The Rings of Kether - Attempt 2

I feel like I did pretty well on my first attempt at The Rings of Kether; at the very least, I almost made it to what I assume was the stronghold of the head bad guy.  I went into my second attempt with a great deal of confidence; if I nearly won last time, surely I stood a good chance of victory this time around.

For my second attempt I rolled a Skill of 12, Stamina of 18, and a Luck of 9.  For my ship I rolled a Weapons Strength of 9 and Shields of 4.  Last time a low Shields score had done me in, but I felt a lot better about my roll for this attempt.

I began my mission to bust the drug rings of the Alpha Cygni system by entering the orbit of the planet Kether.  I began my investigation by checking out the system's asteroid belt (because I already knew that the bad guy's base was there from my last play-through).  Before I could find anything I was attacked by a pair of space vessels: Interceptors (Weapon Strength 5, Shield 3; and Weapons Strength 5, Shield 2).  It was a long, drawn-out dogfight, and the Interceptors shot me twice before I could destroy them (reducing my Shields to 2).  Unfortunately, there was no way for me to find anything among the thousands of asteroids without years of searching.  I would need to find the proper coordinates before I could come back.

(As an aside, the ship-to-ship combat in this game yields very different results to regular FF combat. In regular FF combat, having a higher Skill than your opponent gives you a pretty good chance of getting through unscathed, because only one combatant can score a hit in any round.  With this style of ship-to-ship combat, having a high Weapons Strength in no way prevents other ships from hitting you, and dealing just 1 point of damage per hit means that the battles are bound to be drawn out.  It's almost guaranteed that you're going to lose some Shields if you get into a fight, and I'm not sure that there's any way in the book to replenish your Shields.)

After landing at the spaceport on Kether and being bullied by customs, I decided to hang around the port and ask some questions.  I learned that all cargo comes through the spaceport, but there was no other useful information to be had.  I decided to head to the local authorities and declare my presence as a Federal Investigator.

After asking for one of the senior investigators, a bored man at reception led me to the office of a Mr. Samuel.  (Normally I'd have been taken to see Mr. Perry, but he was apparently out at the pub.  Being taken to Samuel was the result of rolling a die and getting an even number; presumably if I'd rolled odd I would have seen Perry.)  Samuel became immediately alarmed when I told him who I was.  He slipped me a note saying that he couldn't talk, but would meet me later at a restaurant called Viqueque.

I decided to trust Samuel, and went to meet him at the restaurant.  He showed up in disguise, and told me that the local police were rife with corruption.  It was his suspicion that the drugs were being brought in via the city's helipads.  He also told me of his underworld connection, an unemployed starship navigator.

Meeting with Mr. Samuel

I decided to meet the navigator at a local bar.  The man was paranoid, but among his ramblings I picked out two things: there was something odd going on at the moon (also known as Rispin's End), and a fat woman playing cards in the bar was mixed up in it.

Rather than trail the woman, I went back to my ship and immediately took off to investigate the moon.  The only facility on the moon was a small dome town for tourists and scientists.  Before landing I decided to fly around the moon looking for suspicious activity, and before too long I was attacked by two Robot Fighters (both with Weapon Strength 7 and Shields 1).  I blew the first one up with a smart missile, but the second hit me before I could destroy it (reducing my Shields to 1).  I couldn't find anything else on the moon, so I landed at the dome town.

To explore the town I hired a rocket scooter for a few days (this cost me 500 kopecks, leaving me with 4,500).  Someone left a note in my helmet telling me to leave Alpha Cygni if I wanted to live, but I ignored it and continued my investigations.  I didn't turn anything up, but a few days later an assassin took a shot at me.  I fled the scene, but not before getting a good look at my would-be-killer, and I was able to identify him by going to the starport and looking through the recent arrivals.  He was a Mr. B. Smith, age 34, a librarian working for the City Central Library.  Rather than stay on Rispin's End, I decided to return to Kether and check out the library.

At the library I looked through some transport statistics, and noticed that there were some discrepancies.  I headed for the State Computer File Centre for some more information, but was disappointed to find that they only allowed perusal of files more than 100 years old.  I tried to bribe the clerk, opting for a conservative bribe of 1,000 kopecks.  Rather than accept the bribe, the clerk pressed an alarm, and I was swarmed by security and arrested.  The police stripped me of my identification, and my pleas of being an official investigator fell on deaf ears.  Soon I was thrown in prison, and my adventure was over.

THE POST-GAME

Well, I fell into the trap of taking a different path so that my second attempt would be more interesting.  I could easily have followed the same choices I made last time, and I would have done much better.  With a higher Shields score, I very well may have won the whole thing.  Instead I got curious, explored a lot of dead ends, and fell afoul of the crooked authorities.  My initial instincts for this book - to keep a low profile - were much more effective.