[3.5] OK, so apparently building an entire PLANET was not enough. Need help ASAP

[Pika...]

So, you know that saying about planning as little as possible in advance due to PCs finding that 1 thing out of 100 you overlooked? You'd figure making a sandbox world you spent close to two years on would be of use overcoming that, right? Nope.

My player who is a timelord (my cosmology's version of one) taken physical form (they are normally fourth-dimensional beings) decided to grab his prinny slave and flee into the Temporal Plane to reach the Endless Citadel for some information knowing it was almost impossible. In the process he got the party he left (and was basically leading) basically TPKed, though I made it so they are slaves and I can use the village as a backup campaign.

So anyway, he failed to get there (obviously), and got tossed around the currents of time itself.

I made him roll twice. The first was to see which of my past ages along with the next one I knew about and the final one (where the Mind Flayers flee from as time ends) to see where he lands.

First roll he ended up 6k years in the past during the Human golden age before they killed each other off in their Great Human Wars (great, their goes some of the uniqueness of my games. LoL).

Second roll was to see which setting of those I knew he landed in including mine, all the offical ones I am familiar with, and 3rd party ones like Dawnforge and Gamma World. He rolled Spelljammer.

Thankfully I had been working on a campaign/adventure slightly modifying it from the below Dragon magazine on-and-off for weeks:
http://paizo.com/store/magazines/dragon/issues/1990/159

For all those who have read this issue, or who remember it from way back the main world there is called "Below", and the primes is that the Arcane Order brings creatures from all over the Prime Material there to scare off people from finding a hidden base/jammer shipyard there of some importance. According to the article "PCs can find everything and anything from modern day soldiers to cartoon characters on Below". I took this and ran with it, allowing players to literally play ANYTHING they want (withn a bit of reason. no tarrasque basically).

So players rolled up some new PCs except for the Prinny, the Timelord who regenerated as a Kobold, and one other PC who mysteriously showed up (for fluff reasons I need to make up. did it on the fly for potential fluff/story in the base later on). One PC is Spideman...

They left off with an antrophormorphic rabbit running up to them from the jungle saying as he grabbed a PC by the shirt: "Doc, Doc you got to hide me. You have to help me. I know why we are here. They are going to ki..." as he fell over with thirty adamantine crossbow bolts in his back. The bolts had been fired by halflings (unknown to the PCs from the Arcane Order), who proceeded to check his body, but took nothing (I am not sure why I did that, but perhaps I left a possibility open for them to have taken something of importance?). Then after they left the PCs started to talk and Spiderman said "Damn, how many times am I going to be kidnapped to a hunting planet?". Then a voice from behind a small rock said "N..n...no amigo, Yoz are wrong. Muy wrong.". The party proceeded to look over the rock to see a small mouse in a sombrero who seemed as though he had just drank twenty cups of coffee shakingly say: "They are gonna kill me like esceron him....". The Kobold picked him up and said "Talk". The mouse said "Amigo, please don't ask me to tal...tal..talk. They will kill you too. You do not want to know. The PC smirked and replied "I have died before...".


So now here are my two issues:
1. I need to know ASAP by next Sunday what I need to read and what parts to get a Spelljammer campaign going by Saturday. I have a learning disability, so I read slow. Need the kep points and parts first I believe would be best.

2. I need to know exactly what is going inside that hidden base. Is it a special jammer ship perhaps I am thinking (the article never said...)? Maybe one that does not need a caster?

Maybe they are trying to make a jammer ship that can cloak Romulan style Hence giving an excuse for the PCs getting past the fleet of the Arcane Order in the sphere if they manage to get the ship?)?

Maybe they are working on a way to sail the Temporal Plane's time currents, hence why PC #3 is there somehow? Maybe they need the timelord for some currently unknown to me the DM reason to get it going? Maybe they want to see the future with it, or retrieve advance weaponry from the future with it, or rewrite history?

I have no idea here folks...

