Introduction

I was going to start this last night after the Beekeeping Association meeting, but having eaten my dinner I fell asleep in the chair. Tonight, I'm still trying to avoid falling asleep in the chair and I've not eaten dinner yet.

Tuesday's session sort of went according to plan, at least initially. I had pretty much guessed that Matt was going to work out the whole of the scenario before we got into it, and he didn't prove me wrong. The question is can he predict what is going to happen next?

There is one upshot of the way things happened in the end. The Seers certainly wouldn't have predicted that Portia would have gone on a simple goods/payment exchange, nor would they have been able to predict that Emily would therefore be left in change nor what she would do, they simply don't have any data on her, well beyond what the GA published in connection with wanting her in connection with the escape of the crew of the Razza from Hyperion-8. They are also predominately working with data based on old behaviour patterns, behaviour patterns pre your memory loss. This would suggest that Portia would attempt to recover the Marauder, not out of any concern for the crew, but because of the value of the cargo. This is something the writers of the series got totally wrong.

The final upshot of this is are you going to play Jeopardy or Double Jeopardy next session. Jeopardy can potentially put you 1 clock segment apart on the equatorial plane, whilst Double Jeopadry could put you on top of one another.. the fun of 3 dimensions.

There is another chunk of house keeping at the end. If you're going to buy fuel, and/or water, then you need to tell me you're doing so. The same goes for food. I do need to check how many days have elapsed since you last bought supplies, and thus whether you actually have any food left or not.

I also can't remember exactly when certain elements of the conversation with Milo took place. I think I have them in the right place.

I said this was what was going to happen!

We started the session with an update/explanation of the way shield technology works in the series, far more akin to the energised plating of the Startrek Enterprise series (2001=>2005). This means that if you hit the shields hard enough, especially with energy weapons, you can cause damage to the underlying systems shutting them down. This is principly how you stop a ship from jumping to FTL by shutting down it's FTL Drive, and pretty much all ships have their FTL drives in the stern, thus if you hit a ship from behind with surprise you can stop them from jumping away. The other element is that you can't dock to a ship who's shield plating is active, and this includes docking a shuttle into a shuttle bay, you have to drop the shields to allow them to dock.

We then move to the 'action' which is the Razza's attack on the freighter, taking the freighter by surprise, in minimal weapons configuration, and knocking out its shields and FTL drive. This allows the Razza to deploy the Marauder with the 'Away' team to board the freighter as directed by Nyx, whilst Lisa keeps the freighter busy. Note she has to fire enough to keep the freighters shields down whilst not blasting great holes in the ship. She also has to keep them focussed on the Razza rather than what else may be happening. [GM Note: In the TV series she just allows the Freighter to keep shooting the Razza which is just plain stupid. The Razza has more than enough fire power to knock out the freighter's turrets and the maneuverability to stay out of the line of fire of its forward weapons. Just in case you have any ideas, the ship is far more heavily armed than you think. You took them by surpirse thus they didn't have their full weapons capability deployed. This won't be true next time...]

Having docked with the freighter Nyx opens the outer airlock and people move inside. Cycling the inner lock they enter the ship and proceed down the shot access corridor. Nyx signals wait before opeing the door and stepping into the main corridor, firing her stunner as she does so. The rest of the boarding party follow suit, only they're using projectile pistols and in Braddic's case an assault rifle [GM note I would have thought you would have learnt from the fight against the Volkov-Russi troopers that in close quarters stunners are the better weapons]. Having killed the 3 guards in the corridor, Nyx moves ahead followed by Ryo, whilst Portia, Boone, and Bradic relieve the guards of their Pulse Rifles. The rifles are not of a design that even Boone is familiar with. They appear to have an energy cell reminiscent of the Armscorp TRC Mk12 Blast rifle, although they appear they might be detachable (even if Boone couldn't work out how), and  two switch settings on the side, one which says S/L and the other which is a 4 position slider marked 1,2,3,5. The Guards had them set to S5. The markings on the weapons designate them as Electris S12E [GM Note: In light of everything else you've learnt perhaps you might want to ask Nyx about these?]

