You have 100 million credits...

[Kayle Skolaris]

You have been contacted by a Nobleman of the Tion Hegemony and offered a letter of marque and reprisal against the worlds of the Hutt Syndicracy. The Nobleman has a millennia-old debt of honor to settle with a Hutt Clan but wishes to keep his involvement a secret to avoid causing problems for the Hegemony.

You are set up with an account containing 100 million credits and instructions to use those credits to build a pirate fleet, construct a base of operations, and hire crews for both. You personally will be paid 10,000 credits per month of active service with bonuses due based upon performance. What you pay your crew is your own concern. How you divvy up the spoils of taken prizes is your own concern. Your only directive is to make the Hutts hurt and to forget where you came by the resources to assemble your armada.

Oh yes, you are also informed that if you attempt to take the money and run, a similar amount of money will be spent tracking you down and exacting retribution.

What sort of fleet, base, and crew do you assemble?

[Ray]

First off, you need to know what ships are available. The ability to actually wage your Privateering is most important.

10,000,000 sounds like a lot, until you start thinking of modifications and maintence.

So, something smallish, crew unintensive. Some kind of Customs Ship with a Hyperdrive added, or a small Capital Ship (Corellian Corvettes are excellent for this, but will take a *MAJOR* chunk of your money!). Now, modify the ship with some Ion Cannons (Heavy ones are best), and maybe a Tractor Beam. Also make sure that you have some Cargo Space left. If you don't, get a cheap medium freighter. You don't *ALWAYS* want to be taking prizes. (In this case, only take ships that DIRECTLY belong to the Hutts. Otherwise, you're doing Piracy!).

Next, crew. Now, you're a Privateer which will make things a bit easier and harder than if you were a Pirate. Privateers *CAN* dock at a port (Or the port where you're getting your ship), and advertise. They're an "Auxillary Naval Unit", not a Priate-type. So that handles crew. Just do a decent background check, but, at the begining, you unforetunetly can't pick and choose people.

Now, as for Base... An old Asteroid Mining Facility is perfect. Close to major hyperlanes, but not seeing much, if any, traffic. Quiet. Set up with some Pre-Fab living components. Then, you can set up some Automated Defence Turrets floating on the asteroids (Ala X-Wing/Tie Fighter games).

Here's the really difficult part: Paying for everything.

Keep a reserve. You're probably going to have some lean months. Particualrily if they change hyperlanes on you without warning.

Second: Target ships *ONLY* dealing with the Hutts. That is what your Letter covers you for. If they are a Shipping Company that hired out to the Hutts, take only the cargo. Leave the ship intact. Make sure they *KNOW* you're only after the cargo. If it's a ship owned by the Hutts, take it all, leave the crew in an escape capsule on a shipping lane. Take anything else, and, guess what, you're a Pirate.

No killing. Not unless they fire first in a leathal manner, and put it down, hard and fast, and only those that do. Keep a tight hand on the Boarders you got because of that.

Finally, keep the crew happy. You're not on a military ship, so you need to keep morale up higher than usual in order to prevent problems. Fresh food, lots of R&R, ability to spend their ill-gotten gain, and, finally, copious amounts of rum! (While off duty, that is.).

[Kayle Skolaris]

It's one hundred million, not ten million.

[PC-032]

100 mill, a pait of Corllens and a Bulk Freighter minimum, also check the Bounty Bords for extra Cash Flow.

Fighter Support will also be very important, it will stretch your Privitaring capibilitys futher alowing you to spreed out and hit mutiple "Small Packet" cargo carriers (Tramp Freighters and Couriers) at the same time insted of having to Stalk the Big Hulls.
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"Remember There Are No Stupid Questions-Just Stupid People." Mr. Morgan Blackhand.

[Hellcat]

The first thing I'd let the noble know is to not expect me to produce any results for several months to a year as I would be attacking the Hutt Clan and/or it's intrests right off. The reason being here is because I'd want to first beginning getting an idea as to what the clan's intrests are, who they hire, if they have any legitimate buisnesses to serve as a cover for their other activities, and begin looking for a base of operations.

