Firefly Characters #7 of 7: The Ship

In preparation for this year's Christmas Game, I'm going through the process of converting the crew of Betty from the Serenity system to Firefly. In effect, this actually means rebuilding the characters from the ground up, but that's okay. Nonetheless, it may be worth comparing to the previous version.

In the Firefly RPG, as in the Serenity RPG before it, ships are treated largely as characters in their own right - they have Attributes, Distinctions, and Signature Assets. Ships don't have skills, but that appears to be the only significant omission. As for the Serenity RPG, this is an interesting and entirely approach to handling ships in this game.

Oddly enough, my previous stats ofr Betty have never actually seen use - the ship was actually modelled as a Firefly in the first one-shot and didn't appear at all in the second. Therefore, what follows is an entirely new construction.

Betty's three Distinctions are "Auriga Class Transport", which is new, "Battle-Scarred", and "Smuggler's Delight", and her two Signature Assets "Computer-Assisted Controls" and "Hidden Storage". Between them, these model both the ship's extreme age and her use in smuggling cargo.

Betty: Modified Auriga Class Mid-Bulk Transport

Attributes

Engine d10
Hull d8
Systems d6

Distinctions

Auriga Class Transport
Designed as a multi-purpose boat, the Auriga Class Transport is now falling out of use due to the venerable nature of its design. Although variations exist, all Auriga Class ships are engineered with certain fixed compartments: cargo hold, engine room, and bridge.
Runnin' On Empty: Create a Low Fuel d8 Complication to step up Engines for the rest of the scene.

Battle-Scarred
Your ship proudly displays the scars of many battles fought during the Unification War. Though she's showing signs of wear, your boat's still here. Guess that means somethin'.
That Part Don't Work Anyway: Step back your ship's Hull Attribute for the rest of the scene to step back a new Complication that's just been inflicted on your ship.

Smuggler's Delight
Certain ships have been modified to address the needs of "privacy-minded" crews.

Signature Assets

Computer-Assisted Controls: d8
As part of the modification for paraplegic use, Vriess has installed significant computer assistance in the controls. This is frequently useful, but also somewhat glitchy.

Hidden Storage: d8
Salvaging derelicts is good work, provided a captain has the license for it. For those operating outside the Law, hidden storage compartments provide ways to stash precious cargo, illegal salvage, etc.

Roleplaying Notes

"This piece of gosa is even older than I am!"

If the Firefly class is the iconic ship design of the current era of mercantalism, then the Auriga-class would be the standard-bearer for an earlier age. You don't see many of them around these days, but half a century ago they were near-ubiquitous in the spacelanes. Through a combination of design and excellent build quality, the Bernard-Lingotti Corporation managed to capture lightning in a bottle. Between five slightly different official models, and any number of knock-off designs, more than 200,000 Auriga-class vessels were commissioned before the line was finally superseded.

Betty started her operational service as a fairly standard 05-model Auriga class, outfitted for cargo lifting. However, even from the outset she was maintained with exceptional care, thus explaining why she remains in active service even so long after her first registration.

Over the decades, Betty has been reconfigured and repurposed several times. Somewhere along the line, her entire engine assembly was removed and replaced with the integrated systems and power plant from a Firefly-class vessel, a modification that vastly extended her operational lifespan, but one that is itself showing its age. At least one owner was of a sufficiently larcenous bent as to have all manner of hidey-holes fitted for the concealment of small, high-value (and probably illegal) cargoes. And Vriess has gone to some lengths to further advance the ship's systems, installing some highly illegal transponder-foiling software, as well as accessibility controls allowing a pilot to fly the ship without the use of his legs.

Betty's service in the Unification War was, regrettably, rather unedifying. Her previous owner was a Browncoat sympathiser, and took to running weapons and materiel. He was promptly captured by the Alliance, tried as a war criminal, and shot. Betty spent the rest of the war locked in an impound, before being auctioned off. Thus, she made her way into the hands of Frank Elgyn. 'Course, whether her new use is any better than smuggling weapons is a matter of some debate...

Firefly House Rule: The Noble Sacrifice

One of the things that the Firefly RPG deliberately doesn't cover is a rule for death & dying. Characters can be Taken Out of a scene, but this is generally assumed not to mean "killed", at least for PCs. The book includes a sidebar saying that this is deliberate, and that groups should work out for themselves what, if anything, they want to do about death.

