"Movie/TV science fiction small ships/crews" Topic

Which ones get your vote for looks like a fun/functional crew and ship?

Go with typical RPG size team/crew…so no more than 8-10 crew members.

Merchant, pirate, good guys, bad guys, aliens, humans, whatever…not a question of intent, rather how interesting the ship and crew.

If the crew or the ship is a big brown space log then offer up the ship or crew that does not reek.

So either or both.

I offer a couple:

picture the falcon of course
picture (love the look but it seems after careful review the crew compliment is too large…sad)
picture / link Space 1999 Eagle/SSwift
picture I know it is just a hovercraft but I like the look, design, and style
picture Serenity

How about for you and your crew?
Say a limited space opera setting, maybe a handful of alien races at the most if any. Classic RPG options…do you go the route of converted merchant ship, old gun ship, etc.?

Me, I like the idea of a Traveller setting with flavors of Serenity and Alien(s)…the ship is available for most jobs but prefers light cargo, special deliveries, safari, and salvage service along the fringe of common spaceways.

and after doing a few searches I found this topic closely matched one from me, last year, so I will be CC for a moment…if I do not post it he will, being the master of relinking that he is :) TMP link

Serenity, hands down. this show deserved more, and gaming it is the best. Perfect crew size/complement/RPG/miniature gaming potential!

I love the idea of a smuggler with an up-armed transport. The Falcon is my favorite ship hand's down. I love Firefly too, but…no guns!

In the Star Wars RPG we play on and off, we have one of these:

link

It's the same model as Lando Calrissian's yacht. We stole it from a Hutt. We have a crew of my Twi'lek scoundrel, a space gunfighter, a jedi, and a droid. Fun group.

I was in a Serenity style crew 20 years ago. Except things got a bit out of hand. And surreal (one crew member was challenged to a duel. As the challenged he had choice of weapons- so he chose laxative filled syringes). We ended up being the heroes in a movie- but obviously, being a movie, it was nothing like real events.

However they did bring out a range of merchanidise, which my character bought 1 of EVERYTHING. Including the Action Figures. I was playing with plastic toys on the bridge LONG before Wash was thought of. And taking advice from 'Little Valentine'. And 'letting' him press the Hyperspace button. I will never forgive Whedon for what he did in the movie.

Serenity but…

When I ran Traveller games I noticed the players would hire and fire (lay off) crew members as needed. If they were conducting piracy they would hire extra muscle and put them in cold storage etc… Body guards for a shady deal put them in cold storage… Going on safari and you need Crocodile Dundee he gets a state room etc…

It also allowed me some cannon fodder for games!

We had a tough GM that also wanted to be a screen writer. In the Traveller games I played everyone was cannon fodder if we deviated from the GM's "script". And even though we were supposed to be a crack team of skilled ex-military guys, everybody we ran into kicked our behinds. LOL.

I'm partial to the Farscape crew with its mixed alien contingent having different cultures, values, and agendas.

"so I will be CC for a moment…"

LOL!!!

CC

"Which ones get your vote for looks like a fun/functional crew and ship?"

A United Galaxy Sanitation Patrol Cruiser.

With Betty & Betty.

Of course, when hiring and firing left and right, you are less likely to get a crew that may want to help out in a pinch, by going the extra mile.

Probably not an issue of them attempting to jump ship in deep space, but anywhere near a solar system, or planet, they will probably take to the lifeboats, or beat feet, at the first sign of trouble.

I was and am a fan of Farscape…the look was great, the aliens were fun, and the setting was weird enough to keep you guessing…space opera with a flair for runway fashion…sounds like 5th Element, which was also great.

Best Traveller game for me was back in 1980-81 with my regular group, all older by a handful of years, and the setting was a Star Wars lite…with Jedi being a rank like a knight…some were born into it, others apprenticed, and others were commissioned.

The long standing group consisted of a retired Jedi (older teacher at my high school), a Boba type, a Han (he shot first and I am ok with that), a jawa mechanic, and a medically retired trooper with droid legs and droid arm. The ship was a over sized falcon called an eagle…looked the same but the center section had 2 more decks, 1 up and 1 down…up for crew/passenger and down for cargo.

Fun times. I was playing the jawa, "socket" was his name and this was long before the current information available so I played him as a tribal type out on a walk about to gain wealth to return and claim a bride or two and start a new tech clan…was killed by a wookie…the wookie derobed him which is taboo and unforgiveable (in my writeup at the time)…so the wookie was castrated via a laser torch and that whole "pull your arms off"…well it is true, at leas in this case.

The crew played at running covert cargo for the rebels. No ship battles, but lots of being stuck in space stations without passage papers and lots of red tape gaming…do this for a favor, etc..

Serenity looks to be one of the more complete crews, well thought out and well played.

I guess that the "Ice Pirates" crew was too large & the crew of the "Lexx" was certainly not functional; but either could be fun as an RPG!

Ship battles for my group consisted of a military vessel intercepting them with threats to blow them away if they didn't surrender and allow themselves to be boarded.

A favorite past time for my group was to find some backwoods hick colony, act as tourists while they gathered intel and return as raiders. They would land at the local starport with hardpoint mounted weaponry, lay waste to local law enforcment and colonial militia. Once they were satisfied with the carange they would off load an APC and go shopping…

How about the Betty from Alien 4

picture

Small enough crew which didn't exactly stick to legal operations and the ship was nice

"Probably not an issue of them attempting to jump ship in deep space, but anywhere near a solar system, or planet, they will probably take to the lifeboats, or beat feet, at the first sign of trouble."

Loyalty was a huge problem as soon as it was obvious the profit margin was going to vanish or prison time was possible.

I GM'd a pretty good Star Wars (D6) crew for a while. They had a small, armed frieghter. The game should have ended the first run when the captain rolled 5 Ones for his hyperspace navigation, followed by 5 more ones for his piloting roll! By all rights the entire crew should have died, but I didn't want everyone to make new characters before we even had a chance to play an hour.

The Betty and crew are good choices…classic gamers to the core…lots of weapons, killers with character…lol.