This is part 3 of the story of a 3 part adventure; (The players have been asked to find Cortosis for the Rebellion.)
[As a GM my goals are to A) trash the ship, and upgrade the player's ship to something to house their fighters, as well as give the players access to a few new toys.]
The crew of Venture have successfully raided the Jedi Temple, and obtained data for the manufacture and construction of Jedi Star fighters to feed into the Rebellion, and they have determined that the fabled planet of Verona was the site of the first major battle for the overthrow of the Infinite Empire. The Rakatan where known to use force controlled drives and navigation systems, as well as large amounts of Cortosis.
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Infinite_Empire
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Rakata
Verona was known to be infested with Fefze Beetles and not much else lives there. Radiation had thoroughly polluted the planet.
This was the intro credits for this session; (I had prepared a lot of material and read out, Shakespearean because they discover some 25000 year old survivors.)
"Two armies, both alike in dignity,
Fought on fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge broke new mutiny,
And this fatal feud did make civil hands unclean.
With the piteous rage of these ardent foes,
Unleashed was the power of atomic strife,
This did start the Infinite Empire's overthrows,
'Tis said the cleansing fire did end its life."
The Venture headed to Verona and were promptly greeted by a warning. "Planet Interdiction In Place By Order Of The Jedi Council" (Since when would that slow players down?)
The planet is encircled by a huge cloud of metallic orbital debris, and they couldn't get sensor readings through the cloud. So they went for a polar insertion where the cloud was thinnest.
Under the cloud they ran a full scan of the planet's surface. All water sources were highly radioactive, but there were sparse life signs, metal readings, Cortosis readings, there was one odd energy reading. Rain and clouds carried huge amounts of radiation.
In exploring one wreck, they realized that the Fefze Beetles were hiding inside in the shade (think Riddick). Although they did discover that there was a high Cortosis reading in the engine section.
They then flew over what appeared to be the remains of some ground bases. One appeared to have strange energy readings, and cloaked in black. (This is how I visualized a Stasis Field... Cold, and nothing goes in or out.) The players took the bait and flew over the black... ship stopped... alarms, groaning sounds.. injuries abound. (It spiked through their ship.) They are like 300m up in the air, and the ship will not budge. Black feels cold, but gives no readings. (One funny story player touches it, and it won't let go, he needs to cut off the tip of his finger.) The decide to use their shuttle to haul down their Speeder Bikes to look around. They leave the Mechanic on the ship.
They speed over to one abandoned base and using their life form sensor determine that there quite a few Fefze in some rusted holes near the center of the landing pad. In fact all these pads have a similar pattern, and the Black was over what would appear to be the middle of one pad. There should be an entrance...
They head back to the black and start blasting at one of the hatches, its slow going, but the players notice a rain storm coming, so they head into their shuttle to wait it out. Fefze come out and slug it out with each other (think Riddick). Speeder bikes are irradiated.
After it dries up outside, they continue blasting their way into the metallic hatch. They walk down a long corridor and are faced with an odd control panel that seems to reach inside the black. The Slicer looks, and concludes its not electronics he's familiar with, its really old. He can't read the front panel, but there are two buttons, a red one, and a green one.
He presses the Green button and the black disappears, revealing a rather startled looking human is odd clothing who says, "Thou are't strangely garbed. Where dost thou hail from? What is that? (pointing at the droid)". The Marauder (not the brightest player, but he's often standing in front) steps forward, and says, "We come in peace." Noticing his swords, "Dost thou use the Force?" "Yes, but only the light side." The human's eyes go wide, and he reaches up and presses a button, klaxons and red lights light up the facility behind him, then he turns are runs further in. The Marauder chases tackles and knocks him unconscious.
The other players follow in, and are accosted many more similarly garbed men. The Marauder says, "I didn't kill him! I only knocked him out!" To which they say, "Thou are't villains and invaders! Come with us and we'll speak to the master!" (FYI, Humans are slaves in the Infinite Empire.)
They are marched into a throne room, with three Rakatan each carrying a sword, and there are three noticeably tough looking humans in the room. The one in the chair speaks, "To whom do I speak? What manner of animals are they? (pointing to the Twilek, Rodian, and Trandoshan) How did you get into a Rakatan military Base? Speak before I consume you!" The captain answers with, "The war is over. You lost over 25000 years ago, and you are quite possibly the last of your species." One of the humans runs off... runs back and speaks fearfully to the Master. The Master draws his sword, and cuts the man down.
He turns his attention to the players, "If you prick us do we not bleed? If you poison us do we not die? And if you wrong us shall we not revenge?" He looks at the rest of his people, and says, "Eliminate them. Use your null fields." Then he turns to leave.
The human slaves simple cower, with one saying to his slain friend, "Alas poor York, I knew thee well. Thou ar't slain, but by whom I dare not tell." The Humans in combat gear, press buttons on their belts, and vanish. (Stealth Fields) The Rakatan are Adversary 2, with Force Sense, for 4 upgrades they move on the Marauder. Other players quickly realize these guys are hard to hit. One blaster bolt is deflected back on the Gadgeteer in the first round, effectively taking her out of the fight. Its a fast brutal fight, which had the players wondering if they needed to make a defensive retreat, but they won with the Marauder prevailing against the Rakatan.
That is when they realized there was a new alarm. "Warning, you have 3 minutes to reach minimum safe distance."
As the players are getting ready to run (whilst looting the obvious valuables) when one of the human slaves says, "Thou are't brave and valiant. Help with our friend and thou are't welcome to our ship."
[The ship is slow (Hyper Drive 10).. not really upgradable, it has no shields, but it can carry fighters. Oh and it has Cortosis Armor. The players are only able to make communications work by using the com link on their one remaining speeder bike... ]
They get on the ship, take off, the base blows up (their old ship with it).. and they head home... call their handler who asked them to find the Cortosis. What the players don't realize is that their actions on Coruscant have caused quite a galactic stir. Giska shifts visibly from her usual stoic countenance, and switches from speaking in obscure Bothan. She looks at players and says in Galactic Three;
"When I was a cub, I had toy soldiers. For a time they went everywhere with me. In my paws and in my mind, they were unstoppable. Those toy soldiers fought in every war, and won a thousand battles. They faced every adversary, every opponent, no matter the odds.
Then one day I discovered a new toy, and I never thought of those soldiers again.
Until now. You made the emperor bleed on his home ground, which is no small feat. Not since the battle of Yavin has the Rebellion been talked of with such openness. You brought Cortosis and hope to the Rebellion.
The Rebellion needs more beings like you. Will you join us?"