[Drinax] Campaign log

[Pyromancer]

This thread is for updates and questions about our upcoming "Pirates of Drinax" campaign. It will be some time until the campaign begins, since there are other campaigns to finish first, but the first characters have been built:

- Sala, the King's young niece, rebellious master duelist, who wants to escape from the constraints of the floating palace and have adventures.
- Maximus, Earl of Maki (a fiefdom on Number One), a fat pilot urged by his ambitious mother to participate in King Oleb's plan; has a robot butler to take care of him.
- Nikki Kleinkrug, a cunning engineer with a cyber-eye, who attracted the king's attention with a spectacular prank during a state reception.
- Jari Tjuri, a restorer and art historian who dreams of Sindal's lost treasures. He also is psionic.

The will be another character, but I'm already eager to play with this group!

 

[Baldo]

There will be another character...

Try an Aslan from the Hierate. It's true I have a soft spot for honor-driven warriors with more ranks in Melee (Natural) than Tolerance (yeah, played too many D&D games... ), but having an allied Aslan in the party WILL be useful, in my experience.

 

[MonkeyX]

At face value they do t seem “piraty”. are you planning a more political take on the adventures?

 

[Pyromancer]

At face value they do t seem “piraty”. are you planning a more political take on the adventures?

I'll let the players do their thing, but at the moment I fully expect that actual piracy will not be front and center of our campaign.

 

[JMISBEST]

How about someone who is related to Lord Wrax so that it's easier to gain him as A Ally, which can only be a good thing

 

[M J Dougherty]

I would suggest creating a character and playing the game as it happens rather than trying to build a success-machine group.

There are plenty of ways the Drinax campaign can be the backdrop for adventures without doing much of the piratey thing.

 

[Pyromancer]

Music for our campaign:
Intro
Outro (8:15-9:08)

 

[allanimal]

How about someone who is related to Lord Wrax so that it's easier to gain him as A Ally, which can only be a good thing

The PCs in my campaign hate Wrax, and the feeling is mutual. Not sure at this point how his help would have put the PCs in a better position. But who knows.... maybe if they made nice from the get-go, he could have been less resentful that they have the best warship Drinax has seen in ages, rather than him.

 

[steve98052]

The PCs in my campaign hate Wrax, and the feeling is mutual.

Possible e-mail from Wrax to the player characters:

Respected Enemies,

If my people catch you by surprise, they will kill you, or capture you and make you wish they killed you. I understand that your feelings about me are similar.

However, we have other enemies. We probably have common enemies. In the event that there is a common enemy worse than each other, it would be worthwhile to have a channel to communicate.

If you wish to contact me, you may visit F'tisawa Khorrg. She is a Vargr who thinks she is Aslan. Her passenger agency is on [pick a world], in the Ekho Building on Weakhto Avenue. My people are ordered to grant you safe passage in the event that they encounter you anywhere along Weakhto Avenue between the starport Aslan Gate and her office.

In case you doubt the authenticity of this message, my contact code is in the public record on numerous worlds, including [pick a world they have visited], where my people looked up your contact code.

Your Enemy,
Wrax

This foreshadows a couple of things:
- Wrax might have his people mess with the characters if they cross paths somewhere other than the safe passage road.
- They might have worse enemies than Wrax.

 

[paltrysum]

Wrax is a foil in my campaign as well. He curries favor with the king and amplifies every misstep by the players into a catastrophic failure. The hatred between Wrax and the players is mutual and palpable. The one exception: the ex-marine colonel and war hero in the groupo is on speaking terms with Wrax. I think Wrax wonders why such a skilled and honorable warrior would stoop so low as to be a pirate. Perhaps he sees a redeemable soul among the players.

 

[Pyromancer]

I've run a few one-shots in the region around Drinax to set the stage, but yesterday, we finally started the proper campaign. Since August, the pilot changed to a skinny guy named Launcelot Gobo, and the final character is a simple soldier from Asim, aptly named Dodax Asim.

So, the crew of the "Revenge (of Drinax)", cover name "Star of Xindra" is:
- Sala, the King's young niece, rebellious master duelist, who wants to escape from the constraints of the floating palace and have adventures.
- Launcelot Gobo, Earl of Maki (a fiefdom on Number One), a skinny pilot urged by his ambitious mother to participate in King Oleb's plan; has a robot butler to take care of him.
- Nikki Kleinkrug, a cunning engineer with a cyber-eye, who attracted the king's attention with a spectacular prank during a state reception.
- Jari Tjuri, a restorer and art historian who dreams of Sindal's lost treasures. He also is psionic.
- Dodax Asim, a simple soldier from Asim, who had the luck to stand guard in the throne room when King Oleb decided on a whim that the crew lacked a proper warrior, and added him to the roster.

