Charm City Gameday: Traveller

This past Saturday I headed down to Games and Stuff, one of the FLGS in the greater Baltimore area, for the semiannual Charm City Gameday. I was signed up for 2 games: Traveller and D&D 5e. I've never played Traveller before. The closest I've come is picking up the PDFs of the original little black books, and well, this series of posts that came out of it. Honestly, that's a fair amount of content for a game I'd never played...

Bright and early... ok, not all that early, it was 10am, I wandered into G&S found my table, and waited for the rest of the party to show up. John (the GM) was already there, and we chatted. 2 guys who hadn't signed up ahead of time joined us. I think their names were Nick and Nate, but I neglected to write it down, and they weren't wearing nametags. The scenario was described as follows:

The crew of the far trader "Slinky Too" have been hired to carry a young heiress to that most shady gathering of ner'do'wells, The Grapple, and assist her as she searches for an item lost with her father's death. A deep-space gathering of rogues, smugglers, pirates and those who cater to the underworld, The Grapple is where she believes she'll find the next link in the chain to recover her lost heirloom. Finding the person she's looking for will be one problem; dealing with the denizens of The Grapple will be another...

GM: John Appel
Nasuda (Heiress): ??
Captain Fergus: Joe
Zikran (Gerbil Engineer): Me!
Chief Procurement Officer: ?? - First time playing a tabletop RPG

Getting to the mobile station known as the Grapple wasn't much of a problem, and between the Heiress and the Captain, we managed to get a good berth. Very quickly the heiress came to be known as "Princess" and like that other sci-fi Princess, this one was pretty useful when it came down to it.

So we're looking for this guy, and we hit up the Grapple's captain, info brokers, and flesh sculptors, bumping into Max Mayhem and the Aslan Warrior Woman he works with, a former associate of our Chief Procurement Officer (pirate). We finally get a lead on the guy we're looking for, he's got an appointment with a local flesh sculptor for the next day. The pirate and the gerbil set up a lookout outside the doc's office. 2 suspicious looking individuals head in. I run facial recognition, while the pirate heads in to check it out. Turns out these two are body snatchers and they've taken the doc into the back for a little "light interrogation" after killing the receptionist. The pirate signals me in to rescue the doc. The pirate brings a knife to a gun fight, but managers to close in and survive. I brought a shotgun, and blast one in the back as she slices at the doctor with her monofilament fingernails. Then I kick the other one in the head after the pirate stabs and knocks him down. We work out a deal with the doctor

The next day the guy we're looking for shows up for his surgery. Once properly drugged, we enter the operating theater and start asking questions. Turns out he's sold the heirloom to the Zhodani, since it's some sort of memory crystal. The heiress is shockingly focused on getting the trinket back and isn't interested in killing the guy who killed her dad. I guess inheriting a lot of money can ease the grieving process.

Leaving the surgery center, we find the Zhodani ship that was in dock has just left... so we give chase. A failed attempt at verbal negotiation leads to alternate methods. And once we've crippled their ship, we draw alongside to retrieve our loot. They launch a sneak attack through the docking ring, and by teleporting onto the bridge. Our quick thinking captain slams the engines, ripping the docking tube in half, while those at the airlock shoot the guy flying through it towards the ship. I then immediately run to the bridge where the captain and the Zhodani are in a firefight. Once again, I've got a clear shot at the enemy's back.

Tip: Getting shot in the back at close range by a shotgun is going to put a crimp in your day.

We return the bodies, collect the trinket, and sail off into the sunset with a potentially dangerous psionic item (or at least highly valued), and new powerful enemy. But that's a problem for another day.