This game happened Sunday, December 11, 2011.
I and a friend are playing around with the War of the Mecha rules by JB over at B/X Blackrazor. You’ve probably noticed the postings porting some supplementary stuff from the source. Last weekend we rolled for starting units and put together several mecha using the rules. I rolled well on commands (I had an entire battalion, 36 mecha, to my friend’s company, 12 mecha) and mecha types (my third lance ended up with 7 assault, 3 heavy, and 2 medium mecha in it).
This morning, as my planned G+ game was rescheduled due to the GM having something crop up, I finished putting together the rest of my force and we played the first mission so we could test out our understanding of the rules and see how the campaign rules worked with such lop-sided forces.
[Pictures to follow later, once I get them uploaded.]
The Invading Forces
1/23rd Mecha Battalion:
1st Company: 1 heavy lance and 2 light lances, Commanded by Major Rodger Wilco
2nd Company: 2 medium lances and 1 light lance, led by Captain Emily Yuen
3rd Company: 3 assault lances, led by Captain Macarthur “Mack” Archer
The Defending Forces
The Red-Head’s Own (RHO):
Command Lance (assault lance)
Skirmish Lance (medium lance)
Scout Lance (light lance)
The Assault of Dextrose IV
Jumpships left Tektura Station and travelled one day to reach the system jump point. Transition to the Dextrose system was near instantaneous. Flight time to the planet was four days, during which the aerospace fighters knocked down the planetary defenses (such that they were) and the 23rd Mecha Battalion was landed uncontested.
Mission 1
The Mission: Capture Objective
A river-side power plant near an occupied industrial sector was identified by both sides to be critical to their respective agendas. Both sides sent two lances to seize control of the power plant and keep the other side from claiming it. [We decided to limit the game to two lances on each side as the rule’s allowing a single commander to field a full company seemed more appropriate when there were more than two players.]
The Allocation:
The Captain leading the Red-Head’s Own, knowing the importance of the power plant (and having few options) took his Command Lance and the Skirmish Lance to secure the site. Major Wilco, having plenty of options, assigned the job to the 3rd Company, particularly the 1st and 2nd Lance, the command lance and the point assault lance.
The Battle:
The early portions of the battle were occupied with the forces getting into position. Two RHO mecha got into a pile-up when a medium mecha attempting to cross a river and move past a fellow mecha fell, sweeping the legs of the smaller mecha and causing it to fall as well. [This was the result of several failed Piloting rolls for both mecha.] Both mecha eventually left the river…only to promptly fall on their faces on the banks. The captain made a note to doc repair costs out of the pilot’s pay.
Both forces started converging just north of the objective. The RHO forces were up on a large hill under light cover from a fringe of trees. The 1/23rd forces were faster than anticipated and made good use of cover, running their mecha to within 200 m of the RHO forces before presenting any targets.
Much shooting happened in Turn 4. The first mecha down was a BDG-1E Bodyguard mecha on the 1/23rd side that was forced to signal surrender or be destroyed. This heartened the RHOs, until the “Flashlight” [an assault mecha] ran up to within 60 m of the RHO commander’s assault mecha and fired eight small energy weapons, knocking down the commander’s mecha. Additionally, a concentrated fire on a RHO medium mecha in the river [different from the klutz mentioned earlier] caused reactor damage and knocked that mecha down into the river, where the pilot was able to avoid a shutdown of the overheated reactor.
Surprisingly, the RHO forces concentrated fire upon the Brickhouse mecha of the lieutenant in charge of the 2nd Lance. This destroyed the Brickhouse (killing the lieutenant), but motivated the mecha pilots of the 1/23rd, who piled fire upon the assault mecha of the RHO commander, killing him with several strikes to the cockpit. [Three crits were invoked due to damage done in the round, resulting in two critical hits to the head and one to the arm.] Additional fire also destroyed one of the two RHO heavy mecha.
With their leader dead and their blood up, the RHO forces tried to gain revenge where they could, destroying one of the Bodyguard mecha. However, in choosing to do so, they ignored the steaming Flashlight [currently at 10 heat from firing all those lasers], which again fired all eight small energy weapons on a single target, the remaining RHO assault mecha, killing it. The resultant heat forced the Flashlight to power down, at which time the pilot triggered his surrender switch.
Down to two lights, a medium, and a heavy, the RHO forces started to disengage, but the heavy decided to make it a fighting retreat, attempting to kill another mecha. He failed and was burned down by a hail of damage. The remaining medium took some damage as well, enough that he decided to surrender rather than chance another hit. The last two RHO lights flee at top speed, using the hill as cover.
Clean-Up:
The 1/23rd lost a “Brickhouse” (assault) and a “Bodyguard” (heavy) and was able to claim a “Slosher” (assault) and a “Paynix” (medium), maintaining numbers if not strength.
The RHO lost everything but two “Sniper” (light) mecha, including their entire command lance. This leaves them with six light mechs (and a serious morale problem) to hold the planet against a full strength battalion. A change of tactics is mandated.
The Assault on Dextrose 4 continues.
The Future:
The next mission happens 4 days after this one and will be…Ambush!
Thoughts on the Game
We were both satisfied with the game system. The campaign system seems to need more than two players to help balance out forces from a game balance perspective. From a verisimilitude perspective, it works fine. After rolling starting forces, we both decided that the RHO forces were clearly on defense and the 1/23rd forces were the attacking forces as the other way around would be improbable.
There is nothing specifically keeping me from just keeping throwing my assault lances in every battle, destroying the remaining opposition mecha after another mission or two. To combat that, I think I’m going to add a rule stating that mecha (or mecha lances) needing repair cannot participate in the following mission. I might add something about loss of leader as well, but maybe not.
I’m split on my thinking on advancement of characters. Strict reading of the rules says only PCs get better. The RHO PC died and the 1/23rd PC was not involved in the fight, so no improvement happened. I’m not certain how I like that.
Finally, after the fight, I discovered that there is no movement cost in War of the Mecha for changing elevation. The only restriction is that elevation changes can only happen when walking. This would have changed a few things. Next game we will remember that and see what happens.
Our next game will be on the 17th and we are picking up a new player. For fairness, His forces should go on the defending side and will probably represent a unit stationed too far away to participate in the first mission, but now arrived. This will complicate my decisions as I am the target of the ambush and cannot waltz it by overpowering six light mecha!
Monday, December 12, 2011
Thursday, December 8, 2011
More War of the Mecha
Here are a few more rules bits for use with War of the Mecha. I'm working on these in my spare time or to take a break from other things I'm doing. Enjoy!
Dropping Mecha
Mecha can be air-dropped over an area by dropships (as opposed to
the dropship landing and them walking off). This requires the mecha pilot to
select a target hex and make a Piloting roll. A failed roll does falling damage
at one level of elevation per point roll is missed by. Additionally, the mecha
scatters one hex point the roll was missed by, with a failure by five or more
indicating the mecha missed the map and is destroyed for the purposes of the
scenario. The direction of scatter is determined by rolling 1d6, with “1” being
north and counting clockwise around the target hex.
Dropped mecha land during movement, but cannot attack the turn
they land. They may be targeted for attacks at +1 to the roll.
