>> Moonbase Blues Post-mortem

Recently I wrote about my first session of Mothership, and wanted to create a separate posts for my thoughts on the module, things I changed about it, and my post-mortem for mistakes made, lessons learned.

Moonbase Blues

Moonbase Blues is a Mothership module written by Ian Yusem (Art & Layout by Warren Denning, concept by Dai Shugars) that places the players on a research moonbase with strange colonists corrupted with an obsession for blue. The framing immediately gives the players a mystery to attempt to solve (how did they get here and what happened to the base?), provides time pressure to keep the tension high and the action moving, and has truly horrifying imagery to tie it all together. Despite fitting onto a single-page brochure, it’s packed full of enough content to fill a claustrophobic one-shot with tense action on its own, and the descriptions and tables are evocative enough to serve as inspiration for your own additions. I would have liked to see a few more organizational tools, such as a table showing what changes on the base during each hour of the meteor’s orbit, but those are easy to create with minimal prep beforehand. There could also be more detail about locations and base functions, but the gaps are interesting for the Warden and PCs to fill, and help make the scenario unique, so I don’t think they’re needed.

What I Changed

The module is ready to play as-is, but with some prep (and during play), I ended up changing a few things that I’ll list here as well as how well I thought they worked.

The Pod

By far the biggest change to the module I made was excluding the pod the PCs arrived in from the handouts. Since it’s made clear that there are no landing pads on the moon, it didn’t seem reasonable to me that the computer system would be able to plot it on a map as a station feature. There are a couple of ways around this that I could see:

• Have the base terminal receive a transponder from a functional spacecraft on the surface, which would indicate to the players that there is a craft out there, and if you make up a callsign for the pod they can also identify it as their own. I think I’d prefer this for the short one-shot setup, like for a con-game, as it gives the players a direct path to a potential way off of the moon.
• Only hint vaguely that such a craft exists: the players arrived on the moon somehow, automated log messages indicating the approach of a pod or shuttle a short time in the past (perhaps sprinkle in log events in the past that indicate arrival/departure of other shuttles), and make it obvious once the players are on the surface that they can see a half-buried pod. I like this approach as well, since it lets the players feel smart if they figure out their craft must still be on the moon, but also it will be obvious if/when they make it to the surface, so they should always know about it

I ended up using the second approach on my first playthrough, though I think I failed at making the half-buried pod “obvious” when the players made it onto the surface by describing it as “a wreck”. I tried to correct this mistake by having NPCs in the mechanics bay comment on the recent pod arrival, but the players thought back to it being a “wreck” and almost dismissed it as a possibility, eventually endeavouring out to see if they could fix the (unknown to them) functional pod.

Safety Airlocks

A small addition, but one that gives the players plenty of opportunities to do clever things is the addition of safety airlocks in between domes on the base. The intended purpose would be that if any dome lost pressure due to an incident, the safety airlock in place would prevent the entire base from losing pressure. These aren’t strictly necessary, as simple reinforced hermetic doors would suffice to prevent the loss of pressure, and the two full airlocks from habitation and security should be sufficient as redundant airlocks for repair crews to fix any leaks.

However, the safety airlocks allowed my players to set up an elaborate improvised bomb to kill some colonists, and they also serve as safe spaces to scout out domes before proceeding inwards and in a pinch could serve as a temporary safe haven against a horde of violent colonists.

Threat to Androids

In the module as written, it is implied that androids are immune to the meteor psychosis that affects the human players, so I wanted to introduce some additional threats to androids specifically. Expanding on the ideas in the pamphlet of the colonists using blue android lubricant as part of their blue-integration behaviors, I added a colonist behavior of actively tearing apart a barely functioning android to get at the blue-lubricant inside. A minor detail, but it explains more directly why no androids remain on the base, and that androids must still escape even though they are immune to the meteor’s effects.

The Prophet

An idea I took from Warren Denning’s play report, was a unique colonist he referred to as “The Prophet.” The Prophet has succumbed to the psychosis like the other colonists, but leads rituals in the observatory as if some sort of cult leader. She appears to be sane, invites players to join in the rituals and “enter the Blue Grace”, and the psychotic colonists follow her commands.