Upon reaching a corridor junction, which appears to be a central corridor, Nyx closes the doors, and then fires the Stunner into the control panel, in effect destroying it and disabling the doors. She remarks to Ryo that "This should keep them out of this part of the ship for a while". She then backtracks the way she came catching the others coming the other way at the corner. She then says "The cargo vaults are down the far end", which people appeared to be confused by, and then missed the fact that when she got to the double doors half way along the corrdior said "I'm going this way".

Eventually, after clearing up the mixup, Ryo follows Nyx. [GM note in the TV series its Portia who follows Nyx...]

Nyx heads down the corridor and reaching the center of the ship turns forward and enters the room beyond the doors.

I had expected people to make far more of this turn of events that they actually did. They did suggest that they were cryo-pods to start with, which of course they're not. They are pods, but those inside are very much conscious, well sort of. Nyx heads purposefully through the room as if she's searching for somebody, which indeed she is, her brother. Having found the pod her brother is in she opens it, then removes the Mindprobe from his head. Again I expected a greater reaction at this point even when I described it as something Ryo had seen before, something Emily had used to access her dreams, and that this looked like a production standard device, as opposed to the device that Lisa and Emily had cobbled together. I had expected somebody to suggest that Ryo takes it with them when Nyx asks him if he's going to help her with her brother, who appears to be semi-comatose at this point, but nobody did.

As Nyx retrieves her brother the others are retrieveing their second sets of 'Cases' from the storage racks. [GM note. I said the cases had to be some sort of off the shelf case repurposed. These are about the closest approximations I could find. In the smaller cases the groves for the vials run the other way and occupy 3/4 the width]. Each transit case when opened holds 2 rows of 18 of the smaller vial cases, stood on their ends, in each side. Each of the smaller cases holds 7 std injector vials of Shadow. The street value of each case is approximately cr500,000. As the others pass Nyx and Ryo carrying her brother, there is an explosion from further up the ship [GM Note: bascially the Seers blew threw the doors using cutting cord. Faster but more destructive than a plasma cutter. Breaching charges are even more destructive, but if you're using these you don't really care about the damage.]

With everybody back on board the Marauder, the Marauder undocks and they hitail it back to the Razza but not before Portia requests an explanation from Nyx.

Nyx "When we were children we were taken from our home planet along with over 100 of our people, subjected to an experiment on board that ship."
        "We were drugged, put into pods that linked our minds. The experiment was designed to see if the collective human consciousness could solve problems better than computers.
Portia "who did this to you?"
Nyx "Originally it was a corporation called Electis.Several years ago a group of us rose up. We killed the Electis crew and took the ship."
Boone "I don't get it. If you took the ship.."
Nyx "The leader of the rebellion was a man named Hansmeed. He convinced most of us that our survival depended on continuing the experiment. He said it would be on our terms."
Boone "Let me guess. It ended up being on his."
Nyx "I couldn't accept it so I escaped. I've been waiting for a chance to go back and get him. Please. He needs help."

Back on the Razza, the Razza jumps to the far aside of the Star. [GM Note: The Seers couldn't follow you at this point because their FTL drive was offline]

Nyx takes Milo to Medical, accompanied by Portia, whilst Ryo, Braddic, and Boone transfer the cargo to the vault.
Devon's examination of Milo does indeed reveal he's in a bad way. The scan reveals he's been fed Shadow for months if not years. He comments "Normal recreational use of Shadow is not that addictive, but it looks like they've been pumping this stuff into his system for months, I mean maybe even years. Coming off is not going to be easy."

