speed:       70 m/turn
Passengers:        6
Cargo Limits:      3000 kg, 8 cubic meters

The Snow Panther is a tracked working vehicle designed for the bitter cold of the planet Pale’s environment. Most that are used in the outback are optimized to be lived in with fold down cots, a small camp stove and a space heater. With a full complement of passengers, it can be a bit crowded but is still workable.

Kildare’s Snow Panther has been modified with a roof hatch and the roof has a low railing running around the roof. There is also a winch and swing arm for lifting heavy objects to the roof as well as a power port that connects to the parabattery. On the sides and back of the vehicle is a folding catwalk with railing that is just wide enough for one person to walk on. While the cat walk is deployed it is possible to walk on it entirely around the vehicle (but off the ground) except in front.

Note: The generator will operate for four hours on five gallons of fuel. It has a full tank and the jerry cans are full so the generator can be run for a total of 24 hours producing 500 SEU/hour. The snow panther uses 1 SEU/kilometer to travel. The life support systems and cook stove use 2 SEU/day.