On the Radar: Jovian Chronicles in a Bundle of Holding

 And, as if in answer to my plan of ships in the same fleet having different tech levels, there's a Bundle of Holding for Jovian Chronicles!

The bundle covers the following books:

• Silhouette CORE Deluxe Edition
• Jovian Chronicles Player's Handbook 2E
• Mechanical Catalogs 1-2
• Spacer's Guide
• Space Equipment Handbook
• Earth Sourcebook
• CISLunar Space
• Jovian Chronicles Companion
• Four Jovian Planet Sourcebooks
• Ships of the Fleet 1-3
• The Chaos Principle
• Jovian Chronicles GM Handbook

This will give a comprehensive set of materials for the rules and the setting, one that's surprisingly hard SF, despite the presence of humanoid mecha used as fighters.

Also, since the human homeworld is lost to the rest of the world in Stars Without Number, it's not much of a problem to set up a different solar system with the same setting elements. And I would do that, because the setting building is so well done -- it feels like a very well thought out set of interlocking political, economic, and social factions, along with the aforementioned hard SF approach. It's nice to have a semi-stable "home base" for the campaign that characters can refer to in their backgrounds, or return to from the front lines.

Of particular interest to me are the different ship designs for the setting. I like the designs for the Jovian ships, and I'm always interested in the Tender-class ships of any given setting. They'll form the regular ships of the fleet, with the ability to use jumpgates. This is unlike the Star Trek-inspired starships that will have Warp capability.

Not sure where to start aside from trying to build an idea of how many fleets there are, and what ship composition each would have.

Ships Without Number: Artificial Gravity and the Post-Scream Universe

The Stars Without Number universe has a lot of variance in tech levels, enough to make the expeditionary fleet I've been thinking of interesting.

While many of the newer ships would be more akin to the designs of Jovian Chronicles (no artificial gravity, rotational sections, and constant 1G thrust) and similar settings, there would be some space for Star Trek-inspired ships.

The idea is that, with the current level of technology (and psychic construction) they can only achieve Star Trek: TOS levels of starships. And with the limited number of psychics, there are limits to how many can be produced in a solar cycle.

The fleet will therefore have a mix of mostly lower tech ships (which will be higher tech in some areas of non-psychic technology), and a small cluster of slowly growing artificial gravity, transporter-capable ships.

Ships without Number: 0-hr. Carriers

As mentioned in a prior post, I was looking for a ship that PCs could be based on -- one where they'd have interactions with the other crew, where they could conceivably have their backup characters walking around in the background, and where they could snag some heavy firepower if needed.

In addition to that, I also wanted an option for a ship that has shuttles or fighters launched from it, for a possible set of other PCs that are on pilot missions or away team missions.

How fortunate that 0-hr. has three Carriers for use!

Drake (Exploration Vessel)

"At 292 feet long, this PL-7 frigate carries a crew of 18 and a complement of six Sparrowhawk-class fighters. Though only lightly armed as a vessel of exploration, statistics and story for a more heavily armed 'pirate' configurations are also included. Exploration, reconnaissance, journeys to distant stars - Drake is designed to fill these roles and more."

Of the three carriers, this is the most intimate potential home setting (with the option to mingle with the rest of the fleet on the larger ships). With a crew of 18, and an average party of 4, you have enough space for some other NPCs who may eventually become PCs, should tragedy befall one of the party. Also, the six fighter ships on such a small crew can indicate that most of the crew know how to fly them -- great for the variety of missions. Definite naval or merchant campaign use, some espionage groundside options -- not so much for groundpounder campaigns, except perhaps as air support.

 Orion (Strike Carrier)

"Orion is a Retribution-class strike carrier designed to serve as a transport and base of operations for combat vehicles both in space and on the ground. Orion carries sixteen Vulture-class heavy fighters in its internal bays. The side nacelles can rapidly deploy a dozen Aries-class hover tanks and four modified Brahma transports for use as personnel carriers. When added to the strike carrier’s impressive built in fire power, this single ship decide many engagements."

