One of the biggest challenges (and joys) I have in Sci-Fi is defining what is treasure. Sure, you have to define what is valuable on a cultural as well as a resource level but that gets tough. Is natural gold expensive? Sure, if manufacturing is impossible or costly but possibly only because it is somewhat rare and a moderately good conductor. If the culture thinks it is an ugly metal its worth drops somewhat since it would not be used in jewelry (also not soaking up the supply as much).

That said, I often shoot for organic (medicines, chemicals or creatures), technology that is rare and/or difficult to reproduce, and natural resource that are of value to the culture.

So, what do you like in your sci-fi genre for treasure? Examples?

Thanks,
Bill

Antiques.
Art.
Alien folk stuff.
Things that are worthless some places, invaluable others.
Drugs.
Cash/precious items.
Ship parts.
Data.

I do a lot of "ancient writings", art, etc.  I also like to explore what might be priceless "art" to one culture/race is completely worthless, offfensive, or worse to another culture/race.  

Also, rare chemical compounds, rare organics from hard-to-get to planets, stuff like that.  Once, as a joke, one of my Traveller crews found "12 ancient copper pieces".  Those CP happened to be worth a great deal to the right man.

fuel/energy cells are another good source of treasure. Different kinds of energy power your laser rifles, your powered armor and your spaceship.

Weir alien tech is also fun is used sparingly. Half the fun there is figuring out what the darned thing is, and how to use it... with a chance that the players may be completely mistaken on both accounts! .

Beyond that, information is always one of the most valuable comodities.

Depends on what the tech level is and how many alien races(if any) there are
and what the relations are with them. So xeno tech could be worth lots to
the right people(esp if it's illeagle to own)

What's the main method of transport? Better and more efficient travel  methods
can be a great find.(instead of 3-10 weeks it now takes 1-4). That's something
worth having.

Planetoids or asteroid clusters with rare minerals are good.

Rare new high tech item, or rare, old, can't be made any more items(for games
where there was a 'fall' in the primary civilization)

I would be able to think of more if you could be a little more specific about which
sci-fi game you wanted to run. A Serenity game is going to be a lot different
than a Star Wars or 2300AD game.

Also, an 'abandoned' station. One that the players could either clear out (assuming
infestation or pirates) or just investigate. They now have a choice, fix it up.
Which requires an investment (give too much away last game? This is a good
credit sink) or sell it for scrap/as is.

The station should be made barely livable with some work. Requiring
an investment(one large one or several smaller ones) to become self-sufficient.

The station shouldn't be large. A small, efficient setup works best.

wow, i can't remember what i did for treasure back in my old traveller days!  

since everything was pretty free-form, i think my players made their own treasure, i.e., robberies, hijackings, garage sales on efate. . . most ended up like this:

:verkill:

they did love their pgmp/fgmp's

i guess any plot hooks i'd throw out had to do with info/intelligence or Ancient stuff, tho.

Depending on the setting, air and water could be counted as treasure too.

Just get hold of the PC game Independence War 2, get into the configuration files, and copy the cargo lists. They're great.

Salvage, cash up front, ships, high ranking contacts, illegal weapons, drugs, valuable cargos, sexy robots, medical androids...

There are some SPOILERS below for Traveller, specifically the adventures The Kinunir and Signal GK.

PCs can salvage ships, as mentioned above, and the Kinunir (of Traveller adventure 1 fame) itself is a ship worth salvaging, even if it's an obsolete small battlecruiser design with an insane A.I. running it a la HAL 9000. I could see a GM allowing the PCs to keep the ship after recovering it (and fixing the A.I.) via some kind of "detached duty" along the lines of how retired scouts are allowed the use of a scout ship by the Imperium (privateers?). It's a ship powerful enough to hold its own against fairly small ships, and could be used to prey on merchant vessels (if it's that kind of PC group) until it draws the attention of more up-to-speed governments and corporations.

Another interesting bit of "treasure" is found in Signal GK. It's a sentient computer chip. I could see this thing becoming something of a party member. For example, install it in a ship's computer (perhaps that of the Kinunir) and you could make the ship a lot more automated, perhaps an NPC itself, able to act of its own volition if the PCs are incapacitated for some reason. Or maybe it could be installed in a conveyance of its own so it effectively becomes a "droid" like in Star Wars, able to accompany PCs on adventures and get them out of tight spots that require computer hacking.

Advanced weapons and armor, like PGMP/FGMP and battledress in traveller. You could also use "zuchai crystals" in traveller, but those were so ill defined and such a blatant ripoff of dilithium crystals I didn't like them much.

Upgrades for your ship's sensors, computer, shields, armor, drives, etc.

Improved cybernetics, bionic upgrades, possibly biotech implants that improved your abilities, made you immune to a lot of stuff or just looked cool.

Biotech items that could be grown, multiplied and sold, like terraformation fungus that turned most organic compounds into oxygen and nitrogen, pharm animals that produced important or valuable compounds in their milk or blood.

Cloaking devices are always nice, of course. Better ship's main weapons or warheads for your torpedoes usually get a positive response from players. Then again sometimes just a little military grade ECM can be a great asset too.

I liked how in Star Wars d6 you could spend xp (or whatever they called it) to improve your ship if you had one. That makes xp even more of a treasure than it is already.

Quote from: ColonelHardissonI liked how in Star Wars d6 you could spend xp (or whatever they called it) to improve your ship if you had one. That makes xp even more of a treasure than it is already.

Never heard of that, but I guess it makes sense and fits in with Solo's habit of tankering with the falcon to "improve" her...

Speaking of star wars, it sure took character progress to heart, look at how far luke went in the 3 movies. He obviously earned some xp inbetween getting his ass kicked by vader in empire and kicking his ass in jedi.

Too bad he was dumb enought o throw his saber away before the empror started tossing the lightning at him. I wondered if a lightsaber could have blocked that attack until I saw windu do it in the last movie.

Something else I haven't seen anyone else mention: training

cybernetics as well, although they were better used to get rid of excess credits.  "torso reconstruction with additional armor?  sure!  just don't plan on swimming. . . ."