Resource Fanfic Writer's Desk: Your Place for Writing Discussion, Questions, and Advice

Is there a price value on the load of spice that Han dumped, which resulted in his being hunted by Jabba? That might give you an idea of what $1 million or such may be, if we figure that lost was a significant financial blow to Jabba.

Plus how much did Luke get for his old speeder on Tatooine? That’s probably the equivalent of what a crap car was worth in the 1970’s - like $200 or $300.

 

Well Obi Wan wanted to pay Han 2000 credits on Tatooine if I remember corrcetly, so unless he or Luke had some money before we can assume that they got around 2000 credits for the speeder. Luke also says it´s, in his mind, a very low price so lets assume it to be the equivalent of selling a crap car for 200 dollar. Which would, roughly, give us 1 dollar = 10 credits.

 

In my main fic, 1 credit = 1$ = 1€. KISS

 

Your characters barter with kisses?

Explains why they are so popular.

 

Seems like you have already found a logical conversion, but there is this "Wanted" poster from one of the comics. Maybe if you can make out some of the bounties you can look up some bounties for modern-day "political criminals" and work out a conversion from there.

 

I thought KISS stood for "keep it simple, stupid"...?!

 

It can do.

Dots between letters, makes clear that an acronym was intended, but without, either interpretation is fair game.

 

Okie-dokie, then... it's a band of four guys with dramatic facial paint, who really, really like to stick out their tongues. Like this:

 

Hello all

I am currently rewriting my Star Wars version of a prison breakout, which is based on the real Great Escape from Stalag Luft III in WWII and also on the escapes from the infamous Colditz Castle, but I am slightly stuck on a few details at present.

1. With the prisons that I have read about and seen in the franchise, i.e. Rogue One's Wobani Imperial Labor Camp, would it have been at all possible to plan and execute an escape underneath the noses of the Imperials?

2. In the Great Escape, only two men out of the original 250 successfully managed to evade the Germans. With all of the technology that the Galactic Empire has at its disposal, such as droids and so on, would the prisoners have been able to make a "home run" and make it back to friendly space?

 

Welcome to fanfic Kyber Acyk! That's a great fic concept you have there; I'm looking forward to reading it.

IMO the answers to both of your questions is yes, definitely, it's possible, although you'd need to work on some elements such as:

The prisoners need a way to communicate and organise that's innocuous to Imperial surveillance; e.g. a code that uses everyday words to mean escape-related things, or a custom form of sign language (possibly using alien appendages if you have any aliens in your story), or messages written in the dirt while prisoners perform hard labour etc. A classic from RL prison stories is people tapping in morse code against the wall of their cell to communicate with the prisoners next door – that may not work in a SW story because there would be sensors in the walls, but there's got to be a way to adapt it.

The escape method would have to involve some skulduggery to disable or fool sensors and other electronic surveillance systems. This could be low-tech (e.g. digging your tunnels in an area where there are lots of moles or cutting a fence in an area where there are other creatures so that your activity gets confused with theirs) or high-tech (e.g. a datapad or equivalent somehow gets smuggled inside the prison, or a probe droid gets captured and hacked to redirect surveillance devices elsewhere).

Some SW Imperial costumes are great for hiding your identity (stormtrooper armour, pilot gear or the landing pad officer thingie Jyn wears in Rogue One), but unless your characters are working in a factory that produces those, they can't get them without capturing Imperials or breaking into the troopers' stores, and that might not go unnoticed for long (unless, again, they smuggle the armour out piece by piece and somehow manage to have it recorded it as defective/discarded). Plain old fabric uniforms would work, but that's a problem for aliens.

The escapees who are going to survive will obviously need to steal a ship or stow away on one at some point. If any piloting is involved, there has to be a pilot among your characters; if any commando-like operation is involved, there has to be at least one character who knows about such things; if any slicing is involved, you need a slicer, etc.

That's my first thoughts, I may be back later with more

 

Thank you very much for your reply Chyntuck - I appreciate it


And most of the POWs in the story are Galactic Alliance pilots and gunners much like the real life; Stalag Luft III was a camp for captured air force personnel. I have been thinking of going down the route of a secret language using real life sign language hand gestures and also employing Twi'lek pilots and gunners to use their lekku as a back up message system.

In the WWII escape stories that I have read, prisoners would try to find a completely unassuming location to dig their tunnels that was not covered by underground sensors, i.e. the camp laundry, the shower blocks or the camp theatre, so I guess that could be one way for the group to dig their way to freedom.

And another escape route in the movie was when Hendley and Blythe made their way to a German airfield and steal a small two-seater plane. So I was thinking they might be able to make it to an Empire spaceport nearby and "borrow" some TIE fighters or a transport shuttle to make it back home.

