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Tabletop Squadron Transcript, Season 1 Episode 13:
We Tink This Isn’t Our Fault

Transcript by Tyler (Twitter: @Tyler_MoonSage)

Note – Consider reading Nick’s intro for this episode if you would otherwise skip over it, as it contains an important warning.

Note – When voicing Ithorians, Nick uses an incredibly low, deep, drawn out voice and often pauses in the middle of sentences.

Note – Laura’s character Xianna’fan speaks in an accent. Most of her soft I’s sound like “ee,” and most of her TH’s sound like Z’s. Example: “this and that” = “zees and zat”

## Intro

NICK: Hi everyone, and welcome to Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars: Edge of the Empire actual play podcast. I’m Nick, your game master. Every other Thursday, our story follows a thief, a bounty hunter, a fringer, and a slicer as they explore the galaxy helping a mysterious benefactor and each other.

We hope you are all enjoying our double release schedule. Remember that the final episode of the flashback starring Karma and the twins will be out next Thursday. After that, we’ll be back to our normal, every other Thursday release. Did you enjoy getting twice the Tabletop Squadron? There’s something you can do to make it happen again.

We’re trying to boost our social media presence and we’d love your help. We’re trying to get 125 Twitter followers for the Tabletop Squadron official account. If you haven’t followed us yet, take a look! If you have, tell your friends! Twitter is a great way to interact with the show, and we’d love to get out there for more people to see. We’ll be crowd sourcing an NPC through the @Tabletop_Squad account. We’ll be asking questions to our followers and doing a Twitter poll every ten new followers as well. If you want to help shape the world of Tabletop Squadron, get over there early and often.

Also, when we hit the goal, we’ll be releasing another Jedi Adventure series, this time starring two brand new characters. They would release on off-weeks so you’ll be back to a double release schedule for the duration of the run. I’ll even throw in a blooper reel that I’ve been collecting since we started recording. So, please swing by the Twitter-sphere and follow us, bring some friends, help us build a new character, and say hi while you’re at it. We love to talk to fans. Thanks!

On a less happy note, this episode gets pretty intense. I wanted to put a warning before we started that this episode deals with loss, civilian death, and intense situations, especially in the second half of the episode. I do say something before it gets to that, but if that doesn’t sound like your cup of caf, then please skip over this one, or make sure you’re in a comfortable and supportive place to listen to it. At the start of the next episode I’ll provide a recap covering major plot points so you don’t have to worry about missing any of the story if you feel that this is not for you. Take care of yourselves, friends.

Additional music this week is Alarm at Eleven by Pandasetimol and Broken by Solar Flare.

With all of that out of the way, we hope you enjoy the episode.

##

NICK: Hello! Welcome to Episode 13 of Tabletop Squadron! Lucky number 13 episode. Thanks for being with us today. I’m Nick, your host and game master. We’re gonna go around the table. Everybody say who you are and who you’re playing today, starting with Hudson.

HUDSON: Hi. I’m Hudson Jameson, and I’m playing Tink the Gigoran slicer.

NICK: Great. Glad to have you, Hudson. Moving on to Laura.

LAURA: Hi. I’m Laura. Are we doing last names? I don’t wanna do last names. I’m Laura, and I play Xianna’fan, a Twi’lek smuggler who might be down a few toes. We’ll see.

NICK: (laughs) She’s definitely down a toe. Next up we’ve got Cameron.

CAMERON: Hello. I am Cameron, and I am playing Karma Nailo, a Nautolan bounty hunter who has all of her toes.

NICK: Very important fact. We will now be keeping toes as a stat, so prepare for that. I printed out your toe tracking sheet. Make sure you guys have that nearby. Last but not least, we’ve got Steven.

STEVEN: Hi.

NICK: Hi.

STEVEN: I’m Steven.

NICK: Yes you are.

STEVEN: I’m playing Sabos Niks the Togruta fringer, but I misunderstood the toe tracking sheet and just marked my head tails.

NICK: You know what, it’s close enough.

STEVEN: They’re all still there, even the fourth one.

NICK: Good to know. Thank you. Goodness… So, let’s go ahead and get started with the Destiny Roll!

LAURA: One dark side.

HUDSON: Two light side.

STEVEN: One dark side.

CAMERON: I also got one dark side.

HUDSON: Hey!

LAURA: Huh, so it’s the same as last time.

CAMERON: It was two light sides for a second, and then it hit a wall, and ran away…

HUDSON: I’m your savior. …

CAMERON: Thanks Hudson. You’re my hero.

HUDSON: (laughs) That sounded a little culty. I’m very scared.

NICK: (laughs) Yeah. I don’t know how to respond to that.

STEVEN: Are you?

LAURA: I think the Cult of Tink will be … very weird.

CAMERON: Anyway. Our total is three dark side, two light side.

NICK: Wonderful. When we last left off a few things had happened. We’ve got Karma sitting in low orbit waiting to help everyone escape the super star destroyer, Vengeance, we’ve got Tink wreaking havoc through the computer systems at the same super star destroyer… Wow. That’s a lot of S’s.

CAMERON: And also reeking. … He smells bad.

NICK: Oh! Yes.

CAMERON: I was making a word joke.

NICK: That was a good word joke.

CAMERON: Thank you. (laughs)

NICK: Yes, also covered in his own pee, this is of course the most important part of the story and must be noted at all turns. Sabos had recently gotten into a fight with some stormtroopers and a deck captain, along with Xianna, who nearly avoided being jettisoned into the icy, deadly grip of space and may or may not have had a toe crushed off in an airlock. Is that about right?

MULTIPLE: Yup.

NICK: Cool. Am I missing anything?

STEVEN: Nope.

CAMERON: Just mechanically how we’re dealing with toe loss.

NICK: Oh. Right. So, with the toe loss, we have decided to apply a crit to Xianna that she’s gonna have to deal with until she sees some medical attention. We picked “Agonizing Wound.” Laura, what does that do?

LAURA: It increases the difficulty of any Brawn and Agility checks.

NICK: Okay. Well, we’ll have to deal with that, won’t we?

LAURA: Yep.

NICK: So, we start with a quick pan over the Afternoon Delight sitting just below cloud cover above the planet of Ithor. A quick zoom through one of the portholes shows Felton Mox, the slightly portly Selonian male, basically just leaping around and jazz running through the ship. He says, ‘I’ve never felt so alive!”

The camera pans up through the front corridor of the ship into the captain’s chair where Karma is leaning up and looking through the windscreen of the ship, looking up, and in the distance right past the edge of the atmosphere we can see a battle group of star destroyers. There are four regular sized star destroyers, and they’re all pointed almost in confusion at the super star destroyer Vengeance, which is spinning on multiple axes right now and has different flickering lights, and just looks to be in distress.

We zoom in through one of the airlocks to find Xianna and Sabos standing in a hallway.

LAURA: Xianna is on the floor, foot bleeding out of the hole in her boot, and she just goes, “Sabos, get over here…”

STEVEN: “Are… Are you okay?”

LAURA: “Hand me your binders. I will be fine. Do not worry about me.”

STEVEN: I offer my bound hands.

LAURA: Would that be a Skulduggery?

NICK: Yeah.

LAURA: Okay. what would be the difficulty for the binders?

NICK: To pop them off without anybody looking, without having to look sneaky or anything, easy, not hard.

LAURA: Oh, okay.

NICK: You could open normal handcuffs with like, well wishes, so.

LAURA: Yeah, that’s like six successes. (laughs)

NICK: Alright. We’re gonna skip the next roll that I think is about to happen and just say you manage to get them both off very easily.

STEVEN: Hey~!

LAURA: Yeah. I take off Sabos’s and… There’s no more bodies in here, are there?

NICK & CAMERON: Nope.

LAURA: I take off Sabos’s, I take off mine, I put both of the binders into my coat so now I have three pairs of binders…

NICK: But two of them aren’t pink and fuzzy.

LAURA: Two of them are not pink and fuzzy. No, they’d be red and fuzzy. I feel like that’d be a little bit more… yeah. Or pink, I don’t know. It’s an in between color.

NICK: Yeah.

STEVEN: Salmon.

CAMERON: Fuchsia.

NICK: (laughs)

LAURA: Xianna holds a finger up to Sabos. “Okay. Give me a moment. Also, do you have any sort of Band-Aids, tourniquets, anything like that?”

STEVEN: “Nope.”

LAURA: “Okay…” Uh, so first she takes out a stim pack and shoots herself up, which will get rid of the regular wounds but will not take care of the crit.

NICK: Nope.

STEVEN: Do I have my head tails wrapped in something? I forget if I’m depicted with my head tails wrapped in something.

LAURA: No. Karma has a headband, and I have a head… a like…

NICK: A modesty garment.

LAURA: A strappy headgear thing.

CAMERON: It’s like underwear for your head tails.

LAURA: Yeah.

STEVEN: Oh, I don’t do that.

NICK: Of course you don’t.

STEVEN: (laughs)

LAURA: So, I shoot myself with the stim pack, toss that because it’s useless now, and then I take a little box out of my pocket, a little baggie, and just kind of put one hand around my nose… and you just hear a (sniff). Then she pauses… “Okay Sabos, help me up. Let’s go, let’s go, come on.” (giggles)

STEVEN: yeah. I go help her up, and go towards the trash chute?

NICK: Okay.

LAURA: “Wait. Why do we need to go to the trash chute? There are no bodies, Sabos.”

STEVEN: “I thought this was our escape route.”

LAURA: “No. we were going to hide the bodies.”

STEVEN: ‘Oh. I thought it was for us.”

LAURA: “No. we were hiding the bodies. Okay, hold on, Tink. Tink, where are you?”

HUDSON: “I’m still in the technicians room.”

LAURA: “Okay. how do we get there?”

HUDSON: “Alright, so… Where are you now?”

LAURA: “Come on. Speak faster. You know where we are.”

HUDSON: “Uh… Oh yeah, where the airlock just happened. Alright.”

STEVEN: You know—

CAMERON: (laughs)

HUDSON: “Yeah, that’s fixed now. Go, um, down the hall… Actually, you know what, oh it’s color coated. Follow the white line.”

LAURA: “Okay. we follow the white line! Sabos, we go.”

NICK: You get a quick shot of Sabos walking quickly down the hall and Xianna just flat sprinting down the hall. She stops at the door and turns around and starts vibrating in place for a second. We get a wipe over to Tink. Are you doing anything before they get there or are you waiting on them?

HUDSON: I look and see if anything else is happening to the computer Rancore Protocol wise.

NICK: The only thing that it’s doing is what you saw last time. All of the airlocks have stopped blinking, so it’s not doing any overlay there, but you keep getting that pop-up about the biological threat detected, and then the central ventilation shaft blinking, and it just keeps going back and forth between those.

HUDSON: I kind of just talk to myself. “Ah, this goes there…” and point from the box to the screen.

NICK: (laughs)

HUDSON: I might need some help with this. I think I’m gonna wait up.

LAURA: Are you on the coms?

HUDSON: No, but I do say, “Hey guys, I got a thing…” I wasn’t on the coms, I should say. Now I’m on the coms. “Guys, we have one more thing to do before we can get out of here. We gotta deliver a package.”

CAMERON: Did you call just Xianna, or did you call both of us?

HUDSON: I put it on both.

LAURA: “Oh yes, the thing in the little box. We’re going to let it loose. Yes, I know this.”

HUDSON: ‘Yes, but there’s a specific spot, so we’re gonna have to travel there.”

LAURA: “Oh. Okay, yeah, we can do that.”

CAMERON: “Uh, how are you all doing up there? It’s kind of, um, spinning, concerningly.”

LAURA: “Surprisingly, I feel fine!”

CAMERON: “Good?”

HUDSON: “I could, I’m a little thirsty, but otherwise I’m good.”

CAMERON: “Alright. Great!”

LAURA: “I think Sabos is fine. Sabos, did you get shot? I don’t really remember.”

STEVEN: You hear Sabos from the distance. “… No.”

LAURA: “Okay, yes, Sabos is fine.”

HUDSON: “Oh! You know what else? When I was getting to the technicians room I did have to cut through a kitchen and there was this rancid oil I slipped in…”

STEVEN: (bursts laughing)

HUDSON: “…so that was a deal. I’m okay, didn’t sprain any ankles or nothing, but it’s just not the best smell and I kinda mopped it up… like a mop.”

LAURA: “Yes. You are full of hair, so I could see how you would soak up like a sponge. Yes. You are just like a giant sponge.”

STEVEN: “Hold on. What did he soak up?” I hear Xianna talk about soaking.

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: “Yeah. I think he said he soaked up some sort of rancid oil? So he smells? I do not understand.”

CAMERON: “Okay. when you get back on the ship, just go straight to your room and just take a shower.”

HUDSON: “Oh, no, yeah, definitely the first thing I’m gonna do.”

CAMERON: “We do not want rancid oil on the ship.”

LAURA: “We are going to need medical attention. I think I have lost some toes.”

CAMERON: “Oh—But you feel fine?”

LAURA: “… Oh, yes! (laughs)”

CAMERON: “Oh, you feel fine, okay. yes, got it.”

LAURA: “I feel fine. I mean, I will feel terrible later, but we can get to that when we get to that.”

CAMERON: “Okay… Well, be careful. All of the other star destroyers are pointed at you now, so just know that.”

LAURA: “Oh, I figured. (laughs) Many of the airlocks opened up.”

CAMERON: “And maybe go quickly.”

LAURA: “That is what I am doing. Sabos!”

STEVEN: “She got sucked out of an airlock!” I just say, as I’m catching up.

LAURA: “Oh yes. I think I lost the toes because they got crushed in the airlock that Tink opened up.”

STEVEN: “Oh. Tink did it.”

LAURA: “Tink did it. Yes!”

NICK: At this point, you both make it to the technology room. The door swings open, or swooshes open because it’s Star Wars, and you walk inside. First you are hit with a powerful, sulfurous, decay kind of smell.

STEVEN: Ammonia perhaps?

NICK: Uh, yeah, a little ammonia thrown in there.

STEVEN: Weird.

NICK: Yeah. The camera is set over Tink’s shoulder, and you can see his face highlighted in the glow of the holo-screens, and then you see the door swoosh open and Xianna and Sabos walk in right as Xianna is saying ‘oh, this was definitely Tink’s fault.’

LAURA: ‘Yes. Tink, it was your fault.”

STEVEN: “Whoa.”

LAURA: “Is there a bottle around…? Did you PEE yourself?”

HUDSON: “No! I told you. I cut through a kitchen and slipped in some rancid oil.”

LAURA: “Why is it yellow? And on the floor, here?”

STEVEN: “Under you.”

HUDSON: “I don’t know anything about oil, so I cannot answer that for you.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: “Okay. we are just going to pretend that this is not happening.”

STEVEN: “Why is it just your bottom half?”

LAURA: “We are going to pretend that this is not happening! We have more important things.”

HUDSON: “I fell on my rear—We don’t have time for this!”

STEVEN: “But it’s your front!”

LAURA: “Sabos- Just- We all know what is happening, and we are just not going to talk about it. Tink, where do we need to go?”

(laughter)

HUDSON: “Alright. We gotta follow the red line to the blue line, then cross over to the green line.”

LAURA: “Okay. Red, then blue, then green?”

STEVEN: “Red to blue, cross over at green.”

HUDSON: “Wait a second, there might be a faster way. Keep following the white line to second door, and then cross over to blue and green, but you have to have a train ticket? I don’t-“ Actually, there’s a green line- I know the way!” I just start going.

(laughter)

LAURA: Okay. we follow Tink.

NICK: Alright. As you go, we are gonna have a quick montage of you all running through a ship that is obviously in a crisis. It’s not sinking or exploding, but there are definitely different stormtroopers and technician crews running around trying to fix things, so I want a very quick scene from each of you for the montage of one thing that you run into on the way and how you get around it.

HUDSON: Alright. I run into a turnstile, I don’t know, maybe they want to just count the number going in and out of that particular line, but I use the credentials that I took earlier for the technician and I kinda look around to see no one’s looking, and scan it and pass it back, (laughter) and then scan it again. There’s probably a max number of times that can happen, but luckily we’re under that amount.

LAURA: Oh. I bet it’s one of those rotating doors that you have to slide and it only does one circulation, and we have to throw it through a little gap at the top.

HUDSON: Yeah, exactly. So, turnstile or rotating door. I think they’re similar.

NICK: Yeah. That’s- Woof. Okay. what else you guys got?

LAURA: We definitely run into a protocol droid, and we probably just distract it by throwing trash on the floor. It’s a protocol droid. They’re not hard to get around. (laughs)

NICK: “Oh! Intruders! What are you—Oh, who left this trash on the floor, more importantly?” They can’t ben dover all the way, so you see it trying to adjust its weight and bend down and it can’t pull it off, and it’s just trying to bend over and almost falling over going “Whoooa…”

LAURA: It’s like throwing bird seed on the ground for a vampire. (laughs) Just distracting them.

NICK: And, canon!

STEVEN: “We encounter a diplomat dude that I owed money, but I actually paid, but I’m getting close to my bill this time. He’s like ‘What are you doing here?’ I’m like, ‘Oh yeah, I’ve got some people to pay up. I’ll be right back I’ll- Yeah, I gotta pay someone else first. See ya!”

NICK: (laughing) Time out. Describe this guy. What kind of diplomat would you owe money to? Is he an Imperial guy?

STEVEN: Yeah. He’s an Imperial guy. You know, just another dude that might’ve helped out on the colony.

LAURA: Does he have mutton chops?

STEVEN: No, this isn’t that dude. This is a dude that doesn’t hate me yet, because so far I’ve paid.

NICK: Oh, okay. we’ll say he’s a tall, buff guy with a completely shaved head that’s really shiny, and he’s got white eyebrows. He looks really friendly, but he’s wearing a tight Imperial uniform.

STEVEN: Yeah, a tight, white Imperial uniform.

LAURA: Does he have a tight white shirt and one earing?

NICK: (fighting a laugh) Maybe.

(laughter)

LAURA: Okay. Great.

STEVEN: Is he also offended by the trash that the protocol droid was trying to pick up?

NICK: He didn’t see it. This is further on.

LAURA: His name is…

STEVEN: Mister…

LAURA: Captain…

STEVEN: Captain…

LAURA: Cleon.

STEVEN: Yes.

NICK: Captain Cleon. Yes. Imperial Emissary. Yeah, so you move on, and you come to a very large central shaft that seems to go through the middle of the ship. It has a lot of turbines in the middle that go up the middle, they’re really big, and none of them are moving very quickly. Probably Sabos and Tink would know that these kinds of systems spin really, really fast. Xianna might know from having tried to use them to infiltrate before. They are just like blenders, but these are moving very slowly or are turned off. There are hundreds of ventilation shafts as far down and up as you can see that branch off of this, and there’s a glowing reactor core looking thing in the middle, and there is a little panel that says in Aurebesh “Main Ventilation Shaft.”

LAURA: “Okay. do we need to get into the shaft and then release them, or can we just throw them in?”

HUDSON: “We can just throw them in, as far as I’m concerned.”

STEVEN: “Oh boy.”

LAURA: What does his screen actually show?

NICK: The screen was just blinking on the ventilation shaft. I should clarify. You guys are at the shaft. It does one of those Star Wars things where the door opens and then there’s just a deadly OSHA terrifying drop-off into the abyss. You are there. There’s little gantries and walkways and ladders and stuff that go around on the edges. It looks climbable, but you are there, you are ready to go.

LAURA: Okie.

NICK: Oh. When you left, you took the Rancore Protocol with you, right?

HUDSON: Yes.

NICK: Okay. Just checking. That would be bad.

HUDSON: Sorry. I took the Rancore Protocol with me. So, I hand the box to Sabos…

STEVEN: I accept the box from Tink.

HUDSON: …and I pretty much say, “Alright, here’s what you gotta do. You’re gonna open the box, and then you’re gonna drop it into the shaft.”

STEVEN: I look at Xianna to confirm the instructions, because-

LAURA: “I’m still not sure if we just throw it in or if we have to climb into the shaft, but if you do open it and then throw it, open it right before you throw it just in case it wants to eat you too. I do not know exactly what’s inside the box.”

STEVEN: “Okay… Sure.”

LAURA: “Basically none of us know.”

HUDSON: “Alright. Whenever you’re ready.” I turn around to dash, not sure what’s actually gonna happen, I just know I don’t wanna be the one to open it.

(chuckling)

STEVEN: Darn. Opposable head tails would be really cool, really convenient at this point. I reach into the shaft with both hands holding the box, turn the box upside down, as far into the shaft as I can go without falling into the shaft… remove the lid, drop the box, and run.

(laughter)

NICK: Oh boy.

LAURA: Xianna’s hiding behind Tink. Sorry, I’m probably getting blood on you.

HUDSON: It’s okay.

CAMERON: It’s okay. He’s getting pee on you.

NICK: Okay. Who is visually able to see the box when he opens it?

HUDSON: Me.

LAURA: Probably all—Well, I’m probably behind Tink, but doing the little, like, peeking around him.

STEVEN: I’m not looking at the box.

NICK: Okay. you’re not looking?

STEVEN: No.

HUDSON: I can see from above the things that fall out.

NICK: Right. Okay. You open the box. It has two tab inserts that are kind of hooked so you have to kind of prop it open. When you open it, nothing falls out. As you throw the box down, there’s a white blur, and you hear a (hissing noise). Down by your feet you see, it’s about a foot long, like it had to compress a little to fit into this box, it looks kind of like a rat but all white with a naked tail kind of covered in boils… and I would like a Xenology check from everybody who’s looking at it.

LAURA: Okie~

STEVEN: Do I see it now because it’s by my feet?

NICK: Yeah.

STEVEN: Okay.

NICK: Oh, also, you dropped the box so the box is tumbling down.

LAURA: Is there a difficulty?

NICK: This one’s gonna be average. Depending on your successes you might get more information.

LAURA: Nope.

STEVEN: I got two successes and fall prone.

NICK: Did you get three threats?

STEVEN: I did. (laughs)

NICK: Oh god, you’re right by the edge dude. You fall prone… (dramatic base noise) …in your fear of this rat-like creature, and scramble backwards.

HUDSON: Four successes and an advantage.

NICK: Great. So, Xianna you failed, yeah?

LAURA: Yes.

NICK: Okay. Sabos and Tink, the first thing you notice is this thing is extremely pregnant. It is like inflated. You can see it’s tummy moving around, and it looks very big. Tink, from looking at it, this is not a naturally occurring creature. This creature looks kind of spliced together. It looks like some sort of weird, weaponized genetic experiment. You don’t wanna touch it. You don’t wanna be near it. This is real, real bad news, and you have a flashback to several different times when someone said ‘do not open this box until the right moment. Do not open the box.’

Sabos scrambles backwards, this thing hisses at you one more time, and then crawls down over the edge and you hear it start to clank under the floor as it walks through an air vent, and that fades as it goes into the ship.

LAURA: Xianna gets on her com. “Uh, Karma, it might be time for you to come back and pick us up.”

CAMERON: “Oookay.”

HUDSON: “Someone’s expecting, and it’s not one of us, and it’s very scary.”

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: “Alright?”

STEVEN: I’m gonna remove my legs from the door now, the door area.

NICK: Okay. You pull your legs back and the door swooshes shut.

CAMERON: “Where are y’all gonna be? Where am I headed? It’s a big ship.”

LAURA: “Um… Yes. Let’s just go back to the main bay that we came in from.”

STEVEN: “Or! Tink could open a near airlock for us.”

CAMERON: “Whoa.”

LAURA: “No. I do not want to be in the icy coldness of space. No thank you. No.”

HUDSON: “Yeah, I think we’re good with the main bay area. Now, that’s creative, and we appreciate it.”

STEVEN: “(huffs) Y’all non-fringer types, you’re just… Y’all are so conservative with your exploration.”

LAURA: “I do not want to suffocate, or get radiation, or any of those things.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

STEVEN: “Suffocation makes you alive.”

HUDSON: “I feel like this is very, very foreboding. I don’t know. Something…”

NICK: This conversation is happening as you’re jogging down the hallway back.

STEVEN: (laughs)

NICK: You see some stormtroopers running around. None of them really pay you much attention. They all seem to be going places.

STEVEN: I say, “Rats went that way!”

NICK: One guy goes, “Huh?!” and then someone else says, “It’s time to go! Let’s go! We have orders!” and they run off down the hallway in a different direction. Then, we get a shot of Karma—Are you letting Felton help pilot?

CAMERON: Yes. Felton and I are both flying up, because my approach plan is if I get hailed, this time we’re pretending to be whoever the hell’s cylinder we have that we created that I do not remember.

NICK: Alright. George Jetson?

CAMERON: Was his name George Jetson?

NICK: It was George Jetson.

LAURA: Yeah.

CAMERON: Okay.

NICK: That was Hudson’s fault.

HUDSON: That was my fault.

NICK: That was good.

CAMERON: So, I have him in the cockpit with me because I’m going to need him to talk.

NICK: Mm-hmm. … Oh man.

CAMERON: Yeah. We’re gonna need him to talk, because George typically in the Star Wars universe…

NICK: You sure you don’t- You don’t wanna try to talk to the guy so I- Okay, it’s fine. I’ll roleplay with myself. I don’t need y’all.

CAMERON: You can talk with yourself. (laughs) We can also do this. I can coach him on what to say, and then we can just bypass him actually saying it if you don’t want to talk to yourself.

NICK: It’s fine. He won’t have to say much. As you take off you manage to get surprisingly close to the ship before you’re hailed. Someone calls and says, “This is the ISS Vengeance. We’re pretty busy right now. Unidentified ship, identify yourself immediately or be blasted out of the sky.”

CAMERON: So, what Felton is saying is he’s noticed that the ship is in distress and he is Special Agent George Jetson, and he has been commed to come assist with the situation.

NICK: Right. Okay. Felton says, “Hey, yeah, we’re coming to help. We can see you’re in distress. We’re a specialized rescue crew coming your way, so keep that main door open, please.”

The com guy says, “I don’t know who would’ve sent that communication, because that’s me, and I definitely didn’t do that.”

“Well, I mean, it was one of your people…”

CAMERON: (whispered) “One of the other ships! One of the other ships! They noticed the distress!”

NICK: “Oh yeah. It was the ISS… that one over there. That one did it. Uh, but yeah, we’re coming in quick trying to bail you out. Looks like some electrical trouble, just simple electricians from Ithor. Yup.” He hangs up, and you don’t get fired upon.

CAMERON: Great. (giggles)

NICK: We get a great shot of zoomed out in that landing bay, and the ship swings around to land. Just a reminder, the ship kind of looks like the letter W. it has a main thing with the bridge on it with two basically big cargo containers stuck to the sides, so it looks pretty cool. It swings into a landing, and the thing opens just as Sabos, Xianna and Tink make it to the main landing area.

LAURA: “Okie. Let’s sneak across to the ship.”

STEVEN: “(sighs) Yeah.”

CAMERON: We open the entry ramp on the Afternoon Delight. Karma has put her cloak back on. (laughs)

NICK: Ooh.

CAMERON: And is walking down the steps, and has her blaster ready underneath her cloak.

NICK: Okay. Are you all sneaking?

LAURA: Xianna is probably going to hide behind another ship and sneak across and up to the Afternoon Delight.

NICK: So, this is that scene from A New Hope where you’re running low through the open space port trying to get back to your ship while a decent amount of stormtroopers are around, there’s people in formation, there’s technicians plugged into various wall sockets trying to do things. Everybody give me a Stealth check.

STEVEN: Before you do, I ask to borrow Xianna’s binders, because I’m not stealthy at all.

LAURA: “Okay… Fuzzy or not fuzzy?”

(laughter)

STEVEN: “Imperial, please.”

LAURA: “Oh! Okay. Imperial.” I toss him one pair.

STEVEN: I put the binders on me, and I just try to walk as if I’m a prisoner.

NICK: (laughs) Okay. You can roll me a Deception.

STEVEN: Yeah, let’s do that. I was really hoping the cloak might convince it.

NICK: Well, when you’re close to them it might, but you’re gonna have to make it there.

STEVEN: Yeah. That’s gonna be fine.

NICK: Everybody give me those checks.

LAURA: What’s the difficulty of the Stealth check?

NICK: Average. They are all very distracted.

LAURA: And then it’s increased difficulty… Okay.

STEVEN: Hey, I get a success and a threat.

CAMERON: No, just a success.

STEVEN: I get a success. Am I deceiving?

NICK: With a success? Yeah. You get close enough to the cloak before anyone really pays any attention to you. They assume you’re some sort of prisoner thing. Like I said, they’re pretty distracted, and since you didn’t make it to the threat threshold I had for something really bad happening, you don’t have to deal with that.

STEVEN: Cool!

NICK: So, you’re able to get onto the ship. After Xianna and Tink saw him manage to just straight walk across, what did you guys get trying to stealth?

LAURA: I got one advantage.

NICK: Ooh. Okay.

HUDSON: I have a disadvantage, a success and a triumph.

NICK: (exasperated) What the hell, what the fuck… Why are you Cam rolling? (laughs) This makes life so hard.

LAURA: Yeah…

HUDSON: Right?

NICK: Okay! Here’s what we’re gonna do. A lot of stuff happens at once. Xianna starts to go out and immediately her leg starts to give under her. We get a shot of a stormtrooper walking by, and he stops marching and looks down, and there’s like a pool of blood behind the crate that Xianna was standing behind. He goes, “Interesting,” and he turns and starts following it, and there’s just drops of blood every couple of feet. He looks up and sees Xianna just straight booking it towards the ship, but limping. “Hey! Someone seems to be trying to escape that I don’t recognize!”

Tink, at that point, chooses to go and shoulder checks the guy out of the way so he’s not able to get a shot and makes it. The threat is that the alarm starts to go off. You make it to the ship just as blaster fire starts to ping through the place, because you can’t flee a star destroyer without getting shot at… and you all fly for open space.