Mecha Lifting Capabilities
Mecha with a functioning arm may carry things (usually objectives
of some sort). The maximum capacity is based on mecha size.
|
Mecha Size
|
Lifting Max.
|
|
Light
|
3 tons
|
|
Medium
|
5 tons
|
|
Heavy
|
7 tons
|
|
Hardened
|
9 tons
|
A mecha taking its first critical hit to the arm while carrying an
object has a 50-50 chance of hitting the arm carrying the item. Roll 1d6: on a
4-6, the arm carrying the item is hit and the item is dropped. If the mecha
takes its second critical hit while carrying an item, the item is automatically
dropped.
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
Fragments – Session 5: What Ever Happened to the Acojah?
Session 5 happened Friday, November 4, 2011, and was the last session of this story arc.
This campaign uses the Hero System, 5th Edition, with much Traveller material grafted on. I am making use of the Hero Traveller books published by ComStar Games. Sadly, these books went out of print when Mongoose Publishing purchased the rights to produce all things Traveller. Mongoose is doing good things, so no hate mail.
PCs:
The Company:
Maxwell Sloan (male human, communications and sensors specialist)
Cyrano Steel (male Lante, computer systems specialist)
Braddock Grar, Lector (male Low Waldi, archivist)
NPCs:
The Crew:
Echo Salazar, Ship’s Captain (female human)
Ted Yahn, Ship’s Navigator (male human)
Albertha Trufin, Ship’s Engineer (female human)
Dr. Quinton Picknell, Ship’s Doctor (male human)
Maresfield Trade Representative:
Deadra Pagenkopf, Maresfield Trade Liaison (female human)
The Passengers:
Brother Kurts of the Order of the Sacre Illuminae
Sister Gunita of the Order of the Sacre Illuminae
Week 7, Day 5:
While the away team was making contact with the locals, Deadra Pagenkopf took the time to go through the Acojah records taken from the dead ship (see Session 4, Part 2 for details). At the morning briefing, she informed everyone that the Acojah ship had been carrying escaping Acojan colonists in its cargo bay when the nuke hit it.
This led to discussions on whether or not any Acojah might still be alive on Krakatoa. While Grar and Max had been able to determine there were sentients on the planet (loosely speaking), they had not checked to see if they were all humans. This would require smaller search areas for any chance of success. Brother Kurts was asked to perform a planetary survey to determine which areas would be best to search. [They were bemoaning the lack of a planetologist in the ship’s crew until I pointed out that Brother Kurts was a planetologist – that’s why he came with them. They had forgotten that.] The survey would take a day to perform and Brother Kurts promised a preliminary report the next day.
Week 7, Day 6:
After spending the previous day (and much of the night) performing a quick survey of Krakatoa, looking for habitable areas that might house Acojah, a very tired but pleased Brother Kurts made his report. He reported five areas that were habitable and large enough to support viable populations and three areas that were possibly habitable but sub-optimal (either desert, downwind from an active volcanic region, or barely large enough for a sustainable population). Each of these areas is isolated from the others by volcanic badlands. He was able to locate seven large-scale strip mines in the volcanic regions. Finally, he also located five irradiated crates located in one of the otherwise habitable zones.
Based on Brother Kurts’s findings, the PCs decided that one of the mines near(-ish) to a crater might be a good place for Acojan refugees to hide and concentrated mind scans in that area. They found no sentient minds in the area. Concentrating the ship’s sensors on the nearby radioactive crater, they could detect the ruins of a city. Brother Kurts estimates that, based on the levels of radiation still present and the size of the crater, the weapon used was either a poorly made home-made bomb or a purposely-made dirty bomb. He leaned towards it being a dirty bomb.
Suspecting that there were no living Acojah left on Krakatoa, the PCs shifted their focus to a different mine and decided to go down and investigate, hoping for some sort of surviving records. Parallel to this effort, an additional salvage run on the Acojan ship was made. [This moved PCs whose players were not at the game off stage.] With Oscar taking the Iron Pig and the captain not wanting to risk the ship’s boat (with the only fuel scoop the ship has), the investigating away team took an air/raft down from orbit. As the vacc suits also provide radiation protection, this did not bother the PCs. They also took one of the repaired security bots from Guruphon Station and Grar established a mind link with Sister Gunita.
It was a long, elevator-like trip down.
Once on the surface, Grar landed the air/raft adjacent to a small cluster of buildings near the edge of the strip mine, on one of the highest terraces of the mine. In the distance, they could see an immense excavator (example). It was inert, but it made the PCs wary. Of the buildings they were near, one was obviously a holding area for ore, one was three stories tall and had windows on the upper floors, and one was much taller and larger but had no windows. All of the buildings showed signs of receiving weapons fire in the past and the windowed building had (empty) sandbag emplacements around the doors. The PCs decided to investigate this building first.
This building seemed to have been used as a barracks, but was re-purposed from something else. The outer walls of the building were quite thick and made of a strong form of concrete. The inner corridors showed signs of combat, with a scattering of bullet marks. The ground-floor rooms were large (possibly conference rooms?) and had been converted to barracks. The next two floors seemed to have been offices originally, but were converted to individual quarters or gun positions, probably machine guns of some sort based on the occasional cartridge shells found. Based on the anti-Acojah graffiti found all over, the PCs surmised that the human populace had held out here against Acojah attackers.
The roof held two sand-bagged anti-aircraft positions (minus the weapons now). Looking around from the roof, the PCs noticed what was likely the wreckage of a downed aircraft and made note of it for later investigation. They also verified the excavator was still where they last saw it and still immobile.
Having finished their investigation of what was likely the administration building for the strip mine, they headed over to the next building, expecting it to be a smelter of some sort. There were three immense doors on the front side of the building (facing the admin building), one of which is not quite closed. Looking around carefully before opening it any further, Grar locates a tripwire connected to an explosive charge wrapped in ball bearings. He disabled the trip wire and inspected the explosive charge. The charge had degraded to the point where it might fizzle at best. Checking further, Grar found booby traps on the other two doors as well.
The inside of the tall (5-6 stories equivalent) building was mostly made up of smelting and processing equipment (making this a mill), with catwalks and equipment on suspended tracks still filling the upper area. This front area took up two-thirds of the front of the building. In the back could be seen rolling doors blocking off three smaller areas. There was a heavy layer of dust and/or bird droppings on everything.
Investigating the machinery in the front area, the PCs worked out that the machinery was designed for sorting out types of ore, for processing iron ore, and for milling iron into steel. Checking the back area to the right, they found the machinery damaged but not irreparably so. The equipment seems to have been stopped mid-process. Grar and Cyrano jury-rigged a crane to safely lower the six-foot tall cup it still had suspended. The cup was found to be mostly full of gold. Several characters did a happy dance at this point.
[At this point my notes ran out, so the rest is from memory.]
With this indicator that the back areas were processing areas for valuable metals, the PCs eagerly moved to the center area to see what it processed. They instead found the center area mostly destroyed and full of mine tailings. Confused by this, they exited the building and circled around to the back side. There they found a large shipping container [think four times as large as a modern shipping container in all dimensions] standing on its end, partially embedded into the back of the building. Looking away from the building, they could see other piles of mine tailings in strange, low rises. It occurred to the PCs that someone had been dive bombing the mill, using cargo containers full of tailings as kinetic bombs. When the last one hit the building but failed to destroy it (or even really damage most of it), they must have stopped. Or got shot down (thinking about the downed flyer spotted from the roof of the admin building).
