USH'S ANNUAL CHRISTMAS-ISH RP TRIVIA QUIZ! All rejoice...
Back by... absolutely no demand at all, but I am going to hope that people want it anyway, here is a brand new RP trivia quiz for you nerdy nerds to try and equal my great nerdy nerdiness in.
Much of this quiz covers events from the last year of RPing... but by no means all of it, so newer people and veterans alike can dig deep to try and find some answers.
Have fun...
A. Easy Questions!
These questions are easy because they are not hard to look up if you need to.
1. Give the names of each of the Lantarnas family
2. The Golden Serpent is the most powerful crime syndicate on its side of the galaxy; what is the most powerful one on the other side?
3. Several assassins were trying to assassinate the Viceroy on Coruscant in Episode I of the second campaign; what species were they?
4. And what particular advantage did that species possess?
5. What particular reputation did the pirate king Strine have?
6. Where was Kuylen’s transponder unit on Demarus?
7. For what reason did the Techno Union arrange the kidnap of a Taloorian scientist?
8. What were the last words spoken by several antagonists in the first two Jedi Episodes of the second campaign which indicated their complicity in the Conspiracy?
9. Where did the Viceroy go after the events on Coruscant in Episode I?
10. What is the name of the ship flown by a robotic salvage operator (and ex-protocol droid) met by the Dark Siders at the end of Episode II?
B. Actors and actresses
Traditionally, many major characters in my Star Wars game are based upon personalities in other franchises, on the idea that if this were a film or tv show, that actor or actress would be playing them in that particular style. Name the actor, character and source for each of the following NPCs:
1. Kuylen
2. Krisha
3. Jolanta
4. Ascar (this one is a bit of a bluff- see below)
5. The Elder on Zeiton
6. Kir Ascar
7. Vigo Lantarnas. A bonus point for the other inspiration for this character.
8. Jena Lantarnas
9. Melkus Doon
10. Argentis. This was never hinted at, so take some guesses.
C. Harder questions.
‘Harder’ in this context means that you have to have some understanding of issues to give a good answer, rather than just looking up a name or fact.
1. Why did Melkus Doon go through such an elaborate charade with the Dark Siders? There are several reasons for this, but two key ones- one fairly obvious, one less so (but was actually the mechanism by which he could have been exposed beforehand).
2. Similarly, what reasons were behind the Techno-Union’s very protracted activities in the first two episodes of the Light Side campaign? Again, a complex area, but two major reasons, one that you realised at the time, one realised more recently.
3. Why was the Golden Serpent beginning to fragment, giving Melkus the opportunity to get the cells behind him in the first place?
4. Why were Galder’s visions in the Ghost Citadel particularly vivid, and why was that effect spreading to the other players?
5. List as many reasons as possible as to why the Venerable Z’Har and the Jedi entirely failed to get on, and in fact treated each other as enemies.
D. Plot inspirations
Coming up with a long-term campaign plot plays off very well in terms of keeping players entertained and feeling that they are part of something bigger- as recently went well at the end of the most recent episode. The problem is that a lot of plots have to be thought up of within that campaign structure- the last Episode, for example, had four plots going at once. Plots are not THAT easy to write AND keep within the campaign framework AND actually not be simple repeats of stuff that has happened before. To this end, veteran players have long known that certain elements get ‘borrowed’ from other franchises to provide the base structure for a plot (however, the plots themselves are NEVER literally duplicated; these things are used to inspire and shape, not rip-off).
The following situations are all from the Star Wars game, but also describe exactly the storyline they were taken from (they are worded in such a way as to be exact). Name the source.
1. A group of desperate interstellar criminals make an all-or-nothing grab for their ultimate goal- infamous, heavily defended, apparently impossible to access. Surviving many trials, they finally make it to their destination- only to find an empty room (Campaign I, Episode V, Dark Side).
