I recently ran episode 1 of Beyond the Rim. For whatever reason (it was framed as "1 shot" style, most players are new to the game, they were mostly combat-centric*, etc) Reom pitched them his offer, they bought some stuff, and then went to the ship to wait for the droid. They did contact Reom at a couple points (especially discovering the break in), and I reiterated information gathering each time ("You're on your ship?! I thought you'd be out looking for clues!"). In the end, the only information they got out of episode 1 was some astrogation data from the message pod and the answers to some of the questions during the initial negotiation.

What I'd like to do, is make their lack of "buying in" taxing later in the adventure as they effectively "failed" episode 1. It's obvious the information gathered is supposed to help later in the adventure, but the book doesn't comment on how this hurts a group if they don't have it. I've seen some pretty creative things on these boards in the time I've been lurking, care to help me out this time?

*Party is a 1) Human Marauder who deserted from the Imperial military, 2) Corellian Assassin who is indebted to criminals, 3) Human Gadgeteer who is a suspected Rebel, 4) Bothan Scoundrel who has sworn an oath to advance the Bothan species.

Note: I ran things pretty much as written, except to have the Imperials notice these two groups and set them against each other. I had them spread rumors the message pod was being held in the party's docking bay and used the ensuing firefight as cover for attaching the homing beacon (which was undetected). The party recaptured the droid and initially ran from security (and made the unauthorized exit), but once outside with the headhunters they decided to turn themselves in. The ensuing social checks resulted in success and a triumph, but with A LOT (6+) threat. I had them cleared of all wrongdoing, but delayed for 3 days by the interviews and paperwork.

This is pretty much why I skipped E1 of this module, or modified it...there is no compelling reason for the players to want to learn more about it. I dislike modules that assume the players are going to be interested in "going to the bar" or "checking out the equipment shops". If the players need to talk to the equipment shop owner, then the GM needs to damage their equipment in prep for that, or say something like "you might want some extra reloads for this trip". Otherwise that's up to the players, and it's very hit and miss. For my second run through the information came to them tangentially...but how I did it is irrelevant now*...

It might be easier to take a step back first. Break it down and ask yourself what information do you think they need to have in order to continue or to avoid setback/upgrade penalties, gain boost dice, etc.? If they didn't gather information, but they don't really need it to continue, just add lots of setback dice or upgrade the difficulties. Note that failures don't mean they can't find the planet, but the might end up in an asteroid field or a nebula, which provides its own set of challenges. Threats and Despairs might do damage to their ship, or disable a critical part, but not necessarily disable it entirely. They could end up crash-landing on Cholganna too, but there is a big Separatist frigate there they could probably steal parts from if they have to later...that becomes its own adventure.

If they ask "what's with all the setback dice and upgrades" you can just tell them they didn't ask around for more information. But it shouldn't end up being punitive, but rather adding to their set of challenges in a (hopefully) entertaining way.

--------------------------

* if you're interested, I set it up more like a breadcrumb search than a "shotgun hope and pray": the players had been captured by Zygerrian slavers, but the lead slaver took an interest in them because of their various backgrounds, particularly the explorer. The Zygerrian's brother had been on that ship, the Sa Naloar, and just before the jump to Cholganna, his brother sent him a final hypermessage with clues and a plea to come get him. The PCs were drawn in to help decipher the clues and pretty much took over from there (other events helped them break free from slavery, then eject the Zygerrians out the airlock). The clues led to an escape pod that contained what the brother *believed* were their final coordinates, but of course 20 years of time had passed, so astrogating was a challenge. I skipped the whole Imperial thing, except that the PCs already have a name made for themselves so that's easy to reintroduce if necessary...any number of bounty hunters could be following them at any moment. I also skipped the droid...the real sole purpose of the droid is to alert Harsol, but Harsol makes his crew patrol the old ship on occasion so he'd be alerted to the presence of searchers, so the droid felt entirely unnecessary.

I did a lot of foreshawdowing for this adventure. Over the course of 3 or four adventures the players learned of the story of the Sa Nalaor, there was a lot of rumors mixed in, until they met a historian who told them the REAL story.

by the time they reached my version of the "Wheel" they had:

deck plans of the same ship class

last known location before it made it's last jump,

A Crew manifest (including the name of the Captain),

Sliced computer and obtained a short bio of the Captain, which triggered an alert to ISB

They didn't know it at the time, but they also learned of Cholganna and Nexu

The sad part is, in all of the stuff of Episode one, i tried to keep information on the Droid Passenger to myself. And had to let Shira (Reom's sister) inform the players the importance of the droid,So they went looking for why he was late.

I think many things contributed to what happened and it will definitely be different next time. Most importantly, I think I'll have Reom be more ignorant about everything including the Sa Nalaor/his father's past than as presented. He'll basically bring the PCs in and say, "I got this pod. Apparently it's from something called the Sa Nalaor and might be worth a lot of money or have some interesting stuff on board. I've never heard of the thing or Cholganna, the place it's located. I'll pay you 10,000 credits to check in to the rumors and the site. If you find something big out I'll pay more, or reduce your obligation. Right now I have other matters to attend to, but by the time you finish I should be at IsoTech's Raxus Prime location. Head there when you're done."

The idea is to limit the PCs initial information so at minimum they need to go out and ask what the Sa Nalaor is/where Cholganna is. It'd be best if they asked about Reom and Isotech to learn what he might consider "something big" also. If they know little when they hit the streets then the basic success results would be worth something.

For the next session of this game, I think I'll take use some upgrades/setbacks, but moreover the group is behind and they know there's a lot at stake. I'm going to add Fear checks, both cool and discipline, when they reach a point where information gained in Episode I would've been useful.

For example, they didn't look in to navigational data for Cholganna? Well they have no idea there's a nebula, when they come out in it they'll have a moment of, "are we even in the right place?!" The Yiyar are ahead of the group, so when they see the Yiyar ship it'll be a moment of, "Have we been beaten?!?!?" They didn't ask about what to expect from Cholganna, so the "Fearsome Cholganna" checks will probably be upgraded. They didn't learn about the Imperials being interested, so it will be extra nerve racking when they show up. They didn't get any information on this specific Munificent frigate, they'll be nervous about wasting time looking in the wrong areas and wasting more time.

Hopefully this will drive home the point that they missed a lot in Episode 1 which they could've known without making too much of the rest of the adventure strictly more difficult.