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Category Archives: Savage Worlds Games

Walkers, Episode 5: The Vexation

GM: Evil Mike McNeal
Ben (Hernandez. His parents are his dependents.)
Owen (Zach Turner. Has sister and sister-in-law as dependents.)
Mike (Mark Kale. Has one son as a dependent.)
Steve (Shane Hensley. Wife Michelle as a dependent.)
Alex (Joe Reynolds. His brother is his dependent.)

We are being chased by a vexation* of walkers. We decide to hole up in a cave until the vexation has passed. We check out the cave. Someone has holed up in here before. We hope that if they return that they are friendly and that they have missiles for a missile launcher. Night comes and we here walkers shuffling around outside the cave. We all try to be quiet, but Owen critically fails his stealth roll.

Ben fumbles around trying to figure a way out of the caves, so I take charge and push the rock blocking the secret exit. I roll really well for my d4 Strength. The rock rolls away, crushing a few walkers. This opens the way for our escape.

The area on the other side of the rock is filled with walkers, but beyond them is a sink hole in the ground. Ben rushes out of our cave and jumps into the hole—leaving the rest of us to our fate. Alas, it is not the bottomless pit we were hoping for and we hear a “splash”.

The rest of us follow…or try to. I make an opening so Michelle (my wife) and I can run through. We both jump into the hole. The walkers quickly form a vexation formation and surround the remaining group. Alex and Mike decide this is a good time to use the last two grenades that Alex has. Many walkers were stunned by the twin blasts.

The river at the bottom of the hole leads us back to the bridge where we first spotted a gaggle of vehicles. Our truck and trailer is there too.

Ben begins repairing a couple of cars while the rest of us do the heavy lifting. I notice movement in one of the cars besides Mike. He see it’s the bandit that escaped earlier. The man holds up his hand in a sign of peace. Mike blows him away with his shotgun. Just as Mike did to my character in a previous game session. I think Mike’s mentally unstable and should be watched. Maybe his character too.

Evil mike tells us the bandit knew where there were guns, ammo, tools, women, planes, & working cable television. We shun Mike for a while.

Ben gets a couple of cars running and we head out. If you remember—I sure didn’t—our plan is to head to the corporate headquarters of Banal, which is in Dallas Texas.

I fall asleep. (Me, not my character. I haven’t been sleeping well.) Because of this the rest of the write-up will be a little sketchy.

Owen wakes me up to make a survival roll. I get a raise. I still don’t know why I was rolling.

We trade some food for gas to someone in some town.

Ben spends 30 minutes (real time) negotiating with some guy for an unknown car part.

The guy decides to join us…for some reason.

We head out for Dallas. We’re somewhere in Mexico.

Chaos Steve

*vex·a·tion (noun) Group; especially : a group of zombies or walkers when they are chasing you

 

 

Walkers, Episode 4: Bloaters and the Black Cadillac

GM: Evil Mike McNeal
Ben (Hernandez. His parents are his dependents.)
Owen (Zach Turner. Has sister and sister-in-law as dependents.)
Mike (Mark Kale. Has one son as a dependent.)
Steve (Shane Hensley. Wife Michelle as a dependent.)
Alex (Joe Reynolds. His brother is his dependent.)

After saving my wife and three other women from the bandit compound, we all load into one of the bandit’s trucks. There are too many of us to all fit in the truck, so we hitched a trailed to the back and several of us ride in it. (Evil Mike kept reminding us that one of the bandits escaped. I’m sure we’ll never see him again.)

Traveling back we come upon a bunch of vehicles left haphazardly blocking the road. After some investigation we find the drivers and passengers have been dead for a long time. We scavenge what we can, but only Mike finds anything worthwhile. Ben decides to get the Cadillac running so we can use it too. Before he’s able to finish repairing it, we are attacked by a new type of “bloated” walker. These “bloaters” explode when wounded. We soon realize that we can’t defend the truck and trailer from the bloaters. We lose one of the women to Walker Bloat Syndrome—she swallowed some of the bloater splash. The rest of us escape from the vehicles. We hear a lot of moment coming our way from the south. We hightail it north.

The resulting chase goes well for us and we escape the walker horde. A few of us—the best of us—kill a zombie along the way. Ben then leads us into a cave. There we find out that one (or more) of the women had worked for the Banal Corporation. The Banal Corporation is generally credited with starting this whole walker infestation. (I think the corporation’s symbol is a red and white umbrella.) We pump the woman for information. She reveals that they were heading to America (we’re in Mexico) to the headquarters of the Banal Corporation. They hope to discover information on how to stop the walkers. We decide to do the same.

