Category Archives: Transmissions

The characters, may be new or experienced. If they are new, the GM may want to introduce them through Gadios or they could be teleported out immediately although this is not necessary for this game and urgency may actually hinder the story.

The characters are sent out to aid a Scimrahn industry tribe called the Foetsh. Their commanding officer is given a strange bit of information before leaving. The Foetsh very reluctantly agreed to be helped. Usually Scimrahn quickly accept any help offered. The Commanding Officer has orders to stay with the tribe for two weeks to take care of any medical or defense issues they may need. A Platoon of footsoldiers, a TF-2394 and a tank is sent with the group. If any of the player characters are Footsoldiers, E-Suit pilots or Tank Pilots, then they are part of the platoon sent.

Scene One – Needs Of The People

The characters are teleported in to a small outpost and then loaded onto transports (or trucks if I-CA) and then drive for seven hours to the Foetsh tribe’s location. There are no encounters during the trip.

The Foetsh tribe manufactures Sensor Spikes. The tribe is located on the top of thirty Hosent in an industry hex on the fifth floor of the hex. This is a poor tactical site since it is very difficult to escape from but they players may not notice this unless they make a successful military intelligence roll. There are two hundred men and three hundred women and about six hundred young children.

When the players arrive they are greeted by the children of the tribe who look healthy but their clothing is very worn. Beginning characters may not recognize anything odd but these children are unusually noisy and rambunctious for Scimrahn children who are usually taught to be silent at all times. Any Scimrahn characters will immediately recognize this and are likely to be appalled by the noise. A character with Scimrahn Culture and makes a successful roll against it will also recognize this.

The children mob the player characters and those with them. Unless they make an Int roll some small item will be pick pocketed from them.

The Matriarch and Enforcer are very young and come out to meet the PCs next. They are pleasant but will occasionally ask why the players have come. If the PCs say to help them they will reply “But we’re doing fine.”

If there are Engineers in the PC group they will notice that the poor defensive location the tribe is in but that they are in a good position to maintain the Hosent on top.

The first job that the Earth forces are to carry out is to give the Fotesh medical attention. The players may be called on in getting people to come to the clinic set up by medics. If there is a medic character, the PCs are tasked with going to the Scimrahn that will not go to the clinic. Otherwise the players will need to deal with trying to persuade the Scimrahn to come. This could be used by the GM to explain Scimrahn culture to new players or if the players are experienced and already know the basics of Scimrahn culture, then this could be a time to have some lighthearted fun with odd situations.

Once the primary job of taking care of immunizations and medical treatment is over with, the task of the commanding officer is to assess the needs of the tribe when it comes to protection.

Scene 2 – Protection

The players may ask at some point why the Fotesh are unconcerned with protection. The question is likely to be avoided if they can avoid it. If the players are too forceful the Fotesh will act offended and remind the PCs that they are only there as guests and that the tribe did not ask for them to come.

After several days of rounding up tribe members for medical attention an alarm is sounded by an ASO E-Suit Pilot. There are sonar contacts approaching. Further investigating will reveal the sonar contacts are Kelrath and are headed directly for the tribe. There are eight Rall 4s and a cargo Zemot. The commander will scramble combat personnel to set up defensive positions. The players should be brought up to the point where they think they will be engaging the Kelrath in combat but at the last moment are told to stand down. The Kelrath will arrive soon after and the PCs will not have time to flee. Any fleeing characters will be fired on. The Rall 4 loudspeakers will boom out orders in the Kelrath language. Without a successful Speak Kelrath roll the players will not know what the orders are. The order is of course to put down their weapons and surrender. The Players have been told to stand down, so they should surrender. In addition, it should be stressed to them that they cannot do much damage to a Rall 4 on their own, unless they happen to be a tank pilot in which case, tell them that there are friendly forces too close to the Kelrath to safely engage them with their cannon or missiles.

The Commanding Officer (CO) gave the order to stand down because the Enforcer and the Matriarch insisted that they could talk the Kelrath into letting the Earthers go. In reality, they were only hoping that they could. This may factor into the discussion on the Scimrahn helping as things progress.

