Podrace The Ison Coathook: the galaxy's chilliest podrace (open to racers and spectators)

[Jend-Ro Quill]

High on Mount Ison, at the small Jedi hermitage he'd called home for years, Quill sipped caf and looked down on the podrace.

Spoiler

Right now, a good forty klicks east of his hermitage, the race was starting. The pods would take the following route from the Kerane Valley start/end line:

1. Wobbling west along the Lanteel Glacier, past nervous wampa villages.
2. A noisy northerly loop up the slopes of Mount Ison, coming within a klick or so of Quill and his home.
3. A treacherous route over the North Ridge, followed by a skidding straightaway along the Cirque Glacier.
4. A bumpy hairpin turn over the Nev Ice Flow.
5. A deadly close-quarters run through the ruins of Echo Base in the Clabburn Range.
6. The final high-speed skid along the south side of the Ceyan Range, leading into a straightaway north, where the winner would claim a large pot of Underworld Credits.

Quill nursed his caf mug irritably. He really, truly hated people some days.

 

[Kyra Perl]

"Is it me or does this route look ...suggestive." Kyra asked her droid as the thrusters warmed. It whirled in agreement and she grinned. "Right. No telling my dad that. You ready?" All around them engines rived as the countdown drop to ten.

Her knuckles tightened on the gas gear.

This was for the seed vault.

 

[Aeshi Tillian]

WHISTLER'S HOLE

This was more like it. Aeshi kicked back in her chair and put her boots up on the ice-table with her name carved into it. With the First Order gone and Quill back in his hermitage, Hoth was as it should be.

Cold, quiet, desolate, and ironically, making money. She never would have thought to host a podrace on Hoth, but it brought in crowds, that was for sure. The hotel she had helped put up money for was getting quite full. After all, it wasn't like there were too many other options to stay.

Kyra Perl was racing, which was good, but Aeshi wasn't crazy enough to podrace. Make instinctive jumps, sure, but not race at high speeds in very light pods using starship engines. But she'd brought up a bunch of crates of whiskey that she was selling and adding to the hotel's rations.

"A toast to the racers!" Aeshi called across the hotel lobby. She raised a glass high, filled with the rich amber of her own whiskey. "To fast times and no explosions!"

 

[Shaye Ares]

Objective: Spectate and sell

Shaye set up her booth (a crate and folding chair) and set out her goods. This was as good a place as any to try and make a sale -- the crowd would hopefully make it worth her while. And maybe she'd get to see some racers wipe out. That was the bonus. The young woman crossed her arms as she looked up at one of the holo-displays of the racers making preparations.

Kyra Perl.

Wasn't that one of her relatives somehow? Her father's brother's kid? Cousin. Right, that was the word. Though, Shaye didn't really feel like part of the whole Starchaser family, so she wasn't completely sure if it really counted. Who cares about blood, anyway?

"Hey! Anyone need some noodles? It's not a race without noodles, am I right?" She barked at the crowd.

On her little crate were several packs of Spicy Endorian Chicken Noodles, Space Bars, and Rancor Stim Drinks.

 

[Kovacs]

"That's a lotta turns, chief." he whistled to himself, "no way this can steer like a TIE, even if its 'climate control' is equally shit." there was no canopy over this cockpit. The revs went up high. Jon, or rather 'Lawton Vega', would need the best start here.

His finger itched on the clutch.

This was for the Empi--

--for smut.

He had to fit in with these bunch of rebels, right?

Kyra Perl

 

[Eleena Salwa]

Location: Starting Line, The Ison Coathook - Hoth
Racer: RMV-EV40 Skychaser Swoop Bike
Equipment: FAE/A-03 Repulsor Craft Riding Suit
Position: 7th - Qualifying Position
Tags: Kyra Perl Aeshi Tillian Shaye Ares Trinity Harris Kovacs

Eleena winced as she lowered her chest against the vanes of the bike, in anticipation of the start.

Her accident in qualifying, a vicious highsider after a snap of oversteer coming out of the hairpin at the south side of the Ceyan Range, had left her entire body battered and bruised. Fortunately, Eleena knew how to brace herself for a fall and had suffered no broken bones or major, crippling injuries, but the pain lingered even after spending hours in a bacta suit and taking a hefty dose of painkillers before the race. Unfortunately, the crash meant that her girlfriend had spent the entire night fixing her bike. Naturally, Eleena had tried to help, but she was useless as a mechanic and Trinity had made her rest in preparation for the race.

