Hartford Black Book Betamax Stars Without Numbers- Actual Play - Caught Between A Phraint And A Hard Place

 So tonight was my Stars Without Number 70's & early 80's  Science Fiction game. The players have been running salvage for several stick worlds of the Phraint from Bloody Arduin. The Phraint are a race of alien logical, cold blooded straight up mothers right out of the the twisted mind of Dave Hardgrave himself.

The soundtrack for this evening's game

The wiki entry pretty much says it all : 

• Phraint—amoral, logical grasshopper/mantis humanoids who were noted for their acrobatic, leaping attacks where they would throw a javelin at the apogee of their jump, flip over their opponent, and strike from behind with a two handed sword.
   In other words don't screw with the Phraint. The PC's have been clearing out an old tech three and four star field of debris for the logical bad asses while being dogged the whole time by bounty hunters after a slight 'misunderstanding' in another star system.
   The PC's were using light duty mecha and heavy space suits  to clear the interior of some of the shells of these ships. Lots of cutting laser action and room by room searches. 

Random Items and Encounters From The Epsilon Battle Field 

1. Small floating war probe armed and ready to explode will engage the target in radio beamed tight conversation. 1d6 points of damage plus a nice dose of gamma radiation. See radiation rules. 
2. A partially fried soldier's corpse in space suit. 30% of being undead and infected with zombie rot. The corpse still has a communicator worth about 100 credits. 
3. A spinning geodesic dome of alien origin that sends out random radio signals. Does absolutely nothing else. 
4. A bunch of cosmic debris covered in strange writing. There is a 30% chance of a creature from the Outer Darkness noticing when the item is picked up. 
5. A small golden orb about the size of a man's fist. The item is actually a psychic artifact and allows a psychic to learn two addition psychic powers . 
6. A small crystal alien head that is still alive for some reason. The head actually belongs to an alien android race and belonged to the ambassador of said race. The thing has very little recollection of the past but his race will want the return of the thing. Actually he's lying and he's actually a spy working to get twenty year old 'secrets' back to his masters.  
7. A Demon of The Outer Darkness slithers from shadow to shadow across the debris. Its looking for a host to house its evil essence. The thing will burn a body out within 1d4 days and try to flee from anyone it meets. The beast on a mission from its twisted god. 
8. A small flock of  prism beasts Hit points 3 1d4 laser damage, AC 8, there are five of these beasts feeding on star light and making a nuisance of themselves. They can slice hoses cause lots of issues with suits or mecha. 
9. A small statue of Cthulhu- actually the mummified remains of a familiar that belonged to a Star Wisdom cult leader. The thing will spring to life and psychically blast its finder for 1d4 points of damage and then open a warp portal back to its home dimension. 
10. The head of a Robby unit silently spinning in place. The thing's memory banks have seen lots of battles and it knows many secrets but its a manipulative bastard should it be activated. 

 

The players have found themselves between two different hives and their space armada's are about to go to war. The PC's employers and another much more aggresive species. The PC's are trying to squeeze their way out at this point and take the salvage and run. There's a lot riding on the outcome between the two sticks of the hives that have begun ritual warfare on an asteroid.
 The PC's are being called out now! What will they do?


I used to two different sets of rules to outline the Phraint  NPC's  for this evening's game.

1. The rules from Gorgon Milk can be found right over HERE
2. And Jeff's Game Blog take on the Phraint PC class HERE

The Phraint are used without permission and are owned by Emperor's Choice Games. For all things Arduin.
Right over HERE

There was also some double dealing as one of the Phraint's scout ships exploded just be for the end of tonight's session!