Zoomba's Stumbling Society [SFS 2-06 & 2-08] (Inactive)

Game Master Zoomba

Still looking to be solidly low tier

It probably won't matter, but after double checking my chronicles is does look like Moxie turned level 7. I will get her adjusted today.

Yep still 5 here.

I have Abundant Ammunition if we go with the Drake. I also could replace one of our weapons with a nuclear weapons instead.

Just need to know what ship we're using before we depart: Pegauss or Drake

I'm fine with the Drake.

Me too

Drake it is then!

Yay! Then I will slot Abundant Ammunition, so we can get some extra shots with the missile launcher.

Boons:
Starfinder Insignia (Slotless Boon)
Marked Field Agent (Slotless Boon)
[ ] Counter Innovation (Slotless Boon; Limited-Use):
Drat That Rat! (Slotless)
Knights of Golarion Affiliation (Social Boon)
Dream Whispers (Ally Boon)
Nanite Corruption (Personal Boon)
Defender of the Fleet (Starship Boon) - Finest weapons
Coin Award (Promotional Boon)

Okay, lemme pitch this division of labor:

Eselar as the Magic Officer
Data as the Science Officer, likely switching to First Officer once we've got good scans.
Moxie as Pilot
Brock as Captain
Lucky as Gunner
Bugface as Gunner and we can hop over to engineer if we take damage/need to.

Sounds good. We could even have three people gun some turns if possible. The front arc has two guns on it.

Ah, missed this in the Discussion thread. I'm fine with that, if that's what you guys want to do. I can't Taunt drones, so my go-to Captain move isn't that helpful.

You can still shout at us :-p

I'd honestly be fine operating without a captain, but I think one's required?

No ship role is absolutely required. It's fine if none of you choose to be Captain on this or any round.

Heck, even without a Pilot the ship can still slowly glide forward on its own (not recommended)

MORE DAKKA

Sorry I disappeared, weird couple of days. Did you guys decide on a position for Bigface? I'll do whichever job.

It happens.

I think the thought was Bugface would gun for the first round, then either keep gunning or move to Engineer based on how it was going. Right now you definitely get a shot from the presumed gunning last round, and for this current Round 2 you can choose if you want to engineer or fire again.

Note that thanks to Eselar's Starship Boon, all '1's on the weapon damage rolls can be re-rolled, so diverting power to weapons is a less useful Engineering task than normal.

Gunner will be good :)

If I can get an Engineering check to divert power to the engines, I could get the ship two more hexes closer to that drone platform. That would get us exactly in missile range.

If any of you have any questions about the state of things in this combat, please let me know. Starship combat in Play-by-Post can sometimes get hard to track and I'm happy to try and explain anything as best I can.

Right now Data has been able to shut down the platform's drone-launching programs. For now the two fighters attacking you aren't getting any immediate reinforcements.

Targeting weapons is the most common strategy in Star-Trek so I adopted it.

The problem with targeting weapons in Starfinder is that (as I understand it) the arcs affected are determined randomly. So if the ship has multiple weapons on multiple arcs (as they usually do) they can just switch to firing from a different arc. In this case, since the weapons are only in one arc, I assume we do the crit damage on that arc ... although now that I read the rules, I suppose it *could* be interpreted that you still randomly choose an arc, since the turret counts as being in all arcs. I've never had that come up before, that I can recall.

But when I run Starfinder, it's mostly for my kids ... and they never target systems. ;) Plus, I rarely run scenarios with the starship tag for them.

Its not the weapons, it's the arc that's affected. So if you damage the front arc, the turret will have that penalty if shooting at someone in the front arc but not have a penalty shooting at a target in their port, starboard or aft.

True, however turret guns are counted as all arcs. Which means any weapon crit is going to likely affect a ships main and most flexible weapon on top of any other ones

Hmmmm, I've always run it as only being affected if it's firing out of the arc that was damaged. Otherwise, it brings up the question of whether glitching penalties from multiple arcs would stack with each other on the turret. Reading through it again though, I have to say I'm not sure how the authors intended it to work.

Of course you're the GM, so I'm fine with however you want to interpret it.

Hmmm as well :p

It is unclearly phrased:

"Randomly determine one arc containing weapons; condition applies to all gunner actions using weapons in that arc (a turret counts as being in all arcs)"

but my own interpretation is that the way it explicitly calls out turret weapons with that phrasing implies that it hurts the weapons themselves regardless of where they are fired (which would affect off-arc shots with a Broad Arc weapon too). If there's a ruling or better text, I'm glad to see it, but I think this both fits my interpretation of the intent and makes the 'randomness' a bit less frustating (since as we just talked about, otherwise it can be pretty mediocre).

Oh, I'm totally fine with that interpretation and understand the reasoning behind it. I actually think I'll start running it your way in the future.

