My friend and I have started a game with our kids, with rotating GM duties. We've had one session so far, and gotten our current job. Our mission: to help begin blazing a new hyperspace route into Unknown Space. Basically we're dropping hyperspace beacons at various points. We've placed a few, and while dropping one we investigated a derelict dreadnaught haunted with some sort of mad, corrupted humans.

For the next session, GM duties fall to me. That means my character (the pilot) will be taking a backseat tot the action while everyone else does their thing. And I have no idea what should happen out there. While I realize this is basically the Forbidden Zone, I don't want to kill everyone, since we just started out. But it should be nasty. Not sure if it's too early to come across a forgotten Sith temple (with requisite evil artifacts), especially since nobody in the group is Force Sensitive (yet). Anyone have any good suggestions, or know of old published adventures out here?

There was an episode of Stargate SG-1 where their ship triggered an automated defense network surrounding an unknown planet and they had to surrender or have their ship blown up. They end up basically crash landing on the planet and trying to explain to the locals that THEY were not the bad guys, even though they were the same race as the bad guys. They also need help from locals in the way of material/parts and help hauling to get their ship up and running again.

SG-1 befriended the Prime Minister and gained his trust to help them with repairs and traded non-military technology & medicine to them for their help. However the Defense Minister saw SG-1 as a threat to security and was just itching to blow away these 'off worlders' any second he got the chance. He got his chance when repairs to SG-1's ship were complete and they were about to leave. Defense Ministers loyal troops sorrunded the ship and wouldnt let it leave, and pronounced the Prime Minister unfit to lead (COUP), but his soldiers ultimately stood down (due to the calm actions of SG-1) and listened to the orders of the Prime Minister to arrest the Defense Minister.

There was an episode of Stargate SG-1 where their ship triggered an automated defense network surrounding an unknown planet and they had to surrender or have their ship blown up. They end up basically crash landing on the planet and trying to explain to the locals that THEY were not the bad guys, even though they were the same race as the bad guys. They also need help from locals in the way of material/parts and help hauling to get their ship up and running again.

SG-1 befriended the Prime Minister and gained his trust to help them with repairs and traded non-military technology & medicine to them for their help. However the Defense Minister saw SG-1 as a threat to security and was just itching to blow away these 'off worlders' any second he got the chance. He got his chance when repairs to SG-1's ship were complete and they were about to leave. Defense Ministers loyal troops sorrunded the ship and wouldnt let it leave, and pronounced the Prime Minister unfit to lead (COUP), but his soldiers ultimately stood down (due to the calm actions of SG-1) and listened to the orders of the Prime Minister to arrest the Defense Minister.

Inspiration!

While flying in space, one of the beacon points turns out to be the planet a colony went to long ago. They are an alien race which is very scarce now, and they are distrustful of the PCs.

If the PCs act kindly, they are allowed to go. If they decide to whip out the big guns, heads will roll.

There is a WEG D6 supplement called unknown regions it's all about unknown and wild space.

There is a WEG D6 supplement called unknown regions it's all about unknown and wild space.

WEGs galaxy guide 8: scouts, and its Planets collection, are good sources for gear, planets, encounters, and ideas though.

Farscape is also a good source to mine for ideas, there's lots of episodes in the "uncharted territories" that give neat ideas.

One thing that might help expand things is to think of unknown space less like a wholly unknown area and more like a place that just never got around to uploading its navigational info to corascant.So you could find locations well aware of the galaxy at large.

Adventure idea:

The player find a "lost" colony established over 200 years ago, now a quite civilized planet. When they touch down they find people wear the latest corewold fashions (actually knockoffs, but good ones)

The spaceport, while small and catering largely to ships of designs the players have never seen before, is up to imperial standards, and the central traders market, while having no imperial credits on hand, does recognize them and has a listed exchange rate with the local currency.

