The first volume of the Horizons of the Vast Adventure Path, “Planetfall,” is out now, but whenever your group plans on jumping into this campaign, you’ll want to make sure you’re prepared for whatever the planet of New Harmony throws at you! And there’s no better resource for that than the Galaxy Exploration Manual.

With hexploration rules used to survey the land (and which are summarized in the adventure) and deep dives on individual biomes, the Galaxy Exploration Manual is a treasure trove of information for Game Masters about to run Horizons of the Vast. For example, GMs can find advice and tables galore that will aid them in creating engaging NPCs and settlements that will help the PCs’ new home come to life. And if the characters decide to go exploring beyond the boundaries of their charter, there are plenty of random threat tables to keep them busy!

But the Galaxy Exploration Manual isn’t only for GMs! Players about to take on the monumental task of exploring a new world and maintaining a thriving settlement there will find plenty of exciting tidbits in this book. In addition to a wealth of options for every class (as discussed in this previous blog), there are also dozens of items that will help burgeoning explorers tame and survive just about any wilderness. Here’s one example:

Energel Food Pellet

Energel food pellets are easy-to-swallow meals in pill form, capable of staving off starvation, though they lack the appropriate nutrient profile needed for long-term sustenance. You can substitute one pack of food pellets for a day’s food. If you’re already starving when you consume energel food pellets, you automatically succeed at your Constitution check to avoid nonlethal damage that day, but the effects of starvation resume the following day. You cannot benefit from consuming more than two packs of energel food pellets per week.

New Harmony is in a system in the Vast and, as such, regular supply runs from the Pact Worlds will be few and far between. A canny survivalist will want to have some energel food pellets on hand in case they end up stranded far from the nearest settlement after running out of rations. Sure, they don’t replace regular meals, but staving off starvation for a day or two could give a character the time to hunt down a wild beast or determine which alien berries are safe to consume.

So, as you’re packing to begin your new life on New Harmony, don’t forget your Galaxy Exploration Manual. It could mean the difference between life and death!

From low atmospheric orbit, the crashed starship could have easily been mistaken for some great beast, slain in the heat of battle. Its trajectory had cut a fiery and destructive swathe through thick jungle, and here and there small bits of flame still licked at the foliage, the steaming soil smoldering from the heat of the starship’s unexpected collision, ending at its broken corpse. The hull had been nearly rent in two upon impact, and shorn wiring, ducting, loose crates, and coolant spilled from within like mechanical viscera.

As the day bled into twilight, from within the darkness of the starship’s carcass, a life pod beeped rapidly. Kasa took a pained gasp as she regained consciousness. She moved stiffly, feeling the distant ache of what might have been a grievous injury. The life pod had flooded her system with medical stabilizers, a failsafe to ensure functionality in the event of a crash. As Kasa’s mental defenses churned into place, laced with the glittering edge of the medical stimulant’s side-effects, she knew somehow that things couldn’t possibly get much worse.

For a while, she lay in the coffin-snug pod that had saved her life, her breath loud and metallic, her ears straining to hear anything beyond from the stillness of her tight confinement. Wherever the ship had made planetfall, she was likely safest in the life pod for the time being. Kasa’s mind raced. Her eyes grew bleary with the threat of tears as panic took hold in the illogical part of her brain. She blinked them away, taking a deep breath and slowly counting objects within her view, a tool she adopted long ago to help regain her composure when stressed. She was a scientist, first and foremost, and that meant shedding fear of the unknown by making it known.

With a grunt, Kasa found the panel along the wall near her thigh, fingertips gliding over the interface to release the magnetic locks. The life pod’s lid slid aside with a hiss, and she gingerly hauled herself over the lip and waited for her vision to adjust to the darkness of the life support chamber. Blinking as shapes came into sharper focus, the shadows slowly brightening to shades of illuminated gray, Kasa made her way aft, stealing glances at the other life pods, all empty or crushed, she noted with dismay.

As a scientist, she hadn’t been needed on the bridge and thus had no idea where in the universe they—no, it was only she who remained—could be. She knew, as the silence of isolation stretched ever onward during her tentative search, that anybody who could answer such a question had been killed in the impact. What magic or science could divine her location and see to her rescue was lost for now. Perhaps even for good.