You all get onto the ship. Felton is sitting in the co-pilot seat. “Hey, we gotta go right now. We’re getting shot at. Come on. Everybody in. Everybody in?”

CAMERON: “Everybody in!”

LAURA: “Yes.”

NICK: “Alright. Let’s go.” He closes it and he turns to fly away, and you all notice he’s flying back down towards the planet.

CAMERON: “Why are we going this way?”

NICK: “The blockade is still up. They’re all still here. We will explode. I think, with your help, we can make it down to the planet without getting shot, but whatever you did we gotta wait for that to take effect before we try to get out of here. We’re stuck.”

CAMERON: “Fair!”

STEVEN: “Seems reasonable.”

LAURA: Xianna’s probably not even there for that conversation.

CAMERON: “Tink. Shower. Now.”

STEVEN: I also ask Xianna to unbind me.

LAURA: “Eh… Okie.”

STEVEN: “Yes!”

(laughter)

HUDSON: I take a shower.

NICK: Okay.

HUDSON: Get all this oil off me.

NICK: (laughs) So, it takes you a while. The flight down doesn’t take too long. Could I get a Piloting check from Karma?

CAMERON: Sure.

STEVEN: Wait, you’re the pilot now?

CAMERON: Unless you came up to help me, yeah, I’m flying. (laughs)

STEVEN: No, I was bound. I’m just judging.

NICK: You’re standing there rubbing your wrists having recently been freed. ‘Oh, I guess you’re flying. Okay. let’s see how this goes.’

STEVEN: Yeah.

CAMERON: What’s the difficulty?

NICK: Average, but you can upgrade one of your greens to a yellow because Felton is your co-pilot, and he kinda knows how to fly.

CAMERON: Yay. I’m very agile, but… Eh. I can fly. Sure.

STEVEN: That’ll do.

CAMERON: Straight wash!

NICK: You are solidly tracked by the ISS Vengeance. You can see that turrets are following you, and one actually does shoot. The ship is going to take a direct hit by a turbo laser, which is going to potentially cause some pretty intense damage. One of the engines is damaged, not good, but you do make it down below atmosphere where they can’t really see you, and you are able to land.

There is a clock wipe where it goes from right to left on the screen in a circle, and you see Felton walking off the ship. “Well… I don’t know how long what you’re doing is going to take, but I guess we gotta spend the night anyway. I’m beat. That was rough guys. Thanks for… helping. Yeah.”

CAMERON: “You’ve been dancing, all afternoon.”

NICK: “Yeah, exercise, you know. It was nervous dancing. I was supporting you.”

CAMERON: “You should go take a shower as well.”

NICK: “Oh- Okay, fine. But yeah, why don’t you come stay with me at The Gooberfish and we’ll get some drinks, we’ll rest, and we’ll wait for this blockade to break.”

STEVEN: “I feel like we should be ready to go when the blockade breaks.”

NICK: “Well, we don’t even know. It’ll probably be a couple days, at least. Might as well camp out, right?”

HUDSON: I look at him suspiciously.

STEVEN: “Might as well camp out on the ship.”

NICK: You can do a Perception check to see if he’s trying to mess with you.

HUDSON: Yes. Straight, or any difficulty?

NICK: Easy. You know him pretty well at this point. You guys peed together a couple episodes ago.

HUDSON: Two successes, two advantages.

NICK: Yeah. He’s being pretty straight with you. He seems to have gotten a pretty good adrenaline rush, and he’s excited, but otherwise he’s just saying who knows how long this’ll take, let’s go relax for a while.

LAURA: Xianna shouts out from her room. “Can we stop at some sort of medic or doctor first? Please?”

NICK: “Uh, I guess that could happen.”

CAMERON: “So, the only medic I’ve seen has been with the Oracle. We may want to give them an update on the blockade anyway with what y’all did up there.”

LAURA: “I am not really sure what we did.”

HUDSON: “Why do you need to go see a medical person when your shoe is upset? Isn’t that something like a haberdashery, or what’s the place called where there’s like shoe repair…?

LAURA & STEVEN: “A cobbler?”

HUDSON: “A cobbler. Don’t you need to see a cobbler?”

LAURA: “I mean, I will need a new pair of shoes that you will buy, you will also pay for my medical attention, because I am pretty sure I lost at least one toe if not many toes. I have not taken the boot off yet. I really don’t want to look at it. I’m not sure what I could even do for them.”

STEVEN: “You might have to cut the boot off.”

LAURA: “(groans)”

HUDSON: “No, no, no.”

CAMERON: “I don’t think that’s—No. It’s not a nail.”

LAURA: “It does not feel swollen.”

HUDSON: “Yeah, so really, I protected you by getting rid of those troopers, so really I would call this a wash, honestly.”

STEVEN: (laughs) “You wouldn’t wanna take the foot off with it.”

LAURA: “I mean, I was going to shoot them anyways, and also, I think it’s just a few toes. I don’t think I have to lose the whole foot!”

STEVEN: “I’m saying you would have to lose the boot.”

CAMERON: “Yes.”

LAURA: “Oh, yeah. I am getting new shoes. That is already discussed. Yeah.”

STEVEN: “Yeah. You might have to cut the boot off instead of trying to pull off extra toes, not like across the leg cut it off, like down the boot cut it off.”

CAMERON: “Yeah, but I don’t understand… Why would pulling her foot out of her shoe cause more toes to—“

STEVEN: “Fall off?”

CAMERON: “Yeah.”

STEVEN: “Toes do that.”

CAMERON: “Uh, not normally.”

LAURA: “No. I do not think toes just fall off.”

CAMERON: “Has that happened to you?”

STEVEN: “Yeah. They regenerate.”

CAMERON: “Well, that’s weird.”

LAURA: “I don’t think that’s true!”

STEVEN: (laughs)

CAMERON: I’m pretty sure that does not happen. (laughs)

HUDSON: Not canon! Not canon alert!

STEVEN: It’s just adrenaline, really. I’m excited.

NICK: At this point, Felton looks down and goes, “Oh hey, it looks like you got hurt. Didn’t really notice that.”

LAURA: “… Yes.”

NICK: “What if—I’ve been here a while—I could get a medic to meet you at the hotel, that way you don’t have to walk all the way to the far side of the city while bleeding, which you’re still doing.”

LAURA: “Yes. I mean, yeah, that would be nice. Thank you.”

NICK: Alright! We’ll smash cut to everyone in The Gooberfish. If you remember from before, it is a dark wood, pretty simple sort of bar setup. There’s an Ithorian behind the bar with a few glasses. You all have drinks of your choice. Xianna has her foot up on one of the round tables. She’s sitting in the booth with everyone else and her foot is like across the aisle onto another table nearby. There is an Ithorian medic, the same one from before, in a teal jumpsuit, working on your foot and she is putting the finishing touches on the bandaging. It’s a pretty big boot-looking thing. We’re gonna leave it open right now about how many toes you may have lost.

LAURA: (laughs)

NICK: She says, “That… should cover… the damage… for now.”

LAURA: “Okie. Thank you?”

NICK: “Thank you… for attempting… to break the siege. The herdship… is in your debt, even… if you failed.”

LAURA: “So, I mean, do I get any medication for having this? No drugs? You don’t…?”

NICK: “Oh. Of course… I could provide you… with some… Artura leaves.” She just hands you a pile of big, sort of succulent leaves. There’s like three or four of them.

LAURA: Xianna looks at them and kind of reaches over and squints her eyes. “Is this like for pain, or what do these ones do?”

NICK: “You chew the leaves… and they’ll make you feel better.”

LAURA: “Okie.”

NICK: “… In the long run.”

(laughter)

LAURA: “Wait…”

NICK: The nurse turns to leave.

STEVEN: I order a round of Flame Outs for everyone, to make you feel better in the short term. (laughs)

LAURA: Xianna just starts… chewing on her leaf.

NICK: It is kind of gooey, and it makes your mouth fall asleep a little bit, but not in a fun impact way.

LAURA: Aw.

NICK: It doesn’t help with the pain at all. Maybe it fights infection. Maybe it’s a leaf.

LAURA: yeah… I mean, I’m chewing on the leaf.

NICK: Okay. Anybody wanna do anything else, or are you going up to sleep?

HUDSON: I’d say going to sleep.

LAURA: Yeah.

STEVEN: I ask for my blaster back.

CAMERON: Oh yeah, sure, here.

STEVEN: Excellent. I take my blaster.

HUDSON: I had my vibro-axe the whole time, I believe…

CAMERON: Yeah.

NICK: Yeah. Weird that the technician never asked about that.

HUDSON: Yeah, exactly. I was thinking like, that would be a weird thing for a technician to carry, but I just won’t mention it and see if they don’t mention it.

NICK: They’re racist. They probably just assumed that was a cultural thing that you carry a big axe around.

STEVEN: Maybe it’s part of the uniform.

NICK: To be fair, in the Star Wars universe, there are several races, or species, that carry big axes.

HUDSON: And Chewbacca always has- Is that, like- He has the straps across his chest. Do they have bullets in them?

STEVEN: I’m pretty sure it’s a bandolier.

NICK: Yeah, I think they’re ammunition.

HUDSON: They’re ammunition, and whenever they turn in their guns or anything they never ask for that.

LAURA: Well, because you don’t need the bullets if you don’t have the gun.

NICK: Except in Star Wars, all the bullets explode. You could just throw that at somebody.

HUDSON: Yeah, and you could find a gun somewhere and have all this ammo, so I don’t know. It just doesn’t make sense to me.

NICK: Eh. We’re not gonna get into Star Wars gun control arguments right now.

(laughter)

LAURA: Yeah.

STEVEN: It just looks like he’s supposed to wear it.

NICK: You all go up to sleep?

LAURA: Oh yeah. Xianna’s asleep before anyone else.

CAMERON: I ask the bartender of The Gooberfish to send a note to the Oracle with whatever report I got from them on what went down up there. ‘It seems unstable at this point, and it’s spinning kind of weird, but we don’t know what’s going on.’

NICK: Okay. The bartender says, “I will communicate… to the Oracle… for you.”

CAMERON: “Thank you!”

STEVEN: Are you still wearing a cloak on the planet?

CAMERON: Nah.

NICK: She just got rid of that.

CAMERON: Now that we’re down here, I blew my cover to take you and Xianna in.

NICK: Okay. You all go to sleep?

STEVEN: Yeah.

NICK: Alright. Just a heads up, this next bit is gonna get kind of intense, so if you need to like call a time out or talk outside of character that’s fine. There’s nothing like triggery or anything, but eh, eh… It’s a thing.

You are awoken to the sound of deep thunder, turbo laser fire. There are fires outside The Gooberfish. You grab your gear and run outside. Green light lances down from the sky ripping huge holes in the herdship. You see a city block obliterated and replaced with smoke. We cut to the bridge of the Vengeance.

Multiple of the control boards are hollowed out and smoking. We see the corpses of several officers stretched out on the ground bleeding from small wounds all over their limbs. The captain of the Vengeance is a portly man with well-groomed hair that is still in place even under pressure. He sits in his command chair with three stormtroopers standing around him firing outward at scrabbling creatures climbing over piles of dead, white furred rat-like creatures just like them. the camera zooms past the hoards to stragglers chewing through electronic panels and metal bulk heads. The captain pounds his hand onto the arm of his command chair.

“This is Captain Kruller. The ship is lost. Ithorian terrorists have released some sort of bioweapon. Blockade ships, keep your distance. We can’t risk the weapon spreading. To my crew, it has been an honor serving with each of you. You have acted with honor and strength at every opportunity. Gunnery crews, aim for the primary herdship below us. The Ithorian scum will not get away with this travesty. Fire all until the last. The entire Empire will hear the death call of the Vengeance.”

A wave of the creatures pours over the captain and the stormtroopers, silencing them… and we’re back to the planet again. You are being bombarded from orbit.

LAURA: Oh shit. “This is not good… Okay… Or am I still asleep?”

HUDSON: I wake up.

LAURA: ‘No? This is real? Okay. Just checking…”

NICK: The Vengeance must have put two and two together and is living up to its name. the city won’t last long. Another turbo laser blast rains from the sky striking the building behind you. It is obliterated, showering you all with rubble, and there is only darkness. We’re gonna do these one at a time.

Tink, you wake up half buried under the door of The Gooberfish. Can you make me an Athletics check to see if you can get out of the rubble?

HUDSON: Heh, heh, heh…

LAURA: (giggles)

NICK: (laughs) You’re so strong. Do you not know how to Athletics?

HUDSON: I don’t know how to Athletics at all.

NICK: Aw.

LAURA: Yeah, but you have Brawn.

HUDSON: I have Brawn.

STEVEN: Luckily he’s so fuzzy.

CAMERON: You need a difficulty.

HUDSON: What difficulty?

NICK: Hard.

HUDSON: Two successes and a disadvantage.

NICK: Okay. you are able to get the rubble mostly off of you, but you do cut up your hands some. You take a wound, past your Soak, as your hands start to bleed from the sharp rocks. You have to get to the Afternoon Delight and get off the herdship, quickly. This thing is going down.

HUDSON: I run towards the Afternoon Delight.

NICK: Alright. Describe one scene of the destruction of the city on your way.

STEVEN: (explosion noises)

NICK: Yeah, that’s just happening. It’s just bombarded, big chunks are getting blown away.

STEVEN: Just setting the scene for you, Hudson.

NICK: You can describe one piece of destruction.

HUDSON: So, there’s a man stumbling around kind of in shock, and he’s like yelling over to me, and he’s like, “I don’t know what’s happening. Just tell my family—“ A turbo laser hits him and he evaporates.

NICK: Great.

LAURA: Wow…

NICK: You’re the first one to the ship. The landing pad is beginning to crack as you run onboard. What do you do?

HUDSON: I get on the coms and see if anyone else is on their way.

NICK: Alright. We’re gonna stop there, and we’re gonna move to the next one.

Xianna, you come to. The blast threw you across the street and through a shop window. Make me a Coordination check.

LAURA: Oh boy. Do I have that? Yes I do. Okay.

NICK: You’re a rogue. I should hope so.

LAURA: Well, I mean, I actually don’t have any points in it. I looked wrong.

NICK: Eh, oh well. It’s Agility.

LAURA: But I have Agility. Okay. Difficulty?

NICK: Hard.

LAURA: Also, am I still using the Agonizing Wound, or is that gone because of the boot?

NICK: Keep using it. Yeah, it’s going to be extremely difficult for you.

LAURA: Okay, yeah, I’m gonna flip a light side point for this.

CAMERON: Uh-oh…

LAURA: So… That would be a despair, with a threat…

NICK: Ooh.

LAURA: …and then another threat.

NICK: Okay. this window did not shatter in a way that is conducive to you coming away unharmed. You were knocked unconscious from the blast. You weren’t able to catch yourself. You take 10 strain…

LAURA: Cool.

NICK: …and I need you to roll me a crit, please.

LAURA: Can do! Twenty-four.

NICK: Which is?

LAURA: Twenty-four is… Off Balance: Add a black die to the next skill check.

NICK: Okay. a piece of glass has kind of sliced up through your torso and you’re bleeding from there. It also ripped off a lot of the bandages from your foot so it didn’t get enough time to heal, so you still have that one. You’re walking around with two crits. You’re bleeding profusely. You’re in a lot of pain. You can also feel blood running down your forehead. You can smell smoke. The building you are in is burning. You are able to climb over the rubble and through the back door into an alley. You have to get to the ship. The herdship will only stay airborne for so long. You feel the ground jolt as another turbo laser volley strikes the city. Describe one person that you fail to save on your way to the ship.

LAURA: Why are you doing this to me? Um… Oh, I bet there’s like a person in a building and I’m trying to pry a door open to help them out, and I can see the laser blast coming. I’m able to roll away and it hits the farther side of the building, so I don’t get hit but the building itself still blows up.

NICK: Okay. they are obliterated and drop to the jungle beneath.

LAURA: And, they are gone… so then I just keep running.

NICK: You make it to the ship as the city begins to fall. Tink is there ahead of you. Tink, you’ve been trying to call but there’s weird static on the coms. You’re having trouble making connections.

HUDSON: Does our ship have shields I can turn on?

NICK: Yeah.

HUDSON: I turn on the shields.

NICK: Okay. Do you guys say anything as you meet each other on the ship?

LAURA: “So yeah… We’re being blown up. I didn’t realize this was part of it.”

HUDSON: “I think this might be because of us.”

LAURA: “I think it might be, yeah. Let’s pass the blame off to Sentinel. He was the one who told us to do this, and gave us this weapon that he did not explain.”

HUDSON: “I’m okay passing the blame.”

LAURA: “Are Karma and Sabos here yet?”

HUDSON: “No, not yet.”

LAURA: “Okay. I’m going to sit down. I’m kind of hot. I’ll sit in one of the gunnery seats in case we need it, but if I fall asleep please poke me. I’m bleeding out I think.”

HUDSON: “Will do.”

NICK: And she limps into the ship. Karma. You were sent skidding down a side street in the blast. Roll a force die for me.

CAMERON: (giggles nervously) Okay. One dark side.

NICK: You pat yourself down and realize you have lost a piece of equipment. What equipment have you lost?

CAMERON: Hmm… I have so many. I’m going to lose the heavy pistol that I’d stolen from Felton. I’m down a pistol.

NICK: Okay. you lose his heavy pistol. You’re down a pistol. Alright.

CAMERON: Everything else is too expensive to lose.

NICK: The sky is scorched with black smoke. You hear low bellowing somewhere in the distance. The herdship jolts and begins to tilt giving the entire city a slant. You need to get to the ship, now. Your companions will need you. Describe one thing you pass on the way to the ship that reminds you of your time here.

CAMERON: Okay. Karma takes off running down the street, and she runs past the Imperial archive that Sabos had tagged earlier, and all of the buildings around it are destroyed but it’s still standing, and the tag is still like proudly displayed on it, and some other tags have been added since then, like backing it up.

NICK: That’s great. You get to the ship and run inside. Tink and Xianna are there. The landing pad looks like it is about to break free of the herdship entirely.

CAMERON: “Holy shit, guys. Why isn’t the ship turned on?!” She runs to the cockpit and turns it on. (laughs)

LAURA: Xianna’s kind of like, “Oh- Oh… Um, I mean, that’s not really my job. Um, I’m just gonna be in this chair. Um… Yeah. You all can do that. Right? Does anyone have any stim packs? Asking for me.”

CAMERON: “Unfortunately, no. I’m gonna get this ship—Is everybody here?” Karma is flipping all the switches in the cockpit.

NICK: Alright. Good.

LAURA: Xianna starts counting on her fingers. She’s like, “There is Karma, there is Tink—”

HUDSON: That’s everybody—Wait.

LAURA: “There is me… Do we have a fourth person?”

CAMERON: “Yes. Sabos.” (laughs)

LAURA: “Oh, yeah, Sabos. I am bleeding out.”

NICK: So, Sabos. You wake up with your head ringing. The roads are full of rubble. You don’t recognize where you are. You must have been thrown over the back of The Gooberfish. The roads are blocked with solid pieces of durasteel. It will take time to climb over there. The herdship is falling. You smell smoke and can hear the whistling of the wind. You’re far from the ship too far. You’re not sure you’ll make it in time. You’re not even sure it’s possible. What do you do?

STEVEN: “I’m not sure it’s possible…” I run.

NICK: Okay. You start running for the ship?

STEVEN: Yeah. Yeah, sure.

NICK: You’re having to scramble over huge pieces of debris.

STEVEN: Oh, I also just shoot into the air wildly, like hopefully hitting the ISS Vengeance.

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: Okay. Just running and screaming and shooting.

STEVEN: Yeah.

NICK: You also find a com, just in the middle of the street.

STEVEN: Perfect.

NICK: Yeah, you grab that. We jump back to the ship. The pad is cracking and starting to fall. You can feel it. You have to take off or you are going to be dropped to the jungle at this point.

CAMERON: Alright. I engage the engines so we start lifting off, but I’m hovering. I’m  not leaving yet.

NICK: Okay.

HUDSON: “I think we gotta go.”

LAURA: “Let’s see if we can get Sabos on the coms.”

STEVEN: “This is Sabos, on the coms,” Sabos says on the coms.

LAURA: “Oh!”

CAMERON: “Convenient. Where are you at?”

STEVEN: “I… I don’t know. I see durasteel everywhere, and there’s piles of it…”

CAMERON: “That’s not real helpful.”

STEVEN: “…things are cracking…”

CAMERON: I’m gonna start driving the ship along back towards the route towards The Gooberfish flying slightly above the buildings so that we can see the streets.

NICK: Okay.

STEVEN: “I’ll be shooting up into the air.”

CAMERON: “Oh- Okay. Shields engaged. We’re good.”

NICK: So, turbo laser fire is raining down around you. It’s extremely risky, you could get hit, but you’re making your way back along. Sabos, you actually see the ship in the distance with search lights going. It’s headed in pretty much your direction.

STEVEN: I keep shooting at it.

NICK: Are you still running down the street?

STEVEN: Yes.

NICK: You come to a barrier that’s about 20 feet high. You’re not able to get around it.

STEVEN: “Well, I’m not 20 feet tall,” I say on the coms.

CAMERON: “Okay?”

LAURA: “Well, yes?”

LAURA & HUDSON: “What does that even mean?”

STEVEN: “You see, there’s something about 20 feet tall in front of me, and I’m a solid six feet tall.”

CAMERON: Can I roll a Perception to see if I can figure out what 20 foot tall thing he’s talking about since it’s kind of being flattened?

NICK: Sure.

STEVEN: I’ll be shooting at you.

CAMERON: Okay. I’m also looking for blaster fire coming from the surface.

NICK: Sure. This’ll be average.

LAURA: Xianna yells out from the gunnery seat. “I have glitterstim if you want that. It kind of helps you see things better. I mean, it kind of gets weird, but in case you want that…”

CAMERON: “Don’t really have time for that right now.”

STEVEN: I shoot directly at the cockpit.

NICK: (laughs) Okay.

LAURA: “Tink, what about you? You want some glitterstim? I mean, why not?”

CAMERON: That’s three successes and a threat.

NICK: Okay. you can see where he’s at, and you start to head that direction, but he’s a little far.

STEVEN: “Do you see me? I’m shooting at you.” Pew, pew.

CAMERON: “I see you, buddy. I’m coming over there.”

NICK: So, Sabos, at this point, you get a brief moment, you look up and see the glow of a turbo laser barrage headed straight towards you. You have about a second to react. There’s no way you’re getting out of this. Do you have any regrets?

STEVEN: My only regret is that I didn’t save more people with my head tails.

NICK: The last we see of Sabos…

STEVEN: (laughs)

NICK: …is him staring peacefully into the sky. You’re able to get close enough that you see him silhouetted by the laser. A glowing green light comes straight for him. He holds his fourth head tail. There is a roar, a flash, and he is gone.

LAURA: Xianna is in the gunnery seat and she’s like, “Oh! I see Sabos—Ohhh… Oh. Kriff. Oh, oh boy. Okay. Uh, Sabos just died…”

HUDSON: “Are you sure?”

LAURA: “Yes. We kind of just watched him get shot with turbo lasers. I don’t think you survive that.”

CAMERON: I’m gonna swoop over that spot.

NICK: You can see down to the jungle below. About a 50 yard in every direction hole has been blown in the herdship. There’s nothing.

CAMERON: “Yeah, not promising…”

NICK: And the bombardment begins to increase as well.

CAMERON: I’m gonna fly off. I guess I raise the ramp, because it’s been down.

LAURA: “Yeah, he’s gone. We fly away.”

CAMERON: And I’m gonna fly off…

NICK: Okay. So, from the Afternoon Delight you see the back of the city broken by the bombardment. The herdship drops impossibly fast to the jungle below, and is engulfed in flames.

The jungle begins to burn. As you fly for orbit you see that the Vengeance has stopped firing. It’s venting atmosphere and drifting, dead. You see fires and explosions throughout the ship. It looks like the ship finally succumbed to the weapon you introduced. The other ships of the blockade have pulled back far from the super star destroyer. One of them is shooting the smattering of escape pods that are being jettisoned from the Vengeance. You’re able to break from the gravity well without being noticed and jump to hyperspace.

End of episode.

ALL: Ba-na~!

(All make dramatic noises)

STEVEN: Oh–

## Outro

CAMERON: Thanks for listening to Tabletop Squadron. If you enjoyed our show please consider logging into iTunes and giving us a five-star review. Five-star reviews will help new listeners to find the show.

Xianna’fan is played by Laura Penrod. She can be found on Twitter at @cheerio_buffet.

Tink is played by Hudson Jameson and he can be found on Twitter at @hudsonjameson.

Karma Nailo is played by me, Cameron Robertson. You can find me on Twitter at @midnightmusic13.

Sabos Nix was played by Steven Schroeder. He… does not exist on the internet.

Our game master is Nick Robertson, and you can find him on Twitter at @alias58.

Our intro song is Space Jam by Pablo Ribot.

Additional music by James Gunter.

Follow the podcast on Twitter and Instagram at @tabletop_squad. For real! We’re real people and we wanna talk to anyone who listens to the show. Reach out! See you next time.

Word document download: Episode 12 We Didn’t Start the Firefight

PDF download: Episode 12 We Didn’t Start the Firefight

Read in browser:

Tabletop Squadron Transcript, Season 1 Episode 12:
We Didn’t Start the Firefight

Transcript by Tyler (Twitter: @Tyler_MoonSage)

Note – Laura’s character Xianna’fan speaks in an accent. Most of her soft I’s sound like “ee,” and most of her TH’s sound like Z’s. Example: “this and that” = “zees and zat”

## Intro

NICK: Hi everyone, and welcome to Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars: Edge of the Empire actual play podcast. I’m Nick, your game master. Every other Thursday, our story follows a thief, a bounty hunter, a fringer, and a slicer as they explore the galaxy helping a mysterious benefactor and each other.

We hope you all are enjoying our double release schedule for the next few weeks. Remember, another episode of the flashback series starring Jet and Juke will be out next Thursday as well. This was all thanks to your thoughtful reviews. Please continue to spread the word about the show so that we can continue to expand.

Additional music this week is Konjioya by Dan Yankee, Pocket Zombie by FlexVector, and The League of Mice by DZ.

We hope you enjoy the episode.

##

NICK: Hello! Welcome to Tabletop Squadron! I’m Nick, your host and game master. Welcome to Episode 12. We’re gonna go around the table. Everybody say who you are, what your character is, and if you spent any experience since the last time we played let us know what you upgraded. Gonna start with Cameron.

CAMERON: Hello! I am playing Karma Nailo the Nautolan bounty hunter, and I have upgraded my Deception skill to Rank 2 and my Brawl skill to Rank 1.

NICK: Ooh.

CAMERON: Yes.

NICK: Alright. Next up, we’ve got Steven.

STEVEN: Hi.

NICK: Hi.

STEVEN: I’m playing Sabos the Togruta, and I got that right the first time.

NICK: Yeah, we’re very proud of you.

STEVEN: And I had a 2000% increase in my Vigilance score up from 0 to 2.

NICK: Wow, that’s pretty good. Next up we’ve got Hudson.

HUDSON: Hi. I’m Hudson, and I’m playing Tink the Gigoran slicer, and I too upped my Vigilance from 0 to 2.

STEVEN: Two million percent.

HUDSON: Two— … Yeah.

(laughter)

NICK: Last but not least, we’ve got Laura.

LAURA: Hello. I’m Laura. I play Xianna, and I upgraded my Streetwise from 1 to 2, not a 2000% increase.

NICK: One to 2 in Streetwise. Great.

LAURA: I also bought another Grit on my talent tree.

NICK: Nice. That’s good. You’ll be able to stand up to whatever strain you run into.

LAURA: Hopefully. That is the plan.

NICK: I’m sure you won’t need that.

LAURA: It’ll be fine.

STEVEN: I have lots of Survival.

NICK: We’re very proud of you. (laughs) Before we get started, let’s do the Destiny Roll!

CAMERON: One dark side.

STEVEN: One dark side.

LAURA: One dark side.

HUDSON: Two light side.

CAMERON: Thank you, Hudson.

LAURA: You are gonna save us.

HUDSON: Saved it.

NICK: Tink’s the shining light in the darkness.

CAMERON: So, that is three dark side, two light side.

NICK: Great. When we last left off, several of you had been, I’m making air quotes, “captured” by the Empire, and are now actually captured by the Empire. Sabos and Xianna are being led deeper into the ship presumably to some sort of space jail, or as they call it, ‘the brig.’ Karma is leaving on her borrowed ship to go and run support, and Tink is scrambling out of the landing bay trying to get to computers, I assume.

HUDSON: Yes.

NICK: Great. So, we open on the landing bay of the super star destroyer. A small transport is lifting off, and the camera zooms in enough to show Karma in the pilot seat before panning wide. The landing area of the super star destroyer, Vengeance, is lined with TIE fighters. It’s about the size of a football field. The black floors are polished to a mirror shine and there are a series of doors lining the far walls. The camera pans and we see a blur of white fur as Tink runs into one of the doors and into a hallway.

We’re gonna start with you, Tink. You have the Rancore Protocol. What are you planning on doing? You’re on the ship to destroy it, to break up the blockade. The Rancore Protocol is going to help, but you haven’t opened it up, so you’re not sure what it does. It’s like a flash drive with an encrypted program on it that you know will help, you’re not sure how.

CAMERON: You also have the mysterious Chinese take-out box.

NICK: Oh. Do you?

LAURA: Yes.

CAMERON: Yeah.

HUDSON: I do.

NICK: Yeah, he does.

CAMERON: He has everything that they’re gonna need on the ship. The only thing that I think didn’t go up… I still have Sabos’s rifle because it’s ginormous, but I think all of Xianna’s guns and stuff are with Tink. No, you have some of them, because they’re hidden.

LAURA: I pretty much kept all of my stuff except…

CAMERON: Oh! I have all your drugs.

LAURA: yes! I left my drugs.

CAMERON: That’s what it was. I have the drugs.

