GH2: 100 Starting Scenarios

[Joseph Hewitt]

The opening scenario for GH2 needs to change. The game's opening should be exciting, it should establish the setting, set the mood, and it should also provide the player with some idea of what options are open to them.

I've started making a list of possible openers. For the time being I'm not worrying about how these would fit into the random plot generator or anything else, I'm just thinking about what would make a good start. Please list your own ideas. Once we get 100 or so of them, I'm going to start looking at how they can be modeled.

• Scene: barracks. There are raiders approaching, so your squad mobilizes to deal with them. Afterwards your commander goes off to a meeting and your squadmates wonder what's really going on.
• Scene: your apartment. The landlord needs the rent, your friends question your decision to become a cavalier, but you just got a hot lead on a job that might solve everything.
• Your parents were refugees from Luna. You are worried about Aegis's encroachment on L5. Talk with your sister/brother/friend who reveals that they've decided to join the Aegis Space Force.
• You're meeting a boyfriend/girlfriend somewhere later. Suddenly, the news reports that the Blades have announced a terror attack about to happen there.
• Scene: A shuttle. You're going back home after a trip. Suddenly, the ship is attacked by mecha! Escape or fight back? What about the other passengers?
• Scene: Temple. You have been training and meditating. Speak with the monks about graduation, get sent to speak with master, only  to find that they've been killed.
• Scene: Prison. You've just been released from the iso-cubes. The warden asks about your goals, suggests asking someone about a job. One of the other prisoners asks you to help them get out.
• Scene: Family home. You've cleaned things out after the death of your parents. Speak with police officer who investigated.
• Scene: Your place of business, a hospital or garage. A stranger arrives in a barely functional mecha. They give you a cryptic message for some NPC, then promptly die.
• Scene: Tomb. Your parents were refugees from Crihna. Shortly before they were to retire, one of them dies fighting the Aegis Space Force. A friend of the family, a captain, offers you the chance to have your revenge.
• Scene: An asteroid. Your exploration/camping expedition is interrupted by the arrival of an escape pod. The survivor is disoriented, but it soon becomes apparent that they're being followed.
• Scene: A government building. You're there when a maniac with a bomb shows up, taking everyone hostage.

[Trucidation]

Hmm...

• You show up for work one morning to find a pile of rubble instead of the modest offices of the mercenary team you signed on with a few months ago.
• The charismatic section head vanished in the middle of the night with the grant money, leaving you and a bunch of other junior researchers in the lurch.
• For years you've whiled away your life with other bored and idle megacorporate heirs. Then one day you catch sight of a really attractive pilot and all of a sudden you have a goal: to become a hotshot ace pilot yourself. Besides, the tedium of endless parties, drugs, and meaningless relationships was killing you inside.
• Your triumphant homecoming from college with a freshly minted degree was marred by the presence of police officers who escorted you to the precinct to identify the body of your elder brother. He was the only family you had left, who'd been taking care of you since your parents died when you were both young.
• Your commercial pilot's license just came through and you immediately quit your job as a teacher. The principal, a bully and patronizing s.o.b. who loved making you miserable, hadn't wanted to let you go out of spite - so you suplexed him. In front of witnesses. Giving the ass what he deserved sure felt good but that assault rap may have killed your new career as a pilot before it even got a chance to take off. However, surely not everyone is picky about whom they hire...
• Paranoia regarding an alleged government cover-up of the truth behind the ingredients of soya-lentil based foodstuffs got you in trouble with the authorities more than once. In order to continue your investigations you will need a cover to distract the watchers put on you. This is where that new job comes in.

[Burzmali]

1. Scene: Home?
You wake up with your mind completely blank, as you panic, some details about the last few days begin swimming through your head.  Your mother(?) opens the door and informs you that you were in found unconscious at the site of an explosion the yesterday.  The doctors patched you up, but they warn that you memory may take a few days to return, and when it does, the police are going to want to talk to you.

2. Scene: As above, but no explosion or other overt act. You were knocked out and your memory disrupted when someone applied a nerve whip to your temple, but you were not robbed or otherwise harmed.

3. Scene: As 1, but your mother(?) begins pressing for details about what you saw.  After a few questions, a blast opens the wall and the police storm in.  We the dust clears, they escort you out, but the woman, who you now realize was not you mother, is missing.

