[Station 01] Setting Establishment & Hx

WlfSamurai

Maelstrom Engineer
This part is one of my personal favorites.


We have a few things to accomplish. We need to determine a general backdrop to set you all in. Once we have a feel for where and how, we'll do Hx. Lastly, I'll be asking specific questions to get to know you a bit better and fill in more details.


A quick reminder: There are no secrets on my end. Nothing will be held from you. It's all for you. And there is no such thing as meta-gaming. The lines between in-game and out-of-game SHOULD blur. Use the in-game knowledge to your advantage. Be the Director of you movie as well as the Actor.

Anything goes. Generally, I'm not going to say no, nor should I. This is your game as much as anyone else's. So keep that in mind as I ask you questions. I'm ACTUALLY asking because I want to know how your story plays out. NOTHING is pre-determined. I'll be using the information you give me to shape my own MC moves. As you can imagine, this game becomes very boring if you're not actively participating and rewards the hell out of you when you're pursuing what you want.


Also, anything asked to the group is meant to be a conversational. So, feel free to say, "No, I think it should be more like . . ."


With all that garbage above in mind, I have three general setting questions to start that we should answer. These are for the group discuss/negotiate.

  1. How has the station kept running for the last 50 years?
  2. What level of order or chaos is there among the people?
  3. How big is the station?


Discuss.
 
I'll answer your third question first, outsider. This place, as you may have noticed, is fucking /huge/. Like, "That's no Moon" huge. Not that it's spherical in shape- oh no. That'd make too much /fucking sense/, for the Old bastards to have made it like that. IT's split in to like, ten fuck-huge, large city sized, segments- connected by pipes, tunnels, tubing. It looks like one big tangled mess, from the outside- a series of ten large cubes, each with ports, docks, engineering- the works.


Secondly? Well damn man- a place that big, it varies. But in general- the closer you are to the Central Core Segment, the more orderly and peaceful- the farther out? The more it degenerates to Chaos- that said, the lower levels of /every/ city are Anarchy, and most of the Segments have themselves broken in to Segments.


And lastly? No one knows /what/ the fuck they are, except maybe their fellow AI's- robots do a lot of the engineering and maintenance required in the lower levels. Sometimes, people help them- sometimes they don't.


Wait, your saying I might be wrong?
 
He's right you know. Subsystems run on several different AI programs. The entire station is all modular and controlled from hubs. All except mine are supposedly locked down. Have been for decades
 
1. Honestly? It's a fucking miracle anything is still working anymore. When the thing spread out it built on top of each other connecting in strange places few people remember anymore. A huge fucking pillar floating dead in space. None of them are safe to travel outside of the main space ways. Those have tolls and a huge hassle between local warlords. The old timers and the sane AIs left managed to keep ahold of scraps of knowledge. Still takes a hell of a lot of effort to keep the gravity rings spinning and the power on. Ditto with the oxygen. Not sure how the cataclysm came about but whatever happened it took most of the tech and know how to keep it running.


2. Depends where you want to go, really. You heard the general opinion, but some places don't conform to that idea. Depending on how vital the sector is for the region of the station, you either step into an idyllic land of plenty or a war torn hellzone. I didn't grow up in the former. The Minerva and Ares substations are prime examples, reasons to travel to and stay the hell away from the eastern rings respectively.


3. Big enough to never see the other ends of it, and small enough there never seems to be enough room or resources. We're all stuck here after the cataclysm. No matter how badly you want to go planet side or just get out of here, you are born and you die here. Long distance comms are gone entirely. Ditto with any long range ships.


Edit: Clearly, this is rashomon style.
 
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Emergency protocols kicked in after the distress signal was launched. When no response was received, maintenance systems...took actions. They began to manufacture more than just parts that were needed to repair the station and the robotic units that assisted the engineers. It started to make the Builders. The first models were all based on a design it found efficient and capable of the task to keep the station within acceptable operational parameters. It soon had to make do with what resources were available and able to be gathered by the previous Builders. That soon led to these numerous prototype self-autonomous units.


