Saturday, January 25, 2020

TinyD6: The Pyramid on Boontu Star Wars Actual Play

Last night I ran a one-shot using TinyD6 for Star Wars and I think it went great. I really like TinyD6 and find it to be streamlined and intuitive, two things that I think are essential for a good experience.

The Players are Imperial Storm Troopers on the Ajax, an Interdictor orbiting the planet Boontu, a few months after the destruction of the Death Star at the Battle of Yavin. Morale is low due to the Rebellion's defeat of the Empire.

Boontu is a world dominated by bogs, however, there is an ancient pyramid that is visible from orbit because there is no vegetation within 1/2 a mile of it.

The Ajax has been hosting Uriel and Ariel Gonzaga, identical twin scientists and the daughters of Moff Lyra Gonzaga, who are heading up the mysterious Project Menagerie. The scuttlebutt on the ship is that Lord Vader himself has taken an interest in their work.

Uriel, four Storm Troopers, a pilot, and two technicians departed for the pyramid via shuttle approximately six hours ago when Ariel begins howling in pain and her lab techs are forced to sedate her.

They immediately alert Captain Gibbs of the situation when he receives a holo-transmission from Darth Vader because he has "sensed a disturbance" and reminds Gibbs that Project Menagerie is important to him and therefore the Emperor.

At that, Gibbs learns that Uriel's team cannot be raised via radio and he assigns Lt. Stipes to take four Storm Troopers (the Players) down to investigate.

While flying planetside in their shuttle Stipes debriefs them about what little he knows about Project Menagerie and Lord Vader's interest.

The Boontu Pyramid

Upon arrival they immediately investigate Uriel's shuttle and discover that a blaster bolt from an Imperial weapon has destroyed its communication system and one of the Troopers, Mik, notices something scuttling along the shuttle's outer haul, but cannot bet a bead on what it was.

As the rain begins to fall, they clearly see Uriel's team's tracks leading to the right side of the Pyramid. They, however, decide to approach from the left. Rus takes point and heads to a large, sealed doorway on the left side and Mat covers his approach. Both see a creature, a hideous arachnofuge about the size of a hound dog moving along the side of the Pyramid.

Arachnofuge

Neither are able to take a shot and Rus receives a data transmission that allows him to open the door. As they look in the doorway they see the door on the opposite side is also open and several portable lights illuminate a stairwell leading down.  They also notice the legs and lower torso of one of Uriel's Storm Troopers in the northeast corner.  Lt. Stipes sends in a small droid to provide better information of the remains of the Imperial when two things occur: a much larger arachnofuge drops from the ceiling onto the droid and destroys it and another arachnofuge, about the size of a fox, attacks and injures Stipes before being gunned down as it attempts to flee for the nearby swamp by Mik.

The other Troopers fire at the larger arachnofuge in the Pyramid but it is able to dodge their blasts and follow the stairs down below and out of sight.

Rus investigates the remains and discovers that whatever killed the Trooper cauterized the wound.

The team heads down below to a large, circular chamber with a light blue mist covering the floor and find another locked door. As the team investigates the room they find a stationary data-capturing droid, several crates of supplies and yet another Trooper's lower torso that was killed by the same type of weapon. Moments later they hear the doorway they descended close and determine that they don't know how to open it.

The team also learns that radio transmissions are spotty at best underground, but after heading back up to the ground floor to deliver a mission update they are giving partial schematics Uriel was using and the code to open the door in the circular chamber.

The follow a hallway and cautiously find a circular room with dim lighting, a graphic of their current star system on the floor and a statue of a wookie to the right and a trandoshan to the left.

Trandoshan
Investigation of the room reveals that the graphic in the center of the room is interactive and both statues, which are not on the schematics they were given, move aside to reveal doors behind them.