In a short amount of time the Enforcer will come out and meet the Kelrath. He will speak in the Kelrath language. PCs will have to make a successful Speak Kelrath roll to understand him. He will say “They are passing through and will leave soon! You do not have to concern yourselves with them!” A Rall 4 will respond over the loudspeaker “They are not allowed here! You have violated our boundaries!” Again a Speak Kelrath roll is required to understand him. Each time someone speaks in Kelrath a roll must be made to understand them. The Enforcer will then say “We had to allow them here for a short time, they have medical supplies that you can take with you!”

The Kelrath will pause for a few moments at this. If there is a Comm officer PC they will intercept a communication that has a low grade encryption (5 BP). It is unlikely that a single Comm Officer will be able to crack the encryption in the given time but there should be three of them in the platoon. For the GM however, the Kelrath are discussing what to do about the medicine and how to take any medical personnel with them. They will also decide that the rest of the Earthers should be sent to a CCC quarry for slave labor.

The Scimrahn will be told to separate any medicine and medical personnel from the group. The GM may have the players be identified as medical personnel since they were rounding up Scimrahn for treatment. Further they are told to strip the Earthers of any weapons and keep them from escaping. The Scimrahn will reluctantly follow these directions.

Scene 3 – Escape

The Kelrath do not have the ability to move the whole platoon. Two of the Rall4s will leave to get more vehicles to bring the Earthers back to the Quarry. At this point the PCs will have the opportunity to try and win the Scimrahn over to their side. The primary concern is that the Kelrath have been protecting this tribe and the tribe sells to them. They will be afraid of loosing the Kelrath protection and their food that they bring to trade.

This is a prison break/hostage escape situation. The primary danger is the six Rall 4’s that are left. The players have 14 hours before the Rall 4s that left return with cargo vehicles.

The Rall 4 pilots are all Gjorn. The Driver of the Zemot is a Kaloord. The Kaloord will drive away as soon as the the stand off starts and will remain outside the camp until he is given the all clear. The Rall 4s will alternate duties every two hours. Two will circle the area in opposite directions. It takes fifteen minutes for them to make one circle around the camp. Two will stand guard over the Earthers and the other two will leave to where the Kaloord is and get out of the E-Suit and rest. Scimrahn will also stand guard over the Earthers but they are reluctant guards and will be sympathetic.

The Rall 4 Pilots will not get out of the E-Suits while in proximity to the Earthers. They view the risk of infection as too great.

The PCs would be held in a open space between the Hosent. Since the Gjorn won’t get out of their Rall 4s they will rely on the Scimrahn to guard the Earthers and so they can talk. The PCs will have to be cautious about talking so that the Gjorn do not notice. It’s unlikely that the Gjorn can speak Scimrahn.

There are likely to be many ways to get out of the situation, the players should be left to explore any ideas of escape they may come up with however if there is an obvious revolt or attempt to run the Gjorn will not hesitate to fire.

The main point now is to convince the Scimrahn that the ASO or I-CA (dependent on who the players are) are able to protect them. Even at that, the Scimrahn’s way of life will drastically change. This is mostly a battle of the mind so Charisma and Psy will play a large part. The Scimrahn will at this point feel that they want to help but can’t anger the Kelrath

The PCs will have to convince the Scimrahn that they can give protection from the Chezbah and the now angered Kelrath. This will likely involve the idea of moving the entire tribe to a distant location.

This will require all new contacts and customers for their goods. This will have to be negotiated with the Matriarch. There would have to be assurances that a certain percentage of their goods (sensor spikes) would be purchased regularly. A successful bartering roll may be made to make this happen.

There should be one tank and one E-suit for the platoon. If the Scimrahn help, the player’s or NPCs can get back into the tank and E-Suit. However they would be hopelessly outmatched by six Rall 4s but could make a stand against two at a time if they time things right. In addition the Kelrath may surrender if they are isolated in twos (Psy roll). If they can group up in four or six they will fight.

This setting is for ASO or I-CA characters with some Scimrahn and Corporate characters if desired but could be modified to be played with an all Corporate group.

The characters can be new to The Artifact for this setting. It’s up to the GM if they want to go into detail on the character’s arrival. Starting characters would have arrived by teleporter some time before this mission and gone through several days of medical checks and waiting for an assignment but may not have been allowed to leave base due to medical orders. Possibly one character in the group or even an NPC tested positive for some common disease, was given a heavy round of antibiotics and now is clear. The other characters were in the same teleport batch and the group was locked down.

