Devil’s Due: A Space Pirate Haven for Mothership RPG

Devil’s Due: A Space Pirate Haven for Mothership RPG

A campaign framework for a forgotten haven of pirate plunder
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MOTHERSHIP MONTH 👽
#Pirate
#Horror
#Sci-Fi
mothership-month

This project is part of MOTHERSHIP MONTH 👽, which runs from November 12th - December 12th 2024. Learn more →

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For a plaintext Google Doc of this BackerKit page click here.

Devil’s Due
is a compendium of space pirate supplements and adventures centered around the titular planet, with about 100 big ol’ A4 pages of raiding, hijacking, and backstabbing for the Mothership Sci-Fi Horror RPG, crafted by a worldwide team of third-party Mothership creators.

The first space pirate anthology for Mothership, and one of the largest modules published to date, Devil’s Due brings you pirate crews, a pirate planet with the plug-and-play city of Azimuth and surrounding wilderness locales, several new modules, mini-games, random raiding tables of pirates and prey, and loads more from 12 writers and over 20 contributors! This book packs all you need to run space piracy games in Mothership RPG through several campaigns.
Work-in-progress layout from "A Long Way to Go and a Short Time to Get There." Artwork by Birdnest, layout by Spider00x.
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Work-in-progress spread of The Dark Arcana. Artwork by Scragend. Layout by Spider00x.





Curious what we’re packing into this tome? Devil’s Due features:

  • 10 unique pirate captains and crews, each with a statted spaceship, goals, and tactics. 
    • Annie Bone is a savior for the Downtrodden, and a nightmare for those who’d seek to exploit them. Don’t get caught in a corpo uniform when this crew boards you. 
    • The Ragtag Rustlers are composed of a captain with an inexplicable southern drawl, a bunch of scoundrels in cowboy garb, and a six-barreled ship.
    • The Dark Arcana host mysterious masked balls, where the all-android crew maintain secret identities behind Venetian-style masks, conducting bribery, blackmail, and assassinations.
    • Self-appointed Sheriff Big Ash and her Blue Star Patrol bring their own ruthless law and order, as former private security corps engaging in all acts of piracy under the guise of “peacekeeping.”
    • Bloodthirsty and drug-fuelled, the Sykopomp Pack leave a trail of wrecked vessels as they commandeer whatever they can find, captained by the barely lucid Dog-Head. 
    • What the doctor crew of Starcrossed Mercy and their surgeon-captain, Solomon Caydus, lack in firepower they make up for in cunning. Cross their path and you may be the next cadaver on his table.
    • And more!

  • The scrappy city of Azimuth and Flotsam Station above it, anchored to the stars by the space elevator Charon’s Ferry, including: 
    • 10 city locations with NPCs, shops, and built-in adventure hooks. 
    • A hexcrawl procedure for exploring the Wilds of Devil’s Due. 
    • Shops and clinics with new cybermods, weapons, and equipment

  • 7 adventures and 2 adventure frameworks on the pirate haven of Devil’s Due and across the Void. 
    • Salvage artifacts from a wrecked ship sinking into another dimension
    • Scour a covert corporate research station to steal their horrifying new tech
    • Outrun the competition to deliver some VIPs in a high-stakes prisoner transport
    • Make a wager with a god to double your reward
    • And more!

  • Lots of random tables, including four filled with the bounties needed to answer your pirate questions: 
    • Who's that pirate merc eyeing us down?
    • What's that weird gadget?
    • Where can you find your next prey?
    • How did you get press-ganged into service?



Work-in-progress art for Flotsam Station by Ben King.
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For all physical pledge levels, shipping will be charged in the BackerKit Pledge Manager after the campaign finishes. Digital PDF copies of Devil's Due will be fulfilled via DriveThruRPG.

Corsair: Physical ($45 USD + shipping)

You'll get:
  • Physical copy of the book
  • PDF of the book
  • All achievements unlocked
  • If pledging in the first 48 hours: the Devil's Due patch

Pirate’s Life for Me: Deluxe ($75 USD + shipping)

You'll get:

(These PDFs will likely be fulfilled via a combination of DriveThruRPG and itch.io.)


Landlubber: Digital ($25 USD)

You'll get:
  • PDF of the book
  • All digital achievements unlocked

Cross-Collab with Not Enough Scoundrels!

We’re getting in on the BackerKit Cross-Collab fun this Mothership Month by partnering with another project from one of our many contributors: Chris Airiau’s Not Enough Scoundrels from 5 Million Worlds Press. Backing both Devil’s Due and Not Enough Scoundrels at any physical pledge level will get you another patch from 5MW Press and 10 stickers from us!

Dark Arcana Mask Stickers
The android crew Dark Arcana, also written by Chris, use masks to conceal their identities and to mark their rank, with the most-coveted Venetian-style masks going to the Major Arcana officers.

