Hi everyone,

I have been reading this forum for a year or so after I got my copy of EOTE. First, thank you for being of great help understanding the rules.

I wanted to open this thread to ask for help with plots for my EOTE campaign. I run for this game for 2 players. 1 is playing a pilot-merchant with a YT1300 and the other one is playing a majordomo droid gone rogue. They both worked for an old CEO of an oil mining company who was assasinated by his head of security in a plot to take over the whole thing. The head of security turned mob boss is the big bad of the campaign. The big story is to kill this guy as somehow they've found that he's managed to incriminate both my PCs to the point there is a bounty for each of them.

We are already 5 sessions into this campaign which have been basically: to escape and 'disappear from the public eye' with lots of shenanigans in between.

So they are in a planet (Outer Rim) on the other side of a Nebula that connects with their sector. There are rumours that there is a secret way of travelling through the Nebula. They've been sent there by another crime boss who provided them with fake identities for their ship in exchange for a job which they completed (nearly dying). As that's a lot of money and the job wasn't enough to pay for the transponder codes thing... they are now working for this guy, which they see as a necessary means to get to the ultimate bad guy of the campaign. I didn't know how to translate this into obligation... so I am not using more obligation apart from the one they had when created character (I don't make them roll each session because it doesn't suit me). This other crime boss needs them to stablish base there first, get a communications device running (long distance) and finally enquire about the secret Nebula route for smuggling purposes.

So, they arrive to a remote small rural village in this planet inhabited by little aliens. There is a local swoop bike gang that stablished themselves just a few weeks back. They kidnap a local mechanic and take control of the trade of cereal and salt by coercing the major of the village. They take a huge cut of everything sold in there. Nobody knows where this gang have their base.

In the course of the last session, the players learn where the gang's secret base is (an abandoned salt mine), infiltrate through a secret passage only known by an old local that used to work there, catch the bad guys by surprise and after a hard combat in which one of the PCs almost die they manage to clear the mine. Players loved it, so I'm a happy GM.

So, I wanted them to be able to establish themselves in a base and I didn't want to give that for free and make it at least 1 session long. It was a hard combat vs the swoop gang with some very cinematic moments so they feel they've earned it.

I didn't want the gang to have a starship I thought the mine only was an reward enough for them + bikes + some cargo. Now I need some help to give context to this gang that was trying to establish themselves in this remote village, getting money from their locals who are too scared to do something.

These are the ideas I have but I'd love to hear your input to give this a bit more consistency. There are plenty of geniouses in this forum by what I've read in other posts... it makes me feel I don't know enough about SW or crime, mafia etc. to run this game!!!

Premise : The gang were a bunch of renegades with no ship. They had a leader. They end up in this planet, find the abandoned salt mine and start working on setting it as their base.

- Maybe the gang leader had a ship but lost it? Maybe also lost an important cargo? Proper mess.

- How could have lost it? Who was the the original owner if any?

- In this setting is it possible if you mess up so bad a delivery you decide to disappear.

- Is that a good idea? Now that they are dead and the PCs control the mine, when will it be a good moment to bring repercusion. I want a feeling of YEAH! WE HAVE A MINE, but then... wait a second, was anybody following these bad guys?

- How can I present that to my players? Paperwork? How would my PCs investigate the gang's past? A token or a symbol ?

Sorry for the massive post! Any input will be massively appreciated.

Stay safe!

First off, congratulations on getting mod-approved so promptly. Not a common occurrence.

5 hours ago, Josemix said:

I didn't know how to translate this into obligation... so I am not using more obligation apart from the one they had when created character (I don't make them roll each session because it doesn't suit me).

If it doesn't suit you, it doesn't, but I'd like to make a case for it. If they have a Bounty Obligation, then that is something hanging over their head and they'll always be watching their back. A triggered Obligation shows the mental effect this vigilance has on them as it slips into paranoia or they see a real-live bounty hunter, whether the BH is there for them or not. Then, it also prompts you as a GM to enter a complication into the narrative that you might otherwise not. Perhaps a job is going quite easily, but that bounty hunter they saw earlier is actually there for them. Or perhaps they are saddled with a bounty hunter for a job, but then at the end, he reveals that he knows their identities and tries to take them in. This can all be done regardless of the results of a roll, and having it come out of the blue is legal and can be even more interesting, but the triggered Obligation I think is a nice way of prompting GM creativity and player role-playing. As for the new Obligation, that isn't too difficult. Just make it a Debt Obligation that they can work off in fairly short order.

Plus, if their goal is to stay off the grid, they can reduce the Bounty Obligation by staying off the grid, increasing it by making nuisances of themselves.

5 hours ago, Josemix said:

So, they arrive to a remote small rural village in this planet inhabited by little aliens. There is a local swoop bike gang that stablished themselves just a few weeks back. They kidnap a local mechanic and take control of the trade of cereal and salt by coercing the major of the village. They take a huge cut of everything sold in there. Nobody knows where this gang have their base.

---

I didn't want the gang to have a starship I thought the mine only was an reward enough for them + bikes + some cargo. Now I need some help to give context to this gang that was trying to establish themselves in this remote village, getting money from their locals who are too scared to do something.

---

Premise : The gang were a bunch of renegades with no ship. They had a leader. They end up in this planet, find the abandoned salt mine and start working on setting it as their base.

- Maybe the gang leader had a ship but lost it? Maybe also lost an important cargo? Proper mess.

