RainOfSteel
SOC-14 1K
T20:Mission of the Line
Vargr, Required Skills: starshp repair, Required Equipment: J-2/M-2 starship or better
Player's Information:
The players are in a seedy startown bar, somewhere in the Vilis subsector, looking for rumors about the most recent group of mountebanks to have crossed them. They are approached by a disheveled female Vargr (Pirate 9 Terms (anagathic use) AC9765 Brawling-3, Carousing-3, Pilot-2, Survival-2, Sword-6) wearing stained clothing of various styles, military fatigue pants with many pockets, day blouse, high fashion scarf, and old TL-5 aviator goggles pushed up on her forehead. She sits down and tries to buy the players a drink and to regale them with old war stories of being an Imperial Marine (all lies). Lastly, she will tell them of a time when she was part of an Imperial Navy operation to recover a derelict armored cruiser of the Ghalalk class, the Inclement Battle. The vessel she was on, the Thunderous Ovation, itself a second Ghalalk class armored cruiser, was on a mission to recover the Inclement Battle from the outer reaches of the Quare/Vilis system. Why an Imperial Navy armored cruiser would be derelict outside the Imperium like this, she was never told. She and her fellow marines prepped aboard a cutter for transfer to the Inclement Battle to take possession of the ship. The cutter took off, landed on the Inclement Battle, and found that it was without fuel, but otherwise seemed none too worse for whatever time it had spent drifting. They decided to gear up for a fuel transfer between the ships, and when they attempted to contact the Thunderous Ovation (one more routine contact, like all those made during the operation), they received no response. They exited the Inclement Battle aboard their cutter, and could not locate the Thunderous Ovation on their sensors. The marine lieutenant in charge of the detachment decided to travel to the Quare itself, and there managed to contact an independent merchant after a five week wait who would be willing to carry a message back to the Imperium. Eventually, they were picked up, and the entire incident was disavowed. The marine’s service records were amended to remove any information about the operation, the ship they’d served on, or movements in the area.
The Vargr has made several trips to Quare. Aboard rented small craft, she has searched for and located the Inclement Battle. She no longer has any money to continue recovery operations, and she needs assistance in recovering the ship, including some way to bring enough fuel in to restart the ship, and someone who knows how to do so. If the group agrees to help her out, she’ll reveal the ship’s location after arrival in the Quare starsystem. She’ll offer the group a flat million credits for their services, payable after they wilderness refuel the ship at a local giant, and return the ship to the Imperial Navy.
Referee's Information:
The Inclement Battle is on an orbit about the primary at approximately 11,000 AU, and it’ll be quite a trip. At 2G, it’s 210 days; at 3G, it’s 171.5 days. The Vargr will specify that lots of extra food be brought along, plus reserve fuel bladders that will need to be set up in the cargo hold to provide extra fuel for the cruiser’s power plant. A standard Far Trader should be able to handle it. The finders fee, for a ship this size, is .1% of the original value, or about 27,927,800 Cr. This princely sum, if split between the party, will be quite a find. If they can keep it. The Vargr herself was never an Imperial Marine, but is quite convincing to simply talk to. How she knows about the Inclement Battle and it’s current situation may never be known. The Vargr has discharge papers and resume career history that look authentic.
1. All is as presented. Roll 2d6 for mechanical, electrical, and engineering problems the players must overcome before reactivating the ship. Each fault will require 3d6 hours to repair (there are plenty of materials to work with and shops to use them in aboard the cruiser). Any questions about the difference in the ship’s condition and her original story will be brushed aside with, “I’m not an engineer, I have no idea why the techs we brought along said it was ready to go. I was just there to hold a gauss rifle.” The players even get a fair share of the money if they can get the ship back. Hopefully, they negotiated a better return that the mere million credits originally offered them.
2. As 1, above, except that no matter what the players negotiated, the Vargr will take all the money and attempt to get off that world as fast as she can.
