Your First Patron of the 760...

[B_Steele]

I have a fun little thread I want to start now that 760 Patrons is starting to land in the hands of the fans.

I want every reply to this thread to be a fleshed-out description of the first Patron/Adversary rolled randomly using the book's tables. Not just the die rolls and what is listed mind you, but an actual paragraph on how you would include what you rolled in your Traveller game.

Who knows, if you make your description cool enough, perhaps I might try to get him/her/it into a future book I put together for the line!

So...have some fun, roll some dice and get inventive!

-Bry

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

Wow, I'm surprised that no one has done this yet.

Here is my first patron rolled from the book.

Setup:

The Patron is named Gruffty the Hiver. He is a Hiver working in the Spinward Marches. All other data is rolled from the book.

RANDOM ROLLS:
Protagonist/Antagonist: (5) Protagonist
Random Patron Encounter: (14) Marines
Protagonist Marines: (56) Surveillance Officer
Referee Information: (2) Taking a short leave of absense and needs 2-3 people to fill in while he is gone.

COMMENTS:
Well, I knew I had picked a tough one trying to explain mop-wielding Hiver in the Marches, but here goes:

DETAILS:
Gruffty the Hiver is freelancing with the local Starport Authority doing routine surveillance work on several areas of the starport, mostly the warehouse district, but also including parts of the fuel storage facility, but not the refinery area. Gruffty often suppliments his electronic surveillance with on-site inspections, often disguising himself as a janitor. Gruffty has to take a few personal days for vague reasons. If pressed, Gruffty will reluctantly admit that it has something to do with Hiver reproduction (yuck).

Gruffty needs a small group of reliable (preferrably ex-Marine types) to watch the monitors and make occasional on-site inspections (his contract does not include a replacement clause, he has to find his own). A minimum of two people are required to do this job because Hivers have multiple eyes and can watch more monitors than one human can (part of the reason he was hired for the job). Gruffty doesn't expect anything to happen during the 2 days that he will be gone and if bad things do happen, the characters only have to hit this red button and tell the Marine Captain where the trouble is and they will respond. No physical danger at all, just like Hivers like it.

UNFORTUNATELY, what the players, and Gruffty, do not know is that on the second day of his absense, a group of thieves from the Startown will try to break in to one of the warehouses that Gruffty normally monitors. They will start by causing several shorts during the first day that will make it look like some kind of system failure, that way on the second day when they attack, the response will be slow due to all of the false alarms the previous day.

The players will get 2-3 spurious blackouts of their monitors, in random areas, per shift. They will probably dutifully call the Marines in, and when nothing is found and the monitors come back on, they will get lamblasted by the marines, but good naturedly at first. As the number of false alarms increase, the attitude of the marines will noticeably decrease, until they are rude and slow to respond. THEN the thieves will strike (yes they are watching the response times from a safe distance away).

If the players use their electronics skills or conduct on-the-spot investigations, they may be able to detect the equipment being used by the thieves, but even if they do, it will be almost impossible to tell they were not natural problems (like frayed wires, blown fuses etc), so the false alarms will continue.

The players are not expected to get involved in actually catching the thieves, but they may be doing an on-site inspection at the time of the robbery. If so, they will find themselves caught in the middle of a little firefight. The marines will not be in a good mood, and the thieves will be poorly armed.

When Gruffty returns, he will be horrified that HIS area was robbed (or attempted to be robbed) and will be very sorry to the players. If anyone was injured, Gruffty will take it very hard and will do whatever he can to make it up to the player. If the players work this right, Gruffty could become an Ally and help them out from time to time with intel.

Hivers are almost unseen in the Marches and the strangeness of this starfish shaped creature should be played up. EVERYONE looks at Gruffty strangely at first. BUT, he is a very gentle soul and very curious.

NEXT!

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

The situation above was done off the top of my head right after I rolled the dice.

Having had a bit to stew about the results, I think I would change it a bit.

NOW:
The thieves get away without anyone figuring it out until after the fact (the Marines react too slowly, but do see that stuff was stolen). The stuff is high value, but not necessarily dangerous.

The Marines are embarrassed, the players and Gruffty are now under suspicion, since the timing is a bit convenient.

The players must now work to clear their name. Since this is a Marine Patron, I would expect the hideout of the thieves to be armed and maybe a running gunbattle or two (I'm thinking gangsters here).