[magic.coding.fairy.peridot]

• Scene: a luxury apartment. Your date with the corporate heir/only son of a pirate chief/heir apparent to a cult seemed to be going so well until he wouldn't take no for an answer and got violent. You grabbed a kitchen knife to defend yourself and now he's dead and they're after your head.
• Scene: aboard a pirate ship. Your routine commercial flight was ambushed by pirates. For the most part they spaced everyone who wasn't ransomed, but you persuaded them to let you serve as cabin boy. Now you have to try to either escape or persuade them to keep you alive.
• Scene: a cardboard box in a dank alley. Growing up on a tramp steamer you and your family were poor but independent until the big corporations forced you into bankruptcy and took your ship. Now you need to somehow make ends meet, and get back at them if you can.
• Scene: aboard a pirate ship, in a corporate office, or in a government building. While you were still in school you were quietly approached by an ordinary-looking woman who persuaded you to infiltrate the pirates/corporation/government. But now your contact is dead on her way to a clandestine rendezvous with you and you're on your own. Do they know about you? Can you still find out their secrets and bring them down or do you flee and fight them from the outside?
• Scene: in an isolated laboratory. You were so close to the breakthrough, but now they want to shut you down over one piddling accidental death! If you can only finish building your robots/biomonsters/clone army you could free your home from under the yoke of the oppressor/show all the doubters/replace all those inefficient humans!
• Scene: standing before the altar, shocked, as gunshots echo above the body of your husband-to-be. Who has done this? They must pay!
• Scene: standing in a suddenly-empty house. Your husband has fled, taking with him key papers/valuable items from the company/pirates/government you work for and leaving nothing but an insulting note. Not only has he offended you by leaving, your employers think you were involved. You have no choice but to chase him down and clear your name.
• Scene: an empty theatre. You were a member of a very popular pop group until, to your surprise, your bandmates stormed off the stage vowing to never have anything further to do with you. Now you're trapped in a recording deal - you have to form a new band and make it to the top or they'll take everything you've got.
• Scene: a courtroom. A key witness has refused to testify against a criminal you caught. You know it's because he saw a top mobster glowering in the back of the room, but can you prove it? These crooks are getting away with murder!
• Scene: fleeing a palace. You were an important official in the government of your spinner when an armed junta came smashing into the palace. They shot all of the old guard they could catch, but you made it out ahead of the death squads. Not you need a new life and maybe a new face too.
• Scene: a basement music studio. A heavy knock sounds on the door: the Revolutionary Guards want in, and you know music is officially a counter-revolutionary act. They'll shoot you if they catch you. But there's a side door, and maybe you can make it to freedom.
• Scene: a hospital room. Still weak from giving birth, you ask to see your baby and the nurses are strangely evasive. When you stagger into the babies' room, you see the door hanging off its hinges and smoke everywhere: someone broke in and took them all. Slavers? Genetic experimenters? Ransom-seekers? You have no idea, but you have to find them.
• Scene: a burned-out building. You're so tired you can barely stand; your firecrew has been running from one terrible fire to the next, and they look like arson. Now it's your fire station that they torched. Who is setting these fires and why?
• Scene: a devastated checkpoint. Press-ganged into the army, you were guarding a checkpoint from guerrillas who you'd franky rather be joining, when an attack demolished your whole patrol. Only through a freak chance did you survive. Time to take revenge on the guerrillas - or to slip away from the press gangs and join them?

This is fun!

[LomLom]