Returning to the interior of the building, the PCs checked the last back chamber. This room was more damaged than the first one, but not as completely damaged as the middle one, which had taken a mostly direct hit from the tailings bomb. The smelting cup in this area was on the floor, partially crushing some other machinery. Inside was metal, filling about half the cup. After some quick field testing (Max is a field geologist, among other things), it was determined to be Berynium, approximately 1.5 cubic meters (50 cubic feet) of it! [Another happy dance may have happened here.]
With two sources of precious metals located, the PCs decided to finish searching the mill, locating the offices. These were on a raised platform with a commanding view of the main work area. The walkway around the offices had solid sides instead of just railings and seemed to have hardpoints for mounting weapons. Climbing the stairs to the office platform, the PCs noticed that the single entrance area was heavily bullet-ridden. The two rooms that made up the offices themselves were heavily vandalized and shot up. One room appeared to have been a conference room with a large table, now on its side and full of bullet holes and the skeletal remains of a humanoid sophont, minus its head, slumped in front of it. The walls and scraps of things mounted on the walls were covered in anti-Acojah graffiti. The other room was an office with storage cabinets, all looted. Looking through the wreckage of the storage cabinets, Grar located two data crystals in the bottom, under the lowest drawer. There was nothing else of interest here.
Grar used his mind link with Sister Gunita to request that the Iron Pig fly down to the surface and pick up the gold and Berynium the away team had located (it was too large and much too heavy for the air/raft to lift). While the away team waited for the Iron Pig to arrive, they investigated the downed flyer. The wreckage showed signs of being burned long ago and was now mostly overgrown with grasses. In the remains of the cockpit were skeletal remains, which Max’s medical training allowed him to identify as Acojan. Eventually the Iron Pig arrived with gear to pull the cups holding the metals out of the mill, a multi-hour process. The Iron Pig returned to the ship very late in the day and everyone retired for the evening, tired but much wealthier.
Week 7, Day 7:
After a good night’s sleep, the two data crystals were checked for the presence of the VIRUS (they were clean) and then the data was reviewed. The first crystal contained HR records of the mine prior to the Crash, covering a period of eight years. The second was in Acojan and covered the running of the mine some time after the Crash was known to have happened, covering a period of six years, starting after the seizure of the mine and ending roughly 70 years prior to the present. The Acojah records clearly stated that the human workers were now slaves.
With the materials secured from the planet and possible evidence of a hostile power operating after the Crash, the PCs decided it was time to head back to Maresfield and report what they had discovered. Captain Salazar was given the order to make for the nearest jump point and make jump to Caraturth. She gladly set the crew to doing just that.
Week 8, Day 7:
The Just Lucky arrived in Caraturth system and made for the nearest gas giant to start re-fueling operations. Once those were complete, the Just Lucky headed to Caraturth. There they landed Brother Kurts and Sister Gunita, picking up a small delegation in their place. They also provided the Order a copy of all the data they collected in Krakatoa. At the end of the day they left Caraturth and (reaching a jump point) jumped to Maresfield system.
Week 9, Day 7:
The Just Lucky arrived in Maresfield.
*End of Session 5*
[By the end of the exploration of the mill offices, it was getting late, so we just kind of hand-waved the trip back to Maresfield. This was also the last session of the campaign, or at least this part of it. I needed time off as a GM to work on some other writing projects and just had to step away from running a weekly game to do so. In several months I will resume running, possibly returning to the Fragments campaign, but several years down the timeline.
I think one of the mistakes I made with this campaign was running what should have been a long-term exploration game in the short time I was still willing to run. I should have had a definite storyline ready for the players to interact with rather than putting together a sandbox campaign. I should have also run a more standard background rather than a “picking up the pieces again” background. Running an adventure happening during the Crash with the PCs trying to get to some sort of haven as the VIRUS wreaks havoc in the background would have been better suited to the time I had available. Then running the Fragments campaign after my hiatus would have had extra meaning for the players. Something to thinks about.]
This campaign uses the Hero System, 5th Edition, with much Traveller material grafted on. I am making use of the Hero Traveller books published by ComStar Games. Sadly, these books went out of print when Mongoose Publishing purchased the rights to produce all things Traveller. Mongoose is doing good things, so no hate mail.
PCs:
The Company:
Maxwell Sloan (male human, communications and sensors specialist)
Cyrano Steel (male Lante, computer systems specialist)
Braddock Grar, Lector (male Low Waldi, archivist)
NPCs:
The Crew:
Echo Salazar, Ship’s Captain (female human)
Ted Yahn, Ship’s Navigator (male human)
Albertha Trufin, Ship’s Engineer (female human)
Dr. Quinton Picknell, Ship’s Doctor (male human)
Maresfield Trade Representative:
Deadra Pagenkopf, Maresfield Trade Liaison (female human)
The Passengers:
Brother Kurts of the Order of the Sacre Illuminae
Sister Gunita of the Order of the Sacre Illuminae
Week 7, Day 5:
While the away team was making contact with the locals, Deadra Pagenkopf took the time to go through the Acojah records taken from the dead ship (see Session 4, Part 2 for details). At the morning briefing, she informed everyone that the Acojah ship had been carrying escaping Acojan colonists in its cargo bay when the nuke hit it.
This led to discussions on whether or not any Acojah might still be alive on Krakatoa. While Grar and Max had been able to determine there were sentients on the planet (loosely speaking), they had not checked to see if they were all humans. This would require smaller search areas for any chance of success. Brother Kurts was asked to perform a planetary survey to determine which areas would be best to search. [They were bemoaning the lack of a planetologist in the ship’s crew until I pointed out that Brother Kurts was a planetologist – that’s why he came with them. They had forgotten that.] The survey would take a day to perform and Brother Kurts promised a preliminary report the next day.
Week 7, Day 6:
After spending the previous day (and much of the night) performing a quick survey of Krakatoa, looking for habitable areas that might house Acojah, a very tired but pleased Brother Kurts made his report. He reported five areas that were habitable and large enough to support viable populations and three areas that were possibly habitable but sub-optimal (either desert, downwind from an active volcanic region, or barely large enough for a sustainable population). Each of these areas is isolated from the others by volcanic badlands. He was able to locate seven large-scale strip mines in the volcanic regions. Finally, he also located five irradiated crates located in one of the otherwise habitable zones.
Based on Brother Kurts’s findings, the PCs decided that one of the mines near(-ish) to a crater might be a good place for Acojan refugees to hide and concentrated mind scans in that area. They found no sentient minds in the area. Concentrating the ship’s sensors on the nearby radioactive crater, they could detect the ruins of a city. Brother Kurts estimates that, based on the levels of radiation still present and the size of the crater, the weapon used was either a poorly made home-made bomb or a purposely-made dirty bomb. He leaned towards it being a dirty bomb.
Suspecting that there were no living Acojah left on Krakatoa, the PCs shifted their focus to a different mine and decided to go down and investigate, hoping for some sort of surviving records. Parallel to this effort, an additional salvage run on the Acojan ship was made. [This moved PCs whose players were not at the game off stage.] With Oscar taking the Iron Pig and the captain not wanting to risk the ship’s boat (with the only fuel scoop the ship has), the investigating away team took an air/raft down from orbit. As the vacc suits also provide radiation protection, this did not bother the PCs. They also took one of the repaired security bots from Guruphon Station and Grar established a mind link with Sister Gunita.
It was a long, elevator-like trip down.