- How could have lost it? Who was the the original owner if any?

- In this setting is it possible if you mess up so bad a delivery you decide to disappear.

- Is that a good idea? Now that they are dead and the PCs control the mine, when will it be a good moment to bring repercusion. I want a feeling of YEAH! WE HAVE A MINE, but then... wait a second, was anybody following these bad guys?

- How can I present that to my players? Paperwork? How would my PCs investigate the gang's past? A token or a symbol ?

Here are a few key questions first. Intended as food for thought, and these were the problems I'm basing my suggestions around:

-Where did they get the bikes? Are they something that could be available locally?
-Why are they there?
-How did they get there?
-What is trade on the world like?
-Can they leave?
-When can they leave?
-How can they leave?
-Lastly, who? This is more optional, but who financed them, who is in charge, etc.

Here are a couple suggestions:

-They were sent to acquire someone a stake in the world's exports, or possibly to secure the world as a smuggling trade route. Insta-rival! Now the PCs are caught up in a competition between their employer and someone who wants the same thing. The gang just hadn't finished their job yet, and so had no need to call for a pick-up.

-They managed to secure transport off-world for them and their bikes after pissing off Black Sun or some other galaxy-spanning organization. They hired a pilot and got themselves to the world where they set up to terrorize the locals. No desire to leave, no need to leave.

-"They were marooned" doesn't work very well because of the bikes (unless they are available locally).

-If they crashed, there must be a crash site. If there was something valuable still aboard, they'd have gotten it. If the crash site wasn't too bad (which would explain the survival of the bikes, but there might be a cargo to account for), maybe they are working on repairing it (which would contribute to the kidnapping of the mechanic). If the crash site is unsalvageable, how did the bikes survive? The swoop gangers could get out on escape pods, but the bikes can't. Perhaps that's part of why they kidnapped the mechanic, because they needed someone to repair their bikes (aside from the obvious reasons for kidnapping said poor mechanic).

-As for messing up a delivery, sure, that's possible, but why would a swoop gang be smuggling? Doesn't seem to make a ton of sense. If they became a swoop gang after landing, that would require stealing the bikes from the locals (if available locally).

-As for repercussions, yes, I think it's a good idea. As for investigating, perhaps the PCs notice that the gang has the same sort of relay they were sent to install. Then they can be proactive in finding the rival, or perhaps the rival is proactive in finding out why the swoop gangers stopped transmitting and sends out a team to investigate.
-If someone is chasing the swoop gang, then there probably wouldn't be any sign until "pop" there're the new guys. However, I would caution against this course of action as the PCs are probably going to be clever enough to convince the swoop gang-chasers that they took the swoop gangers out, either convincing them to leave or bargaining themselves into a payout. Alternatively, if the swoop gangers had some sort of monetary debt, well perhaps now the PCs bear said debt since they killed the previous indebtees.

P-47, WOW! thank you so much, I didn't expect a reply like that being new in this forum. Thanks for taking the time to write your message.

So, I really like these two:

1- Sent to acquire someone a stake and they hadn't finished their mission yet.

2- Secured transport and got away.

If we go with 1: in SW who could have the jump coordinates through a secret path on a Nebulosa? The idea is that the points of entry in this sector on the other side is blockaded by the Empire. So a secret path through the back would be like a finding a gold mine.

Also at some point I wanted to throw in some esoteric stuff too. Like the natives from that Planet are religious of some sort. There could be something like a lost Jedi Temple that nobody knows location or someone that used to be a jedi who knows those coordinates? An Obi Wan type character? That some people are searching for?

I kind of set up in the last game that first they needed to get a base of operations. That's DONE

Second task: get some sort of long communications device to be able to report back to their current boss. This has to be done in a secret frequency that requires a (insert techno concept) MacGuffin thing. So would it make sense the gang were working on it too until the PCs stopped them? They just needed the final piece.

I read a lot in this forum about communications and came to the conclusion of... it's all sci fi/fantastic jargon, as in GM do your thing but be consistent. So I thought they want secret long communication so they gotta get their own thing with like an encryptor doodah (MacGuffin for an adventure).

Something like that could work. Obviously at some point the bad guys are going to ask themselves...... why haven't I heard from the gang yet? What's going on? And they send somebody to investigate.

I think I'm being maybe too ambitious with the plots and going without a masterplan :S This campaign is a short-ish campaign that fits in my long old d6 campaign. I mastered d6 1st edition (no upgrades) for about nearly 2 years and I ended up not enjoying it much as a GM. The players loved it and super invested in their characters but I felt I just couldn't challenge them (6 dices in dodge...). Basically I felt the campaign got too big for the system and a lot of it had to happen just because the GM said it. So I wanted to try EOTE and run something smaller, less epic but dangerous. At the same time, teach my players the rules and get used to it all. They are very narrative oriented players and they don't care much about rules. As long as there's a good enough story and consistent they're in (****, they don't even care it makes sense in SW terms, which gives me a lot of freedom). So far, really enjoying EOTE even though the rules are a bit not very well explained??? sometimes, but thanks to this forum literally even question I've had figuring out the rules somebody had it before and solved it.

4 minutes ago, Josemix said:

P-47, WOW! thank you so much, I didn't expect a reply like that being new in this forum. Thanks for taking the time to write your message.

No problem! Glad to help. I love story ideas and plotting stuff out. Thanks for bringing this here!

