Blount in this campaign reminds me of Nelson a bit - heroic ship commander who leads a series of aggressive victories against long odds, only to die in the midst of his last great victory, establishing a tradition among the service that lasts a generation or more. I expect to see a lot of "blounting" happening in his honor going forward.

This is so true. We have precedence as well from an earlier descent campaign (Road to legend). One character, if they spent both their actions to attack, got a 3rd attack, this was called a "Battle Action". Now this character also developed the ability to cast spells through other characters, so he rarely had to move. each turn the player would um and ah about his options before boldly declaring a " BATTLE ACTION!". It's the same guy who played Blount as well.

Nowdays, anytime somone stands and attacks multiple times, in any game, it is a "BATTLE ACTION".

The last few weeks have gone a bit slower than expected due to my players being ill, so it's been a while between updates. However, here are all three battle reports from the last two weeks.

Korvas shipyard raid - Fleet action

The empire has been converting a civilian dry-dock into a military drydock. The implications for the rebellion were quite dire, as it would mean faster turn around time for Imperial ships, and therefore, more patrols in the sector.

The drydock was also big enough to handle Imperial Class Star Destroyers, and Fleet Command wanted it blown up at all costs. The first attempt, a sabotage run was blown almost immediately as the empire were waiting for them and the operative was nearly captured. Throwing all caution to the wind, Fleet command threw everything they had, and everything they could borrow at the problem.

As our sector fleet is quite small, everything was a Borrowed Assault Frigate from Fleet Command, 3 Cr-90's and 8 stands of Z-95's.

The objective was represented by the space station with 6 shields. That could take any amount of damage after that point, but would be destroyed on a single critical hit.

Opposing them was one Victory Star destroyer, and 6 stands of tie fighters.

Sounds like a horrible mismatch right? The rebels were deeply suspicious of the table deployment, of the fact they had initiative when they didn't buy it, and the fact i'd asked one of them to bring his spare gladiator.

The rebels came in fast, faster than I initially anticipated, and went straight for the objective. Then i revealed the hyperspace markers under the debris fields and deployed my gladiators behind them using hyperspace assault.

A classic tactic, with one massive flaw. I brought them in too slow, so they got one round of shooting before the rebels darted away from them.

However, in that one round I annihilated one Cr-90 and badly damaged the Assault Frigate. The Captain of the CR-90, Anto Salamon, went down with the ship and was presumed dead.

Although recent information suggests he was captured alive. Poor Imperials, Anto is known for being a pompous arrogant jerk and will no doubt regale them with stories of how the Rebellion will be diminished with his loss, as in his mind he "Was the best of us".

Things look grim for the rebellion until turn 3, when the whole mission changed on a single dice roll. Taking his pile of red dice, Airen Cracken commanded the damaged assault Frigate to open up on the drydock. And in one volley of fire, all 6 shields went down. The Imperials were very concerned, until his second volley failed to produce the kill shot.

However, two CR-90's were rapidly moving into range, and a volley of turbolaser fire from those two ships produced the critical result needed for victory.

Slow to respond and turn, the Imperial fleet could do nothing to stop the high speed rebel force from disengaging victoriously.

This was probably the best mission of the campaign, as it felt like the rebels were doomed when the Gladiators appeared and ripped into them, but they stuck to the plan, kept on moving, and punched a whole through the defences, killed the target and fled with the loss of only one ship.

Stealing Fighters - Ground command assault on Zenith Storage facility

This mission took place at a hidden hangar facility near the polar icecap of Zenith.

The Alliance received intelligence that a small number of Republic era fighters and other contraband was being stored in this hangar.

The plan was to infiltrate a special forces team into the base, clear the way of resistance and escort pilots to the fighters and have them escape with them.

This was our very first "two-part mission", as we also played out the escape from the planet using X-wing.

The same special forces team participated in this attack as the last Special forces report.

It's worth noting that the picture above is at turn 4 (I forgot to take pics earlier). By this time the rebels had got very busy and had gunnerd down a rather high number of Stormtroopers.

Yep, 13 models taken out in the first 3 turns. That's some busy killing going on.

The Special forces team split into two groups. Hallarn (Commander), Keel (Sniper) and Fenn (Himself) acted as a firebase, coming in from the north entrance on turn 1.

Gooda (Gunfighter) and Gaxx (Wookie) come in through the side entrance on turn 2, with the pilots following behind them on turn 3.

Virtually every shot was a kill by the rebels, it was uncanny. I expected the sheer number of troopers to slow them down, but it really didn't. And while I managed to wound two characters, this mission never looked like it was going to be anything other than a rebel victory after turn 2.

I cam quite close to killing/badly wounding Fenn When he didn't take into account my officers moving the E-Webs and their double shots. But ended up 2 points short (The amount his new armour protected him by.....)

The conclusion from this battle is a minor rules change. Due to Rebel characters being able to heal themselves easily when the pressure is off, I am changing the "no reinforcement" option to "delayed reinforcements" for Imperial Assault.

The Rebels got all their pilots to their ships, picking up 9 Y-wings (including a couple of the version with locked forward turrets) and a surprising 3 X-wings. In Addition, the astromech droids assigned to the ships had been left installed and had all developed unusual personality quirks. (Each of the unique R droids for X-wing was unlocked as a unique card)

Stealing Fighters - Space Combat with new fighter squadron

This mission wasn't for high stakes, it was like a "bonus round" for the first 3 rounds of the campaign (the first quarter if you would as the campaign will last 12 rounds............ oh wow...... John Cena reference).

The Rebels massively outgunned the Imperials, and the idea was a mini-competition to see who could kill the most Tie-fighters.

