Just a little AAR from session this past week. Light spoilers follow.
Some backstory:
Team B had led a raid of Casa de Kell. They ultimately prevailed, but during the fracas, one of the police-officers-that-was-actually-a-Kell-mole decided to take the opportunity to collapse a support beam on top of Serena (the Team B technologist).
Team A's technologist (a PC named Schmidt) had been dating Serena, and did not take well to the news that his girlfriend had been betrayed and murdered.
Other backstory, is that during the eschatologist attack on the university, Serena had successfully disabled and salvaged two of the bombs that were wired up in the Flint Tribune.
Those events happened in-person during session. We had some mid-week follow-up on Discord:
Dex (our Gunslinger): Samuel, I'm sorry. I lost track of Serena in the gunfight, and I didn't see who dragged her off. I was senior officer on the scene, I should have been there.
Dex looks away. It was one of the officers or military on our side who did her in. That I'm sure of. His hands are clenched into fists at his sides, knuckles white. I'll take them apart for what they did, I swear it.
Schmidt: It's not your fault, but we will need to make sure we finish this. I will need some time in the Wee hours to mourn her passing.
<offline RP ensues>
Well, Schmidt uses one of Serena's badges (they had fake IDs made up for each other one date night), uses a hat of disguise to become her, and gets into evidence (quartermaster hadn't learned of Serena's death yet), and takes one of the bombs. He sets out into the night on a personal quest, his heart filled with more emotion than his rational mind is comfortable with.
Summary as written by Schmidt's player:
Machete Hill. This is it. We said that we'd need 30 officers, plus Team B, plus even reinforcements from the military and Team A to bring this down. and looking down at it, Schmidt knew it would be a death trap. We'd lose half the force just trying to make the main gates. And who knows what surprises lurk inside. He was done with playing it by the book. Playing it by the book had wasted time, effort, and lives. Now it was time to do it his way. The effective way. The front gate was locked, and if they had an ounce of sense about themselves, guarded and probably locked. The rest of the walls looked undefended. Only a simple loop of barbed wire atop an improvised wall. It should be easy to infiltrate here.
Schmidt decided on the west wall. A small tent city had sprung up there, and they was using that side of the hill as a dump. It was the easiest climb, but going over lightweight trash would be...tricky. At best, there might be some drug quills littered around, and at worst, there might be actual traps. The disguise had worked well so far, but it was time to up the game. Three extracts down the hatch. One to help his climbing, one to help his sight in low light vision, and one keep him invisible. The climb wasn't challenging, but he almost got stuck with a rusted spike covered in something that might have once been poison. At the base, Schmidt started looking for a way to pull back some of the corrugated metal and gain entrance. Unfortunately, the guilders had actually done a good job on sealing up the wall. Cursing under his breath, he climbed to the top of the fence, and cut a hole in the barbed wire. Around this time, he wished had had drunk a potion of detect magic, as any fortress worth its salt would have an alarm spell up. He need not have worried.
The two Kell heavies sat in the courtyard. Rocko and Lucky. Rocko had been a recent recruit for the Kell guild earlier this season. He really wanted to help out his community, and he saw the Kell guild in bringing stability to a district that the police had all but forsaken. They weren't perfect, but what was? As for Lucky, he was a old guard in the guild. He got his nickname from all of the times that he had narrowly avoided death. A police bullet, a rival gang doing a carriage drive by on him, all had left him sometimes a bit hurt, but never down. His last brush with death had finally scarred him, and combined with his advancing age, helped him decide that he was going to cash out of the guild, and take a quiet job somewhere in North Shore as a private security guard. He knew it was a recent trend for to hire rough-and-ready ex-gang members, and looking forward to a quiet life away from crime.
Schmidt looked over the wall. The intelligence report had said that there was one structure inside the walls, but there were three. Not good. He only wanted to use one bomb. By the light of the bonfire, he began to survey the buildings. In one, he saw mundane objects. Some art, some weapons. Must be where things are fenced. The next building was more interesting. At ground level, he saw more Kell guild heavies strewn about, asleep. Climbing up the side of the building to the second floor, he saw was briefly surprised to see the post-apocalyptical-cowboy theme of the compound replaced with a post-apocalyptical-medieval-lord feeling. If the walls were stone he might have thought it to be a real medieval lord's be chambers. Inside, a single person slept. Must been the Lieutenant.
