Saturday, June 8, 2013

Session 1: Heart of Darkness

Favorite Pregame Quote: In this game, if you go up against people with a lower technology level, you pretty much win automatically.

The campaign begins in a bar on a small metalworking planet. Bar flies drown themselves in cheap beer. On the television reporters discuss the disappearance of Zach Kurtz, a gang lord who stole several canisters of neuroplague. Halic Still, ex-agent of the Heyson government, is searching for a new crew. Halic recently stole a ship from a rival agent. Dubbed Providence, the ship is an old corsair model ship perfect for smuggling and adventuring.  These are the people that he found to man the ship-

Kevo Bandalin- Spoiled noble with a criminal record and a nice shuttle.

Jet Walters- Young photographer with a tragic past. Has a vintage camera.

Zex Vespers- Demented medical doctor.

"Kiki"- Explosives expert and pilot.

Dax Griffon- Once a member of both the Navy and the Merchant Marine, Dax was bankrupted by a fellow mariner. Great with turrets.

Dax's brother Hutch approaches Halic with a proposition. Hutch fought in the 2nd Altrani War a few years ago, and was left unemployed at the war's end. He tells Halic about an abandoned gubrox slave ship that crash-landed on a feral planet 10 months ago. He offers to lead them to it if he and his brother get a cut. Halic agrees, but distrusts the young veteran.

After a week of travelling through jump space, Providence reaches the orbit of a mysterious red planet. Quickly finding the crash site, the crew lands in a dense jungle with red foliage. The gubrox ship is mostly in pieces, with the exception of the front section. The crew heads their first. Pushing their way past the green-skinned gubrox corpses and mysterious crystalline corpses, they reach a door that still has power. When Halic opens the door, and a blast of cold air meets him. It seems that the bridge of the ship went into an emergency cryo-freeze during the crash. A massive gubrox corpse lies in the middle of the room. Scattered around are the corpses of several humans who perished in the crash. Suddenly, one of the human forms begins to stir. He is a tough-looking man with a revolver on his hip and a strange cylinder on his back.

Thatcher "the Badger", bad ass smuggler, wakes up after 10 months to find all of his companions dead. Barely batting an eye, he decides to join up with this new crew. When questioned about the cylinder, he replies that it was a plasma cannon wielded by the gubrox captain. He wants to get it fixed. With that, the crew sets off in search of the cargo bay.

Stuff that they find:
1. An ATV (that only Halic knows about).
2. Spare parts.
3. Spare electronics.
4. Spices.
5. A cheap drug known as "Buzz"
6. Gasoline

The crew split in two, one half guarding the loot, and the other half returning to the ship. On the way back they spot a humanoid creature in the bushes. The creature fires a red arrow at the party, which lands at Hutch's feet. A moment later, the arrow explodes, killing Hutch. The crew panics and rushes back to the ship. They discover four similar aliens near Providence. In the ensuing firefight three aliens are killed and one runs away. The party then discovers that some high-tech device has grounded their ship. They need to code to unlock the thrusters.

Using their shuttle, the crew reunites and pursues the surviving alien. Halic snipes the creature in the leg just as a similar creature runs up and attacks it. Disposing of the new creature, Halic brings the injured alien aboard. After a long interrogation, the crew gathers that these aliens are under the orders of some supreme god. The captive's tribe (the Ectgami) is at war with another tribe (the Afgami). The Afgami tribal chief has just been captured, and at sundown the supreme one will judge him for his supposed crimes against the Ectgami. The players release the alien with a small camera on his head.

The players watch as the ceremony begins. A bright light shines out of a make-shift temple, and a human in long robes steps forward. The crew recognizes him as Zach Kurtz, the renegade criminal who has been missing for several months. As the ceremony starts, the opposing tribe attacks. Seeing their advantage, the crew swoops down and decimate the Ectgami. A well-placed cryo-grenade by Thatcher freezes Kurtz in his tracks. During the battle, an Ectgami archer destroys the shuttle's left wing with a red arrow.

When the Ectgami are defeated, the chief of the Afgami thanks the crew for their timely arrival. He explains that Kurtz was after his black heart amulet, which gives the holder psychic visions of the future. Kurtz wanted to use it for evil. He goes on to say that the amulet has troubled him for decades. Thatcher offers to take it off of his hands, and the chief accepts his proposal.

Exploring the temple, the crew finds Kurtz's Pinnace. The crew decides to use the new vehicle in place of their damaged shuttle. They get the code to release Providence and depart from the feral planet. They head to planet Sin, the crime-center of Heyson. Thatcher has a plan to modify the Buzz he found. He dehydrates the plant, dubbing his new creation K-Buzz. The crew then contacts a few friends-

End-Game Actions:
1. Sell the shuttle for 5 million. As a part of the deal, Thatcher gets his plasma cannon attatched to the pinnace (now dubbed The Prophet).
2. Sell the K-Buzz. They got 250,000 for their supply. Their success inspires them to buy Buzz seeds and start a hydroponics lab on the ship.
3.  Kevo contacts his rich uncle Bartholomew. Bartholomew owns one of Sin's moons, and has turned the land into a drug plantation. Kevo hoped that his uncle would give him land to use to grow Buzz, but Bartholomew wouldn't offer anything without the promise of a generous cut. The crew leaves disappointed.
4. Private dealings. All of the players were running in and out of the room making backdoor deals. We'll see how that turns out.
5. The ship travels to planet Zenna to turn in Kurtz.



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