The first part with all the false alarms should be played up for the frustration factor (lots of rolling dice only for nothing to be wrong). Once the theft has occurred there should be an "AH HA!" moment for the players, followed by the "We have been HAD" moment. Gruffty might even be suspected by the players (but he is innocent, or is he...???).

Then it become a mystery, follow the clues type of adventure for the non-combat types, or running gunbattles chasing the thieves through, under and over the Startown...

 

[Gruffty the Hiver]

<...Hiver...>

:shock: 8) :shock: :shock:

I like it! *Very* well done, RTT! :mrgreen:

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

I was kind of hoping I would have rolled Antagonist and then Wild Card Patrons then Cannibal but alas, the dice didn't roll that way... :twisted:

 

[saundby]

Here goes:

2rotag
4,3:rogue
5,1:getaway driver
4:willing to negotiate any form of travel

Njalla Gigja offers to pay the travellers to accompany her on a trip in a chartered tourcraft taking tourists to a cultural city outside the local star city's influence. She has a shopping list of "business tasks" she needs done. Normally her partner would take care of them but he's offplanet negotiating for the purchase of a second tourcraft, and she needs to ferry tourists around scheduled stops in the cultural city in a hop-on/hop-off tour.

The "business tasks" will require careful timing on the part of the travellers. In particular, the final stop's time is inflexible.

The actual purpose of the travellers is to provide cover for the activities of some of the "tourists" who are running a coordinated operation to recover stolen artifacts that are on display in the cultural city. If pressed, Njalla will admit as much, but she isn't in a position to bring the travellers in on the operation itself since she herself has only been hired for transportation, and her "secret" as a getaway driver has been to enhance the operations of her hirers by providing additional cover for their operations, thus providing more getway time and fewer respondants. She is a sort of "socially conscious" getaway driver, only participating in endeavors in which she believes.

The tasks will be a mix. Some will be the passing around parcels in areas under surveillance in the city to initially conceal the activity of the others, then to be a source of data overload to investigators once the taken items turn up missing. Person A takes parcel from location B to person C, who drops it at terminal locker D near tour stop E where person F jumps off tourcraft during stop, retrieves it, then takes it to shop G at tour stop H, to be picked up two hours later by person J.... Ostensibly a family heirloom is being picked up from a relative and taken to a repair shop for scheduled minor work then picked up, with it changing hands to allow for the tour schedule, in one case.

Some will be going to authorities and official offices to keep people busy by submitting requests for records, meetings with specific individuals about matters of licensing, etc.

The tasks should keep the travellers moving, each with several tasks to juggle. Skill checks should be required for many tasks, with opportunities for snafus along the way and improvised recovery plans.

There are some real tourists among the travellers and the artifact recovery team on the trip. They're protective coloration as well. Njalla and the others will avoid having the innocents come to harm if at all possible.

The departure from the cultural city will become a chase (how could it not?) Any travellers who miss their rendezvous should be given an opportunity to find a means of leaving the city otherwise (commandeering a tourcraft from another company, schmoozing their way on or pretending to be a confused tourist, or ???)

Njalla's tourcraft has some special modifications. It has some light armor, though it is unarmed. It is also capable of making an uncomfortable suborbital jump of about 1100km. Once. Then it'll only limp along in normal ground-effect range for about 35-40km maximum. She has prepositioned a pair of other vehicles in places that luck might just allow them to reach if this becomes necessary. If the travellers are let in on the secret of the operation, Njalla will allow them to store weapons on the tourcraft, but not take them off it as no weapons more potent than a ceremonial dagger are allowed in the cultural city.

Njalla's goal will be to deliver her charges to the starport where they have a craft waiting. If constabulary from the cultural city are in immediate hot pursuit (within visual range) when reaching the star city perimeter, they will be allowed to pursue to the borders of the starport. Otherwise, they will be stopped at the star city's perimeter.

If the travellers do their tasks without finding out the real purpose of the trip, they'll be paid handsomely. If they learn the real purpose, and participate actively Njalla will share a larger portion of her pay with them (she is always paid magnificently for her work--part of why she can hire associates of her own.) If the travellers end up taking up arms to cover the retreat, the principles may provide a bonus for all. All payments are contingent on a successful retrieval of the artifacts and delivery to the starport.