Adventure Submission - Darga's Missing Cargo

Dreenan · July 12, 2022, 8:12am

I use the “Never tell me the odds” chart too.
I wish there was a version with boosts and set backs though.

P-47Thunderbolt · July 13, 2022, 6:32pm

FYI, I don’t always remember what I’ve critiqued before, so if you reject a suggestion, please say so, so that I can actually recognize what’s an intentional choice on your part vs. something I missed while editing vs. something you missed while applying.

Also, I know some of these were part of my rewrites or suggested changes, but I’m fine-tuning them now that I see them in their full context and read them with an editor’s eye rather than a writer’s.

I made it through to The Blue Menace, but haven’t done anything in that section yet. Once we’ve settled this section, it should only take one more chunk to finish the adventure, and then we just need to review and comb through to make sure it has a unified style

Mechanics

Page 16: I recommend simply saying that the PCs fall Short range. Damage is only 10/10, both reduced by Soak and by an Average Coordination check (you can reference “see falling in chapter [?] of any CRB” <casual wording, you’d need to write it out). Accordingly, I’d remove the damage reduction via Advantage.
Page 17: Why the upgrade on the Perception check? Generally speaking, I would advise you to default to no upgrades. Only upgrade if there’s a very compelling reason why something about the check increases the chance of a Despair.
Page 18: A leech on the hand? Among “true leeches,” the shortest is half an inch long, well long enough that it would be easily noticed even if only by feel (“I know it like the back of my hand!” “Well you didn’t notice that leech, so you must not know it very well.” “WAHHH!”). Its ability to drain would accordingly be very miniscule, no one is really going to feel ill from it (just think about the quantity of blood it can absorb). The ill feeling would come from any injected toxins, and these (immediate effects) are extremely unusual among earth leeches absent an allergic reaction. I’d recommend you shorten it to a bite/sting from a poisonous creature.
Again, too many upgrades related to the leech. If it was “on Despair, the leech injects a lethal toxin,” there would be more reason for it. But as-is, the extra upgrades seem extraneous and unnecessary.

Adventure

Page 16: My thoughts on the rock bridge are well known, but just to reiterate I think this is a misplaced good idea. While you continue to consider it, I’m going to set aside my broader concerns and simply technically critique it.
Page 17: Instead of “balding sickness,” which sounds kind of silly and has no direct mechanical effect, I’d say lowers their Strain Threshold by X until Y (has happened). Maybe also mention an onset period, like “the start of next session” or whatever. But sicknesses are difficult to handle in this context, especially because you aren’t running their whole game, just giving them a session or two of material to work with. Having effects which run on outside your scope of influence is… a little bit of an overreach, or at least odd.

Grammar et al

Page 12: The red titles are something we need to revisit in-depth, but I’m leaving that for the style review at the end.
“Read the following” clips into the gray textbox.
“Rush of the repulsorlifts” could simply be “rush of repulsorlifts,” but either is okay so take your preference (my original rewrite had “of the,” but the latter removes a proximate repetition of “the”).
Add a paragraph break after “of the landscape.” This will avoid splitting a sentence between columns and bring the two columns to a more even distribution.
Remove “away” from “picturesque scenery fades away.” “Away” is repeated in the same context shortly with “grass dies away.” Since the first one isn’t entirely necessary, while the latter completes a thought, the first should be nixed.
“Land speeder” should be one word, “landspeeder.” It can also be replaced with “skiff.” If “landspeeder” was not a single compound word, it would be hyphenated. “Land” is not an adjective, but a part of the name. If you have two independent words that are a single “thought,” you would generally hyphenate. If you describe something as “red-blooded,” you wouldn’t say “a red blooded man,” you’d say “a red, blooded man” if they were two adjectives or “a red-blooded man” if “red-blooded” is a single adjective. A similar principle applies here, although my soliloquy about hyphens is somewhat misplaced as this… had nothing to do with hyphens.
Page 13: In American English, you can capitalize the first word after a colon if it begins a complete sentence rather than a list, but British English doesn’t. I would capitalize the first letter, and change the end of the first sentence to “comma, and” rather than “period. There” because the two sentences sound sharp when independent. They just flow better when conjoined. So since you’re using British English, leave it uncapitalized but still merge the sentences. (Am I getting rambley? I’m under the weather and my robrain tends to run marathons when I’m hangar-bound)
Move “nearby” to follow “perched,” the sentence will flow more smoothly.
You could add “seemingly,” “apparently,” or something like “you guess” before “wondering” if you want to avoid third-person omniscient.
“Because the scene is a few days old” comes a bit late, and the sentence itself is out of order. I’d recommend splicing it between “investigate the scene” and “asking the players,” and switching the internal order to “Add two Setback because XYZ” rather than “because XYZ, add two Setback,”
You mention the trail from the dragged crate, but not the blood trail.
“It” is lonely on a line by itself, so you should kill it and put it out of its misery. :P (change to “that point away period.”)
“Skiff” is also lonely, but I’m not sure how to reword the sentence to fix that. It’s just one of those things, I guess. It’s a longer word, so you can get away with it more readily.
You put the dice pool out of order. It should come after “Hard” and before “Knowledge”
“Recall basic information”: This is a perfect example of a colon where you don’t capitalize the following letter because it’s a list.
“Narglatch—the party suffers” or “Narglatch comma, causing” (as written, the party incorrectly remembers that the Narglach cause them to suffer Setback to their initiative). Some more specificity would be good, but isn’t wholly necessary.
After “Nexu” it should be a colon, not a semi-colon.
Page 14: “Roll is successful and generates Triumph”
You have two options on the Despair. You can either say “if it” (as in “successful roll”), or repeat the wording of the Triumph entry. Your choice, it just has to be a success condition.
Alternatively, keep it as-is, but say “[DESPAIR] and the roll is successful, the players misremember… or if the roll failed, the players don’t know what to look out for.” That way it’s equally applicable and gives fluff for both. Your choice, and you need to word it. That was just to give you an idea.
“Motivations comma,” rather than semi-colon.
“someone inside the cave desperately call for help” would probably be a better wording.
Page 15: Underlined colon.
Perhaps too much gap between the line and the textbox, but it isn’t clipping.
“into a tall”
“Corners period. Deeper into the caves comma, however is only darkness”
“all checks,” rather than “all check”
“Immune to” or “immune from.” You could also put “see” in quotation marks, since “see” implies “sight” which implies reception of light.
Could also be “these” effects, just to make sure you cover plainly both the darkness effects and the upgrades, though the immunity to darkness may be redundant since their stats should already reflect that (and thus you’re only referring to the upgrades).
Difficulty dice go immediately after the difficulty.
“Adding Setback.” It looks like that period is bolded. Check to make sure you haven’t bolded the die symbol or the punctuation.
Pick a style for “on page #X.” You’ve written it two different ways so far.
“Loses” to sync your tenses, “trail comma, and has… Area 1 in order to”
Page 16: “Failed check with”
Capitalize “Survival”
“This bonus is”
“For each net [THREAT]”
Capitalize “Survival”
Uncapitalize “the” following “[DESPAIR] comma,”
You can remove the success condition for cross the bridge, it’s both simple and obvious.
I think there may have been a miscommunication about falling into the crevice. My recommendation was that it be a fall from Short range, with my analysis being that low-tier characters could probably reduce the 10/10 damage to about 6/6 easily.
Previously identified as “crevice,” referred to continuously as “ravine.” I recommend “crevice,” in part because it has a more “cave-y” sound.
Page 17: Dice immediately follow difficulty.
Check style in published adventures, but I think “with a successful (check)” may be extraneous and you could just say “with a (check).” Success would usually be implicit, but I’m not sure if that’s how they style it.
Boost and Setback need to be capitalized. You also need to address accumulated effects, since you simply say “apply here as well.”
“Area 1” isn’t bolded. Style thing to check, look through each mention and decide 1. if you’re going to style all of them the same way, or 2. if they have conditional styling, what that is, and which is what.
Failure means no comma the party"
Punctuation shouldn’t be bolded. I take it you bold the symbols, and they got caught up in that? (I think bolding the symbols is probably unnecessary, but that’s a style choice you need to make)

