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(Mass Effect is owned by BioWare, I'm only a fan creating a bit of a story in an awesome setting.)
(Also also, there is a bit of an intro)
First off I'd like to say that I am a MASSIVE Mass Effect fan. Love it to bits. So when I started making notes about the campaign I want to run I keep getting nice ideas for visual aids. So I started looking for pics on Google and Deviantart. I NEVER claim I create these master-pieces on account of my drawing skill being horrific. I only use them to bring the world to life in a table-top game. (Please don't sue me, I don't have a lot of money)
I'm a newby GM, so this is also me blogging about how I learn to run a game. I also think I suck at giving things names, so brace yourselves.
Due to this game still running my posts won't be explaining why I mention specific bits of information, just know that that I have a plan. <evil laugh/>
Hope you enjoy my retelling. (To the players, I can't remember your exact words or all the dialogue or all the details 100%, so forgive me and feel free to correct me via email if you like and I'll update it). I'm going to try and blog this soon after the sessions post session 2, since I get a bit fuzzy on some details.
Equipment
I went into this armed with my laptop, extra computer screen, dice, pencil, home-made battle grid, electronic rulebooks, whiteboard markers, the Mass Effect OST and a few of my Iron Kingdoms and Warhammer 40k models for use as miniatures.My laptop had my presentation on it that was displayed on the screen turned to the players. My notes were on a Microsoft Word document.
The Tale
The group are on an Ironfist Battalion frigate called the Varius. The ship seemed to have design elements from many different races.
[Found a cool pick of a starship that I used here. I didn't use any of the standard frigates in the game, since I wanted this one to look like an independent creation made by a collection of races. I thought it would suit the feeling of being in the Terminus more.]
They were gathered in the cargo bay, ready to receive a briefing from their gunnery chief Vinicius. He is a turian of average height. He wears well maintained combat armour and a sniper rifles on his back. He always has this pissed off look on his face for some reason. His facial tattoos are grey and seem to cover most of his face-plates.
"All right, I threw you lot together to see if you work well as a squad. For this mission you will be tasked with on-board security for an elcor cargo freighter bound for Omega. While you lot are on-board, we'll be right next to the ship on the Varius. If any stupid or desperate pirates show up, we'll blow 'em into space dust. We got this job because the previous merc group backed out. Don’t mess this up; we want to keep this business. Any questions?”
One pipes up "Are we expecting any trouble?"
Vinicius: "No, though investors can never be too careful in the Terminus."
Vinicius looks at the rest, waiting for more questions before continuing ”We still have a few minutes before dropping out of FTL, so get to know each other." He then turns and heads to the bridge.
Boneis is the first to introduce himself. He has pale, copper coloured skin. Slightly taller than most salarians. His left horn is a ruined, jagged, scarred mess and a scar reaches over top left quarter of his face. Remaining horn’s tip curls slightly outwards. He has reddish purple eyes. He wears a nice heavy pistol at his side.
Pax also introduces himself. He is a blue-skinned male drell with a few small piercings on his face but nowhere else. He's about 5"10 - 5"11, weighing in at about 75kg. Lithe, graceful, and deceptively strong.
Mirinias simply introduces himself as 'Min'. A little bit shorter for the average Turian (5'11"), but of a more stockier frame, and a small, pink scar on his left mandible near his mouth. He has dark blue tattoo markings that start from his upper eyelids, thick lines that converge at mid-forehead into three smaller lines that bisect the top of his head.
The krogan simply introduces himself as 'Wrahm'. Jorgal Wrahm is a large krogan. His impressive hump seems to bend his whole body down and his armour seems to stretch tight about him. Especially his belly. Wrahm is beginning to show his age. His teeth looked broken and blakened and his scaled skin is loose and wrinkled. He has an impressive array of scars, only those on his face and arms are usually visible. His head plate is a dull brownish orange. He also has large orb-like corrective lenses strapped around his head.
Pentus gives a short introduction. Pentus seems scrawny for a turian. He is of below average height and his recon armour's adjustments betray his lack of physique. His face markings are an asymmetric mess of black whorls and lines, but they do little to mask the scars he has accumulated through his past exploits
Narro introduces himself. The rest can year that he's a male quarian. He's wearing an environmental suit that is shaded dark blue on black with white highlights. When he is accessing his omni-tool you could see that its highly customized.
[I'll insert a description for the other 1 later. Nat(human male) ]
There is a little turbulence as the Varius drops out of FTL. It slowly makes its way to dock with the Detuun. The party board the vessel and are greeted by an elcor with a rather large krogan standing next to him. Though the krogan is armed, he does not have his weapon drawn.
"Pleasantly: Welcome aboard the Detuun. I am Janan, the Captain. This is Gatatog Daghar, “, he gestures to the krogan. “Explanatory: He is part of the permanent security on my ship. Wryly: Hopefully we won’t need your help, but we’d rather pay for it than lose all our goods. Impatiently: let’s get going.” He turns and continues deeper into the ship. “Explanatory: The stern of the ship contains the crew’s quarters, mess hall, engine room and bridge. The rest of it is cargo hold up to the bow. Sternly: You can go about patrols in the ship, but don't open any containers. My crew and I will be on the bridge if you have anything to ask or report.”
Narro enquires if they may have the ship schematics and access to the ships systems.
Janan "Annoyed: You may not have access, but you may have some schematics." He signals to Daghar and Daghar sends them some schemtics via his omni-tool.
