Hey team, looking for some advice/inspiration for planning a one shot adventure to take place in a 4-5 hour span.

My friends and I have a tradition to go to the new Star Wars movies together then play Star Wars board games afterwards. We typically play Rebellion/Legion/imperial assault but the group wants to play the RPG this time.

Half of the group has played through the starter box, the other half is coming in new. None have a big rpg background. I will be the GM.

Currently I own the Force and Destiny core rule book so that is the theme I was thinking of running the one shot under, however the group has expressed more interest in the Rebellion/War side of it. I was thinking then force sensitives sent on a mission by the rebellion.

Just wondering if anyone can give some advice on how to plan these one shots or point me to some examples.

Between my legion and ia stuff I pretty much have any model we could want and can create any setting.. is it better for one shots to just focus on a specific planet/mission? Create choices for the players? Pre make characters or give options?

Im very new myself here so any information is appreciated. There will be 3-4 players and myself. Thank you.

There are beginner games for each core book. Since they've expressed interest in more of the rebellion side of things, the AoR beginner game is pretty good. What's in the game itself is probably a one-shot, if your players like it there's a PDF download with another 3-5 session's worth of materials. Plus you get a set of dice. There are pre-gens in the game, and if your players have no experience with RPGs then I'd suggest to just stick with that (unless you want to create a pre-gen on your own for them to pick from). You won't need the AoR core book to run the one-shot, though you will if you decide you want to keep the adventure going and the players want to spend XP on their characters.

Note that except for careers, and the choice between Morality, Duty, and Obligation, all the core books are practically identical.

You won't need the minis, unless you want them for flavour, but I'd suggest caution using them. Mini games are pretty fixed with movement rulers and stuff like that, and other RPGs like D&D tend to be that way as well. This RPG takes a more free-form approach. Even if you had a 8x4 table set up for a scene, the way encounters often go the PCs will be off that board in no time, and your whole setup will be wasted (unless they are captive in some fixed location). I find an erasable whiteboard (or two, if the party splits) far more useful.

I'm running an AoR w/ FnD characters so let me share with you how I handle this.

Go into this with the assumption that all of the PC's are assigned to a team.

Start (the game) with a Mission Briefing. Include an Objective and available resources.

As far as planning then figure out what locations would be important in the adventure and what types of obstacles and opponents are likely to be encountered.

In general I try to anticipate how my players may react and sort through their logical course of action. But I'm preparing for them to pursue multiple options. Also don't be disappointed if your PC's ignore encounters. (For myself about 60% of the opposition forces that I prepare, never hit the table).

For a 4-5 hour one shot? I'd recommend my "Rothana" Operation.

The PC's are assigned to infiltrate one of the Imperial Research facilities on Rothana and to steal the research info about the secret research project. (In my case the Imperial team was working on the R&D on the TIE In).

In a nutshell, the team is sent to Wroona where a rebel asset introduced them to a sympathetic guild master. The two have arranged for the PC's to steal a third party transport ship that has been running the Rothana cargo run and is trusted. The PC's will need to time their larceny until after the ship is loaded but before it departs. (Yes the current/former owner will object to the theft).

After that, the PC's will make their trip to an uncharted system just out of Rothana where they rendezvous with a lone Y-Wing. The Y-Wing pilot thanks them for the rendezvous and heads out. (The Y-Wing pilot is just meeting the PC's to time a coordinated attack on Rothana, but shhhh. Don't tell the players).

So when the PC's arrive in their stolen ship, they find the system under a strike and fade raid attack by a modest rebel fleet. The rebels make a devastating attack on the ISD protecting the system and then make strafing runs on the cargo ships in the system. Including the ship the PC's are on. The rebels focus on using Ion weapons on the PC ship, but they are attacked at least once with a laser barrage.

And then the Rebels fade.