Introduction

The characters are brought in for a mission briefing. They are being attached to a platoon that is present at the briefing. A Captain is giving the briefing.

Three days ago we received this transmission from the 139th platoon’s Commander Lieutenant Gary MacDonald. He plays an audio recording “Status report on the titan. It is still moving in a random pattern and stopping periodically. It’s course may bring it in contact with the Chezbah town of Hef-elek-meser. There have been two brief encounters with Hunter E-Suits that attacked the titan but we were not able to do any damage from what we can tell. The titan destroyed the E-Suits once with an energy blast and crushed another. We’ve kept our distance as it seems hostile to anything it encounters. Our engineers estimate that it’s mass is in the area of half of a million Kilograms from the ground impressions it has made and their displacement.We will continue to observe the titan and keep you informed.”

The Captain continues by explaining that the Chezbah town of Hef-elek-meser was destroyed by this “titan” an unknown class of vehicle. Lieutenant MacDonald’s platoon is still observing the vehicle and it continues to move away from the town. Command wants to investigate the ruins. Two platoons are being sent in. Your objectives are to rescue any survivors and to recover any intel on the Chezbah or their technology you can in the process. So far the Chezbah have not responded to the disaster but it is expected that they eventually will. If any substantial force arrives the platoons are instructed to retreat.

The two platoons being sent consist of 2 lieutenants 48 Footsoldiers 6 Medics 6 Comm Officers 6 Scouts (and motorcycles for ASO scouts) 2 E-suits and 2 Tanks and various transport vehicles. If the players made characters that are in this list, they make up one of the numbers here. If they made characters that are not on the list like Engineers or Scientists they are added to the list.

The characters are teleported out to a remote operations station that has been set up just for this mission. If there are any Comm Officers in the group it will be their responsibility to report in every two hours with the remote station. If they miss two reports in a row the remote ops crew will pack up and leave the area. The rest of the way they will drive in on Transports or trucks dependent on if they’re ASO or I-CA for another 300 km.

Scene No. 1 – The Rescue

The Town was comprised of two city blocks (See page 87 of The Artifact RPG for maps or Scout Maps for larger city block maps) next to each other. One was leveled, the other suffered heavy damage. The city block that suffered the most damage is mostly impassable. If there is a PC with the tracking skill (Scouts) they can figure that the leveled part of the town was used less. On a 1/4 or 1/8th roll the tracker will be able to guess that it seems like the garrison that was in the town, lead the titan vehicle away from the main habitation. The lesser used block is impassable. Every building is crushed, even the huge walls of the block have been cracked and portions of them melted. Any attempt to investigate it are futile.

The main habitation is also heavily damaged but not leveled. There is rubble everywhere and many buildings are cracked or melted but it is passable.

Every two hours of searching each character gets to roll a Intuition roll. Each character that passes can roll once on the three tables below. Each time the Comm Officer must report back to base and any rescued Chezbah must be prepared for transport. Medics can give first aid to Chezbah in shock or with minor wounds. Survivors with mortal wounds need surgery.

Survivors roll 1d100

Minor Loot roll 1d100

Major Loot roll 1d100

The GM should role play the rescues. Many of the injuries will be from survivors being pinned or buried in rubble. The Chezbah are likely to be frightened if they are conscious and will have to be coaxed to come with the characters (Charisma rolls). If there are characters with E-Suits or Tanks involve them in the rescues by using the vehicles to move large pieces of rubble out of the way. Engineers can be used to great effect here also, making sure that there aren’t cave ins.

The characters will search for ten hours before moving to scene 2.

Scene No. 2 – The Sniper

After long hours of searching the PCs will be tired and dusty. All should take INT rolls to start to notice that there are things moving around in the shadows. There are a group of Chezbah Hounds moving to encircle the characters. There are two for every character on foot and five for each in a vehicle. They will not attack right away but will draw the character’s attention. There is a Chezbah Warrior up in one of the buildings 400 meters away (long range 40% Impairment to hit and 20 points of damage with a Chezbah Warrior’s plasma gun) that will fire down at the characters. Since plasma fire is visible once he fires his position is given away.  Once he fires he will retreat and attempt to take up position in another building. The Hounds will attempt to distract the characters from pursuing him but will only attack if given an open opportunity.