A little investigation reveals the planet is only lost in the bureaucratic sense, with the establishment on record and then... Not much else. Its got a working holonet tranciever, and still distributes the public news and entertainment feeds. Just with all the battles, skirmishes, clone wars and rebellions the planetary government decided to just remain neutral and not get involved.

When the locals find out the players are from imperial space they end up caught between a group of politically active young people who want to unify with the empire (having believed the propaganda) and the political establishment who know it's better to keep to their quiet little corner of space.

The players double back to repair/resupply/whatever at a planet they visited in a previous adventure. They arrive to find a Star Destroyer and support ships in orbit. Turns out its an Imperial Annexation fleet that's been tailing the players looking for resource rich systems to exploit (death stars don't build themselves you know). While the players can't take on the empire head on, they will need to figure how to lose these hangers on if they want any chance of profiting from any claims or discoveries.

The players follow an intermittent beacon to an out of the way system. When they arrive they briefly detect signs of a modern settlement, but the signs quickly vanish, replaced with signs of a small feudal level settlement. When they approach the settlement they are intercepted by a flight of x-wings and ordered to lard. Taken into custody the players learn its a rebel safe world (place where the alliance hides noncombatants like the families of VIPs, spies, seniors officers, ect.) The players aren't treated especially badly (the settlements resources are very limited, so "not bad" can actually be pretty awful), but can't be permitted to leave (whether this mrean imprisoned or just not allowed to leave is up to the gm) the players must figure out how to escape (perhaps with the help of a captive imperial scout). If the players ever attempt to return they find the settlement long gone (simply abandoned if the players just escaped onthier own, destroyed by the empire if they helped the captured imp). Its a little dark, but a more interesting and nontraditional way of presenting the rebels; as nonevil antagonists.

There are lots of "uncharted settlements" out beyond known space. I have to agree with Gostofman - don't think of it as uncivilized or uninhabited space, merely space that hasn't been well documented within the databanks found on the Core worlds. There will be lots of smuggler's bases, hunting camps, primitive civilizations and mining colonies to keep the players busy through their early levels. Since it sounds like their first adventure was probably pretty heavy on action, you might want to make this one more of an exercise in role-playing.

I think if you are questioning whether or not it is too early to introduce long lost Sith temples, then it probably is too early. First of all, with no Force sensitive members of the party (yet), bringing the Sith into play at this stage is probably unnecessary - wait until you do have someone who is Force sensitive and who is maybe struggling to find a balance between the light side and the dark side in the absence of a teacher or established order. Odds are also good that somewhere out there a Jedi may be hiding, and a Sith temple would certainly help mask their presence - much like the dark tree on Dagobah. This would provide an interesting choice, as choosing "good" would likely prevent them from cashing in on both the artifact and the bounty on the Jedi. Choosing "evil"might make them a cautious but powerful enemy.

Anyway, back to the topic -my advice is to save introducing the Sith, at all, until later in the campaign. Give the players time to get their characters' personalities established and get some experience under their belt first. Finding something of the Sith is going to be a game changer - or at least it should be. If they keep it and use it themselves, they risk "infection" from such evil. If they sell it, it's quick credits, but it's probably going to eventually attract some unwanted attention - anything from bounty hunters to an Imperial Inquisitor (Google Star Wars Rebels tv show for an introduction to Vader's newest servants) to Vader himself.

There is a WEG D6 supplement called unknown regions it's all about unknown and wild space.

Here's a good resource: http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Unknown_Regions

Thanks for the ideas, all. A neat possibility came up when I rolled for the group Obligation ahead of time. My son is playing a wookiee bounty hunter, and has the Betrayal Obligation. He decided that he betrayed someone in the past, and we worked out that he sold out a rival wookiee to a group of slavers. Even to an enemy, that's pretty harsh. I'm thinking maybe they find a planet with signs of habitation, and it turns out there's a community of about 200 wookiee refugees that have made a new home for themselves. Of course one of the community leaders will be close kin of the enslave wookiee, and will have no idea of what the PC did, and will show him around, often lamenting, "If only Groztatha were here to see this. This refuge was his dream, you know..." Lay on the guilt really thick.

