Spoilers for Trouble Brewing below.

OK, for those that have followed my woes, this is not one of those posts (Thankfully!)

My Group consists of:

A Twilek Doctor

A Rodian Scoundrel

A Selonian Marauder

And a Drall Mechanic.

All at probably just under 100 XP.

They have sneaked into Dobahs asteroid base, and onto his ship unnoticed (my fault, they should have been).

They got the drop on 4 crew members (2 minion groups of 2).

I gave them one round with the minions, before Dobah, his First Mate, and Godan Nekata joined in.

They made short work of the Minions, tried to negotiate (unsuccessfully, and possibly abit haphazardly with Godan), and were trying to Stun Dobah.

The First Mate went into hand to hand with the Selonian, partly because I’ve not don’t any hand to hand on my side yet, and partly because his Club did more damage than his holdout blaster.

He beat the Selonian to a pulp, 2 Crits, and Unconcious, before she was Stimmed back onto her feet by the Doctor, and FINALLY finished the mook off… then Godan took a shot and put her down again, with a 3^rd Crit.

The Doctor took a Crit too, but was still on her feet.

Godan took out the Mechanic with a Crit, so hes down too.

The Rodian Scoundrel FINALLY stunned Dobah.

When we called it a night, two of the four PCs were out cold, one with 3 Crits (The Selonian), and one with a single (The Drall).

They have not defeated Godan Netaka, but they HAVE made efforts NOT to kill him (They didn’t shoot once at him, and even tried to negotiate, so I think he is safe as he will pretty much give up, and I don’t expect them to extort him after conversations last week).

However, the group have taken a HUGE beating, but everyone says they had fun… it was really rather tense!

My question is this… does it seem like that was too hard? My feeling is No… theres only one really combat character in the group, and it was the ‘Boss Fight’

I have Godan alive to hopefully prevent them stealing Dobahs ship (Godans is grounded, so he needs something to get away in)

So… do think that was a good result? It could have cone TPK, which would have been bad. But it didn’t.

And the next question is: Where do I go from here? They didn’t kill the sentry ship, and I was going to have some of Dobahs goons from Formos come and fight them on the way out (As they didn’t kill anyone when they rescued R4).

I want (And I think they will) turn Dobah into Thakba the Hutt for the 5k.

I would like to use Thakba as the intro to Depts to Pay (From the GM Kit), but I also want to start pushing the Dralls Obligation, so I need someway to get a message from the guy he owes money to, to the player).

I was also thinking I could play on Obligation that Thakba knows, or suspects they killed Teemo, and while he doesn’t care much, wants to use it as leverage.

The players need some serious healing, but I want to put the pressure on them (The Doc might well heal them all up in short order), but I don’t want to give them too much down time.

Suggestions are very welcome!

(Apologise for the possibly erratic writing, its nearly midnight at the time of writing!)

I hope you mean their characters and not the actual players?

I ask because we've driven our GM to wishing he could make rocks fall on us on several occasions.

"Every one had fun." Thats all that matters really. And the best feedback you can get as a GM.

Nothing wrong with a tense game. Let the doc heal them but don't give them to much downtime, as you said.

It's not too hard.

Even if "TPK" it's not like they would be dead, and there are valid reasons why Dobah might not braincase everyone who's down.

I don't know if a simple stim wakes you up from unconsciousness though.

I wouldnt say its a stretch that a Stim Pack that brings you back under your WT brings you back to consciousness... if it hadnt, the group may well all be dead. And I would have had a riot on my hands.

Results as they are, I am happy with it... it was a challenge i wanted them to face, but I wasnt sure if it was over the top so wanted opinions.

Frankly, it sounds like an awesome encounter. If you and your players had fun then that's pretty much my definition of "Doing It Right".

Sounds perfect. They saw the odds --- these non minions may be a hard fight-- lets talk it out! Didn't work... Time to kung fu fight.

If every mission or battle ended with a few scraps and bruises than it would get boring. I'd hope to be in battles that we could joke and talk about later. It makes the PCs feel mortal ...even though they are pretty strong being PCs and main characters there would be no real sense of danger if they didn't get whooped up on from time to time.

Harsh would be literally DPSing a character until they died. Than moved to the next...worse off targeting the softness non combat PC...that's harsh. What you did was remind them that things in the galaxy are bigger than them.

