Never Split the Party: The Crew of the Iron Dawn

There’s been a few games I’ve been with over the years. Some have been good, some not so much. I’d like to talk about a few in a series I like to call: Never Split the Party.

The Crew of the Iron Dawn

This is the longest group I was ever involved in, so I have a lot to say. Sorry if this post is long. Two people are referenced in this story that I previously mentioned. Mike and Kate. You can read previous comments about them here.

I was 16. It had been a couple of years since I had played D6 Star Wars with Mike, who taught me to play. I had shifted over into playing war games for the most part, not thinking about RPGs. Then one day, at the local gaming store where I played Mordheim, I saw it on the shelf: Star Wars The Roleplaying Game.

It looked nothing like the book I had learned from, as it was covered in images from Episode 1. I thumbed through it, and picked it up. One of the best purchases I ever made. I wouldn’t be here writing this blog if not for that book.

I was in a set design class at my local theater, where I knew Kate from. One day, during class, I mentioned this new game I had gotten. She was a big Star Wars fan, constantly battling her little sister over which is better: Star Wars or Star Trek. Since we were both actors, I thought it would be the perfect fit for her. I asked her if she was interested in a game. Getting her acknowledgment, I contacted Mike. He was interested, as was his brother, Cliff. My brother Andrew was interested as well, as were two of my friends from youth group, Nate and Ben. Thus, the Crew of the Iron Dawn was born.

I’m afraid, all these years later, I don’t remember all their names. Guys, if you’re out there and read this, and remember your character’s names, drop a note!

The heroes were as follows: Mike played a Miralukan Force Adept who was quite quippy. His brother was a Jawa Fringer who had more money than he knew what to do with. Andrew played Bax, the Dug Scout (later converted to a Tech Specialist). Kate played Irulan D’Elaine Vendalion (a name I only know because she recently commented on a post), a Jedi Padawan torn between her desire for revenge, and the Jedi code. Nate played a Human Soldier, armed to the teeth with grenades and heavy weaponry. Unfortunately, I can’t remember for the life of me what Ben played. Sorry Ben. And finally, Kibur Blastblade, my Human Scoundrel I played as a GMPC.

Now, at the time, I didn’t know any different. I had learned how to play RPGs with Mike running a GMPC, so I just went with what I knew. Kibur was their pilot and a big time gambler, which will come up later.

The heroes spent a lot of time traveling from planet to planet, performing any jobs they could get to keep their ship, the Iron Dawn, flying, including a big job in which they saved Chancellor Valorum from an assassination attempt at a fairly large parade.

The Black Sun Syndicate

Eventually, they drew the notice of two factions: The Black Sun Syndicate, and the Gemini Syndicate.

Black Sun was particularly important from the start, because Irulan, the Jedi, had witnessed Black Sun murder her master in front of her eyes. Black Sun kept showing up to finish the job. Even when the thugs didn’t know anything about Irulan, if she ran into a couple of minions at a bar, there was a big danger of her unleashing the Force on them in her rage. She had a difficult time keeping it in check.

At one point, the heroes assaulted a Gemini Syndicate base on an out-of-the-way planet. Now, the Gemini Syndicate was an organization of my own devising, and I had big plans for them. After defeating the group, the heroes took up residence and claimed the base as their own.

They spent a lot of time on Coruscant, primarily at an upscale bar in one of the high towers of the upper city. Remember this, as it will come into play later.

About a month before the Battle of Naboo, the heroes discovered the Black Sun was hiring. Getting in under the radar under assumed names, they became bodyguards at a large summit of all the Vigos. They couldn’t imagine their luck. Irulan imagined she could quite easily kill all the Vigos in their sleep bringing the Syndicate to its knees.

But as the Vigos were gathering, a cloaked man stormed the fortress, killing everyone in sight with a red lightsaber. Irulan watched as all her friends died before her at his blade, before he came after her. She was outmatched, and just before he struck her down, he pushed back his hood, revealing black and red tattoos across his head, with spiked horns. “Revenge is never pretty,” he said through rotten teeth, before cutting her down.