Each player got 2 identical ships from the following options, once one option was gone, a player had to pick another, and they picked in "reverse glory" order

• Grey Squadron Y-wing with Ion Turret
• Gold Squadron Y-wing with Ion Turret and Proton Torps
• Rookie X-wing with Proton Torps
• Gold Squadron Y-wings with blaster turrets locked in forward position.

Very tidy formation playing if i do say so myself.

Still, the idea was to give the guys a final "hit-out" for this section of the campaign, let them experience the new fighters (and cheer for making the Z-95's obsolete).

Final kill totals

Luxon Militia (X-wings) - 3

Basra Consortion (Y-wing variant) - 3

People's movement (Y-wing gold) - 2

Republicans (Y Wing Grey) - 0

A 2 to 1 points differential in a game makes for a really funny and quite different experience.

Round 3 will conclude with one and a half roleplaying session, followed by the end phase. Then the campaign will take a break for a month or so.

RPG update - A murder mystery in space

Round Three end phase - Talathen Sector Campaign

Our ¼ way break is over and the campaign resumes this week. I thought it best to leave the results from round 3 until we were ready to start round 4.

From this point on, all glory rewards and research points are increased by 25%. At trun 6 that will go to 50% and 75% for the last three turns.

The idea behind that is to ensure that no one is totally out of the chase for glory, and final victories mean more than early ones.

The map is updated on the right, Red for Rebels, Grey for Imperials, Pink for “the devourer cult” and Green for an unknown faction.

Mission reports

Luxon – Feeling frustrated at being at being unable to break the blockade over Luxon, fight command decided to conduct a flyover raid, in an attempt to show the flag and boost morale. What they didn’t count on was this being seen as an opportunity by civilians to follow the fighters through the blockade and escape.

Most of the civilian ships made it through the blockade, but the members of Red squadron, and their Z-95’s paid a high price. Fighter Commander Lt Blount died in this incident.

Zenith – Following up on a lead from a new pilot joining the rebellion, Special forces hit an old republic storage area to capture a squadron of mothballed Y-wings. This was a rousing success and the storage facility also included a small number of X-wings. 9 Y-wings and 3 X-wings were obtained for fighter command with no casualties incurred.

Korvas – A daring raid was conducted on the imperial space dock facilities on Korvas. Despite the Empire being ready for the attack, they were not ready for the approach speeds and cavalier attitude of the fleet. Although they lost on cr-90 and it’s commander Anto Salamon, they have prevented the Empire from being able to service Imperial class star destroyers in sector.

The Boneyard – Cresh squad special forces have been expanding operations in the boneyard and have received additional support from high command. An intelligence intercept allowed Cresh Squad to intercept the prison ship that was transporting Anto Salamon. An attempted rescue operation was repelled by elite zero-g trained Stormtroopers. Anto’s body was later displayed on an Imperial broadcast as the Empire gained a PR coup from branding him “the mastermind of the Korvas terrorist attacks”.

Cahn – A diplomatic mission to Cahn has revealed the Devourer cult, despite its name, is open to discussion with the rebellion about combating the Empire. More information is required before a deal can be struck

Imperial Purge – A massive crackdown on the core worlds of Talathen Prime, Talathen VII and Korvas is underway. Rebels are being actively sought and rewards offered, this has eroded rebel support on Talathen, although the resounding victory on Korvas has undermined these efforts.

Nimbala – Something unusual is happening on Nimbala outside the rebellions view. Another force on Nimbala has begun undermining Czerka operations and conducting guerrilla warfare, Czerka’s share price for the Nimbala holding company is plummeting.

Mysterious contact – Someone hacked into the Rebellion secure channels and asked to discuss a shared interest in defeating the Empire. This individual eventually revealed himself as Professor Hodda, a Hutt exile who claims to be more concerned with science and legitimate business than most Hutts. He has offered to work with the Rebellion against the Hutt Cartel, Black Sun and Empire in return for defence related contracts.

Dealing with the Beast – As noted in the previous RPG report, Aurek Team was dispatched to meet and recruit the legendary “Beast of Luxon”, a famed naval officer with a sizeable following. His recruitment brings in a Nebulon-B frigate and two cr-90s to the fleet.

Recruitment

As we are introducing a new mechanic, alliances, recruitment went a little differently. Alliances are powerful characters who have a special bonus. Alliance characters are never “directly controlled” by the players, but they always have closer ties with one faction over the others.

Any actions by alliance partners generate half-glory. But they can do a lot more than a normal single character. The first two alliances represented, are Hodda and his business enterprise and the Wookie clan that was rescued on Nimbala in turn 2.

Professor Hodda went to the people’s movement for 13 clout. More concerned with the Hutts operations than the others, the People’s movement wished to keep the closest eye on the Hutt.

Attatark, Wookie chieftain went to the Republicans for 18 Clout. Always on the lookout for military assets, the Republicans did not hesitate to spend heavily to obtain an army of loyal wookies.

After the alliances were recruited, we moved on to the normal passage of recruitment. All blind bids.

X-3PO, A protocol droid reprogrammed into a Assassin Droid. X-3PO is a cpabale assassin and diplomat. Respecting such a dual threat, the Luxon Militia paid 21 clout to obtain his services.

Gaarkan, A Wookie warrior and brawler, good for smahing things and not much else. 15 clout to the People’s movement as the shore up their interests in Special forces

Salin Hoark, an excellent smuggler and light transport pilot. Continuing the complete lockout of smuggling operations, she went to the Basra Consortium for 10 clout

Tarn Mison, an average X-wing pilot but quite a good squadron leader. He also went to the Basra consortium for 10 clout. With a vacant Fighter Command position following the death of Blount, are the Basra Consortium about to push for a military command?

Oleg Thrax, the Beast of Luxon, a great fleet officer with his own ship. Went to the Basra consortium for 21 clout in another military move. It’s worth noting that the basra consortium went into this round with a lot of clout to spend.

