Vril Vrakth

"Inquisitor Draco will pay me well for bringing him your battered bodies in manacles!"

- Vril Vrakth

Vril Vrakth was a male Zabrak, who was born during the last years of the Galactic Republic. He was raised on a colony world, where life was harsh and the settlers soon became divided by a series of violent wars. Vrakth originally trained as a soldier, so that he could participate in the conflict, but he soon switched careers and became a scout. The combat and survival skills he learned helped to keep him alive and he eventually caught the attention of Jeyrs Hundar, a bounty hunter who was passing through the world while chasing a bounty. Impressed by Vrakth's potential, he offered to train Vrakth to become an apprentice to him. The Zabrak agreed and he traveled off-world with Hundar to learn the tricks of the bounty hunter trade. Vrakth adapted well to his new career and after Hundar was killed by a violent Rodian that they were hunting, he was able to capture the Rodian on his own and he used this success to establish himself as a bounty hunter.

During the Clone Wars, a galactic-scale conflict fought between the Galactic Republic and the Confederacy of Independent Systems, Vrakth was hired by a local Republic governor to hunt CIS generals. Following the end of the war, he began to work almost exclusively from the Republic's successor government, the Galactic Empire. In particular, he took assignments from Inquisitor Valin Draco, a Dark Side Adept who served the New Order. After Draco was almost killed by them on Almas by a group of agents working for the Alderaanian Resistance, an anti-Imperial resistance group that was based on Alderaan, the Inquisitor sent Vrakth to capture them. Vrakth learned that the agents were going to travel to the planet Nizon, so he went there and waited for them to arrive. The agents helped to stir up a revolt against Imperial control of Nizon and during the battle, they confronted and defeated Vrakth.

A career as a bounty hunter
During the waning years of the Galactic Republic, Vrakth was raised on a failed colony world, where conditions were too harsh to support much life. Food shortages were commonplace and sparked a series of violent settlement wars on the world for control of resources. Vrakth trained as a soldier, so that he could participate in the conflicts. However, he soon swapped careers and instead learned to become a scout. A bounty hunter named Jeyrs Hundar came to Vrakth's homeworld while in pursuit of a criminal and he met the young Zabrak. By this time, Vrakth was one of only a handful of surviving colonists and Hundar was impressed by his combat and survival skills, so took the young Zabrak on as an apprentice bounty hunter. Vrakth traveled offworld with his new master, who began to train him. He alternated between learning the skills of a hunter and those of a warrior, which eventually resulted in him becoming a crack-shot with a pistol. He would also assist Hundar by serving as his backup while he was chasing a bounty and by covering escape routes of his master's quarry. On occasion, he would aide Hundar more directly, by helping him to take down dangerous targets. However, Hundar was killed while they were trying to capture a dangerous Rodian. Vrakth was able to finish the job on his own and collect the bounty on the Rodian. His success helped him to establish his career as a bounty hunter.

Vrakth eventually took on his own apprentice, a Trandoshan called Koorst. He also obtained six LM-432 crab droids and he modified them, so that they could serve as scouts for him. With the outbreak of the Clone Wars, a galaxy-wide conflict fought between the Galactic Republic and the Confederacy of Independent Systems, Vrakth came to the attention of a local Republic governor, who hired him to hunt down CIS generals.

Tracking the Alderaanian Resistance agents
Following the end of the conflict, Vrakth began to work almost exclusively for the newly-formed Galactic Empire. In particular, he served Inquisitor Valin Draco, a Dark Side Adept who served the New Order. After Draco was severely injured in an encounter on Almas with a group of agents working for the Alderaanian Resistance, an anti-Imperial group that was based on Alderaan, the Inquisitor posted a bounty on them and sent Vrakth to collect it. Vrakth tailed them for a few weeks and when Senator Bail Organa, the leader of the Resistance, made a request to the Aldera University for information about the planet Nizon, Vrakth correctly assumed that that was where the Resistance team were going to go to.

Vrakth and Koorst flew to Nizon in CloakShape fighters. The Zabrak set himself up as a scout for the Imperial forces there, while he waited for the Alderaanians to arrive. He also planned to kill Sartok, the leader of the Nizon resistance, a rebel group that opposed the Empire's control of Nizon. The main Imperial operation on Nizon was the capture of the Nazren, a sentient species that was indigenous to Nizon, for use as slaves in the Sarlacc Project, a secret project to build a Super Star Destroyer prototype. The Imperials gave Vrakth a datachip which contained information about the project. They also allowed him to use a platform at Point Gold, an under-construction turbolaser battery located on Mount Antas, as his base of operations on Nizon. He kept his CloakShape fighter docked at a small landing bay on the edge of the platform, where it was guarded by some of his crab droids. As an additional defense, he loosened one of the plates that made up the floor of the platform to create a primitive trap, so that anyone who trod on it would fall through. Due to the threat posed by blade scorpions, a dangerous predator that lived on Nizon, he sent out his crab droids to search the planet for the Alderaanians, rather than do so himself. However, he did occasionally venture into Ahdjok, the capital city of Nizon, where he would ask people if they had seen any newcomers recently.

Confrontation at Point Gold
"Is this what you've caused all this difficulty over? Is this why a request was made to the Aldera University about this dustball? Well then, come and get if from me."