5 minutes ago, Josemix said:

So, I really like these two:

1- Sent to acquire someone a stake and they hadn't finished their mission yet.

2- Secured transport and got away.

If we go with 1: in SW who could have the jump coordinates through a secret path on a Nebulosa? The idea is that the points of entry in this sector on the other side is blockaded by the Empire. So a secret path through the back would be like a finding a gold mine.

Pretty much whoever you want. Information in Star Wars is very valuable, but changes hands quite frequently. Smugglers, treasure hunters, explorers, historians or wannabe Jedi looking for lost Jedi temples, etc.

6 minutes ago, Josemix said:

Also at some point I wanted to throw in some esoteric stuff too. Like the natives from that Planet are religious of some sort. There could be something like a lost Jedi Temple that nobody knows location or someone that used to be a jedi who knows those coordinates? An Obi Wan type character? That some people are searching for?

That sounds quite good. It should probably be a sidestory, though, not necessarily directly related to the situation at hand. Alternatively, perhaps they stumble into it while exploring the mine. Is the mine active or abandoned? If active, perhaps they break into it. If abandoned, perhaps there are tales of miners vanishing without a trace and haunted tunnels and stuff. If they explore, they discover an un-mapped shaft that exits into an underground Jedi/Sith/Jedi-Sith temple.

9 minutes ago, Josemix said:

I kind of set up in the last game that first they needed to get a base of operations. That's DONE

Second task: get some sort of long communications device to be able to report back to their current boss. This has to be done in a secret frequency that requires a (insert techno concept) MacGuffin thing. So would it make sense the gang were working on it too until the PCs stopped them? They just needed the final piece.

I read a lot in this forum about communications and came to the conclusion of... it's all sci fi/fantastic jargon, as in GM do your thing but be consistent. So I thought they want secret long communication so they gotta get their own thing with like an encryptor doodah (MacGuffin for an adventure).

Something like that could work. Obviously at some point the bad guys are going to ask themselves...... why haven't I heard from the gang yet? What's going on? And they send somebody to investigate.

Yes, that sounds good. Alternatively, the gang already has it operational, but they need to recalibrate the (insert techno concept) MacGuffin thing to contact their boss, and to do that they need an encryptor doodah. In the mean time, they can try to trace the swoop gangers' boss.

12 minutes ago, Josemix said:

I think I'm being maybe too ambitious with the plots and going without a masterplan :S This campaign is a short-ish campaign that fits in my long old d6 campaign. I mastered d6 1st edition (no upgrades) for about nearly 2 years and I ended up not enjoying it much as a GM. The players loved it and super invested in their characters but I felt I just couldn't challenge them (6 dices in dodge...). Basically I felt the campaign got too big for the system and a lot of it had to happen just because the GM said it. So I wanted to try EOTE and run something smaller, less epic but dangerous. At the same time, teach my players the rules and get used to it all. They are very narrative oriented players and they don't care much about rules. As long as there's a good enough story and consistent they're in (****, they don't even care it makes sense in SW terms, which gives me a lot of freedom). So far, really enjoying EOTE even though the rules are a bit not very well explained??? sometimes, but thanks to this forum literally even question I've had figuring out the rules somebody had it before and solved it.

It sounds fine to me. What I understand so far is that they have offended party A (bad guys=letter, good guys/allies=number), and thus have a bounty on their heads. As a result, they ended up becoming indebted to party 1. Party 1 sends them to location 1, where they encounter the swoop gang, who works for party B (link to party A?*). They liberate party 2 from the swoop gang and set about the preparations party 1 requested.

*An easy way to do this is to have the oil mining company be interested in prospecting the planet, and so sent an advance team of sorts (the swoop gangers, who perhaps owed them). This may not make sense, however. I don't know how big or corrupt this company is/was/has become, or how willing they would be to use swoop gangers to accomplish their ends. A way around this would be for party B to work for party A, and have sub-contracted the swoop gangers.
That said, this risks cutting into the "small world" trope and may be enough of a stretch that it's better to just not bother and have it be two separate groups.

Hi,

yes so when we were creating the characters both players came out with this idea:

Player A (name: Zaagar) is a corellian pilot that used to work for the CEO of that oil mining company, but she is like a protegee of the CEO and his delivery pilot. The old man needed some nice tobacco... Zaagar would get it for him lol. She didn't know much about the structure or the ins-outs of the company though.

Player B (CH1K10) is the majordomo droid. No complications there. Both players said that they wanted a plot in which somebody's killed the CEO but is now blaming them so the major arc of the story is to clean their names and avenge the CEO (obligation for both of them).

I thought, alright OK. Don't want to complicate this too much for starters even though a company is made of a lot of individuals, finance department, production, etc. I decided that for whatever reason company wasn't doing great anymore maybe nearly bankrupt. The Empire has invaded the sector 2 months ago and the old man just wants to pass it to the Empire.

Enter the Chief of security & production / final boss of the campaign (Silas Ya'qul). This guy thinks giving the company (even though not profitable anymore) to the Empire without asking anything in exchange is just lame. On top of that he feels the old man is too detached from reality to run this anymore. So he orchestrates the assassination of the CEO and also prepares it all to catch the players and incriminate them.

