Game Session Four - Infiltrating the Black Sun

People Present:
Becky as Kallatherie
Russell as Brick
Renee as Dasha
Joe as Pasha
John as L'Entu
Alex as Talon
Adam as Gamemaster
What Happened:
After being convinces NOT to steal a speeder by Adam, the group heads to Dale's speeder rental to rent a get-away vehicle. Dale, a seasoned shopkeeper, anticipates trouble and asks for 500 credits up front, with 250 refunded when the Vehicle is returned. L'Entu craftily negotiates the price down to 250 up front, with 100 refunded upon return of the speeder. Pash skillfully maneuvers the speeder into an alley near the black sun factory and parks it out of sight.

Arriving at the building's back door,the group finds no guard, bit a note telling then to enter. Sneaking inside, the party is assaulted by a horrible smell. They make their way into a large room filled with rotting corpses, and a young rancor busily chewing on the leftovers. The heroes spot Talon hiding underneath one of the corpses, and gesture for him to sneak over. Talon trips and makes noise, but the rancor doesn't spot him.

After making introductions, the group plans how to get past the Rancor. Talon suggests tying a rope to L'Entu and using him as bait to lure the Rancor into the hallway...using Kallatherie to pull him underneath the rancor's legs last minute so that they can lock the beast in the hallway. Brick suggests using the comlink we stole from the stormtroopers to trick the rancor into eating a body booby-trapped with a frag grenade. The group goes with the later choice, and the ploy successfully kills the rancor.

Dasha then picks the lock on the door across the room, and spots a set of security turrets in the next room. She is able to determine that they are linked to one of the doors, so she can approach without setting them off. Standing on Kallatherie's shoulders, Dasha manages to disable the turrets. The group anticipates trouble behind the turret-guarded door, so they choose a different door to explore. Kallatherie takes point, and waltzes through...only to find a room filled with six Gamorreans gambling at Sabaac. They look up at her, and she tries to convince them that she wants to join their game. They don't believe her, and proceed to attack.

In the ensuing battle, Kallarherie maims and kills three gamorrean, Russell kills two outright, and Pash  kills one (with Dasha's assistance). During the fight, Lash is severely wounded, but L'Entu heals him back to full health. Kallatherie also took some damage, but L'Entu made sure to raid the tables for money before attempting to heal her.

Rewards:
10 xp

New Style for Gameplay Posts

So far, I've been writing the gameplay posts from the perspective of the players. I figured that would help differentiate narrative posts from gameplay posts. When writing the heist though, I felt this made things awkward when writing the extended dialogue sections, and when my character (L'Entu) and Becky's character (Kallatherie) got into an argument. I want everyone to feel free to have their characters argue and say mean things to each other without giving the impression that the players are being mean to each other.

So for future gameplay posts, I will write from the perspective of the characters, and only mention the players when I want to talk about rolls or decisions made out of character.

Game Session Three - Arrival on Nar Shadda

People present

Joe as Pash
Becky as Kallatherie
Russell as Brick
René as Dasha
John as L'Entu
Erik as Dakson
Adam as Gamemaster

Objective

Rescue the income engineers, and the plans for the Xwing, from the Black Sun.

What Happened

Hijinks in Hyperspace

On the way to Nar Shadda, the team discovers that there are crates and a stuffed TaunTaun doll in the Cargo Hold. Renee and Becky head down to inspect the crates. They are unable to decipher their contents, but discover that they are all rigged to open at the same time. Erik comes down to the hold and succeeds a perception check. He notices movement in the crates. The team takes a vote on opening the crates- Becky and Renee dissent but Joe, John, Erik, and Russell decide to open it.
A ton of small frog-like creatures scamper out across the ship (we're assuming their gizzks like from KOTOR).  John inspects the stuffed animal and finds a series of maps to a temple on the planet Aleris. Joe, meanwhile, scavenges the remaining cargo to retrieve two stimpacks and 200 credits.
Returning to the task at hand, Renee uses her character's background as a Corellian spy to reprogram the ship's transponder to appear as a Hurt vessel. While she succeeds in her roll, the threat that accompanies the success leaves her ignorant of which Hurt she associated the ship with.

Laminee's Discount Urine Warehouse

 
Upon arriving, Joe rolls an outstanding piloting skill to find the perfect landing pad on the lower levels of the planet. Immediately after exiting the ship, the team is approached by an elderly man who demands 100 credits a day to use the landing platform. Joe is outraged and exclaims that the team won't pay more than 25 credits. John allays Joe's fears and takes the elderly man aside, whispering ,"Listen, we're on a secret mission for one of the Hutts. We can't say who - they're always working against each other and we have to protect the identity of our employer - but he would consider it a personal favor if you waived the fee." The old man believes the lie without question, but insists on payment. John succeeds in a negotiation check and Joe pays him 30 credits.