Writing advice

I’m not criticizing you, I’m just trying to help you understand your own writing and improve it. You describe the room into which they enter, and then mention the light, when the light is what would usually be immediately noticed (similar to the smoke discussed previously). Your description follows a logical pattern, but it’s not a “human” pattern. When describing what is “seen” in a scene, try to think like the PCs who are experiencing this. What draws their eyes first? What do they notice? What do they feel? I’m certainly no expert, but that’s a large part of what I try to capture in my writing because it helps immerse the players into the situation by stimulating their senses’ imaginations rather than simply telling them what it looks like.

For an extreme example, imagine if you’re walking into restaurant and I describe the black-and-white tile, and the red booths and chairs, and the wonderfully greasy smell from the kitchen, and only then mention that three gunmen are holding up the joint and one is now waving a gun in your face. It’s a logical progression to set the stage and then the players, but it completely misses the point and forms the wrong mental image in the mind of the reader/listener. When you’re “painting someone a picture,” you want to write it in such a way that their assumptions aren’t jarringly contradicted, shaking up their mental image (it breaks immersion, for one thing).

In the case of the cave, the reader has the impression of darkness, carried over from previous descriptions, and so paints that picture as you describe the pillars etc., only to suddenly have to erase “darkness” and replace it with “light.”

In the case of the restaurant, if you say “you step in the door and a gunman points a gun in your face,” the reaction is “surprise! I didn’t expect this.” When you mention it after all of the other descriptions, the reaction is more like “wait, what? Where did this come from?”

How about you rewrite this one, taking my advice into account. Think about the approach to the cave; do they see the light first, or smell the stench?
Dice immediately after difficulty.
You say “clearly belonging.” In what way? It would be clearer to say something along the lines of “an ID card with the name of one of the crew members” or however you’d phrase it, to say they’re able to directly compare the ID of the card against a list of the people on the crew (we might want to go back early on and specify that they were given such a list, as there are many practical reasons why they would be).
You add that “the crate is empty” after talking about a successful check, which implies (contrary, I believe, to your intentions) that they’re able to tell easily. There are a couple ways to solve this. One is to somehow work “empty crate” into the narration, while another fancier option is to describe “empty crate” in what they find, as in “you find X in the empty crate” (as “the empty crate” carries the “empty crate” concept implicitly rather than “the crate is empty” which is declarative). Or a third option is to wrap up the crate mention into the failure condition, where you describe the obvious things that couldn’t be missed in the searching which constitutes the Perception check.
Why dark blue? You already have blue fruit and blue cats, it seems to me that the dark blue is repetitive.
“They find enough for one dose per Advantage.” (-1 dose to your wording, but it’s smoother)
Generally a bad idea to use formulas if you can avoid it. Better to talk it out, as in “a number of hours equal to his Brawn.”
“Any afflicted player becomes Disoriented” (the “Disoriented” condition has the same effect, while being mechanically represented and giving a use to the Hard Headed talent, should a player possess it).
You mention a Medicine check, but that’s rather at odds with the whole “balding sickness” thing unless you need to add an “if untreated” clause. Generally, this whole “sickness” section feels off to me. It’s an interesting concept, but it seems needlessly overcomplicated and like there’s way too much focus on it. It could really be distilled to Resilience check or else Disoriented, or even further to simply enough Threat/Despair=Disoriented.
Dice immediately after difficulty.
“previous owner was led him here” is unintelligible. Is it the datapad of one of the recent victims, or of a previous journeyer? Who led who? You can make it more specific/evocative by mentioning that they find it by a skeleton (perhaps mention species physiology) rather than just implying that it’s “in the mix.” Mentioning an old/dry skeleton also makes it more clear that it doesn’t belong to one of the crew.
“Was led” is also very passive language. Something like “came here seeking” is more active.
As previously mentioned I suggest nixing the leech in favor of a poisonous sting or bite. I think you’ve made the illness/leech effects too time-consuming for very little gain.

Now that I’ve finished that section, I’m going to call it quits for now. Some things were not carefully edited because I advised they be cut or radically altered, but this is restricted to just a couple paragraphs.

P-47Thunderbolt · July 13, 2022, 6:44pm

Just to expand on the writing advice bit some, you generally only need to give the important information. Oftentimes you can leave certain facets up to the PCs’ imaginations, especially if something more important (see: gunman) is drawing their full attention (maybe you don’t need to describe the color of the tiles when a gun is being held in the PC’s face). Other times, you can wrap descriptions subtly into prose as characters interact with the environment rather than outright describing it (maybe the blood from a gunshot wound “casts a red shadow over the black-and-white tile,” or “stains the booth a deeper red”).

As always, style will also have to be adjusted for context. Sometimes something (“casts a red shadow”) might read as unnecessarily melodramatic in one context, while fitting perfectly in another. But that’s a bit outside the scope of my original point, I’m just getting rambly again.

NGSRizzen · July 14, 2022, 11:27am

Just want to let you know I’ve been ill for the past week or so and starting to feel better but haven’t been able to work on the document. I’ll try to get to it this weekend.

Thanks again for all your help.