The players are now in an Imperial system that needs to recover from an attack and the survivors are scrambling to help and assist each other. The PC's will be contacted and if they can, they will be asked to aid in the recovery operations. I used this opportunity to humanize the Imperials and my PC's helped pick up and rescue Tie Pilots who had ejected from their damaged fighters. Other obvious options are for the crew to race in an provide emergency repairs on 'fellow' merchant ships (who are mostly third party cargo transporters), and they may help rescue trapped crew from the dying ISD. (Note that I had 4 ISD's protecting Rothana so the overall security hadn't been severely diminished at Rothana).

After the rescue ops, the PC's can proceed with their cargo to their assigned research facility. And their primary mission.

The chaos of the battle has spilled over to the research team and hopefully the PC's can bypass the facilites security measure and get the data that they need.

In my case there were working TIE Interceptors with chatty test pilots who were enamored with their new fighter. The director was solicitous and friendly and with a 'damaged' ship the Imperials were eager to help the PC's with their repairs, but were woefully under staffed to provide much more than materials. The PC's could fake debilitating repairs and insinuate themselves with the staff while the 'repairs' are underway. If they can figure out how to get into the security portions of the facility, they can slice the computers and grab the design files.

The eventual and inevitable breach of security will trip an alert and the PC's had to fight their way out of the facility.

So there's one "basic" idea.

That sounds like a fun intro (I enjoy having PCs work with "enemies" ) my only concern with new players is the amount of space combat out of the gate. It's tough to get even vets of the game to agree on how to run space battles. For new players it might be best to narrate that part quickly.

Wow great ideas thanks guys. I think I will steer clear of the beginner book just because we already played one of those. They are pretty rail roaded, where as I want something a liiiittllle bit more open for the one shot. Although I imagine all one shots have to have a fairly linear story line to follow?

I'm definitely thinking small Rebel team, infiltrate facility/base, these are very weak force sensitives who have not yet had any training or discovered any powers, which is how they've stayed hidden from the Empire.

Retrieving some type of information, I just have to figure out the settings I want to use. I've got access to a ton of Legion terrain/mats, and also a plethora of IA tiles for smaller rooms/ships etc..

How do you recommend making characters for a one shot? We obviously can't delve super deep we just don't have time, have them pick their race then tell me the overall archetype they want to play, and point them in that direction?

Oh no. You've invoked the dreaded Railroad vs Sandbox debate!

The neat think about AoR are the built in assumptions that the PC's are part of an established team and you don't have to worry about why they are together and why they do the kinds of adventures that they do.

Also, everyone gets to walk in with the assumptions that someone smarter than the PC's knows what's going on and the MOST IMPORTANT thing that needs to happen is . . . "The Current Mission!"

Even if the PC's are sent out to do one of the (many) Grocery Shopping missions that I've presented them with that's the MOST IMPORTANT thing that needs to happen to keep the Rebellion in the game!

That said, I've had the luxury of letting my Players figure out and pursue side quests (at their leisure). I'll leave them bread crumbs to follow and watch them get lost in the woods.

In making up your own mission some of the principles that I use are:

• Establish a goal or objective that the PC's can try to achieve
• Figure out who/what will oppose the PC's from achieving the objective.
• Understand the motivations of the invoked parties.
• Figure out what third parties are going to be in the area and how they are likely to react to the PC's.
• Understand the location and how that will interact with the PC's
• Decide how the weather is going to impact the adventure.
• Try to plot out the major decision points and figure out where those various branches might take the plot.

It's an unordered list because you can sort through all of those elements in whatever order works best for that given mission.

Good Luck and I hope you all have fun!

10 hours ago, FrogTrigger said:

I'm definitely thinking small Rebel team, infiltrate facility/base...

Funny, that's exactly what the AoR beginner game is. It's a bit railroady for the first session (as expected, and yes, that's kind of the nature of one-shots at least as far as the overall mission goes), but after that it's wide open, moreso than the others. There are several fleshed out side quests that can be done in any order (or not at all). I'd even say there's enough base material, with well defined Nemesis NPCs and motives, you could build an entire campaign around it if you wanted.