Obviously larger, carrying larger fighters and ground vehicles, this a very combat-oriented ship -- perhaps more appropriate for naval and military campaigns; less so for espionage or merchant campaigns.

Invictus (Carrier)

"Invictus is the flagship of the Confederation fleet and the first of its kind (so technically it is an 'Invictus-class' vessel). At almost 2400 ft long, the ship carries 200 fighters, 40 boarding shuttles, and a 1500 crew, soldiers, and passengers. It is designed to rapidly deploy combat craft and serve as a long range missile platform – allowing it to command a battle well back from the lines while still contributing massive firepower to the fight."

This one is huge! Opportunities for on-ship intrigue, and a lot of sub-campaigns abound on this ship. Naval campaigns, military campaigns, and options for espionage missions are possible here. Definitely involved in some of the major engagements in a campaign, and unlikely to stray from the main fleet for long periods of time.

Take your pick for the best fit in your ship-based campaign!

Stars Without Number II: Sine Nomine Strikes Back

It has come to my attention that there is a new edition of Sine Nomine's Stars Without Number -- the appropriately named Stars Without Number (Revised Edition). This has rekindled an old interest of mine.

Longtime readers of my blog know that I had many incomplete attempts at building a campaign inside the setting of Stars Without Number (Confederation Chronicles posts). They all trailed off, in retrospect, because I was trying to recreate an old Hero System homebrew setting in a different system, and I got overwhelmed by the conversions.

This time, I have a different approach, and I'm going to try again.

Core Campaign Frame

I'm salvaging what I can from my old Condederation Chronicles posts; in fact it's from one of those failed restarts that I have this summary:

In "Confederation Chronicles: A Campaign Premise" parts 1 and 2, I decided that I was going to riff off of the Battlestar Galactica concept -- a fleet of ships trying to find their way home. Unlike that show, or the other inspiration show (Andromeda), they actually come from a stable part of the Imperium: a self-sufficient cluster of worlds and systems that survived the mysterious disintegration of their galaxy-spanning Empire.

And they've been charged to find a stable path of travel along linked routes back to the Throneworld.

In "Confederation Chronicles: A Mobile Base of Operations -- Part 01", I explore the benefits of a self-sufficient, ridiculously powered ship being available to the PCs, with Blake's 7, Andromeda, and Farscape as inspirations.

In "Confederation Chronicles: A Mobile Base of Operations -- Part 02", I look at how dialing back the power levels and scale might affect the setting, while looking at the other campaign elements shows like Battlestar Galactica, Robotech/Macross, Firefly, and Starblazers/Space Cruiser Yamato dealt with life on a ship.

In "Confederation Chronicles: A Mobile Base of Operations -- Part 03", I decide on the Stars Without Number source material I'll be using to build the campaign's traveling fleet: the Imago Dei and the Bruxelles-Class Battlecruiser sourcebooks in the Mandate Archive series.

However, I'm dropping the Confederation Chronicles part of things, and just embracing a lot of the elements (and ready-made tools, ships, and equipment) in the Stars Without Number setting.

My revised overview is as follows:

The Sol Finder initiative (working title) is a massive conglomeration of ships from various backgrounds with a single purpose -- to find a path across the various Sectors to the Terran Mandate worlds. A cabal of AIs have analyzed decades of data and determined the best route through lost sectors to Lost Terra.

My overall goal for this kind of meta-campaign, is to create a broad enough background wherein many different types of campaigns can be run. There are long-term campaigns that deal with the jump from a known Sector into a lost Sector, and the exploration and adventure that takes place as a result:

• espionage campaigns to infiltrate and gather information in the new sector;
• exploration campaigns to map out and uncover more clues as to how to progress toward the Terran Mandate worlds;
• factional politics as the fleet's progress, discoveries, and own economic gravity impacts the sectors it passes through;
• military campaigns (from police actions to war) as enemies known and unknown are encountered;
• new technologies, psychic abilities, and organizations arise and impact the campaign.