Before I even begin purchasing ships and equipment, I'd want to start by selecting where I'd set up a base. Asteroids and airless moons or planets would be off my list for the first base as the living space and survival equipment alone would be rather costly. Yes, at a hundred million credits I can afford things to be costly. But keep in mind I have to think about modding my ships, paying my crew, purchasing supplies, and maintaining the base, ships, and equipment. Which if I can't get any signifigant prizes for a while I'm going to have to keep turning to what's left of the hundred million. So a moon or planet with Type I atmosphere, and preferably standard gravity, would be my prefered choices for an initial base. Next in consideration is the population of the planet, I'd want fewer people living on the planet than could be expected of most "civilized" planets. This way there are fewer people as likely to give away my location to the Hutts.

If I could find a planet with a large cavern enterable only from underwater, with a large enough entrance to allow a large underwater craft to enter the cavern and does not fill more than a quarter full of water at high tide, then I'll go with that planet. Wanting the entrance to be through a tunnel that is maybe at least a quarter of a kilometer under the surface of the water. And then I'd begin with a DeepWater-class or two or three as my initial pirating vessel. The reason for this is that water is already an initial defense and would mean I'd need to look more at setting up a defense in the cavern to cover just the entranceway.

If I could not find such a planet, I'd then look for a planet or moon with canyons and caves, settling for defense forests as a last resort. The reason reason I want to be looking for canyons and caves over forested areas is because I then have a pretty much natural base just waiting for me to mod it a little where as wit a forest I'm going to have to either hope to find a clearing or make one. Plus the right kind of a canyon, or large caves, will provide better protection for my ships than a forest. However, falling rocks can do a lot of damage, making canyons and caves a bit dangerous. But I am willing to take the risk when the trade off is, as I have already stated, caves and canyons will make a good foundation for a base. Especially caves as they will give me a good start on living/work space.

Since I'm not looking at a cavern to be entered from underwater, then I'd be looking at just about any light, medium, or heavy freighters, though keep them starfighter scale and preferably under a hundred meters. With my prefernce towards modding the HT-2200, then I'd want to get my hands on a couple of those, bringing the speed up to six, manuverability up to at least 1D and preferably 2-3D, adding a forward firing double ion cannon, and increasing the shields by 1D. I'd also add boarding equipment and use these as my primary boarding and transport craft. I'd also purchase a pair of TL-1800's, modding them to a space rating of 7, manuverability of 3D, replace the nav computer with something reliable, and add two retractable turreted lasers, a pair of retractable turreted ion cannons, and a concussion missile launcher each. Plus I'd mod them so that they could dock with a pair of CloakShape fighters kinda partially externally and partially internally. These would be my primary defense/attack/escort ships.

Of course I know folks are saying "You've got a hundred million to play with, idiot, so get yourself a cap ship and a be real pirate." Well, I do eventually plan to get a Corellian Corevette, maybe two or a Muarder if I could find one on the black market and afford it. But I'm right now looking at starting out, at making a name for myself and being more of a nuisseance that would be a little harder to to trace back. Cap ships tend to be a little more likely to stand out, and while the TL-1800s would be a little more unique after their modding, hopefully they could be modded so as to better hide the CloakShapes, light freighters would be a little more common.

So looking at what I've got for ships, I'd be looking at my initial pirate crew would be thirty-eight. I figure ten for each of the HT-2200s (with two of those members being purely for crew and the other eight being for boarding operations), five fore each of the TL-1800s (1 pilot and four to operate the guns), and four fighter pilots. Boarders on the HT-2200s could serve as gunners when not boarding, and on both the HT-2200s and TL-1800s at least one member also doubles as a mechanic for the ship on a mission. The other four would remain full time at the base and serve as a doctor, a quartermaster, and a pair of dedicated mechanics

As for what I'd be looking for in a pirate crew, my initial crew I wouldn't want folks who had been pirates for a while because I feel I'd need to pay them a bit more. What I'd be looking for is folks who have some skill in maintaining ships, flying ships, who know how to handle a blaster even if their not highly skilled in doing so, decent slicers, and folks who have some skill dealing with bypassing security systems. They'd also have be be able to handle light artillery and ship board weapons. For the four I'm leaving full time on base, I'd want the doctor/medic to not only have intensive first aid training but also some training in medicine and basic surgery, the quartermaster to really be skilled in procuring supplies and identifying value, and the mechanics to be highly trained in ship, vehicle, and weapons repair. I'd want only about three to six to really be highly skilled, making these folks my officers, and hopefully they would be the most loyal to me.

