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After alerting the others, Idir is about to try and talk to the corpos to explain they had the wrong woman...until the others make it clear this was going to turn violent.
"Get the one grabbing her first! We need to give them an opening to get away!" he calls to the others, pointing at the one holding Ceren's arm.
Then he grimaces and raises his rifle to shoot at the man he'd just pointed at. He hated guns, but they were an unfortunate necessity to Starfinders, and that's what he was now.
The party closes with the thugs. Thanks to Thundergun's shove and Kuozar's fine shot, the lead thug is off balance and hurt. Xikko's shining crimson axe finishes him. The man crumples near the railing.
Nic nack's stone ricochets off the head of the handsome thug, blood pours from the wound, matting the man's hair.
Cautious about friendly fire, Idir's shot is high.
Tenry is caught off guard. He only manages to draw his weapon.
With only the crumpled body of his friend between him and a raging ysoki, the bleeding handsome thug fires his pulsecaster at Xikko. "Jimmy's down!"
... non-lethal
"Finish the mission." Behind Ceren and Jubair, the quietly menacing thug calmly raises his gun to fire over the pair at the looming izalguun.
... non-lethal
The man shifts his position minimally to cooly dodge Thundergun's attack.
Xikko's axe bites into the man's leg. His head swivels to look down at the ysoki. He says imapssively, "That hurt."
Idir fires again. He's just able to thread his shot past his teammates and Ceren. It catches the the man in the head and he drops.
Nic nack and Kuozar combine to put down the last thug. Ceren and Jubair slip behind Thundergun and travel in the rocking chair of the party for the short remainder of the journey to the Lorespire Complex.
Historia-7 is thrilled to meet Ceren in person. After a few minutes the elderly hacker is escorted to the android's inner sanctum; Jubair is escorted to the Starfinder gun range to play. Historia-7 pauses at the door and thanks the party for their help making a brief quip about having to fix only “some of your work”. Idir knows this is as nice a compliment as Dataphiles leader ever gives.
On your way to your next VC, a rudimentary courier robot greets the PCs. It presents the PCs with a gift box containing a standard datajack and 200 credits. A simple electronic message from Historia-7 indicates that the datajack is a token of thanks from the Dataphiles. The box also contains a frostbite-class zero rifle. The rifle is an old, albeit out-of-place acquisition of Ceren’s that Jubair found while cleaning out the family house. Historia-7 entrusts both items to the PCs for the remainder of the scenario.
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Shooting people lethally on the street. Sending a child to play at gun range. Starfinders are military organisation. Armed heavy and agressive. I was not warned about this but I'll take it into account. - Thundergun shares his thoughts after team recieve some credits and frost-bite rifle.
Kuozar earlier suggested to visit Radaszam. Maybe thats te time?
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Historia-7 is thrilled to meet Ceren in person. After a few minutes the elderly hacker is escorted to the android's inner sanctum; Jubair is escorted to the Starfinder gun range to play. Historia-7 pauses at the door and thanks the party for their help making a brief quip about having to fix only “some of your work”. Idir knows this is as nice a compliment as Dataphiles leader ever gives.
Idir manages a weak smile at Historia-7's "congratulations."
"Coming from her, that's incredibly high praise!" he says to the others, before appointing himself Jubair's unofficial babysitter and rushing after the escort.
"Surprise and terror! The gun range does NOT have appropriate play-equipment for a child his age!"
Shooting people lethally on the street. Sending a child to play at gun range. Starfinders are military organisation. Armed heavy and agressive. I was not warned about this but I'll take it into account. - Thundergun shares his thoughts after team recieve some credits and frost-bite rifle.
"I said the gun range was a bad place to put him! Historia-7 may be a fearsome and brilliant leader but parenting skills are one field of study she has NOT dedicated time or effort to! And I find it especially concerning that WE cared more about the child's safety than his own grandmother!" Idir complains. "As to the Starfinder Society being a military organization...that's...a surprisingly astute assessment, but not entirely accurate. While it is true that the Society has a number of military-grade assets, it lacks the cohesion and uniformity of a true military outfit...and of course there's the grim fact that a majority of those assets and the Starfinders using them are currently missing in action."