Renee's character has a contact on the planet who should be able to help the group, so the team sets off to find him. Renee succeeds a knowledge of the Underworld check, so the group finds Renee's contact, Laminee, at a grungy warehouse. Adam makes it very clear that Laminee refuses to bathe, and smells strongly of urine. Renee shows him a still image of the black sun operative and asks for information about who he is, and his whereabouts. Laminee is visibly shaken - he will tell the group all he knows, but only if they do him a favor first.

John attempts to convince Laminee that the ordinary glass he stole from the Tatooine Cantina is made of rare Devaronian Crystal, and therefore extremely valuable. Becky, angry at the delay, rips the glass from his hand and storms off, insulting his intelligence. John then insists that the wookie does not want to part with such a valuable trinket. Becky then hurls the glass to the ground, shattering it. John persists in selling the lie... and succeeds- Laminee is dismayed at the loss of such a valuable object.

He then explains the favor- the group must reclaim a merchant list that was "stolen" from Laminee. He directs them to another warehouse. Upon arrival, Renee and Russell sneak up to the building, and proceed to climb to a window where they have a better view. Using her night vision macrobinoculars, Renee identifies two guards in front, several inside, and one looking over a stack of papers in the back.
The plan is simple: John, Joe, Erik, and Becky will approach and distract the guards while Renee sneaks across the rafters, snatches the papers, and stalks back out. Russell, meanwhile, will stand ready in a sniper position - ready to mow down the low lives at the first sign of trouble.

The Heist

John et all casually approach the guards out front. Predicatably, they stop and question him. John puts on a puzzled look and glances to his comrades before addressing the thugs "We're here for the shipment. You do have it, right?" Erik pipes in "Tell him about Teemo" John: (to Erik) "I'll tell him about Teemo. " (to guard) "Listen, if you don't have the shipment, we can go elsewhere." John passes the deceit check. The guard slinks into the warehouse and returns after a few moments, "Ok, you can go in to see our boss. Do you have a grav lift?" John gestures to Becky (the wookie), "Does it look like I need a grav lift?" The thug considers a moment and then ushers the group in.

The warehouse is filled with Gran thugs. Their boss puts down the papers and approaches, "You're here for the shipment? Where's my money?" John glances incredulously to his allies before addressing the boss, "You know how Teemo operates- we need to inspect the goods before he sends in the payment."
"Who is Teemo?" The Gran in charge demands. John laughs "You don't know who Teemo is?" John glances back to his comrades and point his thumb at the Gran "These guys don't know who Teemo is."

While the Grans are distracted, Renee silently treks halfway across the rafters towards the papers.

"Oh..uh...of course we know who Teemo is," the head thug stammers back. "Shall we see the goods then?" John persists. The Gran in charge slips into routine and noticeably relaxes as he leads to the group to a man sized crate. He gestures for one of the thugs to open it. It's packed wall-to-wall with the illegal drug Glitterstim. John takes one of them and examines it closely, "Hmm, I don't know about the quality." He casually intones. The head thug seems taken aback, "What's wrong with the quality?"

Renee passes her second stealth check - silently making her way to the end of the room. She uncoils a length of rope and ties it to one of the crossbeams, preparing to drop down and snatch the papers.

"Let me pass it to my expert," John hands the Glitterstim to Erik, who considers it for a moment, takes a long sniff, and shakes his head as he passes it back. "No, this is no good. Teemo can't accept this, " Erik contributes. John turns to the boss Gran, "Where did you get this?" Frustration creeps into the Gran's voice, "We got it from the same place as last time. You didn't have a problem with it then!"

Renee slides down the rope, but loses her grip...she falls a few feet before she is able to regain her grasp and assert control (she failed the initial stealth roll, but used a force point to roll another die and succeed).

John smiles patronizingly "This is Nar Shadda my friend. Suppliers are not always reliable, and they'll try to cheat you where they can. This batch is not as good as the last." Anger courses across the head thug's face, "You said you were here for the shipment!" The other Grans, sensing their bosses displeasure, reach for their weapons. John calmly responds "Relax my friend. We're still going to take the goods, but Teemo can't accept product of this quality at full price."

Renee fails her stealth roll while trying to grab the papers, but since she also rolls net advantage, Adam rules that she swings for the papers and misses, but does not alert anyone to her presence.

