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Chapter 4: Running Starship Campaigns / Starship Campaign Arcs / The Infiltration Race

The Grand Prix

Source Starship Operations Manual pg. 148
The PCs have eliminated one cell of the sect, but many more members remain. The PCs deduce that the terrorist base is located in the Drift, near a relay beacon along the course of the planet’s Grand Prix, a preliminary race for the Pact Worlds’ Championship. The exact course of the race is a secret, so the PCs must qualify in order to find the base. The qualifying races could involve single-pilot racers or larger starships that require the PCs to cooperate as a single crew. At the same time, the PCs discover their contact is more than they appear: a state intelligence agency, a rival corporation seeking sabotage, or some other group with a hidden agenda that doesn’t necessarily alienate the PCs.

Once the PCs qualify for the Grand Prix, they can compete in this multi-day marathon race. The course jumps between relay beacons in the Drift, so it involves larger, Drift-capable starships with racers operating as teams. During the race, the PCs contend with strange Drift creatures and hazards as well as other competitors—some of whom are members of the terrorist sect. They need to do well enough in the race to qualify for the Pact Worlds’ Championship while tracking down the base, but they don’t necessarily need to win. When they find the base, they confront the terrorist presence there and learn that the sect believes the landmark was constructed as a beacon for a nefarious cosmic threat, such as the cult of Nyarlathotep or the Dominion of the Black—a beacon that will soon activate and summon a massive invasion force. The sect plans to destroy the landmark during the Pact Worlds’ Championship, but the leader of the sect—a mystic of their deity—is nowhere to be found.

Archives of Nethys

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The Grand Prix