| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
GM Heavy Spoiler thread for Before the Storm One Shot
Well I am now officially the GM and not a player in this AP sadly, but I am quite excited to be running this AP anyways!!
And to start things off as I have a new 5 player group (all new players for SF except 1) this will be a great intro for them to get used to the system, compared to the hectic and quite interesting "things" going on in Drift Crashers.
So as usual I focus on the maps first thing as they need to be pretty good for the player (and GM!!) buy in.
While not to bad the usual no hi res images kills what we got so I went t and grabbed these.
Rented Shuttle was no issue as a have a number of small and detailed craft maps by now, inside and out!!
As to The Third Gate I could not find that kind of vessel so I ended up using this
The Third Gate Map--Storeys-Orbital-Station-Scova-4--Red-Alert
A nice 3 decker space station ship that has plenty of room and interesting damaged terrain features for the party to enter, exit and interact with.
Next is the Marata (or the Green Golem if your not next running Drift Crashers) and I had quite a time trying to see what works and is somewhat beleavable to meld into that Pirate ship in the opening of The Perfect Storm. so I finally settled on this :)
The Marata -Yoshida
A nice 2 decker ship that has plenty of good room and visuals for the crazyness that follows after pick up me thinks!!
Now trying to figure out when to ask the PC's what their "friend Make up" and extra ship stuff" choices will be... Before we run this one shot or after it is finished, not sure yet myself.
Tom
Encounters look quite nice and with the "new" Third Gate map I have plenty of room to have the 3 decks (one each in separate Roll20 map with Rental in each as well Pages) and space room to have their rent a shuttle token there as well. So can test out the pilot and EVA walk to the wreck, and to pick as they can see the entrances. IF they think/bother to fly their rental around the drift engulfed ship that is, LOL!!!
As I have extra room I am thinking of adding a guard robot encounter in one of the hallways, then a couple of skill checks to get some of the deck plans to see where they might need to go. For one still functional but still glitching Computer in the Comms array area. Perhaps add an extra +1 for DC's for skill checks, an extra Drift Mote, Tiny Water Elemental and add a bit of HP and +1 Armor to the Time eater as I have 5 players instead of 4.
That should about cover it I think for the extra add ins I will pop into this
So who here is running or considering this for your SF group before jumping into the AP?
And what might you change up in your game?
Tom :)
I'll run this one, but not connecting directly to the AP. Doesn't seem like it would work very well, with the "key NPC" element on the player's guide. Not to mention all the intel the PCs get from this one-shot, too much juicy stuff.
Not changing anything, interested to see how this 6-floor building-like ship will work, if they'll use the access between floors for anything, or if it'll go just like a regular crawl.
Ya I hear ya on the info that might be given away so I'll probably trim that down a bit to keep the mystery of Drift Crashers out there.
A little cheesy but the NPC's the players come up with I will have as they just met them on leave or whatnot at Absalom station and they happen to bump into them again kinda thing,should work I think.
Tom
And just had the first session for my mostly new Starfinder 6 party group.
We did not get super far as I had em focus on their characters, the group dynamic of the characters in relationship to each other. So had a longer rent a junk shuttle scene before they ran into The Third gate, or it ran into them, LOL.
This is a group they picked as an Engineering focused and had their security guards attached going to Absalom Station (Aby Station can be quite rough in places don't ya know) for some kind of secret Drift engine project they were hired to help on.
Great piloting checks and not so good Science officer ones made a mysterious vibe as they assessed the damage and what the frigg was going on.
Then they opted for the middle level recon in their shuttle on the outside then went into the Beast known as the now wrecked Third Gate with a little Space walk.
Ran right into the Drift Motes, kinda freaked them as I did some lighting special effects but an easy first combat to ease them into the new system for them. Then one of them found their favored NPC (as a stowaway as a gate crew member now dead was making some extra money on the side) and free piece of gear in the next area. That was quite fun and a WOW effects as they thought they would not get to see any of this til Mod 1 was started :)
Worked like a charm and as intended!! Ha Ha
Next had some not so good checks when they found dead computer ship terminals and a few sort of working ones, explored all of level 2, hit the Tech shop last, took care of the Radiation venting and got their Freebooter armor.
Then we called it there, so quite a nice session 1 so far and everyone had a good time and group dynamics gelled quite well.
Let me know anyone how your group did when you can.
Tom
Kinda curious myself on how the PC's act and react as they meet, engage and make some hard choices.
I set up some generic red shirts on the Marata, as well as the rest of the PC's special NPC's they made that they did not find on the Third Gate.
They will have a bit of time to see who and what they latch onto before the Pirate attack and have to defend and go on the offensive.
Betting the Pirates will have no survivors, but you never know, and the Special NPC's are in danger if the PC's don't direct them to safety in some way shape or form........
Can't wait to get to session 2 where I think we should get into book 1 of the AP, hopefully
Tom
|
Well to be fair, Zev and Navra logically survive because they are non combatants and Zev is mentioned to be available for engine room check(which obviously happens inside and not anywhere near cargobay). But since the adventure makes zero mentions of any pirates, it just feels like as if the adventure just expects them to die.
This ap reminds me of Jade Regent: There is lot of potential for roleplaying with NPCs but AP leaves it 100% up to gm making it bit harder how to handle the NPCs.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Fair, I remember running Jade. Had to do a lot of work and mostly wasted as the group did'nt really latch onto most anyone from the main NPC's (no matter how I tried) but a couple of random peeps I popped in there they did, SIGH...
With this group all new to SF I am not sure what to expect as they run into them, but hopefully interesting.
Tom
And finally completed took 3, 3 hour sessions (and missed a week as the holiday ate that up) but we are now a bit into mod 1 of The Pefect storm.
All new to Starfinder and as I voice vetted every player they noted that I stress RP as well as the combat to really flesh out the characters and to get a real cool and in character (and out) group for the long haul.
And they all did a stellar job, now onboard the Marata, met their hand crafted NPC's got a good nites rest as I leveled them up to 2,only fair when they gave it their all and adjusting encounters and DC's are pretty easy for me with all the experience I have by now.
The end of their rest was interupted with a cool star trek alarm, "Pirates on board, please report to the engineer bay to repel boarders ASAP" got them out of their bunks, Left that as the cliff hanger.
Overall I think it really adds to the Drift crisis and bonding the group together a LOT more than if you just did the opening per The Perfect Storm opening :)
Tom
Finished running this for a 2nd group of new Starfinder players, , took 4 sessions for the 6 player group but they were loving the RP so I had a great time as well.
Now off to Crashers for them!! Ha Ha
Tom