Catch a Falling Starscream

"Catch a Falling Starscream" is an adventure scenario released that ties in with the Decepticon Directive sourcebook, released as part of Renegade Game Studios exclusive "Play Renegade" line. In keeping with the Decepticon focus, this adventure introduces a party of 4-6 players to the dark side—either using original characters or the pregenerated character sheets provided in the booklet. This adventure follows a group of Decepticon rookies as they become spies for Soundwave, and find themselves working undercover to foil Starscream's latest scheme.

Contents

Part 1: Falling in With Starscream

On the crashed Nemesis, Laserbeak brings a small group of Decepticon rookies to Soundwave, who explains the nature of their mission: recently, one of Soundwave's Recordicon spies observed Starscream fraternizing with Autobots, and now the Decepticon spymaster needs them to infiltrate his inner circle and figure out what he's planning. Soundwave suggests meeting with Skywarp, as they might be able to trick the dimwitted Seeker into getting them close with their _target.

When the group finally finds Skywarp, he ropes the group into helping him with his practical jokes; if they help him, he'll put a good word in for them when he meets with Starscream. After hacking Shockwave's computer, scrambling one of Soundwave's recordings, and stealing Thrust's sonic vortex optimizer, Skywarp brings the group to a large hangar, where they meet Starscream for the first time. Initially, Starscream doesn't trust the group; the players may choose to argue their case, and in the end Starscream decides to bring them along anyways. The treacherous Air Commander explains that he has acquired details on an ancient Cybertronian shipwreck, and plans to excavate the site with some hired help.

Part 2: Chasing the Moon

In the desert, Starscream, his Seekers, and the player characters establish a temporary field camp. Eventually—whether through interrogating Starscream or analyzing the crash site itself—the players realize that the old ship contains several Polarity Gauntlets, extremely powerful weapons capable of manipulating metal. Additionally, they learn that Starscream has recruited some gullible Autobots to go into the still-active ship for him deactivating its security systems, and then double-cross them when they least expect it.

After learning what Starscream's really up to, the group heads toward the crashed ship: they may choose to either sneak past the guards, somehow convince them to leave, or just defeat them in combat.

Part 3: The Fallen Star

Inside the ship, the group make their way through the wreck, dealing with the ship's automated security systems, until they finally come across a single, half-damaged Polarity Gauntlet in a supply room. The players must attempt to crack the lock, and can use their technological experience to assist with the codebreaking. In the end, however, one member of the party now has access to this unique weapon.

Part 4: Autobots Assembled

Outside the ship, the team runs into a furious Starscream, who demands that they hand over what's his. At that moment, however, Soundwave arrives; Starscream wisely flees, and Soundwave orders the group to deal with Starscream's would-be Autobot patsies while he teaches the Air Commander a lesson. Not long afterwards, Rollbar and three Throttlebot recruits arrive, intent on double-crossing their double-crosser and seizing the Polarity Gauntlet for the Autobots.

If the Decepticons lose the fight, Rollbar and his allies take the Polarity Gauntlet, leaving Soundwave to drag the defeated recruits back to headquarters. Otherwise, the villains defeat Rollbar and his allies; Soundwave promises that the Decepticons will be able to study the artifact and replicate its functions. Although Megatron believed Starscream's claims, Soundwave tells the group that he'll need their help keeping an eye on their treacherous comrade in future...

Featured characters

(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)

Notes

• This adventure booklet comes with six pregenerated character sheets: Bitstream, Dirge, Heavywait, Howlback, Scatterspike, and Swift.
• This adventure booklet ties in with the Decepticon Directive sourcebook.

Transformers references

• The aforementioned character sheets draw quite heavily from the 2019 IDW continuity—all of the pregenerated characters either appeared in or were created for the comic, and several of them have "Voin" as one of their spoken languages.
• Scatterspike's profile notes that she likes to bet on skitter races, a form of gambling that appeared in Transformers #20.
• Howlback's profile mentions the Cobalt Sentries from her original toy bio.
• The opening setpiece has the player characters enjoying a game of Praxus Fold 'Em, a card game that originated in Brimstone's online Cybertron profile.
• The Polarity Gauntlets originated in the Transformers: Prime episode "Metal Attraction", although they've previously featured in the Roleplaying Game material as part of a free PDF

Errors

• In an aside relating to role-playing respectfully, the text claims that all Transformers movies are rated PG. However, as of writing, this is only true for The Transformers: The Movie and Transformers One; all of the live-action films distributed by Paramount are thus far rated PG-13.
• Howlback's Threat sheet in Field Guide to Action and Adventure describes her as a clone of the Mini-Con Ravage, puts her size as "Small", and notes that she is effective at taking down enemies many times her size. Here, Howlback's character sheet gives her the "Monstrosity" Origin (i.e., she turns from a humanoid robot into an animal) and gives her a "Huge" size rating. It's especially odd given that Decepticon Directive has rules for playing as an independent Mini-Con!
• The character sheets flip-flop between "Junkion" and "Junkian" as the official language of the Junkions.
• Dirge's profile sheet has a typo that renders "good" as "food".
• Despite the adventure being aimed at 1st level characters, the pre-generated Decepticons are all level 3.
• Unlike the previous adventure (Winner's Cup), the pre-generated character sheets are presented similarly to NPC stat blocks (or the pre-generated Autobots in the free PDFs). Which would be fine if they'd ensured each character had their own page. As it stands, there are 6 characters spread over 7 pages, usually with half one character's stats and half another on the same page.