LAURA: All of them? Shit.

CAMERON: I think so.

STEVEN: It might be a long time in that cell.

LAURA: That was a bad idea.

CAMERON: Because I think you didn’t want them finding them.

NICK: (laughs) Roll for withdrawal. (musically)

CAMERON: Wait, no. you have a little compact case thing. You kept your compact case. I think I just had the extra drugs.

NICK: If it comes up we’ll figure it out. I’m not too worried about it.

CAMERON: Okay. We’ll just say the only thing I have, definitely, is Sabos’s gun, because that’s not something Tink can sneak with easily.

NICK: Sure. So, they’re on the ship captured. You’re presumably gonna wanna break them out, run support. You have already proven you can get into these computers, so you can do research for them, you can fuck with stuff on the ship, you have whatever’s in the take-out box of doom which you know if you open it in the right place will pretty much destroy the ship but you gotta figure that out, and you have your encrypted program that will do something really cool but you never decrypted it so you’re not sure what it is. Does that make sense?

LAURA: Remember that you have coms and I have coms.

CAMERON: Sabos got his confiscated.

LAURA: Sabos does not have coms, but you and I can talk to each other, at least.

HUDSON: Yeah. Okay.

CAMERON: And y’all can talk to me.

HUDSON: Why?

CAMERON: Because I also have coms, but I’m not on the ship. I’m leaving.

STEVEN: I should’ve hidden them in my head tails.

CAMERON: I mean, that’s where your ear would be, they just… Yours was more visible than Xianna’s.

STEVEN: Yeah. It’s a shame.

CAMERON: They were just real excited about finding the spray paint on Xianna so they stopped looking.

LAURA: Well, Xianna has the benefit of being a Twi’lek, so she wears a headgear piece that can hide things.

STEVEN: That’s true.

HUDSON: So, I’m in a hallway right now.

NICK: Yup. You’re in a standard hallway for a super star destroyer. It is long, it is lined by doors, there are some cameras but they’re not really pointed towards you. You think you’ll be able to avoid them pretty easily, kind of like at a department store where they have the cameras but they’re just pointed into random corners and stuff. They’re not that good.

STEVEN: The eight and a half foot tall Gigoran can avoid the cameras easily?

NICK: Yup.

HUDSON: Yeah, my Stealth.

STEVEN: Pretty good. (laughs)

NICK: He’s solid. So, you would be wanting to probably get into the system, and first thing would probably be support them in some sort of escape attempt and decipher the Rancore Protocol a little bit.

HUDSON: Yeah, I know what I’m doing. I know what I’m gonna do now.

NICK: Okay. Talk through the thing.

HUDSON: In the hallway, I look left and right and try to read if there’s anything on the doors that is legible, any signs that say something like ‘Technology Room.’

NICK: (laughs) Roll me a force die, would you? (hums a Star Wars tune)

HUDSON: One light side.

NICK: Yeah. It turns out that this place is super organized and has the hospital colored stripe lines to lead you places. Because this is where people land and then debark through the ship, you’re next to one of the keys that’s like ‘red arrow, Barracks, yellow arrow, Mess, black arrow, the Bridge, white arrow, Technology Center.’ (laughs)

HUDSON: Ah, good. I go towards the Technology Center, being stealthy along the way.

NICK: Alright. Make me a Stealth roll.

LAURA: Nah, it’s fine.

HUDSON: What level of difficulty?

NICK: Average, two purples.

HUDSON: Two successes, three threats.

STEVEN: (laughs)

NICK: Yeah, so… You are able to sneak through these corridors pretty easily. There are a few patrols. You see two stormtroopers turn around the corner, and right before they see you an officer comes through a door and starts throwing a fit, and he’s yelling. “Oh, this is stupid! I can’t believe they’re doing this! This maneuver makes no sense!” The two stormtroopers just ‘nope’ and turn around and leave, and you’re able to get past them without any problems.

You get to a clear transparesteel door, and inside you can see banks of computers and a couple of technicians. It looks very 1970s mission control in its setup. You get to the door, the door swings open, and you fall prone with a loud bang. (dramatic bass noise) And we’re gonna switch perspectives!

So, moving on from that, you can think about how you’re gonna deal with that situation. Sabos and Xianna, the camera pans into the back of Tink’s head and you see a forest of white fur, and then zooms out of a stormtrooper’s helmet. You are being escorted down the hallway by two stormtroopers and the deck captain with his squeebly mustache and his well-pressed black uniform. The halls are almost blank. You pass a door and four  more stormtroopers pile out of an adjoining hallway and fall into formation.

The captain says, “It’s lucky that we were treated with reinforcements yesterday. This is the most secure ship in the Empire.” It’s almost like it would have been easier to navigate the ship if you had been there a day earlier.

STEVEN: “How many reinforcements were you treated with? I just want to know how bad of an idea bad ideas would be.”

NICK: “You know, it’s really weird, I almost told you exactly what our armament is, but you’re a prisoner!” He motions, and a stormtrooper smacks you in the back of the head.

STEVEN: My head tails absorb it and I make a (yelping) ‘ow’ noise.

(snorts, snickering and giggling)

LAURA: (mockingly) ‘Ow.’

NICK: Yeah. That makes sense. You are being led further and further into the ship. This is a super star destroyer, so it’s roughly city sized, it’s very big. The Vengeance is not the biggest one but it is still quite large. Xianna, can you make me an Underworld check?

LAURA: I can!

NICK: We’ll see if you’ve been arrested in a star destroyer before.

LAURA: Ooh! Maybe.

(laughter)

CAMERON: It shall be so interesting to find out.

LAURA: Just a straight one, or is there difficulty?

NICK: Average.

LAURA: Yeah. Two successes, and one threat.

NICK: Alright. Time to start the threat counter. Don’t worry about what that’s adding up to, everybody.

LAURA: It’ll be fine.

NICK: It will be fine. So yes, you’ve been arrested on a star destroyer before, and while you haven’t ever been on a super star destroyer, one of the things that happens in empires is they standardize a lot of stuff. It’s pretty easy to tell. You’re on a—Ooh! What’s the name of that stupid pattern? The one that’s like checker board but it’s not.

LAURA: Hound’s Tooth?

NICK: Yeah. You’re on the Hound’s Tooth line and you pass one of the keys on the wall that says ‘Detention Area.’ You’re following that, and you know in the past that it tends to be pretty far in, the security gets stronger the closer you are, and the longer you stay with this group the harder it’s going to be to rendezvous with Tink and do the mission, but as you’re thinking that through, one of the stormtroopers peels off and gets on a turbo lift and goes away. You think it’ll be harder to get back out, but there will be less people to overpower or confuse or trick or whatever your plan is the further in you go.

LAURA: How many stormtroopers are currently around us?

CAMERON: It would be five plus the deck captain.

NICK: Mm-hmm. It was six plus the deck captain, one just left, so you got six dudes.

LAURA: Xianna kind of whispers over at Sabos. “Mmm, Sabos? Hypothetically speaking, in the past, have you ever gotten into unarmed bar fights?”

STEVEN: “Oh, I have a knife.”

(laughter)

NICK: “What?!”

LAURA: “You don’t just say that out loud.”

STEVEN: “Uh, we call head tails, uh, my fourth head tail.”

LAURA: “Oh. Oh yes, of course, that Togruta slang.”

NICK: “Captain. Captain! The captive is saying he has a knife!”

STEVEN: “It’s a fourth head tail, Togruta things. I’m a diplomat—“

NICK: You can roll me a Deception.

STEVEN: Yeah, let’s do it. Yeah, this is gonna go well.

LAURA: Can Xianna help him by trying to talk…?

STEVEN: How hard is it?

NICK: It’s gonna be average. They don’t actually believe that you’re competent. You can have a blue die for chipping in.

LAURA: Xianna wants to chip in and be like, “Oh yes, it’s head tail slang…”

STEVEN: Um… It’s two advantages.

NICK: They don’t believe you, but you can have some advantages. You can spend the advantages to give yourself a blue die on the opposed Skulduggery check to see if they find the knife that you were talking about.

STEVEN: Yeah, that’ll be fine.

CAMERON: Can the advantages be that they’re like, ‘eh, he’s not that threatening. There’s five of us. I’m sure it’s fine.’

NICK: They’re still gonna pat him down. This deck captain’s pretty mad. “Well, we must search the prisoner again.” They go to pat you down.

STEVEN: “Yu… You already did.”

NICK: “Yes, but clearly you’re admitting to contraband, you strange mutant.”

STEVEN: “By the way, my knife is hidden under my head tails.”

NICK: Gross.

STEVEN: (laughs) It’s sheathed.

LAURA: I’m assuming we’re in binders. Are our hands in front or behind?

NICK: In front.

LAURA: Okay.

STEVEN: Perfect.

NICK: You can try an droll me some sort of talky check to make them not want to search you by making your head tails sound gross, which you did, or you can say that it’s hidden well enough they don’t find it and they think you’re crazy. Which would you prefer to do?

STEVEN: Let’s try a talky check. We’ll Negotiate?

NICK: No. you can do Charm or Deception.

STEVEN: Well, yeah, let’s do Deception again. Yeah.

NICK: Okay. A blue die from your advantages from your last one. This is average. They don’t really wanna search you again, they’re just trying to get you to the brig so they can get on with their actual job.

STEVEN: Yeah. I’m just gonna start talking about head tails, like you can touch the fourth head tail if you’d like, and that’s what I call my knife.

NICK: You don’t even have eyebrows, but they’re wiggling.

STEVEN: A success and an advantage.

NICK: There you go. Okay, the captain looks and says, “He probably has a knife… but we’re not going to look for it. Continue on.” You get bashed in the head again with a rifle.

STEVEN: I give him one head tail to feel, like ‘this is my knife.’

NICK: “No, no, no. Prisoner, I don’t even know how you managed to do that. Your hands are bound in front of you.”

STEVEN: “I am double-jointed in the shoulders, and I—“

NICK: “Gross. Gross. Stop it, stop it, stop it. Soldiers, keep your prisoners under control, and we’re gonna keep on moving.”

LAURA: “So, anyways, (sternly) Sabos.”

STEVEN: “You wanna touch the head tail?”

LAURA: “No. I have my own. They are much nicer, thank you.”

STEVEN: “That’s true.”

LAURA: “Thank you.”

STEVEN: “Mine are bigger.”

LAURA: “No… No thank you.”

(laughter)

LAURA: “Anyways. If you in the past had gotten into bar fights, how many people did you fight at once with no weapons? In the past, you know that bar fight you got into a few months ago?”

STEVEN: “Yes. That bar fight.”

LAURA: “How many people was that against?”

STEVEN: “Solid one, maybe two.”

LAURA: “(heavy sigh)”

STEVEN: “Maybe, maybe not even one. Does a mug count?”

LAURA: “No, Sabos, a mug does not count unless you have a mug on you right now.”

STEVEN: “No. I fought a mug.”

LAURA: “(sighs)”

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: (laughing) Alright. On that line, we’re going to pan over to Karma, actually. So, we jump to a shot of you, it’s an over the shoulder view, as you’re steering away from the star destroyer. You’re in a square, blocky space ferry basically, not the best ship in the world. What are you doing?

CAMERON: So, at this point Felton has climbed out of the other storage compartment he was hiding in when we landed.

NICK: “Is it good to come out?”

CAMERON: “Yeah. We’re already off the ship.”

NICK: “Oh. I thought I felt some acceleration, but you know, with a… uh, that joke’s not good. Anyway. What were you saying?”

(laughter)

CAMERON: “I wasn’t saying anything. I’m just flying.”

NICK: “Yeah. I’m working on censoring myself a little better, making friends, you know.”

CAMERON: “Cool. So yeah, we’re flying away from the star destroyer.”

NICK: “That’s exactly where I want to be.”

CAMERON: “Yeah, so we’re gonna head back down to the herdship.”

NICK: “What are we gonna do down there?”

CAMERON: “Well, uh, first off I need to get rid of this ship, probably, and just turn it back into the rental facility, like not actually get rid of it.”

NICK: “Yeah. Yeah.”

CAMERON: “Because I want my ship back. And, I mean, we got a while… I don’t know how long it’s gonna take them up there, but I mean, we can hang out and talk…”

NICK: “Ooh…”

CAMERON: “We could, um, we could go mess around with some of the other ships in the blockade?”

NICK: “That sounds interesting.”

CAMERON: “I would need your assistance on that, because I do have a…” She pulls out the security cylinder from her jacket. “I do have this, so we can fake credentials, but it is a male officer so I would need your voice for that to work. I don’t know what exactly we would accomplish by doing that, but…”

NICK: “Well, you’re the mission planner. I was just supposed to secure supplies, and you keep threatening to shoot me when I try to leave the group, so…”

CAMERON: “Yup.”

NICK: “It’s whatever you wanna do…” The ship will go down to the planet. Is your goal to get back up in space on the Afternoon Delight or are you staying on the herdship?

CAMERON: We’re gonna stay on the herdship for the moment.

NICK: Okay. If you’re on the ship with the com setup that you all have, anybody with a com is gonna be able to communicate with you, so if things start to get hot or you feel the need to get them a distraction, something like that, you’ll be able to jump in. we’ll check in on you periodically if you are deciding to do that.

CAMERON: We probably will head back up, but I don’t want to get up high enough that I show up on any of the sensors as approaching them.

NICK: Okay, so you’re thinking low orbit on standby.

CAMERON: Yeah.

NICK: Okay! So, we are gonna jump back to Tink. You have just loudly face-planted. There are three technicians in this room. Two of them kind of jump up and turn around. They’re wearing white kind of static suits that you see on people in server rooms occasionally but with the little Imperial logo on the breast pocket. They turn around, and they don’t even know exactly what to do.

One of the guys goes, “This is highly irregular,” and the other one just starts routing around under his desk. You don’t know what he’s looking for.

HUDSON: “Ow. Man… Can someone help me up?”

NICK: “Uh, yeah.” The first guy grabs you and tries to help you to your feet.

HUDSON: “Ah, thank you. I’m actually here to fix one of the systems.”

NICK: “Uh, what? You’re not on the information core.”

HUDSON: “Oh, no, no. it’s a weird thing. My escort’s actually in the bathroom right now, and he forgot to put me on there.”

NICK: (grinning) Alright. Make me a deception roll, please. (laughter) I’m super happy that you’re trying to social engineer this.

LAURA: Oh boy.

HUDSON: Yeah. My Deception is not so hot, really. Let’s look here.

NICK: You could flip a light side point.

LAURA: You have nothing in Deception.

HUDSON: I have nothing in Deception.

STEVEN: But you have Cunning.

HUDSON: I do have Cunning, though.

CAMERON: You got this.

NICK: So, it’s gonna be an average difficulty, because you are big and imposing. This guy doesn’t really wanna call your bluff, but he’s also obligated by his duty to the Empire.

HUDSON: Alright. Two successes and a threat.

NICK: A threat, you say? One more for the threat counter. (musically) Don’t worry about that, I’m sure it’s fine.

Okay. The guy stands up, takes a step back from you and looks at you. “Well, whoever your escort is, he really shouldn’t have done that, but we’ve got an extra terminal over here. The other technician was off duty today. I guess you can set up there. You have your login credentials, right?”

HUDSON: “Yes, absolutely.”

NICK: At this point, the guy who was routing around under his desk pulls out a heavy blaster pistol and goes, “Ha-ha! I got it—Oh… You’re a contractor. Darn,” and puts it back under the desk and goes back to sit down.

HUDSON: “Ha. No need for that unless it’s Nerf.”

NICK: “No, I can assure you, it’s quite real.”

HUDSON: “Oh.”

NICK: “It’s not one of those stun blasters from the Nerf Interstellar Corporation that some offices like to use for teambuilding.”

(laughter)

CAMERON: That was great.

NICK: I saved it!

CAMERON: I’m happy those exist now.

NICK: Yup. Nerf blasters are a thing.

HUDSON: They survived hundreds of years.

NICK: And a different galaxy.

LAURA: Different galaxy, Hudson.

HUDSON: Oh yeah.

STEVEN: About the same time.

CAMERON: Also, a long time ago.

NICK: LEGO is also canon.

HUDSON: Oh, it is?

NICK: It is now. I just said so. So, moving on! The technician shows you over to a seat. It’s like a spinny barstool kind of thing. It is way too short for you so you have to hunch over, but there’s lots of glowing lights and a clear screen with a bunch of geometric shapes on it that don’t seem to move no matter what you do, and there’s some data ports. It’s pretty much a node into the main computer of the star destroyer. Good job.

HUDSON: Alright. I say, “Thank you so much. I’m good now.”

NICK: “Alright. Well, I think I need to oversee until your minder gets back, so I’ll just stand here… Don’t mind me.”

HUDSON: ‘Okay. Sounds good.”

NICK: “Great.” (musically) One Deception check does not complete access get you. (laughter)

Okay. We’re gonna jump back to Sabos and Xianna. you are heading deeper in. you have taken a turbo lift down at this point. It was quite crowded, five stormtroopers, a deck captain, the two of you in a small elevator. As you pile out, two more of the stormtroopers peel away and head off on a separate patrol, so you’re down to three stormtroopers and the deck captain.

LAURA: Once those other stormtroopers get far enough away, Xianna looks over at Sabos. “Uh, Sabos…”

STEVEN: “Yes?”

LAURA: “My hands are currently in my pockets, and I am about to take my hands out of my pockets.”

NICK: How do you have your hands in your pockets?

LAURA: I have many pockets. (giggles)

NICK: Oh, okay.

CAMERON: She’s got the two side pockets, and then there’s a middle pocket that connects the two, so she just reached into that one. (laughs)

LAURA: I probably have my two hands in one of the side pockets, so it’s a little awkward looking, but the coat flairs a bit so there is room to kind of shift it to do that. I am holding my blaster in one hand as I tell this to Sabos. “Okay Sabos, hands are coming out of the pockets in three… two… one,” and then I pull out my blaster and start shooting.

NICK: Alright. You can make a Cool check.

LAURA: (gasps) I have Cool!

NICK: Sabos, you can make a Cool or a Vigilance check on whether you’re surprised by this maneuver or not.

STEVEN: I’ll do Cool.

LAURA: Was there a difficulty in that?

NICK: NO. it’s initiative. It’s a straight check.

LAURA: Three successes, one advantage.

NICK: Damn.

STEVEN: A triumph and two advantages.

LAURA: Ooh.

CAMERON: And a success.

STEVEN: And a success.

LAURA: We’re cool.

NICK: Triumph, a success, and two advantages… And then, the stormtroopers are going to roll as a group, so that’s gonna be three greens for them. these guys are reasonably capable.

CAMERON: Three successes, two advantages.

NICK: Oh shit.

STEVEN: They pretty cool.

NICK: And then the deck captain is a green and a yellow.

CAMERON: Three successes, one advantage.

NICK: Ooh, this is not gonna go well. We’re gonna do NPC slot, PC slot, NPC slot, PC slot. That being said, with those advantages and that triumph, you can add some stuff to this scene to work in your advantage.

LAURA: So, I definitely want there to not be any cameras in this particular area.

NICK: Alright. That’s two advantages. You have one advantage and a triumph left.

LAURA: (gasps) There’s some sort of large cleaning droid, like trash can sized, that we can get behind a little bit.

NICK: Okay. I’ll even give you, if you spend the triumph on it, I’ll say that it’s driven between you and the guards as it goes off, so you’ll have cover when they try to shoot you, and that’s why you moved when you did.

LAURA: It’s your triumph.

NICK: Unless you want to use your triumph on something else. Either way, you get an advantage or a triumph to spend.

STEVEN: Yeah. That seems pretty good, or just them falling prone.

CAMERON: Can the other advantage be that there’s also a trash chute in this hallway? Because there’s a trash droid, you need a trash chute.

NICK: Steven rolled a bunch of stuff. If he has an idea, I’d love him to use it.

STEVEN: One of my ideas was they fall prone, but I kind of like a trash droid better. I think a triumph can make them fall prone.

LAURA: Yeah.

NICK: You got three advantages and a triumph, so you can have…

STEVEN: Yeah. You can have a trash chute.

NICK: No cameras, a trash chute, and a trash droid that’s driven between them. it’s like a mini-fridge…

STEVEN: Do we know where the trash chute goes?

CAMERON: … To the trash room.

STEVEN: Perfect. Just wanted to make sure.

NICK: (laughs) Okay. So, that’s all going on right now. As you go to pull your pistol, it’s almost like there were people guarding you, watching you, that could hear you, and the stormtroopers are going to attempt to basically just tackle you to the ground. I need a green and a yellow against two purple, unless you have Melee Defense.

LAURA: Um, I don’t have Melee Brawl, but I do have 1 Defense in Melee.

NICK: … What?

LAURA: The smuggler’s trench coat gives you 1 Defense for both Ranged and Melee.

NICK: Okay, so there’s a black die in there too, and they’re basically just trying to tackle you to the ground. “She’s got a gun! She’s got a gun! Get her!” Oh, and another black die because there’s a droid in the way, and the three of them are trying to pile on Xianna.

LAURA: I have Agility. (laughs)

NICK: Does not matter. You also have Streetwise, and we’re all very happy about that.

STEVEN: I just yell, “Watch the head tails!”

CAMERON: Two purple, two black, a yellow, and a green?

NICK: Yup.

CAMERON: That is one failure.

NICK: Aw. Okay. They run to try and tackle Xianna to the ground, the three stormtroopers, leaving Sabos unguarded for a second. They trip up over the droid, and the one that manages to get past them tries to throw the butt of his rifle in your direction but it gets kind of deflected by the folds of your coat, and you find yourself with an open shot. Now it is a PC slot. Who’s gonna take it?

LAURA: I’m gonna take it since I have a gun.

STEVEN: Yeah.

LAURA: Yeah.

NICK: (laughs)

STEVEN: And people near you.

LAURA: And people near me. I’m gonna shoot him!

NICK: Alright. They’re at engaged range, which should make it an easy shot for you, unless you have… What’s the range on your pistol?

LAURA: It’s medium, but I have increased difficulty past short range, but if they’re engaged…

NICK: So it just makes it average then, because it goes one for engaged, but then one back for… Well, we’ll just do two difficulty. Whatever. Who cares? Not me.

LAURA: Yeah. So, two purple?

NICK: Two purple!

LAURA: I’m gonna flip a light side point.

NICK: (hums Star Wars tune)

STEVEN: Oh—

LAURA: Yeah. That’s a complete wash.

NICK: Oh, okay. So you pivot on one foot and shoot up at the people who tried to attack you, and also shoot your trash droid, and it starts to (wailing noise) and starts spinning in circles. It looks like you hit one of the wheels.

LAURA: “Sorry!”

NICK: Moving on to an NPC slot. The deck captain says, “This is highly irregular!” He pulls out a small hulled out blaster, and seeing that Sabos is also spinning around tries to take a shot at him. That’s gonna be a green and a yellow versus two purple.

STEVEN: I’m just spinning around following the droid.

CAMERON: Does he get the black because the droid’s in between them?

NICK: He does get a black die because of the droid that is getting in the way of everything right now.

CAMERON: Okie-dokie.

NICK: (musically) Mobile cover.

CAMERON: A failure and one advantage.

NICK: He’s gonna use the advantage. He shoots at you, also hits the droid but doesn’t seem to hit anything important. The pitch of the droid’s screaming gets higher, but he doesn’t hit anybody or anything. “Blast! Ha-ha.”

STEVEN: ‘You tried.”

NICK: And it’s Sabos’s turn. (laughs)

STEVEN: I’m gonna try to vibro-knife him.

NICK: The deck captain?

STEVEN: Yeah.

NICK: Alright.

STEVEN: Because that’s what I got.

NICK: What does that look like, you running to stab this guy?

STEVEN: Well, my hands are also bound, but I can get the knife from the pocket, like, just two handed stab.

NICK: Cool.

STEVEN: I’m just gonna walk up to him, head tails a-swinging, and try to knife him.

NICK: Oh, okay. So that’s gonna be two purples.

STEVEN: I’m gonna look inquisitive, like, ‘why, why did you try to shoot me? I’m just over there spinning with the droid,’ and then (impact noises), you know.

LAURA: (laughs)

NICK: Okay. So, a black die because your hands are tied together, but otherwise just two purple.

STEVEN: Yup. This is gonna go well.

NICK: Oh, I’m sure.

STEVEN: Well, I got two advantages. (laughs)

NICK: Okay, so he steps backwards, your stab doesn’t connect because you’re wearing handcuffs so you’re not able to extend all the way. He points his gun at you. “Rebel scum!”

STEVEN: Can I spend one of the advantages on Xianna having a blue die?

NICK: Yeah, we’ll say you trying to stab their commanding officer—

STEVEN: Took them by surprise.

NICK: Yeah. Two of the stormtroopers turn to see what’s going on with the guy who’s their boss, and…

STEVEN: Also, if they think I’m even more incompetent, that would be cool too.

NICK: I think everyone thinks you’re incompetent. It’s okay. “Wow! He actually did have a knife.”

STEVEN: “Where was it?”

NICK: “Gross!”

STEVEN: (laughs)

NICK: Then we’re gonna jump to karma, so we can keep on moving. So, what has happened?

CAMERON: Felton and I have parked the ship, to the herdship. The shot probably shows us just at the Afternoon Delight floating above the herdship with some of the, you can kind of see some of the hazy forest floor of the planet below the herdship, and we enter into a deep conversation that they’ve been having about Felton’s hopes and dreams.

NICK: “Well, I always wanted to be a professional dancer, but… I try really hard, and I’m an athletic guy, but yeah, dancing. You know, Selonian dancing, some of the finest in the universe, and being a male Selonian, of which there are not many, I had lots of partners until I got … banished.”

CAMERON: “Oh… Well, I’m sure there are other Selonians who don’t live on planet that you could join up and form a dance troop.”

NICK: “Uh… I mean, yeah, except most of them don’t really like to talk to me, just like, in general. I could dance with anyone. I’m not a big fan of the traditional Selonian dances. I really like that one Twi’lek dance where they move their arms in like a really repetitive pattern.”

CAMERON: ‘Oh yeah, I love that one.”

NICK: “Yeah. That one’s really good. I just haven’t had time. I’ve been busy being the Rancore of Coronet.”

CAMERON: “Yeah, so, you mentioned that the talking isn’t really a thing, but I’ve found in dancing that that’s not often required, so I don’t know really why you would see that as being an issue for you, unless it’s really just getting past, getting through the door to start the dancing and making friends. It seems like once you get there you’re just letting yourself go and the talking shouldn’t really be necessary. The dancing does that for you.”

NICK: “You’re right. I do speak with my body.” (laughing) And we’re gonna cut back to—Egh. I don’t like this character. (laughter)

We’re gonna cut back to Tink. You are at your programming station with a presumably competent computer technician watching what you’re doing. Whatcha gonna do?

HUDSON: I try to log in a few times with just random credentials that say ‘Admin1’ or something like that. It doesn’t work.

NICK: Roll me a force die.

HUDSON: One dark side.

NICK: Nope. Doesn’t work. It actually starts a security countdown, or is about to. You use up all of your allowance for inaccurate passwords before it does it.

HUDSON: “Oh man. This is my first week… Uh, ugh, I don’t think my credentials are turned on yet. Do you mind… Do you mind?”

NICK: Make me… some sort of check. You can do Computers if you want by saying you’re using like proper jargon and stuff.

HUDSON: Yeah, I’m using proper jargon, so computers.

NICK: Yeah. It’ll be average, but a black die, because this is getting highly irregular.

LAURA: Did you go to an Imperial school for computers?

HUDSON: Yeah, so I should know the jargon.

LAURA: Yeah, so you might know some of the specific terms they use.

HUDSON: Mm-hmm.

NICK: That’s what he’s doing.

HUDSON: A success and a triumph.

NICK: Alright. What would you like to use your triumph on? He’s gonna log you in. I have an idea, but I wanna know what yours is.

HUDSON: Do I see any security cameras? Can I see what’s happening to them?

NICK: We’ll go ahead and say, just with what’s going on, there are security cameras but they’re not pointed directly in your direction. Probably no one would notice that you were in here.

HUDSON: Oh. I have something for the triumph.

NICK: Okay.

HUDSON: Alright. Can I pee myself, and then ask them to get me towels acting really embarrassed?

(laughter)

LAURA & CAMERON: What?!

CAMERON: This is a triumph?!

LAURA: What?!

STEVEN: That’s his granola.

LAURA: That’s what you wanna use the triumph on?!

HUDSON: The person beside me actually walks away, no one pays attention to me—

NICK: No. You clear the room!

LAURA: That’s an everyone would pay attention to you!

NICK: Nope! Nope! New canon. Gigoran pee smells terrible. You pee yourself, and what do you say?

HUDSON: “Oh my god, I’m s—Uh, uh, can y’all go get towels?!”

(laughter)

NICK: The technician goes “Oh, oh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh. Okay, okay, okay. We can fix this. Oh, that’s—Oh gosh.” You can see his eyes start to water up. “I gotta get out of here.” The other two technicians get up and one of them goes, “What is going on? We gotta go. We gotta get some towels,” and all three of them run out of the room.

HUDSON: Alright. Quickly, I take out the Rancore Protocol and I plug it in, see what I can do with it.

NICK: Okay. You plug it in and it starts running. You’re not sure what it’s doing. You can make me a computer check to decrypt it a little bit, get some info.

HUDSON: Yeah, I’d like to see what it’s doing.

LAURA: God, Tink is SO weird.

NICK: It’ll be average. It should be a lot harder than that, but you’ve done so many good computer things getting it that you’re pretty sure you know what you’re doing.

HUDSON: Okay. We have three threats, five successes, and a triumph.

NICK: Okay, so you slip in your pee and fall prone.

(dramatic bass noise)

(laughter)

CAMERON: Ew. He just slides off the stool.

STEVEN: But he’s a mop, so he cleans it up.