Plus they had fun. Sounds fun. I had my PC get slapped by a whompa for 9 damage of my 12 wounds in one hit lol!

The closer the shave the better, as long as you don't cut their throats.

And, remember you're not obliged to crit with combat rolls; use the advantages and triumphs for other effects, that don't affect the immediate combat encounter. I tend to damage/destroy expensive noncombat gear.

Sounds like the perfect encounter. And if they're beaten up, maybe instead of fighting the mooks on the way out that you had planned, they get to try and slip away from them hiding in lockers whilst the armed mooks tromp about looking for them - that sort of thing. Give the players the opportunity to pull this off and don't make it all hinge on one dice roll, give them ways they can legitimately get some boost dice to hide / ways where the difficulty would be lower.

What they said

As to using Debts to Pay next, I did the exact same thing.

Just my interpretation to work with how the first story went down and linking the next one.

If you want to Tap the Drell's debt obligation, you could have Godan let him know that his loan shark has been starting to put his name out in the bounty hunter's guild for non-payment. Nothing officially posted yet, but it can't be too far behind.

My group turned Dobah into the Hutt and then gave the Hutt a deal on the glitterstim spice if they could have Dobah's body, which they turned around and gave to the Imperials for a reward.

For the OP question, no it sounds like you handled the encounter fine honestly, players are extremely tough to permanently kill, your more specialized characters may even invest a little more into a broader selection of combat skills as a result.

They havn't had a chance to search the ship yet, we ended the session as soon as Dobah went down.

They need to deal with Godan now, and I plan on having Godan not so much surrender, but no longer threaten them.... the group seemed quite taken with his sisters worry, so I dont think they will kill him.

I will probably have him try and extort some portion of the bounty from them, but I wont worry too much if he doesnt succeed.

I will use him to prevent them stealing/salvaging Dobahs ship, on the bases Godan needs something to get away on himself, since his own ship is not usable, and he will take Dobahs ship to clear his debts. (This plays to my advantage on the previous issues ive had with the group).

I AM going to have the Party jumped for a beefy space combat on their way out. They didnt kill the sentry (Just the droid), and some of Dobahs goons from Formos will be there to try and rescue Dobah... I was thinking a Wayfarer or similar, and a 4 Headhunters or similar, just to make them sweat.

The group seem set on claiming the Hutt bounty, not the Imperial one, which surprised me... and mildly annoyed me, as the Imp bounty is actually a much smaller payout in the end.

After than, Thakba is going to pay out fine, they may need the cash, and I think the Doc is going to demand a Bacta tank, which wont hurt, (Just the bank balance). He is then going to subtly suggest that he may well know they are responsible for Teemos death.... he doesnt care, but others might.. so you might want to do a few favours for his silence....

like checking out my new mine (Debts to Pay).

Suggestions welcome!

Although you came close to a full party wipe out I like your approach. I prefer to run the Star Wars universe with certain NPCs stated just the way they are. I don't scale if the heroes force a confrontation. In the end that keeps it fun for them (oddly enough) because there's real threat and they have to think through their plans very carefully. They've talked or schemed their way around difficult battles because they know unless they roll some triumphs the dark side will be strong where they're headed. It keeps the Star Wars campaign exciting and realistic.

Now to the question of repeatedly critting on a downed PC to commit a death. I wouldn't go that route. I like that in EotE it's difficult to actually "die" because we're talking about heroes here. They might get down and captured but they ultimately will always have a chance to prevail. Luckily it hasn't happened yet; however, if the whole party gets knocked out they're going to find themselves delivered to someone they owe Obligation to or local authorities. Then the roleplay fun commences as they try to get out of their situation and reclaim their equipment (sadly loot or "lewtz" is still important to my players even in a non-D&D game).

So keep running your game world as a dangerous galaxy. There are forces that the heroes won't just show up and roll over. If, for example, they were to decide to bargain with Jabba the Hutt they'd find themselves with a nice chunk of Obligation or a stay in his prison if they try to force a fight. Plus there's always that pesky Rancor...

I dunno, Waltzing into Jabbas' throne room holding a thermal detonator could work.

It worked well enough in ROTJ.