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Jubair was very close when laser fire, throwing rock and other harmful effects smashed few men of his kin. Thundergun is sure that this could be really traumatic experience for the youngling.
So maybe this child really needs a babysitter.
Thundergun shares these thoughts with Idir when the team heads towards Radasazam's spot.
Radaszam “The Dealmaker” manages the deployment of the Acquisitives and his personal mercenary outfit, the Obsidian Spiders from a public-facing office in the Nyori Palisades, a luxurious neighborhood located in Absalom Station’s transparent central dome mere blocks from the Lorespire Complex.
Inside the offices, plain white doors of the office slide open to reveal a stark, dimly lit room. The chamber is bleak and expressionless in its emptiness—no vanities line its smooth black walls, and no signs of use mar its smooth black furniture. The only occupants of the suite are a bug-eyed tadpole wriggling in a glowing blue aquarium and a reptilian vesk seated behind an onyx desk. The vesk gestures to a number of chairs in front of him, his features sharply illuminated by the light of his desk’s green holoscreen.
“The new graduates,” he greets, in a low and pleasant voice. “Good day. I am Radaszam, though since you are here, I should hope you already knew.
“I trust you are aware of our Society’s traditions, so I will cut to the point. I have a minor situation that needs resolution. One of our members, a human named Laboni, had a rather public altercation with a junk scavenger from the Spike. You might be more familiar with the scavenger than I, actually; he is a ysoki who fancifully calls himself Ratrod. I am told he runs a popular racing competition that has, hmm, several hundreds of thousands of viewers on the station’s infosphere. For some reason, Laboni felt the need to tell him that any ‘real’ mechanic could easily beat the garbage that Ratrod and his associates slap together. Now that Ratrod has issued an infosphere-wide demand that she race him and prove it, Laboni doubts she can back that claim up.
“Embarrassing, isn’t it? Not really the sort of troublemaker that suits our Society. Perhaps she would be better suited to the bottom of a trash compactor... Well, we cannot afford to throw her out, not after so many Starfinders were lost in the Scoured Stars. Besides, we can’t let people think we are so weak that we can’t control our own members, or that we cannot stand up to a scrapyard junker. No, I would like you to assist Laboni in winning this race. Show our detractors that even the least of our Society is not someone to be trifled with.”
"I have badges which will get you into the pit area of the race.
The race is in Botscrap. I'll send the exact location to your comm units. You should hurry down there. You'll need every moment to build a vehicle that can beat Ratrod."
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Thundergun feels comfortable in the dimly it room where team arrived. He watches at the tadpole in aquarium all the time while Radasazam talks.
So we need to find this Laboni-human and help him to build a self-riding toy-machine? How large? Where do we get parts for it, from junk there? When the next race is expected to happen? , - THundergun sounds like he wanna prolong time he is able to watch the tadpode which obviously mesmerizing and calmin izalguun.
"I think that's the general idea. The bikes are 'improved' with gear found in the refuse heap that the race course is immersed in. I trust you have the technical skills ."
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Idir is decidedly less comfortable than Thundergun when entering Radasazam's office. He audibly gulps before taking a seat. As they listen to his briefing his eyes widen when Radasazam insinuates Laboni'd be better off dead, and he opens his mouth to protest before the venture captain continues and reveals that wasn't what he was asking them to do.
He then breathes a sigh of relief.
"This is good, technical work is good...much safer...less chance of...altercations like our previous task."
He thinks a bit on what he can remember about Ratrod's reputation.
Once again you take the long lifts toward the Spike. Ratrod’s racing circuit is a hollowed-out section of a mountain of spare parts in Botscrap, a seedy industrial district dedicated to reclaiming technological waste, and home to private junkyards filled with complex robotics, suspiciously functional and restricted military “trash,” and gangs of goblin squatters.
The track is specifically sanctioned by the ysoki-dominated Salvage Union that controls most of the yards.
