A Darker Side to Trek

[Ensign Sears]

A Darker Side to Star Trek

I have been debating for a long while (3 years) about running a Star Trek RPG and I have decided to try it. I got the Narrator’s Guide, the Players Guide, and the Starfleet Operations Manuel in this morning. However, I am not sure if my campaign will be exciting enough to keep the players interested. I am hoping that maybe you could help me out in that area. Written below is an outline of what I plan to do.

The campaign is set several months after the events of Deep Space Nine and the conclusion of the Dominion War. Cardassia is under the supervision of a joint committee with the Federation, Romulans, and Klingons playing key members. (i.e. Germany after WW2).

The Cardassians have opened their borders and the Federation will send in several of their ships to restore order in their space. The Starship Expedition is one starship that is ordered into Cardassian Space. The Klingons and Romulans will do the same.

I really want to do a story-arc type game, with each game session building on the next. Here is where Trek will get darker in my campaignNote: I will not be using Time Travel or the ‘reset’ button in this campaign)

Cliff notes version of the series:

Season 1: getting the story started
1. Expedition is sent into Cardassian space to restore order and explore space.
2. As a background issue:
- Federation Presidential Election Year
- In an episode mention that ‘aliens’ are abducting people from border colonies.
- middle of the season mention that the presidential candidate will make a tour along the border colonies.
- Presidential Candidate wins election

Season 2
1. Tensions between the Klingons and Romulans begin to mount.
2. President starts instituting small policies to weaken the Federation from its allies.
3. Several Key Federation members speak out against policies.

Season 3
1. UFP president steps up his or her actions in weakening the from its allies and starts to implement policies of a dictatorship.
2. The Key Federation members break away from the UFP & President takes actions to ensure they will not threaten him or her.
3. Civil War erupts.

Season 4:
1. The War and its conclusion

Season 5
1. Reconstruction of the Federation.
2. The Romulans and Klingons enter into a conflict.
3. A ‘Threat’ is mentioned from beyond explored space

Season 6 & 7 (not yet thought out completely)

Notes:

The parasites from the TNG season 1 episode ‘Conspiracy’ would be the driving force behind the cause of the Civil War in the Federation. We never saw what became of these creatures, so I thought this might be a good ‘plot point.’ They would infect the president and use him to start weakening the Federation as a prelude to an invasion. Over the course of the game, the players will learn that other members of the Federation and Starfleet are infected. My desired effect is to have a moral conflict that they will have to fight their friends and comrades who are not in control of themselves.

In Season 5, the players will learn that the ‘Threat’ is the parasites–who have an empire deep within the unexplored areas of the Alpha Quadrant.

Anyways, this is my vague outline of the game i would like to run. I have never run a game, so i am hoping you all could have some suggestions on my ideas or if you like or dislike my ideas. Thank you so much for all your help!

[AslanC]

I LOVE IT!

I mean it is fantasticly interesting and not reset to zero at the end of every ep

[Phoenix]

Nice!
Good luck with the continuity part, as players have this wonderful way of trashing the GM's best plans over long story arc's.

[Ezri's Toy]

Babylon 5 meets Star Trek.

The 'Conspiracy' parasites are a great explanation as to why things were souring in the Federation. They allow for great conflict while leaving the Roddenberry optimism about humanity intact. Plus, it also allows you to paint moral decisions in shades of grey at first (humanity vs. "humanity") and then in black and white (humanity vs. evil aliens) after the conspiracy is revealed.

Nice! Great concept!

[Balok]

Very nice concept! You will need to address certain details, however -- the parasites will need to be harder to detect, or else the players will cry "foul!", saying that since these creatures tried once, the Federation would be on guard against them.

Please post updates as this unfolds, so we can follow along...

[CmdrBluejeans]

Originally posted by Fesarius
Very nice concept! You will need to address certain details, however -- the parasites will need to be harder to detect, or else the players will cry "foul!", saying that since these creatures tried once, the Federation would be on guard against them.

Please post updates as this unfolds, so we can follow along...

As someone who uses these critters in his own game -- they are called 'the Bombyx' in Star Trek: the High Frontier -- I can share my own methods for turning a one-shot enemy into long-term threat after the PCs have already discovered their 'detection signs' and 'weaknesses'.

