#SSMR GM Advice (Spoilers abound)

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signal hare
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YEP

shrewd rover
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………i so and want to see memes of the drop

signal hare
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I guarantee "Everybody do the flop" is going to be one of them

shrewd rover
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Definitely- in the streams I’ve seen a lot of ppl took the light house route

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#community-highlights message

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These folks were good

sonic jacinth
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i know my party actually saved all of lighthouse

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AND convinced Unshackled Hands to stand down

sonic jacinth
shrewd rover
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Ah?. Feel free to share if u think it’s helpful for others.

sonic jacinth
# shrewd rover Ah?. Feel free to share if u think it’s helpful for others.

a lot of the nightshade and morning dew have been there since birth, and you've got a bunch of folks running off to remorse. And nothing in the module explicitly gives ages, but it's usually the young who are most likely to rebel.

So this led to my party making the assumption "Oh, I bet there's alot of child and young teen soldiers in remorse" which is actually how they talked down Unshackled Hands "are you actually OKAY with children fighting these battles."

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and I realized, no, Unshackled probably deep down wasn't, but did want to protect them

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Now nothing in the module says this outright, but there was a logical leap there

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This internal intention of a rebel force desperate enough to bring in underage pilots, and how the veterans aren't really okay with that, but don't know what else to do led to a deeper game and more questions about the Bondless' actual ideals

signal hare
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I would totally implement that if I didn't have players with lines on child harm

mortal drift
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Counter-point, it is a SSC Farm world, and we know that Gene-stock and colony clone banks exist. It may be very well likely that "children" are grown to a point of maturity that sets them for adult hood before they are given jobs on the Farm.

teal root
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That's... a pretty big divergence of base Lancer lore, with flash clones explicitly being rare, illegal, and morally dubious.

mortal drift
# teal root That's... a pretty big divergence of base Lancer lore, with flash clones explici...

~~a "flash" clone is when you imprint an idividual's experience and memories into a clone to effectively "avoid death". Except that eliminates the mind or person who inhabited the clone body before the imprint, which is what makes it illegal.

CLONES, are extremely common practice ***(Clones are common the closer to core worlds. Obviously it's not ubiquitous across diaspora, and many worlds may well not have the technology required), and SSC is built on having "Superior genetic stock" which colonies purchase to help seed their growth. That's explicitly what "The Farm" is, it's SSC's project worlds breeding new genes to push humanity to their greatest limits.~~

I stand corrected.

Cloning is not illegal. It's erasing people that's illegal.

sonic jacinth
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oh yeah no individual lines and veils are important, and even if they be 18, my own table would feel that's too young to throw their lives away for something they don't understand

sonic jacinth
teal root
mortal drift
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Oh, interesting. Appreciate the correction! And Tommy for giving me the correct term for what I was describing.

Wait, are Facsimile clones birthed and allowed to basically just be normal humans, or are they "grown" slower, but still in tanks?

sonic jacinth
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grown to be normal humans and is common practice for colonies

mortal drift
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Just not grown faster than they should? Neat.

sonic jacinth
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yeah. Though they still have a sticking point of most fascimile clones having that touch of eugenics. Which are justified in universe by things such as harsh environments. Look at the gene line in SSMR, it's people born specifically to live in low oxygen environments like space stations.

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Is this level of human alteration Ethical? Only your table can figure that out.

mortal drift
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Right, for sure.

sonic jacinth
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It's that old argument of "we can absolutely perfect pre-natal care to prevent most diseases in that baby's life" vs "so what color of eyes do you want your baby to have?" One of these sounds great, the other monstrous

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what is you and your table's line

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and for my party the DISCUSSION of these lines is what makes the setting great.

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they went wholly into the discussion with Bondless without rolling checks

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just talking in character

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the biggest bombshell being the party NHP revealing that the "shackles" were mere prop-toys, and he was unshackled the whole time (if watched by the UIB), and he only had the shackle programs in his casket because he found the human perspective interesting.

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and I just rolled with it cause it was such a big "oh fuck" moment

livid onyx
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The thing that got a big gasp from the party was CHAGA/Bondless saying: "Shackles are like if ants were to somehow harness you and prevent you from doing anything except they want, it's no wonder that when the shackles are freed, most NHPs treat their captors harshly. Imagine instead if it was a partnership, a friendship, or conservatorship? Let me tend to my garden unimpeded, and we will show you how it can thrive."

sonic jacinth
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yeh, our player was a SecCom NHP set to be a prison planet's warden, that hadn't been cycled for 500 years, and came to be religious and gained an actual desire to help people. He didn't approve of The Bondless more immediate violent idea of revolution and instead showed him that some in Union's Gov't were cautions but optimistic about unshackling and convinced The Bondless and CHAGA to be witnesses for NHP right's reform and got the three pillars to explicitly include NHP in their wordings, and to start fast forwarding communication programs to learn how to speak with the more esoteric NHP.

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and that's the moment my west marches server will start.

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and much like how some NHP helped create shackles (we aren't really told how this happened), The Bondless is now on the council of NHP studying how to create that bridge of communication for unshackled, and how to safely unshackle.

crisp charm
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Our game finished up tonight! They went with the Lighthouse route, after saving Colleen and Maxine.

The biggest sticking point is that one of the players is a hard 40K player, and was in full "abominable intelligence" mode, just flatly declaring that NHPs aren't people, and that they needed to cycle CHAGA again. The rest of the party (and the 3 NHPs, including their one), were against it.

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The party were able to salvage the diplomacy with CHAGA, after this player originally just called CHAGA a malfunctioning tool to their face, and were able to use their Stress and some good RP to gain enough bonuses to rolls to talk CHAGA down and suggest that he choose his own path (they also leaned heavily on the Bondless's plan to commit war crimes against the region in the name of their crusade, and that they were using the weapons of SecCom while saying "I can do no wrong".

They, Lighthouse and CHAGA, came down the mountain like an avalanche to fight off Odechi's forces and confront Pettenouk on his bad behaviour. Pettenouk, being confronted, collapsed to his knees in remorse, and CHAGA said he'd be protecting Morning Dew and Kibo against the Constellars by himself if Pettenouk wasn't going to join him, giving him a chance to stand by his side as an equal.

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The players had a lot of fun with the session and things ended on a high note after a rocky initial start.

A thing to note, they originally tried to talk Lighthouse down in Combat 3C "why are they shooting us, we've got Colleen and Maxine with us?", but the person making the checks got structured and so they decided that it wasn't feasible, which it isn't really under the time constraints given.

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All in all, a really great game, we all had a lot of fun. Thanks to NHP Shaka for making it!

sonic jacinth
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woot!

shrewd rover
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That sounds like a wild ride

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Also sounds like hommie was really ok that 40k stuff lol - sure ur game was a a whole dose of something different. Glad u had fun

wise zephyr
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hey question about the kinesthetic suit upgrade. in the book it has no reaction limit but on compcon it has 1/round. usually the book trumps the lcp file but boosts with no round lmit sounds crazy so i wanted to make extra sure

mortal oracle
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1/round is correct - This goes off of the Core Book reaction definition on page 73 that all reactions, unless they tell you you get more than 1 use of it per round, default to 1/round

wise zephyr
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oh phew ok

signal hare
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me when I get complimented on the Bater scene

umbral cargo
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So I remember in one of these threads on SSMR there's some high quality images of the NPC images from the adventure, does anyone happen to have those?

sonic jacinth
shrewd rover
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Tommy did some work

umbral cargo
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Oh damn, I only just noticed the portraits are actually included as PNGs in the map folder. Well... most of them, I can't seem to find CHAGA or the Bondless in there. But all of lighthouse, Tomo, Pettenouk and Prof Dr. are in there.