Fantasy, Super-heroics, and Science Fiction

Dark Corners of Calidar

I do enjoy the potential of Calidar, and I think I shall try to begin converting many of my old Mystara posts to Calidar.

There will be some adjustments to those old posts (and I'll probably link back to them), but the full backstory of Calidar can certainly be tweaked to fit better.

The swashbuckling feel of Calidar's fiction, for me, needs to be roughened up a bit. Perhaps darkened and expanded more than a little bit. I do enjoy the promise of the second Kickstarter, and hope to see it when it comes out.

In the meantime, I'll begin perusing the old posts for consolidation and rewriting.

West Coast Champions

As the Kickstarter for Aaron Allston's Strike Force draws to a close at the time of this writing, I suppose I must embrace the gravity of my nostalgia and my mental synergy with many of the principles of the Hero System, and my love for the super-heroic genre.

Just not sure what posts I'll be posting here. Right now, I'm leaning towards a setting -- West Coast Champions -- that builds upon a trio of cities I was quite fond of: San Angelo (from Gold Rush Games), Bay City (under the Fuzion imprint), and Night City (yes, it's from Cyberpunk 2020, but it's such a fit for the Dark Champions genre).

Right now, I think that it's a matter of figuring out what it will be, because I'm currently focused on the series Things I Learned From Champions.

It's an exploration of the system, really. And a realization that it's a deep well, some of which is very geeky and tightly focused in terms of fandom, and not as general as I've been posted in the past.

Confederation Chronicles

A return to the twice-interrupted attempt at a complete-ish SF setting temporarily labeled Confederation Chronicles. It was originally meant to be implemented in the Stars Without Number system, and I am now equally tempted by the D6 system and by the OSR-based White Star in concert with the original Stars Without Number system.

Star Wars and Star Trek and Andromeda and a bit of Battlestar Galactica -- and all of the treasured source materials I've collected for the genre over the years.

A Welcome Diversion

But I'll be honest, it's all meant to de-stress and distract from the stress of many things going on in life right now.

Confederation Chronicles: A Gumshoe Sidestory

I've been reading through Ashen Stars and began looking at ways to integrate it into the Stars Without Number setting. I suppose it's due to my curiosity about Gumshoe's focus on both investigation issues in RPGs AND about tackling the procedural format in gaming sessions.

My original concept for the Confederation Chronicles tackles an all-out exploration / expeditionary approach to the Stars Without Number setting & system.

The setting is different, but not campaign shatteringly so. There are echoes of Stars Without Number here, and the mystery of the Mohilar war certainly has resonances similar to the Scream of SWN.

In the end, it's the campaign framework I'm looking at testing, and having Lazers trolling the Bleed to solve mysteries and uphold justice on the frontier does have a nice feel to it.

Confederation Chronicles: Review and Restart

In 2012, I tried to create a campaign setting that would be based on much of the material available from Sine Nomine's RPG line titled Stars Without Number, but inspired by some favorite SF properties from live action and animated TV series.

In 2013, I tried to restart that work, but failed.

So, here I am again. As a counterpoint to the fantasy campaign I'm working on called Border Wardens, this is to be my Science Fiction work.

Review

Since it's been quite a while since that initial burst of activity, I need to refresh my memory.

In "Confederation Chronicles: A Campaign Premise" parts 1 and 2, I decided that I was going to riff off of the Battlestar Galactica concept -- a fleet of ships trying to find their way home. Unlike that show, or the other inspiration show (Andromeda), they actually come from a stable part of the Imperium: a self-sufficient cluster of worlds and systems that survived the mysterious disintegration of their galaxy-spanning Empire.

And they've been charged to find a stable path of travel along linked routes back to the Throneworld.