This scene ends when the Sniper is dead or captured.

Scene No. 3 – The Kelrath Warband

A group of Kelrath have followed after the titan looking for spoil in its wake. The band consists of two Rall 4s four Kerdi and thirty Geetin in a skiff. If the war band is too much for the two platoons, then have small groups of Chezbah Hounds attack. The Kerdi and Ralls are not threatened by them but they will turn their attention to the hounds to protect the Geetin.

Once the players are winning against the Kelrath, they will receive a transmission from the remote ops station. A group of five Chezbah Demolishers are on their way to the ruins and will arrive in fifteen minutes. They are advised to evacuate back to the remote ops station with any survivors.

The Wrap Up

On returning, the characters will not be allowed to keep the items they have found (unless the characters can hide items with the Conceal Object Skill). They are to be turned over for study, as a reward for turning Major Loot items over, they receive an extra XP up to three for the session representing honor medals and rank increases.

From the Admin: Just a note, the redacted segments of this transmission were that way when it was sent from The Artifact to Earth. Apparently not even ASO Command is allowed to know the information? Perhaps the eyes that this was meant for know enough to fill in the blanks? I don’t know, this is an odd one.

Report by: Redacted – Top Secret

Position: Redacted – Top Secret

Assigned Objective: Redacted – Top Secret

Purpose of Mission: Win the trust of Kelrath in the city of City Redacted

Progress Report: This is an ancillary cultural report for other Position Redacted in the field. My contact had me witness an interesting ritual today. The Gijorn seem to have a very different culture from the rest of Kelrath society. There was an incident where a low ranking Gijorn was caught stealing from a superior. I was told that there would be a judicial meeting to determine his fate and I was invited to attend.

I was taken down into the tunnels below the city where we were greeted by several Geetin of Battle who were guarding a pit that housed a single Chezbah Warrior who was stripped of everything. When I asked why he was kept alive I was assured I would find out soon enough.

After several minutes four very wide Gijorn came down carrying a tied and stripped Kelrath. Apparently the Gijorn thief. They cut his ropes and waited until a Gijorn commander came down and pushed the thief into the pit.

What came next was a brawl between the Chezbah and the thief. The thief lost, badly. The Chezbah Warrior didn’t stop until the thief was dead.

When I was asked why the thief was executed this way I was told that he chose this because if he won he would be set free. I imagined this was some kind of a contest in the form of a ancient judicial championship fight but it appears it was simpler than that. If he was able to beat the Chezbah he was too valuable in combat to execute. He would have been flogged and set free.

Voice recognition – Starting

Sound Database – Starting

Martin Thomas 94% – Mission report. We’ve crossed the region known as the graveyard. While in the graveyard I couldn’t report on our progress because of the periodic EMP bursts so I had to write my reports on paper. As soon as I can scan them I’ll send them in. In the mean time we found the source of the electromagnetic activity. Equipment that was built onto the plasma conduits act as a coil and an antenna. When a charge built up in the coil the system tripped and emitted the pulses. Our mission objectives did not include interfering with the emitters so we have left them undisturbed.

There is a section in the middle of the graveyard that the EMP does not reach. We are currently investigating this area with the idea that whoever built the emitters may be using them for protection.

We found a Hosent robot when we entered an agricultural hex. It’s just out here laying on the ground. The engineer says it’s circuitry seems to have been damaged by a pulse. He says he can bypass the damaged circuits and then I can try and communicate with it and find out why it’s laying out here. I’m

Sound – mechanical grinding – unknown sound

Jacob Davison 62% – Get back. It’s moving.

Sound – Hosent ultrasonic sonar 81%

Martin Thomas 74% – What’s going on?

Jacob Davison 72% – I don’t know. It just started moving after I bypassed a damaged circuit. My god. It’s standing up. Get the men back.

Martin Thomas 88% – Stand back idiots. You want to get crushed by that thing?

Sound – Hosent ultrasonic sonar 93%

Jacob Davison 45% – It’s not built like a walking robot, It shouldn’t know how to walk on it’s arms like that.