2. In an ancient place of learning, a pair of investigators arrive and start to examine issues of politics, heretical thought and buried secrets, kept within a labyrinthine library that is hidden in plain sight. They are clearly disliked by the local authorities even though the investigators have official standing. The villain exposed, the library is destroyed as the investigators flee. (Campaign II, Episode III, Light Side).
3. Trapped on a hostile planet with no escape, a group of tetchy friends is rescued by a highly competent salvage operator who offers them fresh hope. However, the operator only rescued them for his own ends, and intends to sacrifice them to further his goals (Campaign II, Episode I, Dark Side)
4. At a luxurious medical facility, a trained investigator (working incognito) begins to suspect that things are not as they seem- he thinks another patron is in fact a trained killer, accompanied by an equally lethal female, whilst he discovers the dead body of another patron who seems to be walking around the facility just fine. The killer knows the man is on to him and tries to fake an accident in the facility to kill him, but the investigator gets the better of the killer (Campaign II, Episode III, Light Side). This one, incidentally, was the inspiration for this part of the quiz, because someone got closer than they knew to spotting this.
5. A famous group of outlaws makes their home in a safe spot that no-one else knows the location of. Taking a risk to go back and perform another heist- arguing with each other all the way- they are dismayed to find that the authorities have become so annoyed with their continual activities that a specialised group consisting of the finest and most deadly talent available has been put together for the specific purpose of hunting the outlaws down. The outlaws flee, barely making it away, but know that the chase is joined forever (Campaign II, Episode III, Dark Side).
E. Damn difficult questions
These ones are really getting into the ‘arcana’ of the circumstances surrounding the game itself, and will require some discussion and speculation to get the correct answer to!
1. Kir Ascar is played by an actor, as is a question above. But he is played by the wrong actor. Who should he be being played by, why isn’t he, and why that replacement actor?
2. A lot of effort went into the background story of Siva Lantarnas- but instead of being presented to the players, it actually had to be extracted from a number of different sources. As part of the most detailed setting ever used- the Ghost Citadel- but not actually directly relevant to the player’s objectives, what purposes did the Siva backstory serve?
3. How many thematic differences exist between the Sith and the Dark Side characters? How is this used to form part of the plot for the Dark Siders as protagonists rather than villains?
4. This is a broad question… but what was the ‘point’ of Kuylen’s storyline?
5. And now for the big one… in what places where the activities of the Dark Master Sienar foreshadowed within the game? Other than various more obvious ones, there is one LARGE reference in the Light Side and one much more subtle one in the Dark Side which people are yet to spot, that show what a role he has played in the past.
F. Join the Dots
Writing full campaigns like these ones is a very different experience from playing them- and not just in the obvious ways, but also in continuity. They are played in a straight line (unless you are being really tricksy with your game- I’ll do that sometimes but not in Star Wars) (though that said, we can do some clever things now the OT game is started), but when written, you tend to come up with several major events that define the campaign, and then you fill in the gaps with other stories that provide extra time for development, drama, or even just a simple break from having major plots fly in your face every ten seconds. These, of course, are therefore written after, but placed before, some major plot events.
Taking each storyline, Light and Dark, including multiple ones in an episode… can you come up with a guess as to in which order were each of the plots for the game were created?
G. Impossible questions
Take guesses. These aren’t really questions- they are spoiler hints
1. What policy destroyed Matadan’s credibility as Guildmaster?
2. What has turned Gonderkorro into a ghost world?
3. And why does it gain a reputation of having lethal Deputies?
4. What is the greatest difference between Sienar and a Sith Lord?
5. And when given the opportunity, why do the Jedi refuse to kill him?
Alright cool...
OK I'm gonna give this a go all off the top of my head for the simple reason, that I am currently way too lazy to go look them all up.
A:
2, The Hutts.
5, He was unkillable or something like that, But in reality he just had a crazy huge amout of fortune points. (God damn mother F***ing Strine...)
6, It was in a grain silo.
B: No, not even gonna try, Can't think of actors/actresses to save my life.
