Every second session ends with that phrase. We can never go back to:
-Rodia
-Corellia
-Centerpoint Station
-Drall
-The Wheel
-Raxus Prime
-Imperial Center
-Sleheyron
The reason for this is because of our insistence on getting into fire fights with authorities. And the galaxy seems to be getting smaller all the time.
So my question is how does one go about altering their transponder codes? Can't just be as simple as a computers check. Would we need to steal them from another ship?
How would you folks handle this?
We can never go back to...
I'd make them pay someone with pretty serious computer skills and a facility for working on a ship. I'm sure there is more than one way registration of starships occurs and there is probably a lot involved in completely scrubbing a ship to give it a new ID.
Computers on the transponder itself, Streetwise or Skulduggery to establish a past history (a decades-old ship that doesn't show up on any port logs is suspicious), Mechanics or Skulduggery and some parts to alter the hull shape slightly to fool scanners.
Since they seem to burn bridges often, I'd make this into a narrative sequence to add to the story, not just a series of checks. Fast-forward over the course of couple weeks, with each player describing some way they're contributing to concealing their old identity and adopting the new one. Let them tell you what their characters are doing, then you decide what roll is relevant.
Steal a transponder from another ship.
Do they have any rivals?
Reason I ask is it would solve two problems at the same time if they do a swap. Put their transponder in a rivals ship and take their rivals transponder for theirs.
Of course, if your players are incapable of stealth they could just shoot the crew and steal the whole ship.
Here's a good thread for it:
Bounty hunters. You need that scum.
If they are pissing off authorities they should be acruing obligation. Imperial warrants issued for them and bounty hunters chasing them.
Add obligation to them and keep adding it till the characters learn to play nice, or they get so much they can't spend experience.
I made my characters pay several thousand credits to have the work done for them. I think I might have initially quoted 5,000, but they rolled well bargaining, and talked it down to 2 or 3K and a short cargo run. It was 7ish months ago so I don't remember the specifics.
If the characters want to do it themselves I'd make it a computers and a mechanics roll, both pretty tough.
I know this is digging up Ancient Star Wars Gaming Lore and all that, but according to the wisdom of Platt Okeefe in Platt's Smugglers Guide, you're looking at between 6,000 to 10,000 credits to forge the transponder verification codes and BoSS documentation, plus another 3,000 to 5,000 credits for a slicer to actually get into the BoSS database and match your records up with the fakes.
For Edge of the Empire, I'd say that this is rife for adventure potential, or for taking on Obligation in place of spending cash for having the records and transponder changed accordingly.