The Twi’lek could only imagine her pole position if she hadn’t crashed. The crash was only made worse when she realized that she went purple in sectors two, three, four, and five, on course for pole position or at least a front row start, if she had just finished the lap with a respectable time in the last sector.

Instead, she was caught in the heart of the mid-field.

Nevertheless, Eleena reset her focus back on the race. The numbers on the countdown indicator dropped before her eyes, starting from ten and steadily decreasing, as she revved her engine, once, twice, then thrice.

This was for Trinity.

 

[Trinity Harris]

Spoiler: Equipment and links

Riding: Phantom
Accompanied by: Plushee Companion Droid
Wearing: Guarderma Bio-suit
Ship: Luminary class light explorer exchanging crew space for biolabs

Spoiler: Outfit

Eleena Salwa

The night before the race

"Oh dear Eleena, you need to be more careful OK," Trinity grunted as she lay on her back in her overalls, covered in oil and using a wrench to straighten the Heat sink. She had rolled the bike and ripped off at least three vanes. More oil squirted on her shoulder as the metal finally gave. She whacked her arm on the exhaust manifold and swore. "Hand me that micro-welder please, tool on the right of the kit that looks a little bit like a plasma weapon." She took the tool from her girlfriend and flipped her goggles on while she welded, the bright plasma arc fusing the metal back together. As she finished she slid back out and looked up at her.

"Its not just the bike you know, you could have died out there, don't do that OK?" She had a stern but loving voice when she spoke, she was genuinely concerned, a bacta injury in qualifying was pretty serious. She leaned over without standing and stroked Eleena's calf gently while she read the sky chaser schematics again. "This is a heck of a machine, but it goes back together alright you know."

She looked up again, Eleena looked tired, the injury obviously hurt. "Go to bed beautiful and get some sleep, I will join you when I am done OK?" She blew her a kiss, not forcing her to bend down. Before sliding back under the bike. She would be there until nearly sun up, but the bike was fixed and good to go. She showered and then slid into bed next to the little white twi'lek, cuddled up next to her and went to sleep.

Not enough hours later

Trinity was tired but felt good, she had slept very well after the rough night with the machine. She pulled her headset down and looked at the readout in front of her. "OK baby, you are looking good out there, readings on the bike are great, your form looks amazing, obviously, and I hope you feel better. Remember, you, are, speed! one winner, lots of losers, you eat losers for breakfast."

She would enjoy this, her girl was an amazing racer and Trin would use her experience to be the best crew chief she could. "Good luck out there, try not to mess up that bodywork again. And look after the bike too" she laughed.

There was no significant changes to the track condition since the day before. Everything was looking green.

 

[Jend-Ro Quill]

It was a still, clear day. The noise of engines starting rolled through the mountains, up to where Quill sat. With a mumbled curse, he spilled his caf down the flank of Mount Ison. His last cup of the good stuff, too.

Stomping up to the hermitage and going downhill by speeder took a long few minutes. By now the race would be starting. In fact, as he scraped ice off his boots at the door of the Whistler's Hole, the lights (as shown in the lobby holos) were already blinking red, yellow, green...

A roar went up from the crowd in the lobby. Quill flinched.

Aeshi Tillian Shaye Ares Kyra Perl Kovacs Eleena Salwa Trinity Harris

OOC: Rules are very very simple. Roll a d20 for each of the six legs of the route. The higher you roll, the better that leg goes; write that however you like.

• Roll a 1, you crash and you're out.
• Roll a 7, you get to give one other racer a -1 to their next roll. Yes, that can make them crash if it takes them down to 1.
• Roll a 20 and you get the power to re-roll exactly one of your future rolls as soon as you make it. Yes, that can save you from a 1/crash. No, you can't just save your re-roll until the race is over and replace your lowest roll. That would be, like, time travel.
• At the end, highest score out of 120 points (your scores/rolls out of 20 for the six legs) wins the race.