I'm not sure exactly what conflict to introduce. I'm thinking if I want to keep the combat down, they meet a madman in the wilderness. Basically he's a Jedi in exile for, what, twenty years now? So, he's probably gone to the Dark Side, but is more of a Smeagol/Gollum kind of figure than any kind of dark lord. Dangerous and rather insane, but also pitiful and starved for human interaction.

The other possibility is to have a group of slavers arrive not long after the PCs. This would set up a pretty quick "Seven Samurai" situation, but we really have only one combat-oriented character. Perhaps the nutter in the wilds could give them warning of unsavory types who've been scouting the place, unbeknownst to the wookiees. He's just being a good guy here, he wants the colony to leave, as he feels they're bringing the heat down on him.

Why are they blazing a trail? Are they working for the Bureau of Ships & Services, and will ultimately report back to them? Are they trying to find new trade partners for their trade organization, or their shipping union? Are they on their own, and doing it for the profit or the fame? Are they on the run from known space, and have to blaze a trail?

Also, why are they hyperspace beacons, which were (according to canon, anyway) made redundant by navicomputers? Are they HoloNet beacons, and are those beacons legal or pirate beacons? Are they beacons meant to guide slave ships?

My personal favourite thing to do every time a group decides they'll go to the Unknown Regions: break out other Sci-Fi.

In short-lived games (ah, my college days), my players have fought Cylons, various types of genetic beasts, a scouting party of Klingons, and whatever other alien crossed my mind.

I basically used it to test my sci-fi loving brain to see just what I could create or what I could cross over. Always fun, there.

My friend and I have started a game with our kids, with rotating GM duties. We've had one session so far, and gotten our current job. Our mission: to help begin blazing a new hyperspace route into Unknown Space. Basically we're dropping hyperspace beacons at various points. We've placed a few, and while dropping one we investigated a derelict dreadnaught haunted with some sort of mad, corrupted humans.

For the next session, GM duties fall to me. That means my character (the pilot) will be taking a backseat tot the action while everyone else does their thing. And I have no idea what should happen out there. While I realize this is basically the Forbidden Zone, I don't want to kill everyone, since we just started out. But it should be nasty. Not sure if it's too early to come across a forgotten Sith temple (with requisite evil artifacts), especially since nobody in the group is Force Sensitive (yet). Anyone have any good suggestions, or know of old published adventures out here?

Here is my upcoming adventure in "Unknown Space" next week, it involves a derelict imperial Star Destroyer...

Its called: CRUDE MATTER

Module backstory: Around 30 years ago, Senator Palpatine secretly recovered Darth Mauls corpse from Naboo and performed a Sith burial for the Fallen Dark Lord (why?..Palpatine always has his reasons). The ceremony is performed in two phases, 1. Cremate the body and 2. Release the ashes into space. After Palpatine completed the first phase of the ceremony, he had one of his imperial guards secretly bring the ashes to "Unknown Space" in a modified T-4 Lambda class long range shuttle. The shuttle contained the ashes in a small Sith Pyramid resting on a pedestal with Mauls black robes covered in runes (drawn on during the first part of the ceremony). When the shuttle reached deep into "Unknown Space" the remains were released. As soon as the remaines were tossed into space, Unexpectedly,a random, rare form of supernova appeared, destroying the Lambda's computer systems and causing the pilot (imperial guard) to be thrown across the ship killing him instantly. The supernova, uncharacteristically, also merged itself with the sith remains causing a large cloud of pure dark force energy that was left to drift aimlessly, untouched, for almost 30 years in Unknown Space. Almost 30 years later, an imperial Star Destroyer scouting "Unknown Space" , unknowingly, flew straight through the dark energy. The energy latched on to all organic beings aboard the massive ship causing them to enter madness then later turning into ghoulish creatures called "Rhaghouls". Due to the chaos onboard the ship, most of its power is gone and most of the crew is dead or a Rhaghoul.