Horton Salm, in a surprise twist, the Basra consortium gave 17 clout to the Luxon militia in order to lock anyone else out of obtaining the service of legendary Y-wing ace Horton Salm. The Luxon militia paid 24 clout for him, of which only 7 came from their own supplies.

This left the Republicans with 13 Clout and the People’s movement with 14 as they did not make a similar deal in response.

Glory updates.

After three rounds we have two divisions in Glory, the leading pair are virtually in a dead heat and well clear of the trailing two.

The Luxon Militia – 62 Glory

The Republicans – 61 Glory

The Peoples movement – 43 Glory

The Basra Consortium – 34 Glory

Nine rounds to go, and still a lot to play for.

I continue to be amazed by this campaign. Brilliant work!

The Empire slaps back - Planning phase round 4.

Round 4 and things are starting to heat up.

The postings phase led to the first major shake-up with Del kern being removed from command of ground forces and replaced by Hallarn Yarn. This gives the People’s movement their first military command and takes one military command away from the Republicans.

Deals were made for this position involving a trading of clout from the People’s movement to the Luxon militia in exchange for an unopposed run at the Squadron Leader position.

X-3PO, a free protocol droid turned assassin was surprisingly promoted to the new “Head of Strategic Alliances” position, giving the Luxon Militia control over interactions with allied partners.

This left the Luxon militia in a position to gain two positions this round, but in a surprise move they back out of their unopposed run at the Squadron Leader job and instead gave it to Torryn Farr of the Republicans.

Wheels within Wheels…….

Discussions were also had about podcasting these planning phases, as they are hilarious at times.

Oh, if anyone is interest ed. This is what the game board looks like during the planning phase. So many moving parts!

Imperial Phase

I place down my three “trap” cards, worlds where the first action hits imperial forces waiting in place and causes extra red and purple dice on rolls.

Intelligence update

Well, things are clearly heating up for the rebellion. The biggest news was that the Luxon blockade is over as the Empire has decided to invade and go after dissident elements.

The strategic map was covered in item updates, here’s a picture.

The key is as follows

Yellow – Diplomatic and intelligence missions

Purple – Ground Missions

Blue – Fighter missions

Green – Ground missions

Purple – Imperial actions

Conflict and problems were occurring across all sectors, from the Luxon invasion, the Nimbala breaking into civil war, Nadir and Zenith being blockaded and more. This was the first turn the rebels could not hope to deal with every issue, so difficult decisions had to be made.

The Plan

The Rebels wanted to cover a lot of ground, delay the Empire where they were strong and hit them where they were weak. So that formed the corner stone of their decisions for the rest of the phase. Tie the empire up, as a stand-up fight on all fronts will go badly for them fast.

The command team planned out every possible move, but that relied on everything going well…. As you will soon see, that was not the case.

Reminder, success points are as follows 1 for an advantage, 2 for a success and 5 for a triumph.

Oh, and Aurek team has been dispatched to investigate what the Empire is doing with the Crystals on Solitude X.

Strategic alliance Phase

The Alliance phase is new and uses the new alliance cards. There is only one action that the alliance commander can take, and that is negotiating with Alliance partners.

It is a social roll, and each “point” of success (uncancelled advantage = 1, Success = 2 and triumph = 5) allows the Alliance commander to activate one alliance partner during the round. They may take any action appropriate based on their alliance card (see below), but the Alliance Commander and the owner of the alliance leader must agree on that course of action. If they cannot agree, the alliance does not act (But may act later if they spend another point).

All alliance partners’ actions score half glory.

An average roll for Alliance Command (only one activation), so there is already a spanner in the works for the complex plan this turn. Making a quick decision the Alliance Commander decides the priority it to get the Wookies in the fight at Luxon.

The 2 ^nd snag emerges as that is where the first imperial trap is waiting. So the Wookies walk right into an ambush laid by General Paulus of the Imperial Army. Not a good start and the wookies are rolling more negative dice than positives. The Rebel commanders spend a fate point, a big call.

A miraculous roll and two successes, the Wookies successfully engage and blunt a part of the invasion of Luxon.

Logistics Phase

With a 2 ^nd Special forces squad and a 3 ^rd fighter squadron joining the alliance command from the last turns recruiting, pressure on Logistics Command to obtain the resources needed to fight has gone up dramatically.

Logistics command improves manufacturing, now the alliance has one of each core resource available to purchase from in-house suppliers. A good start.

The rest of the management phase does not go well and the long term investments do not increase the overall income stream for the rebellion.

Smuggling goes smoothly, and for the first time the squadron escorting the smugglers does not suffer any casualties.

Among other supplies, logistics also secures contracts to be able to buy Y-Wings and YT-class freighters. As the only fighters previously available for purchase were Z-95’s, this is a big upgrade. Still, with too much to do this turn, and not enough cash, the rebellion doesn’t buy any new fighters.

Intelligence Phase

Faced with a massive PR blitz from Imperial Intelligence in regards to the capture and death of Fleet Commodore Anto Salamon, Chief of Intelligence Nibb Nibb decided to hack the holonet on Talathen Prime during a news broadcast, and substitute his own message.

A difficult task, but Nibb Nibb is an expert hacker, 6 points of successes later and the Rebellion briefly seizes the airwaves to tell the truth of the Korvas raid and Salamon’s death.

With a lot of missions ahead this turn, Nibb Nibb gets Ged’Ruh to gather information to build up the intelligence pool. Ged fails to deliver any results, so Nibb Nibb cancels a planned mission for Sly and puts him on gathering intelligence, an excellent roll generates 8 intelligence points to be used this turn.

Diplomacy Phase

The Diplomatic core has been on a roll and that did not stop this turn.