For operations I'd work this way. Half the ships and fighters would be sent out up to six jumps away from my base so as to make it a little harder to track back to the base. Because of the number of boarders, they would have to hit small targets, targets where the target is not going have have a great numerical superiority. The rest remain at the base as the base staff. The order of active blunderers and base staff would rotate on a four mission basis, a single mission lasting a set number of hours. Gunners and boarding troops would be rotated between the HT-2200s and the TL-1800, giving everyone a chance to serve as boarders and gunners. If enough folks have piloting skills, I'll do the same with the regular crewers and fighter pilots.

Standing orders would be not to kill unless absolutely no remaining choice. Depending on the ship, capture it and it's crew, we might be able to sell the ship for big credits or keep it and add it to our fleet. We also offer the ship's crew the chance to join us. If they don't, then we send them back to the Hutts without their ship or cargo.

Booty will be divided as follows. Mission crews get rewarded one share of the profit from a capture while those remaining at the base gets half a share. A share being two percent of the total profit. Boarders get a share and a half of the profit, officers get two share, boarding officers three share. Though they don't go on the missions, the doctor and quarter master would recieve 2 shares and the mechanics 1 and a half shares. If injured the pirate recieves their share plus a hundred credits just for being injured. On top of which they can get extra for the loss of certain body parts. Loss of an eye is an extra hundred credits, same for a finger. Loss of an arm is six hundred credits, a hand is five hundred, a leg is five hundred, a foot is four hundred.

Regular payment will be 500 credits a month for the "enlisted," 1,500 credits a month for officers, 800 credits a month for the mechanics, 1,000 credits a month for the quartermaster, and the doctor would recieve 2,250 credits a month.
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FLUFFY for President!!!!

Wanted Poster

[renault]

you want a pirate fleet? slave rig an old victory II (probably a pretty penny, but thats why its last and you dont buy it, you yoink it with the rest of your new toys, after all, I think one even patrols nal hutta. anyways, with the right technical mind you can slave rig a verbo brain to each control station, and with skillware costing only about 300creds per die, you could even end up with a fairly competent crew (as per cynabar's droids, anyway) and what new toys would allow you access to such a wonder?

grab yesself a nice little cargo container (bout 150,000 creds) enviroseal and sensor block the hell out of the bay. dump all your power out of shields and lateral thrust, strip down to backup hyperdrive. now, y'get yerself one of the nice lil kdy v150 plant guard ions (150,00 used or so, 8d capital scale ion damage) rbeak it down into its components and reinstall these through the free hull space you have created. set yourself up with a blow away cargo bay and you've got the nastiest little surprise this side of anything. all ya got to do is "fall" out of backup hyperdrive. having no shields, visible weapons or hyperdrive will make the vessel appear crippled, hail the victory and request aid, yadda yadda yadda, y'all play role playing games you know where this is going

now I have a star destroyer for the cost of a pimped out yt, and am already accomplishing my goal of stickin' it to the slugs
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Be like the waters of tatooine
flow endlessly like bespins plain
I am the stand alone clone
republic is my only name

[Jedi Skyler]

I gotta say, I really like Hellcat's scenario. Very well thought out, dude.

I agree that it'd almost be better to build up the name and reputation first, using methods that are harder to trace. Not that you'd want to switch over to more easily tracked equipment later, because even then reputation will only take you so far. But if you're able to build up a mountain of credits while you're paying your dues, then you can concentrate on picking up the better ships and technology. That's one of the reasons pirates like to establish bases in asteroid fields. They're dangerous to negotiate, often the metal content of the different rocks can mess with sensors (unless of course you've taken the liberty of installing a sweet sensor network throughout the field) and you don't necessarily have to dump a cruiser-load of credits on the defenses right off the bat.