So I've given some thought, and here it is:

Noble Sacrifice

At any point, a player can declare that his PC will make a Noble Sacrifice, giving up his or her life for the good of the Crew. At this point, all hostile NPCs are immediately Taken Out of the scene (the GM will decide what happens to them - as with PCs, this doesn't necessarily mean "killed", or even "captured").

Thereafter, the player gets to narrate the rest of the scene, including the PC's inevitable, heroic, and ultimately tragic, death.

Any other PCs involved in the scene can at this point opt to gain 1 PP in return for accepting a d6 "Traumatised" Complication. Or, if they're hard as nails, they can choose not to.

Firefly Characters #6 of 7: The Mechanic

In preparation for this year's Christmas Game, I'm going through the process of converting the crew of Betty from the Serenity system to Firefly. In effect, this actually means rebuilding the characters from the ground up, but that's okay. Nonetheless, it may be worth comparing to the previous version.

As I discussed in my earlier post, it is my intent to build these characters by first working out the three most important things about the characters, and using that to select Distinctions. Further, as a rough rule of thumb, I intend to select two of these from the depiction of the characters in "Alien: Resurrection", and add a third to better suit the character's use in home games.

The most obvious aspect of Vriess' character is his disability - the character is in a wheelchair. Unfortunately, I found in the "Firefly: Furiously Fast" one-shot that this could lead to a player focussing on what the character couldn't do, rather than what he could. However, I'm hopeful that this will actually not be the case in the Firefly RPG - the character is assigned the "Invalid" Distinction, which is a clear fit, and also has his chair listed as a Signature Asset. Hopefully, this will turn a seeming weakness into a strength, without totally negating a key part of the character.

The other Distinctions for the character are the obvious "Ship's Mechanic" role, and "Steely Reserves" - Vriess has had a knock, but he's a tough one.

John Vriess: Engineer

Attributes

Mental d10
Physical d8
Social d6

Skills

Craft d4
Drive d6
Fight d4
Fix (Engines) d12
Fly (Transports) d6
Focus d8
Influence d6
Know (Art) d6
Labour d4
Move d4
Notice d6
Operate (Machinery) d10
Perform d4
Shoot d6
Sneak d4
Survive d6
Throw d4
Treat d4
Trick d4

Distinctions

Ship's Mechanic
A ship's a living thing, no matter what they say. You can feel when she's sick, and she makes you proud when she's well.
Miracle Worker: If you replace your Fix Skill with a d4 for your next roll, gain a Big Damn Hero Die equal to that Skill's normal die rating if your roll is successful.

Steely Reserves
People think you're a pushover. They're always a mite surprised when you don't bend.
Not Today: When you take a Complication to stay in a fight, you can spend 1 PP to double an appropriate Attribute in your next roll.

Invalid
You can't get much of anywhere without somebody's help.

Signature Assets

The Chair: d8
Vriess has been working on his chair for years, constantly modifying and refitting. Part mechanised transport and part concealed arsenal, it is practically designed to foil a weapons scanner.

Roleplaying Notes

To hear Vriess tell it, he was born in battle at Serenity Valley. He was serving with the Browncoats when a stray bit of shrapnel hit him in the lower back. In that instant, the man he had been was killed, and the man he is today was born.

His reticence to talk about his life prior to this moment has led others to conclude that he doesn't like to talk about his injury, but the truth is quite different. To his way of thinkin', there's no point in dwelling on the past and on what was lost. He reckons he's already survived the very worst the 'Verse can throw at a man, and so he can live without fear. He's actually quite cheerful about it.

After the war, Vriess spent a lot of time in a Veteran's hospital, where he came to profoundly hate doctors, but more especially that breed to beautiful young woman who will come and 'cheer' patients with their sympathy. Bad enough that he was disabled, without them inflicting new torment on him by looking at him as a cripple, instead of as a man.

Eventually, he had had enough, and he fled the hospital, only to find a new hell outside. Nobody had any time for injured vets, especially an injured vet from the 'wrong' side. Work was nigh-impossible to find, and starvation beckoned until an old foe, Frank Elgyn, crossed his path. Elgyn was puttin' together a crew for his ship, and he needed a good mechanic. Although they had been on opposite sides in the war, he knew ability trumped sentiment, and so a deal was struck. And in the years since, the two have forged a strong, if quiet, friendship.