The crowd varies from upper class younglings of various races, mostly human, lashunta and kasatha, trying to blend in but obviously standing out in their cleaner, crisper clothes, and the way they shrink into themselves, trying to touch nothing, to a wide smattering to the working classes, to a party of vesk soldiers, to ysoki scroungers and mechanics, and small packs of goblins.
Sounds fill the air -- ragged nova-metal from the loudspeakers, punctuated by the occasional announcement, the hubbub of any large crowd, and the sporadic brutal roar of high octane mechanical drives, the whine of turbos, and the crackling of electric drive fields.
At the competitors’ entrance, a small robot informs them of the basic rules of the race: racers and their pit crews are to build and improve their vehicles from the available scrap around the racetrack. Vehicles built at previous junkraces can return. Racers can fire upon other competitors during the race, but firing into the audience is grounds for immediate disqualification; racer weapons must be nonlethal and may affect only opponents’ vehicles.
In a relatively quiet corner of the pit area, Laboni, a human woman in her late teens, is working on a racer alone. She wears a bright, white lab coat over paisley clothes.
To her credit Laboni has worked hard to pull together a decent racer from the piles of junk in Botscrap. Unfortunately, despite her efforts, Laboni’s machine is probably not a match for vehicles that have been tested and improved over the course of multiple junkraces.
Improve Laboni’s Junkracer: Make a Computers, Engineering, Perception, or Physical Science check to find parts in the scrapyard and install them in Laboni’s racer. Possible improvements are:
• The vehicle’s base speed increases by 5 feet.
• The vehicle gains a +1 Piloting modifier.
• The vehicle gains a +1 attack modifier.
• The vehicle gains a +2 bonus to its EAC.
• The vehicle gains a +2 bonus to its KAC.
• The PCs install a basic energy weapon on the vehicle (imposes a
–4 base Piloting penalty on a hit).
• The PCs install a basic kinetic weapon on the vehicle (imposes a
–4 base Piloting penalty on a hit).
• The PCs upgrade a weapon to impose an additional –2 penalty to
enemy Piloting checks on a successful hit.
Investigating the Enemy: PCs can scout out their opponents with a Sense Motive check, or examine their opponents’ vehicles with an Engineering check. —the PC can take breaks during the improvement attempt and casually investigate one of the other racers. Otherwise, it costs a PC one of his prerace actions to converse with or examine all members of the competition. This check does not grant exact knowledge of an opponent’s statistics, but the GM can provide the PCs an idea of a driver’s skill or the associated vehicle’s strengths and weaknesses. On a successful check, the PC can ask one pertinent question about the pilot’s skill or about the vehicle the pilot is driving (or receives similar relevant information, if a player is unsure what he or she should be asking about).
Sabotage: PCs can attempt to sabotage the other vehicles, but they must dodge the eyes of everyone in the ramshackle stadium by spending a prerace action and attempting a Stealth check. A PC who succeeds at this check can then attempt an Engineering check on one of the opposing vehicles to either reduce the vehicle’s speed by 10 feet or to impose a –4 penalty on one of the vehicle’s modifiers. If the PC is caught cheating in this manner, the offending PC is tossed out of the engine pit. If the PCs are caught cheating again, it is grounds for the immediate disqualification of the entire team.
Socializing: PCs may also take this time to speak to the other pilots. During their prerace actions, they can forgo making an Engineering or Sense Motive check to examine and socialize with their opponents. The other pilots each require different checks based on who you approach.
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Not much for building robots, but Ysokis tend to have a sixth sense for this kind of stuff so I begin to examine the piles of junk.
In the mounds of parts, I find an inflatable swim ring long since deflated and full of holes. I quickly grab it and take it over to Laboni.
"Laboni, this would be the perfect armor! Look, you can wrap it around this pipe over here, then adjust this like so."
As I return to the junk pile, I find a broken water pistol. Figuring this would make a great upgrade to Laboni's weapon systems, I add it to the pile of weapons that they're installing.
With my work here done, I look at the other contestants.
