STARHAVEN

Ron (aka BADDAWG) asked me to forward this game scenario

THIS title is from an 1950s ACE SCI FI double novel of the same title
about a man made heavily armed spacestation where criminals and others
find refuge from the forces of law and order.

LOL, i changed the idea around a bit for my scenario!

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BACKGROUND ------------------------------------------------------
STARHAVEN is a mobile interstellar naval support activity built by
the ALLIANCE in the closing months of the SYSTEM STATES WAR. the
station was close to completion when 3 powerful FEDERATION naval task
forces jumped into the system where STARHAVEN was nearing completion,
and NSA STAR - HAVEN, which was nearing completion, was forced to make
an emergency jump outsystem with 4 attached fuel barges and a small
escort of warships.

the ships of the escort arrived at the planned destination, but without
NSA STARHAVEN. something had gone wrong during the jump, and STARHAVEN
was presumed to be lost with all hands.
the escort was ambushed by a FED task force while refuelling from a
gas giant in another system, was destroyed with a loss of all vessels
and their crews.

STARHAVEN, relied on multiple jump engines, all working in perfect
synchronization, to move from star-system to star-system. during the
jump, one or more of the engines malfunctioned, resulting in a mis-jump
that moved the STARHAVEN uncontrolled light years across space and
decades forward in time. during this mis-jump, somehow, deadly creatures
( i used genestealers) from another time and place appeared inside the
vast naval support activity. these aliens ran amok, slaughtering naval
and civilian construction personnel, carrying off some as hosts for MORE
aliens, and preventing the desperate humans from making repairs to the
jump drives. a few of the crew (some impregnated with aliens to be)
escaped into low berths and avoided the massacre . . . .

the aliens, with no one to prey upon, went dormant, but the alien
ubermind remained alert and on guard against intruders.

back in the STARHAVEN's home system, fighting resulted in the
destruction of information about and the deaths of key personnel with
knowledge of STAR -HAVEN. no one even knew STARHAVEN had been built
and was almost ready to go into service, so no one ever looked for her .
. .

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NOW------------------------------------------------------
STARHAVEN had misjumped aross hundreds of light years, emerging in the
empty system belonging to a red dwarf star. the dwarf star was located
inside of a dark nebula full of stellar gas and dust clouds tthat masked
its interior. this nebula was far beyond the known frontiers of human
space of the time.

STARHAVEN had also misjumped across 60 years of time, making the
transit without the knowledge of the station's computers, or crew.
although decades had passed since the mis-jump for the rest of the
universe, the station has only been in safe orbit of the red dwarf for
3 months.

STARHAVEN was designed and built to be able to repair, refit or
provide maintenance for 2 batleships, 6 heavy cruisers, 6 light
cruisers, and 10 destroyers or smaller warships at the same time, with
docking and service facilities for her own tenders and yardcraft, as
well as bays for 100 small spacefighters, and truly impressive defensive
weaponry.

the power plant is running hot and normal, lifesupports are good, air,
water, food, and everything needed to support humans and warships in
battle is at hand. the fuel barges are full. inside there is evidence
of combat between men and aliens, wih some compartments sealed and
airless. STARHAVEN's AI (artificial intelligence) engine is badly
damaged, and just able to maintain lifesupports to keep human life
viable.

in 60 years, the frontier in this region of space has moved,
considerably, and now the dark nebula is part of the new frontier. the
nebula is located within jump -2 of a travelled star route, but remains
dark and unexplored, with the reputation of a ship /crew killer. this
is because many vessels have entered this nebula, but none have ever
emerged . . . .

the 16 year old TYPE A2 free trader MERRY MAUDE, making a routine
transit from JONE'S WORLD to BIG RED with a cargo of agricultural
equipment, luxury goods, five middle passengers and 10 lowberth
passengers has been ambushed by a large corsair, the NOSFERATU.

the ambush happened as the trader was entering orbit of a gas giant to
skim fuel, a brief running fight followed,when the trader made run
for it, was caught and grappled to the corsair. in a desperate attempt
to escape, the free trader skipper engaged his jump drive, but only
succeeded in dragging the corsair along during the resuting mis-jump .
. .

both vessels arrived in the red dwarf's system, and within a few
hundred thousand klicks of STARHAVEN.
the free trader's pilot recovered from the loopy side effects of the
mis-jump first, and broke the grapples. boosting away as fast as her
short legs could carry her, MERRY MAUDE, again ran for it, this time
toward the massive "ship" her sensors had detected.

