Welcome to Sail the Solar Wind Quest, an episodic soft-SF spaceship adventure simulator based on a horrifying amalgamation of TRPG, RPG, and Quest mechanics. What to expect: Starship captains shouting "Fire everything!" as they pound on the arm of a command chair; A band of plucky lieutenants finding more trouble than they bargained for on shore leave; Highly placed command staff engaging in hand-to-hand combat despite all reasonable expectations; Insubordination; Fraternization; Treason; Archaeology from the Indiana Jones school; Treachery; Anomalously advanced alien artifacts; Betrayal; Smuggling; and a beautiful view of the C-Beams off Tannhauser Gate before the radiation melts your retinas.
Welcome to Sail the Solar Wind Quest, an episodic soft-SF spaceship adventure simulator based on a horrifying amalgamation of TRPG, RPG, and Quest mechanics. What to expect: Starship captains shouting "Fire everything!" as they pound on the arm of a command chair; A band of plucky lieutenants finding more trouble than they bargained for on shore leave; Highly placed command staff engaging in hand-to-hand combat despite all reasonable expectations; Insubordination; Fraternization; Treason; Archaeology from the Indiana Jones school; Treachery; Anomalously advanced alien artifacts; Betrayal; Smuggling; and a beautiful view of the C-Beams off Tannhauser Gate before the radiation melts your retinas.
The first thing we'll be doing is generating the local cluster—the set of systems that can reach each other with conventional ship-based FTL drives that form the setting for the beginning of the adventure. This bit is stolen straight up from Diaspora, so if you like you can follow along in the SRD here, but I'll be providing simplified explanations along the way for those who don't want to bother. The important part is that each system has three ratings in Technology, Environment, and Resources ranging from -4 to 4, trending heavily toward a 0 average. Higher numbers mean more advanced technology, more hospitable environments, and abundant resources; low numbers mean premodern technology, inhospitable environments, and depleted or absent resources.
System A: 2T,1E,2R
System B: 0T, 0E, 0R
System C: -2T, -2E, 1R
System D: 1T, -1E, 2R
System E: 0T, 2E, 0R
System F: 0T, 1E, 2R
System G: 0T, -2E, 0R
System H: 3T, 0E, -2R
«Slipstream Guarantee met.»
«Generating Connections...»
A- :connects to B
B+ :connects to C,D,E
C+ :connects to D,F,G
D- :connects to E
E- :connects to F
F- :connects to G
G :connects to H
That leaves us with a map that looks a little something like this:
For better or worse, this is a cluster whose destiny is dominated by System H. As the only system with a Tech level above 2, it is the only system in the cluster capable of manufacturing FTL drives... and with Resources at -2, its economy is hungry for things it can only get elsewhere. Only System D has any hope of contesting them for orbital superiority, should System H choose to take it—all that remains to be determined is if they are nice enough to ask other Systems for the resources they need... or just reach out and take them.
Does this look like the kind of setting you'd like to go for an adventure in?
[X][Cluster]Yes, this cluster looks good.
[X][Cluster]No, roll a new one.
On the assumption that this is the cluster we're working with, it's time to add some Aspects to each System. For those not familiar with FATE, Aspects are short, pithy phrases that help describe something, and which have mechanical effects. This quest handles invoking/tagging Aspects differently than FATE, but the principle remains the same. Good Aspects serve as plot hooks for the QM and both an advantage and drawback for the players.
Let's look at a sample vote for System C to show you what I mean:
{O}{C-ASP}Bring down the lightning! | Heirloom oxygen exchangers | Steam(punk) tunnels
-{O}name:Tesla
Add a little imagination, and you get the following:
TESLA
TECH -2 | ENVR: -2 | RSRC: 1
Tesla is a dustball planet with a hyperactive magnetosphere and unbreathable atmosphere orbiting just barely inside the Goldilocks zone of a yellow star prone to an unusually high number of solar flares. The dust storms that ravage the surface cause enormously large and powerful sheets of lightning that hammer down constantly. The human population was once a mining colony from some long-collapsed empire—in the wake of its absence, they lost much of their technology and regressed to an Industrial-era tech base, powered by lightning collectors on the surface. They eke out an existence in played-out mining tunnels, hanging by the tenuous thread of ancient life-support systems they no longer understand maintained by a nearly priest-like class of mechanics and engineers.
With that laid out, I've prepared a set of pregenerated Aspects for these Systems. Feel free to pick one set as is, or create new sets with the write-in option. Don't be afraid to mix and match existing options, either. Let your creativity run free!*
*QM will not be held responsible for a plethora of thinly-veiled expies.
Aspects for System A (-2T, 1E, 2R)
[X][A-ASP] Moon Wizards | Special crystals what glow | And you thought the Balkans were bad
[X][A-ASP] Get these mecha out of my regency romance! | Big fish in a tiny puddle | On the ascent
[X][A-ASP] Forgotten backwater | Asteroids of unusual size | Antisocial natives
[X][A-ASP] Write-in
-[X]name: Write-in
Aspects for System B (0T, 0E, 0R)
[X][B-ASP] Babby's first moon rocket | Friendly neighbors | They come in threes
[X][B-ASP] Just want to be left alone | Drifting derelicts | The real folk blues
[X][B-ASP] Perfectly average nothing to see here no sir | I never liked that moon anyway | Cult? What cult?
[X][B-ASP] Write-in
-[X]name: Write-in
Aspects for System C (-2T, -2E, 1R)
[X][C-ASP] Bring down the lightning! | Heirloom oxygen exchangers | Steam(punk) tunnels
[X][C-ASP] Autominers only, no meatbags allowed | Excitability is not generally a quality appreciated in stars | High risk high reward
[X][C-ASP] Voted least-hospitable caravansary three centuries running | Everything's on sale | A culture in hiding
[X][C-ASP] Write-in
-[X]name: Write-in
Aspects for System D (1T, -1E, 2R)
[X][D-ASP] YES HELLO WELCOME TO OUR DEATH WORLD | Not going down without a fight | The blood of the covenant
[X][D-ASP] Vive la Resistance | Pulling up on their own bootstraps | Technically, they're privateers
[X][D-ASP] Can't wait to get off this rock | Colony drop | Dueling ideologies
[X][D-ASP] Write-in
-[X]name: Write-in
Aspects for System E (0T, 2E, 0R)
[X][E-ASP] Homesteading the outer sphere | Heros born here | Quiet... too quiet.
