Computers and Vents in Sci Fi Ruin Dungeons

 I wrote some notes to myself about the kind of ways I want to use computers in my ancient science fantasy ruins and I think the list is worth sharing. Players read at your own risk, though honestly I think most of this is pretty unexciting.

I also included some notes about Ventilation Shafts as a bonus.

 

Computers in dungeons

They may contain:

• Secret Door Locations
• Keycodes to locked doors
• Reason the ruin was abandoned (emails putting together a story, etc, especially if remnants of the hazard might still be here today)
• Bunker location/ factory location / other ruins (treasure map, essentially)
• Secret of ages past (worth money to the right people)
• Copy of books/movies/games (also worth money to the right people)
• An AI, preserved (a companion? a hireling even? or maybe just a little fairie that does a single script but does it well?)
  
• Schematics for an item that players could build with the right tools
  

To Access the Computer:

• Physically behind an obstacle, like a locked door. 
  
• Power may be off, requires turning on facility power. In some cases, an energy cell or portable power generator might be needed.
• Hacking is often necessary. Robots generally can hack with ease, as can anyone who has collected knowledge related to the old ways of tech use.
  
• Lots of junk (routine work emails, pdfs, porn, etc) and will take extra time to search for anything of worth.
• Data may be corrupted, needs to be cleaned by an expert. Cannot clean fully, but might be able to get some pieces.
• Sometimes, the computer is just there, and it works. 
  

In general I would have multiple pieces of data loot for a single dungeon. If there's one computer, it might have multiple files with goodies. If there's a whole bunch of computers,  you might need to collect pieces of the *data* to get the whole thing, especially for item schematic, overworld locations, and AI systems. I would represent a file as, for example, TERRA PROJECT- 33% COMPLETE. I vaguely remember Cavegirl's Stygian Library did a similar idea for collecting data.

Door keycodes probably only need to be split into multiple files you have to collect in the case where the door is very important- a treasury, for example, in which case TREASURY KEY- 25% COMPLETE might be an acceptable thing to give the players as they scramble around the dungeon. 

In particular I really like giving out multivolume tomes on a subject in my fantasy games, and this could be a similar way to hit the same notes. While I imagine many of the files found are basic entertainment from the past ages, you could litter history textbooks and specialist tomes too. I suggested they be sold for money, but you could also use collecting scholarly electronic files for knowledge "checks", as the equivalent of a sage, etc. 

Ventilation Shafts

When designing old ruined facilities and crashed spaceships, there is a 1 in 6 chance that there is a ventilation shaft access in any given room that is convenient and easy to access. If you roll a 6 on the dice, there is also a ventilation shaft but it's a pain in the ass- the entrance may be on the ceiling, hidden behind a desk, blocked off by a grate, has a dangerous fan, etc.

You can map these properly, probably keeping vent systems local and small, and expect they'll be simply used as an alternative means to travel, maybe to get around some obstacles. Encounters in these sort of vents are optional, depends on how big the vent map is.

Alternatively you can just have them all be connected in a twisted vent maze and some sort of check may be necessary to see if you arrive at the place you intend to crawl to... or if you get lost. There should definitely be a chance of vent encounters in this case. Basic vermin, perhaps, but look, we've all seen Alien... (thanks to deus ex parabola for suggesting the nightmarish vent maze)

Wanderers in the Deep Time Session 2

Friendly- Mutant Magic-User 1
Ithaca - Human Cleric 1
High Quality Organs  - Mutant Magic-User 1
Kaldeth, The Big Roller - Trilobite Fighter 1
0x424F42 - Robot Fighter1
Thorned Rose - Mutant as Class 1
Otto Gilligan - Mutant Druid 1

- The party woke up at the dawn of the festival, and did some light scavenging in the party-wreckage and found some extra coin- insufficient amount to qualify for loot splitting and xp but certainly useful nonetheless. (+50 xp)
- The party traveled to the nearby tower to the northeast, as the day heated up. Typical scorcher weather of the wastelands, I suppose. The party identified the tower as being a steel structure surrounded by a blue glowing field of energy. There was only one way in and out, through a guard station.  (+50 xp)
- While waiting in line for an hour to be allowed into the fortress, a friendly cyberknight named Uz struck up conversation with the party. He loredumped a bit about how citadels are basically the default cities of the wasteland due to generally having protections, but often have tech troubles and are run by people who probably shouldn't be given a fortress city to control. The party inquires about the guitar the cyberknights have, and learn it is MAGICAL but do not learn what it does.  (+50 xp)
- Allowed entry to the Citadel City, the party goes straight for the job board in a cool space age dance club bar, and discover three quests (+50 xp)