C:
1, He wanted control of the Serpent. He used the Darkies to assasinate all of the male members of the Serpent, so he could marry Jena (or whatever her name was) and take control.
3, The leader was concered about his legacy, and none of his sons were good enough to take over inhis place, they all had some major flaw. His daughter, who For consistancy I am going to call Jena would be the best choice, but it was a paternal society and she could not take over.
5, He thought we wanted to steal the information from the vault. We were both under the influence of the mysterious dark side power, and therefore not all my fault. He was worried about the immediate safty of the vault, and we took different positions on how to approach that, with him wanting to attack ASAP, and me wanting to be more diplomatic. (I'll think of more later...)
D:
2, I really want to say National Treasure, but the time line is off, and the ending is wrong.
5, This HAS to be Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, which was one of the worst movies I have ever seen.
E:
2, It made the Darkies actually want to go to the Golden Serpent HQ, The legend of the Sith Tablet was like the carrot dangled over their head to make them do Doon's bidding.
F:
No clue, But I bet the Serpent was the orginal Idea, with everything else kinda revolving around that, for the darkies.
Few answers:
-Cassilis plotline was influenced by "Name of the Rose" by Umberto Eco.
-The legend about Siva was supposed to be a warning against Doon`s manipulation, and to show that mundane beings are capable of making fools out of Force Users.
-Kuylen`s purpose- besides providing the driving force behind the plot, to show that not every powerful Dark Jedi can be a real threat to Galaxy, and not all ancient stories can lead to Power.
-Galder`s visions- as a violent C type he was an emotional person, who didn`t have a great control over his emotions, he had the greatest link with Kuylen of all players, was desperate to find him.
-Golden Serpent in crisis- you need trully great man to hold such big criminal Empire. When the leadership is hereditary, it is impossible. Yigo was competent, but not trully great.
-Shienar diffrence- perhaps he really sees himself as good?
Now few questions of my own:
-What templates did you use for the Mika, Deva, Bora, Yigo and Yago Lantarnas? I think Slaver template is best to represent higher ranking criminals, this is why I wondered about it`s narrow name- there is nothing that makes it restricted to slavery. Actually, why you don`t post the stats for death villains?
-What is Yoda`s Force Rating?
-Would the first Campaign be much diffrent if the players were let by someone like Shienar instead of Kuylen?
Okie, I haven't even looked at what others have posted yet.....
A.
1. (in no particular order) Jena, Bora, Yago, Deva, Mika, Vigo.
2. The Hutts
3. Ummm....can't remember. Something that was feline.
4. Weren't they telepathic or something.
5. Unkillable or really lucky or something like that.
6. In a grain silo.
10. Flotsam I
B.
1. Keith Carradine
2. Carrie-Anne Moss
3. Weren't Krisha and Jolanta sisters? I'll guess the same for her.
7. Uhhh.....I knew this....can't remember.
8. Monica Bellucci
C.
1. So we would trust him, basically....though Galder could have been able to figure out that he wasn't who he said he was (especially with the story about the tablet). He wanted to take control but couldn't because he wasn't a Lantarnan.
3. The Lantarnans themselves were botching things, I think. Plus the only one who was really competent was Jena, who couldn't lead.
4. Wasn't he already starting to lose it at that point? I dunno....
D.
1. Blake's 7
3. Also Blake's 7 😛
5. Butch Cassidy
E.
2. To ultimately show how we had been tricked the same way, more or less.....
3. Um, quite a few (working in secrecy, which we're not very good at, the Rule of Two.....at least that's what I can think of....). We're not really bad guys, exactly, we're being messed with by the Sith as well as the Jedi, ummm....
F.
Umm.....well, I know our first two episodes of this Campaign were written for us, so I'd assume that means they were written after the third episode.
Well, that's what I've got right now....without going back to look at anything (I'm too lazy) 😛
A.