P-47Thunderbolt · July 14, 2022, 11:41am

Oof, that’s no fun. I hope you recover quickly!
(The forum is scolding me for constituting more than 53% of the replies. *Shakes fist*)

P-47Thunderbolt · July 16, 2022, 10:30pm

Since you haven’t been able to go over my previous suggestions yet, I’m able to cover more ground now.

Mechanics

Page 18: It should be Vigilance, not Perception. Perception is for when you are actively looking for someone trying to hide using Stealth, Vigilance is for when you are unaware and someone is trying to sneak up on you using Stealth.
“If visibility is poor, add a Boost.” Do you mean in terms of darkness, or cover? If you mean darkness, then the Narglatch already get Boost dice for darkness (see “Concealment” in any CRB). If you mean cover (e.g. “have a concealed approach” or something) then a Boost would be appropriate.
“If a Fear check was triggered previously…” Why? What if they succeeded? What if it was caused by something else? I think you can cut this part, a single upgrade for unfamiliarity should be sufficient.
I think you can just say to add a Setback due to the unsettling nature of the boneyard.
Since they’re close to the lair and there are fresh tracks, I’d simply make the difficulty Average rather than Hard with a Boost (the actual difficulty is easier, rather than there being an effect which helps you overcome an equally difficult obstacle). Increased proximity=increased traffic=increased signs. Also, check the Boost and Setback modifiers as I previous mentioned when this was last brought up.
Seeing how often the “3 Strain for fatigue” comes up, I think it might be better at 2. 1 is definitely too low, but I didn’t originally realize that it’d be 3 each time. If they have somebody with YGG in Survival, a Hard (unmodified) Survival check is basically a coin flip, so on average that would mean 9 Strain between the three navigation checks.
Another option (which is not an either-or) is to facilitate strain recovery, which could conceivably be done with either the crystals or bone, although the already-mentioned medicinal properties of the bone is probably your best option. Giving a tangible strain recovery effect will be more immediately and noticeably useful than a Boost to future Medicine checks. Something should probably be mentioned about needing a medkit in order to craft the… “drug,” or whatever you want to call it.
4,000 credits is incredibly low (given the price Darga is paying the PCs, perhaps even less than the price of the ten crates). I count credits as being ~4x the value of a dollar, which is more favorable to your amount as-written than if I took it as a 1:1 ratio with the American dollar (as most credit amounts for “consumer price index”-type items generally seem to be). Working from that, let’s say the family provides ~$60,000 worth of labor (what they would be paid if they weren’t slaves) a year, and let’s just say they consume about $12,000 worth of food each year. On net, that’s $48,000 in production. In today’s money, a slave in the 1850s in America cost about $40,000 according to one source I found. However, in today’s market, a slave costs on average $90 worldwide. That, however, comes in large part mostly from extremely poor regions and I’m not sure how applicable it is to the issue at hand. (If you want more data and don’t mind a churning stomach, you can check here.)
If we go with my 4:1 ratio, then you’re pricing a family of slaves at $16,000.
You also have to consider the Hutt’s situation. If he sells these slaves, he’ll have to either hire employees or buy more slaves, and he loses the expertise these slaves have built up. And what about the debt? If Darga sells them, either they’re still indebted to him or that debt is wiped clean, in which case he can’t collect on it.
I think that any realistic amount will be astronomically high (compared to the PCs’ capabilities). But if you want an amount, Darga would probably say that if you pay off their debt, plus ten percent, he’ll free them. The catch is that the debt is something like ($48,000*20/4=) a quarter million credits, indicating that I may have buried the lead here. Obviously, this is astronomical for the PCs. Now they have a choice: leave it as a sad ending to the story, or decide to take matters into their own hands and risk crossing Darga if he finds out about it.
Page 21: I suggest making it 5/5 soakable (we don’t want to overdo it on the strain). 1 Threat for one or two Wounds and Strain is acceptable. I’d also recommend shifting it to Average difficulty, as Hard is pretty steep for, again, something that costs 1 Threat (it’ll also bring it in line with the next two).
Too many upgrades. I don’t think any of these are necessary (whole page), particularly as there’s never even a listed consequence for Despair.
-1 Agility for 1 Threat, even conditional, is pretty steep. That’s equivalent to an Average-difficulty crit. Instead, I’d recommend a Setback to Agility checks. Remember, this is only a single Threat and you don’t want to hamstring the PCs by the time they’re facing what is a very dangerous foe for non-combat PCs/PCs without a lot of EXP.
This second check for the cobweb is where I can see good reason for a Despair, but only if you intend them to have an encounter with a giant spider (and say as much). Depending on how big and nasty it is. However, given the relatively unpressured nature of the second check, I think this could be safely replaced with something like a spider bite/scorpion sting, dealing one wound and one strain (with no related checks). This does make it somewhat less steep than the poisonous fungus, but all that says to me is that maybe the poisonous fungus should be further nerfed (perhaps at least make the second check Average at most).
Philosophically, I disagree with your approach to the “Individual Hazards.” In my book, 1 Threat should be something very minor like 1 Strain. Because this is more involved, I can see good reason for bumping up the consequences slightly, but adding one or two checks to the mix makes it too complicated for a single Threat, I think. I recommend easy one-and-done effects, with the exception of a saving throw for the fall (that helps justify the higher damage). I’d suggest replacing the effect of the fungus with something like “hallucinogenic spores,” upgrading the difficulty of that PCs’ Perception and Vigilance checks once. Easy one-and-done that isn’t too serious, along with the spider bite and a minor fall.
^That’s all up to taste. While I think I’m right (obviously, otherwise I wouldn’t have mentioned it), if you prefer it the other way I’m not going to belabor the point.
Group Hazards, triggered by Despair, are much more interesting to me and I think you have a lot more room to elaborate here.
If this is a corrosive atmosphere (see the combat chapter in any CRB), then there’s no Resilience check and they simply start taking damage. I recommend having some kind of “solve” check or trade-off choice they have to make. A “solve” check can be something like Athletics to push aside/climb over some obstacle, or something like Knowledge (Education) to find a way to neutralize the effect of the fumes (you’d have to get fairly specific, though), while the trade-off choice could be “failing” an otherwise successful check and having to find another way around, increasing the difficulty of the next Survival check by 1. Each attempt at a “solve” check would count as a round of exposure. However, I have to mention that if the Narglatch came this way… why? Path of least resistance and all that. Just something to think about.
(The “per ten minutes” bit is unworkable. You give no guidelines for how long such a thing should take or why it should take much time at all.)
The Fear check is good. You might want to add something here, like “if they fail, the difficulty of the next Fear check is upgraded once.”
A cave-in along their route is quite serious, blocking them off from the known route. I’d cut the “health” penalties (plenty of those already) and say that if they failed the Survival check, they increase the difficulty of the next one once. In addition… hmm, I’m not sure. I’d rather not do something with health, so maybe some valuable item or some supplies get damaged? But there has to be some penalty even on a successful check. Maybe just that any checks to backtrack out of the cave system have +1 difficulty per cave-in.