Silas is planning to use the old mining company as facade. The real truth is that he's ruthless and has started dealing with a new type of plant based drug called Fen Chu'ik which is proving highly lucrative. So he wants to use the company to smuggle this drug in barrells and to laundry money. He's not alone in this, his girlfriend a beautiful Twi'lek called Zafiro is in on this. She controls one of the most important 'entertainment establishments' in the capital city of their jungle planet.

But the players being players.... escaped! Not only that, they managed to badly injure Silas. Silas learnt that can't underestimate the players as he'd done. Him and his thugs had it all ready to cath the players but he should have taken more precautions. Basically he's arrogant (or was because the players manage to shoot at him once with a YT1300 turret before fleeing the complex). He'll return a bit more insecure but full of hate for them. Also part cyborg (I roll one of those results above 100). Ah! also CH1 the robot peaked through the door in time to see the assassination and take a recording lol so he's a living proof that they didn't do it!

Then, players flee to Moirai which is my Bespin analogue. The first thing they want is to disappear off the radars. They rolled bad on obligation so they found that Zaagar's bank account had been hacked, that now there's a bounty on their heads and somehow the bad guys have manage to broadcast their faces and that they are kind of working with Imperial Authorities. So we played a couple of adventures in which after some shenaningas and a droid boxing match... they end up meeting this boss called Gonja Façey. She controls the flow of spice in Moirai City and needs new routes for smuggling. First she has problems with a couple of his employees ... so after learning that there's a bounty over the player's heads instead of killing them outright she decides to see how these guys work as she needs another pilot/smuggler in her workforce. So their first mission was to kill one of Gonja's second in command who thought he was too clever by reselling some of that spice without telling his boss. They nearly died but managed to complete the mission and Gonja took the players under her wing as part of her crew. But the players know how ruthless she can be. In exchange she fits their YT-1300 with a tranponder thingy doode from Fly Casual and forges new identities for the ship. Both players change their appearance too.

And that's how they end up in this new planet. The whole story arc to kill Silas (big bad guy) will take time and they have a feeling that first they have to disappear, plan, get closer, closer, closer, etc. and finally learn enough to kill him.

Side note: I need that story arc to span over 2 (in universe) years. Because it fits with my other campaign. In the meantime, Silas the big bad guy has to recover, set up his drug smuggling facilities and from time to time try to get info on where are the players. Maybe send a few bounty hunters to eliminate them.

So BIG BAD GUY (one faction) - PARTY A and main arc of the campaign (revenge).

DODGY ALLIES IN THE CLOUD CITY (other faction) - PARTY B

Now about to introduce third faction-> Those swoop gang bikers were sent there by PARTY C (new guys and temporary bad guys of this campaign vs. PARTY B ). Following your advice P-47

These players are a couple. She is very forward and he is shy and tends to follow what she says (even though he's able to deliver some great RP moments!). So at some point in the future I'd like to give some hooks to the droid rather than just being a side quick but so far couldn't come up with anything interesting.

How would you present the info to the players that the bikers were working for PARTY C? Also that PARTY C is misterious, something they have to investigate and when they find out they go ... oh f**k. What sort of clues would hint to that? I don't want them to find a paper or datapad that says ''we work for PARTY C who are bad guys, now they are coming after you''. Want it to be more subtle.

By the way, the mining facility is based on a salt mine I visited on a tourist trip to Romania. Amazing place called Salina Turda. One of the chambers has a lake. I've put this lake on the secret abandoned passage that the players took to sneak through the back door. Maybe they will be surprised by a minor 'salty' Dianoga?

PS: English is not my native language so apologies if some paragraphs don't make much sense.

On 4/9/2020 at 9:02 PM, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

Alternatively, the gang already has it operational, but they need to recalibrate the (insert techno concept) MacGuffin thing to contact their boss, and to do that they need an encryptor doodah. In the mean time, they can try to trace the swoop gangers' boss.

Yes! that's awesome.

The options for my next game:

- Count material, see state of the whole mine with help from the Mechanic.

- Go back to their ship parked at the back (secret entrance). They have to cross the salt lake... time for a small Dianoga encounter? It was kind of hinted in the last adventure with one of the players saying 'this lake gives me the creeps'. ENCOUNTER possibility.

- Sort the situation out in the small village. Learn trade of cereal in the area, how many hours to the capital city of the planet, how to get there, etc. Why the planet is the way it is. Talk to the major of the village who was under gang control (fear). There's also a cantine, a junkyard and an infomerchant who might know some bits about the gang's bosses?

- See that the gang had ready a communications device for long distance communications but missing the MacGuffin. Maybe they were scouting for shipwrecks? Once get to the shipwrecks ... what sort of adversary would be cool? A bunch of Mynocks? Planet is like the Grand Canyon.

- Drop some clues as to who sent the gang there and why. For example Black Sun or whatever, actually maybe a crime syndicate with very limited resources but that they are ruthless. How to do it subtle so the reveal lasts few episodes?

2 hours ago, Josemix said:

- Go back to their ship parked at the back (secret entrance). They have to cross the salt lake... time for a small Dianoga encounter? It was kind of hinted in the last adventure with one of the players saying 'this lake gives me the creeps'. ENCOUNTER possibility.

- See that the gang had ready a communications device for long distance communications but missing the MacGuffin. Maybe they were scouting for shipwrecks? Once get to the shipwrecks ... what sort of adversary would be cool? A bunch of Mynocks? Planet is like the Grand Canyon.