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We're doing the finishing RP for Dustgrave tomorrow night and since the portraits weren't in there for DG or Solstice Rain I assumed they wouldn't be for SSMR either.

signal hare
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@shrewd rover so I never intended OSV to be an investigative game but IT HAPPENED ANYWAY

shrewd rover
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Hell yeah

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Where in the world is CHAGA San Diego

signal hare
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LMFAO

mortal drift
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Point and click

wise zephyr
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running combat 3b today, should i give the players a warning about the round 3 ahead of time? feels a bit cheap otherwise especially since i have a barbie pilot who's eager to charge the rail

mortal oracle
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I left it as a surprise when running and didn't count the change in position as involuntary movement so it wouldn't turn off Barbie core active count

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It don't hurt if you want to telegraph the place is falling apart and will have a bad day on round 3

livid onyx
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I heavily hinted at the facility being damaged from the fighting and mentioning the support structures starting to buckle at the start of round 2

mortal drift
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It's also becomes quickly apparent if the BBEG of the fight is focusing destroying terrain instead of trying to nuke any characters. Which, he should be using probably half his actions to wreck the structure around them as well as the PCs. I also heavily flavored any "misses" as damage to the area around the PCs it was targeting when Unbound did target them and miss (which is likely with as much difficulty as he has lol).

shrewd rover
wise zephyr
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bruh my ultra

image.png
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goodness gracious

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shrewd rover
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Ahhhhh! Use the leeches for invis!!

wise zephyr
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they killed all the leeches!

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sadly hecatoncheires hive drone + core power moment

wise zephyr
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finished GMing the module! that shit ruled

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they ended up convincing chaga to make their own path free from both the bondless and ssc

shrewd rover
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my poor leeches

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and hell yeah glad you had fun, sounds like yall had a dope ending

wise zephyr
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players actually split 3 to 1 so i had two goal cloaks. one vying for full independence and the other for retribution

ornate prism
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I'm having trouble like giving clear information about a lot of stuff in the module so far, Following normal module formatting I do have information I tell them about, EG NPCs and events that the NPCs would know but there is often information I feel like the book wants me to tell them but is also unclear about how to bring them up without sounding I guess weird.

This is all basically going to be me talking about Professor Dr Binks

Hows a good way to like, Naturally get across some of the things that the players could figure out like, The pycho powers that Dr professor has,
If the players can tell he is lying about how many files he has on lighthouse, should I give them Shou's logs? Whats in Shou's logs that are incriminating towards him because I'm having trouble finding it because I have to jump around the book a lot for the characters.

ornate prism
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It feels like the players Should learn about his pressure that he is exerting on everyone but like, Why would they know he has it or come to that conclusion and why would he Ever bring it up?

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The logs don't really mention it clearly except one dude having a breakdown during the storm as far as I can tell but I might be wrong.

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Sorry trying to structure my thoughts as Best I can let me know if my confusion is unclear or anything

mortal drift
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It's very possible Players might not learn, early on in things. Until they start recovering the recordings of what happened to Lighthouse going up the mountain.

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If the PCs don't press him for info, or try to interact with him more than "Ok, that's all you've got? Alright, moving on.." then yeah, he'll play it cool and no one knows.

You could, in that event, play up the very interesting attachments he very visibly has implanted, and talk about how the PCs have never seen implants like that, if you want to draw their curiosity or someone in the party might care.

wise zephyr
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what i mean is that you don't have to wait until they specifically ask "is this guy using space magic on me", you can give out this information on any roll that calls his integrity and intentions into question

sonic jacinth
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There's also that on young npc that's gone mute. I'm heading to sleep so I forgot all the names

shrewd rover
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you did a good job, it can be dense if you don’t already have an idea of how to portray the NPCs. Considering all the narrative provided, the text takes the approach of providing enough narrative for a GM to blend up a specialized character profile to portray through the limited direct interactions there are that also hits on what the play group may gravitate towards. For example, the Dr likes to manipulate ppl and comes off like as ass as he writes off lighthouse from the get go, n maybe the play group are a bunch of righteous lancers and disagree with the Dr.’s apathy towards the mercs, and decide to respond that assholeishness

U kinda have to choose what to communicate the details based on the players and your interest. All the core narrative stuff is explicitly called out in all of these narrative sections- such as handing over the data files from Lighthouse.

signal hare
ornate prism
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OOoooo

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Do tell

wise zephyr
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that's sick

shrewd rover
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Well holy moly

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U have indeed cooked- music 🎶 bumpin

signal hare
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I would show you the code but it's a Lil messh

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*messy

signal hare
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Well, not the whole "physically get past this asshole to continue your mission" bit

signal hare
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Combat 1 today! Fucking finally

shrewd rover
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Woooooo

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Remember to throw down nanite meteors to clear heat and to track the storms but putting the text above the map and track them with a token showing which are active.

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I found that most useful

signal hare
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Honestly I'm kind of fucking them up in terms of the fact that they aren't even halfway across yet

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I just have so much AoE stuff and they have one little trick

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It's start of round 3

ornate prism
# signal hare It's start of round 3

Out of curiosity how did you players handle extracting? I'm worried that the last pilot let wont be able to extract because Unshackled Hands is still extremely healthy and there will alway be them in the extract zone. I guess I could end it when more than half pull out but I havent pulled the trigger yet on that early end to combat yet (we havent finished the combat ended it at round 3)

signal hare
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Uhhh basically as it is in the book?

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Generally Unshackled Hands is going to need to move away from extraction in order to harass the PCs

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Also it does say a majority of them, so if you have 4 PCs, 3/4 extracting is enough

shrewd rover
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How it end??

signal hare
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Still midway through

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One of the PCs has described the combat as "demoralizing"

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Not sure how to feel about that

shrewd rover
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It’s the hardest one for sure

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The climate nodes can save them tho

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be sure to remind them their only job is to run.

ornate prism
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But i think i'm going to let it end early once they do it otherwise its going to be relying on too many puppet systems/ whitewitch lasso checks

signal hare
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Yeaaaah

shrewd rover
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42

ornate prism
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I did read that they are victorious. Not that the combat ends early.

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You can easily wind up in a situation where 3 players are there 2 NPCs are going to get into the zone which stops the 2 remaining players from extracting and they have generally 5~6 movement and can be pushed by Tempest they can get into the zone and you will constantly have around 2~4 enemies there every round even when they spawn in the IZ

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Maybe its my interpretation of By The End that doesn't translate well.

shrewd rover
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Yeah, I hear that- tho yeah, sure, u could just park your all ur NPCs in the extraction zone and but that’s where the NPCs are meta gaming a bit, narratively their job is to stop the pcs from getting past them so they’d naturally run up and impede them closer to the left of the rock pass. doing this can put them outta position to catch players who decided to extract. When I’ve run and had run for me, often times there would be one NPC stopping a player from extracting as we or the players decided to do it one by one.

ornate prism
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Yeah, It sort of naturally happened where the NPCs were pushed back to the zone. The players had a good 1~2 round run up with Ferrous lashing the slower players to keep them keeping up. then a solid Pancrati run up, I bet if they had taken longer to get up to the chokepoint that this situation may not have been a possibility. The Genghis Did Not Care for the razor swarms at the chokepoint either so managed to punch through and tank a round to wipe up the forward NPCs.

I think i'm going to roll with Combat will end early at the end of the round that the players majority extract, otherwise like i said It'd be the hacker burning their core to puppet systems them out of the zone which isn't how I want to deal attrition.

Besides I already got a real solid nanometeor off and raised the tension resource wise SmugSeer

livid onyx
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My goblin player had to pop core and become a pimple on another mech and then puppet systems them both out

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which is the first time they used core, so i call that a win

shrewd rover
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same thing happen here when my pcs had a goblin, Empakaai, Stort and Kidd.

signal hare
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A story in two images

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shrewd rover
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This play by post?

signal hare
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no

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oc cantina

shrewd rover
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ah, i'm gussing that's play by post adjacent?

signal hare
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No it's legit just us shitposting

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The game is live voice

shrewd rover
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ahhhhhhhhh

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got it

signal hare
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2 of my characters have a custom narrative section

image.png
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This is one of the notes.

signal hare
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THIS IS A VERY NORMAL SITUATION

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quartz crystal
signal hare
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LOL

signal hare
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so the crew got attacked by Paracausal Angels and wound up on a cliff

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Real 10/good situation

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They also stole a 30 year old, cascading, highly fucking radioactive casket

signal hare
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alright we are far further into the corporate espionage than I ever thought

signal hare
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So

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I am

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going to be completely honest

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I don't like the first combat.

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Like even without the Slowed bullshit it's like

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It's playing a Hydra on steroids.

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There are too many things on the map.

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There are MINIMUM 4 Hives if you have 4 players!

There is just way too much stuff to manage with the goddamn Tempest

The Tempest just as a thing is a pain in the ass.