Milo suddenly wakes up.
Milo "You have to take me back."
Nyx "No."
Milo "You don't understand. I have to go back."
Nyx "It's just the drug talking. Just give it a chance to leave your system, get your head clear."
Portia "I want to know more about what's going on."
Milo "Electis discovered that some of the people of our home planet had a genetic mutation. It gave them enhanced levels of what they called Cognetive Predictive Ability. Everyone has it to some degree."
Nyx ""Most people call it intuition. A gut feeling"
Milo "Like when you feel someone behind you before you turn around."
Portia "I don't see how that's relavent."
Milo "That's where the machine comes in. It links everyone together into a collective consciousness"
Nyx "It's horrible. It's like drowing in an ocean of 1000 voices. You can't block them out"
Devon "So they give you the drugs to make it easier."
Milo "well it also allows the Seers to access their subconscious mind and link them to the collective."
Portia "Seers?"
Nyx "It's what they call themselves. The Seers go into the machine and then they feed them data. huge amounts."
Milo "The Galaxy is awash with information. It's everywhere. It's just a matter of tapping in. With enough data you can calculate the probability of any event happening."
Portia "So how come they didn't see us coming"
Milo "I saw it coming. I manipulated the data stream so that they didn't"
Emily "Can you do that remotely, could we hack into the machine and change the data"
Milo "No you can only do it from within the machine, and not everyone can do it"
Portia "But you can?"
Nyx "Milo is the most powerful Seer they have."

Devon "I'm going to start an IV. Get some fluids going, that'll help the process for him." then to Portia "I'm going to need a case of Shadow. It might help in weaning him off."
Portia "Okay, but you're only going to have it under supervision" Devon looks a little dejected but nods. [GM Note: this is not how things happened in the TV Series, Devon steals a case from the cargo bay of the Marauder where the cargo is left. Five catchs him doing it but sort of believes what he says and lets it go. This does change things to a degree...]

Next on the agenda is to locate Devon's drug dealer contact. The first step of which is to jump to Odaran Sector, the closest station being Tahines-2.

Whilst enroute there are a couple of conversations that take place with Milo, principly at the behest of Nyx. The first is with Ryo, the second with Emily.[GM Note these are technically secret squirrel so unless they are specifically mentioned 'in-character' nobody else knows anything about them.

The conversation with Ryo is principly based on if Ryo can provide Milo with a comprehensive data set and history of his people and planet, could Milo predict what the outcome of the current situation would be. Milo says that with sufficient data, then yes he could predict what the most likely outcome would be, but he then goes onto to say that based on current data one of the crew of the Razza is going to betray the others. When Ryo comments that that has already happened, Milo says he's not talking about the past he's talking about the future.

After Emily's conversation there is a second conversation with Ryo, about what Milo and what the likelyhood of what will happen to him if he goes back to the Seers. Milo talks about fighting from inside, and paossibly staging another rebellion, but Ryo knows that Milo is just blustering and its never going to happen. Now in the TV series the scene cuts at this point, but due to what happens later its intimated that Ryo must have spoken to Milo, about honour, and self-sacrifice, and Samuri traditions. He also leaves Milo with his locking folding blade pen-knife. As far as things go this conversation also takes place and Ryo will also leave Milo with his knife. Note Ryo never reveals this fact or this conversation to anyone.

Emiliy's conversation is a little different, in that she asks more genreally about the future, and the fact that they appear to be able to do nothing to escape the consequences of their past. Milo at this point says that a full on war between the MegaCorporations is coming, and soon, in the next few months. In such times of Chaos and upheaval, a small band, or even a single individual can have a huge impact on how things turn out.

Enquiries on Tahines-2 lead you first to Bion-6 and then to Palia-3. On Palia-3 you make contact with the dealer and arrange a rendevous for 2 days time in the Drora system. Note you would already have an agreed price for the quantity you're selling at this point, which is basically cr8,000,000 for the 22 cases you're selling (remember you said you wanted to keep one transport case for possible future use, plus you have 1 opened transport case for treating Milo - although Devon doesn't actually use any of the drug in the pocket case ). Side Note:- some information you picked up on Tahines-2 means you have a possible lead as to where you might find Talbor Calcheck.

Jumping into the Drora system (Drora-8) you wait for the rendevous. At the schedule time the Drug Dealers ship turns up, and you verify the exchange [GM Note: The Drug Dealers ship wouldn't come closer than 50Km, and any attempt to close the distance on your part would be viewed as a hostile action. 50Km is well outside weapons range, but not missile range..The contact you spoke to on Palia-3 basically gave you a set of codes which guarenteed who you said you were and allowed you to verify that the other ship was the one you were expecting. Unlike in a Holliwood its not in their interest to try and double cross people. Its very bad for their rep and business.] Loading the cases into the Marauder, Varrick, Portia, Boone, and Ryo head out for the exchange.

