RPG Idea

[erithromycin]

It sounds a bit obvious, but start at the beginning. Where did this constantly evolving thing come from? Where is it going? What has it encountered? As for the rest of it, well, apply those same rules. Journeys have to begin somewhere after all.

One thing though. Use timelines. They help you keep things straight in your head, and allow you to build on things. Also remember that profound changes in one area of life will affect everything else, so don't forget to reflect that.

Don't worry so much about historical personalities or incidents or things. What I've always found is that if you ensure there are two or three entities in your history that have opposing viewpoints or agendas, they'll surface as you take them along your timeline if they're fleshed out enough. Is that clear?

Figure out a rough timeline of technological change and contact with things.

Figure out what groups of humanity there are at the start of this timeline, then work along it. See where things lead to conflict, or cooperation. Write something about those, and watch as they build up to other things, because those conflicts or cooperative efforts will affect other groups. Ok?

[Mike Holmes]

Does the history include Earth? If so, does our history and the game's diverge at some point? Or is it just the future of Earth? In any case, if Earth is included, then simply start with tomorrow, or the point at which the histories diverge, and go forward and extrapolate a series of events until it looks like what you need it to be. Make up all sorts of crazy twists to get you there if you need to. Plausibility is good, but so is creativity. After all, this is a world of aliens and weird tech.

Fading Suns is a really good example, IMO. Also, if you need to eat up lots of centuries, check out Traveller which is set in the 53rd century. Sure it's got a cliche "Dark Age" and is thin in other areas, too. But it does at least connect the dots.

If not Earth, then you'll have a bunch more history explaining where the people all come from. There's always the "lost history" kludge to make this easy, but that's a cop out.

Mike

[Bret]

My completed timeline can be found here - http://bigcupgames.tripod.com/behemoths/timeline.html

This is just a crappy working one. I'm pretty sure that the times I set between events are pretty unrealistic, but I'll work on them more at a later time. After this I'm going to work on information on the different alliances, the aliens, technology, and anything else the player would find to be worth talking about in fluff format. Any feedback would be great. :smile:

Peace,
Bret

[Bret]

I suppose I should be more specific about what kind of feedback I'm looking for specifically. I was wondering if my the history I've created is reasonably realistic, if there's anything that needs to be extrapolated on, and also if you think the setting sounds somewhat interesting. If not, is there any improvements I could make.

Thanks a lot.

Peace,
Bret

[Ryan Ary]

A note on the "evolution" question. One possibility it that the alien race has mastered bioengineering to the degree (or have a natural gift for editting their own dna if you want them non-technological) that each member of the hive (same race)is hyperspecialized to the degree that they don't share any common morphology. Rather, the particular (and I mean very, very particular) function of the individual defines there unique morphology.

For example, in a particular hive assult squad one member is is designed to breach defenses. It has massive stength (in one limb even), dense frontal armor and a keen dislike for a pherimone (sp?) that can be released by a "leader" onto the surface the "leader" wants breached.  

In another squad the creature that fills that function might be totally different or might be specilized in breaching field (i.e. force field) barriers.  

An even more bizarre twist would be to have some members of the race serve as "agricultural" units. That is they just produce energy (either in food, some other form or both or many different varieties for different functions) for the hive. These members simply churn out biochemicals (or whatever) for the others but are otherwise mindless. Sort of a sustainable cannibalism.

This is just too weird. I must stop.

Ryan

[Mike Holmes]

As far as the timeline, a couple of questions. What year does zero AW correspond with? Or do you intend to leave that open, as in "a few years from now".

Also, how fast is your Warp travel? In terms of how long it takes to travel from inhabited system to inhabited system? Can a light year be traversed in an hour, a day, a week, a month? This will be very important in determining how reasonable your timeline is. Is there a max speed? Can it be maintained constantly? Is it like Star Trek Warp travel where the intervening space is traversed, or are there jumps of some sort involved (makes a big difference in how routs are determined)? Is the technology improving, or static? Do the bad guys use the same technology essentially, or is it different?

Your interstellar travel technology will say more about the universe than almost anything else.

Mike