10 hours ago, FrogTrigger said:

How do you recommend making characters for a one shot?

Having a bit more experience with the game, I spend a LOT of XP. But more importantly, I tell the players what kind of situation I'm going to run and what type of PCs I need, and then ask what they would prefer. Example: I recently ran a murder mystery, and I needed the PCs to be cops. But they could be jaded, eager, old, young...Rick Deckard from Bladerunner, or Columbo...whatever. Ideally a "good cop, bad cop" team. The players got back to me with these descriptions (roughly): "Grizzled ex-marine, takes no BS, smart, good shot, can hold his own in a fist fight"; and "Friendly guy, does well with the locals, can beat you to a pulp, intuitive, thinks he's a great driver but is actually terrifying to be in the car with."

First, I used this attribute spread for both PCs: 4/3/3/2/2/1. For the first I spread the stats in order of Intellect, Willpower, Agility, Brawn, Cunning, Presence. I gave him sufficient skills in Coercion, shooting, piloting and scattered around some others (mostly in the Intellect group) to give flavour. For the second: Cunning, Presence, Brawn, Intellect, Willpower, Agility...that was the only way to ensure he was a terrible pilot, and I gave him one rank to reflect own ego about being a "trained driver". Then lots of Deception, Charm, Brawl, Xenology, etc. Note even with Agility 1, he can be a decent shot with 4 ranks in Ranged, as he'll roll YGGG. He just won't have as many narrative opportunities as the first PC, who can roll YYYG (and has some Talents to back him up).

I should mention when making these PCs I don't stick strictly to careers and specs. It's too difficult to shoehorn a concept in to the career and specialization straight-jackets, especially when the PCs aren't going to be developed further. So I just scatter around skill ranks and make sure the PC has 2-3 "special things they can do", like Scathing Tirade, or Sniper Shot, or something suitably flavourful.

For the next one-shot I'm planning, it will be Imperials having to either salvage or destroy a spy-ship that's crash-landed. Get there before the Rebels, recover the important tech, or blow it all sky-high before the Rebels can acquire it. (There will be a political backdrop to this which may affect their Imperial allegiance...but they won't know that going in.) So I'll be asking for volunteers for at minimum a demolitions guy, and a sergeant; but there's definitely room for a shooter, a tracker, a techie, a gunner, or whatever else they want to bring. (I'm hoping for at least 4+ players for this one.) Then I'll do the same as above, plus I'll scale the challenges according to the groups strengths and weaknesses.

12 hours ago, FrogTrigger said:

How do you recommend making characters for a one shot? We obviously can't delve super deep we just don't have time, have them pick their race then tell me the overall archetype they want to play, and point them in that direction?

If more than half your group has minimal experience with the system (which I define as "only played once or twice") or never played the system at all, I'd suggest going with characters that use starting XP, possibly with an additional 25 earned XP (i.e. XP that can't be spent on characteristics) and an additional 1000 credits with which to purchase equipment. I've found that extra XP and credits can really help round out a basic character concept, allowing them to purchase a couple extra skill ranks, a couple of talents, and still have plenty of XP to spend on bolstering up their characteristics, while the extra credits helps them to get the base gear that they'd need for their role without having to buy up Obligation or buy down their Duty.

It might also not hurt for you to build the characters for the one-shot, especially as it'll give you a better handle on what the characters are capable of when you're putting together the adventure, which in turn lets you better tailor the adventure to allow for these characters to have at least one decent chance to shine. It wouldn't hurt to ask your players what sort of character theme they'd like to play, to give you something to go from when making these pre-gens. I'm in one group where we routinely do one-shots of various systems, and those of us who routinely GM will ask the would-be players, "okay, here's the base idea of the setting, what sort of character concept do you want to roll with in this one?" Thus far, it's worked out pretty well, especially for those players in the group who have a very rough time wrapping their heads around new game systems.

This thread would be incomplete without a plug for the REBELS-themed Beginner Box adventure from Rancor Publishing Group .

But also: thanks for introducing more folks to the game!