• Scene: Your home. While you're fixing your breakfast you flip on your news terminal. Your name is plastered all over it, wanted by the government and the police, with warnings for members of the public not to approach you. You have absolutely no idea what you're supposed to have done.
• Scene: Prison. Maybe your crimes were unforgivable, maybe you just pissed off the wrong people, maybe you were framed, but whatever the case you're in for a long stretch. Or so you thought. A year into your sentence you're dragged out of your cell by men in black carapace armor and taken to another facility where you're fitted with a bomb-collar. A person in a sharp suit tells you that you belong to them now, and that if you want to keep your head on your shoulders you'd better do exactly what they tell you.
• Scene: Military/Police/Mercenary faction building. You're a cadet and this is your graduation ceremony. You've just received your certificate from the Higher Up when mecha infiltrators from a rival faction attack.
• Scene: Office/Laboratory. A respected colleague hasn't shown up for work in days and isn't answering calls. Your boss asks you to check up on him at his home. When you get there there's no sign of him, but just after you finish calling your boss to let him know, you get an e-mail from the missing colleague telling you he's on the run because someone is trying to kill/abduct him.
• Scene: Theles Spinner hab building. Your gang has been under attack by a rival gang using military grade equipment and experimental devices and none of you have any idea where they're getting them from. Your gang boss tells you to find out who's supplying them and why.
• Scene: Nightclub/Mall. A person is running through the crowds, closely pursued by two thugs who look like they mean business. The running person bumps into you and you're both sent sprawling. You have seconds to decide whether to get involved or not.
• Scene: Your home. You wake up and head into the lounge. Whah? Where did those Dragon Serpents come from? The snakes move in for the kill but then your front door flies open and gunshots ring out, icing the biomonsters. Your mysterious rescuer tells you you're life is in danger because of the project/research/case you've been working on and tells you to go with them.
• Scene: Your home. You get a call from a wealthy client, the kind that pays well for your shady services. They're very interested in someone/something and will pay top money for information, or better yet, retrieval.
• Scene: Tohru Spinner. The corporations are all skirmishing in 'plausibly deniable' actions to be the dominant one after the rebuilding is done. One of them gets ruthless enough to use unmarked combat mecha inside the Spinner, and during the battle a stray plasma bolt flies through your window and kills your pet Marsh Lobster. Lobby, NOOOOO!!! Someone's gonna pay...
• Scene: Your home. Journalism turns out to be tougher than you thought. Your editor says that you'd better start writing something more newsworthy than this Z-list celeb gossip drivel or you'll be out of a job. Just as you're starting to despair of finding anything juicy, an old contact calls you to tell you he's found out something unbelievable that you just HAVE to hear.
• Scene: Temple. The temple master summons you and tells you about disturbing visions he's had. He charges you with finding the person/place/thing he saw in the visions.
• Scene: Temple. Turns out your temple was secretly run by a criminal group looking to attract gullible celebrities and take all their money. Revenge ensues.
• Scene: Space. Your first mission for your faction didn't work out so well. Your lancemates are toast and here you are, surrounded by four custom high-end mecha. You're braced for the end when the lead mecha opens a comm-channel and says they're going to let you go so that you can warn your faction not to try to mess with them again.
• Scene: Home. You're e-mailed a photo of yourself in a comprimising intimate situation with a Yatate pole-dancer and a Gremlin in a tutu. Hey, that's a photoshopped fake! No one's going to believe you though. The sender has certain demands if you don't want the photo going public, and it looks like you'll have to play along for now.
• Scene: Mall. An eco-preservation group is holding a 'Save the Space Worms' rally in the mall. With the cops' attention on the demonstrators, raiders stealthily hit a store belonging to your faction (or just where you work) and take your friend hostage as they flee with the loot.
• Scene: Government HQ office. You got a call 'inviting' you to meet with a government representative. You went along and they say they know about the questionable legality of your activities. They could get you sent down, but they're prepared to overlook these things if you just do one 'simple' job for them.

[RadonPlasma]

This is rather exciting.  I think I'll have a go.

• Scene:  A construction site.  You're a robot coordinator for your construction coop, and something strange has happened.  A malfunctioning robot beckoned/dragged you to an off-limits area of the site, and used a passkey to open the unmarked door blocking it off.  The robot leads you inside before catastrophically breaking down.
• Scene:  The local hospital.  After escaping a fight that turned out to be way out of your league, you and your mates wonder what will become of your fledgling lance after the death of its leader.  A stranger who claimed to know your departed leader drops a datachip into your pocket as s/he leaves the building.  You give chase, but your blood runs cold when you catch up; s/he's dead, blood pouring from a puncture wound to the cerebellum.

Maybe I'll do more tomorrow.

[Joseph Hewitt]

• Scene: A research craft. You've just been attacked by pirates. The navcomp is down, and the only people who might be able to help you get home just flew off with your cargo module... which they don't realize contains a sedated space squid who's about to wake up.
• As a member of the AMX program, you've been trained since birth to be the ultimate soldier. Today you are supposed to choose your final placement in one of L5's defense fleets. There's a lot of pressure to pick a side and you're beginning to feel like human livestock... maybe you should choose none of the above and make your own way?