[X][E-ASP] Tourist destination | Rebels been rebels since I don't know when | All she wants to do is dance
[X][E-ASP] Moonbases coming out of our ears | They can't kill all of us | Governance by who's left
[X][E-ASP] Write-in
-[X]name: Write-in
Aspects for System F (0T, 1E, 2R)
[X][F-ASP] Owned by the company store | No fight left in these guns | Ecumenopolis
[X][F-ASP] When not-Mars attacks! | Industrial powerhouse | Variable boot:neck ratio
[X][F-ASP] Luxury gay space communism | Natural monopoly | That could never happen here
[X][F-ASP] Write-in
[X]name: Write-in
Aspects for System G (0T, -2E, 0R)
[X][G-ASP] Woe to the conquered | Tapped out | Choking clouds of ash
[X][G-ASP] That new-terraform smell | Target of opportunity | Dream big
[X][G-ASP] Wouldn't live here if you didn't pay me | Necessary evil | Cloud-surfing cities
[X][G-ASP] Write-in
-[X]name: Write-in
Aspects for System H (3T, 0E, -2R)
[X][H-ASP] Enterprising empire | Give and take- you give, I take | Unmatched in arms (and arrogance)
[X][H-ASP] Will trade tech for food | The well is dry | If you die in the game you die in real life
[X][H-ASP] The great enablers | Fading fast | It's lonely at the top
[X][H-ASP] Write-in
-[X]name: Write-in
ODIN
TECH -2 | ENVR: 1 | RSRC: 2
-Moon Wizards
-Special crystals what glow
-And you thought the Balkans were bad
The gas giant Baelra has two inhabited moons, the garden-like Odin and the icy Misra. Strange, glowing crystals grow on both, and select humans have found the ability to tap the power within them. Using that power, they have asserted dominance over their fellow man, and gathered into uncountable "Wizards' Towers," constantly feuding for land, resources, and pride. Even invaders from beyond the stars have not caused them to unify, and so armies of automata and conventional soldiers clash with alien supersoldiers and each other, and great levitating airships are cast down by fire from on high. It is a time of great heroes doing great deeds, and the suffering of millions that fuels them.
DIAVEL
TECH: 0 | ENVR: 0 | RSRC: 0
-Perfectly average nothing to see here no sir
-I never liked that moon anyway
-Cult? What cult?
Diavel is a perfectly average system in every way. A yellow main sequence star, a small superheated terrestrial planet in the inner system, a pair of gas giants in the outer system, and a garden world sitting smack in the middle of the Goldilocks zone orbited by the remains of a moon still radiating heat from whatever tore it apart. It remains mostly untouched by the Kaalrox, their presence mostly restricted to refueling stations around the gas giants that they use as a jumping-off point for assaults on Odin. Raids on the surface of Diavel were greatly curtailed due to the number of dropships going AWOL, or vanishing in unexpected weather events. The planet is well known for what visitors call "mind-bending" architecture, and from orbit it is possible to appreciate the way major cities and highways have been planned in complex geometric shapes "almost like writing."
PETRA
TECH: -2 | ENVR: -2 | RSRC: 1
-Voted least-hospitable caravansary three centuries running
-Everything's on sale
-A culture in hiding
A tidally-locked moon of a gas giant the size of Neptune, the only reason Petra seems to have been settled at all is astrographic convenience. The extraction industry of the gas giant itself is dangerous but lucrative work, and the system is two jumps away from Hierophant and only one from Kaalrox—far enough to be deniable to squeamish netizens, close enough to be convenient. All sorts of things pass through the black markets of Petra… including human lives. Somewhere along the terminator, it's whispered that an ancient settlement of escaped slaves exists, biding their time.
KAALROX
TECH: 1 | ENVR: -1 | RSRC: 2
-YES HELLO WELCOME TO OUR DEATH WORLD
-Not going down without a fight
-The blood of the covenant
Kaalrox is the terror of the cluster. Kaalroxian mercenary companies, either independently or on the retainer of Hierophanti megacorps, raid with near impunity across all known space. The Kaalrox have a culture of personal honor so complex as to be entirely opaque to outsiders, but the only atonement for many failings is death—and they hold outsiders to standards just as high. The planet Kaalrox IV supports life perhaps too well, as nearly everything in the biosphere is hostile to humans in one way or another. The rest of the system is abundant in rare earths and other exotic materials, which the Kaalroxians trade for stardrives with the Hierophanti, though their spaceships tend to be produced domestically. It's rumored that much of their advancement comes from reverse-engineered Hierophanti technology, and the rest of the cluster fears the day that they crack the final secret of FTL production and even that loose leash slips from their necks.
CONNOR'S WORLD
TECH: 0 | ENVR: 2 | RSRC: 0
-Moonbases coming out of our ears
-They can't kill all of us
-Governance by who's left
There is nothing so indomitable as the human spirit, as the inhabitants of Connor's World prove every day. The system was once home to a great number of valuable resources, and the desert-like Rose's World and the super-earth Evan's World were home to thriving colonies. Then the Kaalrox showed up. Connor's World has become the favorite punching bag of the merciless raiders, and over the course of decades all wide-scale government has collapsed. Nevertheless, the Resistance continues, in a hundred ways in a hundred pockets scattered throughout the system. Counter-insurgents and the contingencies of doomed governments plague Hierophanti carpetbagger compounds, and careless Kaalroxians find the tables turned upon them.
PAX NOVA
TECH: 0 | ENVR: 1 | RSRC: 2
-Luxury gay space communism
-Natural monopoly
-That could never happen here
Some people have all the luck. Pax Nova is a carefully-maintained jewel of a world, the worst of its heavy industry already in orbit or on the cool-Venus Pax Labor. A large asteroid belt swimming with the exotic materials Hierophanti megacorps need to build their stardrives ensures even the biggest wigs in the cluster need to play nice with each other and the Paxians, or risk killing the goose that lays golden eggs. A large portion of the economy is agrarian, exporting food and luxuries to less fortunate worlds, and that peaceful and one-with-nature atmosphere seems to influence all their dealings. Yes, the troubles that envelop the rest of the cluster seem so very far from here…
GUILDER
TECH: 0 | ENVR: -2 | RSRC: 0
-That new-terraform smell
-Target of opportunity
-Dream big
Many years ago, Guilder was a Mars-like planet with barely a wisp of atmosphere and barely any ice even at the poles. Then early Hierophant explorers came through and did a little comet seeding, and voilà! Sure, maybe the atmosphere is still unbreathable, but there's water now! And I'm sure they'll get that whole magnetosphere thing sorted out any day now. Guilder is the sort of place where anything seems possible. Whether you're a Hierophanti out to find something real and meaningful beyond the Great Game or a refugee from Connor's World fleeing from the Kaalrox, Guilder is the place you go to start a new life and make your dreams come true.*
*Results not guaranteed by the Guilder Development Corporation, all rights reserved.
