YET ANOTHER SHORTYLICKENS CAMPAIGN WORKBOOK! Business!

[Shorty Lickens]

Yes I know Shorty is the only one who keeps coming up with these wacky ideas, BUT THATS BECAUSE YOU LAZY BASTARDS NEVER DO ANYTHING!!!

This one is a doozy.
The Players Start a Business!

No really, thats it, thats my campaign idea.
What you dont like it??

WELL SCREW YOU PAL!!

I LIKE MY IDEA!
I LIKE IT FINE!


So listen, the idea is I been getting bored with traditional campaigns, and I wanna do something different and fun. What would you suggest?

1. Delivery or transport service. I already started this campaign idea in another thread, about the smugglers working thru Chi-Town and believe me we had ideas. So maybe this one can sit on the back burner.

2. Pet Care.
But its like, gryphons and minotaur's and crap. Good stuff, lot of ideas here. Maybe even they have a side gig, like trapping and training and breeding exotic animals.
OHHHHHHH!!!! GUYS! Thats a great idea! The PC's are exotic animal trainers! They have to catch their own, or buy them, then raise and train and breed them! OH DAMN THATS A WHOLE CAMPAIGN ALL BY ITS DAMN SELF! HOT POOP! I LOVE IT!

3. Running an inn or tavern.
This could have MASSIVE opportunities, as it allows PC's to overhear and possibly be offered any number of wild and crazy adventure opportunities! OH MAN THIS IS PERFECT! THIS IS THE PERFECT CAMPAIGN YOU GUYS! GUYS! the PCs run a bar and thats how they find and hear about jobs! In fact its a perfect set up to run an open-ended campaign. You know the kind! The kind where we do a different adventure every week with no rhyme or reason??
YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN!
Its the perfect generic campaign! You do whatever you like and can even seek out the kind of adventures you want, whether its a unique experience or a mission to get a specific reward, something you want or need.

OH! SIDE BONUS! SIDE BONUS! In addition to have a new wacky adventure every week and picking your friends, allies, contacts, and acquaintances, and enemies, you can also build your business! Thats right! Pick a locale! Make a structure! Set up advertising! Decoration! Booze and food selection! Do you have entertainment as well? Screen the Dancing Girls, Chi-Towns own solid titanium dancers, on stage right now!!
You can do other business too, like smuggling drugs or weapons or people. Or just sales. Or "other" services if you know what i mean and I think you do!

Yeah, running a bar, tavern, inn, Motel 6 would be pretty fun and open itself to lots of other possibilities. If you use it to make real money you can open other businesses, like merc combat services, or medical services or government contract or big business like magic or cybernetics.

OH DAMN THATS A GOOD ONE!

4. Running a medical service. Either downtown hospital, cyber-clinic, or emergency services in the Burbs. Or frontier medicine in the field. Yup, medical service is a good business but can also have many adventure opportunities. People from all backgrounds may end up in emergency medical services or EMS. They may inform you of other lucrative opportunities as a way of saying thanks. The kind of juicy inside info you could never buy or torture off someone, but that one in a million person who may tell you of a good shot at something because you saved their life. They ONLY way you'd ever get this kind of inside dirt. Also just trying to save poor bastards in a very bad spot. City violence. Burb Violence. Country violence. Rifts Earth: Its all pretty scary and provides loads of opportunities. Maybe they get hired by a small town to cure a strange disease. Or provide combat coverage for laborers or miners. Or coscript in a military to provide first aid only, and bonuses for saving top officials. Or to do something really specific like provide insurance to a group of Juicers on their Final Run. Or Crazies doing something only they can do, but they also need psychiatrist aid right there in the field. Yeah, again a LOT of potential opportunities here.

5. Independent Contractors if you know what I mean and I think you do...

They can work for the CS in Chi-Town, the CS in the field as scruffy mercs who the Grunts despise but the brass love, can they can do things unofficially and be disavowed if captured or killed? You know?
It can be retrieving live cargo, dead cargo, magic or special items. Artifacts. Intel. People. Animals. Contacts for later missions, or whatever. I bet intel and blackmail are the two most important goods in an evolved society. Its always about the information. And of course getting it back safely. And getting paid. and not getting killed by your new enemies. or independent agents who want your money or your intel. your your boss. or your "buddies". OH THE POSSIBILITIES ARE ENDLESS! Spies! Super Spies! Alien Intergalactic Spies!