Oh, and Ben hears the bad news that his parents are dead. He immediately starts hitting upon the Banal women.

Chaos Steve

Walkers, Episode 3: Attack on the Compound of Walking Dead

GM: Evil Mike McNeal
Ben (Hernandez. His parents are his dependents.)
Owen (Zach Turner. Has sister and sister-in-law as dependents.)
Mike (Mark Kale. Has one son as a dependent.)
Steve (Shane Hensley. Wife Michelle as a dependent.)
Alex (Joe Reynolds. His brother is his dependent.)

We meet a new guy, Joe Reynolds, and his brother.

My wife, Michele, had wondered off during the last game. I decide that I must search for her, no matter who comes with me! (Everyone comes with me.)

We track her through the woods and come upon a benny sucking trip line. Next we come upon a small compound being used by an area gang.

I trade my empty rocket launcher for Michele.

She tells us that there are several other women being held inside. I decide that we should try to save them. I walk out hoping to trade my watch for something—this is a distraction.

Alex uses his crossbow and Owen shots his desert eagle. Owen kills his target. Alex only does two points of damage to his. I shoot the same gang member and shake him (Ben loaned me his 9 mm).

A rocket launcher pokes out at us. Alex is on hold and tries to run out of the blast area. He’s successful. We only end up taking 17 points damage. We expected much worse. Everyone survives.

Three more gang members exit the building. One fires at me and misses.

Alex gets a joker, but so does the Evil GM. Alex goes first and kills the entire group with a shot from his grenade launcher.

Then the gang opens the door to the zombie pens.

I happen to be near the gang’s vehicles. I hop in one and wedge/crash it into the pen opening.

I run into the building and free one of the women. A gang member shots from the rooftop

Mike took a wound earlier and now gets shot again taking another four wounds–he soaks two of them and ends up with only three wounds.

Evil mike gets another joker (who shuffled that deck!) and nails Ben for two wounds. Ben soaks one. He missed soaking both by a single point.

We continue our assault and I free the rest of the women.

The women and I make it to the car that mike’s driving. The women get inside. There’s no room for me. Mike doesn’t leave. He’s bleeding too badly.

Owen nails the leader, but he soaks all but one wound. The leader then turns around and nails Ben. Ben has no bennies and goes to the incapacitated table.

Alex interrupts the leader and shoots him. He doesn’t do enough damage (again).

Alex tries FOUR times with a d8 skill to hit a gang member. He needs to roll a 6. He rolls a 5 on all 4 attempts.

(My notes are a little skimpy now. What do you mean “now”!)

We get the girls, kill the gang, and return victorious to the town we use as base camp.

Chaos Steve

Walkers, Episode Two: Out of the Frying Pan…

[I had thought I posted this a couple of weeks ago. Uh, I was wrong.]

Walkers GM: Evil Mike McNeal
Ben (Unknown name. Unknown dependents.)
Owen (Zach Turner. Has sister and sister-in-law as dependents.)
Mike (Mark Kale. Has one son as a dependent.)
Steve (Shane Hensley. Wife Michelle as a dependent.)

Those no longer with us…
Mike Brady (Ben) Turned.
Carol Brady (Ben) DOA.
Mike McNeal and his kids (Steve) Turned. Killed by Mark Kale (Mike),

This was a particularly brutal session with three player characters either dying or turning into walkers. Evil Mike couldn’t be happier.

We were still on the cruise ship, but it was time to make a run for the lifeboat. With a few thousand walkers on board, this was not going to be easy. Mike used the Chase rules to simulate our mad dash. It lasted five rounds. We rolled Agility to get cards during the chase. Obstacles are walkers who attack us. As an extra incentive, we get to scavenge any walker we kill. Let the mayhem begin!

First round, first roll, Owen critically fails his Agility roll. Bad things happen to him. Second round Mike critically fails his Agility roll. Bad things happen to him. Third round is uneventful. On the fourth round the walkers get a joker and attack us all. Owen is surrounded by walkers and takes five wounds! He soaks them all! Ben gets bit and (because of the poor card he drew) immediately turns into a walker. He attacks Owen, but misses. I also get bit, but it will take a while for me to turn. (I hoped no one noticed.) The fifth round comes and goes and we make it to the lifeboat!