3. As 1, above, except that communications are down in a strange computer glitch that will require their repair before the computer system can be activated. As soon as power is restored and communications are brought online, they players receive an Imperial Navy military encoded signal from the Thunderous Ovation. It is ten kilometers off the port beam, and its captain is very angry when she discovers that her entire marine detachment is missing. She will not accept any explanation involving the now over ten year long disappearance of her ship (to her, it seems as if no time has passed). She will send over another detachment of marines, and will forcefully (using her one hundred fifty or so remaining fully battledress armed marines) take possession of the Inclement Battle. All the players and the Vargr will be detained. On return to the Imperium, the Vargr will be found to have been a wanted pirate criminal. The players will be put on trial as accomplices. Proving that they were dupes should be difficult, but not impossible (if the player’s push it, their lawyer will play strongly upon the strange disappearance of the Thunderous Ovation for the last ten years, and the Imperial Navy will request the judge find them innocent if they’re all willing to sign non-disclosure agreements about the entire affair). If they’re convicted, send them to prison with one chance to get out, after which they’re fugitives. If they’re acquitted, set them free with some overly wise judicial warning about associating with criminals.
4. As 1, above, except the Vargr is a Zhodani-turned spy. As soon as the vessel is operational, she’ll try and use her formidable combat skills to take control of the ship (which she can pilot, and has preprogrammed courses on memory chips across various worlds back to Zhodani Consulate, and so she need make no Navigation rolls; these chips are in her possessions, and a snoopy player may just run across them). If she can kill, disable, or lock out the players, she’ll do so, and then she’ll take the ship back to the Zhodani Consulate for the intelligence coup of the century (if she makes it).
5. As 1, above, except that anyone that remains aboard the starship that brings the players and Vargr to the Inclement Battle will vanish untraceably within 1d4 hours after the first people reach the Inclement Battle. Any players remaining on the ship should be given a warning that the structure of the ship is beginning to fade away, or dematerialize. Give them three minutes (use a stopwatch) to run to the airlocks, get suited, and EVA before the ship disappears, with them on it forever. It shouldn’t be too difficult for any escaped players to get to the Inclement Battle. The Inclement Battle’s original four cutters are all still aboard, and one, remarkably enough, has a fuel scoop module. It’ll mean a lengthy trip to a local gas giant to pick up some fuel, including some coasting on minimal power, and the emergency rations still aboard are abominable, but it can be done, and they should still be able to get the ship itself over to one of the gas giants.
6. The entire situation is a lie. As soon as the players get to Quare they will fall under the attack of a 400 dTon (or other appropriately sized vessel) Corsair manned by other Vargr pirates. The players will have to shoot or fight their way out. Good luck.
Vargr, Required Skills: starshp repair, Required Equipment: J-2/M-2 starship or better
Player's Information:
The players are in a seedy startown bar, somewhere in the Vilis subsector, looking for rumors about the most recent group of mountebanks to have crossed them. They are approached by a disheveled female Vargr (Pirate 9 Terms (anagathic use) AC9765 Brawling-3, Carousing-3, Pilot-2, Survival-2, Sword-6) wearing stained clothing of various styles, military fatigue pants with many pockets, day blouse, high fashion scarf, and old TL-5 aviator goggles pushed up on her forehead. She sits down and tries to buy the players a drink and to regale them with old war stories of being an Imperial Marine (all lies). Lastly, she will tell them of a time when she was part of an Imperial Navy operation to recover a derelict armored cruiser of the Ghalalk class, the Inclement Battle. The vessel she was on, the Thunderous Ovation, itself a second Ghalalk class armored cruiser, was on a mission to recover the Inclement Battle from the outer reaches of the Quare/Vilis system. Why an Imperial Navy armored cruiser would be derelict outside the Imperium like this, she was never told. She and her fellow marines prepped aboard a cutter for transfer to the Inclement Battle to take possession of the ship. The cutter took off, landed on the Inclement Battle, and found that it was without fuel, but otherwise seemed none too worse for whatever time it had spent drifting. They decided to gear up for a fuel transfer between the ships, and when they attempted to contact the Thunderous Ovation (one more routine contact, like all those made during the operation), they received no response. They exited the Inclement Battle aboard their cutter, and could not locate the Thunderous Ovation on their sensors. The marine lieutenant in charge of the detachment decided to travel to the Quare itself, and there managed to contact an independent merchant after a five week wait who would be willing to carry a message back to the Imperium. Eventually, they were picked up, and the entire incident was disavowed. The marine’s service records were amended to remove any information about the operation, the ship they’d served on, or movements in the area.
