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Category Archives: Savage Worlds Games

Tarsa: Episode 2 – Jailbreak!

More on the Tarsa Setting can be found on the Tarsa Backround Post.

Players: Lee – Logan – Kantorian master of matter manipulation.
Mike – Pythos – Former military cybernetic being with mercenary tendencies.
Shawn – Sycrom – The most intelligent dense person (like really really tough to hurt) you’ll ever meet.

Logan decides to make a quick (several hours) journey to the Pythorian to see if he can dig up any additional information, while Sy cools his heels in the local Big House. Turns out Mero 10 is not big on separating the accused from the convicted when waiting for trial!

Sy spends his time chatting up the other inmates and making notes on the warden. He finds two very interesting things. First, the warden is making money off of holding people in jail regardless of their crime. And second, Pythos was seen in this very jail AFTER he was supposedly incinerated in the Hopper House.

Logan finds nothing of value on the Pythorian that was hidden in an abandoned military complex on Drakos (Mero 9) and returns to Mero 10.

Sy was brutally tortured in some hidden facility (but of course it didn’t hurt him at all and oddly, they asked no questions). When Logan returns, Sy fills him in on what’s going on so Logan uses his matter control to enter the jail.  He did a great job on being stealthy, but the guards did a better job of looking for trouble!  Logan and Sy hatch a plan to free all the prisoners and then find the secret entrance. After the prisoners get free, Logan decides not to go hunting for the location and just opens a hole in the ground to try and find it.

Sure enough they find a maze of tunnels under the jail and Logan quickly leaves Sy in the dark only to stumble across a hive of spiders that quickly web him up! Sy goes as fast as he can to find him and does just in time for Logan to break free. Meanwhile the jail guards have come down to the caverns looking for the escapees. Sy heroically kills two of the spiders before getting wrapped up himself – at which point Sy has a sudden realization that the glue guns and the no-question torture really indicate that his arch enemies the Overminds may be behind this whole set of circumstances and Py was only bait!  Logan who is now facing four guards, emulates a godlike posture and causes everyone around him to be shaken!

Just then, three meganauts and an Overmind enter the room where Sy is held by webs and Sy suddenly realizes his worst fears are true! Logan, thinking quickly fires his blaster full blast at Sy, shredding the webbing in time for Sy to get a shot at the Overmind causing three wounds! He quickly ducks back into the room with the well, and jumps in telling Logan to run for it!  Logan gets shot for two wounds but quickly follows Sy using his matter control to make a bubble of air as they narrowly escape the trap!

They wash up some ways down the underground river into another set of caverns where Sy and Logan heal Logan’s wounds and they begin to plan how they can save their friend from Sy’s worst enemies!

 

Tarsa: Episode 1 – Py’s in trouble – again!

More on the Tarsa Setting can be found on the Tarsa Backround Post.

Players:
Lee – Logan – Kantorian master of matter manipulation.
Mike – Pythos – Former military cybernetic being with mercenary tendencies.
Shawn – Sycrom – The most intelligent dense person (like really really tough to hurt) you’ll ever meet.

Logan gets a generic distress communication from Py stating that he’s in deep shit.  So of course, Logan reaches out to Sy and they high tail it to Mero 10 where the Pyro (Py’s shuttle) is located and where the distress call came from.  Mero 10 is a backwater scum and villainy planet with the kind of clientele only desperados, hard luck cases, and Py would hang out with.

When they get there, they find that the Pyro is nearly ready for demolition by the local salvage operation. They salvagers want a ridiculous amount of credits for Sy and Logan to buy the ship back so they pay them to hold off on demo for a few days. They also board the Pyro and Logan is able to decrypt Py’s appointment calendar to find he had a meeting scheduled with somebody at a bar called the “Hopper House” and so they go to investigate that.

At the Hopper House they find that Py was shot by a blaster and was vaporized. Something that doesn’t usually happen, but several parties are in agreement did happen.  Sy was not able to confirm or deny it with his readings of the DNA splattered on the floor.  The story is a couple of Meganauts came in and Py just beat the crap out of them then some bald dude came in and blasted him.

Logan and Sy then go to the nearest medical facility (at the nearby spaceport) to see if they can find out more about these Meganauts. The medical crew seem to be oddly morel as they refuse to disclose any information, so Sy causes a distraction by jumping in front of a commuter tram!  In the confusion, Logan hacks into the computer and determines that they Meganauts were not part of the local military and seem to be normal guns for hire.

Logan and Sy decide they need to find the Pythorian (Py’s interplanetary ship) to see what can be found there, so they decide to just steal the Pyro so it (and any evidence it may have) won’t be destroyed by the salvagers. Unfortunately, things do not go well (means Shawn was rolling more ones than a one sided die…or something like that). Logan was able to skedaddle with the Pyro but Sy got shot by the local “peace force” with glue guns!

Tarsa Background

Here’s a link to the setting information for Savage Tarsa, a space opera type setting!

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!)