Adventure

Page 18: You say they’ve been “stalking” the PCs. In the caves? Should the PCs have been given a chance to detect them prior to this point?
Then later you say that the Narglatch approach from the west, and the players from the northeast. If they’re coming from the opposite direction, were they really stalking?

Males and females only commingled during mating season. Females were more fierce hunters than males, but males could chase a female from her kill. A pregnant narglatch always gave birth to twins, one of each gender. Since young narglatch could hunt immediately upon birth, mothers abandoned them.

No egg (feline=mammal=live young), no “hatchling,” no singular.
“A solitary hunter, narglatch silently stalked and quickly killed its prey, usually kaadu or jimvu.”
The above is a good argument to have only one of the Narglatch attack the PCs, which makes the fight less dangerous (and if the female is as pregnant as “soon-to-be” suggests, to me, at least, you have that excuse/reason as well for only one to engage). However, I think the best solution is to completely do away with the concept of “baby on the way” since the egg idea is out the window anyway (besides, given the males’ propensity to kill young, and the mention that Narglatch of the opposite sex only interact during mating season, she would likely not want to be around him when she’s about to give birth).
Nowhere heretofore has it been specified that the Narglatch are both male and female, nor is it important to the story, so we just have to determine what makes sense. I see basically three approaches: ignore it entirely (if you never take a position you can never be wrong); make them both of the same sex (they’re just working together for survival); or posit that it is mating season. Personally, I think the last option fits best, though the first would probably be fine.
“Fight to the death…” but will they though? “Fight to the death” is always a dangerous instruction, because that death could be the PCs’. Without any young to defend, I think leaving an opportunity for retreat is best. After all, why would the Narglatch die for a cave, when they could just leave and find another lair? If they do retreat, then the PCs have to decide whether to try and find and kill them or not.
Some tactical description or “win conditions” (e.g. to cause the Narglatch to retreat) would spice up this combat section. Text-wise, you effectively jump directly from “here’s how to handle the Fear check before initiative” to “the battle is over and everything is quiet.”
Rather than simply saying “the thugs attack,” I’d recommend taking a similar tack to the one you took a little bit earlier and have it be optional. For example, if the PCs are badly hurt, the encounter could go very badly for them. While a GM should use his best judgement and be willing to simply ignore it, some GMs will stick too closely to adventures as-written, especially if they are inexperienced (or tired, and not thinking clearly. Most of my mistakes have been made within that context).

Grammar et al

Page 18: “They wait until the characters are distracted, then attack them.”
“Perception skill,” “skill” should not be capitalized
“Read the following out loud” is underlined, a break from previous styles.
“Narglatch” is sufficient if the PCs succeeded on their previous check. If they didn’t, then your description is more in order, but lacks in punch since they were expecting something totally different. You basically have three approaches here: write two textboxes, one for each possibility; write a single, neutral textbox that really touches on neither; or leave it entirely up to the GM. I would recommend the first and third options most highly.
If you want to take the neutral approach, the prose will need some touching up. For example, you place “they have blue skin and move gracefully and powerfully” as an independent sentence following the first rather than intertwining it with the previous sentence.
“At a medium distance” should be “at medium range,” or “at medium range instead.” This is more specific and directly addresses the mechanics, whereas “medium distance” is far more vague. Yes, it would be understood, but it isn’t technically the best choice. If I tell you that “Corellia is a medium distance from Brentaal IV,” it means something very different than if I tell you that “the barbershop is a medium distance from the cantina.” But wait, do I mean that the barbershop is a moderate drive, or a couple dozen meters?
Mentioning “make sure to learn their statblock” is unnecessary. I’d recommend removing that entirely.
I recommend reordering the initiative and Fear checks. You introduce it as Stealth>Initiative>Combat>Fear when the pattern you actually want the game to follow is Stealth>Fear>Initiative>Combat. I would suggest that after the description of the Stealth check’s pool, if you intend to have a textbox, you put it here (I strongly suggest that you either have two, one for success and one for failure, or just leave it up to the GM. So much of the narrative is contingent on dice results). Then introduce “have each PC make a Fear check,” and then finally address the initiative. Then maybe have a text box introducing the actual combat, but by then the pace has been slowed down enough that you might be better off without it.
Bolded punctuation by the symbols.
Page 19: “Groove” is probably not your best word choice here. A “groove” is a long, narrow slit. What most people will think when they read “groove” is something like a stress gap in pavement, not a habitable space in a cave, or a ditch, which is what it sounds like you mean? At any rate, I’m not sure what connection the groove is supposed to have with the following narration, or if there even is one, in which case I’m not sure what its purpose is.
Again, I suggest that you rewrite this whole textbox using the advice I gave you in my last post, but here are some particular things to look out for in what you did write:
Six items is a bit much for a list. I’d recommend either trimming it to only the most important parts, or using some kind of catch-all like “anything at hand.” You can also take a hybrid approach, making list of broader categories (e.g. “natural materials”). Three is best, four is pushing it, but acceptable. Five or more is too many in most circumstances (especially in prose).
“Bright, blue stains” and “bright-blue stains” are different. “Bright blue” is a shade of blue, whereas a “bright, blue stain” is a “blue stain” that is also “bright.”
You say “ruined equipment.” Why would they have brought any equipment with them? Or do you not really mean equipment, and you mean more like personal effects that were still on the victims or parts of the crate? More specificity would help you here.
Oxford comma after “equipment”
“Three” and “two,” not “3” and “2”
The way you phrase this, with the comma, is like a list. However, it lacks the third entry which would make it whole. Accordingly, there should be some kind of conjunction like “but” or “and” (see how I wrote “‘but’ or ‘and’” instead of “‘but,’ ‘and’”?).
That isn’t so much for clarity as for correctness. Sometimes people do talk like that, but it isn’t technically correct.
Extraneous “successful” before “Average Perception check.”
You might want to be more specific on what the valuables are, like cred sticks from the corpses, jewelry, etc. Could also be a moral question, because it’s technically corpse robbing.
“Irreparably broken and worthless.”
As mentioned previously, Narglatch egg is a no-go.
Extraneous space between “and” and “receive”
“The three-hour ride back to the city of Zarra is uneventful.”
“It is probably quite late by now”
Unnecessary bolding. As it is the entire sentence, as opposed to giving context to a previous sentence, it is its own emphasis.
Extraneous space after “returned crate”
Extraneous space after “agreed-”
“If they received an advance at the beginning of the adventure, remember to deduct that amount from this payment.” (I’m not totally sold on the latter half. “Amount” and “this payment” in particular are not ideal)
Instead of decimated, you can just say something like “killed.” A bit less dramatic, but that could be a good thing. Also, “decimated” technically means to reduce by one-tenth, and there will often be someone ready and willing to point that out (“So only one of them was injured?” is a comment I can readily imagine someone making, or perhaps it is simply me projecting my penchant for literal humor).
“Their employer” can be “Darga,” and then “the crime lord” can simply be “he”
Alternatively, the first could be “the Hutt” and the second could be “Darga”
“Lenient” isn’t the best word, as it implies withheld standards or punishments. I recommend “partial to” instead. Some longer phrases (such as “favorably disposed”) are also applicable, but I think “partial” is your best bet.
“Hutts loves money” should be “Hutts love money”
Extraneous space and “is” after “Negotiation check”
Page 21: “Affects one character”
Change “requires” to “The character must pass” (note capitalization). Applies to all three.
“fall comma, taking”
Overuse of ampersands. Don’t do it! Generally, only use an ampersand if it is part of a proper noun (e.g. “Smith & Wesson”) or of a pseudo-proper noun (e.g. favorite breakfasts: donuts, pancakes, “biscuits & gravy,” and “bacon & eggs”).
“Or until one week has passed.”
“Gets stuck comma,”
Dice come immediately after difficulty
You’re inconsistent on the styling of the introduction. You basically have two options: either the intro/name leads directly into the text, or it’s a title, with a colon that leads into the text. Personally, I suggest the latter as it the usual style for effect tables. However, I understand why you might like the other option and it also appears in a few locations. Take your preference. Just know that you should capitalize the first letter after the colon if you take the “title” method. I’ll address wording once that’s all been worked out.
“Piece of Clothing” shouldn’t be capitalized (also, extraneous space after “clothing”).
Darga’s symbol drawn on a wall indicates that the person was still alive and cognizant enough to do such a thing (not grammar, I know, but just so we keep it all in one place…)
Three of these require knowledge of the identities of the victims, and imply that the PCs have some kind of bio on each of them. This should be mentioned early on in the adventure, probably a simple clause you can add to the paragraph for “Who were the guards?”
Since you removed the maps, you can remove the credit.
Change “over at” to “from the” or “over on the”
“Forum” rather than “forums”
“for helping make this more presentable”
“For all his very helpful suggestions” (aww… thanks!)

