And so we come to the end of the story arc, Episode 5 should give the players a chance to fight with their new Mecha and win or loose - establish a setting and a number of plots for them to follow up on in the continuing saga of our pilots facing Alien invaders, CTA machinations, and day to day drama in the SRS: Coalition 2171.*
The players make it back to the Jeanne D'Arc as repairs are under way and preparations for battle are frantically being made. They learn that the Jeanne D'Arc suffered a mysterious system breakdown exactly when the communications went down. It's obvious but not proven that this was caused by the CTA as they pulled out - taking everything they could carry and possibly even detonating charges to seal off the rest. The reason for this is that the INTRUDER changed course and greatly increased it's velocity - heading directly for 2060 Chiron. The CTA ship Enterprise is fleeing the scene with the booty - leaving the Jeanne D'Arc to face the INTRUDER. What a bunch of dicks!
Players have little time to prepare before they must suit up and defend the meet the incoming Aliens. Things look grim, however they now have Babylonian super science on their side! If the players haven't selected their new ship/mecha points and their configurations and associated traits yet, this should be done prior to the player scenes.
I'd also make sure that the players have at least one overdrive point each so they can use their new configurations. Since they haven't been budgeting for this, if the players are tapped out either let them exchange some AP for Overdrive or have an additional player scene session where the players all have to do social scenes.
-- Player Scenes --
It's unfortunate I never got to play test this far, because I think that the overall story experience would have been better for the players. Had they played their scenes I expect they would have focused on gathering Tactical points and Overdrive over Recovery scenes. Maybe we would have even have done a follow up session where the players would start driving more of the story. Even if this had just remained a one-shot session it would have been better to go out with a bang than the grind that Episode 4 turned into
-- Combat --
This combat has three Alien Aces and 6 base 3 mooks. It's basically a rematch of the combat in Episode 3 but with the configuration mechanics on the table to balance the odds.
The Bullseye Battle map is set up as per the book, players choosing to start in Quadrants 1&2 and the Aliens in 3&4. The Tactical Way point here represents the players keeping the Alien forces occupied long enough for the Jeanne D'Arc to blast the Alien comet with her capitol ship laser batteries. The way point is in Quadrant 4 sector 2.
Stats for the Alien Aces are as follows:
ATT: 6
DEF: 5
ENG: 4
MOV: 5
Piloting (Mech Combat): 4
Weapons:
4/Energy Bolt (Laser)
3/Energy Bolt (Laser)
1/Anti Matter Projectile (Antimatter)
0/Physical
Ace1 has the Boomer and Defender configs
Aces 2 and 3 have the Disruptor and Defender configs
If the players win, the Jeanne D'Arc will manage to deliver enough of a beating on their comet-like mother ship to destroy it, leaving their wreckage behind for the Coalition to study. If the Aliens Win - the Jeanne D'Arc will retreat towards the Saturn colonies and the Aliens will blow up (or inhabit?) 2060 Chiron and then return to their inner planet trajectory.
That's the end of this story arc and the crew of the Jeanne D'Arc has a lot of directions to go in from here. Do the aliens keep coming? Who are they and what do they want? What does the CTA do with the technology they acquired? How has this incident impacted political relations and what about that joint forces team forming up to meet INTRUDER. What's the Republic of China doing about all this? And what about Lon Granger and Beta Squadron - what happens to them? And most important - who's the real person behind that sexy voice on giving situation reports the comms?
Tune in next Episode to find out!
*or SRS: Coalition 2171 (Young Space Pilots in Love).
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