[Here I showed then a pic of a cargo ship I found online. The schematics show two docking points, one on the stern of the ship and one on the bow. The length of the ship is 80% cargo hold with the stern containing the bridge, crews quarters etc as the Captain said.]
The cargo hold is filled with many containers. Some stacked high above the floor and some no higher than your chest.
Pentus surveyd his options and clambored onto some high containers on the port side of the stern. He lay down with his sniper rifle at the ready incase there is trouble.
The rest were either patrolling or positioning themselves in the ship for good coverage of the entrances.
During the trip a few of the squad spots a salarian wearing the elcor mining insignia on his uniform darting inbetween the containers on his way to the bow of the ship. Pax and a few others try to persue, calling to him to stop. The salarian ignores them and tries to continue in the opposite direction until he's eventually cornered.
"Oh, hey sorry, I'm in a bit of a hurry." the salarian stammers and tries to step past, but his path is blocked by Min.
"In a hurry to do what?" Pax question him.
"Eh, to look at readings and status reports." he stammers nervously.
Narro pipes up "What readings? The ship seems fine and your Captain said as much."
Those close enough and paying attention, notice that there seems to be a strange patch of raw, scabby skin on the salarian's neck. Some remember hearing or reading that mercenaries usually remove their faction tattoos with an exfoliating acid wash to hide their affiliation. They would usually get the tattoo redone after the mission.
Pax pushes him against one of the containers "You know something, so talk! Who are you working for!?"
Salarian "Hey I get paid to keep my mouth shut and even more if I keep it shut."
Pax "You won't get paid if you're dead!"
The elcor pilot's voice is heard over the intercom. “Alarmed: I've lost control of ship propulsion. We are dropping out of FTL."
The salarian laughs at this.
Pilot "Concerned: We've dropped out of FTL and sensors indicate an approaching ship. Scared: Controls have been hacked and docking sequence has been engaged."
"Engage onboard defence turrets you stupid pyjak." Daghar yells over the comms.
Pilot "Hopelessly: I can't bypass the hack."
[I might miss things in the retelling of combat and I want to make it shorter, so there might only be highlights]
The noise from Daghar yelling wakes Wrahm up and most of the squad take up defensive positions as the boarding attempt is occurring at the bow of the ship. Pax knocks the salarian unconsious with a biotic punch and ties him up. He leaves him behind one of the containers. Narro heads off to the nearest ship's terminal and manages to hack past the ship's systems and bypass the defence turret hack. He remembers to double check the friend or foe settings. The turret activates and scans for hostiles as the docking doors at the bow hiss open and smoke grenades come flying out.
Nat is caught in the smoke as he is crouched behind some containers near the entrance. He hears running and sees vague shapes move past him. Wrahm, coming down the starboard side of the ship, sees Vorcha move out of the smoke. They are armed with assault rifles and wear the colours of one of the many pirate gangs in the Terminus.
Another figure scrambles up the set of containers near the smoke. When he reaches the top you can see that he's turian, before he drops prone in a sniping position, much like Pentus. A fire fight ensues.
The pirate sniper fires at Pentus, but the shot glances off his shield. Pentus returns in kind and the blue glow of the pirate's shield shatters with the impact. Pax, noticing this and seeing the sniper's position sends a biotic throw towards the sniper, arching it up to avoid the containers The force of the attack knocks the sniper off the containers and into hull of the ship before he falls to the floor.
Wrahm fires at the vorcha infront of him, but misses. He hits his gun complaining about buttons that he thought he presses. A krogan also comes running out of the smoke from behind the Vorcha. The krogan is covered in orange glowing armour and fires at Wrahm, past the Vorcha.
Other vorcha and another krogan flank along the bow of the ship. Boneis throws a grenade at the group on the far side, but doesn't quite manage to be on target. The on-board defence turret fires at the vorcha causing some of them to become shaken.
The smoke clears and some of the closer squad-mates can see all the pirates except for the turian. Wrahm tries firing at the vorcha in front of him again, this time riddling it with bullets. The vorcha slumps to the floor, dead. Wrahm laughs "Muuuch better."
Nat moves to engage the krogan near Wrahm and lands himself in between the krogan and the sniper. The sniper shakes off the stun from the fall and puts his sights on Nat. Steadying his sniper rifle he fires a shot at Nat. Both of Nat's shield layers shatter under the impact and his own tech armour can't stop the impact completely as it wounds him. [I rolled so many aces and I thought I was going to kill a character at the first session T_T Luckily I managed to hit the tank with this shot. ]
A vorcha runs around most of the furthest containers from the entrance and finds the salarian unconscious and tied up. "Stupid lizard got caught." it laughs and Pax sees it put a bullet through the salarian's head.
Min takes out the furthest krogan's shield and Boneis pulls of a remarkable pistol shot that takes off the krogan's head. Vorcha numbers dwindle while Nat and Wrahm take out the other krogan. Finally the turian dies last and the elcor pilot can be heard over the comms.
"Relieved: The pirate ship is disengaging. Cheering: They are running away." As the pirate ship disengages, the Varius drops out of FTL and manages to blow the pirate vessel into space dust.
The rest of the trip to Omega is uneventful.
Tips from Session 1 Part 1:
- Printing out powers for you and the players is useful for encounters. Its easier to reference than the electronic version.
- I had the enemy stats on my session notes on Word. Its a bit awkward finding stats while they are in between my notes and wastes a bit of time. I'm going to try printing the enemies out in a nice format for easy reference in session 2.
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