It took her the better part of an hour to dig through the med-bay, salvaging what stimulant packs she could find. The armory had survived the crash, as had its door, which remained barred to her without proper authorization. Kasa stared at the flickering interface, which flashed warnings and reported on various system malfunctions that could be distilled into a single message: without brute force or proper authorization overrides, she would find no weapons here.

That first night under alien stars, she was fitful and skittish. Several times she nodded off, until fear exhausted her and she shut her eyes out of necessity.

Dawn came on suddenly, and Kasa was reminded that this world, its atmosphere, its sun—or suns—were all variables in the new problem that unfolded before her. She blinked wearily as her dry, exhausted eyes pricked in the alien air. With a grunt, she unfurled herself from her crouch, stretching and shouldering her pack. If the shuttle bay was intact, there was bound to be something working. She rationalized that it had to be so; no circumstances could be so dire, after all. Unfortunately, her path to the shuttle bay was too obstructed for her to climb through, and she realized she would finally have to go outside and see if another path presented itself. She backtracked but found that the only way out would be up, through the ship’s now-open overhead. Beyond, she could only see the forest canopy, still but for the occasional rustle of leaves, the cries of unfamiliar fauna.

Grimly, Kasa began her ascent, using the ship’s exposed wiring to haul herself up and onto the outer hull. It was a great effort, and had any been there to witness her summit, they would have found her sprawled across the sun-warmed hull, catching her breath before she finally sitting up to look around.

All around her was dense, writhing jungle: trees as tall as towers, with thick, obdurate vines crawling possessively around their trunks and boasting vivid blossoms with pollen-rich stamen. Try as she might to place the flora around her, nothing in the catalogue of her mind recalled even the slightest comfort of familiarity. She shielded her eyes against the harsh glare of the sunlight that beat through the treetops and discerned, just barely visible through the overgrowth, a trail. It may have been abandoned, but a trail meant this place was once inhabited, and that would suffice.

Fear of the unknown gave way to Kasa’s inherent curiosity, and she picked a path along the curve of the ship’s hull toward the shuttle bay. Much of the vessel had broken apart in the crash, and she made short work of climbing down into the massive bay. The collapsed half of the starboard bulkhead had taken all but one of the three Explorer vehicles with it, but the remaining Explorer sat almost pristine, save for a single crack along the window shielding. Kasa let herself smile at the first good news she’d had since waking up.

Illustration by Victor Manuel Leza Moreno from Starfinder Galaxy Exploration Manual

Kasa ripped through the jungle in the Explorer for hours, following the ancient overgrown path. She took her time, checking for signs of intelligent life, and for a while she thought all she would find would be jungle. But then the path opened into a wider avenue; not quite paved, but clearly marked by the deliberate imprint of civilization. She brought the Explorer to a halt, peering through the windows to see jungle give way to more deliberate architecture. This ruin, though empty of all life, was the surest sign of someone having lived here. Kasa popped the hatch and climbed out of the vehicle to have a look around.

Whatever else this was, it was a discovery—one that none but the forgotten ghosts of those who once called this place home would bear witness. Kasa lamented not being able to salvage her research equipment as she stood in the clearing, taking in the moss-draped, domed towers like ancient mushrooms and arched doorways that stood like portals to another world, waiting to be opened. Though the ruin had collapsed around them, surrendering to the jungle, these remained, all seemingly built for beings much larger than she.

“Giants?” She wondered incredulously, her first word in hours, voice dry and reedy from disuse. She turned a slow circuit, once again frowning at her inability to recognize any of the architecture, its design at once ancient but still entirely too alien for her to get even an echo of familiarity from it. Something about the jungle here was quieter, as if the order once imposed upon it still lingered, beating back all save the hapless moss that crawled along the ancient stone. She soon saw why.

The thing—the monolith—was massive, jutting from the ground like a spear, and indeed was so anachronistic in comparison to its surroundings that Kasa wondered how it wasn’t the first thing she noticed. It was metal of some kind, she could tell from first glance, emanating soft blue light from the markings along its surface. Unlike the rest of the structures, it didn’t seem to warp to the ruinous touch of time, and the vines of the jungle barely forayed onto its massive base, as if the jungle itself were hesitant to claim the invasive structure. Kasa craned her neck to peer upward. Its length seemed to vanish beyond the forest canopy, bathing her in its light.