"1000 credits," the boss thug barks. John smiles and retorts "Teemo can't pay that much for goods of this quality. 600 credits." The boss thug's anger continues, "1000 credits. That's the price we agreed upon!" John chuckles a bit, "I like you - you have good business sense. You have to understand though- I'm Teemo's right hand. If I went back to Teemo having paid full price for lower quality goods, it will be more than just my job on the line. 800 credits." The Gran seems satisfied "Deal."

Renee passes her stealth roll. She silently grabs the stack of papers and stuffs them into her back pack.

John and the thug boss shake hands, "Just give us the payment and your wookie can haul the crates out." John releases the Gran's hand, "Wonderful. We'll go notify Teemo that the goods are legit and then we'll return with your payment." John and his group turn and start walking toward the door. The Gran forcibly grabs John's shoulder and barks, "You give me my money, or you don't leave!"

Renee barely passes her stealth roll to climb up the rope. Adam, seeking to inject a little more challenge, uses a force point to make her roll a challenge die. Luckily, it  doesn't turn up any failures, despair, or threat. She makes her way back to the rafters, unties the rope, and stashes it in her pack.

John slowly looks at the Gran's hand and then turns to face him, "What's your name?" The Gran appears taken off guard, "I...er... it's Connell." John rests his shoulder paternally on the thug's shoulder, "I like you Connell. You have good business sense. But let me ask you this. If you were Teemo, busy running..." John turns to Erik, "How many planets does Teemo own again?" Erik responds, "Three now I think." John turns back to the thug, "If you were busy running three planets, and your right hand man was held up by a group of amateur thugs - no offense - with no respect for how you run your business. How do you think you would feel? How many planets do you own again?"

Renee fails her stealth check as she makes her way back across the first half of the room. She uses a force point to roll another die, but still fails the roll. She lands enough advantage, however, that Adam rules that she makes no sound. Instead, one of the sheets of paper slips out of her pack and slowly drifts towards the arguing group below.

Connell relents, "Ok, you can go." John smiles at the Gran, "You've made a wise choice. I tell you what -" John reaches back into his pocket and pulls out fifty credits. "You've got promise kid. This is for you," John hands the thug the fifty credits, "This isn't part of the payment, and this isn't to be shared with your underlings, this is for you."

Renee passes her final check. She and Russell climb down the warehouse outside and wait for the rest of the party.

Connell beams proudly, "Thank you! I hope to see you again soon." John returns the smile, "Don't worry my friend, you will." The party exit the warehouse and head back to return the list to Laminee.

Rewards

• 12 xp
• 200 credits (for Joe)
• 2 stimpacks (for Joe)
• 1 stuffed TaunTaun doll (for John)
• A set of maps to the planet Aleris (for John)

Game Session Two - Stealing the Ship

People present

Joe as Pash
Becky as Kallatherie
John as L'Entu
Erik as Dakson
Adam as Gamemaster

 

What Happened

 

Eliminating the Guards

Erik uses his perception to discover a sewer entrance on the side of the bay. He then uses a force point to give himself a grenade. The plan is to rig one of the speeder bikes with explosives and send it flying towards the stormtroopers while Becky and Joe sneak in through the sewer. Becky tries to rip the grating on the sewer entrance off, and fails. She does manage to loosen the lock, and John is able to pick it for her. Joe and Becky climb into the sewer, and make their way to a ladder. At the top of the ladder, Becky again fails to rip the grating off, but she is able to pick the lock herself.

Erik, assisted by John, tries to rig the speeder bikes while he hears ATST walkers approaching in the distance. He fails the roll, but get enough advantage that Adam allows him another boost die to re-attempt the check. He succeeds, and passes a coordination check to send the kamikaze bike straight at one of the troopers. The first trooper is vaporized instantly, and the other two . Becky bursts out from the sewer access, and slashes another trooper with in half. Joe, meanwhile, runs up the ramp of the starship, and stops himself just short of crossing the laser to a trip mine. Erik and John sprint for the ship as the ATSTs come into view - there are two of them, and they are accompanied by nine stormtroopers.

 

 Storming the Ship

The remaining trooper in the bay fires some shots from his prone position, and fails to hit anyone. In return, Joe peeks the corner of the ship to provide some cover fire. Erik and John reach the landing ramp, and study the laser mechanism in an attempt to get boost die for the roll to disable it. Becky slashes at the prone trooper, failing to hit him, and runs for the ramp herself. Erik and John make an attempt to disable the mine, and succeed with enough advantage to recover it.