We cast off with everyone breathing a sigh of relief. Then I turn into a walker and attack my kids. Fortunately Mike saw me get bit and was waiting patiently. He puts a shotgun blast square in my chest, knocking me and the kids overboard.

The survivors spend several grueling days at sea fighting hunger and thirst. Meanwhile Ben and I quickly roll up new characters. I’m now Shane Hensley and Ben is Carol Brady (the wife of his previous character.)

The survivors find land and dock at a small town in Mexico. Right away a couple of dependents wander off into the water to clean up. Meanwhile Ben and I are holed up in a building in town. Our building and the church are surrounded by walkers—they know dinner is inside. Someone comes into town to look it over, but before they can do anything, there’s shouts and screams from the water. This gets the walker’s attention and they begin heading to the beach.

One of the items Ben’s new character had scavenged was a dirt bike. My new character had found some gas and an empty rocket launcher. Ben takes advantage of the distraction and moves the dirt bike outside. He fights off some walkers, but eventually heads out on the bike. The walkers are drawn to the noise and start following Ben as if he’s the walker pied piper.

Meanwhile Owen is busy saving his dependents that wandered out into the water. There are some tense moments, but everyone survives.

Ben makes a fatal mistake. He decides NOT to move his full Pace of 15 on the dirt bike and is caught by 3 walkers. Ben ditches the bike and RUNS! I run to the bike and rev the engine in an attempt to distract the walkers. It doesn’t work. The walkers catch Ben. Carol Brady goes to meet her husband in Brady heaven.

I now have the bike and lead the zombies out of town and lose them somewhere out there. I return to town and we go to the church. Inside we find many people.

Evil mike had a detailed family tree of everyone inside the church, along with relationships and blood types.

Now we have a ton of people to keep safe. We’re doomed.

Chaos Steve as Shane Hensley

Walkers, Episode One: It’s All Fun and Games Until Someone Gets Bit

Walkers Gm: Evil Mike McNeal

Ben (Mike Bradley. Has four kids as dependents.)
Owen (Zach Turner. Has sister and sister-in-law as dependents.)
Mike (Mark Kale. Has one son as a dependent.)
Steve (Mike McNeal. Has twin kids as dependents.)

This week (uh, last week really) we started a Savage Worlds campaign in a new setting Evil Mike developed called, Walkers. It’s a zombie apocalypse setting with a twist—you must have dependents. The setting has various rules for these dependents, plus a few new edges and hindrances. We all start the game with five draws from the Hell on Earth scavenging table. The end result is that we find lots of various ammo, but only a few firearms and none of them use the ammo that we scrounged. Evil Mike makes a rule that you can spend a Benny to change one type of ammo to another type of ammo. Maybe now we’ll have a fighting chance? (I doubt it.)

Our adventure starts with us and our families having a great time on a Carnival line cruise ship. (Right there we should have known we were in trouble.) While on the ship we began hearing news about a virus ravaging the land around us. We were not too concerned. We’re on a ship with tons of food and fun. We’ll wait out the breakout until the authorities get it taken care of.

Six months later…

It turns out that one of the passengers was infected with the virus. We are the last survivors on the ship. Now the entire ship is filled with the walking dead or “walkers”. Many of our family members have died or have turned. For the last few days…weeks, it’s hard to tell which, we’ve been barricaded in the ship’s ballroom.

Our food is running low. It’s time to make a break for the lifeboats. But first we decide to head up to the bridge to see if we can get anything useful like maps or navigation equipment. We quietly remove the barricade from the window of the ball room and sneak out. I fail my Stealth roll. Owen fails his Stealth roll. Mike critically fails his Stealth roll and falls flat on his face in the hallway. The heck with sneaking. Next round we open fire.

Mike takes the brunt of the walkers’ attack. He uses up all of his bennies to soak his wounds. We fight to staircase which is bi-step-ual—meaning the stairs go up and down. (Evil Mike’s joke, not mine.)

I and my dependents make it to the bridge level. The walkers catch the rest of the group on the stairs. We can hear their near-hysterical screams. We quietly move down the empty hall towards the door to the bridge—away from our noisy ex-companions. The rest of the group make it to the top of the stairs. There are more screams and gunfire. Oh well…might as well let them come along.

The door to the bridge is locked. I use my lock picking skill to open it. I fail on my first attempt. I try it again and get it open. We all rush inside and close the door. Inside we find a thin, foul-smelling crew member. For a ride on our life boat, he’ll show us where all the things we’re interested in are. We agree.

