After a couple of years of not running a regular game, I suddenly find myself with more games than I know what to do with. I’m currently running three different Roll20 games:
- Age of Worms. This is the restart of a fun Roll20 game that ran weekly from 2013 to 2015 before getting derailed by real life. We used the classic Dungeon magazine adventure path adapted for Pathfinder 1e. The PCs have just started the 11th installment, “Into the Wormcrawl Fissure,” and are at 18th level. I think it will probably need 6–12 more sessions to polish this off. So far I’m really looking forward to completing this campaign, but it’s been something of a learning curve going back to a high level 3.5e/PF game after mostly playing lower level 5e for the last few years.
- Into the Interface. This is an open-ended sandbox campaign set in Magyar sector circa 1100 and using Mongoose Traveller 2e rules. I’ve enjoyed being able to run a regular Traveller game, though I wish Roll20 offered better support for the Mongoose Traveller system. And I’ve discovered that running a sandbox game with Roll20 has had some unexpected challenges. Any virtual tabletop is designed to use grids, maps, tokens, and so on. With an adventure path, you know more-or-less what visual materials you need before each session. But a sandbox, by its very nature, can very quickly move into unexpected directions. I can already see the utility of having some generic terrain sets purchased and ready to go if necessary.
- Out of the Abyss. This is a 5e campaign using the Wizards of the Coast module designed by Green Ronin. There’s a lot to like—demons! the Underdark!—but the implementation of the sandbox here is a bit shaky; this might have been better with a more conventional adventure path structure. The PCs are 4th–5th level, so we’re roughly a third of the way through.
The only downside to suddenly having so many games is that I’ve got a lot less time for blogging or painting miniatures. Certainly an acceptable trade-off!
Stanko Downport Patron Encounters
The benefit of playing through so much Traveller is I’ve been using a lot of patron encounters to give the players a taste for the Third Imperium setting. Here are three patrons that I’ve used lately; they could be dropped into Imperial starports almost anywhere.
1. Lord Rush, Noble
Locations The Chapel, Piwiarnia, Sipsmith
Required Skills None
Required Equipment None
Player’s Information
Lord Rush is a pale, priggish youth of fifteen, the son of the Baroness Leonila Folse, the Imperial representative to Stanko (Magyar 2810 A555649-C). The boy is accompanied by his tutor, Dr. Silvio Medved, a gaunt and rather officious fellow. Four years ago the widowed Baroness married a cunning opportunist, Crawford Folse. While the Baroness was at first completely smitten by her new husband, Crawford soon revealed himself to be a wastrel and philanderer, spending his days carousing and gambling with a group of off-world hanger-ons at Stafford, the Folse family estate on the outskirts of Racimir, the planetary capital. A year ago Lord Rush and Crawford quarreled so violently that the boy fled Stafford in the middle of the night.
Referee’s Information
Dr. Medved can offer the PCs Cr20,000 if they will drive the wicked Crawford out of Stafford forever, by any means necessary. Crawford has become politically connected, so straight-up violence will likely draw the attention of the local authorities. The attractive but lonely Baroness could also be swayed by the charms of a suitor or even just the kindness of an earnest friend.
2. Captain Caterina Zheng, Merchant
Locations The Lone Star, Luksus Grand, Scout’s Lounge
Required Skills Investigate, Streetwise
Required Equipment None
Player’s Information
Captain Zheng is a short, dark-skinned woman with curly brown hair and an intense, abrupt manner. She is the half owner of the free trader Dust in the Wind, which has plied the backwaters of the Walpurgian Main for several years but with only mixed success. A month ago her first officer and business partner, Fitz Kelsey, skipped out with their ship. She has traced the Dust to Stanko, and has determined that Kelsey sold the lucrative cargo of pharmaceuticals and is now living high on the hog with the proceeds.
Referee’s Information
Captain Zheng will pay the party Cr15,000 to help her locate and apprehend Kelsey before their lender, the Walpurgis Central Trust, repossesses the Dust. Complicating matters is the recent onworld arrival of Made Merric, an experienced skip tracer from the Trust. Kelsey is hiding out in the Luksus Grand hotel.
3. Bathshua Munro, Colonist
Locations Bang!, Dear Zosia, Scout’s Lounge
Required Skills Flyer, Mechanic, Recon
Required Equipment None
Player’s Information
Bathshua is a tall, resolute woman in her early thirties with a fair complexion and brown hair pulled back. She lives with her husband Gabriel in Jane’s Point, a farming town of some 5,000 located nearly 15,000 km away on the eastern shore of the Sweitny Ocean. Bathshua wants to hire a crew to fly an old ornithopter loaded with farming equipment to Jane’s Point.
Referee’s Information
The biotech megacorporation Schunamann and Sohn AG (SuSAG) has been attempting to buy up land around Jane’s Point to establish a research station for genetically engineered crops. The independent farmers have rejected all offers, so SuSAG has sent in a small security team to harass the holdouts. The team is composed of armed, vat-grown mercenaries. As all weapons outside the home are illegal on Stanko, the farmers have been relatively defenseless against the clones and recently Gabriel was badly wounded in a confrontation.
Bathsua has traveled to Racimir to purchase a smuggled shipment of 50 Hero HR-5 hunting rifles. The weapons are hidden in the ornithopter, which will not make the entire journey without significant mechanical interventions.
She will offer Cr10,000 for this service, but is authorized to offer up to Cr12,000.
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