Lets suppose the players have a slow moving grav vehicle. Suppose I want to add a minor encounter with an alien life form that would be a large herbivore that and the males (or females for that matter) would get very protective of the herd..and would could...unless treated gingerly, get angry and attack said vehicle....Something...rhino-ish/akylosaur-ish/hippo-ish....

...and any ideas on how to handle such interaction?

I think you need to have the players come upon a herd, and almost by accident. As you climb the hill and begin to crest it you notice a herd of Yikklebeasts scattered for a few hundred metres in the valley below. You could go around or through the herd for the least amount of time. If you backtrack your route to avoid the herd you will add about an hour to your trip. What would you ike to do?

At this point maybe have a Knowledge test to help highlight some details about the Yikklebeasts. A triumph may indicate that Yikklebeasts will leave you alon if you run dirt through your cloths and chirp, a despair will indicate that they are preditors and chase the players endlessly until they are dined upon. Or perhaps you just fail to mention that they will charge any one wearing red or gold, and that the red and gold droid aught to be extra careful.

Now, the players could try to sneak past or just boldly plow through the middle... Once the players get to a rather dramatic point have them make a roll. Which should be a skill that reflects their choice of method. My first reaction was to make a succession of rolls, but that will just be boring after a while. So make maybe two at most.

Perhaps a few disadvantages may have a "fake charge" or a baby Yikklebeast will follow the grav sled having mistaken it for its mother. Despair may have the players eye to eye with a bull, and that red and gold droid is now in dire peril. Unless of course the other players throw dirt over it and all start chirping.

Great stuff.

I felt like a mini-skill monkey while writing that up.

So if you don't listen to Order 66 continue to not listen. Skill Monkey also has just his bits somewhere.... Try Google.

I never listen to Order 66. Also, Skill Monkey is on iTunes...yeah.

Actually, until your post I never thought of this....I really don't need to stat them up, I can just have the PCs make rolls and add the narrative accordingly.

Great write-up, Amanal!

azato, you're totally right, you don't really need stats, you can just describe what happens based on the rolls!

I had some times in our adventure tonight where some NPCs who were allied with the PCs were also helping the PCs fight their enemy NPCs. So when it was NPC-vs-NPC I often just declared how the attack went rather than rolling it all out to save time.

I was thinking of how to improve this. I'll just bullet up some additional ideas:

• Make it happen in a canyon that follows a river and the creatures are drinking. This way the players go through the encounter or clilmb out and spend a whole mess of time avoiding the encounter. (You could also up the risk and have them being chased by flyers and getting out of teh canyon isn't going to be all that good.
• Have each player make a knowledge test and have bits of paper ready that you can hand them based on successes, failures, triumphs and despairs. They can compare notes and such but seperating the truths from the half-truths could be fun.
• Narrate the encounter and include all the players but have one special event for each one. The beasts are chewing on the cud, small insects swarm around the ears which flick in annoyance as do their tails. A small one looks up and makes eye contact with you (in the knowledge test this player passed and got a disadvantage - so maybe he should break eye contact or ...) These shouldn't take more than a minute or two to describe and roleplay through, but give everyone a bit of "hero time", maybe some are funny maybe some could become very dangerous.
• Those insects could attack the players too.
• Or something bigger and more dangerous could come along and attack the Yikklebeasts, perhaps if the players defeat the Beast that Eats Yikkles they may get left alone or even semi-tame one and get some help with the grav-sled pushing. Maybe they get accepted into the herd and can use the beasts as cover to get out of the canyon and move a bit faster towards their destination.