I think I'd strangle your Captain player after all the plotlines they've damaged by being trigger-happy.
As I was explaining the AI's motivation and situation, the Captain and another player were making wrist cutting motions and going "Oh my god it's so emo." This is, unfortunately, mostly what I have to work with. They're strong personalities at table but they, for lack of a better descriptor, are complete emotional retards when it comes to gaming. Shooting things, looking cool, dropping dope lines, that's what it's all about to them.
And to be fair, the Psyker was actually trying to talk to the AI at first. Several times actually. But when it became clear it was going to nuke the whole facility, they got on board with subjugating it.
S'alright though. Some time ago I would have walked away from the campaign as "ruined" but I've learned to roll with the punches better. (And not to invest too deeply in my own creations; it's just as likely they'll make a real impact on my players as get a bullet to the face.)
To be fair, I do have MORE ideas. Just none super fleshed out. I've got a doc of idea hooks going and I need to go through the process of adding them as systems and planets to the Reach map, figuring out where they fit in the picture of things going on in the Expanse. I do need some variety though. Way too many NPCs just waiting to die. Couple ideas I still have kicking around:
-Planet and society totally dominated (like mentally dominated) by a cabal of Psykers.
-Study in contrast between a savage human world and a moderately technically advanced society in their response to Dark Eldar piracy and slave-taking.
-Gonna throw the Rak'Gol in there at some point as a another "Let's see how much abuse players can really put up with" encounter.
-Totally new alien race I cooked up, hell-bent on secret keeping. Gonna try to really dig into a non-human mindset, a totally reordered way of thinking.
-Space Station of rich noble who went crazy and died while his medieval space fantasy palace went on without him.
-System where like 4 factions are engaged in all-out war and no-holds bar plunder.
Couple other things. Sadly some of my other pre-generated ideas fill out areas of the Expanse the players won't be going unless they get a very good reason too.
Still kind of at an impasse with this whole Ork Freebooter thing. I'd always envisioned him living in a system full of Ork Freebooterz, like "Pirate Island" for Orks, and after the last major campaign they came back defeated without their leader and turned to fighting each other. A great time to strike for VENGEANCE, right? My players (or at least one of them) on the other hand keep saying they envision a "villain of the week" kind of encounter, where they
just miss him every so often, they're chasing him across the Expanse, yadda yadda.
It's not really the campaign I've been envisioning. I want this revenge tale to end, at some point, because i don't want to run 6 months of pretexts for why they still haven't caught and killed this fucker. I want a big climactic battle, and then I want them to actually
live in the Expanse, make something of themselves, stake their claim or just wander to all the weird, wonderful places I'd like to create. And not just basically leave a trail of destruction and tears across the galaxy as they treat literally every single thing I present them as a secondary objective to "kill that friggin guy." It's almost like it's a defense mechanism against having to take anything seriously.
Still not sure which direction I'm going to go: their way, my way or some bastardized combination of the two.
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