Oddities for a Sci-Fi Saloon
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On our latest d-Infinity Live Challenge Episode you're favorite hosts and contributors are tasked with creating an original RPG that blends science fiction and wild west elements, and nothing hybridizes those concepts more than a rough and tumble watering hole packed to the gills with aliens, mutants, and a token human or two. So for those chomping at the bit to run a scifi western of your own, we present a new ever growing, ever evolving table of unusual objects, NPCs, and encounters to bring your saloon to outlandish life!
The saloon has no windows, but once inside several exit doors are apparent. The saloon exists in a pocket dimension, and each doorway is a wormhole leading to a shop front on a different world.There is a 50% chance at least one door connects to a different time.
A well-used spittoon rests in the corner brimming with the expectorate of countless life forms. When he's sure no one is looking, the bartender empties the spittoon into a tumbler and sells the contents as an exotic cocktail. It doesn't look like much, but it's highly intoxicating.
1+1d4x sit around a table playing with five-sided cards marked with alien numbers and symbols. There is no game played with five sided cards. The beings are con artists going through the motions of playing a game and waiting for a mark to take the bait and join in.
A robot outlaw buzzes and dings to himself in the corner. Forced into retirement when his arm was blown off by a marshal's blaster rifle, he is reduced to gambling for spare parts with anyone who cares to take a spin on the modified chest display panel that's been modified into a random number generator. There is a 50% chance the game is rigged.
1d4x prostitutes of various species and genders play their trade in the saloon, entreating patrons to join them upstairs for a tumble. Should anyone take them up on their offer, there is a 50% chance of a complication. If so, there is an equal chance the prostitute is a shape shifter who till take the adventurer's place, an alien monster who implants larva in its partners, an android assassin from the future hoping to kill (or castrate) the adventurer before they can sire a future anti-robot revolutionary, the adventurer from the future.
A mutant bartender serves of exotic drinks. If the house special (or anything suitably esoteric) is ordered, the bartender opens his coat and fills a glass from one of several pulsing udders. The drink is slightly chilled.
A dispute over cheating at a card game in the corner leads to a bloody shootout taking the lives of all involved. The bartender and regular patrons take no notice of this, at most seeming slightly annoyed. Before the bodies can cool, the air around the table shimmers and the card game begins again, the shootout replaying again exactly as before. The gamblers are caught in a time loop, and the owner of the saloon would be grateful if someone could correct the chronological incontinence so the table can be freed up for new paying customers. However, several of the people in the card game were patrons who tried to do exactly that and became trapped in the time loop.
1d4x flowery drinks served in hollow coconuts and pineapples sit unattended on a table. However, these are not drinks, but a party of aliens from a species that just so happens to look exactly like tropical drinks. Attempting to drink one assault, and successfully drinking one is an act of war.
A complicated chart behind the bar details the chemical basis for several species and what intoxicants are safe to drink and which react violently with their biochemistry. A skilled bartender can use this chart to serve safe drinks to patrons of various origins, while the unscrupulous can use this chart to perform any number of drink-based assassinations.
A raygunslinger working security mumbles to himself as he obsessively cleans his blaster pistol. However, close observation reveals he is not talking to himself. he's speaking with his pistol, which is equipped with artificial intelligence and is several orders of magnitude more intelligent and canny than the raygunslinger himself. The pistol his helping him size up patrons and look for potential troublemakers.
And that's only the beginning! We'll be adding to this chart in the run up to the show, and if you have oddities of your own, post them in the comments below! Let's see how long it takes to get to 100!
