Freighter in Your Campaign

[Admiral Tolval]

I'm sure I'm not the only GM out there that used freighters from other books as the players main ship. I made sure that my group didn't have the YT-1300 starting off. The Imp. smuggler of the group did want one but agreed that its used too much in the game. So I used an alternative that he fell in love with, the HT-2200. The first part that won him over was that it was Corellian. The second was the cargo holds. For those that are not familiar with the HT-2200, it has four seperate cargo holds capable of holding 200 tons each. This is a 800 ton medium freighter. It worked well with our group. At the beginning of the campaign, the NPC Captain the players reported to had modified it for the smuggler for special ops runs. The ship is a U or horseshoe shape. 2 cargo holds on either arm. The forward, starboard hold was modified as a hanger bay capable of holding 2 starfighters. Which the TIE pilot parked his TIE/In into. The forward, port hold had a folding down ramp and room for ground vehicles. Only time we really used this was to pick up a squad of Storm Commandoes on speeder bikes. The aft, starboard hold was actually for cargo. Once we did transport a Hutt in it but that's a story in itself. The aft, port hold was called the "junk room". It contained spare equipment and other parts that was supposed to be delivered to the Captain's dreadnought in the 3rd adventure but Bel Iblis attacked the shipyards it was in destroying it and really started the campaign to rebuild the Empire. The last starting modification was in the common area. A holoprojector w/holonet hookup was installed for briefings and communications.

It was a nice ship. The smuggler stayed around at first since the Captain was his sponsor and he owed his money to but later saw how his fortunes could rise. The players had 3 core members; smuggler, TIE pilot, and ISB agent. The Imp. scout would join later and bring his Lone Scout with the group. After some adventures, the smuggler talked the rest into putting credits into his ship to make it more battle worthy. The ISB agent actually paid for turbolasers for it. Which later down the road threaten to rip them out when he got into an argument with the smuggler. They later obtained a Z-95 for the hanger. Than later another TIE/In when the Z-95 was taken off the ship and installed at their hidden base at Darknon Station.

Blackrazor was the name of the HT-2200 if I remember right. It had some good adventures. Once, after they finished Sarne, the players were on a scouting mission to a suspected shipyard that Sarne had built in the Qektoth Confederation. Their orders were to scout the systems and report back any information about Sarne's forces as some ships had escaped back through the Kathol Rifts after the battle including a ISD. And they were not to engage rebel forces. Report back with the information so the fleet (which consisted of the damaged Bastion and a few smaller ships like Marauder Corvettes) could move in. The players charted out the systems and actually found information leading to the shipyards. They jumped in at the edge of the system, started toward the inner planets than cut speed and main power. Not long they discovered patrols of Qektoth cruisers in the area and the location of the shipyards. Wanting to verify the ISD's condition and location, the smuggler proformed a short, in system jump (his rolls were incredible and yes, for lots of actions, players are required to roll in the middle of the group on a table top to reduce chances of cheating). They found the ISD and a Corona-class Frigate. So after verifying the location of the shipyards, the number of rebel ships in the area, Qektoth ships, and the location and status of the ISD, what do my players do? Do they jump out and report this? Of course not! They're players! The TIE pilot got to his TIE and launched, the ISB agent took the gunnery controls, and the smuggler turned on full power and turned toward the ISD. Of course, my players being lucky sobs survived to brag about their successful attack on the ISD which with no shields and being damaged (not to mention Force &character pt spending by the players and a critical failure on the ISD's part of absorbing damage) was destroyed. They had a public ceremony to honor them for their attack which saved countless lives for their side and a private butt chewing for disobeying orders even if things turned out right.

So, what freighters did your players use?

[Guardian_A]

I have to confess that I have a fondless for the HT-2200 too. Over the years, they have graced several of my campaigns.

I'm not sure if we have ever had a character owned YT-1300 in one of our games.