In "Confederation Chronicles: A Mobile Base of Operations -- Part 01", I explore the benefits of a self-sufficient, ridiculously powered ship being available to the PCs, with Blake's 7, Andromeda, and Farscape as inspirations.

In "Confederation Chronicles: A Mobile Base of Operations -- Part 02", I look at how dialing back the power levels and scale might affect the setting, while looking at the other campaign elements shows like Battlestar Galactica, Robotech/Macross, Firefly, and Starblazers/Space Cruiser Yamato dealt with life on a ship.

In "Confederation Chronicles: A Mobile Base of Operations -- Part 03", I decide on the Stars Without Number source material I'll be using to build the campaign's traveling fleet: the Imago Dei and the Bruxelles-Class Battlecruiser sourcebooks in the Mandate Archive series.

I was all set to talk about inserting the PC roles in the campaign, but I stalled -- briefly posting on possible inspirations from the excellent Gumshoe-powered RPG by Pelgrane Press: Ashen Stars -- but not really following through.

But maybe it's time to dust off the notebooks and get back to work on this project.

On the Radar: Some Thoughts on the Ennies

I was browsing through the winners of the Ennies, trying -- I suppose -- to see how up-to-date and in tune I really was with the popular view of the RPG industry. Overall, I sense that I'm really a niched kind of gamer, with off-center tastes, but I'd hesitate to call myself eccentric or unusual given the pool of gamers out there.

Here are a few things that caught my eye:

Night's Black Agents gets the Silvers for Best Game AND Best Writing

I did an Armchair Review for this RPG and its related campaign, The Zalohzny Quartet, and I heartily agree with the award. It's a lovely crafted subgenre that does spectacular work in focusing on the parent genre -- espionage -- for genre emulation.

I think a lot of people recognize its many merits; after all it was nominated for Best Rules, Best Interior Art, Best Game, Best Writing and Product of the Year!

On a meta level, the Gumshoe ruleset is certainly coming along nicely. It's gotten so that the ruleset allows for a greater variety of genre scope.

In fact, with Night's Black Agents, Ashen Stars, Trail of Cthulhu, and Mutant City Blues, a possible sub-campaign premise in my developing Confederation Chronicles campaign would be:

Not all Lasers are released into the wilds of space. Some are tasked to keep track of worlds and systems being brought into the fold of the expanding Confederation -- to make sure that the weaknesses, dangers, and existential threats that might be lurking beneath the surface of these rediscovered wonders do not destroy all that the Confederation has built.

Trained, Motivated, and gifted with special abilities that set them apart from their peers, these Ultra-violet Lasers stand against another Fall of Night, as the Confederation struggles toward a true rebirth.

Doctor Who: Adventures in Time and Space wins the Gold for Best Family Game AND Doctor Who: The Time Traveler's Companion wins the Silver for Best Supplement

I quite like this RPG, and I'd never actually thought about it as being a family game. The de-emphasis on combat (and rules that support this -- with talking and running taking place before any combat initiative-wise) was, in my mind, a great nod to this genre of TV show.

In retrospect, it does have a family appeal with the emphasis on resorting to communication first, before resorting to an out-and-out rumble.

The supplements for this RPG have also been astounding, with real love for the entire series very evident. A review of the Second Doctor's sourcebook will be upcoming.

Other Items of Note

Eldritch Skies gets a Judge's nod -- a game whose take on the Cthulhu mythos deserves a return, beyond my initial Armchair Review. Certain themes and aspects of the themes and tone make it a fresh feel on the standard mythos treatement, in my humble opinion.

Also, this Pathfinder RPG seems to be really popular. ;) Probably should give it a read.

Confederation Chronicles: A Quick Review

Before I get started on the mini-settings in the macro Confederation Chronicles setting, it helps to review what has gone before.

Last year, I wrote about how I wanted to set up a quasi-military campaign that still allowed for exploration and strange encounters with the wonders and horrors of the universe in part 01 and part 02 of the basic Confederation Chronicles premise.