Next time: Man the Life Boat!

Chaos Steve

2013-03-19 19.26.53

Necessary Evil: The Phonebooth

necevil
Evil Mike as the GM. He’s Evil.

The Scum of the Earth:
Ben as Hobo Jack: (I’m sure he has super powers. I just haven’t seen them.)
Lee as Mal “Hex” Hexington: can go insubstantial and packs a powerful punch when substantial.
Shawn as Viridian: Greatest Atlantean scientist ever! (Just ask him.)
Steve as Strike: Produces and controls lightening at will.
Mike as Arclight: A super sorcerer and a handy guy to have around.
Owen as Professor Moriarty: Able to animate inanimate objects with just a thought.

Disclaimer: My notes for this game were stolen by a V’sori hacker who wiped them clean off my device. That means this write-up will be from my memory. And as you know; what I don’t remember, I make up.

We continued our monthly Necessary Evil adventure. This time Dr. Destruction ordered us to steal something from the laboratory of Hydra. Hydra was killed when the V’sori took over his secret base. We know the location of the base, but Dr. Destruction first wanted us to seek out a former V’sori battlelord who we may be able to convince to help us. The battlelord controls a power relay station. If we can convince him to “black out” the base, then the V’sori will not be able to send any distress messages while we’re there.

Hex insubstantially delivers a message to the battlelord to meet us at a discreet location. The meet goes well. It turns out that the battlelord has a grudge against the Warlord Shavak, who controls the base. He gives us a pen and asks us to show it to Shavak before we kill him so Shavak will know at whose hand his destruction came.

At this point I should mention that the object we are going to steal is something the size of phone booth. Dr. Destruction described it to us, but didn’t tell us what it was. We plan on having Dr. Moriarty animate so it can walk out on its own. We also want to destroy the lab. Mostly so the V’sori won’t know what was stolen, but also to keep the rest of Hydra’s experiments out of their hands.

As we stealthily approach the base. I think it was Strike that critically failed some roll that alerted the V’sori drones and K’tharen troops. The battle began.

Hex had insubstantially gone ahead to scout out the laboratory. To his amazement (and ours), the guards there had a device that could harm his ghost-like form. He spent the rest of the game incapacitated. The rest of the team either couldn’t get to him or didn’t have any reason (Hindrance) to help him. Yep, we’re a “Team” spelled with an “I” in there somewhere.

The battle was fierce. So fierce that Shavak decided it was time to leave. He headed for a V’sori Stingray parked nearby. We tried to stop him, but he made it to the ship and was gone. With the V’sori now leaderless, the tide of the battle quickly turned in our favor. We were able to get the phone booth (or whatever it is), destroy the laboratory, and be gone before V’sori reinforcements arrived.

Chaos Steve

 

World War II: Mission 5, Top Secret Plans

War Master (Owen): Yes, a great War Master Indeed.

Lambert’s Losers Lt. Dick Dan (Lt. Dan): Our fearless squad leader, Distinguished Service Cross.
Private (E-2) Destry Lambert (Evil Winters): Our commando medic.
Private (E-2) Charlie Winters (Winters): Not sure what he does, Distinguished Service Cross.
Private (E-3) Hector Goldman, Bronze Star

In this journal entry I’ve had to change the names to protect the innocent…or because I couldn’t remember the names…or because I couldn’t spell the names.

Major Stalwart gave us our new orders. We were to infiltrate a French town (Le Pewy) behind enemy lines. Once there our primary objective was to recover a set of secret plans. Our secondary objective was to transport an allied spy back to safety. The spy’s name was Frederick Himmler—codename Pineapple.

Infiltrating behind enemy lines turned out to be a piece of cake. We just parachuted in under the cover of night. Winters and I made perfect landings. After two tries, Lt. Dan also landed, but not perfectly. Lambert missed the landing spot by a bit, but landed safety as well.

Sneaking into the French town turned out to be harder than it looked. Mostly due to the leadership of Lt. Dan who critically failed his stealth roll and stepped on a land mine. He was Shaken by the resulting explosion—the same explosion that alerted the Germans to our presence. That started what would later be called The Dance of the Land Mines. We had to move through the mine field all-the-while being shot at by the Germans. Lambert stepped on a mine too and soaked the resulting wound. I stepped on a mine and soaked the resulting 3 wounds. Yes, I’m that good. Eventually even Winters steps on a mine; just as he was stepping onto the safety of the road.

