LUZ's Tramp Freighters Campaign first adventure discussion

[LUZ-TAK]

This thread is for discussing the very first adventure of my Tramp Freighters campaign: https://rancorpit.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=200722

This is what I have so far (I will update it in my googlesheet as it progreses: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1OxVdhPXLeqh_oBdGtMomTHkfG6JK6R6GIJW9MHm4JEU/edit#gid=1496373305

Plot summary

After the Captain NPC vanishes, the Heroes negotiate with loanshark taking the ship (and it's debt) for themselves. Then they need to get up and ready: getting a captain's liscence, transfering ship¿s ownership and registry.,paying docking fines, finding some cargo to move and deliver the goods, all spiced with interesting challenges.

Prelude

Flahanam, the NPC captain and ship owner, originally from Minos Cluster, spent last decade tramping around the Galaxy. Picking up the players characters as crew, he finally decides to returns to Minos Cluster to stike rich. After months of bad work and running too many times into imperial customs, his debt to the loanshark has pilled up... a lot. Hearing that the loan shark goons are after him, he vanished, leaving the crew to face the collectors. They are forcedfully taken to the loan shark officein Shesharile 5, where they might struck a deal of a lifetime.

Part 1: you friendly loan shark

Negotiate with loan shark to get the ship, and the debt (185.000 CR so far), give them some negotiating room, not too much. Loan shark is the one featured in sourcebooks, the Twilek that will become a big fish with sheshariles falls into chaos.

Part 2: registering the ship and captain

They need to register the ship to a new owner, plus get a captain licence. Have them deal with spaceport and BOSS bureaucracy,

Part 3: finding cago, both normal and "special"

Maybe the loanshark has a cargo run for them? Maybe they have to bring something illegal from Travinin to Shesharile?

Have them run into a gang while they look for cargo or move it around: ground based combat encounter. Nature of the cargo?

Maybe having the rebel afiliates slicer jump in as passenger? RP opportunities

The PCs ship has 2ton of scanner resisitant secret compartments.

Part 4: take off!

Have them deal with corrupted custom officials leaving Shesharile

Part 5: a uneventful journey

No action in first leg of space journey, give chars some down time to roleplay and do their own things, maybe heal up if combat encounter went badly.


Part 6: delivering the goods

Run into Babel Torsch when arriving into Travnin, showcase him a as future villain, but let them thru. Give them sense of imperial prescence in the sector.

Use Byblos space tower from Platt's Starports guide as located in Shesharile.

Then move to spacers cantina (the one descibed in the sourcebook); then to deliver goods and such

Part 7: getting back

Have pirates making them drop of hyperspace? space battle to run away? Seems like adventure needs a space combat scenario to feel complete. Need to flesh out pirates to have them as recurring menace

Part 8: wrapping up

Getting back to shecharile, having some challenge in collecting the money. Wrap-up.
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I’m one with the force
The force is my ally

[LUZ-TAK]

Any ideas or suggestions on improving the adventure?

For part 1 for example, any input on fleshing out Shesharile starport or the loanshark encounter?
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I’m one with the force
The force is my ally

[Whill]

I like this adventure. It seems very full of different things. And I agree. It definitely needs space combat. Are these pirates the Rebel privateers as in Minos Cluster Campaign in GG6?

The Shesharile spaceport is Gallisport on Shesharile 5, correct? It's a poor and dirty industrial planet, so there could be air quality alerts and you have to wear gas mask filters that everyone there has except the PCs who have to scramble to get some. You could include the swoop gangs in the story somehow. You could have the PCs doing some underworld dealings with one of them and the rival gang shows up to create havoc. Or the PCs could be harassed by a swoop gang until the rival gang and/or the LA-LAs show up.
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[LUZ-TAK]

As for the pirates, I was thinking about them being regular pirates. I really want to wait till the Rebellion shows up.

Swoop gangs are at the moment prime candidates for the ground fight indeed.

Thanks for the Gallisport reference. At first I thought about using the Byblos tower spaceport found in Platt's starport guide as located there, but looks "too big and important" so I will be using that in sector capital Travnin.

In giving shesharile 5 some identifiable traits, besides de pollution warining, I intended to show it as a burgeoninig place, so it will be more striking contrast once it strats to go down into economic and political crisis. Maybe show some hints of that, eg I plan the cities police to be in the loanshark's payroll and let it be shown.

So, what else can I ring in to flesh out either Shesharile or the loanshark?
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I’m one with the force
The force is my ally

[LUZ-TAK]

Here is an idea I just came up with:

When they are dragged out of hyperspace by pirates, there is another freighter ship ionized and about to be boarded. They get two messages, one from the pirate captain asking them to surrender their cargo nicely or else, and one from the freighter captain asking for help.