Firefly Characters #5 of 7: The Newbie

In preparation for this year's Christmas Game, I'm going through the process of converting the crew of Betty from the Serenity system to Firefly. In effect, this actually means rebuilding the characters from the ground up, but that's okay. Nonetheless, it may be worth comparing to the previous version.

As I discussed in my earlier post, it is my intent to build these characters by first working out the three most important things about the characters, and using that to select Distinctions. Further, as a rough rule of thumb, I intend to select two of these from the depiction of the characters in "Alien: Resurrection", and add a third to better suit the character's use in home games.

In this regard, Call is a little tricky - the key feature of the character in "Alien: Resurrection" is that she turns out to be an Auton, an artificial person. Of course, Autons aren't a feature of the Firefly 'Verse, and after trying this out in the "Firefly: Furiously Fast" game it was felt that this element of the cross-over was best avoided. So Call needs some rework to make fit.

Fortunately, it's possible to rewrite her background to keep the core of the character intact: make her hugely secretive with something dark in her past, give her infiltration and computer skills, and retain her role as ship's technician. With that in mind then I've assigned her the Invisible Ops Distinction to reflect her hidden agenda in the film, Mysterious Past to reflect the big, dark secret she has (albeit a different one from the film), and Wet Behind the Ears to reflect her being the newbie on the ship.

Annalee Call: Technician

Attributes

Mental d10
Physical d6
Social d8

Skills

Craft d4
Drive d6
Fight d8
Fix (Hotwire) d8
Fly d6
Focus d4
Influence d4
Know (Electronics) d8
Labour d4
Move d4
Notice d6
Operate (Security Systems) d12
Perform d4
Shoot d4
Sneak (In Plain Sight) d8
Survive d4
Throw d4
Treat d4
Trick d6

Distinctions

Invisible Ops
I could tell you what I do, but then I'd have to kill you and everyone on this ship and I do hate making a mess
We Were Never Here: When acting on your secret orders, spend 1 PP to step up or double Sneak for an Action.

Mysterious Past
You weren't born to the life you're livin' now.
Ghosts of Yesterday: Create a d8 Complication relating to your history to step up your Fight, Know, or Sneak for a scene. This Complication cannot be stepped back by spending PPs to activate Opportunities.

Wet Behind the Ears
Folks say you're naive. It ain't that. You just grew up a mite sheltered, is all.

Signature Assets

There's an App for That: d8
Call carries a bunch of electronic gizmos about her person. These are useful for disrupting the operation of many electronic systems.

Roleplaying Notes

The newest member of Betty's crew, Call seldom talks about her past. She was born to an unremarkable middle-class family on an unremarkable planet, and enrolled to an unremarkable school. However, her native intelligence, coupled with her affinity for computers let to her quickly being fast-tracked into a top-notch religious school. The rigourous discipline of the school, coupled with the intensive learning environment, lead her to joke that she was built, rather than born.

In her inevitable teenage rebellion, Call avoided the classic "drink and boys" mix, in favour of hacking and burglary. She proved quite adept at this, and so avoided being caught for all but the most minor of infractions. But, of course, since getting caught was a large part of her purpose, this merely inspired her to ever-greater exploits. Eventually, people got hurt.

After her schooling, Call spent some time drifting from one job to another. She could have easily commanded a high wage in a legitimate career, but she could never stomach the tedium. And so, a few months ago she signed on with the crew of Betty, with no real goal than just seeing more of the universe.

Call is an inherently secretive person. She has several talents that she'd simply rather people didn't know about, even those people closest to her. And she's fairly prone to going off-mission, in order to pursue some agenda of her own. Still, outright betrayal is not really her scene - she's more than smart enough to realise the value in not burning bridges.

Firefly Characters #4 of 7: The Pilot

In preparation for this year's Christmas Game, I'm going through the process of converting the crew of Betty from the Serenity system to Firefly. In effect, this actually means rebuilding the characters from the ground up, but that's okay. Nonetheless, it may be worth comparing to the previous version.

As I discussed in my earlier post, it is my intent to build these characters by first working out the three most important things about the characters, and using that to select Distinctions. Further, as a rough rule of thumb, I intend to select two of these from the depiction of the characters in "Alien: Resurrection", and add a third to better suit the character's use in home games.

