A Series of Companion Adventures (looking for help)

[johndesmarais]

I've got an idea bubbling around in my head for short, Companions-only, campaign.  

Player Characters

No Doctor.  Every player plays a “retired” companion.  Companions can be associated with any Doctor, and can be from any time period (past, present, or future).  Aliens are also possible, so long as a plausible race is chosen (see All the Strange, Strange Creatures, Volume 1 for ideas). It is not necessary that the character be from any published Doctor Who source. Assume that a typical incarnation of the Doctor was active for much longer than the few seasons of TV episodes.

Setup

At the time of their relative “present” each former companion has been back into their real life for long enough to be comfortably settled back into it (the exact length of time is up to the players). 

Without warning, the Companion hears a loud “VWORP, VWORP, VWORP” followed by the appearance a familiar blue box that he/she never expected to see again. Once fully materialized the door opens.  No one emerges from the box.

Presumably, the Companion will eventually enter the Tardis.  As soon as he/she does the door will rapidly close and the distinctive noise will start again.  Nothing the Companion attempts with the controls will have any effect.

As the noise fades the door opens again.  Outside is a distinctly non-Earth landscape (Knowledge at difficulty 24 to identify the planet).  As soon as the Companion exits, the door will close and the Tardis will vanish. This cycle happens until all of the Companions have been collected. (Alternatively, the TARDIS collects all of the companions within in order to let the all out together. As each companion first enters the TARDIS they enter directly into whatever room in the TARDIS would be familiar - probably their old quarters.)

What’s Going On?

The Doctor has been captured. The Tardis, being self-aware, recognized that the Doctor needed help that she is unable to provide - so she collected beings that could be trusted to rescue the Doctor.  Although self-aware, the Tardis is only minimally sentient.  She will help the Companions as best she can, but this help will be scant at best.

If the players don’t figure out on their own pretty quickly that the appearance of the Tardis without the Doctor indicates a problem, the Tardis will clue them in.

In order to find the Doctor, the Companions will travel through a series of adventures that revisit several of the Doctor’s past exploits (see Doctor Who the ________ Doctor Sourcebook for ideas). The missing Doctor is the current incarnation.

Revisit in Doctor order (1st through current minus one, or backwards current minus one through 1st) - a pattern will help the players (or their characters) figure out what’s going on. The current Doctor hasn’t really had enough stories to offer fodder for revisiting.

Each past Doctor adventure will involve:

- Set in, around, parallel to a familiar Doctor Who adventure.
- A temporal stalker (probably a Ravenous, possibly an altered or Cybermanized one).
- Stalker is draining regeneration energy from each incarnation of the Doctor.
- PCs must try to stop the temporal stalker from stealing regeneration energy or set the energy loose if the stalker does get it, if they can (or stop him from doing even worse). The exact goal of the PCs can be a little loose so long as they are working to interfere with what the stalker is doing.
- Energy drain process leaves a temporarily traceable residue of "inverted artron energy" (or some suitable timey-whimey technobabble).
- Stalker does not need samples from every Doctor, but more is better (GM may arbitrarily decide how many is enough).
- Because the goal is regeneration energy, each encounter will occur very soon after regeneration. Within the first couple of episodes of that Doctor’s series - some fuzziness expected with 8th Doctor and War Doctor (if used) as 8 only had the one TV movie (perhaps look to books/audio?) and the War Doctor even less. Also, the regeneration that resulted in the 1st Doctor was never shown, so there might not be one (recent Doctor Who TV episodes have implied that the Doctor has had more regenerations than first believed, so I'm still up in air over this one).
- PCs may not directly interact with any of the incarnations of the Doctor - for reasons.


Where I'm looking for help?

Who's a really good big bad? (not the Master, too obvious and a bit overused) 

At the moment, my shortlist is Davros, Skagra, and the Valeyard (with assorted vaguely plausible reasons why each of them would be harvesting regeneration energy)

If you have a clever thought on the villain, why would he/she be stealing regeneration energy?