IMC, the Bombyx are skilled genetic engineers -- in fact, the running 'hidden truth' is that they are distantly related to the Trill symbiots, but either the Trill were ousted from them, or vice versa, over the genetic engineering matter, over 15 thousand years ago. The interrupted transmission sent in the Conspiracy episode was just enough for the Bombyx to know that the UFP was wise to their existence, so they've spent the intervening time re-engineering some of their advance scouting forces to counter some of the advances in Federation medical technology.

I've divided the Bombyx into a few castes, in fact ... the caste which translates into Fed Standard as 'The Viziers' are the keepers of this genetic engineering knowledge. The Princesses are those with the potential to become brood-queens. The Hierophants are those with the potential for full-fledged psionic powers as well as their parasitic neural linkage abilities. The Acolytes are those who have the Hierophant potential dormant within them, but can breed true Hierophants every few generations (Hierophants are rare).

This was necessary, mind you, because our major rules-lawyer player plays the very psionically powerful (after several years of LUGTrek advancement, then conversion to CODA last year, and 8 advancements since) Vulcan CMO of the ship. So between strong medical skills, and psionics, I needed to give the Bombyx some way to adapt to him. The rest of the story clicked into place from there.

My advice, to anyone who wishes to use a Parastic Invasion plot, especially one which relies on the parasites already being within Federation space, in some influential positions -- grab the starship building guide of your choice (Spacedock, NG with or without Starships, etc.), and start working on three or four 'mystery vessels'. Let these represent non-Federation races taken by the Bombyx (or whatever name you choose to give them, if you name them) and used as 'decoy fronts' early on. Allow no visual contact from bridge to bridge -- the parasites' hosts will communicate audio-only, when they communicate at all. One or two encounters with hostile mystery ships will set the players up, a la Balance of Terror, for a really great episode in which they 'see' their enemy for the first time, peeling back the first layer of the onion.

Intercut these episodes with the political drama. Then, when you have the time, allow a pivotal plot-point episode in which the mysterious invaders are caught sabotaging a subspace relay or other weakly defended 'point of entry' into the Federation communications grid. Let the mystery build as the players realize the sabotage was cover for a slipping of a covert message into the grid, destined for someone 'high up' in the halls of power. Perhaps another purely political/espionage/suspense episode in which a major sub-array of Memory Alpha -- one used purely for classified data -- is raided by a mysterious enemy. The second layer of the onion is peeled accordingly.

Then, when the players finally capture one of these enemies -- after you have revealed they are already in cahoots with 'rogue elements' of other major powers (Thus explaining why a Bird of Prey, or a Galor-class vessel, was occasionally spotting in the vicinity of these mystery ships but aided the wrong side if it intervened at all) -- have someone find the bluegill ... perhaps this time it's not on the neck, but the arm or chest or thigh.

Then watch with smug satisfaction as the wheels turn, and the players realize just who the enemy has been the whole time.

Depending on how paranoid your PCs are, having some long-running NPCs display some 'odd behavior' around this time, as a red herring, is a beautiful touch. Trust me.





-CmdrBJ, about 2 episodes away from drawing the Bombyx War to what *appears* to be a close, it having fueled 3 full seasons of ST:THF. There will, in fact, be a fourth.

[tonyg]

I also used the parasites in a post Dominion-War story. THey managed to take over most of the crew, including the PCs!

And they were supposed to come back in TNG (I beleive the concept was the basis for what evolved into the Borg).

As for the story arc, I am a bit less enthusiastic. It not that it is bad, just that...a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. Very Star Wars-ish.

I'd make thier attack more bradbased. Have them go after serveral of the major powers, or how about someone other than the Federation. That would put the PCs in the spot of trying to convince aliens to trust them over thier own (inhabited) leaders. The Roms would be an idea target, since Nemisies left a power vaccum, making them ripe for conquest.

An alliance between the parasites and the dominion might be a good idea too. Since the founders aren'T solid, they probably can be infected, and might view the parasites and a potential ally/weapon to use against the alpha quandrant.