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Thundergun walks around the junkyard before come to any decision. After situation and a race-trail becomes more understandable, he suggests:
I will try to find proper parts and later improve the this awful toy-machine. TO make chances more solid and our participation more competetive. But I'd use some keen eye during looking for proper material and schemes. Maybe you, Tenry?
Than izalguun dicides to instruct his mates.
Xikko, Idir talk to this yong-fem Laboni and describe our involvement and maybe gather some additional info about other pilotes or toy-machines. Please. Kuozar, can you add or improve weaponary of toy-machine?
Nic, will you be ready to rule toy-machine's movements later? Maybe you should familirize with the trail better, or with other participants.
After short dialog, the technomancer going to look for part to later improve speed, piloting opportunities and defenses. He will gladly use next simple technomagic to self-aid: Transfer Charge, Detect Magic, Psychokinetic Hand.
"Good afternoon, Ms. Laboni! Radasazam sent us to aid in your race. What can you tell me about your...um...competition today?"
The young woman is puzzled. "Radaszam sent you!? After the awful things he said to me? Have you come to stop me racing?" Her expression turns hopeful. " Or are you here to help?"
Assured you're here to help, she opens up. " This is a disaster. I've been working hard, but I've barely got the rig running. And it's slow. I tried a test lap and the others were all faster than me. I think Ratrod plans to kill me during the race. His crew keeps coming by and saying I'm going to crash. If I could just double the pulse rate, I think I could get the speed up. "
She is plainly worried, excited, and concealing nothing.
Thundergun and Xikko get right to work, plunging into the garbage heaps and emerging with goods of wildly ranging usefulness. Thundergun then immerses himself in installing them into the racer.
Searching through the junk, or strolling through the racing pits and crowd, you get a sense of the track. It's roughly a 3000 foot diameter circle that winds through the junk, and at one point banks into a hairpin turn against a wall. Numerous hazards line the route.
LABONI’S BASIC JUNKRACER (pre-mod)
Speed 40 ft., full 400 ft.
EAC 10; KAC 12
Attack energy weapon (–4 to Piloting)
Modifiers +2 Piloting, –3 attack
Passengers 1
SPECIAL ABILITIES
Remote Control Laboni’s junkracer and weaponry can
be remotely controlled by the PCs, allowing them to
attempt Piloting checks and attack rolls in her place.
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Nic, will you be ready to rule toy-machine's movements later? Maybe you should familirize with the trail better, or with other participants.
Nic nack just stares at Thundergun, then says "You want me to drive? Oh thank you I hope to not disappoint your trust in me." and he skips of excited that this race was full of choices being made of which items to get from the junk piles. But he goes to the track to see when he pilots the craft what choices he may need to make.
Walking around a the track Nic Nack takes a hard look at where to hit the thrust and where to start a turn, plus any issues of the track that could be a hazard to the pilots.
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"Good afternoon, Ms. Laboni! Radaszam sent us to aid in your race. What can you tell me about your...um...competition today?"The young woman is puzzled. "Radaszam sent you!? After the awful things he said to me? Have you come to stop me racing?" Her expression turns hopeful. " Or are you here to help?"
Assured you're here to help, she opens up. " This is a disaster. I've been working hard, but I've barely got the rig running. And it's slow. I tried a test lap and the others were all faster than me. I think Ratrod plans to kill me during the race. His crew keeps coming by and saying I'm going to crash. If I could just double the pulse rate, I think I could get the speed up. "
She is plainly worried, excited, and concealing nothing.
"Indeed, my fellow Starfinder: Idir of Herd Fernas, at your service. I...probably should have opened with that, I apologize. Despite The Dealmaker's...intense...nature, he has an interest in seeing you win. Even as we speak, our colleague Thundergun is working to improve your vehicle's functionality. You're in good hands."
With that finished, he idly strolls towards the other racers, trying to get a bead on them without looking conspicuous.