Later during the firefight, Lt Dan rolled another critical failure throwing a grenade. I took a wound from the blast. Later, in a moment of respite, Lambert healed the wound.

We make it to Frederick’s house just in time to see him being taken away as a German prisoner. After the Germans leave, Winters and Lambert watch to street as Lt. Dan and I search Frederick’s house. We find a cryptic clue:

“if lost drain pineapple”

Lt. Dan orders me to search in the sewer drain behind the house. I was tired from the fight, so I took a break instead. I told Lt. Dan I didn’t find anything. Fortunately the others decide to search the drain in the street in front of the house. Winters critically failed his Agility roll climbing down the ladder into the drain. Then he critically failed his Vigor roll. He falls; landing on his head. Disoriented from the fall he swallows a bunch of sewer crap.

Lt. Dan joins him in the sewer and together they search for a sign from Pineapple. They find a hidden nook with the plans we were looking for. Now we must decide whether to leave with the plans or try to save Frederick.

We’ll miss Frederick.

Lt. Dan signs the papers that put us all in for medals. Lambert gets a citation. Winters gets a Bronze Star and I get a Silver Star.

I heard that we all may be getting transferred to a nice soft job back at the states. If this is true, this will be my last journal entry.

Corporal Goldman. (That’s right, I got a promotion!)

Necessary Evil Episode 4: The Wretched Hive

Evil Mike as the GM. He’s Evil.

The Scum of the Earth:

Ben as Hobo Jack: (I’m sure he has super powers. I just haven’t seen them.)
Lee as Mal “Hex” Hexington: can go insubstantial and packs a powerful punch when substantial.
Shawn as Viridian: Greatest Atlantean scientist ever! (Just ask him.)
Steve as Strike: Produces and controls lightening at will.
Mike as Arclight: A super sorcerer and a handy guy to have around.
Owen as Professor Moriarty: Able to animate inanimate objects with just a thought.

Our monthly Necessary Evil game continued this week. Owen joined us for the first time as Professor Moriarty. Ben’s new character, after the timely death of his last one, showed up as well. What didn’t show up were the figures we used for our supers. Evil Mike forgot to bring them. We were all able to find replacements, but next month we’ll be completely confused trying to remember who is who on the map. There was much talk about all of the new upgrades for our new lair aptly named “The Wretched Hive”. (We each gave one or two power points to get these upgrades.) Evil Mike informed us that the lair does not have these upgrades yet. They are all sitting in crates waiting to be installed. That means our lair is currently just a big dank hole in a bridge support near Star City. I guess we’re called the Scum of the Earth for a reason.

We are still trying to get back in Dr. Destruction’s good graces after some previous “unforeseen circumstances”. Since we were on our way back from Aruba, Dr. Destruction had a new super villain, called Professor Moriarty, watch over The Wretched Hive. Apparently it was immediately overrun and taken over by a K’tharen warlord named Surgot. (Thanks Professor.) The professor did escaped with his life. (So much for giving his all for the team like what’s-his-name did.) This warlord seemed to be a K’tharen traitor. Per Dr. Destruction, it’s now our job to convince him to join the resistance and to get him the heck out of our lair. Let’s see how that goes…

There was much discussion on how to approach Warlord Surgot without killing him or being killed ourselves. Had our upgrades been installed we could have just overridden the Evolving Mind-Like Computer Core (or EVIL MIKE for short) and take control of the lair back. As it was, we went with a plan from Hobo Jack. We should have known better.

Hobo Jack entered the tube lift that leads to our lair. He carried a com-link that had Viridian on the other end ready to plead our case and win Warlord Surgot over to our cause. Warlord Surgot is not impressed by this tactic and had his men attack Hobo Jack. Arclight goes in to smooth things over while Hex tries moving through the floor insubstantially.

All attempts at negotiation fail.

Our team “Negotiating”.

Our team “Negotiating”.

Hobo Jack takes two wounds from the failed negotiation attempts. Arclight is able to soak his two wounds. Professor Moriarty shows up and animates a crate that attacks a K’tharen. Strike has had enough of the nonlethal approach. He steps in the room, fries a K’tharen and Shakes four others.

Hobo Jack runs and hides.

Arclight, still thinking we’re negotiating, merely ensnares a group of K’tharen. Finally Viridian shows up and mind controls the warlord. Viridian has him order his men to stand down.

To get the warlord on our side, one of us must fight him. We all point at Hex who we know packs a powerful punch. Hex agrees to fight. In the meantime we discover some K’tharen war spheres. We think these are Surgot’s ace in the hole if things go badly for him.