Present time: The Empire is looking for the lost destroyer and reached the point of sending out galactic transmissions to planets offering a very large reward to whoever finds the destroyer and reactivates the navo computer so they can verify and locate the ship (Why?...the empire has their reasons)

Enter PC's...

**GM needs to come up with how players have co-ordinates of the lost destroyer**, I had the players find an R2 units processor with attached lens that showed a star map with general location of destroyer. The PCs found this at the Nikto bounty hunters lair at the end of the "Shadows of A Black Sun" module ...

Players need to make 3 daunting astrogation checks to reach Destroyer

After the First successful check, the players come across the lambda shuttle and can search it to find the pedestal, robes, long dead imperial guard. This invites Lore, core world, mechanics, computers Skill checks for learning of the shuttles age, what the runes are for, etc...

At the 3rd successful astrogarion check, the players arrive

At the Destroyer.

In the destroyer:

-Should receive a setback die to all checks because of poor lighting in the ship (most of the power is out), need to climb through elevator shafts etc...

-The players should make random fear checks when inside the destroyer because of the dark force presence that remains.

-because the dark energy involved the remains of Darth Maul, he should randomly appear on the ship, at first at a distance. The players should not be able ever tell it is darth maul, you should only say "you see some humanoid figure at the end of the corridor, wearing black robes and yellow, red eyes, you cant make out his face (enter the fear check) he then walks out of sight or fades into the darkness". Maul is only a spectre and cant actually harm the players, because he is a product of the dark energy that haunts the ship, he is just there for the fear checks

-at some point when a player is briefly alone he should turn and see darth maul directly/engaged in front of him and all at once Maul ignites his red lightsaber and slices down on him (daunting fear check - lightsaber does not damage...hes a spectre, but a very real feeling spectre) and as quick as he slices down on you he fades into darkness where a Rahsghoul steps out and attacks the player. remember the players dont know that the evil yellowed eyed figure is darthmauls spectre, he is there to bring the feeling of madness of being on the ship.

Anyway, more Rahsghoul encounters, infected prisoners (one who may know one of the players perhaps?) etc on the destroyer...i have more details for it but you get the idea, think Aliens meets Event Horizon but on a Star Destroyer. lots to play with here for a scary setting, and a small portion of what im doing for my Star Wars session this halloween season..

My friend and I have started a game with our kids, with rotating GM duties. We've had one session so far, and gotten our current job. Our mission: to help begin blazing a new hyperspace route into Unknown Space. Basically we're dropping hyperspace beacons at various points. We've placed a few, and while dropping one we investigated a derelict dreadnaught haunted with some sort of mad, corrupted humans.

For the next session, GM duties fall to me. That means my character (the pilot) will be taking a backseat tot the action while everyone else does their thing. And I have no idea what should happen out there. While I realize this is basically the Forbidden Zone, I don't want to kill everyone, since we just started out. But it should be nasty. Not sure if it's too early to come across a forgotten Sith temple (with requisite evil artifacts), especially since nobody in the group is Force Sensitive (yet). Anyone have any good suggestions, or know of old published adventures out here?

Here is my upcoming adventure in "Unknown Space" next week, it involves a derelict imperial Star Destroyer...