"Indeed, my fellow Starfinder: Idir of Herd Fernas, at your service. I...probably should have opened with that, I apologize. Despite The Dealmaker's...intense...nature, he has an interest in seeing you win. Even as we speak, our colleague Thundergun is working to improve your vehicle's functionality. You're in good hands."With that finished, he idly strolls towards the other racers, trying to get a bead on them without looking conspicuous.
"Thanks? I mean thanks! It's great to see you all." Laboni watches the dromada walk away. Then she returns to the cycle and continues working on it.
"What did you find?" She asks Thundergun. "Power's kind of shakey. A couple good inverters would smooth things out and make the power more dependable."
The pits are arranged more or less in a line. In order from close to Laboni's pit and moving farther away, the pits belong to these drivers.
LEMGEM (FEMALE FEYCHILD GNOME TECHNOMANCER)
NYIZIN (FEMALE RYPHORIAN SOLDIER)
ORSIS (MALE DAMAYA LASHUNTA MECHANIC)
RATROD (MALE YSOKI TECHNOMANCER)
VELOCITY (NONBINARY ANDROID ENVOY)
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After returnign from junkyard, the technomancer starts to improve the toy-machine.
I suppose you're one of the best pilots at least among our group, Nic. I improved controls options a bit, see? So yes, I'd prefer you to drive, unless you have other suggestions.
When he realize to need a break, he walkes around to see how other participants prepare. He especially interested in another technomancers solutions, so spend some time looking closer at Lemgems work. Is it large or small compare to Laboni's? What about speed, controlls and weaponary?
Nic nack walks the track. Along the way he picks up a little gang of little goblin followers who heckle him. "Hey man! .. Not a man, that's a bug. .. You're a bug. .. No! Man is just a general term in context. .. Context! I'll show you context!" Two of the goblins are left behind while they engage in a physical discussion of vocabulary and semantics. The others continue to plague the shirren. "You with that Laboni skirt? Ratrod's got it in for her. I've got 5 chits says she piles up in the first turn. .. She won't get to the first turn. That slow dray of hers will be left on the start line. .. Or maybe Ratrod torches her. Dude might be mad enough to DQ just to get her...."
Wandering the pits, Idir is almost overcome with alien, and therefore threatening, sensations. The crowd presses close; smells of ozone, burning metal and burning fuel choke his nose and throat, loud sounds issue from all sides.
Taking a quick break on a foray for more parts, Thundergun peers in on LemGem's pit. The gnome's racing machine is large, blocky, and looks ungainly, but that just means there's room to mount a more powerful motor. Some quick mental calculations and Thundergun estimates LemGem is 25% faster than Laboni's.
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"Why does Ratrod have it out for Laboni so bad? I am sure their are others racing to day that Ratrod can chose to set his sights on. Can you tell me who else is not a friend of Ratrod's? I am sure a bunch of smart fellows like you have all the in's and out's of all the racers, what they like and dislike. Who is an ally to who and who has it out for who. I am even willing to bet 5 credits that you can tell be all about it and about their racing machines. What defects and strengths each of them have. And I am willing to put up another 5 credits that you all know which junk piles have the best stuff in them, just waiting for someone to scoop it up."
Nic nack says as he hold up a 10 credit chip as he walks the track with his fallowers.
The Universe shall provide. he thinks to himself.
Nic nack's followers talk over each other in eagerness to win the credits.
'ongshanks felt da need to tell him any ‘real’ mechanic could easily beat da garbage .. Garbage! Dat's Ratrod's ride! She means. .. dat Ratrod and da racers pile up. .. Pile up! What's she know? .. Ratrod's da KING! Fastest ride, quickest guide! .. We don't got s*%! down here in B'scrap. .. We got dis! .. And pride! .. B!%%$ shat all over his life. You be pissed too."
Kuozar spots a couple interesting pieces. On closer inspection, it looks like they've shorted out, but with a little patient work they'll be serviceable.
Idir sidles into the ryphorian, Nyizin's pit. She's a tall humanoid with fine tan fur marred in places with ragged scars from which hair won't grow. Little death's head adorn her ears.
Currently, she is working on her racer alone. The pit is relatively quiet. She notices you, turns and stands. "Can I help you?"
