#01: Chariot of the Gods

3903 messages · Page 4 of 4 (latest)

flat wraith
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If we're being honest here I TANKED my first runthrough of it. The PCs boarded the Cronus, pulled out the motion tracker, found a ping (the neo I ran in stealth mode), tracked it down, murdered it as a full party, and gained 1 stress total damage from the fight. It wasn't exactly a tension building exercise.

bitter loom
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They did not get the memo about splitting the party

candid apex
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Neos seem to be particularly fragile. My last run it was blasted to bits by a single shot from a shotgun.. 😢

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Bad armour roll and critical injury. Sad times..

whole frigate
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Yeah I've got the base rules and all down it just feels like there's too much. I don't think it's a bad module, certainly not with a more experienced GM, but as a starter, I've been a bit put off to the system with it, as opposed to our off-game Mothership sessions

candid apex
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Yeah it's advisable to split up the npcs so you only have to portray one or two at a time and just kill them off at steady pace. After a while, with a bit of luck, the plot gains critical mass and the players start driving the action.

solar trellis
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So much this. It's got a few rough edges but nothing that reall hampers the game if you don't run it RAW. I've seen like a dozen let's plays on YouTube and almost all of them are like "rules?"

elder anchor
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Yes absolutely. It’s a great scenario but the formatting leaves much to be desired

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I’m a big fan of OSR games, so it’s a pet peeve of mine

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If they presented the Cronus similarly to how OSE, Questing Beast, or Mothership present dungeons, it would be way easier to run

elder anchor
whole frigate
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We finished out with an absolute bang! Super dramatic, a sole survivor and a self-destruct sequence left us all stressed and on a super high note. I'm an avid OSR GM, so running it as such really worked for me, but yeah, I just felt like I was cutting a healthy handful of stuff out- there's a lot of ways this module can be worked.

candid apex
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But that's fine, it means you have a lot of space to maneuver when the players inevitably do something unexpected. I've not had to invent something entirely new on the fly when running this module, and that's three times now. Every group also seems to get a different story out of it. Presentation might have been easier but this is honestly a great module.

solar trellis
whole frigate
flat wraith
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I’ve always liked solid rules over rulings because it protects players from bad GMs or at least GMs who don’t get what the game is doing.

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I literally just got back from a Monster of the Week game an hour ago that ground to a halt because the GM wasn’t using the Keeper Moves and not giving out info when the PC move clearly says they do. He “ruled” that it didn’t make sense to know. I think that’s why I have such a negative reaction to the OSR thing. It basically makes every game the GM runs the same game they always run.

candid apex
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Solid rules are important in a game, they provide a basis to fall back on. Good gms know when to apply them and when not, though.

The Alien rpg rules don't shy away from deadly situations, so osr gms need not fear 😅

novel walrus
flat wraith
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Like, a GM blatantly breaking the rules vs a GM believing they should be ruling on a situation are two different things.

jaunty panther
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Anyone else imagine Ava as that broken doll that was popular on Twitter for a bit?

image0.jpg
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In my (totally not biased at all) opinion the Elster redraw also goes hard, albeit a bit less in line with the alien world

IMG_4880.jpg
candid apex
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The idea that anything can or should protect players from bad gms is incredibly odd. Nobody is at risk of actual harm.

Well-crafted rules help gms run good games and set expectations for players on how the game world works. Facets that are abstracted with die rolls, mostly things that ttrpgs can't model be talking very wel, such as firing a gun or jumping across a gap, benefit from this the most. Other parts that can be modelled by talking well, such as talking to npcs, don't need many rules because most people know how that works.

Minimalist rulesets lean more heavily on the gm, but crunchy rulesets increase mental load in a different way. Both have advantages in certain situations and gms and players will have personal preferences that come into it. A good gm can make both work, a bad gm will struggle regardless.

elder anchor
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The discovery of OSR was a big game changer for me

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I used to only play narrative-style D&D 5E and it just never hit the spot for me

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Now when I GM, all my games must have robust maps, lots of freeform exploration opportunities, legit threats which don’t care about plot armor, random events, rules-light skill systems

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I was attracted to CotG because it had most of those elements already

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Mothership actually has all of this in spades, so that’s how I try to run Alien

flat wraith
# candid apex The idea that anything can or should protect players from bad gms is incredibly ...

Nah you’re reading too much into it. When a player reads a game book, the expectation of the game experience is purely from the rules/setting because they don’t know what the GM will do. So when the GM decides a rule should be a ruling, they change that experience. Now if it enhances what the game is trying to do that’s one thing, but I’ve mostly seen that happen when the GM doesn’t understand what the rules are trying to do. So when I say it protects players, what I mean is it protects the player’s expectation of what game their playing. The ruleset is like an implied session 0 for everyone and changing or overruling parts of it is (granted this is overly dramatic) lying to the player in a sense.

candid apex
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Ah fair enough.

None of my group own any of the arpg books and only half of them had d&d books when we played that, so my reference point was a bit different..

flat wraith
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I’m mean granted - that’s probably the most likely scenario

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I think I have the burden of the most RPG experience in my circle so I probably have that experience most often. I find a game that actually does something different and want to try it - the GM doesn’t understand the difference and nerfs it so it works like other games and completely removes the reason I wanted to play <sad trombone>

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Anyway, my point is just following the rules in the book prevents all of this without even having to think about it - or having this conversation.

candid apex
hardy sedge
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Hey together.
I have a question about Chariot of the Gods and how to handle the ||infection with, either the Fungus (don't know the english word cause i only have it in German) or the disease with the vaccination||. I suggest i will not let my players make rolls against the Virulence because then i believe everybody would be infected. I think i will have the players infected cinematic how i want it to be.
How are your experiences with the diseases?

jaunty panther
# hardy sedge Hey together. I have a question about Chariot of the Gods and how to handle the ...

I choose to give players only 2 vaccines so they would have decide who gets it right away but I did make what some may see as a controversial choice to give them a true cure but at the cost of going on a deadly fetch quest for it. This becuase I wanted to keep them alive longer since I was running the game longer than most ppl with a lot of my own custom stuff. If they die I would prefer to be from their own choices and not just a twist

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Like by knowingly doing something risky or slipping up hidding or in combat

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Like basically making risks deadly but at least known

solar trellis
jaunty panther
hardy sedge
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Since the rules say an opposed roll against the Virulence.
Do you actually "Roll" AS a GM for the disease? E.G. Disease of Virulence 9 you roll with 9 dice for the Virulence?

primal yacht
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thats what i did

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0 success on my roll and 0 success on the player's roll, so im treating it as them fighting off the infection for a Shift before they'll need to make another roll

solar trellis
hardy sedge
solar trellis
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Yeah, I mean, do it as you wish, I was just saying what I did

primal yacht
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(dont tell my players this but i roll and then choose to follow or ignore the dice based on what i want to do anyway kekdog)

hardy sedge
fringe vessel
candid apex
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Yeah there's quite a bit of detail in there. On the other hand, you don't sell it as regular sci-fi and then spring the reactor ruin abomination on them. That's not right either..

fringe vessel
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yeah i feel like being upfront what to expect could work in my favour in a setting like alien with so many preconceptions about it anyways. on the other hand, a player without too many alien knowledge could still be surprised 🙄 i'm gonna look for a shorter description ^^

candid apex
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I tend to pitch the system and setting, then say I want to run the starter set. No spoilers but everyone has the right expectations.

quasi parcel
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I found that my content warning drummed up quite a lot of interest:

It’s a space horror game, which may involve depictions of: Severe injury and death; Stress, anxiety and mental breakdown; Suffocation; Body horror; Parasitic invasion; Explosions; Drug addiction and alcoholism; A 12-year old character who may come to harm; Conflict and violence between the player-characters; Reference to past suicide and self-harm; Manipulation and lying

candid apex
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You're also at risk of having a great amount of fun.

elder anchor
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So we finished our last session and Cham/Lucas kind of messed it up

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So I sent him his Act III agendas for Cham and Lucas

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…and the guy only bothered to read Cham’s 😳

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So he saves most of the fucking crew.

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I was like, “did you not read the agenda?”

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When he finally read the agenda, Miller, Flynn, and Rye had already escaped on the EEV

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So he decided to fight the last survivor, Wilson

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Wilson narrowly won the fight thanks to the flamethrower

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I’m just a bit disappointed that the ending was anticlimactic

candid apex
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Aw that's a shame.

What's your opinion on the scenario in general though?

elder anchor
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Which was a shame because I literally spent countless hours prepping

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Wilson’s player felt a bit cheated by the ending as Cham suddenly and inexplicably led all the Montero crew to the EEV

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In the last moment, Davis stole Wilson’s seat

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Then Cham’s player finally read the Lucas agenda and tried to kill Wilson

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It didn’t really make sense

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I kept Acts 2 and 3 open in order to maximize player agency, so I was prepared for a bunch of possible endings, but it never occurred to me that the Lucas player wouldn’t bother to read his agenda.

candid apex
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You can't cover for that sort of thing, sadly. I had one player misunderstand the lucas agenda and it didn't end so great either. Oh well

elder anchor
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He literally just revealed himself as an android for no reason and said, “I’m here to save you all!”

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We also had some issue with the fighting, as it dragged on for a long time

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“Dice fatigue” as they called it

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They had a fight with an infected Reid that went on for like six rounds

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And wasn’t that eventful except that Reid threw Johns off the catwalk

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And the fight between Cham and Wilson went on for a while

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I think I’m going to take a break from Alien until 2e comes out. In the meantime, we’ll run Mothership

hardy sedge
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I had the first Act of CotG Yesterday.
I have seven players in my group and i needed to add two more Characters to fit.
I used all five main chars of the Montero with their original Agenda plus one character with the Lucas Agenda and one with a self made.
It went pretty well. They had enough time for RP and had a pretty good insight of the Cronus and its damages plus a bit of reveal of some secrets.
I think Act II and III are going to be great, too

solar trellis
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I hate players who don't take the game seriously. Show up.

candid apex
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Someone stood you up?

solar trellis
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I mean, bring your intent and attention to the table, which includes reading things your GM gives you.

flat wraith
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The Sotillo is the “pull in case of emergency” lever for that sort of thing.
“Oh - so Lucas is good now? Good thing because here’s a ship full of infected pirates about pop Cooper style.”

elder anchor
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And this also isn’t the first time this happened. The previous time I ran an adventure, he got drunk and completely ruined a session

elder anchor
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Anyway, I’m just disappointed because I feel we had a really good adventure that was ruined by a Game of Thrones finale

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And it was because a trusted player was really careless

flat wraith
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Yeah I’ve been there. It just sucks.

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Hey I will say though - running it again for a different group will heal your soul 🙂

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The experience from the first run pays dividends.

solar trellis
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Yeah. I am really excited to run it for the third time. At some point.

elder anchor
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Yeah I’m going to give it another shot eventually

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I might wait until to after 2E comes out though

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I guess I should focus on the positive. All the other players did an excellent job

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Flynn got shot and managed to crawl into the escape pod as people were distracted

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Miller and Rye stole all the money

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Wilson is basically responsible for the deaths of Davis and Johns

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There were a lot of other great moments as well

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This was our table

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I think the atmosphere in the room was really good

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I used the tv in the back to project a PowerPoint that taught the rules

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It also played the music

jaunty panther
elder anchor
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Such a great environment for TTRPGs

jaunty panther
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they let you use the room?

elder anchor
jaunty panther
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aaaaaaahhhhh

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thats a sick privillage

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I thought that was either your house or you rented out a room somewhere

elder anchor
jaunty panther
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mmm

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i get it

elder anchor
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I utilized the school’s printing service to make poster sized Cronus maps

jaunty panther
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my apartment is too open for smt that atmostphereic

jaunty panther
elder anchor
jaunty panther
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i think my school only has A4 sized printed unfortunetely

jaunty panther
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that too

elder anchor
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The nice part about this set up is that it’ll work equally well for Mothership

jaunty panther
elder anchor
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I’m a foreign teacher in a Chinese international school

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All the players are also foreign teachers

jaunty panther
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mm

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honestly I should use that more Ive mostly just used shopee or lazada

solar trellis
elder anchor
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Next time around, I want to do a better job of imparting on the players that fighting should always be a last resort in this kind of game

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They deliberately got into a fight with an abomination and it nearly wiped a team of four players

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But I telegraphed the danger and even warned them to run away

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These players are used to 5E where combat is balanced and nearly always winnable

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They had two fights with the Neomorph and one with an abomination, and someone died every time

solar trellis
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I mean, you don't haaaaaaaaaaaaaaave to. It's not like the characters themselves know the danger of the xenos. Maybe the char is a tough guy, they'll learn quick, or maybe they're a scaredy pants, in which case they will be more cautious.

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But yeah it's good to at least explain the combat is more deadly. And I like to remind the players that even moreso than D&D this game isn't about winning it's about telling a good story. A good "going out" death is amazing.

candid apex
candid apex
elder anchor
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Honestly, I’m still disappointed by the ending. I really planned ahead and was ready for so many possibilities, but it never once occurred to me that the Lucas player wouldn’t read his card and would instead literally give the other players all the data and put them in escape pod.

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It was the stupidest ending.

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It made no sense.

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The story still had a lot of gas left in it until it abruptly ended for the silliest of reasons.

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They had just fixed the air scrubbers, acquired the food stores from the cargo hold, and even got the Alien 3 napalm to try to set a trap for the Neomorph

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Then Lucas (who stole Clayton’s card) finds the escape pod in her room and reveals, “Hey everyone. I’m actually an android. I’m here to save everyone I can! Get in the escape pod!”

