HawaiiSteveO
Blistering Barnacles!
Kind of worn out on the old D&D for a bit (running it, anyway). Our group has 2 other DMs that are taking care of it.
I decided to give a new game system a shot, and sure glad I did.
SW is a really fun system and DLR is really well done.
Should you be the type that's interested, actual play of first 2 sessions below.
Characters are huckster Shady Doug, mad scientist Doc Lightning, Father Sam Johnson, and native scout Plays With Fire.
The first 3 started off on a stagecoach on the way to Carson City. They had never met each other before that point. As luck would have it, one of the horses pulling the coach stepped in a hole and broke its leg, and the other came up lame and was not able to pull it solo. The carriage driver Zeke apologised profusely and told the 3 it was less than 2 hours walk to town and to start hoofing it before it got dark.
The posse took off and soon the area became hilly and a little more rugged. They spotted Plays who seemed to be tracking some walkin’ dead. There was a very quick battle with a gang of the ½ dozen zombies, and the players got a chance to roll some dice right away and learn some of the basics. The walkin’ dead didn’t last very long, one of them was able to score a hit on Father Sam although he made his Spirit roll and wasn’t shaken. The whole scrap lasted 3 rounds. Plays got a raise and some serious Aces on his damage rolls so shot a second zombie straight through the first one he rolled so well. The group was concerned that padre was 'infected'!
They made it to the Conway farm and met the family. That night they caught Jaimie sneaking into the old barn to see his dad. There was some pretty decent RP and I was pleasantly surprised as a few of the guys got into it. Father Sam knew a bit about Hellestromme, and made a Smarts roll to figure out it was very possible that automatons could be rigged with real brains! The guys thought this was cool.
The next day at breakfast one of the retrieval team showed up looking around. The party told him to shove off, and they figured out quickly someone was looking for their lost property and he would likely be back. The group made a quick trip into the trading post to buy some ammo for dad and a few other things.
They came up with a plan and we going to go looking for trouble, but the retrieval team showed up at the farm that evening. They were riding in a ‘war wagon’ – a ghost rock powered tank complete with turret gun. There was a brief stand off and then all heck broke loose.
Main bad dude Duncan insisted on looking around the farm, saying they would be gone right after. He headed towards the old barn and was not impeded, Dad automaton blew him away. The wagon started up and stuff started happening fast!
Shady Doug jumped up onto the wagon and pretty much destroyed the bad guy manning the turret gun with some well placed bolts (with multiple Aces). Doc Lightning incinerated 3 villains who unfortunately standing in a row so his burst took them all out (more crazy aces!). Plays With Fire was using his bow and dropping bad guys right and left.
Dad came out of the barn and started blasting, making sure he was protecting his family with his bulk. Doc Lighting decided to try and ride him at some point but fell off. He charged the war wagon (which was accelerating towards him as well) and they collided, wrecking the old barn. Shady Doug snuck down into the interior of the wagon, saw the drivers, and opened the back door so the other guys could get in. Plays came charging in and buried his tomahawk into one of the drivers, and Dad got up and put his gatling right against the window slit of the wagon and blasted everything. Plays and Shady Doug were able to get cover just before so they weren’t ripped apart by the concentrated fire.
Victory! The party looted what was left of the bad guys (you can take the guys out of a dungeon . . .) and the session was over. Sherilynn was reunited with Rob, and Jaimie though the whole thing was the coolest thing he has ever seen.
TWO
Father Sam, Doc Lightning, and Plays With Fire came across Dr Oswald Franklin buried up to his neck in the desert. Dr. Franklin had been out experimenting with his new camera design, and had been caught taking pictures by some very unhappy Comanche. The braves were ready to kill Dr. Franklin until there seemed to be a disagreement between them. The leader was able to communicate that he wanted Dr Franklin to take a picture of the whole band, then they wrecked the camera, took the photograph, and buried the hapless Doc in the ground and left.
Escorting the doc to the nearest town of Fairchild, the group spotted that they were being tailed by a group of Comanches. Sure enough, the natives attacked the group and everyone was surprised to see the natives were colorless like tintype photograph images. The Indian attack was not a serious one, and whatever the party tried it seemed to have no effect on the black & white war party. The braves themselves seemed ecstatic that they were resistant to attack and broke off the attack after touching the characters with bare hands . Dr. Franklin babbled on and ranted about "Psychosomatic aetheric waveform transference" and explained to the group the braves believed that the picture he took held their souls, so their bodies were impervious to damage.
En route to Fairchild, the group came across the native shaman Laughs At Darkness. He invited the group to spend the evening in his kiva lodge and participate in a vision quest. He seemed to be waiting for the group and knew quite a bit about them. The filled him in about the photograph and he told them he knew of Pale Moon, an evil and reckless warrior who was likely the leader of the war band that was encountered.