Example: On their third leg/post, Lando rolls a 7 and Han rolls a 20. On their fourth leg/post, Han rolls a 3 (down to 2 from Lando's sabotage) and decides to spend his 20. Han re-rolls and gets a 10; Lando's sabotage got spent, so Han's roll stays a 10. Everything continues as normal. But wait! Han rolls a 1 on the final leg and crashes. If only he'd saved that re-roll. Lando wins.

So it's mostly chance with a very limited strategic element. Sound fair?

Any dice roller will do; the Scar Worlds Discord has a bot, for example. Honour system. Just be sure to say what you rolled in each post, and if you wanted to provide cumulative totals, I sure wouldn't hold that against you.

 

[Jend-Ro Quill]

OOC/ One additional rule worked out with Trinity Harris , who turns out to be writing a PC racer's crew chief:

A racer can have support crew (one account, different writer). The effect: one re-roll of a roll that's just happened. In other words, the crew chief gets to save the racer's bacon exactly once.

 

[Kyra Perl]

Red... Yellow... Her muscles kicked into action in sync with the green. G-force tugged at her chest as she shot forward. The wind swallowed her her wallop of exhilaration and she had to remind herself to keep her mouth closed or she'd be eating bugs.

Again.


The ground crew quickly left her peripheral, great glaciers the size of space stations looming overhead as she entered the first leg. The beauty of it all took her breath away, and the nervous ripple of whama clawed at her senses, but she made herself deaf to it all and put her focus forward. She did not want to give up her lead.

Steady now.

She eased the accelerator to full throttle.


Kovacs Trinity Harris Eleena Salwa Jend-Ro Quill

 

[Aeshi Tillian]

Jend-Ro Quill

"Jend-Ro!" Aeshi yelled above the roar of the crowd, waving a glass of whiskey as she stood perched on her table now, looking over the heads of the crowd. Did it damage the table? Probably, but she owned the fething table. And besides, it was ice, wasn't it? Not like there was anything resembling an ice shortage on Hoth.

"Come on over and let me pour you a drink!" She cupped one hand around her mouth to call out to him. "I know you don't like people, but this will be fun!" She reached over and dragged a crate serving as a chair over to the table and patted it. It clunked beneath her metal hand as she dropped down into the chair, eyes glued to the screen as the racers left the starting gate.

 

[Eleena Salwa]

Location: Leg One, The Ison Coathook - Hoth
Racer: RMV-EV40 Skychaser Swoop Bike
Equipment: FAE/A-03 Repulsor Craft Riding Suit
Tags: Kyra Perl Aeshi Tillian Shaye Ares Trinity Harris Kovacs

Three, two, one…

Go!

Eleena slammed down on the accelerator off the line, her engine giving a bestial howl as her machine screamed off the line in the wake of the much larger podracers. By virtue of her bike having a superior power-to-weight ratio than the larger podracers, she managed to jump a few of them off the start, but it didn’t take long for the podracers she had passed to catch back up and pass her in turn as they left the Kerane Valley section, especially when Eleena realized that something on her bike hadn’t quite fired right…

“The Aether boost isn’t responding! Is…there something...wrong...with the software?” The Twi’lek said as she leaned her bike into the long, sweeping left through the Nev Ice Flow, the G-forces pushing against her body as she did.

Nevertheless, Eleena continued on with the race. Considering the crash, she was lucky to have not suffered an engine failure outright, which would have ended her race entirely. Fortunately, even without the boost, she was still competitive, but winning was another question.

Departing the Ice Flow, Eleena drove her bike through the first technical section, a series of winding turns through the Lanteel Glacier valley. Unfortunately, this was where the dirty air coming off the larger podracers began to hurt, throwing her bike off line more than a few times and subsequently, ruining her exits out of the corners.

She could only hope that her fortunes would turn around in the next sector.

Spoiler: Dice Roll

Roll Executed in TSE Discord Server
Total: 8

 

[Trinity Harris]

Spoiler: Equipment and links

Riding: Phantom
Accompanied by: Plushee Companion Droid
Wearing: Guarderma Bio-suit
Ship: Luminary class light explorer exchanging crew space for biolabs

Spoiler: Outfit

Eleena Salwa

Trinity watched as all the racers roared off the line and and into the distance, her ship was hovering in low orbit directly above them giving her person visuals tracking Eleena so she didn't have to rely on the holonet feed.