HIEROPHANT
TECH: 3 | ENVR: 0 | RSRC: -2
-Will trade tech for food
-The well is dry
-If you die in the game you die in real life
Life on Hierophant is one of stark divides; principally, either you are wealthy enough that real life is worth living, or you've retreated into VR. Heirophant has attained great heights of technology, the envy of the cluster, but exhausted its natural resources to do so. Every citizen is provided for by the government in a direct digital democracy, but only to the lowest level of care, as all real wealth lies in the hands of the megacorporations that control the import markets. Vast amounts of energy and rare earths go into maintaining the network of life-like simulations collectively known as the Great Game, where players can go anywhere and do anything… as long as you're willing to pay to win. Meanwhile, the megacorps sell stardrives all over the cluster to anybody who can afford them... and some people who can't, as long as they do the corp a tiny little favor. Off the books, you understand. That's just how the game is played.
Well, now that we know a little more about the setting, it's time to learn a little bit more about you, the player character. Characters get Aspects just like systems do, but they also get Skills and Stunts. I'll have a full writeup in a bit, but Skills do pretty much what they say, while Stunts are like a really flexible class ability. Character creation is going to be a multi-step process, with equally viable (hopefully, if it works as designed) branching paths along the way.
First of all, are you a boy? Or a girl?
[X][Gender] Male
[X][Gender] Female
[X][Gender] Other
Next up is your origin. Just what set you on this path to interstellar adventure?
[X][Origin] Moon Wizard's Apprentice
You were an apprentice from a Wizard's Tower on Odin, or maybe Misra. Kaalroxian raiders scooped you up while you were out gathering crystal shards for your master, and you managed to talk yourself out of instant death. Through a long and convoluted series of events, you found yourself taking ownership of the very vessel that had kidnapped you. Now, the starlanes of the cluster open before you, and you find yourself on the path to the future more expansive than you ever dreamed of staring at the stars from your attic room.
-Aspect: War-torn childhood
-Aspect: Magical thinking
-Tags the Lore, Will, Energy Weapons, Archaeology, and Charm skills
-Locks in a spellcasting stunt
[X][Origin] Made It Big on Guilder
Everybody on Guilder has got big dreams, which is a nice way of saying they haven't got much else. You though, you've managed to hit the jackpot. By hook or by crook, you've managed to get your hands on an impounded spaceship with enough fuel to take you anywhere you want to go. It's time to blow this popsicle stand, and really show the Cluster what dreams are made of.
-Aspect: Orphan by choice
-Aspect: A little hard work goes a long way
-Tags the Assets, Deceive, Brokerage, Notice, and Projectile Weapons skills
[X][Origin] The Last, Best Hope
Things are desperate for the Resistance on Connor's World. It took blood, sweat, and the sacrifice of good men and women, but you and your cell managed to take a Hierophant ship completely by surprise. One boarding action later, and you were in command and headed outsystem with Kaalroxian "security forces" hot on your tail. Other cells burned a lot of resources to get you into this position, and you carry their hopes for a free world with you as you venture out in search of an advantage to turn the tide.
-Aspect: Rebel scum
-Aspect: A score to settle
-Tags the Tactics, Stealth, Close Combat, Physique, and Oratory skills
[X][Origin] Write-in
Got a better idea of who you want to be? Go ahead and write it out! Just be sure to add two related aspects, and a good enough description that other people might want to vote for it too. If this option wins, I'll throw in a free re-roll on a failed test. (That will also be the standard reward for omake, should I be so lucky.) Don't worry about the skills—I'll fill in what makes sense.
QM/N: Would it kill you guys to have named anything? I feel like that was the hardest part of coming up with the planet descriptions. Sheesh...
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Mechanics- Aspects, Skills, the Curve, Tracks, and Stunts
Some notes on mechanics- Tagging Aspects, the curve, Skills, and Stunts
ASPECTS—If you've played a game using the FATE system before, you're probably familiar with these. Aspects are short, pithy phrases that define something important about a person, place or thing. They're not just used for flavor though—any time dice need rolling, if you can make an aspect relevant to the action you get a bonus of +2. That's called TAGGING AN ASPECT. You can only tag one aspect of any given scope: Your character, your opponent, the scene, the map zone, the quest as a whole, etc. The exception is "free-taggable" aspects—even if you've already tagged an aspect in that scope, you can always tag a free-taggable aspect. Unlike the FATE system, you don't have to pay a fate point to invoke an aspect—optimize your actions to tag as many as you can! Let me give you an example:
Alice wants to stab Bob with her knife. She tags her own aspect "Now THAT's a knife," the scene aspect "Gladiatorial combat," the quest aspect "Blood and glory!" and Bob's aspect "Get that thing away from me!" for a total of +8. She justifies this by narrating flourishing the knife for the crowd, and taking advantage of Bob's flinch when he sees sharp, pointy objects. Even though the scene also has the tag "Two men enter, one man leaves!" Alice can't tag it, because she has already tagged a scene aspect. Alice's skill with Close Combat (the relevant skill to wielding knives) is 3, so Alice rolls 1d100+3+8. Alice rolls a 90, for a total of 101—a critical! Crits explode, so she rolls 1d100+1(the remainder over 100 from the last roll)=32, so her total roll is 132. Bob rolls his Agility and also tags "Get that thing away from me!" to pratfall out of the way, but it isn't looking good for him—he's not proficient in agility, so his effective skill is -1. 1d100-1+2 get him a total roll of 19, not anywhere close to offsetting Alice's crit. Alice absolutely slaughters Bob, and the crowd goes wild.
The player character receives a certain number of aspects through character generation, and aspects may be added, subtracted, or changed through the course of play.
SKILLS—You're probably already familiar with the concept of skills, numerical representations of how good a character is at accomplishing certain types of tasks and actions. The player character starts with one skill at 5, two at 4, three at 3, four at 2, and five at 1. A skill at level 1 is amateur, 2 is professional, 3 is skilled, 4 is mastery, and at 5 you're the best of the best. A skill you're not trained in can sometimes be used at -1... but only within reason—some things simply can't be done except by someone who knows what they're doing! Skill advancement is different from FATE though, because if there's one thing I know questers like, it's watching their numbers go up. Skill XP can be earned by succeeding at skill tests, or by choosing a downtime activity that raises it. Any skill above 4 also comes with a SPECIALIZATION. A Specialization is like a free-taggable aspect that can be used whenever that skill is being tested, and the specialization is relevant.