[olegrand]

Great series concept! Incidentally, have you read the 8th Doctor sourcebook campaign? It has a somewhat similar premise to your campaign plot - so you should definitely check it out (if only to plunder it for ideas

Just a thought: if the TARDIS is able to find the various companions through space and time, then why cannot she fly herself to the Doctor's rescue? This obviously means that the Doctor is captive in some inaccessible, out-of-time pocket dimension, impossible to reach by TARDIS, at least at the start of the story...

As for the Big Bad Behind It All, how about Fenric, with his timestorms... or the Black Guardian, bender-of-rules extraordinaire ?

[johndesmarais]

Mar 3, 2021 19:38:47 GMT olegrand said:

Great series concept! Incidentally, have you read the 8th Doctor sourcebook campaign? It has a somewhat similar premise to your campaign plot - so you should definitely check it out (if only to plunder it for ideas

Just a thought: if the TARDIS is able to find the various companions through space and time, then why cannot she fly herself to the Doctor's rescue? This obviously means that the Doctor is captive in some inaccessible, out-of-time pocket dimension, impossible to reach by TARDIS, at least at the start of the story...

As for the Big Bad Behind It All, how about Fenric, with his timestorms... or the Black Guardian, bender-of-rules extraordinaire ?

I have not read the campaign in #8 (guess I need to now).

Fenric is an interesting choice. I’d forgotten him entirely. (And I don’t remember the Black Guardian at all. Off to go research).

[olegrand]

Frankly, the Black Guardian seems ideal for your idea - as an almost omniscient entity, with a very strong grudge against the Doctor and the ability to manipulate reality more or less at will... not to mention his tendency to act through agents/servants/puppets, making him the "behind the scene" villain par excellence.

[johndesmarais]

Mar 3, 2021 19:38:47 GMT olegrand said:

Great series concept! Incidentally, have you read the 8th Doctor sourcebook campaign? It has a somewhat similar premise to your campaign plot - so you should definitely check it out (if only to plunder it for ideas

Just a thought: if the TARDIS is able to find the various companions through space and time, then why cannot she fly herself to the Doctor's rescue? This obviously means that the Doctor is captive in some inaccessible, out-of-time pocket dimension, impossible to reach by TARDIS, at least at the start of the story...

As for the Big Bad Behind It All, how about Fenric, with his timestorms... or the Black Guardian, bender-of-rules extraordinaire ?

Just read through the campaign in the 8th Doctor Sourcebook. I’m borrowing several bits from it now.

Now to read up on the Black Guardian.

thanks

[Catsmate]

Mar 3, 2021 16:54:21 GMT johndesmarais said:

I've got an idea bubbling around in my head for short, Companions-only, campaign.  

Player Characters

No Doctor.  Every player plays a “retired” companion.  Companions can be associated with any Doctor, and can be from any time period (past, present, or future).  Aliens are also possible, so long as a plausible race is chosen (see All the Strange, Strange Creatures, Volume 1 for ideas). It is not necessary that the character be from any published Doctor Who source. Assume that a typical incarnation of the Doctor was active for much longer than the few seasons of TV episodes.

Setup

At the time of their relative “present” each former companion has been back into their real life for long enough to be comfortably settled back into it (the exact length of time is up to the players). 

Without warning, the Companion hears a loud “VWORP, VWORP, VWORP” followed by the appearance a familiar blue box that he/she never expected to see again. Once fully materialized the door opens.  No one emerges from the box.

Presumably, the Companion will eventually enter the Tardis.  As soon as he/she does the door will rapidly close and the distinctive noise will start again.  Nothing the Companion attempts with the controls will have any effect.