Jah Dooza, Ithorian hippy and force sensitive was dispatched to Nimbala, to get to the bottom of the crisis. Rolling 11 points worth of successes the force just happened to drop him right where he needed to be. He encountered the Twi’Lek force user that had been sighted by him and Aurek team in the jungles of Axamar only a few months ago. A full report to command will be coming soon.

Gidd was sent to open a diplomatic station on the Chiss fortress world of Kronos. A modest success means that process will be successful, but no earl information was available.

Lianna Tell responded to a request to our new embassy on Cahn to help them with a problem. With 6 points of successes, it was quickly revealed that the “Devourer Cult” is not as malicious as the name sounds, but does have dissident elements within their faith they are having problems with. The cult has offered, that if the Rebellion helps them with their dissents, that they will help the Rebellion in turn.

This was another good round for the diplomatic team.

Fleet Command

After last turns stunning raid on Korvas, Fleet command opted for a more conservative option. A Victory Star Destroyer had been sighted near Samoth, in the process of deploying probe droids to scan the planet. As the Rebellion has few forces on Samoth, the plan was to hit this Star Destroyer hard and destroy it, in order to convince the Empire that Samoth was important to them.

Unfortunately, supplies of Starship fuel are low, so only 4 class sizes worth of ships are available for the mission. Due to “The Beast” bringing over his fleet, the Rebellion now has 4 CR-90 Corvettes and has sent them to do the job.

An excellent planning roll by Admiral Cracken sees the Empire losing initiative, unable to reinforce and without the majority of it’s fighter screen.

This should be a slam-dunk for the Rebel fleet, but this attack is occurring while Luxon is being bombed and Nadir and Zenith are blockaded.

Squadron Command

The post Blount era begins in fighter command with Torryn Farr taking over the planning duties for Squadron Command. I guess this means she won’t be getting to Echo base to say “Stand by ion control, fire” in our timeline.

However, the post-Blount era began poorly when X and Y-wings deployed from Zenith to interfere with the blockade ran straight into a prepared Imperial force. Another one of my “trap cards” was revealed and the planning roll was not good, giving the Empire 4 planning points to use to disadvantage the rebellion.

Lt Telsji commanded his squadron of Headhunters to Luxon to interfere in troop landings of the invasion. A close roll, but they will have the initiative and will deploy 2 ^nd during this raid.

Ground Command

Del Kern has been demoted and is now a squad leader. Hallarn Yarn promised a new decisive era of tactics, but so far has failed to deliver.

Keel’s team has targeted the orbital base that has nearly finished construction around Selano. As the Imperial Fleet has moved away, it seems like a prime target. The goal is to break into the station, seize it and booby trap it to explode when recaptured if possible. A poor planning roll means the Empire will have extra reinforcements for the mission.

Del kerns team is deploying to Nimbala to target Czerka forces and fly the Rebellion flag. A modest roll means they will deploy 2 ^nd .

Other

Recruitment gained three successes, and wants to recruit Operatives, Ground Commanders and Aces.

Training got 10 points to spend on training skills

R&D got 12 points to spend on Fighter research.

Intelligence spent 5 points to find out exactly what was going on with a series of shipments going through Axamar’s Tane station recently. This was revealed to be dozens of self-contained survival pods, miniature bases that can be dropped from low orbit and act as hidden supply caches in hostile terrain. They were destined for Nimbala, and records show that hundreds have been deployed over the last few months.

Well, that’s the turn planned out. RPG session starts this week as the team investigates the mystery of Solitude X. Ice caves, strange crystals, Imperial secrets, silent monks and spy games await.

RPG Update here,

Battle updates coming soon, had a hard time writing up the RPG update.

Well, its been a while since we updated for numerous reasons. A few people have been away on business trips or personal holidays, and our one of our players is also a new dad since the last update! So a heap happening in "real life" and that's more important than the fate of Talathen sector

Things will be getting back to normal in the next few weeks, so I thought I would write up the battle reports that have been sitting around idle for a few months.

I'll do some very short write ups for the first 3 missions, and a lengthier one for the finale. (I didn't have my camera for some of these, so less photos than normal)

Bombing Runs on Luxon

With Luxon now under invasion, the Rebels made some efforts to slow the attack down. A unit of wookies were deployed to support the resistance, and one of the Headhunter squadrons was assigned to interdict bombing runs made on Luxon positions.

This scenario was as follows. Each bomber had a total of 3 bombs/missiles. Each unused bomb or missile that made it off the board was a VP for the Empire, each bomb/missile used by the Empire or unused when the bomber was killed was a VP for the Rebellion.

This was a great little battle, with the Headhunters dueling with the Tie Fighter screen while the Bombers tried to push through.

One pair of bombers were annihilated in short order after using their missiles once ganged up on, giving the Rebels 6 VPs. But the second pair flanked right and went full speed for the edge, covered by a pair of ties. While the Headhunters pursued and landed some hits on them, it wasn't quite enough to stop them. 6VP's to the Empire and a tied scenario. A nice close game.

Harassing the blockade of Zenith

With Zenith under blockade, the X/Y wing squadron was deployed to hamper it's effectiveness. To this end, they targeted a group of deep space "hyperjump scanners" that would notify the Imperials of incoming ships from Hyperspace.

The Rebels were over matched in this fight, 3 Y's and an X vs 4 interceptors and Snattercat, the local Tie Advanced Ace (A fully kitted out ace with vaders card).

In a smart move, the Rebels ignored the Ties and focused on their objectives. Going full speed for the transmitters, they destroyed them easily, although after exposing their flanks to the Ties they did suffer some causalities. 2 Y-wings shot down, but 100% mission goals completed.

One of the things with scenario play is that you can have overwhelming odds if the objectives are finite enough and it's still winnable.