During Thundergun's visit with the blue-haired gnome covered in
piercings, tattoos, and augmentations reveals she is obsessed with continual alterations to herself and her racer. He notices that she has electric systems layered on top of perfectly functional mechanical ones. The racer has a kinetic weapon mounted on an arch above the driver's seat.
Improve Laboni’s Junkracer: ]/b] Make a Computers, Engineering, Perception, or Physical Science check to find parts in the scrapyard and install them in Laboni’s racer. Possible improvements are:
• The vehicle’s base speed increases by 5 feet.
• The vehicle gains a +1 Piloting modifier.
• The vehicle gains a +1 attack modifier.
• The vehicle gains a +2 bonus to its EAC.
• The vehicle gains a +2 bonus to its KAC.
• The PCs install a basic energy weapon on the vehicle (imposes a
–4 base Piloting penalty on a hit).
• The PCs install a basic kinetic weapon on the vehicle (imposes a
–4 base Piloting penalty on a hit).
• The PCs upgrade a weapon to impose an additional –2 penalty to
enemy Piloting checks on a successful hit.
During the race successful hits with weapons don't do damage. They impose a penalty to the target's piloting modifier.
Investigating the Enemy: PCs can scout out their opponents with a Sense Motive check, or examine their opponents’ vehicles with an Engineering check. A PC can do this as part of making a prerace improvement skill check —the PC can take breaks during the improvement attempt and casually investigate one of the other racers. Otherwise, it costs a PC one of his prerace actions to converse with or examine all members of the competition. This check does not grant exact knowledge of an opponent’s statistics, but the GM can provide the PCs an idea of a driver’s skill or the associated vehicle’s strengths and weaknesses. On a successful check, the PC can ask one pertinent question about the pilot’s skill or about the vehicle the pilot is driving (or receives similar relevant information, if a player is unsure what he or she should be asking about).
Sabotage: PCs can attempt to sabotage the other vehicles, but they must dodge the eyes of everyone in the ramshackle stadium by spending a prerace action and attempting a Stealth check. A PC who succeeds at this check can then attempt an Engineering check on one of the opposing vehicles to either reduce the vehicle’s speed by 10 feet or to impose a –4 penalty on one of the vehicle’s modifiers. If the PC is caught cheating in this manner, the offending PC is tossed out of the engine pit. If the PCs are caught cheating again, it is grounds for the immediate disqualification of the entire team.
A failure of the Stealth check will have repercussions for the PC and possibly the team.
Socializing: PCs may also take this time to speak to the other pilots. During their prerace actions, they can forgo making an Engineering or Sense Motive check to examine and socialize with their opponents. The other pilots each require different checks based on who you approach.
Idir takes a very personal tack, slowly and carefully trying to build a rapport with Nyizin.
The goblins are an enthusiastic font of information. They start to spill all the latest gossip about the racers.
Lemgem -- the goblins love the blue-=haired gnome, her high-risk driving style, and the wild alterations that she makes to her bike. "Remember the rocket boosters?! Yeah! If she hadn't fallen off the bike when they fired, she'd have smashed into the ceiling with it...."
Nyizin -- "She is so rad. Great scars. I miss the body paint. The look. Oh so good. Used to have a little dragon partner, but they died in a fight. Gonna die on the track. She's got that look. Nothing left to lose, that one. Might even want some help doing it."
Orsis -- The goblins are not impressed. "Also ran. Best thing you can say is he's got the balls to race."
Velocity -- "Pretty silver boy-girl. Could be the best pilot, but no vision. No mission. Just wants to drive faster and shoot other racers.
Their crew is a bunch of block heads. Janzer tried to show them how to cross wire a amp-relay to boost speed, but they didn't unnerstan. Threw us out. Can't figure it. V must want to win or even place in the worst way. "
Ratrod -- you've probably already guessed that they are huge fans. King of the track and all the drivers would love to beat him.
On the tech side, Kuozar and Thundergun continue to modify and improve Laboni's machine.