Darths & Droids IV: Not in Numerical Order

[Rogar Demonblud]

Now that's a call back to rival the guy firing the Death Star Peace Moon laser, just to one of their jokes.

[theangelJean]

Yanno, up until the latest episode (movie), I hadn't actually pictured any of the players as looking like their characters. I didn't know any of the Episode I-III characters, but they were pretty clearly distinct from the players. I did know the Ep IV-VI characters, and there wasn't really any confusing them with their players. But Poe in the screencaps in the latest series of strips? To me, that IS Jim. You could tell me you picked him based on the facial expressions alone and wrote the plot around that, and I'd believe you.

[Rogar Demonblud]

I suspect they may have.

[Rogar Demonblud]

I doubt character death is much of a thing for Corey, memnarch. Setting aside any of their other campaigns he's been in, he's a console gamer and has watched plenty of built-up characters get ganked.

[keybounce]

I doubt character death is much of a thing for Corey, memnarch. Setting aside any of their other campaigns he's been in, he's a console gamer and has watched plenty of built-up characters get ganked.

The impression I got was that Corey was used to games where as long as one member of the party survived the fight, everyone lived, otherwise you just reloaded and continued.

There's no indication that he's used to Rogue/nethack, or any sort of perma-death game.

Ahh, yes. The games where you could send 10 characters into the dungeon before you got a level 2 character and a chance of success. ... Of course, there's the people that have "solved" the game, and can win with any random character because they've learned all the tricks.

(No, that's not me. I've never actually gotten the Amulet without cheating, and even trying to get out of the dungeon while cheating showed me just what an "11" is to the nethack dev team.)

[memnarch]

The impression I got was that Corey was used to games where as long as one member of the party survived the fight, everyone lived, otherwise you just reloaded and continued.

...

Handily, there's even a comic pointing out the respawn thing.

[theangelJean]

Heh. Went on an archive walk from there and found that the GM played six characters who were incapacitated in two sessions in an in-between session run by Jim (was it Casablanca?)

[Rogar Demonblud]

Nope. Airplane! When you get to the end of that campaign arc, you'll see Jim's notes for the game.

[keybounce]

Oh my. Reading 846 (thank you!), and I have this question: Should I bump the forum thread over there to comment, or should I add to this thread here?

[Rogar Demonblud]

After this many years, probably better to ask here. Or whatever is the current thread there.

[keybounce]

So 846:
https://www.darthsanddroids.net/episodes/0846.html

Having your component atoms ripped apart and scattered far and wide enough that there's no detectable trace of you left behind has to be pretty traumatic. Your Raise Dead spell is going to have a tough time of it. Particularly in settings where there is no Raise Dead spell.

Naah, we already know that the pile of ashes is perfectly capable of being brought back to life. It's "Gust of wind" that changes the one word to 4 words, and triggers the prophecy. (Ok, ok, that was a "fan" view, and not the official 4 words). And, since when has the lack of a raise dead spell stopped things? Sufficiently advanced science can give us Punch and Judy, and Klaus. And there's every indication that this setting is sufficiently advanced -- what they do is practically magic (how else can you explain Coruscant? Never mind the cloning tech available.)

A character who dies is dead for good? Fine. But what about the 5 clones that they had in the background?

[Rogar Demonblud]

The clones fight to the death to decide which of them is the real 'me', like in Twice's backstory in MHA.

[SirKazum]

Since we're talking about 846, I like the crazed expression Luke has in the second-to-last panel there.

[Rogar Demonblud]

I prefer the joke in the transcript below the commentary: Obi Wan's Pile of Robes. As if the robes are the ones talking.

Hmm. That's an idea for a game sometime. Everyone's had experience with talking weapons, and some with an intelligent shield or helmet. But nobody expects a sentient doublet.

[137beth]

Spoiler: Entire trilogy spoilers

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While that would be great, I suspect that either Snoke is going too be his own villain or will be a corrupted Palpatine, possibly possessed by Anakin.

Actually, we know that Rey is the daughter of Han and Princess. Princess is Anakin's daughter, and we know from the second Death Star that Anakin can possess the bodies of his descendants (subject to potential need for anger). This already makes the ending of E9 make a lot more sense.

Anakin, the one true Sith, has managed to come back from the dead by possessing a body. However due to it not being a family member's it's started to decay, causing him to return to being the man behind the man and controlling his First Order through Smoke (who might just be an independent villain under his command, or might be directly controlled via the Force, hive mind Sith?). Anakin has Snoke tutor Kylo Ten (secretly Rey's brother Ben Solo, or her cousin Ben Starkiller), hoping to increase his rage to the point where he's possessable. Blah blah, E8 happens, and Anakin guides Kylo to him, realises that despite his apparent anger Kylo is too calm to possess, and so uses Kylo to guide Rey towards him, thinking that she is more naturally inclined to the dark side. Blah blah, In the final battle Anakin learns how to stabilise his body, tries to kill off his grandkids, and gets his own Force Drain reflected back at him, the galaxy is saved for now but Anakin might return as long as his bloodline endures.

Huh, I definitely like that more than the actual movie.

[Rogar Demonblud]

There's one very good reason for getting away from the crash site y'all missed. That's where the goon squad your former bosses are sending down will land.

[b_jonas]

There's one very good reason for getting away from the crash site y'all missed. That's where the goon squad your former bosses are sending down will land.