(no known space pirates had anything THAT BIG, so the logic was it must
be a naval vessel)

the pirates recovered from the mis-jump more slowly, but when they did,
soon realized the trader was getting away, and boosted after her, using
her longer legs to good effect. the space pirates were stunned and
paniced when they detected the massive "ship" , and attempted to flee
from the expected salvo . when no salvo was fired, and additional
sensor reports indicated the station was fully powered by apparently
abandoned, the chase was resumed.

the trader, too had discovered the "ship" appeared to be abandoned, and
decided to board it and hide from the pirates. the trader arrived at the
station before the corsair, but not by much. crew and middle passengers
grabbed up food, water, meds and weapons before cycling through the
empty berth's personnel lock.

the corsair slid into a nearby berth, and dispatched a large, well
armed boarding party to first seize the trader, capture the
crew/passengers and then to explore the station itself.

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THE GAME
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all or most of the game should take place inside compartments and
corridors the vast STARHAVEN station, so tiles from SPACE HULK or
LEGIONS OF STEEL will be needed, or some sort of deck plans in sale
with your miniatures.

deck plans of the docked trader and corsair will also be useful, just
in case!

you will 8 figures to represent the trader crew, and 5 figures to
represent the passengers. the traders have normal weaponry for their
trade (small arms, mostly civilian types, but maybe with a few military
smallarms, no machineguns or heavier weaponry). the traders can all have
flak armor and commo headsets, with normal duty clothing. the
passengers are PASSENGERS, so it is not very likely there will be a
RAMBO among them, but there is the possibility of a former soldier or
policeman with his own weapons and armor. use the nomad chart to
generate reps for the crew, and one passenger. the others are generated
on the civvie chart.
if you have figures that will do for vacc- suits, use these. if not use
wot ever you got! the skipper is a rep-4 or rep-5.

the corsair has two different and distinct types making up the crew;
space pirate techs, and space pirate gunfighters. the techs can have
light space armor, as well as personal and weaponry, and reps are
generated using the nomad list . the captain is a rep-5. there
are 30 techs in the crew, divided into two watches. there are 30
gunfighters, ground and ship boarding specialists, in the crew led by a
rep-5. they all have armored vacc-suits personal armor and weaponry.
use the merc chart to generate gunfighter reps.

the traders use red cards and the space pirates use black cards, UNTIL
THE FIRST JOKER IS TURNED OVER! from this ponit onwards the traders are
red hearts, the pirates are red diamonds.

the hive mind will become aware of intruders after they enter
STARHAVEN, and when a joker is played, the aliens become active in
random sized grouping (1-10 aliens) and will home in on the humans.
after the joker is drawn, the aliens become all black cards. the number
of active alien groups homing in on the humans is determined by the
black card number value (2-10 and a face card DOUBLES the number of
the aliens in each group!

you will need at least 24 aliens of some sort, and i recommend plastic
genestealers! recycle them as need. use the big nasty alien rep and
rules for them for genestealers or other beastial aliens. aliens DO
NOT USE any weapons other than he ones they are born with!

lowberth containing survivors are discovered when any face card is
drawn, and can be safely revived by the finder in 1D6 turns.
remember, to these people decades have not passed, and they are still
at war with the FEDERATION. there are 1-10 survivors in a low berth and
they are not armed but may have weapons stashed nearby the lowberth.

if the face card is red, the survivor is not infected, but if the card
is black, survivor is infected by the gene- stealers, and becomes an
active, willing member of the hive mind ! survivor is now controlled by
the genestealer player.

ten face cards indicates the passage of one day inside the STARHAVEN
and inboard the docked ships.

the game is set to run for a maximum of 3 game days, LOL, but it is
possible that the humans may be dead, or have fled the station in
their ships or any of the auxiliary craft STARHAVEN is equipped with
before then!

note, these are not starships!

also note, the free trader does not have enough fuel in her tanks to
jump outsystem! it must refuel from a fuel barge or from station side
tankage before leaving (10 face cards to refuel!).once refuelled the
trader, given time to plot a course, can make a safe jump back to known
space.

the corsair does have suffient fuel to make a jump, and given enough
time to plot a course, can safely jump back to known space.

i used CHAIN REACTION (modified) for this scenario, but you can use any
rules of your choice.

have fun!

DAWGIE