NICK: Yeah, that’s worse. You’re gonna be so soggy. So, with all those successes, having messed with this a few times even though you decided not to decrypt it you couldn’t help but think about it over the course of the last few days, and you’re like ‘I betcha this kind of encryption is what’s going on,’ and you’re able to try it, and you’re right, and you get right in.

The Rancore Protocol is a program that is surprisingly deep. It has a lot of different layers, and it all interconnects almost like a brain. There’s a lot of stuff going on. What you see as you plug it in, it started auto-running, and it started doing a few things all at the same time.

  1. The security system started doing some weird stuff, you’re not sure what, but a lot of cameras are starting to flicker. 2. All of the ventilation shafts are turned down, so all of the heat for the hot air, hot water, all that stuff has been turned luke warm, all of the cool has been turned to average, and all of the vents are now open. You’re not sure why. 3. A little pop-up comes up that’s like its own situational feed which you’re not used to seeing. One of the geometric shapes moves, you guys!

LAURA: (gasps)

NICK: A little pop-up comes up, and it says in Aurebesh “Biological Alert Detected,” and it is blinking right on top of you.

HUDSON: Um, Escape Key, Escape Key.

NICK: (laughs) You can Escape out of that, but through the tying of everything, it seems to be saying that you are a biological alert of some kind, or something near you is, and it seems to be in relation to everything it’s doing to this computer system, all of these weird support systems it’s hijacking and making do weird things.

HUDSON: Okay. so, I get on my coms and I check in on everybody. First I’ll check in on Xianna.

LAURA: “We are getting shot at~ Pew pew!”

STEVEN: You just hear blaster noises.

LAURA: (giggles) You hear ‘pew, pew!’ “Uh, we will be fine in a few minutes… hopefully.”

HUDSON: “I believe all the vents are open if you need that going on. I just did something… uh, something weird is going on. Basically, the vents are open, and you’re probably good as far as security cameras go too, so…”

LAURA: “I figured that. We are being shot at, though. I will get back to you.”

HUDSON: Alright. Then I check in on Karma.

STEVEN: (chuckles)

(start ballet music)

CAMERON: (sweetly) “Hey Tink. What’s up?”

NICK: Oh. It’s a holo-feed, and in the background you see Felton doing ballet leaps behind her on the screen, so he just comes onto the screen as a hologram and then off the screen again really quick. You hear him being like, ‘ah-le-oop! … (boof) Ow!’

HUDSON: “… So, uh, yeah. I just activated the Rancore Protocol, and uh, things are getting weird.”

(ballet music fades)

CAMERON: “Okay. what’s it doing?”

HUDSON: “Security cameras started flickering. The vents all cooled down and opened themselves inside of the facility. It said it detected a biological force, being myself, at the computer where I entered the protocol.”

CAMERON: “A biological force? Like, on you?”

HUDSON: “Yeah, like, I am the biological force.”

CAMERON: “But like no others, though?”

HUDSON: “Yes.”

CAMERON: “So, you have the thing, right?”

HUDSON: “Yeah.”

CAMERON: “In the to-go container?”

HUDSON: “Yeah.”

CAMERON: “Could it be that? Because if it’s not firing off any other—I’m assuming, well, we know at least that Sabos and Xianna are on the ship with you, and if it’s just highlighting you, it might actually be that since Sentinel sent that with us as well.”

HUDSON: “Oh… Interesting. I’m not gonna open it. I think what I’m gonna do is try to cause a little bit of a distraction to make sure that Sabos and Xianna can get out.”

CAMERON: “Makes sense. Yeah.”

HUDSON: “Uh, what’s the best kind of distraction on a ship like this?”

CAMERON: “Um…”

HUDSON: “A kersplosion.”

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: “Well, I mean, a—An explosion?”

HUDSON: “Explosion? Explosion! Sorry. I’m a little light headed. There are some fumes in the room. It’s like a weird fume.”

CAMERON: “Oh yeah. The larger starships like that can get like that sometimes, especially if you said all the vents opened up. It’s probably just coming up from one of the refreshers or something.”

HUDSON: “Oh yeah.”

CAMERON: “So, yeah. Explosions tend to be pretty effective on ships. If you’re at a computer terminal you could just start opening airlocks and stuff, too, or turning off the shields in the landing bays and stuff… If you’re at a computer terminal, you could cause some major havoc besides just blowing shit up.”

HUDSON: I start humming to myself, opening airlocks, turning off shields, causing some alarms to go off at areas very far away from me…

NICK: (laughs) Alright. Make me a Computers check to wreak general havoc.

HUDSON: Difficulty?

NICK: This one’s gonna be hard.

HUDSON: Ooh. That is a success, a threat, and a triumph.

CAMERON: Goodness gracious.

LAURA: So, that success is from the triumph.

HUDSON: Correct.

NICK: Okay. Man, those triumphs have bailed you out several times.

HUDSON: Yes they have.

NICK: Alright, so, the threat: You sign your name again. You have StarDestroyer1, ‘leet hacker,’ you leave that buried in the code somewhere. I think maybe, because this keeps happening, there’s some weird gap in the programming where if you do that it makes stuff a lot easier elsewhere but it does leave a trace that you’ve been there. The ship starts to shutter and jerk as you just start venting atmosphere out of certain places, and in space when you do that things start moving. The ship is starting to get kind of unstable. You hear some weird claxons going off, and Karma and Tink still have the com open, so Karma hears one pretty loud explosion and the com call ends as Tink gets really into it and starts typing on things.

CAMERON: I look up at the ship. Are there like TIE fighters floating out of the landing base? (laughs)

NICK: Are you in the low orbit already?

CAMERON: Yeah.

NICK: Okay. No, not yet.

CAMERON: Okay.

NICK: You just see the ship. It’ll drift a few hundred meters one way, and then there will be a vent of gas, and part of the ship will flicker and it will jerk back the other way. All of the other star destroyers are doing that slow capital ship turn of like ‘what the hell…’ as this is starting to go on.

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: We’re gonna jump back to Sabos and Xianna. It was an NPC slot. That’s gonna be the stormtroopers. They have been knocked off their feet, so they are going to have to spend their maneuver to try and get back up. It’s two private stormtroopers and one corporal stormtrooper. He has a little stripe on his shoulder. He looks more important.

The slightly more important stormtrooper says, “Get it together men. We have to stop these prisoners so that we can help with whatever’s going on with the ship.” They all turn to shoot at…

LAURA: I would like to say that they were all looking at Sabos and the captain, and that’s where I’m getting my blue die from.

NICK: Oh, you’re right.

CAMERON: Because he just stabbed him, or tried to stab him.

STEVEN: I start heckling them anyway about not being able to keep their ship together, and this is the shittiest prison I’ve ever been in.

NICK: Okay. When you start doing that, they go “Alright, we’ll shoot that one first,” and they shoot Sabos. It’s gonna be three greens against two purples, but they have a black die for unstable footing.

CAMERON: Nothing!

NICK: Great!

STEVEN: Complete wash? (laughs)

NICK: They shoot the wall real good. Yep. That’s all that happens. I’m going to flip a dark side point though, and the trash droid gets its wheel stuck back on enough that it goes (wailing noise), and just takes off down the hallway away from everybody as fast as it can. We get a shot of everybody shuttering around shooting at walls. It’s kind of like that scene in Inception with the rotating hallway, except if the camera was still and everybody was just like flapping around and having a good time, and the droid smacks into the wall next to the door with a loud thunk, winds back up, and then goes through the door and is gone. We’re gonna move to a PC slot.

LAURA: Xianna is going to shoot another one of the stormtroopers.

NICK: Okie-dokie. There is a difficulty involved with that.

LAURA: Yes there is. (laughter) I’m assuming it’s average.

NICK: Yep, you’re right. Yep, yep, yep.

LAURA: So that’s average, and I have a blue die from Sabos’s turn. That is one success, one advantage.

NICK: How much damage does that do?

LAURA: That does 7 damage.

NICK: Okay. One of the stormtroopers, not the corporal but one of the other stormtroopers, takes a blaster bolt to the chest and gets knocked off his feet. He seems out of the fight. You hear (muffled sounds of pain). That’s my attempt at a Wilhelm scream. Thanks everybody for coming. Have a great night.

STEVEN: Poor little stormtrooper.

NICK: Yeah. Then, we are to another NPC slot. The deck captain, seeing one of his troopers get dropped, is going to try to punch Sabos as hard as he can, also making sure to keep Sabos in between him and Xianna.

STEVEN: How does Melee Defense work?

NICK: It adds a black die. Do you have Melee Defense?

CAMERON: You don’t have any.

STEVEN: I just have Melee. I don’t know where Defense is… Oh, yeah, sorry. I don’t have that.

CAMERON: If you were using… like, some of the vibro-swords have Defense, if you were using them, because you can block with it, but you probably don’t have any Defense. You definitely don’t from your knife, anyway.

LAURA: Yeah, I don’t believe knives do. It’s mostly the large melee weapons.

STEVEN: Okay.

NICK: Roll away, please.

CAMERON: It was a yellow and a green, right?

NICK: Yep. He’s doing fisticuffs. ‘Wot-wot.’

CAMERON: Two advantages.

NICK: Great. All he does is distract Sabos and set him up for a good shot. He tries to punch him, Sabos actually does a very competent block, but stands up straight and makes himself a bigger target. If he gets shot at again that might be bad. Moving on to Sabos. Whatcha gonna do?

STEVEN: Try to vibro-knife the dude.

LAURA: Can Sabos have a blue die because I had an advantage?

NICK: Sure. All the gunfire flying, everyone’s getting to be a bigger and bigger target. It’ll be against two purple.

STEVEN: I’m just gonna try to vibro-knife the big dude. Hey, some advantages, two advantages.

NICK: Goodness. Okay. This whole room is just full of blaster fire and punching and stabbing…

STEVEN: (laughs) I’ll give one of the advantages back to Xianna next time.

NICK: Alright. We’ll do that.

STEVEN: Oh. I have two. Can I act smaller now, not stand up straight?

NICK: Yeah, but it’s not gonna give you any sort of mechanical advantage, because your trash can’s gone.

STEVEN: No, that’s fine, as long as his advantage goes away.

NICK: Yes. You can absolutely crouch. Cool, so that’s that. We’re gonna jump away from this fight, and—

STEVEN: It’s a good fight. (laughs)

NICK: Oh yeah, it’s great. It’s going super good. Karma? Whatcha doing?

(resume ballet music)

CAMERON: We’re watching all of the ships slowly turn to look at the Vengeance, and Felton’s like doing pirouettes behind me. His grace has improved substantially since the holo-call with Tink. The practice is really doing good.

NICK: “You have reawakened in me… my love of dance! Thank you. … Whoop-whoa. (effort noises)” There you go. He’s just dancing around. That’s what’s happening on the ship?

CAMERON: Yup. I mean, I’m watching. I don’t want to approach yet. I’m here if anybody calls me.

(ballet music stops)

NICK: Cool. We’re gonna jump to Tink. The Rancore Protocol is still running. A couple of things have happened. Now that you’ve started playing with all the airlocks and things it has started highlighting airlocks, and you notice whenever you open those that the ship does crazier, weird spins and things, and is starting to destabilize. It’s like making suggestions. The other thing that you’ll notice is towards the middle of the ship, kind of high up, there’s a room that starts blinking red. You click on it, and it says “Ventilation Main Shaft.” It’s blinking on it. Then that little pop-up that you closed out jumps back up, and it says “Biological Alert,” and it’s blinking on you. Then it flips over to that ventilation shaft which starts blinking red, and it’s just going back and forth between the two. You also notice that there is a specific airlock that keeps blinking yellow that you haven’t hit yet.

HUDSON: Okay. oh, there’s an airlock that’s blinking yellow? Okay.

NICK: Yeah. Mm-hmm. It’s not one you’ve opened yet, but it looks like it’s, I don’t know, maybe half way to the detention level.

HUDSON: Ohh, interesting. Hmm… I go ahead and look around the room using Perception to see if there’s anything I can steal, like badges or uniforms or things like that.

NICK: Great. Go right ahead. Roll me a Perception. I think that would actually probably be Skulduggery, honestly, since you’re looking for stuff to loot.

HUDSON: Skulduggery? Okay. What difficulty?

NICK: Easy.

STEVEN: There’s no one there, and it smells like pee.

NICK: Yup. (laughs)

HUDSON: A success, and that’s it.

NICK: You find a swipe badge, well I guess it would be a code cylinder for this. It’s not a very high level one, but it is a technician one, so you’re gonna be able to get into some weird rooms with it, you’re just not sure what because it doesn’t say what kind of technician. You find no uniform, but someone left their little Imperial navy hat, you know the ones that look almost like a Burger King hat but aren’t, there’s one of those. It’s white and has the little Tech Core logo on the back and the Imperial logo on the front.

HUDSON: Okay. Real quick out of character, you said it was blinking?

NICK: Mm-hmm. On the display you were using to mess with the airlocks, certain ones were blinking and when you hit them they were more effective. Now there’s just one blinking.

HUDSON: There’s just one blinking, and it’s not opened…

NICK: Nope.

HUDSON: …between here and the detention center.

NICK: Yup.

HUDSON: I’m trying to figure out if that’s going to kill them or if that’s going to help them.

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: Well, probably not.

HUDSON: That’s what I was thinking. Okay. so, I go back over, kind of just relax at this point, kind of playing the computer like a piano, and open up the airlock on the blinking yellow.

NICK: Oookay. Do you say anything, or do you just hit the button?

HUDSON: I’m just kind of humming to myself. Actually, right before I do that, can I actually hijack a droid and have it come over to me, like a fast one?

NICK: Mmm. You can try.

HUDSON: Yeah. I want to try to hijack a droid to come to me.

NICK: Okay. most of them aren’t wireless, but they do have an order system, so you could try to get one to come to you. Are you thinking like the little mouse droids?

HUDSON: Something that can hold a box.

NICK: Yeah, the mouse droid will do that.

HUDSON: It will? Oh, okay.

NICK: Yeah. Those are the things that look like the Pizza Hut logo on wheels.

STEVEN: That’s it, actually.

LAURA & CAMERON: Yeah.

(chuckling)

NICK: Go ahead and make me a hard Computers check.

HUDSON: A failure and an advantage.

NICK: We’ll say you can apply the advantage to something that’s probably about to happen. Most systems in Star Wars don’t connect to droids. The really longwinded EU explanation is before the movies started they actually were playing with big AI computers and stuff, and that went super bad and killed a bunch of people, so they use droids as small siloed AIs. They don’t usually connect directly to the computer systems. You’re just not able to find one that’s linked. There are some, which is why you looked, but they don’t really have any that are available for you.

HUDSON: Okay. in that case, after that fails I don’t try again.

NICK: Cool. So, do you open that airlock?

HUDSON: I open that airlock and just kind of lean back and wait.

NICK: Alright. I’m gonna spend your advantage for you if you don’t mind.

HUDSON: Sure.

NICK: We’re gonna jump to Sabos and Xianna. a yellow light starts flashing for a second giving y’all a slight heads up before one of the walls slides open and starts venting atmosphere! I’m gonna need Athletics checks from the two of you.

STEVEN: Yeah, that’ll be fine.

LAURA: Oh boy. Can I do an Agility instead of Athletics?

NICK: Sure you can. You can cartwheel out of the way of this situation.

HUDSON: (laughs)

LAURA: Okay. Yeah.

STEVEN: What’s an Agility?

NICK: You can use Coordination instead of Athletics.

HUDSON: Acrobatics is not a thing, just Athletics.

NICK: Coordination is the Athletics.

STEVEN: Oh. Oh, I’ll use Coordination.

NICK: Okay. that’s fine.

LAURA: Difficulty?

NICK: We’re gonna say three purple, but you both get a blue die because you had a chance to get a head start.

STEVEN: I got a success and two threats.

NICK: Two threats, you say?

STEVEN: Yup.

LAURA: Two failures, one advantage.

NICK: Okay. So, the stormtroopers, the deck captain, and Xianna get pulled towards this sudden opening into the vacuum of space. The stormtroopers go first. The last one to go is the one that was shot. He ragdolls into a wall with a sickening crunch and then gets pulled out into space. Xianna, you are able to grab nearby, you’re not sucked out, but you are in danger of being sucked out. Is there anybody you might want to talk to, or anything?

LAURA: Am I still IN the ship?

NICK: Yes, you are still in the ship, but you are very close.

LAURA: Yeah. I yell into the coms, “Tink! There is an airlock open! Please close it! Close it! Close it!”

HUDSON: “Huh… Oh! Oh, yes!” I close the airlock.

NICK: (laughs) Okay.

STEVEN: I don’t understand the problem.

CAMERON: You don’t hear the problem either.

STEVEN: No. No. I just see she’s floating out. I’m like, ‘what the hell.’

CAMERON: And she’s yelling for Tink.

NICK: Sabos, what you were able to do is you saw the flashing yellow light and went ‘that’s an airlock indicator,’ and jumped really quickly over to a wall and grab on. You had time to wrap your arm in something. You’re safe.

STEVEN: Can I offer her a head tail?

NICK: You are too far—

STEVEN: Okay.

NICK: –and that’s gross.

HUDSON: So, Computer check?

NICK: No, you’re not gonna have to do that. Xianna, I am gonna need an Athletics check from you to hold on as the door starts to slide closed.

LAURA: Oh boy… (laughter) What’s the difficulty?

NICK: Average.

LAURA: I will flip a light side point.

CAMERON: To upgrade your one green to a yellow.

LAURA: I have a 1 in Brawn.

CAMERON: Oh no…

STEVEN: Oh, that didn’t do it.

LAURA: That is a failure and a threat.

NICK: You start to slide towards the vacuum of horrifying space and decompression. You probably have never been exposed to that before, but it’s not as cold as you expected, or maybe that’s just that you’re going numb. Then the airlock slams shut… on your toe, and it hurts real, real bad.

LAURA: (gasps, whines) Oh no!

STEVEN: (laughs)

NICK: You are able to pull your foot free, that jerk reaction, but your foot is bleeding really bad, you’re not sure how bad, and there is a hole in your boot. You are gonna take 3 strain for your hitting the wall and 2 wounds for getting your toe smashed by an airlock door.

LAURA: Yep.

NICK: It was that or die. So…

HUDSON: “Hey Xianna, what happened? Are you there?”

LAURA: (crying) “My favorite boots! I think I might’ve also lost a toe! Tink! What happened?!”

(laughter)

STEVEN: “I’m not Tink. I’m Sabos.”

LAURA: “I’m not talking to you Sabos, I’m talking to Tink.”

STEVEN: “Oh.”

LAURA: “Tink. What the kriff happened?”

HUDSON: “I… I opened an airlock?”

LAURA: “Why would you open an airlock?!”

STEVEN: “Wait. Who opened an airlock?”

HUDSON: “I mean, it just felt right. It was blinking. You tap on things that are blinking. This is half of computers.”

LAURA: “No! Blinking is usually a warning of either, hey, keep this in mind, or hey, maybe don’t do this. (groans in pain)”

HUDSON: “Did you go to school to be a slicer?”

LAURA: “No. I really didn’t go to very much schooling.”

HUDSON: “So, you don’t have any weight of knowing what blinking means, so…”

LAURA: “No. Blinking is pretty universal.”

HUDSON: “You know what, we’ll just, it’s just a mulligan. We’re fine. Uh…”

STEVEN: (laughs)

LAURA: ‘You owe me new shoes! And a new toe!” (laughs)

HUDSON: “Uh… Gotta go!”

(laughter)

NICK: And on that, we’re gonna end the episode!

(all make dramatic noises)

NICK: –really cool. I like that.

(all make “pew pew” noises)

## Outro

CAMERON: Thanks for listening to Tabletop Squadron. If you enjoyed our show please consider logging into iTunes and giving us a five-star review. Five-star reviews will help new listeners to find the show.

Xianna’fan is played by Laura Penrod. She can be found on Twitter at @cheerio_buffet.

Tink is played by Hudson Jameson and he can be found on Twitter at @hudsonjameson.

Karma Nailo is played by me, Cameron Robertson. You can find me on Twitter at @midnightmusic13.

Sabos Nix was played by Steven Schroeder. He… does not exist on the internet.

Our game master is Nick Robertson, and you can find him on Twitter at @alias58.

Our intro song is Space Jam by Pablo Ribot.

Additional music by James Gunter.

Follow the podcast on Twitter and Instagram at @tabletop_squad. For real! We’re real people and we wanna talk to anyone who listens to the show. Reach out! See you next time.

First ordered in Episode 27 the Supernova packs a punch. It’s a deliciously strong combination of gin, green chartreuse, Campari, and vermouth, and has a beautiful rust-orange color.

The Supernova

Look at that color!

Sweet vermouth is also known as rosso (“red” in Italian) or rouge (“red” in French) vermouth due to its red color. Like its name suggests it brings some sweetness to the drink, preventing it from tasting like pure alcohol.

Green Chartreuse is a beautiful, naturally green liqueur made with over a hundred different botanicals. It’s hard to replicate given its unique flavor, but given its price (often $50-60 a bottle) if you wish to substitute it try a 50/50 mix of elderflower liqueur and absinthe or Jägermeister. It brings some lovely floral and herby notes to this drink and blends wonderfully with the gin.

Campari has a very bitter citrus flavor that is quite similar to grapefruit. It has a beautiful red color and adds a ton of depth to this drink.

Glamour shots

Supernova [serves 1]

1 ounce gin
1 ounce green Chartreuse
1 ounce sweet vermouth (aka ” Rosso” or “Rouge” vermouth)
½ teaspoon Campari
Garnish: Lemon peel

Combine in a shaker with ice and shake well. Strain into a martini glass. Garnish with lemon peel.

Bantha Blasters are first ordered during Episode 24. They’re pink and green, and pop and fizz. Our real life version uses watermelon for the pink, melon liqueur for the green, and Pop Rocks for some great popping and fizzing.

Finished drink and a small bowl of Pop Rocks
A good ol’fashioned Bantha Blaster

This recipe uses seedless watermelon, vodka, simple syrup, lime juice, Midori melon liqueur, and, finally, Pop Rocks.

All the ingredients laid out
Bantha Blaster in the making.

Now, we had some real trouble finding Pop Rocks in our local grocery stores and ended up buying a few packages online. Sadly, the online packs did not have the flavor we wanted: Green Apple. The Green Apple is preferred for its green color, but other flavors will work if you also have trouble finding them.

First, cut up the watermelon into cubes and put them in a blender along with the vodka, simple syrup, and lime juice. Our watermelon was a little under-ripe so we used 2 ounces of simple syrup. Use less if your melon is nice and ripe.

A clear pink blender canister filled with watermelon and other ingredients.
And yes, this is blender was once used at a certain coffee chain.

Blend everything up until smooth. There will be watermelon “foam” at the top and more of a juice at the bottom.

Two tall glasses filled with ice cubes, each with a small amount of melon liqueur at the bottom.
The first layer.

Fill 2 highball glasses with ice and pour 1 ounce of midori into each glass. Using a fine mesh strainer or something similar, strain the watermelon mix between the 2 glasses. This will remove the foamy pulp so that you’re left with a smooth juice.

Two tall glasses filled with ice cubes, each with a small amount of melon liqueur at the bottom, and the watermelon mix on top.
Getting ready for those popping rocks.

Very carefully pour 1 package of pop rocks onto the top of each drink. Very carefully! If your Pop Rocks are particularly “fresh” or you live in a fairly dry environment the Pop Rocks might, well… pop quite vigorously when they hit the liquid. When we first made this drink a while back the Pop Rocks exploded everywhere and made a bit of a mess. For this photoshoot the house was humid and since the candy had to sit out while everything was made they didn’t react quite as violently.

A top down shot of the finished drink, topped with red Pop Rocks.
Shown here with Watermelon Pop Rocks.

Bantha Blasters [serves 2]

2 cups fresh seedless watermelon, cut into cubes about 1/2-inch in diameter
4 ounces vodka
1-2 ounces simple syrup, depending on how sweet your watermelon is*
2 ounces lime juice
2 ounces midori
1 small package Green Apple Pop Rocks**


Place watermelon, vodka, simple syrup, and lime juice in blender. Process until smooth. Fill 2 highball glasses with ice and pour 1 ounce of midori into each glass. Strain the watermelon mix between the 2 glasses. Very carefully pour 1 package of pop rocks onto the top of each drink.

*Simple Syrup recipe found here
**Or whatever flavor you can find.

In episode 23 the crew treats themselves to some ice cream. They get pistachio, lime, and salted caramel. Pistachio and salted caramel are easy enough to find in the grocery store, but lime can sometimes be tricky to get (outside of sherbet and sorbet). So today we’re making lime ice cream and using coconut milk as the base. This adds a wonderful hint of coconut flavor, and keeps the recipe vegan.

Waffle cone bowl with scoops of lime ice cream topped with coconut flakes and a lime slice.
Scoop into a waffle cone and top with coconut flakes!

The ingredients for the recipe laid out on a cutting board.

This ice cream uses coconut milk and coconut cream in place of traditional dairy. Coconut cream and milk have higher fat contents than many other non-dairy alternatives and will give your ice cream a smooth, creamy taste.

Cornstarch and xantham gum are used as thickeners and binders. They will keep the coconut fat from separating out of the mixture and make the base thicker which will create a richer mouthfeel.

Xantham gum is a soluble fiber and bags of it can usually be found in the baking aisle. Most grocery stores I’ve been to carry the Bob’s Red Mill brand. If you can’t find it, or don’t want to buy a whole bag for one recipe you can leave it out.

Coconut milk and cornstarch being mixed in a small bowl.
Tiny whisk not required.

In a small bowl or cup pour ½ cup coconut milk. Whisk in the cornstarch until completely combined. Mixing the cornstarch into a small amount of liquid will make it easy to combine and prevent clumps.

This will get set to the side to be used later.

A saucepan with coconut milk and cream and lime zest being whisked together.

In a saucepan combine the coconut cream, remaining coconut milk, and lime zest. 

Over medium heat bring to a boil, stirring frequently.

An R2-D2 kitchen timer set to 30 minutes with a covered saucepan in the background.
R2 units are quite helpful in the kitchen.

Remove from the heat, cover, and tell your R2 unit to set a timer for 30 minutes.

This will infuse the coconut milk with all the flavor in the zest.

A fine wire strainer atop a metal pitcher.
Any sort of fine wire strainer should work.

Strain the zest out of the coconut mix. At this point the zest has given up its flavor and removing it will give a smoother texture to the ice cream.

Return to a clean saucepan with the xanthan gum, salt, and sugar, and any optional extract or food coloring.

a bottle of lime extract, "leaf green" food coloring, and "lemon yellow" food coloring.

Adding a little bit of lime extract will create a very strong, punchy lime flavor. If you want a more mellow, smooth flavor leave it out.

Naturally this ice cream will have off-white, barely there green color. If you want a more colorful lime green color you can add some food coloring.

A little ceramic bowl with 3 drops yellow food coloring and 1 drop green.  A tiny spoon is in the background.
Tiny spoon not required.

If you can’t find “lime” food coloring, you can make your own by using 3 parts yellow, 1 part green.

I mixedg mine in a little sauce bowl, 1- for the photo and 2- because I want just a hint of color and 4 drops would be too much for that.

But if you want a strong green color go ahead and add 3 drops yellow and 1 drop green directly to the mix.

A small ceramic bowl with mixed food coloring and tiny spoon.
Look at the beautiful color!

This is the finished “lime green” food coloring mix. I used about a fourth of the mix.

Ice cream base before food coloring. Off-white, barest hint of green.

Before

Ice cream base after food coloring. A very pale lime green.

After

Ice cream base boiling in a saucepan.

Stir the ice cream mix over low heat until sugar has fully melted and mixture is warm.

Gradually stream the cornstarch mixture into the saucepan while whisking non-stop. Once everything has been incorporated, whisk continually until the mixture comes to a soft boil.

The ice cream base in a metal pitcher with plastic wrap pushed against the surface of the ice cream base.

Strain the mixture into a large measuring cup or pitcher to remove any lumps. Stir in the lime juice. The lime juice is getting added at the end here to keep it bright and tart.

Press plastic wrap against the surface of the mixture so a skin does not form.

The metal pitcher on a shelf in a fridge.
Maybe there’s too much yogurt.

Place in the refrigerator next to all your yogurt cups and fully chill. You want the ice cream mix to be as cold as possible so when it goes into the ice cream maker it’ll freeze faster, which will make smaller ice crystals which means a smoother texture.

A Cuisinart ice cream machine on a counter with the metal pitcher beside it.

Churn in an ice cream maker, following the machine’s instructions. You could make this recipe and use a “no churn” or “no machine” method, but the result won’t be as airy and smooth. An ice cream machine will freeze the mixture faster, creating smaller ice crystals, and churning will introduce air, making the ice cream lighter.

Ice cream being churned.
Look at that creaminess.

Once out of the ice cream maker, place in an airtight container, cover, and freeze for at least 3 hours to allow it to further firm up.

Ice cream in a reusable ice cream quart container.
Use a reusable ice cream container or a tupperware.

Lime Coconut Ice Cream [makes about 1 quart]

1 400-ml can coconut milk
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1 400-ml can coconut cream
3 tablespoon lime zest (from 2-4 limes)
¼ teaspoon xanthan gum
¼ teaspoon salt
⅔ cup sugar
2 tablespoons lime juice (from 1-3 limes)
Optional: 1/2 teaspoon lime extract
Optional: lime green gel food coloring (or 3 parts yellow + 1 part green)

In a small bowl or cup pour ½ cup coconut milk. Whisk in the cornstarch until completely combined.

In a saucepan combine the coconut cream, remaining coconut milk, and lime zest. Over medium heat bring to a boil, stirring frequently. Remove from the heat, cover, and let sit for 30 minutes.

Strain the zest out of the coconut mix. Return to a clean saucepan with the xanthan gum, salt, and sugar, and any optional extract or food coloring. Whisk to combine. Stir over low heat until sugar has fully melted and mixture is warm.