The Vargr has made several trips to Quare. Aboard rented small craft, she has searched for and located the Inclement Battle. She no longer has any money to continue recovery operations, and she needs assistance in recovering the ship, including some way to bring enough fuel in to restart the ship, and someone who knows how to do so. If the group agrees to help her out, she’ll reveal the ship’s location after arrival in the Quare starsystem. She’ll offer the group a flat million credits for their services, payable after they wilderness refuel the ship at a local giant, and return the ship to the Imperial Navy.
Referee's Information:
The Inclement Battle is on an orbit about the primary at approximately 11,000 AU, and it’ll be quite a trip. At 2G, it’s 210 days; at 3G, it’s 171.5 days. The Vargr will specify that lots of extra food be brought along, plus reserve fuel bladders that will need to be set up in the cargo hold to provide extra fuel for the cruiser’s power plant. A standard Far Trader should be able to handle it. The finders fee, for a ship this size, is .1% of the original value, or about 27,927,800 Cr. This princely sum, if split between the party, will be quite a find. If they can keep it. The Vargr herself was never an Imperial Marine, but is quite convincing to simply talk to. How she knows about the Inclement Battle and it’s current situation may never be known. The Vargr has discharge papers and resume career history that look authentic.
1. All is as presented. Roll 2d6 for mechanical, electrical, and engineering problems the players must overcome before reactivating the ship. Each fault will require 3d6 hours to repair (there are plenty of materials to work with and shops to use them in aboard the cruiser). Any questions about the difference in the ship’s condition and her original story will be brushed aside with, “I’m not an engineer, I have no idea why the techs we brought along said it was ready to go. I was just there to hold a gauss rifle.” The players even get a fair share of the money if they can get the ship back. Hopefully, they negotiated a better return that the mere million credits originally offered them.
2. As 1, above, except that no matter what the players negotiated, the Vargr will take all the money and attempt to get off that world as fast as she can.
3. As 1, above, except that communications are down in a strange computer glitch that will require their repair before the computer system can be activated. As soon as power is restored and communications are brought online, they players receive an Imperial Navy military encoded signal from the Thunderous Ovation. It is ten kilometers off the port beam, and its captain is very angry when she discovers that her entire marine detachment is missing. She will not accept any explanation involving the now over ten year long disappearance of her ship (to her, it seems as if no time has passed). She will send over another detachment of marines, and will forcefully (using her one hundred fifty or so remaining fully battledress armed marines) take possession of the Inclement Battle. All the players and the Vargr will be detained. On return to the Imperium, the Vargr will be found to have been a wanted pirate criminal. The players will be put on trial as accomplices. Proving that they were dupes should be difficult, but not impossible (if the player’s push it, their lawyer will play strongly upon the strange disappearance of the Thunderous Ovation for the last ten years, and the Imperial Navy will request the judge find them innocent if they’re all willing to sign non-disclosure agreements about the entire affair). If they’re convicted, send them to prison with one chance to get out, after which they’re fugitives. If they’re acquitted, set them free with some overly wise judicial warning about associating with criminals.
4. As 1, above, except the Vargr is a Zhodani-turned spy. As soon as the vessel is operational, she’ll try and use her formidable combat skills to take control of the ship (which she can pilot, and has preprogrammed courses on memory chips across various worlds back to Zhodani Consulate, and so she need make no Navigation rolls; these chips are in her possessions, and a snoopy player may just run across them). If she can kill, disable, or lock out the players, she’ll do so, and then she’ll take the ship back to the Zhodani Consulate for the intelligence coup of the century (if she makes it).
5. As 1, above, except that anyone that remains aboard the starship that brings the players and Vargr to the Inclement Battle will vanish untraceably within 1d4 hours after the first people reach the Inclement Battle. Any players remaining on the ship should be given a warning that the structure of the ship is beginning to fade away, or dematerialize. Give them three minutes (use a stopwatch) to run to the airlocks, get suited, and EVA before the ship disappears, with them on it forever. It shouldn’t be too difficult for any escaped players to get to the Inclement Battle. The Inclement Battle’s original four cutters are all still aboard, and one, remarkably enough, has a fuel scoop module. It’ll mean a lengthy trip to a local gas giant to pick up some fuel, including some coasting on minimal power, and the emergency rations still aboard are abominable, but it can be done, and they should still be able to get the ship itself over to one of the gas giants.
6. The entire situation is a lie. As soon as the players get to Quare they will fall under the attack of a 400 dTon (or other appropriately sized vessel) Corsair manned by other Vargr pirates. The players will have to shoot or fight their way out. Good luck.