He didn't want the bomb to be found. A short timer would do. Two minutes. Schmidt wanted to cause maximum personal damage, and so he looked to where he could put the bomb in the bunk house. Killing the lieutenant would have the greatest effect, but judging by the quality of the construction, he wouldn't have to choose. Any sizable blast will turn the walls into a maelstrom of shrapnel. The building leaned on a single support column. That would do. He carefully placed it on the second story at the base of the support beam, set the timer and left. As he left quickly, he accidentally stepped on something soft and loud....a very angry raccoon began to squeal. One of the people in the camp below looked up to try to find the source of the sound. And immediately stopped caring about the raccoon in the trash heap, and started caring about the explosion at the top of the hill. A Deafening roar pulsed through the nettles, and everyone nearby ran for cover as debris began raining down. Schmidt hit the ground. After making sure he was still on this plane and not the bleak gate, he crept up the hill to look in. The bunkhouse was gone. The two evil criminals by the bonfire were gone. Schmidt began to consider sneaking into the guard tower, but realized that there was likely an arsenal in there, and the fires burning wouldn't stay small and contained for long.
It was time to leave. Making double time, he lit a cigarette and began moving. A few stunned civilians looked up and asked him if he knew what happened. The only response they got was that the ghost of an RHC officer slain by the Kell guild must be out for vengeance. As he lit a cigarette to try to calm his adrenaline rush, a second explosion let him know that the gate house wouldn't be a problem any more.
Schmidt thought he would feel better after that. But where he expected to find satisfaction for his vengeance, he felt....nothing. Maybe vengeance wouldn't bring back Serena. Maybe he needed to find another way to heal that wound. As he walked back to RHC, he started to feel something at last. To slaughter that many Kell Guilders, to know that they wouldn't be killing any more officers and more importantly, knowing that Kell himself would fear for his life after this started to feel...good
(If this were a WoD campaign, Schmidt would lose a humanity)
---
Yes, the PC wrote that last parenthetical line, not me (the GM). I was amused.
He's missing next session for OOG reasons (which is partly why we indulged the above offline side quest), but it will be fun to see how the team comes back together after this. I try to encourage PC introspection, but it rarely happens, so I thought I'd share here.
Cheers!
Some backstory:
Team B had led a raid of Casa de Kell. They ultimately prevailed, but during the fracas, one of the police-officers-that-was-actually-a-Kell-mole decided to take the opportunity to collapse a support beam on top of Serena (the Team B technologist).
Team A's technologist (a PC named Schmidt) had been dating Serena, and did not take well to the news that his girlfriend had been betrayed and murdered.
Other backstory, is that during the eschatologist attack on the university, Serena had successfully disabled and salvaged two of the bombs that were wired up in the Flint Tribune.
Those events happened in-person during session. We had some mid-week follow-up on Discord:
Dex (our Gunslinger): Samuel, I'm sorry. I lost track of Serena in the gunfight, and I didn't see who dragged her off. I was senior officer on the scene, I should have been there.
Dex looks away. It was one of the officers or military on our side who did her in. That I'm sure of. His hands are clenched into fists at his sides, knuckles white. I'll take them apart for what they did, I swear it.
Schmidt: It's not your fault, but we will need to make sure we finish this. I will need some time in the Wee hours to mourn her passing.
<offline RP ensues>
Well, Schmidt uses one of Serena's badges (they had fake IDs made up for each other one date night), uses a hat of disguise to become her, and gets into evidence (quartermaster hadn't learned of Serena's death yet), and takes one of the bombs. He sets out into the night on a personal quest, his heart filled with more emotion than his rational mind is comfortable with.
Summary as written by Schmidt's player:
Machete Hill. This is it. We said that we'd need 30 officers, plus Team B, plus even reinforcements from the military and Team A to bring this down. and looking down at it, Schmidt knew it would be a death trap. We'd lose half the force just trying to make the main gates. And who knows what surprises lurk inside. He was done with playing it by the book. Playing it by the book had wasted time, effort, and lives. Now it was time to do it his way. The effective way. The front gate was locked, and if they had an ounce of sense about themselves, guarded and probably locked. The rest of the walls looked undefended. Only a simple loop of barbed wire atop an improvised wall. It should be easy to infiltrate here.