As the noise fades the door opens again.  Outside is a distinctly non-Earth landscape (Knowledge at difficulty 24 to identify the planet).  As soon as the Companion exits, the door will close and the Tardis will vanish. This cycle happens until all of the Companions have been collected. (Alternatively, the TARDIS collects all of the companions within in order to let the all out together. As each companion first enters the TARDIS they enter directly into whatever room in the TARDIS would be familiar - probably their old quarters.)

What’s Going On?

The Doctor has been captured. The Tardis, being self-aware, recognized that the Doctor needed help that she is unable to provide - so she collected beings that could be trusted to rescue the Doctor.  Although self-aware, the Tardis is only minimally sentient.  She will help the Companions as best she can, but this help will be scant at best.

If the players don’t figure out on their own pretty quickly that the appearance of the Tardis without the Doctor indicates a problem, the Tardis will clue them in.

In order to find the Doctor, the Companions will travel through a series of adventures that revisit several of the Doctor’s past exploits (see Doctor Who the ________ Doctor Sourcebook for ideas). The missing Doctor is the current incarnation.

Revisit in Doctor order (1st through current minus one, or backwards current minus one through 1st) - a pattern will help the players (or their characters) figure out what’s going on. The current Doctor hasn’t really had enough stories to offer fodder for revisiting.

Each past Doctor adventure will involve:

- Set in, around, parallel to a familiar Doctor Who adventure.
- A temporal stalker (probably a Ravenous, possibly an altered or Cybermanized one).
- Stalker is draining regeneration energy from each incarnation of the Doctor.
- PCs must try to stop the temporal stalker from stealing regeneration energy or set the energy loose if the stalker does get it, if they can (or stop him from doing even worse). The exact goal of the PCs can be a little loose so long as they are working to interfere with what the stalker is doing.
- Energy drain process leaves a temporarily traceable residue of "inverted artron energy" (or some suitable timey-whimey technobabble).
- Stalker does not need samples from every Doctor, but more is better (GM may arbitrarily decide how many is enough).
- Because the goal is regeneration energy, each encounter will occur very soon after regeneration. Within the first couple of episodes of that Doctor’s series - some fuzziness expected with 8th Doctor and War Doctor (if used) as 8 only had the one TV movie (perhaps look to books/audio?) and the War Doctor even less. Also, the regeneration that resulted in the 1st Doctor was never shown, so there might not be one (recent Doctor Who TV episodes have implied that the Doctor has had more regenerations than first believed, so I'm still up in air over this one).
- PCs may not directly interact with any of the incarnations of the Doctor - for reasons.


Where I'm looking for help?

Who's a really good big bad? (not the Master, too obvious and a bit overused) 

At the moment, my shortlist is Davros, Skagra, and the Valeyard (with assorted vaguely plausible reasons why each of them would be harvesting regeneration energy)

If you have a clever thought on the villain, why would he/she be stealing regeneration energy?

I like this. But I've always preferred to keep a full blown Time Lord as an NPC.

A few specific points.
1. The overall plot has similarities to 'Doom of the Daleks' in the Eighth Doctor Sourcebook. If you're not familiar with this it may be worth mining for ideas.

2. There's no reason a former companion can't come with an attached partner/relative/small child, to further complicate matters

3. There's also the idea of a Zygon duplicate or other imposter being picked up.

4. An alternative to the idea of the companions being picked up individually is that some may have kept in contact and were meeting up, specifically in the vein of A Companions' Christmas.

5. Looking for a good Big Bad? I agree that the Master and the Daleks are rather hackneyed. How about Ramón Salamander (from The Enemy of the World). I've rather liked the idea of him returning (as in The Heralds of Destruction, however I have serious problems with that particular plot). I'd keep him well concealed and operating through a few layers of minions, to give the players some apparent victories.

6. Alternative Big Bads.

1. The Terrible Zodin. Whatever she was
   
2. Magnus Greel: not just one of them but many Greels, temporal echoes caused by his crude meddling with temporal technology. Though I'd have the Greels as minions of the real BB.
   