OR, they can work for independent city-states. The kind of people with resources but not means, who would gladly trade all kinds of illicit or legitimate goods to get a service or object they desperately need. A specialized service that only a specialist provides. So the PCs now have to track down the specialists thru a chain of adventures!
Or simple training or garrison duty for a small town. This could literally be two guys protecting a farmer or miner or scientist or travelling salesman. Just two guys on 12 hour shifts guarding a moron or a mad man. Either of those has ample opportunity for a small PC group to get started on Mercenary work. Who knows? In ten years they could easily have amassed an independent super army. With its own corporate charter! and a home town! with little independent suburbs! they have tiny communities! OH GOD THIS LEADS TO MY NEXT BIG IDEA!

6. Starting and growing a Merc Army!
The Possibilities here are ENDLESS! Like growing from a two man operation literally begging for work and passing out hand made business cards (good idea for a movie right there). To potentially an intergalactic Mercenary Empire! Not like literally they have their own tiny empire. Like a billion members who are technically part of the mercenary empire or mega-corp. And only a tiny percentage of them actually fight any more. and the other 99.9 percent contribute to a regular society like farmers and manufacturers and tradesman and salesmen and insurance adjusters and green grocers. All that civilized society crap. Like its now its own unique culture where .1 percent of the population does the suffering and killing and dying and stealing and pushing forward so the rest can grow and prosper and survive and thrive and advance society. While they die like noble bastards. OH MY GOD! YOU GUYS! I JUST INVENTED WARHAMMER 40K! And I invented it with the Imperium of Man first! Literally like 20 trillion people being serviced by a paltry billion soldiers. The Space Marines. Which itself is technically a large army, one billion servicemen. But a teeny fraction of the fat happy dumb lazy nation they serve. Most of whom don't even know the soldiers.
WHICH LEADS ME TO MY NEXT MEGA BIG IDEA!

[Shorty Lickens]

7: RUNNING AN EMPIRE!


OH GUYS! I DID IT! FINALLY DID IT! I FINALLY CAME UP WITH THE TRUE ULTIMATE MEGA CAMPAIGN!

RUNNING AN EMPIRE! GUYS! I DID IT! I BEAT THE GAME I BEAT RIFTS! I MADE THE ULTIMATE CAMPAIGN!

running an empire is as follows.

[Shorty Lickens]

you start as two strangers in the wasteland. there is nothing. they each have nothing, but they understand each other. they understand their situation because both of them happen to be smart. they stick together out of desperation and recognition they need each other to survive. they dont even speak the same language. they are both intelligent recognize their mutual need and communicate with gestures. this is how civilization starts. two strangers meet in bad circumstances and need each other to survive. Boom. Civilization begins. They are totally different but they agree one thing: we need each other to survive. and they do. and they thrive. a year later they have a band. a party of maybe 5 great travelers. adventurers. they each have skills and each contribute to the needs of the group. two years later they have a party. a travelling community. maybe they stop and make camp once in a while. to swap goods or stories or rest and recreate. And if there is a nice stream of water nearby you have a couple people thinking maybe they will stay a while. BOOM!
five years later! there are buildings! actual permanent structures and more. People had a name for this place but it keeps changing. and most of its members come and go through out the year. only a handful are truly permanent residents. Some of the sillier folk talk of elections and offices and taxes and red tape! HA! what a ridiculous idea that is! That'll be the day! HA!

BOOM FIVE YEARS LATER! They city rat catcher informs the Local Street Urchin Union 347 they better pay their "Protection" money, or ELSE!

BOOM TWENTY YEARS LATER they are holding free market union nationalist liberation free market agreement votes at the central union calamity station square on New Planetia this afternoon at 17 hundred hours! Unite against the common enemy, the Slimy Scaly Drooly Monster Combine! Enlist today and fight our eventual victors in glorious pointless space battle! YAY!

And so on. You know? Civilization? The same thing that happens every time?

