I watched The Wild Bunch a couple of days ago, and thought the core idea of the movie, a train heist, would make a pretty cool game. Since we're all basically playing a spaghetti western - and train jobs are part and parcel of the genre - I thought I'd share my notes with you guys. Enjoy!

General Mapache is a commander in the Southern Federal Army, on a planet in the middle of a civil war. He's supposed to be fighting the war, but is really using the chaos and fighting as a cover to run a well organized mob of goons under the banner of planetary defense. He enjoys lording over his men, being a big fish in a small pond and extorting the citizens of his territories of their meager wealth.

The problem is that The General's militia has been running low in munitions and resources, and he needs to resupply his men. The General has learned of some imperial supplies being moved from City A to City B and while he can't spare men to steal it, he is flush enough to hire a crew to do it for him. He contacts his old dear friend NPC Crime Lord for someone to do the job for him.

NPC Crime Lord contacts the team, telling them that they have a chance to make a little bit of money and/or pay back their loan to him. All they have to do is steal four crates from a moving train before it reaches its destination. What's the cargo? Munitions and supplies bound for an Imperial outpost - so expect at least some Imperial resistance.

THE TRAIN -

The train is a high speed monorail that travels from City A to City B, a four hour journey. There are several stops along the way at smaller outposts where passengers and cargo are loaded.

The train is configured so:

Engine - cargo car - cargo car - dining car - passenger car - passenger car - passenger car - lounge car

The target crates are in the second cargo car, unguarded, save for a conductor doing paperwork at a terminal at the other end of the car. There are 110 civilian passengers on-board scattered throughout the train, 20 crew members (engineers, porters, conductors and so on), 12 imperials of various stripes, one imperial officer and 12 stormtroopers- two with the officer, 10 guarding a completely unrelated cargo in the first cargo car.

HOW TO BOOST THE CARGO?

* Uncouple the cars behind it

The team might remove most of the imperial entanglements by simply detaching the cargo from the rest of the train. That might take get the 100+ passengers out of the line of fire and cut the Imperials on board by half, but it does nothing for the significant force in cargo car 1. It also doesn't stop the detached imperials from calling in reinforcements when they figure out something has gone wrong

* Hijack the entire train

At one of the stops along the route, the team might sneak into various key positions on the train, take out certain personnel and highjack the train. It could be interesting, if no one has the technical aptitude to actually operate the engine.

* Steal the train car with the ship

This would require precision flying and coordination on the train, but the team could employ a heavy lifter or their ship (if it's capable of lifting enough mass) and simply steal the entire car. Not a very subtle method, but effective. There are long stretches of open railway where a team could attempt this high risk stunt, peppered with dramatically appropriate landmarks and tunnels.

* Steal the cargo with the train in motion

A simpler variant on the above method would be hiring a speeder truck, pace the train and transfer the cargo. This is more subtle than stealing the car, but it requires longer to actually steal the goods. No doubt that an Imperial will stick their nose into the car at just the wrong moment. Plus - lots of skilled driving checks.

* Brute force

Possibly the most risky approach - simply pull out the blasters and start gunning the imperials down. Civilians might be injured in the exchange, and while they'll have the element of surprise on their side, if one part of the attack goes slowly, the rest of the Imperials will fortify their positions making stealing the cargo more difficult.

* Sleeping gas

The avenue that will offer the least resistance, but require the most set up: pumping some kind of knock-out gas into the train, incapacitating the Imperials aboard. This would require acquiring the gas, sneaking onto the train before the cargo and passengers are loaded, installing the delivery system undetected and then deploying the gas mid-trip. Also, the Stormtroopers have filters that may or may not keep them safe. A fight may ensue anyway).

GETTING AWAY -

Depending on how they pull the heist, there might be an exciting escaping with the guns. The Empire had some speeder bikes nearby and now chase the repulsor truck or there was a TIE patrol nearby and the team now gets to dogfight with a cargo car strapped to the bottom of their ship.

COMPLICATIONS -

The cargo was indeed munitions and supplies, but one of the crates also contains medicine critical to treat Conklin's Fever, a disease that's hit a small mining town along the train route. The cargo - or at least that portion of it - was scheduled for delivery - and now innocent people will suffer and die because the team stole their medicine.

Well, crap - now what?

NOW WHAT?

* Proceed with the deal as planned

Give all the crates to The General. Obviously this is the most cold-hearted option to take, but the team receives full payment and kudos from the General with no complications.

* Return the medicine, deliver the weapons

This is probably the most optimal solution all around. The villagers get the supplies they desperately need, The General gets his weapons, and the team still gets partial payment. The problem, of course, is how to get the supplies back to the villagers without them instantly fingering them for the bandits?

* Deliver nothing to The General, give it all to the villagers

Shockingly noble, and the villagers would be grateful for the weapons - but they will have made a powerful enemy and they dont get paid.

* Keep everything, sell it all later

This option will provide maximum profit but maximum screwing for everyone but the team. The blood of dead civilians will be on their hands and a powerful enemy will be at their backs - but they could make some sweet, sweet money doing so.

DELIVERING THE GUNS -

Knowing the type of person The General is, odds of a double cross at the exchange of weapons are probably extremely high. This means that they should devise a way of bringing him the stolen weapons without him being stabbed in the back.

Any precautions should do - simply hiding the deliver out in the wilderness, riding into the General's compound and exchanging payment for cargo location would work. This would work especially well if they do it in several stages, with the cargo in multiple hidden locations.

The team could also simply roll into the Generals compound with a show of strength and firepower, making the exchange with brute force. Lastly, they could go through a third party to make the exchange, an underworld Escrow, if you will.

DELIVERING THE MEDICINE -

The team could simply roll into the town with a show of force, drop off the medicine in the town square and leave before someone could come catch them and/or stop them.