Yes, I think the dianoga encounter is a good idea. Mynocks, maybe. An indigenous creature might be a better idea because it can be more difficult and make for a bit more flavor to help make an interesting combat (if you need ideas, I'd suggest reskinning something like a Nexu; just describe it somewhat differently and give it a new name... "Uxen? ). I've actually just been using Mynocks in one of my campaigns and they are not good opponents at all. I didn't intend for them to be, but I haven't even bothered having them attack the PCs, they just tried a ****** and grab with one of the PC's small droids.

2 hours ago, Josemix said:

- Drop some clues as to who sent the gang there and why. For example Black Sun or whatever, actually maybe a crime syndicate with very limited resources but that they are ruthless. How to do it subtle so the reveal lasts few episodes?

If you do use Black Sun, don't have any Black Sun symbols on anything as that is a dead give-away. Alternatively, if it is a small crime syndicate, leave a Black Sun symbol as a red herring with some explanation of how they got a piece of Black Sun equipment. Best I can suggest for subtle is to not drop all that many hints. Give them a tad here, a piece there, but just be careful about what you let slip. If you do accidentally let slip more than what you intended, KEEP A STRAIGHT FACE. Treat it like nothing happened and hope they gloss over it. Worst thing you can do is start making faces or stammering because they'll know something of note just happened. Not guaranteed to keep them from realizing, but you just might get by. I can't give a ton of advice on this other than to just play it by ear and be careful.

Played yesterday.

P-47 thanks so much for your input. All seeds planted and plenty of stuff for my players to investigate.

In this season:

- counted material, found the ring (with only a carved circle, no Sun), got a map to go to the old wreckage. They confirmed there might be a 'big man' behind the gang but no clue who that could be.

- Fought a Dianoga at the back tunnel and lake. I didn't have great rolls at all so couldn't pull some of the crazy stuff that creature can do (ensnare, knockdown etc.). Best scene: Zaagar spent a light point to fire the ceiling covered in salt stalactites (she came up with it). The creature was hurt a little but lost defensive stance, so CH1 lined up an aimed shot causing a critical and 6 damages with a heavy blaster pistol (7 base + 6 + 1 point blank damage... ouch), which finished the creature. Lots of cool stuff in between, water splashes, lights that fall, people falling prone and kicking some tentacles (I failed all my rolls to cause ensnare...). Not very challenging for the 2 players + an NPC that just provided light to avoid setback dice penalties.

- Restored peace at the village and befriended locals to get stuff for future games.

- Finally, they fought an Uxen (Nexu stats, thanks for the suggestion!) at the wreckage. CH1 ended up alone against the creature nearly dying while Zaagar struggled to get back to the scene after having found the Encryptor doodah while the wreckage was literally disintegrating by pieces falling to a river about 30m below. Some more action film scenes there.

Players loved it! I think I'm too soft of a GM but they had a great time and I like they feel more comfortable in their characters now. I like the wounds threshold thing and counting up of this system. This last fight CH1 ended up 1 HP from his wounds threshold so the player really 'felt a risk'. Thing is also I have 2 players only so if I go mega hard on them there's no campaign and I've invested time to create story lines for them. If they die of a silly death... it'll be pretty disappointing (unless they act super stupid).

Really enjoyed these posts! Been great to listen to you two bounce ideas around!

You see, this is what these forums should be for 👍

6 hours ago, Josemix said:

- Finally, they fought an Uxen (Nexu stats, thanks for the suggestion!) at the wreckage.

Did you really call it that? I didn't mean it seriously...

I'm glad it went so well! I really enjoyed helping you with this, it was fun!

1 minute ago, AceSolo5 said:

You see, this is what these forums should be for 👍

Amen!

So, I'm preparing the next sesh.

At the moment PCs finalised what they were doing in the little village of Kodala so we are going to jump a month on the timeline:

-> They have cleared the salt mine and realised they need to improve it. They have also requested their boss for some security guards and personel which I said, ok but 10 obligation following 'Far Horizons' guidelines. How would you go getting rid of this obligation? I thought if they felt their obligation check they will face some problems with those new people coming to the base (maybe they are not happy, they get into trouble?, mutiny...). They have also opened a small office in the village to give their business like a more legal face.

-> At some point in the future the bad guys that were boss of the biker's gang will appear. Players atm feel they have to reinforce their base and fear that moment will come soon. I want my players to get confident and forget a bit about this, then bad guys they will show up (although I don't want to penalise PCs for their efforts in taking measures to avoid these bad guys).

-> The current overarching story is a simple 'find the lost temple' story. This is what they have so far:

* Rolling a triumph on a perception check they found a clue in the derelict ship where they got attacked by the Uxen (lol). A simple small figurine carved in bone with an inscription they dont' understand. I feel they have completely forgot about this. Even though it was 2 sessions ago.

* I feel someone in the main capital of the city has to know how to translate it.

So.... figurine with a carving -----> translator -----> get a name ----> how would you proceed?

Basically an Indiana Jones type of story. This is not even applied to Star Wars, just like general story writing.

The goal is an ancient temple lost and forgotten. In there is the tomb of a former jedi master that escaped order 66 and travelled through the Nebula that connects with the sector my PCs are from. Obvs nobody knows about this secret path... although there are stories. Also everybody (old locals and a few historians maybe?) think the temple is a legend like El Dorado, doesn't exist. But someone has to know about this, or been or something. How to go classy about this? Other than... you find a map... or you find someone that has been there?

