A Starfinder Society Special designed for 3rd-level pregenerated characters, playable in 3-4 hours.
Emerging suddenly from deep space, a massive alien starship has crashed into the surface of the planet Akiton, in an isolated region known as the Sloughscar Hills. Although the starship was traveling at speeds that should have cracked the planet in half, Akiton endured and the fallout was minimal. Within hours, salvagers and explorers the world over race to the wreck, determined to salvage what valuables and technology they can from the mysterious vessel.
Believing the starship has a connection to the mysterious First Ones, an advanced civilization from antiquity that the Starfinder Society believes aims to invade the Pact Worlds, the Starfinders hire the nearest team of mercenaries to enter and explore the wreck—you! Overcome dangerous creatures, malfunctioning technology, volatile magic, and opportunistic salvagers in your quest to be the first to explore the Wreck of the Returned!
Players use 3rd-level versions of the Starfinder iconic characters in this debut special adventure of Starfinder Society for Starfinder Second Edition! This adventure additionally serves as a prequel to the upcoming Invasion’s Edge storyline.
Written by John Godek.
[Scenario Maps spoiler - click to reveal]
The following maps used in this scenario are also available for purchase here on paizo.com:
Serves as a great intro to the Starfinder 2e setting and mechanics, the nodocites are fun, and the quildebeest cub is adorable. Both tables I ran through this had a great time with it. Having specific interactions with Detect Magic and Investigate exploration activities laid out in the scenario was a fantastic decision, in my opinion, and one I greatly appreciated on a personal level.
My only complaint is that both maps have an area mislabeled--A2 is labeled as a second A1, and B11 is mislabeled as a second B7. Otherwise this was awesome!
Honestly this scenario had everything, action, mystery, exploration and atmosphere. All my players were really focused and invested. The rival adventuring party was a great touch and my group called them at points to check in. The adventure does a great job of luring the party through the dungeon, slowly building up the suspense and plot before the big reveal in the theater. On a mechanics side I really enjoyed that the module game me basic routines for the monsters to follow and the elevated terrain and maps with cover. It made the range fighting feel more competitive and involved.
The only change or advice I would have to someone running it would be to allow the mercenaries to purchase supplies with any extra credits they have before starting the adventure. For example, Navasi starts with a laser pistol with expend 2 and a battery of 10 charges. This gives her 5 shots for the entire adventure and 230 credits just weighing down her pockets.
Longer review coming after I recover from Gen Con. But!
Wonderful visuals, great NPCs, and evocative encounters! This was a fantastic way to rope people into the first season of Starfinder Society's metaplot. Boo that we lost that one mercenary, though!
PS - Some of the physics of the crash could be nitpicked here, but that's not enough to downgrade this adventure from being 5-stars!
I've been waiting for a long time to read this first episode of the new SFS2 Era !! it was with both excitement and aprehension (as this new program is coming with a lot of changes) that I went through Collision's Wake.
This scenario as all it take to become an iconic introduction, exploration, mystery and a good pacing. I enjoy every line I read and particularly appreciate the way new characters are introduced and when encounters were added to sustain the suspens.
I really miss the illustration handout present on SFS and PF2 scenario as they were handy to show to player when playing in-person. I hope those may re-appear later.
Thank you Paizo and thank you to Mr. John Godek III for this 1st scenario !!
On the longer end, but fun introduction into the SFS Season
The adventure is a bit long, we played it for almost 5 hours and the players skipped one encounter, one hazard and were quickly to disable another one. The lower level length can be dramatically different depending which route the players take first. My players took the one that took them straight to the control room for the blast doors, and then to the blast doors, which is probably the fastest route as they immidiately realised they can just disarm the laser turrets from that place. The chase at the end is super cool.
Overall a great intro into the Season, as this is the Inciting Incident that starts all events into Invasion's Edge.
Also, Invasion's Edge Players Guide contains a spoiler of this adventure, which makes sense yet still none of my players realised this is the same place mentioned there until after we finished
Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, LO Special Edition, Maps, PF Special Edition, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Society Subscriber
morbon wrote:
Is there going to also be a downloadable file with the pre-gen characters for your GenCon GM's?
A little late, but we did have the pregens before they were released publicly (today). Received them about a month ago.
We played through this yesterday and it was a blast (sometimes literally). After seeing the crash on Akiton - is this essentially the same thing that happened in Numeria? Is it possible for The First Ones to appear in Pathfinder?
Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, LO Special Edition, Maps, PF Special Edition, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Society Subscriber
We played through this yesterday and it was a blast (sometimes literally). After seeing the crash on Akiton - is this essentially the same thing that happened in Numeria? Is it possible for The First Ones to appear in Pathfinder?
My guess is that the First Ones are almost certainly not the Androffans. The Androffans - the people that built the Divinity and later crashed it into Golarion - are not native to Golarion's system and just stumbled into that neck of the galactic woods. However, the First Ones arose on Aballon ages ago, and then left.
That doesn't mean they aren't the same, but there seem to be enough differences between the exploration of the Divinity in the final book of Iron Gods and the tiny bit of the Wreck of the Returned we've explored thus far that I don't believe they're the same species.
And as for the metareason - I suspect the Starfinder team wants to do something new rather than expand on old stuff. Not that there's anything wrong with expanding the lore, I just figure they want to shed light on new corners of the galaxy. There's a lot of space out there, after all!
Convention and Organized Play Manager