Algernon Aeronautics Patch
Manufacturers of somewhat novelty ship types, Algernon Aeronautics created The Six-Shooter, the six-barreled ship stolen by the Ragtag Rustlers, and The Big Top, a ship now, fittingly, controlled by the Big Top Bandits. They also produce the Pelican X2 Trade Scout ship type, Raquelle Winz’s Just Pelican, OK? from Not Enough Scoundrels.



So if you're a backer of Devil's Due but haven't checked out Not Enough Scoundrels yet, get on over to their page and take a look!

Free Early Bird Patch!

Anyone backing at the Corsair (Physical) pledge level in the first 48 hours will also receive the Devil's Due patch free, based on this design by Scragend!

Work-in-progress design for the Devil's Due patch, by Scragend.



Add-Ons from Our Team

Some printed zines and pamphlets from our team can also be included in your Physical or Deluxe pledge as Add-Ons, to help you save on shipping! Check them out if you're also looking for print copies of:

Additional copies of Devil's Due and even more products from RV Games will be available in the Pledge Manager after the campaign to add to your order as well!
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Devil's Due is being created by an international team of over 20 people, including veterans of the Mothership community, relative newcomers, and everything in between.

When the idea of funding a bunch of new books and zines for Mothership Month was first pitched, Reece Carter (Scarius on the Mothership Discord) had the idea of a big collaborative book about space piracy and asked who might be interested in working together. After dozens of responses, six months, and a Discord server full of messages, we had a draft and some compelling art.

The majority of our team has been working together as a collective on a profit-share system, commissioning some additional art and other help to round out the book and distribution. Learn more about the Devil's Due crew below.






















Special Thanks 

We’d also like to give special thanks to D.N. Wilkie, Owen O'Donnell, Reece Carter, and SL Perry for their help in organizing this project and ushering it along toward completion.
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The text for Devil's Due is written. The art is coming along nicely, layout design is underway, and editing will start in earnest soon.

This is the largest book most of us have worked on, so any timeline is only an estimate. But in the absence of any serious delays, we're aiming to finalize the book in the first quarter of 2025 and do printing and fulfillment in the second quarter of 2025.
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Worldwide shipping will be organized by RV Games via ShipBob. The following table shows estimated shipping rates. These are only estimates and can change between now and fulfillment.

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Pledge Manager

RV Games will be using BackerKit as a pledge manager once the campaign is complete. They will be using a feature called auto-lock and charge that will lock your order and charge you for shipping and add-ons when you complete your survey. For this reason, you will end up receiving your survey a little later than you may be used to, surveys will go out once products have arrived and are able to be shipped out to backers.

Add-Ons from RV Games

Add-ons from RV Games and others will be available via the Pledge Manager. Shipping is included in the pledge level cost for zines and pamphlets purchased as add-ons, but books and larger items will have a per-item shipping cost added. Items that include dice will be charged a 25% fee on top of the item price when being shipped to the UK.
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Brace yourself for Mothership Month—a group-collab project led by Tuesday Knight Games featuring some of the brightest stars from the Mothership third-party publishing (3PP) community. Each 👩‍🚀 creator has launched a brand new adventure filled with criminals, smugglers, and rimspace pirates.


 

Mothership Month Supply Pods

🚀 Back 5+ projects at the physical level and gain access to the SUPPLY PODS. All Supply Pods are now unlocked, so backing just 5 projects will get you all of the below:


  • 🌟 Supply Pod 1 (Unlocked!): 1 pack of Mothership CHARACTER CARDS. Each pack contains 13 pre-made character cards ready for use as pre-gen characters or NPCs. Each pack comes with at least one FOIL card.
  • 🌟 Supply Pod 2 (Unlocked!): +1 pack of Mothership CHARACTER CARDS, 5 foil campaign project stickers.
  • 🌟 Supply Pod 3 (Unlocked!): +1 pack of Mothership CHARACTER CARDS, +5 foil campaign project stickers, and an exclusive Mothership Month 24 pin!
  • 🌟 Supply Pod 4 (Unlocked!): +1 pack of Mothership CHARACTER CARDS, +11 foil campaign project stickers, and Shadow of a Doubt a brand new "reverse murder mystery" pamphlet adventure by Ian Yusem (Hull Breach, The Drain).

All in: if you back 5+ projects you're getting 4 Character Card packs (an entire deck of cards), 21 foil project stickers, an exclusive Mothership Month 24 pin, and a brand new adventure pamphlet.

Are there more Supply Pods to come? We're looking into it now!

Streams, Interviews, and more!

All month long, we're diving into the void with daily streams, unsettling interviews, and exclusive, heart-pounding reveals. Whether you're a veteran spacer or new to the Mothership, join us in celebrating the universe’s bravest survivors…and those who didn’t make it back.

Thanks for joining us on our first ever Mothership Month! 👽
If you believe that this project is not in compliance with BackerKit’s Community Guidelines or Terms of Service, you can file a report by sending a message via this link: Report this project