Having established the broad strokes, I then gave some thought to the mobile base of operations and the fleet that accompanied it in the setting. I even revisited the overall mission that this fleet would be involved in, and how it might occasionally reconnect with the larger body of civilization it's tied to.

Next: some ideas on what the people in this fleet are doing in the short term, and what regular cycles of living and protocols of encounter might entail.

Confederation Chronicles: A Mobile Base of Operations -- Part III

So what can we put together from the materials already out for Stars Without Number to set up our mobile base of operations?

First I'd combine two Mandate Archive sourcebooks: The Imago Dei, and Bruxelles-class Battlecruiser for the fleet.

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Here's a snippet of The Imago Dei promo blurb:

Not every synthetic mind is bent on mankind's destruction. Some have a higher purpose, a nobler war to wage in the darkness between stars... Aside from their little-known history, you'll find specifications for their bleeding-edge ship hulls. Included are seven sample Imago Dei warships for your own campaign, whether found as derelict plunder, seized by fanatics, or threatening the PCs' homeworld with the guns of a heretical Shepherd Fleet!

Certainly an ultra-powerful set of ships, with a fleet of battlecruisers, is a plausible starting point for the mobile base of operations, and it helps combine the idea of 'ultra-tech', 'sentient ship', and 'battlegroup fleet of ships' quite nicely.

The AIs in charge of the Imago Dei fleet would be driven by some noble purpose -- like rebuilding the fallen empire -- which could pose future problems as the empire wasn't all that noble. Furthermore, these AIs also have a tendency to deteriorate as they age, and not in the funny Red Dwarf way either. Early on, though, the AIs can be completely fair and noble with just a hint of what is to come.

Of course, even with a critical mass of people in the fleet hopping from system to system in their quixotic quest, resource, production, and resupply problems are bound to arise. Hence the introduction of the following technologies in top secret areas of the Imago Dei ships: Transhuman Tech. The matter compilers and a status-based economy in a 'post-material' environment are interesting to explore given that there will be a slow, but steady drain of resources on the fleet that needs to be replenished, even with this wonder technology.

Next up: where do the players come in?

Confederation Chronicles: A Mobile Base of Operations - part 2

Battlestar Galactica

While advanced, it was nowhere near the levels of the prior three examples.

It did have something else: a fleet and a population that moved with the protagonists, providing a backdrop of civilization and commerce and secondary characters that the they could interact with.

Why is it significant? Well, it sets up a really nice traveling community (from village to city to mega city, depending on the resources, information, and NPCs that you need) to help change the pace of downtime scenes, to sell the idea that important services and materials are continuously available to the players as they explore unknown areas in the galaxy.

Of course, shortages can trigger necessary plotlines. And factions can push similar agendas.

Firefly / Serenity

While this neo-classic TV show / movie was about an adventuring party based on a single ship (with no weapons) on the fringes of a large Alliance of worlds, there are certainly things we can borrow from this setup.

The primary thing: what it's like to be on frontier worlds, and what it's like to be in the core. Obviously, access to things like energy weapons (and weirder things) are more prevalent in the core world, but tech levels drop (due to manufacturing and maintenance concerns) as you move away from there.

Another thing: there were some pretty nasty hush-hush projects that were partially revealed.

Who knows what other black projects reside amongst the stars, and are being covered up -- perhaps even by the members of the current fleet?

Yamato / Starblazers & Macross / Robotech

While these are very different shows, there is also that core idea of a ship separated from the civilization that birthed it, on a mission to return to and save that core civilization using alien technology that was discovered by accident.

A touch of desperation and firm resolve is mixed in with all that, along with cool fighter ships, steel-eyed captains and hotshot pilots.


CONSOLIDATION

The ideal campaign premise for me would mix in all these elements somehow.

Confederation Chronicles: A Mobile Base of Operations - part 01

Part of the goal for the setting is to allow a bit of the classic exploration themes pioneered by the original Star Trek series, while still retaining that frontier feel mixed in with the 'fallen empire' premise.