[LomLom]

48 so far by my count! About half way.

• Scene: asteroid mining base. The news was buzzing all over the Rock - a mining co-op uncovered a strange artifact and have brought it back to the hab area for study. Out of the blue an unidentified raiding team of mecha and spec-ops troops hit the hab area and steal the artifact, causing a lot of collateral damage to the colony in the process. You might have any of several motives to pursue them - retribution, glory, or the riches the artifact is sure to bring.
• Scene: Nightclub. A boozed-up old space-dog is entertaining you and your friends with tall tales of the Deep Black. Well they're surely all wild nonsense yarns... though one had a ring of truth, something about a legendary artifact said to have been lost somewhere near this Spinner. Maybe you should check it out. Let's hope it's not a wild goose chase, and that if not, no-one else got there first.

[LomLom]

• Scene: Tohru Spinner. Construction workers demolishing a ruined building complex uncover a weird bunker built into the foundations. Next day, the workers arrive to find the bunker door lasered off its hinges and the bunker completely empty. Maybe you can find some clues around the Spinner to put you on the trail of whatever was inside it and whoever took it.
• Scene: Spaceport. Your family from Earth are coming up to join you on the Spinner and you're waiting for their shuttle at the Spaceport. As the shuttle enters the Spinner's sector it broadcasts a distress call saying it's under attack by unidentified mecha.
• Scene: Any Spinner HQ. You ran for office but the dirty tricks your opponent used made sure that they won and you lost, badly. What you can't work out is just who was funding their campaign to make it all possible. There was a lot of money being passed around so it must be backer from a major faction looking to put a puppet in the government, you're sure of it. You had a 'friend' look into things to see what they could turn up.
• Scene: Arena club. Your first fight is going to begin soon and while you're fussing over your gear a shady character approaches you. They tell you that their employers are very keen to see the other guy win and offer you money to throw the match. They might have further work for you if you cooperate... if not, you might be making a powerful enemy.
• Scene: Arena club. The local arena champion is an arrogant jerk. They have the best win ratio but they're not even all that good! But somehow they've always got the best mecha going and bundles of cash. A lot of their opponents seem to have strange 'mechanical faliures' on the field while others submit just a little too easily. Maybe you should find out what's going on behind the scenes, find out if there are any sinister backers involved.
• Scene: Anywhere a Mecha can be. You're happily driving around in your mecha, admiring the views and enjoying your new stereo system, when out of the blue a lance of mecha attack you. Their leader claims he'll get revenge for what you did. You genuinely have no idea what he's talking about! Is it a case of random mistaken identity or has someone set you up? You'll have to figure that out later, right now the stompy deathbots moving in are a more pressing concern.
• Scene:Hospital. You were given a spot as a test pilot for a corporation or military faction, and today is the new prototype's maiden voyage. Everything goes smoothly until fast raider mecha appear and attack. Their first shot blows out your cockpit and you're sent spinning into the void while the raiders make off with the prototype. Your distress location beacon is working fine and your faction sends someone to pick you up. A high ranking member visits you in hospital and offers you a chance to regain some face by helping track down the raiders.
• Scene: Dojo. Your elderly master confides in you, telling you about an old rivalry they have with another master, an evil person who channels the dark ki and is known to deal with criminals and other sinister groups for power and money. Years ago he stole a sacred weapon from your Dojo. As the most accomplished student, you are charged by your master with recovering that weapon.

[Inu]

• Scene: Mysterious Girl crash lands her spaceship/mech/whatever into your house/bedroom. She's out cold. Outside your window you see a BuruBuru and at least one of dem skitty power suits. What. Do. You. Do?
• Scene: Mysterious person bumps into you in the street. Apparently s/he is running away from some Goons in suits. Time to kick butt or run for the hills?
• Scene: A Neko crashes into your mech. Your mech is destroyed. Thankfully you ejected in time. When you get to the ground, you notice a Martian Princess running your way and from beneath the rubble of your Once-Beloved Mech a Badger is crawling up and out. Proceed to either a battle on foot with the aid of the Martian Princess or fight the thing in your newly aquired Neko that survived due to superior martian armour.