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…I just gotta start my own table for another night of the week and cultivate my own regulars.

clear idol
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Yeah but it isn’t your fault, this can happen. It is a shame that the player didn’t read their Lucas agenda properly

elder anchor
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I even met with this guy face to face and explained that he is being given a really special, secret role and that he isn’t on the same team as everyone else

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After all the cancellations and delays (all caused by the same guy) he must have forgotten everything

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I’m just a bad judge of character

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I had the same meeting with the Wilson player and he did a phenomenal job the entire time, but he was totally let down by the ending. I feel really sorry for him

clear idol
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That is understandable

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It is simply the pitfall of these games

hardy sedge
elder anchor
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He could pretend to be everyone’s friend while conspiring against them

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It worked without any problems for Acts I and II

hardy sedge
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Oh my. I see.
It sounds logical as you explained that he can pretend to be a friend to the crew.
It is double confusing that it worked well for Act I and II 🤦‍♂️

elder anchor
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The guy who did it is normally our long term DM. I just do short term stints

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I’m not competitive but I do new things each time like bring in Alien, Into the Odd, Pilgrims of the Nighted Path, etc

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We’ve been in the same tired 5E campaign for two years and I’m just trying to spice things up at the table

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Also, we are teachers in the same school, but he comes from a position which he believes is harder than mine, so there is resentfulness when I have the time to want to try out all these new game systems

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It might not work out with me and this particular person

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It’s a shame because we always played well together when he was DM

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I also invested a lot into his games. I always took his stories seriously, got into character, didn’t deliberately mess with his railroads, and was quick in battles

candid apex
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It's entirely possible he's a good dm but not a good player.

flat wraith
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Just a thought - did he think both agendas were applicable?

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Like, technically, you could think the whole crew was "your family" and you want to protect them AND get all the info you can for your secret company. And if he's coming from 5e and being a DM he may be looking at those two cards as "Rules as Written" and following them both. It may have come off as pretending in the first 2 acts.

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He may have just missed the point maybe?

elder anchor
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And didn’t think to ask any questions

flat wraith
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Eh. well I guess it’s just a suck sandwich all around.

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I still say run it again when you feel ready. The experience just gets better.

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My first run had the PCs use the motion tracker to hunt down and one shot the first neo. Not exactly horror inducing.

elder anchor
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That’s a really good point. I just need to remind myself that I haven’t GM’d that much and this is just part of learning

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The game was way more good than bad

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The last session was just a bit like the finale of GoT or Seinfeld

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I introduced a ton of new materials, concepts, and systems to our table. It was the first time the players had played anything other than 5E

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With one exception: it was the first TTRPG experience for one of the players and he loved it

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He played as Miller and was really proud that he survived the scenario and got out on the escape pod with a million dollars

clear idol
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That does make it worth it

candid apex
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It's easy to focus on the negatives, and it sucks if one player is a lot more casual about the game than the others, but it sounds like you had a pretty good game for most of it.

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Gm'ing is hard. Anyone can do it, but it's not easy and gm'ing well is harder still.

Best way to get better at it is running more games and reflecting on what you could improve. Sometimes that's changing something you do or don't do, sometimes it's swapping out players.

left kelp
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Question? Is it just normal that people rather ghost than give a genuine response as to why they cannot commit?

candid apex
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Depends on what you mean by normal.

  • "following established social conventions": no
  • "common": probably yes, I guess it's easier
carmine marsh
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Getting set to run for a new group and reviewing notes. Confused about a few things and hoping for some help: in the MedLab there are vials with a black liquid that if not in cold storage will sweat. In the science lab 1 there are engineer ampules that contain the black liquid strain of 26 Draconis

So are these the same liquids? Is this the stuff that Agent Wilson wants to acquire?

Lastly, the urn in the medlab is already broken so aren’t these not in cold storage already?

flat wraith
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  1. Yeah - all the same liquid. Basically riffing on and the same stuff from Prometheus.
  2. Everyone on the Cronus basically went into cryo in an emergency situation after a catastrophe so everything in the labs was just left where it was - that’s why everything isn’t stored consistently.
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Also, keep in mind the meta game reason the stuff is there:

  1. to be dangerous
  2. To demonstrate something so terrible happened on the ship so quickly that no one put it away safely
  3. To give Wilson a few ways to fulfill his agenda.
    So you can riff on it a bit with those parameters in mind.
quasi parcel
flat wraith
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@wise glen Hey - I wanted to ping you here before you re-read the module just because talking about what it's "supposed to" do before reading it will give context when you do. Give me a couple hours or so and I'll drop some bullet points.

wise glen
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Thank you Nooch. I just feel a bit overwhelmed with quite how much I am meant to be coordinating as ARPG DM versus letting the world play out emergently as per standard D&D style DM'ing

flat wraith
wise glen
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OK thank you!

flat wraith
# wise glen OK thank you!

ACT 1
-So first is the wake up and finding the Cronus. Depending on how much your PCs like to RP and be in the Alien universe you might want to give them some time here before introducing the Cronus. Besides setting up the plot, the point here is to introduce the mechanics a little with piloting rolls, ect...

-When you give the PCs the map, point out the important/relevant places to them because it will be just as overwhelming to them. So the Bridge will have life support and logs, the science labs will have what they found, here's the medlab (Davis with the drugs agenda will be listening), here's the cryo chamber where any survivors will most likely be, here's the reactor and the power controls, ect...

-When they get into the Cronus it's supposed to be tense. Everything is dark, and enforce air rolls every turn - that's one every two zones which is a lot. They'll probably split up to fulfill their agendas on time, and you can power on the ship before they run out if the dice go south. Pay attention to how the room descriptions describe the backstory and riff on it. Most of it doesnt' need to be exact except for the important rooms above that fulfill agendas.

wise glen
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TBQH Act 1 is the furthest I'm going to go in the first session by a long shot, so maybe hold fire on a follow up until I've run it?

flat wraith
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I do have more for Act 1 though 🙂

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-The book says to turn the power on basically whenever you want ("in response to the PC's presence"). This means it could be just from sensing them at some point, or if they start fiddling with controls. It's probably best to try to synchronize it to a PC action when one of their air supply drops to 1. So messing around on the bridge, the reactor, MUTHER, ect.

-Here's the big one that the book doesn't mention: You have 5 NPCs to introduce and roleplay all at the same time so figure out how you're going to do that ahead of time. Here's how I did it:
Johns - trys to take control and gives bad orders (go into that shaft alone)
Reid - paranoid of outsiders and draws a gun and tells PCs to leave
Clayton - quietly watches unless approached until she figures out who she can bribe.
Flynn - Scared, runs away and hides at first opportunity (good set up for if he changes later)
Cooper - set up as main quest giver (I have research that can save us!) so the bloodburster comes as a shock.

wise glen
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I'm feeling a bit more like this could be doable!

flat wraith
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Here's one more thing - this probably won't make 100% sense until you re-read the module, but I like to have one of the Cronus's cryopods broken out from the inside with a dead occupant when the PCs find it. That sets up the second neomorph if you need it (I've never had a game where the PCs DIDN'T kill the one from Cooper immediately) and simultaniously takes the suspicion off of the NPCs being "infected". You can elude to it at other times with broken vent covers and frozen slime around them too.

wise glen
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Perfect, re-reading now.

solar trellis
flat wraith
quasi parcel
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Personally I recommend removing the flamethrower from the starting equipment. It doesn’t make much sense having one, and makes it highly likely that the bloodburster will die at first sight.

I also recommend prepping some equipment cards, so it’s easy to keep track of who has what (key cards, vaccines, money, drugs, the fire axe…)

solar trellis
quasi parcel
flat wraith
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I did this for DoW (which never actually happened... yet). That's a lot of ink 😉

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And I actually disagree on the flamethrower. "Smart" players will give it Davis first because she has the best shooting score and she will definitely be the point man from there. BUT, when the drugs run out she'll empty it pretty quickly and cause some panic spirals in the process. Also, I think it makes sense if it was the jerry-rigged flame thrower from the first movie. Like, they built it, it's not the military one from Aliens.

quasi parcel
flat wraith
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yeah - I really feel like including it for the scenario was kind of fan service for the first movie it's mostly homaging.

wise glen
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One thing I had noticed - CRB291 'Humans can only move 1 zone per turn' && A Turn is 5-10 minutes. So when "T-Minus 10 Minutes" occurs, unless the players are essentially adjacent to the airlock, they have no chance of getting to the Montero. Is this a case of fudging the time scale a bit?

clear idol
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Yes

wise glen
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Thanks!

flat wraith
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I’m also pretty sure that “1 zone per turn”. includes moving carefully and investigating the area in stealth mode. I think it says that somewhere.

solar trellis
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I'm still not really sure how coherent the time and movement rules are.

flat wraith
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I think they’re deliberately vague/flexible to suit the situation.

solar trellis
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Interesting. I think I just fudged it both times I did the T-Minus section last time, but now that I think about it doing it via combat rules (e.g. each turn is 10 seconds) might be kind of fun. That said, 10 minutes is... 60 turns, which is clearly way too many turns to make it tense. Like, you could run around the whole ship a couple of times in ten minutes.

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I like to have the T-Minus event happen in the middle of another event though (like a xeno attack or during a PVP/PVNPC situation) so that makes it even more interesting to me.

flat wraith
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I popped Cooper once AFTER the countdown happened. That was tense 🙂

solar trellis
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I think last time I did it while everyone was split up. I'm pretty sure two PCs and Reid were in the nuke room and I had the abom in there wake up because of the super-loud warning from MUTHUR. It was chaos.

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Dammit now I want to run this again.

flat wraith
hardy sedge
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It says on P. 85 in the CRB that the movement in Stealth Mode is two Zones per turn. That includes, exploration of the Zones, scanning for enemies and getting a superficial description of these two zones from the GM.
So when you are not in Stealth Mode, the speed you are moving is managed by the GM as it makes sense or it is thrilling

jaunty panther
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I had them go to the armoury to retrieve it but had a neomorph start hunting them on the way there so I was a huge risk vs reward for it

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It wasn’t there cuz some crew member took it so while one of the was hidding in a locker I put on the bridge in the corner of their eye they saw it on the table just as the Neomorph was outside. I forgot they found the noisemaker earlier and she threw out in the corridor before making a mad dash to it

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it was empty BUT USED HER OWN OXYGEN SUPPLY AS FUEL AND LIT THER SUCKER UP UNTILL I RAN INTO THE VENTS AND FAR AWAY

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I fucking loved my players

flat wraith
jaunty panther
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If anyone wants to um actually it would be on me

flat wraith
quiet walrus
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Sidebar on pg 143. I believe it actually implies a headbutt.

wise glen
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Re-reading the adventure (gosh, there's a lot of text and distilling it down to core ideas is a bit tough) I now understand a few extra things: The adult neomorph woken when Mother turns on, separate from the bloodburster in Cooper - and the distinction between the Abominations/Vaccines and the Neomorphs/Motes/Eggs. I've got commitment from 5 players for at least the first session, and I'm starting to get antsy!

clear idol
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Yeah, that is normal for a first session

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Stay frosty and enjoy yourself as well

flat wraith
wise glen
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Am I correct in assuming that Wilson, Miller are key PCs, one of Cham/Rye, and Davis - in order of importance, with the Synthetic being Cham/Rye/Davis as appropriate.

clear idol
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Wilson and Miller definitely have the more interesting personal agendas

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To me, Chan is the least interesting and my choice pick for Lukas

#

And Lukas also has plays a big role much like Wilson and Miller

flat wraith
#

I think Rye makes the best Lucas mechanics wise. Davis has the whole needing drugs thing, and Cham & the power loader is basically the only way for people to all survive the act 2 moving tanks event.

wise glen
#

Excellent. I'm summarising the Neomorph and Abomination on my quick ref sheet and it seems that the Abomination stats are derived from PCs - but the one in the Reactor, on the exterior of the engines, etc. are extant already. Based on the stat blocks for Stage3 and Stage4 I can derive Strength from Health, and Wits/Empathy are 1 - but what do I do for base agility?

clear idol
flat wraith
flat wraith
wise glen
#

Thank you 🤗

flat wraith
#

And I think they're all stage 4 aren't they?

wise glen
#

Not if a PC gets infected? But I guess that's an Act 2/3 problem, so I'm going to ignore it\

flat wraith
#

Oh right - then it's their base stats plus the mods

wise glen
#

Mobility is specialisation of Agility though, right? Is there some internal logic which says the Mobility 5 of the Stage III/IV Abominations 'must' be higher than the Stat +1 of Stage II?

#

Doesn't matter, just trying to understand 🙂

flat wraith
#

Oh that's an interesting point. Given the rules emphasis on simplicity I'd say (and always assumed) no. Once the GM takes control, it's just base monster stats.

hardy sedge
#

Hey all together.
Just want to say that all Agendas are interesting.
I play CotG with a group of seven players. All of them use the premade Characters. I made two characters myself, they are basically other Characters from Last days of Hope of the CRB.
It works pretty well til now. I gave the Players all Agendas of the Characters. Plus Lucas' Agenda what makes it six and i made one Agenda myself, that makes it seven.

jaunty panther
hardy sedge
#

Thank you. It is quite a challenge.
The Intention of this was to get my players familiar with character play and it works pretty well. They know that the size of the group slows down the play but we managed to play one Act per session, always 3 hours.

wise glen
#

Bloody hell, gave out my agendas and one guy has come back saying he now can’t attend - he was Miller. He thinks he can attend the next sessions so my thought is to have Miller very sick from cryo and essentially devolving the command to Davis - are they gonna be any major problems with this?

somber seal
candid apex
jaunty panther
#

Wilson could use it help stir the pot amongst the crew as cover

#

I mean they are the captain no less

#

if anyone would have full control over all systems it would be her

#

Also Davis could maybe be enjoying the power they had a bit too much and may be a bit resistant to give it back to her

#

causing further tensions

#

tbh this is really an interesting setup for events

#

couldnt have been a better pc

wise glen
#

Definitely - I don’t want to red herring anything really, so may tell players outright that he should be a PC but can’t be ?

candid apex
#

Just let things play out as they do. No need to red herring anything, let the players draw their own conclusions.

wise glen
#

Thank you all. I am vindicated in my choice to make Rye == Lucas, and give Cham to the least reliable player - because they've just dropped out on the morning-of as well. Typical, but at least limited damage. We're now down to Davis, Wilson and Rye - and my hope is that Miller comes back in Session 2, so if Davis drops out (next least reliable) then there's still the quorum of key players.

quasi parcel
jaunty panther
quasi parcel
jaunty panther
solar trellis
#

That does sound kind of fun to do it all at once

jaunty panther
#

Okay can someone explain to me what the company’s whole plan was destroying the montero cuz I just can’t really seem to have it make sense

#

You are exploding a ship worth countless of dollars for what? Additional motivation to make sure the Cronus is brought back? And what if they can’t then? They just wasted a ship, it’s cargo, it’s crew and a chance of getting the vital samples back to the ship for nothing (yes I’m sure backup was informed and is on the way but still like??). Suppose maybe the intent is that there is no way off to limit the probably of anyone escaping with the sample or spreading the spores or black goo somewhere else, would the company even know if the escape pods were operational or not making that whole point null?