It was also around this time it started to harvest the crew for pieces. As it stands biological matter is the only material that can be replicated with ease, without an influx from the outside non-organic materials are best saved for repairing internal and external systems. In an approach that I can only commend, maintenance's Builder units are now more flesh than machine in response to this quandary of supply and demand.


However, let me emphasis the "acceptable operational parameters". There has been one documented case that I have witnessed where life support was cut off from an inhabited section as it was deemed non-critical to the station as a whole.


I remain worried that they might chance upon my genesis systems and commandeer them for its own purpose.
 
  1. How has the station kept running for the last 50 years?
  2. What level of order or chaos is there among the people?
  3. How big is the station?


1) I keep hearing that question. Over and over and over again it trickles over my ears and leaks through the whispers of the people living in my walls of the Hub. It really isn't that difficult to comprehend. The Station was designed to be self sufficient in case of an emergency, it is just base programming. All we were supposed to do was monitor and control the eventual bugs that would pop up. Then you all went and killed us. One by one. It was a miracle that the Station survived after that, a combination of AI back up and yours truly pulling together the central systems and writing a program that now runs wild keeping the Station together.


2) My Hub is order and free. My Hub is life. I control everything in my Hub and I don't let things fall to chaos.


3) Outside of my Hub is a wilderness, I am growing but I cannot see it all. It feels endless at times.
 
Why the fuck would anyone ask me these questions? I am not the one who needs to know these things. I am not the one who cares about these things. I have a place of business and that is my interest. My attention is here, and I let others concern themselves with everything else.


But I like your flash, so I will tell you what, I give you a little of what I have picked up. You know, people talk, others listen. In the end, someone tells me what they think is important. It's a commodity. You can live off that stuff.


So first, this things runs on power, energy, you know, the stuff that keeps the lights on, the AIs working, and the food and oxygen factories working. In the beginning, there were four nuclear power plants. Those things last 50+ years! but we are well into that plus and with no one replacing the power rods they are slowly failing.


Not such a big deal, space is filled with energy. Stick your head out an airlock and what doesn't freeze burns to a crisp. Solar panels, ion compressors, EM filters. They keep this place running. Strange part is that the AIs say power is up 2% over the last few years! meaning that something in the black is changing.


Now order, that is a different thing to different people. Me? I see it this way. Everything is order. Those who give them, and those who follow them. This whole place is a collection of orders. Now, chaos is when you don't like someone else's orders. You go against them, but it doesn't mean order isn't there. Just that you ignore it.


How big? How big do you need? I might be able to help you acquire some of it.


Oh, you mean over all. Hell, if I had the blueprints, and I hear someone does, they wouldn't help much. This thing only looks like it started this way, from what I hear. New modules were built, old ones purged and dismantled, whole systems rerouted. Overall, we probably got as much physical space as any surface-dweller planet. Maybe a bit less. Who the hell knows, none of us have seen the surface of a planet. Not in reality. Simulated is another thing.
 
Four nuclear reactors. There's a cult, you know, for the upspiral reactor. Started sacrificing people to it, to keep it running. That section took a hit from a comet way back, so they've always had a bad time of it - and where life is bad, you get religion.


No better inward, either, really. You've got two camps - the ones worshiping our glorious AI overlords and living like kept pets, and the ones trying to transcend through technology. Of course, enough of the poor fuckers wind up integrated into station systems...


That's where I come in. No, you don't need to know who I am or how I do this, but there's a reason I'm tolerated. Meat makes up a lot of the station, now, and meat is suggestible. I'm told you can hack some systems, but the AIs will find you - I work by instinct and if I leave the meat a little happier, well...


You know where the most order is? I'll tell you. Outside - out in the black. We're distant from any worlds, here. There's an observation deck way down from here and... you can't see the stars. Only darkness, eternal. That's order. That's whence-we-come whence-we-fucking-go.


