Here's a question for those of you familiar with JoY. My players sprung this on me and I didn't really know what to say. What does Arend Shen bring to the table for the heist? He has the idea for the heist, yes, but anyone can have the idea. In the adventure as written, he doesn't fund the PCs, doesn't have any intel, cannot give them access to anything. He has no useful resources to the PCs outside of loaning them a cloud car, providing them with the untraceable bank account, and picking them up in a getaway car after the heist (which is the answer I gave my players).

If I would have thought of that question ahead of time, I probably would have reworked the adventure a little bit to have him provide funding. Perhaps a base of operations and maybe some basic dossiers on the bidders with some leads to follow-up. Tough to say without spending some time going over it.

What answer would you have given?

Hes giving the players 'ground support', you could say. He isn't providing funding, but he's providing what the players need in order to pull off the heist. If the players question him about it, what hes bringing to the table, have him lay it all out for them.
"Look kids...I'm getting you the air car for the race and the less you know how I'm doing it the longer you'll live, I'm setting up the account through three different shell accounts and two bogus IDs, and I'm going through about a half a dozen middle-men and cut-outs to have a get away vehicle waiting for you. I'm burning almost a lifetime of favors, influence, and hard cash to make this happen and be as untraceable as possible. So when you nerf-herders ask what I'm bringing to the table, my answer is 'I'm bringing the **** table'."

4 hours ago, LugWrench said:

Hes giving the players 'ground support', you could say. He isn't providing funding, but he's providing what the players need in order to pull off the heist. If the players question him about it, what hes bringing to the table, have him lay it all out for them.
"Look kids...I'm getting you the air car for the race and the less you know how I'm doing it the longer you'll live, I'm setting up the account through three different shell accounts and two bogus IDs, and I'm going through about a half a dozen middle-men and cut-outs to have a get away vehicle waiting for you. I'm burning almost a lifetime of favors, influence, and hard cash to make this happen and be as untraceable as possible. So when you nerf-herders ask what I'm bringing to the table, my answer is 'I'm bringing the **** table'."

And then you laugh at him and walk away from his blaster-cooked corpse. Then have your slicer (the one you already need to have for other parts of the adventure) get you into the gala without ever needing to do the race.

2 hours ago, HappyDaze said:

And then you laugh at him and walk away from his blaster-cooked corpse. Then have your slicer (the one you already need to have for other parts of the adventure) get you into the gala without ever needing to do the race.

And then the players are surrounded by a smiling security outfit next time they check in anywhere, because they couldn't set up an untraceable money laundering scheme and ISB agents really hate loose ends. (P.S.: I didn't like him for other reasons, namely what he brings to the table smells like set-up five miles against the wind, but that's a different topic.)

7 hours ago, Spraug said:

And then the players are surrounded by a smiling security outfit next time they check in anywhere, because they couldn't set up an untraceable money laundering scheme and ISB agents really hate loose ends. (P.S.: I didn't like him for other reasons, namely what he brings to the table smells like set-up five miles against the wind, but that's a different topic.)

Never assume the PCs are less capable than NPCs. If the two Pantoran losers can set this up, so can a group of PCs.

I guess the thing is this really: If Arend and co already have the frame work set up and just needed operatives then that's cool, just then have them have everything ready to go aside from the heist itself. It feels a little bit arbitrary/silly to have the players enter a race that draws a lot of the attention away from the heist itself to focus on character's that ultimately don't matter. Make it clear all the PC's have to figure out, aside from how to raise the funding really high, is to how to break in and take it. If the PC's only have to focus on the job at hand because these folks were so good at setting stuff up then they will trust them more in principle, assuming the PC's treat the NPC's like people, not meal tickets.

To me the Jewel of Yavin is the most interesting adventure out of most of them as a true heist, but it has a lot of moving parts that either needs the GM's tinkering (how the party meet Arend and his daughter) doesn't really give a huge incentive to trust him. I feel it's one of those adventures that the working relationship with those two needs to be built up a bit more on smaller schemes (where they mightn't be aware of her association with this guy looking to commit a perfect crime) to build some trust with at least one of the NPC's, then spring this on them when your capability has been personally verified. Don't then have them feature an axhullary race of little interest but rather have them involved with the clients more deeply, watching them, have some clients take action against others away from the stage and have the PC's become invested in the core cast of characters bidding on this thing all the while they are gathering information on how to get their prize. If the players want to take additional contingences, let them but have it be a lot of work to set up, the heist itself doesn't leave very much time at all so by making a lot of effort it reminds the players how much effort these folks must have gone through to set up the accounts, and rewards them all the deeper for accomplishing the same results in much less time. It also makes the conflict between Aris and her father more compelling if she has a pre-established friendship with the PC's before hand aside from being a background provider of stuff.

Of course, this advice comes way too late to those who have actually played the adventure. But it's a good rule of thumb for future adventures, if someone is providing a lot of resources for a heist, make it abundantly clear from the outset and for the love of all things holy, don't say "well, I don't know." The moment you state that players are already beginning to disbelieve in the world you have created, which is different from "hang on, let me consult my notes a second" and make something up. That at least indicates that there is an answer you have written down, even if you've yet to do so.

Basically, I feel this is a good lesson for "super capable" NPC master minds in general. If they have a ton of resources that will allow you to accomplish the task, state what they can give you and don't give too many awkward hoops to jump through otherwise the players will wonder "hey, what did that guy ever do for us aside from a plot hook?". Really engaged PC's will quickly realise that this situation might lead them into a trap, which in the case of the Jewel of Yavin is totally correct; and either invest a lot of energy into exploring this puzzle or otherwise prepare contingencies in case the mastermind betrays them. once you have the PC's questioning the motives of the NPC's on a regular basis (sometimes favourably, sometimes unfavourably) you have an engaging world.