Star Wars d6: Nerf Rustlers of Bogden IV

 I ran my Star Wars d6 game yesterday afternoon. My older boy wasn't feeling very good, so he sat out the session (no Mandalorian in the party), but Jeff showed up, so there were two Jedi. With daylight savings time in the U.S., it's a little easier for him to attend games at that time. Jeremy also managed to attend even though he and his wife were on vacation. So we had: 

Steven -- Minor Jedi

Jeff -- Young Jedi

Jeremy -- Sentient Battle Droid

Denis -- Smuggler

Philip -- Brash Pilot

Not a bad party. The last session (back in May?), they were on the 4th moon of Bogden, helping their Mando allies set up a covert after the Imperial Purge of Mandalore. In order to secure food supplies, they were dealing with local nerf herders. The nerf herders were being squeezed by the dewback ranchers who had lucrative Imperial contracts to supply stormtrooper mounts.They also ran into some gangsters, and nearly got into a fight with them, but managed to talk their way out of it, with promises of an alliance with the Hutt.

This session, they continued. Having secured the sale of some nerfs, they got an urgent call from the Mandalorians. Going to the arranged drop off point for the nerf herd, they found the remains of two or three nerfs, totally torn to pieces. Looking around the area, they found strange divots in the rocks that seemed to form a trail. At first, they suspected droids, but further investigation, and some comlink discussions with the nerf herders, they were told that the tracks probably belonged to acklay.

They followed the tracks to a cave, and realized they should head back to the spaceport to buy some supplies, and to get their ships. They set up an ambush, with the minor jedi (who has a rocketpack) as bait, in front of multiple bear trap type snares. The battle droid and other jedi were hiding in the nearby rocks, the smuggler and pilot were flying nearby in their ships. After creating a bunch of noise, one acklay came out, but the ship guns took it down pretty quickly. 

The other acklay wouldn't come out, so they eventually sent in the minor jedi's C1 astromech to map out the cavern, but after a few minutes they got a short emergency message that was cut off. They had no choice but to go in. The brash pilot stayed in his Z-95 to make sure no acklay escaped out other cave entrances, while the rest went in. They found the two remaining acklay, and thanks to spending character points to get their initiatives up beyond the monsters', they managed to take them out in two rounds without suffering further harm. But there were no traces of nerfs in the cave and no where for them to have gone. 

Realizing they may have been tricked, Satt (the brash pilot) scanned the area, and detected a group of nerf headed north, away from the nerf farms and toward the dewback ranches. Everyone else hopped in the freighter, and they flew up to see what was going on. They found six drovers herding the nerfs along. They landed (except Satt), and confronted them. The drovers revealed themselves to be bounty hunters. After a brief but tense gunfight (aided by Satt's Z-95, which was impervious to the hunters' missiles), they won and were able to bring the nerfs back to the Mando covert. 

While there are still tensions with the Imperials and the dewback ranchers, and gangster stuff they could follow up on, after getting paid by the Mando covert, they decided to leave this planet and seek jobs elsewhere. Maybe following up on the bounty pucks the rustlers were carrying. 

It was a pretty fun session. Both fights were easy in the end, but that's due to smart use of CP to improve initiative and some lucky rolls. Both the acklay and the bounty hunters had the potential to do a lot of damage, if more of their attacks had hit. Going first, and getting a stun or wound in on an enemy, or even just forcing them to dodge, really helps a lot. 

At the end of the session, I basically told the players to give me ideas for what they'd like to do. It's a big galaxy, and I feel like my own ideas are getting a little stale. I'll come up with some interesting information for the bounty pucks, but there's no requirement for the party to track them down (although some are interested in that). I'm happy with whatever: exploring the margins of the galaxy, bounty hunting, more gangster stuff back in Huttspace, or finally joining the Rebellion are all options, but not the only options.