Tentatively, she raised a hand, reaching out toward it. Perhaps it was an interface, albeit an ancient one. There could be no harm in a simple touch.

There was a sudden rustle, and bursting from the copse of trees beyond the ruin came several avian-simian creatures, taking wing in unison. Fleeing.

Kasa took one more glance at the monolith, rummaging in her pack for a datapad she’d salvaged from the wreckage. The device flashed cheerful yellow warnings that there was no communications node available for outside access, but she could still use the local capabilities. She did her best to scan and document the relic before her, sweat prickling the nape of her neck as she began to realize that she was no longer alone in the ruins, and that whoever—or whatever—had sent the creatures into startled flight would be upon her soon.

She turned, backing up to the monolith, the security of its solidity offering her the only comfort and protection she could find in this alien world. With her head against it, she could hear it thrumming—a faint, rhythmic buzzing that seemed to come from deep underground, wherever the spire’s roots held it firm to the jungle floor. Beyond that sound, Kasa heard and saw nothing. The alien creatures had fled, leaving her alone with the monolith.

As suddenly as lightning, the thrumming stopped, and in its place—in her mind—Kasa heard, felt, a high-pitched shriek. There were words in the cry, or the feeling, the meaning, behind words.

“Help us,” they pled. “Help us, Kasa! Free us…before it returns.”

About the Author

Hajara Mahmud is a bard of many talents, including that of a professional musician and dancer. They hold a degree in English and Creative Writing, with a concentration in fiction, and have been published in the University of Michigan Press’ textbook, A Tumblr Book: Platform & Cultures as a contributing essayist. Hajara believes there is no greater freedom than the potential of a good story that’s yet to be told and finds that joy at the crossroads of their two greatest loves: good food and the comforting potential of a blank Scrivener document. They can be found in the chattering void known as Twitter: @dajiruhu.

About Tales from the Drift

The Tales from the Drift series of web-based flash fiction provides an exciting glimpse into the setting of the Starfinder Roleplaying Game. Written by members of the Starfinder development team and some of the most celebrated authors in tie-in gaming fiction, the Tales from the Drift series promises to explore the worlds, alien cultures, deities, history, and organizations of the Starfinder setting with engaging stories to inspire Game Masters and players alike.

The Starfinder Galaxy Exploration Manual offers a robust, yet simple system for generating entire science fantasy worlds on the fly, including populating them with creatures, adventures, and more. So let’s make ourselves a world, starting with nothing but our trusty dice and the two-page Building Worlds article in the Galaxy Exploration Manual.

For our first step, we’ll see what type of world we’re generating: is it a gas giant, an asteroid—even a colony ship? We roll 42 on our d% table and get… a terrestrial world, which is one that’s naturally habitable and has one or more biomes (coming in step 3). Not a bad place to start for most worlds, though we could always just choose something weirder if we wanted it.

Next, we’ll see what kind of gravity and atmosphere this world has by rolling d% twice more. Results of 42 and 84 give us standard gravity and a thick atmosphere, respectively. Handy page references guide us to the parts of the Starfinder Core Rulebook that’ll tell us more about thick atmospheres.

Next comes a key step: identifying our world’s biomes! What kinds of environments are present on this world? Do the creatures and cultures reside entirely in the air? In rugged mountains or soggy marshes? Let’s roll a d12 on the biomes table and find out! Our first roll is a 2, which gives us the aquatic biome. We could stop there and have a water world, but let’s roll a couple more times and see what else we get. Two more rolls (a 5 and a 10) add forest and subterranean biomes to the mix.

Illustration by Tuan Duong Chu

We’ll return to the biomes for more inspiration in a moment, but let’s fill in our world’s cultural attributes first. We roll a d6 six times and get a 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 (what are the odds?!). This tells us, respectively, that the world has low accord (meaning folks don’t much get along), a chaotic neutral alignment, medium magic, high religion, and high technology.

With that, we’re done generating the basics of our random world! But wait—there’s more! The next 80 pages of this book offer tons of flavor, adventure hooks, inhabitants, and player options tied to the biomes and cultural attributes we just generated. For now, let’s just use our aquatic biome and high technology attribute to get some more details about this place, shall we?