The fight begins. Surgot acts first and misses Hex. Evil Mike spends a benny and he still misses Hex. Hex pounds the crap out of the warlord resulting in two wounds. Surgot responds by giving Hex two wounds of his own. Hex gets off Shaken an attempts to intimidate Surgot. He fails on the first attempt…and second attempt.   Next round Hex gets to act first. He attempts to intimidate once again and scores a raise! Warlord Surgot concedes and agrees to join the Resistance. He will also give us back our lair in exchange for the one we cleared out in Aruba. Being a shrewd negotiator, Warlord Surgot also gets one of our lair upgrades.

Dr. Destruction is quite pleased with our results and we’re back as one of his go-to teams!

Can’t wait to see where Hobo Jack next time! Or what nefarious plans Dr. Destruction has for us.

Chaos Steve

World War II: Mission 4, Holding the Bridge

War Master (Owen): Yes, a great War Master Indeed.

Lambert’s Losers
Lt. Dick Dan (Ben): Our fearless squad leader, Distinguished Service Cross.
Private (E-2) Destry Lambert (Evil Mike): Our commando medic.
Private (E-2) Charlie Winters (Mike): Not sure what he does, Distinguished Service Cross.
Private (E-3) Hector Goldman (Steve): Armored Vehicle Crewman, bronze metal.

We’d had a long hiatus from our Savage World War II game. I think we were all ready to see just how well we could hold the bridge against the German onslaught. Some of us were less than prepared. I brought an old character sheet and Ben’s character was still written on a small yellow piece of paper. Oh well. (Later, I did find my latest character sheet tucked away in my Weird War II book.)

Since it’s been awhile, I’ll recap our mission. Hold the bridge until reinforcements arrive. If we can’t hold the bridge, we’re to destroy it.

Lt. Dan and Goldman check the buildings on the German side of the bridge. The buildings are clear. Winters and Lambert do a dramatic task to set the demolition charges under the bridge. On the first round they get a club and Winters needs a 7 (after all of the penalties) for a success. Lambert’s help gives him a +1 and together Winters ends up with exactly a 7! …using his d4 demolition skill. One success down and four more to go. Things didn’t go well after that. On the fourth round they still need three successes to get the charges set. They managed a single success for the round. Now they needed two on the last round. Winters critically fails his demolition roll…BOOM! The damage is rolled. Lowest damage ever—only 6 points. This Shakes Winters and Lambert. That could have gone much worse. Thankfully they are lousy at demolition.

A German truck followed by a Panzer IV appear at the edge of town and are heading towards the bridge. Lt. Dan and Goldman open fire. About that same time a French women with a baby carriage is also heading along the banks of the canal towards the bridge. She loses her grip on the carriage and it rolls into the water. “Epargner mon bébé !” she cries. (Translation: Save my baby!)

Winters rolls another critically failure while trying to climb around under the bridge. He falls into the canal. He can’t swim.

Lt. Dan fires the bazooka at the German truck and rolls 8 points of damage. I point out that he’s rolling the wrong dice for the damage. He rolls the correct dice and gets 13 points of damage—still not enough to stop the truck. (Loser.)

The French woman jumps in the canal to save her baby. She doesn’t appear to know how to swim. Lambert skillfully does a somersault dive off of the canal bank into the water. He plans on saving the baby and the women. Winters splashes to the canal’s steep bank. (At least he didn’t drown.)

As the truck turns down a side street near Goldman, he throw a potato masher into the open window of the truck. Goldman doesn’t have a throwing skill and its medium range and it’s a difficult shot. A -6 penalty. Goldman rolls an eleven and makes it! The explosion kills the driver and the truck hits the building Lt. Dan is in. The Panzer IV shoots at Lt. Dan’s position in the building and misses. The shot goes wide and hits the building across the street where Goldman is. The building partially collapses, but Goldman is unharmed. Lt. Dan jumps out of a second story window onto the truck and rolls a critical failure! He takes 18 points of damage. Lt. Dan soaks it all. (That’s our leader!)

Write-up note: My notes from my iPad says “Winters doors a German.” I’m not sure what that’s supposed to mean, so I’m going with “Winters shoots a German.”

Winters shoots a German. He was one of two German officers that were heading along the canal banks apparently searching for the French woman. Lambert is able to grab the baby.