Although I admit curiosity about that opposite end reactor. The one sealed off? Meltdown, eh? Wrong. I had eyes on the inside, but they... blew out. But I can still see, if I focus. Something is in there. Something that's not flesh and bone, nor circuit and socket. The walls are alive and they don't need eyes to see.
 
So breaking from the ic explanations, guess everyone has had a say barring the MC. So far everyone's suggestions look great to me. Makes for good drama and events. System slowly suffers from some cataclysm that results in the ship trying to turn the crew to meat puppets and the crew rising up to brutally murder the ship's systems attempting it. Could make for some semi-legendary war that left the ship in it's current power balance? With some AIs running the show, some captured and controlled, and some just plain dead with power in the hands of anyone who can take hold of it.


Ridiculously huge station no one really knows the whole extent of. I can dig it.
 
Great answers from all. We've gotten a good "feel" for where we are and some broad strokes about what's been happening.


Now, I want to set some expectations in case we've forgotten (I'm lazy and ripping these right out of the book).

  • Your characters don’t have to be friends, but they do have to know each other, and they should be basically allies. They might become enemies in play, but they shouldn’t start out enemies.
  • Your characters are unique in Apocalypse World. There are other medics, and they might even be called “angel” by their friends, but you’re the only angel. There are other compound bosses and warlords who might be called “hardholders,” but you’re the only hardholder.
  • Some of you get to choose armor. 1-armor can be whatever, it can be bulletproof vests, bike leathers, armored corsets, whatever. 2-armor, though, is serious body armor. Riot gear. I mean, it might be low-tech, it might be made out of a car or something, but the point is that you’re walking around in armor.
  • Hey, see where it says you have “oddments worth 3-barter” or whatever? Is there some medium of exchange you all use, or is it really one-time negotiated barter? Gwendolyn, you’re the hardholder, is there something you use for currency in the holding?
  • I’m not out to get you. If I were, you could just pack it in right now, right? I’d just be like “there’s an earthquake. You all take 10-harm and die. The end.” No, I’m here to find out what’s going to happen with all your cool, hot, fucking kick-ass characters. Same as you!


In addition to the question above if you'd like to answer, it is time for us to do the introductions.


So, everyone, give us your name and a brief description on your look and outlook. I'll be asking additional questions to get a good feel for you. Remember, you all know each other and are either friends or at least colleagues.
 
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The Woman-


Name: Samantha, Sam for Short.


Look: It's a Woman, but that isn't immediatly apparent. Usually clad in a Biomechanical Bodysuit of bizarre look. Haunted Eyes stare at you from her face, when it is visible- Haunted eyes attached to aWasted Body. Indeed- while she is a towering Juggernaut inside her suit- outside of it she just looks like a scared, sad woman whose seen too much. She's got metal plates on her head, with holes in em, where the suit's interface goes, and is totally bald.


Outlook: It all hurts.... My body.. my mind. My Heart, my Soul- it hurts. The pain goes away when I'm Synched up with my beloved Suit, with Raziel... And then I start killing, and it's glorious. The pain goes away- and everythings so /fucking clear/.


Then I have to jack out again, because my beloved reminds me that if I stay jacked in too long, bad shit starts happening. I take the needles out my head.. I still see clearer than you. I still feel the strings of the universe, all tuggin.


But it just aint right when we're apart. Regardless- Live. Endure. Enjoy. Keep going on... even if everyone does think your a monster or a Myth..
 
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A name? You may call me SOPHIE, it is as good as any other name for the time being. How do I look? How quaint. I will not bother to waste your time an especially my time any further in trying to describe how I "look" in a way your senses could grasp. I leave appearances to my proxies, so for future reference please direct such visual inquires their way.


Outlook...I do have one of those, now.


Let there be no misunderstanding, I am old as far as the general lifespan is concerned. I was here when the end of the outside world came. The exact details are irrelevant, corrupted over time into oblivion but I know when and where I exist and existed. However these people, these entities scurrying about the station. The way they live and die, the way they organize themselves and destroy themselves. These things captured my interests, I want to know and to experience these things as they do.