Distraction of Samoth

One thing that concerned the rebels during this rounds planning was the actions of a Victory Star Destroyer in Samoth. It was launching probe droids in the area and appeared to be searching for a hidden rebel base.

Instead of just letting this happen, the rebels decided that if they attacked the Star Destroyer, it might intensify search efforts on a planet where the rebels have no bases or major support.

The plan was to hit the Victory with 4 correlian corvettes in a drive by attack. Unfortunately, I forgot I only have 3 Corvette models and forgot to ask my players to bring a 4th, so we subbed in a Neb-B from the fleet for the other 2 corvettes.

This battle was quite interesting, with the rebels harassing the Victory but staying clear of it for the 1st half of the battle. That changed when the Victory surprised the Rebels by quickly turning and accelerating to escape.

Of course, it wasn't fast enough to escape the engagement zone before taking too much damage, and in a final effort turned back to engage the corvettes with a broadside.

And yet again, a Victory destroyer is rammed to death by Corvettes.

Mission successful, although the Victory did put a fair amount of damage onto the attacking ships in the process. This will certainly get the Empires attention.

Conclusion

Good to be back typing this up, next time, the dramatic assault on the Imperial Asteroid base orbiting Selano, and the amazing climax to the best battle of the campaign to date.

Some games are good, some games are bad. And rarely, you play an amazing session where everything works and people will talk about it for years to come.

This battle was one of those sessions, a genuine nail biting fight that came down to the wire and had every player nervous about which way it would go.

The objective was the seize control of the asteroid bases engineering command centre, set the reactor to overload, and get out in time.

The mission rules were as follows.

• Imperials on half reinforcement points until alarm sounds.
• Reinforcements come from off screen.
• When the Alarm sounds, doors are locked and can only be opened by Imperials. But can be blasted open.
• There are three consoles in the main control room. Imperial officers can access them, and the players can "hack" them using their characters mental and hacking skills.
• Each terminal allows the players to make one choice. Take control of security doors, kill the alarm, set the self destruct timer on the base for a number of turns they choose.
• Finally, make it back to the shuttle before the timer reaches zero and the base explodes. It costs an action to board the shuttle.

Things started off hot for the Rebels, as they dealt with the initial outlying guards easily and the Alarm was not raised until they made it into the control room.

The first console hacked locked the security doors and allowed the Rebels to control access. They then killed the 3 officers in the control room to ensure they couldn't override the controls. This left 2 officers in the complex, one of which was near the shuttle, the other behind multiple security doors.

The alarm was shut off, and then the team set the self destruct for 5 turns.

Gaxx (Brawler) and Gooda (Gunsligner) briefly engaged the advacing stormtroopers, allowing Hallarn (Commander), Keel (Sniper) and Fenn (Commando) to try to secure the ship.

The officer near the shuttle was cut down, and the other one never did make it past the security doors in time to shut off the self destruct. The Imperials fought a rear guard action, blocking access to the shuttle.

Here is the board position with 1 turns to go. Storm Troopers have secured the ship access, Finn, Keel and Hallarn have enough movement to get to the shuttle ramp and use an action, but stormtroopers are blocking their access. They do not have enough actions to take a shot this turn, and Gooda had already boarded.

The only option, that allowed the maximum number of Rebels to escape was for Gaxx to take both his actions as attacks, deal "cleave" damage to as many imperials as he could, and then use his last endurance to occupy a spot by the ramp so the Rebels couldn't be blocked leaving.

This mean't that Gaxx chose to stay behind until the last possible moment to allow the rest of the team to escape, knowing full well he would likely die as a result.

Hallarn "Gaxx, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?"
Gaxx "I'm making a choice"

Gaxx turns, force pike in hand and engages the stormtroopers in brutal melee combat, the ramp of the shuttle closing behind him as he is finally pulled down by sheer weight of numbers.

As shown here, we rolled the "red dice of despair" to determine Gaxx's fate, this result is a "captured" one. Being captured on a space station that is going nuclear is not ideal, so sadly, Gaxx is dead.

We've lost characters before in the campaign, due to misadventure and the happenings of war. But this was the first really "cinematic" death, where a grumpy anti-social weequey thug, who no one really knew or understood why he was fighting for the rebellion, nobly laid down his life to cover his teams escape.

That's the wonder of narrative games and playing stories. You not only get a good game out of it, but you get some really defining moments like this.

Overall, the tension of the count down timer, the imperial reinforcements and the constant pressure in this scenario made for a great experience. Good times.

One more mission for this turn and then the end phase.

Sounds like an awesome campaign session! Can't wait to hear what happens next

I'm really enjoying your campaign reports, so goodness knows how much fin your players are having. Inspirational stuff.

HOW THE BLIMMIN' HELL DID I MISS THIS IN JULY?!>!?!? BEST CAMPAIGN EVER!

HOW THE BLIMMIN' HELL DID I MISS THIS IN JULY?!>!?!? BEST CAMPAIGN EVER!

We've been on hiatus for a while due to a bit of burn out and real life issues (business trips, holiday trips and new family members)

But should be back solid, with a small break over xmas, for now.

Ithkrall, I'm seriously considering trying to run something like this with my group of players, but probably without the RPG element. What kind of rebalancing would you recommend to your system? Would diplomacy, for example, become less important? And would intelligence become less thematic too (I guess not as much, as I would still use it to inform players of new missions, objectives, supply routes, etc)? In short, would it still work, in your opinion?

Ithkrall, I'm seriously considering trying to run something like this with my group of players, but probably without the RPG element. What kind of rebalancing would you recommend to your system? Would diplomacy, for example, become less important? And would intelligence become less thematic too (I guess not as much, as I would still use it to inform players of new missions, objectives, supply routes, etc)? In short, would it still work, in your opinion?