Gradually stream the cornstarch mixture into the saucepan while whisking non-stop. Once everything has been incorporated, whisk continually until the mixture comes to a soft boil.

Strain the mixture into a large measuring cup or pitcher to remove any lumps. Stir in the lime juice. Press plastic wrap against the surface of the mixture so a skin does not form. Place in the refrigerator until fully chilled.

Churn in an ice cream maker, following the machine’s instructions. Once out of the ice cream maker, place in an airtight container, cover, and freeze for at least 3 hours to allow it to further firm up.

Waffle cone bowl with scoops of lime ice cream topped with coconut flakes and a lime slice.

We’ve reached the final installment of our Nerftown breakfast series: pancakes! And not just any pancakes, but buttermilk buckwheat pancakes. These pancakes are hearty, nutty, and just a little tangy. Perfect for mornings out on the range.

A stack of pancakes with butter and maple syrup.
Nerftown Buckwheat Pancakes

Ingredients of the pancakes laid out in bowls.
All the ingredients.

Buckwheat flour gives these pancakes a delicious nutty taste and hearty texture, but regular all-purpose flour keeps these light and fluffy. The brown sugar will help bump up that wonderful rich flavor of the buckwheat flour. And buttermilk will give a little tang to the batter, but will also help activate the baking powder to give these pancakes more rise.

The flours, sugar, salt, baking soda and powder combined in a bowl.
The flours, sugar, salt, baking soda and powder.

Combine the flours, sugar, salt, baking powder, and baking soda in a large bowl. You’ll want to make sure there are no large clumps of flour left.

Melted butter and eggs added to the dry ingredients.
The eggs are under all that butter! We promise.

Add the melted butter and eggs. Stir until just combined.

The buttermilk being poured into the batter.
Pour that good, good buttermilk in.

Pour in the buttermilk and stir. You don’t want to over mix the batter or else the pancakes will come out dense and chewy from the extra gluten formation.

Whisk held above the bowl of batter to show the batter dripping into the bowl.
Texture of the batter.

Batter should be thick, but still pourable.

A pat of butter melting in a cast iron pan.
This is probably too much butter. Learn from our mistakes.

Heat a nonstick pan or heavy cast iron over medium-low heat. Place a small pat of butter on the pan. Once the butter has melted pour batter using a 1/4 cup scoop onto the surface.

Pancake cooking in the pan.
Some bubbles beginning to form.

When bubbles begin to form on the edges of the batter and the edges start to look matte, flip the pancake. Cook until deep golden brown.

Serve with butter and good maple syrup.

Pancakes stacked on a plate. Scones and sausages are in the background.
The full spread.

Nerftown Buckwheat Pancakes

1 cup (120g) buckwheat flour
1 cup (128g)all-purpose flour
4 tablespoons brown sugar
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1-1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
2 eggs
2 cups buttermilk
Additional butter; for pan

Combine the flours, sugar, salt, baking powder, and baking soda in a large bowl. Add the melted butter and eggs. Stir until just combined. Pour in the buttermilk and stir. Batter should be thick, but still pourable.

Heat a nonstick pan or heavy cast iron over medium-low heat. Place a small pat of butter on the pan. Once the butter has melted pour batter using a 1/4 cup scoop onto the surface. When bubbles begin to form on the edges of the batter, flip the pancake. Cook until deep golden brown.

Repeat with remaining batter.

The crew spends a lot of time during episodes 23 and 24 having breakfast. One of the many things they ate were nerf sausages. We were unable to find any nerf at our local grocery store, so we had to make due with beef. And then we also added some maple and bacon and jalapeno because why not?

Patty sausages on a plate. Scones can be seen in the background.

Nerf Sausage- aka Maple Bacon Jalapeno Beef Sausage

Ground beef chuck and minced bacon make up the bulk of the sausage. You can use whatever type of bacon you’d like, we used an applewood smoked bacon. For seasonings use we salt and pepper, some red pepper flakes, sage, fennel, and nutmeg. Then diced fresh jalapeno for some heat and maple syrup for a bit of sweetness and to mellow out the spice. A little bit of ice water helps everything combine.

The ingredients of the recipe set out in little bowls.
The ingredients

In a large bowl you’ll combine all the ingredients and stir well. Everything must be thoroughly combined.

All the ingredients in a mixing bowl.
Ingredients in a bowl
All the ingredients in a mixing bowl after being mixed.
Mixed mixture.

To form the patties you’ll take 1/4 cup (for small patties) or 1/2 cup (for large patties) of the mixture and form into a disk shape.

7 patties in a cast iron skillet being cooked.
Let’s get cooking!

Heat a heavy skillet or cast iron over medium-low heat. Cook the patties for about 5 to 8 minutes on each side. They should be deep brown on the outside and cooked all the way through.

8 patties in a cast iron skillet being cooked.
Look at those babies… or nerfies?

Serve while still warm.

Patty sausages on a plate.
Mapley bacony spicy sausage goodness.

These freeze incredibly well. Once you’ve formed the patties place them on wax or parchment paper on a tray and place in the freezer for an hour. Transfer them to a freezer bag. Let them thaw before cooking.

Nerf Sausage- aka Maple Bacon Jalapeno Beef Sausage

2 pounds (910g) ground chuck
0.50 lb (230g) minced bacon
1/4 cup (42g) ice water
1/4 cup (60g) maple syrup
1-1/2 teaspoon (11g) kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon (1g) coarsely ground black pepper
1 teaspoon (2g) red pepper flakes
3/4 teaspoon (2g) dried sage
1/2 teaspoon (1g) ground fennel
1/2 teaspoon (1g) ground nutmeg
2-3 (75g) diced jalapeno

Combine all ingredients in a large bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer. Mix thoroughly until completely combined.

Form into patties using 1/4 cup of the mixture per sausage for small patties, or 1/2 cup for large.

Cook patties over medium-low heat in a cast iron or heavy skillet. Cook until brown and cooked through, approximately 5-8 minutes on each side.

Word document download: Episode 11 Not So Civil Disobedience

PDF download: Episode 11 Not So Civil Disobedience

Read in browser:

Tabletop Squadron Transcript, Season 1 Episode 11:
Not So Civil Disobedience

Transcript by Tyler (Twitter: @Tyler_MoonSage)

Note – When voicing Ithorians, Nick uses an incredibly low, deep, drawn out voice and often pauses in the middle of sentences.

Note – Laura’s character Xianna’fan speaks in an accent. Most of her soft I’s sound like “ee,” and most of her TH’s sound like Z’s. Example: “this and that” = “zees and zat”

## Intro

NICK: Hi everyone, and welcome to Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars: Edge of the Empire actual play podcast. I’m Nick, your game master. Every other Thursday, our story follows a thief, a bounty hunter, a fringer, and a slicer as they explore the galaxy helping a mysterious benefactor and each other.

Friends, a lot of things have happened since two Thursdays ago so stick with me, namely I have some reviewers that I am excited to thank. First up, opRIAter. Thank you so much for your kind words and review. Also, I wanna thank Rated RConO. You’re wonderful. FLSocialWorker, you said some very nice things , and you’re a super cool person. ProperGentleman, you rhymed and were sublime, thank you. I want to thank the user FunnyStarWarsPodcast. You said some extremely kind things, and you have a super appropriate username. Special thanks to FrostyTheSnowman92. Drive safe, and thanks for joining us on our adventures. Last but not least, I want to thank Dolpheus123. You’re a thoughtful and engaging human that we all enjoy.

Phew, that was a lot. Right? Well, for anyone that was counting, that puts us at exactly 20 reviews. Cameron is currently stressfully, but happily, editing our bonus episodes featuring Karma and her twin sons. You can expect the next episode next week. I hope you all look forward to six straight weeks of Star Wars shenanigans. Everyone on Tabletop Squadron is ecstatic with the recent listener responses we’ve been getting, and we want to thank you all from the bottom of our multiple alien hearts.

After all that, thank you for listening, and I hope you enjoy.

## [0:02:05]

NICK: Hello! Welcome to Episode 11 of Tabletop Squadron. I am your host, Nick. This is going pretty good. I’m pretty happy with it. Thank you for joining us on this journey. I’m gonna go around the table. Everybody introduce themselves and their characters, starting off with the person who gave me the double bird when I said 11.

LAURA: Hi, I’m Laura. (laughter) I play Xianna who is a Twi’lek thief, and I did indeed double flip Nick off. I was just making sure you knew we were on Episode 11.

NICK: Yeah, obviously.

LAURA: I was being helpful.

NICK: Thank you very much, Laura. This is great for my self-esteem.

LAURA: You’re welcome.

NICK: And, next we got Hudson.

HUDSON: Hi Nick, it’s great to be here.

NICK: I’m glad.

HUDSON: I’m Hudson, and I’m playing Tink, a Gigoran slicer.

NICK: And, Steven.

STEVEN: Hi Nick.

NICK: Hi.

STEVEN: Thank you for allowing me this chair.

NICK: Oh, I mean, it depends on how you behave. We may take it away.

STEVEN: Yeah. … I play Sabos, a Togruta, a fringer. I’m done.

(giggling)

NICK: Good work. Yay!

CAMERON: You should just leave all of those in. Leave the whole thing in.

NICK: Listeners need to know that was like the fourth try. And last but not least, we have Cameron.

CAMERON: Hi. I’m Cameron. I’m playing Karma the Nautolan bounty hunter.

NICK: Good job. Professional. Succinct.

CAMERON: Thanks. I memorized my script.

NICK: Yeah. It’s like a sentence, so…

CAMERON: Mm-hmm!

LAURA: It’s really not that hard.

CAMERON: No, it’s really not.

STEVEN: I’ve only given it 11 times. Okay?

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: It’s true.

NICK: Alright. Before we get started, let’s kick it off with the Destiny Roll.

STEVEN: Two light side.

CAMERON: One dark side.

HUDSON: One dark side.

LAURA: One dark side.

STEVEN: God damn it, guys.

NICK: Yeah, that’s what I’m talking about.

CAMERON: Three dark side, two light side.

NICK: It’s better than last episode where I didn’t have toys to play with. This is much better. Alright. If you remember, last time we left off you went to a gaming den on the outside of the Ithorian herdship looking for Kettle, as she’s known in the underworld “the Queen,” who had won an important piece of equipment off of your contact and you needed to go get it back. You had challenged Kettle to a Sabacc tournament to try and get the Rancore Protocol back and you were successful, you even secured an IOU from the mobster, and we left off with her seeming not really that worried about it, almost like that’s what she had expected all along.

LAURA: I’m not worried.

CAMERON: I’m sure it’ll be fine.

NICK: Yeah, it’ll be fine. Don’t worry about it. I’ll probably forget. Right?

STEVEN: She’s a kind, benevolent queen.

NICK: Sure she is. Is there anything else you guys want to do in the casino? Do you want me to start you back in the bar, or on the street?

LAURA: Yes, please.

STEVEN: Bar sounds good.

CAMERON: Yeah. Let’s go back to the bar.

NICK: Okay.

LAURA: No, so, Xianna definitely goes back over to the Twi’lek waitress and gives her her com number, and is like, I’m sure this will be totally fine. “That is my number. I do not know how long we will be here, but you know.”

NICK: I’m not sure what it looks like if you’re green and you blush, but that happens.

LAURA: I think Twi’leks bleed red?

CAMERON: Yeah, but if your skin’s green…

LAURA: It would be kind of like a rutty…

NICK: I guess her skin would just darken… Eh.

CAMERON: Karma blushes a darker green, so… as blood rushes to the skin.

LAURA: I think it would just be kind of like a rutty red.

NICK: Here’s a cool writing trick. The green Twi’lek waitress blushes and titters behind her hand, and does some lekku twitches that show that she’s pleased with that ,and tucks it inside. “Well thank you, and thank you for joining us at the gambling den.” She makes eye contact for just a second, and then someone calls for her by the bar and she hurries away to go continue her job.

You leave the gambling den, and the camera zooms in on a tray of drinks and into the top of the drink, and then zooms out from a circle of drinks at a round table as you all each grab a glass, and you are back in The Gooberfish. You’re in that round booth from before, so you’re all sitting, there’s one table. You all have Felton Mox crammed between you two on each side so he’s not going anywhere. The Ithorian bartender is off kind of in the corner bustling around with the glasses, and that’s where we’re gonna start.

STEVEN: I take my Imperial Stout and say, “Good job, guys. Thank you especially, Felton.”

NICK: “Yeah, uh…”

LAURA: “I mean, he did not do very much, so…”

NICK: “What? I, I am a valued member of this team at this point. I brought you to the contact. You were successful.”

STEVEN: “You are sitting with us.”

HUDSON: “Zero is a value, I guess.”

LAURA: “Very true.”

CAMERON: (laughing) The hood giggles.

NICK: “You know, I didn’t do a lot of math growing up, so I guess—I don’t know. That’s fine. So, you have your tools you need.” The camera zooms in on the data spike and the plasteel box that you have collected. The data spike for the Rancore Protocol is curved kind of like a talon and has some exposed circuit boards on the outside. It looks a little less finished than most that you are used to. The plasteel box is about six inches by six inches and it rattles ominously for a second before going still again.

LAURA: “So, does anybody have a plan?”

STEVEN: “Do you know how to use these devices, Felton?”

HUDSON: “I can use them.”

NICK: “Well…”

STEVEN: “Tink?”

HUDSON: “Why would he—Why would you want him to use them?”

STEVEN: “Oh. I don’t want him to use them. I’m curious if he knows how.”

LAURA: “I would assume Tink would know how to use a data spike.”

HUDSON: “Yeah.”

STEVEN: “Do you know how this relates to shutting down the Imperial blockade?”

HUDSON: “Are you questioning my knowledge?”

LAURA: “Oh. We have to get onto one of the ships and then use the data spike. Right? That was said at some point”

HUDSON: “That’s correct.”

CAMERON: The hood nods.

LAURA: “Yes. So, all we have to do, just a little thing, get on an Imperial ship, and then put in the data spike, and then destroy the blockade.”

STEVEN: “That should be fine.”

LAURA: “Yeah. Uh-huh.”

NICK: Felton has really wide eyes, and he goes, “Well, uh, we’re not really sure what that data spike does, or at least I’m not. You probably are gonna wanna open that up. Since the big guy seems pretty confident in his skills he should probably work on that. Remember, the goal is to crash the flagship, break the blockade for the Ithorians, that little box there probably would be pretty useful in taking down a Star Destroyer. I wouldn’t open it though, yet, if I were you.”

LAURA: “What is in it?”

STEVEN: “Should we open it on the Star Destroyer?”

NICK: “Uh… Yeah. If you open it on the Star Destroyer it’ll probably do it. Let’s just say it’s a particularly unconventional weapon. That’s all Sentinel told me, but he did say don’t open it.”

LAURA: “Okie.”

HUDSON: “So it varies from normal convention?”

LAURA: “Well yes, that is what unconventional means.”

HUDSON: “I’m just making sure, man.”

NICK: “Yeah. You know, it’s an important point to clarify. I think you should ease up off my buddy here a little bit—“

HUDSON: “Yeah!”

NICK: “—you know, because us hairy folks gotta stick together. Am I right?”

HUDSON: “Yeah! People are questioning my knowledge. This guy gets it!”

LAURA: “No… No…”

NICK: He puts his arm up for a high five. You’re sitting on the outside of the table, so you’re gonna have to high five over Xianna.

HUDSON: I try and I miss.

NICK: Oh…

CAMERON: He’s still a little drunk.

HUDSON: I’m still a little drunk.

NICK: So, your hand hits the table, everyone’s drinks rattle, Sabos’s Imperial lager which is still pretty full goes over the side of the glass just a little and it leaves kind of sudsy, but your arms are long enough that you can reach Felton so he kind of like picks up your wrist and then high fives next to your hand so that the high five was completed.

HUDSON: “…Alright.”

LAURA: “So, anyways. We will have Tink look at the data spike, investigate that, figure out how it works. Any ideas how we get onto the Imperial ship?”

STEVEN: “We do have a code cylinder.”

CAMERON: Karma pulls out the code cylinder.

LAURA: “Oh yes, we have that.”

CAMERON: And then places it back in her jacket.

LAURA: “Big problem, none of us are human, and while you are, you know, you—“

NICK: “I knew it!”

CAMERON: (giggles)

LAURA: Xianna like holds up a finger at Felton Mox to shush him, “and you are you, but that is a special circumstance and we do not know how far we will get before they ask to see who exactly you are.”

HUDSON: “Shave me and I look enough like a human.”

STEVEN: (laughs)

LAURA: “I mean, have you shaved yourself before?”

HUDSON: “There was this one time in college. It was kind of a bet. And, yeah, it’s happened.”

LAURA: “I mean, I have seen a hairless Wookie. They do not look like humans.”

HUDSON: “They look like a human with something messed up about them.”

LAURA: “No. They look like a hairless Wookie.”

HUDSON: “You’re only one part—What do y’all think?”

NICK: “I mean, my hairy buddy here isn’t a Wookie, so maybe he looks more human. You don’t know.”

HUDSON: “That’s right.”

STEVEN: “How about we make him look like a Wookie.”

LAURA: “Wait, wait, who here is a Wookie?”

NICK: “You said a hairless Wookie doesn’t look like a human, but he’s not a hairless Wookie, he’s a Gigoran. Right? Yeah. I’ve been there once. It’s real nice. There weren’t any Gigorans there, though. That was weird.”

HUDSON: “Ah. Yeah. You just got some bonus points there, Filmon.”

(snorts)

NICK: “Uh, Felton.”

HUDSON: “Yeah.”

NICK: “Yeah. Yeah, so we’re, we’re pals—Hey. I gotta go to the bathroom, so if you guys could just let me scoot out of this booth for a second here, I’ll be right back.”

HUDSON: “Oh, no. I’ll join you. Social convention and all.”

LAURA: “Yes, Tink, you go with him.”

NICK: Okay. So there’s a way too long shot of you all like skootching out of the booth, and Xianna has to get out and wait…

LAURA: (sighs heavily)

NICK: …and Felton gets out and starts to head towards the back, and Tink goes with him?

HUDSON: Yup.

NICK: Okay. They go off camera-right into somewhere, and it’s the three of y’all sitting at the table.

LAURA: “Okie, so, how badly do you think Felton will react if he ever figures out who you are?”

CAMERON: “He was pretty drunk, so I don’t know if he’d 100% remember. He’d definitely recognize me, but it’s also at this point I’m wondering if I can just start talking but leave the hood on so that any cameras don’t see me… but the quietness is chafing.”

LAURA: “Yes.”

CAMERON: “I’ve been working on my Imperial accent, but it’s not great.”

LAURA: “We should’ve picked a human.”

STEVEN: “As long as they don’t recognize me, Togrutas aren’t super threatening.”

LAURA: “No, but they do not look Imperial.”

CAMERON: “But you’re also an alien.”

STEVEN: “I could be a servant.”

LAURA: “No.”

CAMERON: “Well yeah, that’s how we got here—“

STEVEN: “Indeed.”

CAMERON: “—was that we’re ignoring the fact that I’m not human.”

STEVEN: “Yeah, oh yeah, right. I am the servant.”

CAMERON: “Yeah.”

STEVEN: “Oh. Yeah, that’s true.”

LAURA: “So, getting through the blockade is one thing. Getting onto an Imperial ship is a different thing, because then like, real people see us in person and see that we are not human.”

CAMERON: “So, well, this gets a little weird, but some of y’all do have Imperial bounties on you. I could turn you in, we get the money for the bounty, and then you’re on the Star Destroyer, we’re there, we wreck whatever havoc we need to, and then hopefully we leave.”

LAURA: “Yes.”

STEVEN: “That sounds alright. I’m just not sure if my bounty is important enough to them to actually seem not sketch.”

LAURA: “Well, we could always wreck up the place down here a bit.”

STEVEN: “We… could. Somewhere the Imperials are watching?”

LAURA: “Yes.” (laughs)

NICK: The Ithorian bartender kind of leans around the bar and goes, “I… would like… to disagree.”

LAURA: “No, no, not this place specifically, this bar, I mean like an Imperial station or something.”

NICK: “With that plan…”

LAURA: “Yeah.”

NICK: The Ithorian bartender is like paused with a finger up… and then goes back to wiping down the bar.

LAURA: “Yes. So, if we could find some sort of Imperial outpost or galactic run company front, or something like that.”

CAMERON: “The way that this would need to work if it is me turning y’all in, I would need to drop you off and I would need to leave, and y’all would need to get another ship to get off.”

NICK: Smash cut to Tink and his buddy Felton in the bathroom at two urinals. Tinkly water noises.

LAURA: Psss… (hissing)

NICK: Oh, no, that’s like a sibilant noise. We don’t want that one. Have you been in a men’s bathroom? It doesn’t sound like that at all.

LAURA: Well, I can’t make the tinkle sounds of hitting the porcelain!

HUDSON: Blorb blorb blorb blorb blorb.

STEVEN: Just imagine asparagus.

HUDSON: Ew.

NICK: Ugh.

LAURA: That’s not a sound!

NICK: You’re gross!

STEVEN: I use too many bathrooms at work.

NICK: Sounds like asparagus. (others giggle)

The camera is on their backs, and you see Felton’s head turn towards Tink. “You know, sometimes they call me the Rancore of Coronet,” and he’s like looking pretty proud of himself.

HUDSON: “Are you coming on to me?”

NICK: “Uh… I—No? May—“

HUDSON: “Good.”

NICK: “Okay. Yeah, I wouldn’t, come on, no. we’re, I hope—It’s platonic!” And he turns around real quick. We cut back to the table.

HUDSON: So awkward. (laughter)

CAMERON: It’s so awkward.

LAURA: “So, yes, we will throw some like grenades at some—“

STEVEN: “I could be your bounty.”

CAMERON: “No no no.”

LAURA: “No, not my bounty. I’m not bringing them in. I have a bounty out for me. It was more than yours.”

STEVEN: “Aren’t you the bounty–?”

CAMERON: “I am a bounty hunter, under the cloak here.”

STEVEN: “Oh okay, yeah.”

LAURA: “Karma is the bounty hunter.”

STEVEN: “Yeah, that’s right…”

CAMERON: “Y’all are the ones with bounties.”

STEVEN: “Yeah. I’m trying to find a reason…”

LAURA: “Yes. Well, Tink doesn’t really have one—“

CAMERON: “No. Tink was clean.”

LAURA: “—but I’m pretty sure if you just bring a Gigoran in they will assume he did something.”

CAMERON: “Well, it’s also how we want to work it. Do we want to split and have Tink be somewhere separate where he can hack into things if necessary, or do we want him on the ship?”

LAURA: “You know, he is surprisingly sneaky for his size. He could be on the ship and then sneak off while you are bringing us in. we will just make some sort of loud commotion as you are bringing us in so that they do not look as closely to the ship as they should. He sneaks off and he hides in there, and then we meet up later?”

NICK: Smash cut to the bathroom! They’re still standing at the urinals. Felton says, “You know, I’ve always kind of had a thing for tentacles.”

HUDSON: “Oh… Yeah. I know a fellow with head tails. Is that what you mean?”

NICK: “Uh… You know, my friends always said never date a Togruta. I’ve made that mistake before.”

HUDSON: “Oh, and you’re not willing to make it again, are ya?”

NICK: “I mean, what’s a mistake but another of life’s little lessons, right?” And we snap back to the table.

(laughter)

LAURA: I want Tink to set Sabos up on a date!

STEVEN: And I hope Felton is—He’s like, he’s been done peeing, but Tink obviously isn’t, so he’s just standing there still, just pretending.

LAURA: Just like a race horse, just goes forever.

CAMERON: He had a very large drink at the gaming den.

NICK: Okay, yeah. That’s canon.

STEVEN: He’s bigger, clearly.

CAMERON: Tink has a very large bladder.

LAURA: Yes. He’s giant.

STEVEN: Yeah. “So, I need to be on the ship, or I go out with you as your servant still?”

LAURA: “No. So, you have a bounty.”

STEVEN: “I do.”

LAURA: “I have a bounty, so we have to be seen, and we should probably do something here to make it a little bit more pressing, so we should like be seen doing something to a building, or Imperials, or stormtroopers, something of that nature, so that when Karma brings us in they are a little bit more excited about it.”

CAMERON: “Just so that there’s a reason that I’m disturbing the blockade.”

LAURA: “Yes.”

STEVEN: “Will they not be suspicious that Karma’s servant now suddenly has a bounty?”

CAMERON: “No.”

LAURA: “No, no, she will take off the robe, the cape, situation.”

CAMERON: “Yeah. I would become myself again.”

STEVEN: “Oh, I see. I understand now.”

LAURA: Because she is a known bounty hunter, so they will not be suspicious if she, as Karma, brings us in.”

STEVEN: “Will they let her as Karma back through the blockade on the way out?”

LAURA: “No.”

CAMERON: “They probably will not let me leave, but I should at least be able to get to the ship and drop y’all off.”

STEVEN: “Yes, that’s true.”

LAURA: “And then Tink can hide in the ship, and when we make some sort of commotion he gets off the ship and hides, and then we will just somehow try to meet up later, get out of the prison, or you know Tink come gets us.”

NICK: So, one thing I do want to call out, if you “turn in a bounty,” if you want to preserve your relationship with the Empire, you would want to be careful that they don’t see you for what you’re doing, which is like letting people loose on their ship for hijinks.

CAMERON: Yeah. That’s why I was saying that I would need to leave once I dropped them off, and like once the dealings were done and I found out if there were any other people I could go after on the planet, because obviously I’m not gonna try and leave because of the blockade, and I respect the Imperials, so it’s just if there’s anyone else down there they want me to get while I’m stuck here.

NICK: Yeah.

LAURA: “Also, you can tell them that you have another bounty. Does Felton have a bounty?”

CAMERON: “One sec. I know he does on Coronet. I don’t know if he does within the system, though.” I get out my data pad and look up Felton Mox.

LAURA: “We could always bring Felton with us when we go… I don’t know, throw grenades at the place? We’ll figure that part out.”

NICK: Smash cut to the bathroom. It is very clear that Felton has been done peeing for a while but he’s still standing there staring at the wall, and his head tilts over towards Tink again who is still going. “So, uh, what’s your deal?”

HUDSON: (laughs) “So… Tink made a tinkle.”

(laughter)

NICK: “Ha ha ha…”

LAURA: Oh, you are too drunk.

NICK: Felton stops for a second. “Uh… Yeah. Yeah, you did,” and then snap back to the table.

LAURA: “What we could do is you drop Sabos and I off and then you say that you have another bounty back on the planet that you will have to bring up later, and that way you can come back for us.”

CAMERON: “That’s true. I could do that.”

LAURA: “And we will just have to be very careful to sneak onto the ship so that they do not ever know we are together, because I think you want to still stay a respectable-ish bounty hunter?”

CAMERON: “Everyone’s life is a lot easier if one of us on the crew is not wanted.”

LAURA: “Yes.”

STEVEN: “You could just say you caught me gambling, because I think it’s clear that my bounty is a money problem. Right?”

LAURA: “I do not think that gambling is illegal. Is it?”

STEVEN: “Well, I have a bounty, though.”

LAURA: “I mean, in some places it is.”

STEVEN: “I do have a money problem bounty.”

CAMERON: “Yeah, I mean, I could definitely pick you up in the gambling den, but that wouldn’t be why I was turning you in. It would just be, that might be where I saw you, to make them think that you were gambling away all of the money that you stole from them.”

STEVEN: “Exactly. I feel like they would take me for that.”

CAMERON: “Well, I mean, they’re gonna take you anyway. There’s a bounty out on you.”

STEVEN: “It’s a little bounty.”

CAMERON: “I know, but they’re still gonna pay me and take you.”

STEVEN: “True.”

LAURA: “But again, that is why we are going to go be seen publicly doing something illegal so that when she brings us to the ship it is a little bit more impactful, because we would have just done something.”

STEVEN: “I’m just worried about my diplomatic status.”

LAURA: “That is not a thing at this point. That is gone. It is no more.”

STEVEN: “Oh, I am an Osaronian diplomat.”

LAURA: “No…”

CAMERON: “Yes, so we’re not arguing with that. What Xianna is saying is that you already kriffed up your relationship with the Empire.”

STEVEN: “Oh, they don’t know me.”

CAMERON: “Uh, yeah they do. They have a BOUNTY out on you, Sabos.”

LAURA: “You have a 2,000 credit bounty.”

STEVEN: “Just a little bounty.”

CAMERON: “Yes. That still means they know about you.”

STEVEN: “I play both sides. You know, I know some of the Empire, I make deals with the others, some try to catch me.”

LAURA: “Okie. So, as someone who often plays both sides, the problem is eventually—“

NICK: Heh.

(laughter)

LAURA: “Eventually both sides figure out what is going on, and sometimes those both sides get together to come after you as a group, and that is worse.”

NICK: We cut to a well-furnished dark wood office overlooking a jungle, and we see a tan man with little horns wearing an Imperial uniform holding a martini glass staring out the window. Falx goes, “Wow. I feel like someone was just talking about me.” And we cut back to the table.

LAURA: “So, if you have an Imperial warrant for your arrest for 2,000 credits, the Empire knows because they issued the warrant. Do you understand how warrants work?”

CAMERON: “And did you notice that eventually Falx did look y’all up. That’s something that they do. They do run your credentials.”

STEVEN: “Eh…”

LAURA: “I am not surprised about that. I am a career criminal. That is how that works. That’s why I use fake names. You keep using the same two names.”

STEVEN: “Normally Osaron is just too far and remote for them to come and worry about.”

LAURA: “And that is fine…”

CAMERON: “And see, that works great as long as you’re not interacting with Imperials, but you’re going to be.”

LAURA: “…but you are interacting, and you have an Imperial warrant.”

STEVEN: “Oh… That’s fine. I think I can pay it off.”

NICK: Smash cut, back to the bathroom. There’s no longer any urinating noises. They’re both still standing at the urinal. Felton turns to Tink. “We’ve been in here a really long time.”