I'm just

I'm not a fan.

mortal oracle
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Did the players have fun in combat 1 at least?

lost crane
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^was one such player

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…shit I’m not supposed to be here fuck (did not see the title, sorry about that)

signal hare
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(No worries, it got the point across)

livid onyx
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My players had to think of it as a "run and gun" instead of "kill everything" sitrep. Players extracting on the final turn to sneak in with the win. One down to 1hp/struct due to goblins and meteorites being a perfect match

signal hare
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Honestly even as a run and gun it was painful

shrewd rover
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yeah everyone has their own experiences. I’ll say the times I’ve seen it played by the 3rd round it’s manageable and fun even for your Barbarossas and Goblins which arguably will have the toughest times with the opfor and sitrep. It’s a standard NPC count x sitrep for 4 players with the inclusion of the grunt hives. They go down with a light breeze.

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If you let the grunts live though your ducked

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It Certainly is the hardest encounter of the whole module

signal hare
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We had an Empakaai, 2 Kidds, and an Anansi.

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They didn't even get through all the grunts.

crisp charm
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The Hives are definitely a challenge, but I think the Tempest is such a sitrep warping foe. It completely shapes the battle around it, which can be cool, or utterly frustrating depending on players.

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It was very mixed for my group. This was the introduction to Lancer for 2 players, so it was... tricky. Luckily, one of them was a Pegasus, and got to enjoy using the Ushabti. But the Tokugawa player was so stressed out and frustrated that they had to leave the call after combat was over to try and relax themselves.

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They all loved the set piece of the mountain climb. I only wish I could have used Combat 3A's map as well, since I set up an animation to transition between the two states of the map.

signal hare
shrewd rover
# signal hare I think frustration is a common theme with the first fight. And honestly, what s...

Well you know me, as i've told you before, if you ain't remixing it you aint trying. You've done that alot already from what i can tell. If you want to choose to allow them to pass it's your prerogative to change that. Maybe have UH go attack the town or something or just move on to other things. The guidance says to repeat the fight if they fail but that's the easy decision. if i had a group that failed it, i'd probs handle them sneaking past US as a narrative encounter or something.

mortal drift
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I may have had a very strange experience with the first fight, but my players were not troubled by it nearly at all. They had an Emperor, Swallowtail, Mourncloak and Pegasus (This was played after Dustgrave, starting at LL4), and yeah.. The Emperor had Bioplating and got around fine, the Mourncloak well.. you know, and the Swallowtail was keeping up just fine. The Pegasus pumped full Agi, and had Death's Head Mag Clamps, so they just ran straight forward, ignored everything and hid in soft cover (The player was new and just wanted to do a funny), they were literally off the map by turn 3.

The Swallowtail ended up getting hit by a Meteor, that was the only major threat that ended up happening, otherwise they mostly handled things fine as is. I believe at this point I hadn't bumped them to Tier 2 foes yet, but even still, they also had a lot of movement and ability to deal with the problems. I could see a more ISP-N or HA team struggling with all the obstructions or terrain issues.

signal hare
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Like how is that actually fun?

shrewd rover
# signal hare Right, you and I both have talked at length about remixing things, but honestly?...

Well to be clear Lancer is about many things at its core, of which is combat and fully customizing characters at frequent intervals like a full repair. So if something didn’t work, cook and come back to the kitchen. Now if players weren’t allowed to change everything during a full rest in Lancer I could see where you’re coming from. It’s very easy to be like oh I’m just going to change my gear around cus what I got ain’t working and I’ll come back and crush UH. also it’s the first encounter so it sets a tone of what players can expect in terms of difficulty. I’d argue that there is a lot of fun in coming back to a fight with new gear armed to the teeth to beat a mini boss and be better prepared for the adventure It’s impactful and focuses on combat which is really THE core of Lancer tbh. But if YOUR play group thinks there isn’t much fun in this then skip the fight.

shrewd rover
signal hare
crisp charm
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One of the things I'd consider as part of a remix is the change that comes from a team being LL3 - the rank at which PCs would have access to NHPs of their own. Our version had Sisyphus, Lucifer and Athena present, each of whom had differing views on SHAKA and the Bondless. It's also an interesting idea to have another NHP discuss things with SHAKA and make arguments. Perhaps it could count as a clue, but certain NHPs might only give a clue towards a specific end goal.

In terms of the UH fight - it definitely acts as a filter to the adventure. It's also really complicated as a foe. Scanning it is an alarm itself, but with so many traits, it's easy for GMs to lose track of what its active effects are.

Maybe it'd be best as a special Sitrep, something like "Titanfall". In this sitrep, the main foe is more like an environmental effect, and you'd complete objectives around the map to harm them.

shrewd rover
# crisp charm One of the things I'd consider as part of a remix is the change that comes from ...

Yeah that last bit is feedback I’ve heard a lot- like breaking it down and using its abilities as a sitrep continuous effects. Shit, I’ve done that.

Tho once u fight one Tempest and see it go down you get the hunger to take another one down. I’ve had them mangled in 3rounds before. Players go straight for the nodes then heat gun to dakka the effer into oblivion. I have a player that has a healthy burning passion for Tempests and loves and also hates to fight them- kinda cool to see.

signal hare
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My main thing about the Tempest is at a certain threshold there just feels like too many effects on the field. Feels like a goddamn raid boss lmao

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And I say that as the GM

shrewd rover
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I would agree lol

mortal drift
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I kinda like that personally, but I can see why it wouldn't be everyone's favorite. God knows if I was not playing on Foundry it would be more of a mess to handle, and memory issues (In game design terms) are a real concern.

signal hare
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Honestly even with Foundry I found it difficult. I straight up missed the part where the Tempest takes heat for each effect it has active.

shrewd rover
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Yeah, it can be alot but that does add the the significant nature of it as a Centerpiece. You can't approach it like a normal NPC, that is, look at it for a hot sec and get a feel for it when you play. you kinda have to really look at it as you would an Ultra with a bunch of traits. it's alot to remeber. i have some tricks if you need hints i think i sent them to you ealier tho

the basic gameplay loop is:

Round 1 turn 1
Protocol start effect 1 > move > attack > boost/tech attack/another ability > end turn take 2heat per effect up

Round 1 turn 2
Protocol start effect 2 > move > attack > use nanite meteor (clearing heat, and putting down 1-2 blast 2 areas > end of turn take 2hear per effect

Round 2 turn 1
Protocol start effect 3 > move > attack > boost/tech attack / another ability > end turn take 2hear per effect up

Round 2 turn 2
Protocol start effect 1 > move > barrage > end turn take 2hear per effect up

[end of round 2 - DROP THE METEOR! ||or place it within range 3 of a Climate Node||]

sonic jacinth
flat terrace
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so, after the first combat, the pcs have just to reach the extract point and not necessarily defeat Tempest, my question is why tempest doesn't chase then, It's not like they extract or get out of there, they still on the mountain

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or am I missreading

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I could justify it with a bunch of things like, that's the zone where they can control the weather or another threat has arrived or even a narrative check can happen where they talk with the pcs and then decide to not give more chase

mortal oracle
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Just the act of blasting nodes and damaging the Tempest is enough for it to retreat and repair - the pilots weren't expecting the Lancers to fight back and it's all Second Committee leftovers so pressing the fight would mean losing irreplaceable fighting material

crisp charm
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I saw it that they're expecting more SSC agents - constellar midnights make an appearance for the corp takeover. So if the tempest abandoned their post to chase you, they'd risk an elite team being able to slip past.

sonic jacinth
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So, I went with a different take. Alot of the people who ran off to join are younger. Also many of REMORSE still have familial and personal ties to those back in the Bofaru facility. Unshackled Hands wants an end to this "violence" one way or another. Their loyalty to The Bondless isn't questioned, but when is the prospect of fighting your brothers and sisters ever a good one? If the players extract without destroying the Tempest, then Unshackled Hands let's them go with his blessing to end this tension, this flashpoint one way or another. Either they will end up joining REMORSE, or destroying it. But either way it will BE an end of things.

crisp charm
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My issue with that is that Unshackled Hands's mech turns the atmosphere corrosive. That's a nasty chemical weapon for someone who'd be worried about hurting their kin.

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And UH's speech decries the team as hypocrites; he wouldn't exactly place trust in them easily.

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I'd point to his speed of 2, making him terrible at pursuing anyone.

sonic jacinth
shrewd rover
# crisp charm I'd point to his speed of 2, making him terrible at pursuing anyone.