I want to run a kingdom. A modern, frontier sci fi kingdom. Like Rift Wilderness Wild West stuff. In the forested areas between the civilized nations of Chi Town and The Federation of Magic. The REAL wilderness! Where a millions things can kill you. And even worse is trying to run a group of people desperate to survive with a great will power but against terrible odds. That's the kind of campaign I've always wanted to run. A real epic pure Rifts campaign. Surviving in a violent post-apocalypse. Trees and logs and wilderness and woodcutters and scavengers and building huts and later cabins and later structures and god forbid even a government! The real Rifts experience. You survive solo for a while. Realize you need help. You expand. And before you realize what's happening, you've got a town! CIVILIZATION! and it was so fast you didn't realize they put you in charge. And holy cow! Its not easy! and you are really worried and you have lots of problems. Man that stinks!

So yeah I want to seriously run a campaign where the PCs somehow find themselves the founders of a group, that eventually becomes a clan, that becomes a colony, that some how ends up becoming permanent and fixed, and there's buildings, and a government, and a religion, and god forbid red tape over every thing, and something big comes along and threatens the civilization, and the PLAYERS, TIRED AS THEY MAY BE, MUST NOW DEAL WITH THIS NEW THEAT! HELL! IT MAY EVEN BE THE COALITION ITSELF!

Or at least, a campaign where the PCs are the village elders and leaders of a small group determined to protect and later expand this tiny village. Probably 100 inhabitants or less. It may be homogenous, like only one species, like D-Bees, creatures alien to Earth. and they are either horribly racist, OR open minded but small and not used to dealing with strangers.
Or they may be a WEIRD and mixed group. Creatures from all over the 9 dimensions. Widely varied but with one thing in common, like their ancestors, they understood the common need to survive, and come together and work towards survival and thriving. And one day they have a city. and one day they have an empire.

and im asking YOU guys, when would be a fun time to start?

I'm thinking a small band of renegades or refugees who need to stop their vehicle or wagon team and come up with a plan for survival RIGHT NOW! that would be the most fun for a group of players between 4 and 12. And they could have oodles of potential right then and there. Find shelter? Make shelter? Sit and wait for rescue? Ask for brain storming session? form group leadership right there on the spot? How do we get started? You guys decide!

[Shorty Lickens]

8: Running A Pawn Shop

[Shorty Lickens]

No that's it. A pawn shop. They see a lot of unusual and fun and interesting things pass their way. Maybe the objects get them in trouble. Maybe some tough guy wants to know where the object is. Or where the person who had it is right now. Or who else has seen it or asked about it. did the object do anything while it was here? did you touch it? see it? Speak to it? Did it speak back?
Or maybe someone just wants the money that the object was sold for. Or they want something exotic right now and are desperately hoping a pawn shop would have it. Or someone is desperate to sell, and you get the feeling there's more to their story. Either they have to get rid of the item itself, for any number of reasons, or they need serious cash right now, again for any number of reasons.

[Shorty Lickens]

9: Travelling Salesmen. Or Travelling Entertainers.

They love the open road. They love moving cross-country. They love encountering strangers on the road, and new friends in new towns. And, on occasion, old friend long missed. They decided to hit the road for any number of reasons. They didn't like home. they were bored. They were abused. They were run out by gangs or police, or raiders or maniacs. Or the political situation changed, they decided to leave on their own before getting tossed out, or imprisoned. Or they just didn't love big city life. Wanted to try a whole new way of living: The frontier. Live your own life by your own rules. You are ready. You trained for this. You lived for this. And now, here you are. Oh, but you'd be a darn fool to do it alone. TAKE A FRIEND WOULD YOU??!? And maybe even a party. So you have some chance of survival. And again you are all different. Maybe different races, different goals but a common belief. You all need more, and its out their on the frontier. and the open road. You and your gang.
Maybe one kid is looking to prove himself. He comes from either a poor, middle-class, or affluent background. And he wants to get out of the damn city and go prove himself. To himself, his family, friends, god, or just no one. But he has to prove he can make it on his own, despite what everyone says. Also the recently orphaned Spunky Kid, who is usually lovable in some way.

Any way, they got together and agreed to travel around and sell their goods, or their services on the road. Small towns, big cities that need a little help, other travelers, refugees on occasion, and the once in a blue moon Special Needs Individual. Or SNI's. they might be a wizard looking for a particular rare hard to find item. An isolated military unit in need of emergency support. a man or woman has to get an emergency message to her sister in a far away locale. Or emergency repair services at an isolated farm house. Or clearing out a cursed mine. Or cleaning up a river or lake. Or removing a hostile inhabitant from them, one way or another.