Once on the surface, Grar landed the air/raft adjacent to a small cluster of buildings near the edge of the strip mine, on one of the highest terraces of the mine. In the distance, they could see an immense excavator (example). It was inert, but it made the PCs wary. Of the buildings they were near, one was obviously a holding area for ore, one was three stories tall and had windows on the upper floors, and one was much taller and larger but had no windows. All of the buildings showed signs of receiving weapons fire in the past and the windowed building had (empty) sandbag emplacements around the doors. The PCs decided to investigate this building first.
This building seemed to have been used as a barracks, but was re-purposed from something else. The outer walls of the building were quite thick and made of a strong form of concrete. The inner corridors showed signs of combat, with a scattering of bullet marks. The ground-floor rooms were large (possibly conference rooms?) and had been converted to barracks. The next two floors seemed to have been offices originally, but were converted to individual quarters or gun positions, probably machine guns of some sort based on the occasional cartridge shells found. Based on the anti-Acojah graffiti found all over, the PCs surmised that the human populace had held out here against Acojah attackers.
The roof held two sand-bagged anti-aircraft positions (minus the weapons now). Looking around from the roof, the PCs noticed what was likely the wreckage of a downed aircraft and made note of it for later investigation. They also verified the excavator was still where they last saw it and still immobile.
Having finished their investigation of what was likely the administration building for the strip mine, they headed over to the next building, expecting it to be a smelter of some sort. There were three immense doors on the front side of the building (facing the admin building), one of which is not quite closed. Looking around carefully before opening it any further, Grar locates a tripwire connected to an explosive charge wrapped in ball bearings. He disabled the trip wire and inspected the explosive charge. The charge had degraded to the point where it might fizzle at best. Checking further, Grar found booby traps on the other two doors as well.
The inside of the tall (5-6 stories equivalent) building was mostly made up of smelting and processing equipment (making this a mill), with catwalks and equipment on suspended tracks still filling the upper area. This front area took up two-thirds of the front of the building. In the back could be seen rolling doors blocking off three smaller areas. There was a heavy layer of dust and/or bird droppings on everything.
Investigating the machinery in the front area, the PCs worked out that the machinery was designed for sorting out types of ore, for processing iron ore, and for milling iron into steel. Checking the back area to the right, they found the machinery damaged but not irreparably so. The equipment seems to have been stopped mid-process. Grar and Cyrano jury-rigged a crane to safely lower the six-foot tall cup it still had suspended. The cup was found to be mostly full of gold. Several characters did a happy dance at this point.
[At this point my notes ran out, so the rest is from memory.]
With this indicator that the back areas were processing areas for valuable metals, the PCs eagerly moved to the center area to see what it processed. They instead found the center area mostly destroyed and full of mine tailings. Confused by this, they exited the building and circled around to the back side. There they found a large shipping container [think four times as large as a modern shipping container in all dimensions] standing on its end, partially embedded into the back of the building. Looking away from the building, they could see other piles of mine tailings in strange, low rises. It occurred to the PCs that someone had been dive bombing the mill, using cargo containers full of tailings as kinetic bombs. When the last one hit the building but failed to destroy it (or even really damage most of it), they must have stopped. Or got shot down (thinking about the downed flyer spotted from the roof of the admin building).
Returning to the interior of the building, the PCs checked the last back chamber. This room was more damaged than the first one, but not as completely damaged as the middle one, which had taken a mostly direct hit from the tailings bomb. The smelting cup in this area was on the floor, partially crushing some other machinery. Inside was metal, filling about half the cup. After some quick field testing (Max is a field geologist, among other things), it was determined to be Berynium, approximately 1.5 cubic meters (50 cubic feet) of it! [Another happy dance may have happened here.]
With two sources of precious metals located, the PCs decided to finish searching the mill, locating the offices. These were on a raised platform with a commanding view of the main work area. The walkway around the offices had solid sides instead of just railings and seemed to have hardpoints for mounting weapons. Climbing the stairs to the office platform, the PCs noticed that the single entrance area was heavily bullet-ridden. The two rooms that made up the offices themselves were heavily vandalized and shot up. One room appeared to have been a conference room with a large table, now on its side and full of bullet holes and the skeletal remains of a humanoid sophont, minus its head, slumped in front of it. The walls and scraps of things mounted on the walls were covered in anti-Acojah graffiti. The other room was an office with storage cabinets, all looted. Looking through the wreckage of the storage cabinets, Grar located two data crystals in the bottom, under the lowest drawer. There was nothing else of interest here.
Grar used his mind link with Sister Gunita to request that the Iron Pig fly down to the surface and pick up the gold and Berynium the away team had located (it was too large and much too heavy for the air/raft to lift). While the away team waited for the Iron Pig to arrive, they investigated the downed flyer. The wreckage showed signs of being burned long ago and was now mostly overgrown with grasses. In the remains of the cockpit were skeletal remains, which Max’s medical training allowed him to identify as Acojan. Eventually the Iron Pig arrived with gear to pull the cups holding the metals out of the mill, a multi-hour process. The Iron Pig returned to the ship very late in the day and everyone retired for the evening, tired but much wealthier.
Week 7, Day 7:
After a good night’s sleep, the two data crystals were checked for the presence of the VIRUS (they were clean) and then the data was reviewed. The first crystal contained HR records of the mine prior to the Crash, covering a period of eight years. The second was in Acojan and covered the running of the mine some time after the Crash was known to have happened, covering a period of six years, starting after the seizure of the mine and ending roughly 70 years prior to the present. The Acojah records clearly stated that the human workers were now slaves.
With the materials secured from the planet and possible evidence of a hostile power operating after the Crash, the PCs decided it was time to head back to Maresfield and report what they had discovered. Captain Salazar was given the order to make for the nearest jump point and make jump to Caraturth. She gladly set the crew to doing just that.
Week 8, Day 7:
The Just Lucky arrived in Caraturth system and made for the nearest gas giant to start re-fueling operations. Once those were complete, the Just Lucky headed to Caraturth. There they landed Brother Kurts and Sister Gunita, picking up a small delegation in their place. They also provided the Order a copy of all the data they collected in Krakatoa. At the end of the day they left Caraturth and (reaching a jump point) jumped to Maresfield system.
Week 9, Day 7:
The Just Lucky arrived in Maresfield.
*End of Session 5*
[By the end of the exploration of the mill offices, it was getting late, so we just kind of hand-waved the trip back to Maresfield. This was also the last session of the campaign, or at least this part of it. I needed time off as a GM to work on some other writing projects and just had to step away from running a weekly game to do so. In several months I will resume running, possibly returning to the Fragments campaign, but several years down the timeline.
I think one of the mistakes I made with this campaign was running what should have been a long-term exploration game in the short time I was still willing to run. I should have had a definite storyline ready for the players to interact with rather than putting together a sandbox campaign. I should have also run a more standard background rather than a “picking up the pieces again” background. Running an adventure happening during the Crash with the PCs trying to get to some sort of haven as the VIRUS wreaks havoc in the background would have been better suited to the time I had available. Then running the Fragments campaign after my hiatus would have had extra meaning for the players. Something to thinks about.]
Monday, December 5, 2011
Additions to War of the Mecha
[So I'm messing around with the War of the Mecha rules, a simplified set of rules for playing BattleTech. The original rules fit on one side of a single page and cover the basics. I've come up with some rules for interacting with buildings and here they are. I haven't play-tested them yet, but will soon. Leave me a comment if you beat me to it so I know how they play.]
Patrick’s Additions #1
Buildings
Mecha can move into or onto a building. If the building can
support it, a mecha can jump to the roof or climb onto a Level 1 or 2 building.
