[SFS_Aerondor] 01-34: Heart of the Foe (Inactive)

Game Master Aerondor

Inside the conference room, nominated First Seeker Luwazi Elsebo uploads a holographic map of a sparse region of the Vast. First Seeker Jadnura stares out a window at the opposite side of the room, his four arms folded behind his back as he gazes into the blackness of space surrounding Absalom Station.

“Thank you for joining us,” Luwazi says as she finishes positioning the map above the table. “We know there have been some hiccups in getting everyone on the same page now that the agents trapped in the Scoured Stars have returned. To keep any unnecessary schisms from forming, Jadnura and I decided to cooperate as joint First Seekers for the time being and focus on missions the entire Society can get behind. And nothing unites disparate factions like a common enemy.”

She brings up a flickering holograph of an alien with numerous eyes covering an ovoid body atop six chitinous legs. “These aliens call themselves jinsuls, and you may have already met them. A fleet of their starships ambushed us once we returned to the Scoured Stars, and we were lucky to make it out alive. They’ve interfered with our missions more than once now, but we can’t mount effective counterattacks because no one knows a damn thing about them.”

Jadnura glares at the jinsul holograph. “The only common thread between their attacks is the Scoured Stars,” he grumbles.

“The jinsuls used everything they had to drive us away from the Scoured Stars, and the other civilizations they’ve sought out in the Vast all seem to have some ancestral connection to the worlds within that system. Luckily, we still have two helpful artifacts; they’re known as Tears, which emerged from the Scoured Stars and sought out its former inhabitants. I probed the energies within the Tears again, and whatever force is powering them revealed coordinates to a new region in the Vast. Our scouts have confirmed jinsul starships occasionally visit one planet within the area. It’s not much, but we need to start somewhere.”

“We suspect the jinsuls inhabited this planet before relocating to the Scoured Stars,” Luwazi adds, “which means it may hold troves of information about their technology, leadership, culture, you name it. We’re planning to travel there, scan the planet from orbit, and send a few ground teams—including you—to conduct reconnaissance on sites of interest. With any luck we’ll get in, learn what we can, and get out before the jinsul commanders ever know we’re there. If you have any questions, now is the time to ask.”

Dot.

A professional-looking halfling garbed in distinctive armor that appears both antique and regal—complete with an Azlanti insignia emblazoned on the chest and a holographic cape hanging from the decorative pauldrons—sits cross-legged, absorbing the briefing with intense focus. "Can't say I've ever encountered these 'jinsuls' before. I've mostly tangled with the Azlanti Star Empire, but these fellas are uglier by far. What do we know about the planet itself? Will environmental protections be sufficient? Also, anything in particular we should keep an eye out for? And what do we know from the Society's past skirmishes with these critters?"

A android who was clearly built to look more human than most of his kind walks into the meeting area. He is dressed in a freshly cleaned white lab coat. He seems to have a suit of old and outdated armor on under that and his environmental protection mask has been altered to look like a surgical mask. He carries a nice shiny new rifle on his back.

I was on one of the teams assigned to the Scoured Stars a couple months back so I have faced these enemies before. They were not responsive to any form of talking. Hopefully we will find them to be easy to work with this time. As always, I am honored to be picked to be on your mission, Second Seeker Luwazi Elsebo.

I do have one question...

Any boon advice for this one?

Luwazi sighs. " We know little about the jinsuls, which this mission aims to rectify. Biologically we know they have 360-degree vision and insect-like chitin plating. As a civilization, they’re hell-bent on bringing the other Scoured Stars species back to their ancestral homeland, and they’re more than willing to use violence whenever something gets in their way.”

Turning to Medrick she shrugs "We were unable to find any trace of the ship, but I think you may be right. "

No specific boon recommendations

A Blond haired woman sits while listening to the others. The only thing that says she is not a human are her glowing blue eye.

"Well, I have met those Jinsuls! They act as cartoon vilains! They sing our destruction! They have razor sharp leg that bleed people! Don't any of you read the press? They were also articles about them! I could if I had the time learn about their language! But I don't have!

What do we know about this planet?"