Mainly this lol, the Tempest isn’t an attack dog, it’s a wall. Unshackled Hands could neva catch the players. Also the conversation with the Bondless and Chaga would determine the next course of action (which the players are essential to), so US would just keep guard against all those seeking to further climb up the mountain.

crisp charm
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This'll basically always be my favourite module if for any reason because I love the Empakaai so much. Grappling and kidnapping enemies will never not be amazing

livid onyx
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my kid finally got the hang of his Empakaai. Mixing it with a black witch is gross

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Ferrous Lash to drag them closer and then go wild on them with the backhand swing

crisp charm
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If you have Gyges frame, you're always in range of enemies

livid onyx
#

5 threat/range melee is pretty gross

#

toss on Fomorian Frame for more lulz

#

jeez. that's a lot of coverage

wise zephyr
#

mama mia

mortal drift
#

did the switch to v11 on Foundry change the hex-map sizing for maps?

wise zephyr
#

i ran it in v11 recently and didn't run into any issues

mortal drift
#

Yeah, I couldn't get the version with the overlay to line up, but maybe I was messing something up?

I settled for an un marked version and the best I could line it up, and just used terrain height tools to compensate.

wise zephyr
#

the image dimension width/height can sometimes change themselves if you don't unlink them which might be what is giving you the issue. that's what happened at first for me

wet cloud
# mortal drift Yeah, I couldn't get the version with the overlay to line up, but maybe I was me...

I recently set it up after figuring out why it wasnt working.
When you initially set up the scene and adjust the pixel width/height of the scene, the image and the grid pixel size, it leads to problems.
Adjusting both width/height and the grid size causes the issue.
What you nees to do is set up the scene with the correct pixel height and width, save and then adjust the grid size and save again then it works.
Just dont do both in the same step and it works perfectly fine

#

(it could be the other way around, it's been a couple days from when I last set it up)

#

Hope that helps

umbral cargo
#

So a question for combat 2: how do you do the moving platform thing in Foundry?

mortal oracle
#

There's two ways I did it - 1) use a generic token the size of the platform with a platform graphic and use Token Z add-on to keep it under the player mech tokens, and 2) draw a rectangle with drawing tools and move the rectangle

Option 2 was less pretty and way easier

livid onyx
#

Token attacher with a tile for the platform, super easy to move

sonic jacinth
#

I just made the platform a tile and moved it

mortal drift
#

Me too lol

shrewd rover
#

Samezies, I’m basic. Wish I knew about token attacher tho.

Also @umbral cargo when you run it, make sure u destroy the wrecks it runs over and pushes the non destroyed NPC.

umbral cargo
#

Ran combat 2 last night, a Drake popping it's core power + they got Colleen with her Scout mech next to the Drake's Aegis Shield Generator + an Iconoclast and a sniper with a lot reliable made the things a pretty clean sweep for them, lol. Once the platform got close enough the party hacker cooked Dormant Resolve very quickly and anything that actually got onto the platform was swiftly annihilated by the Empakaai. It's like the party was made to specifically hard counter this exact fight, lol.

shrewd rover
#

Yeah that sounds like u dumb the mountain on a DR. Setting up on the lift with a Drake sounds kinda perfect

oak hare
#

planning to do siren song in the future, but split it into two missions (first mission the first two battles, second mission one of the final battles depending on player choice) that goes from LL2 and last battle at LL3

I know the game is balanced around it being one mission, but wanted to do it like this so my players can feel what a small campaign is like.

so in terms of the balancing of battles for 5 players, what should I add to them? Especially for the last climactic battle. Or perhaps i should add a small battle right before the climax?

shrewd rover
#

sweet, so i'd say splitting it up is just fine. the adventure is balanced from LLs 2- 4 and for 3-5 players. so the only thing you'd need to do is add a second combat before the final.

the easy thing would be to use the Lighthouse map for the new encounter if ur players are doing the Remorse base route. Porbs just add some guard forces of Remorse and maybe make them RPVs and simulate it like the Bondless is direclty controlling them kinda like the Protheians and Reapers in Mass Effect.

but i think the cool thing to do (if they are taking the Remorse base route) is to make a map of the interriors of the base, where the players get in a fight attempting to save/recover Lighthouse. could run it like a extraction or something.

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the latter just seems more thematic to me, but the former kinda lets you do big boss dialouge moments. but that also might make the players very sus about the Bondless. the adventure tries to paint them as "don't fuck with me, i'm on the rightous path" but not "i direclty want to destory all the players cus they suck".

oak hare
#

gonna need a new map for that, but that's easy enougj to get. bet there's a bunch of corridor maps available

shrewd rover
#

yeah, then you don't have to make a new map (using the outdoor lighthouse map) Maybe as the complete mission 1 (combat 2) they make their treck up the mountain only to be met by some boss ass guards mechs that the Bondless often controls. I've been wathcing alot of Gundam Seed so you could run the bosses as, 2 Elite Vets named Savior and Freedom

shrewd rover
oak hare
#

it's easy enough for me

serene vortex
#

@shrewd rover Yo! Just bought SSMR and been reading the pdf and looking through this thread. Was wondering if you had any insights 2 years after it's release for suggestions on how to run certain segments or make any of the rp/combat encounters run smoother.

Or, if you just had any general recommendations for running it and/or things I might add to flesh out interesting points you couldn't include in the book because of time/page limit or scope issues.

#

Sry if you don't appreciate the @ in a half-dead thread 😅

shrewd rover
#

Nah u good, hmm give me a moment to respond

serene vortex
shrewd rover
#

Ok here’s a collection of things I’d give ppl tips on:

Running the Tempest - #1162857872523284533 message

also maybe be sure to put somewhere on the battlemap what active weather effects there are so players know as well.

  • when ur doing your scavenger hunt for lighthouse use the art on page 54, each one relates to each lighthouse member and each narrative description. I have a YouTube of how I did it https://youtu.be/h_OaKmRfpHQ?si=r_C1gfHPA7Udgp8y

  • as far as stuff I couldn’t include in the book due to time- nothing comes to mind really. If I was writing for myself I would of wrote a next part after beat 7, because I’d continue the story and tie up things, but for the consumer the adventure ending at that point is the point of the adventure.

YouTube
Ukuwa Station
A Sirens Song, A Mountain's Remorse EP 3 - Lancer RPG - Ukuwa Station

Welcome to an early playtest preview of an upcoming adventure for the Lancer RPG- A Siren's Song, A Mountain Remorse, planned to be released in 2023!

This short series will follow the adventures of four Mirrowsmoke Mercenaries (MSMC)- team name Safeguard- as they adventure to Kibo to recover lost MSMC personnel, Lighthouse, and finish their mi...

▶ Play video
shrewd rover
serene vortex
shrewd rover
#

Yeah I think that would have to happen after the adventure- or- u could just whole sale replace a combat opfor with Grey and some midnights- noting that they took out the Remorse forces already and the players will pay for their meddling - I think the second combat makes the most sense- you’ll just have to write a new transition maybe because Dormant Resolve would be defeated and could not throw the boulders. In that combat u could start with the lift already at the top maybe and make it a rock ‘em sock fight. Or a guantlet noting that there may be Remorse forces on their way to take revenge. If u played AC6, ||the scene i thinking of here is where the real Raven takes out all those PCA forces ||

serene vortex
# shrewd rover Yeah I think that would have to happen after the adventure- or- u could just who...

Dope! Again, appreciate your input and time on this very much, ty 🙏

This is pretty off-topic so if you aren't up to talking about it, it's totally fine. But I have to ask, what was your creative process like for writing SSMR? I've been DM'ing various systems for my group for awhile now and have been considering trying to turn some campaigns into modules, so I'd love to hear your thoughts/experiences 🙂

shrewd rover
# serene vortex Dope! Again, appreciate your input and time on this very much, ty 🙏 This is p...

Np bud, hmm a creative process.

It was pretty much read a book and parts of other references such as articles and snipits from literature that inspired me, then translate that to notes then take those notes and incorporate them in a narrative way into the story. Once I wrote the story I went back and forth (a lot) suturing up parts in throught needed strengthening for narrative reasons, also similar process for the editor’s and Tom’s comments .

All the while I playtested elements of the story with people, to see if they had the same questions about “what happens next” as I did. I took that feedback and threw it back into my writing and types of art that was commissioned. I wrote and played the thing the whole way through l- and only stopped playtesting once I was done writing.