The following skill list is representative, not exhaustive, and has been broken down into categories for your convenience.
Assets:
The assets skill and associated track covers both a character's nonliquid assets that they might be expected to have but aren't indicated in Equipment (like a house, apartment, or car,) and the personal connections they may have made to the unnamed background characters populating the setting. Use of this skill tends to involve leveraging those assets in some way, whether that's taking out a loan on your house to afford a spaceship or meeting an old college buddy at the bar to hear him complain about his job at that secret government laboratory. Physique:
Physique covers your health and general athleticism. Tests against Physique are things like lifting heavy objects, resisting poison, and recovering from injury. Will:
A character's resistance to stress, resolve, and ability to focus are modeled by the Will skill. It's used to defend against composure attacks like intimidation or being shelled by enemy artillery. Some types of supernatural shenanigans may also make use of this skill.
Close Combat:
Close combat represents training and experience in using melee weapons like knives, spears, and lightsabers. It also covers maintenance and design of such weapons. Energy Weapons:
If the stuff that comes out of the killy end of your weapon moves at an appreciable fraction of c or faster, this is your skill. Energy weapons cover use and maintenance of point-and-shoot weapons like lasers, lightning casters, and wands of disintegration. Hand-to-hand:
Found weapons, martial arts, and good old-fashioned fisticuffs are the domain of the hand-to-hand skill. MicroG:
MicroG is a bit of a funny one; in any situation where gravity no longer applies, a character's skill at Close Combat, Hand-to-hand, or Projectile Weapons is limited by their skill at MicroG. Recoil's a bitch. Projectile Weapons:
Any personal ranged weapon whose projectiles have to deal with things like "leading the target," "relative elevation," or "Newtonian physics" fall into this category, from bows and arrows to coilguns. The skill covers use, maintenance, and even design.
Communications:
Communications is a bit of a euphemism—this is your "movie hacking" skill. I mean you could use it to jury-rig an AM radio, but its primary purpose is to subvert enemy networks, pop electronic locks, and paradox-loop unfriendly AI. Use it in space combat to attack the enemy data track, because even in the grim darkness of the far future they still haven't fixed Meltdown/Spectre. Computer:
If Communications is the skill you use to break computers, Computers is the skill to actually use them. Searching a database, building a computer from parts, and programming your own software all fall under Computer. Use it in space combat to defend against hacking and repair data damage. Engineering:
If something on your spaceship is broken, you're going to need Engineering to fix it. It will also work on things like tanks, airplanes, and mecha, but not bridges or roads (that's Profession: Civic Engineer or Profession: Architect) or personal equipment (that's Repair or possibly a weapon skill.) Also good for finding your way through derelict space hulks. Gunnery:
You want to fire the big guns? Gunnery is your skill. It covers everything from man-portable indirect fire emplacements to the Macross Cannon. Use it in space combat to put holes in the other guy. Helm:
Flying a proper spaceship is entirely different from handling an atmospheric craft. Use Helm to pull tricky maneuvers in combat or fly through an improbably dense asteroid field without scratching the paint. Navigation:
Space is big. Really big. Even if it's mostly empty, it's surprisingly easy to get lost, or at least burn half your r-mass on boosting to catch a planet. Use Navigation to chart efficient routes in system, find hidden celestial bodies, and to jump from system to system successfully.
Aircraft:
Interface shuttles, one-man aerospace fighters, and passenger airplanes all fall under the umbrella of Aircraft. Generally you'll use your Aircraft skill for any integrated weapons like missiles or wing-mounted beam cannons as well. If your plane also turns into a mecha, you'll need Pilot Armor while the legs are down. Drive:
If it's got wheels or treads, Drive is the skill you need to, well, drive it. Watercraft and hovercraft use this too. Direct-fire integrated weapons like a coaxial machine gun will use this skill, but indirect-fire weapons like naval guns will need Gunnery. If your tank turns into a mecha, you'll need Pilot Armor while the legs are out. Pilot Armor:
This skill covers everything from EVA suits to power armor to Gundams. If it has legs or arms, it probably needs Pilot Armor. Missile weapons use Pilot Armor for their skill checks, but hand-held guns or swords require their relevant combat skill to use effectively. If your mecha turns into a plane, you'll need Aircraft while it's flying. If it flies around in space, you may need MicroG. If it turns into a tank, you'll need Drive while the treads are down. If it turns into a frog, you'll need Animal Handling, and maybe a cleric or wizard skilled in breaking curses.
Charm:
When you need to make a positive impression or soft-talk a target, Charm is the skill to use. Deceive:
When you con somebody or just straight up lie to their face, you're using Deceive. Also useful for actors! Intimidate:
Intimidate is for making threats, open or implied, physical or psychological. It doesn't make many friends. Oratory:
Whether you're giving a Picard speech to rally your crew or ranting to your hunchbacked assistant about how they'll rue the day they threw you out of the university, it falls under Oratory.
Agility:
Use Agility to sprint, climb walls, dodge bullets, conduct legerdemain, or backflip away from a table. Demolitions:
Need to mix some explosives out of common ingredients, set a detonator, or determine which walls are load-bearing for the purposes of bringing down the house? Then you need Demolitions. Medical:
Need to patch up someone who failed their demolitions check? Then you need Medical. Also good for treating illness, brain surgery, and midwifery. Stealth: Moving unseen, unheard, or unremarked on is the province of the Stealth skill. Tactics:
Use Tactics to change the battlefield. With a successful Maneuver roll, you can add free-taggable aspects to an opponent or scene, like "the sun is setting" or "exposed!" To quote diaspora, "The implication is that this was always true, but the character with Tactics can make it useful to himself and his allies, so now it is an Aspect."