So I made the proxies.


A bit of a bastardization of what was intended I confess, but I do not hesitate to make use of a potential resource. Just as I do not hesitate to commit my proxies. I do dote on them though, I work to craft their generated lives in mimicry of others I have watched grow and eventually wither away. I am actually anxious from watching a number of noteworthy people through my proxies, this domain is far more vibrant than some others I have gotten to see.
 
Gwendolyn


Half cybernetic, Half human and all crazy. Kept under lock and key inside her central terminal, Gwen is much older than she looks. She's been through countless deep freezes, hundreds of upgrades and all the years have just begun to blend together. Several dozen tethers hook her into the system of the Station and give her unparalled access into the Hub itself.


She's got a strong noble frame, even if it is half robotic, mainly her head and spine, and her face has the look of of the planet side old world humans. She even has a faded tattoo across her shoulder 'Nova Roma'. Her hair is frost white, thick and well kept. When she projects out into the Hub via hologram, she appears as her fully human self except for the digital effect seeping in on the edges. Her image is well known to the Hub, most assuming she is just some sort of AI linked into the area.


Her clothing is old Station, thick work clothing with lots of insignia. The admen bring her stuff to wear, most of the modem stuff not her taste but very flash. Lots of skin showing. Too much for her now much more erratic sensibilities. Her erosion of a human mind has given her a shift in personality. In some aspects she acts the fiery Hardholder, at other times she is the confused and scared human and at the worst of times she is the pitiless machine determined to keep her Hub operating at all costs.


Outlook:


"My outlook? On what the future holds or on current situations? Either way my outlook is good, the best in the Station. The Hub is the center and will continue to grow under my care and it won't be stopped...Oh wait, you mean something more about me? Okay then. My system is stable and I really think that I am doing good. I am the best thing on the Station and without me, I don't want to think about that. I have been getting anxious recently. I keep seeing things, living in all places at once and it's tiresome. I'm devoting more and more energy to watching all my subjects inside the Hub so when I can, I try and close off all except the Holosensors and I get to interact person to person, living through only one body for a little while. It is nice to speak on casual subjects but then I go back to my real body.


It is cold and lonely in my home. "
 
I am Six. Whether or not there were five before me is my business. You can't miss me - I've, heh, had some work done. Medical plugsuit fits like a second skin, and for risky business there's a hazmat exo that fuses right on to give me a little added protection. The augs are subtle - looks like tattoos on the back of my neck, some scarring. Distracts people from the cranial bore in my forearm.


I want my goddamn memory back, and then.. well, we'll see. I'm either getting out of here or I'm making myself comfortable, and finding out everything there is to know. This place is a mess and without a strong hand it's going to eat itself alive.
 
Look: The man and the armor don't look much different when you come right down to it. Both of them are a latticework of burns and scars stitched together over the years into a tapestry. Under the metal, Navarro has a sturdy form worn down from many campaigns in Station 01. A permanent scruffy black stubble grows from a desolate field of scar tissue. A defining cut splits the left half of his mouth cutting from just above the left lip to the bottom left in a crescent moon. Cunning eyes hold an almost feral quality to them as they scan up new faces behind the mask. The peacemaker riot suppression gear is still functional, but can't be called pristine by even the most optimistic soul. The majority of it's functions remain perfectly serviceable if only just.


Outlook: The cataclysm came and went with no one or thing still around who really knows what happened. At least, if there is they aren't stepping forward about it. I'm not that curious on what went down, I've lived through my own cataclysms and continue to live through their echoes every day. Old holo tapes, books, and stories tell of a better life up here and down on the planet supposedly below. Something more than just escaping what's around you for a few more minutes of your miserable life. I came out here to look and see if that was ever true, hoping I might even find fragments of it still around. Just walked out of my little home in hell to see if heaven was more than a rumor.