Becky storms onto the ship and accesses the computer to check the security system. She finds no security measures have been put in place, but finds that the engine has been sabotaged. Erik runs for the engine room and attempts to fix the engine - he fails. Joe runs for the cockpit, and fails a perception check - he notices nothing but feels really good about himself  (he recovers some strain). The ATSTs arrive and beginning firing at the ship. John runs into one of the ship's turrets and fires at the ATSTs - he misses. Piercing the commotion of the firefight, another starship nearby lifts off from the spaceport and heads into the unknown. The team realizes that they've been tricked, and that the incom employees are not on the ship.

 

Narrow Escape

 Erik makes another attempt to fix the engine - the check fails, but the advantage he rolls gives him a boost die on his next attempt. Joe tries to turn on the shields, but finds that they can not be powered without the engine. The ATSTs score another hit on the ship, and Adam informs the team that another hit will disable the ship from lifting off. Becky runs into one of the turrets and returns fire - she fails to hit any of the walkers. John then fires at the walls of the bay - attempting to collapse the door that the walkers are firing through - success. Erik desperately rolls to fix the engines again and fails...until Becky reminds him that he got a boost die for this check. Erik rolls the boost die and succeeds. The ship roars to life, the shields activate, and Joe pilots the ship off into space.

Safely away from any immediate danger, Joe passes a perception check to notice a holodisk hidden under his seat. John uses the ships computers to scan for any other ships - he succeeds magnificently, but can find no trace of the ship that fled earlier. Erik then plays the holodisk in the conference room. On it is a message from the incom engineers - they refused to give the imperials the plans and sabotaged the ship so it could not take off.  While he's speaking, we hear a fight in the background. The recorder pans to see an imperial officer killed by a Black Sun operative. We hear that they are taking the engineers to Nar Shadda, and ransoming them back to the empire. The holorecording ends.

 

Rewards

• 15 xp
• Consular ship

 

Game Session One Continued - Searching for the Engineers

 

"Sneaking" Around the City

Adam informs the group that they'll need to find local clothing in order to attempt to blend in, otherwise they'll be spotted easily and trouble could brew. The team finds a run down shop selling the filthiest of rags, failing their stealth roll on the way, and the shopkeeper tries to push the shoddy clothing off for 25 credits each. Becky passes her coercion check to bring the price down to 5 credits each.

John then rolls his streetwise skill to determine the best place to get information on where the incom engineers crashed at. He succeeds and the team makes their way to a nearby cantina. Again, the team fails the stealth roll on the way. John then makes another streetwise check to coax information from the patrons. He succeeds, but the Duros he speaks with only says he can't be seen speaking to the team, and that they should leave. John takes the hint and starts walking out, but Becky is not satisfied and coerces the Duros into telling more - the imperials have captured the incom engineers and have a bounty out for the team. Before John can reach the door, three stormtroopers enter and demand the team to surrender.

The Bar Fight

Joe passes a perception check  and notices a back door out.
John ducks under a table near Russell and throws a rock at a glass by the bar. The glass shatters, successfully creating a distraction. Joe and Ren take the opportunity to sneak to the back door. John runs for the back door, but is seen by the stormtroopers. They open fire at John but miss. Becky pulls out her blaster and hits one of the stormtroopers, but doesn't kill him. Russell opens fire with his rifle set to full-auto, and decimates two of the troopers.

René, meanwhile, opens the door to peak out while Joe waits, blaster in hand, in case a trooper comes in that way. René spots three stormtroopers - one manning a turret. She closes the door and ducks out of the way as the turret blasts holes in the door like swiss cheese. Two more stormtroopers enter from the front, as well as two Gamorreans. The troopers fire at Russell and land a decent hit. In return, Joe takes a shot at one them, and Russell kills two other stormtroopers. John runs back to Russell and heals him for a few wound points with a successful mechanics check.

Becky and René manage to take out one of the Gamorreans threatening Russell, while Joe provokes the other one to attack him. The Gamorrean takes the bait, and runs over to bash Joe in the face. Becky pulls out her vibro-ax and slashes the gamorrean in half while Russell kills the remaining stormtrooper. The team then loot the bodies for blaster rifles and a stormtrooper comm while John pockets a glass from the bar.
John shouts into the radio "Get prepared, we've routed them and their going to come out the back." The team then exits through the front and steal three speeder bikes.

 

 Standoff at the Spaceport

The team take the speeders to the nearest spaceport bay while monitoring the voice traffic on the comms. René sneaks past two security droids so that she can hack into the computer terminal for clues about the incom engineers. She fails her computers check, but comes out with a few advantage, so Adam tells her that she can not locate information on the engineers, but determine that one of the bays has a heavy imperial presence. The group take the bikes to the indicated bay, and see three stormtroopers guarding a consular class ship. René pulls out her climbing rope and the scales the wall to get a better vantage point. The group debate what to do, but do not decide on any action before calling things a day.