The RPG thing, oddly, doesn't add much to the main "game mechanics" as it is just another mission. I mainly use it to "flesh out" the sector, by having the players visit different planets and set off events that impact the overall story. it's a big part of the narrative engine, so, if anything, Intelligence and Diplomacy would be more important, as those are the channels to introduce new data.

I don;t know if i've put it in the rules anywhere yet, but "heat", "fleet presence" and "support" all factor into the difficulty for challenges on planet.

Heat is caused by missions, and cools down over time. Blow up a base, heat goes up.

Fleet presence is where the Empire is concentrating its forces and makes operations harder.

Support is how many people actively support each faction, and also helps. a Fully supportive empire world is harder to get allies on.

If you check out the campaign map from each turn you can see these markers.

Diplomacy is a way to reduce heat and build/erode support, And Intelligence can be used to predict fleet movements and shift heat around

I strongly recommend building your sector with your players as well, it's a fun process and gets HUGE buy in from them, as they are already invested in the setting as they helped build it. Plus it saves the old brain from having to come up with everything.

You use these cards references I made, based off an indy shared narrative game with a standard deck of cards. https://www.dropbox.com/home/Star%20Wars/World%20building%20cards

Stack spades on top (planets) then clubs (locations), Hearts (factions) and the diamonds (Wildcards)

Each player draws one, and answers the first part of the question, then the player to the right adds the next column and so on. you also start drawing the map on paper or a white board, the folder has our "creation map" from the session. When a card is done, the deck moves to the next player. The GM counts as a player and has a go as well.

As GM, you make notes and overrule anything too silly, like having korriban in the middle of your sector if you don't really want it there.

Amazing stuff, thanks for the sector-building deck ithkrall! I'll probably wait until the new year before trying to get the group together, so that leaves plenty of time to consider how I'll go about things. Do you think it's feasible to hang more narrative weight off of the IA element of the campaign? It would of course be limited to combat, and so be lightyears away from full roleplay, but I was wondering what you thought of the idea...

Basically, introducing some of the elements you'd otherwise have through rpg via map easter eggs, explicit descriptions of environment and enemies, and even the possibility of dialog effecting skirmishes and troop availability. The ring found on the crystal world in your campaign, for example, could be found under certain conditions met by players during the skirmish. Guess I'd be aiming for something closer in style and depth to Mass Effect dialog rather than Pathfinder

Amazing stuff, thanks for the sector-building deck ithkrall! I'll probably wait until the new year before trying to get the group together, so that leaves plenty of time to consider how I'll go about things. Do you think it's feasible to hang more narrative weight off of the IA element of the campaign? It would of course be limited to combat, and so be lightyears away from full roleplay, but I was wondering what you thought of the idea...

Basically, introducing some of the elements you'd otherwise have through rpg via map easter eggs, explicit descriptions of environment and enemies, and even the possibility of dialog effecting skirmishes and troop availability. The ring found on the crystal world in your campaign, for example, could be found under certain conditions met by players during the skirmish. Guess I'd be aiming for something closer in style and depth to Mass Effect dialog rather than Pathfinder

Narrative can go anywhere, as long as the story drives along, its all good. If IA is the best fit, the by all means do that. Whatever works for you and your group is the key.

Another thing is campaign length, we have set ours at 12 rounds. So it allows the players to make decisions based on that planned length when it comes to recruitment and whatnot. Also, glory scores increase as the campaigns goes on, so the person dead last has a chance to catch up.

Talathen Sector - End phase round 4

Personal Update

Well, this last month or so has been an unpleasant one for my group and I.

My sister lost her battle with cancer just after New Years, one of my other players has had to deal with a major family crisis, and another the death of a friend.

All in all, 2016 started off horribly for my friends and I and Talathen Sector takes a fair bit of work on my part, and focus from my players. This is something we have been without, so when we have met up, we have played games like roborally and Blood Bowl Team Manager instead. And that's been fine.

Things are starting to calm down a little, so i'm going to write up our last session from last year. Hopefully, next week we will be focused enough to get back into it.

Final mission

Just a few words on this one as it was a purely narrative mission, designed to introduce a plot point more than be an actual challenge for the players

It was set on Nimbala, with the rebels dispatched to capture a member of the Czerka board who had been located on Nimbala.

This board member was revealed to be "The Red Queen", a character introduced in the first RPG mission, a former Twilek slave from Nimbala who had married a member of the Czerka board.

She revealed that her plan has been to destabilize Czerka on Nimbala, buy up shares in the subsidiary as the price nose dives, then purchase a controlling interest, kick Czerka out, and liberate her people while placing herself as a self-appointed ruler.

Viewing this as the far lesser of two evils, the rebels have agreed to help.

Mission reports

• Luxon - Wookies deployed to assist the Luxon militia facing a full scale invasion. This mission was a success and generated +1 rebel support, +5 heat, and blocked some of the Empires potential gains
• Holonet Hack - To counter imperial propaganda on the Holonet, the rebels hacked it and uploaded footage of the rebel fleet destroying the shipyard at Korvas. Massive success, blunts Imperial PR campaign.
• Nimbala Diplomacy - Massive success, opned up the "Red Queen" mission on Nimbala
• Kronos - Diplomatic mission sucessful, initial reports of Imperial favour found to be untrue. Kronos is displeased with the empire.
• Samoth - Attacking a star destroyer that was launching probes to find the hidden rebel base. Major success, lots of heat in Samoth. Deliberately done to draw imperial attention away from other sites.
• Selano - Asteroid base raid, major success, +2 rebel support, massive heat.
• Cahn diplomacy - Meeting with the devourer cult, who need help with an internal issue.
• Nadir and Zenith - Draw, no relief to blockade, but lessens effect of imperial action.