#

I just. Don’t get it.

#

Now is this was an order ment for LUCAS, that would make sense since their goal is to sabotage

#

But Wilson? I just don’t get the rationale

quiet walrus
#

They'll claim the insurance back on the ship and cargo. Probably doubled their money.

flat wraith
#

For what it’s worth, I agree. It makes more sense dramatically than rationally. If the crew decided they had enough and were leaving first, THEN it self destructed as a last resort to keep them there it would make more sense.

#

When I ran it I had MUTHER just refuse to power on the engines. So the act 2 repairs either happened on the Cronus or the Montero

jaunty panther
quasi parcel
#

It’s inconceivable to have the Alien Starter Set with no countdown to destruction 🙂

flat wraith
#

I actually had to drop almost all of act 2 because scheduling made my act 2 session become my act 2 and 3 session. It was arguably the best run of CotG I had. I do like the countdown but it's not really core to the Alien experience.

candid apex
#

The main thing it does is remove the Montero as an option for escape. It also adds another opportunity to give your pcs stress points.

flat wraith
#

I just had MUTHER shut down so it couldn't leave/

candid apex
#

Yeah that works as well

wise glen
#

After avery successful act one, I’m about to run act two tomorrow. it seems that other than the Montero destruction there is far less for me to stage manage? At the moment, two of the neomorphs are loose, and one abomination in the reactor room has been awoken.

#

I would really appreciate any advice on what to focus on this act as mother

flat wraith
#

There’s not quite so much because the exploration part is mostly over. Mostly this act is about the existing monsters, and the existing NPCs turning into abominations. The description of what needs to get done for the repairs gives some clues. There’s the reactor abomination, the antenna abomination, the air scrubbers shaft seems custom made for a Neomorph ambush, etc. Plus, the PCs act 2 agendas will drive it somewhat.
You’ll be ready for act 3 when there’s basically no more NPCs and Lucas has all he needs. Drop Ava in at the end to info dump any clues the party missed.

solar trellis
cold swallow
#

Anyone want to read my take on the Cronus backstory?

clear idol
#

Sure

wise glen
#

Act 2 was a great success - Cham sacrificed themselves to get the Montero safe distance before it exploded, And that player took over Clayton (drawn at random) - quite the role reversal!

#

All of the Cronus crew apart from Flynn now dead, and the players are aware of Ava but haven’t located her.

clear idol
#

Damn, things escalated

cold swallow
# clear idol Sure

First the basic ideas

LV-1113 is not just an engineer outpost, but built over a Xeno city underground populated by ancient citizens, the creators of the engineers who modeled their civilization after them

The basic gist is that the black goo is the blood of the Biomechanoid old ones

The progenitors having used a vaginal shaped Stargate to open a portal to the Gigerion dimension

The gateway involves using the energy to pierce into an embryonic black hole

Creating a kind of tube between a portal and the black hole

This Stargate and the Xeno city was being excavated by nomadic engineers, it is believed that they rebelled against their creators and destroyed themselves and the progenitors in the process

With this context in mind, here is the new backstory for the Cronus

I also reinvented the Erebus to look like the space station from aliens vs the avengers, but red and brown rather than torquise

IMG_0941.png
#

This sets up destroyer of worlds and heart of darkness

The space jockey is the pilot who bombed the Ariarcus colony

The Erebus is reinvented to look like this station from avengers vs alien

clear idol
#

Interesting

#

Do like the xeno city

#

I also liked how it looked in dark descent

quick pike
#

I have a question about Lucas and how it is revealed they are an Android. It says in the cards that only if they are critically injured this fact is revealed. However, wouldn't it make sense that as soon as they take a health hit this happens?

quasi parcel
#

The outer layer of clothing and artificial skin is enough to keep the mechanics concealed even with a few surface searches.

quick pike
#

Yeah but the white fluid would be seen I'd say. That's a pretty evident clue

candid apex
#

Losing hp doesn't equate wounds, just superficial nicks.

quick pike
#

I see

flat wraith
#

...or possibly even just exhaustion. It's pretty abstract until an actual injury is rolled.

solar trellis
#

Ah, the eternal discussion about whether health or hit points means actual damage or just sorta draining the person's sort of "fight energy" until they take a real physical hit.

#

ALIEN just suggest the latter because you can just wait for a bit and all your HP is back

flat wraith
#

It's an eternal discussion because no one likes the actual answer: Abstraction and nothing more.

solar trellis
#

Personally I like the idea of fight energy (or whatever you call it, I just made that up), it just fits with the cinematic idea of combat I like to use when I imagine combat.

candid apex
#

I believe hit points were invented as a measure of how many shells of a certain type a ship could take in wargames, a long long time ago. It's no wonder they don't model living bodies very well (or android ones, for that matter).

quick pike
#

Agreed. I struggle a bit to see how hit points fare against bullets in a body

candid apex
#

You need the abstraction in a ttrpg but once you start working out what it all means it breaks down. Hp is both meat points and fight energy, but it's also neither.

In video games it's different again, but they have more processing power to track all of that stuff.

#

You could dispose of them altogether and work with a table of injuries that get progressively worse, but you run the risk of it getting incredibly complicated. Game needs to be playable by human beings after all. Probably fits arpg better than a heroic fantasy game, though.

quick pike
#

Who makes more sense for you to be lucas? I think miller as the captain would have a too important role to be Lucas.
Davis could be a candidate but being a drug addict. It's weird
Rye is the one that most makes sense for me. It's specially cruel due to her "brother sick back in her home world" backstory.
Cham... Could be too. But he is a good guy. It's not bad there is a sacrificial good guy around instead of all morally grey people or evil
Wilson has already a good role as the corporate agent too I think

So what's your take on it?

flat wraith
#

I think Cham or Rye have the least to lose interest wise. I think the choice between the two really depends on if one of your PCs actually want to be the "good guy" (Cham) or not.

flat wraith
#

I'm watching the Mystery Quest play of Chariot. It always annoys when a "professionally" streamed game f's up the rules. I always feel bad for people trying to find advice on how to run these things from actual plays who never get it right.

candid apex
#

Yeah, but then on the other hand I screw them up as well from time to time 🤷‍♂️

solar trellis
solar trellis
quick pike
solar trellis
#

Yeah, but I feel everyone except Wilson is really a "good" person at heart so when shit hits the fan I think they're the ones who would make the "good" moral choice. At least that's how it has played out in the two times I've run it.

flat wraith
solar trellis
#

Enh, I really don't mind. Learning whole new systems is difficult and ALIEN is a weird one. I would say it depends on the streamer, if you're a dedicated professional that's one thing but most streamers are part-time and don't make much if any money.

flat wraith
quick pike
#

I think it would be far better if it had leaned more into a more narrative/cinematic side of the rpg spectrum. I personally modify the rules in a way that I see that achieves that better

flat wraith
#

I mean, that's fair for the table as long as everyone agrees ahead of time. If it's presented as the Alien RPG without any caveat for mass consumption, that makes you a liar.

#

To save space, just assume I attach that grandpa simpson meme to everything I post from here out.

#

I have a fairly regular experience where I search for some RPG review for something that isn't super popular and when I finally find one it's someone talking about their opinion of the rules instead of an actual review. I guess I've just been burned enough looking for something promised in a title and getting the equivalent of a tiktok dance (someone just wanting attention in front of a camera) where I'm really sensitive to it now.

solar trellis
quick pike
#

Raw. Imo. Not well. With changes, it has the base for a really cool system. But that's a lot of GM work and most of us buy the systems precisely to avoid that xD

I'll stop with it now. As it's the Cotg thread

solar trellis
#

Heh OK, um, let's see... "should I include the Sotillo?". That works as a COTG question.

cold swallow
#

A main villain for players wanting to further capture the spirit of alien

A “she-wolf” who spreads pestilence(insect-like black goo) to infect others…though a bite works too

She is the “mother” of the monstrous entities of Cronus

IMG_0351.jpg
quick pike
#

Funny. Lucas hijacked the sotillo and destroyed the Cronus all by itself.

solar trellis
#

Haha I mostly brought it up as a joke because it's asked so often.

#

It's mostly there as an option should your game end up needing it and it's great for that, but it's not necessary. I haven't needed it either time.

flat wraith
quick pike
#

Mhm. I wanted to see other opinions about it

solar trellis
#

ducks

flat wraith
quick pike
#

Speaking of. It's mentioned that the neomorphs die within 24 hours. However it's safe to assume that the Cronus has been drifting far longer than that (can't recall exactly how much time)

So... How long do your neomorphs live for?

solar trellis
#

It's been drifting for like 75 years IIRC

#

I said the xenos could hibernate

flat wraith
quick pike
#

How did you paced stress in this module? I remember last time I ran it they entered the famous panic cascade even if I did let them rest a lot

quasi parcel
# quick pike How did you paced stress in this module? I remember last time I ran it they ente...

I decided that dehydration meant they could not reduce stress in Act 1 (this might be in the scenario, in fact). I also made sure they each had a significant skill test during the initial ‘wake up on the Montero and figure out what’s happened’ scene. I found that worked well, otherwise they might not have any stress at all for most of the exploration.

Once they are into encounters with neomorphs and abominations, then splitting the party is the best way to avoid panic spirals.

Also drugs.

solar trellis
#

They start dehydrated coming out of the pods but I think it's very easily rectified.

quasi parcel
solar trellis
#

Damn! No hope?

quick pike
#

"Take this - it is Hope. The very last of it. It is yours now."

quasi parcel
#

*Stress. I’ve been playing too much The One Ring rpg!

quick pike
#

I feel that the rulebook philosophy of "don't roll for everything" doesn't align with the adventure and the suggested rolls.
There are a lot. And I mean a lot of meaningless rolls specially at the start of it.
Am I the only one that feels this way?

quick pike
#

On another note. For those of you who didn't introduce the Sotillo. How did the module end in your case?

flat wraith
# quick pike I feel that the rulebook philosophy of "don't roll for everything" doesn't align...

Kinda - I think this is a special case where the beginning is meant to get the PCs used to the system where there isn't much risk. Like, they should have to roll to use the intercoms and all the incidental stuff like knowledge or things outside what Alien expects to roll for. But once you're in Alien's systems (Stealth, Combat) yeah there's a bit of rolling. I think clearer explanation should be there shouldn't be many rolls outside of those more stuctured systems.

flat wraith
#

Another time Lucas overrode the controls, locked all of the doors open, and then opened the cargo bay to suck everyone out into space or suffocate them.

#

Once I introduced the Sotillo after all the monsters were killed and it ended in a shootout with it's crew which wasn't really climactic. I did happen to have an abomination handy (I forgot the circumstances as to why they weren't there in the first place) to chase them as they escaped off the Cronus into the Sotillo, but it wasn't quite enough. Next time I'd have most of the Sotillo crew infected with something if I had to do it again.

quick pike
flat wraith
quick pike
flat wraith
#

I think before the impact Wilson ended up being hunted the Clayton abomination alone on the Montero at one point.

solar trellis
solar trellis
quick pike
#

That's smart. My players literally just did shoot at everything and had very decent rolls

#

Until Lucas blasted them out of space with the Sotillo

#

By ramming the sotillo against the reactor

solar trellis
#

lol sweet

calm kettle
#

Guys i have a question

#

If i got it right

#

In CoTG after the systems come back online

#

The neomorph spores infects all of the ship, right?

#

And that's when the PCs get the whole "get the cure" in medbay

#

But as stated, the cure only turns the person into a abomiantion

#

So, how do i deal with the neomorph infection occurring?

quasi parcel
calm kettle
#

If the PC don't use the cure a bloodbuster kills them

#

So in the end they die either way?

flat wraith
#

Also, the spores don’t have to infect the ship. I’ve seen people play it where it only happens if they come into contact at one of the places where there’s spores. That being said, it’s easier if it just infects the ship when the power comes on so the GM has cart Blanche to infect whoever is convenient.

#

…which is the long way of saying “it’s your call”

somber seal
hard oriole
quick pike
# hard oriole How?

Extensively. Sharing my changes would take me a lot of time Im afraid I don't have.
But in a nutshell. Streamlining certain things (specially combat) and giving action/consequence to every roll

hardy sedge
#

Message was too long. My game resume of CotG with seven player characters.

📎 message.txt
somber seal
hardy sedge
blazing maple
#

Hey everybody, I’m pretty new to the Alien RPG, and when trying to read the CotG scenario I am just a bit lost. Is it laid out somewhat confusingly or is that just me? Any recommendations or tips for this?

dull lagoon
#

A little more specificity would help: what’s confusing you/getting you lost?

blazing maple
#

Again, maybe just me, but I feel like it’s ordered/laid out in a way that’s confusing. I’m not even super sure where to start. I’ve read some but not all of it.

#

Might be best for me to just look up a video explaining it.

flat wraith
#

A lot of it is figuring out which details are the important ones, and which ones are flavor. It helps to imagine what’s happening as you read it and do it in somewhat of a chronological order. For instance, Act 1 is the haunted house - everything is dark, and the PCs are racing their air supply to find the survivors.
Act 2 is fixing the ship while being hunted by a neo and battling NPC infections.
Act 3 is the end game agendas including the PCs who are becoming abominations.

blazing maple
#

Gotcha, I think doing that on top of some video guides might really help me. I will start with the room descriptions, then the acts, I think.

flat wraith
#

Btw - most actual plays of this I’ve seen they screw up so pay attention. I think when you read it and get that “oh this will be cool” thought in your head - pay attention to that more.

#

Also - for act 1 review the air supply and stealth rules. They’ll be rolling air supply roughly every room at first and that frequency works well.