1. Jena, Vigo, Mika, Deva, Bora, Yago, in order of intelligence...
2. The Hutts?
3. Zepharin (sp?)
4. Telepathy!
5. Strine was supposedly able to defeat death several times, until Roan cut him in half...
6. Under the floor boards of the silo we entered.
7. The Taloraanian scientist had developed a missile targeting program they needed for their hailfire droids.
8. "The New Order is coming, and you have no place in it," or something to that degree.
9. Serenno, Dooku's homeworld
10. Flotsam I
B.
1. Kuylen - Keith Carradine, d'Hubert, The Duelists
2. Krisha - Carrie-Anne Moss, Trinity, The Matrix
3. Jolanta - Eliza Dushku, Faith, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
6. Kir Ascar - Malcolm MacDowell, possibly Dr. Solan from Star Trek?
7. Vigo Lantarnas - Brian Blessed, dunno the character & source...
8. Jena Lantarnas - Monica Belluci, Persephone, The Matrix Reloaded
C.
1. First off, Doon wanted us to assassinate the Lantarnas, with the exception of Jena. With the family dead, Jena's husband- Doon- could control the Golden Serpent. Secondly, if he could kill us and return the tablet to the Serpent, he would have full support; we could have exposed him by his story of the 'Avalar' tablet coming from the Sith Armada, because they never left Avalar until we grabbed some.
2. The first one was to upgrade the hailfire droids, I think? The second one was to make a droid capable of taking down Jedi.
4. Because he had been 'touched by the Sith'; he'd been to Avalar AND Zeiton's Mausoleum; Takuan's probably would have been pretty vivid if he had visited both sites as well...
Ok, let's see how you folks have done! I shall compress your answers into one super-answer sheet, made by a combined player gestalt, that I call Bob.
---
Bob says!
(note I give advice on gaps here)
A:
1. Jena, Bora, Yago, Deva, Mika, Vigo... boring but true.
2. The Hutts- yes indeedy
3. "Something that was feline" hmmm... Zeraphrain they were.
4. Telepathic indeed- but only amongst their own siblings
5. All got the right answer, though missed the phrase- he was the 'Pirate who could not die'. Roan proved that wrong but it sure took a lot of effort.
6. Grain silo is good, but Bob's second answer of being beneath the floor of that silo is better!
7. "The Taloraanian scientist had developed a missile targeting program they needed for their hailfire droids." Beautifully exact. If you wanted more, you could point out that the scientist refused to simply sell the info, on moral grounds.
8. "New Order" is the key, "Long Live the New Order" was the line.
9. Seronno indeed, though it appears in retrospect that Dooku happily talks Gunray into working for Sidious again. That's Corruption for you.
10. Flotsam I- yup! That'll be back. Good resource for people.
B.
1. Keith Carradine, d'Hubert, The Duelists. Absolutely- man spent his whole life duelling, it seems.
2. Carrie-Anne Moss, Trinity, The Matrix. Created so just to make one of my friends attracted to her.
3. Eliza Dushku, Faith, Buffy the Vampire Slayer- ditto
4. Ignore this one; I was only making the point that Ascar'sactor had to be changed. Answer E1 instead.
5. Think films, old but not too old, think smart person is trying to kill hero not because of evil motives but because what the hero represents in the way of doom to the Elder's people.
6. Malcolm MacDowell- but as noted later, not in that role orignally but standing in for it (because he fitted well having played such arrogant, superior roles many times in his day).
7. Vigo Lantarnas - Brian Blessed- playing just about any role he ever played
8. Monica Bellucci- Persephone... well, not necessarily Persephone but that's as good a source as any.
9. I've pretty much given you all you need to answer this one.
10. Argentis- young, fit attractive... and for a big clue, dead.
C.
1. Ok, I am assuming everyone knows Doon's basic motives to destroy the Serpent leadership, but specifically, why the Dark Siders?
2. I guess BB hasn't had a shot yet. He knows what the Union was up to, I am sure.
3. Everyone's getting in the right area but haven't quite hammered it down- 'competent but not great' is the best so far, but what behaviour actually caused people to make that diagnosis?
