The Black Campbell

Last week was supposed to be the start of the next “volume” of our pulp game, taking place in 1937 New york, Philadelphia, and possibly Washington DC, but a last minute cancellation left me hanging so I ran a Battlestar Galactica episode.

Episode 107 was titled Agent Provocateur: The ship is at Scorpia Yards for repairs after the terrorist attack on her, using a freighter jumping out while in the flight pod as a weapon. The MARDET commander/intelligence officer is going over mission logs from before her taking her position and finds that one of the missing members of a deep-range observation post (from the first epsode) was one of the diggers on the Sagittaron archeological find in a later episode…does he know what happened to everyone? Were they taken by the Cylons, and if so, what danger does he pose?

The commander passes the information up the chain of command, but also informally sends it to his father, the president’s security advisor. Suddenly, he gets tasked with bringing in the man — who was posing as an archeologist from the University of Leonis, but who was actually a Canceron astronomer than worked for the Defense Department — and finding out what he knows.

They arrive on Leonis and Luminere was portrayed as a “city of lights”: elegant, “old world” feeling, and an ancient cultural center. Think a very, very high tech Paris or Rome. They are working with the Colonial Fleet Security Bureau, and their liaison is a baron in old Leonine aristocracy (he family fled to Virgon after they were struck from the civil list.) They find the guy’s apartment, were attacked by his security bot which didn’t call the police, but a cell number they’ve tracked to a woman from Caprica who also seems to have spoofed the credit card numbers of a rich Luminere citizen. They figure out from credit card and phone records that the two are in Hedon — sort of the Monaco of the Colonies.

They are on route to find the two.

The good: the episode brings back an NPC I always liked from our first campaign. One of the players was ecstatic to see her, but they were both happy to see connection in this “reboot” of the old campaign. Another PC turned NPC for this episode was the Colonial Security Services man (originally a character of the commander’s player.) Fan service at its best.

Each episode has been attempting to show more of the colonies and their unique flavor. I’m trying to build a realistic feel for the setting so that when the Cylons show up, there’s a real sense of danger and loss.

The bad: I didn’t have all the player so there was a lot of tap dancing around some of the PC’s roles in the episode. Also, it wasn’t as well planned as I like for investigation-type adventures, so while it’s allowing for more improvisation, it’s also (to me) feeling a bit kludged together.

With one of the players out for the week (he’s got a big reveal in the upcoming Supernatural session), we shifted to a Battlestar Galactica one-shot last night. The mission was a follow-up to the attack on the ship in the last episode.

The vessel is limping to Scorpia Yards after Sagittaron Freedom Militia terrorists used a revictualing freighter as a weapon, jumping out of the portside landing bay as they were landing and tearing the pod up badly. They get intelligence from a courier raptor that the FTL signature of the ship was spotted by a couple of ELINT/SIGINT trainees at a post near Canceron. The sharp-eyed recruits spotted a ship jump in and change it’s transponder to an Intersun liner, even though it jumped outside the “bullpen” (the companies in my campaign purchase jump areas for their exclusive use to avoid jumping in on top of each other), and flagged the craft. Columbia BSG has a gunstar on route to the freighter’s destination, Aquaria.

They also have intelligence from an investigation on the Colonial military post on Sagittaron from which the attack originated. They have positive IDs on two of the four hijackers of the vessel. One is a Sagittaron Freedom Movement (shut down after Tom Zarek’s arrest and reborn as the Sagittaron Freedom Militia) terrorist, and one is a Colonial officer that spent 5 years in prison for selling materiel to Ha’la’tha criminals on Tauron. Two others are unidentified.

The commander (GM played for this session) sends a small detachment to find and recover the bad guys. they arrive at the Scandinavia-like setting of Skellinsgard, a small city with a municipal spaceport. The freighter is there, and they find the real crew executed (and the supplies for their ship still aboard…) The police aid them in going through possible SFM sympathizers from the Restoration Party — a political party seeking to return to pre-Articles of Confederation independence. They get a hit on a suspected arms dealer with ties to the disgraced colonial officer.

The denouement put them at a snow-bound farm in the boonies, where the hijackers were holed up with the arms dealer and a few of his friends. There was a big firefight with bad guy snipers, countersniping, a grenade launcher that nearly killed one of the characters (BIG plot point expenditures here!) They also found the arms dealer and some local buddies were keeping kidnaped women for “fun”…and food.

Eventually, they only captured one guy, had to cut some bureaucratic wheeling and dealing with the commander of the gunstar (not pleased to have his mission snaked from under him!), and were able to return to the ship, avenged.

It ran swiftly and smoothly, and shows that — when you’re out a player for the week — swapping games for a one-off isn’t a bad way around an absence.