Sabra has always been the most difficult of the characters to generate, as there was very little to hang the character on. But Firefly makes it almost ridiculously easy to generate the character: the "Ship's Pilot" and "Hitched" Distinctions match the two things we know about her from the film, leaving only one to choose. For the upcoming adventure I have created a new Distinction, "Not Guilty", reflecting the fact that Sabra was the only character not to feature in the previous "Bound by Law" adventure. The fact that she, alone of all the characters, doesn't have a criminal record is liable to prove very useful...

Sabra Hillard: Pilot

Attributes

Mental d8
Physical d8
Social d8

Skills

Craft d4
Drive d6
Fight d4
Fix d4
Fly (Transports) d10
Focus d4
Influence d8
Know d4
Labour d4
Move d8
Notice d8
Operate (Computers) d6
Perform d4
Shoot d4
Sneak (Surveillance) d8
Survive d4
Throw d4
Treat d6
Trick d10

Distinctions

Ship's Pilot
The list of folks wanting to hire you is longer than your arm. You're just that good.
Born Behind the Wheel: Spend 1 PP to step up or double your ship's Engines Attribute for your next roll.

Not Guilty
You may have been before the magistrate, but nothin's ever stuck.
These Aren't the Goods You're Looking For: Step back your Physical die to step up your Social die when convincing someone you're not a threat.

Hitched
You ever been with a warrior woman?

Signature Assets

Betty: d8
She may be a piece of le se, but Betty can still turn a trick or two with Sabra at the helm.

Roleplaying Notes

Sabra Hillard was born in the Black, and has lived most of her life out there. Indeed, she prefers the feel of artificial gravity to the real thing.

Growing up, Hillard was constantly on the move, constantly seeing new places, new faces. And, when the time came, she eagerly joined the Trader's Guild, following the same career as her parents before her. And she was happy there for several years.

But in time, even sticking with the same job proved to be stifling to her, and so when the opportunity came to sign on with Betty, she eagerly did so. Shortly thereafter, she became involved with the captain, and things were good.

Once again, though, Hillard is beginning to find the routine of it all uncomfortable. She's starting to think that her future is elsewhere again. It's not that she wants to leave; it's just that she's not sure she can stay.

Firefly Characters #3 of 7: The First Officer

In preparation for this year's Christmas Game, I'm going through the process of converting the crew of Betty from the Serenity system to Firefly. In effect, this actually means rebuilding the characters from the ground up, but that's okay. Nonetheless, it may be worth comparing to the previous version.

As I discussed in my earlier post, it is my intent to build these characters by first working out the three most important things about the characters, and using that to select Distinctions. Further, as a rough rule of thumb, I intend to select two of these from the depiction of the characters in "Alien: Resurrection", and add a third to better suit the character's use in home games.

In the case of Christie, then, the two Distinctions from the film are simple: we know he's the First Mate, and we know he is a crack shot specialising in twinned pistols. For the third, I have selected Friends in Low Places, to tie in to the background I have invented for the character. From there, it was all reasonably easy...

Christie: First Officer

Attributes

Mental d8
Physical d8
Social d8

Skills

Craft d8
Drive d6
Fight (Kung Fu) d8
Fix d4
Fly d4
Focus d4
Influence (Streetwise) d6
Know d4
Labour d6
Move d8
Notice d8
Operate d6
Perform d4
Shoot (Trick Shots) d10
Sneak d4
Survive d4
Throw d6
Treat d4
Trick d4

Distinctions

First Mate
You're the captain's right hand, but as often as not you're his fist.

Dead Eye
You're cool under fire and a keen shot.
Take Aim: Step back Move until the end of the scene to create an In My Crosshairs d8 Asset.

Friends in Low Places
Those of us on the Rim don't have much, but we stick together. There's a power in that.
I Know a Guy: Spend 1 PP to create a d8 Asset when you call in a shady friend with the skills you need.

Signature Assets

Guns Akimbo: d8
Christie has two pistols concealed in the sleeves of his greatcoat. These are attached, so cannot be disarmed, but neither can he "drop them!"

Roleplaying Notes

Christie has lived a hard life, partly through outrageous fortune, and partly through his own mistakes. His first error was being born the son of a writer who aspired to be dirt-poor. On Osiris, that was a minor transgression, although one that was probably forgivable. But his unforgivable sin was that his mother was the daughter of one of the planet's richest advocates. When she elected to marry Christie's father, the old bastard disowned her, cut her off from all connections, and then systematically blackballed Christie's father.