#

It also kind of helps to do a separate pass to match the PCs agendas with the areas they’ll be fullfilled on the map. That makes for a nice overview.

blazing maple
#

I love actual plays, but rarely use them to get advice or rules, so no worries there.

#

Thanks for the advice though!

flat wraith
#

No prob. I remember struggling through this myself so I like to pass on the knowledge having been though the same thing 🙂

solar trellis
#

my suggestion is to make a cheat sheet of the events along with things that can trigger them. You can just reference it as you go along

#

I do agree it can be confusing to understand because unlike most RPGs it splits the room descriptions from "Events" and gives you the freedom to place the latter when you want

#

So much depends on your players creating the narrative yourself, it can be tricky to know when to step in yourself with the events

flat wraith
#

I actually like the events split up - it’s a better structure for a “toolkit” for the DM. After I got used to it I actually like the layout of the Alien modules better than most others.

solar trellis
#

Yes, sorry, I didn't mean it as a criticism, I think it's great. It's just quite different from most TTRPGs I've seen.

flat wraith
#

Oh yeah - no offense taken. Just talking about my personal evolution too 🙂

olive sparrow
#

It is not the standard adventure structure that is used by D&D and most other RPG adventures. But by splitting up the locations from the events, it makes it easier for a GM to make an event happen WHEN it will be best for the progressive escalation of tension in the adventure, instead of events being written to be tightly tied to WHERE in a location.

#

It takes a bit of adjustment, but it is ultimately a very flexible structure to present the ideas. Especially once you get used to the idea that events are mostly optional. Beyond the mandatory ones, only use the events that excite you and as many events as you need/have time for. Be prepared that your players will be making decisions that generate plenty of drama on their own by following their agendas.

solar trellis
#

Yeah, exactly.

#

Especially that last point about the players driving a lot of the action.

hardy sedge
#

@blazing maple Hey. This Video helps at least about the way to read the Campaign Booklet.

wise glen
#

Is there an idiot guide to using the blips on the map? I started being fairly free form until the party split and I needed to track everybody was - but I realise it’s probably a good shout to do it from the get go

wise glen
#

How can I reasonably track aliens without the players knowing?

candid apex
#

Write down their current location on a piece of paper, then cross out and write down the new location as it moves.

Or just eyeball it, to be honest.

wise glen
#

Yeah I just did whatever was best cinematic effect my first time playing

clear idol
#

Same here, I went quite loosely with a xeno moving and more looked at what made for a great movie to screw the players

flat wraith
#

Yeah - to be honest it kind of doesn't make a difference where it is unless it's being actively tracked by the PCs. It CAN be anywhere until they prove it can't be. Obivously you should watch for if any sections are completely unavailable to it for any reason, but if it's not moving even a motion tracker won't spot it so it's not a huge issue.

solar trellis
#

I mean, I have literally created bad guys out of thin air because I felt the game needed it.

wise glen
#

Crikey, so a second attempt at running CotG went a good deal more rapidly than before - two PCs headed to the reactor before the ship was awoken and 'mother of all headaches' - and there were a number of Xenomorph fights. I think I got things a little wrong - it was always up-close and personal, but can I clarify - Xenomorph attack rolls auto-hit? You can't roll mob to avoid them, because there is no opposed STR to roll against, right?

candid apex
#

There's an attack roll. If there's at least one success the target can make an armour roll if they are wearing armour of any kind, or a close combat roll of they are carrying any kind of weapon and have a fast action left for the round.

Each success on either negates a point of damage. If there is any damage left over, the attack is a hit and the effect listed under the attack happens as described.

flat wraith
#

For what it's worth, some of my PCs always went to the reactor too. When they find the burnt "spacesuit" it's always a great jumpscare 🙂

solar trellis
#

in Kuato voice: START THE REAC-TOR

gusty grail
#

Hi, getting ready to GM this for the first time and I have a question.

Why is the Company sending space truckers instead of a specialized task force to retrieve this supposedly mega important space vessel and its cargo. You are told that they know in advance the Montero is going to encounter the Cronus and they send 4 randos and 1 agent of their own. Anybody got a plausible explanation for this?

flat wraith
#

It's probably someone like Burke wanting to keep it under the radar. "...then corporate gets involved, the military gets involved, then there's no exlusive rights for anybody..."

clear idol
#

Company policy is to do as the Company tells you to

gusty grail
#

Also it occurred to me that they probably also want to be fast and quiet about it so nobody else gets to it first since there is competition and corporate espionage involved.

clear idol
#

Aye

#

Low profile, quickly and quietly, take in the big prize

flat wraith
# gusty grail Hi, getting ready to GM this for the first time and I have a question. Why is t...

This is a great module btw - you should have fun with it 🙂 A few tips:
-Review the stealth mode and air supply rules for Act 1. The PC's should be rolling almost every new room. This will push them to get to their goals quickly and probably split up. And since the module says "MUTHER turns on life support" you can turn it on for any excuse really so there's actually no danger.
-When you give the PCs the map of the Cronus you might want to point out important locations. They should be moving through the ship with a plan - not like a dungeon crawl
-Think of interesting ways for the xenos to attack and present themselves. The module says where they are, but not what makes them creepy. Also - Neos are very squishy. Attack from ambush almost exclusively.
-All of your NPCs wake up at once, so figure out how you want to RP them ahead of time unless you want to improv that on the fly. I know I don't want that kind of pressure 🙂

solar trellis
candid apex
#

Yeah he's great. Didn't his sister slap him in the face for playing such a horrible actor after seeing the movie?

solar trellis
#

Oh I'd never heard that. Burke was definitely the poster child for evil corporation for a while (and still is I guess).

candid apex
#

Can't remember where I heard that story, may be v fictional but it's too good not to believe.

alpine owl
#

As a DM do you all memorise all the rooms and discription? Of do you take the booklet out and then see how to tell it?
Gonna do chariot soon for the first time 🙂 need some pointers

flat wraith
#

I've found it's just easier to memorize it. Like, you'll probably memorize it anyway trying to come up with the right amount of detail for notes, so you might as well lean into it 🙂

candid apex
#

I just wing it. Sometimes I forget something, tough 🤷‍♂️

solar trellis
flat wraith
#

You just have to read the description, THEN picture it and walk through the ship in your mind. Then later at the table you describe your memory of the walkthrough.

solar trellis
flat wraith
fossil seal
# alpine owl As a DM do you all memorise all the rooms and discription? Of do you take the bo...

When I ran CotG on Roll20 I put notes on the map in the GM level to show things like infestations, body positions and the track the PCs have already followed. I made cheat sheets for skills and talents (actually I did these for a con last year). For Destroyer of Worlds I made little booklets from the original materials to cover "Combat & Damage", "Locations", "Events", "Xenos" and so forth. These are tabs on my PDF reader and I can quickly fly to whatever I need.

wise glen
#

I am running Act III (without Sotillo) tonight for the first time. The problem is, that it's been 2.5 months since the previous session and it's all a bit hazy for both the players and myself. Does anyone have tips on how to make this a successful session?

#

Cham is dead, Rye is undiscovered as Lucas, Davis is a bit of a non-entity so far, and Wilson/Miller are in some degree of cahoots. Ava has not been discovered, nobody has been Infected. The air scrubbers have been fixed, but comms and engines are offline.

#

My gut feeling is to re-set everyone into the cryo bays with the recovering Cronus crew, and give a verbal introduction: "This has all gone to shit, there are spores everywhere and your air is running out (everyone down to 1 air). You keep hearing the distant noises of something moving around the ship. Without the Montero, you turn to Johns to find out what can be done. (and then re-iterate the comms/scrubbers/engines)

candid apex
#

I'd probably spend a fair amount of time on the recap to go over everything again, although that doesn't always work.

flat wraith
# wise glen Cham is dead, Rye is undiscovered as Lucas, Davis is a bit of a non-entity so fa...

So here's the deal - you're still in Act 2 if all this is true. Either plan for a long session that goes from the rest of act 2 through to Act 3, or plan for another session after this.
Act 2 should have the rest of the repairs happen and a few encounters with the abominations where those happen (and maybe a neo - but that ideally should have happened in the air scrubber shaft).
The Cronus crew should mess things up. Have Johns give contradictory orders from Miller, WY-whats her face try bribing people to escape with her and abandon their friends, Reid gets really on edge waving a gun around, the doctor freaking out and running off, ect... AND THEN when the party is vulnerable one of the NPCs turn.
By the end of Act 2 you should have casualties from aboms one way or another, and should probably have no character not occupied by a player at that point - either they die and ended up in an NPC, or the rest of the NPCs turned into aboms or got killed by them.
Also make sure all the players know, and have the opportunities to fullfill their agendas. Especially make sure Lucas knows that he has found everything he needs.

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From there, Act 3 is just about handing out the Act 3 agendas and watching the fun. Feel free to turn any PCs whose agendas got nerfed for whatever reason. With Lucas trying to destroy the ship, Davis going all Rambo with no way to relieve stress, and Wilson trying to save his own ass you should have a decent plot going you don't even have to push forward. Any turned PCs are just a bonus at that point.

And don't decide on the Sotillo yet. Weird dice rolls may mean you need more characters for PCs OR more monsters to kill.

wise glen
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This is really got to be the last session I think - unless there is some extreme circumstances at the 11th hour.

flat wraith
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...also - I'm assuming the Montero already blew up?

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...also also - has it been revealed that the rest of the Cronus crew took the Draconis 26 cure? Because if not, having a bunch of them pop and leave neos on the ship is a quick way to move things forward.

wise glen
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The Montero is gone, most of the crew are down to one to 2 air, Johns revealed to everyone took the cure just after the blood buster

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I have about 2.5 hours total, everyone has their act three agenda - so we now have two people wanting to repair the ship and two people wanting to sabotage it

flat wraith
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Did Cooper's neo get away after it popped out of his head?

wise glen
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They managed to kill it, but I’m not above synthetically adding another one in

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Similarly, I don’t mind making the reactor encounter more dangerous and ignoring the engine relays

flat wraith
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Okay - so in general, here's what I'd do:

  1. Don't worry about the air supply. STRICTLY enforce the supply rolls - that's every turn, AND every time something stressful happens and it will take care of itself while adding a bit of tension to boot.
  2. Ignore the comms and the outside engines. Just have them need to fix the bridge controls and the reactor.
  3. You should have 4 Cronus crew left I think. Have two go off alone to do something and have them turned the next time a PC meets them. If none of the players die by around midgame, have a neo kill the remaining NPCs. Flynn makes a good candidate to run off and hide and Reid makes a good candidate for being aggressive and people thinking it's normal :). I also like attacking Clayton with the Neo and having a PC witness it because she has that ability to move the attack to them.
  4. Give a PC the infected agenda as soon as the game starts who doesn't have the suit.
    Bonus - try to attack Lucas with a xeno at least once when he's with the party. The white blood spew if he gets hit is a good moment. But don't push it - if he's clever enough to get to the end without revealing himself let him have the win.

The goal is at about the 1 hour to go mark to have no more NPCs left, a xeno or two, and most of the PCs opposing each other.

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RE: #4 - if they've taken the cure. If not, I'd have them make a sickness roll early and if they miss they birth a neo.

wise glen
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Thanks for the advice - I did what you suggested and we managed to bring to a satisfactory conclusion

flat wraith
wise glen
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I had the bloodburster kill Johns pretty sharpish after he gave the exposition about needing the pilot station online. They finally figured the duality of the spores vs mutating vaccine.

The final end sequence was as follows:

Davis had gained so much stress she killed Reid deliberately and then went berzerk, shooting Rye/Lucas and revealing him before running off. Miller got infected and throttled Wilson, then broke into the Medbay and killed Flynn by crushing her skull with bare hands before bleeding out. Davis ran off to the corporate suite, thinking MUTHR was lying about there being no escape pods, while Lucas rolled all the Quintrycetiline into the Reactor and blew it up.

flat wraith
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Yeah that sounds suitably satisfying 🙂

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I think Lucas always has a bit of a leg up because he can usually isolate himself and do what he wants before the rest of the crew figure out he's after EVERYONE.

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And Davis with a flamethrower is always a good time 🙂

clear idol
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Holy Hell, things really escalated in your session

still breach
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Hello there! Im about to start my first game of alien rpg tomorrow. Starting from Chariot of the Gods.

How have you handled the communication? I mean yhe pressure suits surely have radios so they can speak with eachother even from distance. But how do you run it, do they work through the whole ship or just a couple of rooms away (walls being int he way etc), and does it work to communicate from outaide the ship from pressure suit to pressure suit, or perhaps if you are outside of ship the radio cant go through ships hull but can go through comms array to inter com for example?

flat wraith
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I've always figured it's implied that the suits don't have radios because the map clearly marks where intercoms are.

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...but like, anything is possible in future-retro tech so who knows?

clear idol
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From Alien we can clearly see that the suits have communication build in

flat wraith
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Yeah that's true.

candid apex
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I eyeball it. "you're too far for radio communication now, the ship's metal structure blocks the signal".

quiet walrus
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At least 2k range. Structural and atmospheric interference a definite possibility though.

quasi parcel
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The intercoms are there for when the suits have come off (Act 2?).

In my game, the radio has a habit of failing when something interesting is about to happen. Or when the players are spending ages debating their next moves, when they’re not even in the same place.

solar trellis
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I always have it that the players have little intercoms they can use in or out of the suit, but might think about that next time. I kind of hate the idea of them keeping the suits on just for that, it feels so weird that suits don't have negative effects on anything (that I know of)

candid apex
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Last session I just flat out said I hated it when players tried to keep the suit on without the helmet, arguing that they should get some armour rating but no oxygen limitations. Yeah it's a glaring oversight in the rules, no you're not living your life wearing that all day. No armour rating for you.

Fortunately I have reasonable players.

still breach
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Thank you all for your thoughts! It really helps :).

Do you think it would be reasonable to give -1 mobility from using the pressure suit?

solar trellis
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I think I actually did when I ran this a couple of times.

candid apex
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It won't come up very often though. Maybe if you make running a slow action?

amber field
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Just wondering who, in your opinion, is best for the secret android? Mine would be Cham.

somber seal
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Same, either that or Rye

flat wraith
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I’m not 100% on Cham because a lot of times there’s at least 1 player who wants to be an unambiguous “good guy”

solar trellis
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That's a pretty good point. Other than him, definitely Rye, and I think Davis is a sneaky good pick because of her "alcoholism".