[schnarre]

As the listed price for a Nebulon-B escort frigate is 194 million credits (Module: Strike Force Shantipole), getting a used one isn't unreasonable at 50% of cost at surplus auctions. Refurbishing & equipping it is the real trick.

Tying this in with an established group helps somewhat in terms of crew & material (depending on the PCs' Templates this could be alleviated further--Senatorials could lend family funding, Armchair Historians could employ scholarship funds, a Retired Imperial Captain could procure any necessary permits to allay suspicions, etc..). Just an idle thought anyway!

[Lor-Pbk]

that kind of money could be used to create great influence also...

Say instead of building a fleet from scratch, what if you used it to influence the politicos from a nearby nuetral system, and paid off thier leaders to start a seamingly profitable war with the faction you are opposed. Keeping your hands out of the dirty work. And letting history record the outcome as some one else's fault.

[Hawk Warboy]

Hellcat definitely has learned his lessons from the real-life buccaneers of the Spanish Main (and elsewhere). It was a good system then, and it's a good one for a galaxy that's somewhere, at some time...

Excellent scheme. Glaciers with a high metallic quotient on an ice world is another option I've tried in the past...
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C-3PO: "What a desolate place this is..."
R2-D2: "Boop bee duh doop buh duh boop BEEP!"
C-3PO: "Where do you think you're going?"

[ggmoridin]

I would buy an asteroid mining ship for 60 million and have it modified with droid brains at the critical crew stations and install skillware by removing crew quarters and such it would provide more room inside, this can be used along with the already formidable cargo space to install a fabrication plant that is slaved to a main computer/droid brain that is used to store design information and analysis of battle data e.t.c. the objective is to have a ship that can operate as a mobile processing plant and launch facility for custom designed starfighters [or any design in the main computer any way]operated by a pilot droid brain. The ship would be maintained by droids and could be operated by as few as 10 people.

Once completed i'd set myself up in an asteroid belt and use it's resorces to begin my fleet. When operational i should have an effective 100% loyal fighting force of flexible fighters and support craft that can strike at almost any target. I would keep my factory ship out of combat and use my almost unlimited industrial capability to wage war on the hutts.

My forces will always stalk prey at least 3 jumps from my factory ship and my factory ship will relocate frequently in order to prevent them from narrowing down my operational area or key structures and personel, ion cannons will be employed to disable all key ships, Standing orders would be not to kill unless absolutely no remaining choice. Depending on the ship, capture it and it's crew, we might be able to sell the ship for big credits or keep it and add it to our fleet. We also offer the ship's crew the chance to join us. If they don't, then we send them back to the Hutts without their ship or cargo.

This setup allows me to adapt to the hutts tactics and the like it also makes it almost impossible for the them to discover who is behind this no matter how mutch money they spend.

[Buttonz]

Who needs a fleet? Ships are easy to trace and crew give information away by accident or under torture.

Hire one amazing slicer and a droid engineer.

I would buy a small selection of droids. Something cheap and not too conspicuous that most people would just ignore for the most part. They would be modified with secret compartments and programming that could survive all but the most vigorous memory wipe. Something like a redudent memory backup you have to remove from the droid, and would be difficult to locate in the first place. These are then sold off again in strategic places.

Post bounties one key personal within the Hutt Clans. One million credits for a Hutt. Half a million for someone with a "key-role" in a Hutt's plans or per Hutt ship with cargo take/destroyed . 10,000 for Hutt property taken/destroyed, stuff like warehouses, small freight ships, vehicles, favorite pod thats about to win the race, etc. 1,000 per "thug" the not so important people in the operation, but what is a crime lords with no underlings?

Proof is required for bounty to be collected. proof is collected with a dead drop system. One of the modified droids does the pickup then returns to its master with no memory of where it had gone. if the droid is followed, it will just walk around the city until whomever following realizes it is not going anywhere. Payment is also done by droids. They simply walk up to the person whom did the drop for the bounty and hands them the credits.