3. The Doctor: his alternative universe evil version of course.
4. The War Lord: fresh from the defeat of his Nazi plans, brain/consciousness transplanted into a new body and looking for revenge.
   
5. The Tymewyrm: she returns.
   
6. Neniu: a person who'll be encountered by a later incarnation of the Doctor and cursed with immortality or become a Scion of Gallifrey but at a Terrible Price (planet destroyed, love erased from history et cetera). A potentially somewhat sympathetic villain, until s/he starts destroying planets.
7. Scaroth, the last of the Jagaroth.
   
8. The War Doctor.
   
9. All (or some) of the above: a shifting alliance of people who feel themselves wronged by the Doctor.
   

7. If you're looking for a suitable stalker you could go with an evil echo of some or all of the PCs. Versions from a different universe where they were far less pleasant people (somewhat like my EDCverse). Or there could be several groups following them

1. A pair/team of Time Agents who are concerned about the disruption to time
   
2. A renegade Time Agent seeking some piece of Gallifreyan technology for their own purposes. May be an ally in some respects, but an unreliable one.
   
3. A sentient humanoid TARDIS from the last days of the Time War.
4. Hounds of Tindalos. Once kept in check by the Time Lords
5. The Dead. Echoes of those who died because of the Doctor's actions. Sara Kingdom, Adric, Fadros Pallujikaa, Shockeye of the Quawncing Grig, Az and Oza, Solomon, Mehendri Solon et cetera.
   

8. One reason that strikes me to harvest regeneration energy is o create Scions of Gallifrey; perhaps someone thinks there needs to be new Lords of Time?

[Catsmate]

Mar 4, 2021 0:55:15 GMT olegrand said:

Frankly, the Black Guardian seems ideal for your idea - as an almost omniscient entity, with a very strong grudge against the Doctor and the ability to manipulate reality more or less at will... not to mention his tendency to act through agents/servants/puppets, making him the "behind the scene" villain par excellence.

Th Master of the Land of Fiction and the Celestial Toymaker also come to mind. However you don't want a Big Bad that's too powerful for the group to be able to fight. Perhaps they acquire some allies?

ETA: and don't forget the Eternals. It could all be a game....

[johndesmarais]

Mar 4, 2021 9:56:39 GMT Catsmate said:

Mar 3, 2021 16:54:21 GMT johndesmarais said:

I've got an idea bubbling around in my head for short, Companions-only, campaign.  

Player Characters

No Doctor.  Every player plays a “retired” companion.  Companions can be associated with any Doctor, and can be from any time period (past, present, or future).  Aliens are also possible, so long as a plausible race is chosen (see All the Strange, Strange Creatures, Volume 1 for ideas). It is not necessary that the character be from any published Doctor Who source. Assume that a typical incarnation of the Doctor was active for much longer than the few seasons of TV episodes.

Setup

At the time of their relative “present” each former companion has been back into their real life for long enough to be comfortably settled back into it (the exact length of time is up to the players). 

Without warning, the Companion hears a loud “VWORP, VWORP, VWORP” followed by the appearance a familiar blue box that he/she never expected to see again. Once fully materialized the door opens.  No one emerges from the box.

Presumably, the Companion will eventually enter the Tardis.  As soon as he/she does the door will rapidly close and the distinctive noise will start again.  Nothing the Companion attempts with the controls will have any effect.

As the noise fades the door opens again.  Outside is a distinctly non-Earth landscape (Knowledge at difficulty 24 to identify the planet).  As soon as the Companion exits, the door will close and the Tardis will vanish. This cycle happens until all of the Companions have been collected. (Alternatively, the TARDIS collects all of the companions within in order to let the all out together. As each companion first enters the TARDIS they enter directly into whatever room in the TARDIS would be familiar - probably their old quarters.)

What’s Going On?