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Just not the Corpo or the Captain, they already have agendas of their own that are really useful to moving the narrative

amber field
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Thanks all, I've gone with Rye and they have accepted. Should be interesting.

fossil crown
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Why is my favorite since she can covertly overload the reactor with that great comtech skill

solar trellis
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QUAID START THE REACTOR

topaz vector
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so, many of us have run COTG, some have run it many times.
something i love to do is give each PC a kind of, actor. like, casting them. to help me play them in a certain style as a GM. i dont know if anyone else does this in game, but regardless, if you were to cast the movie/tv series of the chariot of the gods cinematic, who would you cast as each of the characters, and based off what performance?

for instance, maybe you'd cast Ava-6 with Dichen Lachman based on her work in Severance.
or Cham cast with Paul Walter Hauser based on his work in Black Bird

flat wraith
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Signoreny Weaver would be a pretty good Miller. I think she was in some old sci-fi thing that would fit pretty well.

fossil crown
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Kristen Stewart as Rye

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Zach Galfinakis as Wilson

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Tom Cruise as Dr. Cooper

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Benecio Del Toro as Cptn Bolaji

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Tom Holland as Horton

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Karen Robinson as Reid

flat wraith
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It's gotta be Tom Cruise from Tropic Thunder

fossil crown
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Exactly what I was thinking

topaz vector
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Im playing as captain miller in an upcoming game, gonna sass it up and give my best Taraji Henson

amber field
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how about Charlize Theron as Clayton?

topaz vector
somber seal
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I got invited to a game, and I decided to play Cham:

9ryxkt.jpg
candid apex
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See if you can be Lucas

flat wraith
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You can always tell Cham players who have played CotG before because they refuse to get out of the cargo loader.

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It’s real awkward trying to drink coffee in that opening scene with those giant grabbers.

candid apex
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Heavy machinery roll at -3

flat wraith
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Me: So who am I playing?
GM: Cham
Me: Oh. So who am I playing in act 3?

solar trellis
somber seal
solar trellis
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Yeah one of my favourite things in TTRPGs is when the player you chose to be Lucas plays well into the role.

somber seal
solar trellis
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Gonna be running this in-person for the first time (have run twice in Roll20). Any suggestions for cool third-party things I can add in?

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Documents or maps or sound/music/whatnot

raw agate
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I'm running Chariot of the Gods as a forum quest if anyone's interested. basically a play-by-post but everyone collectively votes on what the crew does instead of roleplaying individual characters. using midjourney for extra visuals, take a look if this strikes a chord - https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/chariot-of-the-gods-alien-rpg.144113/

Sufficient Velocity
Chariot of the Gods - ALIEN RPG Sci-Fi - Horror

You are space truckers on the starfreighter USCSS Montero, running "the Gauntlet"—the trade route between Anchorpoint Station and the Frontier. Your ship's cargo hold is packed with dozens of tanks of dangerous Tritium gas that is in the process of decaying into extremely profitable Helium-3...

flat wraith
raw agate
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I'm essentially using the agendas as character motivations, and the hidden agendas are still meant to be a surprise to the collective players. Picture it as a narrative following the entire crew of the Montero, where you interact by voting or writing in to influence what happens in the fiction

candid apex
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Has anyone actually had the Sotillo appear in this scenario? I'm running it again and am thinking to lean a little more heavily into that angle.

flat wraith
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Basically they killed all of the xenos so brought it in as more bad guys and it ended in a shootout which didn’t feel “right” as a finale for an Alien scenario.

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In retrospect, I think it would work better as a ship full of potential xenos or a ship full of replacement PCs (or a combination if need be)

somber seal
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It is intended as a possible group of replacement PCs

solar trellis
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"only add the Sotillo to the mix if you feel the need for another twist in the story, want to make the scenario longer, or really need replacement PCs"

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(from the book)

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I haven't included it when I ran it, but it happened when I was a player. It was OK, felt a little like there were too many NPCs and the GM just wanted to use everything.

somber seal
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It only really works when you and your group are planning for the cinematic to go longer than 1 or 2 sessions

flat wraith
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But I mean if you want to use it right it’s pretty easy. Use the extra Neo, and infect 4 PCs who manage to survive. Boom - you need the Sotillo 🙂

somber seal
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A fun thing that can be done for longer sessions, especially when one considers the amount of air in the spacesuits, can be that the players can use the vent that takes you to the air scrubbers, and actually clean them of the spores, me and some other guys that have run that idea usually require the players to go back to the Montero and collect scrubber cleaning supplies, but it works as an idea to allow longer play, and gives an extra thing for players to do

solar trellis
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WITHOUT the Sotillo

solar trellis
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Looking for some music to play during my live sessions, any suggestions?

clear idol
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I used the soundtracks from the various Alien movies, Prometheus and Covenant should lend themselves quite well

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Even scared my players a few times

solar trellis
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I'm also looking for the printout that comes from Cronus's MUTHUR, it looks like it came from a dot matrix printer

hardy sedge
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I tried to use the various movie Soundtracks but honestly they did not fit really well because a lot of the single Tracks tend to start slow and with a tense mood bit suddenly rise into a very loud music that destroy the tense mood.

There exists a German musician called "D20Sounds" who has a Soundtrack which is called "Dark Gaming Ambiance" i believe is for free on Amazon and Spotify. I like his ambiance music a lot.

solar trellis
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Agreed, I usually try to find music made specifically for certain RPG sequences that's longer and less of a uh, "song". I've found a few good logner clips for ambiance and setup (like the Alien Isolation menu) but really want something for the action/horror scenes and that's rough.

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I know AI is bad but damn it would be cool if we could take a specific piece out of a movie sound track and sort of loop/extend it easily. I would love to use the music for the first bodyburster scene in Covenant for the Cooper death/reveal scene but it's only 7 minutes long, a longer version would be awesome.

candid apex
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Alien isolation tracks, occasionally just gently in the background. Unless there's a tense scene of course..

solar trellis
clear idol
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Oh those are cool

cinder herald
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I played little fluff that Flynn stares into Coopers eyes in moments before birth and yells “Cooper, black veins in eyes…. how…” and one of players now use this check of eyes as a help. Pretty clever 🫶

solar trellis
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Had my first session, with a crew of people I've never met, and I cannot overstate just how much I love this little module. Third time in and it's just so much fun to run, I absoutely love listening to the players discuss options, just from the first little bit where they're looking at the map of the Cronos and figuring out their gameplan while considering everyone's desires, and air needs, etc... so good.

flat wraith
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Yeah it’s gets better each time right?

somber seal
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I always pick Cham if I can when playing, I wanna do a run where I can get him out alive as a human.

I, without fail so far, either end up sacrificing myself to save someone, die clearing the air scrubbers to save everyone from getting infected from the spores (this is a nice way to allow longer play in the cinematic, as it allows players to not be stuck on the oxygen time limit), or the GM picks me as Lucas because they know I can keep my mouth shut

flat wraith
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Oh my god this sounds lovely.

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Playing as Cham with the complete freedom to be the guy we all know Cham is because you’ve already seen the module so survival offers nothing over just being a good dude.

somber seal
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I have not succeeded, but I will continue to try

9ryxkt-1.jpg
flat wraith
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I literally just asked one of my players if they ever wanted to run Alien after this conversation.

somber seal
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The idea of looking at how a scenario asks for one to be a backstabbing jerk, picking the nicest golden retriever of a person that is available, and just going out of one's way to be a genuinely heroic person is really fun

candid apex
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Yep, this module deserves a prize.

clear idol
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Do you think it’s possible to play this scenario without the perfected? Not fond of them and kinda want to do more with synths and some Pathogen mutations

candid apex
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Cotg doesn't have the perfected

clear idol
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Oh yes right, stupid me

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I got it confused with HoD

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Need more coffee

solar trellis
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Just curious when you guys allow your PCs to recover stress during the module. Seems to me that the moment they know there's a threat of some kind on board the Cronos the whole ship is no longer safe. Does that make sense?

solar trellis
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I was also thinking that until they know the "rules" of the threats they don't feel anywhere is safe. Like, they're going to assume the seed pods have put infectious stuff in the air, so they might think any air in the ship is infectious (and honestly I'm not sure if it isn't lol).

candid apex
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If players say their characters don't feel safe anywhere, who am I to say they do..? 😅

"what could you do to get a sense of safety?" and go with that. Lock themselves into a room and close the vent access would do it I guess.

quasi parcel
# solar trellis Just curious when you guys allow your PCs to recover stress during the module. S...

From a gameplay perspective, it’s important to have an ebb and flow. Stress rises rapidly as soon as a crisis occurs, and once they have 4 stress they are odds-on to panic each time they roll, which can then easily snowball. So you don’t want them at a high level of stress going into those situations, at least not until the end game. You also want the players to be willing to push rolls without feeling like they already have too much stress.

From a thematic perspective, the movies are full of calm moments followed by jump-scares and action scenes. Moments of rest and stress recovery are one way in which the game emulates that pacing.

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I’ve never heard GMs complain about a lack of stress when running cinematics, but I’ve very often heard complaints about the panic cascade as one player’s panic causes another to go.

fleet patio
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Has anyone ran CotG with the Evolved Rules yet? Apart from the combat and item rule (like ammo), what should one be mindful of?

candid apex
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I haven't yet, but I just started a game so with hindsight this would've been a perfect opportunity.

solar trellis
main flicker
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So first off, thank you everyone for the advice and ideas. I just got done running my second session of ARPG Chariot of the Gods. We just finished Act I, things have kicked off and I could not be happier. Please don’t mind the wall of text for the recap.

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My players took Rye, Cham(Lucas), Davis and Wilson leaving me Miller to run as an npc. Things moved slowly to start, though once they found the Cronus, Wilson took Miller aside and told her some of his orders in order to convince her to work with him for profit. Miller stayed behind to coordinate things while the rest moved into the Cronus. Davis and Wilson went to the corporate suite while Rye and Cham went to the reactor. Wilson and Davis stumbled over the headless man and there was a disagreement on who would get the shotgun (Wilson got it), before going to the corporate suite where Davis managed to find the hidden EEV without Wilson noticing. Rye went into the reactor room to begin cleaning it, while Cham began trying to clean the pile of debris and woke up the abomination. After a valiant effort by Cham to wrestle the abomination while Rye swung at it with a cutter tool, it broke free, Cham dropped the incinerator, the PCs hard panicked and began to run. Rye ran back to the reactor room and Cham ran out to the hall. Rolled to see who it would follow and the abomination went after Rye and crushed her skull. Cham kept running.

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While the rest heard this pandemonium going on over comms, I had Ava-6 appear and I was playing up the creepiness factor when Davis shot her with the pistol causing a system shutdown. The Mu/Th/Er on the Cronus turns the main power back on and they heard an alien screech echo as the adult neomorph is awakened from hibernation. Rye’s player comes back taking over Miller, calls everyone back to the Montero which starts Montero’s Mu/Th/Er to start the reactor failure at the same time the Cronus Mu/Th/Er also deactivates the cryopods.

Everyone races back to the Montero, Wilson and Miller try to get Mu/Th/Er to stop the countdown but only got a “unable to comply, Order 966” and they then have a private argument over whose fault the situation is. Cham and Davis try to go to the reactor and shut it down manually but learn that the controls have been disconnected from the reactor. At which point they abandon ship. Cham breaks the umbilical free, Miller and Wilson prep Daisy and Davis catches the ship’s cat, puts it in a carrier and tries to set the autopilot. She is rapidly running out of time, fails, panics and flees…leaving the cat carrier behind. The three of them get into Daisy and manage to hide behind the Cronus as the Montero goes critical rupturing a bunch of rooms on deck A which get sealed. The game ended with Davis doing drugs and lowering stress in the cockpit of Daisy, Wilson and Miller spacewalking to fix the engines, and Cham secretly wandering into the sci labs, getting a sample of the black ooze, Mu/Th/Er‘s emergency keycard, and releasing the spores into the atmosphere of the Cronus. As we faded to black they heard a voice come over the intercom system “This is …acting captain Johns, is anyone there?”

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I am so excited to see how things go next week after everyone got their act 2 agendas because it promises a lot of conflict with how players are setup and to definitely continue spiraling. And I have a player who is coming back from vacation who is going to be taking over one of the Cronus crewmen and will be getting the story of what happened from the other PCs during the game, which should be fun.

P.S my wife who is playing Davis has still not forgiven me about the cat carrier.

clear idol
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Glorious

candid apex
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Hey @main flicker, welcome to the server! Didn't realise you'd shown up.

Sounds like you made a great start with this. Fascinating how everyone ends up with a completely different story with this module.

main flicker
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Hey Richard! I have been lurking here for a couple weeks now.

That is definitely one cool thing about it. I am excited about my Miller and Wilson working together, somewhat at odds with the rest of the group, which I feel like I have not seen before. They definitely don’t trust each other, but their goals are aligning as they both want to make it rich. Davis is currently looking for the most expedient way off the ship, and I am not 100% sure what Cham(Lucas) is up to as he is playing things solo and close to the vest. But having already gotten a sample, and having secret access to Mu/Th/Er definitely sets him up well for the rest of the game.

candid apex
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Ha, if he lives long enough with those spores flying about..

solar trellis
solar trellis
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So my Wilson dropped a vial of 26 in a hallway... how dangerous is it? The book says ingesting it results in a Virulence 12 disease, would you be ingesting it if a small vial broke in a hallway or...? The only time I think we've seen it in action is when David nukes the engineers with like a billion of them.