And that’s a run-through of the whole thing. Once we’ve worked through these last two posts, we’ll have to do another run-through, but it should be much faster going than the first time through since we’ve fixed the biggest issues, especially the structural ones.

Once we’ve at least worked out all the mechanical details, would you like to try a Play-by-Post to playtest the game? I can quickly draw up a party according to your specs and then we can run it through organically.
Or, if you’d rather cut to the chase, I can just run some basic roll-tests behind the scenes and present my findings rather than actually play-testing it in the course of a game.

NGSRizzen · July 19, 2022, 10:39pm

I’m pretty behind on updating the document but will take it one thing at a time ;). It’s amazing how time can slip through our fingers sometimes.

I just realized on P.6 that we don’t have a description readout for what the market looks like. I think that would be a useful addition. Thoughts?

FYI, I don’t always remember what I’ve critiqued before, so if you reject a suggestion, please say so, so that I can actually recognize what’s an intentional choice on your part vs. something I missed while editing vs. something you missed while applying.

For the most part I think this is how we’ve been handling it. It is possible I missed a change here and there but if I disagreed or wanted clarification on something I usually brought it up.

Page 16: I recommend simply saying that the PCs fall Short range. Damage is only 10/10, both reduced by Soak and by an Average Coordination check (you can reference “see falling in chapter [?] of any CRB” <casual wording, you’d need to write it out). Accordingly, I’d remove the damage reduction via Advantage.

I like this. I have never had anyone fall yet so I didn’t realize it could be reduced by Coordination… good to know! I removed most of the paragraphs for advantages and disadvantages because they were focused alot on the damage.

Page 17: Why the upgrade on the Perception check? Generally speaking, I would advise you to default to no upgrades. Only upgrade if there’s a very compelling reason why something about the check increases the chance of a Despair.

No particular reason, was mostly there to mix things up. I removed it.

Page 18: A leech on the hand? Among “true leeches,” the shortest is half an inch long, well long enough that it would be easily noticed even if only by feel (“I know it like the back of my hand!” “Well you didn’t notice that leech, so you must not know it very well.” “WAHHH!”). Its ability to drain would accordingly be very miniscule, no one is really going to feel ill from it (just think about the quantity of blood it can absorb). The ill feeling would come from any injected toxins, and these (immediate effects) are extremely unusual among earth leeches absent an allergic reaction. I’d recommend you shorten it to a bite/sting from a poisonous creature.

Sure! I’m not very familiar with what would be appropriate as an effect but I re-wrote using the strain damage idea.

Page 16: My thoughts on the rock bridge are well known, but just to reiterate I think this is a misplaced good idea. While you continue to consider it, I’m going to set aside my broader concerns and simply technically critique it.

I am certainly open to modifying it but would like to keep it there. What you’re saying about animal behavior and all that makes sense.

At the moment, what I am considering is making it so that Narglatch rarely cross through there unless they really have to, but the players still find the room. On the other side of the ravine would be one of the mangled bodies they are looking for but they need to cross to ID it. A Narglatch could have dragged it there from the boneyard to eat it away from the stench of the pile of bones. If the PCs decide to cross, they can ID the body and continue down that other passageway following a different but similar kind of bloody + dragging trail.

Once we’ve at least worked out all the mechanical details, would you like to try a Play-by-Post to playtest the game? I can quickly draw up a party according to your specs and then we can run it through organically.

PBP would be too slow for me but if you think you would enjoy it and we could scrounge a group for a one-shot session I would be open to running a live session on R20 or RPG Sessions. I think that would have more potential

I’ll get to the many other changes over the next few days when I can.

Thanks again for all your help. Also 53% of all the posts is a pretty high figure ;)

P-47Thunderbolt · July 20, 2022, 12:27am

A description/narration wouldn’t be bad, but I don’t think it’s necessary. If you want to add something, by all means, I just don’t think you have to.

Good to know, I just wanted to clarify and make sure we were on the same page going forward.

Note that it’s Coordination OR Athletics. Check the falling rules in the combat chapter if you need more info.

I’m not sure that’s the best reason, but I don’t have any better ideas at the moment. Keeping it in there definitely makes sense, making it optional isn’t quite ideal, but ought to be good enough. My robrain is tired, I might think of something better later.