The Doctor has been captured. The Tardis, being self-aware, recognized that the Doctor needed help that she is unable to provide - so she collected beings that could be trusted to rescue the Doctor.  Although self-aware, the Tardis is only minimally sentient.  She will help the Companions as best she can, but this help will be scant at best.

If the players don’t figure out on their own pretty quickly that the appearance of the Tardis without the Doctor indicates a problem, the Tardis will clue them in.

In order to find the Doctor, the Companions will travel through a series of adventures that revisit several of the Doctor’s past exploits (see Doctor Who the ________ Doctor Sourcebook for ideas). The missing Doctor is the current incarnation.

Revisit in Doctor order (1st through current minus one, or backwards current minus one through 1st) - a pattern will help the players (or their characters) figure out what’s going on. The current Doctor hasn’t really had enough stories to offer fodder for revisiting.

Each past Doctor adventure will involve:

- Set in, around, parallel to a familiar Doctor Who adventure.
- A temporal stalker (probably a Ravenous, possibly an altered or Cybermanized one).
- Stalker is draining regeneration energy from each incarnation of the Doctor.
- PCs must try to stop the temporal stalker from stealing regeneration energy or set the energy loose if the stalker does get it, if they can (or stop him from doing even worse). The exact goal of the PCs can be a little loose so long as they are working to interfere with what the stalker is doing.
- Energy drain process leaves a temporarily traceable residue of "inverted artron energy" (or some suitable timey-whimey technobabble).
- Stalker does not need samples from every Doctor, but more is better (GM may arbitrarily decide how many is enough).
- Because the goal is regeneration energy, each encounter will occur very soon after regeneration. Within the first couple of episodes of that Doctor’s series - some fuzziness expected with 8th Doctor and War Doctor (if used) as 8 only had the one TV movie (perhaps look to books/audio?) and the War Doctor even less. Also, the regeneration that resulted in the 1st Doctor was never shown, so there might not be one (recent Doctor Who TV episodes have implied that the Doctor has had more regenerations than first believed, so I'm still up in air over this one).
- PCs may not directly interact with any of the incarnations of the Doctor - for reasons.


Where I'm looking for help?

Who's a really good big bad? (not the Master, too obvious and a bit overused) 

At the moment, my shortlist is Davros, Skagra, and the Valeyard (with assorted vaguely plausible reasons why each of them would be harvesting regeneration energy)

If you have a clever thought on the villain, why would he/she be stealing regeneration energy?

I like this. But I've always preferred to keep a full blown Time Lord as an NPC.

A few specific points.
1. The overall plot has similarities to 'Doom of the Daleks' in the Eighth Doctor Sourcebook. If you're not familiar with this it may be worth mining for ideas.

2. There's no reason a former companion can't come with an attached partner/relative/small child, to further complicate matters

3. There's also the idea of a Zygon duplicate or other imposter being picked up.

4. An alternative to the idea of the companions being picked up individually is that some may have kept in contact and were meeting up, specifically in the vein of A Companions' Christmas.

5. Looking for a good Big Bad? I agree that the Master and the Daleks are rather hackneyed. How about Ramón Salamander (from The Enemy of the World). I've rather liked the idea of him returning (as in The Heralds of Destruction, however I have serious problems with that particular plot). I'd keep him well concealed and operating through a few layers of minions, to give the players some apparent victories.

6. Alternative Big Bads.

1. The Terrible Zodin. Whatever she was
   
2. Magnus Greel: not just one of them but many Greels, temporal echoes caused by his crude meddling with temporal technology. Though I'd have the Greels as minions of the real BB.
   
3. The Doctor: his alternative universe evil version of course.
4. The War Lord: fresh from the defeat of his Nazi plans, brain/consciousness transplanted into a new body and looking for revenge.
   
5. The Tymewyrm: she returns.
   
6. Neniu: a person who'll be encountered by a later incarnation of the Doctor and cursed with immortality or become a Scion of Gallifrey but at a Terrible Price (planet destroyed, love erased from history et cetera). A potentially somewhat sympathetic villain, until s/he starts destroying planets.
7. Scaroth, the last of the Jagaroth.
   