Nonetheless, Christie's parents knew the value of a good education and of refined manners, and they ensured their son acquired both. Unfortunately, amongst the poor that only made their son a target. Christie was bullied for years, right up to the point where he fought back - sadly, a little too well. That was the last time he was ever bullied, but it was also the last time he went to school, or saw his parents. He ran - better that than a murder rap.

During the war, Christie fought for the Alliance, purely because the military gave him a place in the 'Verse. Sadly, once the war was done, his family connections bit him again, and he was out. That was when he signed on with Elgyn, and found a new place for himself.

Christie is broadly loyal to his captain and his crewmates, but he is very definitely his own man. In particular, he won't accept being bullied. He also now takes a somewhat perverse pride in remaining poor - he appreciates what money can do, but prefers to use it for short-term pleasure, rather than accumulating it and risking becoming his grandfather.

Fixed and Flexible Rules

In most games, because of the competitive nature of the game, the rules need to be fixed, clear, and (hopefully) complete. At no point during play should you reach a point where you have to ask "what happens now?", because if you've reached that point then you are in a position that someone has to make a decision that will favour one side or the other. (Note that this even applies to games with an impartial referee in place - the job of the referee is to apply the rules, not to cover for any holes in them.)

Due to the cooperative nature of roleplaying games, however, an exception can be made. Provided the players trust the GM to be fair, the rules don't have to be fixed and complete. And this is a good thing, because the range of scenarios covered by roleplaying games is vastly different from other types of games.

This gives the designers of RPGs a choice: they can either attempt to provide a comprehensive ruleset, covering as many possibilities as possible, and trying to eliminate the corner cases; or they can leave sections of the ruleset vague and flexible, and let the GM fill in the blanks as needed.

(You can see examples of both approaches in D&D: 3e and 4e both attempted to provide comprehensive rules; 5e has deliberately been designed with flexibility and GM rulings in mind.)

I don't think there is a 'correct' approach here: many players will enjoy the security that comes from knowing exactly how things will work ahead of time... but any attempt to provide a complete ruleset is ultimately doomed to failure.

However, there is definitely at least one 'wrong' approach, which is to write an intentionally vague and flexible ruleset and then to start providing large numbers of "official rulings". Because what that means is there actually is a 'correct' way to play the game; it's just that the designers aren't going to tell us what it is.

If the game is intended to be left open for GM judgement calls, then leave it open for GM judgement calls. Don't immediately start closing up all those gaps you deliberately left in place!

(Of course, the above doesn't apply to places where the rules are simply mistaken - where they simply don't say what they were intended to say. However, even that isn't really a place for 'official rulings' - that's a matter for errata.)

The Character Sheet Blues

Why is it that every RPG ever seems to be saddled with bad character sheets?

Okay, that's a serious exaggeration, but it really does seem that most if not all games have official sheets that are almost but never quite what you really want.

The latest offender is the Firefly RPG, which actually has quite a good sheet. It's a single page in landscape format. Top and centre are the attributes and skills, which have rather neat visual representations (and which make replacing this sheet with another very unappealing). To the right are the character's three distinctions, complete with triggers. And on the left we have things like the character's name, background, and appearance, and then a box for Signature Assets.

Shiny! Except...

In the Firefly RPG, each Distinction and Signature Asset has a little block of descriptive text. This same text appears in all the pre-gen character write-ups. It's very nice. And it's missing in the Distinctions box. Likewise, the Signature Assets box omits the spaces for the Asset triggers entirely. It's really close to being ideal... and really painful that it just misses it.

The sheet also has two other flaws - one thing that should be there but isn't, and two things that shouldn't be there but are. Specifically, each character should have an "Episode Guide", being a list of episodes that they've been in previously. This works somewhat like XP in other games. These really should appear on the character sheet, as they'd be good to have.

Conversely, the sheet has spaces for the character's Plot Points, and five different types of Big Damn Hero dice. But because these change quite often, it's better to handle these using tokens handed out during play (just as you would Assets and Complications) - Plot Points are best done with poker chips, while for BDH dice you could either use literal dice (colour-coded for convenience, of course), or generate some cards to that effect. Or, all else failing, just use a post-it note.

(Firefly doesn't have any concept of hit points, or anything equivalent. But for systems that do use hit points, I've long been an advocate of not including a box for these on the character sheet. Again, just use a post-it note, and use the space freed up for something more worthwhile.)