Animal Handling:
Use this skill to build a rapport with animals, train them, or ride them. Archaeology:
Indiana Jones-style Archaeology, complete with deciphering dead languages, reverse-engineering ancient technology, and disarming malfunctioning booby traps. Arts
Appreciation or creation of any kind of art for any planet you have Culture/Tech for. Brokerage:
When you need to sell something for a profit, whether that's the armor stripped from a dead mercenary company or stock in your holding company, Brokerage is the skill for the job. Bureaucracy:
Characters skilled in Bureaucracy make the red tape work for them, whether that's getting a retroactive gun permit or blocking a competitor's expansion through zoning laws. You could even chase down corruption! Culture/Tech:
Characters with high Culture/Tech are well traveled. They can blend in and operate as a native in their native system, plus one more system per level of Culture/Tech. Those systems need to be specified, and can't be changed without truly exceptional circumstances. They are considered familiar with the weapons, armor, animals, and art of any system they have Culture/Tech for. All weapons and armor have a Tech rating, and characters are only proficient with the armor and weapons that fall within the range of the system with the highest Tech rating and the system with the lowest Tech rating that they have Culture/Tech for. For instance, a character from a T3 world without any skill in Culture/Tech might be able to aim and fire a coilgun (T3) just fine, but have no idea how to operate a crossbow(T-3) effectively, even though they're both projectile weapons. Another character with Culture/Tech (1) for their native T-1 system and a T1 system would be proficient with T-1, T0, and T1 weapons. In addition, instead of specifying a system, you can choose "archaic weapons" to get proficiency with arms and armor for every tech level below the tech level of lowest system you have Culture/Tech for, or "advanced weapons" for proficiency with arms and armor for every tech level above the tech level of highest system you have Culture/Tech for. Lore:
Lore is the research skill in systems below T-1 and anywhere else Computers is not appropriate, and is also useful for some spellcasting methods. Notice:
Notice is the catch-all sensory skill. If you want to notice how things look, hear, smell, taste, or feel, you'll need points in Notice. Useful for investigations, avoiding poisoning attempts, and breaking hiding character's Stealth. Profession: X
No, it doesn't make you one of the X-Men. Profession is the catch-all skill for activities that don't fall under other skills, and as such is the only skill that can be taken multiple times. Swap out the X for Barber, Civic Engineer, or Rock Star, and you can be expected to do anything that a Barber, Civic Engineer, or Rock Star of that skill level would be able to do. Repair:
If it's broke, you can fix it—so long as it's not a weapon, computer, or spaceship. Or technology more advanced than the highest tech system you've got Culture/Tech for—that'll need Archeology. Science:
More than just knowledge of mathematics, physics, chemistry, and such (though it certainly includes this knowledge,) the Science skill is also the ability to apply the scientific method to any body of knowledge, from the mundane to the magical. Where Computers and Lore will let you know if somebody else has found an answer, Science will let you find it yourself. Survival:
The universe as a whole is really surprisingly hostile to life. A character skilled in Survival can do things like find their way through a forest on a garden world, patch a hole in their pressure suit, or mine the right kind of ice for their jury-rigged electrolyzer to turn into breathable atmosphere for their patched pressure suit.
THE CURVE— You may have noticed that in comparison to the output of 1d100, +1-5 from a skill and +2-10 from aspects isn't really a lot. FATE, which most of these mechanics were stolen from, is designed around a very particular probability curve that skews very heavily towards average results, and it ranges from -4 to 4. Even the worst possible roll, which only occurs 1 in 81 times, can be saved by an apex skill of 5 to be 1, which is generally enough to be a success. If you roll anywhere from 1-10 on a 1d100, which has a flat probability curve, adding 5 isn't going to get you anywhere near high enough to pass a DC 50 test. Is there no hope for skill in the face of raw randomness?
Not quite. This is where that flat curve I mentioned before comes in, as well as something else FATE doesn't have but StSW does—exploding criticals. Anything that gets your total test to 100 counts as a critical and triggers another 1d100 roll, and if you get above 200 is explodes again. That means with a +5 bonus, you go from 1/100 chance of auto-succeeding to 1/20. Add in one aspect from each of five scopes, and that gets you to 3/20 chances, or the equivalent of rolling an 18, 19, or 20 on a d20. The odds get even better if you add some free-taggable aspects from scopes you've already covered.
So at the high end, this system should generate a fair number of criticals, but at the low end we're still seeing a lot of ostensibly capable characters bumbling tests in what should be their area of expertise. That's where variably scaling static-DC tests come in. Not exactly the snappiest name, but I think you'll like the sound of the effect—the higher your skill, the lower the DC you have to beat is. If a character with Drive (1) is desperately slewing the wheel as they try to maintain control on an icy road with the cops closing in behind them, they might be up against a DC 50 test. Those circumstances are old hat to an experienced getaway driver with Drive (4) though, so they may only face a DC of 20.
The one place RNG does hold indomitable sway is opposed tests. You and your opponent will each stack the deck as much as you can, but in the end the chaos of the battlefield will decide your fate.
TRACKS—Going back to bits stolen from FATE, the system models a character's well-being on three Tracks: Health (governed by Physique), Stress (governed by Will), and Resources (governed by Assets). Characters have three boxes in each Track, plus one for every two levels in the applicable skill (rounded up.) So a character with Assets 1, Physique 2, and Will 5 has four boxes of Resources, four boxes of Health, and six boxes of Stress. When you lose a contest, you may take one or more hits to a Track, which fills in boxes. Take more hits than you have boxes, and you'll need to take a CONSEQUENCE—a negative aspect that your enemies can use against you. You get one mild, one moderate, and one severe Consequence spread across all three of your Tracks, and they are worth 1, 2, and 4 hits each. Run out of both boxes and Consequences, and you'll be TAKEN OUT... which is never a good thing.
Combat injuries are just one of the things that target Health. You might also take a hit to Health from fighting a disease or running out of sweet, sweet oxygen. Being taken out on the Health track usually involves being crippled, infirm, or just dead.
Stress takes hits from some social attacks, composure attacks during combat, overworking yourself, or having your worldview upended by a "the reason you suck" speech. Being taken out on the Stress track could involve a nervous breakdown, breaking morale and retreating in disorder, or getting Knocked The Fuck Out.
Resources is a bit of an odd one out, since your organization's monetary wealth is kept track of through the budgeting mechanic. This track mostly represents hits to your reputation, whether through social attacks, assassination of your subordinates, a bank deciding to foreclose, or a giant robot stomping your house flat. Old friends won't return your calls, and you may never work in this town again. Someone taken out on the Resources track tends to die cold, friendless, and alone.
Hits to your tracks usually clear at the end of the turn after you took them, not counting combat or mission rounds. Recovering from Consequences takes time, often money, and sometimes skill.
STUNTS—Stunts are specific ways that characters get to break the rules. The player character starts with three, and more can be acquired through play—although it requires truly exceptional circumstances. Stunts generally fall into a few categories: Exceptional Skill, Have a Thing, Skill Substitution, Alter a Track, or Everything Else.