Also important, the rebellion actually knows the location of this temple and the coordinates. So in this campaign the rebellion might be an actual thread to the players!

4 hours ago, Josemix said:

-> The current overarching story is a simple 'find the lost temple' story. This is what they have so far:

* Rolling a triumph on a perception check they found a clue in the derelict ship where they got attacked by the Uxen (lol). A simple small figurine carved in bone with an inscription they dont' understand. I feel they have completely forgot about this. Even though it was 2 sessions ago.

* I feel someone in the main capital of the city has to know how to translate it.

So.... figurine with a carving -----> translator -----> get a name ----> how would you proceed?

Basically an Indiana Jones type of story. This is not even applied to Star Wars, just like general story writing.

The goal is an ancient temple lost and forgotten. In there is the tomb of a former jedi master that escaped order 66 and travelled through the Nebula that connects with the sector my PCs are from. Obvs nobody knows about this secret path... although there are stories. Also everybody (old locals and a few historians maybe?) think the temple is a legend like El Dorado, doesn't exist. But someone has to know about this, or been or something. How to go classy about this? Other than... you find a map... or you find someone that has been there?

Also important, the rebellion actually knows the location of this temple and the coordinates. So in this campaign the rebellion might be an actual thread to the players!

If the players show no continued interest in the figurine, where is the figurine? If it is out in the open, perhaps someone from the town sees it and mentions that they know someone who can translate the script. For motive for why, perhaps the person is looking to get paid a finder's fee for sending them to someone to have it translated.

However, sometimes it's best to let something like that drop. Then later, when they learn of the connection retroactively, they'll go "Ooh... That was stupid of us." and you'll probably come out looking better as a GM for having allowed the players to miss something rather than just nudging them along.

If the Jedi came and then disappeared into the temple (who buried him? If locals, then there's your answer), surely someone would know something about it. Rumors, stories, distant memories... Then of course you have the person(s) who is/are the key to the matter, but they'll need convincing to open up to the PCs about it.

If the Rebellion knows about it, then others almost certainly do as well. Something you could do in this vein is to have someone come, following the same path as the PCs, to search for the temple. There are various ways to handle this, but the operative may be disconcerted to find the party operating out of the temple site and may try various tactics to chase them off or sneak past them.

Perhaps the group learns that there is a map but it is being held by a collector of artifacts in a personal collection. The collector does not know the value of the map (which requires the figurine to be able to decipher the runes on the map) but is unwilling to part with it. The PCs can either travel off-world to steal the map from the collection, or they can attempt to negotiate with the collector for use of the map. However the collector will want something in return, perhaps obligation or something in particular from the tomb. Something that may actually be very dangerous in the collector's hands.

So, I'm back to this! Have mastered 3 sessions since. I'd like to thank you both for your ideas which I have fitted in my game with some tweaking hehehe. Basically using them to shape the narrative and make it feel that everything makes sense and not pull out of thin air or as a neverending MacGuffin.

Up until the line is just me sharing some of the story going on, because... why not, it's Sunday and I don't have to work today. For my questions please jump below the dotted line:

So, definitely somebody else have heard the rumours about this path through the Nebulose. (Coordinates for the jump are in a lost temple where a jedi chose to be buried after fleeing and jumping thanks to astrogation force powers).

There's a historian/collector of artifacts in the capital of this planet they are in. My players discussed the map, the coordinates, etc with him. Just when they were getting into deep conversation and thought they had solved the riddle...... I ended that session with a kidnap.

The conversation with the historian is going well and he's super keen on getting logistic help (he's very old, so this would be a last trip/opportunity to find the Lost Temple. The historian wants to see the temple and study the knowledge he might find there, the PCs only want the coordinates to jump through the Nebulose. Both need each other, all good). All of the sudden a noise of a broken window and a stun grenade detonates. Someone knows has learnt about this historian and comes to kidnap him. Crappy Vigilance rolls from my PCs. They couldn't deal with the strain damage and lost conscience. First time I used stun setting weapons, it was successful. Also the bad guys that came to kidnap the historian just wanted him and they are honorable (I explain below).

Jump 2 sessions later (some investigation, clue finding, etc.), yesterday we had a boss fight vs the crew that kidnapped the historian and it was intense. I felt combat dragged a bit because of my fault... as in this game is a bit hard to keep track of all the bonuses and set backs, specially not playing in person (discord). The initative count was big with 6 to 7 slots so I have to practice a bit more on this. Does this happen to you?

Anyway my 2 players played smart though, ambushed the 'bad guys' at night at a landing platform where they were doing some repairs for their ship. My two players brought 2 NPCs allies with them from their base (an alien race I've called Merovech part of the Sector my PCs are from. We are using the stats of Barabel Enforcers as it fits the description, but ****... they are beefy! maybe I should take their wounds down a bit?).

The crew of bad guys were a desperate crew of renegade guards from the Guard of Valera in Edden, which is the main planet in my other campaign, the original one we are in the process of moving from d6 First Edition. My two players play PCs from this planet in that campaign, one of them the rightful ruler, house of Artemis, and the other his loyal bodyguard. At the beginning I found my players were a bit reticent to changing game systems but d6 wasn't working for me anymore as the game took epic proportions (kind of Age of Rebellion stuff). I wanted to GM a smaller type game but with lots of ties to the original campaign to keep my players interested and to start preparing stats for the new system. I'm blessed they are both not interested in min maxing or rules heavy games but more about making cool cinematic moments while keeping a loose Star Wars feeling. So far so good.

