Kingdom Come: Side-Mission Submissions

The TTV Channel
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As is discussed in TTV Episode 136, I wish to include some community involvement for the Bionicle RPG that is coming up soon. Or whenever the rest of the cast gets their character sheets filled out.

In any case, the title of the specific campaign I’ll be running is “Kingdom Come” and I have a pretty solid idea of the sort of events that will take place. That being said, every good RPG has some side-missions to shake up the formula and provide some extra opportunities. Since side-missions typically aren’t tightly tied to the main over-arching plot, this allows for more freedom and variety. This is the part where you come in.

You are being given a chance to design a side-mission the players may encounter during their adventures. Now, before submitting an idea, I highly encourage you to listen to TTV 136 first as I outline the process there pretty well (don’t be afraid to ask questions here though). That said, I’ll provide a brief recap of the two biggest points:

1) Avoid too many details. A side-mission can only be presented as a possibility when circumstances allow. Making your side-mission depend on a specific location, pre-established/canon character, event, or time era will heavily decrease the likelihood of your side-mission being used. An example of a bad side-mission would be “Turaga Jovan sent a courier to seek out Lessovik for a secret mission to the island of Karzahni, but the courier was taken hostage by the Dark Hunter Mimic”.

Paint with broad strokes. Use simple criteria such as “small village”, “a large forest”, “happens every night”, “a Vo-Matoran doctor named Dixnic”, etc. If you want a frame of reference as for what time era you should shoot for, the events taking place are in the era of 4000-5000 years before The Great Cataclysm.

2) Avoid not enough details. Riding off the back of the last one, you do need to give your side-mission some thought. If the long and short of your side-mission is “the players must stop a local Skakdi gang from terrorizing the townsfolk”, there’s immediately two things wrong with your proposal. First, you can’t tell the players how they must react to this event. What’s to stop them from joining the local gang instead? Nothing, that’s what. Second, one event does not a side-mission make. There needs to be something to generate interest with some sort of semblance of implied cause-and-effect.

A good example of a side-mission would be something like “A nearby gang of Skakdi are terrorizing the inhabitants of a local town, looking for an escaped Vortixx slave that stole off with a prototype Kanoka that enslaves the mind of those it hits. The Vortixx secretly plans to use this Kanoka to enslave the townsfolk and form them into a mindless army that can be used to take revenge on the Skakdi gang”. We now have a generic setting and a point of conflict. Left to their own devices, it’s hard to say what the outcome would be, but the players can influence what happens by helping the Vortixx (should they find him/her), the gang (perhaps hoping for a reward or influence), the townsfolk (t’would be the noble thing to do), or even themselves (maybe they’ll just seek out the Kanoka for themselves and leave everyone else to their fate). Either way, the mission’s course would run beyond that of a single combat encounter and could be approached from multiple angles.

Don’t be afraid to give character’s some personality traits either. Is the gang leader greedy? She may try to convince the players to help capture the Vortixx for a fee she never intends to pay. Is the Vortixx a coward? They may succeed in building a drone army only to chicken out at the end. Perhaps the townsfolk are stubborn and don’t want the player’s interference in their affairs. The possibilities are endless.

Alrighty then, go at it, folks. Don’t be afraid to ask questions if you have any. If I like a submission, don’t be surprised if I decide to ask questions about it myself. Also, the rest of the cast are on their honor not to read your side-mission ideas, so you don’t have to worry about spoilers and using spoiler tags.

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Seems pretty neat. I may consider the RPG.

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Idea: don’t call it Kingdom Come unless you plan on having aged version of the Justice League engaged in a war.

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Sounds great. I’ll be back once that episode is up.

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The original phrase referring to the apocalypse says hi.

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It was a joke.

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The new TTV episode is up, so give it a listen.

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Are escort missions allowed? I have a good idea for one!

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Any kind of mission goes, just keep in mind that the players may choose not to act as you anticipate. They could just as easily decide to kidnap their quarry instead of escorting them.

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A small village is inhabited by a single matoran inventor, who’s inventions led the town to be destroyed, sending the matoran into an emotionally unstable insanity caused by his heavy guilt. He’s used his machines to re-animate the bodies of the matoran, and now controls them like puppets, having them “live” out there normal routines. Until one day, when the group visited and noticed something was strange, and the matoran tries to prevent them from leaving, attempting to kill them, too, and turn them into more of his puppets.

3 Likes
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I presume that when you say “the group” you’re referring to the players, yes? This actually sounds pretty legit.

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Yeah, by the group I mean the group of players. And I referred to the matoran as a “he”, but it really doesn’t matter, so make of it what you will.

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In their adventures, a body of explorers find a temple built into the side of a mountain. Upon entrance, they discover that the temple is home to the Cult of Tren Krom, which have attempted to reincarnate the spirit of the primeval god in the temple… with disastrous results. A huge, eldritch creature has taken control of half the temple, and its offspring have blocked the Matoran cultists from the entrance, preventing them from leaving. The heroes must find the Matoran and escort them out of the temple, as the cultist leader promises them a strange reward to help them in their quest… or will they refuse to let the cultists be free for their arcane deeds?