Turning to the aquatic biome, we find an inhabitants table, which has both sentient species (those likely to have cultures and settlements) and threats (those likely to attempt to eat or rearrange our faces). We roll d% a couple times for inhabitants, getting 42 and 84, and find that our sentient creatures are lacedon ghouls (chaotic evil aquatic undead) and stelliferas (diminutive cuttlefish-like creatures adapted to the deep sea)—no wonder they don’t get along! For our threat creatures, we roll again and get glass serpents and aquatic jubsnuths (bulbous predators with two mouths).

Our aquatic biome also has a wealth of adventure hooks, but let’s turn to the technology section and roll something from its adventure-hook tables instead! Rolling a 14 on the high-technology table gives us “a dangerous nanite malfunction threatens an entire world.” Uh oh! Did the nanites originate from the experiments of one of our aquatic species, or are perhaps some of our forest or subterranean dwellers to blame? Is our world’s atmosphere thick because it’s choked with nanites, or were the tiny robots originally made to clear the air? And what else is happening on this world? We could turn to any of our biomes or cultural attributes to get still more inspiration and adventure, but for the purposes of this blog, we’ll leave these mysteries to be solved.

Also, if we want to fill in details about settlements, NPCs, or the like, there are a number of toolboxes that will serve us well in chapter 3 of this very book!

Leave a comment if this world inspired any ideas of your own. And if you’ve already used the Galaxy Exploration Manual to create your own worlds, tell us about them!

Joe Pasini
Starfinder Lead Designer

With the Starfinder Galaxy Exploration Manual comes a bevy of player options, but there’s plenty more value packed into this tome. While you’ll want to keep an eye out for an upcoming blog that details the world-building system, today we’re looking at the multitude of toolboxes and tables provided in the Galaxy Exploration Manual!

While some of these tools will be useful to players building their characters’ backstories, GMs will find them invaluable in running open-ended adventures. So, let’s put ourselves in a Starfinder GM’s shoes and see what we can get out of GEM

Let’s suppose our party has used the exploration system in the book’s first chapter to identify a new system and decides to travel through the Drift to find it. Our first stop as GM can be the Drift Encounters Toolbox, where we have a d% table with 50 options for encounters in the Drift, ranging between combat and exploration. We roll a 42 and get “A time dragon travels the Drift, ensuring any temporal differences of active planar bubbles are not being abused.” Depending on our party’s makeup, their actions, and their goals, this usually neutral dragon might be a help, a hindrance, the quest giver of a new side quest—or merely another interesting but brief sighting on a journey through the Drift.

Our players might also encounter another ship in the Drift, so let’s turn to the Starship Toolbox and roll up a random name and a quirk! We roll 42 for the first word of the ship name (Infinite) and a 42 for the second word (Hope), as well as a 13 for the starship quirks table, which tells us that “the ship is a replica of a fictional ship from a popular holovid.” Again, we can make as much or as little of this as we and our party is interested in. We could instead roll on the legendary starships table to have a brush with a famous (or infamous) starship from the Starfinder setting.

Illustration by Victor Manuel Leza Moreno

Our next stop is a new world the party is exploring! Again, a future blog will cover the world-building system, which includes fleshing out a world’s physical and cultural characteristics and it inhabitants, but for now, let’s use the Settlement Toolbox to inspire us for the first settlement our PCs visit! Rolling on the settlement quirks table, we get 42: Many inhabitants claim to be descended from a lost line of an important family that originates from this world or another. We then roll 42 on the settlement challenges table and learn that the settlement’s inhabitants enjoy a form of entertainment that surreptitiously carries a supernatural form of illness. We also have a table of locations for when the PCs want to wander around, do some investigating (or window shopping). Rolling 42, we get the local transport dealer, where people can purchase or repair ground-based transportation (the details of which will vary wildly depending on our world’s tech level, biomes, and so forth).

Of course, there are people populating this settlement, and our PCs are bound to want to harangue—I mean, meet—some of them, so let’s turn to the NPC Toolbox and see who their first victim—I mean, new friend—is! Perhaps they’re the transport dealer we just met. We roll twice on the name and species table (two 42s) and get Lajai, an ikeshti. Of course, to bring the character alive, we’ll want a personality quirk, so let’s roll on that d% table. We get a 42, so now we know that Lajai hates their day job and dreams of becoming a vid star.