•     An escort quest through the Cactus Forest east to the nearby city of Denethix (200 per person payout)
• A dungeon crawling quest where they have to go into the mines below Fate to clear a blockage (2000 gp payout)
•  A Slay The Monster quest- a wyvern. (Payout to be determined, talk to the Priests of Bacchus)

- Having picked to go into the mines, the party gets the details from Mr. Johnson and the key to the service elevator (+50 xp)

Event Bonus XP: 250
DISCOVERY BONUS: Citadel FATE (+200 xp)
BASE OF OPERATIONS BONUS: +200 xp for finding a place that can be used as a base of operations
Early Quit Bonus: 50 xp to make the xp even

 

Total XP: 700 xp

---

Not a long session, not a ton to say about it, but it was good stuff anyway, and necessary, introducing a fairly important part of the setting. Players decided to head to the tower in the distance to stock up on adventuring gear, and discovered Citadel FATE, the initial "home base" location. I expect the players will go wandering after they gain levels and confidence, but for now I'm expecting a more dungeon crawl focused campaign so they have a solid home base with some minor irritations that will simply have to be lived with.

Getting into the Citadel took awhile, and I took the opportunity to loredump a bit and rolled a random faction for the party to socialize with. Or in this case, be socialized at. Cyberknights, wandering heavy metal knights, were a concept that were core to my vision of the world but I named them after thumbing through Rifts - got to respect my predecessors!

The Citadels are ancient war fortresses, of aging sci fi tech that no one is 100% sure how to use correctly.  FATE was named such because I was reading Ten Foot Precis's play reports shortly before I start this. The phrase "Fortress City Fate" managed to stick in my mind, and once something is named in my head I don't tend to fight it- free association is important. That said, I always write the citadel's names in all cap because I imagine all of them have corny names like FATE or HONOR that were silly forced acronyms, meaning lost to the ages. 

I generated the quests on the spot, and by that I mean "made them up"- though I did so by drawing from my notes of things that existed in the area. The players chose the dungeon crawl, and that meant I needed to write up a dungeon crawl- the mines below the Citadel. And that, we would play next week (give or take a week...)

Deep Time Wanderers Campaign Post

 Started running a new campaign yesterday.

It's a weird one. I didn't feel a strong conceptual impulse, a need to run this. Rather, I started rolling on random tables and accidentally generated something playable, at least some strong improv seeds. And when combined with the fact that I haven't run anything in a year I decided to push it hard. I'm driven not by strength of concept but by desire to see a campaign break the 10 session barrier. We'll see.

In theory, it's a love letter to 70s prog rock and science fantasy art, heavy metal, that kind of stuff. I'm using Sword and Wizardry, though without strong ties to the system- I'm going for that Science Fantasy feel- a world so very far in the future that post-apocalypse no longer sums it up, a world of mutants and wastelands but also fantasy and wonder. A friend has been talking about Gamma World recently and this has made me realize I really should have read that system before starting this because I suspect I'm hitting a lot of the same beats independently. Not a big deal!

A major source of this venture is Elfmaid and Octopi's Planet Psycon PDF which I downloaded some years ago but started thumbing through on a whim and it is in large part responsible for the whole thing. Also pulling liberally from Vaults of Vaarn and  Ultraviolet Grasslands. But I'm not afraid to throw some vanilla OSR modules in here- I can either reflavor stuff, or I can leave it as normal vanilla fantasy for contrast- when everything is Weird, nothing is, after all. 

The initial centerpiece megadungeon is Highfell, the Drifting Dungeon. To be a little blunt, I have some reservations about using this one as I have not heard good things about Gillespie in recent years, but Gillespie's dungeons are... to put it nicely... a little bland, and in this case it means they can be reflavored however I need them to be. I do not have to worry about the author's views, as the author's voice is barely there. Highfell itself is a solid concept and I hope to make good use of it. Of course, getting to the dungeon is difficult, as it floats through the air, so as of session 1 the party has decided instead to set their sights on the "Swarming Jungle" to the southwest and it's fabled gem mines.

 It's all a very different approach from my usual anime-fueled weeb aesthetic, but I can contain multitudes, and when I gm I've noticed I usually go for much different themes than when I'm a player. That's ok, I contain multitudes.

I had some fun with the player races, coming to the conclusion that of the traditional D&D races, only humans and elves really fit, and elves only because space elves are absolutely an established tradition- I am going to be drawing on Hill Canton's Eld a lot, I think. I also suspect I really need to get around to reading some Moorcock.