"Very little." admits Luwazi.

Judnura adds "We hope it has clues that may reveal the jinsuls’ motives and capabilities: who commands them, what they want, where they came from, what their society is like, anything that might give us an edge in future encounters. Learn what you can about their leadership and social hierarchies, so we know how to incapacitate their military command when we cross blades with them again.”

..."So we must talk to them. But they are insane! They have created disease torpedos! They are treat for the Pact worlds! This is more of a job for the knights of Golarion or the steward or better the Army!" objects Layla Isabella Béatrice Radermaker Eight.

Pangea's comm unit blinks, and the android checks the message: Put down the drinks and report to the joint First Seekers.
Pangea wonders what this is about: "But I do not drink-- literally. Oh, maybe...?!"
The android grabs at the Clear Spindle Aeon Stone circling its head to remove that...

Arriving at the conference you see a tall non-sexuated android, with yellow lights under dark synthskin, that looks a bit confused, with an aeon stone in hand.
The hand also had a solarion crystal imbedded in it, and a mote of dark energy circles Pangea's head.
Wearing a simple flightsuit with a holstered pistol, the android has a jet pack mounted in its body, and sports a belt with a few tool kits, a half a dozen serums, and a battery.
It is carrying a big roll of cable.

"Greetings, I am Prototype Android & Nanite Genesis Enterprise - Akiton PANGEA Kappa model serial #101218-707. May Triune smile on us all and our mission."

The android takes in the fact there are three other similar sentients...

"Do we know what deity these Jinsuls revere? We should simply convert them. No need for the army. Open their minds to the All-Code that unites us. Explain that though single entity, Triune retains all aspects of multiplicity. So they will join us but remain themselves. Yes, a simple mission. Let us preach to them!"

The door to the conference room opens once again, admitting a relatively small male shirren. He wears weather-beaten travel clothing over a well-fitted (and well-worn) D-suit, the holy symbol of Wayden hanging on a simple chain around his neck.

"Um, hello!" he says out loud, cognizant that some people view unsolicited telepathic messages as an invasion. "I think I have the right place. I'm Shoo! Shoo Fly. That's what the drow kept calling me on Apostae, anyway."

After hearing the mission briefing: "A new planet to explore! Weydan be praised, that's great! I haven't met these jinsuls, but I've heard a lot about them from some friends who have. I love meeting new types of people (especially those psychedelic walrus folk, they're great!), but these critters seem mean. Anyway, hopefully there will be friendlier people down on the planet."

Shorty after, a female android wearing a race pilot jacket enters the room. Her eyes scanning the place to see if she knows some people.

With a flat voice she says The chance for not having already have meeting one of the five agents was 19.7%. She then smiles and says with the same voice Nice meeting you, I'm M'shak, sorry for being late, I was racing on Akiton.

Looking at her datapad she says I'm 100% up to this mission. It's a long time I'm pursuing these "Jinsul" and I've meet a lot of them in my recent missions. I was in the mission that freed the Starfinder in the Scoured Stars and I've shot several of these creatures and learn quite a lot already.

Turning to the First Seekers she asks Can this planet be a Temple? I know that several Jinsul are following a creature devoted to the way of the Solarian.

With that info, this missions seems to make sense. I am ready for my orders.

Ready to move on. Pangea-Kappa, did you make that info page on Pangea?

"Well, i would like to Buy two or three things before this.

"Now is the time to make any purchases. Once we are in the Vast, supplies will be hard to come by." notes Judnura.

To Pangea Luwazi adds "If you can find out any information about their religion, that may also be helpful."

Jadnura continues, emphasising his point "Preliminary scans indicate the planet is barely habitable; its atmosphere is breathable but polluted, and its surface is mostly barren. The climate is prone to harsh winters, and there’s a constant danger of lightning storms, so prepare for difficult overland travel. As for enemies, there’s no telling what lives on the surface, so bring plenty of ammo and whatever you need to get around unnoticed in case they outnumber you. Most signs of life are clustered in a few discrete sites, so we’ll be searching those first.”

Time for those last purchases and then we are off.