They could leave the cargo in the nearby wilderness and radio the town that their goods are nearby and to pick it up.

Lastly, they could be charming and diplomatic, roll into town with their hats in their hands saying "We didn't know it was medicine, sorry". The villagers still might take it the wrong way or be impressed enough that the bandits did the right thing that they let them go - depending on the tragedy or triumph rolled.

HEROIC VARIANT -

The players deliver the entire cargo to the villagers, guns and medicine, and inspire them to stand up to The General. Use the new arms, take the fight to him, and deal with his marauding ways once and for all.

EVIL GM VARIANT -

Remove the ambiguity of the guns from the equation and make the cargo consist of nothing but strictly humanitarian supplies. The players now have the choice of who gets the cargo. Do they screw the civilians by giving the General the supplies or return the medicine and make a powerful enemy?

Sounds like a pretty cool, loose adaptation of the second episode of Firefly, espicially in its "Evil GM" variant.

"Now, this is all the money Niska gave us in advance. You bring it back to him. Tell him the job didn't work out. We're not thieves. But we are thieves. Point is, we're not takin' what's his. Now we'll stay out of his way as best we can from here on in. You explain that's best for everyone, okay?"

Really? Never saw the show - but I wouldn't be surprised if the writer totally stole from The Wild Bunch, too. It's a genre classic, up there with Leone's Dollars movies.

That may be the case, although I would also Firefly is effectively a western with spaceships; and a "Train Job" is part and parcel to the genre. You should take a look at the synopsis of the episode ( http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Train_Job ) it might give you more ideas to Crib for the tangents the adventure might take, better yet see the show on Netflix.

As of right now I do feel you do have a really solid adventure. I am a curious to see some of the NPCs written up for the module, as they really could become reoccurring NPCs after this adventure depending on its conclusion.

Another nice scenario, Desslok - thanks!

'Firefly' (and all the classic westerns it pays homage to!) greatly informs our EoE games in any case.

And a perfect way to show how the Krayt Dragons are 'scoundrels with a heart of gold'.

I can hear our leader screaming as she realizes she has to 'do the right thing' and lose the big payoff

I havent seen this flick in years. Good excuse to watch it again. "

Research"

Okay, having watched the Good The Bad and the Weird last night (awesome flick, by the way), I thought of a wrinkle for the game, another couple of items for a Evil GM to unleash:

* Rival thieves -

The players are on the train, getting ready to steal the cargo (or unleash a firefight, as they see fit) when suddenly there's commotion on the train. Another band of miscreants learned of the weapon shipment and want it for their own purposes. Suddenly there's a three way gun battle between the Imperials, the second band of criminals (who are both on the train and riding speeders beside the train) and the players.

On the other hand, they could let these thieves steal the cargo, get it away from the high security train (and take the heat from the Imperials) and then steal it from them instead.

* More than they bargained for -

The theft goes down as expected, but part of the cargo had something more than just guns and medical supplies. It had a data pad with a map, records, something up to the GM whim, something that everyone wants (like, say, a treasure map). Suddenly the guns become irrelevant as everyone and their brother start chasing the players while they have this hot potato.

In a shameless plug, I'll mention that my blog has an article about mag-lev trains.

http://talesfromtheedgeoftheempire.blogspot.com/2014/01/mag-lev-train.html

-Nate

I was wondering how much preparation would go into this on the part of the PCs?

Hmm what if the General has a few of his men aboard maybe they're looking to secure the cargo themselves?

Have you watched the Peacekeepers with George Clooney and Nicole Kidman?

They basically gas everyone aboard and unload the train onto another train and then send the original train off on its way with noone aboard alive to stop it plowing into another train heading the opposite direction, of course that involved the transportation of nuclear missiles being sent to be dismantled...

I was wondering how hard it would be to detach the train's passengers carriages and then have a train engine of their own to attach to the back and then detach the second cargo carriage and move off taking a junction to head away undisturbed?

Really love this idea!

Really? Never saw the show - but I wouldn't be surprised if the writer totally stole from The Wild Bunch, too. It's a genre classic, up there with Leone's Dollars movies.

haha, what you wrote is practically a cut n paste from Firefly (In fact, the episode is called The Train Job, if I'm not mistaken). I'm unfamiliar with Wild Bunch, so I guess that's where Firefly got the idea from.

Dude, you should watch Firefly. Its full of stuff like this.

Oh they even ran a caper to "acquire" medical supplies from a Core World Hospital since their doctor knew if they ran out they'd just reorder and be resupplied within the day (correct me here if you have a better recollection of that episode) meanwhile the doctor used the time to use the facilities to try and figure out what they had done to his sister...

Lord even Firefly's movie sequel Serenity started off with a bank robbery that all but screamed wild west!

Have to admit I recognised this from the Firefly series having never watched the Wild Bunch movie you mentioned.

haha, what you wrote is practically a cut n paste from Firefly (In fact, the episode is called The Train Job, if I'm not mistaken). I'm unfamiliar with Wild Bunch, so I guess that's where Firefly got the idea from.

I wouldn't be shocked if that's where it came from. Although to be fair, a train heist is a really common trope in westerns. It's almost inevitable that the plots start to double up after a while.

Apparently another idea I posted here was also very close to another Firefly episode, despite me stealing the idea shamelessly from the John Wayne flick Rio Bravo and Assault on Precinct 13. I wonder if Joss ever stole The Magnificent Seven as a firefly episode? (:

Have to admit I recognised this from the Firefly series having never watched the Wild Bunch movie you mentioned.

Oh, you totally should try and catch it someday. It's got all kinds of awesome ideas to draw upon for EotE - and a classic of the western genre in it's own right. One of Sam Peckinpah's best flicks.