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An entity who goes by the name of Athoth-cthun begins orbiting the planet. He appears to be observing the planet until he decides to take interest in a village of matoran by creating illusions to mess with their heads. The entity claims he is just having fun, but something is a miss as the matoran appear to be getting hurt. The Shenanigans of Athoth-cthun also appear to be irritating the local rahi. But interestingly enough, one of the local matoran appears to be working with Athoth-cthun.

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What kind of strange reward?

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The players come across an isolated kingdom of Matoran. It’s a very low technology, more medieval-esque society. It has feudalism, the Toa follow a strict code of conduct, and medicine appears to be not that high of a priority. Upon arriving, they find their Turaga has a quest for them. There is an island off the coast of the kingdom which has an artifact that the Turaga wants, but all the Toa he’s sent have never returned.

Perhaps before describing said island I should mention that the Matoran are very disgruntled with how the state has been treating them. They’re pretty much on the edge of revolution, they just need someone to lead them.

On the island their are very dangerous feral rahi that should provide quite a challenge to the party. The landscape is a very open grassland, though it has many tunnels. At night the rahi sleep in the tunnels. Their are still some fairly dangerous rahi out at night, but nothing too awful. The artifact is in a ruined temple guarded by a single Toa, wearing the same armor as the ones in the kingdom. The artifact is whatever you want it to be, but hopefully something good enough to make the players contemplate taking it instead of giving it to the Turaga.

As for the reward, their is a large mine underneath the kingdom. The metal here is used for the Toa’s armor and weapons. It’s a very strong metal and will tear through or protect from most things. The Turaga would get one of the Matoran to reinforce your weapons and armor with this metal. Money would not make much sense because the kingdom is quite isolated.

However, if one was sneaky enough, they could sneak into the dungeons and from there steal armor and weapons from the armory. This would be new items though, and all the armor would be Toa-sized. However, the dungeons also connect to the mines, and if you could find a smith outside the kingdom, you could get the same reward. The dungeons are filled with insane prisoners and small rahi pests.

If you manage to anger the kingdom, like through a failed revolution, failed sneaking attempt, or keeping the artifact, they may reappear as an antagonistic force. On the other hand if you succeed in a revolution or give the Turaga the artifact, they’ll be more inclined to help you.

Characters:

King Turaga- A rather likeable fellow. While he is awful at maintaining his kingdom, this can be attributed more to ignorance than intentional malevolence. His friendship is a universal constant.

Guardian Toa- Originally the Turaga’s apprentice. He became disillusioned after venturing too far from the kingdom and seeing more advanced states and comparing it to how his people were treated. He used his mission to the island as an excuse to disappear. Should the players defeat and spare him, he will become more friendly and move to Metru Nui or something.

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During their journey, the cast encounters a strange Le-matoran, Uneek. He asked them to escort him to a new land. He explains how he had a vision of a new island, much different from Metru Nui where giant mechanical crabs rule the land. On the way, the cast must fight off a triad of giant visorak, ascend a giant pillar of gelatin, and destroy the Temple of Citrus Fruit to get Uneek to this new land, so he can become the king of the crabs, but they (the crabs) aren’t so thrilled about having a new ruler.

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As the players come back to their HQ. They intercept a message from a operative of The Order Of Mata Nui. They find out that a Advisor of The Order Of Mata Nui has betrayed them and is making a deal with The Brotherhood Of The Makuta to assassinate a Famous Matoran Mask Maker. The orders are to stop the assassination and kill all Makuta Brotherhood Assassins. The next orders are to hunt and eliminate the Treacherous Advisor and his fellow Makuta Brotherhood co-conspirators. Leave no evidence behind.

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In the party’s adventure, they encounter a crashed ship. If they look inside they find a le-matoran near death. In his dying words he says, “The cult has risen. You don’t have much time, save them!” He hands you a map with a nearby island circled.

If the players decide to go to the island (assuming they have transportation) they are greeted by a ta-matoran. He says in a gruff voice, “Leave now travelers, for there is nothing here for you.” You can allude the matoran by getting in your ship and going slightly north along the shore.

Once there, you notice all the vegetation is burning and only ta-matoran live there. By talking to the matoran, you learn that a vortixx showed up a few days ago and enslaved a large group of nearby ta-matoran. Their eyes started glowing green and they went on a rampage.

By building up the matoran’s moral, you convince them to fight against the vortixx and her matoran. After the battle (if they won) the remaining matoran give you a device with a button and say “If you need our assistance, press this button.” If they press it, a group of four un-enslaved cultists posted throughout the universe will come and aid them in battle.

Also, if the decide to search the cultist camp, they will find a amulet with a green crystal on it. They can use it to make others susceptible to reason.

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WARNING: This is incredibly stupid. It obviously doesn’t fit with canon as much as you would like it to, but you’re the one running the game, so maybe spicing it up with something as ridiculous as this could be good. Also, you have stated its in an alternate universe, so you can’t say wether or not the variables exist. Lastly, :stuck_out_tongue:

In their travels the players come across a deserted village. After exploring they find a colleseum echoing with cheering. As they’re about to enter, a shady Le-Matoran approaches them with an offer. He presents a camcorder to the party and says he will pay them 100,000 widgets to make a bootleg of the Bon Jovi concert that is about to start. If the players accept they will get the widgets and spend 3 hours enjoying some classic tunes.

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