Schmidt decided on the west wall. A small tent city had sprung up there, and they was using that side of the hill as a dump. It was the easiest climb, but going over lightweight trash would be...tricky. At best, there might be some drug quills littered around, and at worst, there might be actual traps. The disguise had worked well so far, but it was time to up the game. Three extracts down the hatch. One to help his climbing, one to help his sight in low light vision, and one keep him invisible. The climb wasn't challenging, but he almost got stuck with a rusted spike covered in something that might have once been poison. At the base, Schmidt started looking for a way to pull back some of the corrugated metal and gain entrance. Unfortunately, the guilders had actually done a good job on sealing up the wall. Cursing under his breath, he climbed to the top of the fence, and cut a hole in the barbed wire. Around this time, he wished had had drunk a potion of detect magic, as any fortress worth its salt would have an alarm spell up. He need not have worried.
The two Kell heavies sat in the courtyard. Rocko and Lucky. Rocko had been a recent recruit for the Kell guild earlier this season. He really wanted to help out his community, and he saw the Kell guild in bringing stability to a district that the police had all but forsaken. They weren't perfect, but what was? As for Lucky, he was a old guard in the guild. He got his nickname from all of the times that he had narrowly avoided death. A police bullet, a rival gang doing a carriage drive by on him, all had left him sometimes a bit hurt, but never down. His last brush with death had finally scarred him, and combined with his advancing age, helped him decide that he was going to cash out of the guild, and take a quiet job somewhere in North Shore as a private security guard. He knew it was a recent trend for to hire rough-and-ready ex-gang members, and looking forward to a quiet life away from crime.
Schmidt looked over the wall. The intelligence report had said that there was one structure inside the walls, but there were three. Not good. He only wanted to use one bomb. By the light of the bonfire, he began to survey the buildings. In one, he saw mundane objects. Some art, some weapons. Must be where things are fenced. The next building was more interesting. At ground level, he saw more Kell guild heavies strewn about, asleep. Climbing up the side of the building to the second floor, he saw was briefly surprised to see the post-apocalyptical-cowboy theme of the compound replaced with a post-apocalyptical-medieval-lord feeling. If the walls were stone he might have thought it to be a real medieval lord's be chambers. Inside, a single person slept. Must been the Lieutenant.
He didn't want the bomb to be found. A short timer would do. Two minutes. Schmidt wanted to cause maximum personal damage, and so he looked to where he could put the bomb in the bunk house. Killing the lieutenant would have the greatest effect, but judging by the quality of the construction, he wouldn't have to choose. Any sizable blast will turn the walls into a maelstrom of shrapnel. The building leaned on a single support column. That would do. He carefully placed it on the second story at the base of the support beam, set the timer and left. As he left quickly, he accidentally stepped on something soft and loud....a very angry raccoon began to squeal. One of the people in the camp below looked up to try to find the source of the sound. And immediately stopped caring about the raccoon in the trash heap, and started caring about the explosion at the top of the hill. A Deafening roar pulsed through the nettles, and everyone nearby ran for cover as debris began raining down. Schmidt hit the ground. After making sure he was still on this plane and not the bleak gate, he crept up the hill to look in. The bunkhouse was gone. The two evil criminals by the bonfire were gone. Schmidt began to consider sneaking into the guard tower, but realized that there was likely an arsenal in there, and the fires burning wouldn't stay small and contained for long.
It was time to leave. Making double time, he lit a cigarette and began moving. A few stunned civilians looked up and asked him if he knew what happened. The only response they got was that the ghost of an RHC officer slain by the Kell guild must be out for vengeance. As he lit a cigarette to try to calm his adrenaline rush, a second explosion let him know that the gate house wouldn't be a problem any more.
Schmidt thought he would feel better after that. But where he expected to find satisfaction for his vengeance, he felt....nothing. Maybe vengeance wouldn't bring back Serena. Maybe he needed to find another way to heal that wound. As he walked back to RHC, he started to feel something at last. To slaughter that many Kell Guilders, to know that they wouldn't be killing any more officers and more importantly, knowing that Kell himself would fear for his life after this started to feel...good
(If this were a WoD campaign, Schmidt would lose a humanity)
---
Yes, the PC wrote that last parenthetical line, not me (the GM). I was amused.
He's missing next session for OOG reasons (which is partly why we indulged the above offline side quest), but it will be fun to see how the team comes back together after this. I try to encourage PC introspection, but it rarely happens, so I thought I'd share here.Cheers!
