Bases. Boy, do I love Bases.
Headquarters, Hideouts, Clubhouses, and Secret Sanctuaries, I am a huge advocate for the PCs in a tabletop RPG having somewhere to call home sweet home. One of the [albiet many] reasons the old school idea of the Murderhobo never clicked for me is that most of my heroes aren't aimless vagabonds.
Batman has the Batcave, Captain Kirk has the Enterprise, the Fantastic Four the Baxter Building, and the Ghostbusters their Firehouse. Most heroes of Comics, Manga, Anime, TV, and film, especially those who work with a team, have a Base from which they head out to investigate problems and return to in order to analyze the clues they found, get the right gear for the job, and/or have a quick meal to keep up their stamina.
Unfortunately, few games have great Base-Building mechanics. Those that do include a decent number of Superhero games - since that is a genre where Bases are common - and Science Fiction games of the Space Adventure variety. The latter usually appears in the form of Starship Construction but often cover both Orbital and Planetside Stations. A wonderful aspect of the Computer/Video Game 'No Man's Sky' is your character's ability to construct all sorts of cool outposts on your alien world of choice.
And of course as I've mentioned before, the upcoming SMURFS RPG has Base Buolding rules for your very own Mushroom Cottage. Dang I like that game!
Since each system has different mechanics for handling the creation of Bases, I am going to go rules agnostic and focus on more on ideas for what you can do with the concept.
Base Assumptions
When creating a base, the key things you need to decide on are what form will it take, where is it located, and why is it there.
That last bit may seem rather obvious; after all, 'It's there because we need a base', right? Well sure, in a meta-sense, but let's get a little more creative.
What I'm really getting at is what are the Base's Origins. Before it was your group's headquarters, what was it and what purpose did it serve? It could have been nothing of note, you can even decide it was an empty plot of land bequeathed to the PCs by the local Duke as a reward for ridding the land of a monstrous beast. Perhaps it was a parking lot purchased the the team's billionaire industrialist.
It could also have been:
- An abandoned Space Station left behind by earlier interstellar explorers.
- The former hideout of an old Supervillain.
- A foreclosed upon Victorian House in the middle of the woods (possibly Haunted)
- An old Police Station in a rough part of town.
This little touch gives the location or the edifice itself a little more character and adds to your overall World-Building. It also opens up possibilities for adventures connected to the Base itself, likely tied to its past history
Example: In the original Winghorn Guard campaign (Advanced Dungeons and Dragons 1st Edition w/ lots of House Rules), after the PCs went through the Expedition to the Barrier Peaks Module, they set about clearing the place out completely and eventually converting it into a base for their team. I fleshed out a bit more of the 'Mountain's' background and the PCs were constantly finding new secrets, capabilities, and dangers within their unique, adopted HQ.
Underwater Base from No Man's Sky
The next thing I'll address is where the Base is geographically. You know what they say, 'Location, Location, Location!'. This really depends on your campaign and it's tricky to discuss this in generic terms since a Base's placement will be tied to a number of rather specific genre and setting elements.
Consider the nature of your campaign...
Are you local heroes or criminals, mostly operating in and around a single neighborhood? Conversely, does your party protect a large city, a state, a country, or an entire planet? The Ghostbusters can easily cover New York City from their Firehouse on NYC's Lower East Side but its gonna take a while for them to drive the Ecto-1 to the outer burrows or Upstate NY. Clients might need to call one of the Franchise Offices if there a Class IV Repeating Phantom in Southern New Jersey.
Is this a Secret Hideout like the Batcave or a publically known location like Avengers Mansion? One is underneath a remote hill some miles outside of Gotham City (a fictional city), while the other is on the Upper East Side of New York City near Central Park. This strongly effects how those using the facilities interact with other people and vice versa, from average, everyday people to their disgruntled enemies. How accessible is the Base to the public?
Cost of operating the Base might be a concern if tracking resources is part of your game. A group of 'Kids on Bikes' hanging out in an old bomb shelter would be focused on snacks, a way to generate power, etc., while a Private Detective Agency would be worried about the rent, the phone bill, and maybe paying a receptionist/secretary. Here Location matters because its a lot cheaper to maintain a Treehouse in your backyard then a fancy townhouse in London's Notting Hill or Knightsbridge.
Seven Dwarfs' House by Seiji Yoshida
Now let's talk Form, as in 'What Form does the Base take?'. Arguably this could have been the first thing I addressed but I really wanted to put the idea of a Base having a 'past life' front and center.
As with other aspects of this subject, the Form a Base takes is highly dependent upon the milieu in which you're running or playing your game. So what general points can I make here? Well...there are some notes I can make based (no pun intended) on considerations I've made in past campaigns.
First, when it comes to the size of the Base, one should choose a structure that is somewhat larger than you need it to be. This gives you room, in both a literal and figurative sense, to modify and expand the hideout in question. To put it another way, if you have a 3 or 4 person group of PCs, don't have them occupy a 3-4 person Base. Ideally, their HQ should have the capacity to house and support 6 members, their gear, etc. What if one of the PCs wants to add a laboratory several sessions in? What if a friend hears about your game and really wants in? I'm just saying, leave yourself a little extra space.
Second, have the Form of the Base share the same character as the PCs and the premise of the game. A grim and gritty group of rookie ne'er do wells is unlikely to operate out of a fancy locale. Give'em a place with problems - a leaky roof, right over a train station, and/or next to nosy neighbors - the objective being to reinforce the theme of their lot in life. The opposite is true as well; a government backed, top secret espionage agency should be operating out of a state-of-the-art black ops facility. Of course, if the spy agency is based in a decommissioned bomb shelter or the crooks have a luxury highrise, we know there is a story there.
The Baxter Building, Home and Headquarters of The Fantastic Four
Marvel Comics
Also, as I've said about Starships in the past, the above is designed to give the Base its own personality. It makes the place are more direct part of the group and the campaign.
As your game goes on, the Base will likely improve [or deteriorate] right alongside the PCs. When the team's reputation, roles, abilities, and so forth change, the Base will change as well, reflecting the state of PC party.
From Haunted Houses - Ghosts and Spectre, an Usborne Pocketbooks Publication
There is so much more I could say about Bases and may in a follow up post if there is any interest. Let me know if there is something specific you'd like me to cover. Do you and your group love Bases too? Let me know in the comments!
Until next time,
AD
Barking Alien
PS: Yesterday was the birthday of my dear departed friend David Cotton. Happy Birthday Dave. Miss you a ton.
Today happens to be my birthday so...Happy Birthday to me I suppose.
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