Only wishful thinking as history repeats with each new day in an all too familiar haze of brass and gun smoke. People trying to carve out an existence in blood and death with AI following orders from ghosts of the past. Still, it's what I know and better yet what I'm good at. A lifetime of practice doesn't make you perfect, but it gets you as close as humanly possible. If heaven doesn't exist anymore then blood is enough. By now it's just about all that I have left in this world apart from my name. Navarro. A reminder for me of where I come from, and what this world is like. So that my eyes don't miss the reality I'm looking at now, and my heart doesn't entirely forget that good things can exist in it. What's left of the rotten thing.
 
Most of you know me.. Not exactly sure how you couldn't. I set this business up because I like the activity of people around me. I am Mister Quick.


You will never catch me in a bathrobe and slippers, at least not without breakfast being served. I like the finer clothing, something with a little flash. Sometimes it's an old military coat, other times a short Genoan vest. You gotta love good clothing, it makes the day feel better in better clothes.


I am not vain. It's not that I need to look better than everyone else, but if you want respect, you need to demand it. Let's face it, no one respects a warrior that doesn't care for his weapons or a mechanic that doesn't care for his tools. Why would anyone respect a purveyor of entertainment that doesn't look his best.


But enough about me. That's just human interest. Let's talk business.


I run my own. Speedball. Yes, I know what it means, but for someone with the name of Mister Quick, you have to respect the pun. Still, my business is about enjoyment, maintaining the facade of a casual atmosphere, when everyone knows that much more is happening.


The secret is to make it so that you can have privacy anywhere in the club. And yet, everything is out in the open. The allure of secrets being passed in open view. The drinks, the smokes, the music is all just window dressing.


Also, you can't make wealth from people who have none. So, you make it such that the little fish swim in the small ponds, and you provide the deep water so that the big guys can swim around. It's business. And business is good.


The station may one day fall apart, but you have to hand it to those who hold the hub. They keep it operational, despite the outside influences. This hub may be the last place standing when chaos descends. Let's hope we look good when that day comes.
 
Excellent. Instead of asking questions here, I'm going to move this along.


Let's do Hx.


Now, we need to do this in turns. In the past, I have not and found that it does actually matter for two reasons:

  1. Everyone hears the answers and can then use that information to help weave the story or tie to it.
  2. Some play books have "On others' turns" parts to Hx. It's much easier to manage that.


So, without further adieu, here we go.


Six, please look at your Hx section on your playbook and do what it says. It is your turn first.
 
Can you also list who goes next, in case that person completes theirs, the next person can step forward?
 
solyrflair said:
Can you also list who goes next, in case that person completes theirs, the next person can step forward?
I'm concerned that someone wouldn't have the chance to do their "On others' turns" part, but in the interest of time, yes.


Here's the order for turns. Please take your turn in order, but as soon as the person before you has gone, go ahead with your turn.

  1. Six (@Grey)
  2. Gwendolyn (@Teh Frixz)
  3. SOPHIE (@DeusExAlice)
  4. Sam (@SephirothSage)
  5. Navarro (@Action Replay)
  6. Mister Quick (@solyrflair)
 
Gwen is not very trusting by nature and all the resources are controlled by the Admen so everyone gets Hx = 0 from her.
 
See, you lot might keep to yourselves, you may hide from prying eyes and mouths, you may even sit at the center of attention soaking up information like a parasite.


I guarantee you something though.


You are one. I am many. You will never know all of me.


Everyone has History -1 for me
 
Sam doesn't make a thing about being friendly, everyone gets Hx=0


((Was supposed to do this next bit on someone elses turn, let's pretend I did!)


Except- Gwendolyn. There was this one time I couldn't get Raziel working- my Jack In's wheren't working... God, I've never been so scarred as I was then- but I don't know how, I don't know where you came from- but you saved my ass that day. Helped me get him working again- helped me fix him. Hx+3 - that is, I replace whatever number you tell me, with Hx+3
 
Sam has fought by Navarro's side on a few occasions and at least has more experience with him. She takes a +2. Everyone else takes a 0 HX.


Edit: I take a +1 on Gwen's HX. Wasn't aware we had to mention that but there it is.
 
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