If the building cannot support the mecha, the building collapses and the mecha
falls, taking falling damage (1d6 damage per size class of the mecha) plus 1d6
damage per level of the building’s elevation. Mecha can enter the upper levels of buildings from the roofs of adjacent buildings.
Moving into a building causes a Piloting roll, modified by
building type and distance moved so far that turn. Exiting a building requires
an additional roll. On a successful roll, the mecha takes no damage, but the building
take 1d6 damage per size category of the mecha. On a failed roll, the mecha
takes damage equal to the buildings current SP, but does not fall.
Building
|
SP
|
Supports
|
MP Cost
|
Piloting Mod.
|
Light
|
15
|
Light mecha only
|
2
|
0
|
Medium
|
40
|
Medium mecha or lighter
|
3
|
-1
|
Heavy
|
90
|
Heavy mecha or lighter
|
4
|
-2
|
Hardened
|
120
|
Assault mecha or lighter
|
5
|
-3
|
Piloting Roll Mod. For Movement: -1
for 1-4 hexes, -2 for 5-8 hexes, and -3 for 9+ hexes
|
||||
Buildings may be shot at, providing a +4
bonus for being immobile. Buildings reduced to 0 SP collapse into rubble. Mecha
inside a building that collapses takes 1d6 damage per category of the building
times the levels of the building above the mecha (so a mecha in the ground
floor of an elevation 4 hardened building takes 16d6 damage when it collapses). Mecha on the roof or
an upper floor also suffers falling damage.
Thursday, December 1, 2011
Fragments – Session 4: Bhuddas and Bubbas – Part 2: Krakatoa
Session 4 happened Friday, October 21, 2011. This is the second part of the adventure log for this session.
This campaign uses the Hero System, 5th Edition, with much Traveller material grafted on. I am making use of the Hero Traveller books published by ComStar Games. Sadly, these books went out of print when Mongoose Publishing purchased the rights to produce all things Traveller. Mongoose is doing good things, so no hate mail.
PCs:
The Company:
Maxwell Sloan (male human, communications and sensors specialist)
Cyrano Steel (male Lante, computer systems specialist)
Braddock Grar, Lector (male Low Waldi, archivist)
Nomen Fire-eyes (male human hybrid, negotiator)
NPCs:
The Crew:
Echo Salazar, Ship’s Captain (female human)
Ted Yahn, Ship’s Navigator (male human)
Albertha Trufin, Ship’s Engineer (female human)
Dr. Quinton Picknell, Ship’s Doctor (male human)
Maresfield Trade Representative:
Deadra Pagenkopf, Maresfield Trade Liaison (female human)
The Passangers:
Brother Kurts of the Order of the Sacre Illuminae
Sister Gunita of the Order of the Sacre Illuminae
Week 7, Day 4:
The Just Lucky arrived in Krakatoa system and started scanning the system, first using passive systems. They immediately picked up a beacon in Krakatoa orbit, an Acojah beacon, not a human one like they expected. This made everyone a bit nervous. The PCs decided to play it safe and headed to the system’s other gas giant (the one Krakatoa is not in orbit around) and start refueling operations.
While there, the passive systems picked up evidence of debris fields in orbit around Krakatoa. Once the Just Lucky was refueled, the PCs chanced active scanners. The active scanners confirmed Krakatoa is ringed with debris fields – there is no sign of the class B port that should be there. Additionally, the scanners detected an inert ship in orbit around the gas giant Krakatoa orbits. Suspecting the VIRUS hit this system hard, the PCs decided to investigate the derelict ship first.
A couple hours later, when they got within visual range of the derelict ship, they realized that it was an Acojah ship. There was obvious damage on the side, near the cargo area, and the high rad count told them this was the result of a nuclear weapon. The PCs took the Iron Pig over to the Acojah ship, looking for answers and maybe some salvage. Oscar started removing the jump engine nacelle from the ship, something that would take him and Ro and Albertha several hours to accomplish [conveniently keeping Oscar and Ro in NPC-mode as their players could not make the game]. The rest of the group made their way up to the front of the ship, keeping the body of the ship between them and the radioactive parts of the ship, and entered the bridge through an emergency access hatch.
The away team found most of the command crew, all Acojah women, dead at their posts. The only crew member with an obvious wound was the captain and she appeared to have died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the palate of her mouth. Max’s limited medical training told him that, except for the captain, the crew died of slow asphyxiation, suggesting the ship’s hull is breached and it was unable to maintain atmosphere. They located the ship’s black box and removed it, returning to the Iron Pig.
Back at the Iron Pig, the PCs accessed the black box and started going through the Captain’s Log. The ship was the Sargtlinen Cahallin and was a cargo vessel. It ran supplies to Acojah forces apparently operating on worlds that were human worlds pre-Crash. The Acojah captain (Maynolu Claddath) had received the ship new at a date the PCs knew was after the Crash started and the captain complained about some of the systems being difficult to work with due to the “anti-VIRUS modifications”.
There were months of standard log entries. At the end of the log, the ship was sent to Krakatoa with all other cargo ships, but with no explanation why. There were a few entries showing the captain’s frustration about being kept in orbit and not told what was going on. The penultimate entry is hurried and terse, explaining “the rivvil have broken their bonds and are driving the Acojah from the planet”. The final entry is a day later and shows the damage to the command deck the away team observed. The captain is obviously having trouble getting enough breathe to speak. She barely gets out “I’m sorry,” before the sound of a pistol being cocked is heard and the screen it shut off.
The PCs speculated on what they had learned. They decided that the Acojah had attacked neighboring worlds during the Crash, taking advantage of the chaos caused. Krakatoa was one of the worlds they appeared to have conquered and enslaved, but the enslaved humans had revolted and pushed the Acojah off the planet. This could mean that the Acojah still had space travel and may control the next several worlds along the main route through the sub-sector. This was very troublesome, especially as one of the systems past the known Acojah world was a major shipyard prior to the Crash, and had the capability to produce warships, something Maresfield never had the capacity to do.
Once the Sargtlinen Cahallin jump drive nacelle was removed and secured inside the Just Lucky, the ship headed over to Krakatoa to see what more could be learned. In orbit, Max and Grar used mind scans to see if there was anyone alive on the planet. They discovered there were 100’s of thousands of sentients on the planet, but the ship’s scanners picked up no electronic communications of any sort. Broadcasting to the surface produced nothing but static in response, so the PCs decided to attempt a landing. The planet’s surface is broken up into arable areas isolated from each other by stretches of volcanic terrain, areas where the planet was being flexed by the gas giant’s gravity. Many of the arable patches seemed to be inhabited based on the mind scans. Uncertain of what sort of response they would receive, the away team decided to land the Iron Pig on the fringes of a settled area and make contact where the population was not as dense.
As they descended, they could see evidence of agriculture and some roads near the settlement they had selected. As they landed the Iron Pig in the middle of a crossroads (of two dirt roads), they caught glimpses of wooden and stone buildings making up the settlement. They could also see locals running around, having noticed the Iron Pig’s descent.
Cyrano, Nomen, Grar, and Max (the only non-blue entity in the party) descended from the Iron Pig and waited for the locals to show up. A relatively small group did show, carrying what looked like muskets and hoping from cover to cover. Eventually the locals got close enough and the PCs called out greetings to them. One of the locals then approached and a conversation was had. Two things became immediately obvious during the conversation: the locals were under-educated hicks and noticeably xenophobic, talking directly only to Max, the only obvious human in the group. [This led to Cyrano’s player quipping “space travel turns you blue”.]