3. I need to basically know where to go from here.

Due to the timelord PC failing a Sanity check and seeing flamingos with fangs he tossed his prinny slave into the jammer chair of a ship which had crash landed (aka how the Wild Elf PC got there in a fleeing attempt from Mind Flayers). Because of this prinny went some miles North, and the rest went with the cabin end of the ship South East. This was before the rabbit and mouse incident. I just thought I would point it out.

4. I need to know if I can make this last as a fun adventure getting out of here, and after that perhaps stop by the moon refuge (need to know the article for details sadly...) for even more fun and adventures.

5. And after that what the frail do I do?

What the frail do I do now?!

LoL. I think this is one of those cases where a potential DM's metal is being tested.


As always, many thanks in advanced!

[The_Mad_Linguist]

Cartoon characters can be stretched, and are invulnerable to most types of harm, neh?

You want a special spelljamming vessel with an unusual hull, neh?

Perhaps one with its own consciousness that can still be controlled?

[veekie]

Perhaps one with its own consciousness that can still be controlled?

One with it's own consciousness, a superweapon, and requires psychiatric help after so long stuck alone. It needs love.

[Pika...]

Perhaps one with its own consciousness that can still be controlled?

One with it's own consciousness, a superweapon, and requires psychiatric help after so long stuck alone. It needs love.

Wut???

Please go into more detail...

I am thinking anime here from your description. 

[Pika...]

Cartoon characters can be stretched, and are invulnerable to most types of harm, neh?

You want a special spelljamming vessel with an unusual hull, neh?

Perhaps one with its own consciousness that can still be controlled?

1. So what cartoon characters would you throw at them, and what should their weakness be? 

2. What do you mean by unusual hull? What would you suggest?

I am having a real hard time coming up with what this secret base built, unique, uber cliche ship is, or if it is a modification of a real Spelljammer ship(s) or is a mixmatch of parts from many differ style of Jammer ships.

Is it that the ship is the first (and maybe only due to the PCs...) jammer ship that does not need a helm? (Maybe insert the "love" idea here...)

Perhaps it can cloak/cast invisibility like a Star Trek Romulan ship?

Maybe it has some kind of super weapon on board?

If you painfully connect a Timelord into it as a "navigator" 40K/Outlaw Star style could it sail the Temporal Currents of the Temporal Plane?

I do not know nearly enough about spelljammer to know what would work, and what would still keep things somewhat balanced wet is this significant ship-wise.

[veekie]

Well, nothing specific to any inspiration, just a ship fully capable of flying itself, with a superweapon(or not).

And some psychological issues any would be pilots would have to deal with.
It's lonely.

[Pika...]

Well, nothing specific to any inspiration, just a ship fully capable of flying itself, with a superweapon(or not).

And some psychological issues any would be pilots would have to deal with.
It's lonely.

Hmm, right now I am thinking perhaps an intelligent Lost Universe style ship that is being finished by the Arcane Order. Nice idea adding a "I'm lonely" aspect to the ship for fun/humor which a potential pilot would need to deal with. 

She would be in the middle of a gigantic underground drydock (with a mechanical opening zeppelin style roof) surrounded by other spelljammer ships in various stages of gutted and/or missing parts. She would clearly have characteristics of various styled ships from those of the Mind Flayers to Halfling ships. How I will stat this I am WAY to early in the Spelljammer core book(s) to know.

I need some unlockable "secrets" within her that PCs could discover later. Perhaps Farscape style with that certain plotline? I am guessing she would need to be pretty big for this, though? 10+ stories maybe? By who know how long and wide?

Maybe a "final secret" they can find at near epic levels is that the Arcane Order had installed their prototype (and perhaps only???) timelord timeship copying technology into a secret/inaccessible hall/room only a certain NPC knows the trick to get into? Perhaps they wanted the timelord to finally be bale to complete the thing, or to connect/plug him into it to be able to sail the Temporal Plane?