Several shows provide the inspiration for that!

Andromeda

This show is named after the ship called the Andromeda Ascendant. The ship itself is an obscenely powerful remnant from the fallen empire's military might. Dylan Hunt (played by Kevin Sorbo) commands this ridiculously powerful ship of the line that has weapons that can destroy planets, automated defenses, and internal repair and construction facilities called the Andromeda Ascendant. The only reason he has it now, long after the Long Night of the setting, is because he got trapped on the edge of the event horizon of a black hole.

The ship has a female avatar that appears onscreen, as well as in a manufactured humanoid body, affectionately called "Rommie", which allows players to interact with the ship and shout commands to it, while it speaks and expositizes to them.

This high level of technology handwaves the need for a lot of repairs and refitting and resupply (unless it's a plot point for the episode), and rationalizes why such a small crew can pilot the damn thing. It also allows players to skip having to answer to a rigid chain of command and go 'adventuring' in pursuit of their goal.

Blake's 7

Again with the ridiculously powerful ship (the Liberator), with a sentient (though less polite and helpful) computer known as Zen that quite possible caused the deaths of its prior crew, the show has the initial trio of protagonists (Blake, Jenna, and Avon) explore the nature of the ship as much as they spend running away from Federation patrols and running to places they can sabotage or get information.

The alien nature of the ship allows them some tension that Andromeda lacks when on the ship -- except when something happens to Rommie, of course -- because the crew struggles to control it and are forced to interact with Zen when it refuses to do exactly what they say.

Also, the speed of the ship allows them to criss-cross a vast interstellar empire and carry out their little missions of rebellion and revenge.

Farscape

As I was reminded in the comments, there's another type of powerful ship that is also easy on the maintenance and advanced enough to be valuable: Moya the Leviathan from the TV show Farscape. Moya was from a race of living ships that bonded with Pilot from the race of Pilots, and even gave birth to another ship known as Talyn. It has little drones that perform repair and maintenance, and has a personality of its own.

Once again, there is  potential for tension due to the alien nature of the ship and its Pilot, as well as the sense that the ship is alien and isn't entirely understandable in the way that an inanimate ship built by one's own race might be.

Moya had no weapons, by the way, except for the defensive capability to Starburst (jump through a tear in space and time) to other locations. This made it interesting when other ships tracked them and shot at them.

Talyn, another Leviathan and child of Moya, had weapons -- but was more of a genetic experiment on the race of Leviathans that escaped.

Next: examples of larger ships that follow the 'aircraft carrier' role in a campaign.

Confederation Chronicles: An SF Campaign Premise -- Part 02

In our original campaign, there were several major players in the galaxy (a different one from the Milky Way), with the Confederation as the 'good guy' star nation, the Alliance as the 'bad guy' star nation, and the remnants of the recently shattered Second Vegan Empire acting as the 'collapsing star nation rife with intrigue, politics, and sources of recently liberated resources and technology'.

There was a horde of sentient machines on the other side of a wormhole that acted as the bogeyman for the campaign (its invasion was the one that shattered the empire by destroying the Second Vegan Homeworld), and was one of the few things that the Star Nations would, at that point in time, cooperate with one another one eradicating.

But what really mattered in the old campaign was the core premise: that of a civilian-led star nation served by one of the finest -- not necessarily largest or most powerful -- military organization in the galaxy.

And this was the core of the campaign premise: most of the PCs are members of military / quasi-military organization.

Benefits

Since everyone was new to the setting, the military structure allowed for briefings, being sent on missions, meeting sentients from races or cultures different from the norm, and provided a fertile breeding ground for rumors from the campaigns that the veteran NPCs had been on.

There's a ready rationale for a team with members shifting in and out -- being reassigned, being dropped and finding yourself in a different group, ad hoc teams thrown together due to special circumstances, etc. Also, there's a very large potential pool, lots of equipment that can be assigned for one mission then taken away right after, etc.