I would say that it makes more sense from the stand point of the rules fitting the action. I always interpreted it as the sensors on that arc being damaged, but intuitively it makes more sense for the actual weapons to be damaged. It does also make targeting the weapons a bit more rewarding as most ships have at least one turret weapon.

As for the out of character thing, put yourself in your characters place or in this case my characters place. Would you yourself resist magic missiling the creature that shot you even if you know the mission? There is a heated battle and no guarantee of it stopping or the creatures backstabbing us. This can probably be taken into discussion thread, but in real life you'd be under stress, fear, and other factors when doing it.

I'm not sure what "out of character thing" you mean. I don't see where anyone said anything about you behaving out of character ... we are responding mostly in-character that you are violating the rules of the mission ... rules that we were not only given at the *start* of the mission, but which we in-character re-iterated before leaving the ship.

But your out of character explanation is even worse than the in-character behavior appears: because you are explicitly saying that the magic missile was out of some kind of instinctive, uncontrollable revenge.

If you jumped the gun that's fine, it happens ... but if you try to defend it in-character as anything other than a mistake, then that will have in-character consequences about how the team reacts.

I did make an ooc comment on my post, which is what Data X was referring to. I was venting my frustration as a player there, not as Moxie. It was unnecessary and I should have left it out. You do have the right to play your character how you see fit and that does include taking actions that other party members don't agree with. So I do apologize about that.

I did make an ooc comment on my post, which is what Data X was referring to. I was venting my frustration as a player there, not as Moxie. It was unnecessary and I should have left it out. You do have the right to play your character how you see fit and that does include taking actions that other party members don't agree with. So I do apologize about that.

That is what I was referring to in the out of character thing.

Re: the nonlethal discussion from the Gameplay thread.

You can take the -4 penalty to fire for nonlethal with any wepaon in Starfinder unless its explicitly disallowed. That includes with bullets, flamethrowers, or acid.

How does it work? Magic future tech! So for acid I guess nonlethal shots are more like shooting strong orange juice or something at them.

In character response here are fine, but I would remind everyone to continue to post in-character, especially in the Gameplay thread, and recall the Society's in- and out- of character tenets of Cooperation.

That said, Data: attacking Vixis right now is going to get you an Infamy point. While he and his group have not agreed to give you any of the weaponry back yet, they have not attacked you here or been aggressive in any way. If you wish to discuss further, feel free to PM me.

I think this situation is exactly what the Infamy rules are designed for, but I might hold off posting for a little bit to see what happens.

Regarding nonlethal acid: shooting for legs and arms, to disable them but not damage critical organs, would likely be the explanation.

Data: In character, I am having trouble coming up with a way for Brock to react *other* than attacking you for this behavior. But I'm not going to do it, because devolving this into a PvP among the players isn't the goal. I do have to ask, though - Are you out-of-character TRYING to fail at our mission for this scenario, for some reason? Or are you trying to gain Infamy points?

We can't engage in PvP, but if a player insists on breaking laws (and I think attempted murder is a crime in most societies) then we're not obligated to defend them from the consequences of their action. The simplest solution may be to allow this tribe to arrest Z Data Z while we finish the mission. She may also have to pay 5 Fame for body recovery.

If someone does something that will cause Infamy though, the GM is supposed to warn them of the consequences of their actions. So I'm just waiting to see if this whole incident ends up getting retconned before writing my next post.

Edit: Ninjaed by Moxie Moon, I was posting when she got her post up.

Given he is an Android and Androids take things literally, I was trying to see what the NPCs let me get away with. I didn't want to participate in the card game cause of my low skills, so I'm trying to take the mission by force.
I'm actually trying to help complete the mission in a different way. I'm trying to see if the NPCS excuse the Androids behavior because he is an Android and Androids don't understand sarcasm and stuff. I'm actually trying to succeed, not fail, even if it means getting infamy, and the reporting notes say an important NPC died, like a box is checked because of the NPC dying. Did I know for sure if the NPC would die? No, but if I could cause him to be confused, which is what the inject nanobots does, it would give use a huge advantage on the card game.
When I think of Data, I think of Data from Star Trek NTG. "Data, I will have to give you a rain check." Said the by female counselor.
"You can certainly check me for rain, but I assure you I'm not wet" or something like that. Said by Data. That conversation actually happened on the last episode of Star Trek Enterprise.