When the Marauder reaches about 15Km from the Drug Dealers ship, the Seer's Freighter drops out of FTL and opens fire on the Razza with its main forward weapons[GM note: These are considerably more powerful than the Razza's]. With the Razza's shields on the brink of complete failure, Lisa tells the Marauder hide and then jumps the Razza away to the far side of the star. Varrick had already worked out that the Marauder would never have been able to make it back to the Razza, given the Seer freighter, is now between them and the Razza, and heads for the planet, hoping that the super dense atmosphere is more than enough to shield the Marauder from detection. He's right but the atmosphere is far more dense, corrosive, and energized than he initially thought. With effort he manages to put the Marauder down on the deck.

Portia, Varrick, Ryo, and Boone, discuss what to do. Varrick says they should be okay for as long as the shields hold. Boone and Porita worry about oxygen and other factors. As they discuss things there is a huge electrical discharge (C-Sprite - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sprite_(lightning)) and the power on the Marauder goes out.

On the Razza Emily discusses their current situation with Lisa. The shields are badly damaged. She can do some makeshift repairs but without spare parts which you just don't have she can't do much, and the Razza won't stand up to any form of standup or prolonged fight [GM note, all the forward and main fusalage shields are down to about 40% operating capacity]. She also notes that from scans she was able to make if the Marauder went down to the planet then it wouldn't be able to last more than 20 hours in the planet's atmosphere. They would be completely undetectable whilst in the atmosphere if the Seers were looking for them.

Emily goes to see Milo. She wants to know about the Seers, how they found them, and why he wants to go back. Milo basically says they knew about the escape from Hyperion-8 and who was wanted in connection with that escape. The also knew about Devon, and his past, and therefore probably concluded that if Devon were on board, the most probably scenario for the Razza to fence the stolen cargo was via Devon's previous drug dealer contacts. Knowing this they just calculated the most probable excahnge point based on previous behaviours and any other data they possessed. As to why he wants to go back, he basically says he doesn't have a choice. When pressed he says that his presence on board endangers everyone else on board. 

She instructs Lisa to calculate 3 random jumps based on the radio-active decay of an isotopes, to take them back to  the orbit of  Drora-8. [GM Note: now I've had time to think about this its a completely pointless exercise and doesn't gain you anything. Assuming the Seer's detection capabilities are on par with the Razza's then they can only detect an FTL window within 10,000km (approx 30seconds flight time at 0.1C). The decay time would only give you a time between jumps and that time would have to be at least 8 seconds which is approximately the time it takes for Lisa to calcualte and lay in a jump. Given how vast 3D space is predicting a random jump location in a 3D volume is almost impossible and not something they would need to do. They pretty much know you're not going to abandon the Marauder, so to only things they would need to predict are how long the Marauder is likely to stay hidden in the atmosphere, and what the most likely position the Razza would enter orbit to search or collect it. The latter would very much be predicated on what Portia would do given she is ships captain. Thus Lisa would be able to make the same supposition to Emily. This does potentially give you an edge, since Emiliy is not Portia and may therefore make a different decision in relation to how to collect the Marauder. Note also for the Marauder to dock it has to be travelling at the same speed as the Razza on the same vector (something else which the TV series neglects, the Marauder and only accelerate/decelerate so fast, not instantaneously. 41ms-2 to be precise). Note also that the speed the Razza enters FTL has no bearing on the speed when exiting FTL. The Razza needs to be traveling at 200ms-s to enter FTL for a 'normal' jump. It exits FTL at this speed. The Razza has a top speed of approximately 0.1C (299.7kms-1) and an acceleration/deceleration of 48ms-2. Note because the Nacells can be rotated it can accelerate/decellerate in both the horizontal (x) plane and the vertical (z) at this rate. It's lateral thrust is nowhere as good at 6ms-2. The Marauder has a top speed of 37,000ms-1. The planet has an escape velocity of slightly over 8,000ms-1. From takeoff with a gravity turn, it will take the Marauder approx 220s to achive escape velocity, with an altitude of between 200km (minimum base on atmospheric denisty and planet gravity) and  450km(maximum achieveable using full planetary spin assist) above the planet surface. The Marauder is actually moving at 8170ms-1 at this point, and yes to a large degree I have very much simplified the maths. Ships entering orbit from FTL generally do so at between 500km and 1000km from the planetary surface, it depends on the planets size and thus it's gravity. For reference the escape velocity of Jupiter is approx 60,000ms-1. ]

More GM Notes

The more I look at how things played out in the series the more I find that they couldn't have played out the way they did.