This way there are few overheads on staff or expensive equipment that can be damaged or lost. Almost no chance at all anything can be traced back to anyway (most specifically me, who cares about the noble if your the one taking on the Hutt's?). Anyone tracing the driods only gets their current owners who know nothing or the company that sold them that is no longer in business.

[YodaWI]

The droids and bounty ideas sounds simple enough, but when you get that set up, then what? If it is supposed to be a setting to be roleplayed, this set-up may make it much more difficult on your GM.
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"May the Force Be With You."

[Buttonz]

maybe so, but there is always the need to verify bounties, throw off anyone who is trying to find out who is causing the trouble. Its also a great cover for sending a team of commandos (see PCs) to assassinate someone or steal something valuable from the Hutts. you might even have to save some people from over zealous bounty hunters who target the wrong people.

I'm very in to all the cloak and dagger type thing, so it may not sit well with some/any groups, but the aim is to cause maximum confusion with little or no chance of our employer getting found out. and there is always the fun of a spy vs. spy situation

[Reaper63]

I think everyone here is on the right track, but a few thigns I'd do differently.

Let's face it, if you are being asked to do this, and being given such a large sum of money to do it, you will have the underworld contacts to find pre-existing pirate groups. I would hire them out at first for the more simple beginnign missions. I'd set up a percentage of profit from all booty to be split, but most of it would go to the pirate groups. You'd also, obviously, allow any related missions against the target groups to bring in full profit to the pirates. you'd only get a share of specific missions.

While the pirate groups now have incentive (and I'd use more then one to keep the hutts guessing) I'd build my force. all fringer types. Smugglers, Slicers, And defiantely droid techs. I agree with using droids And I'd have the slicers and droid techs doing all sorts of things to them. And using common types is the key, you don't want them noticed. well maintained but not new looking, all the same color. you don't want them standing out.

a Base, I like the idea of an old mining facility, Even if it's on an airless astroid or moon. The facility is either still wired for life suppport, or can be rewired easily enough. You want something off the beaten track so that if someone sets up survailence on you, you can spot them as well. And remote droid stations are good for this. If mantained and programed correctly.

I would also keep a fleet of ships that are on their last legs. Why? cause I wouldn't want to leave survivors of your missions left in lifeboats. Hutts don't forgive quickly. The hutts are sometimes likely to execute all the survivors to set an example to the next crew to fight to the death. you give them the ship and let them jump away. THIS will prove you don't want senseless deaths among the crews. you may get volunteers on later missions and should get more cooperation.

When it comes to your actual combat fleet, you don't want ships that will stick out, or large capital ships. YOu are not a planetary force, and generally won't be facing one. Converted Frieghters, hidden weapons, ION cannons are a must! eventually as your missions gorw, fighter escorts. And do it like the Wraiths did. Get a medium to large bulk freighter and turn it into a pocket carrier. the ship must still pass as a freighter though! you show up in a Vic Star or Venerator, or even an Acclamator Class will stick out and bring down official notice of your operations. Keep it small but well armed.

Hidden turrets, Ion Cannons and missile launchers. Let the opposition underestimate you as much as possible. Star Wars Gamer had a few examples. I can't find them at the moment online, but there was even a Mashed together Corellian Ship that sported 2 Heavy turbo Lasers off of a Nebulan B. That would give you the firepower you want! and still keep the profile of a simple frieghter (you'd have to add jammers as well as the power capasitors to the ship to hide the power output on those babies)

you will have to hit legitimate as well as illegal Hutt operations, but only in that Clan. And if you're smart, you will contact that clan's main adversaries with the Hutt society. they are just as likely to pay you for your services as well. What hurts the profit of an adversay helps their profit. appearing to favor one hutt Clan will give you resources. And a fall guy if your crews are captured. You only telll them you are workign for another Hutt Clan. Clan wars are common. use that to hide your true employer.

And no matter what, stockpile any profits. You have 3 cuts to make, Reinvest in the operation, pay the crews and yourself and then the contingency money that noone else knows about. Not a big stake, but tnough to use later on. MAKE a profit for yourself, in addition to your pay.
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