Its called: CRUDE MATTER

Module backstory: Around 30 years ago, Senator Palpatine secretly recovered Darth Mauls corpse from Naboo and performed a Sith burial for the Fallen Dark Lord (why?..Palpatine always has his reasons). The ceremony is performed in two phases, 1. Cremate the body and 2. Release the ashes into space. After Palpatine completed the first phase of the ceremony, he had one of his imperial guards secretly bring the ashes to "Unknown Space" in a modified T-4 Lambda class long range shuttle. The shuttle contained the ashes in a small Sith Pyramid resting on a pedestal with Mauls black robes covered in runes (drawn on during the first part of the ceremony). When the shuttle reached deep into "Unknown Space" the remains were released. As soon as the remaines were tossed into space, Unexpectedly,a random, rare form of supernova appeared, destroying the Lambda's computer systems and causing the pilot (imperial guard) to be thrown across the ship killing him instantly. The supernova, uncharacteristically, also merged itself with the sith remains causing a large cloud of pure dark force energy that was left to drift aimlessly, untouched, for almost 30 years in Unknown Space. Almost 30 years later, an imperial Star Destroyer scouting "Unknown Space" , unknowingly, flew straight through the dark energy. The energy latched on to all organic beings aboard the massive ship causing them to enter madness then later turning into ghoulish creatures called "Rhaghouls". Due to the chaos onboard the ship, most of its power is gone and most of the crew is dead or a Rhaghoul.

Present time: The Empire is looking for the lost destroyer and reached the point of sending out galactic transmissions to planets offering a very large reward to whoever finds the destroyer and reactivates the navo computer so they can verify and locate the ship (Why?...the empire has their reasons)

Enter PC's...

**GM needs to come up with how players have co-ordinates of the lost destroyer**, I had the players find an R2 units processor with attached lens that showed a star map with general location of destroyer. The PCs found this at the Nikto bounty hunters lair at the end of the "Shadows of A Black Sun" module ...

Players need to make 3 daunting astrogation checks to reach Destroyer

After the First successful check, the players come across the lambda shuttle and can search it to find the pedestal, robes, long dead imperial guard. This invites Lore, core world, mechanics, computers Skill checks for learning of the shuttles age, what the runes are for, etc...

At the 3rd successful astrogarion check, the players arrive

At the Destroyer.

In the destroyer:

-Should receive a setback die to all checks because of poor lighting in the ship (most of the power is out), need to climb through elevator shafts etc...

-The players should make random fear checks when inside the destroyer because of the dark force presence that remains.

-because the dark energy involved the remains of Darth Maul, he should randomly appear on the ship, at first at a distance. The players should not be able ever tell it is darth maul, you should only say "you see some humanoid figure at the end of the corridor, wearing black robes and yellow, red eyes, you cant make out his face (enter the fear check) he then walks out of sight or fades into the darkness". Maul is only a spectre and cant actually harm the players, because he is a product of the dark energy that haunts the ship, he is just there for the fear checks

-at some point when a player is briefly alone he should turn and see darth maul directly/engaged in front of him and all at once Maul ignites his red lightsaber and slices down on him (daunting fear check - lightsaber does not damage...hes a spectre, but a very real feeling spectre) and as quick as he slices down on you he fades into darkness where a Rahsghoul steps out and attacks the player. remember the players dont know that the evil yellowed eyed figure is darthmauls spectre, he is there to bring the feeling of madness of being on the ship.

Anyway, more Rahsghoul encounters, infected prisoners (one who may know one of the players perhaps?) etc on the destroyer...i have more details for it but you get the idea, think Aliens meets Event Horizon but on a Star Destroyer. lots to play with here for a scary setting, and a small portion of what im doing for my Star Wars session this halloween season..

This nice thing about an adventure like this is you could have it in the wait and just throw it at them for when a character rolls the sinister despair on an astrogation check or when you don't have anything planned that day. In this case you don't have to set it up, the player's blunder does all that for you. You just need to think of a way to get them onto the star destroyer.

My only critique is there should be a way to figure out why the ship is haunted/infested. Certainly a force sensitive could detect the darkside, however that does little to explain why specifically Darth Maul is showing up. Probably some imperial records on the Lamda shuttle originally encountered that the slicer will not be able to decrypt until it's plot appropriate (pretty much when the players figured out they keep running into Maul ghost).