With regards to the Imperial uniforms, I came across reports that POWs made their own German uniforms from scrounged fabrics or their own uniforms, so I think it could work if the characters are put to work in a clothing factory; taking left over pieces to create fabric uniforms and taking the "defective" sets of armour to get the armour serviceable and able to be used in the escape.

~ Kyber

 

You're welcome! A couple comments:

I was thinking of Twi'leks and Togrutas too for lekku-language. Another option could be Bothans; there's quite a bit in Legends about how the rippling of their fur expresses feelings; maybe you could build on that?

Hmmm. My interpretation of the Empire (but that's a strictly personal opinion of course) is that they wouldn't leave anything to chance, so my assumption was that there would be sensors everywhere in the prison – but I'm sure you can make it work having places without sensors. Yet another option could be a setup like Wobani in Rogue One, where the prison (where the prisoners are held) is in one place and the labour camp in another (where they have to be taken every day). This opens up possibilities for the escape spot to be in an open field, for instance, or in the transport that ferries the prisoners on a daily basis.

Did you read Rebel Rising? There are a few chapters about the layout and organisation of Wobani camp that could give you more ideas.

I absolutely love the concept of this story. If you don't see me in your story thread within 24 hours of your first post, please PM me to tell me that it's up!

 

A classic I can see the Empire use is placing the prison in the middle of a harsher environment where you die if you lack the right clothes/water/food/breather-mask/etc., you need to return to the prison to survive. The wall is purely symbolic, if it’s even there, the guards usually wait a day or two before sending tracking-beast units to retrieve prisoners who have tried to escape just to show how futile it is.

But there is also the chance that they have given the prison right to a private contractor (I can see the right to use the prisoners as slave-labour as part of the contract) or are just dumping their prisoners on the nearest planet with a prison. Telling that planet that the prisoner is now their problem.

 

Actually, one of the X-wing novels has the hero escaping from an Imperial prison, although there were some extenuating circumstances.

There was also an excellent book on Axis POWs in America and their efforts to escape. All but one were captured. Their biggest problem was that once they had escaped, there was really no way to get back to Europe. But they also tried to change their clothes, etc. Two of them told the locals that they were Boy Scouts...and the locals believed them!

 

I would generally agree with Gamiel 's second paragraph.

Imperial military units and bases have been known to not have top-of-the-line equipment, so as long as there are no special prisoners there, I can see the Empire not supplying a prison with that much in the way of security.

For instance, Kessel had drokk-all!

 

I agree with both of you, but I do think that there would be a difference between an Imperial prison for any old prisoner and an Imperial prison for captured officers of the Rebel Alliance. I'd expect the latter to be a high-security type of prison, whereas the former (like Kessel) would just be a dumping ground. But there again that's a personal opinion, YMMV

 

That is exactly what I am saying. If it is a place for any old prisoners, eg. not Command, and not Intelligence personnel, I don't think Kyber Acyk 's inmates would be having to deal with that much in the way of sophisticated countermeasures.

MMIOTSPAYM (My Mileage Is on The Same Page As Your Mileage).

 

Maybe it's me overinterpreting how closely Kyber Acyk intends to stick to the Great Escape scenario. My understanding, or rather my guess (since he doesn't spell it out in his post other than mentioning the film title) was that he's going to have all the escape artists in the same prison like in the film, which would entail extra security.

 

Does anyone know exactly when Obi-Wan sends the message warning the Jedi away from the Temple as shown in Rebels in the Kanan comic? I am writing an alternate universe story that starts in the middle of ROTS, and I wasn't sure if Obi-Wan sends his message when he changes the signal to warn Jedi away, or at another time, because he mentions the Empire in his warning and I don't think he knew about the Empire at that point.

 

So, I hope that this is the appropriate thread for this. I have multiple things open, but I'll only manage to write if I, err, focus on one. Which one do I pick first?

- The belated, non-competitive challenge response for the OTP Thread's Fairy Tale...in Space! , featuring one Canon and two Legends characters in Beyond: Legends - no limit, kind of scared of how people will rip me apart, but I want to do it so.much.

- The competitive challenge response to the OC Revolution challenge, featuring two OCs - due by January 01st, but the easiest to finish (which I didn't expect it would be!)

- Combined non-competitive Memorable Memories and competitive Fanon Horror challenge responses, due by December 27th

- The next chapter of my silliest of silly fics, which WarmNyota_SweetAyesha is impatient about.

 

And sorry for not going into more detail about the story in my initial post Chyn, but yes, this particular camp will house some of the most prolific, and repeat, escapees.

 

Ewok Poet - the OTP one.

Chyntuck - Oh right. I forgot about the nature of those particular prisoners.

Pain and Suffering - In ROTS, Obi Wan's warning to stay away from Coruscant, and maybe go see a movie till things settle a bit, was when he was at the Temple with Yoda.