Reading Star Wars RPG sourcebooks is a guilty pleasure of
mine. What I love most about the Star
Wars Chronology Project is that it affords me the excuse to sit down and read
an RPG sourcebook cover-to-cover. If I
wasn’t on this quest there is no way I’d simply sit down to read a
sourcebook. I’m not sure I could justify
to myself such an expenditure of time.
As I’ve mentioned before in my other posts on RPG
sourcebooks, what I love about them is that they offer the nitty-gritty details
of the Star Wars universe. They contain
information that would otherwise be difficult to inject into a regular
narrative like a novel or comic. From
this particular source as an example, there is this great explanation from the
Trade Federation Technology section on the cost benefits of having a
droid-controlled ship over having droid brains that operate independently. Essentially the Trade Federation was saving
millions of credits using the droid controlled ship because they never believed
the ship’s defences could be breached.
But the most important thing I walk away with from this source is that
this narrative even exists. In what manner
can an author effectively introduce dialogue between Nemodians as they decide
how to set up their droid army? I think a sourcebook is the best way to do this.
I walked away from this source respecting the Trade
Federation a little more, and basically having an overall higher opinion of
battle droids. The obvious benefit of a
droid army is strength in numbers. If
they don’t come into contact with Jedi and are facing a regular standing army
of beings they should be able to overwhelm their opponents into defeat. What I never knew before is that battle
droids are designed to be salvageable in order to re-deploy into the theatre of
operations.
“After a battle, cleanup droids
gather the spent parts from the field.
Workers in properly equipped shops can then reassemble the undamaged
modules into working droids. In this way
the Trade Federation can recover a majority of the droids who fell in combat,
thus maximizing its investment in the manufacturing process” (11).
Here the Nemodians have taken a page from American military
history. Utility is the key to victory. Tank parts should be able to work in Jeep
parts, and vice versa. Any good military
should be able to recover equipment from the battle field and reprocess into
the theatre once more. It’s simply a
combination of good economics and military strategy if you ask me. Like I said, my opinion of battle droids, and
the Nemodians, increased a little. A wounded soldier takes precious resources
to rehabilitate. A droid requires only
some welding and re-wiring.
Weapon stats are another feature of sourcebooks I enjoy. Though I’m still unfamiliar with the inter-workings
of the D20 system, figuring out which weapon is the most powerful is pretty
simple. In this sourcebook that honor
goes to the Naboo S-5 Heavy Blaster Pistol with a damage output of 3d8 plus a
1d2 paralytic poison – Captain Panaka’s weapon of choice, naturally. The artwork for the guns was pretty neat as
well.
As far as story goes, the most important aspect of this text
is the RPG scenario Peril on Naboo, but before I get to that I want to mention
a tiny piece of narrative which, had I been lack in my reading, I might have
missed. In the section on Green Glie
there is this strange little tidbit of narrative about the poisonous nature of
the algae. It starts with an advisory
note at the end of the explanation of Green Glie:
“Advisory Note: All Jedi who
visit Naboo should be extremely careful when accepting hospitality from even
the most trustworthy individuals. The
Council is still investigating the death of young Jedi Knight Keiran Valn on
Alderaan last month. Preliminary reports
indicate that he died by ingesting a glie-derived compound at a banquet held by
his own family” (52-53).
When I first read this I thought it was a reference to another
story somewhere else in the EU, but this is not the case. After looking through
wookieepedia it’s apparent that this story is only found in the Secrets of
Naboo sourcebook. This narrative is curious
because it raises some fascinating questions.
Firstly, why is this Jedi visiting his family? Is there a Xanatos element going on here,
where he has been called to his home planet on a mission and faced with his
family to test his dedication to the Jedi Order? What has this Jedi done to warrant an
assassination? Why would his family kill
him, if indeed they are responsible? For
you short story writers out there, here is a great hook to explore the demise
of Keiran Valn. This story has yet to be
explored and is opened to anyone creative enough to fill in the blanks of Valn’s
murder. Maybe the protagonist could be a
Jedi investigator and the story could have a CSI type ‘whodunit’ element.
My last point of discussion centres upon the RPG adventure
Peril on Naboo. Taking up almost half of
the sourcebook this RPG scenario is one of the largest I’ve read. The adventure is separated into three parts
with three scenarios per part. It starts
with a group of level 1 to 2 heroes stranded on Naboo as the Trade Federation
invades. The heroes come together to
save the daughter of a tramp freighter by trying to smuggle out of Theed some
medical supplies. Needless to say events
transpire against them, and the heroes are forced to fight battle droids and
join the Naboo resistance movement. The
adventure ends with the heroes assisting Queen Amidala’s in her plans at the
end of the film, with all the major players of the Phantom Menace making an appearance. It was truly an epic adventure.
Star Wars RPG sourcebooks makes the Star Wars universe
better.
For my next post I’m going to take a look at the 3-page RPG
comic, Battle for Theed, from Wizards of the Coast. Until then my friends, may the Force be with
you.