To come so near, and yet not quite get things just right is frustrating. Especially since I can see what would need done to fix it, but just don't have the means. Sigh.

The Four Act Structure

I've been reading through a lot of the published Firefly adventures recently, and I was struck by something in the structure - they all have exactly four acts. It took me a while to realise this, as I'd expected some to have three, some five, or whatever; or perhaps for the number of acts to vary with the length of the adventure. But, no. Four acts it is; no more, no less.

Now, I was of course familiar with the 'classical' five-act structure: introduction, rising action, climax, falling action, denouement. And I was equally familiar with the compression of this into the three-act structure (where the falling action is compressed to the "final scare" and the denouement is almost non-existent). But I hadn't encountered a four act structure before.

(Incidentally, how come I had to learn all this from reading JMS talking about crafting "Babylon 5"? Why wasn't this covered in English at High School, even at CSYS level?)

I therefore did some investigation and found out what was going on. For obvious reasons, the three-act structure can also be described as "beginning-middle-end". However, the problem with this in terms of movies or TV shows is that the beginning and the end are usually quite short and self-contained, while the middle is extremely long. Therefore, it is common to define a mid-point in the story, and thus split the "middle" into two acts, thus giving beginning-mid-dle-end. Perhaps more importantly, though, it's important that this mid-point has some sort of meaning - that is, the second act "mid" should be somehow different from the third act "dle", in terms of what is happening, or of tone, or whatever.

(Not coincidentally, American TV shows are structured so that the ad breaks fall between the acts. Or, at least, they should be.)

What this means, as far as story goes, is that we have something like this:

• Pre-credits: Introduction, and "inciting incident"
• Credits, and ad break.
• Act One: Immediate reaction to "inciting incident". Statement of the problem.
• Ad break
• Act Two: Attempt to fix the problem. Doesn't work. Add complication.
• Ad break
• Act Three: Second attempt to fix the problem. Partial success. Raise the stakes.
• Ad break
• Act Four: Completion of the solution.
• Ad break
• Denouement: All wrapped up nicely. Coincidentally in 42 minutes. Huzzah!
• End Credits

Of course, that's not an absolute template, or TV would be incredibly dull. But it's pretty good.

What this means in terms of RPGs, and especially for something like the Firefly RPG (which deliberately models itself on a TV show) is that a session can be structured into four distinct parts. Each part should be 'about' something, probably representing a distinct step in solving the 'problem' of the session, coming naturally to a climax in Act Four. Plus, it's useful for pacing purposes - if you have 3 hours in the session, each Act should be about 35 minutes long; if you have 5 hours, each act can stretch to 65 minutes. (Plus 10 mins each for Introduction and Denouement; and a few minutes for breaks, waiting for late players, and general goofing around.)

(This of course needs to be flexible. But that goes without saying.)

Unfortunately, defining all that's the easy bit. Somewhat harder will be populating the various tags as required for the "Firefly: Inglorious" game in a few weeks.

Chameleon

I've just hit upon the solution to my difficulties with the character of Sabra in Firefly one-shots!

As I mentioned a few posts ago, I'm inclined to think that the best way to create characters for this game is to write down the three most important things about the character, and use these to create the character's Distinctions - probably the key defining element of characters in this game.

However, Sabra had always struck me as something of a 'void' character - she's the ship's pilot, she's involved with the Captain, but other than that we know virtually nothing about her. Well, except that she gets killed by an alien while swimming.

So, I was trying to come up with a good "third thing" about the character. And, being honest, I was doing so with one eye on the upcoming Christmas Game. However, I kept hitting on a criticism: "isn't it incredibly convenient that she just happens to..." Plus, of course, if she just happens to fit this adventure, she probably doesn't fit the next one.

Then the solution hit me: what if this character didn't have a fixed "third thing", but was instead built with two 'permanent' Distinctions with a third assigned at the time so that she always "just happens" to fit the adventure?

(Which is not without precedent in the Firefly RPG - one of the things that threw me on my first glance through the book was that the character of Saffron was actually quite different from Yo-Saff-Bridge. Because they took the wise decision to limit the complexity of NPCs, the publishers established that it was legitimate to rebuild such characters if they need to play different roles in different Episodes.)

So, that's my solution: Sabra will be built with the "Ship's Pilot" and (probably) "Hitched" Distinctions, plus a third "Chameleon" Distinction which will be assigned closer to the time. And that's that problem solved. Huzzah!