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I kind of already ruled that nothing really happened and people just ran over it but I was thinking of it having a reduced effect or something.

solar trellis
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Also, what exactly triggers act III?

clear idol
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Ava spilling the beans

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The planet they visited, the Pathogen, what killed so many crew, what the vaccine does, that they still have this shit in the ship

main flicker
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I wouldn’t have it do anything unless there is direct skin contact. That said, if they stepped on it, it is on their suits/shoes and they are tracking it around. Which opens up a lot of opportunities for them to come into contact with it later

somber seal
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If you don't want everyone infected by the spores in the ship, or at least less likely to, a common thing me and some other GMs did the as give the players a chance to check the air scrubbers, because there is a vent to them, so it's possible, and if they can succeed a good enough roll or they could RP getting cleaning equipment from the Montero or in the Chronus, it would allow for taking off the space suits more, though it often has a character (mostly Cham if he isn't Lucas) get infected in the process of cleaning it

candid apex
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No space suits in the vents in my game.. Junior

somber seal
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Then sacrifice it is

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Either that or they RP getting something they can throw in there to do the work over time, and they won't know when it is safe, just that it will eventually be

candid apex
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They don't even know it's not safe initially, unless they've played it before.

somber seal
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Only if they either figure out there is something wrong with the air scrubbers, or they come up with a reason to check them at all

solar trellis
solar trellis
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Is it maybe when the Montero decides to self-kabluey?

clear idol
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No, the Monterro blowing up can happen either in Act 1 or 2

flat wraith
solar trellis
flat wraith
solar trellis
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Aha.
I do see that the first event of Act III is the engines coming online (after being fixed) and the ship heads for Earth. But it says it's because of Order 966... how does Order 966 get into the Cronus? Did the Montero's MUTHER kinda jimmy it over or something?

flat wraith
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I like showing that order to another PC besides Wilson if they go into the MU/TH/UR room

solar trellis
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Yeah, when someone else tries to find out why things are the way they are I hae MUTHER say Order 966 but refuse to give any more information. Usually leads to more Wilson/Miller conflict.

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Interestingly, there's this dot-matrixy looking printout someone made that comes from the Cronos' MUTHER showing what happend before the Cronos crew went to hypersleep. One thing it shows is that at one point Clayton recalibrated navigation to go to another planet (the one it mentions isn't on the map and I can't find info on it). Kind of similiar to the Cronos bugging off for Earth.

solar trellis
quiet walrus
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Atol - Atol was a celestial object orbiting the star POL-6387 in Three World Empire space on the Frontier.

image.png
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Weyland Isles.

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Its from the old Aliens RPG by Leading Edge.

image.png
solar trellis
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Oh, interesting. Seems like a weird place for Clayton to want the ship to go to?

flat wraith
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That handout isn't anything official right?

solar trellis
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I'm thinking maybe there's a secret Weyland base/facility/station there I can make up

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No it's not official, but it's pretty ticky-boo so I assumed when it was written they were using established locations/ideas

flat wraith
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Oh, scratch that. Forgot it was Clayton we're talking about.

solar trellis
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Yeah, where was it set in the first place?

quiet walrus
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Quicker to get there than risk transporting an infectious cargo to the Core systems.

flat wraith
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Heh. That log file includes Singh. Nice.

solar trellis
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Who's that? Oh, is that from Heart of Darkness?

flat wraith
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Yeah. They really crossed all i's and dotted the t's with that printout. I just read the whole thing. I think I'd use that for the next run.

solar trellis
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I really like it. The only thing I don't like is how it says MUTHUR can detect alien lifeforms, that seems like something the humans could exploit.

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Though... now that I think about it, that could maybe be something "broken" that could be fixed.

solar trellis
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Seriously, I can't find where the Cronus was actually set to go after leaving 26 Draconis.

long elk
clear idol
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You can always go with that the course is to one of the many bio-labs that WY owns

main flicker
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Finally finished running Chariot of the Gods, took about 16 hours of playtime. Since the last gameplay report, they mostly were split into 1s and 2s trying to fix the Cronus. In the back half of the module, they met the crew of the Cronus, cooper popped and they managed to get the bloodburster as it was escaping into the vents.

There was a big fight in the air scrubbers shaft where Miller got killed when the neomorph ambushed them(critical injury 66), Cham(Lucas) revealed himself as he and Johns heavily injured the neomorph and tried to hunt it down when it ran. Which led to them finding Wilson who had locked it into cargo bay 1, and together the three of them went in to finish it off. Unfortunately the abomination from the reactor showed up as well, attracted by all the noise after being disturbed earlier. Wilson got thrown into a wall by the abomination and broke his foot, Cham shot and missed multiple times before moving in with a maintenance jack, Johns got knocked prone by the neomorph which was a blessing in disguise as that made the abomination focus on the neomorph. As the two Xenos fought that gave the PCs time to stop panic spiraling, and despite only having 1 hp left the neomorph ended up winning with a tail spike through the abomination’s head as it moved in for the kill. The neomorph ran at this point and escaped.

During all of that Reid turned, breaking Flynn’s arm and then turned on Clayton and Davis. Clayton threw Davis in front of her, causing Davis to go down, and after a little bit of running around the bridge managed to kill Reid. At that point Clayton used Davis’ addiction against her offering the drugs from the corporate suite to earn Davis’ undying loyalty.

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Wilson spent most of the back half trying to move the urns Clayton hid in storage up to the escape pod, with him being interrupted multiple times and being found in random places by the rest of the crew, who never actually figured out what he was doing. In a surprising moment, he ended up chasing after the wounded neomorph and locking it in the cargo bay before being found by Johns and Cham in the aforementioned fight. At one point he had gotten himself alone with Flynn who was in the autodoc getting his broken arm fixed, decided Flynn was too unreliable and lied to Flynn who did not want to be alone, saying he would just be in medbay and instead finished moving the urns. They had refused to investigate the other med pod with the vivisected abomination, so I had it get out and kill Flynn, while Wilson was gone and supposedly watching Flynn. When Wilson returned to get Flynn and rejoin everyone else, the abomination was feasting Flynn, and Wilson immediately closed and locked the door.

Cham(Lucas) upon learning the Cronus was locked onto a course to Earth, sabotaged the air scrubbers breaking them permanently, began secretly sabotaging their efforts to fix Ava, and was looking for a way to destroy the ship without the crew stopping him.

#

Everyone else thought they were close to getting the ship under control with only the abomination in the medpod bay, and the wounded neomorph left. Wilson Davis and Johns went and annihilated the abomination, while Cham(Lucas) and Clayton continued work on Ava. Cham(Lucas) Took the opportunity to kill Clayton, distracting her and then clubbing her in the back of the head with a maintenance jack. After hiding the body he joined the others claiming the neomorph got Clayton. Wilson and Johns were infected by the inoculation and began feeling the first effects getting angry and arguing. They end up rushing to cryobay hoping to freeze and be able to get help on the other side. Johns fully turned as the pod closed, but was unable to break out before getting frozen. This left Davis and Cham(Lucas) who decided to hunt down the neomorph. Cham(Lucas) Tried to sneak attack Davis but she saw it in time and a fight broke out. Davis was lucky and managed to get a couple shots in, revealing Cham to be an android. She gave up not knowing Cham only had 1 health left and tried to defect to Bionational. Cham agreed telling her to get in the cryopod and promising to kill the neomorph. After she got in the pod, Cham went and overloaded the reactor. Just before it went off the neomorph entered the room and curiously inspected Cham as everything went white.

candid apex
#

Oof, that's a tense game Tanninks! Bloody hell

main flicker
#

It was a great time, the Lucas player never found out about the EEV in Clayton’s quarters. He said if he had known he would have set the Cronus to explode and actually took Davis with him on the EEV to the nearest Bionational outpost with samples. I was a little surprised it did not come up from Davis when she tried to defect, but her big concern was that the alien died and did not question Lucas that much on his goals.

solar trellis
#

ending with a big KABOOM, as always

#

good read

solar trellis
#

Montero just blew itself up. I made a document regarding what needed to be done to get the Cronus operational, made a ton of changes to checks and times but I think my group will really dig the planning aspects. Note that Johns went ABOM on the Montero, the Montero was like "OK I go boom now" so everyone fled to the Cronos and Cham (Lucas) and Rye flew the half-loaded Daisy outside the Vehicle Deck.

sinful fern
#

Hey, has anyone had any deaths actually occur before the Montero crew meets the Cronus crew in the cryo chamber? The birth of the neo seems like the first real opportunity, unless, for some reason, PCs get to the abomination before that.

somber seal
#

Only time it happened for me was when a player got themselves killed by going to the engine room first thing without anyone else

clear idol
#

Not yet although I did have one player almost die as they came across the Abomination in the reactor room before they went to the cryo room

candid apex
#

My current playthrough had Miller lose an arm to that thing before the Cronus crew woke up..

main flicker
#

My playthrough Rye and Cham immediately went to the reactor to bring power back on, and Rye got her skull crushed by the abomination. They did not meet the crew of the Cronus until after the Montero blew up and they had already fixed the engines.

flat wraith
#

My crew heads to the reactor too. I strictly do the air supply rolls so I think they were looking to turn the power on as their top priority. So the reactor is a logical first place to look.

sinful fern
#

Ah, I was thinking of railroading the first death to come when the neomporh comes out of Cooper so that the player that gets their character killed could swap to Cham/Lucas, but that reactor room actually sounds like one of the locations explored early, so I better just let them do so freely

#

(That player is playing Miller, so I doubt they'd be the ones go to the engines room instead of probably Rye)

flat wraith
#

The reactor room is a great reveal too. You describe the body in the suit with the "mask" all greyed out. Then they either look closer for clues or turn around and try to turn on the power. Either way you can describe the thing either lifting it's head up like a jump scare or slowly getting up behind them and then call for an ambush check to see if the PC notices in time.

candid apex
#

It's important to note that you can't force this.

I ran a pbp game where they saw the state of that room and noped out right away.

Later, when Ryebot was revealed (as an npc) they had to chase her to the reactor room, where she threw something at it, waking it up. It stumbled out, ignored the synthetic and attacked the pcs while Rye tried to overload the reactor. They managed to overcome all this (just), but it goes to show that the reactor room abomination could be the final boss fight of the scenario..

sinful fern
#

Just reading about it makes me all giddy for running it this weekend lol

flat wraith
# candid apex It's important to note that you can't force this. I ran a pbp game where they s...

This is a good point and leads to a small tangent. I at first didn't like Alien's module layout because it was too confusing and vague, but now I think the Events/Key Rooms only with only a small paragraph of the essential info is my favorite module format. It guarantees a non-railroady playthrough, and all those entries feel like tools you can just grab when you need them. And that bare minimum style entry tells you what important (what's there) and what you can improvise to suit the situation, and you can do it at a glance. You're not going to find something five paragraphs in that should have been in bold that wasn't that was an important detail you should have brought up.

#

(can you tell I'm running a 5e adventure path that has stuff buried in paragraphs all over the place from the size of my last post? 🙂 )

candid apex
# sinful fern Just reading about it makes me all giddy for running it this weekend lol

I haven't even told you how Ryebot was ousted. She tried to get the pcs on her side and not repair the Cronus. They refused, the Cham player then typed out a long and heartfelt speech about friendship (this was pbp).

It was so touching I struggled with the next bit, where the synthetic simply shrugged and tried to blow them out of the airlock.

They were wearing suits and managed to hold on to something, but my word were they furious.. 😆 🙈

sinful fern
sinful fern
candid apex
#

I felt seriously bad for the player at the time, but it made for a great gaming moment so I'm glad I did it.

candid apex
quasi parcel
# sinful fern Ah, I was thinking of railroading the first death to come when the neomporh come...

There’s absolutely no need to railroad anything in this scenario. Run it by the book with turn by turn exploration and air rolls, and let it pan out.

If someone dies when there’s no NPC available to take over yet, they can spectate for a little while.

The Cronus crew can wake up as soon as Muthur turns on the lights, and that can happen whenever you like - no need for any action by the PCs.

#

And no, waking up Muthur ‘early’ is not railroading. You’ve let the players’ choices take effect, and now you’re deciding how the world reacts. Maybe Muthur smells fresh blood?

[lecture over 😳 ]

clear idol
#

“Unregistered lifeforms detected. Begin sterilazation protocol” well, that is an unpleasant welcome

sinful fern
somber seal
solar trellis
#

I'd say it needs to be OK with the other players too. A couple of times this has happened in games when I was a player and it felt awkward and weird, definitely railroady to an extent. Especially since I like the "dead" characters, it felt like my affection for them was being manipulated.

sinful fern
#

But how would other players know that the PC's death was agreed upon in advance? Wouldn't the gm at least fudge a dice roll?

solar trellis
#

I would hope that the player and the DM was up front about it, myself.

somber seal
#

In my case, I moved my character to the agreed upon place, and I was pulled into the vents

quasi parcel
#

I don’t really like the idea, as it puts constraints on what the other players choose to do. What if one of them wants to move to that place by the vents? The GM is then in a position of trying to move them away to engineer the event they had planned.

Prepared events are great, but I wouldn’t want to decide in advance which PC is going to be involved in them.

somber seal
#

I never recommend this happening more than once

hollow flint
#

First time Alien GM here! I'm running this scenario with 2 players, and it looks like they're picking Davis and Cham as their characters. Given Miller and Wilson will be NPCs, any tips to drive the plot forward?

#

Also, would you suggest dropping Lucas? I'm already dropping the Sotillo plotline entirely

flat wraith
#

Davis and Cham as their characters. Given Davis and Wilson will be NPCs
Typo here?

flat wraith
hollow flint
flat wraith
#

So here's what I would do: Make one tough to get along with but absolutely looking out for the PCs, make one basically useless and nice but scared. Not a "bad" person, but excess baggage that the PCs need to decide if they're going to be helping or not. Then make the last one Lucas. I think the obvious choice would be:
Miller-good guy
Wilson-Useless
Rye-Lucas
but mixing that up could make it less cliched if that makes a difference for your group.

#

...athough Wilson does have pretty much "bad guy" orders. Maybe he's both useless AND not a great person.

hollow flint
#

I was planning on running Wilson as pretty useful and supportive while he secretely works towards securing the samples. That way it will look like I'm subverting the corporate ghoul archetype most of the game. Basically as-written.

flat wraith
hollow flint
#

Also, another question. Is the existence of ancient alien civilizations common knowledge? Or should the reveal that the Cronus was digging up alien ruins be world-changing for the characters?

somber seal
flat wraith
hollow flint
#

Right. So the UA, UPP and W-Y have suppressed so far what they have found on the Engineers

flat wraith
#

This is definitely a hot take - but the complete Alien canon as a package is just stupid. Take your cues from the movies to emulate the movies' feel. In the movies no one knows there's any sorts of aliens anywhere.

