Our Deepnight Revelation campaign has been on-hold for a few weeks now. Not due to any plan to pause things, but just bad luck in there has been either being someone away, or ill, for the last few weeks. We haven’t had much Ars Magica either for much the same reason.

Hopefully we’ll be back to Traveller this week, and I have the latest ship update which has been waiting to be handed out to the players for some time now. Most of it concerns the physical health of the ship, which is deteriorating, but nothing serious. There was meant to be a big ‘things go wrong’ event scheduled in the next part of the campaign, but the players have already spent time doing as good an overhaul as they can at the Erline starport. So I’m going to skip that, rather than forcing a second similar event on them for no reason.

We are now in between The Crossing (chapter 3) and The Far Side of Nowhere (chapter 4) of the campaign, and I’m not expecting too much to go wrong between now and then.

Note that this handout is published on day 139 of year 1116. According to the official timeline of the Third Imperium, the Emperor Strephon was assassinated 7 days ago, and the Imperium is beginning its decent into civil war. The Deepnight may not have a home to go back to. However, the crew of the ship have no idea what is happening back home. To be honest, neither do I. That’s something for me to work out if the campaign ever makes it as far as the return journey.

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1116-139: Leaving Nisakhe

After spending two weeks at Nisakhe, the Deepnight is ready to leave. We have discovered a lot of information at this world, and the crew seem in good spirits.

Ship Status

The Deepnight Revelation is long past a proper maintenance overhaul, but she is still doing well. The repairs to the main drives a few months back went well, and they are now running smoothly. Most of the primary systems are still working, though cracks are beginning to show. The list of systems that need fixing every week is growing, though most of the issues can be fixed. Its just that a lot of time is being spent fire fighting, and we’re having to prioritise what gets fixed and what doesn’t.

Many of the food replicators have lost the ability to generate a large proportion of the usual flavours, so there is a greater need to rely on proper food from supply stops than being able to generate anything other than bland meals from basic organic compounds.

Some of the internal grav plates are beginning to show their age, and their ability to generate a consistent gravitational field is dropping. The problem has mostly been resolved by switching out faulty plates in high traffic areas with reliable plates in low traffic areas. Even faulty plates can keep a field within a few percent of the desired level though.

The long distant sensor systems have had a failure in several of the arrays, which will begin to provide a small degradation to long range sensor scans. The last of the backup components have now been put in place, so any further replacements will require access to TL 15 factories.

Recent quality check of the sandcasters has shown that several of the ammo cannisters are no longer meeting standards. There has been a leak of water vapour, which has caused corrosion and degradation of the ‘sand’ particles.

None of these are considered serious, and are within the expected failure rates. We don’t expect there to be serious problems before we reach our final destination, but things aren’t going to get better. We have spares for all the parts which were expected to fail – it’s the parts that weren’t expected to fail that are causing problems. Some of these are TL14-15 and we are unlikely to find direct replacements, those fabricators have been able to come up with lower tech equivalents in most cases.

Navigation

The next part of Crossing is to head diagonally across the line of systems heading from Core/Spinward (top left) to Rimward/Trailing (bottom right).  From Nisakhe, the plan is to head through the following systems:

• Aluwot 2018 (supplies)
• Rodus Nuna 2221
• Dewoykod 2522
• Iwus 2822
• Eguh 3123

After this, we hope to have better data on the systems at 3126 and 3225. If either of them can be used, it would be the quickest route  to go to one of these and then Otoya 3129. Otherwise, we can move into Far Shore sector:

• Urutned 0323
• Ojenah 0226 (Jovic worlds, but other water bearing worlds)
• Onidot 0128

Then back into Crossing sector. Avoiding the move into Far Shore would save us two jumps and a difficult refuelling.

• Otoya 3129 (supplies)
• Phuretare 3132

At this point the options become limited. There may be better systems which will become clear once we get closer, but a 5 parsec jump to Epop 3137 might be the best option.

The final jump in the sector will be to Duhequaquan 2940. We are trying to track down the crew member who named that system.

After this, the next jump should take us to Brittia sector, and Thahane 2903. This puts us within 3 parsecs of Ghone Minor 2604, which shows signs of a TL 7+ civilisation. We have no idea what to expect, but they may be able to provide information about the journey ahead.

Far Scans

The long range scanning of the Deepnight has good data on a number of systems throughout Brittia sector.  Another technological civilisation has been discovered at Doredre 1819, which may be worth a visit.

It should be noted that Crossing sector is further Rimward than anything in the Solomani Sphere, and Brittia is further than the furthest known extents of the Aslan client states. There are thought to be some small polities as far Rimward as this, but nothing so far to Spinward.

The Crew

A new person is joining the crew, Talliena, the young priestess of Nisakhe. She has memories that were implanted by the Ancients, and is spending a lot of time talking to the mission team.

Tracy, one of the Erline that joined the crew, is not doing well. She is having difficulty breathing and is complaining of severe pains in all her joints.