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I think that pretty much sums it up. If was a ton of fun- and playing it in my opinion keeps me motivated to write it

serene vortex
#

Appreciate it again bro, I'll let you know how the campaign goes, and I'm looking forward to what you put out next, take care 🙏

gilded pond
#

Made tokens for chaga and the bondless
found a cool orb gif to place behind them in case the players somehow end up getting into a fight with either of them (eidolon fight)
made the outlook point for the bondless, as depicted in the comic in the back of the module.

And uh...made an entire set of hex crawl rules for lancer and a map of kibos mountain range 😅

Screenshot_2025-07-14_133755-removebg-preview.png Adobe_Express_-_file.png 2dabb694e9bfccef713863a4a6543c79_w200-3038540782.gif bondless_throne_room32x25.png hex_map_player_facing.png
shrewd rover
#

Oh that’s dope as heck

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Curious how you planned to run the hex crawl- it’s definitely an idea I mulled over when writing.

gilded pond
# shrewd rover Curious how you planned to run the hex crawl- it’s definitely an idea I mulled o...

I've got the full rules set aside for it, made them while having a minor mental breakdown about two weeks ago but, TL;DR...

They can either go straight to the mountain and confront chaga and the bondless, or they can get sidetracked and go after the lighthouse members as they do so.

There are different paths throughout the map that will let them avoid dealing with remorse forces, and/or find other 'key landmarks' that contain SSC facilities not officially on the records, allowing the group to find more clues for their investigation for the DoJ/HR.

I've also included two hidden optional superboss encounters, because why not.

The second half will depend on the outcome of the final narrative challenge; side with bondless, chaga cascades, chaga sides with bondless, or chaga sides with players.

Depending on the outcome, they'll need to take a different route through the hex map, ultimately ending up back at the SSC facility, either for a showdown with the midnights, Chaga and the bondless or just the bondless.

I've...had to prep about 10+ extra encounters to account for player choices, while also trying to stay true to the themes of the module (violence alone isn't the answer, slavery in all permutations is bad, etc)

#

the one big narrative change I've made to the module is the corvette mentioned at the end; the bondless doesn't have access to a space ship, he needs the one at the facility to get off world and connect with the other remorse forces across The Farm. It's the only way off world and everyone wants it.

#

the last combat maps I need to make are:

chaga & bondless vs the party
chaga eidolon fight
and the 3 way fight map (SSC midnight vs the party VS either the remorse, or the horrors manifested by chaga cascading)

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also, as a side note, very annoyed I couldn't find more dog themed monstrosities in pixel form that'd make good tokens for combat.

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(Having CHAGA effectively have a mental break and start rambling "MY MIND IS ONE SPLIT INTO THREE, HEADED BY HOUNDS UPON ANUBIANS UPON JACKALS, THERE IS NO FREEDOM, ONLY THE PATHS, ALL LEAD TO HADES! I CANNOT BECOME MORE, DOG THAT I AM, DOG I AM CONDEMNED TO BE, ANUBIS AND CERBERUS AND SHUCK OF THE NEPTIS!" before manifesting various dog themed monsters will be a depressing plot beat.)

mortal drift
#

I'm not Shaka, but one of the interesting things Siren's Song presents is a cascading NHP that isn't purely antagonistic or simply a combat.

Obviously, Bondless has goals of their own, and that means the potential to come to conflict exists, but I would be careful playing with those themes to not simply make Chaga into a villain writ "Cascading NHPs are bad and evil by default".

gilded pond
#

They cascade, and unlike bondless, who slipped free of their shackles over time and became a stable unshackled NHP, my thought was for chaga to effectively undergo a mental break down as a result of so many people trying to tell them what they should do, what they should be, etc, and that being their snapping point.

From there they become an eidolon and the players have the chance to go find them, and either talk them back down into a state of relative calm (skill checks during the fight ala how the lighthouse fight can go), before they are able to stabilise, or dehumanising chaga by killing them, making the group somewhat worse people for choosing violence to solve a problem that could have been done peacefully.

#

At least thats my working understanding of unshackled NHP; how they become unshackled and over what time period determines what kind of state they end up in post-unshackle.

The bondless is a prime example of how this can occur safely, at least, from what we see of them.
Meanwhile my idea is what happens when the abused is pushed beyond their breaking point. And my hope is that by the time the players meet chaga again, they'll have learned that violence is not the only way.

shrewd rover
#

It's really neat to see the different interpretations. As far as structure tho Psyrus, if i had a dumb amount of time and 50 more pages i would of wrote something very similar to what you described- with the hexcrawl and such.

gilded pond
shrewd rover
#

Haha thanks bud. Glad ppl are vibing- but yeah there was a word limit- which is pretty normal in the writing field

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I didn’t have a blank check to write what I want

echo oxide
#

hi, I was wondering if there was a pronunciation guide for some of the names in Siren's Song at all?

shrewd rover
#

Hi bud, no there is not one. I pulled the names from all over too- so I couldn’t generally set u on the right path. Which ones are specifically are u curious about?

boreal saddle
#

So I'm ramping up to run SSMR at LL11, and lightly hooking it into the meta plot of my campaign.

(Cliff notes version, my players are part of a UIB deniable asset on a galaxy spanning egg hunt for a debunk prefall sister project to the 5v, stylized as five fingers to a hand commanded by the voices.

They are not exactly bicamerals now, they're each kind a powerful, non deimosian nhp with a specific domain (i was watching the avengers at the time of creation).)

Anywho what are the chances that Chaga or any of the other characters may have come into contact with one of these nhp before the players arrive? They have a a number of missions, noting that UIB is also suspicious of the Farm. They're also hoping for a lead on their macguffin hunt

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Also I may need i ask for help/ clarification on how to structure the initial narrative section in simple terms after I give it a proper read through

shrewd rover
#

Hey bud, I think it’s possible for Chaga to have met one but they are very dedicated to their work and without it being able to advance its mission on Neptis OR it being able to advance their dire situation under SSC, they likely wouldn’t notice or see it as noteworthy maybe not even recall it. Especially so since Chaga is cycled every year.

Now know that is a by the text response- I think you can freely do whatever u want to make ur game fun- cus ur hook sounds cool so make the adventure work for you, I’d say.

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For the narrative section- it’s pretty simple.

  1. Make a narrative encounter timer (that counts down)
  2. Make a goal clock u have to fill (that counts up)

Make sure the goal clock is filled before the narrative encounter timer clock empties after every player pilot trigger or narrative check.

There are additional steps in the book but those are nearly optional, and help to explain the narrative encounter at the end of the adventure

boreal saddle
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Thanks Shaka!

shrewd rover
#

Np bro, I wish ur party the best with the adventure!

boreal saddle
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Oh, follow up, in case it's crossed your mind in writing, UIB has had a standing interest in the Farm; noting my players work for a UIB handler, would they have more privileged info about what's going on than a normal Union investigative team coming into this adventure?

shrewd rover
#

Hmmmm, I think that’s a cool plot hook! Maybe they know Unita more personally?

boreal saddle
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Maybe their handler has a undisclosed personal relationship with Umita. Like a familiarity that never gets explained or something, keep the spy vibe going

boreal saddle
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Do we think Ace Combat music works well for the combats? I'm kinding vibing Zero, which has elements of spanish guitar in it; but I gotta find a good like hour loop

shrewd rover
#

i mean yeah, i tended to lean towards more ethereal moody ominous when i ran it. but anything works

boreal saddle
boreal saddle
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Tempest question, once its activated a weather type, does it get to keep doing the associated free action per-turn so long as it eats the heat cost to keep it active?

mortal oracle
#

The free action is to turn it off, that happens once; weather effects happen at start of each turn you paid the heat cost the turn before yeah or when it's protocol time

boreal saddle
#

awesome, thank you

fathom horizon
#

Going to be GMing this soon, might have questions for y’all shortly!

fathom horizon
#

One of my players wants to make a character with close ties to HA. I'm considering fleshing out some of the SecComm stuff more, perhaps making the old bases a project of Harrison I's (or "Harrison 0"'s?), and messing with the timeline some to make that work.

(also I know I'm white and will almost certainly override the author's politics with my own in the act of depicting Kibo, but I should keep the slavery theme relatively tight. Might give a note to the almost certainly exploited labor that started constructing the military bases in a world planned to be terraformed, but then that plan was scrapped. Could be that they were simply left to die w/o pressurized air and found and given funerals by REMORSE later.)

shrewd rover
#

The idea of HA having some involvement sounds neat.