 

 Rewards 

• Ugly clothes
• Four blaster rifles
• A stormtrooper comm
• Three speeder bikes
• A glass from the cantina

Different Types of Posts

I realized that it will take forever to try to track our progress in story form, so I thought we should split the blog up into three types of posts: narrative, gameplay, and clarification:

• Narrative posts interpret the events that happen during our session as a story.
• Gameplay posts detail what actually happened during a game session.
• Clarification posts explain conventions we'll use on the blog.

We can use these terms as a label yo identify which post is which.

Game Session One - The Train Job

 

People present

Joe as Pash
Becky as Kallatherie
Russell as Brick
René as Dasha
John as L'Entu
Adam as Gamemaster

Objective

Find the income engineers with the plans for the Xwing and successfully escape Tatooine.

What Happened

Stopping the Train

The group gets into an escape pod, and Joe successfully rolls his piloting skill as the team plummets towards Tatooine. Nothing special happens, but we assume that we avoided something bad. The team checks the tracking device to determine which direction they should head in. They notice that, in the distance, there is a hover train heading in the direction they need to go. The team debates about how to best stop the train so that they can hitch a ride.

John suggests that the whole team tries to push the escape pod in the way of the train. Russell asks if there are rock outcroppings around, and Adam tells the team that there is one hanging right over the tracks. Russell rolls his gunnery skill and successfully starts a landslide that blocks the tracks. The team makes their way towards the train and John picks up a hand-sized rock from the landslide. John successfully rolls his outer rim knowledge to determine that the nearest city is Mos Espa.

Getting on the Train

John then attempts to walk onto the most crowded section of the train as if he were a normal passenger. He fails his stealth roll and attracts the attention of eight people on the train who point their guns at him. René and Joe use the distraction as an opportunity to sneak off to the car just behind the engine - they succeed with their stealth rolls. John tries to convince the armed men that the team is a group of geologists and that the municipal government in Mos Espa will reimburse the train for a ride - he fails his roll.

Meanwhile, René successfully picks the lock on the car and Joe attempts to sneak past the Banthas he sees there. Joe fails his roll and is ejected from the car by four stampeding Banthas. Becky decides it's time to put her coercive prowess to use  - she punches through the glass of the engine car and rips the engineer out of the train. She successfully puts him in a half-nelson and threatens to slit his throat with her vibro-ax if they don't let the group on the train and get going. She fails her coercion roll, and the engineer refuses.

René then picks the lock to the passenger car where the majority of armed men reside, and she uses a force point to give herself a stun grenade. She tries to throw it at their feet, but fails the roll. Since she rolled advantages to go with the failure, Adam decided that the grenade explodes outside the train and tricks them into believing that the group has more firepower than they expected, so the armed men surrender. John successfully rolls his deceit to convince the train that the group is with Black Sun, and that the criminal organization will reimburse the train for their ride.

Riding the Train

The group settles into the seats - John sits next to Russell up front, René and Becky sit next to each other a row behind, and Joe sits in the far back by the door between cars. Moments later, three stormtroopers enter from the back. Russell rolls his stealth to see if they fail to see him - he is unsuccessful. The lead trooper speaks into his comm "Sir we've found the." John cuts him off and shouts to René "Use the comm jammer!" René flips the switch and the trooper's comm turns to static. Joe nonchalantly points his gun at the stormtrooper in the back and fires a blaster bolt clean through his skull. John climbs underneath the train seats as Russell stands up and massacres the front stormtrooper with a vicious salvo from his rifle. The remaining stormtrooper exits the car through the back door.

René opens the door with her blaster ready, and but the stormtroooper is not waiting for them. She attempts to disable the coupling linking the cars, but fails. John fails his cool roll, and is too nervous to go over and attempt to disable the coupling. Joe finally passes the roll and unlinks the rest of the cars from the train.
The team then needs to figure out how to dispose of the dead stormtroopers as Adam informs the team that they would probably raise suspicion. While the rest of the team is busy pushing the bodies off the train, John extorts the other passengers by threatening to blame the stormtrooper deaths on them - he successfully rolls his deceit skill and receives 10 credits. To help avoid being spotted, the group decides to leave the train at a ten minutes walk from the city. Joe shoots the train's controls to prevent it from arriving and potentially informing of the team's presence.

Rewards

• 2 xp
• A rock
• 10 credits