Live play is simply not a good option for me, unfortunately. While I agree on the pros of doing it by that method, it is not practical on my end. PbP can go pretty quickly if it’s only two people doing it and both are pretty committed, and it’s easier for me to set aside a chunk of time to be on stand-by (when I can juggle multiple things) than it is to set aside a chunk of time for live-play.

I’m glad to do it! You’ve been a lot of fun to work with, especially because you haven’t gotten offended at my plethora of suggestions. :P

NGSRizzen · July 20, 2022, 11:26am

A description/narration wouldn’t be bad , but I don’t think it’s necessary. If you want to add something, by all means, I just don’t think you have to.

Makes sense. I think we can do without.

Note that it’s Coordination OR Athletics. Check the falling rules in the combat chapter if you need more info.

Roger that.

I’m not sure that’s the best reason, but I don’t have any better ideas at the moment. Keeping it in there definitely makes sense, making it optional isn’t quite ideal, but ought to be good enough. My robrain is tired, I might think of something better later.

Robrain? :P

Yeah the reason isn’t perfect, simply an idea. I also considered making another creature having brought it here but that could complicate tracking, etc etc. It could also simply be that he was alive but near death and crawled over from the boneyard when the Narglatch weren’t around.

Live play is simply not a good option for me, unfortunately. While I agree on the pros of doing it by that method, it is not practical on my end. PbP can go pretty quickly if it’s only two people doing it and both are pretty committed, and it’s easier for me to set aside a chunk of time to be on stand-by (when I can juggle multiple things) than it is to set aside a chunk of time for live-play.

When I got to thinking about it I pictured you and I with a group of people; in PBP each extra person multiplies how long it takes to take a turn, make decisions, etc. If it was just you and I running PBP it would be much faster than I was first thinking so I would probably be open to it once we’re done.

I’m glad to do it! You’ve been a lot of fun to work with…:

Oh well thank you!! I do think we’ve worked well together and the adventure is leagues better because of it.

especially because you haven’t gotten offended at my plethora of suggestions.

Lol! I wasn’t sure how to take it at first but I made my peace with it :). Few people would take the time to make suggestions and corrections in such detail, especially for a stranger. At the end of the day, the errors and imperfections are there so might as well fix them.

P-47Thunderbolt · July 20, 2022, 12:11pm

I’m a sentient fighter plane, so yes, robrain. Short for “robot-brain.”

Awesome, I look forward to it.

Well I always want to help, especially if I’m asked to.

NGSRizzen · July 20, 2022, 6:49pm

If you take my advice and either remove the obstacle or make it optional, that’s one layer. Making it not too difficult to cross (maybe allow them to cross without a Coordination check, if they’re taking it slowly) gives you a second layer. For the third, recovery, don’t make failure equal a fall. Failure means you didn’t succeed in crossing. If you just jumped, maybe it means you’re grabbing onto the side. If you ran across a bridge, maybe it means you lost your balance and fell down. Despair or three+ Threat on a failure might mean you fall, but even then there are ways to recover without “death.”

I changed it to Easy difficulty and 3 disadvantages for a fall. I added a condition that if two players cause noise it alerts the Narglatch to their presence and they show up within a few rounds.

For the jump / athetlics check, though I am comfortable with difficult at Hard, I think an upgrade would be appropriate here.

I added a short blurb in the readout and description about the corpse.

I modified the strain damage for failed survival from 3 to 2. I agree this is a good middle ground.

Page 17: Instead of “balding sickness,” which sounds kind of silly and has no direct mechanical effect, I’d say lowers their Strain Threshold by X until Y (has happened)

OK! I also changed it to 2 threat instead of 1 as that is a pretty bad effect for a single threat.

I implemented the changes up to

“Adding Setback.” It looks like that period is bolded. Check to make sure you haven’t bolded the die symbol or the punctuation. (post #49)

Page 13: In American English, you can capitalize the first word after a colon if it begins a complete sentence rather than a list, but British English doesn’t. I would capitalize the first letter, and change the end of the first sentence to “comma, and” rather than “period. There” because the two sentences sound sharp when independent. They just flow better when conjoined. So since you’re using British English, leave it uncapitalized but still merge the sentences. (Am I getting rambley? I’m under the weather and my robrain tends to run marathons when I’m hangar-bound)

You don’t sound any more rambly than usual ;) but now I am getting sick again so I’m trying to get to some of these changes in before my brain goes zombie on me.

P-47Thunderbolt · July 20, 2022, 6:58pm

“Than usual” being the operative term, I suppose. xD

I agree on all counts aside from the upgrade. I’m not going to argue the point other than to say there’s nothing about the check that makes a Despair more likely, but I think it’s fine.

NGSRizzen · July 20, 2022, 9:18pm

“Than usual” being the operative term, I suppose. xD

I agree on all counts aside from the upgrade. I’m not going to argue the point other than to say there’s nothing about the check that makes a Despair more likely , but I think it’s fine.

It was to make the difficulty somewhere between 3 and 4; since you seemed to think that 3 wasn’t enough but to me 4 would be too much. Would it be better to leave it at 3?

I am changing it so that it takes 2 threats instead of 1 to trigger an individual hazard. I know you touch on it in more detail later but I’m not there yet.

I think there may have been a miscommunication about falling into the crevice. My recommendation was that it be a fall from Short range, with my analysis being that low-tier characters could probably reduce the 10/10 damage to about 6/6 easily.

I see that now.

Check style in published adventures, but I think “with a successful (check)” may be extraneous and you could just say “with a (check).” Success would usually be implicit, but I’m not sure if that’s how they style it.

You are correct; here are two random examples I found:

Accessing the building in this manner requires an Average (PP) Computers check with a Setback die ∫ to bypass the security system.

An Easy (P) Coordination check allows the PCs to maneuver through the tunnels safely

I think I got them all… It will make it less repetitive.

(I think bolding the symbols is probably unnecessary, but that’s a style choice you need to make)

It bolds itself for whatever reason when I switch between fonts and I catch most of them but I do miss a few here and there.

You say “clearly belonging.” In what way? It would be clearer to say something along the lines of “an ID card with the name of one of the crew members” or however you’d phrase it, to say they’re able to directly compare the ID of the card against a list of the people on the crew (we might want to go back early on and specify that they were given such a list, as there are many practical reasons why they would be).

This wasn’t clear. I modified it slightly :)

Why dark blue? You already have blue fruit and blue cats, it seems to me that the dark blue is repetitive.

This color was chosen before everything else turned out to be blue, as it seemed an interesting color for the bones of an alien species. I’ll change it to black.

“Any afflicted player becomes Disoriented” (the “Disoriented” condition has the same effect, while being mechanically represented and giving a use to the Hard Headed talent, should a player possess it).