Now the battle with the Germans is in full swing. Goldman is having a continual firefight with Germans who are continually outflanking him, but he is holding his own. Lambert now has the baby and the French woman and is heading for the Allied side of the canal to get them to safety. Winters has scrambled out of the canal and moves towards the action to help Lt. Dan and Goldman. (Write-up note: it occurs to me that for this entire time Lt. Dan and Goldman have been holding off a truck full of German soldiers and a Panzer. Yeah, that’s the stuff we’re made of.)

Lt. Dan drives the truck out of sight of the panzer. A German throws a potato masher through the window of the truck. Lt. Dan takes a wound but soaks it. The truck takes a wound (its door is blown off and the steering is affected. The truck can’t turn left.) Another German notices the truck but not Lt. Dan. He assumes a German is driving the truck and jumps in beside Lt. Dan. Lt. Dan draws his pistol and shoots the German besides him. This is the beginning off a short, up-close gun battle between the two. It ends badly for the German.

We sight more Germans entering the town—a tiger tank and halftrack. The allies are coming towards the town from the other direction, but we can see they are woefully outgunned by the Panzer and Tiger tanks. Lt Dan calls for us to blow the bridge. Unfortunately the bazooka is laying in the road. Only Goldman has a chance to grab it, but he’s doing a fighting retreat against a squad of Germans. . Lambert, the baby, and the French woman all make it out of the canal and head for cover.

As I said earlier, the gun battle in the truck ends badly for the German. Lt. Dan Kills him then throws the truck into reverse to get the back to the bazooka.

The panzer destroys the oncoming Allied Sherman tank.

Goldman runs across the street and grabs the bazooka.

Lambert and girl run towards the Americans.

Winters and Goldman jump into the truck.

Another German Tiger tank shows up.

Lt. Dan backs the truck out from behind the building and heads towards the bridge…in reverse. Somehow Goldman and Lt. Dan switch positions in the truck. Goldman’s now driving and Lt. Dan has the bazooka in the back of the truck. Winters grabs the bazooka from Lt. Dan and shoots the panzer IV for no effect.

Us escaping backwards in the truck trying to cross the bridge and escape the advancing Germans.

Us escaping backwards in the truck trying to cross the bridge and escape the advancing Germans.

Goldman crashes the truck (intentionally) on the Allied end of the bridge and bails out. Knowing the Panzer will shoot the truck next, the smart move would be to jump into the canal. Goldman has a phobia of water so he instead jumps to the nearby shore—well within the burst radius of the panzers shot. Winters and Lt. Dan are still in the truck.

The panzers shot misses the truck and hits the bridge! The bridge collapses. The truck falls into the canal. Winters and Lt. Dan jump free.

A perfect ending for us! The bridge is destroyed. We’re all safe. And by the looks of it, we followed our orders perfectly.

Lt. Dan gets the Distinguished Service Cross for acts of heroism. Goldman and Winters get nominated for metals, but only Winters gets one—the Distinguished Service Cross! Unfortunately Goldman’s goldbricking past still haunts him when it comes to medals and such.

Write-up note: I know the guys (especially Mike B.) will read this and catch that the account for Winters is a little off towards the end. That’s because my notes conflicted about just where he was during the end of the battle. So I went with something I made up.

Oh, and image you just read this as an entry in the journal of Pvt. Goldman. I forgot to write it that way, but I’m sure you have a good imagination.

Pvt. Goldman, E-3

Necessary Evil Episode 3.1: The Lab in the Grass

Evil Mike as the GM: evil, cruel alien being from another planet.

The Scum of the Earth (no, really, that’s their cell’s code name).

Ben as Mr. Smith: able to duplicate himself with ease. (Lord help us!)
Lee as Mal “Hex” Hexington: can go insubstantial at will and packs a powerful punch when substantial.
Shawn as Viridian: greatest Atlantean scientist ever! (Just ask him.)
Steve as Strike: produces and controls lightening at will.
Mike as Arc-Light: a super sorcerer and a handy guy to have around.

(This week the talented new guy who wrote last session’s write-up has been replaced by a guy they found loitering behind Burger King.)

After the debacle of our last mission, Dr. Destruction was not pleased. We were the laughing-stock of the super villain community, while Dr. Horrible was credited with preventing the presidential family from being executed live on TV.

Nevertheless, Dr. Destruction gave us a chance to redeem our self-respect. We were to find Dr. Horrible. Supposedly he knew another source from whom we could get the information Dr. Destruction had wanted from the first family. We found Dr. Horrible in a hole-in-the-wall bar thoroughly enjoying his moment in the villainous limelight.