After a few minutes of extremely tense conversation, the PCs left, returning to the Just Lucky in orbit to report what little they had learned and decide what to do next.
*End of Session 4, Part 2*
This campaign uses the Hero System, 5th Edition, with much Traveller material grafted on. I am making use of the Hero Traveller books published by ComStar Games. Sadly, these books went out of print when Mongoose Publishing purchased the rights to produce all things Traveller. Mongoose is doing good things, so no hate mail.
PCs:
The Company:
Maxwell Sloan (male human, communications and sensors specialist)
Cyrano Steel (male Lante, computer systems specialist)
Braddock Grar, Lector (male Low Waldi, archivist)
Nomen Fire-eyes (male human hybrid, negotiator)
NPCs:
The Crew:
Echo Salazar, Ship’s Captain (female human)
Ted Yahn, Ship’s Navigator (male human)
Albertha Trufin, Ship’s Engineer (female human)
Dr. Quinton Picknell, Ship’s Doctor (male human)
Maresfield Trade Representative:
Deadra Pagenkopf, Maresfield Trade Liaison (female human)
The Passangers:
Brother Kurts of the Order of the Sacre Illuminae
Sister Gunita of the Order of the Sacre Illuminae
Week 7, Day 4:
The Just Lucky arrived in Krakatoa system and started scanning the system, first using passive systems. They immediately picked up a beacon in Krakatoa orbit, an Acojah beacon, not a human one like they expected. This made everyone a bit nervous. The PCs decided to play it safe and headed to the system’s other gas giant (the one Krakatoa is not in orbit around) and start refueling operations.
While there, the passive systems picked up evidence of debris fields in orbit around Krakatoa. Once the Just Lucky was refueled, the PCs chanced active scanners. The active scanners confirmed Krakatoa is ringed with debris fields – there is no sign of the class B port that should be there. Additionally, the scanners detected an inert ship in orbit around the gas giant Krakatoa orbits. Suspecting the VIRUS hit this system hard, the PCs decided to investigate the derelict ship first.
A couple hours later, when they got within visual range of the derelict ship, they realized that it was an Acojah ship. There was obvious damage on the side, near the cargo area, and the high rad count told them this was the result of a nuclear weapon. The PCs took the Iron Pig over to the Acojah ship, looking for answers and maybe some salvage. Oscar started removing the jump engine nacelle from the ship, something that would take him and Ro and Albertha several hours to accomplish [conveniently keeping Oscar and Ro in NPC-mode as their players could not make the game]. The rest of the group made their way up to the front of the ship, keeping the body of the ship between them and the radioactive parts of the ship, and entered the bridge through an emergency access hatch.
The away team found most of the command crew, all Acojah women, dead at their posts. The only crew member with an obvious wound was the captain and she appeared to have died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the palate of her mouth. Max’s limited medical training told him that, except for the captain, the crew died of slow asphyxiation, suggesting the ship’s hull is breached and it was unable to maintain atmosphere. They located the ship’s black box and removed it, returning to the Iron Pig.
Back at the Iron Pig, the PCs accessed the black box and started going through the Captain’s Log. The ship was the Sargtlinen Cahallin and was a cargo vessel. It ran supplies to Acojah forces apparently operating on worlds that were human worlds pre-Crash. The Acojah captain (Maynolu Claddath) had received the ship new at a date the PCs knew was after the Crash started and the captain complained about some of the systems being difficult to work with due to the “anti-VIRUS modifications”.
There were months of standard log entries. At the end of the log, the ship was sent to Krakatoa with all other cargo ships, but with no explanation why. There were a few entries showing the captain’s frustration about being kept in orbit and not told what was going on. The penultimate entry is hurried and terse, explaining “the rivvil have broken their bonds and are driving the Acojah from the planet”. The final entry is a day later and shows the damage to the command deck the away team observed. The captain is obviously having trouble getting enough breathe to speak. She barely gets out “I’m sorry,” before the sound of a pistol being cocked is heard and the screen it shut off.
The PCs speculated on what they had learned. They decided that the Acojah had attacked neighboring worlds during the Crash, taking advantage of the chaos caused. Krakatoa was one of the worlds they appeared to have conquered and enslaved, but the enslaved humans had revolted and pushed the Acojah off the planet. This could mean that the Acojah still had space travel and may control the next several worlds along the main route through the sub-sector. This was very troublesome, especially as one of the systems past the known Acojah world was a major shipyard prior to the Crash, and had the capability to produce warships, something Maresfield never had the capacity to do.
Once the Sargtlinen Cahallin jump drive nacelle was removed and secured inside the Just Lucky, the ship headed over to Krakatoa to see what more could be learned. In orbit, Max and Grar used mind scans to see if there was anyone alive on the planet. They discovered there were 100’s of thousands of sentients on the planet, but the ship’s scanners picked up no electronic communications of any sort. Broadcasting to the surface produced nothing but static in response, so the PCs decided to attempt a landing. The planet’s surface is broken up into arable areas isolated from each other by stretches of volcanic terrain, areas where the planet was being flexed by the gas giant’s gravity. Many of the arable patches seemed to be inhabited based on the mind scans. Uncertain of what sort of response they would receive, the away team decided to land the Iron Pig on the fringes of a settled area and make contact where the population was not as dense.
As they descended, they could see evidence of agriculture and some roads near the settlement they had selected. As they landed the Iron Pig in the middle of a crossroads (of two dirt roads), they caught glimpses of wooden and stone buildings making up the settlement. They could also see locals running around, having noticed the Iron Pig’s descent.
Cyrano, Nomen, Grar, and Max (the only non-blue entity in the party) descended from the Iron Pig and waited for the locals to show up. A relatively small group did show, carrying what looked like muskets and hoping from cover to cover. Eventually the locals got close enough and the PCs called out greetings to them. One of the locals then approached and a conversation was had. Two things became immediately obvious during the conversation: the locals were under-educated hicks and noticeably xenophobic, talking directly only to Max, the only obvious human in the group. [This led to Cyrano’s player quipping “space travel turns you blue”.]
After a few minutes of extremely tense conversation, the PCs left, returning to the Just Lucky in orbit to report what little they had learned and decide what to do next.
*End of Session 4, Part 2*
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Fragments – Session 4: Bhuddas and Bubbas – Part 1: Caraturth
Session 4 happened Friday, October 21, 2011.
This campaign uses the Hero System, 5th Edition, with much Traveller material grafted on. I am making use of the Hero Traveller books published by ComStar Games. Sadly, these books went out of print when Mongoose Publishing purchased the rights to produce all things Traveller. Mongoose is doing good things, so no hate mail.
PCs:
The Company:
Maxwell Sloan (male human, communications and sensors specialist)
Nomen Fire-eyes (male human hybrid, negotiator)
Oscar Dougray (male human, salvage expert)
Ro Owen (female human, team security expert)
Braddock Grar, Lector (male Low Waldi, archivist)
NPCs:
The Crew:
Echo Salazar, Ship’s Captain (female human)
Ted Yahn, Ship’s Navigator (male human)
Albertha Trufin, Ship’s Engineer (female human)
Dr. Quinton Picknell, Ship’s Doctor (male human)
Maresfield Trade Representative
Deadra Pagenkopf, Maresfield Trade Liaison (female human)
Week 5, Day 1:
The Company decides that the next system they want to explore is Krakatoa System. It will take two Jump 2s to get there, but it was known to be a source of Berynium, a metal necessary to produce the cores of jump engines and not naturally found on Maresfield.
