Need a particular kind of adventure...

[Lagomorph]

Hey all! I'm running a TNG-Era campaign. My players are cadets nearing graduation of Starfleet Academy and the upcoming arc of the campaign will focus on a six month cadet cruise before the cadets graduate and receive their first assignments. I'm thus looking for adventures that would be good for cadets.

Right now I need an off the shelf adventure (doesn't matter what system, I'll adapt it) that is ship based where the stakes are "low." This is the sort of adventure where at most the fate of the ship, not a world, is at stake. Something "light" like the episodes "11001001," "Up the Long Ladder," "Galaxy's Child," or, "Evolution." Humorous is a plus, but not a requirement.

I want a "welcome to space, kids" kind of adventure that feels appropriate for Cadets to go through their first time out. No deep intrigue needed (that comes later). Any suggestions?

[Orville]

I don´t have an off the shelf adv. focusing on ship bound problems but I am running a cadet focus campaign. So I want to give you some ideas.

The ship is going to perform repairs on a sensor array that studies a nebula. When the ship makes an uplink to the array a feedback surge starts and the ship is not able to disengage the uplink from the ship end. The cadets are send to the array to find out why this happende but first shut down the uplink. Perhaps a strange creauture from the nebula tries to chase off the ship. The sensor array malfunktioned and instead of being a sensor it is a weapon off mass destruction against this type of energy being.

[Dan Gurden]

ideas; these should suit either a cadet or a lower decks style game.

Training simulation. As you say; 'welcome to space kids' give them a damage control team with orders from the bridge coming fast and furious... Perhaps leading to a full blown evacuation and abandon ship... Dont drop the 'holodeck simulation' card until the very end when the XO/Department head gives them a performance review and assigns their team.

Anomaly Research. The main ship is called away to an emergency, but the cadets are assigned to a mid level Lt. in a shuttle/runabout to investigate an anomaly. Of course something will happen that they have to face down locally, perhaps an attempted incursion by Romulan spy in an equal powered craft

Diplomatic Relations. A truckulant' diplomat is on board and has made everyones life difficult... This diplomat has been 'assigned' down the rungs and the cadets are given the job with nowhere to delegate any further and so they get to play host to the diplomat during whatever trials the ship itself is going through (this would give them pretty much free-reign of the ship for the duration, along with a narrotor BNPC to push them to be in the right place at the right time, and all you need to know is whats happening outside)

TBH, run all 3 of those and those cadets should be shaping up into promising junior officers with a department assignment, team leader, commendation and perhaps a patron/contact in the diplomatic corps...

[Sarge]

This one might be a little tough for cadets, maybe better at the end of the cruise. But if you have any TOS fans in your group, it ought to make them happy.

While on a routine shuttle/runabout training mission near Vulcan, the crew's shuttle is caught in a temporal anomaly and collides with a strange ship. (Describe it like the collisions between Ent-D and Bozeman in that TNG time loop episode, except that neither ship is destroyed.) The crew eventually discovers that the other ship is an Orion raider, its crew is dead, and it was sent out to attack Kirk's Enterprise on the way to a council at Babel. And, oh yes, judging by the stars, it's about a hundred years ago. In order to preserve the timeline, the crew has to take over the Orion ship, attack Kirk's Enterprise, and get blown up when they fall for Kirk's "play dead" trick. Give them some bonus points if they can pull this off and stay alive at the same time.

[The Tatterdemalion King]

What kind of ship are you thinking of putting them on?

Anyway, let's look at the episodes you picked to explain the idea and see if you can just steal them:

11001001
Basically, some dudes come aboard to do a routine bunch of stuff and then hijack the ship for a sympathetic reason, while distracting the crew.
Act One: At a distant refueling station, the PCs are hauling supplies down to a mining planet in a shuttlecraft (ionic interference, doncha know). While they're landed there, the ship is called away on a bogus distress call. One of the miners is apparently romantically interested in the PC, while another arranges for a fake accident to keep the others busy.
Act Two: The miners try to keep the ruse going as long as possible, until they get the PCs in a makeshift cell and force one of them to pliot the shuttle to a rendezvous with a mysterious person. If one or more PCs escape, they have the opportunity to discover that the Breen have some sort of leverage over the miners (they owe money, require parts, have a hostage, or will just blow them out of the sky, which works best if the PCs ship is poorly armed). The point is that the miners need the PCs help to solve their Breen problem.
Act Three: The scheduled rendezvous approaches. What do the PCs do?

Up the Long Ladder
Did you read the sequel?

Galaxy's Child
A dumb but powerful entity needs the ship to live, competing with the crew for their resources.
Act One: While studying an aging binary system, an alien smuggler picked up by the crew is carrying a secret compartment full of ancient artefacts. His tiny vessel is experiencing systems failures, which can be easily attributed to its age and poor repair. He and his two-man crew are probably Tellarites, Pakleds, Ferengi or some other ornery and difficult but mostly non-threatening species. The captain is a blustering idiot, but one of the crew (the youngest) is inquisitive and gets into stuff when no one's looking. The sensors detect a stellar reaction about to occur; a large solar flare or somesuch. Pretty, but not particularly dangerous.
Act Two: Systems malfunctions and inter-cadet bickering (science guys angry at engineering guys) plague the ship as the solar flares get worse. The captain tries to steal a shuttle to get away. The inquisitive alien crewmember is caught or injured sneaking into something they shouldn't, but on their own, not with the captain's blessing (to establish their curiosity and dumbness). Power drain increases, followed microseconds later by weird energy-flow equipment failures.
Act Three: What's really going on is that the aliens picked up a cache of things from a small planet in the system, which included an alien solar-flare shield generator. Detecting solar flares, it's drawing power from the ship in order to protect it, but not being hooked up to anything it's just activating inside the ship, causing malfunctions with the power it just drained away. Connecting the dots on all the malfunctions allows the players to point the centre: the artefact. The players have to figure out where they got it, what it does and how to get it to interact with the ship's shields before the solar flares destroy the ship.

Evolution
A jerk scientist kills some dudes, they retaliate, but the jerk has clout so they can't just ignore him. Also, communication difficulties. I'm actually pretty tired, so I'll let someone else do this one...

A commonality, really, is that the 'villain' is misguided, dumb or both.

[Lagomorph]

The ship will be Excelsior class.

Thanks for the ideas so far. Keep'em coming if you've got them!

The Tatterdemalion King: Thanks for the break downs. Not only are they handy on their own, but also they give me a good framework for breaking down other episodes and getting at their core ideas.

[The Tatterdemalion King]

Thanks! Once I figured out that most TNG episodes were "A jerk visits the Enterprise and the crew have to put up with it until they figure out why/what to do," they all kind of fall into place.

[Nuclear Fridge]

Really @?@& late to the party, but the Pakleds from "Samaritan Snare" could be an avenue to explore...

Though why Riker & co. decide it was a nice idea to send their chief engineer (ALONE!) over to a ship full of aliens they'd never seen before escapes me...

[Thakowsaizmu]

Though why Riker & co. decide it was a nice idea to send their chief engineer (ALONE!) over to a ship full of aliens they'd never seen before escapes me...

Speed of plot

[Nuclear Fridge]

Speed of plot

Heh. That sums up at least 47% of Voyager in a nutshell!

[The Tatterdemalion King]

Really @?@& late to the party, but the Pakleds from "Samaritan Snare" could be an avenue to explore...

Though why Riker & co. decide it was a nice idea to send their chief engineer (ALONE!) over to a ship full of aliens they'd never seen before escapes me...

The week before Geordi was all like "I want to be in command of an away team," and the Riker was all like "Do you now..."