4. Galder's visions- he is wild, but that wouldn't change them much. He DOES have a close link to Kuylen, but that's only why he saw Kuylen, it doesn't account for the strength of it. Truth was indeed that Galder, having been to Zeiton and Avalar, is touched deeply by these Dark Side presences already- and especially at Avalar, where he was already tested on emotional response in the same manner as the drug was stimulating in his head. But why was the effect spreading?
5. Well, we have a few, feel free to list more
D:
1, Nice try on National Treasure, though I am sure they would be flattered to be called 'interstellar'. Bob has a better stab at this later, with Blake's 7; the episode was called 'Pressure Point', and you guys got off easy- one of the regular characters gets killed on the way out when they found their empty room. His last words were "I'm not worth dying for" which was probably true but it's still a spectacularly pointless way to have died.
2. This is indeed 'Name of the Rose'; well spotted, Bob. In fact, a line from the film- "You have found many things in your time here, but the short route through the labyrinth is not one of them" was rather cheekily almost directly quoted to Roan in the finale. Looking at the set-up for NOTR, you can see how this story was originally written for a Jedi Master (ok, Gundark is female, but SW is gender neutral in this regard), and if it had been a Master and his Padawan, so much the better. As it is, note Sunda's sudden taste for girls in that episode. Oh my, all the things that get missed...
Ok, a load of you haven't seen that film, have you? That's an error that needs correcting.
However, no equivalent of Kuylen or his army in NOTR, no equivalent of the activities of the Lady, no murders in my Episode (until the end)... and so on.
3. Blake's 7 again! This time from the episode 'Rescue'. Doon is very similar to resucer Dorian from B7, especially in having a ship named Scorpio, and his hidden base on the planet Xenon (with the wine supply that runs out) is eerily familiar, as is his double-crossing of the protagonists who then kill him.
Of course, Doon isn't a centuries old vampire-type living off the absorbed energies of his hapless victims who feed their existances into a hideous looking (both in intention nd special effects) monster who lives in the basement of the base, nor was he looking to try and finish off his experiment in teleportation by gaining access to the only people who regularly used it. Concept- identical. Plot- not even remotely similar.
As I have pointed out before, though, the B7 protangonists were harder to dupe; when Dorian saves the lives of some of them, the leader pulls a gun on him. When Dorian protests that he just did the life saving, Avon replies "Well, every silver lining has a cloud" and proceeds to hijack his ship. That's the spirit!
4. No tries on this one? Odd, this is the one that was almost guessed by mistake at the time. This is actually a plot for a section of a film, not for a whole film.
5. It is indeed Butch Cassidy- as I note, this is actually for real as well as fiction, representing the authorities adjusting to previously unbeatable threats.
E:
1. Admittedly this one is very hard. Easier if you are in the UK and could at least recognise the source. Basically, though, what reasons could there possibly be to not use the actor that played the original role?
2. The detail about Siva's background went way beyond just the existance of the tablet- Doon handled all that, but there was much more to find out actually in the citadel.
Bob comes back for a second try at this and gets some of the key points exactly- first, that it is not impossible for a smart enough non-force user to get the better of even powerful force users- a direct warning to the players that this was happening right now.
The second reason ties into what is wrong with Vigo, and the third... is really just a comment on legend from my brother.
3. Rule of Two- yes that's the easiest, but what are the details of that? And I dunno in what sense you consider yourself 'not bad guys', you murdering bastards...
4. Kuylen's purpose... ok, yes, definiutely first of all to show that you can't beat the Republic.
"Wait," says Bob, "but the Republic was beaten!"
To clarify then- you cannot, as a bunch of elites as you are, destroy the Republic in the ways you might imagine- amassing vast amounts of power and marching directly on the Republic. Why not? Because doing so requires a chain of events, starting with A and getting to at least z before you have your army. The Jedi will predict and intercept that chain long before completion- and in Kuylen's case, they knew that he could never reach Z at all. The Jedi are just too good at it compared to you guys.
