Star Wars: Corellia Campaign

[Arnu]

Hi,

I though I should start a thread for the Star Wars campaign I am planning to run this year (as a Thursday night game).

First off the basic setting idea.

The campaign is set in the Corellian system a few years before episode I. 

The story is based around a wealthish family (who own a business in the Corellian system)

The players are the younger members of the family and their friends.

I am looking for who would like to be part of family and who would like to be friend of the family.

Those who want to be part of the family need to decide which of the major species they would like the family to be (these include: Human, Twi'lek, Rodian, Sullustan, Duros or Zabrak)

Those who want to be friend of the family can be of any available species (that are present in that time period).

Please let me know which you would like to be. (then we can move on to character concepts - from there I can begin to flesh out the adventures)

[Snakes in the Tiki Lounge]

Oooh.
I had already decided to be a member of the main family, (originally assuming it was going to be defaulting to human), but this certainly makes things interesting. If I remember correctly, didn't both Zarniwoop and Dat volunteer to be family members? Possibly Dust also?


So;
Human
Twi'lek
Rodian
Sullustan
Duros
Zabrak

I'd suggest first, family members should give a skim-read of the above, perhaps? I'll spoiler my thoughts below. Read once you have had chance to form your own opinion, perhaps?

So, Human would be a pretty fair, if generic race to default to as the core of the group. It does keep things relatively open thematically, but also gives us a little less to build off of.
They'd be my third choice, I think.
I think I'm going to put forward the Rodians and the Twi'lek. They are the two that interest me.

With the Twi'lek being basically an under-class, the few Free Twi'leks outside of their homeworld usually resorting to Theivery or Prostitution to get by. The idea of a family of Twi'leks trying to make ends meet through legitimate means and methods sounds like an interesting point to start, to my mind.

The Rodians on a similar, but very differently flavoured note, seem to me to essentially be a race of arborial lizard mafia. They have violent tendancies and a strong clan focus that could provide an interesting backbone for the group. A similarly morally grey generation of a off-world Rhodians could be a fun place to start. Clan rivalries, the lure of Organised Crime or simply Violent means to solve our problems and so on would make for fun stuff, I think.

[Dat]

Humans are dull, and reading about the political wars they started all the freaking time bores me to tears. I'd go for twi'lek but their doormat nature doesn't sound great, though they sound like they'd be good for people who like to think. On the other hand, the violent and action packed history of the Rodians sound like something our players (or maybe just me) would enjoy more.

[Snakes in the Tiki Lounge]

Hmm. Interesting. Now if I could only track down the other one or two people who said they were interested in being part of the family... If only I could remember who actually said they were interested in that!

[Arnu]

So the family is now up to two strong.

I reckon two or three more players (just over half the group) should make up the family.

Then you need to decide how you are all related.

I'm liking the non-human family idea (A Twi'lek family that fought back and carved a niche for them selves or a Rodian family that hunt business and power rather than wild animals).

[Snakes in the Tiki Lounge]

I'm absolutely certain that exactly two other people did say they would be up for it, actually. I just can't remember who.

[Dat]

i can't remember either. Volunteers; - volunteer.

For the record, i don't mind twi'lek, i'm just not sure their 'bend like a reed' 'go with the flow' attitude is particularly condusive towards a good game. On the other hand they'd follow a plot hook like it was the pied piper of hamlyn. Gah, they're hard to undertand.

[Snakes in the Tiki Lounge]

I'm leaning rodian, too. Playing against type would be half the fun of twilek though.

[Snakes in the Tiki Lounge]

So, reguardless of whether they actually volunteered at the time, Jamie and Sam both would be interested in being family. Not managed to get a race-opinion out of them yet, though.

