Savage Odyssey Prime: Enemies, Enemies Everywhere...

Good Afternoon, All:

Before I can get too far into the development of my Savage Odyssey Prime setting, I feel like I need to know a little bit about who the big players are going to be. There are a lot of ideas that I have for local bad guys and that sort of thing. However, when it comes to villains that the Odyssey or Damage Control teams might interact with on multiple worlds (including our own Earth), it helps to have some ideas laid out at the beginning of the game. You may never use them all, of course, but having them gives you fodder for adventure ideas.

Taking some cues from Stargate SG-1, a lot of the mythology of the game can come from one source that is never addressed in the core rulebook: Who build the Sherman Ring, the device that opened other dimensions to us for exploration? For lack of a better term, I'm going to call them the Builders. Whoever or whatever the Builders are, their interactions with themselves (internal factions) and with other races (external factions) can provide a lot of background for adventure scenarios.

While the Builders themselves aren't going to be the Bad Guys, I imagine that others who have stumbled onto their technology would be among the most commonly encountered multi-world groups. For example, a Trade Coalition that uses the portals to raid other worlds for goods, resources and even slaves would make for a decent enemy. A group of dictators bound by their access and their use of stolen Builder technology to pose as False Gods would be another enemy group to meet. The concept of a Rogue Builder who somehow survived to the present day (or travelled through time via a portal device) makes for an interesting enemy as well. Maybe the Builders had a war going on with someone, and the Enemy's Descendants are still around and making trouble. If that ancient war had escalated into super weapons, then Berserkers or Drones might be another force to be reckoned with. Perhaps a significantly less advanced society stumbled upon a working portal device. In that case, maybe there's a plane-hopping variant of Alexander the Great, intent on conquering the realms beyond "La Porta" and extending his Great Roman Empire to other worlds. Who knows?

And the Builders don't have to be the source of all of the conflicts. What about an Enemy Government here on Earth, also engaged in their own portal program using stolen technology? Or what about another source of Dimension Travelers with their own reasons to push out onto other worlds, perhaps even including Earth? (Of course, that last one would probably want to leave Earth once they find out about the asteroid, but that's another issue.) What about a race of Psionic Masters who use their psionic gifts to travel between dimensions, and their extensive powers of mind control to take over the civilizations they encounter? What if a Cabal of Archmages used portal magic to open gates to other worlds for their own personal needs, and didn't take kindly to those who would intrude on the worlds they claim as their own?

I'm sure that there are other options and opportunities to explore in the setting that will evolve out of play. What might start as a simple "Lair" world might suddenly take on greater significance in the eyes of the players. When that happens, I know I've got a winner. I don't mind doing a little rewrite on the background here and there, so long as I haven't introduced material as yet. The key is to make the setting as consistent as possible, from the players' perspective. Oh, and as fun as possible, too.

Looking Forward To It,
Flynn