HUDSON: “Uh, I don’t even know what time is anymore. I can’t figure out how long I’ve been in here. You’ll have to help me with that.”

NICK: “Right. I think it’s probably time to go back to the table. If you go first I’ll make sure I wash hands for the both of us.”

HUDSON: “I’m supposed to be watching you because you’re my friend, so I think that we should wash our hands and I’ll follow behind you.”

NICK: “Alright. Let’s get those hands washed, big guy.” And they go over to the sink. Cut back to the table.

LAURA: “So again, I feel like we have this plan already planned out pretty well.”

STEVEN: “Sounds good.”

LAURA: “Okie. Do you understand?”

STEVEN: “I think so.”

LAURA: “I’m sure it’ll be fine. Okie.”

STEVEN: “Oh yes.”

LAURA: “So, I guess we should find some sort of Imperial galactic place that we can be seen, like, graffiti-ing, or throwing a grenade at, or… Do we have like real bombs?”

NICK: On that note, Felton and Tink walk back to the table. There’s an awkward silence as Xianna skootches out and Felton skootches in.

HUDSON: “Me and Femur are back from the whiz palace, all.”

LAURA: “Anyways. So Felton, do you have like any bombs on you? Or not necessarily on you, but like at your place, or one we could borrow?”

NICK: (Felton sighs)

STEVEN: “Well…”

LAURA: “I guess one we could just use.”

STEVEN: “We might not return it.”

LAURA & CAMERON: “We will not return it.”

NICK: “Yeah, no. I gave you two of the strongest weapons in the galaxy just now, so.”

LAURA: “No, we need like a little bomb.”

NICK: “Mmm… no, but I know someone who might be able to help.” We can swipe cut, and what I want to do is a montage of Sabos and Xianna doing public disturbance type stuff for the camera. So, think of your first thing that you do.

STEVEN: Where are we at?

NICK: You’re on the herdship.

STEVEN: No, I get that, but what do we see around us?

LAURA: Like, are there stormtroopers? Is there like…

STEVEN: Statues that are important to the Imperials?

LAURA: Yeah, anything important to the Empire?

CAMERON: Trying to mess stuff up for the Empire, not necessarily the people who live here.

LAURA: Is there a statue of Sheev?

NICK: So, the problem is Ithor has been fairly neutral, and you guys may remember the first Imperial to set foot on the planet since the blockade was Karma, apparently, so there isn’t a lot of stuff. There’s a few things. There is an Imperial archive that has been there, because they place those all over the place, so it’s like a library with a lot of military records, but they’re like propaganda records so they’re not that helpful. There are some communication nodes that go back and forth into space. They’ve been silent lately but they are monitored. Your best bet you realize would probably be to take out infrastructure stuff, because the Imperials want these things functioning so they can use them. If you take down like public transit or electro-grids or anything like that, that’s something that they’re going to notice, but because there’s no Imperial presence the more stuff you do the Ithorians may complain. It may go into your reputation a little bit, but they’re kind of incommunicado, so it’ll really just help you get off planet and to the ship faster, it’s not gonna make you higher profile, and the more you do the more you’ve messed up this neutral city.

CAMERON: So, before we start selecting the targets, Karma wants to go talk to the Oracle again and just explain we’re trying to break the blockade, which we had talked about beforehand when we met them before.

NICK: Let’s just do that scene.

LAURA: Yeah. Let’s say that Sabos and Karma go there, and then Xianna and Tink take Felton and—

CAMERON: And babysit Felton?

LAURA: –and go get a bomb.

NICK: Okay. We need to do those two scenes. So, we’ll start with, we swipe to Sabos and Karma standing in front of the Oracle who is sitting cross-legged. “You have returned… quickly.”

CAMERON: “Yes. We are putting a plan in place to break the blockade, and wanted to run a few things by you and get some advice.”

NICK: “I exist… for advice…”

STEVEN: “That’s true.”

CAMERON: “Wonderful.” Karma’s never quite sure where the sentence finishes, so she waits a little bit longer than—It becomes slightly socially awkward to make sure that the Oracle’s done talking.

NICK: The Oracle looks extremely placid and calm, and doesn’t seem to notice how uncomfortable you are with conversing with him.

CAMERON: “So, the current plan is to try and cause some problems on the herdship that hopefully do not inconvenience your people in a particularly large way but would cause the interest of the Empire so that the ones responsible could be taken to them to reach the ships. So, I would like to request assistance in selecting these targets to where hopefully the end result of this is that the blockade is no more and you can resume life normally, but not have the small amounts of destruction impede that normal life.”

NICK: “The wisdom… of the Mother Jungle… states… that to preserve the trees, sometimes you must prune branches. You… will not… be prosecuted… for any mischief. What… targets are you looking… to attack?”

CAMERON: (giggles) “Things we had discussed were potentially communication nodes that the Empire might be utilizing, the Imperial archives, but also potentially some infrastructure as they want Ithor to continue its current production of everything, so some infrastructure things there. I’m more requesting assistance in selecting infrastructure targets that do not impede your people but might seem like large enough disturbances to warrant the Empire’s attention.”

NICK: The Oracle’s eyes get real wide, and they say, “Whatever… you choose… do not destroy the repulsor pylons. The city will fall out of the sky.”

CAMERON: “Oh, of course. Yes. Not the pylons ,no. more like transportation and those types of things. On top of the herdship, not the inner workings of the herdship at all.”

NICK: “Good. We have a small but respectable metro system… It’s like a monorail, but it’s Star Wars.”

CAMERON: “Oh, cool.”

NICK: “And we don’t use it much, because our population… is shrunken. Knock yourselves out.”

CAMERON: “Wonderful. We’ll make sure the area is clear of any citizens before knocking ourselves out.”

NICK: It’s eyes widen again, and says, “I had assumed… that was a given.”

CAMERON: “Yes. I was just stating it to be clear.”

NICK: “Thank you. We will allow you… to handle the details. What else did you need?”

CAMERON: “Did we need anything else?”

STEVEN: “I think that’s all, your Oracle-ness.”

CAMERON: “I think that is it.”

NICK: It smiles at you like it likes that title. “Well, thank you.” It turns around and it is clearly dismissing you.

STEVEN: “Good bye.”

CAMERON: We leave.

NICK: Swipe cut to… Tink and Xianna and Felton are doing a deal to get a bomb.

LAURA: I’m picturing that we’re like in some back shop that just has like electronics, and we’re doing the whole like, ‘so we need, you know, some special equipment.’ We’re doing one of those things where Felton is asking somewhat code, and we’re just like ‘mm-hmm.’

NICK: From the camera angle, it’s like a dark shop, it’s got a glass case, there’s some random assorted electronics. There’s a Devaronian shopkeeper, which is like a sort of devil-looking guy if you’ve listened to any of the episodes—

CAMERON: A ‘dee-vil.’

LAURA: A ‘dee-vil!’

NICK: Oh man.

LAURA: Hudson, say it.

HUDSON: ‘Dee-vil!’

(laughter)

NICK: Okay. There’s a Devaronian behind the counter, and he’s like, “So, I’m not sure I quite understand. What exactly are you looking for?”

LAURA: Xianna leans in real close, and I imagine this is after a few minutes of subtle little things, like “you know, some equipment,” and she leans in and she goes, “we need, um, how do you say, a bomb.”

NICK: He’s also leaned in, and he goes, “Oh, a bomb. All this weird double speak, I thought you were looking for like drugs or something.”

LAURA: “You have drugs?”

NICK: “Uh, well, that kinda depends.” You can see there’s a little curtain, and on the other side of the building there’s a normal large shop that seems to be selling a lot of gardening implements and stuff like that.

An Ithorian pokes its head through the curtain and says, “What is the problem?”

And the Davronian goes, “Hey, don’t worry about it, just doing some deals back here. You know, I’m here to sell the over inventory. That’s why I’m here. Don’t worry about it one thing. Why don’t you just go back to the main part of the shop?”

“Okay…” And they go away.

“Oh yeah. We got lots of drugs.”

LAURA: “Do you have impact?”

NICK: “Oh yeah, we got impact.” He hits the counter and the top pops open, and you see that it’s like a mirror case, and inside there’s just a nice container shadow box with a lot of different compartments, and he pulls out a surprisingly large baggy of impact.

LAURA: “How much?”

NICK: “Uh, probably only charge you about 20% over the going rate.”

LAURA: (pauses)

NICK: “We’re under a blockade.”

LAURA: Yeah. How many doses of impact do you think is in the bag?

NICK: Like, ten.

LAURA: So…

NICK: Okay. Here’s what I want to happen story-wise, Laura. I want you to have to choose between getting a shit-ton of impact and being able to buy the bomb.

LAURA: So, Xianna’s like, “How much is the bomb?”

NICK: “About 1,200 credits.”

HUDSON: “I think we may have that.”

LAURA: “No, so, do You have 1,200 credits?”

HUDSON: Uh… I thought we had 1,200 credits.

LAURA: I have 1,500.

HUDSON: Oh, that’s not group money.

LAURA: No, I personally have 1,504 credits. What do you personally have?

HUDSON: 270.

LAURA: Okay…

STEVEN: (laughs)

LAURA: Xianna’s like doing the math in her head. She’s like, ‘oh shit, no.’ (sighs) “Okie, fine. We will buy the bomb.”

NICK: “man, you’re really missing out. You know, this impact, it’s like top notch stuff.”

HUDSON: “We’ll take the bomb!”

LAURA: “I mean, could you sell me like, a smaller amount than the giant bag?”

NICK: “Well… no.”

LAURA: (sighs)

NICK: “I would hate to break up such a big collection, you know. The dealers really prefer this amount. If I break it up even less than that then I won’t be able to get all my money back.”

STEVEN: Yeah, that’s how that works.

NICK: Shut up.

(laughter)

LAURA: ‘Hate to break up the collection!’

HUDSON: That’s how drug dealers talk.

NICK: “No, it’s like this is our gross. If you start selling less than this then people won’t be able to smuggle it.”

STEVEN: Oh, I’d hate to break up the distribution size to people that buy it to make money on the distribution—(laughter) Sounds fine, though. It’s all good.

NICK: “No, because plot points!”

LAURA: “Fine. We will take the bomb.”

HUDSON: “Thank you, Xianna.” I’m very sober by this point.

NICK: Okay. He routes around and he pulls out what looks like two thermal detonators stuck together with a toilet paper tube.

LAURA: Cool.

NICK: It’s got like extra wires and things, and he sets it on the counter and nudges it so that it rolls, and that seems real sketch.

LAURA: Yeah. Xianna takes it and then holds it for a second, and as she’s putting it in her pocket goes, “Oh, and do you have cans of spray paint?”

NICK: “Uh, yeah.” And we’ll cut from there to the next scene.

LAURA: So, the bomb was 1,200?

NICK: Yeah. Expensive bomb. But now you have a large story bomb that does story bomb things.

LAURA: Yay, story bombs. Booomb~

NICK: So, you all wanna do your sabotage montage?

LAURA: Yes. The first one we’re gonna do is we walk to the archives. Xianna has Sabos walk to the Imperial building, and she throws him a can of spray paint and goes, “Okie. Tag the front of the building, Free Ithor.”

STEVEN: “In Basic?”

LAURA: “In whatever language you want, but probably Basic so that the Imperials read that it says Free Ithor.”

STEVEN: “Oh, I see.”

LAURA: “So, tag that building.”

STEVEN: I tag the building that says the Imperial Archive that says Free Ithor, in Basic. I also draw a figure with four head tails.

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: It’s your signature.

LAURA: As he’s doing that, Xianna’s just kind of watching, and once he finishes up walks into the building—

STEVEN: Oh, and I use my head tails to rub some of the paint artistically.

NICK: Egh.

LAURA: No…

CAMERON: Oh god.

NICK: So, how I picture this, Sabos wasn’t around for parts of the plan so you just hand him the spray paint and say just tag Free Ithor on it, and he goes up and tags it, and as he’s rubbing his head tails into it and really getting into it you can see he’s starting to like… He started with just a tag, and then he’s going back and starting to like, perfectionist stuff. Karma, how do you arrest him while he’s doing this?”

CAMERON: Alright. We’re kind of all standing in the shadows to the side. I turn to Felton, “Don’t freak out,” and I drop my cloak.

NICK: He looks at you and goes, “Oh, that actually explains a lot. Man, that Togruta is gonna really be surprised when he finds out that he’s been hanging out with a bounty hunter this whole time.”

CAMERON: “…Yup.” (laughs) “Surprise.”

LAURA: Surprise~

CAMERON: I swing my carbine around to my front and just stalk out into the street, and I think I’m gonna shoot him. I’m gonna stun him.

NICK: Okay… So, Sabos—

CAMERON: It’s gotta be convincing, okay?

STEVEN: (sighs)

CAMERON: I didn’t tell you I was gonna stun you, though. You knew you were gonna get arrested, but you didn’t know I was gonna shoot you.

STEVEN: I did.

NICK: So, Sabos, you turn around and you’re like, ‘Hey, is this re—‘ (whooshing shooting noise) and you just get dropped. Then we swipe cut to a monorail station, but it’s a real small station with a really big track, and a train has just gone by with two Ithorians on it. It’s like a six car train, but not very many people are using it. Xianna, what do you do?

LAURA: So there are people on the train?

NICK: They’re on the train but they just went by, so if you destroy the tracks it’s not gonna drop them.

LAURA: Okay. So, Xianna also takes out a can of spray paint and tags the building again with Free Ithor, and then sets the bomb and runs off, but she makes sure that she looks into the cameras and probably does a little kiss and wave at whichever one she sees as she’s tagging the place, and then just like sets the timer, tosses the bomb behind her, and runs out.

NICK: Karma, how do you arrest her before she makes her escape?

LAURA: Oh, we definitely timed it. I was like, I will run out of this building, and you tackle me.

CAMERON: Yeah. I was carrying Sabos around, because I literally just arrested him, and just—

NICK: You can have like a wheelbarrow that you’ve been carting him in.

CAMERON: Yeah. I just had a wagon. I was pulling a wagon behind me, and I had Sabos in the wagon. He’s in binders at this point. I just see the explosion start as Xianna runs out of the building, and just run and flying tackle from the side… but it’s all done very artfully so that we both land on the side so that we don’t hurt each other.

LAURA: We rehearsed it.

CAMERON: Yeah. We practiced a lot.

LAURA: It’s very WWE.

CAMERON: Yeah.

NICK: So, we get two different camera shots. The first one is a close up kind of grainy security cam film of Xianna in profile spray painting and she does her smooch and wave and winks at the camera, and turns, and then becomes all business and runs out. Then we get a pan of the wide street of another security camera that’s kind of gritty, and she takes like three steps, and then we just see Karma go (three impact noises) and just nail her, and they go flying off screen again.

So, from there, we cut to you all in space. Is Tink on the ship as well? I would imagine so.

LAURA, CAMERON, & HUDSON: Yeah.

NICK: So, you’re on the Afternoon Delight—

CAMERON: Can we take a different ship up?

NICK: Yeah.

CAMERON: I’d like to not take our ship.

LAURA: Just like rent a ship.

CAMERON: Yeah. I just want a rental, because obviously I’m not in my bounty hunting ship, and I’ve been here a while. I didn’t come in on the Imperial shuttle. ‘I’ve been here.’ So, I just rent a ship.

NICK: Okay. We’ll get you the Star Wars equivalent of a daycare van.

CAMERON: Awesome, great.

NICK: It’s a very blocky ship with just like a single view port, nothing fancy, seats like six people, and that’s it. It’s for short hops.

CAMERON: It has a cargo compartment though, so that Tink can hide in the cargo compartment.

NICK: Yes. There’s a compartment under the floor of the ship that a Gigoran laying prone could fit in. we get a shot from behind the ship as it’s on an approach vector to the Star Destroyer. You get a ping on the com, and you hear, “Unidentified vessel, why are you approaching the ISD Vengeance?”

CAMERON: “Yes. This is bounty hunter—“ insert Karma’s bounty hunter ID.

NICK: Whoop! We get the close-in of a slide in card, and the three yellow lights that go across over and over again, because 70’s Star Wars thing. “We have your identification. Why are you approaching the Vengeance?”

CAMERON: “I have two bounties to turn in to Imperial control.”

NICK: “We don’t normally accept bounties on blockade. Why should we let you onto the ship?”

CAMERON: “Well, there’s no holding pattern on the ground, and they’ve been causing some mayhem aboard the herdship. There was a transportation center blown up, and tagging, causing some unrest across the populous, and I figured you’d like them off planet. You are my only option to turn them in at this point.”

NICK: “Oh yes, because you’re not getting out of here, especially not in that.”

CAMERON: “Well, obviously. (laughs)”

NICK: “Roger that, Ithorian sip, uh, Harmless.” (snickering) “You can approach to the third landing bay. Have your prisoners restrained and we will process bounties accordingly.”

CAMERON: “Thank you. Proceeding to the landing bay.”

NICK: Beep-boop. And then we get the shot of the ship going in, and it’s like the cool Star Wars models so it looks nice, and then it lands. How do you all look coming off of the ship? Are they beat up? Are they bindered?

CAMERON: Yes, bindered.

LAURA: Yes.

CAMERON: Sabos is looking a little worse for wear, because I shot him…

STEVEN: Do I come in on a wheelbarrow?

CAMERON: No. it’s been long enough by the time—My stun probably didn’t 100% knock you out, it just, yeah.

LAURA: Stun just works how you need it to work in Star Wars.

CAMERON: Yeah. It just, it got you pretty good, and I was able to get the handcuffs on you while you were unaware. So, you look a little frazzled, probably.

STEVEN: I look frazzled.

NICK: Does Sabos have like, a head tail askew, like bad hair? Is he that frazzled?

LAURA & CAMERON: I don’t think that’s how that works.

LAURA: That’s like a nose. I think it’d be broken.

NICK: Oh no.

CAMERON: Yeah, no. he’s fine. He looks a little roughed up. He’s—What color spray paint were you using?

STEVEN: Uh, we’ll go with black.

CAMERON: So, he’s got the tip of his head tails kind of covered in black, and it’s kind of a nice ombre up his head tails with the black.

NICK: Nice work.

CAMERON: Yeah, well he was doing gradient for his graffiti painting, so it kind of did that naturally, but his hands are kind of covered in paint.

STEVEN: See, it couldn’t be red, because it would just blend in with me.

NICK: I was picturing mustard yellow for the graffiti. I don’t know why.

STEVEN: I figure the Imperial archive is a nice, uh…

CAMERON: Clean gray building.

STEVEN: Yeah.

NICK: It’s always gray.

CAMERON: It’s a nice solid black, looks nice.

STEVEN: Exactly. Nice clean gray, so black is definitely noticeable.

NICK: Yeah, it’ll be a pain to clean, and they can never match it when they try to paint over it, so then it looks really obvious. Xianna?

CAMERON: You probably have some soot on you from the explosion.

LAURA: Yeah. I probably added extra soot, and I definitely made sure to hide everything in my deepest pockets. I probably left a can of spray paint in one of the easy to find pockets, so if they search me they feel like they found something, and then I took my scanner goggles off and put it in the deep pockets with my other stuff.

CAMERON: Well, anything you don’t want them to have Karma can keep, too, if you don’t want them to confiscate it. Like, your rifle and stuff, I won’t turn you in with a rifle

STEVEN: That would be a good idea.

LAURA: So, I most likely gave you things like my binders, my surveillance tagger, the IOU from Kettle, but I probably kept my blaster and my little snuff box, because I just put them in my deep pockets because they’re decently hard to check, but I did leave a can of spray paint and some little things for them to find and they feel like they did something when they search me.

STEVEN: I’ll have nothing but a com link in my padded armor.

CAMERON: Your com link’s probably in your… however you have ears.

STEVEN: Yeah.

NICK: So, you’re frog marched out by Karma. There’s two stormtroopers next to a low ranking Imperial officer. He looks like the deck commander. He says, “Well, are these our ne’er-do-wells?” and he looks pretty proud of himself. He’s got like a little squeebly mustache.

STEVEN: “I think I did pretty well.”

CAMERON: “Indeed, officer, they are.”

NICK: “Well, if the records of the scans are to be approved, I don’t know why you look so proud of yourself, Togruta. All you did was spray paint some things.”

LAURA: “I mean, that is actually quite a bit for him.”

CAMERON: “They apparently know each other.”

NICK: “Huh, interesting.”

STEVEN: “Oh, we know each other pretty well.”

LAURA: “No…”

STEVEN: I say implicatively.

LAURA: (laughs)

NICK: “Well, we’ll be taking over custody now. After the bounty has been turned in and approved you can expect your payment in six to eight weeks.”

LAURA: “I mean, so who approved your mustache?”

NICK: “I’m an Imperial. We can have mustaches.”

LAURA: “You really shouldn’t, though.”

NICK & STEVEN: Ohhh.

NICK: He motions to a stormtrooper and they punch you in the stomach with the butt of their rifle.

LAURA: “Ow!”

NICK: It hurts.

CAMERON: I swap out my binders with the binders that the stormtroopers have.

NICK: Yeah. It’s all very professional, just click-click, snap-snap.

CAMERON: Yup. Remove mine, put them back up on my head tails.

NICK: The deck commander looks kind of smug and leans over. “Not so smug now, are you? Search the prisoners!” And the stormtroopers come up and start to pat you down. What does your smuggling coat do?

LAURA: It’s an opposed Skulduggery.

NICK: Oh shit. So they’ll have two green… Does the coat make it an opposed Skulduggery, or give you a bonus to it?

LAURA: No, it is an opposed Skulduggery to search.

NICK: Oh. Yeah, they only have two greens. Well, we’ll make it a green and a red. This guy’s been trained. He’s a marine.

LAURA: I want to flip a light side point. I really don’t want them to find my stuff.

NICK: Well, so it’s opposed… Yeah, you can roll a purple and a red on yours, so that we’re building a smaller pool.

LAURA: Six successes, but two threats. And remember, they will find the spray paint.

NICK: Yeah, so they find the spray paint. The stormtrooper pulls it out and says, (muffled) “All she has is this, sir.”

LAURA: “Hey, I want that back. That is mine.”

NICK: “You can have that back… in jail! Ha ha ha.”

LAURA: “Oh, so you will actually give it to me once I am in my cell?”

NICK: The deck commander just slowly shakes his head and says, “Take them to the holding cell.” They pat down Sabos and pull off his com. They leave your armor on, they don’t care. They start to march you away, and the last shot we have is Karma standing at the thing… You’re gonna leave, right?

CAMERON: Yes, after Tink gets off the ship.

NICK: Right. Karma is standing at the foot of the on-ramp, and Tink lifts up the roof of his smuggling compartment and sticks his head out, and says…

HUDSON: “Am I good to go?”

CAMERON: (quietly) “Yeah, I thought you left already.”

HUDSON: “Oh—“ I run out.

(laughter)

NICK: And that’s where we’ll end the episode!

(all make dramatic noises and Star Wars tunes)

## Outro

CAMERON: Thanks for listening to Tabletop Squadron. If you enjoyed our show please consider logging into iTunes and giving us a five-star review. Five-star reviews will help new listeners to find the show.

Xianna’fan is played by Laura Penrod. She can be found on Twitter at @cheerio_buffet.

Tink is played by Hudson Jameson and he can be found on Twitter at @hudsonjameson.

Karma Nailo is played by me, Cameron Robertson. You can find me on Twitter at @midnightmusic13.

Sabos Nix was played by Steven Schroeder. He… does not exist on the internet.

Our game master is Nick Robertson, and you can find him on Twitter at @alias58.

Our intro song is Space Jam by Pablo Ribot.

Additional music by James Gunter.

Follow the podcast on Twitter and Instagram at @tabletop_squad. For real! We’re real people and we wanna talk to anyone who listens to the show. Reach out! See you next time.

The crew spends a lot of time during episodes 23 and 24 having breakfast. One of said breakfast items was scones. Some were certainly regular cream scones served with butter and jam, but some were probably heartier, like these Oatmeal Rum-Raisin Scones.

The scones piled on a plate. Pancakes, maple syrup, and sausages are out of focus in the background.
Breakfast is ready!

These scones are made with a mix of all-purpose flour, whole wheat flower, and oats. This creates a wonderful hearty flavor and a chewy texture. Brown sugar adds sweetness, and cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves add a warm spice. Orange zest brings a hint of freshness and prevents these from tasting flat.

All the ingredients measured out into small bowls.
The ingredients

The real secret in letting the raisins soak in spiced rum. This plums them up and adds some extra flavor.

If you don’t wish to or cannot use rum, apple juice or cider would work as well.

These will sit for an hour and get nice and plump.

Rum poured into the bowl of raisins.
Rum-Raisins in the making.

When the raisins are almost done soaking you’ll combine all the dry ingredients in a large bowl and give them a good mix.

All the dry ingredients combined in a large mixing bowl.
The dry ingredients.

Then you’ll add the cubed butter. You’ll want the butter to stay as cold as possible for the best texture. If the butter gets too warm into melt into the flour and create a doughy texture instead of light and crumbly.

Cubed butter adding to the mixing bowl of dry ingredients.
Add the butter.

You’ll “cut” the butter into the flour mixture by cutting it up into small pieces. You can do this with a pastry cutter, a handle with thin wires or cutters, or you can use two butter knives and slice at the pieces of butter.

The final butter pieces should be very fine and blended into the mixture.

Then you’ll add the buttermilk and stir just until the dough begins to form. Drain the raisins, you can use the leftover rum for whatever you’d like, and add to the dough. Continue stirring until the dough is mostly combined.

Raisins added to the dough.
Raisins added.

Next, you’ll pour out the dough on a flat surface, with some extra flour to prevent sticking, and knead until the dough is fully mixed and cohesive.

Dough turned out onto a surface for kneading.
Time to knead!

Form it into a flattened disk about 2 inches tall.

The dough formed into a flat round.
The final dough.

Cut the dough into 8 equal pieces.

The dough divided into 8 triangular pieces.
Divided up.

Place the scones on a lined baking sheet and put them in the 400 degree F oven for 15-20 minutes.

The scones on a baking sheet.
Baking time.

While the scones are baking you’ll make the cinnamon-maple glaze. It’s quite simple. Powdered sugar, cinnamon, maple syrup, and salt, with a little bit of water to smooth it out.

Glaze ingredients in a bowl.
Glaze ingredients.

Add the water a teaspoon or two at a time until the glaze is thick, but pourable. It should pool up when drizzled back into the bowl, but after a second or two melt back in with the rest of the glaze.

The mixed glaze with a spoon drizzling some back into the bowl.
The mixed glaze.

The scones should be a wonderful golden color when they are done baking.

The baked scones on the baking tray.
The baked scones.

Wait 10 minutes before glazing. This lets them cool down enough that the glaze won’t completely melt away, but lets them be just warm enough for the glaze to fully stick.

An R2-D2 kitchen timer set to 10 minutes.
Other kitchen timers will do.

Drizzle the glaze on in thick stripes or zig-zags. I used a butter knife, but you could also use a spoon or even a piping bag.

The scones on the baking tray with the glazed drizzled on.
That good, good drizzle.

Oatmeal Raisin Scones [makes 8 scones]

1/2 cup (90g) raisins
Spiced rum (or apple juice/cider)
1 1/2 cups (192g) all purpose flour
1/2 cup (64g) whole wheat flour
1 cup  (100g) oats
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 cup (100g) brown sugar
Zest of 1 orange
1/2 cup cold butter, cubed
3/4 cup (180g) buttermilk

Place the raisins in a small bowl and fill with enough rum to just cover them. Cover and let sit for an hour.

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

In a large bowl combine the all purpose flour, the whole wheat flour, the oats, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, ground cloves, brown sugar, and orange zest. Mix well.

Add the cubed butter to the bowl. Using a pastry blender or two butter knives, cut the butter into the flour mixture until the butter is evenly distributed.

Add the buttermilk and roughly mix until just beginning to combine. Drain the raisins and add them to the bowl. Stir until mostly mixed. Place dough on a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth and cohesive.

Form the dough into a flattened circle about 2 inches tall. Cut into 8 equal pieces. Place the scones on a lined baking sheet.

Bake for 15-20 minutes.

Let cool for 10 minutes before glazing; recipe below.

Cinnamon Maple Glaze

1 cup powdered sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
2 tablespoon maple syrup
A pinch of salt
1-2 tablespoon water

Mix together the powdered sugar, cinnamon, maple syrup, and salt in a bowl. Slowly add water, a teaspoon at a time, until the glaze is smooth and pourable, but still thick.

A plate of scones sitting on a fabric napkin. One scone is off the plate sitting on the napkin.
Time to wrangle up for nerfs!

Word document download: Episode 10 Sabacc in Business

PDF download: Episode 10 Sabacc in Business

Read in browser:

Tabletop Squadron Transcript, Season 1 Episode 10:
Sabacc In Business

Transcript by Tyler (Twitter: @Tyler_MoonSage)

Note – Laura’s character Xianna’fan speaks in an accent. Most of her soft I’s sound like “ee,” and most of her TH’s sound like Z’s. Example: “this and that” = “zees and zat”

## Intro

CAMERON: Hi everyone, and welcome to Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars: Edge of the Empire actual play podcast. I’m Cameron, not your game master. Every other Thursday our story follows a thief, a bounty hunter, a fringer, and a slicer as they explore the galaxy helping a mysterious benefactor and each other.

Thank you so much to GearedForMusic for leaving us an iTunes review. You saying that listening to us was like hanging out with your funny, nerdy friends in space made us smile. iTunes is actually the reason that I’m giving the intro today instead of Nick, your actual game master. GearedForMusic’s review took us to 13 reviews. When we reach 20, we’ll be releasing a series of flashback episodes that I ran featuring Karma’s twin sons. We brought in two of our best friends to play Jet and Juke Nailo, and we had a ton of fun recording this little side adventure. The best thing about the flashback episodes is that we’ll be releasing them on off weeks, so you’ll get double the Tabletop Squadron in your ears for approximately six weeks. I have the first episode edited and ready to go as soon as we hit that 20th review, and I would love for all of you lovely listeners to make me feel rushed to get the next two done.