Only the Sith can rival this, and indeed they do, and Yoda and Windu are concerned indeed when they note that they never foresaw Kamino.
Theoretically speaking then- can ONLY the Sith have such power? Well, Master Obfuscate does help, but it's not at Palpatine levels. Worried players might note that no-one predicted either Sienar or the Lady. That's not actually true, several people did both, but the clues were often obscure.
Let's just leave it as saying that the Dark Side players might be able to push the boundaries here, having learned their lesson.
As for not all ancient stories leading to power... well, true, but we wouldn't have much plot if we shot that down entirely.
There WAS a comment to be made that you don't have to get locked into this idea that ancient Sith stuff is necessary for power- Sidious needed none of that (except in the EU). In my game, nor does Sienar. But the plotline for the Lady may be somewhat different (though it's still not going to be quite as straightforwards as many EU sources have it); at the end of the day, the 'Jedi Lore' skill has a purpose.
Basically... Sith Myths ('Syths'😉 do have purpose in the game- Avalar was totally genuine, and totally useful (though in a more mundane way than the "I now have the [power of a GOD!!!!" way the EU likes it).
But... there was most certainly a warning that the Sith do not give up their secrets, and to see the Dark Side is to invite destruction. Demnos in particular had some skill in this regard, as you might find out one day.
5. Still no-one got any idea on this? Oh man, and you were obsessing about it at first... the Dark Side player linked is Gallador.
F. A bit of logic will get you a loing way on this one! Just put the Episodes in order then jiggle them around as seems to make sense as to the writing order.
G.
1. See if you can have a guess as to what might make an Osokan a pariah in the view of his peers.
2. It's an old friend, and when I say friend, I mean not even vaguely a friend.
3. Because they are the rootinest, tootinest deputies in town, of course!
4. "Your evil is my good."- classic line from Sutekh in Doctor Who. "I am Sutekh the destroyer. Where I tread, I leave nothing but dust and darkness. I find that good."
Moral flexibility may well be the hallmark of many Sith in times past- as may self-delusion about their motives (just look at Anakin). Be assured, though, Sienar revels in the evil he has caused, and he does not see himself as good.
5. Because they are too weak. Seriously.
To answer my interrogation in turn...
Slaver is indeed a good template for those sorts of villainsm, and that is to do with the way around it was created; the Slaver was a Star Wars archetype, and then a useful type of character was put onto that archetype.
As it was, I tried to make the Lantarnans as varied as possible- big gun Bora was a Mercenary, Vigo was actually closer to being a Primitive Warrior, Deva was a Slaver... and so on.
Difficult as it is to be drawn on 'real' character values, Yoda is probably a 17, though as all this might be re-calibrated soon, we shall see.
And yes, it would have been totally different if Sienar was in charge. He might possibly have gone to Avalar; he would never have gone to Zeiton, and his objectives would have been completely different. he's also not much of a team player, though, so the set-up is a bit forced.
Gallador's the link, eh?
I would say 'Grevor Scovione,' but that's ridiculous.
I remember it was in one of his hallucinations. Was it WHERE the hallucinations were?
Oh, this is one of those quizzes that makes me want to become a recluse and watch old movies the rest of my life to try and catch up with Ush...
Bob is the gestalt entity, as I explained.
As for meeting Sienar- that's what you think! As for his faked behaviour-he is a true Master of the Dark Side, and all the deception that goes with it. He's twisted but he's not insane. Well, actually, by most measures all Dark Siders are insane really, but he's in control.
And it depends what you mean by where. And Grevor's not ridiculous at all.
Oh, not what I meant. 😛
I seem to remember Scovione talking to Gundark about a Dark Jedi he hunted who died off? Before Gallagher met Sienar, I supposed that, in retrospect, he was speaking of Gallador. Could he have been talking about Sienar, not known as Sienar?
And Palmero and Vataan are just background places for Gallador...right?