There are
nominally 21 episodes available for me to run: 12 offical and 9 from
TrekRPG.net. Not all of the episodes are suitable (2 Holodeck, one that
I can't see the players dealing with well, one that is just the
Koboyashi Maru test). Plus I can draw a couple of episodes from my
FASATrek modules. Since there are 18 episodes left in the campaign,
this should be adequate for my needs.
Season 4 is going to be a break from the general Romulan-centric
campaign that I've been running so far. At first I thought I'd throw in
the episodes with the other threat races like the Klingons, Jem'Hadar,
Cardassians, and Ferengi but that looked a bit goofy. So instead I put
all the episodes on index cards, removed the Romulan episodes, and
chose six random episodes to run.
It was actually a good distribution. Two TrekRPG.net episodes, both of
the episodes set in the TOS era (and both involving Klingons), and both
Holodeck episodes. This gave me the idea to run a Klingon theme for
season 4. So I looked through the FASATrek modules and picked two,
replacing the Holodeck episodes. Now I have two sets of three episodes,
each having a random episode, a Klingon episode, and a long Klingon
episode.
The setting will be the last year of the Klingon Civil War (the third
year in my campaign, although it only lasted one year in the official
time line). The Duras faction is winning against Gowron's forces, and
it'll be up to the players to subtly alter the balance of power by
getting involved in their own inimitable way. This will be more
action-oriented than other seasons, which means it's more tailor made
to John Kalhoun and Venor Pertham's style of play.
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Episode 401
will be a short adventure to introduce the main Klingon adversary, some
distant relative of the Duras family. This one is not going to be a
direct confrontation, since he's not going to be actively against the
PCs yet. We follow with episode 402, involving a race to find the cure
for an epidemic. The Kzinti are the featured antagonists; and how are
they involved with the Klingons? Episode 403 is a full-day adventure
with the PCs travelling to Axanar to investigate reports of Klingons.
It should end with the Kzinti joining the Duras faction.
With that bleak note we start the second half of season 4 with episode
404, wherein the Tarellans have finally decided to return to the planet
of their origin. But the Duras family doesn't want them there so the
Kzinti are sent to stop them. It's up to the players to diffuse the
situation. Then in episode 405 the players race with the Klingons to
retrieve an ancient artifact of immense power, lost somewhere on a
mysterious planet. Finally, in episode 406 the players travel to the
Trianguli sector to find The Dixie, an intelligence ship with vital
information that can turn the Kzinti against the Duras family.
Now that I've written it out it makes more sense. All the episodes
resonate the same theme: the Kzinti-Duras alliance that the players
have to stop, much like the Enterprise and crew dealt with the
Romulan-Duras alliance. There is still all the reading I have to do and
a bit of work to make sure the episodes tie in together somewhat. We'll
see if this season is popular, or if I should go back to the ad-hoc way
of running a season that I've been doing so far.
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