Greetings All!
I am working on a new adventure for my crew called Tempest Fury. Setting the stage for this adventure, the hook and the secondary obstacle is a massive subspace called a Gabriel.
I'm shamelessly stealing the idea from the TNG novel Spartacus and adapting it for my own use. Detailed below are the effects of the storm listed in the novel.
A Gabriel is a massive subspace/energy storm in space, and is the rough equivalent of a conventional typhoon. Massive energy bursts, plasma flares, and unusual subspace effects threaten the ship while high particle counts obscure sensors and communications. The storm severely affects electronic equipment, interfering with safe operation of shipboard systems and causing numerous false alarms. According to the novel, the Enterprise was struck by energy bolts repeatedly over a period of several days with little real damage, but the computer dutifully reported one or both warp nacelles destroyed, a warp core breach, fires, floods, etc., and phantom intercom calls.
Subspace turbulence and the buffeting from the ion currents kept the crew bouncing around and on edge for the duration of the storm. For obvious reasons, the replicators, transporters, and holodecks all had to be shut down, and most of the damage control systems were being run manually, with spotters throughout the ship.
While the storm was more of an annoyance and a trial for the Enterprise, it was also reported that the USS Ghandi was struck by one of the energy bolts and transmuted with all hands into a single large dilithium crystal! An asteroid floating near the Enterprise was struck and transmuted into a solid block of high explosive.
According to Picard, the only way to deal with a Gabriel was to shut everything down and ride it out, or get the hell out of the way. BTW, the storm isn't named for the archangel, but for the first captain to encounter one and survive long enough to report it.
Now here's how I intend to play it:
Warp drive is non-functional (due to the subspace instabilities) and the extreme ion currents make sublight navigation tricky. Throwing in the turbulence and the computer malfunctions just to make the players crazy. Phasers are at 1/4 potency (minimum of 1) and all Protection scores are +10 inside the Gabriel. Shields would have a maximum threshold of 1.
I figure the best way to handle the energy blasts is to roll 2d6 roughly every hour of game time- if the result is a 2, a bolt hits the ship. A second roll is made to determine if there's damage. If the second roll also comes up a 2, the ship suffers 1d6 damage. I figured to keep the spectacular effects at GM discretion and to advance the story.
I also thought that for each block of system (Ops, Tact, Life Support, Propulsion, etc.) active, I would reduce the 2d6 rolls mentioned above by 1 point (i.e., the more powerful and active the ship's systems, the greater the likelihood of a strike).
I also figured the only sure-fire protection against the effects of the storm would be a nice deep atmosphere, and allow creative players to hide in a nearby gas giant.
As a bit of a red herring, I'd decided that the spectacular effect for the storm (barring something incredibly stupid on the part of my players) would be minor hiccups in the timestream- with the PCs witnessing events from a few minutes in the future or in the past- which might allow them to save the ship from the freak lightning bolt that'll turn'em all into crystalline nick-nacks.
The real object of the mission isn't the storm, but rescuing a largish civilian liner that was also caught in the Gabriel, and now finds herself in shoal water on a lee shore.
Okay,
Feedback! Please! I will welcome (and entertain) any suggestions or advice on how to carry this out or to intensify the player's discomfort and anxiety level. Preferably, the more evil the better!
Thanks
Boy, this came out longer than I thought it would!