That evening, Laughs At Darkness told the group he had a vision from the nature spirit Tacheene that they were champions of the sun, and he was to help them on their quest to battle the evils of the dark times and the dark spirit of Ahpuch. After sharing a meal, Laughs covered the entrance to the lodge and scatted some strange powder into the fire and the group soon lost contact with the world in the dense & aromatic smoke and darkness of the lodge.
The visions were quick and strange, sounds and images that didn't appear connected or follow any particular pattern.
The group saw the image of natives, dancing around a fire, smoke, the creak of a rope, the sound of rocks falling, bottles banging together, a train in the distance then approaching and passing, water dripping, the image of a 2 headed snake, a ranch during a storm, a large figure from behind that slowly turned and seemed to have blue bloated skin, a man sitting in a rocking chair smoking a pipe, and a bowie knife.
The group awoke the next morning, Laughs At Darkness nowhere to be found.
Later that day they approached to town of Fairchild - on the outskirts of town they found a gallows with a dead sock-footed desperado swingin' from the rope, with a sign marked 'MURDERER' hanging around his neck.
Entering town, the group found it fearful with plenty of locked doors and suspicious faces peeing out of windows. They quickly learned that there had been a murder each night for the past week, and that many of the townsfolk believed the ghost of the executed man was taking his revenge on the town. The town marshall, a doughy incompetent Byron Pickens asked the group to look into the murders and deputized them.
The group did some looking around, finding tracks from one of the murder sites to a fence on the outskirts of town near a scare crow, and some dug up graves at the town cemetery on the church grounds.
That evening the trio patrolled the town and sure enough there was another murder - the group was able to spot the killer was none other than the town marshall. There was a chase from roof top to roof top, with the showdown on the roof of the general store across from the town saloon.
Marshall Pickens had been transformed, and was wearing a pair of overly large cowboy boots. He was almost almost unstoppable in combat, and slashed at the party repeatedly with a gigantic bowie knife. Doc Lighting suffered a serious and life threatening series of knife attacks and his right arm was damaged beyond repair. In the end the Plays With Fire was able to make the final tomahawk chop against the demonic marshall, and managed to put him down for good.
One of the trio is now officially the Marshall of the town with the other 2 as deputies. Doc's arm was cleaned and dressed down to a stump by the town sawbones and he's already looked into Smith & Robards company to order a custom fitted clockwork replacement, which is sure to cost a pretty penny!
I decided to give a new game system a shot, and sure glad I did.
SW is a really fun system and DLR is really well done.
Should you be the type that's interested, actual play of first 2 sessions below.
Characters are huckster Shady Doug, mad scientist Doc Lightning, Father Sam Johnson, and native scout Plays With Fire.
The first 3 started off on a stagecoach on the way to Carson City. They had never met each other before that point. As luck would have it, one of the horses pulling the coach stepped in a hole and broke its leg, and the other came up lame and was not able to pull it solo. The carriage driver Zeke apologised profusely and told the 3 it was less than 2 hours walk to town and to start hoofing it before it got dark.
The posse took off and soon the area became hilly and a little more rugged. They spotted Plays who seemed to be tracking some walkin’ dead. There was a very quick battle with a gang of the ½ dozen zombies, and the players got a chance to roll some dice right away and learn some of the basics. The walkin’ dead didn’t last very long, one of them was able to score a hit on Father Sam although he made his Spirit roll and wasn’t shaken. The whole scrap lasted 3 rounds. Plays got a raise and some serious Aces on his damage rolls so shot a second zombie straight through the first one he rolled so well. The group was concerned that padre was 'infected'!
They made it to the Conway farm and met the family. That night they caught Jaimie sneaking into the old barn to see his dad. There was some pretty decent RP and I was pleasantly surprised as a few of the guys got into it. Father Sam knew a bit about Hellestromme, and made a Smarts roll to figure out it was very possible that automatons could be rigged with real brains! The guys thought this was cool.
The next day at breakfast one of the retrieval team showed up looking around. The party told him to shove off, and they figured out quickly someone was looking for their lost property and he would likely be back. The group made a quick trip into the trading post to buy some ammo for dad and a few other things.
They came up with a plan and we going to go looking for trouble, but the retrieval team showed up at the farm that evening. They were riding in a ‘war wagon’ – a ghost rock powered tank complete with turret gun. There was a brief stand off and then all heck broke loose.
Main bad dude Duncan insisted on looking around the farm, saying they would be gone right after. He headed towards the old barn and was not impeded, Dad automaton blew him away. The wagon started up and stuff started happening fast!