8. The War Doctor.
   
9. All (or some) of the above: a shifting alliance of people who feel themselves wronged by the Doctor.
   

7. If you're looking for a suitable stalker you could go with an evil echo of some or all of the PCs. Versions from a different universe where they were far less pleasant people (somewhat like my EDCverse). Or there could be several groups following them

1. A pair/team of Time Agents who are concerned about the disruption to time
   
2. A renegade Time Agent seeking some piece of Gallifreyan technology for their own purposes. May be an ally in some respects, but an unreliable one.
   
3. A sentient humanoid TARDIS from the last days of the Time War.
4. Hounds of Tindalos. Once kept in check by the Time Lords
5. The Dead. Echoes of those who died because of the Doctor's actions. Sara Kingdom, Adric, Fadros Pallujikaa, Shockeye of the Quawncing Grig, Az and Oza, Solomon, Mehendri Solon et cetera.
   

8. One reason that strikes me to harvest regeneration energy is o create Scions of Gallifrey; perhaps someone thinks there needs to be new Lords of Time?

Lots of cool ideas. 👍

[johndesmarais]

Mar 4, 2021 9:58:48 GMT Catsmate said:

Mar 4, 2021 0:55:15 GMT olegrand said:

Frankly, the Black Guardian seems ideal for your idea - as an almost omniscient entity, with a very strong grudge against the Doctor and the ability to manipulate reality more or less at will... not to mention his tendency to act through agents/servants/puppets, making him the "behind the scene" villain par excellence.

Th Master of the Land of Fiction and the Celestial Toymaker also come to mind. However you don't want a Big Bad that's too powerful for the group to be able to fight. Perhaps they acquire some allies?

ETA: and don't forget the Eternals. It could all be a game....

Oooh...  Master of the Land of Fiction. Another one I’ve forgotten about.

[Catsmate]

Mar 5, 2021 3:37:44 GMT johndesmarais said:

Mar 4, 2021 9:58:48 GMT Catsmate said:

Th Master of the Land of Fiction and the Celestial Toymaker also come to mind. However you don't want a Big Bad that's too powerful for the group to be able to fight. Perhaps they acquire some allies?

ETA: and don't forget the Eternals. It could all be a game....

Oooh...  Master of the Land of Fiction. Another one I’ve forgotten about.

Yes the Land of  Fiction can be a venue for one of the stories, or part of an overarching plot (rather like the conven Conundrum). Olegrand had a thread recently on the Land.

[missyfan45]

feels like Clara and me!

[boredeternal]

Mar 4, 2021 9:58:48 GMT Catsmate said:

Mar 4, 2021 0:55:15 GMT olegrand said:

Frankly, the Black Guardian seems ideal for your idea - as an almost omniscient entity, with a very strong grudge against the Doctor and the ability to manipulate reality more or less at will... not to mention his tendency to act through agents/servants/puppets, making him the "behind the scene" villain par excellence.

Th Master of the Land of Fiction and the Celestial Toymaker also come to mind. However you don't want a Big Bad that's too powerful for the group to be able to fight. Perhaps they acquire some allies?

ETA: and don't forget the Eternals. It could all be a game....

Love the Eternals.  I created an Eternal adversary called Staunton who left chess pieces when he was in the area.  He did just enough to get a rise out of the players. 

[starkllr]

Mar 4, 2021 9:56:39 GMT Catsmate said:

6. Alternative Big Bads.

1. The Terrible Zodin. Whatever she was
   
2. Magnus Greel: not just one of them but many Greels, temporal echoes caused by his crude meddling with temporal technology. Though I'd have the Greels as minions of the real BB.
   
3. The Doctor: his alternative universe evil version of course.
4. The War Lord: fresh from the defeat of his Nazi plans, brain/consciousness transplanted into a new body and looking for revenge.
   