Now they have a choice: they can either try to escape more or less easily while the pirates are still dealing with the other freighter, or they can help the fellow tramp captain, that declares he just needs some time to restart his engine. Of course, that means flying stright into harms way, buy the freighter some time and then make a much harder escape.

Should they help the tramp captain, he becomes an ally, otherwise, a nemesis, for he will loose his cargo, but not his ship. Probably choose one of the tramp captains form the Tramp sourcebook.

How does that sound?

BTW, besides moving asteroids into a hyperlane, is there any other way for pirates to make ships drop out of hyperspace?
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I’m one with the force
The force is my ally

[Raven Redstar]

They could jury-rig a gravity well projector into a bulk freighter and use it as a miniature interdictor cruiser.
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RR
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[LUZ-TAK]

[Whill]

[Raven Redstar]

[cheshire]

[LUZ-TAK]

[LUZ-TAK]

I'm liking some concept art on "star Wars: Underground" I wound in the webz. Also I got the Loan Shark portrait nailed down: https://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/starwars/images/a/aa/Fortuna_lookalike.jpg
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I’m one with the force
The force is my ally

[LUZ-TAK]

Greeting folks. Brief recap on the first session.

It was a bit slow as expected as we had to go over some game rules and details as we progressed. Not much “Star Wars” action, in terms of combat or suspense, must address that soon.

Characters interactions already start to develop (like, everyone but the Duro Pilot is ready to get rid the cantankerous astromech PC’s ASAP, hehehe). Negotiation with Loan shark went as expected, then I fast forward a bit of the paperwork (the ex imperial doctor that was obvious choice to be registered captain couldn’t make it to the game, so I fast forward that part, still I mentioned the Duro how easily he got the document in contrast how he never managed to get one).

Then the tracked an actuary and managed to “sped-up” the ship’s registry in exchange for them to deliver some “special cargo” from Travnin before week’s end (I’m using an actual calendar, game session 01 was Wednesday January 1st).

Then they looked for some work. They failed their Business roll to find any legal cargo, but rolled nicely on the Streetwise roll, so thy found some illegal liquor to deliver to Travnin (30 mt). Then they used most of the credits left to purchase grain and foodstuff to act as cover and maybe get some profit out of it. They probably have less that 2000 CR of working capital.

At the end of the session, they left Shesharile. I made an Imperial corvette hailed them and request information but skipped the inspection and official’s bribery because time constraints. So that must come first thing next session.

We wrapped up with the Duro Pilot astrogation check with a 1 on the wild die, hehehe. He rolled for mishaps a 3 and a 5. They don’t know it yet, but the backup hyperdrive will blow up and the main hyperdrive will have its multiplier doubled.

So, instead of the 20 hours they would normally take to do the journey from Shesharile to Travnin, it will take them twice that time and will have to fix it once on Travnin, otherwise they won’t be able to make it back to Shesharile on time to deliver. A blow out backup hyperdrive is also a wonderful excuse for some imperial inspector to extract some extra credits in bribery to overlook it. Also nice side quest to repair main hyperdrive and replace backup one (gotta flesh out some NPC for them to get the hyperdrive from) and more costs to drain their coffers (about 3000 CR by my calculations, if they do the repair themselves, which I expect they will to save some cash).

Next session should be about discovering a bit of Travnin, delivering the goods and picking up the special cargo, probably gonna have to roll up some combat encounter to spice things up a bit (not sure how swoop gang’s fit on the Sector’s Imperial Capital…) and fixing the hyperdrive, all on a tight schedule. Not sure if all that is going to fit in one gaming session (we are paying weekly on Tuesdays for about 3 to 4 hours straight).

RECAP:

The good:
- Negotiation with loan shark went as expected.
- PC’s feel cash-strapped already
- Emerging inter PCs interactions.

The bad:

- I had to speed up the imperial interactions both because the key PC for them was away but also time constrains
- Didn’t feel I gave Shesharile as a location much personality. I intend to correct that about Travnin by using the Byblos Spaceport Tower material.
- Not enough “Star Wars action”…
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I’m one with the force
The force is my ally

[Whill]

It's great to read this!

[LUZ-TAK]

It doesn't have to be a swoop gang per-se, I just need a combat encounter (preferably non lethal, just fist fight, maybe some clubs) to spice up things and let the Cathar martial artist shine and showcase the combat rules.
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I’m one with the force
The force is my ally