The Freest Trade 4
It's Year of the Emperor 845,360 in the Milky Way galaxy, and through nearly a million years of near-total peace and political stability, the Dark Forest has given way to a thriving de-facto confederation, united by threat of force from the Third Tefinian Empire and its immortal robot Emperor. Galactic civilization has slowly overtaken nearly two thirds of the galaxy, and commerce is rich and lucrative even in the relatively lawless rimward expanse.
Which is where you come in. You're an independent, free merchant and freight operator; a citizen of no system government and a member of no trade conglomerate, spending most of your time subject only to the handful of essential laws the Empire imposes upon interstellar space. Your home is your workplace and you only pay the Empire's minuscule tax every year; while a large part of your crew's freight income goes to maintaining the ship, the lack of personal expenses means space traders usually end up with very healthy retirement funds.
Of course, that does assume you make it to retirement. Though interstellar space isn't quite as bloodstained as it was between the fall of the First Empire and the rise of the Third, it's still not the most hospitable place a person can go. There's pirates, criminals - even slave-traders on the very rim of the Milky Way, past the extent of the Tephinian sphere of influence.
And there's something just about to come over the horizon; something no-one seems to see coming. Something big. Big enough that everyone has a part in it; even (especially?) members of freeest of all trades...
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Vital statistics:
System: GURPS 4e
TL: 9-10*
Points Available: 120 (-45 for disadvs)
Starting Wealth: $15,000/150cr**
Estimated Length: Indefinite (Open game)
*TL is a bit complex in this setting. The area you'll be operating in most of time has access to TL10 and even very rare and controlled >TL11 equipment from the core of the Empire, but doesn't have the industrial capacity to actually produce it. Thus, the "effective" TL of these areas is TL9 (even late-TL8 even further out!), even if people have access to TL10 knowledge. Take skills at TL10. Down-TL penalty from 10 to 9 is ignored.
**All characters should have the "Struggling" disadvantage. Interstellar merchants aren't quite as wealthy as the average planetary citizen, but the Credit goes a long way and you don't have to pay for a house or a family. This does not count against your disadv. cap.
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This game is a "semi-sandbox" sort of deal; there's things going on around you in the galaxy at large, but I'm generally not going to be dictating your part in them; I'll have "quest hooks" scattered here and there. I'm mostly making this up as I go along; there's only the loosest semblances of a campaign plan.
Please click the "game form" link to the left to see the game threads; post character designs in the Character Thread for approval and restrict all not in-character discussion to OOC tags or the OOC Thread.
I expect a high degree of player initiative. Please feel free to move your character around, add insignificant details to the scene (that is, if your character needs a hyper-plasmic vacuum awl for some repair work, don't post "Marvin looks around for the hyper-plasmic vacuum awl" and wait for me to tell you whether or not there's one around; if it makes sense for there to be one, just have him pick it up and do what he needs with it), et cetera. I am the final arbiter of overall setting details and I reserve control of NPCs, of course, but I don't mind if you assume the port town I already described as having all kinds of stores contains the specific kind of store you're looking for, nor do I mind if you write its description yourself.