Do you think think a reduced strain threshold after a 24h incubation is bad enough or should I add also an immediate disorientation to the effects of the poison?

You mention a Medicine check, but that’s rather at odds with the whole “balding sickness” thing unless you need to add an “if untreated” clause. Generally, this whole “sickness” section feels off to me. It’s an interesting concept, but it seems needlessly overcomplicated and like there’s way too much focus on it. It could really be distilled to Resilience check or else Disoriented, or even further to simply enough Threat/Despair=Disoriented.

Hehe… I was trying to do something interesting but I agree it got a bit muddled along the way.

“previous owner was led him here” is unintelligible. Is it the datapad of one of the recent victims, or of a previous journeyer? Who led who? You can make it more specific/evocative by mentioning that they find it by a skeleton (perhaps mention species physiology) rather than just implying that it’s “in the mix.” Mentioning an old/dry skeleton also makes it more clear that it doesn’t belong to one of the crew.

Yikes. Sorry about that; I rewrote it

OK. I implemented all changes from post #49 minus the rewrite for the Area 3 readout. That’ll be the next phase :).

Cheers

P-47Thunderbolt · July 21, 2022, 12:19pm

There’s a pretty strong “real” odds jump (if you’ll pardon the pun) between 3 and 4 because 3 Brawn is very common, making it a roughly 55% chance of success most of the time (factoring a rank or two of Athletics), while Daunting knocks that down to a 42% chance for anyone with 3 Brawn, with four Brawn being much rarer. I think Hard is fine. An upgrade is effectively about the same as adding a Setback in terms of average generation over Difficulty, and two Setback/two Upgrades are about the same as a direct increase in difficulty. If there’s no particularly relevant choice for Despair, or anything that makes Despair particularly more likely, you could achieve the same result with a Setback.

I also just realized that you put the check to cross at Easy, but require 3 Threat to fall. That’s impossible outside of conditional Setback. I’m still in favor of removing the Easy Coordination, but that’s up to you.

Excellent, thank you.

Ooo, mysterious. Sounds good. Come to think of it, I wonder how much variety there usually is in bone color? Science be darned, it’s a good idea regardless.

I am generally opposed to effects that kick in after a time, unless it’s something fairly soon (like “2 rounds”). I’d have to look at it again, but potentially have both kick in immediately. If it came to a choice between the two effects, I would go with Disorientation. It carries more of a kick and actually gives Hard Headed a use (assuming the character can even succeed…).

Excellent. I’ll wait to go back over anything until you’re caught up. I hope you start feeling better soon.

NGSRizzen · July 22, 2022, 11:41am

There’s a pretty strong “real” odds jump (if you’ll pardon the pun) between 3 and 4 because 3 Brawn is very common, making it a roughly 55% chance of success most of the time (factoring a rank or two of Athletics), while Daunting knocks that down to a 42% chance for anyone with 3 Brawn, with four Brawn being much rarer. I think Hard is fine.

OK. I’ll drop it back to Hard :).

I also just realized that you put the check to cross at Easy, but require 3 Threat to fall. That’s impossible outside of conditional Setback. I’m still in favor of removing the Easy Coordination, but that’s up to you.

Ok. As per a previous suggestion I’ll change it so that outside of combat a check is not required but in combat an average difficulty check is required. With two purple dice it would still be very unlikely that a fall would happen but it could make it so the players are separated for a few rounds if hostiles show up. What do you think?

Ooo, mysterious. Sounds good. Come to think of it, I wonder how much variety there usually is in bone color? Science be darned, it’s a good idea regardless.

Thanks! I thought so :)

I am generally opposed to effects that kick in after a time, unless it’s something fairly soon (like “2 rounds”). I’d have to look at it again, but potentially have both kick in immediately. If it came to a choice between the two effects, I would go with Disorientation. It carries more of a kick and actually gives Hard Headed a use (assuming the character can even succeed…).

OK! I changed it to immediate disorientation lasting for the session and cleaned up the paragraph a bit.

P-47Thunderbolt · July 22, 2022, 12:26pm

That’s perfect. Everything looks great.

NGSRizzen · July 22, 2022, 6:24pm

I rewrote the readout for Area 3; let me know what you think.

As I was writing it, I am wondering if we should call for an Easy Resilience check because of the nasty smell? Most people walking into that room would gag =P.

Page 18: It should be Vigilance, not Perception. Perception is for when you are actively looking for someone trying to hide using Stealth, Vigilance is for when you are unaware and someone is trying to sneak up on you using Stealth.

Hmm… that’s interesting. We only have the AoR rulebook (which has no mention that I know of of Vigilance) but if I understand correctly this was updated in the FaD. Either way, I see how that can make sense.

“If visibility is poor, add a Boost.” Do you mean in terms of darkness, or cover? If you mean darkness, then the Narglatch already get Boost dice for darkness (see “Concealment” in any CRB). If you mean cover (e.g. “have a concealed approach” or something) then a Boost would be appropriate.

I am referring to the Boost for darkness; I’ll modify the wording a bit.

Since they’re close to the lair and there are fresh tracks, I’d simply make the difficulty Average rather than Hard with a Boost (the actual difficulty is easier, rather than there being an effect which helps you overcome an equally difficult obstacle). Increased proximity=increased traffic=increased signs.

I was just thinking the same thing.

Another option (which is not an either-or) is to facilitate strain recovery, which could conceivably be done with either the crystals or bone, although the already-mentioned medicinal properties of the bone is probably your best option. Giving a tangible strain recovery effect will be more immediately and noticeably useful than a Boost to future Medicine checks. Something should probably be mentioned about needing a medkit in order to craft the… “drug,” or whatever you want to call it.

Sure, we could do that.Modified it so that they could heal 2 strain instead of the boost die, with one use per adv. rolled.

4,000 credits is incredibly low (given the price Darga is paying the PCs, perhaps even less than the price of the ten crates). I count credits as being ~4x the value of a dollar, which is more favorable to your amount as-written than if I took it as a 1:1 ratio with the American dollar (as most credit amounts for “consumer price index”-type items generally seem to be). Working from that, let’s say the family provides ~$60,000 worth of labor (what they would be paid if they weren’t slaves) a year, and let’s just say they consume about $12,000 worth of food each year. On net, that’s $48,000 in production. In today’s money, a slave in the 1850s in America cost about $40,000 according to one source I found. However, in today’s market, a slave costs on average $90 worldwide. That, however, comes in large part mostly from extremely poor regions and I’m not sure how applicable it is to the issue at hand. (If you want more data and don’t mind a churning stomach, you can check here.)
If we go with my 4:1 ratio, then you’re pricing a family of slaves at $16,000.
You also have to consider the Hutt’s situation. If he sells these slaves, he’ll have to either hire employees or buy more slaves, and he loses the expertise these slaves have built up. And what about the debt? If Darga sells them, either they’re still indebted to him or that debt is wiped clean, in which case he can’t collect on it.

