When we started out, only one of my players really wanted to follow the "Jedi/lightsaber" path. After much adventuring, we've had a bit of a player shuffle, just wrapped up Chronicles of the Gatekeeper (SPOILERS AHEAD!), and now we have two fairly experienced PCs who would like to build their own. I'd like to do some personal sessions with each PC, so they can each have a cool thing they do. The group successfully rescued Suljo Warde, who has agreed to teach them. He isn't free of the Dark Side, so he feels he would cause more harm than good if he were to directly join their struggle against the Empire. The PCs are as follows, though I'm mostly struggling with adventure ideas for the last two.

• Ara'Sul Mithran, the would-be Jedi who has had his saber for a while. Guardian: Protector/Niman Disciple. Definitely the goody-two-shoes of the group. I was going to send him on a search for a safeworld where their Rebel cell could hide their civilians. They could also establish a nearby Jedi training sanctuary for a half-dozen Force-sensitive youths they rescued from an Inquisition training program.
  
• Gel Marcolf, the villain from Act 1 of CotG. When introducing new players, I like to hand them an established NPC for a session or two. They can learn the game, and THEN learn to make a character. In this case, the player liked the NPC, we rebuilt him as a PC, and here we are. Marcolf is a dark-sider, but he's trying to back away from the eeeeviil. The player is unsure if he wants to go for redemption, more that he wants the character to have control over himself while still being self-interested. He has the crystal of Jiv Durael, one of the Jedi companions that Warde killed. I was thinking he could have a journey to a Vergence somewhere to commune with Jiv Durael's spirit. The spirit would want to guide him away from the Dark Side, as part of healing the damage of Warde's fall. Of course there would be a choice between the Dark path and the Light. If he chooses Darkness, he can "bleed" the crystal, driving out the remnant of Durael's spirit. If he chooses the Light, the path will be a little tougher. He'll have a spirit guide, but the crystal won't really be his until he reaches some level of harmony with the spirit.
  
  Of course, I'm kind of at a loss for where this vergence should be, and I'm not great at moral dilemmas. If anyone has some ideas, I'd love to hear 'em.
  
• Nathan Arizona and his son, Nathan Jr. Before becoming a rebel, Nate Sr. was an unpainted furniture salesman with a checkered past. Then his son was kidnapped by Lenno the Small, a Gammorrean bounty hunter commonly called "The Warthog from ****." Lenno was working on behalf of the Inquisition, and Nate Jr was one of the kids rescued from the training program. The player wants to train alongside his kid, and have like a Father-Son road trip to find their crystals. I like the idea, but man, I'm stuck on this one. Is there a Coen Brothers movie that could be adapted to this? Because that would be just perfect.

I can only speak for myself and how I write these kinds of scenarios, but here's my two cents.

Force vergences that test layers are always best when they have some foreshadowing of the challenges they either have already faced and failed, or will face later in the campaign. The moral dilemmas your players will have and the challenges they face in the campaign should be linked in order to maximize their effect on the player (not just the character). It also means that the player is reminded of the vergence test when said foreshadowed plot moment occurs, and they realize they have a choice to make.

I realize that may not be as helpful as you had hoped, but if you like, I can give you some examples of things I wrote and how they hang together with characters motivations and future plot? Hopefully this gives you more ideas either way.

The Crucible Episode of the Clone wars Cartoon is really good for showing what the character will experience. Each of the Younglings faces a challenge they were struggling with.

On 6/16/2020 at 5:16 AM, SufficientlyAdvancedMoronics said:

I can give you some examples of things I wrote and how they hang together with characters motivations and future plot?

Man, I'm always down for examples.

I'm thinking that the Arizona boys should face a vision of the Inquisitor that trained and tormented Jr (who is a bit closer to the Dark Side than a young fella should be). A fight ensues (mostly narrative), Sr is clearly overmatched and downed, but Jr is able to back the Inquisitor up to the edge of a Bottomless Pit ™, where he has him helpless and is clearly about to kill him.

This would be the main decision point. Sr can either let his son unleash his rage, moving toward the Dark side, or he can tackle the Inquisitor off the edge, and they both fall together. Both of those would be pretty much automatic, but he could try to do something else with a skill check. Perhaps talking the boy down or holding him back. I figure the best possible outcome is talking the boy down, the worst is letting an 11-year-old kill out of revenue and hatred. Tackling the Inquisitor off the edge will give Sr some Conflict, but I think doing the "bad" thing so others don't have to is kind of a Sentinel schtick anyway. He's also going to take a nasty fall, so we'll see how that goes.

1 hour ago, The Grand Falloon said:

Man, I'm always down for examples.

I think my favourite one that I ran was for two players with very different characters. One is a Zabrak Warrior(Aggressor) who is a dark-side user with an huge chip on his shoulder and a weakness for vengeance, and the other is a light side Human Guardian(Armorer) with a weakness for obsession with lore & tech. Both share a mentor who neither of them really trusts and has had some significant cybernetic work done. The human distrusts his mentor because his intentions/goals aren't clear and he has done some unpleasant things because the ends justified the means. The Zabrak wants to kill the mentor (for personal reasons), but knows he can't because of how powerful his mentor is and is biding his time and learning from him until he thinks he can.

They enter a force nexus where they are looking for a holocron but they entered through a separate door to their mentor, and they have become separated - occasionally seeing each other on different paths through the cave system (either through crystal walls or on walkways). Then comes the test/dilemma.

They come to a room where their mentor is crouched in the dark and muttering to himself. They speak to him and he stands to his full height and throws off his cloak. He has a sith holocron in one hand, his lightsaber in the other, and a wild look in his eyes. He activates his lightsaber and it's now red, he uses the force to pull down a boulder to block their escape, and he attacks them. They can try to talk him down but he's raving about some power that he needs to acquire. They have two options:

1. Kill him. He fights ferociously and rages against them, but its possible to take him down. Lots of narrative mixed in with the combat to show he's wild and dangerous. If they kill him, then his lighsaber falls to the ground and the holocron skitters accross the floor, and opens when it comes to a rest. Whoever killed him is the sith lord/guardian of the holocron "I am lord [character]. Ruler of [planet] and guardian of this holocron containing the technique of [bad plot-relevant thing]." they look back over to their mentor who has fallen on his face, and roll him onto his back to see he is the other player's character.
2. Destroy the holocron. They have to wrest it from his cybernetic fingers, but once they have it he exclaims "No! I need it!" and they can destroy it in one swipe of the lightsaber, and it bursts with light which floods the chamber. As the light fades, They're left holding their mentor's corpse, and he has died in their arms as they destroyed the holocron. In the fading light they can see their mentor's blue outline, which regards them for a moment before melting away into the dim light of the cave.

Of course, he was never there, and meets them soon after, saying he's found the room where he thinks the holocron they're looking for is hidden (looks different to the one in the vision)

For the rest of the campaign, they are asked by him to find knowledge from various sources, and they are ultimately in control of whether he falls to the dark side or turns to the light. They influence his decisions as he teaches them and they have the choice to return empty handed (much to his displeasure) or give him what they found (which is not always wise). They find force-sensitive children and bring them home to teach, and he helps them to train them.

What they only discovered later in the campaign is that he's dying and is trying to find a way to extend his life so he can pass on his full teaching. If he succeeds, he falls to the dark and they will have to kill him and take over training the children, forever setting that as an example for them. If he fails, he fails with his humanity intact but they lose their mentor.