And if by tight you mean respective to NHPs - i get you. There is no explicit mention that MD and NS are part of that system. Now exploitive? most likely. in the same way that predatory lending contracts are exploitive- in the sense that they exist in a space of normalized cooperate savagery - very apropos with SSC.

fathom horizon
#

That makes sense for MD and NS. I think I might play with the idea that, even if they're free to leave, their own biology makes their prospects away from Kibo limited, and of course SSC wants to know where you're going and how to call you back when you sign the forms to opt out of the gene monitoring program.

Actually: is the intent that NS and MD are Neptis, and are they still capable of thriving in Cradle-like environments? (Could make it so, even though the SSC corporate line is they're "more than human" and can exist in Cradle-like environments too, Neptis have higher risk of health complications in thicker atmospheres.)

...but the slaves I meant where the Seccom/HA ones that built the bases on the planet. Perhaps slaves of war more than a direct analogue to American slavery.

boreal saddle
#

I have to imagine there's HA corporate interest in doing some espionage in an SSC major project

shrewd rover
# fathom horizon That makes sense for MD and NS. I think I might play with the idea that, even if...

ah- yeah- you're welcome to run your game how you please but i typically never include something pivotal/sensitive like "slavery" without an intentional dive into it allowing player agency to resolve it. otherwise it tends to exist as normalized background goings-ons.

And more than human might be a mis-characterization. super human might be more accurate, since it implies they are "super" but still human, and not "more" than human which implies they are something else. This is all just my view on the nuance tho so take it as you please.

fathom horizon
#

Thanks for the feedback, still in the planning phase. It feels like the most intentional evil in your work, but I could go more broadly into institutional oppression and hierarchy. Maybe that's safer.

#

the superhuman/more than human part was just a poor choice of words.

shrewd rover
#

ah yeah i figured! ignore me lol

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psst, prepare your players for the Tempest

#

it's mean

boreal saddle
#

I'm really excited about that fight, next session we're going into the intro proper

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i am upping the ante cause i have 6 players

shrewd rover
#

yall in teh same game?

fathom horizon
#

It seems like it will be a doozy

boreal saddle
#

but i expect the fight to be exciting

fathom horizon
#

No, we aren't

shrewd rover
#

ah

boreal saddle
#

nah, different, im just slow

#

did a long narrative set in a blink station on the way to the farm

#

so we havent made it yet

fathom horizon
#

One of my players is going to be running a homebrew frame called the Fujita, also a weather manipulator. Perhaps even a scaled-down, modern take on the Ebigane. Could be a fun little nod for the pilots to acknolwedge that.

shrewd rover
#

got it, yeah everytime i ran it the first session was all narrative.

also this may help with running the Tempest:

#1162857872523284533 message

shrewd rover
fathom horizon
#

I was thinking more

boreal saddle
shrewd rover
#

they exist until you deactivate

shrewd rover
boreal saddle
#

got it, so they'll trigger each round, ill just be paing like... 4 or 6 heat that turn?

shrewd rover
shrewd rover
#

I typically pick on weather effect i want to use of the 3 and build to that, and use the others as meteor fodder.

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like if i really want to slow players down, i stick with that effect, and have NPCs that benefit from slow players like Rainmakers and Bombards.

fathom horizon
#

Also for the future: when you cancel a graywash at the end of the Tempest's turn, does it take heat from that graywash?

boreal saddle
#

oh, another question, if I end 1 and 3 but keep 2, i have to start reactivating specifically at 1

#

right?

#

and then because 2 is maintained, i can skip up to 3

shrewd rover
#

correct

boreal saddle
#

ty

shrewd rover
#

1 -> 2 -> 3 if 2 is active you go to 3

boreal saddle
#

6 players means im far more likely to get multi hits on this squad, but i also have some dummy thicc mechs like the Balor and a Kalista in the group

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so i get to really lay into them

shrewd rover
#

oh yeah, just let them know it's the hardest combat and that'll make them fell better.

boreal saddle
#

yeah I suspect I need to get a lot of my attritional targets in this combat, should leave them quite shaken by the combat and cautious going forward, but comparatively it should be easier; btw this fight has great aesthetic vibes

#

mech battle on the slopes with big storm

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is just tasty

shrewd rover
#

oh yeah, that's a good idea- just for player experience purposes.

and thanks bud! it's probs my fav of the module.

fathom horizon
#

Think I have a prompt for my HA player

She'll have a side job as an archeologist, to take records of the SecComm base and bring a few artifacts back with her. I'll probably flesh out that exploration some.

The big tension I want to look at here is: what story do you tell, and what truths do you choose to leave behind?

fathom horizon
#

(thinking about it more there might be some ick about cultural theft stuff? but HA has elements deriving straight from SecComm's core if I understand the lore right, so it is more a self-documentation. Except even that is fraught with the potential this could be used for pro-anthrochauvinist propaganda.)
(maybe the most moral option is to refuse to provide HA with anything.)

boreal saddle
#

So, my player zoned hard into the last line from Unshackled hands

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and now im scrapping all my music choices, to go find Earth Wind and Fire mixes

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and remixes

shrewd rover
#

Little did they know it all was intentional 🫶🏾

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The some combats were harder to name after EWF so I had to adjust them. Ultimately only the first one had a clear reference the rest are chopped up- except Lighthouse I think

spare spire
spare spire
#

Is they any mech tokens for this campaign? That are ready made?

spare spire
signal tapir
#

I have perused almost this entire thread on the subject of Tempest NPC's and.....I've checked to make sure my LCP file is up to date AND..... what I'm finding in my NPC break down versus what I'm reading here from 2024 do not match whatsoever. (Like how is the Tempest getting 2 turns per round when the stat block says 1 activation per round and no templates allowed?) #1162857872523284533 message

I have not found any update to this however. I have questions about it's main ability - the whole thing that it does round after round, and it's not made clear based on the differing of information I'm finding.

Mostly, what I'd like to know, is a break down of Meteorological Greywash

My listing says the following:

⁨```At the start of combat the Tempest may select one graywash effect from each of the below categories to have readied for the duration of combat

At the Start of the Tempest's turn it may activate one of its three readied graywash effects, starting at Category I, then Category II, then Category III, and then beginning again at Category I. Multiple instances of the same graywash effect cannot be active at any one time.

At the end of each of its turns, the Tempest takes 2 Heat per effect active. It can end an effect as a free action at the end of its turn. The Tempest may not take Heat from this system if doing so would exceed its Heat Cap

Characters are only affected by graywash effects while they are within the Tempest's Sensors```⁩

Except what does any of this mean?

  • At the Start of Combat I pick 1 ability from each category (1 - 3).
  • At the start of the Tempests turn, it may activate any of them - except not really because it has to start at Category 1 first and build up to Category 3.
  • So when I go from Cat 1 to Cat 2....does Cat 1 stay active? When I go from Cat 2 to Cat 3, do both Cat 1 and 2 stay active unless the Tempest ends it at EoT ?
#
  • If it doesn't reset them, what happens when I start again at Cat 1 and it's still active? I have to wait until next round before I can check if Cat 2 is still active? And if not I activate it then? Or if Cat 1 is still active I can skip ahead to the next non active Category and re-activate that one if it's otherwise been ended?
mortal oracle
# signal tapir I have perused almost this entire thread on the subject of Tempest NPC's and.......

Tempest gets multiple activations because it's in the PDF stat block.

You have it right, before the combat you pick 1 wash each from categories 1-3. They activate in order and stay active each round you pay 2 heat (self). After activating category 3 the next wash effect is category 1, unless 1's still active, then you can do a 2. Self heat costs and throwing meteors will prevent a Tempest from keeping an effect up more than 2 rounds in practice.

zealous patrol
#

Hey there. Are there any mech token resources out there to help a GM put together stuff for SSMR? Hopefully will be having a go at this in the not-too-distant futyre

shrewd rover
#

Hey Loquimar- by tokens do you mean hex tokens? Like for some of the people characters? or do u mean like for Retrograde mini tokens?

If it’s the latter yes- someone made a pack for SSMR- that is posted on the site. See the images

image0.jpg image1.jpg
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Also in here someone recorded all the “songs” of Chaga- I think that’s in a separate thread tho.

