Game Idea 3-10-2019 Dedicated to The Mission

While Patrolling the borders of unknown space...

The PCs receive a distress call. Ship in distress.

They arrive to find two small scout ships, disabled. They are disabled by each others weapons fire.

On Ship A, the Karees there is a band of humanoids. They are old space dogs, you can tell by how they dress and the gear they carry.

On ship B, there is an Android, Q-99

Both ships are about used up and have been heavily field modified.

Both request rescue and assistance.

The story -

Q-99 is a police unit. Two fugitives, Saconna and Borjalla had a violent spree, did a lot of damage, injured several people and androids, then fled. Q-99 is following them to bring them to justice.

The Crew of the Karees describes themselves as "Resistance fighters" - they resisted the AI Domination, on their homeworld, Jacama. The war was touch and go when they left home. Early in the war the Saconna and Borjalla become heroes of the resistance.

The event described as a violent lawless spree by Q-99 is considered a heroic battle by the Resistance.

It was actually a minor raid for supplies and ammo gone very wrong. After it went south, Saconna and Borjalla's desperate attempt to escape became an epic chase scene culminating in the fugitives stealing someone's spaceship and running for it.

The Crew of The Karees is bent on destroying Q-99.

Q-99 is just as determined to find the Saconna and Borjalla and return them to Jacama to face justice.

The two parties have been pursuing each other across space for almost 30 years.

If the PCs get curious, yes, Saconna and Borjalla came to the Federation about 10 years ago. They signed on to a tramp freighter and have been upstanding citizens and civil leaders since then.

All three groups The crew of the Karees, Q-99 and the Fugitives have been pushing across space by any means necessary, trading when they can, scavenging and salvaging when they can. Stealing when necessary.

Q-99 has grown as a person during its voyage and eschewed robbery and theft some time ago. It traveled with people, not always making straight lines, getting involved in different people's stories.

However, the drive to locate and apprehend Saconna and Borjalla is fundamental to its mental make up. This is an urge, a desire Q-99 could not resist even if it wanted to.

The crew of Karees is composed of 3 old timers who are all but insane.

Arzegg Is large man, a heavy weapons expert. Foreddem is an intrusion man and a hacker. Tohamma is their leader, a charismatic female commando. 4 followers who are following them out of loyalty or because it was the best option at the time. Trobek is a failed space pirate who found himself as part of the Karees crew. Troman was a space going conman and slick talker. Enolleb was a waif, mainly good at scavenging and pick-pocketing when picked up. Tennest was a failed monk.

All are competent space pirates now, although not necessarily sane or well adjusted.

The old-timers have become monomaniac about destroying Q-99. It's been their goal for so long and they went to such extreme places to continue their pursuit that it has warped their thinking.

So what do the PCs do with these crazy beings and their starships? The PCs Chief Engineer would be surprised the two ships are still flying. Q-99's is original to its culture although it has been modified, repaired and upgraded from lots of different technological bases on the trip. The hull is tired and on the verge of becoming dangerously used up.

The Karees is the Android hunter's third ship. It's is an old beater of a transport modified with two heavy guns fixed firing forward (This is what they used to disable Q-99's ship) It's less used up than Q-99's ship, but parts of it (Its warp core for instance) could only be repaired for one run to a starbase - after that, it's done and should be scrapped out immediately. The Karees crew found the ship abandoned on an out of the way moon and rehabbed it into something that could fly... if you were really brave.

For added fun

A Cruiser from the Egnal Worlds shows up, pursuing both Q-99 and The Karees.

The Egnal Worlds used to be Space Nazis. But they've moderated themselves. Being Space Nazis was expensive and ran into diminishing returns. So the Engal worlds look like "Space West Germany"

But they have elements of being Space Nazis left over, including an unfortunately harsh legal system for people they consider space pirates.

The Karees crew was not shy about shooting space nazis and taking their stuff. They figured that the Space Nazis volunteered for this by being Space Nazis.

They can cite all sorts of injustices and massacres by the earlier Space Nazi form of the Egnal Worlds. This is true. The forces of the Egnal Worlds did terrible damage up to and including genocide.

They prefer not to talk or think about such things these days. They have not done a justice process about it. They just sort of stopped and pretended it never happened.

The Karees crew will assert that they only attacked targets supporting mass murder forces and targets supporting genocide.

Like stealing food, fuel and vehicles from the Wehrmacht.

The GM should make the evidence of this as clear or as muddy as he likes.

The Egnal position is "Be that as it may, it was still space piracy and The crew of the Karees should still suffer penalties for it. All else is irrelevant."

Is it?

Q-99 is also wanted for the equivalent of traffic violations and failure to appear in Egnal court. Androids have no civil rights in the Egnal Worlds, so their first move would be to deactivate Q-99, disassemble it and send the pieces to an engineering lab to be reverse engineered.

Q-99 will fight to prevent this. It would not be able to capture Saconna and Borjalla if disassembled. Its own view towards its own existence is more ambivalent. It understands wanting to live and that each living and semi-living creature like it are complex and wonderful phenomenon in the universe and so killing people should be held to a minimum.

However, it is locked in by its fundamental directives. It would love to cherish its own life and be able to redefine itself according to its own needs and desires. It advises humans it meets to cherish this about themselves. However, Q-99 has a mission and not much free will about this. It will even fight to prevent being altered away from its main directives. It has to.

So. Is Q-99 a sentient creature? Can you remove its main directive and still have it be the same person? Should you?

Meta - Jacama would be 10+ years away from the Federation if the PCs ship just turned and drove in that direction.

The Resistance succeeded and now there is a mixed human/AI government in place which is getting along okay.

They would consider Saconna and Bojalla, Q-99 and the Crew of the Karees to be insane relics of a war long passed by, in essence, they'd have to invent solutions like the Federation has to.

The old timers of The Karees crew and the Fugitives would not recognize their world anymore. It's a lot nicer but their attitudes prejudices and ideas are 30 years out of date.

The newbies of The Karees are not the sorts of folks who fit in well anywhere too civilized. They are born adventurers, wanderers, hobos and criminals.