She awoke, disturbed by the vision. They had never infiltrated Black Sun. None of it had happened. But when she brought up the holonet that morning, news reports were flooding in about Black Sun being wiped out by a single assassin. A shiver ran down her spine.

A few months later, the heroes were sent to Naboo, where they ended up stranded as the Trade Federation took up occupation of the planet. They joined the resistance, and performed a few missions before being brought to a council with Queen Amidala, Boss Nass, and a few Jedi. The plan to save Naboo was hatched, a three-pronged attack. The heroes were to accompany the decoy queen and see her safely into the palace.

At one point, inside the palace, they encountered a cloaked man on his way to the hangar bay. He watched them suspiciously, and Irulan could see the black and red tattoos under his hood. She had seen him in her vision. Before she could warn the others, he had bolted down the hallway at unnatural speeds, and they were forced to move on to protect the queen’s decoy.

Eventually, they helped win the Battle of Naboo, and were duly awarded.

It was about this time that Nate broke his leg. It was in no small part my fault, so I spent the summer going over to his house every few days and playing some side adventures with his hero, blasting away at anything that moved, as was his modus operandi.

During this time, the two of us devised a plan. In order for it to all be on the up-and-up, he took over and GMed for me. Our two characters were hanging out at the Coruscanti bar referenced earlier, when Gemini Syndicate thugs busted in and started shooting up the place, looking for us. Kibur ended up diving at one of the thugs, smashing through a glass window to a vertical drop. Before Nate’s character could get to the window, Kibur was gone. It looked like he had fallen to his death.

When we told the rest of the group, they were visibly shaken. They couldn’t believe a member of their crew had died. The players couldn’t believe that a PC could die.

During a routine assault on a Gemini fortress, the heroes ended up captured, and taken before the Council of Twins, the leadership of the Gemini Syndicate. They each sat in large ornate chairs, lit only by a single light on the ceiling. One chair remained unlit. When the heroes turned to look at the chair, its light activated revealing… Kibur Blastblade, his eye lost in the scuffle at the bar.

Kibur had a serious gambling problem. So bad, in fact, that when it came time to pay his debts, he discovered the group he owed was none other than the Gemini. He was secretly offered immense wealth and power, if only he joined them. He did.

The attack in the bar was staged, sending him out the window and into a waiting speeder below. He had lost his eye when he fell through the window.

There  he began to work against his own party in the shadows, knowing when and where they might attack.

The group was offered up as rewards to the leaders of the Gemini Syndicate. Each hero would be interred in stasis and given to the most honored leaders. They would not be carbon-froze, instead placed in a glass case, frozen exactly as they had been in life. They were lead down a passageway where they would be frozen. But once in the room, Nate’s character swiped a gun from one thug, firing wildly. One shot hit the pipes of coolant, pouring stasis gas into the room. After the room filled for a moment, it escaped out a crack in the ceiling. They finished dispatching the guards before the gas cleared.

The crack in the ceiling grew larger. A farmer was digging into the roof. The heroes emerged from the hole to discover the Gemini secret base had been beneath a farming village in the Outer Rim. They quickly learned that the gas had actually placed everyone in the room into stasis, and 25 years later had been unsealed. 25 years had passed the heroes by in a heartbeat. The Empire was now in power, and the Rebellion was there to oppose them.

This is where the campaign pretty much ended. The group steadily fell apart.

Years later, in the Jedi game I ran (which I’ll discuss in a later “Don’t Split the Party”), Irulan made an appearance, as well as Bax. Following that campaign, another Star Wars campaign, consisting of a band of smugglers, ended up encountering Kibur Blastblade 20 years after he froze his friends in stasis. He had since reformed his ways, and become a prominent member in the Rebellion. The picture on the left, I made of him when the heroes in that campaign encountered him.

That’s it for the Crew of the Iron Dawn. Kate, Nate, Mike, Cliff, Ben and Andrew, if you’re reading this, I had a fantastic time being your GM. “Who do you work for?!”