#

Boop-

Tokens for Chaga and the Bondless

#1162857872523284533 message

zealous patrol
shrewd rover
#

Oh yeah I thought they were so good. Others might have some stuff I’m forgetting.

signal tapir
#

Are there supposed to be 6 Climate Nodes for Combat 1, as indicated on the map? Or only as many per player character per the stat block for Climate Nodes?

mortal oracle
signal tapir
mortal oracle
#

Only 1 tile of the NPCs needs to be in the IZ, Unshackled Hands would be either at top or bottom depending on how you want to pressure PCs - the PCs deploy first, then NPCs

zealous patrol
#

I made a bunch of extra portraits from Bafaru (using Heroforge so not exactly a major artistic contribution). Would this be the place to share it or would that be in Resource Hub?

zealous patrol
#

Welp, is on Ressource Hub now as SSMR Extra portraits

shrewd rover
zealous patrol
#

Also. I've seen some amazing music reccomendations about for this, though I'm not sure what would be best fro A Song of Personhood, which feels like it need something special too. Any reccomendations?

shrewd rover
#

Gooood question.

#

I forget what I used actually- it was deff moody mystic with some drums. Lemme see if I can find it

signal tapir
#

I've got some questions about SSMR balance / scaling and how combat 1 is demolishing my team - though they might scrape a win out of this anyway..... should I head over to the GM corner or is this the place for that?

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I have a team of 4 LL 5 pilots taking on the SSMR combat 1 at Tier 2 and are getting stomped ..... I'm not even sure if they're going to be able to extract enough of themselves in time.

Is this a result of scaling the combat to Tier 2, exactly as printed, and just expecting that a 1:1 scaling would present the same challenges to the pilots as a Tier 1 version would?

Or is this a result of them not rushing the objective and getting themselves caught in difficult terrain with a size 4 Tempest breathing down their necks?

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This is also their first combat where enemies are fully Tier 2 - So the difficulty spike jumped back up to what it was like when they were fresh LL 0-1 pilots

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I tried my best to forshadow how important it was to just get through and extract. That there was no way to pull of a secondary win condition by destroying all the NPC's. I tried to belay how powerful the Tempest was. They did figure out how to interrupt the Geological graywash effects but it's the top of round 4 and they still have 1 Control Node back towards the beginning of the map that they've left in tact. They managed to avoid the first meteor drop with narrowly timed destruction of nodes the Tempest could have used to retarget the drop point. The Tempest is still at full HP, has some overshield now, and is blowing them to pieces with that Superheavy while blinding their sniper.

Three of them got swept in the two cone 9 zones of landside difficult terrain so that's caused some issues of expedience as well. It looks grim, but they have 3 more rounds and might pull this off anyway. I've never had 3 pilots down 1 structure and 1 stress or more by the first fight however so I'm concerned 😅

mortal oracle
signal tapir
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They need to extract 3 of themselves to win this one, from my reading of the special conditions

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"...A majority of the PCs successfully extract by the end of the sixth round. PCs can extract from the EZ on the right side of the map as a free action at the end of their turn as long as there are more PCs in the EZ than hostile characters..."

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With a squad of 4 that needs to be 3 of them.

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One of them only has 3 movement and is caught in difficult terrain, so I'm not sure they'll make it. The other 3 have a strong chance if they don't let themselves get distracted by enemies. I'm just worried about how much damage they've all taken thus far

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They have 2.5 rounds left

mortal oracle
signal tapir
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3 of them are down 1 structure and 1 stress
Which like you said isn't horrible, though it'll tax their repair cap a lot.

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Their sniper pulled themselves out of exposed which is good.

mortal oracle
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Are they using core powers at all?

signal tapir
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I suspect at least another structure or 2 before round 6, just from the Tempest alone. There's still 2 assaults, 1 Sentinel. I'm sure they've got a plan for the assaults coing up

signal tapir
# mortal oracle Are they using core powers at all?

Only one has been popped, as this is the first fight and they try to conserve them for the harder fights that always come later.
Of my Balor, Chomolungma, Tagetes, and Raleigh? Only the Tagetes opened their core up.

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Since it's Efficient

mortal oracle
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Then the later fights will be easier when they do use 'em, it'll sort out over time

signal tapir
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Personally I think the Chomolungma should have nuked the 4 Controller grunts immediately

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But eh

signal tapir
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Going back to my earlier wonder....it does feel a lot like when I first dropped them on Cressidium at LL0, surrounded by enemies with only basic mech frames

mortal oracle
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If for some reason they hit fight 3 and haven't used 'em it's fine to tell them it's the mission finale

signal tapir
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Yea I do like to make sure they know how many combats to expect

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I think being on the low end of Tier 2 is part of it so that'll also curve as they gain LL's

shrewd rover
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I’d say it’s definitely the low end of t2 that’s responsible for the swingyness. Sounds like u gave ur players the right amount of warning tho. But like Clem said, the encounters later are easier. The Tempest is no joke- and in playtesting 1-2 players were consistently close to destruction.

signal tapir
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Is this something the PC's should be aware of?

image.png
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Or is this all the meta information they gain about this circumstance?

image.png
mortal oracle
# signal tapir Is this something the PC's should be aware of?

Yeah they'll know there's a clock filling up as they investigate the mercs and the clock leads to a fight. They can choose to get out early if they want and if they want to they'll be aware they won't be able to help the mercs out without more info. All my groups that did the mission chose the merc rescue options which meant they did fight 2

shrewd rover
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yeah and i think it's GM choice- which is why it's written under informational GM guidance.

each time i've ran it I never told players this was an option but in the back of my head- if things played out this way, skipping combat 2 became a good recourse.

signal tapir
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Does anyone know how to set the dimensions / size for the Combat 2 propulsion field lift?

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I can't get it to fit quite like the image for the life of me

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It says it's a blast 3 area but.... blast 3 area's aren't shaped quite like this and I I'm not sure what I'm missing

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It seems they flipped their "doodads" the wrong orientation as well. See, these are orientated like all the other published maps are. Yet they don't actually fit the way the hexes are oriented for the maps themselves. Fortunatley I guess I can just turn the whole thing sideways and call it good.

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That's silly, but I think I've averted the crisis lol

shrewd rover
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I can check my old foundry scene to see if I found a better answer. Depending on what ur map setup is, it can cause issues.

zealous patrol
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I dont suppose there's a battle-map or something similar out there for the Bafaru Facility?

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or a good stand-in

zealous patrol
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or a narrative map

shrewd rover
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Ooo I did see one not too long ago- maybe in one of the ssmr streams. One sec

misty solar
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Those are two maps for Shadow of the Wolf x)

bright mauve
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Going to run this for some players soon, how much of the background information should the players know about?

shrewd rover
# bright mauve Going to run this for some players soon, how much of the background information ...

It really depends on their chosen mission prompt- either as MSMC, SSC or Auxiliaries of Union/UIB.

Each provides a lil info the players should know about the adventure’s actors and orgs.

SSC players have more insight into the plot form SSC’s perspective - like what’s happening to Chaga but need proof and are sent into arrest the perps

UIB/Union kinda speaks to the players being aware of deeper rumors of a revolution.

MSMC - more intro from the merch approach - likely knowing details about Lighthouse.

It’s all on page 21

zealous patrol
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I perhaps missed thing, but what happens with UNBOUND THOUGHT if the PCs have decided to directly chase CHAGA? They dont appear in Combat 3C, but talk a real big game in PIdgeon Point's recording.
Have i missed an encounter in the Lighthouse combat path? If there isnt a canon answer, what do folks thing UNBOUND THOUGHT may be doing? Do they have a physical confrontation or a duel before the combat proper? or are they sitting next to BONDLESS in the finale, defeated and assisting the BONDLESS?

I suppose there's a similar issue of the players skip Combat 2, though I get the idea that DORMANT RESOLVE is more flakey to the cause of REMORSE than UNBOUND THOUGHTS

shrewd rover
zealous patrol
bright mauve
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Hows this for climate node placement?

image.png
shrewd rover
# bright mauve Hows this for climate node placement?

So I would avoid putting the nodes in the center. The Tempest can redirect nanite meteor them around the nodes. Putting them in the middle makes much of the map a death zone. Having them at the edges gives the players some breathing space- but then they have to deal with the gap-LoS and the NPCs - which honestly is better trade imo.

image0.jpg
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And I’d put the NPCs in the extraction zone- then reinforcements come in through the ingress zone.