[Rowanthepreacher]

Scene: Hospital. Your grandfather, his mind marred by old age, asks you to find a "family heirloom" that doesn't exist. You speak with your parent/aunt/uncle and they reveal that it really does exist, but was hidden in the local -insert dungeon here-. The words of your grandfather carry great weight in the family, and if he thinks it's time for you to have it, then you must seek it out.

Scene: The bedroom of a respected local figure, or more precisely, his child. The door slams as they enter the house, ruining the "2 person party" you were holding. You can try to escape, hide, or take them on with a couple rounds of fisticuffs.

Scene: You burst out of the cryogenic pod about 10 years too late. Instead of being awoken to fight the -insert local bad guys-, you discover that they haven't been around for half a dozen years. You can decide to track them down and wipe them out, or get on with your life, but either way, they're going to crop up occasionally to make your life difficult.

[Crucifix]

Seems a shame to leave it at 71, lessee....

• Scene: Your brother's cramped apartment. You were the shining star of the boardroom, every decision you made struck gold.... And then everything went wrong, industrial accidents, unlucky pirate encounters, missed deadlines and just plain bad luck have stripped you of your position, driven you into bankruptcy. Now you're living on your good-for-nothing brother's couch, when you stumble across a clue that your fall might not have been the coincidence it appeared...
• Scene: Your home. The orphanage you were raised in was one of the few good things in your life, but now you've just received an email from its administrator - it's now fallen heavily into debt, and without $50,000,000 to pay it off, the orphanage will close down. But how can you make enough money to save the orphanage? Maybe you can reform your rhythm and blues band?
• Scene: Orphanage: You never knew your parents, you thought they were dead all this time. So who sent this email from "Dad"? And why is the only word on it "Run"?
• Scene: Spaceship. You and your friend are emigrating from Earth. Whilst travelling to X spinner, your shuttle is attacked by the Aegis space force! You slip into one of the service mecha aboard the shuttle. Can you defend everyone in your newly acquired Dora?
• Scene: Hospital. You can't remember what happened to you, all you know is that you can't move, your every waking moment is pain. A mysterious figure comes to your bedside. They can rebuild you, they have the cyberware. All you have to do is sign one little contract...
• Scene: Theles Spinner - Outdoors. You are protesting unfair labour laws at a union rally. A private police force mecha arrives on the scene, the pilot doesn't even say a word before opening up with their anti-personnel machine guns. Even if you manage to escape, the technocrats will know, and they won't stop until they've wiped out every last witness to the Theles Square massacre....
• Scene: Your home. You are just beginning to leave on your journey, leaving your mother behind and bringing only your pet Lightning Rat with you, you've gone to visit the professor, with a single vow on your lips: one day you're going to be the very best, like no one ever was.
• Scene: Sewer system. You remember nothing but your name. Your head throbs. You have nothing except the clothes on your back, a coppery taste in your mouth, and a barcode on the back of your neck. A creature attacks you from the darkness, and you strike it down with a burst of lightning from your hands. Somewhere outside of this murky hole there must be answers.
• Scene: Laboratory. You live a happy, contented life assisting your father, a famous scientist. Suddenly, men burst into your home, wielding guns. They gun down you both down, steal your father's research and leave. Struggling despite his wounds, your father reactivated you and repaired the damage to your chassis, saying that you have to recover his research on hyper realistic androids, before they can decipher its contents and create an unstoppable army of war. You must fight X-4702! Fight for everlasting peace!
• Scene: Space. You were a warrior in the Aegis Defence force, you were forced to eject during a battle with Earth's forces, and were never recovered. You've drifted for almost a month now, slowly atrophying off your diet of recycled water and nutrient pills. Finally in the distance you see a ship, finally someone responding to your distress call... a trucker heading to Maquise spinner. Weak from your long spell in zero gravity, you're trapped behind enemy lines. Can you make it home? Or will you forge a new life and hope that Luna has forgotten you?
• Scene: Underground. You are a miner, trapped underground after a cave in that killed your coworkers. If you can find your way out of here, it might be a good time to consider alternative employment....
• Scene: Bar. You used to be the best, any lock, any treasure. You were so good you got out of the game years ago. But now they're trying to pull you back in for one last job. Do you still have what it takes? Or have you gone soft over the years?
