Traveller salvage question

[payn]

Greetings Traveller fans,

Retreater stay out!!

I am running a Pirates of Drinax campaign currently. The Travellers have been on the trail of a long lost Sindalan Rorix command ship. After chasing many leads, they believe they know the system to find the wreck. Currently, the wreck is in a system that has a large colony of Vargr asteroid miners. The ship is currently resting on a moon and is either a prime salvage op, or could be brought back to functionality with a large credit and time investment. So, the choices seem to be either quietly and stealthily salvage the wreck, or try and restore it to functionality. However, the wreck is technically within Vargr colony territory and thus rights belong to them. So, the Travellers are going to need to find a way to do option 1 or 2.

My question for y'all is how would you run this? I happen to have a contact NPC for the Travellers that is currently working in this system. This guy is a semi-former pirate and may be able to assist in a few ways. One is he can help connect the Travellers to the colony admins and see about purchasing the rights to the wreck. This option will obviously make it much more expensive, but the Travellers have no worry about timing or interference from locals. The contact could also help in keeping the salvage op off the radar of the locals too (for a small fee). Another idea is that the Travellers find a way to get the wreck into orbit and then apply law of salvage as another way around the locals. Either way I want there to be a number of ways to salvage the ship and make an adventure out of it.

 

[darjr]

How about this?

The moon is in a weird orbit and for a few days it will be outside Vargr territory.

So it becomes a race against time.

To get there and find it in time and ti salvage/restore it in time.

Meanwhile the Vargr will know what they are up to as soon as they start, it’ll be difficult to hide from them.

They gotta find it, salvage/fix it, and get outa dodge before the moon drifts back into Vargr space.

In the meantime Vargr pirates and mercenaries are deployed to sabotage them, hopefully untraceably. Don’t want to start a sticky political issue.

Or do they?

 

[darjr]

Oh! And if they do so happen to drift into Vargr space just as they lift off it might end with a climatic space battle and chase scene.

 

[darjr]

Oh! Also a race to find it first before the alerted Vargr do.

 

[payn]

How about this?

The moon is in a weird orbit and for a few days it will be outside Vargr territory.

So it becomes a race against time.

To get there and find it in time and ti salvage/restore it in time.

Meanwhile the Vargr will know what they are up to as soon as they start, it’ll be difficult to hide from them.

They gotta find it, salvage/fix it, and get outa dodge before the moon drifts back into Vargr space.

In the meantime Vargr pirates and mercenaries are deployed to sabotage them, hopefully untraceably. Don’t want to start a sticky political issue.

Or do they?

I like it. One thing, the ship will definitely take awhile to restore. Also, more credits/resources than they have on hand, so the restore and fly option is going to be difficult. I was thinking along the lines of fixing it up on the moon unbeknownst (super difficult but maybe doable with the help of their Vargr contact) or get the wreck into space and claim it with a hauler (also something their Vargr contact could help with).

Or, they could just salvage it quickly (love the moon orbit idea) and just take the parts with them for fixing their own Sindalan Harrier ship.

 

[darjr]

Hmmmm

Maybe then they sneak in months ahead of time to prep for that window if opportunity

 

[darjr]

In any case I might have to run this. Thanks!

 

[payn]

In any case I might have to run this. Thanks!

This scenario or Pirates of Drianx? Either way, im more than happy to talk shop on this.

 

[billd91]

One would presume that restoring it to function would probably entail multiple trips in and out of the system? Seems challenging to really keep that a secret for too long as it runs the risk of detection every transit in and out of system. But that too could be part of the fun depending on how trafficked the system is by other ships passing through.

 

[payn]

One would presume that restoring it to function would probably entail multiple trips in and out of the system? Seems challenging to really keep that a secret for too long as it runs the risk of detection every transit in and out of system. But that too could be part of the fun depending on how trafficked the system is by other ships passing through.

Yeah my thoughts exactly. How do they come and go for the long time it takes to fix this up? I mean, I can see finding it, and hauling it away quickly working, but fixing it on the moon surface for months just doesn't seem reasonable. Which is why im thinking they work out a contract for the wreckage, so its fine they come and go, or they get it into space and haul it away as law of salvage (of course finding a way to fool the system dwellers is the adventure). The final option, is of course, salvage parts and get out before anyone is the wiser of them doing it.