Hmm… thanks for the insight. Originally there were only 2 adults but now there are 3, and I had purposefully priced a bit low to actually make it somewhat affordable to PCs to reward altruism. That being said I think 10,000 would be a reasonable compromise.

I think the best way to handle the debt situation is to instead make it so their debt is already paid but Darga just chose not to release them. We’d need to review the section at the farm but I think that would work. Thoughts?

That 4:1 ratio is interesting.

This second check for the cobweb is where I can see good reason for a Despair, but only if you intend them to have an encounter with a giant spider (and say as much). >Depending on how big and nasty it is. However, given the relatively unpressured nature of the second check, I think this could be safely replaced with something like a spider bite/scorpion sting, dealing one wound and one strain (with no related checks). This does make it somewhat less steep than the poisonous fungus, but all that says to me is that maybe the poisonous fungus should be further nerfed (perhaps at least make the second check Average at most).

I considered including giant spiders but then thought it would be overkill and would take away from the main goal.

I modified it to a spider bite on failure with no further check.

Philosophically, I disagree with your approach to the “Individual Hazards.” In my book, 1 Threat should be something very minor like 1 Strain. Because this is more involved, I can see good reason for bumping up the consequences slightly, but adding one or two checks to the mix makes it too complicated for a single Threat, I think. I recommend easy one-and-done effects, with the exception of a saving throw for the fall (that helps justify the higher damage). I’d suggest replacing the effect of the fungus with something like “hallucinogenic spores,” upgrading the difficulty of that PCs’ Perception and Vigilance checks once. Easy one-and-done that isn’t too serious, along with the spider bite and a minor fall.

At this point I downgraded them all, but maybe having a requirement of 2 threats would have been more appropriate to begin with.

Group Hazards, triggered by Despair, are much more interesting to me and I think you have a lot more room to elaborate here.

OK! I am up to here in post #53.

P-47Thunderbolt · July 22, 2022, 10:49pm

I don’t think so. There are a couple circumstances in which I have, but the penalty is usually either Disorientation or Strain, and you have plenty of both in here already.

Uh… huh. I’ve been so deeply into this game for so long that some habits have become inseparable from the rules. Per RAW, Perception is the skill for opposing Stealth. I think my way of doing it is better, and fits more properly with the names of the skills (and the skill distribution/balance), but it is not RAW. Good catch.

If the debt is already paid, then they are no longer indentured servants, but slaves outright, with no sugarcoating to be found. If you take that tack, it does make the 10,000 more achievable, but you will definitely have to do some rewriting of the section you mention.

You still have to look at what happens to Darga if he sells them. He needs to either buy more slaves, or hire employees. While the former is doable, he’ll lose productivity. The latter is much too expensive to justify a low sale price for the family. The whole point of slaves is that they are cheaper to maintain than hired hands, thus making them more economical.

I can see 10,000 as a reasonable compromise, if the debt is not a factor. If the farmers were simply pressed into labor, however, why are they being left seemingly entirely to their own devices on the farm? To the point where Darga doesn’t know they’re being shaken down? This can be mitigated in certain ways (shock collars are always a popular option, particularly for the dehumanizing element they introduce), but it has to be accounted for.

The other factor to consider is that it’s likely still out of reach for the PCs outside of outside interference. If they are Rebellion players (working for an organization), they usually aren’t making much money. But if they’re getting payouts like 2,500 consistently, say once per session, now you’re talking about five sessions of money (minus expenses) in order to save one NPC family that will be quickly replaced by another family of NPCs. At that point, I would argue that you may as well crank it up higher. But, 10,000 is more achievable than 250,000, and 10,000 takes more work to fill in.

Those’re my two cents, I leave the final decision up to you. Either are valid options.

Sounds good. And I agree with your decision on the giant spiders.

I’ll let you know how I think they sit when I go back through them.

NGSRizzen · July 23, 2022, 11:42am

I don’t think so. There are a couple circumstances in which I have, but the penalty is usually either Disorientation or Strain, and you have plenty of both in here already.

Makes sense.

Uh… huh. I’ve been so deeply into this game for so long that some habits have become inseparable from the rules. Per RAW, Perception is the skill for opposing Stealth. I think my way of doing it is better, and fits more properly with the names of the skills (and the skill distribution/balance), but it is not RAW. Good catch.

p.129 AoR
Stealth checks are typically opposed by Perception, based on whether the
opponent is passively or actively searching for the hidden character

(quoting someone else’s quote since I don’t have the book)
FnD pg. 127: Stealth checks are typically opposed by Perception, based on whether the opponent is passively or actively searching for the hidden character. If the opponent is actively searching for the character, the character’s Stealth check would be opposed by the opponent’s Perception. Otherwise, it would be opposed by the opponent’s Vigilance.

I wouldn’t have known if you hadn’t mentioned it but yeah it was modified in Force and Destiny. It makes sense anyhow

If the debt is already paid, then they are no longer indentured servants, but slaves outright, with no sugarcoating to be found. If you take that tack, it does make the 10,000 more achievable, but you will definitely have to do some rewriting of the section you mention.

The more I think about it the more I like this idea. I’ll start tweaking the farm section, taking your suggestions into consideration.

You still have to look at what happens to Darga if he sells them. He needs to either buy more slaves, or hire employees. While the former is doable, he’ll lose productivity. The latter is much too expensive to justify a low sale price for the family. The whole point of slaves is that they are cheaper to maintain than hired hands, thus making them more economical.

Though it is not mentioned in my adventure, Darga regularly gets ALOT of slaves for “free” in exchange for his sketchy services so there is no shortage of replacements.

Just a random thought: should we make it so that one of the Narglatch starts the fight missing a few wounds since it was in a battle just a few days ago? Or is that not necessary?

Edit: I modified the price to 10,000 and adjusted the negotiation check accordingly in the last page with Darga. I also deleted the mention of the Narglatch egg because though I’m not there yet I saw you mentioned that they don’t lay eggs. I remember looking this up somewhere and now I can’t find the (obviously incorrect) reference anywhere

P-47Thunderbolt · July 23, 2022, 12:45pm

Ooo, so I wasn’t crazy! Thank you. I’d looked in FaD, but I didn’t see that paragraph. I don’t think it was mentioned in the description for Vigilance, at least not in the bulleted use-cases.

Natural rest heals 1 Wound each day. If it has been 5 days, any Wounds accumulated are likely gone. However, you might want to add a GM note on balancing suggesting that if the two Narglatch are too much of a challenge, you can add some Wounds for the previous combat.