Anyway, traveling salesman or entertainers can have LOADS of different adventure opportunities. And I really like this idea a LOT! Especially that it could include a variety of classes, backgrounds, ideas, and skills, and personalities.

[Shorty Lickens]

ONE ADVENTURE FOR CAMPAIGN IDEA NUMBER NINE!

The traveling group was planning to do a show, like Macbeth or whatever. But instead the tiny hamlet they happen across has issues. Their water filtration and processing unit is on the fritz! They need it fixed and soon, they need personal water but also irrigation water. They are in planting season and they need lots of clean fresh water right now!
The party's engineer can fix or repair or rework the water unit. He'll need help. From the team nurse. Not that her skills are actually needed, but he has a thing for her. And he wants to talk while he works. But actually they fight. and work on the water unit goes slowly.
Meanwhile the team sleaze ball is hitting on waitresses in slimy bars in the little town. And the team leader wants him to stop. Also they need what few supplies they can scrounge up while waiting on the water unit repair. and they try to meet with contacts while there, and talk to people who may offer help or opportunities. Something happens. Some antagonists.
Maybe raiders or bandits come by. Or a small warlord. Or an envoy from a much bigger, serious theat. Or other people further down the road also need help. Or the village just happens to be having a Thanksgiving Meal soon. What luck! And when the players get down with their work they can have either a quaint little meal, or a giant festival, depending on the resources of the community, or scale of gratitude. Keep in mind it is still planting season. Or maybe a vermin or pest or animal invasion. Mundane, supernatural, magical, malicious, accidental, trying to help but failed experiment.

Anyway, they deal with the problem. Make some friends. Maybe some enemies. Put on their original play! and also possibly pick up a new item, or maybe even a new member. and they hit the road again, on their merry way, a little richer for the experience. Yet another story to add to their ever growing collection of stories. They have a way. Its a good way. And they shall continue it. Travelling salesmen, or showman. They act, maybe do stunts, or magic or a dance show, something fun. Then they move on, like Kung Fu or Renegade.

[Shorty Lickens]

10: Magic Shop. Either a store in town, or a traveling magician. either he goes strictly into the Burbs and offers services and supplies, or he moves out to the wilder and back in thru town every day, getting lots of business along his path.
This kind of business offers loads of potential adventure opportunity.
To start, local authorities harass them frequently, either for legit illegitimate reasons. They get scammed a lot. they get beggars. they get muggers. they have a wide variety of problems to solve and me be called upon to suggest a solution to a weird problem. They also have to acquire weird and dangerous items, frequently. Sometimes simply having the item makes the gang a target for all kinds of strange people wanting it for themselves. Also sometimes the item itself is dangerous. Either directly harmful, or likes to trick the holder into doing dumb stuff and getting hurt or killed.
And sometimes the strange magic item provides opportunity to have some wacky fun! Or adventure! or just some silliness and thats ok!
Magic shop, lots of possibilities. and if the players make real money with it, they can start a little magic colony or community. And start growing their little empire. All because they started with something clever like a magic shop.
Yet another great campaign idea from Shorty Lickens! YES!

[taalismn]

2. Pet Care.
But its like, gryphons and minotaur's and crap. Good stuff, lot of ideas here. Maybe even they have a side gig, like trapping and training and breeding exotic animals.
OHHHHHHH!!!! GUYS! Thats a great idea! The PC's are exotic animal trainers! They have to catch their own, or buy them, then raise and train and breed them! OH DAMN THATS A WHOLE CAMPAIGN ALL BY ITS DAMN SELF! HOT POOP! I LOVE IT!!

And what do the PCs do when a Minotaur comes in with a human on a leash and asks them to kennel its pet until it gets back from a business trip?

[Shorty Lickens]

2. Pet Care.
But its like, gryphons and minotaur's and crap. Good stuff, lot of ideas here. Maybe even they have a side gig, like trapping and training and breeding exotic animals.
OHHHHHHH!!!! GUYS! Thats a great idea! The PC's are exotic animal trainers! They have to catch their own, or buy them, then raise and train and breed them! OH DAMN THATS A WHOLE CAMPAIGN ALL BY ITS DAMN SELF! HOT POOP! I LOVE IT!!

And what do the PCs do when a Minotaur comes in with a human on a leash and asks them to kennel its pet until it gets back from a business trip?