Sound – Parts Rubbing 82 db 60%

Jacob Davison 41% – It’s arm is failing, get away.

Sound – Impact thud 6 sources 40 db 30%

Unknown Speaker 3 sources – (shouting)

Unknown Speaker – It’s attacking. Fire. Fire. Fire.

Sound – G-82 Fire 14 sources 156 db 98%

Sound – AVW Launch 98%

Sound – AVW Detonation 172 db 98%

Unknown Speaker – It’s going down. Move.

Sound – Impact thud 78 db 40%

Martin Thomas 84% – Is it safe?

Unknown Speaker – I don’t know, wait.

Jacob Davison 15% – It’s moving.

Unknown Speaker – Fire.

Sound – G-82 Fire 12 sources 153 db 98%

Sound – ASO Transport Engine Start 50 db 30%

Sound – Impact thud 2 sources 45 db 25%

Unknown Speaker – (shouting)

Martin Thomas 21% – No. No.

Sound – Wind 63 Km/h

Sound – Impact thud 79 db 86%

Sound – AVW Launch 20%

Sound – AVW Detonation 30 db 20%

Possible microphone malfunction please check orientation and make sure the microphone is unobstructed.

Jacob Davison 11% – Thomas. Thomas. No. He’s gone.

Sound – AVW Launch 25%

Sound – AVW Detonation 45 db 25%

Sound – AVW Launch 41%

Sound – AVW Detonation 180 db 98%

No input 5 minutes – sleeping

No input 15 minutes – shutting down

Report by: –

Position: –

Assigned Objective: –

Hounds everywhere I dont know where thyer comiong from. My PET malfunctioned or maybe i din’t do it right. Making me skic. Rescue me! The hounds just started showing up all around us and the rest of the platoon teleported out. I’m left here on my own. Hounds must have been dormant. They don’t give off heet usntil they start moving. I’m out of ammo. If no one comes soon I have only one grenade left. If any come I’ll take them with me. Please

Report by: Warrant Officer Victor Markov

Position: Field Scientist

Assigned Objective: Investigate the ruins of the Kelrath city of Gethamol

Purpose of Mission: Examine the ruins of a city destroyed by a Chezbah attack.

Progress Report: Of the few buildings that withstood the destruction are two temples. One of the Oracle Dari and one of the Oracle Sha’duk. It is simply luck that both these temples survived. Without both of them we would not have been able to determine how they are connected. For some time it was thought that Sha’duk was some kind of a death cult. On first look it appears that way but our findings significantly change that understanding.

The Oracles are less of a religion than a philosophy and as such, most Kelrath follow the philosophy of Dari for their every day life. Dari espouses a lifestyle of peace, staying calm and dispassionate. However the literature we have examined shows that when a person becomes agitated, angry or distressed and Dari’s tenants cannot help them, the monks of the temple send the student to Sha’duk. It is here that they learn how to use their negative feelings to try and resolve problems. It is apparent that from the writings we deciphered that the Kelrath believe that every agitation must be forced out of their lives. If a person stays in an agitated state for one thing for too long they will die from it. In fact the Kelrath word for death is very similar to complain or protest. It is said that what kills a person is an agitation that they secretly held onto for many years. It is the custom for a Kelrath to name that agitation on their deathbed and the family is obligated to try and remove it to prevent the family member’s death. If the family member dies anyway it is assumed that they did not do enough soul searching and did not find the right agitation that was killing them.

Report by: Major Jacob Kibler

Position: 4th Special Sciences Division Commander

Assigned Objective: Investigate Space Time Warp

Purpose of Mission: Evaluate the connection between Array structures and space time distortions

Progress Report: Our second expeditionary team has gone missing. So far all attempts to contact them has failed. I am putting a stop to manned missions because one of our engineers has been able to put together several autonomous probes. Dr. Largo has devised a device he is calling a warp gauge that we will be installing on some of the probes. With this device Dr. Largo hopes the probes will be able to navigate into the hole and back out again. Radio telemetry is unreliable in the warp hole so the probes will record their sensor data to be reviewed by the scientists when they return.

The first team brought back evidence that the Kelrath have been in the hole at one time in the distant past. Before disappearing the second expeditionary team reported finding evidence that the warp hole is inhabited by someone but were unable to report who they had encountered.