A huge thank you to everyone who has left us reviews so far and said nice things about us and the show. The squad appreciates it more than you can possibly know. Anyway, I’ve talked enough. Thanks for reviewing, thanks for listening, and we hope you enjoy.

[musical chime]
Hi, I’m Lilit and I play Xianna’fan, a Twi’lek smuggler. I was going by an old name during this recording and while we have left the audio as originally recorded, I would request that you use my current name when discussing the episode. Thanks!
[musical chime]

## [0:01:47]

NICK: Hello, and welcome to Tabletop Squadron, Episode 10! I’m your host, Nick. Good to have you back! Nothing special.

(long pause, laughter)

HUDSON: Wait, what? Oh, okay. I get it. You can say good to have you back because you’re not referencing it as like we’ve been gone.

STEVEN: Yes.

NICK: Some people may not know…

CAMERON: (sighs)

NICK: This show releases every two weeks, so we can pretend that we know our listeners and that we’re happy to see them. (laughter) This is going in the god damn episode.

LAURA: We are happy to see our listeners despite this being a purely audio medium.

NICK: Well that’s what the microphones are for. If you look through them you can see, like, ten.

STEVEN: Oh, I see it.

LAURA: Oh.

NICK: Yeah. See!

CAMERON: Mine must be broken.

NICK: So, we’re gonna go around the table—

LAURA: Is that why there’s a crystal ball in the middle of the table, so we can astrally view our listener?

NICK: Well, that’s a d1, actually. You roll it if you need a number between one and one.

CAMERON: Hmm. Alright, cool.

HUDSON: The villain from Mighty Morphing Power Rangers left it.

(laughter)

NICK: So, moving on! We’re gonna go around the table and introduce everybody real quick, starting with Steven!

STEVEN: Hi.

NICK: Hi.

STEVEN: I’m Steven.

NICK: Hi Steven.

STEVEN: I play Sabos the Togruta. Sabos a Togruta? He’s not the only Togruta.

NICK: Good work. Moving on. Cameron!

CAMERON: [through giggles] Hi, I’m Cameron.

NICK: Hi Cameron.

CAMERON: I’m playing Karma the Nautolan bounty hunter.

NICK: Great. And, Hudson!

HUDSON: Hi, I’m Hudson. I’m playing Tink, the Gigoran slicer who has the career skill of Technician.

NICK: See Steven, they remember specific facts about their character and relate them in a standard way.

STEVEN: Oh. … No, I don’t do that.

NICK: Yeah, obviously. And, Laura!

LAURA: Hi. I’m Laura. I play Xianna, a Twi’lek smuggler.

NICK: We got some experience last time we played, if you could just rattle off what you’ve spent any experience points on. We’ll start with Cameron.

CAMERON: So, for Karma, I bought a talent on my Assassin bounty hunter tree, Quickdraw. Once per round I can draw or holster a weapon or item as an incidental.

SEVERAL: Ooh.

NICK: Does it have a limit on what kind of weapon?

CAMERON: Nope.

NICK: So you could like draw a rocket launcher?

CAMERON: Sure. If I have one. I don’t currently, but…

NICK: Eh, I’ll get you one. Yeah, that’ll be fine.

CAMERON: Maybe we can fix that.

NICK: Let’s go to Steven.

STEVEN: Hi. I, Sabos, the Togruta fringer—

NICK: Hey! Good work.

STEVEN: Yay—spun, spent, did spend, spent, right? Spent 15 points on Rapid Recovery in my fringer tree which allows me, when healing strain after an encounter, to heal one additional strain per rank of Rapid Recovery.

NICK: Okay. So, continue to shoot Sabos. Duly noted.

LAURA: Got it.

CAMERON: Only with stun, though.

NICK: I’ll just—He’ll figure it out.

STEVEN: I haven’t got the crit one yet, sorry.

NICK: Okay. Laura.

LAURA: I am hoarding my points.

NICK: You have spent no points.

LAURA: I have spent no points.

NICK: Saving up for that shiny new talent.

LAURA: Yes.

NICK: Okay. Hudson, did you spend any experience points?

HUDSON: I’ve spent zero experience points this time, because I’m saving up for a shiny new talent on my talent tree.

NICK: Okay! How about the Destiny Roll!

CAMERON: Two light side.

STEVEN: Two light side.

LAURA: One light side.

HUDSON: One light side.

CAMERON: So we have six light side points!

NICK: Alright, so, we haven’t recorded in a while, just a peek behind the curtain. We’ve had some stuff happen and haven’t recorded in a while, worked our way through our back log, so we’re gonna give a little bit of a recap and make sure all of the players know what’s going on.

So, stepping back a couple of steps. You fled Unroola Dawn. You went to an asteroid and shot some people, and killed them, and then you went to Ithor, which is a planet with like hammerhead slow-talky guys. You landed on the planet, and you went and met the Ithorian Oracle, and gave them the Stone Breaker, further cementing your business relationship. You then went to the…

CAMERON: Gooberfish!

LAURA: The Gooberfish.

NICK: Yeah, The Gooberfish, one of the bars that is near the Oracle’s retreat, and you met with your contact. Karma is currently disguised as an Imperial something or other in a full cloak and robes, and it turned out that your contact was…

CAMERON: Felton Mox.

NICK: …was Felton Mox, a large otter of a guy with a beer belly. He’s a Selonian, and somebody who you may remember was your original bounty in Prologue 1. So, you talked to him a little bit. He was able to give you a small, gray plasteel box with something inside with instructions that it would help you to break the blockade, and he also informed you that he may or may not have lost another piece of the puzzle, the Rancore Protocol, and he tried very hard to convince you that you didn’t need him and that he was gonna go on his way and everything was good, but that’s about where we left off, you all grabbing him as he tried to leave and saying ‘no, we think we’ll hold onto you.’ You know that Kettle has the Rancore Protocol somewhere, and that she’s somewhere on the planet, and you know that Felton Mox is supposed to be your contact with local information who can help you, and you now have the little plasteel box with something in it.

Okay. We start our scene. You are standing in the late afternoon sun on the street of the Ithorian herdship, which is a giant floating city above a beautiful, pristine jungle way below. You can’t see it from where you are, but it’s there. You’re standing outside The Gooberfish. Tink has a big mitt on Felton Mox’s shoulder. He looks extremely uncomfortable, he’s sweating a little in the humidity and is trying to inch away from you, but he’s not going anywhere. You have just exited the bar, and it’s time to make a plan.

CAMERON: I forgot—I’m not talking.

HUDSON: Out of game real quick, would Felton know where Kettle is?

NICK: Yeah.

STEVEN: That was kind of my strategy was to tell him that [mumbled speech]

HUDSON: We should find an alley to rough him up.

NICK: Yeah, he knows where Kettle is.

HUDSON: Okay. Back in game.

NICK: Okay.

HUDSON: “So, you’re gonna tell us where Kettle is, right?”

NICK: “You don’t really… You’re not gonna go after her, are you? That seems like a really bad idea. I wouldn’t recommend that.”

HUDSON: “I don’t think I asked for your advice, friend.”

NICK: He pulls at the collar that he doesn’t have, and goes “ewwehheww” and looks at your giant vibro-axe, and says, “Duly noted. Uh, yeah. She’s at a gaming room at the edge of the herdship. I could show you, I guess, where she is. And then we’re done, right? I can leave after that.”

CAMERON: Karma shakes her hooded head ominously, in a ‘no…’

NICK: Getting a real ghost of Christmas future vibe.

LAURA: “Do not worry about them. They are fine.”

NICK: ‘Oh. Yeah… ‘kay. Yu know, it’s weird, you all seem kind of rough and tumble. It’s strange for you to be hanging out with a high profile Imperial agent. That’s not normal.”

CAMERON: Karma nods. (laughs)

LAURA: “It’s not normal, but it is just how we do things. It works.”

HUDSON: “You haven’t gotten to know me. I’m actually a very sensitive soul.”

NICK: “Yeah, I can feel that, from that—Hey, hey, I think you’re grinding my bones together. Can you lighten up a little bit?”

HUDSON: “Sorry.”

LAURA: “Yes, yes, please do not break the captives.”

HUDSON: “Yeah. I shouldn’t do that at all. I thought my fur would provide enough, you know, kind of filter, buffer.”

NICK: “Yeah, uh, business partners. Just wanna clarify, business partners. Not captive. Same team.” He gives an optimistic double thumbs up.

LAURA: “Well…”

STEVEN: “You don’t wanna know how I ended up with the fourth head tail.”

NICK: “You’re right, I don’t, because I imagine that is a story involving your conception.”

LAURA: Xianna does not handle this. “Wait. Okie. Have you always had it, or did you get it? How did you get it? And why is it a bad thing that you have it?”

STEVEN: I just point at the Imperialist, and be like, “Don’t mess with her.”

LAURA: “But what—Because the head tails symbolize virility…”

STEVEN: “Yes.”

LAURA: “…would it not be better to have more? Because some Twi’leks have a third one…”

STEVEN: “… Yes.”

LAURA: “…and you know, they are considered sexier.”

STEVEN: “… No.”

LAURA: “So is it yes or no?!”

STEVEN: “Yes.”

NICK: Someone’s been watching a lot of Senate hearings lately. (laughter)

STEVEN: “I try to be scary sounding with threats—Emperors, Emperor, Imperial!”

NICK: There it is!

LAURA: “I still do not understand what that has to do with your head tail.”

STEVEN: “I have head tails. Anyway, you’re gonna show us where Queen Kettle is.”

NICK: As you turn back to Felton, you can see he’s been slowly sidling. Tink’s arm is so long it’s just been stretching out towards an alley, but he hasn’t let go. He stops. “Okay. Fine. I’ll show you to the gaming room. It’s not that far. I guess I owe Sentinel enough that I can at least do that part of the job.” And you take off through the beautiful herdship.

The floating city is very nice. It looks almost organic in its construction. It’s very clean. You see not a ton of Ithorians, but all of the people you see pretty much are Ithorians. That tends to happen when there’s a blockade in orbit, but there’s not that many. Maybe you see a couple every block or so kind of walking around. It looks like there’s not a ton of population for the size of this city. As you continue you come to a dome that looks right on the edge of the herdship. There’s a low, waist-high wall that circles the edge of the city, and over that you can see the horizon, and a drop of like 8,000 feet, and then the jungle down below. You can see kind of the ebb and flow of trees but not necessarily like individual details. The dome doesn’t really have any features. The top third of it is all glass sky lights. The construction looks kind of similar to the pavilion that the orca? was staying in, just more permanent, and a revolving door, because I like those, so there’s one on this dome at the front. It is glass, but the glass gets opaque as it gets hit by the sunlight and starts to fade as it goes around, so you can’t see into the building, but you see it getting darker and lighter as it goes around. It’s very nifty.

Felton says, “Well, so that’s the gaming room. It’s just called the gaming room. It caters mostly to off-worlders, because the Ithorians aren’t really much for gambling. They’re a little more placid, honestly.” He looks at Tink and says, “Placid, not flaccid. Placid. It means calm, like you’re not being.”

HUDSON: “I know what it means.”

NICK: “Right. So, anyway. The gaming room’s right there, Kettle’s inside. I have guided you. Have a great day.”

STEVEN: “Why don’t you show us in?”

NICK: “Oh, you just walk through the doors. It’s not that complicated.”

LAURA: “No, you should come with us.”

CAMERON: The hood shakes no.

STEVEN: “I’m not familiar with these doors on my home planet. I think I need you to help.”

NICK: He seems so confused that he starts walking before he does anything, and is quickly at the doors and pushes through. Inside is, imagine a ritzy kind of casino look but it’s not that big, probably a couple thousand square feet, the size of a medium gymnasium. There are gaming tables around. I want everyone to provide one detail of this gaming room, this alien gambling den, starting with… whoever thinks of something first.

HUDSON: The trunk people are all playing baccarat.

NICK: (laughs) The trunk people?

HUDSON: I mean, that might be racist, I just don’t remember their real alien race name.

NICK: The trunk people are playing baccarat. It’s an alien—

HUDSON: They’re also drunk.

NICK: The drunk trunk people are playing baccarat, but it’s like space baccarat, so are there lasers involved, or…?

HUDSON: Yeah. It’s high stakes in like a life or death way, which you would never think of baccarat as being normally, but they’ve done it.

(laughter)

NICK: Okay. The back wall, you actually see that the dome protrudes over the edge of the herdship a little bit, and the baccarat table is over there, and they seem to be standing on little trap doors as they’re playing. Nothing comes from that, but those are there. That’s cool. Okay, what else?

STEVEN: So, it has like a fountain, except the fountain is a drink fountain, and the drink that comes out of it is Flame Out. It’s got a Flame Out fountain.

NICK: A fountain of Flame Out…

STEVEN: And it kind of sparkles and buzzes in the scary way.

NICK: Yeah. That sounds about right.

STEVEN: Slightly luminescent.

NICK: Eh. Sounds less and less appetizing.

LAURA: Sounds less and less like a Flame Out.

STEVEN: It’s flaming out.

NICK: It’s as though you can’t tell if the pipes can’t handle the alcohol content or if there’s a loose electric wire somewhere in the basin.

STEVEN: Right. They might be enhancing the look of the Flame Out fountain.

NICK: Yeah, and with a fountain of that particular type of drink, that means that the air has a spicy, minty smell just permeating the place. It starts nice. It gets old real fast.

LAURA: There’s a large Sabacc area, and all the little Sabacc machines are like gilded gold. They’re very pretty.

SEVERAL: Ooh.

CAMERON: There’s a kickass chandelier that may or may not have aliens doing acrobatics on it in the center of the dome.

LAURA: It does.

CAMERON: I mean, it does.

NICK: What’s the name of the little rat guy from Jabba’s palace?

LAURA: Salacious B. Crumb? It’s not that.

NICK: There’s Salacious B. Crumbs wiggling around?

CAMERON: No. It’s not those. It’s not those, no. It’s like the Kushibans who are just doing flips and stuff in the chandeliers.

LAURA: Oh you—Xianna’s gonna get nothing done, you guys. (laughter) She’s just gonna be standing in the middle like, “Oh, there’s a chandelier. Look at that! Oh, look at them go!”

NICK: Okay, so yeah. The whole thing is lit very nicely.

HUDSON: And it is lit, like—

NICK: It is lit, 420.

HUDSON: Yes.

LAURA: And as we walk in, Xianna looks at everyone else and goes, “Oh, by the way, does anyone have like a gambling problem? (snorts and laughter) That we should watch out?”

CAMERON: A little late.

NICK: Sabos is looking a little nervous right now.

STEVEN: “Uh, no. I like—No. I like the home world just fine. Everything’s fine.”

LAURA: “Kay… because I kind of do. So, watch out for me.” (giggling)

STEVEN: “I don’t escape the home world to gamble. No, I mean, eh. We’re fine.”

HUDSON: “My only problem is I’m not gambling. That’s my gambling problem. Just kidding, I don’t have a problem at all.”

NICK: Oh boy.

LAURA: “I will probably be fine. Don’t worry. I’m sure I will be fine.”

NICK: What thoughts are going through Karma’s head as everyone admits that this is a dangerous situation for them?

CAMERON: She’s just shaking her head. She’s far more comfortable here than she was on Unroola Dawn, because this is the type of scenario she’s used to being in when trying to track people down. She’s often in bars and casinos and stuff, because that’s where the type of people that she’s after normally hang out. And she feels far more elegant than everyone else, and like she fits in better because of the cloak.

NICK: So, the camera pans around to the jingling sound of holo-slot machines striking jackpots. There are several Sabacc tables with golden Sabacc projectors in the middle. They definitely are projecting HD cards, because you normally see in Star Wars holograms are kind of woobly and look like their bunny antenna had been out of wack. These are all very crisp. It looks like you could almost touch them, but they disappear as people play them.

While most of the players are some assorted races, there’s probably 20 or 30 people in here, all the dealers are Ithorian pretty much. So, the ones at the Sabacc tables, each table has two or three people, you know that up to seven can play but they tend to like to spread out. So, Sabacc is—For the people who don’t know Star Wars… (snooty)

LAURA: Mm-hmm… (snooty)

NICK: Sabacc is sort of a mix between Poker, Blackjack, and Yu-Gi-Oh, as far as I can tell.

LAURA: Good description, actually. That’s about right.

CAMERON: Yeah.

NICK: You can build your own deck. It’s got some math junk in it, but it’s mostly Blackjack except when it’s not, and the rules change depending on which extended universe book you read, but the professional Sabacc people like to play with about three, as they think that gives them the best odds. It’s sort of like when people go to Vegas and they try to count cards because they’ve read the book about counting cards and think that they’re very good at it. It’s just a rule of thumb, it doesn’t actually really do that much, but that’s why there’s so many tables is people like to play low. You can tell that a lot of the seats don’t get used that much because people also have favorite seats, and we’re getting too into Sabacc. I just think it’s interesting.

So, some of the Ithorian card dealers look up as you come in and look at you before dismissing. Some eyes definitely stay on Karma for a while, because she is the first Imperial that has set foot on the planet since the blockade started as far as they know, so that’s real weird. You can see they have some questions.

Everyone except for Karma is feeling pretty solidly buzzed from the drinks that they had at The Gooberfish. You all had several. Felton Mox stands in front of you. He kind of shakes Tink’s hand off his shoulder and gestures grandly to everyone. His fur ripples with the motion. He says, “So, this is it, I brought you in. That’s great, right? I’ll, uh, see you later,” and he turns to try and leave again.

LAURA: Xianna was like looking up in the chandelier and is like, “Oh, yes, we are doing something. No, you cannot go yet. No.”

CAMERON: Karma walks over to Felton and links her arm through his.

NICK: He shudders a little, and then he gets like a look on his face as you’re standing there arm in arm. “This… is a weird feeling of space deja vu right now, standing arm in arm with you. Have we met before?”

LAURA: “So anyways… (laughter) Um, yes. Uh, Kettle? That is who we are–?”

NICK: As you bring that up, you can see that there’s a separate Sabacc table in a roped in area kind of towards the far back. It’s on part of the transparasteel floor that overhangs the jungle, and it has a little Chadra-fan dealer running the table. For those of you who don’t know, a Chadra-fan is a little bat person that’s like three feet tall, and doesn’t have wings, and is super cute. You can see it in New Hope. It’s the one that gets its drink from the bar with two hands and makes a cute little squeaky noise.

He’s wearing a green vest with a leaf pattern on it, and has one of those little green visor dealer hats on. He looks kind of torn as he deals out the cards. So, he’s setting out one set of cards for a human that is sweating profusely. His dark hair is matted down to his face and he’s gripping each card like it’s the only thing in the galaxy. The other set of cards goes to a strange insectile-looking creature with their back to you. They’re covered in scars and their wings are tattered. If you make a Xenology check you might know what this thing is. Except for Sabos, Sabos recognizes this thing.

CAMERON: What’s the difficulty on the Xenology check?

NICK: Hard.

HUDSON: I’ll let you guys handle this one.

CAMERON: Sure. It could happen.

LAURA: I mean, I’ll roll.

NICK: Also, while they’re rolling, you may notice that some of our dice noises changed. We got cool little dice cups because our dice pools were getting too big, so thanks Kickstarter.

LAURA: I got a failure.

CAMERON: Yeah, so Karma got two failures and two advantages.

NICK: Okay. Is there something you would like to spend the advantages on?

LAURA: Wait, Hudson, why don’t you make Xenology rolls? You have a four in Intellect.

CAMERON: You’re smart!

HUDSON: Oh! You’re right.

LAURA: You do way better. I only have a two.

CAMERON: I have a two! You’re way smarter than us.

HUDSON: And I get to use this new fun cup.

LAURA: Xianna’s cunning, but she’s not smart.

HUDSON: What’s that, two advantages?

STEVEN: Absolutely nothing.

HUDSON: Oh.

NICK: Complete wash! Okay. None of you recognize what this particular species would be, but you do notice that Felton is staring pretty pointedly at that table, like that’s where you guys need to go. Sabos, you recognize that as Kettle most likely. You don’t see Geonosians every day, but that’s definitely one of them, and those are pretty rare.

STEVEN: I didn’t see her from the back, though.

NICK: No, but it’s like—

STEVEN: Yeah.

NICK: So, it’s a large, brown insectile creature. There’s not so many of those out there. What do you guys wanna do?

LAURA: “Okie, Tink, give me your credits.”

HUDSON: “Your—My what?”

LAURA: “Your credits! You know, your money.”

HUDSON: “Oh, credits. Oh, uh, wait all of it?”

LAURA: “Most of them.”

HUDSON: “Why?”

LAURA: “So I can go to the table.”

STEVEN: While they’re doing that, I just walk up to the table and say, “Hi Queen.”

(laughter)

LAURA: “Oh, never mind. It appears Sabos knows her.”

HUDSON: “Wait, don’t you have cred—Never mind.”

LAURA: “I have some, but I need more for the gambling. I do not know what the buy in is.” (laughing)

NICK: So we get this nice top-down shot of the Sabacc table and Kettle playing cards, and it angles over to Sabos who walks up and greets her, and in the background we see Xianna and Tink talking about credits and elbowing each other, and then they just stop and turn to look at the scene.

As you say ‘hi Queen,’ the Geonosian tosses down her cards and says, “Well, Mr. Alto, it looks like we’ll be in touch,” and he hangs his head and stands up from the table before walking away. The human looks very distraught and runs his hands through his hair. Whenever the Chadra-fan dealer looks at Kettle he smiles real big and looks really excited, but then he’ll look back at the human who’s slowly walking away and look like someone just stole his vest and looks very sad, and he kind of alternates back between being happy for Kettle and sad for the human.

So, Kettle sets her cards down and cracks her neck, which makes a really hollow popping noise. She looks up at you. “Ah, Councilman Sako. What a pleasant surprise.”

STEVEN: “Yes, it’s been… ages, it seems.”

NICK: “Yeah, it’s been about… three days, I think, at this point.”

STEVEN: “A lot happens in three days as you might know.”

NICK: “Really? You’ll have to tell me about that sometime.”

STEVEN: “Absolutely. So, you got through the blockade too, huh?”

NICK: “Oh, blockades are really more of a formality for someone like me.”

STEVEN: “(chuckles) I understand.”

NICK: “It turns out they are until you get down on the planet when they take it real seriously. Sometimes you get, well, inconvenienced.”

STEVEN: “I couldn’t imagine.”

NICK: “Yeah. It’s actually convenient that  you’re here. Maybe with your political clout, Councilman Sako…”

STEVEN: “That’s exactly how I got through the blockade.”

NICK: “Yeah, well, maybe you can help me get out of this particular situation.”

STEVEN: “I actually think we’re looking to have you help us get out of this situation as well, so this seems like a very mutualistic situation.”

NICK: “How fortuitous. You’ll have to introduce me to your friends.” She looks around to the rest of the group.

STEVEN: “Yes. Absolutely.”

LAURA: “Hello~!” Xianna waves at her.

CAMERON: Karma and Felton have floated over.

NICK: She nods to you regally.

HUDSON: I scrunch up and look suspicious.

CAMERON: Scrunch up what?

HUDSON: Body-wise.

CAMERON: Like, just your whole body? You just like shrink?

LAURA: Like your little face?

HUDSON: Like a slight tense up.

NICK: Kettle nods to you all, and sees Felton, and goes, “Felton, what are you trying to do bringing muscle on me? You lost fair and square, and it’s time for you to go do your part of the bargain,” and she looks very disinterested in him.

He says, “Well, look, hey—“

STEVEN: “Oh, he’s not here for muscle. He’s actually a very lovable creature.”

NICK: “Oh, well—“

STEVEN: I say pointing at Tink.

NICK: “Oh—Uh, yeah. I thought you were talking about me. That would’ve been…”

STEVEN: “Oh, no.”

NICK: “No. Obviously not, right? Uh, no, Kettle, I’m just here to introduce my new friends, uh, business associates. Really just some people I met in a bar. We’re not really associates… You’re right, I should probably go work on that thing—“

STEVEN: “Nope!”

NICK: “—that you told me to do…”

CAMERON: Karma does not let go of his arm.

NICK: “…but I can’t seem to be rid of them.” He smiles real big. “So, yeah. I guess we could play some cards, maybe, or go to a business room, or do something…” and Kettle just waits to see what you guys have to say.

STEVEN: Is there a VIP room available? Like, you know, big bets, away from listening crowds.

NICK: The Chadra-fan perks up and starts to look eagerly between you all, and Kettle says, “Well, this is basically the big bet area right here. You can tell from the velvet rope and the nice floor windows, but we don’t have those crazy trap doors.”

STEVEN: “I’m okay with that.”

NICK: The camera snaps over real quick to the baccarat table You see an Aqualish which is like a big walrus person go (roars) and then there’s a red buzzer noise, and the floor jiggles a little, and they all look real nervous but it doesn’t give away, and then the camera snaps back to you.

(giggling)

LAURA: “Oh no…”

STEVEN: “Cool.”

NICK: “Yeah. The designers of this game room really like the idea of high stakes, meaning more than just bigger numbers, but the Ithorians aren’t real big on raining gamblers down upon their sacred jungle, so it’s pretty rare. We have that mostly turned off.”

STEVEN: Well, uh, I invite my acquaintances to have a seat, and it feels kind of weird inviting the Imperial to have a seat because I would think the Imperial would invite us to have a seat, but I invite everyone to have a seat at the table with Kettle.

LAURA: Xianna sits pretty quickly.

NICK: Cool, so you all sit at the table. The Chadra-fan eagerly starts dealing out cards. Let’s say it’s 100 credits to get in on this.

STEVEN: (deep inhale) “Give me a sec…”

LAURA: (laughs) Sabos.

STEVEN: “Okay. I can play a game or two.”

NICK: So, it’s like 100 credits for playing through the scene, it’s not gonna be per hand.

STEVEN: Oh. I can play that.

CAMERON: Karma can’t.

NICK: Ouch. Are you gonna try to get credits from someone else to play with?

CAMERON: No, Karma’s just not playing.

NICK: Okay. You’re just gonna stand in the background?

CAMERON: Holding onto Felton. We’re just standing ominously to the side of the table.

HUDSON: I’ll play.

LAURA: Yeah, Xianna puts in credits.

NICK: Okay. You toss the credits in. A little mini mouse bot, probably like three or four inches long with what looks like a snow plow on the end, comes out and scoops your credits off into a slot and goes away, so it makes the little meepy droid noises, and then digital—except it’s Star Wars—so like analog displays pop up with your credit count, and the Chadra-fan starts to deal out cards.

Kettle says, “Oh, so your Imperial friend…” If she had eyebrows she’d be wiggling them. “You Imperial friend won’t be playing, and I know Felton can’t afford to play, but this is a friendly game. What brings you to my end of the herdship?” And you start playing cards.

STEVEN: I look at Xianna.

LAURA: I looked at Sabos, in this face of like, well he knows her, so… Also, I kind of forgot what we were doing. (laughter) Did you see the chandelier in here?!

STEVEN: I excuse myself for a second to go get some Flame Out, and I come back. “As you might know—”

NICK: Wait, wait, wait. You can’t describe something fun like that and then just move on.

STEVEN: (chuckles)

NICK: As you run over to the fountain the smell gets stronger.

STEVEN: It does.

NICK: Your eyes start to water a little bit.

STEVEN: It reminds me of home.

NICK: A green Twi’lek, she’s not very tall, she’s even a little shorter than Xianna, because Xianna’s what, 5’6”?, 5’?

LAURA: I am 1.71 meters.

NICK: What does that mean in English?

LAURA & CAMERON: 5’6”.

NICK: Okay. So, she’s shorter than Xianna. She’s probably about 5’ flat. She’s green, and she’s got a waitress outfit on, and she grabs a copper mug and scoops some out and takes a cloth to wipe the edge so that it’s dry. She tells you, “The high rollers don’t pay for drinks,” and she hands one to you.

STEVEN: “Oh. Thank you very kindly.”

NICK: So, you have your booze.

STEVEN: I do.

NICK: You head back to the–?

HUDSON: “Hey! Can you get me a–?”

STEVEN: “Flame Out?! Absolutely!” I get my Flame Out and just bring it to him, then I go back and ask if they have a bigger glass.

NICK: The Twi’lek cocks a tattooed eyebrow at you, because fun Star Wars fact: Twi’leks don’t have eyebrows but the females often tattoo them on to make people not freaked out about not having eyebrows, and gets two mugs and does the routine of scooping it out and shrugs.

STEVEN: I apologize and point at Tink, and then I think she understands. He is large.

NICK: She doesn’t really seem all that engaged.

STEVEN: Perfect.

NICK: Professionally polite is how I would describe her.

STEVEN: I take both mugs and keep them to myself as I sit down.

NICK: (laughs) Okay.

HUDSON: Where’s my drink?

STEVEN: I gave you the original one.

NICK: He gave you the first one.

HUDSON: Oh, sorry.

STEVEN: I just got more of it.

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: Xianna, after watching this whole thing, you see her kind of put her hands on her hips and cock her head to the side in mild annoyance at the whole exchange, but she doesn’t do anything.

LAURA: No.

NICK: So, Kettle’s been holding cards this entire time. “So, are we playing or what?”

STEVEN: “Yes. I apologize, Queen. I play better with drinks.”

NICK: Alright. I want a gambling roll out of y’all.

CAMERON: Is that Skulduggery?

NICK: Yeah, I’d take Skullduggery.

STEVEN: Oh will you?

LAURA: Can do.

STEVEN: Will you take… yeah, well… Streetwise?

NICK & LAURA: No.

STEVEN: Uh… Negotiation?

NICK: No.

STEVEN: Cool.

NICK: No.

STEVEN: Okay then.

(giggling)

CAMERON: Astrogation!