The first session was mostly introduction. The crew wasn't very convinced of Oleb's grandiose plan to restore the Empire of Sindal, but played along, and wasn't very impressed by the light show (backed by a life soundtrack from the Royal Symphonic Orchestra) either when he gave them their ship. Their despair grew when scholar Voha gave them the list of all the repairs their ship needs to function properly (and the cost!).
In the end, Princess Rao told them her version of the plan ("That's exactly what my father meant, he just phrased it differently!"), a saner vision of a defensive pact (lead by Drinax) with the neighbouring worlds against the Aslan.
In the end, they decided to take it slow, test the waters, and familiarize themselves with the region before doing something rash - and they took off towards Torpol.

This was one of the most funny sessions I had in a long time, with a lot of hilarious scenes. Lord Wrax confronting Launcelot ("I know exactly what you and your mother are up to!") before Launcelot knew himself what was going on; the disbelief of the players/characters when Oleb told them his plan ("We are supposed to do WHAT?"), the revelation of the starship (I normally don't use soundtracks for my roleplaying sessions, but I did for this scene, there was an orchestra playing in-universe, after all), a lot of slapstick and situational humor (with phrases like "public-pirate partnership").

 

[steve98052]

. . . the final character is a simple soldier from Asim, aptly named Dodax Asim.
. . .

My convention is that citizens of low-population worlds often use the name of their homeworld as a surname. Is that what's going on there? If so, cool to see that others use that convention.

 

[Pyromancer]

My convention is that citizens of low-population worlds often use the name of their homeworld as a surname. Is that what's going on there? If so, cool to see that others use that convention.

I don't know what the player was thinking, but that sounds plausible.

We also played a second session:
The "Star of Xindra" (they decided to set their transponder so that their ship is registered on Asim) arrives at Torpol and lands at the starport on the north pole. They wander around and are bombarded with advertisements for holidays on the beaches of Torpol, and are approached by sales persons. They also notice Daniel Vlaw making a deal with two Floriani, and two figures in black hoods sitting and eating in silence. They learn from the news that a diplomatic delegation from Clarke is present, and that there was some kind of spectacular pirate attack recently. They speak with Provost Falx and Keeper Malos and learn of the bounty on the pirates. They decide to try to earn it and search for the pirates. As they plan to depart, they are confronted by Daniel Vlaw who angrily wants to know who they are, since he has the only ship from Asim. When Dodax reveals that he, too, is from Asim (proven by his strong Asim accent), Daniel gets sentimental. Launcelot quickly spins a story how they rescued Dodax from the floating palace and stole a ship from the King of Drinax, and are trying to free Asim. This gets them an invitation from Daniel, and after a night of heavy drinking, he decides to join their Asim Liberation Front. He understands that money is important and will help them catch the pirates, for the bounty. He is sure they are on Theev, so this is where the group is headed now.

The group now has a problem, since Daniel will be very unhappy if he ever finds out they are actually in the service of the King of Drinax - but the group is confident they can keep up their charade for the time being.

 

[Old School]

BS’ing their way through space right from the get go. I like it.

My group managed to get some information from Vlaw, but missed opportunity for a long term contact.

 

[Pyromancer]

3rd session:
The group found Krrsh around Borite. I ditched the bug hunt (for now, I will probably relocate the station to another system). Redthane simply put him in a spacesuit and threw him overboard to slowly die there. Krrsh managed to hide a hibernation drug pill in his mouth beforehand and but his space suit into power saving mode, only broadcasting a short distress signal every 10 minutes, so he was still alive when the group found him. He managed to appeal to the pity of the characters, so they adopted him into their crew (for now) after he told them the backstory of Redthanes pirate attacks. The group then continued to Theev. They were supposed to meet with Daniel there at Tuks, but Daniel wasn't there when they arrived. But they could witness the rough customs of Theev, and some local youths managed to con them out of a little bit of money. They also got an invitation from Admiral Darokyn. He talked to them about their "interesting" ship, and offered them a place in his "enterprise", either as full-on members, or as "freelancers" under his protection. They demanded a little bit of time to consider, and have scheduled another meeting with him the following evening.