I did consider the consequences of what I did. I was viewing every possibility that could come out of this.
1. I gained infamy, I knew that I would regardless of what he is and the reason. I'm okay with this.
2. There was a possibility of the NPC surviving the attack but becoming confused do to the nature of Inject Nanobots giving us a huge advantage in the card game.
3. There was a possibility of the NPC dying. This doesn't bother me.
4. There was a possibility of the spell attack missing. Like a roll a 1 or something
5. There was a possibility of other NPCs brushing me off as a dumb Android who takes things literally and doesn't understand sarcasm, after all he is an Android. Not to mention Androids take a -2 to sense motive on others and others take a -2 to sense motive on me. In lameness terms, they would hate and possibly kick out me, but not the rest of you.
6. There was a possibility of other NPCs going in as an open revolt or kicking out the party because of what he did.
7. There was a possibility of other NPCs being scared of me regardless if Data knew what he was doing or not and they'd give us whatever we wanted.
8. After I analyzed every possible consequence, I took a gamble.

In Star Trek, Data pushed Crusher off the side of a holodeck ship into the water. He didn't punch her in the face. ;)

But, again, you're giving conflicting responses here. Either Data was confused because of his android nature, or he wasn't. The fact that you explicitly identified that it was a card game and THEN performed an attack suggests that Data was not confused, so I don't understand why your response here is citing this sort of confusion, when that confusion is clearly not the cause of your in-character action.

Even if you wanted to RP something like that, you could do it (much like the way this plays out in Star Trek), by saying something like, "Oh, will we be performing gladiatorial combat to the death after the card game is completed, then?"

Play-by-post as a gaming medium has many pros and cons. Unfortunately, this type of situation is one where the medium is at its most limited: conversations that could be done quickly and with more engaged and simple back-and-forth become much more complicated when people can only read and post responses hours apart (and sometimes see the conversation shift even while they're typing a response with ninjaing). EDIT: I see I was ninja'd myself typing this

For right now here is what is going to happen, and what is needed to keep this scenario moving forward:

1) As mentioned Data, you are receiving an infamy point.
2) We are going to need a Diplomacy check from someone to appease/try to explain the situation to Vixis and the Reflectors. Depending on how that goes, a few things may happen.
3) Data, please provide IC some level of response to the other party members' reactions.
~The rest of the party: your characters do not need to like or agree with this explanation, nor are Brock, Eselar, etc prevented from IC deciding you would rather not go on missions with Data after this. But at the moment you are Starfinder with a mission and the bar on PvP remains though again, that does not force you to intervene and defend PCs committing flagrant acts from the consquences of their actions.

To clarify Brocks question. Data knows what he is doing, but is trying to trick the NPCs into fooling them that he does not. He is hoping to be stereotyped as the over the top Android who takes things literally, has paranoid programming and stuff.
This is a hard scenario for me given it seems to be a lot of diplomacy and roleplay and I'm the dungeon crawl and roll skill checks type of player.

It's not like you did something cheeky and mischievous...that spell does a lot of lethal damage. It's like hitting someone in the head with a hatchet and then saying that you were just kidding and it's not a big deal anyways because they didn't die. It's hard to imagine they'd let someone who gets confused and then murders people because they don't understand metaphors or something into the Starfinder Society. Or that Z Data Z just wouldn't be in a maximum security prison for having killed some random store clerk or something. Anyways...I'll try to post something later to get this sorted out.

I don't want to pile on you Data but I do want to point something out in case you're in a similar situation in the future. You forgot one possible outcome in your calculations: we could fail the mission completely.

Edit: 2 things you forgot to calculate: these dudes don't know what androids are so assuming they'll think you took it literally because of being an android is a long shot.

Using Data as an example, if there was an episode where Data was working with Wesley in engineering and Wesley said something like, "More problems with the trachyon emitters? Kill me now," Data wouldn't grab Wesley by the throat and snap his neck like a twig. More likely Data would say something like, "Wesley, my ethical protocols don't allow me to harm any living life form except in self defense." And then they would have a nice little laugh and maybe that would be the start of an episode dealing with the ethical issue of euthanasia or something.

So basically, I'm saying I don't really buy your explanations for what you did. There's a lot of ways to play an android or some other kind of hyperliteral entity.

I really don't have much to add that hasn't been very eloquently stated upthread, but, control over one's own character as a given, it was still a heck of a move to make without bringing up the plan in Discussion...

Since I was not timely with this for the first chronicle(don't forget that I don't have it yet btw) I figure I'll do this now.

Prof Starship Mechanic: 1d20 + 12 ⇒ (2) + 12 = 14

I am so sorry about that Bugface. Making that ASAP.

And for the rest of you, if you have a Day Job for this scenario, now's a good time to roll it

Day Job

Profession (MD in Psychology): 1d20 + 9 + 1 + 4 ⇒ (17) + 9 + 1 + 4 = 31

Profession(corporate pro): 1d20 + 11 ⇒ (19) + 11 = 30

Profession:Actor: 1d20 + 20 ⇒ (4) + 20 = 24

The Known Quality social boon multiples the dayjob amount by the Acquisitives tier, which is tier 3. Reading through the boon again, it gets tripled AFTER it it gets doubled. 24X2=48; 48X3=144