Finally, we’d be remiss to overlook the Treasure Toolbox, full of story-rich treasure that can be far more interesting than another credstick or hunk of starmetal. Perhaps Lajai knows of one of these treasures and offers to split the profits if the PCs can recover it (finally allowing Lajai to pursue their vid-star dreams!) We roll 13 on the table for treasures worth 5,000 credits (there are tables for multiple values) and get a computerized music box that algorithmically generates new songs based on what other music it has overheard.

Of course, if we want to reroll any of these results, or even just handpick them, we’re free to (and we might want to get our d% dice checked out, anyway…). These toolboxes provide inspiration for countless adventures throughout the galaxy!

We’ll see you next time, when we build a world from scratch with just a few rolls.

Joe Pasini
Starfinder Lead Designer

The Starfinder Galaxy Exploration Manual has released, opening up not just brave new frontiers of exploration, but also unleashing a wealth of new character options to enable your PCs’ space-traveling hijinks! Each character class receives two pages of fresh possibilities. While creating these new operative exploits, mystic connections, and more, our authors and development team considered what challenges PCs often face when investigating an unfamiliar site, culture, or environment, as well as the ways wilderness-focused adventures open up new opportunities for dynamic encounters and novel PC tactics. Let’s take a look!

Surviving the Great, Itchy Outdoors

Your armor’s environmental protections might shield you from the worst temperature fluctuations and breathability issues, yet wilderness adventures are rife with other threats and nuisances. This rain is messing up my ranged attacks. Is that plant poisonous, venomous, carnivorous, or all of the above? How are we supposed to survive on this planet with high gravity and constant lightning strikes? Also, gah, how did swamp water get into my powered armor?!

Fortunately, we have a wealth of tools for identifying, surviving, and even exploiting environmental hazards. The mechanic packs a new trick called sample scanner, which lets you plug small material samples into your exocortex and have it analyze the material to tell you everything you want to know about that weird rock formation or unfamiliar flora you’re investigating. Ever had your armor’s environmental protections run dry while you’re halfway across a trackless continent? Maybe you want the technomancer’s magic hack extend protections, which can recharge your armor’s batteries using leftover spell slots. As a witchwarper, why not borrow environmental resistances from an alternate version of yourself with the paradigm shift shifting adaptation? Or laugh off any hazard with the soldier’s rover fighting style, which helps you shrug off discomfort while clambering over just about anything the galaxy throws at you.

Does that sound too rugged and confident? Would you rather play the shaky character who’s entirely unhappy about being cold, wet, unconnected to the infosphere, and convinced that everything is out to eat you? To my delight, the envoy boasts some delightful new improvisations that turn your shouts of “Aah, what’s that? AAAAH, what’s THAT?!” into powerful tools. Convince animals and vermin to leave, thank you very much, with the shoo! improvisation. Or signal that something is strange and very wrong with early warning. You can even redirect your companions’ readied action triggers, changing these to react to a strange new threat with changing circumstances.

Art by Mirco Paganess

Getting From Here to There

Alright, we’re alive. Fantastic! Now we just need to get to that exploring part. So how exactly are we going to navigate this alien wilderness again?

Look no further than a host of new options dedicated to finding paths through difficult conditions. How about your mystic, whose trailblazer connection allows you to bond with environments, helping you sense the safest trails through deadly areas? Stuck in mud, pinned by a hungry ksarik, spinning helplessly in zero-g, or gazing forlornly at a ravine you can’t jump? That sounds like the perfect time for your witchwarper to teleport to safety with the dimensional extraction paradigm shift. If piloting a vehicle for hours on end sounds tedious, maybe it’s time you snagged that artificial pilot mechanic trick, which turns your drone into a capable driver. Or when the GM throws hazards in your way, just shout no…by activating new vanguard disciplines like blaze a trail (which lets you disintegrate difficult terrain as you move through it) or Blast Through (which lets you break huge obstacles with remarkable ease).

Art by Tuan Duaong Chu

We Jump Together!

One of my favorite components of wilderness encounters is varying elevation, and the Galaxy Exploration Manual provides tons of ways for you to navigate, exploit, and just outright enjoy altitude differences.