STEVEN: How about Astrogation? (laughs) So, just Skullduggery, huh? Okay.

HUDSON: What’s the difficulty?

NICK: Let’s do average.

LAURA: Sure.

HUDSON: Might I go first?

NICK: Yeah, go ahead.

HUDSON: Two successes and a threat.

STEVEN: I got a success, without Skulduggery. Hell yes.

LAURA: Ohhh!

HUDSON: Oh snap.

CAMERON: Oh shit!

LAURA: Ohhh snap! Okay, so it’s two triumphs that are not cancelled by anything, plus two more successes… Yes.

NICK: Two triumphs and two more successes?

CAMERON: Yes, so four successes total, and then also two triumphs.

NICK: Oh boy. Okay, and then if someone could roll me a hard check against just three greens, please.

CAMERON: A success.

STEVEN: Fall prone.

CAMERON: … No, they cancel.

STEVEN: Oh. I didn’t see that bottom one. Okay, yeah.

LAURA: Mm, fall out of the chair!

CAMERON: It was three threats, but it is also three advantages, so it’s just one success.

NICK: Okay. Thank you.

CAMERON: You’re welcome.

HUDSON: I start to get a little nervous because my hand was bad, so I drink my drink pretty fast.

NICK: Okay. You start pounding away on this drink. You guys have made some small talk, and after the first few hands Xianna makes an extremely aggressive bet and you all go for it, and Kettle has a very contemplative look on her face, and then she goes in on it too, and she just mops the floor with you. You have a Purple Conundrum, one of the best hands in Sabacc as far as anyone knows.

LAURA: Well, I build up a fake tell. I assume that’s what I do, is I probably hustle a little bit and I do a few hands where like, oh I twitched my eye a little bit so it makes it seem like when I do the high bet that I’m bluffing, and then I’m not.

NICK: Nice. Kettle nods with respect to you as your counter goes way up and everyone else’s goes down. Nobody’s out, but there is a definite disparity. That could be one of the triumphs. Is there something as far as outside the game you would like your other triumph to do for you?

CAMERON: (gasps) I have a thing that I was wanting to do…

LAURA: (whispered) What?

CAMERON: Okay. I was trying to figure out if I would do a Skulduggery or Stealth check to try and get my binders on Felton, because I have the ones that are individual bracelets and then I can do something to magnetize them and they go together, so I have one of his arms, but he’s very into the game now and doesn’t notice me do it.

NICK: Sure. Yeah. Are you binding him to you or just his hands together?

CAMERON: No. I’m just—He’s getting a bracelet that he can’t remove on both wrists.

NICK: Is that how you would like to spend your triumph, or do you want her to roll for it and you want yours for something else?

LAURA: No, so, we’ll do that, and what I want to happen is I can see her starting to get like the prep ready. I can see her surreptitiously pulling a binder down, and so then what I do is, I think I’m probably sitting next to Tink, and I spill his drink and make a big scene over it. “Oh no, Tink, I spilled your drink! … Oh, haha, that rhymed.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

HUDSON: “I was gonna get another anyway.”

LAURA: “Oh no! We will get you a new one.” And I try to flag down the Twi’lek waitress from before.

STEVEN: I slide one of mine over.

LAURA: “No, we do not want Your drink. We want a New drink. I want that Twi’lek waitress. Hello~! We need some new drinks, and maybe a towel of some sort, or maybe a cleanup droid. Please?”

HUDSON: “Oh hey, hey, could you get me a Green Extermination?”

LAURA: “I do not know what that is. Also, you are all wet with the drink.”

HUDSON: “Things always dry on me.”

CAMERON: (laughs) Ew.

LAURA: I’m still flagging the waitress down.

NICK: Yeah. The waitress pointedly doesn’t make eye contact with Sabos. She flounces over. She’s got, I’m picturing like the beer maiden German waitress outfit on her, but space, so like a sticky-outie skirt, a very cleavagey top with straps that go aside the shoulders, and she comes over and leans down towards you and says, “What can I help you with?”

LAURA: “Hi. Well, first off, there was a drink that got spilled.”

NICK: “Oh yeah, I see that.”

LAURA: “Yes.”

NICK: “You know, it always seems to happen to whoever loses the hardest. Isn’t that interesting?” She titters away behind her hand.

LAURA: “Yes.”

HUDSON: “This whole thing’s a scam.”

LAURA: “No it is not. I just beat you.”

HUDSON: (growls)

LAURA: “He would like… He called it a Green Extermination. I do not even know if that is a real drink, but he wants one.”

NICK: “I think we can make that happen. Would you like anything?”

LAURA: “Yes. I would like a Starship Juice, please.”

NICK: “Starship Juice? Oh, that’s one of the specials of the house,” and she flounces away. If this was animated there would be little boingy noises as she goes. She’s much happier talking to you than she was to the others.

LAURA: Because I smile, and say thank you.

NICK: Yeah, and as she walks away she winks conspiratorially at you.

LAURA: No, she doesn’t wink. She Twi’lek winks.

NICK: Ooh.

LAURA: Which is, she does a little lekku move that we know is our equivalent of a wink, because we can like somewhat use them to communicate.

NICK: Ooh, I like that a lot. Ooh! She also has the suits of Sabacc cards tattooed on her lekku.

CAMERON: Oh cool.

LAURA: Aww, yes.

NICK: That starts at her forehead and goes back, so those look very neat. You get distracted by that for a second. Yeah, so she goes away and gets a drink. While that’s all going on, Karma very quickly slips the binders onto Felton. He doesn’t notice, until she starts to go by and you can see him—

CAMERON: I didn’t magnetize them. I just have them on there so that if he tries to run I can make his hands jump together.

NICK: Okay, so he doesn’t notice at all, he just has heavier bracelets, which means he does slap her on the butt as she goes by, and the waitress turns around and in one fluid motion plants a fist into his solar plexus, which is a pretty satisfying thing because he’s kind of paunchy, and he doubles over groaning.

LAURA: “That is what you deserve.”

CAMERON: Karma laughs. She tries not to, but she can’t help it.

NICK: The Twi’lek waitress gives a lekku twitch that, I don’t know if Karma can read lekku, probably not.

LAURA: Probably not.

NICK: But she gives one that’s like the equivalent of the jaunty salute, and she keeps going. Felton, who’s head is down by his knees, you can tell he’s trying to breathe and having trouble. “I just—I’ve always had a thing for tentacles. (groans)”

LAURA: “Don’t we all.”

STEVEN: I turn around and look at him, like look at my head tails. (laughter)

CAMERON: The camera slows and does a slow motion shot of Sabos’s head tails flinging over, and it does like the star, slightly glittery…

LAURA: Oh! There’s absolutely the anime sparkle!

CAMERON: Yeah!

LAURA: And then like little roses appear on the corner of the screen as he stops.

CAMERON: Oh yeah. It’s gorgeous.

NICK: And then the camera snap cuts to Felton’s face twisted in pain and mesmerized disgust as he stares at Sabos, and then we get back to the game.

STEVEN: I turn back around and try to hit him with the head tail as I turn back.

NICK: He’s like 20 feet from you.

STEVEN: I try. It doesn’t work.

NICK: Okay. They fling out. The Chadra-fan is practically vibrating. The thing about being a Sabacc dealer is you don’t actually touch cards because it’s all holographic, so you’re mostly just touching a keypad and then working as the craps dealer kind of announcer of ‘this is here’ and ‘you were worth 20 points, hooray,’ but he doesn’t really talk, he just squeaks a little. Everyone seems to be having a good time. Nobody’s out. When he looks at Tink he looks a little anxious like he wants you to be happier but he can’t figure out how. The Chadra-fan presses some buttons and starts to deal a new hand, and Kettle as she’s picking up her cards kind of looks sidelong at Xianna and says, “That was some fine playing there. You seem to have some experience.”

LAURA: “Oh, you know. I play cards here and there.”

NICK: “Yes, clearly. So, you’ve come to the gaming table, currently wiping the floor with me, and normally this is about the point where someone says what exactly they want. I don’t normally get approached just for fun and games. If you’re with Felton you probably need something. He rarely has anything to give. He’s more of a taker, that guy.”

STEVEN: “That makes sense.”

NICK: “So what are you here for?”

STEVEN: “So, you know the blockade exists…”

NICK: “Mm-hmm.”

STEVEN: “…and it might not be the…” I look behind me and see the Imperial and talk quieter. “…might not be the best thing for the planet.”

LAURA: She’s at the table.

CAMERON: I’m standing like right behind you.

STEVEN: I’d say it anyway.

NICK: No, I said you were like ten feet back.

CAMERON: Oh, okay. I didn’t realize I was that far away.

NICK: If you’re not playing you have to be outside the ropes.

CAMERON: Oh, okay.

LAURA: Okay. So you’re probably like right at the ropes, so we could talk to you, but if we whisper you won’t necessarily hear it.

NICK: Plus, that lets you be a little more imposing, because you get to be like mysterious in the distance. Yeah, so.

STEVEN: Anyway. “So, you know, it might not be the best thing for the planet here, and I understand you might have a device, the Rancore Protocol, or an object that might help us defeat the blockade.”

NICK: At that, Kettle nods to herself. “Ah.”

STEVEN: “Well, Felton was supposed to have it, we understand.”

NICK: “Yes, he was, wasn’t he.”

STEVEN: “But he is a little bit, uh, loose-fisted.”

CAMERON: “Useless.” You hear from the other side of the rope. (laughs)

LAURA: “Yes.”

NICK: Kettle stops and cranks all the way around to look behind her. She’s in the middle seat, so she cranks all the way around to look at you, makes eye contact with Felton who’s finally starting to straighten up a little, and goes, “Yeah, useless,” and turns back. “This is making a lot more sense. It’s interesting…” and she’s fiddling with the cards in her hand. The Chadra-fan is waiting for people to start making their moves. “It’s interesting how many things from Coronet City are ending up coming full circle, isn’t it?” And, if I could get another Skulduggery roll from everyone as they play another hand.

LAURA: Can do.

STEVEN: Sure. Average or hard?

CAMERON: Average?

NICK: Yeah, let’s just do average. It’s more of a competition thing.

STEVEN: Alrighty. I get two successes and a threat.

LAURA: So, two failures, but three advantages.

NICK: Hm.

LAURA: Yeah. I rolled the worst you absolutely could on these dice. It wasn’t…

NICK: Yep.

CAMERON: Kettle has one success.

HUDSON: One failure, two advantages.

NICK: Is there anything you all would specifically like your advantages to get used on? The way we’re doing this gambling mini-game, obviously successes and failures are how well you’re doing. You can either use your advantages to manipulate something in the room, do something outside the game, or they can count towards what your Sabacc total winnings are going to be, but they don’t do very much compared to successes. So, if you have advantages, now would be the time to say if there’s something you wanna spend them on.

LAURA: Could I spend mine to where I’m not winning anything, but I’m kind of folding because I know my cards aren’t right, so I’m losing a little bit of money, but I want to try to set myself up a little bit better so I can just have like a blue die on my next roll.

NICK: Yeah. That’s what I was gonna—(goofy) So, mechanically!

LAURA: (goofy) So, mechanically! Can I get a blue die, please?

NICK: Yeah. You can have a blue die on your next roll.

HUDSON: Can I do that as well when I’m playing my hand so that I can maybe do a little better?

NICK: You only have two advantages.

HUDSON: Ah, that’s true.

NICK: Hell. Okay. You get one blue die. Xianna can have two blue dice.

HUDSON: Okay.

LAURA: Ooh-hoo.

NICK: So, you all do the Botanelli’s Sabacc defense and set up for a later hand. … It’s Sabacc. I can make up whatever the heck I want.

HUDSON: We count Sabaccs.

NICK: Four Sabaccs make a trick.

LAURA: Five Sabacc. They’re not plural.

NICK: (laughs) Okay. So, the cards lay down, and Sabos actually comes out with the win. Tink and Xianna do very poorly, but yeah, they’re playing defensively, whatever that means in cards.

STEVEN: “I’ve never gambled before, guys.”

HUDSON: (groans)

(laughter)

STEVEN: But I say it in a way where you’re pretty darn sure I’m serious.

LAURA: “I actually have no idea if that is true or not. No idea.”

NICK: Kettle is playing really consistently. She’s not losing much money, but she is very clearly evaluating you all, more than she’s focused on her own hand. Sabos makes a pleasant win. He is still in the negative because everybody lost so much money to Xianna on that first hand, but you’re no longer worried about getting knocked out of the running, as it goes. You win. Your analog counter goes up. I’m picturing like old alarm clocks with like the flippy cards. There’s one of those set in the table in front of you and it changes. Extremely 70’s. The little mouse droid that collected your credits does a little victory lap and does a little (small trumpet noise), and then goes back into a little baby garage set into the wall of the table for the mouse droid.

Kettle looks at you and says, “Well, Councilman Sako, that was particularly impressive.”

HUDSON: “Who?”

(laughter)

LAURA: “Tink. Our friend, you know, Sako.”

HUDSON: “Yeah…”

LAURA: She nudges Tink a little bit under the table.

STEVEN: I just, I look at Kettle and say, “It’s a hard word to pronounce in their language, I think.”

NICK: “What, Basic?”

STEVEN: “Yeah.”

LAURA: “Well, no. You see, he speaks Gigoran, but the translator turns it into Basic, and sometimes it has difficulty with some words.”

STEVEN: “—says Sa-ko, sits, harded… Sako.”

NICK: “Oh, so you weren’t referring to the fact that his name is actually Sabos, and that he was impersonating someone when I dealt with him originally.”

LAURA: “Oh! You know that? Okie, then never mind. Yes, we know that.” (laughs)

STEVEN: “Well, of course she knows that.”

LAURA: “We are just confused, because he doesn’t seem to know which one he actually is, so it’s… you know, confusing.”

NICK: “This is interesting data. So, Sabos, which one do you think you are?”

STEVEN: (deep inhale) “I… Well, most recently I was… Well… I don’t know.”

LAURA: ‘He has gotten too far into the con! He does not know who he is anymore!”

STEVEN: “Because most recently I was actually some Imperial officer that got me through the blockade, so I’m actually pretty darn confused what I am right now.”

NICK: “Duly noted. You know, I’ve worked with some front men before who have had similar issues. It’s an interesting choice in crew leader, (snickering) but if that’s the way you choose to do business, that makes sense.”

HUDSON: “Where’s my kriffin’ drink?”

NICK: As you say that, the Twi’lek woman comes back and sets your Green Extermination in front of you. It’s a very large glass. That’s the only descriptor I’m gonna take, you can take the rest, but it’s a very large glass, and the table actually pops a little side table out so that you have somewhere to set it because the lip of the table isn’t big enough. She sets it down with one hand. She’s a very good waitress, because this is a big thing, she takes it off, loses no balance with anything, keeps the other more normally sized glass. She sets your Starship Juice in the set coaster and she brushes against you a little as she does it. She looks at you and says, “Oh, well I hope you’re doing well.”

LAURA: “Oh yes. Thank you.” I tip her. What is an appropriate tip for this place? What have I seen people tipping?

NICK: So, are you going for an appropriate but generous amount, or like an obscene amount?

LAURA: I’m going for a flirtatious amount. Whatever a flirtatious tip is—So, more than normal, not like crazy extravagant, so I guess our equivalent of like a 40% tip. I don’t know if 20 is the normal Star Wars amount.

STEVEN: A flirtatious tip is like 80-100%.

CAMERON: Uhh…

NICK: Oh, no…

LAURA: No no no. (laughter) Having waited tables, it’s just a bunch of business dudes…

STEVEN: It’s an old dude? Yeah.

LAURA: ……who like, have the company card and just know they can and are feeling generous.

NICK: It’s probably like 30 credits. That’s a solid amount.

LAURA: Yeah. I tip her 30 credits.

STEVEN: That’s a big tip. The buy-in at the table was 100, at the higher roller table?

NICK: We’re using the 100 for that. The table is less of a high rolling table and more of an exclusive table. It’s also because if I set it at actual high roller numbers you guys wouldn’t have been able to play.

STEVEN: Eh, maybe a hand.

NICK: Eh.

LAURA: That’s why I asked for Tink’s money.

NICK: Also, Xianna is still sitting on a lot, so I imagine you’re paying out of your winnings.

LAURA: Yeah.

NICK: Like, flipping her some—I guess it wouldn’t be chips. You press a little indicator on your flip board of numbers and it goes down 30, and her tray beeps at her. She looks and she goes, “Oh, well thank you. Is there anything else I can get you?”

LAURA: “Uh, no thank you.”

NICK: She does a little secret lekku move, that—

LAURA: Ooh~

NICK: –means whatever you want it to mean.

LAURA: (giggles) Xianna smiles at her.

NICK: And she bounces away. Do any of the rest of you notice this whole thing going on?

HUDSON: I’m just happy that I got my drink. I mean, she brought it over, right?

NICK: Yeah. You have your own special extra-large coaster for your very large drink.

HUDSON: I don’t tip. I just tell her that the tip was included with hers.

NICK: She looks at you, rolls her eyes, and just moves on. She’s in a good enough mood now that most people’s hijinks aren’t gonna get to her. So, describe your beverages!

HUDSON: I’m drinking a Green Extermination, which is a green, cinnamon flavored drink with some red ice cubes in it, and in addition some red floating what looks like little candies.

NICK: Huh. Sounds interesting. Xianna, what is your beverage?

LAURA: Oh, well I ordered the Starship Juice. It is very strong, but also very fruity, and since it’s a tiki drink it almost certainly comes in a cutesy little carved tiki glass. It looks like—Ooh! So it’s carved to look like a little loth-cat, and it has an umbrella on the top, and a colorful straw.

CAMERON: It’s a loopy straw.

LAURA: Yes.

NICK: A Luby’s straw?

LAURA & CAMERON: Loopy!

NICK: Oh.

CAMERON: It’s a straw that has loops in it.

NICK: I was gonna say, last time I went to Luby’s the straws were not that special.

LAURA: No, it has at least two loops in it.

HUDSON: That’s usually called a curly straw, right?

CAMERON: Probably.

LAURA: Or curly straw, yes.

HUDSON: No. Crazy straw! Crazy straws!

CAMERON: Crazy straws! There you go. It’s got a crazy straw.

LAURA: It’s got a pink umbrella. It’s pink.

NICK: That’s the important part.

LAURA: Yeah.

NICK: Okay. Your waitress friend has left. “So, the Rancore Protocol…” Kettle says, as the table starts to reset. The way the game has been going, you’ve played several hands, you’re not rolling for every hand, but there’s probably one more big climactic hand coming. “It’s an interesting piece of technology. I have no real use for it. It turns out, I’ve had it analyzed, and it’s still encrypted. If I could get it back to Coronet I think I could probably have someone break it up, but here on Ithor my resources are a little more limited than I would like. Wonderful people, the Ithorians,” she says, as an Ithorian in a pit boss kind of sequenty blazer and pants walks by, and he slowly nods his big hammer head and then continues on, “but not necessarily the most technological. They value nature a little too much. So, I might be able to part with it. You would just have to make it worth my time. It is a resource. I did win it.”

HUDSON: “Why don’t you bet it on this game?”

NICK: “Wow. I hadn’t really thought of that. I was going to charge 20,000 credits for it… but maybe we could make that happen. We won’t even bet it on this game, we’ll bet it on this last hand. Now, you’re gonna need a bigger ante, though.”

STEVEN: “How about if we make it more interesting with say, an Imperial code cylinder?”

CAMERON: (laughing) The hood head tilts.

STEVEN: (laughs)

LAURA: Xianna’s head tilts, like ‘What…?’

CAMERON: And then like, the head considers it.

NICK: “I mean, it would really—Do you have it with you? I’d love to see it.”

CAMERON: I do have it on me.

LAURA: “I think so. I mean, we will bet it.”

NICK: She turns around and looks at the cloaked figure of Karma and just imperiously gestures, and does the ‘give me’ hand sign. “I’m not going to take it. I just need to see what level it is.”

STEVEN: “Oh, it’s a… Sure.”

LAURA: “It is a code cylinder.”

STEVEN: “It’s the… it’s the best.”

NICK: This is the one you all already modified, right?

STEVEN: It’s the bigly-est code cylinder.

CAMERON: Uh, we didn’t modify it.

STEVEN: Yeah we did.

NICK: Didn’t you use that to get through the blockade? You used it as part of your passcode?

CAMERON: Oh yeah.

STEVEN: Yeah. It’s a very important intelligence officer code cylinder now.

LAURA: Now it’s pretty important.

CAMERON: It is now, actually. Yeah. It has very high clearance.

NICK: So, do you hand it over?

CAMERON: Yeah. I take it out of my jacket and hand it over.

NICK: So, it’s a cylinder.

CAMERON: Ooh.

NICK: The fun thing is this one’s obviously been bootlegged a little bit. There are some wires sticking out of one end that are crossed over to the other, and the casing is not sealed all the way. It’s like when somebody tries to play with an iPhone and doesn’t open it right, and it mostly goes back together but not all the way. She’s looking at it, and she goes, “Oh, okay. It’s a petty officer cylinder that is actually very important now. Interesting. Yes, that would definitely take some off the ante. I’d take that into account. The only thing about it would be, I’d also want to know who made this, because I may have some more work for them later on.”

HUDSON: “Do you think it’s a good job?”

NICK: “Yeah, actually. It’s good work. There are some things we could do about the cosmetics of it, but once we have that underway I think we could use this to make a pretty lucrative business.”

HUDSON: I look happy, but I’ve also been drinking, so I look a little glazed eyed, and I say, “You’re not part of the conspiracy, are you?”

NICK: She looks at you very seriously and leans forward. The Chadra-fan also leans in. his ears are all perked up.

LAURA: We all lean in.

NICK: She goes, “It depends on the conspiracy, but not the one you’re thinking of.”

HUDSON: “Good.”

NICK: Yeah. She nods to you self-assuredly.

HUDSON: “Okay. Just, right now, things are just everywhere, man. I, they’re all watching us, and we’re all just asleep. None of us are awoken…”

LAURA: “Tink, Tink… Are you on drugs, or do you need to be on drugs?”

STEVEN: “I think his translator is malfunctioning.”

HUDSON: “No, no. I’m as clear-minded as I’ve ever been.”

LAURA: “Are you sure?”

HUDSON: I take another giant drink. “I just, just need some assurance right now, guys.”

NICK: Kettle sits back in her chair. At this point you all have your cards for this last hand, because for whatever reason they’ve been dealt out before you finished deciding what you’re betting, but whatever. She nods and says, “Green Exterminations will do that to you.”

LAURA: “Yes.”

NICK: “Yeah. I’ll take the code cylinder, probably another 1,000 credits. That seems like a fair trade for a piece of code I can’t use right now.”

LAURA: “Okie.”

STEVEN: “And, winner takes all.”

NICK: Yeah.

STEVEN: Yeah. That’s how betting works.

NICK: She pulls out a computer spike. It looks like a talon, it’s curved which is weird, and it has a lot of exposed circuitry on it. Tink, you would recognize this as the spike that you used to collect the Rancore Protocol a few days ago. She tosses it into the middle, and she also places the code cylinder, and you all I guess pool your credits and put them in the middle so it adds up to 1,000, and then the mouse droid comes out and hits the pile of things and just goes (small struggle noise), because it’s too much stuff and it’s too heavy for it, so it’s wheels start spinning and you can see it put little tiny divots in the felt of the table. The Chadra-fan looks real concerned and scoops up the mouse droid and the bets and helps it get back to its little garage.

LAURA & CAMERON: Aww.

NICK: It like shakes its head nurturingly. It likes its mouse droid. Then, the hand is dealt, and you all play your final shot.

HUDSON: Who has the best dice?

LAURA: I am rolling two yellow, two green, two blue, and I think I’m gonna—

HUDSON: And we’re gonna flip a point.

CAMERON: Flip a light side, Laura.

HUDSON: Yeah. That’s what I was gonna suggest.

LAURA: So now I’m at three yellow, one green, two blue.

HUDSON: We roll Skulduggery when we gamble?

NICK: Mm-hmm, against average.

STEVEN: I’ll just roll for the fuck of it. Oh, cool. I’m gonna lose.

LAURA: So that is three successes, and (counts) seven advantages!

NICK: Gee whiz.

STEVEN: I just got an advantage.

HUDSON: Um, I have an advantage.

STEVEN: Same.

LAURA: Eh, you tried.

NICK: That’s it?

STEVEN: Oh fuck.

CAMERON: Uh, Kettle got five successes and a threat.

NICK: Yes! Ha ha!

CAMERON: I’m sorry guys. I rolled good that time.

HUDSON: Ooh. We can just take it and run.

NICK: No. it’s in the little garage.

HUDSON: Oh, it is.

NICK: It’s almost as if I thought that might happen. So, what happens is, you all start laying down cards, because Sabacc is actually—you don’t just necessarily lay down a hand, you start anteing each other. Immediately Tink and Sabos play cards that cancel each other out and they’re just out. There’s nothing you can do. You did The Fool’s Gambit. You can make you lose in three parsecs. Star Wars.

LAURA: Ha ha.

NICK: Kettle and Xianna start playing back and forth very quickly, and I think you end up tying. I’m assuming you would use your advantages to try and win the bet.

LAURA: Yes. I would use all seven of my advantages.

NICK: So, yeah. You end up having the exact same hand for some reason. The interesting thing is that the cards that you have, there’s only one in the deck, so somebody’s been cheating but it’s not sure who because the cards are identical. The Chadra-fan looks confused, and then starts to go to press a security button, and Kettle says, “No, no, it’s okay. We’re gonna do one more, but if you lose I’m gonna need a special favor as well.”

LAURA: “Mm, what kind of special favor are we talking about?”

HUDSON: (whispered) It’s sexual.

NICK: No it’s not.

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: Well, it might be. You don’t know. Don’t judge. “A special favor like a business favor, you know.”

LAURA: “Okie.”

NICK: “Something that might take advantage of your talents. You never know.”

HUDSON: “She loves my talents.”

NICK: We’re gonna do one more, but flip a dark side point because Kettle’s gonna get an upgrade. You can still have one blue die Xianna

LAURA: Cool.

NICK: As the cards are starting to deal the Chadra-fan looks real embarrassed and motions for Sabos and Tink to leave the area because they’re out of the game at this point, so you guys have to go an stand outside the velvet rope because you lost. What Kettle does is pulls out a little piece of flimsy and writes a little IOU on it and signs it and puts it in the middle, and hands you a piece of flimsy to do the same thing, Xianna.

LAURA: I definitely write like a little IOU, and I make like a little heart at the end. Or! I don’t remember what the aurubesh letters are for IOU, but I feel like one of them can be turned into like a little heart. That’s definitely how Xianna writes stuff.

NICK: Great. As you’re writing that up the waitress comes back with just a glass of water and puts it next to you. Roll me a Skulduggery check, please. This one’s easy.

LAURA: Three successes.

NICK: Yeah. She hands the glass of water and her hand brushes against yours. You feel the tell-tale nudge of an Alderanian palm sleight of hand technique, and as she pulls her hand back she winks at you one more time and there’s a clone card, which is how you cheat at Sabacc.

LAURA: Yeah!

NICK: It’s a card that’s basically a wild that you’re not allowed to use and can get your ass shot if you use one.

LAURA: Yeah. (laughs)

NICK: So, you get a blue die to your roll because your waitress friend has helped you out. That’s what the blue die was.

LAURA: Okay.

NICK: She backs up real quickly, and Kettle is looking at her own cards and does not notice.

LAURA: Cool.

NICK: Yeah, so, go ahead and roll one more time. Did you upgrade Kettle’s?

CAMERON: Yeah.

NICK: Cool.

CAMERON: Kettle got one success.

LAURA: Um, a triumph with its success, another success, and one threat.

NICK: Okay. You win pretty handily. The threat is, you feel like there were some moves that Kettle could’ve done that looked like really obvious newbie mistakes that would have made it a lot closer, that she made that make you start to feel like maybe this was on purpose.

LAURA: Oh no.

NICK: But yeah. The whole big pile, the little garage door on the table opens up, and you just hear a little high pitched machine whining as if little tires are pushing against this big pile of stuff, and the Chadra-fan looks embarrassed and pulls like a craps hook and pulls the stuff out towards you on the table while the mouse droid bumps against the craps hook trying to push the stuff towards you.

LAURA: Aw.

NICK: You end up with 1,000 credits, that’s just your winnings. Whatever you have now is 1,000. Sabos and Tink, you get the 1,000 part of the money back, so you didn’t lose that ante. You get that back. Out of the hundred that you guys anted, Tink gets 10 credits, Sabos gets 15. You guys didn’t do great at cards. Out of the 100 you anted you get that amount back. Xianna’s in the money, apparently, so that’s cool. You also get the Rancore Protocol, your code cylinder back, and you get a little piece of flimsy that says IOU signed by Kettle.

CAMERON: I’m gonna grab the cylinder again.

NICK: Kettle sits back and goes, “Wow. It looks like now I owe you a favor.” And that’s where we’re gonna end the episode.

(all make dramatic noises and Star Wars tunes)

## Outro

CAMERON: Thanks for listening to Tabletop Squadron. If you enjoyed our show please consider logging into iTunes and giving us a five-star review. Five-star reviews will help new listeners to find the show.

Xianna’fan is played by Laura Penrod. She can be found on Twitter at @cheerio_buffet.

Tink is played by Hudson Jameson and he can be found on Twitter at @hudsonjameson.

Karma Nailo is played by me, Cameron Robertson. You can find me on Twitter at @midnightmusic13.

Sabos Nix was played by Steven Schroeder. He… does not exist on the internet.

Our game master is Nick Robertson, and you can find him on Twitter at @alias58.

Our intro song is Space Jam by Pablo Ribot.

Additional music by James Gunter.

Follow the podcast on Twitter and Instagram at @tabletop_squad. For real! We’re real people and we wanna talk to anyone who listens to the show. Reach out! See you next time.

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