Downside

Well, you can put a definite crimp in player agency. Even a quasi-military agency assumes that you take orders from a chain of command, gentle sentient, or you end up in the brig or kicked out (if you're lucky). A small band of profit-oriented adventurers, or a wild bunch of explorers probably wouldn't prosper in the closely monitored and reviewed military arm of the Confederation -- a star nation that's had its bad run-ins with military coup attempts in the past.

The Twist: Returning To Old Frontier

To soften the downside, we can take a page from shows like Battlestar Galactica and Babylon 5, which seasoned their military tension with interstellar politics and intrigue, encounters with strange aliens and technologies, and occasionally dealt with having to source necessities for survival and protection from new providers when their original ones were cut off.

Yes, I'm advocating coming up with a setup where there's a traveling military outpost. This is something like a spike drive -- or something more powerful, heh heh -- capable space station (Babylon 5) with its own fleet of military and supply vessels (Battlestar Galactica) with a mandate to expand the borders of their star nation, or perhaps to return to the Terran Mandate worlds as part of an expedition to reignite the flame of the old worlds.

Instead of seeking out new life and new civilizations, they go back to the old one to find out what happened and perhaps to make us of ancient technologies that have yet to be re-unlocked for use in the newer era of Stars Without Number.

Additional Inspiration

Given the mix of possible stories, I'd throw in comic books like Alien Legion and maybe even the cyber-police manga Appleseed. On the Anime track, definitely Ghost in the Shell, with a bit of the powered-armor and mechs thrown in like AT Votoms, and the military elements of the Macross series and Gundam series (without the super-robot elements that creep in from time to time).

But only things that would add to the depth of the core premise; two many elements might confuse the core campaign. Of course, if an element were particularly awesome, I might bend the guidelines a bit.

"I got a little somethin' for ya, Borg Cube thingie. Say hello to my little -- Wave Motion Gun!"

Up next: fleshing out the premise a bit more with the goodies from Stars Without Number.

Confederation Chronicles: An SF Campaign Premise -- Part 01

My old gaming group used play a Star Hero campaign, which is the main influence for this idea -- coming up with a (mostly) plausible basic premise that allows for multiple types of adventures for an ongoing Science Fiction campaign. I'm hoping to recreate it with the toolkit and setting elements in Sine Nomine's excellent series of Stars Without Number RPG books.

But before you put together something big like this, it helps to list the goals for the premise.

Goals of the Campaign Premise:

• Combat - no bones about it, we love combat. But because we do, just another combat scene isn't enough for us. We look for different challenges, different restrictions, different locales, different scenarios, and different stakes for every combat scene that's sprung on us. That pretty much makes a military aspect a must in the campaign.
• Starship combat - related to combat, but a different experience altogether, we want the opportunity for ship-to-ship combat, whether we're talking capital ship combat or fighter ship combat or ships with boarding tactics or some mix of everything..
• Strange New Worlds - the Star Trek influence of having a new race, a new planet, a new wrinkle in the setting exposed in almost every episode stuck with us as well. This suggests a rationale for constant travel in the setting.
• Space Opera - inspired by Star Wars, the Lensman series, and elements of Babylon 5, we also looked for things like 'space knights', and 'fragments of a fallen star empire', and 'lost technologies', and 'god-like alien entities and artifacts' mixed up into the stories and adventures of our characters.
• Cloaks, Daggers, and Senators - equal parts Babylon 5 and Alien Legion, we also like to have that feeling of politics and espionage and compromise and brinksmanship and betrayal. Most of the time, this is backstory for the hoops that the PCs go through, but on occasion they do get to impact the interstellar (and sometimes intergalactic) stage.

Of course, at the same time, I'd need to have a rationale that not only allows the players to portray a team of PCs that work together, but also has a rationale to (a) shift characters in and out; (b) introduce replacement characters; and (c) perhaps send in completely separate character teams connected to the same storyline.