At this point, Mat notices one of the arachnofuges, a smaller one moving in the hallway behind the wookie and Stipes accesses the stationary droid to get a video feed of a chamber connected to the doorway behind the trandoshan statue. The room features a hovering matte black cylindrical object about the size of a coffin. 

Dav moves through the hallway leading to the chamber with the camera in it to confirm their assumption was correct while Mik and Mat enter the hallway behind the wookie. Mat attempts to blast the arachnid and when it enters the room toward the left side he sees an identical coffin to the one Dav is monitoring, but it begins to glow as soon as the creature enters the room.

Mik decides to investigate it and discovers a control panel and finds a way to open the object revealing an adolescent wookie whose breathing is labored. As the team regroups to observe the wookie a door on the north wall opens revealing a large droid that hovers twoard them while two arachnofuges charge from behind it.

After driving off the arachnofuges, the team is able to communicate with the droid, Alpha Eleven Seven. It reveals that is serves "the Master" and claims that the Master created the trandoshan and wookie species through the Genesis chambers in this chamber and the one across the hall. When questioned about the arachnofuges, Alpha reveals that they were a failed experiment that the Master chose to spare.

When the Troopers peer into the hidden door that Alpha and the arachnofuges came through the see a steep ramp leading deeper underground. They also hear a faint cry for help from that direction.

As the Troopers move down the ramp they find a larger nest of the arachnofuges with a giant "Queen" and notice that Uriel is attached to the front of the leader's torso with greenish mucus.

Arachnofuge Queen

While dealing with a small horde of the monsters, Mik watches in horror as Lt. Stipes begins to howl in pain as a large tumor on his necks swells and explodes revealing an infant arachnofugue and a shower of arterial spray. Mik stomps the tiny predator into oblvion when Alpha is cleaved in two by a devaronian dressed all in black wielding a red laser sword. 

Devaronian in Black

He demands to know where Davos is and Mik, thinking quickly, directs him toward the onrushing horde of arachnofuges surging toward his allies.  The newcomer acrobatically leaps beyond the Troopers and makes short work of the small horde of monsters and again asks about Davos' whereabouts. Rus points toward the Queen and while the devaronian is distracted the team unloads their blaster at him.

The Troopers fight valiantly, even as the newcomer deflects their blaster bolts back at them, but through sheer numbers take him down. Rus examines the laser sword and uses it to decapitate the devaronian.

In the ensuing firefight, the Queen makes her retreat and the Troopers cautiously pursue her. They discover a sealed door and two viewscreens and a workstation that ate all powered down.
After a few minutes, the bring all the systems back online and the viewscreens show two large chambers with large matte black "coffins" in them. One of them is opened and they find the top portions of the Troopers assigned to Uriel, as well as the two additional Troopers and their Pilot's head.  

They are shocked to see the Queen enter into the other chamber where it looks around for a moment before spitting some kind of acid to destroy the camera the feed uses. Additionally, Dav uses teh workstation to learn that Darth Davos is the builder of this Pyramid and that the life pods house him and Darth Antagus.

After using some medical supplies to treat some wounds they open the doorway and follow the mucus trail that the Queen left in her wake.

After confirming that the Queen is located behind a sealed door to their left, the group blows it and enters a deadly fight with the monster. They find that Uriel's moaning body in the far corner and have several smaller arachnofuge attack them from the rear.

The final battle was savage but the Queen and her kin were destroyed. Mat uses his medkit to stabilize Uriel and excise the small tumors forming on body.

He rushes topside to find the doorway leading to the ground portion of the Pyramid is open again and radios for back-up while carrying Uriel to their shuttle and lifting off toward the Ajax.

The back-up arrives with orders not to touch anything an await a senior officer to arrive and take over analysis of the Pyramid.

Within 12 hours, Lord Vader himself arrives to relieve Captain Gibbs and to meet the Troopers responsible for the rescue of Uriel and the death of Darth Antagus.



1 comment:

Sergio Benito said...

Nice adventure. Thanks for share. I will use it!

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