An Exceptional Skill stunt lets you use that skill in ways that other characters can't. Exceptional Agility might allow you to roll Agility to dodge in a combat round even though you already rolled it to sprint, and Exceptional Energy Weapons might let you use military-grade weaponry or special prototypes.
Have a Thing lets you get your hands on a goodie, whether that's a weapon one tech level higher than anything in the cluster, an adamantium skeleton, or a spaceship of your very own. Things granted by a Have a Thing stunt can't be taken away by the vagaries of fate like other equipment—they're an integral part of your character.
Skill Substitution does one of a couple things: Let you use one skill in place of another, let another character use your skill instead of theirs under certain circumstances, or give a skill synergy bonus on certain kinds of checks. This might look something like "Hero of the Imperium: can use Deceive in place of Oratory," "You're all clear, kid: an ally can use my Aircraft defensively when I'm within weapons range of their attacker" or "Just like brain surgery: add Medical to Computers or Repair when repairing an android." Skills you substitute don't actually give you training in that skill—"Gymnast: can use Agility for Physique" won't grant you any extra boxes on the Health track.
Alter a Track lets you change how your Health, Stress, and Resource tracks take or recover from hits. How this can work is pretty dynamic: "Resilient" lets you take an extra mild consequence, "Lucky" lets mild/moderate/severe consequences absorb 2/3/4 hits instead of the usual 1/2/4, "Extra [track]" just flat out gives you an extra box on that track, and a skill replacement like "Shadow Clones: use Deceive instead of Physique for the Health track" would make the length of the Health track dependent on your skill in Deceive (although this wouldn't allow you to roll Deceive to lift rocks- that would take a Skill Substitution stunt.)
Then, of course, there's Everything Else. All of the weird edge cases that come from wanting your character to be made of nanomachines, or turn into a werewolf on the full moon, or combine with their mecha. You can do just about anything you can think of, but it's going to cost you in one or more Stunts.
>[Gender] Other
>[Origin] Moon Wizard's Apprentice
It is a time of great conflict for the Crystal Moons, though in truth peace here has never been wide-spread. The Dominion of Jugdron has fallen, and so the Alliance of Seven Stars who united to defeat him have also fallen into squabbling over the rubble of his grand Towers. Those who swore allegiance to him are now little more than hedge-wizards, and have fled to the far reaches of the Star continent or the icy hell of Misra.
A Wizard calling himself The Ancient One, though he is far from the first to claim that name, gathers adherents to his school of magic on the northern coast of the Shield continent, and his followers are conquering neighboring Towers there. This threatens to start the cycle of war anew, as the Great Archer's Tower and Ultimos's Tower have already declared against him from their position at the center of the continent.
A prole rebellion was put down in the great city of Landing on the Sword continent. The mob was put to fire and the sword by the surrounding Towers, and all hedge-mages captured were executed. Rumor has it that the ringleader was an alien, though not one of the fearsome Raiders, whose strikes have also been on the uptick these last few seasons.
Of course all this hardly matters to you now, as you were abruptly uprooted one fine morning by those very same raiders. This was your home though, and that of your master. What sort of being were they?
[X][Wizard] The Exiled Genius
Even before the defeat of Jugdron, Misra has long been the hiding place of heretics and the mad. Your master in the magical arts was one of them, and you are not merely her apprentice—you are her masterwork. Designed to lead her army of automata to victory over the soft Odinfolk and serve as a repository for all her arcane knowledge, you are what she calls a Crystal Mind. An intricately carved sphere of blue-glowing Cintamani pulses within your steel chest and powers your every move and thought. Your detachment was overwhelmed by the Raiders while gathering the last of the materials she would need to open a Gate, and the last you have heard of her fate is your captors boasting that they burned her Tower down around her. You may be her final legacy, and the drive to spread her teachings burns within you.
-Aspect: A Crystal Mind
-Aspect: Burdened with glorious purpose
-Tags the Intimidate, Science, Tactics, Physique, and Pilot Armor skills
-Locks in Stunt Armored Heart: This character is mechanical, and need not breathe or eat. They are treated as always wearing equipment equivalent to [Armor II | Agi-1 | Pressurized, User-friendly]
[X][Wizard] The Revolutionary Heretic
It's not often a hedge-mage takes an apprentice. To be so poor as not to be able to build your own Tower and not powerful enough to seize someone else's is a great mark against a wizard, and a poor position to offer support and training from. Your master was different though—a hedge-mage by choice, he scorned the Tower system entirely and traveled with a small group of students, leaving pockets of his teachings across the breadth of the world. He dreamed of an end to the constant cycle of conflict between rival schools embodied in the Towers, and a syncretized approach to the manipulation of the Dreamstone, taking the best from each. He is derided as a thief and outlaw among the Towers, but there is always someone willing to give aid and succor to one who preaches peace. You traveled with him for a time, and his ideas have shaped your own on the nature of magic and its place in the world. Separated now by the vast gulf of space, you look to the distant stars now within your reach and wonder what new discoveries you can add to your knowledge.
-Aspect: Radical pacifist
-Aspect: Dine-and-dash philosophy
-Bonus Aspect: Rejects the trappings of gender
-Tags the Oratory, Science, Agility, Survival, and Notice skills.
[X][Wizard] The Shooting Star
You were one of a multitude of apprentices to Biel Starflame, renowned member of the Alliance of Seven Stars. It was he who cast the final blow to topple the would-be Emperor Jugdral, and rendered him into ash. Admittedly, you haven't seen much of him—after arriving in your town to test the populace for magical potential, your instruction has been at the hands of senior apprentices. Nevertheless, you hold in your heart the moment he met your eyes with his glowing hand held above you, praised your strong meridians, and pronounced you worthy of instruction. Life in the Tower was difficult for a gutter-rat like you to adjust to, but you learned to work the system and get every scrap of star-jade you had earned. In a strange way, life among your captors wasn't much different.
-Aspect: Star-struck
-Aspect: Strong meridians
-Bonus Aspect: The gender of the day is ______
-Tags the Deceive, Bureaucracy, Hand-to-hand, Agility, and Medical skills
[X][Wizard] Write-in
Perhaps there is another mentor you already have in mind? The Towers on Misra and Odin are many, and there are a multitude of paths to a magical apprenticeship. Or perhaps one of the options offered just needs a little tweaking? Make sure there's two Aspects and five Skills, and Bob's your wizardly uncle. Bank a free re-roll on the house, too.
-[]-
Since you locked in a magical stunt earlier, it's time to decide what form it should take. Each Tower is the home of a single Wizard and their apprentices, and each teaches a school of magic crafted from their own unique insights into the nature of the crystals. They hoard their knowledge like gold and dispense it even more rarely, even to their apprentices. In which school were you instructed?