Krakatoa is a T-type world, but is a large moon orbiting one of the system’s gas giants instead of having an orbit of its own. Its orbit is unstable and the world is slowly spiraling in to the gas giant, with an expected impact in 4,000 to 5,000 years. The pre-Crash star charts indicate it had a Class B starport, so The Company is somewhat hopeful of survivors and some level of technology.
Additionally, Caraturth, the mid-point of the trip, is the home of the Order Grar is a part of and he has a vested interest in stopping there. When he reports back in to the Order, he is entrusted with a copy of all records of the Order on Maresfield for the last 80 years. If the Order is still active on Caraturth, he is to submit the records to the head temple for approval. This includes Grar’s induction into the Order and elevation to Lector.
Week 5, Day 2:
Nomen files a flight plan with the Maresfield Exploratory Committee. It indicates the Just Lucky will jump from Maresfield to Caraturth to Krakatoa and then back along the same route. Normally, getting the flight plan through the Committee can take a week or more, but Nomen knows where all the right people sit and has all the right paperwork prepared, so the entire process only takes a day. The downside is that Nomen and his wife now have a dinner appointment with one of the chief bureaucrats and his wife, a couple they loathe. Nomen’s wife sets the date for the get-together two days after the Just Lucky is expected back. And he better not be late.
Week 5, Day 3:
The Just Lucky jumps out of the Maresfield system, heading to Caraturth. During the one week jump, Cyrano constructs five McGuffins, using one of the bars of Red Gold Phoenix Salvage held onto from the run to Guruphon. Grar spends the week memorizing all 80 years worth of Order records.
Week 6, Day 3:
The Just Lucky arrives in Caraturth system. An active sensor sweep of the system brings to life an old navigation buoy in orbit over the planet Caraturth. A recorded message from the buoy provides instructions on where to land and what frequency to contact Caraturth Station, which is down on the planet. The Company and crew has some worries about the buoy being VIRUS-infected, but they quickly determine that the buoy is too simple and small to hold the VIRUS.
During the flight in from the jump point, Max calls in on the frequency specified and gets a very surprised junior member of the order on the other end. After a delay to get a more senior member of the Order, contact is made and the Just Lucky arranges to drop off an away team while the ship itself goes to refuel. When the ship enters orbit, Grar and max use their psionics to verify there is a population on the planet. They do, plus they notice a few minds verifying them. Grar is able to get a lock on one of the minds, but does not have the power to get a message across from this distance. Max has the power, but cannot establish a lock. [This is a recurring theme between the two of them.]
The Low Port for Caraturth is a grass field – the only grass field on the planet, as Caraturth has no native biosphere. The Order of Sacre Illuminae on Caraturth consists of several interconnected monasteries built into adjacent peaks of a large mountain. They are sealed from the high CO2 atmosphere, but there are large window-walls exposing open areas to the sunlight from the red primary. A sealed walkway, consisting of several large sections of transparent material extends to the Low Port landing field, where it connects to a larger reception chamber with airlocks. There are several dignitaries there to greet the PCs. Grar can identify robes indicating all five branches of the Order amongst the assemblage.
As Grar is a lector in the Order, he is the primary speaker for the PCs. The primary speaker for the Order introduced himself as Abbot Balvis. Grar explained that the PCs are an exploratory/mercantile company, of which he is a member. He then presented the combined records for the Order on Maresfield to the Abbot for verification and validation. The Abbot accepted the records, handing them off to a member of the Archivae for review. He then invited the PCs to a meal while the records were reviewed and the Just Lucky was away refueling.
During the meal, discussion was had about how the Order had weathered the period since the Crash. The abbot explained that the monasteries were designed to be maintained over the long term with minimal resources, so they had not had any social upheaval or loss of life. The data systems were isolated from all external systems and so the VIRUS had not been able to spread here. They had been running short on supplies to maintain the datasystems and had initiated a project to hand copy the material into books for preservation.
After a quick discussion amongst themselves, the PCs offered what spare parts they had themselves and the computer core they had secured from Guruphon Station. The monks were overjoyed at receiving these items and offered access to all of the preserved astrogation data and technical specifications they had. The PCs tried not to drool too much while accepting the deal. The abbot also requested passage for a delegation to Maresfield so that formal communications could be re-opened between branches of the Order and official ordinations could be delivered. The PCs agreed to this, but explained they were going to Krakatoa first. The abbot asked if they could use a trained planetologist (albeit one with little field experience) for that part of the trip and the PCs stated they would be very grateful for the loan of one. And so Brother Kurts and his bodyguard, Sister Gunita, joined the crew of the Just Lucky.
Week 6, Day 4:
In the morning, Grar is informed that the Maresfield records have been reviewed and all ordinations approved, including his own. A small Ceremony of Ordination is planned for mid-day, where Grar will trade his provisional robes (which all members of the Order on Maresfield wear) for a set of confirmed robes appropriate for his rank. The ceremony would have been sooner, but they needed to get Grar’s measurements and have properly tailored robes created (as a Low Waldi, he is a foot and a half shorter than the other members, who are all human).
After the Just Lucky returns from refueling operations, the trade of computer parts and core for complete pre-Crash astrogational data and other technical specifications happens. At mid-day the Ceremony of Ordination happens and Grar receives his robes as a fully confirmed Lector of the Order of Sacre Illuminae. A few hours later, the PCs and the new crew members return to the Just Lucky, head out to the nearest jump-point, and initiate the jump to Krakatoa.
*End of Session 4, Part 1*
This campaign uses the Hero System, 5th Edition, with much Traveller material grafted on. I am making use of the Hero Traveller books published by ComStar Games. Sadly, these books went out of print when Mongoose Publishing purchased the rights to produce all things Traveller. Mongoose is doing good things, so no hate mail.
PCs:
The Company:
Maxwell Sloan (male human, communications and sensors specialist)
Nomen Fire-eyes (male human hybrid, negotiator)
Oscar Dougray (male human, salvage expert)
Ro Owen (female human, team security expert)
Braddock Grar, Lector (male Low Waldi, archivist)
NPCs:
The Crew:
Echo Salazar, Ship’s Captain (female human)
Ted Yahn, Ship’s Navigator (male human)
Albertha Trufin, Ship’s Engineer (female human)
Dr. Quinton Picknell, Ship’s Doctor (male human)
Maresfield Trade Representative
Deadra Pagenkopf, Maresfield Trade Liaison (female human)
Week 5, Day 1:
The Company decides that the next system they want to explore is Krakatoa System. It will take two Jump 2s to get there, but it was known to be a source of Berynium, a metal necessary to produce the cores of jump engines and not naturally found on Maresfield.
Krakatoa is a T-type world, but is a large moon orbiting one of the system’s gas giants instead of having an orbit of its own. Its orbit is unstable and the world is slowly spiraling in to the gas giant, with an expected impact in 4,000 to 5,000 years. The pre-Crash star charts indicate it had a Class B starport, so The Company is somewhat hopeful of survivors and some level of technology.