A smart player can put the robes/pedestal and Darth Maul ghost together, but it's kind of stretch. But then again, my players tend to crave "plausibility" so they would question why the ghost is there.

My friend and I have started a game with our kids, with rotating GM duties. We've had one session so far, and gotten our current job. Our mission: to help begin blazing a new hyperspace route into Unknown Space. Basically we're dropping hyperspace beacons at various points. We've placed a few, and while dropping one we investigated a derelict dreadnaught haunted with some sort of mad, corrupted humans.

For the next session, GM duties fall to me. That means my character (the pilot) will be taking a backseat tot the action while everyone else does their thing. And I have no idea what should happen out there. While I realize this is basically the Forbidden Zone, I don't want to kill everyone, since we just started out. But it should be nasty. Not sure if it's too early to come across a forgotten Sith temple (with requisite evil artifacts), especially since nobody in the group is Force Sensitive (yet). Anyone have any good suggestions, or know of old published adventures out here?

Here is my upcoming adventure in "Unknown Space" next week, it involves a derelict imperial Star Destroyer...

Its called: CRUDE MATTER

Module backstory: Around 30 years ago, Senator Palpatine secretly recovered Darth Mauls corpse from Naboo and performed a Sith burial for the Fallen Dark Lord (why?..Palpatine always has his reasons). The ceremony is performed in two phases, 1. Cremate the body and 2. Release the ashes into space. After Palpatine completed the first phase of the ceremony, he had one of his imperial guards secretly bring the ashes to "Unknown Space" in a modified T-4 Lambda class long range shuttle. The shuttle contained the ashes in a small Sith Pyramid resting on a pedestal with Mauls black robes covered in runes (drawn on during the first part of the ceremony). When the shuttle reached deep into "Unknown Space" the remains were released. As soon as the remaines were tossed into space, Unexpectedly,a random, rare form of supernova appeared, destroying the Lambda's computer systems and causing the pilot (imperial guard) to be thrown across the ship killing him instantly. The supernova, uncharacteristically, also merged itself with the sith remains causing a large cloud of pure dark force energy that was left to drift aimlessly, untouched, for almost 30 years in Unknown Space. Almost 30 years later, an imperial Star Destroyer scouting "Unknown Space" , unknowingly, flew straight through the dark energy. The energy latched on to all organic beings aboard the massive ship causing them to enter madness then later turning into ghoulish creatures called "Rhaghouls". Due to the chaos onboard the ship, most of its power is gone and most of the crew is dead or a Rhaghoul.

Present time: The Empire is looking for the lost destroyer and reached the point of sending out galactic transmissions to planets offering a very large reward to whoever finds the destroyer and reactivates the navo computer so they can verify and locate the ship (Why?...the empire has their reasons)

Enter PC's...

**GM needs to come up with how players have co-ordinates of the lost destroyer**, I had the players find an R2 units processor with attached lens that showed a star map with general location of destroyer. The PCs found this at the Nikto bounty hunters lair at the end of the "Shadows of A Black Sun" module ...

Players need to make 3 daunting astrogation checks to reach Destroyer

After the First successful check, the players come across the lambda shuttle and can search it to find the pedestal, robes, long dead imperial guard. This invites Lore, core world, mechanics, computers Skill checks for learning of the shuttles age, what the runes are for, etc...

At the 3rd successful astrogarion check, the players arrive

At the Destroyer.

In the destroyer:

-Should receive a setback die to all checks because of poor lighting in the ship (most of the power is out), need to climb through elevator shafts etc...

-The players should make random fear checks when inside the destroyer because of the dark force presence that remains.