Anyway, more spoilers for those wishing to decide blind and then compare opinions later;

So, partly due to my initial reading of the Rodian and Twi'lek entries, and partly due to the fact I've recently been playing the GTA-esque game 'Saints Row 2', what I'm currently interested in is trying either of those races with a view on the whole criminal-underworld kind of angle of things.
I understand the core identity of the family is intended to be a business, of course, but there are two twists on that which I would be interested in, personally. The one that fits most with it would be if we were going the Rodian route.
Essentially, as I mentioned, playing up the 'arboreal lizard mafia' side of things, and exploring the world of organised crime and carefully implied violence and the threat of it. Sustainable and organised criminal enterprise, not only fronted and supported by, but genuinely in-concert with a series of legitimate business concerns.
The way I see it, and if the others are interested of course, it would be nice to start out with that being a minor element of the family's identity. It gives room for the members to either embrace or reject that side of family life, and leave their own legacy via how their decisions effect the direction the family evolves in over the generations.
Perhaps by the second or third generation, we'd be entirely legitimate businessfolk, or alternatively, we could be a majorly ingrained crime-family, system-wide, or even a rival to a Hutt or two. Perhaps somewhere in between. Perhaps the family could hold together as a fiercely devoted unit, or spread out as various members loose interest in crime/business, becoming Popstars, Senators, Landscape gardeners or heaven knows what.  Just a thought.

If we were going Twi'lek, I'd be interested in a slightly more gritty starting-point. I figure that being famed for being unlikely to make a fuss or go against the grain, basically being galactic pushovers, and with general opinion being that a Twi'lek who isn't a slave is probably a dancer, a theif or a whore, they could over-compensate slightly and be quite a violent, forceful presence on the streets. I'd enjoy exploring the idea of a Twi'lek street-gang, (Like the Bloods and the Crips but with lekku, perhaps). Likewise, this could be supported by legitimate business, but there's more room in the idea I think that I could very much do that kind of thing without needing the rest of the family to buy into the idea quite as much as for the very family-focused Rodians. It would likely mean in such a case supporting the idea on the back of my own character, mechanically, by taking the appropriate classes and so on, (sure there's a prestige-class or two, as well as that you've-founded-an-organisation talent/thing).

The above is purely what I am, at this moment, considering. I'd love to hear some other ideas for what we could get up to, or themes that might be fun to play with, even if it is only Dat reading the thread at the moment!
That said, if you could confirm or deny whether any of the above would be an acceptable idea or if it would go too far away from what you had planned, Andy, that's probably not a bad idea either.

[Dat]

In this system, you gotta make the money first.
Then when you get the money, you get the power.
Then when you get the power, then you get the Twi'lek.

...You wanna play rough? Say hello to my wookie friend! 

[Arnu]

There are some interesting ideas forming on this thread.

I will give you a little detail of the legal side of the family business.

The business supplies parts and consumables for starship and space stations (I am reasoning that the Corellian system has a lot of space stations - as hyperdrive travel is impossible in the system).  NOTE: parts and consumables are things like lights and heating coils water and waste pipes (all of it non-glamourus but it brings in a steady income).  The business also owns 3 cargo ships (with captain and crew).

Any other side of the business (legal or otherwise are up to the players in the family to decide).

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How I envisage the history of the business is that is was set up by your character's grandparents and is now run by your parents generation.

The players hold the posistion of troubleshooters and in charge of "special" projects.

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One possible idea if you can't decide between Rodians and Twi'leks is to spilt the difference and have the family business as an alliance between two families (one Rodian and one Twi'lek)


Let me know what you think?

[Snakes in the Tiki Lounge]

I think for me and Dat it's Rodians at the moment, with Twileks as the preferred alternative if necessary? Depends on what the other (2) family players think though.

[Arnu]

Rodians sound good to me.

Any ideas who the other two family members players are?

By the way I forgot to say on the last post that if you have any differing ideas of this history of the business or the current side lines of the business then let me know.

Also you may wish to name the family and the company.

Also I don't have names for the 3 cargo ships yet so you may wish to name them too.

[Snakes in the Tiki Lounge]

Well, Jamie and Sam have both volunteered...

[Sam]

I quite like the sound of the Rodian group.