Additionally, Caraturth, the mid-point of the trip, is the home of the Order Grar is a part of and he has a vested interest in stopping there. When he reports back in to the Order, he is entrusted with a copy of all records of the Order on Maresfield for the last 80 years. If the Order is still active on Caraturth, he is to submit the records to the head temple for approval. This includes Grar’s induction into the Order and elevation to Lector.
Week 5, Day 2:
Nomen files a flight plan with the Maresfield Exploratory Committee. It indicates the Just Lucky will jump from Maresfield to Caraturth to Krakatoa and then back along the same route. Normally, getting the flight plan through the Committee can take a week or more, but Nomen knows where all the right people sit and has all the right paperwork prepared, so the entire process only takes a day. The downside is that Nomen and his wife now have a dinner appointment with one of the chief bureaucrats and his wife, a couple they loathe. Nomen’s wife sets the date for the get-together two days after the Just Lucky is expected back. And he better not be late.
Week 5, Day 3:
The Just Lucky jumps out of the Maresfield system, heading to Caraturth. During the one week jump, Cyrano constructs five McGuffins, using one of the bars of Red Gold Phoenix Salvage held onto from the run to Guruphon. Grar spends the week memorizing all 80 years worth of Order records.
Week 6, Day 3:
The Just Lucky arrives in Caraturth system. An active sensor sweep of the system brings to life an old navigation buoy in orbit over the planet Caraturth. A recorded message from the buoy provides instructions on where to land and what frequency to contact Caraturth Station, which is down on the planet. The Company and crew has some worries about the buoy being VIRUS-infected, but they quickly determine that the buoy is too simple and small to hold the VIRUS.
During the flight in from the jump point, Max calls in on the frequency specified and gets a very surprised junior member of the order on the other end. After a delay to get a more senior member of the Order, contact is made and the Just Lucky arranges to drop off an away team while the ship itself goes to refuel. When the ship enters orbit, Grar and max use their psionics to verify there is a population on the planet. They do, plus they notice a few minds verifying them. Grar is able to get a lock on one of the minds, but does not have the power to get a message across from this distance. Max has the power, but cannot establish a lock. [This is a recurring theme between the two of them.]
The Low Port for Caraturth is a grass field – the only grass field on the planet, as Caraturth has no native biosphere. The Order of Sacre Illuminae on Caraturth consists of several interconnected monasteries built into adjacent peaks of a large mountain. They are sealed from the high CO2 atmosphere, but there are large window-walls exposing open areas to the sunlight from the red primary. A sealed walkway, consisting of several large sections of transparent material extends to the Low Port landing field, where it connects to a larger reception chamber with airlocks. There are several dignitaries there to greet the PCs. Grar can identify robes indicating all five branches of the Order amongst the assemblage.
As Grar is a lector in the Order, he is the primary speaker for the PCs. The primary speaker for the Order introduced himself as Abbot Balvis. Grar explained that the PCs are an exploratory/mercantile company, of which he is a member. He then presented the combined records for the Order on Maresfield to the Abbot for verification and validation. The Abbot accepted the records, handing them off to a member of the Archivae for review. He then invited the PCs to a meal while the records were reviewed and the Just Lucky was away refueling.
During the meal, discussion was had about how the Order had weathered the period since the Crash. The abbot explained that the monasteries were designed to be maintained over the long term with minimal resources, so they had not had any social upheaval or loss of life. The data systems were isolated from all external systems and so the VIRUS had not been able to spread here. They had been running short on supplies to maintain the datasystems and had initiated a project to hand copy the material into books for preservation.
After a quick discussion amongst themselves, the PCs offered what spare parts they had themselves and the computer core they had secured from Guruphon Station. The monks were overjoyed at receiving these items and offered access to all of the preserved astrogation data and technical specifications they had. The PCs tried not to drool too much while accepting the deal. The abbot also requested passage for a delegation to Maresfield so that formal communications could be re-opened between branches of the Order and official ordinations could be delivered. The PCs agreed to this, but explained they were going to Krakatoa first. The abbot asked if they could use a trained planetologist (albeit one with little field experience) for that part of the trip and the PCs stated they would be very grateful for the loan of one. And so Brother Kurts and his bodyguard, Sister Gunita, joined the crew of the Just Lucky.
Week 6, Day 4:
In the morning, Grar is informed that the Maresfield records have been reviewed and all ordinations approved, including his own. A small Ceremony of Ordination is planned for mid-day, where Grar will trade his provisional robes (which all members of the Order on Maresfield wear) for a set of confirmed robes appropriate for his rank. The ceremony would have been sooner, but they needed to get Grar’s measurements and have properly tailored robes created (as a Low Waldi, he is a foot and a half shorter than the other members, who are all human).
After the Just Lucky returns from refueling operations, the trade of computer parts and core for complete pre-Crash astrogational data and other technical specifications happens. At mid-day the Ceremony of Ordination happens and Grar receives his robes as a fully confirmed Lector of the Order of Sacre Illuminae. A few hours later, the PCs and the new crew members return to the Just Lucky, head out to the nearest jump-point, and initiate the jump to Krakatoa.
*End of Session 4, Part 1*
Monday, November 28, 2011
Update
So the weekend before Thanksgiving I had a relapse of my cold and was miserable the whole weekend and Monday back at work (which was not the best idea, but I had already turned in my time for the week and felt obliged to meet that commitment). Then we had tons of folks over for Thanksgiving and I had to help in preparations/keep my wife close to sane Wednesday through Thursday. I was not terribly successful, but folks had a good time and were glad they came.
Friday was supposed to be low-key, but guests had to leave due to them falling ill or folks deciding to sleep in (plus some confusion in my wife's invites), so we ended up in our jammies watching DVR'd recordings of several seasons of Ladies of Ninja Warrior.
Saturday I slept in, still shaking off the vestiges of my cold while my wife was out with a friend, seeing a movie I had no interest in (the one with the vampire/werewolf/drama queen love triangle). I slept most of the day and watched a few things on the DVR I'd been meaning to watch for months.
Sunday was chores around the house and grocery shopping for the week.
You may notice that no where in there did I mention writing. There's a reason for that.
Now, however, I'm over my cold and the yearly chaos-fest of Thanksgiving has passed, so I can get back to my writing. Expect Aldelle group updates and a batch of Traveller updates so I can close out my notes on that campaign. I'll finish that up with some thoughts on what I did wrong (too much material for too little time) and where I plan on going when I resume running it (that part is secret for now).
That's it for today. I will post several times this week to make up for the silence of last week. Hope you enjoy and thank you for reading.
Friday was supposed to be low-key, but guests had to leave due to them falling ill or folks deciding to sleep in (plus some confusion in my wife's invites), so we ended up in our jammies watching DVR'd recordings of several seasons of Ladies of Ninja Warrior.
Saturday I slept in, still shaking off the vestiges of my cold while my wife was out with a friend, seeing a movie I had no interest in (the one with the vampire/werewolf/drama queen love triangle). I slept most of the day and watched a few things on the DVR I'd been meaning to watch for months.
Sunday was chores around the house and grocery shopping for the week.
You may notice that no where in there did I mention writing. There's a reason for that.
Now, however, I'm over my cold and the yearly chaos-fest of Thanksgiving has passed, so I can get back to my writing. Expect Aldelle group updates and a batch of Traveller updates so I can close out my notes on that campaign. I'll finish that up with some thoughts on what I did wrong (too much material for too little time) and where I plan on going when I resume running it (that part is secret for now).
That's it for today. I will post several times this week to make up for the silence of last week. Hope you enjoy and thank you for reading.
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