- Vril Vrakth

When the Nazren began to revolt against the Imperials, Vrakth rightly believed that the Alderaanian agents were behind it and he planned to use it as an opportunity to capture them. He believed that, by luring them to Point Gold, he would be able to defeat them, then turn the tide of the revolt and collect a large bounty from the Empire. While he prepared for combat, he remained in contact with Koorst, who was flying his CloakShape fighter in orbit of Nizon.

After the Nazren and Alderaanians captured a planetary control center in Martyr's Plaza that had been used to track asteroid fragments around Nizon, an Imperial officer contacted Vrakth. The officer told him to wait for any surviving Imperial officers to make their way from Ahdjok to Point Gold, and then destroy the Sarlacc Project datachip. The bounty hunter acknowledged the officer's order, but didn't promise to obey it. Knowing that the Alderaanians were seeking to learn more about the Sarlacc Project, Vrakth planned to instead use the datachip to lure them to Point Gold, where he could capture them. Wearing his battle armor, Vrakth stood at the edge of the platform waiting for them. The Alderaanian agents had seen a copy of the Imperial officer's conversation with Vrakth and took the bait, heading out to Point Gold to recover it. When Vrakth saw them, he held up the datachip in his hand and then used a voice amplifier to project his voice, enabling him to taunt them from a distance. Shortly afterwards, he engaged them in combat, but was defeated. Although the datachip was cracked and burned by the fight, the Alderaanian Resistance agents were able to recover it from Vrakth and eventually decoded it, learning that the Sarlacc Project involved a massive construction project in the Deep Core, which was coordinated from Coruscant.

Personality and traits
Vrakth was tenacious and self-reliant, which enabled him to survive the violent conflicts that plagued his homeworld. Following his decision to become a scout, he learned that prey should be hunted with caution and that most battles were won by those who could fire the fastest and withstand the most damage. He tried to put these principles into practice and as a bounty hunter, he used situations to his full advantage. For example when he traveled to Nizon, he planned to make the most of being there by hunting Sartok, in addition to the Alderaanian agents, who were his primary target. He could also adapt his plans to suit changes in circumstances, as shown when he used the Nazren uprising as an opportunity to lure the Alderaanian agents to Point Gold. He was astute and deduced that the Alderaanians were going to travel to Nizon and later, that they were in part responsible for the Nazren uprising. However, he knew when not to take risks and deployed his crab droids on Nizon to search for the Alderaanian team, rather than to do so himself and risk being attacked by a blade scorpion.

Due to his training under Jeyrs Hundar, Vrakth was a skilled hunter and warrior. However, his skills were more similar to those of an assassin, rather than a conventional bounty hunter. He was multi-lingual and in addition to Basic, could also speak Huttese and Zabrak.

Equipment
As a bounty hunter, Vrakth wore battle armor, to protect himself. He armed himself with a variety of weapons and while on Nizon, carried two blaster pistols, a force pike and four thermal detonators. Other pieces of equipment carried by him included a pocket scrambler, to encode any comlink messages that he sent; a code cylinder, which could store encrypted information; and a voice amplifier that enabled him to be heard clearly from half a kilometer away. Like his apprentice Koorst, Vrakth flew a CloakShape starfighter.

Vrakth owned six LM-432 crab droids and each one was heavily modified. They served him as both scouts and hunting drones, allowing him to search large areas for targets, like they did when he deployed them on Nizon. Although they were programmed to operate independently, they were all fitted with comlinks, to enable Vrakth to give them override orders from his CloakShape fighter. They all also bore an owners stamp, which consisted of a Zabrak symbol that translated into Basic as Long Hunter, identifying them as the property of a bounty hunter.

Behind the scenes
Vril Vrakth was created by writer Owen K.C. Stephens and made his first and only appearance in The First to Strike, the fifth scenario in the Dawn of Defiance campaign, a Wizards of the Coast online supplement to the Star Wars Roleplaying Game. In the supplement, the actions of the player characters, who are the Alderaanian Resistance team, can affect Vrakth in a number of ways. When the players first land on Nizon, if the location of their ship is discovered by the Empire then one of Vrakth's crab droids steals something from the ship and he uses it to guess some of their plans. If the players succeed in destroying Checkpoint Gamma, an Imperial checkpoint, then Vrakth sends two crab droids to Ahdjok. If they don't destroy the checkpoint, then the Imperial forces give him information about the activities of the players and he sends two crab droids to the next encounter they have in the scenario. Also, after the players investigate The Bloody Credit, a ship used to transport Nazren slaves off Nizon, then any of Vrakth's crab droids that have survived attack them and after one is destroyed, the rest flee in different directions and rendezvous with Vrakth. After the players help capture the Imperial control center, they intercept and watch the Imperial officer’s conversation with Vrakth and after it has ended, have the option of calling the Zabrak. If they choose to do so, then he offers to leave the Sarlacc Project datachip intact, but taunts them and suggests that they come and speak to him about it in person. It is possible for the players to kill Vrakth during the confrontation with him and if they do so, he drops his comlink as he falls and Koorst calls out from it, asking for more information from his mentor. If the players reply, then he swears his eternal hatred to them for killing Vrakth.