Need a boost? The biohacker can learn locomotive adaptation and its advanced version as theorems, granting allies climb or swim speeds to navigate difficult obstacles. Once you’re up high, your operative might want the high-ground sniper exploit, which gives your sniper weapons an extra punch when you strike from above—and let’s not forget that wildernesses often involve longer encounter distances, which can make snipers really shine!

But perhaps my favorite abilities are the ones that embrace the inevitable: that PCs eventually need to descend quickly to escape trouble or join a melee. Why not do it in style? That biohacker can also learn the theorem cushion the blow, which lets you buffer a companion against falling damage (or even against incoming bludgeoning attacks). Or just embrace the falling damage with the solarian revelation heavy landing, which transfers that falling damage into your weapon, allowing you to strike someone with impossible force! It’s abilities like these that excite me as I imagine bold character’s shouting “Check this out” before pulling some absurd-yet-effective acrobatics.

Art by Alex Stone

A Bonus for Every Biome

And that’s just a taste of the class-specific options—each biome article includes even more! In alaxy Exploration Manual you’ll also find:

• Aerobatic feats for aerial biomes
• Underwater weapons for aquatic biomes
• Rugged armor for arctic biomes
• Tough vehicles for traveling desert biomes
• New creature companions for forest and weird biomes
• Feats for blending into marsh biomes
• Earth spells for mastering mountain biomes
• Sniper rifles to show off in plains biomes
• Biotech augmentations to navigate space biomes
• Weapon fusions to defend yourself in subterranean biomes
• New feats to navigate and make friends in urban biomes
• Plus a ton of new gear for all occasions

So check out the Galaxy Exploration Manual, and open up infinite possibilities for your characters!

John Compton
Starfinder Senior Developer

Attention: Zo!

I’ve attached files containing the transcript of Live Audition Extreme! along with the raw footage you requested and a few post-production versions. Essentially, we have two options to choose from for our pilot episode. The first is uncut footage shot on Kelikazord. Second, we have a cut that removes all unscripted content related to the on-site translator malfunction. Which version to utilize is ultimately your decision, but after talking with the other producers, they think the unedited footage could be a fun way to spin the unpredictable nature of the program. I’m available to meet whenever you’re ready to share your thoughts.

Sincerely,
Wazasha Kevir
Executive Assistant & Co-Producer
Zo! Media Productions

[Begin transcript]

Zo!: Aaaaaand action! Who’s ready for an extreme casting call?! For today’s special broadcast, we’re here on scenic planet Kelikazord recruiting the next team of superstars for our mega-hit series, Live Adventure Extreme! Everything about this world, including the ground we’re standing on right now, is one hundred percent alive. Now that’s extreme! The weather’s mostly sunny, but we’ve got some cloud cover rolling in—our orbital scans tell us those green clouds are highly toxic gases. Good thing I don’t need to breathe, am I right? But you’re not here for a weather report, are you, dear viewers? It’s about time to meet our contestants. Let’s see if they have what it takes to become the next Extreme Adventurers! Alright, folks, why don’t you introduce yourselves to our audience back home? Contestant Number One, you’re up first. Tell us your name and why you want to be on the show.

Alien #1: (Speaking alien language)

Zo!: What’s that? Wait a minute, the translator’s not working. Wazasha, get the field-tech team on this ASAP, will you?

Wazasha: I’m already on it.

Zo!: Excellent! I knew I could count on you.

Wazasha: Watch where you’re pointing those finger guns, boss.

(Zo! laughs)

Zo!: Haha, safety first, you got it. Now where was I? Right! As I was saying, today we’re here for an eeeeeeexclusive first-contact scenario with some up-and-coming reality stars from the Vast looking to break into the Pact Worlds scene! That’s right! We’re here with three representatives of cultures never before encountered in the Pact Worlds, folks, and they’re ready to show you what they’re made of!

Alien #2: (Speaking alien language)

Zo!: Oh, I can tell they’re building up to something big! Contestant Number Two here seems like a real pro, you can just tell by the way they move that they’ve got some serious combat training. Ex-military, maybe?

Wazasha (muffled): They’re just standing around, Zo!

Zo!: Let’s get the cameras in there, then. That might spice things up.

(Buzzing and whirring sounds, followed by a series of clicks)

Zo!: See now, what did I tell you?