The Aether boost isn’t responding! Is…there something...wrong...with the software?”

"Checking" Trinity looked at the telemetry, damn, something must have broken inside the component that she missed while repairing. The safety sensor had failed and was tripping the power limiter. "OK, software is good but you ripped out the safety diode yesterday. Attempting to bypass" She went silent for a few moments and there was cursing. "No can do, going to have to blow out the limiter by over revving, you are going to feel like you got rear ended by a freighter but the acceleration will be a heck of a ride. Give me a check when you are ready for that, you have a straight coming up in two turns. Patch is ready to go when you are."

She looked at the calculations, and was glad that Eleenas job was what it was, anyone else would struggle to keep control with what she had planned. But theoretically the extra revs would blow the limiter, so the broken safety sensor could go complain all it liked.

"Next turn, stay high, breakdown on the apex, then quickly right on exit to avoid obstacle. Then hard in the throttle for short incline."

Some idiot had pulled right into the racing apex of the corner after his pod lost power, he was still moving but barely, safety flags were out but at this speed the reactions might not be enough without advance warning.

 

[Jend-Ro Quill]

WHISTLER'S HOLE - LOBBY
SPECTATORS: Aeshi Tillian Shaye Ares
RACERS/CREW: Kyra Perl Kovacs Eleena Salwa Trinity Harris

At Aeshi's invitation, Quill pulled up an ice chair. The chill didn't bother him, but the noise sure did. He surreptitiously swallowed a couple of pills that helped him in situations like this.

"Captain Tillian," he said. "Good to see you. Ah..."

His attention wavered. On the holoscreens, the racers were taking off. The sound of their engines reverberated through the ground, through the floor, even from this far away.

"That one," he said, looking at the podracer belonging to Kovacs /'Lawton Vega'. Quill squinted as the Force whispered a little intuition. "That one's about to—"

 

[Kovacs]

"That one's about to—"

"—burst a blood vessel—*************!—the PU just went—******************! Even a ******** TIE's not—" whoops.

smile.

You're Lawton Vega, smile.

Smile and wave. You're a rebel. You've never been on a TIE. Smile.

Leaving the somehow sentient wampas to drag away the speeder from the race track, Jon skittered away towards the vendors looking for a way to back up his disguise. Who would've taught the damn cold would tamper with his undercover skills so bad. A thousand COMPNOR screens flashed through his mind. How to be a Rebel 101. Walk like a Rebel, talk like a Rebel.

He stopped at a noodle selling booth ( Shaye Ares ) and a shit-eating grin glowered on his face.

"Whatever you're selling - I'm buyin', toots." he winked.

Talk like a rebel.

Kyra Perl Eleena Salwa Aeshi Tillian Trinity Harris Jend-Ro Quill

 

[Kellum Velos###]

Podrace: [1d20]=9

Kellum Velos was normally more for swoop bikes than pod racers, but one of the Bloodwolves had suggested he scout out new opportunities for the gang. If he had known just how cold Hoth was he might have declined, but Kellum was a prideful man. He sat in his pod, trying to use the Force to keep him warm as he waited. After what seemed an eternity, the lights began to flash.

red, yellow, green...

A snarl like grin crept onto Kell's face and he clenched his handle. The pods growled to life, and Kellum was off. He attempted to get up to speed, but had to weave and trust his breaks as he went through a village of Wampas. Snowballs, boulders, and gnawed bone were thrown at the at the racers, but Kellum held on. This race would be his.

Jend-Ro Quill Aeshi Tillian Kyra Perl Eleena Salwa Trinity Harris Kovacs Shaye Ares

 

[Eleena Salwa]

Location: Leg 2, The Ison Coathook - Hoth
Racer: RMV-EV40 Skychaser Swoop Bike
Equipment: FAE/A-03 Repulsor Craft Riding Suit
Racers and Crew: Kyra Perl Trinity Harris Kellum Velos###
Spectators: Aeshi Tillian Shaye Ares Kovacs (RIP) Jend-Ro Quill

"Next turn, stay high, breakdown on the apex, then quickly right on exit to avoid obstacle. Then hard in the throttle for short incline."