No. The Tattooine sand blocks the signals, so the goons can't just follow them to find where their dropship landed. The goon squad will have to land wherever, and then track them the hard way, by asking in taverns and putting up wanted posters. And we the readers already know where the goon squad will land anyway.

[Kantaki]

No. The Tattooine sand blocks the signals, so the goons can't just follow them to find where their dropship landed. The goon squad will have to land wherever, and then track them the hard way, by asking in taverns and putting up wanted posters. And we the readers already know where the goon squad will land anyway.

I mean, they went down in a huge ball of fire and hit a giant sand geyser.
You don't need scanners to know where they went down, just someone looking out of the window.

[Rogar Demonblud]

An basic ballistic calculations from the navigation computer will tell you about where to look.

[Anonymouswizard]

Huh, I definitely like that more than the actual movie.

It helps a lot that I'm working in broad strokes (notably skipping over any parts of the film that don't revolve around a specific element), and drawing from lore that a) the films couldn't utilise and b) was clearly telegraphing one of the key elements I used. I suspect that whatever the WIs have worked out by now is much more detailed and even better.

Like, if I wanted I could do a full rough outline of the sequel trilogy that might improve it without making major changes to the story, but it's much easier to work with rough outlines than the details.

[Rodin]

Pete's going to sell BB-8 for extra rations, isn't he?

Spoiler

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Seeing the TIE fighter crash again really drives home that Poe wasn't supposed to survive this. I wonder what the sequels would have been like without them having to come up with stuff for him to do? He's easily my least favorite character from the trilogy because of how pointless he feels.

Prediction: Poe actually did die here as far as our players are concerned. Jim won't be able to come up with a new character and the GM will reintroduce HanGreedo for him to play. Since Ben is already out a character Chewie will be tagging along. Later on, Jim will get himself killed again and Poe will have "miraculously survived" to give Jim something to do during the climax.

The only difficulty is that Poe shows up in the movie a bit earlier to rescue them from the bar attack. That should be easy enough to write around I think? Just don't mention that Poe is leading the attack and avoid any screencaps with him in it.

[b_jonas]

Pete's going to sell BB-8 for extra rations, isn't he?

Over and over again, once in every town, and BB-8 will escape each time.

Spoiler

Show

Prediction: Poe actually did die here as far as our players are concerned. Jim won't be able to come up with a new character and the GM will reintroduce HanGreedo for him to play. Since Ben is already out a character Chewie will be tagging along. Later on, Jim will get himself killed again and Poe will have "miraculously survived" to give Jim something to do during the climax.

The only difficulty is that Poe shows up in the movie a bit earlier to rescue them from the bar attack. That should be easy enough to write around I think? Just don't mention that Poe is leading the attack and avoid any screencaps with him in it.

Spoiler: Force Awakens movie spoiler

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Still no. Poe is clearly there when Han dies. It's not possible to just hide him from the screencaps.

[SirKazum]

Small thing, but re: Keybounce's comment in the latest comic, I don't think Pete was speaking against metagaming in the previous comic, just teasing Annie about it in a "welcome to the club" way. I mean, it's Pete, metagaming is in his blood.

[Rogar Demonblud]

Over and over again, once in every town, and BB-8 will escape each time.

Shades of The Good, The Bad And The Ugly.

[Rodin]

Good night, BB-8. Good work. I'll probably sell you in the morning!

[Rogar Demonblud]

To answer one of keybounce's questions. It's easy to find the Star Destroyer, as you just have to look for the megaton hunk of metal sticking up out of the ground. Finding a specific part when you don't have access to the (classified) blueprints, well, that's a different problem.

And memnarch, you'll find Monopoly goes a lot faster if you don't use house rules and definitely do use the auction rules.

[theangelJean]

Re the alternate title, I grew up in Sydney in the 80s, but we didn't get Sydney TV (our antenna was pointed the wrong way and we got Newcastle TV). I guess that's what I was missing out on.

[b_jonas]

It's easy to find the Star Destroyer, as you just have to look for the megaton hunk of metal sticking up out of the ground.

I'm not convinced. A desert planet is huge, and this one is apparently protected against remote scanners. Rey probably can't use satellite imaging, information might not spread quickly among all these desert colonies, and a star destroyer is so useful that the locals who found them might have kept it in secrets. Rey probably didn't grow up in this settlement near the star destroyer, he's moving between them, hoping for a big catch. And there's no rule that the metal has to be sticking up out of the ground all that much when this desert has quicksand that can swallow a dropship. On the one view that we have in Darths & Droids, this star destroyer isn't sticking up by more than 15 meters, there are sand hills around taller than the destroyer.

Even on our real world Earth, with all the scanning technology, there is at least one Egyptian pyramid that was right in the area where all the other Egyptian pyramids are, and yet its ruins weren't discovered until 2017. I suspect that there are time-traveling shenanigans involved with that one, and the pyramid actually wasn't to have been built until someone traveled back in time from recently before 2017 to cause to build a new pyramid, but if so, the same could be true about the downed star destroyer.

[Rogar Demonblud]

Those 'sand hills' are dunes, and they tend to form wherever there's something to block the wind so the sand can drift up. Like a massive warship that got dropped out of orbit.

[Rogar Demonblud]

For a moment there I was expecting Jim to be the one doing a vector optimization problem in his head.