(Deep rumbling and growling sounds)

All Aliens: (Yelling in alien language)

Zo!: —that thing!

(Loud bestial roar)

Wazasha: What is that?

Zo!: That, Wazasha, is the talent! Feast your eyes upon today’s obstacle, folks. As tall as a Vercite skyscraper, it’s a horrific sight beyond your wildest nightmares! Look at those horns, those teeth! It could tear any of us in half just like snapping a toothpick. Oh, it’s extreme, all right. And our three brave contestants are going to take it down!

(Roaring, followed by frantic yelling in alien language, grunts, and combat sounds)

Illustration by Geun Cheol Jang from Starfinder Galaxy Exploration Manual

Zo!: Oh, look at that. Number Two’s charging right in there. It’s a good thing they’ve got that armor, because those teeth look nasty. Contestants One and Three are setting up for some extreme teamwork. Whoa! Three boosted One right up to smack the beast in the face with her blade. Ouch, that looked like it hurt! Our three contestants just scored first blood!

(Howling, then a resounding thud)

Zo!: The beast retaliates! Wow, Contestant Number Three went flying. I hope she’s okay! We’ll have our medical team take a look after the fight. Oh, there goes One ripping into the monster’s leg. Way to fight back, One!

(Grunting and yelling in alien language.)

Wazasha: Translator’s back online.

Zo!: Excellent! Now we can get some extreme reactions from our contestants. Alright, Number Two, can you tell me about your team’s combat strategy?

Alien #2 (panting): I thought this was a casting call!

Alien #1 (wincing): Yeah, we prepared a traditional Kelikan opera for—oh no, it’s coming, dodge!

Alien #2: Thanks! It almost took my head off with that hit.

Alien #1: We thought we were auditioning for a variety show.

Zo!: What an extreme miscommunication! But I’m sure Kelikan opera is lovely. Why don’t you go ahead and share that performance with the audience?

Alien #2: We need Uaya to sing the bassline, and she’s out cold.

Zo!: Wazasha?

Wazasha (sighing heavily): I’m already on it, boss.

(Sound of a trigger clicking)

Alien #3: Huh? What happened? Did we get the part?

Alien #1: The smiling dead man wants us to sing now.

Alien #3: While we’re fighting this thing?!

Aliens #1 and #2: Yes.

Zo!: You betcha! Three, you should be feeling pretty spry right about now. My assistant just shot you with AbadarCorp’s new “Get Up ‘N’ Go” serum, a healing and enhancing vitamin cocktail, available at pharmacy superstores near you! Alright Contestant Number Three, hit us with that beautiful bassline.

Alien #3 (clearing throat): Here goes. And a one, two, three—

Alien Beast: If they actually start singing, I’m done here.

Alien #2: Wait, the monster we’re fighting can talk, too?

Alien Beast: And how do you think I negotiated my contract? I possess the powers of speech, but it seems you drew conclusions about my intellect based on my physical appearance. How rude. Now listen here, Zo!, my agent said I could be on your show if I beat up these weaklings. I took one of them out and you woke her up to belt out showtunes? Preposterous. I’m calling my agent.

(Sounds of alien beast stomping off)

Zo!: What a wild turn of events! A ferocious fight to the death gives way to a surprise musical performance, starring our three remaining contestants. You don’t want to miss it, folks. But first, let’s hear a word from our sponsor: AbadarCorp, makers of the new “Get Up ‘N’ Go” serum!

[end transcript]

About the Author

Jenny Jarzabski is a longtime freelance writer and the Starfinder Society Developer at Paizo. She writes adventures and rules for Pathfinder and Starfinder, in addition to some weird fiction of her own. She is just as likely to be found on the trails or at the climbing wall as delving the word mines or gamemastering at a convention. You can follow Jenny’s real-life adventures on Twitter at @jenjski.

About Tales from the Drift

The Tales from the Drift series of web-based flash fiction provides an exciting glimpse into the setting of the Starfinder Roleplaying Game. Written by members of the Starfinder development team and some of the most celebrated authors in tie-in gaming fiction, the Tales from the Drift series promises to explore the worlds, alien cultures, deities, history, and organizations of the Starfinder setting with engaging stories to inspire Game Masters and players alike.