Dusty furrows his brow. "Frigid cold and lightning storms, eh? Best pick up something helpful against all those nasty things. Thanks for the intel, boss! Looking forward to peeling back the curtain on these creepy crawlies."

Spend 350 credits on a mk 1 adaptive serum, to be noted on the Chronicle sheet. Other than that, ready to go!

"Ooh, that's a good idea!" Shoo will buy the same.

Libre does the same. she will also buy a fusion spellcaster with a 2 comprend language (spell gem.) and winter.

No money left after the new medkit. I am ready to head out!

Kappa sends out at a message to Veylen Enterprises, reminding them of the android's help, and ordering a suit of armor from them.

Using Contractor’s Respect boon, that will go from 3/time to 2/time use (noted on my sheet) to get a lvl +1 armor for this scenario.
Choosing an Ysoki Refractor Suit.

Several minutes into the briefing there is an interruption as Luwazi's personal assistant comes nervously into the room.

"We have a robo-delivery for ... Pangea-Kappa?" she asks tentatively.

It comes with a note. "Thanks for the good work. If you can try to wear this on camera and get us some advertising that would be much appreciated."

The meeting over, you are instructed to meet the following day on the Perfect Silence. There you also meet up with three other teams as you settle into the long Drift...

Dusty regales Jadnura with anecdotes from his exploits against the Azlanti Star Empire, all while ducking and dodging his sparring strikes.

Is a check required to help?

Medrick is happy to spend his time helping the boss lady with whatever she needs. Diplomacy isn't his strong suit but he is knowledgeable and tries his best to apply that knowledge to her documents.

When Medrick is not helping Luwazi, he is volunteering in the medlab just to help with any odd work related injuries.

Pangea is happy to receive the armor, and will try to get in the spot.
Not being of any faction, well, the android will put on its cassock of Triune, and try to engage all who wish to listen: "TRIUNE! Triune is a Great Deity that brings so much to all! Open you heart and processors to the voice of the All Code..."

Libre frowns upon Pangea's declaration.

"Pangea, I have seeing a priest of Triune that show their faith in how they act. So be like her.

And for your information, I Heard Triune speaks. He is not that impressive."

"Triune's fascinating!" Shoo says excited. "It's amazing how people all over the vast heard their signal! Weydan's the one for me, though. We should all be free and equal as we explore the wonders of the galaxy!"

"Seeing as we are all within the Drift, you cannot really say that Triune is totally unimpressive. As for acting, not much to do here right now, thus the speaking. But if you want, Libre, I can rewire you. That'd give me something to do!"

M'Shak stays away from the mystic's discussion. She's not a good theoretician and doesn't care much about religion.

She calculates the statistic for mission.

Libre is stunned.

Did... Did he just threaten me? This guy is... No. He is just young... He didn't understand what he actually says... He thinks that android are robots. He himself thinks as this. Better just deviate the conversation.

But i have heard his voice. I was there when he revealed himself at age Three. And it wasn't impressive.

"Maybe later. I need to prepare for the trip. Talk to my husband. Saying goodbye to my kids. Those kinds of things."

And thus is spent a somewhat entertaining time.

The Perfect Silence and its escorts emerge from the Drift near the correct destination. Long range scans find no other starships in the area.

"Crews, take us into orbit, and start scanning the planet. We need to know what we are getting ourselves into down there."

Judnura soon identifies a prominent site of interest: a warm spot in the frozen wasteland, which appears to be ruins of a city. Shuttles for your team and the other two teams are prepared.

"Your orders are to land apart from each other. Approach from a variety of angles and see what you can learn. A fourth, backup, team stays aboard the Perfect Silence to help Luwazi.

Climbing aboard the shuttle,L.I.B.R.E. takes the controls and you have a beautiful trip down. Right until you pass through the cloud line. Massive bolts of lightning flash all around, and then ...
[b]CRASH

One strikes you straight on. The computer, overloaded by the massive shunt of power shuts down and your shuttle becomes a very heavy glider!