Anyway in Edden each ruler house has a totem animal. The crew of guys that kidnapped the historian are a renegade group of the house of Valera, ( the lion). The house of Valera worked alongside the Empire to facilitate the invasion of Edden and bring down the rulers of the planet: house of Artemis (the wolves). (lots of Dune style references as we are big fans). As this particular crew renegated from Valera's house for consider it treason they cut or burnt all the hair from the lion head shaped helmet as a sign of breaking with all they used to believe in. They are honorable though, they only use stun guns in order not to kill if not needed and at the moment they were desperately trying to find the Nebulose path to go back to their home sector and join a rebellion fighting there to bring back peace to Edden and the whole sector.

Their lion helmets came with night vision too... probably somebody would pay £10000 for one of them as it's an odd collectors item. One of this crew had died in the past and they had to sell the helmet to buy a bunch of stun grenades and grenade launcher from a dodgy merchant to kidnap the historian (they were desperate, they thought this guy could have ties to the local government etc., so they decided to go all in). Basically really desperate to go back to their home sector through the back door (path through the Nebulose).

Battle was pretty brutal. The lion helmet of the enemies made for great visuals. 2 red eyes looking from the darkness. 1 set back die for everybody without nightvision. PCs and NPCs ended up being close to their strain or wound thresholds so I feel my PCs really earnt their victory. Bad guys didn't fight until the end, once they were in big disadvantage they surrendered, they had to give up the historian or be killed. My players spared them and recovered the historian. This crew of bad guys took off and won't ever come back. They had microchipped the historian while unconscious but one of my players decided to run a medpac (which has a scanner) and located the chip and destroyed it (some advantages rolled etc). Actually this bad guys might come back but as good guys in the old campaign.

Anyway.... I don't know why I write this, I guess to share the awesomeness of roleplaying games!!! Hope not boring you all.

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Right now, the main story arc is they are about to decipher the coordinates for the long lost temple with help of the historian.

They will have to go to the temple. As P-47 said, some locals have to know about this, right? But not many, it's secret and an old legend on a lost location. Only problem is the natives of this planet are short... so kind of using the stats for ewoks :S Doesn't feel very scary. Maybe they are mutated? Maybe they are hundres? does the force mutate people but not in a creepy way? Any ideas?

At the same time, my players are definitely bringing the historian with him. I let them roll/control this guy so maybe he could try his awesome xenology / arcane knowledge rolls to pass the locals without any combat. Maybe recite the whole poem that contained the coordinates of the temple in their lost language. In the end, they had another plot thread that could have let them come to this place without the historian but they still decided to save him from the Lions so I think it can be a reward bringing him (but without outshining the PCs).

They would still have to be tested by the temple (force visions?, nightmares? against their worst fears?). Anybody has thrown something like this in their games? How did it go?

I'm thinking caves, mountains and the temple is definitely in a valley underground. Fight some force mutated locals - keepers of the secret? Maybe a beast? Some spiders? I asked the player that has the PC corellian smuggler to tell me what she thinks her character fears the most. She said 'fear of ending up alone' Maybe I can include that in a twisted force vision?

I think this could also be a way to reward the player that plays the Droid as I think at the moment he feels he's the weak spot as has been down a couple of times in combat. Throw some crazy visions but this guy is a droid so... he can shine a bit this game.

Maybe a last riddle to open the door to the valley of the temple? Maybe a riddle in the Temple?

Sorry if this is mega boring, is just a bit of Sunday evening fun to write all this and share some plot ideas. Apologies for my written English, it's not my native language.

1 hour ago, Josemix said:

They will have to go to the temple. As P-47 said, some locals have to know about this, right? But not many, it's secret and an old legend on a lost location. Only problem is the natives of this planet are short... so kind of using the stats for ewoks :S Doesn't feel very scary. Maybe they are mutated? Maybe they are hundres? does the force mutate people but not in a creepy way? Any ideas?

"Short" and "non-threatening" are not synonyms. What do they look like? This will help me make suggestions. If it's been covered earlier in the thread, I don't remember and can't find it (it's been a while).

1 hour ago, Josemix said:

At the same time, my players are definitely bringing the historian with him. I let them roll/control this guy so maybe he could try his awesome xenology / arcane knowledge rolls to pass the locals without any combat. Maybe recite the whole poem that contained the coordinates of the temple in their lost language. In the end, they had another plot thread that could have let them come to this place without the historian but they still decided to save him from the Lions so I think it can be a reward bringing him (but without outshining the PCs).

If the historian is physically useless, that alone should keep him from outshining the PCs. If he only has a couple things he's actually good at, let him be useful. But make sure you throw in some other stuff as well, possibly even some things that would be fairly trivial for the PCs, but a challenge now that they have to lug this guy around.

Here's a basic outline of an idea for using this: Challenge one: Easy for the PCs to get through, but difficult to get the historian through. They can leave him behind, or they can spend extra effort and time (with the potential for failure) to bring him through. Challenge two: Uh-oh, now they need the historian. If they left him behind, now the PCs have something difficult they have to do. If they brought him, now he can assist them. This way, the solution pattern is Easy-Hard or Hard-Easy depending on whether or not they brought the historian along.