“Copy that! Adjusting!” Quickly shifting her position on the pillion, Eleena set her bike on a course to avoid the apex of the next corner, giving a sigh of relief as she passed the broken-down pod. From there, she had the climb up Mount Ison, which had a small straight leading up to the loop along the slope, which might allow her to use her bike’s speed to make up time.

"No can do, going to have to blow out the limiter by over revving, you are going to feel like you got rear ended by a freighter but the acceleration will be a heck of a ride. Give me a check when you are ready for that, you have a straight coming up in two turns. Patch is ready to go when you are."

“Give it to me now!” The Twi’lek cried out as she approached the small straight. Not a moment later, a light on her dashboard gave her the signal and Eleena braced herself for the G-forces that would hopefully come. All the while, another podracer soared past, eliciting a growl of frustration from the Twi’lek as she waited.

“Trin, where’s the-”

Then, it hit.

The engine gave a primal, deafening howl as it propelled her bike up the incline with violent, sudden acceleration, before the rider shifted her body across the vanes to lean her bike into the loop, only barely letting off the throttle in the process. The podracer that flew past her a moment earlier was left in her dust as she passed it overhead, thereby avoiding the turbulent air disturbed in its wake. Fortunately, the first part of the loop up the slope could be taken at near-full throttle, meaning that her bike’s speed was leveraged to full effect, especially since Trinity had tuned it specifically for high-speed sections such as this.

Before long, Eleena came up to the sharp left towards the end of the loop. She deployed the air brakes right on her marks, before lining the bike’s nose up with the apex and leaning her body deeper into the turn. Feeling the bike hook up with the apex, Eleena sensed that her pace was nearly on par with what she had done during her qualifying lap, where she had set multiple purple sectors before crashing out in sector five.

Hopefully, she wouldn’t repeat that mistake or one like it in the next four legs.

Spoiler: Dice Roll

Roll Executed in TSE Discord Server

Total: 26
Leg 1: 8
Leg 2: 18

 

[Kyra Perl]

Leg 2
The wind rattled her senses, the seal of her ear pads pulling up and ripping the whole head gear off. She turned her head back in time to see it smack into her droid's sensors and get stuck on its arm.

Chit.

Her eyes watered as they accelerated up the slopes, the noise and the biting wind creating a distraction that not even she could shake. Her droid whirled in indignation. "Well stop playing around and give it back," she countered, one hand spared from the well to reach back. She leaned into the force and listened... 1, 2.. 3-- a tug ripped the headset forward, back into her hands.

It all slowed her down, but within moments she had the damn thing back on. The wind left her eyes and the world grew quiet.

She breathed a sigh of relief and reeved up the throttle.

That had eaten up too much of her lead, she could see speak of movement edging in behind her.

Eleena Salwa Kellum Velos###

 

[Hera Padrusco]

Hoth had never been on Hera's list of planets to visit. But when someone calls for a job to be done, or rather make sure it is done, she didn't say no.

A gust of wind blew snow into her vision, blurring the race track for a moment before her helmet slid shut. Darkness surrounded her for a moment until her HUD activated and she could see the track again. Beside her one of her grunts shivered and blew warm breath into his gloves.

"You really think this'll work out?" Hera shrugged massive shoulders.

"That's why we're here. To make sure it does." They were already on the second leg. It wouldn't be long now.

 

[Trinity Harris]

Spoiler: Equipment and links

Riding: Phantom
Accompanied by: Plushee Companion Droid
Wearing: Guarderma Bio-suit
Ship: Luminary class light explorer exchanging crew space for biolabs

Spoiler: Outfit

Eleena Salwa

The scientist held her breath as her code did its job and she saw the burst of smoke out of the back of Eleena's bike from the limiter blowing out, the acceleration was as expected and the yaw forces on the bike spiked, but Eleena held on with her core strength.

"Good work queen, now enjoy that boost, I can't promise how long it will be before the whole Aether system burns out. Time for that section was great." She had a look at the video telemetry, the leaders were approaching the glacier, usually you would think repulsors wouldn't be bothered by the surface, but corber too hard and the sensors might read the white sky and ground as the same and send you sideways. "Track same as practice. Watch your hard turns, powder in the glacier may reduce visibility so try and stay out of the wake of those bigger pods."

"You have a bogey on your 5 o'clock, half a lane right and close the door."