For the rest, we have the mutants of the wasteland- Mutants being the assumed default of the setting- "pure" humans are fresh from the vaults so to speak, or cryogenically preserved from eons past. Mutants roll on a table to determine 3 peculiarities, which given the table I am using , so far suggests they may be busted.  I'm also trying out a "Mutant as class", whose whole thing is getting a mutation per level up, and getting advantage on mutations. This is an idea I've had for awhile, and have had fun with in my solo games, but time will tell whether it's a solid one. 

There's beastmen, stolen shamelessly from Vaarn, and two of my players jumped on the opportunity to be Veins of the Earth Trilobite Knights. Animal people are something of the wildcards of the setting, as their abilities aren't predefined- better to work with the players.

Finally, we have robots, which are 100% assumed to be made of steel and chrome, and can be upgraded in a number of ways. I suspect this may be the actual stealth OP option, as I have... so many upgrades for robots. Of course, the reliance on loot or purchasing items may keep robots from reaching their potential. 

So... the balance is not good! It's a "hot mess" but I'll refine it as I go. What matters is that it's a fun conceptual foundation to begin play. 

Here's to hoping this one lasts more than 5 sessions!

Wanderers in the Deep Time Session 1

 

Friendly  - Mutant Magic-User 1
Ithaca  - Human Cleric 1
Nine Times Carried Away - Trilobite Fighter 1
High Quality Organs  - Mutant Magic-User 1
Kaldeth, The Big Roller  - Trilobite Fighter 1
0x424F42  - Robot Fighter 1
Tawadrosa Shao Rou (红烧 تواضروسا) - Mutant Fighter1
Thorned Rose  - Mutant as Class 1

- The party found themselves in the middle of a party in the Evergreen Skylands. Introductions were made and bonds forged, or just a bunch of strangers traveling with each other for profit. (+50 xp)
- The group encounters a Rat Creature who runs entirely on drugs and follows them around. High Quality Organs lets the Rat Creature pet his head and the creature starts following them around. (+50 xp)
- The group encounters a Robot Drug Store run by a little r2d2-esque robot. Unfortunately, before purchases can be made, a pair of robed individuals grab r2d2 and take them to the pyramid at the center of the party. The party loots the robot drug shop and gain 7 premium oil (+50 xp)
- The party encounters some bounty hunters while traveling to the pyramid. They're in a foul mood, and try to pick on High Quality Organs, but are driven off by two trilobite knights breathing down their necks.  (+50 xp)
- They follow the priests to the pyramid, and it is revealed that yep, there is a SACRIFICE going on at this festival. Unfortunately the party is very under prepared for dealing with an entire region's worth of cultists and r2d2 seems resigned to their fate, so sadly r2d2 is murdered in cold blood by the gm (+100 xp as an apology)
- The party hunts for rumors and gets some good ones! (+50 xp)

•  They learn about "Highfell, the Drifting Dungeon" from traveling partygoer Glamdalf who shows up to give exposition and recommend magic beans or getting a ride from Jet Guy
• They learn about the Swarming Jungle, and it's wonderful gem mines, and the rumored ruins in the center
• The party learns about a war going on to the south, between machine and the dead. No chance of it ending anytime soon.
  

- High Quality Organs recruits the still following rat creature "Little-spit" with Robot Drugs, losing -1 premium oil and gaining a lifelong friend, until it overdoses on Robot Oil, at least. (+50 xp)

Loot Gained: 6 "Premium Oil" sold for 200 coins each = 1200 coin total (150 coin each)

Event Bonus XP: 400 xp
DISCOVERY BONUS: Festival of Bacchus Pyramid: 200 XP

Total XP: 1800 (225 xp each)

 

---

This went better than I feared it would! It was a bit of an experiment. My default is to start the players in the dungeon, but I've also discovered you should highlight the gameplay you want to see in the first session, and I don't want this campaign to just be a Dungeon Crawler- I want it to be about exploration, travel, and meeting weird people (with a good bit of dungeon crawling too, sure). So the glorified tavern start actually was solid. The party even got some loot!

I felt very bad setting up the R2D2-esque robot up to be sacrificed. It was meant to add a little bit of pressure to the party's dealings in this region, but i set up a funny npc then immediately rolled a dice that suggested they'd be the one to be chosen for slaughter. A bit depressing for session 1, in hindsight!!!

On a whim I brought back a gag NPC from previous games that were set in Marlinko over in the Hills Cantons, and I did not realize how beloved the NPC was until multiple players started cheering at Glamdalf's return. I'm touched, y'all.

Overall the strongest thing I can say about this first session is that the party ended up with a very good idea what the next step is, the last thing a sandbox needs is lack of direction from the get go, and that was something I was very worried about here. Next session should involve exploring the Swarming Jungle to try and find the gem mines.