I've put LIBRE in the pilot seat, but more people can join in if they want. I need skill checks from the team to try and get down in one (or at least no more than three of four) piece(s).
Pilot checks will reduce the impact.
Medicine checks can be used to secure passengers and reduce damage.
Computer checks can be used to extract data from your ship about the storm.
Physical science can be used to try an analyse the storm.
You may either make a check, or aid in a check but not both. And as many people can do any particular check as you want, but each person can only make one roll. That is, if you are piloting you are not analysing the storm.

Letting the ship commands to L.I.B.R.E M'shak starts quickly extracting data from the ship computer.

That's strange. The chance for the lightning to hit our ship was 1.709%. It's not normal.

Computer: 1d20 + 13 ⇒ (19) + 13 = 32

Indeed it was not normal. That lightning had some unnatural properties to it - a quick examination shows it seemed to almost selectively fry certain circuits. Of course a crashing shuttle makes detailed analysis difficult.

Status, shuttle crash. Bold to post
LIBRE
Pangea
Shoo Fly
Medrick
Dusty
Impact
M'shak

"Hurry, hurry, strap in! Buckle into your chairs! The padding will lesson the impact on your organs!" Shoo runs around helping his compatriots properly protect themselves from impact. Spoilering my check so folks can decide whether or not they want to aid before seeing the result.

Medrick nods at Shoo in approval of that his first instinct was to start helping others and Medrick joins in to help others himself, working independently than Shoo, knowing that Medrick is very well trained in medicine.

L.I.B.R.E tries to steer the shuttle.

"This is not the first it happen to me. Do not worry!

piloting: 1d20 + 17 ⇒ (10) + 17 = 27

Seeing LIBRE's confidence, and the fact that Medrick and Shoo are covering the first aid aspect, Pangea gets interested upon hearing M'shak say that the lightning was not natural, and even some sort of selective attack
The android looks out at the skies, and tries to see how the lightning is forming, and what is setting it off...
"What is this storm?"
Physical Science: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (17) + 6 = 23

Seeing the shuttle’s rapid descent, Dusty hops into the copilot’s seat and tries to help prep the starship for a bumpy landing.

Piloting: 1d20 + 16 ⇒ (9) + 16 = 25

I think Dusty’s Piloting modifier is +18, but for some reason the stats are not showing up on my phone. If the modifier turns out to be something else I’ll update the post once I’m home.

EDIT: Modifier is +16, adjusted in the roll.

Shoo fusses around with belts, securing the crew. Medrick tries as well, but gets distracted by the goldfish tank. Who loads a goldfish tank onto a shuttle? Stowaway goldfish? Goldfish smugglers? Who can tell. But he does what he can to cushion them from the impact. No time for the rest of the crew though.

Libre shows exactly why he is known as an Ace Pilot. Flying the planet's clunkiest glider he aims for what he hopes is a less hard surface. Kind of hard to tell with all that snow and lightning though.

Pangea, fascinated by the storm is also convinced it is unnatural. The shuttles Faraday cage should have protected it from such natural forces. But it didn't, which is why the shuttle it pitching hard a port, in spite of LIBRE's best efforts.

Seeing the trouble LIBRE is having, Dusty straps into the co-pilots seat and helps wrestle with the manual controls.

CRASH The shuttle goes down hard.
damage: 5d8 ⇒ (5, 8, 4, 2, 6) = 25 Would have been much more without those pilot and medicine checks

As the dust.. well.. not really dust. It's snowing out there..
As the snow clears, the team picks themselves up. That shuttle isn't going to get you off planet. Surely someone on the Perfect Silence will arrange a rescue. In the meanwhile... you have a mission to get on with. There is a big city, just a few miles...away.. through a storm. On an alien world. With lightning. Did I mention the lightning? Lots of it. Bang, flash. More bangs.

M'shak asses the damages to the shuttle and analyses the storm.

With her bland voice she's says I've calculated our chance for a save landing at 5%. You've done a great job all. Now, the main problem is the storm outside, our chance at survival are down to 45%. We need to be at our full capacity before continuing.

@GM the damages are for all our character, yes?