#

...except a handful a WY guys that want to learn about something they half heard about.

somber seal
#

Essentially, unless you're high up or really important, you don't know shit outside of some alien wildlife and maybe the Arcturians, nothing else

candid apex
#

I've run Lucas as an npc and it worked really well as a plot device. Your can drop hints and keep him under cover for a dramatic finale.

last bane
#

Hi!

Question. I'll be starting up a run of CoTG this weekend, and while I'm dotting my i's and crossing my T's for the GM prepwork, I find myself wondering if the PCs start out with a lot of firepower? Do you guys usually cut down on the available weapons, nix the incinerator or the motion sensor?

I'm partial to keeping the motion sensor, primarily for the tension of having sporadic pings they can't quite pinpoint or identify, but I'm curious as to what the general thoughts are in the community.

clear idol
#

Keep the motiontracker as it gives you the chance as GM to mess with players

sinful fern
#

Personally, I got rid of the flamethrower and the service pistol. There's already 2 guns (shotgun and storm rifle) + a barrel of QTC on Cronus

sinful fern
quiet walrus
#

The service pistol is fine. It makes sense that the captain has foresight to carry personal protection in an unknown situation. Loose the flamer. It makes no sense for a commercial starship to be equipped with a military flamethrower. If the group needs one later they'll have to Parker one up with the tools available on the Cronus. Also, swap out the pulse rifle/storm rifle in the armoury for a Covenant model F90. Non armour piercing.

clear idol
#

Agreed, shotguns and pistols make sense for a crew to have for self-defense

clear idol
last bane
quiet walrus
#

They won't have access to the shotty until they discover the first corpse. Going aboard with what's essentially rescue tools should be enough. Have Miller keep the pistol handy but hidden from the rest of the crew is a nice touch. Personal safety first.

candid apex
#

The corpse is also an optional event, so they might never get it if the gm doesn't want them to.

clear idol
#

You should the corpse though, extra stress

last bane
#

Corpse seems great.

#

I'm a heavy prepper, so I've got a grip on most of it. I've transferred most of the rules and mechanics from the Core Rulebook into an Obsidian project, and have begun attaching the CoTG elements on top of it to make it easier for myself when running the game. That's when I noticed the sheer list of weapons they'd start out with, which left me a little 🤨

image.png
clear idol
#

If you feel they have too many weapons then reduce it

last bane
#

Yessir! 🫡

sinful fern
#

Meanwhile my prep was half a page of scribbles including 2 reminders to ask players for oxygen rolls each turn 😅

#

It's probably obvious, but just putting out there that it's worth making a bullet list for each room. Helps to keep the flow as some printed descriptions seem made more so for GM than the players

last bane
#

Yeah, bullet lists were golden when it came to condensing the very long room descriptions into at-a-glance information

dull crow
#

Is there a name of the original captain of the Cronus? I can't seem to find a reference.

#

same with whoever the first officer was

quiet walrus
#

Lavigne was 3rd officer. Lugar was chief engineer. Without double checking HoD I'm not sure on the rest.

solar trellis
#

The Captain was Singh.

dull crow
#

I feel like the Foundry module didn't include that

#

I noticed a ship's log document that was posted here that doesn't seem to be included in the module unless I just can't find it.

flat wraith
dull crow
#

oh okay, kinda strange that they wouldn't include that in the CotG

flat wraith
solar trellis
#

Let's say that we're in Act II and everyone's prepping to have the Cronus ready for FTL. Clayton sneaks into MUTHUR or something and sneakily changes the desitination to someplace more friendly to her little plots... any ideas based on ya'll's knowledge of where they are and what's around?

candid apex
#

It'd have to match Clayton's idea of what's nearby 🤔

clear idol
#

Weyland-Yutani biolab 14. Gateway Station. Earth orbit.

quiet walrus
#

Gateway hasn't been built when the Cronus begins it's mission.

#

Weyland Corp - now Weyland Yutani - probably has Phobos Station orbiting Mars in the Core Systems, but chances are she's wanting safer and more isolated - Tark Weyland Station or any number of out of the way R & D complexes in the Weyland Isles.

clear idol
#

Once more Lurker delivers

#

All hail the Great Lurker

hollow flint
#

How long do the motes survive in the air if they cannot infect a host outright (ie. they are wearing a vacuum suit)?

#

One turn? One shift?

somber seal
quiet walrus
#

Just go with four shifts, same as the adult lifespan, or halve it if you're feeling generous.

sinful fern
candid apex
#

Spores can survive for days or weeks in nature, but these ones move actively so wouldn't be able to keep that up for very long.

I'd say the chance if infection is highest when just released (a Turn) but the area will remain contaminated for the rest of the game.

quasi parcel
#

Key point here: the PCs have no way of knowing. Have them roll stamina without giving a reason once or twice.

solar trellis
#

Just finished running this for the third time, man, I love it so much, easily my favourite TTRPG experiences. Always ends in a completely different way.

candid apex
#

Certainly. Could this be the best alien module?

solar trellis
#

I think it is no question, but I like the other two a lot as well.

sinful fern
#

Finally got to play the 3rd session of CotG. Reid sacrificed herself to get Montero far enough from Cronus to save her crew and Miller and Rye barely escaped on Daisy. Sadly Cham didn't survive the blast as he had to unlock a chain that secured Daisy in the loading bay and he got slammed in the cabin having no spacesuit on. It made for a nice makeshift funeral scene later on. He was so nice to the crew that one of the players actually teared up. Also Davis got skewered by a neomorph. This scenario is really amazing!

astral coral
#

Hii! I'm trying to start in the world of beign GM (alien is my first game to be mastered, but i also play some other rpgs)
So, thinking about it, which ways to bring lore to players about the Chronos is the best? And which things they should know by explore the ship? (Also, pardon my poor english, it's not my mother tongue)

solar trellis
#

My suggestion would be to read the scenario a couple of times and take notes. There is a lot of information there, almost too much and it can be overwhelming.

#

The Chronos would have been a somewhat-famous voyage so PCs might have heard something about it (though it was 70+ years ago). MUTHER can also provide them with limited historical records (and the ship's map, to help them plot where to go).

flat wraith
#

I'd also say (just for the sake of making it eaiser to remember) keep the system and what the draconis strain does (or is) locked behind either MUTHER or the keycard and a compture on the bridge. Lucas will need to know that stuff and you want to give that player some motivation to continue looking. The rest of the lore you can screw up (or forget) and it won't break the scenario.

#

...and if you've seen Alien Covenant you can use that a basis to riff off of as to what happened on LV-1119 if you need to.

sinful fern
# astral coral Hii! I'm trying to start in the world of beign GM (alien is my first game to be ...

From my experience I can say to remember it's a mystery but there's no point in making NPCs too secretive. Obviously Clayton and Flynn will want to obscure some details that connected directly to their motivations, but Johns will disclose what needs to be disclosed cause he wants someone else to take over. So if I were you I'd do as Snarpo says and read the background story a couple of times and write up what you want players too learn early and what tou want to stay secret for a dramatic reveal (like the vaccines containing black goo)

astral coral
#

Ty so much guys

fleet patio
# astral coral Hii! I'm trying to start in the world of beign GM (alien is my first game to be ...

You can also make the lore more attractive by putting some resistance to gaining it. In my game, I had the Montero crew's first inquiry be shut down by Clayton, who pointed out that the Cronus crew is under very strict NDAs and aren't in liberty of telling anything. Of course, this motivated the players to figure out what they were hiding, poke their noses into all the mainframes and prod the crewmembers for some "secrets".

solar trellis
#

that's fun and allows the party the opportunity to try and get Cronus members on their own and try to maybe manipulate some info out of them

worthy axle
#

hey guys, just wondering how you guys prep for chariot of the gods

#

ive got all the maps and character sheets ready
some music too
im populating the maps with monsters in advance
i guess, how do you guys run the npcs and how do you prepare for them all
youre playing 5 different npcs all with different agendas
i know one of them dies pretty quickly
but what about the rest

flat wraith
#

Here's what I did (link to higher up in the thread):

worthy axle
#

thanks that makes it a bit easier

#

gives them all one meaningful interaction with the cronus that solidifies the type of character they are

#

good stuff

flat wraith
#

I like having Cooper start giving directions or "clues" so the PCs think he's the "questgiver" PC. That sets up the bloodburster nicely.

#

Reid is a nice "combat" that's with an actual human where there's no downside to talking her down instead so I like that with her.

#

If Flynn runs away and hides a couple times that sets up him becoming an abomination a little later off-screen that the PCs won't see coming.

#

Johns is a GREAT excuse for you to give terrible orders and have Miller step up or the other PCs need opposed rolls to disobey. "Okay everyone split up and check the air vents"

#

And for Clayton I like to have a neo attack - just so she can use her talent to move the attack to the PC 🙂

solar trellis
#

It's too hard to keep track of monster movement IMO and it makes it may more interesting to have stuff happen in a way that pushes the story (both overall and for individual character narrative).

#

I like to keep a separate set of notes where I update a) what events I have left I can use and b) a list of the NPCs and what goals I think they have at any given time.

#

For example, I have Clayton as "when wakes up will try to get to her cabin ASAP to check her stuff, and she'll ask Reid to protect her on the way".

worthy axle
#

but i get ya

solar trellis
#

Ah, OK. I think the only ones I tied to a specific location where those two abominations. Everything else was "where do I want them to encounter them", especially early on where I wanted them to see the pds and the guy with the self-inflicted shotgun would early for for suspense and setup.

#

I also added an abominatoin on the outside hull just standing there, can't remember if that's in the module or if a friend did that when I was a player first lol

candid apex
#

There's one on the outside as written, but a second one wouldn't break anything either. Same with the interior to be honest.

fleet patio
#

If one were to have of the outer rooms on the Cronus having suffered decompression, that outside abomination could also be moved onto the ship. 🤔 The armory would be a pretty decent place for this, cause A) it teaches the players of the risk of firing and missing on the ship and B) it makes acquiring weapons slightly more complex.

candid apex
#

The system automatically seals off vented rooms though, so getting in would be tough.

fleet patio
worthy axle
#

When do the players need to go outside?

#

Is therr something they need to repair outside?

candid apex
#

Yes, the power feed to the engines and the comms array.

worthy axle
#

Oki

quasi parcel
#

Also (potentially) when moving between the Montero and Cronus.

primal wolf
#

I think instead of a slow burn this should be fast paced and over in the space of a day, 2 max. Keep events happening and players on their toes. Just like a movie otherwise it turns into a campaign and players don’t take risks.

#

Does anyone have a good alien rpg sound board?

sinful fern
#

Not really Alien, but it's close enough for a free and easy option, I'd say

solar trellis
primal wolf
#

I find it easier to match a known actor to a character and use their role in a film for inspiration, put a photo in your notes with their specific goals and your done.

#

How do I know how much health to give the PCs and NPcs? It’s not on the sheets.

candid apex
#

Generally, health is equal to a character's strength score

#

There are exceptions, but that's it for 99% of characters.

primal wolf
#

Great, I think I read that somewhere and forgot it. Cheers

jaunty panther
#

Thinking of doing a rerun of COTG and one part I always had trouble with would be like how would the crew of the Cronus and montero react to the whole 70+ year time gap between them, particularly in terms of how technology has changed in that time

#

Like what technology would be considered novel and what would be consider archaic

fleet patio
#

Have a look at the difference in tech in Alien (1979) vs Prometheus (2012) — those early exploration ships got waaay more advanced tech going for them. I think they covered a reasoning for this in Fireteam Elite as relating to durability and ease of manufacture on-site at the remote colonies. The craftmanship and materials on the Cronus is leagues above that of the Montero, though their properties might be subpar.
Both ships work off of MU/TH/ER mainframes, so the general user experience might not be that different. That being said, the Cronus might have been produced during a time when there was less risks of corporate sabotage etc. so logins and controls might be more immediate like credentials on a RFID-fob. Compare this to how Dallas & Ripley log onto Mother - open a cubby with the little circuit card, which is then placed into the device to open the core-door.

jaunty panther
#

Yea the difference between a cutting edge huge science exploration team vs basically a skeleton crew of space truckers is smt I thought of

fleet patio
#

There might also be disconnects in backwards compatibility, so stuff like air-recyclers might have different couplings (no refreshing air supply without taking off suit), etc.

jaunty panther
#

I wonder how different synthetics would be

somber seal
#

A major thing I like doing in CotG is the air scrubbers only being accessible through the vent connection, why is that ? Because when the ship was working fine, they could just activate an auto way to do it, but you guys are from a time where that has been hacked way too often to be sensible, so you naturally go and clean it manually to clear the air, as that is what is done for your ship's scrubbers.

candid apex
#

It says in the book that that's the case too somewhere (access through vents), plus no suits in the crawlspaces. That doesn't fit.

#

If you step back a little, there's no real reason to have air ducts that size unless going into them gives you access to areas you couldn't otherwise access. Some systems or cabling that's tucked away from the main rooms and corridors because when they work well you don't need to get to them at all.

jaunty panther
#

ngl the first time I ran it I just used it as a chance to make a short joke about one of my players

#

(It was all in good fun of course nothing mean lol)

quasi parcel
#

Yesterday my parents-not-quite-in-law turned up on their bikes that they bought in 1979. One of them has an electric wheel from Swytch, but it struck me that all the basic components are unchanged in almost 50 years: tyres, inner-tubes, nuts, bolts, cables, gears, cranks…. any enhanced versions of these have been made backwards compatible by the designers and manufacturers.

I don’t know much about military hardware but I suspect the same is mostly true there.

It’s only really the digital sphere where new tech is (deliberately?) made incompatible with the old.

candid apex
#

Digital tech has had to cope with vast increases in storage capacity, computing power and bandwidth.

That's not so much the case with bicycles.

quasi parcel
#

Fair. But I think it’s also because digital tech is far easier to replace (and therefore discard) than physical tech.

primal wolf
#

So i am running COTG on Wednesday, i have 4 players and none wanted to play Captain Miller. So i will DM PC the chr till one of them kicks the bucket. I hadnt even thought this might happen so now im thinking. Do i take Miller over to the Cronus or leave him on the Montero?

candid apex
#

Ah, first one to go I guess. Boss people around incessantly, pull rank, then "I'll do it myself so I know it's done well".