Our group tends to put together their own templates when creating characters, as such, they choose their own equipment. Sometimes that equipment includes a starship (Either heavily damaged, or with serious strings attached.) Because of this, our characters have owned a wide range of ships through the course of several campaigns. There have been a few custom built ships early on, but by the time GG6 and later Stock Ships came out, we drew most of our ships from those sources. We've had almost as many ships as we have had campaigns.

[Bren]

We have a plan to use an HT-2200 for a new series of adventures. Our thoughts were similar to your Imperial group. We connected the starboard side cargo bays into a single long bay so that we could fit a pair of X-Wings. Still hoping we get a chance to play that.

Other groups have used the Ghotroc 720 and the YT-1300. One of the more unusual ships was the single wing Rendili-Surron Starlight-class Freighter. They named it the Lame Duck for obvious reasons.

I like having floorplans for the ships as it makes the ship itself a real thing and a setting in and of itself. We even mapped out key areas like the bridge for the captured Imperial Vigilance-class Corvette that one group of PCs commanded.

[garhkal]

Big thing is, do you compensate giving him such a larger and more expensive ship, by upping his bounty/debt he owes?

I mean i have often used a house rule that any template, even those not normally starting with a ship can start with one, by taking on the debt of owning it like the 1e smuggler did (to a hutt).. But it is kind of off, if you give someone a 4x more expensive ship (yt-1300 compared to ht-2200) with around 8 times the cargo capacity, without having something offset the increase.
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[Kaloth Varsk]

County me in the 2200 fan club as well. I "acquired" one playing a pirate way back in the day modifying the heck out of it.

As a GM, I used one for a recurring villain's ship (and am actually updating that campaign to possibly run online at some point in the future.)

I did have a group with a YT-1300 at one point when I was running a campaign based on the materials in GG6. I actually had dozens of freighters designed during that campaign and the PC's actually lost 2 ships during it, having to acquire new ones. (So they had 3 ships during the course of the campaign, and the middle one happened to be a YT-1300. Although that ship is a little cliche, GG6 is what really made me fall in love with it. The multiple designs based on the same model is really what got the creative juices going when it came to modifying "stock light freighters". I probably still have a photoshop file with a couple dozen freighters used in that campaign. (Worked in lots of layers to modify ships as I went.)

Edit: Side note on the YT-1300, I remember it completely drove a couple of my players nuts because it was "left handed". I don't know why having the cockpit on the opposite side was so hard for them to accept.

[Bren]

[garhkal]

Yea.. we breaka da legs when you don't pay da boss
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[Admiral Tolval]

garhkal wrote

[garhkal]

Dat will teach him to read before he signs!
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[ZzaphodD]

Im going to have this famous ship 'forced' upon the characters...



Here are some deckplans (allthough not very good ones)
http://www.coldnorth.com/owen/game/startrek/universe/source/fun/decks.htm

The idea is that its a freighter model produced by some insect species as a failed attempt at pleasing the galaxy market..
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My Biggest Beard Retard award goes to: The Admiral of course..

[Bren]

If only you could change the letter for "STARBUG 1" into Aurabesh.

[jmanski]

lol, I like the way you think
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Blasted rules. Why can't they just be perfect?

[Fallon Kell]

I built a class of medium light freighter for my player, and expect he'll take up residence in one at some time or another.
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Or that excessively long "Noooooooooo" was the Whining Side of the Force leaving him. - Dustflier

Complete Starship Construction System

[Raven Redstar]

I tend to keep away from the classic ships like the YT-1300. The ships I've used and had used in my games that I can remember are:

Gozanti Cruiser
Crinya Light Freighter
Kazellis Light Freighter
YT-1930
Deep Water Light Freighter

Each one has it's own charms. I like the aesthetics of all but the Deep Water, and that one was picked because it has individual state rooms for each passenger along with backup shields.

I try not to use the same ship more than once or twice, otherwise it feels too much like I'm playing the same character with a different name.
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RR
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[Jedi Skyler]