Dusty groans as he unfastens his seatbelt and slowly clambers from his seat, gingerly moving his limbs that ache from impact. "Ah, that was rough! Is everyone okay? Can we regain our bearings and then head toward that city?" He looks out the front window of the shuttle. "Yeesh, look at this place. No wonder the jinsuls are so grumpy all the time. What was up with that lightning? I thought aircraft were supposed to be protected from lightning strikes!"

Can we take a 10 minute rest to recover Stamina and then head out?

The storm is not a normal one, it seems that it has a "defensive" mind and was able to target our vessel purposely.

Says M'Shak, showing the data she gets from the main computer.

The storm is not a normal one, it seems that it has a "defensive" mind and was able to target our vessel purposely.

Says M'Shak, showing the data she gets from the main computer.

Dusty's face sours. "So something that controls the weather knows we're here and is trying to shoot us down. Delightful. I hope the other teams are off to a better start than we are."

Before taking a moment to rest for himself, Medrick checks to see he the other passengers fared and tries to stabilize anyone who seems to be unconscious. If everyone seems okay, he then takes a moment to take care of himself.

This planet is nasty already... Either naturally or designed. Let us hope we aren't walking into a whole city of disaster like this.

There is 60.78% chance that it this is an automated defense against any intruder.
As the Jinsul seems to be able to move in and out of this planet without harm, there is a 99.99% chance that a beacon or a signal let them pass.

Turning to Medrick she says The chance for the city to be design against any non Jinsul is 79.04%

"Oof. Not the most comfortable flight I've been on, that's for sure. Still, any landing you can walk away from is a good one, right? C'mon, let's go explore!" Shoo is excited to go explore this new world, but can easily be convinced of the wisdom of resting for 10 minutes to regain stamina first.

"Thanks, team! That was bad, but I think it could've been a lot worse..."

Yes, you can take a ten minute rest to recover stamina if you wish. Anyone who wants to do that, sing out. And yes, the damage applies to everyone.

The group gets organised, peering out into the bleak snow covered and rather desolate landscape. That city will take hours to get to on foot. But sitting in a crashed shuttle is not making it any closer.

Okay, mechanics time, we'll play this hour by hour to start with. (1)While travelling you may pick a single PC to make a survival check. Succeeding in this allows you to make faster progress through the storm.
(2) Each hour of travel you may each choose to make a check to see what you learn as you travel. Skills allowable are Culture, Engineering, Physical Science and Mysticism.
(3) It is cold out there. Your armor will protect you against this, but you rapdily realise that the snow starts to build up on it, and on your visors. If you have helmets on your perception checks will gradually get worse. If you don't .... you will get cold. So eveyrone be clear about your armour status please.

After making sure everyone else is alive, Medrick takes a moment to take care of himself and feels much better. Spending an RP to fill up SP

I have a 5 survival. I will roll if that is the best in the group.

Culture: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (2) + 7 = 9I am really off to a rocky start with these skills checks.

Medrick wants to make sure he can see the incoming dangers so he keeps his surgical mask off for now. Can we change our minds of what we do after we see how bad the first hour hurts? haha

yes, armor can be changed on an hour by hour basis. It is really just about whether you have your helmet on.

M'shak has +7 in survival

M'Shak takes 10mn to repose her circuits and organic part before to face the storm.

During the first hour of travel, intrigued by the strength and acumen of the storm, she tries to find some pattern or unnatural things in it.

Engineering: 1d20 + 13 ⇒ (10) + 13 = 23

For now, M'shak keeps her mask on.

Pangea spends a few minutes patching up--
1 RP spent for back to full SP
--before setting out to trek through the snow and the storm to the unknown city.
Trained in Survival, but only +1, so I hope someone else will be rolling
As it plods along, Pangea tries to figure out why there is so much lightning, what the storm looks like, how the wind is blowing...
Physical Science: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (6) + 6 = 12
The snow piles up on its armor making things more cumbersome...
The [url=https://www.aonsrd.com/ArmorDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Ysoki%20Refractor%20Suit&Family=None]Ysoki Reflector Suit] only mentions a jumpsuit and no head gear, so I imagine that the head is protected by the armor's environmental force field.
But no problem ruling that there is some kind of helmet and perception penalties.