[X][Magic] Array
Meticulous carving of tiny channels filled with powdered crystal allows for a wide variety of exotic effects, although the precision demanded bars it from direct combat application.
-Pros: good for crafting, fail-safe
-Cons: long set-up, material costs
-Stunt: Array Crafter: This character may use a Lore test to craft magical Arrays.
[X][Magic] Resonance
Mental manipulation of the energies emitted by the crystal can be leveraged into evocations such as telekinesis, throwing fireballs, personal flight, and much more.
-Pros: instantaneous, energetic
-Cons: limited scale, exhausting
-Stunt: Rewrite Reality: This character may use a Will test limited by Lore to produce magical effects.
[X][Magic] Cultivation
Matter is just another form of energy, but it is no simple matter at all to take the energy tangibly emitted by the crystals and make it a part of your own being. Those who do are rewarded with long life, superhuman feats, and some minor mystical effects.
-Pros: empowering, healing
-Cons: short range, limited offense
-Stunt: Channeler: This character may use a Will test to store power points (PP) which may be expended to boost another test. The character may store 2xWill PP at a time.
[X][Magic] Alchemy
While the properties of the crystals themselves are fascinating when studied in isolation, the properties of their mixes and alloys are perhaps even more promising when it comes to practical applications.
-Pros: flexible, rewards lateral thinking
-Cons: middle-of-the-road, indirect
-Stunt: Transmutation: This character may use a Lore test limited by an appropriate skill (Medical, Repair, Science, etc.) to produce a magical substance.
Although there are innumerable approaches to magic, write-ins for the Magic vote are subject to QM approval. I've got to write the spell lists, after all.
Administratrix Eudora taught you well in the ways of alchemy and war… but not well enough. The raiders from the skies strike unpredictably, and with technology you and your rivals have no answer for. Perhaps united you might stand a chance against the Kaalrox, but there is no unity to be had between the Towers of Odin, much less of Misra. Your small detachment of automata on a gathering mission stood no chance against their might. How did you fall into their clutches?
[X] In desperate darkness
Their coming was heralded by that dreadful roaring, so different from the quiet hum of a proper levitation engine. Caught on the open ice with no cover or even proper equipment, you did the only thing you could: on death ground, fight. It was for naught, of course; the raiders spat death at your forces with their cannons, and the armor of their flying transport laughed off the rounds of the rifles of your subordinate automata. The heavy weapons mounted on your warform they dodged with impossible agility, and replied with rockets of their own far stronger than their size. In the end your company was wiped out nearly to the last, and you lay trapped in the slagged hulk of your Titan Frame.
They took you for salvage, and hauled you back to their ship in orbit. The technician melting open your cockpit received a very unpleasant surprise indeed, and you escaped the cargo hold in the confusion. You hid in the maintenance areas and side passages, ducking out of sight as you gained your bearings and the raider's watchfulness waned. Alone, in the dark, you heard the first note. It is a soft song that the Kaalroxian ship sings, but you can hear it, and with some difficulty sing back.
You hunted them. In ones and twos, the isolated, the unwary. Accidents with the airlock safety interlocks, faulty cabling carrying a high current arcing at just the wrong time, an overstressed girder in the cargo bay. The power would flicker, and you would be there. They grew paranoid and superstitious, and you grew bolder. Poisoned supplies in the galley, life support failure in the engineering compartment, a man trapped in crystal with his arm outstretched and fear in his eyes. In the ensuing mutiny they fell upon each other like beasts, but as you closed your gauntlets over the captain's throat, you knew that the most dangerous predator aboard was no animal at all.
-Aspect: Fantasy Bluetooth enabled
-Aspect: Cold as steel
-Tags the Communications, Hand-to-hand, Repair, Stealth, and Demolitions skills
[X] At the point of a sword
You were already among the crevasses of the ice plain when you heard the raider's approach, so it was the work of moments to set a count-ambush. Without the support of their vehicle they were forced to enter your killing field on foot, and your forces managed to down two in the initial volley. Their powerful rapid-fire weapons and specialized armor proved too much of an advantage to break through, however, and in the end your forces were forced to fix bayonets and charge in a desperate gamble. A gamble you lost.
When you lay defeated, a raider's sword poised above your core, instead he sheathed the weapon and offered you a hand. In fighting to the last you had proved your mettle, and you were offered a spot among their Janissaries. With death as the only other option, you accepted.
You and your new companions, a mix of defeated alien opponents and disgraced Kaalrox alike, served as cannon fodder for your masters. The first into the fray and the last to leave, sent on suicide runs where the reward was deemed worth the risk, you raided the Odinfolk (no friends of yours anyway) and other bands of pirates, forging a bond of trust in battle. Eventually, your masters' greed eclipsed their good sense and their safeguards proved too few. You and your fellows swept them up in a grand mutiny, and when the dust had settled, you took the captain's chair yourself.
-Aspect: A strange sort of honor
-Aspect: Soldier for hire
-Tags the Gunnery, Culture/Tech (Kaalrox), Medical, Assets, and Close Combat skills.
[X] Under a flag of truce
The attack came from nowhere, blowing your engine to pieces and forcing you to crash-land your poor airship halfway up a mountain. When the belated order to heave to came through you were too busy helping your crew beat out the fire in engineering to do more than transmit an off-the-cuff surrender. The Kaalrox seemed bemused at your businesslike attitude to being taken prisoner, and brought you before their captain. He refused your offer of parole, unfortunately, but you did manage to talk him into giving you the run of the ship.
You quickly made yourself indispensable to the ship's navigator as a local guide, leveraging your creator's plans for conquest into increased trust. Your own quick-thinking calculation saved the ship from the effects of a convergence of the moons, and you became a regular guest on the bridge. You barely had time to appreciate the expanded opportunities, however, before disaster struck again.
The Kaalrox crew was double-crossed by their Heirophant contractor after unloading their looted cargo, and a desperate boarding action ensued. Most of the senior officers were killed in the melee for control of the bridge, the captain himself dying in your arms. You put your tactical engrams to good use and rallied the crew in a counter-boarding, and this final reversal of fortune found you and your allies of convenience in possession of two ships and not quite enough crew for either. You and the chief engineer agreed to each take command of one, with no one left to argue against it.