He was happy to see us. After all, his newfound popularity was because of us. He revealed to us that the man we were to look for was named Vijay Gupta. Gupta was the assistant to the villain called Dr. Devolution. (To be a real villain you must have to get your doctorate.) Dr. Devolution was killed during the alien double-cross that destroyed the super heroes of the world. When he died, most thought the location of his secret laboratory died with him. There’s a chance that Gupta may know the lab’s location. If so, Dr. Destruction hopes it holds the information he seeks.

Strike set out to intimidate a few thugs to see if they knew anything of Gupta. He was less that successful. Arclight took a different approach. Through some clever connect-the-dots research, he determined that Gupta was acting as a servant in the very home that Dr. Devolution used to own. It was now owned by a V’Sari General.

We cased the place and spot Gupta leaving. Mr. Smith tracks him to an open-air marketplace. There we confront him and he eventually agrees to help us. He does mention that to find the lab we will have to be shrunk down to the size of…well, a size where ants seem huge. We are to meet him that night in the garage behind the house.

Feeling uneasy about the entire arrangement we do let Gupta shrink us. We suspected Gupta of some kind of double-cross, but that never happens. The V’Sari kill him first. Using the shrink ray alerted the V’Sari. They stormed the garage; literally bringing it down upon our heads and blowing Gupta to…goop-ta. Fortunately for us, our super small size enabled us to survive.

Gupta died before telling us the whereabouts of the lab. Viridian, being a mechanical super genius, McGyvers together a device that will be able to locate the lab’s power source—we hope. We head off into the jungle…er, tall grass of the backyard. Ants of monolithic proportions ambush us! (Ok, they are regular ants, but we’re so small as to make them seem huge!) We are immediately in trouble. Both Veridian and Arclight are incapacitated with life threatening wounds, leaving Hex and me to deal with the ants. Right away I kill three with my lightning strike. There are still plenty more. Hex cuts one in half with his vibro-knife.  We’re doing ok, but we’re not killing them fast enough! That’s when Evil Mike (the GM) gets a joker. Somehow Hex and I survive. The ants begin dragging Veridian and Arclight off into the grass jungle.

Oh, I completely forgot about Mr. Smith! He and his clones are surrounded by ants. I try a few times to kill some of them (the ants, not Mr. Smith and his clones) and fail miserably. Mr. Smith attacks and critically fails. He ends up with three wounds. Hex realizes that two attacks are better than one and begins killing two ants a round by smashing them to a pulpy goopta. Hex saves Veridian and Arclight from a fate worse than death in the ant queen’s harem. (I’m just guessing at what the ants wanted with the two of them.)  I get a joker and attempt to save Mr. Smith. My lightning strikes fail to hurt the gigantically tough creatures. Mr. Smith dies under the ant onslaught. We’ll miss him greatly.

Hex and I eventually kill the rest of the ants. We both roll Smarts to figure out how to use Veridian’s healing device. We both fail our rolls. Hex spends a Benny and with his élan, he makes it. Hex revives Veridian. Veridian uses the device to heal one of his own wounds. Then he revives Arclight.

We rub ant juices on ourselves to hide our scent from any other ant patrols. Battered, wounded, and short one party member, whose name I can’t remember, we follow Veridian’s device to the laboratory.

We find the lab. It’s cool. Hex goes insubstantial and recons the lab for us. Unfortunately, Hex fails to notice the spiders of monolithic proportions hiding in the rafters. They surprise us. Arclight is incapacitated again. Veridian is incapacitated again. Thanks to Ben pointing out he had élan he does not die. Ben’s new character, Stalker, bursts out of one of the cryro tanks and aids us against the spiders. My lightning is slightly more affective against huge spiders than it was against huge ants. Stalker helps me finish off the last of the spiders. Hex uses the equipment in the lab to heal Veridian. The machine works on Veridian, but fails to work on Arclight. The whole place begins to shake and we realize that the V’Sari are digging up the yard! Hex comes up with the great idea to grab the hard drives and look at the data later. We also grab a prototype shrink ray device on our way out. Using a drilling machine we discovered earlier, we escape the lab.

So in this adventure we say goodbye to…that other guy and say hello to Stalker. Arclight and Veridian come away with lots of cool scars and Hex emerges as one heck of a two-fisted fighter. I realize that I need more power in my lightning bolts. (Giant ants? Really!?)

Strike