• Scene: Pirate ship - Brig. You messed up, you missed the big score once too often and now you're due to be spaced. Can you escape your former companions with your life? And even if you do escape, how will you evade the wrath of your ex-employers?
• Scene: Deep space - You've been selected to test out an incredible experimental mecha for your faction. After a failed pirate raid you've become separated from your allies. Do you struggle to return the mecha to safety with your faction, or do you take the opportunity to elope with your new mechanical love?
• Scene: Your home. - You've just returned home from work to find your house empty - your spouse and children are missing! You're just a regular person, you don't know why anyone would have kidnapped them, but you'll set all the spinners ablaze looking for them.
• Scene: Orphanage. - You were a foundling, discovered in a deserted micro-spinner full of dangerous creatures, now you're grown you want to go back there and find out more about yourself.
• Scene: Spinner - Outdoors. You're a pilot in an L5-Law Enforcer Mecha, handling a particularly violent uprising over Mecha Engineering costs. Your superior contacts you over your comm and orders you to open fire on the crowd immediately. Do you trust the Authority, or do you turn on the other L5 Enforcer Mechs to protect your people?
• Scene: Hospital. You've tried everything but it seems like there's nothing more that can be done, your love interest is going to die of an incurable illness within months. Telltale clues indicate that there's something not quite natural about the illness. Do you try to seek out the source of this disease, or do you scour the spinners for a cure?
• Scene: Spinner Engineering. You're a rookie engineer, called out to routine maintenance on the spinner systems, but whilst in the engineering section, you hear the alarms sounding over a major life support failure. You don't know whether there's anyone else close enough to help. Approaching the life support systems you see a shadowy figure running away. Do you stay and try to fix the damage, or do you chase after the culprit?
• Scene: Office: This will be your big break, a starring role as the Earthman who defeated Typhon! But your agent has told you that they need to do your own stunts and get some first hand cavalier experience, so you've had your budget stripped, been temporarily barred from your penthouse and been allocated a clunky old mecha. You're pretty sure your first mission is to find a new agent!
• Scene: Your home. You've been having headaches lately - ever since you started your job at the Genes Associated Research Union in fact. In fact, at your last check-up, the doctor told you that you were looking a bit green, literally! You've just called in sick for the day when some thugs wearing G.A.R.U uniforms bust in!
• Scene: Dojo. You're goofing off training hard and seriously with your friends when a hooded figure enters and challenges your master. He's not there, so the figure goes to take the sign. His kung fu is too powerful for you, do you attempt to defend your dojo's honour, or do you surrender the sign to the man?
• Scene: Spaceport. It was your first espionage mission, you weren't even supposed to be in that deep, but you lucked out and got a hold of a dataslate and cracked the encryption. Now you know too much and even your own side is gunning for you. Where can you go to lay low for awhile?
• Scene: Bar. You've built your entire reputation around never losing a bounty, but the whole time one target has eluded you, and even left you with a few scars from your encounters. You've just received a notice that s/he was seen on this spinner, it's time for payback!
• Scene: Stage. This is it, your first gig, your big break. You've built up to this, you've trained for it. You're ready! You get up onto the stage.... And the building is attacked by mecha. The show must go on....
• Scene: University. You've just finished giving your lecture on Pre Zero history when someone approaches you with a proposition. They've found the ancient and powerful Foo, and they need someone educated with what the artifact can do to help them retrieve it...
• Scene: Your shop. You've just been robbed, your priceless foo has been stolen! Time to show this rogue why they shouldn't mess with the merchant class.
• Scene: News Headquarters - Your workplace. You've tugged at the threads long enough, you know where you might be able to find the next piece of the puzzle and reveal the %Insert Naughtiness Here% for what they are, but it's going to take getting your hands dirty....

[li]Scene: Party. You are the %prince of the X corporation, child of the president and heir to fabulous wealth, as soon as your trust fund kicks in at 31 at least. You spend your days idling at parties and whiling away the time until you see the most attractive %girl you've ever seen. It's the %daughter of your main business rivals! Do you risk everything and go talk to %her?
[/li][/list]