Screams from the reactor control room. Don't roll for it, just tear off that arm and crush that skull. Problem solved.

primal wolf
#

was thinking of having him aboard the Montero, call out a few orders, takesome updates and keep them on track but ultimately have him blow up with the ship trying to save it from the overload destruction. He can jettison the daisy maybe to help later on if needs be. He flies it away to keep the rest of the crew safe. Boom.

candid apex
#

I don't want an npc save the day, typically. Give the pcs a reason to take control of their own actions, the captain could give increasingly erratic orders to maximise potential profits. It's in line with the agenda and forces the players to act on their own initiative and following their own conscience, which is one of the great wonders of playing a ttrpg.

quasi parcel
primal wolf
#

i think i saw that one too, very much covenant copy, i get not having the NPC do the saving, they probably dont care about him if he isnt a PC so him saving them will feel meh. To kill him off seems a waste. I think i might just send him along, he can do his own thing, till people die.

flat wraith
#

Take the opportunity to give dangerous orders and use “pull rank” to make them roll or obey. One or two “hey Rye, check out that movement in the air vents” should do the trick. Now you’ve got them coming up with their own plans and have another antagonist (albeit mostly friendly) to use in the game.

#

Use Miller as an NPC obstacle, not something to steal plot points away from the actual players.

jaunty panther
primal wolf
jaunty panther
#

Yea sometimes it’s good to have a character die off early just to prove a point about the lethality of the situation

#

Like how easy it is to die from an alien and why they should be smart and careful about what they do

candid apex
#

Plus your need to reduce the number of npcs fast or you'll be talking all session, spinning ten plates while you're players sit there and await their turn.

#

Exaggerating a bit, but the game runs a lot smoother when your have fewer actors to keep track of.

fleet patio
clear idol
#

As well as backup bodies for the players when the eventual shit hits the fan

candid apex
#

That's fair, but 6 is a lot for me. Might be a personal preference.

somber seal
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Main way to limit how many NPC's you have is simply don't have the pirate ship show up, it's completely optional anyways.

You have Miller and the starting crew, which is 5, and you have the surviving Cronus team, which besides the scientist who dies immediately, and includes the synth you can fix, is another 5, that's already plenty, and a good portion of that number is expected to die due to infection.

In terms of character numbers, it is one of the smallest in how many people there are of the Cinematics

flat wraith
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I've said it before but it bears repeating - don't decide on the pirate ship showing up ahead of time in prep. You'll know if you need it when Act 3 hits.
If you play the events EXACTLY as they're written (which you don't have to btw) - you'll hit Act 3 with the same number of crew as PCs. Of the 5 new NPCs:
Cooper dies fairly quickly
2 should become infected and turn into abominations
Clayton goes rogue
One of the existing PCs gets infected

So the wildcard is how many PCs do the neo, the aboms, and all the dangers take out? If it's a bunch, you need the pirate ship for new PCs. If the PCs wipe the floor with the aboms and neos, you need the pirate for more infections for Act 3. If you have 5 surviving PCs and a couple neos/aboms still lurking you're in the sweet spot and don't need the pirate ship.

candid apex
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That's a great summary, thanks Nooch.

solar trellis
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If the PCs wipe the floor with the aboms and neos... you can also just add more heh

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I've run this three times and never had to add the Sotillo people (though I wanted to, it usually has worked out via the PCs driving the narrative enough)

clear idol
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In my case Lukas (one of my players) killed the last two members of the Cronus himself as they posed a risk to Miller and Wilson bear the end of act II

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Johns went missing hours ago, Reis turned and got violent before she got killed, they just found Ava, and everybody else is dead

frail grotto
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Ran this in a 4 hour slot at a con. Wildly successful, folks said it was the highlight of their con.

Nobody got killed directly, but ||Davis (Lucas) volunteered to pilot the Cronus back while the rest of the crew went into Hypersleep…||

quasi parcel
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4 hours?!? Morse

candid apex
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I'm wondering what that would look like. Maybe if you wake up mother and the cronus crew immediately when the pcs enter, Cooper pops shortly after and folks start turning abom shortly after?

flat wraith
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I did it in 2 3 hour sessions by gutting act 2 - no Montero explosion at all and only 1 thing needed repairing. I'd imagine if you do that and start off with just a 5 minute narration of everything before actually entering the Cronus it might fit.

solar trellis
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I love this scenario so much it makes me kinda low-key grumpy to hear people shorten it down lol

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I get that sometimes you gotta do it of course, it's just so good in terms of RP potential I hate to see it cut short for time.

flat wraith
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Although I never did like the ship blowing up thing. It's too heavy handed and actiony. I like it going dark and needing to be investigated better.

solar trellis
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Oh man I've run COTG three times now and the Montero going up was the best part of each according to my players

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but it does need to be connected effectively to the rest of the story so it doesn't just happen for no reason

candid apex
solar trellis
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Yeah that's cool

clear idol
candid apex
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Thank you. I just rolled with the punches if I'm honest. "I'll try to delete order 966" was the action declaration that I needed. I'll admit that he'd have the same outcome no matter what his roll would be, but it was too good an opportunity not to.

clear idol
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You're totally right on that

flat wraith
candid apex
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Yeah but not with blowing up the ship I guess? By that point they'd partied with the reactor room abom and the captain lost an arm.

Or maybe the player just messed up, that seems likely. But it suited me fine if I'm honest

flat wraith
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Fair - just wondering if I missed something.

candid apex
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No you're spot on there

solar trellis
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Yeah, the trick is to give an actual reason for MUTHUR to decide to blow. In my last couple of runs I think it's been because one of the crew has decided to had back to the Montero to get something or look up what 966 is, and MUTHER is interpreting that as "oh they're scared of the new ship, need to force them to take the Cronos".

frail grotto
solar trellis
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I get that, I'm not saying you can't.

uncut maple
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Does anyone have experience running this with only 3 players? Was it easier/harder than with 4-5 players?

sinful fern
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@uncut maple I recently finished running it with 3 players. Depends on what you mean by harder - I can imagine the story progresses quicker if there's more players and if someone's playing as Lucas and Wilson, we only had Lucas so Wilson was an NPC and, with plenty of things to take care of on board of Cronus for the GM, he got a little sidetracked. On the other hand, with less players you don't have to worry as much about running out of spare characters in the case of sb dying so I never had to introduce the Sotillo event. Admittedly, it's MUCH harder to get them to split up, but you can try pairing them with people from the Cronus and making it so that, for example, some of the repairs have to be handled at the same time because insert technical mumbo-jumbo. Another thing that helped to split them up was when Davis rolled the panic effect that makes them run to safety. Oh, and you should look into limiting the weapons, I regret not switching Reid's rifle for another shotgun or maybe service pistol as they weren't as scared once they found it. It made for a couple of bagasse moments though, so you should decide what you prefer beforehand. I guess that's all the observations I had, hope it helps, good luck 😄

clear idol
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Have to second the tip to limit weapons, also I did not enjoy having only 3 players as there were a lot of npc for me to handle

solar trellis
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Yeah it can be a lot. I like to find ways for them to busy themselves and/or get up to shit. Like, as soon as they wake, I have our favourite corporate stooge steal Reid and head to her office to check her stuff.

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And obviously killing them off is a fun time

primal wolf
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After some advice. When a player is infected would you tell them in secret or say it to the group that that player seems to be itching and has a rash on their neck.

candid apex
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I tend to just hand out the infected agenda card. If I ask for stamina rolls to resist infection for the moment then they'll know what's up soon enough anyway (even if I don't tell them what the roll is for).

quasi parcel
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The infection check is an opposed roll. I rolled my side of the check behind my screen, so the player didn’t know how many successes they needed.

primal wolf
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So do the opposed roll, if they fail send them (vtt) the infected agenda so they can role play it or as a GM do you get others to do an observation roll to see if they notice anything or skip the obs roll and just say they notice player x scratching.

candid apex
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I started following EE in this and made it a regular roll (not opposed), at -2 to boot.

Then I give the agenda to the player/s and let them do their worst. They'll pick up on it soon enough.

quasi parcel
fresh pulsar
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So I just finished session 4. The PCs finally got Act II done, managed to take down Lucas and an infected Reid. They got to the end of the session and wound up in a Mexican standoff, guns raised with Wilson & Clayton vs Miller and Davies (Davis?) on the bridge. We’d just finished a long bit of combat, and I wanted to give them a break before jumping into a new initiative, and perhaps leave with a bit of a cliffhanger, so I made a split second decision to end the session with the Sotillo pinging on the ship’s radar. I know that the Sotillo is only meant to be brought in if you need new NPCs for players to take over, so I’m wondering if maybe I’ve fucked up and am just dragging this out now? I’ve still got Ava & Clayton alive as NPCs. Plus I’ve got AbominationFlynn, a new bloodburster, and fully grown neomorph still loose on the ship. Considering maybe halving the Sotillo crew?

candid apex
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You haven't fucked up at all, you can do whatever you deem appropriate with the Sotillo crew.

Are there any abominations left? You can have them run into one and have any outcome you like. The pcs may only hear gunfire and run into a few bodies. Then the last survivor will try to leave with their ship.

Or maybe there an abomination on the outside and it starts damaging the umbilical for example.

primal wolf
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Can i ask how weveryone deals with the secret agendas in terms of players wanting tohave scenes or do things they dont want others to know about yet, like rigging a ship to blow, going after Clayton to "deal" with her. Would you insist each of these scenes is played out so everyone hears it or would you indulge playters desires for secrecy?

uncut maple
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I do kind of a mix. If a player wants to go off on their own to do stuff, I’ll generally resolve that over private messages. But if a player wants to like secretly converse with an NPC or something like that, I’ll usually play that out in front of the table

solar trellis
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My games usually start with everything in secret (notes/texts/other room convos etc.) but eventually we just make a decision to metagame it and it's all out in the open. Seems to work really well.

olive sparrow
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@cold swallow is asking if the Cronus might have visited other planets before the fateful expedition to LV-1113. The text of the cinematics give no indication one way or the other. It could be a Maginot type mission like we saw the aftermath of in Alien Earth, if you'd like your story to go more in that direction. The Heart of Darkness cinematic mentions the Saturn as a sister ship of the Cronus that was on a similar exploration mission that was lost in that same area of space as the Cronus. So the Saturn is another lore poor open opportunity (or you could add more sister SEV ships from the 2110-ish expedition periord, the Nepture, the Hades, whatever Greco-Roman deities you'd like to name ships after). Lots of potential to expand things.

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I repurposed the Saturn as a ship stuck around a black hole for a scenario. Time dilation was much leveraged as a story element, like in Interstellar.

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Anyone else done an interesting angle or expansion to the story of the Cronus?

cold swallow
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My idea is that the Cronus didn’t get fucked in LV-1113

But rather found a Star map there leading to a Dyson sphere

There, they got fucked by the Fulfremmen and got adrift

olive sparrow
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I anticipate no meaningful challenges incorporating that change.

solar trellis
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Might as well write an entirely new scenario IMO

calm kettle
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Guys, a question!

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Lucas is a synth, right?

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That fact is only revealed if he receives a critical attack

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but what if he receives an normal attack, or hurts himself somehow

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The fact that his blood is white would not reveal the truth?

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I thought the truth about Lucas would be revealed if he received any type of attack

flat wraith
tidal oak
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So if Lucas takes some damage, but isn't reduced to 0 health, you're meant to assume that whatever the cause, it didn't draw blood. Atleast not enough for anyone to notice.

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I think whoever is playing as Lucas is also allowed to reveal themselves at any time, in case they want to take advantage of the android extra stats or to ignore panic. But it should explicitly give them away as a synth to the other PCs.

flat wraith
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Then I can confidently say

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Woops

solar trellis
calm kettle
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Do we have an clue when CoTG happens?

olive sparrow
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2183

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Aliens is in 2179, for comparison.

calm kettle
calm kettle
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DMed CoTG

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Only Lucas survived

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Lol

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Neomorphs killed them all

quasi parcel
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“Neomorphs killed them all” is fairly unusual, I think. Pray tell on 🙏

clear idol
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Yessssss do tell us more

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And don’t you dare to skip all the juicy details

flat wraith
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subscribed

charred osprey
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Ran my first session of CotG last night. Very thankful the module has AVA-6. She’s been the games Deus Ex Machina twice already and is so useful for moving the plot along! Everyone instantly reimagined her as a Thea/Tessa model so have ran with it.

Really enjoying it so far! 6 hours of play and the gang hasn’t even managed to revive the crew of the Cronus yet. There’s definitely a lot of scope for expansive play in this story which I’m loving!

…has made the post game write up a bitch tho haha. Anyone got any tips or game changes they would recommend for when the crew wake up?

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candid apex
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Don't have the cronus crew all on-screen at the same time if you can help it. It's a lot to track. Have them to off to do stuff and just disappear one or two randomly if you need to.

clear idol
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And try to use them to get the party to split up

solar trellis
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I have them not wake up in the same way. They've been in for 75 years, it's going to be hard. So some wake up quickly and are fine (I have whatshername pretty much go straight to her cabin to check on her shit), others are either wildly sick or totally exhausted and need medical coverage. And you don't have to do Cooper's little explosion right away, time it when it's best. I do try to get all the players' PCs in there so they all "participate" in that moment though.

clear idol
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Definitely lean into the Cronus crew having a rough case of morning sickness. It throws off the players of they were expecting trouble.

flat wraith
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I actually premade a little script that each one runs through when they wake up. The prospect of improvising 5 NPCs at once on the fly was terrifying.

clear idol
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Yeah, there is a lot being asked of the GM with the number of npc they have to do

solar trellis
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and just keep updating it

charred osprey
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Update: session 2 -
My players absolutely LOVE AVA-6. She’s saved them multiple times and they completely view her as their guardian angel. So when I had Rye (Lewis) deactivate her in an attack they instantly went straight to repair their synthetic friend without checking for tampering…

AVA has new module….

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