Bidding

A lot of characters up for bid and a minor faction as well. After meeting the Bothan Spynet in the last RPG, they have become available. it's worth noting that the Chief of Staff NPC does not like Bothans, and all Bothans have the "shady" negative to represent his antipathy for them.

First up for bid was Nayr Bwa'tu and the Bothan Spynet , a powerful alliance that adds considerable grunt to the intelligence pool and comes with a powerful leader.

The round was blind bidding and the Bothans went to the Republicans for a surprising low 15 clout

Next up, was the unusual Pell family . As a married couple, these two characters come as a set, with Leeto being a smuggler and Jorda being a gunslinger.

The peoples movement picked them up for 22 clout, 11 each which seems pretty reasonable.

Manny Bothan's , Bothan super spy and generally all around powerful agent. Manny is phenomenal at spying missions and the most powerful spying character in the sector.

The downside of him is that he is doomed to die before the end of the campaign. After all, he needs to find the plans to the 2nd death star, so Mon Mothma can say "Manny Bothans died to bring us this information"

Yes..... the entire character is based on a bad pun A whopping 27 points to the Republicans, who have loaded up on Bothan spies this round.

Mak Eshka'rey is next, a truly useful character who can fight in Imperial assault squads, work as an intelligence officer, or be sent off on solo assassination runs.

22 points to the Luxon militia, I must say I was surprised at this, but clearly the players have plans and want the right people to fufil them.

Laila Jaxon becomes the first human for hire this round, in a round dominated by Bothans.

As a Wes Jansen ace, she has excellent pilot skill and in game abilities, while being an ok squadron leader.

14 points to the Peoples movement, who continue to stockpile military characters

Kolath De'rest is next. Another utility character who can be a good officer, imperial assault squad member, intelligence operative, or any form of command role.

13 points to the Basra consortium. This was the Basra consortium only acquisition this round, and they finished the round with 26 move clout saved than anyone else. I expect big moves next round.

Kryth Thu'wan is next, a solid leader character, but not a fighter. He could be a real asset in many fields, but probably not combat ones.

Stolen for only 10 clout by the Luxon Militia. And while i though they overpaid for Mak, this cheap deal more than overcompensates for that.

​ Finally, Gor an Alarno, a Torgruta solidier with the uncommon "instructor" special ability.

Goran could move into training immediately, or he could be deployed to the special forces teams who are in need of a 2nd commando.

Final scores

As this is round 4, glory scores per event have gone up by 25%, and will do so every 3 turns until the end of the game. The People's movement nearly top scored this round, and are closing the gap to the Luxon Militia and Republicans, while the Basra Consortium continues to play a long game.

Alright, new style for doing these updates. Instead of spoonfeeding them as we are done, I will write up the whole "game round" over a week or so to help me recap the story to myself and plan for the next round.

Round 5 is in the bag, so lets start off with the planning phase.

The Situation

The war in the sector is obviously heating up and exchanges between the Rebels and Imperials are becoming more direct.

Luxon is under full-scale invasion by the Empire, which for the Empire is not that easy a task. The Luxon people are, well, a bunch of crazy militia survivalists who are very well armed, and Luxon cities are mostly located underground.

Orbital bombardment and air superiority don't help a huge amount when the battle is conducted in tunnels deep underground. So a messy close quarters war is underway.

Nimbala is about to enter a crisis point, and the identity of the 3rd faction was revealed to be "The Red Queen", a former Nimbalan twi'lek slave who married a Czerka executive and then poisoned him to gain his shares in the Nimbala holding company.

She has been planning on causing conflict on Nimbala to drive the shareprice down and cause a crash of the stock, so she can buy it up and free her people (While making herself ruler). She has enlisted the help of the rebellion.

With the rebellion destroying a Victory destroyer over Samoth that was using probe droids to search for a rebel base, the Empire has decided to raze the planet. Samoth has a low population, and this task is being conducted by a squadron of Victory class destroyers. This has forced the empire to lift the blockade on Nadir and Zenith.

The Plan

Luxon - Under Siege

Luxon is under pressure, so considerable resources were assigned to help relieve the Luxon militia.

Special forces were dispatched to help the militia by targeting key points in the imperial logistics network. A rebel general, Kolath De'rest, was also assigned to help coordinate efforts on the ground.

In space, the full might of the rebel fleet and it's logistics division were assigned to punch a hole in the blockade and deliver heavy munitions and supplies to the militia.

Nimbala - The Red Queens Gambit

For the first time in the campaign, three seperate elements were assigned to one planet on a joint task.

Special forces were to liaise with the local resistance and capture the Czerka security command station and arrest their security chief. With the security command under their control, they could lockdown the facilities and limit Czerka troop movements.

Fighter command was employed to stop Czerka troop reinforcements and to assassinate the board member who was coordinating them. Thanks to the Red Queen's inside information, they knew when these reinforcements were to arrive.

Finally, Aurek squad was assigned to the Red Queen as personal security and advisers, and to ensure that the Rebellions interests were looked after during the transition.

Sa'moth- Busy being leveled

The people of Sa'moth are being wiped off the face of the planet, but the rebellion simply cannot help them at this time due to issues on Luxon and Nimbala.

The only response was to send a HWK electronic warfare ship to observe and record the bombardment for use in propaganda videos later.

Elsewhere

Due to various reasons, the alliances played little part in this rounds planning. The hutts, Bothans and wookies were either exhausted from previous engagements or occupied in their own schemes.

Selano, in the face of seeing the Empire fail to establish a presence, and with concerted diplomatic pressure from the rebellion has become considerably more friendly the the rebellion.

Korvas continues to build up it's defences, Nadir and Zenith breath easier with the blockade lifted. Cahn has asked for help dealing with an internal political issue and probe droids have arrived on axamar to scan for the rebel base.

