Crab tracer

A crab tracer was a type of tracking device. In 19 ABY, the Hutt Zonnos secretly installed crab tracers aboard the Suwantek TL-1200 transport New Ambition to allow mercenaries of the Bomu Clan to locate and attack the vessel.

Description

Crab tracers were minute, autonomous electronic tracking devices. Though not sufficiently intelligent to be classified as droids, crab tracers had complex programming. They were designed to slip onto targets silently and undetected. The tracers had six legs that they used to move about and a saucer that could extend or withdraw. They weighed 0.1 kilograms and typically cost 3,000.^[1]

Once in place, the tracers could communicate their locations via the HoloNet by use of a miniturized hypertranceiver. They transmitted the location of a target even while traveling in hyperspace and vessels pursuing a starship where crab tracers had been deployed could lock onto a tracer's signal to assist in targeting the infiltrated starship's weapons systems. Crab tracers could be remotely controlled and directed to return to their remote control device for reassignment to a new target. They could also be shut off manually.^[1]

History

In 19 ABY, the Jedi archivist Mander Zuma and the spacers Reen Irana and Eddey Be'ray^[2] were assigned by Popara, the leader of the Hutt clan Anjiliac to search for Popara's missing son Mika on the quarantined planet Endregaad.^[1] While docked on the world Makem Te, the trio took aboard their vessel, the Suwantek TL-1200 transport^[1] New Ambition,^[2] supplies of medicinal spice for distribution to plague victims on Endregaad. Eager to prevent Mika's rescue, Popara's elder son Zonnos secretly had crab tracers installed inside the frames of four packets of the medicinal spice cargo aboard^[1] New Ambition.^[2]

While^[1] New Ambition^[2] was en-route to Endregaad, the crab tracers activated, allowing the Bomu Clan, a family of Rodian mercenaries contracted by Zonnos, to track the Suwantek transport. As^[1] New Ambition^[2] approached Endregaad, it was ambushed by the Bomu Clan YV-260 light freighter Vengeance, which locked onto the signal transmitted by the crab tracers to target the Suwantek vessel.^[1] However, the Bomu vessel was destroyed by Corporate Sector Authority forces that had placed Endregaad under quarantine.^[2]

Behind the scenes

Crab tracers appeared in the 2002 Wizards of the Coast roleplaying adventure Tempest Feud, by Jeff Grubb and Owen K.C. Stephens. The roleplaying adventure was designed to be set in any era from the reign of the Galactic Republic to the Yuuzhan Vong War,^[1] however the 2012 novel Scourge, an adaptation of Tempest Feud, later dated the events of the roleplaying adventure to 19 ABY.^[2]

In the Tempest Feud, the players roleplay as individuals hired by Popara to rescue Mika on Endregaad and it is possible en-route to Endregaad for the players to find and destroy the crab tracers that are aboard^[1] New Ambition.^[2] If the crab tracers are not destroyed, after the players arrive on Endregaad, the Bomu Clan track down the Suwantek vessel again using the tracers and ambush the player characters on the planet surface.^[1] No such ambush is depicted in Scourge^[2] hence this outcome is assumed to not form part of the official course of events in Star Wars Legends continuity.

At the conclusion of Tempest Feud, as part of a reward for thwarting the distribution of the spice tempest by Mika, Popara's former intermediary Vago offers the player characters a set of four crab tracers for their personal use.^[1] In Scourge, Zuma, Irana and Be'ray take the place of the player characters in Tempest Feud^[1][2] and no such gift is depicted in their meeting with Vago following Mika's defeat.^[2] It is therefore assumed that the gifting of the crab tracers by Vago is not part of official continuity.

Appearances

• Tempest Feud (First appearance)

Notes and references