-because the dark energy involved the remains of Darth Maul, he should randomly appear on the ship, at first at a distance. The players should not be able ever tell it is darth maul, you should only say "you see some humanoid figure at the end of the corridor, wearing black robes and yellow, red eyes, you cant make out his face (enter the fear check) he then walks out of sight or fades into the darkness". Maul is only a spectre and cant actually harm the players, because he is a product of the dark energy that haunts the ship, he is just there for the fear checks

-at some point when a player is briefly alone he should turn and see darth maul directly/engaged in front of him and all at once Maul ignites his red lightsaber and slices down on him (daunting fear check - lightsaber does not damage...hes a spectre, but a very real feeling spectre) and as quick as he slices down on you he fades into darkness where a Rahsghoul steps out and attacks the player. remember the players dont know that the evil yellowed eyed figure is darthmauls spectre, he is there to bring the feeling of madness of being on the ship.

Anyway, more Rahsghoul encounters, infected prisoners (one who may know one of the players perhaps?) etc on the destroyer...i have more details for it but you get the idea, think Aliens meets Event Horizon but on a Star Destroyer. lots to play with here for a scary setting, and a small portion of what im doing for my Star Wars session this halloween season..

This nice thing about an adventure like this is you could have it in the wait and just throw it at them for when a character rolls the sinister despair on an astrogation check or when you don't have anything planned that day. In this case you don't have to set it up, the player's blunder does all that for you. You just need to think of a way to get them onto the star destroyer.

My only critique is there should be a way to figure out why the ship is haunted/infested. Certainly a force sensitive could detect the darkside, however that does little to explain why specifically Darth Maul is showing up. Probably some imperial records on the Lamda shuttle originally encountered that the slicer will not be able to decrypt until it's plot appropriate (pretty much when the players figured out they keep running into Maul ghost).

A smart player can put the robes/pedestal and Darth Maul ghost together, but it's kind of stretch. But then again, my players tend to crave "plausibility" so they would question why the ghost is there.

Right! The players can learn the questions about the Lambda shuttles mission (the basics) by repairing the shuttles computer and slicing its terminal to get at the ships logs, just the basics of the pilots mission (that Palpatine had sent the imperial guard on a secret mission to unknown space to release the remains of some controversial friend of Palpatine)". On a Lore check the PCs would learn that the pedestal and runes are for the purpose of a Dark Jedi burial. On an education check the players could learn how long the ship has been floating in space for etc..

As for why the destroyer is haunted, the PCs could once again slice into terminals on the destroyer and find logs in the medical bay about the madness affecting the troops and how when other troops are attacked by the infected troops they turn into the same creatures over a period of time.etc. in the science bay of the destroyer The PCs could learn about the dark matter and how much of an unusual phenomenon it is and how the imperials have no records of any such experience on record etc.. Imperials have strict protocol for all situations, and they will not defer from them as long as possible.

The thing to remember is when the destroyer initially flew through the dark matter is was a period of a few days before the entire crew became useless (players could learn this in the ships logs as well), so there was some time for the imperials aboard the destroyer to try and deal with the madness happening around them. They have protocol for all situations, but this one eventually got so chaotic so quickly the destroyer never had much of a chance to get out of unknown space or send a distress signal due to the commanding troopers slipping into madness and were therefore randomly destroying systems on the ship.

Right! A force sensitive would most certainly sense the dark side of the force throughout the entire destroyer but that doesnt mean he will know who Darth Maul is, or understand the science of intersteller phenomenon mixing with the dark side of the force, or know enough about jedi lore to know what a Rasghoul is and what exactly is happening on the ship. Thats what skill roles are for, giving all the answers or helping the PCs form an educated guess.

As soon as the characters learn that the destroyer is immobilized and the entire crew went insane and/or turned into flesh eating monsters...they will assume something really bizzarre is happening.

If your players like plausibility then i assume they have at least one character with good skills in knowledge, which always helps to piece together a story . I dont like handing the information too easily to my players all the time, because that is what skills are for (computers, knowledge skills), if they still cant piece together the puzzle of the adventure...well its always good to have abit of mystery..especially during halloween

I like this idea