-Aspect: Internal orrery
-Aspect: Silver-tongued (7.5% copper by volume)
-Tags the Navigation, Aircraft, Helm, Notice, and Bureaucracy skills
[X] Write-in
There are many forms that desperate last stand might have taken. Perhaps you had a different outcome in mind? Or maybe one of the current options just needs a little tweaking. Write in a description, assign two aspects, and pick five skills you believe relevant to the adventure... and take a free re-roll too.
QM/N: Clinic work ate all my time today, sorry this is so late. Just two more parts to character creation left, and then the real fun starts!
Just on the edge of hearing, something viscous is dripping. Probably blood.
You'll clean it up later.
Of course, you're not completely alone in the echoing silence. One boon companion accompanies you, and will likely stick around for some time to come. The structure of your alliance is… complicated… but something tells you they are just the first of many to follow.
[X][COMP] The tiny terror
-Aspect: Child safety overrides
There was one more reason for your brutal sweep through the Raiders' ship. Pandora, daughter of Administratrix Eudora, had been accompanying you on your errand to keep her out of the Administratrix's hair. Life cooped up in the Tower had been stifling for the inquisitive child—it's hard to go outside to play when the snow is made of methane, and Misra was not suffering an abundance of playmates her age. She's probably a bit spoiled honestly, but you wouldn't know it from how well she's held up over the last month. You managed to keep her hidden (and her hands mostly clean) and in the course of events you think she's learned more about how this ship is put together than you have. Now that it's safe, she's put her foot down: no more adventures without her! You don't have to obey her orders exactly, but it's hard to say no to that wobbly lower lip.
PANDORA
HEALTH [][][]
STRESS [][][] [][]
RESRCS [][][]
Science 5 (fundamental principles), Survival 4 (Cryogenic), Lore 4 (Alchemy), Will 3, Deceive 3, Arts 3, Charm 2, Projectile Weapons 2, Engineering 2, Repair 2, Profession: Princess 1, Stealth 1, Pilot Armor 1, Energy Weapons 1, Agility 1
-Pint size
-Child prodigy
-That's a big gun you have there
-Childish cruelty
-You've activated my trap card!
-(Not-so-)Sheltered heiress
Transmutation: This character may use a Lore test limited by an appropriate skill (Medical, Repair, Science, etc.) to produce a magical substance.
Whiz Kid: Skill XP gains doubled.
Newton's my bitch: May use Science for MicroG when making attacks with the Projectile Weapons skill.
[X][COMP] The prisoner
-Aspect: Calculated mercy
Not every Kaalrox aboard this hulk deserved death, and you are not without mercy. Kel was one of the raider's network engineers, tasked to track down the source of the errors plaguing the ship. You played cat-and-mouse for weeks as she tried to silence your song and you stalked her shipmates through the corridors. Near the end, the captain ordered her stripped of all rank for her failure to catch you and ordered her execution as a co-conspirator in his paranoia. Out of spite you decided to make a truth from his pitiful lies and excuses, and spirited her away from her holding cell. In you she sees a worthy opponent who has bested her, and in some strange Kaalroxian manner this means she is now under your command. You will never understand organic customs.
KEL
HEALTH [][][] []
STRESS [][][] [][]
RESRCS [][][] []
-IT noir
-History of bad bosses
-Gumshoe
-Strange sense of honor
-Better relationships through blackmail
Bluff: May use Intimidate in place of Deceive when bluffing.
Sherlock's Gambit: May use Notice in place of Hand-to-hand if the target also has ranks in Hand-to-hand.
Lives on black coffee: This character doesn't need much to get by. Add a box to the Resources track.
[X][COMP] The Otherworlder
-Aspect: Impregnable poker face
Cid says he's no damned Kaalrox, but a prisoner from Connor's World they kept around to do scutwork. Cid says he's happy to have a mysterious murder robot in charge, as long as you actually pay him and let him off back home one of these days. Cid says he's the best damn pilot in the cluster, and you'd be a fool not to let him at the controls. Cid says a lot of things. You're not sure if you believe him. That doesn't make him any less useful.
CID
HEALTH [][][] []
STRESS [][][]
RESRCS [][][] []
-Liar liar
-Just a drop'll do you
-Old hand
-Knows a guy
-Quicker than he looks
Make the Old Lady dance: Once per combat, may re-roll a failed Helm or Aircraft opposed test to dodge.
Old war stories: May use Deceive in place of Oratory when telling a story.
Resilient: Make take an extra mild consequence.
[X][COMP] Write-in
-Aspect: ???
Got another idea for a character to accompany you? Want to grab all of the above? Write it in, and we'll make it happen. Sidekicks get five aspects and the same skill pyramid you start with, as well as three stunts. If I think the stunts won't work, we'll hash out an acceptable compromise along the lines of the "Yes, but..." model.
-[]-
Regardless of the help you have, it isn't like you took this ship peacefully. You've managed to make a powerful enemy in doing so. You'll have to move carefully if you don't want them to hound your every step and oppose you throughout the cluster. Then again, the Administratrix had that saying about judging a being's worth by the quality of their enemies…
[X][NEMESIS] Distress called
-Aspect: Blood feud
The raiders made a number of distress calls, each more desperate from the last, and they were far from the only raiders their clan has sent into space. Anyone of Clan Ironfern who recognizes your ship is going to have a number of pressing questions, and aren't likely to be too polite about it.
[X][NEMESIS] Wanted for insurance fraud
-Aspect: The Black Spot
A representative of a Heirophanti holding company has contacted you and demanded the surrender of your vessel pending a full investigation. Apparently the raiders took out a loan on their ship? You didn't exactly follow the legal terms he was throwing around, but apparently he doesn't much care that they were slaving scum and dead now to boot—he wants his pound of flesh, and is willing to take it out of your hide if he can't collect it from theirs. Something struck you as shady and very suspicious about the whole deal, and you told him exactly where he could stick his subpoena. Now the company has set its "impounding agency" against you… funny, those look an awful lot like pirates…
[X][NEMESIS] Unfinished business
-Aspect: Somebody's white whale
You left precisely one other survivor unaccounted for from this ship. The first mate mutinied when the captain refused to abandon ship after it became clear that your depredations weren't just a spate of bad luck. You got a good look at him as you killed your way to the escape pods, and you've never seen an organic face twisted into such a rictus of hate. He escaped, but there's no doubt in your mind that he'll be back. It's personal between you, after all.
[X][NEMESIS] Write-in
-Aspect: ???
If you've got a better idea of who to face off against, I'm all ears (and eager writing fingers.) Add a description for why they hate your crystalline guts and the aspect that you get out of it and earn a re-roll as your bounty.
Doy.