Well at this point the PC's decided they need to pick alignments!

[taalismn]

Well at this point the PC's decided they need to pick alignments!

Depending on the amount of cash involved, alignments can be ...flexible...

Or, if the Minotaur's a reasonable sophont, and the human on the leash is a bestial jerk...

PC: "Yeah, I had a boyfriend like that....spend all the time hogging the comfy furniture, smelling bad, and tearing up the garden for something to do."

[Incriptus]

7: RUNNING AN EMPIRE!


OH GUYS! I DID IT! FINALLY DID IT! I FINALLY CAME UP WITH THE TRUE ULTIMATE MEGA CAMPAIGN!

RUNNING AN EMPIRE! GUYS! I DID IT! I BEAT THE GAME I BEAT RIFTS! I MADE THE ULTIMATE CAMPAIGN!

running an empire is as follows.

Incriptus's day dream campaign was the player characters setting up their own Warlord camp of in Russia. The game begins right before the big breakthrough. You are self sufficient in 6 out of 10 areas. You're struggling in 2 out of 10 areas. You're getting pretty desperate in 1 in 10 areas. However like I said you just hit the motherload and you have a surplus in 1 in 10 areas. The player characters will choose priorities in each of those areas for example they may be rich in foodstuffs but poor in Robotics, or vice versa. However with this windfall in Priority A it is time for our Warcamp to make itself known on the bigger political scene. Are we trader or are we raiders, or are we traitors or raters.

Each player makes 2 different player characters. 1 of them is the political leader / war councilor. This is the character who is making strategic decisions for the warcamp. The second character is an elite warrior [likely cyborg but maybe not] who deals with the tactical decisions. Character A is involved in leading the camp, Character B is involved in Fighting.

[Grazzik]

3. Running an inn or tavern.
This could have MASSIVE opportunities

Did this and it was awesome. Set up a bar/distillery called The Rubber Duck (the entire building was painted a bright yellow) just outside the walls of a CS settlement on the western border of CS Missouri. It was a "semi-autonomous economic zone", so pretty wild part of town. So many adventures - protected outlying farmers from a land baron trying to chase them away or burn them out, met mercs in the bar who were working for a research team that wanted to explore underground ruins, battled a horde of zombies from the back of a moving NG Mule hauler drone, stood eyeball to eyeball against the sheriff and deputies to protect some wasteland scum that turned out to be CS Intell agents... all while making booze in the basement and securing supplies to keep the stills working. Good times!

[taalismn]

Here's another possible business with potential...Private jail/lockup...While it's been best satirized in Neal Stephanson's -SnowCrash- with themed lockups that arrestees can pay to be housed in, there's enough RL examples as well.
Basically the PCs are hired to provide security and possibly facilities for holding misdemeanor offenders for short stays, or more serious offenders until they can be transferred to longer--duration facilities(like the bottom of a mine) or executed. Like early English prisons, inmates might be required to pay for their own furniture, food, and other perks, and the wardens on the take to allow family members to visit(or even live in the cells).
It's like running a motel, only they can't check out whenever they want(unless the lockup is run like some Mexican prisons).

[Grazzik]

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[Shorty Lickens]

Professional Exterminators.
They specialize in the weird junk that comes from our 3 Conversion Books.
Gremlins are especially nasty.
Also the Chi-Town Burbs are filled with Dire Rats.

Actually I think that might already be an established campaign idea.

HOW MANY OF YOU have run a party of exterminators?
I guess it would get boring for a while, but it could also be a launch pad for bigger better campaigns.

That and a Runaway business. They only catch stray robots and nothing else.
THAT MIGHT BE FUN! cuz they would probably prefer to use non-violent methods when possible, and it could actually involve a lot of depth and planning not often seen in the simpler, violent adventures you've been running.

[taalismn]

Professional Exterminators.
They specialize in the weird junk that comes from our 3 Conversion Books.
Actually I think that might already be an established campaign idea.

HOW MANY OF YOU have run a party of exterminators?
I guess it would get boring for a while, but it could also be a launch pad for bigger better campaigns..

Of course, at some point the PCs run the risk of running afoul of the 'the hunters become the hunted' trope unless they're extra cautious (and genre-savvy). Discovering the hard way that the bigger-than-normal termites or ants have a hive mind that learns from experience with abnormal speed.....