Arcology Setting

>>50739360
>Food can be grown with hydroponics and power is a cinch thanks to fusion/fission plants.

So here's the issue with that setting then:
How is the surface inhospitable?
With that kind of tech, we're looking at pretty easy geodesic domes and moon colonization.

>>50739381
Radioactive fallout? Something that makes it far more efficient to just move underground. Either that or perhaps a more alien threat. They prowl the surface but generally can't find / attack the arcologies.

Until they can.

>>50739434
Alien threat is more plausible. Because otherwise why wouldn't you just >spacelaunch, you know?

However, I'm not sure how easy it would be to hide the arcologies. Maybe they've got great defenses though. Could be entertaining.

>>50739463
>why wouldn't you just >spacelaunch, you know?
Insufficient reserves of fossil fuel.

You could take Pale Cocoon as an inspiration.

>>50739463
Assuming that they were under construction before the threat arose, it could just be that the entrances are so unassuming. It might be the equivalent of a little hut in the middle of a 100 mile forest. A network of smaller entrances would be safer than one more heavily used one I think.

>>50739477
>Insufficient reserves of fossil fuel.
Ya can't do that with >>50739360!
>fusion/fission plants
Project Orion can just nuke a colony ship into orbit. Don't wanna leave plot holes in a story like that, it can make readers roll their eyes pretty quickly.

But I mean, something particularly aggressive toward anything showing on the surface could be decent. Even down to 'tons of little asteroids', perhaps.

>>50739509
C&C style Ion Storms? They can be predicted to a degree but never too far in advance and they'll kill or ruin pretty much anything caught in them.

>>50739477
Pale Cocoon seems to have the sort of tone that would work for this.

There certainly should be some big secrets hidden away.

Here's how I'd do the background lore:

Aliens invaded, and a terrible war was fought on the surface, but there was long enough to build the underground cities.

The alien value (their own) lives very highly, and are unwilling to spend the blood needed to storm the vaults. Instead, they've left teams on the surface to keep humanity under siege, while the main alien fleet left for parts unknown.

That was a few hundred years ago. The aliens garrison left on Earth is depleted, and instead of guarding each vault, they attack parties on the surface, and come down hard on any vault that dares go to far. They've also got some orbital capability for calling in the big guns.

That's your overarching plot right there. Either a desperate long term game, as the vaults race to pick the aliens apart before they themselves fail, or more standard quests for the Mcguffin, or even attempting to forge a truce.

Lots of ways you could go from there.

>>50739877
So things on the surface aren't as bad as they used to be, but the higher-ups in the city want stability and aren't prepared to have everyone rushing back to the surface.

>>50740005
That could be it, or that things on the surface are still wrecked pretty bad, and they know that cities that send out a lot of explorers tend to stop answering the radio.

There could be automated defense platforms in orbit that stop an big expeditions, or permanent settlement. That could be a campaign ending plotline, trying to turn those off.

You could play around with the details and what players know a lot, depending on what kind of game (city politics, small groups exploring a wasteland, city management, etc) and what sort of theme (sci fi, horror, something like Metro: Lost Light) you want.

You could have whole games dealing with mutants in the upper levels, or a city that's running out of clean water, and wants to go to the surface. Or you could be the team they send to explore.

>>50740140
If I were to run a game in it, it'd combine mecha action on the surface with intrigue and the like inside the city.

The city's darkest hour took place over two decades ago. The protective seals of the city's few exits were damaged beyond repair by extremely bad weapon, and were breached entirely. Near half of the entire city was slaughtered by the ensuing alien attack before it could be contained by >insert famed scientist here<. Using a new technique, he was able to completely destroy the murderous invaders, but at great cost. The upper sections of the city were never resettled, left as a buffer zone in case such a thing were ever to happen again. The city's more wealthy residents moved deeper in response, despite >Chief Scientist's< assertions that such an event would never take place again. To his credit, it hasn't, though the aliens presumably now know the location of the city. Travelling through the city's deserted layers is a rite of passage for all new SUIT pilots, and a first hand reminded of what might happen should they fail.

SUITs (Specialised Units for Interception of Tangos) are the only manner of surveying the surface. Nobody ever actually leaves the city, instead pilots are neurally linked to vat-grown puppets made in their likeness. These bodies look and move like them, but can't function without the pilot being interfaced into the system. Even these bodies can't survive on the surface for long before becoming degraded, and so all activities are conducted from within mobile, mechanised suits. These units are tasked with preventing the alien threat from rediscovering the city as a priority, though they're often tasked with other missions. Such missions have increased in recent years owing to a decrease in alien activity.


I'm seeing the aliens as more of a swarm-of-locusts sort here, rather than bipedal or whatever. They simply strip any flesh they come across.

>>50739360
>>50739360
>What secrets are being kept from the average joe?
Founders were extremists/dissident/cultists
surface is habitable & inhabited by the society the founders fled from. Founders fled to escape persecution/prosecution or during/after a civil war/terror attack they launched.
insects as food source: crickets/grasshopers are good as are silkworms. Soylent green addatives to bulk it out?
dissidents/adventurers often get randomly selected for recon/salvage patrols but never seem to return...

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>>50739360

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This sounds like a fucking fantastic setting.
10/10 would play in.

What system ya gonna use, OP?

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Isn't this the "real world" of The Matrix?

>>50742301
I was thinking earlier that it might be easiest to just mash Eclipse Phase and Battletech together, as dumb as that sounds.