Since all colonists are basically the same besides their unique psychosis behaviors, it seemed useful to me to have a few stand out from the rest and be recognizable to serve as recurring threats or notable challenges. To this end I had “The Prophet” appear again at the end of the game, leading a large group of colonists to assault the players as they tried to make their way to the escape pod. She served as an effective antagonist, but almost too effective, as the players briefly considered that the psychotic behavior could be due to a cult following and drugs rather than supernatural effect, but the tension and fear caused by the character is worth it I think.

I also had plans to reveal bits of a backstory for her, that she became the de facto leader by being a prominent scientist on the base that first studied the meteor (the random punch cards with blue wavelength on them would have been hers), succumbed to the psychosis early, was held in security, and later freed by the colonists as they all turned. However, besides station logs, accessing research documents through hacking or punch cards, and correlating with behavior/a name patch on her jumpsuit, this information doesn’t flow naturally. Still, it’s an idea I’ll keep in mind for future runs if it comes up.

Things I Wish I Had Done

Is the Rover Actually Broken?

My players initially missed the SOS in the weather report, which is how the players would normally discover that some NPCs are still sane in the Mechanics Bay, which encouraged me to think about how other ways the survivors would communicate their presence. After the game, I had the thought that the rover in the mechanics bay may not even be broken at all, but the survivors purposefully tripped whatever maintenance sensor is necessary to make the base AI request assistance in the mechanics bay. This would be useful especially if the players are short on time before the meteor’s rise if you want to have a dramatic race of the players trying to reach the pod before the light of the meteor corrupts them, without making them take time to fix the rover.

Are Those… Rocks?

During the climactic final sequence, I had “The Prophet” ambush the players with a veritable horde of colonists. The players in the rover tried to speed past, resulting in an exciting scene with colonists climbing on the rover and the players fighting them off as they drove towards the downed pod.

I liked the tension of this scene, and players afterwards listed it as one of their favorite moments, however the sudden ambush without warning made me pull some punches in regards to realism. Initially the colonists opened fire with rigging guns and improvised firearms, which realistically should have punctured vacsuits in addition to detailing damage, however it felt very unfair to have a failed dice roll immediately seal the fate of players without telegraphing the threat.

What I wish I had done was reveal that the colonists had broken apart the meteor chunk from the Geo Lab, and were using those chunks as blunt weapons or even throwing them into the rover at the command of the prophet, which pushes forward the unique threat of the scenario (the psychosis). Then, when fighting off the boarders, the players are both fighting against the physical threat of having their vacsuit helmets cracked open or cut on the sharp edge of a rock, while trying to maintain their sanity fighting against the call of the blue light.

I also described this potential alternative to a player afterwards and they said “Well I hate that,” which makes me think that it was definitely the right idea.

What I Learned

Being my first time being a Warden for Mothership (and GMing in general), I took away a number of lessons that may be useful to others:

• Panic rolls are for more than critically failed saves. Something I lost in the controlled chaos of running a game was when to call for panic checks, a number of which are detailed in the players survival guide, but that doesn’t cover all cases. Panic checks should punctuate big, scary moments, for instance the final sequence when my players got ambushed by The Prophet and her cult
• Telegraph danger, and then don’t pull punches. During the final sequence, there were not one, not two, but three critical failures from my players. Each time I didn’t think the danger was telegraphed enough to punish with outright death, even when the logic of the situation demanded it, and ended up pulling back to some minor damage or a slightly worse situation. When stakes are high, it’s important to lay out what consequences to failures are, and then follow through on those implied threats, otherwise the environment loses its teeth.
• Fear and Sanity is a spectrum. I struggled at a few moments in the game between asking for a fear or a sanity save. In theory it’s quite clear: fear is for physical danger, loneliness, depression, and other human natural responses, while Sanity is for things that cannot be explained. However, situations often arise when both apply, like being confronted by a human surviving in the vacuum of space violently brandishing a weapon. Fear is a natural response, but his survival cannot be explained. Ultimately, I don’t think there’s a “correct” answer when this comes up, just use whatever feels right.
• GMing is fun. There’s nothing quite like putting the players in a tough situation and sitting back and listening to them plan and scheme in character for whole minutes at a time without my input. It’s a rewarding experience and I can’t wait to do it again.