Shady Doug jumped up onto the wagon and pretty much destroyed the bad guy manning the turret gun with some well placed bolts (with multiple Aces). Doc Lightning incinerated 3 villains who unfortunately standing in a row so his burst took them all out (more crazy aces!). Plays With Fire was using his bow and dropping bad guys right and left.
Dad came out of the barn and started blasting, making sure he was protecting his family with his bulk. Doc Lighting decided to try and ride him at some point but fell off. He charged the war wagon (which was accelerating towards him as well) and they collided, wrecking the old barn. Shady Doug snuck down into the interior of the wagon, saw the drivers, and opened the back door so the other guys could get in. Plays came charging in and buried his tomahawk into one of the drivers, and Dad got up and put his gatling right against the window slit of the wagon and blasted everything. Plays and Shady Doug were able to get cover just before so they weren’t ripped apart by the concentrated fire.
Victory! The party looted what was left of the bad guys (you can take the guys out of a dungeon . . .) and the session was over. Sherilynn was reunited with Rob, and Jaimie though the whole thing was the coolest thing he has ever seen.
TWO
Father Sam, Doc Lightning, and Plays With Fire came across Dr Oswald Franklin buried up to his neck in the desert. Dr. Franklin had been out experimenting with his new camera design, and had been caught taking pictures by some very unhappy Comanche. The braves were ready to kill Dr. Franklin until there seemed to be a disagreement between them. The leader was able to communicate that he wanted Dr Franklin to take a picture of the whole band, then they wrecked the camera, took the photograph, and buried the hapless Doc in the ground and left.
Escorting the doc to the nearest town of Fairchild, the group spotted that they were being tailed by a group of Comanches. Sure enough, the natives attacked the group and everyone was surprised to see the natives were colorless like tintype photograph images. The Indian attack was not a serious one, and whatever the party tried it seemed to have no effect on the black & white war party. The braves themselves seemed ecstatic that they were resistant to attack and broke off the attack after touching the characters with bare hands . Dr. Franklin babbled on and ranted about "Psychosomatic aetheric waveform transference" and explained to the group the braves believed that the picture he took held their souls, so their bodies were impervious to damage.
En route to Fairchild, the group came across the native shaman Laughs At Darkness. He invited the group to spend the evening in his kiva lodge and participate in a vision quest. He seemed to be waiting for the group and knew quite a bit about them. The filled him in about the photograph and he told them he knew of Pale Moon, an evil and reckless warrior who was likely the leader of the war band that was encountered.
That evening, Laughs At Darkness told the group he had a vision from the nature spirit Tacheene that they were champions of the sun, and he was to help them on their quest to battle the evils of the dark times and the dark spirit of Ahpuch. After sharing a meal, Laughs covered the entrance to the lodge and scatted some strange powder into the fire and the group soon lost contact with the world in the dense & aromatic smoke and darkness of the lodge.
The visions were quick and strange, sounds and images that didn't appear connected or follow any particular pattern.
The group saw the image of natives, dancing around a fire, smoke, the creak of a rope, the sound of rocks falling, bottles banging together, a train in the distance then approaching and passing, water dripping, the image of a 2 headed snake, a ranch during a storm, a large figure from behind that slowly turned and seemed to have blue bloated skin, a man sitting in a rocking chair smoking a pipe, and a bowie knife.
The group awoke the next morning, Laughs At Darkness nowhere to be found.
Later that day they approached to town of Fairchild - on the outskirts of town they found a gallows with a dead sock-footed desperado swingin' from the rope, with a sign marked 'MURDERER' hanging around his neck.
Entering town, the group found it fearful with plenty of locked doors and suspicious faces peeing out of windows. They quickly learned that there had been a murder each night for the past week, and that many of the townsfolk believed the ghost of the executed man was taking his revenge on the town. The town marshall, a doughy incompetent Byron Pickens asked the group to look into the murders and deputized them.
The group did some looking around, finding tracks from one of the murder sites to a fence on the outskirts of town near a scare crow, and some dug up graves at the town cemetery on the church grounds.
That evening the trio patrolled the town and sure enough there was another murder - the group was able to spot the killer was none other than the town marshall. There was a chase from roof top to roof top, with the showdown on the roof of the general store across from the town saloon.
Marshall Pickens had been transformed, and was wearing a pair of overly large cowboy boots. He was almost almost unstoppable in combat, and slashed at the party repeatedly with a gigantic bowie knife. Doc Lighting suffered a serious and life threatening series of knife attacks and his right arm was damaged beyond repair. In the end the Plays With Fire was able to make the final tomahawk chop against the demonic marshall, and managed to put him down for good.
One of the trio is now officially the Marshall of the town with the other 2 as deputies. Doc's arm was cleaned and dressed down to a stump by the town sawbones and he's already looked into Smith & Robards company to order a custom fitted clockwork replacement, which is sure to cost a pretty penny!
