((The RP XP with MJ #44))

Welcome to the second segment of “Captured Moments” with ((The RP XP with MJ)), my ongoing nod and /salute to the great RolePlay inspirations found throughout the awesome living atmosphere of SWTOR’s set design and NPC placement.

 

Keep in mind this little vignette wasn’t produced, endorsed or even recognized by BioWare. It’s just me doing what every good RPer does: finding those captured moments of “realism” throughout the game and making up my own story to go with it. For the passing gamer, these are nothing more than animated space filler. For me, and maybe you, they are something more. They’re little untold stories, pictures that spark the mind and give you ideas. Like this one….

 

 

CAPTURED MOMENT #2:

WHAT IT IS:

A lone Jawa stands atop a half-buried sand crawler in a remote spot on Tatooine, apparently making a plaintive call to a cohort via holo.

WHERE TO FIND IT:

(-2346, 456) “The Dune Sea”, Tatooine

 

Let’s call him Vizxiz.

 

Several cycles ago, Vizxiz was a simple tool modeler aboard the Sandcrawler Jjakwi V. He wasn’t one of the favorites among the clan of 26 Jawas (well, 25 since Shaman Ulnazrik was eaten by a Krayt Dragon) who lived aboard the Jjakwi, roaming from one side of the Dune Sea to the other, looking for broken down speeders, crashed ships, and the tastiest of all Jawa pursuits: unclaimed droids.

 

No, poor Vizxiz had a hard time fitting in. Many of the Jjakwi’s clan were hard pressed to deal with him, grudgingly approaching him to repair or requisition tools. Behind his back they delighted in teasing him about his height (he was the shortest one in his crew) and his sight (Vizxiz’s eyes didn’t glow as brightly as his peers, earning him the nickname “Vizxiz oytia vyzt gr’eek!” loosely translated to “Vizxiz dim-seer” from a local rough Huttese translation to Basic from Jawaese).

 

One day the Jjakwi V was caught in a late-night sand storm. And, without Ulnazrik, their mystical all-seer to steer them through the hissing gritty mist, the crew had no choice but to sit and wait. Hours later, when it seemed no hope was in sight, Clan-Chief Tyaqua happened to notice that the crawler was getting hemmed in by huge drifts of sand. Now it’s good to note here that not only was Tyaqua the crawler’s clan chieftan, he was also the union boss of the Jjakwi’s crew and always the one the others would turn to when it came time to make a big decision.

 

His brilliant idea: “Abandon ship!”

 

So the crew of the Jjakwi V pulled their robes tightly around their little bodies, collected all the tools and droid parts they could (neglecting to pack any kind of water or nourishment), and headed out into the skin-cutting tempest of the storm. Jawas have a pretty good sense of direction, and superb night vision, but when it comes to navigating a late-night storm in the middle of the Dune Sea… Needless to say, they were never heard from again.

 

Until now.

 

It seems everyone forgot about Vizxiz Dim-Seer in all the commotion. He woke up to the silence of a new day, the light of the twin suns peeking through the tiny slit that served as the window to his quarters and tool shop. In a panic, Vizxiz ran from one end of the crawler to another, unable to find a door that wasn’t blocked, until he looked up and spotted the dorsal hatch above the clan-chief’s sleeper pod. That, he reasoned, had to be how the others left.

 

Vizxiz may not have been the tallest or brightest-seeing of the Jawas aboard the Jjakwi V, but given half a chance his crew might have recognized him as a pretty smart thinker. Vizxiz pieced together a holocommunicator from spare parts and the tiny tools that were made for his little rodent-like hands, toiling against the Jawa code of “Not look for uses in salvaged item, but rather to imagine someone else who might find use for it.” (1) Before too long he had established communication with the clan leader of the Zkozk VI, a sandcrawler just 74 kilometers away.

 

He stands there today, frantically trying to explain his situation as the Zkozk makes its long, slow crawl toward his rescue.

 

 

 

CAPTURED MOMENTS LINKS

“The Sad Tale of Arlon and Jurie”

 

RESOURCES

(1) The Jawa Code – from a Wookieepedia reference.

 

If you have a favorite “captured moment” scene, screenshot it and send it to me (swtorliferp(at)gmail.com). If you’ve got a story to go along with it, let’s hear it; or if you want to see what I can make up, we can do that too. ((The RP XP with MJ)) appears exclusively on swtor-life.com. You can contact MJ directly by writing to swtorliferp(at)gmail, leave a comment, or follow him on Twitter @MJswtor.

 

Tags: Captured Moments, RP, RP XP with MJ