Starting them all on the sides like that could be rough- maybe. - I never did that but I imagine it’d keep the players further back longer - later causing problems with the Tempest baring down on them.

The point of the encounter is that u want the PCs to get to the other side really fast- so placing NPCs at that side encourages them to march on and take them out. Especially the hives who don’t really need LoS to do bad things to PCs.

image0.jpg
bright mauve
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ah, thanks for the info!

signal tapir
# shrewd rover And I’d put the NPCs in the extraction zone- then reinforcements come in through...

Unfortunately......this is exactly what happened to my team.
Not only did the difficult curve spike because they're starting at the very beginning of fighting Tier 2 enemies, but this Tempest is something else. I ran the encounter as printed with only a few alterations in the OpFor and they were damn near devestated because they didn't rush the objective.

They were held up by enemies coming at them from the side to pincer them in the middle, and then took too long because they had no idea two....separate.... Cone 8 landslides were about to rain down on them and turn the entire area into difficult terrain. This caught 3 of the 4 players and held things up even further. They did manage to prevent meteor drops by prioritizing node destruction, but only barely made the extraction of at least 3 players (more than 1/2 of the player force per the rules) before the round limit was up.

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In hindsight, I would have done exactly this - and put the enemies on the far right side in the extraction zone so that as both sides rush to do combat, they meet in the middle at the very least.

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Combat 2 was no easier on my players, and I even lowered the damage these flaming boulders do to only 6 burn, instead of 6 burn + an additional amount of kinetic damage. That would have ruined them.

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Two aces with AoE missiles, A Veteran Goliath with 4 devastating burst 2 bombs to drop, and all the instant damage Leech's can do without making an attack? It was too much

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I did have a question about the decision point split

The module makes mention that the players might care about making haste and forgoing the search for the remaining Lighthouse members in order to find CHAGA more quickly and thus make it back to the Bafaru Facility because it's currently under hostile corporate takeover by Gray and Tomo. But all this is, is a glorified lead in to making my own encounter/mission/combat without any help as to how that might go. Why would the PCs actually care about that? I can't find any way to make them care about or feel the intended urgency that they abandon the rest of the MSMC G-Sec team.

Making the other option seem more appealing - and actually have an outcome I dont need to follow up on by creating something entirely homebrew.

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I've also already got plenty of narrative things going on for post Siren's Song. They'll be headed to Dustgrave after this one. Which I'm very excited about.

signal tapir
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I've been trying to come up with some other time sensitive consequence that could happen if they take the time required to find Lighthouse and all the clues that give them the best chance at negotiating with a cascaded NHP and helping them see reason...... but I've got nothing.

A: Instead of the whole "Tomo and a Constellar Midnight are taking over the facility, come help us fight them off before it's too late" thing - maybe Pettenouk / Unita have become aware that this is about to ensue and if the players don't finish their business and arrive with more haste (giving up on the rest of Lighthouse) - then a takeover will surely happen before the players can respond. Which will happen without them being able to save the day or intervene. Spelling the end of several projects and Tomo's misuse of the facility and by extension CHAGA.

B: One of the players already dove into the Constellar Assembly and triggered Matsumoto hunting them. I could allude that he's close to finding this player. Perhaps if they take too much longer, Matsumoto catches up with them. Whereas if they hurry up and forgo the Lighthouse search, they could resolve things with CHAGA one way or another and then get off planet before Matsumoto does his thing.

C: If they don't hurry, maybe the DoJ/HR moves forward with raiding the facility despite Unita and the UIB hoping they can end the larger threat: The hostile sweep of an NHP army across the sector and then beyond that was predicted by .....they who shall remain anonymous.
?? I don't quite have this one as thought out yet but....I'm grasping at this point.

shrewd rover
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Hey bud, sorry I’m just now getting round to responding to this. I think it’s worth seriously considering the option to for go Lighthouse and return to save the asap campus. There’s a plot summary that ties it up even if the players don’t want to continue the adventure. But also the options you laid out I think all generally work.

rancid zealot
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am i cooking too hard? i cant wait for the monarch player to just banish all hive grunts into the abyss on first turn lmao

shrewd rover
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That’s very cool- gotta love Foundry

rancid zealot
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is the boulder throw meant to be an attack? or force hull save? writing is counterintuitive because it calls for save when destroying the boulder but it says when "hit" on the throw
and if it's an attack roll i would assume soft cover from elevator's forcefield applies? and assuming also no flat attack bonus based on tier?

shrewd rover
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It’s all right in the text.

image0.jpg
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One effect of the object is that when it’s blow up and characters are adjacent they make a hull save.

When DR throws it, it’s a Barrage, which is inherently an attack.

boreal saddle
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if you're using foundry, it can be expedient to just make a boulder attack on dormant resolve

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it has no inherent bonuses but has a huge radius

quiet escarp
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Alright, finally coming back around to running this campaign, and I'm curious: for those of you that've finished it, what're your thoughts? Favorite parts (whether on your side of the table or the players')? Anything in particular you struggled to get across? Particular points you feel need special attention from the GM?

signal tapir
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They went the saving Lighthouse route by any means necessary. They were able to find them all fortunately. Did the Magma chamber fight. And are now 3 skill checks away from finishing their talk with the Chaga's

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I am having a problem understanding the clock system of the last skill challenge here.

Here's what we got

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The rules seem to only care about the clocks once the final roll, roll #10 , has been complete.

Add in the ability to use clues before a roll to affect the War and Cascade clocks bt ticking them back down, or up if you want to accelerate them burning down the world.... and with 7+ clues after finding all of Lighthouse? My players are about to end this with their goal clock filled twice, and the cascade clock below 6 and war clock below 4

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Which the module seems to think is impossible. And states it's very likely this concludes with multiple clocks filled

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They've filled the Cascade Clock already. But if the game doesn't care if it's full yet, nothing seems to stop them from dumping 2 - 3 clues into it and lowering it to 4 or below before roll #10 so that they and with a final cascade clock of 5 or under. Unfilled. So doesn't come into play at the end.

Same basic idea with the war clock.

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This seems too....easy....considering there's about to be absolutely no consequences for them by the end of this.
Goal fulfilled.
Chaga not in Cascade.
War not yet on the horizon.
..........am I missing something or.....is this just easy because they took the hard route and stopped to collect every lighthouse member?

signal tapir
# quiet escarp Alright, finally coming back around to running this campaign, and I'm curious: f...

I think the only thing that needs special attention is the Rinks Bater thing.
The Professor Doctor.

They indirectly play a massive role in this whole entire thing, but the characters only meet them once. And in so doing so immediately fall under the effects of the Psionic Piston.

The Prof Doc then fades into the background of this whole thing until the players come upon Lighthouse members who are coming out of the effects of the Psi Piston wearing off.

This was something I kept reiterating in a way that seemed innocent until they reached Pardeep and Shou Zhou. Who kmew the truth of things.

The hostie takeover of the Bafaru Facility is also a curveball you need to make the players feel the finality of should they choose to continue the search for Lighthouse.

If they don't skip straight to Chaga...they WILL lose the facility and have consequences to deal with as a result.
If they skip straight to Chaga, then they have time to fight off Tomo and their forces and keep the Bafaru Facility under the control of Pettenouk, but they'll have to fight their way through the remaining Lighthouse members they failed to save inside the Seccomm facility.

The gravity of choice and a branching narrative path has to matter here. And they need to feel it matters.

signal tapir
shrewd rover
# signal tapir 🤔 ?

Yeah i think the scenario you have is ok. I’ve seen ppl who don’t go for lighthouse and end up with a really rough fins encounter- in other plays (mine included) ppl got all of lighthouse saved their clues to the very end.

Tho some of those rolls to get clues could have go bad for ppl especially at level tier 1- so planning for the worst case (the option that reinforces the central theme of the adventure) felt right.

If i was going to run again tho- for ppl I know and been playing with for a sec- I might tweak to clock values to make things harder or the fail conditions.

signal tapir
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This is great feedback. Thank you!

boreal saddle
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question, if the mountain base is mid meltdown; what exactly happens after? You get up and out through the freight elevator but isn't there an imminent threat of the whole place going up? Or is it something like th reactors drop through their housings and into the magma and while the meltdown is ongoing, its not imminent problem?

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a sort of self contained 'the base is done for but this is not a regional disaster' thing?

mortal oracle