Perhaps the ship has a cloaking field, but after "narrowly escaping" this sphere it is wrecked, and it will take the timelord PC centuries to repair? Hence explaining realistically why they escaped, yet not overpower them? Or perhaps it can work every once-in-a-while if the ship's repair man/tinker/timelord gets lucky on Scotty style engineering rolls to conveniently save themselves at dire moments (like a fleet of Arcane Order ships heading their way)?


I am also thinking of them having multiple projects going on there if time permits, such as research into the timelords in an attempt to make a timeportal. This perhaps can give the leader PC the dilemma of having to interfere to make sure time continues as it would have, but at the same time wanting to go back to his adopted home and time.


Oh, and the "fallen" timelord player did talk to me of trying to become a leader style PC who would bring together a group of people/followers who would act to "make sure things happened how they should". It was a short talk, and he talked as though it was a longshot, far off, and possibly pipedream goal for his PC, but perhaps with a ship this big(if I make it big?) and this powerful (if I make it powerful or brokenish powerful?) he could do that? Perhaps he could even pick up some crew on the planet who want to escape, or even experiment subjects in the base?


OR


Perhaps they have one of the miniature Spelljammer ships that can turn into a and/or the full Spelljammer itself in their?

Perhaps they are trying to prematurely trigger the transformation without the need of attacking the Spelljammer?



Or

Any other ideas or suggestions?

[axenome1]

Hmmm well, I've personally already run something remarkably similar to this a few years back- I'll let you use this idea, although I don't recommend spelling out the implications of it to the PC's. Let them suffer the consequences if they don't figure out how seriously powerful the idea is.
An experimental magic matrix utilizing permanent versions of Ghost Sound, Silent Image, Amanuensis, Erase, Read Magic, and a very heavy log book. Congratulations. You have created a magical computer with visual and audio display. And the entire thing could be done by a first level wizard if he somehow gained access to the Craft Wondrous Item feat.
How? The spell matrix utilizes Read Magic to take instructions from the book, as well as access memory(pages) that were recorded with the Amanuensis spell. Amanuensis can also take written instructions from a "logger" and implement them according to the matrix instructions, carrying out interpreter functions according to prewritten instructions. The Erase function can clear out old, unnecessary clutter, and clean up any pages written by the logger that he doesn't need anymore, and the whole thing can use Silent Image and Ghose sound for the aforementioned audio/video display. Wan to make it seriously awesome? Give it a scanning function with Clairaudience/Clairvoyance, a second level spell, that can record things at a distance, scan around the outside of a spell jamming ship automatically and convert the information into written storage for later retrieval through Amanuensis and Read Magic. Not going fast enough? Dual, Quad, or ten core it with multiple iterations of Read Magic/Erase/Amanuensis. True, one copy of amanuensis can only record 250 words per minute(and a word can be very specific or shorthand for often repeated codes or data that consist of two or three words) but ten of them working together can start giving some processor power to your shiny new computer. And even with the Clairaudience/Clairvoyance the design could be assembled
- unaided, mind you- by a 3rd level wizard with Craft Wondrous Item.
Big Brother potential aside, this thing is a nightmare for anyone concerned with security, would be a godlike tool in the hands of a general of an army, could literally put the holder on any throne he chooses if he's clever about it. Pity the guy who designed it died "mysteriously," we have to take this thing in to an item crafter and figure out how the damn thing works... While it's true most higher level casters are going to have defenses against this sort of magic, its sheer ease of construction would make it almost mandatory for every ruler to have one, and the fact that it doesn't have to be attended to record what someone is doing makes it scarily useful.
The party I was running regretted it greatly when they let it slip from their hands for a few thousand gold to fix up the derelict spalljamming ship  It found its way into the hands of the BBEG and they were suddenly running into ambushes any time they turned around, and always the moment the party was splitting up. Most of the mayhem died down when they all invested in non detection gear, but they were absolutely miserable for a couple months whiile this guy plagued them at every possible turn.