1 hour ago, Josemix said:

They would still have to be tested by the temple (force visions?, nightmares? against their worst fears?). Anybody has thrown something like this in their games? How did it go?

I'm thinking caves, mountains and the temple is definitely in a valley underground. Fight some force mutated locals - keepers of the secret? Maybe a beast? Some spiders? I asked the player that has the PC corellian smuggler to tell me what she thinks her character fears the most. She said 'fear of ending up alone' Maybe I can include that in a twisted force vision?

I think this could also be a way to reward the player that plays the Droid as I think at the moment he feels he's the weak spot as has been down a couple of times in combat. Throw some crazy visions but this guy is a droid so... he can shine a bit this game.

Maybe a last riddle to open the door to the valley of the temple? Maybe a riddle in the Temple?

Fear of ending up alone doesn't have to be faked. What if the character really is separated from the others. Trapdoor opens and the party is split up into individuals. Each has their own test of sorts, be that mental or physical, but tailored to the character, to get through and out the other side.

That isn't to say that you can't use Force visions, though.

Here are a couple drafts of scenarios:
They come to a fork in the path. Miss Autophobia follows her companions down one of the tunnels, but after a few minutes, they vanish into thin air. If she runs back to look for them, she can't find them. If she calls, they don't respond. If she takes the other path and runs after them, she doesn't catch up to them. Where to go from here, I'm leaving open since I don't know the PCs and I don't have all the information.
Explanation: She thought she was following them/they thought she was following them (or she thought they were following her/they thought they were following her), but it was an illusion. Through mental trickery, they were split up. Through further trickery, they were separated into different parts of the temple entirely (like having one maze right next to an identical maze, and mapping the characters through that. So even if they are both in square D4, one is on map A and the other is on map B).
This one works less well because of the droid, but there may be a way to excuse that. She stops to tie her shoe, they round a corner, they disappear?

Or perhaps. They are all standing around doing whatever, when all of a sudden the floor drops out from under them. They each slide down a chute that deposits them into different locations, splitting them up entirely. The droid is rather nonplussed, seeing as how he isn't receiving any Force vision, and just tries to find his way out. Miss Autophobia, however, starts to receive a Force vision. She chases her companions through the maze, but they are always just around the next corner. She finally rounds a corner to find herself at a dead end. Perhaps there is "someone/thing" else in the maze with her, speaking to her unseen or reaching out "kindly" when she finds herself alone and distressed, a companion in her loneliness, only to turn on her later on.

Aww man! lots of cool ideas there!!!!

The local aliens look like this (normal ones)

I was thinking the pre-temple ones are more savage like, and possibly blind (but they 'see' through other senses). I was thinking going full darkness except for glow of certain plants or insects or something. Kind of like in the depths of the ocean. Maybe teeth bigger as adapted to hunt/eat creatures/spiders whatever.

The historian looks just like a character I saw in Critical Role which thought was pretty cool. I wanted someone with a mystical kind of vibe to him. So he's like Shakaste (black dude, white afro, old, blind but highly functional through other senses). Maybe force sensitive but never developed. Can't outshine the characters although they do enjoy some help from time to time specially if they have earned it (like in this case battling the Lions).

Man, amazing suggestions for the force stuff/visions/final 'encounter' before entering the temple. My brain already working on it.

I'm thinking a tunnel and then throw in some of the concepts you have mention. Maybe the droid can help the human if she's struggling to complete alone. I'm thinking, darkness lightly illuminated by the faint glow of some //insect//plant//whatever. After encountering the village and either dispersing them or talk to them in their ancient language (the historian will help), they point at one path at the bottom end of this cave. They can see something in this faint glow: 2 stones painted completely chalk white on each side of a incredibly narrow gallery (the whole colour black/white duality has been hinted a lot in the campaign at this point). This gallery, the complete darkness, not even night vision helps. The shaman of the tribe indicates, follow that path (or they just go in if they have dispersed them). Step into the narrow and claustrophobic gallery and then...

I start throwing them some force challenges/visions/maze on the vibe you have suggested.

Thank you!

Sounds good! Maybe throw in some growly voices for the locals if you want to play up the creep factor.

6 hours ago, Josemix said:

I felt combat dragged a bit because of my fault... as in this game is a bit hard to keep track of all the bonuses and set backs, specially not playing in person (discord). The initative count was big with 6 to 7 slots so I have to practice a bit more on this. Does this happen to you?

Anyway my 2 players played smart though, ambushed the 'bad guys' at night at a landing platform where they were doing some repairs for their ship. My two players brought 2 NPCs allies with them from their base (an alien race I've called Merovech part of the Sector my PCs are from. We are using the stats of Barabel Enforcers as it fits the description, but ****... they are beefy! maybe I should take their wounds down a bit?).

Meant to address this earlier, but forgot. So I'm coming back to it now:

For handling initiative, I just use a glorified rule and tokens to represent the acting characters. Makes it much easier to remember order.
As for remembering Boost and Setback, this can be more tricky and I forget it all the time in my rare in-person games. The SkyJedi roller (not the integrated Discord version, the website one) has a way to note Boost/Setback next to characters, which could be helpful. Another way to do it is to just pick up physical Boost/Setback dice and stack them up in a tray or something when they're assigned to somebody, and then it's just a matter of remembering who to. I find that to generally be the easier part.
I think the Barabels are fine as-is. They are beefy, but they aren't too bad if you're packing decent weaponry.