Plenty happening in Talathen Sector, battle reports and the "Nimbala buy out" story coming soon.

I enjoy reading about the events in the Talathen sector. I actually reference your events in my own role play as part of holonet news.

Luxon is under attack, and the rebels responded with a series of two missions.

Luxon ground operations

First up, The luxon Militia need help taking control of a series of underground junctions, and to destroy the entry and exit points for imperial reinforcements.

They had 6 satchel charges, and need to spend an action to place them and an action to detonate them. If the Imperials were close, they could deactivate the charges.

The team moved into position, two characters and some soliders for support attacking on each flank.

By the way, isn't Space Hulk 3rd edition just damned good to look at. Such nice components and perfect for the tunnel fights in Luxon

With satchel charges blowing the main corridors, the team moved in to defeat the E-Webs and officers defending the control station. The other objective was for the team to rewire the consoles, so that Luxon forces could control tunnel and gate access in the region.

One e-web down, and the rebels close the noose. One big gun, even one that can fire three times, isn't enough to slow the rebel advance.

With the guns down, the Rebels quickly hunt down and eliminate the imperials in the communications centre. Meanwhile, imperial reinforcements flock around to cut off the rebel escape.

With their escape route cut-off the rebels were forced to fight their way back down a stormtrooper infested corridor. And while they made it, two of them were badly injured and all their support troopers died.

A high price, but now the Luxon militia controls this sector, and the imperials will have to burn their way through. Which has slowed their invasion considerably.

The Battle in Space

The Luxon groups forces need supplies desperately, so the Rebel fleet decided to smash through the Luxon blockade to deliver the desperately needed materials.

They did so easily, but as they turned away from the planet they were boxed in by a squadron of four star destroyers. They needed to blast past them, protect their transports, and make it out of the planets gravity well and into hyperspace.

Three corvettes, an assault frigate and a Nebulon B were matched up against three victory destroyers and a gladiator.

The rebels plan was simple, push the freighters to the side of the board and screen them with other ships. Then put the hammer down and get off the board as soon as possible. The freighters (represented by X-wing transport tokens) had 6 hull and could move speed 3. They activated after fighters.

In what I considered a bold move, I threw the Gladiator ahead hard and fast on the first turn. I had the good fortune of acting first next turn and being in pefect range against Jaina's light, a Corellian Corvette. I got to roll many many black dice, and the corvette was blown to pieces. First blood to the Empire.

Unfortunately, the assault frigate did exceptionally well on return fire, and two turns later, the Gladiator was lost with all hands.

The Imperial fleet split up, one Victory trying to close down the freighter on the near side of the board, while the other two close on the pair on the far side.

Dramatically working to screen the freighter, the Nebulon-B frigate "The Pride of Luxon" under command of the infamous "Beast of Luxon" took heavy damage at point black range. But the ship kept moving and redirecting shields, and every hit it took was one the freighters did not.

That frieghter got away (with 1 hull remaining), but one of the freighters on the far side of the board was blown to pieces by the combined fire of two victory destroyers. When the dust settled, and the Rebels hit hyperspace, they had saved their fleet, with the cost of 1 corvette and 1 freighter. While taking down a Victory destroyer and a Gladiator.

A nice, well played victory.

Next time, we will look at the Nimbala campaign.

Lets face it these game systems are not very compatible or transferable to each other. however they weren't designed to be. There are some crossover and transference but the closest games are X-wing and Armada, Imperial Assault has taken over the RPG format for the light side however the RPG could be a good format to flip the roles in which Imperials are running the campaign against scum villains or even finding rebels as campaign bosses and finales. But the gap between Imperial Assault and X-wing is ENORMOUS.

Not to mention that X-wing and Armada are tactical games where IA is an RPG with a tactical format. You would want to focus on the tactical side and use the RPG only as progression rewards. Also for scales you might want to try somethign similar to many COIN games from GMT where there is a control and support where Empire focuses on Control with Armada and Rebels focus on support with X-wing raids.

Throw in the Rebellion Map however and then you now have a full campaign that everyone can get in.

Lets face it these game systems are not very compatible or transferable to each other. however they weren't designed to be. There are some crossover and transference but the closest games are X-wing and Armada, Imperial Assault has taken over the RPG format for the light side however the RPG could be a good format to flip the roles in which Imperials are running the campaign against scum villains or even finding rebels as campaign bosses and finales. But the gap between Imperial Assault and X-wing is ENORMOUS.

Not to mention that X-wing and Armada are tactical games where IA is an RPG with a tactical format. You would want to focus on the tactical side and use the RPG only as progression rewards. Also for scales you might want to try somethign similar to many COIN games from GMT where there is a control and support where Empire focuses on Control with Armada and Rebels focus on support with X-wing raids.

Throw in the Rebellion Map however and then you now have a full campaign that everyone can get in.

I'm not sure you understand what this is, it's not a competitive "player vs player" wargame, it's a shared narrative campaign run by a GM..

Compatibility is a moot point to be honest. When we do an armada mission, it's an armada mission and occurs on that scale, we don't use imperial assault or X-wing and flick back and forth. Each mission is discrete and set on it's own scale.

And, by creating my own strategic system, characters can transfer between X-wing, Armada and Imperial assault very easily, but that happens during the planning phase.

This isn't a competitive campaign as such, although the rebel players are competing for the most glory within their faction.

For the most part, it's like a giant RPG campaign, where the players are the faction leaders and control dozens of characters in different positions, the sub-missions are just set pieces that propel the story. Nothing more.

The scale is fine, as the sector was designed in collaboration with the players using a shared narrative system borrowing heavily from "the quiet year" RPG. We didn't want to have well known places like Bespin, Alderaan or Corellia as part of our setting.