5. The Tymewyrm: she returns.
   
6. Neniu: a person who'll be encountered by a later incarnation of the Doctor and cursed with immortality or become a Scion of Gallifrey but at a Terrible Price (planet destroyed, love erased from history et cetera). A potentially somewhat sympathetic villain, until s/he starts destroying planets.
7. Scaroth, the last of the Jagaroth.
   
8. The War Doctor.
   
9. All (or some) of the above: a shifting alliance of people who feel themselves wronged by the Doctor.
   

For that extra timey-wimey twist, have the Big Bad not be constant. As the Doctor's regeneration energy is stolen, his personal history is subtly altered, and each such alteration changes who the Big Bad is at the moment. Maybe the campaign begins with Magnus Greel as the one who's captured the Doctor, but after he siphons off some energy from the 1st Doctor, that leads to a change such that the events of "The Talons of Weng Chiang" never happened, and Magnus never encountered the Doctor and suddenly he never started up this scheme in the first place, but now it's one of the other potential Big Bads who was doing it all along as of 5 minutes ago.

[korith]

I'll cast my vote for the Valeyard as the big bad. There were a lot of unanswered questions at the end of his arc that would make a great story for the game

I'm thinking the regeneration energy might be needed for a newly invented parthenoregeneration - where by overloading the regeneration process with past, present, and perhaps future regeneration energies, one Time Lord regenerates into two beings. In this case, one exhibits the virtues of the Doctor, and the other starts down the path of becoming the Valeyard.

[Catsmate]

Mar 22, 2021 14:54:02 GMT starkllr said:

Mar 4, 2021 9:56:39 GMT Catsmate said:

6. Alternative Big Bads.

1. The Terrible Zodin. Whatever she was
   
2. Magnus Greel: not just one of them but many Greels, temporal echoes caused by his crude meddling with temporal technology. Though I'd have the Greels as minions of the real BB.
   
3. The Doctor: his alternative universe evil version of course.
4. The War Lord: fresh from the defeat of his Nazi plans, brain/consciousness transplanted into a new body and looking for revenge.
   
5. The Tymewyrm: she returns.
   
6. Neniu: a person who'll be encountered by a later incarnation of the Doctor and cursed with immortality or become a Scion of Gallifrey but at a Terrible Price (planet destroyed, love erased from history et cetera). A potentially somewhat sympathetic villain, until s/he starts destroying planets.
7. Scaroth, the last of the Jagaroth.
   
8. The War Doctor.
   
9. All (or some) of the above: a shifting alliance of people who feel themselves wronged by the Doctor.
   

For that extra timey-wimey twist, have the Big Bad not be constant. As the Doctor's regeneration energy is stolen, his personal history is subtly altered, and each such alteration changes who the Big Bad is at the moment. Maybe the campaign begins with Magnus Greel as the one who's captured the Doctor, but after he siphons off some energy from the 1st Doctor, that leads to a change such that the events of "The Talons of Weng Chiang" never happened, and Magnus never encountered the Doctor and suddenly he never started up this scheme in the first place, but now it's one of the other potential Big Bads who was doing it all along as of 5 minutes ago.

Oh I like that! In fact I like it so much I'll be borrowing that idea. Excellent.
It reminds me a little of the adventure Flux by misterharry

[Catsmate]

Mar 22, 2021 16:20:21 GMT korith said:

I'll cast my vote for the Valeyard as the big bad. There were a lot of unanswered questions at the end of his arc that would make a great story for the game

I'm thinking the regeneration energy might be needed for a newly invented parthenoregeneration - where by overloading the regeneration process with past, present, and perhaps future regeneration energies, one Time Lord regenerates into two beings. In this case, one exhibits the virtues of the Doctor, and the other starts down the path of becoming the Valeyard.

I like this too, but then my Evil Doctor notes run to a couple of hundred pages....