In this session (from about a month ago now, I'm a bit behind on writing these) the players made their escape from the pirate ambush at Roseem's Bay in the belt and returned the freighter Kirglen safely to port. With their return came evidence that they're involved in something larger than a mere pirate attack, and a deal to get them a ship in exchange for help dealing with the hidden hand behind the attack. But first they will have to crawl into the guts of a disabled ship and do some pest control.
Opening Monologue
"The electrovore is a unique lifeform originally from the planet Verlor but now found throughout much of known space. It's unique physiology is based on electricity for sustenance, with each cell in its body functioning as a battery. This specialized diet was supported by the niche environment of Verlor, which featured several species of electric eels, which sustained the electrovore population. However, the planet's increasing volcanic activity began destroying the electrovore's habitat. This would have led to the species' eventual extinction but for explorers from the Pact Worlds surveying the planet. In the course of their survey several electrovores found their way onto the ship, which formed the core of the widespread population we see today. Starships, generators, and electrical systems provide an abundant food source for electrovores, and the species' rapid reproduction rates ensured their rapid spread through the Pact Worlds, Veskarium, and many other systems."
The Players
This session we only had 2 of the 4 players due to travel and some unexpected circumstances. So Zaori (human operative/pilot) and Fink (Ysoki engineer) were run by me as the DM. Te'tch (Shirren envoy) and Calm (Vesk biohacker) had their usual players. The characters were level 3 for this session.
The Hook
The players return the Kirglen safely after escaping the unusually precise warp-in pirate attack on Roseem's Bay station. While in Drift they receive a message from the owner of the Kirglen and their temporary employer, sending the Cuvacara Voidship Company's thanks, a bonus, and a retroactive uprating to Able Voidsman for each of the characters. They're also told they're welcome at CVC facilities for training in the future and will have preferential treatment if they sign on with CVC ships in the future or take CVC contracts. The players are instructed to dock at Absalom Station where a repair crew will meet them to take custody of the ship and begin repairs.
When the players dock they are instead met by Absalom Station Police Department personnel and two Stewards. It turns out that a street gang, which appeared to be hired by a third party, mugged the repair crew, stole their uniforms, and was going to try and pose as the crew to dig something out of the ship and destroy it. The Stewards go to a panel at the aft top of the ship and pull out an unknown device, which was what the hired goons were paid to find and destroy. The Stewards let the players know that they would like to discuss this further with the case officer working on this issue and that they can't say more until they're back at the local Stewards fortress.
At the fortress they meet with Supervisory Inspector Rikrik Arlkari, an ysoki agent who has been following an increase in pirate activity and capabilities. Once the players leave the grand marble entrance hall and are seated in the dingy, government-issue meeting room he explains that he suspects the pirates are getting outside help, and he thinks it's the Corpse Fleet, the extremist Eoxian fleet that ran into exile after they objected to Eox signing the Absalom Pact. The object pulled from the Kirglen was a hybrid device, part mechanical and part magical, that served as a mini Drift beacon, and allowed the pirate ships to execute a pinpoint jump to surprise the ships anchored at Roseem's Bay.
Rikrik has a proposal for the players: They showed that they're capable in an emergency, clearly skilled and resourceful individuals, but Rikrik notes that they don't have a ship of their own. He can get them one in exchange for him being able to call in a favor with them to take down this Corpse Fleet operation. If they agree, he'll put them in touch with a contact who has a couple hulls they can pick from if they'll clean out a little vermin in a new acquisition of her's, surely an easy task for such skilled adventurers.
The players discuss and agree to the deal. They are then given a cover story that they're headed to Songbird Station in the belt for some R&R and put on a courier ship headed there. To prevent anyone knowing their real destination, partway through the journey the ship's pilot shows them to the Sled. Which is basically a torpedo with the warhead removed, storage space in its place, and four seats strapped to the sides. The players are launched from the cargo bay to a hollowed-out asteroid, with the courier continuing on without making a stop, to make sure anyone tracking the ship doesn't see anything suspicious.
The players are let inside the asteroid salvage yard by its owner, Coriatta Li. Coriatta runs this shop, acquires hulls, and uses her robotic workforce to refurbish them for resale. Recently she received the wreck of a Dmolangari-class freighter, a massive Vesk vessel that will sell for a pretty penny if she can get it running. Unfortunately for her the bargain price included an electrovore infestation. She managed to take down most of them before they knocked out her robots, but she needs some non-mechanical help to clean the rest out. If the players do that, they can have their pick of one of three hulls she can get back into shape for them.
Setpiece: Pest control
This was the first ground combat in this campaign. Before we used the tactical rules for a cargo recovery operation in 0g, and we had one instance of ship combat. In this setpiece the players board the Dmolangari-class and using the full size of the battlemat I drew the interior for the top two decks. The command deck is organized around a V-shaped layout with rooms branching off the V and the bridge at the point of the V. The lower deck is a long hallway with cargo bays on either side of the hall. A total of 5 electrovores are hidden in various rooms around the ship. They stay there until disturbed and then attempt to fight. They will attempt to flee if their HP is reduced below half.
The players investigated the eerily quiet and dark ship until they bumped into the first one. It gave them a nasty shock with its charged area effect attack but they took it down fairly easily. A bit more complicated when they opened a small room with two of them in it. Calm, our Vesk biohacker, was first through the door with his large shield and took the brunt of the damage while the other characters contributed with their weapons from range. Zaori used a dart cannon while Fink had an interesting choice, an acid cannon. Zaori ended up missing all of her shots by a string of bad rolls so when the last electrovore was pinned to the wall and killed with Calm's injector spear I had her take out her knife and stab at it angrily to show her frustration.
In The Bank
Things that the PCs did that were unexpected, creative, natural 20s, etc that I will give them some story reward for later.
-In between agreeing to the deal and leaving Absalom Station the characters were walking through the port area and the players led the story to some very fun impromptu roleplaying around food. Te'tch, our diplomat Shirren, wanted to find a place for dinner and looked up online a place that was supposed to have an amazing chef. It was a hole in the wall with cheap plastic tablecloths but it had a disgruntled gourmet chef who left Verces with a bad attitude over celebrities coming to his former restaurant only to be seen there. He nearly took Te'tch's head off when he asked for a substitution in the order but the characters loved their food. This was all ad hoc stuff I made up as we went along and it was fun to flex those DM muscles again.
-After dinner the characters passed by a Vesk coffee stand near the docks and sat down. An older Vesk couple was running the drus'ta shop, which is what I decided Vesk coffee would be called. The players also had a nice bout of roleplaying here too, with one ordering a flight of a small cup of each of the shop's special brews.
-The Starfinder menu. Since the players were so food-oriented I made up some foods and their names off the top of my head. So now we have valo, a two-appendaged clam from a distant world, and drus'ta, a coffee-like drink from Vesk Prime known for a thick consistency.
Influences and Blatant Thefts
-When I was improv'ing the food scenes I decided that Vesk should have something like the Klingon coffee Raktajino from Star Trek. Now we have drus'ta.
-For music in the Sled launch scene I used Vivy - Cutting Edge from the Vivy - Fluorite Eyes Story OST, Ruins from the Akadama Drive OST, and Uninvited Guests also from Akadama Drive from the moment the first electrovore is found until the end of the fight.