The Seers would be able to predict 4 things based on information they had.
1) That the Razza would go back to get the Marauder - Not for any sentimenatal reasons but for the cargo.
2) The most likely orbital entry point for the Razza based on where the Marauder entered the Atmosphere and thus where it would exit - yes the two are related.
3) The most likely time at which the Marauder would leave the planet given the general nature of people's inability to sit still in a complex situation
4) The most likely time at which the Razza would have returned based on Portia's previously known behavior patterns subject to any repair times.

Now 3 and 4 would most like not have been coincident. 3 is most likely to happen first.
The problem is the massive electrical strike that knocked out power on the Marauder would not have been predicatable, nor would its effects. Thus the Seers would likely return to orbit before the Marauder leaves the Planetary Atmosphere unless they were sitting approximately 1AU away and watching for the emergence of the Marauder from the atmosphere in which case they would arrive approximately 2 to 5 seconds after the Marauder emerges, but the Razza at this point may be several hours away in terms of when it returns.

Now there are 2 sets of independent actions here (because neither side knows what happened to the other and therefore have to act independently)
1) What those on the Marauder do and the timeframes in which it occurs
2) What Emily and the Razza do based on the fact that repairs will take approximately 6 hours.
Now the Marauder cannot make a subspace call from inside the atmosphere, nor with the Razza sitting in the radiation sphere of the sun can the Razza receive one. Its the main point of them being where they are, to hide from detection. Note that the Razza could contact the Marauder if it were in orbit around the planet, at least if it were reasonably close to where the Marauder is.
Those on the Marauder also don't know what actually happened on the Marauder, only that it was attacked and Lisa was forced to jump away. Similarly those on the Razza don't know what happened to the Marauder only that the maximum time it would be able to stay on the planet would be something approaching 20 hours.

House Keeping - Dates and Fuel

	Event	Date	FTL Jump Distance	Fuel	Fuel Remaining	Water Remaining
	Jump to Attack Freighter	2672.328.18	Intra-System	2000l	1,039,500	51,734(26,000)
	Shield Recharge during combat	2672.328.18	Intra-System	19,680l	1,019,820
	Jump to star	2672.328.18	Intra-System	2000l	1,017,820
	Depart Ullore for Tahines-2	2672.328.19	21.3ly	42,600l	975,220
	Arrive Tahines-2	2672.334.05	N/A	N/A	975,220	42,104(26,000)
	Depart Tahines-2 for Bion-6	2672.334.15	5.6ly	11,200l	964,020	42,104(26,000)
	Arrive Bion-6	2672.336.03	N/A	N/A	964,020	39,176(26,000)
	Depart Bion-6 for Palia-3	2672.336.15	7.6ly	15,200	948,820	39,176(26,000)
	Arrive Palia-3	2672.338.14	N/A	N/A	948,820	36,248(26,000)
	Depart Palia-3 for Drora-8	2672.338.02	6.5ly	13,000	935,820	36,248(26,000)
	Arrive Drora-8	2672.339.14.5	N/A	N/A	935,820	33,705(26,000)
	Shield Recharge during combat	2672.340.0	Intra-System	20,740l	915,080
	Jump to star	2672.340.0	Intra-System	2000l	913,080
	return to Drora-8 orbit	2672.340.12	Intra-System	2000l	911,080	32,780(26,000)

Incidental Expenses (Bribes/Inducements/Payoffs) : $9,700

Docking Fees: $28,830

Your last supply stop was on 2672.283 at the Opleesh-8 Station. That was 57 days ago. As you typically buy 60 days food at a time, you've about 3 days food left. Note you hydorponics just supplements what you buy meaning you have fresh 'leaf' vegetables on tap which raises the quality of your meals.

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