Dramatis Personae
+Linlin Kins as Umquat
+Frotz Self as Varouj
+Ronnie Whelan as Ronnina
+Adventures of the Mind as Don Harper of Mars
Rulings
The Spandau now deals 2d4 base damage.
A possible use for the scientists is that the players can post them a technological problem. The referee will then assign some appropriate difficulty number to the problem. Each haven turn, that difficulty will be reduced by the number of scientists working on the problem. When it reaches 0, the problem has successfully been solved.
Information
The Team Gopher mooks all look kinda samey. Not identical, but pretty close to it. They’re also unnaturally devoted to their duty.
Ongoing Effects
Don Harper has 1 use of his Deception Potion left before its effects will have worn off.
Loot
A hard drive containing the research data Team Gopher had assigned their people to.
11 Scientists
NPC Interactions
Lugud: Died ;_;
Albert the Great, Sheniqua, Robot Monster, Norno, Faylana: So, because someone died, the check this time would normally be to determine if they LOSE morale, rather than gain it. However, that roll would be modified by whether or not Lugud’s body was recovered. However, it’ll be several sessions before Lugud’s body can even be called “recovered” or “Not recovered,” so I rolled a check to see if the +1 difference would matter to any of their rolls, and no, it would not. All of them rolled way below their current morale, so none of them lose morale. I guess maybe they didn’t like Lugud all that much. ;_;
Unconscious Door Guard: Was tricked by Don Harper, then tranquilized. Is currently tied up back in the crawlspace that led to the decontamination room.
“S Guy”: The first scientist the party took captive. Is being dragged along with Varouj, and has been ordered to pick up Lugud’s equipment and follow along. Has so far complied out of fear.
10 Other Scientists: Captured by Umquat, left tied up.
Highlights Recap
Freshly decontaminated of worm goo, Don Harper cracked open the door leading out into the complex beyond, intending to set his rover down on the ground. Immediately, however, he was met by a guard standing beside the door who asked for his identification. He asked for a moment to retrieve it, then fished a Potion of Deception out of Albert’s pack. Once quaffed, he was able to say 4 things which would be believed no matter what.
Popping his head back out, he held out his smartphone (screen off) and said “Here’s my Infrared Level Clearance.” which the guard accepted. The party then placed a pipe bomb in a sack, and rigged it to explode when the sack was opened. They handed it to one of the guards, and Don said “This is an urgent delivery for Guard HQ.” Again, the guard believed him, and ran down the hall to make the delivery.
Don and Umquat quickly used stealth to neutralize the two door guards (one was killed, whilst the other was hit with a tranquilizer dart and shoved back into the decontamination room. Lugud prepared to throw a grenade into the southern door, while another grenade was rigged to the northern door, set to blow when the door was opened.
When the explosion came from Guard HQ, the party was ready. Lugud’s throw took out everyone in the on-duty guard room, 9 in all. Lugud pointed out that all of the guards in that room had looked kinda…samey. A few rounds later, when the guards in the off-duty room tried to file out, the first in line was blown to pieces by the door grenade. Ronnina then followed this up by casting SpiderBall on the doorway, killing only two, but effectively preventing anyone from leaving the room, since it only had one entrance.
Most of the party pressed south, where they discovered some Scientists working at computers. They were ordered to surrender themselves, and when they didn’t immediately comply, Varouj put two crossbow bolts into the chest of one. The other, cowering, agreed to follow.
It was right around this point that the guards finished moving their Vulcan Cannon into position, and unleashed a barrage of fire down the hallway. Ronnina’s Zombies were almost completely torn to pieces, and many other characters took severe damage. Ronnina would have died, had Hans (her claveger) leapt in front of her, and been reduced to nothing but gibbets.
Tragically, the noble Lugud took the full brunt of the blast, and his body was torn to pieces.
Hoping to avoid the hallway-of-death, most of the party retreated to the Southern room where they’d found the scientist, bashing and hacking their way through the sheet-rock walls. They moved room-to-room, most of which had scientists in them, which Umquat would quickly round up and hold as prisoners.
Meanwhile, among the first rooms they broke into was a server dedicated to the scientist’s various research projects for Team Gopher. Don Harper set to work accessing and downloading all of the research data, in the hopes it may prove useful later.
The guards trapped in their barracks seemed to have the same idea as the party. They set to work smashing through their walls, and filing into adjacent rooms. Thinking fast, Varouj took the party’s second pipe bomb off of Lugud’s corpse, and tossed it across the hall. The explosion took out most of the guards, but a significant chunk of them managed to make it out in time.
From here, the party began a slow slog through mook corpses. Each round they took some damage, killed some mooks, and advanced a few more feet down the hallway.
After a short while, a woman appeared at the far end of the hallway, wielding a long rifle with a large scope. This was TCP, a member of Team Gopher. Each round her rifle lanced down the hallway, picking away at the party.
The party did their own fair share of picking, though, dealing 42 points of damage to TCP before she moved off to retreat.
As the session was winding down, Don Harper and Robot Monster cornered the lat remaining 8 of the 40 guards who started in the off-duty barracks. With his best attempt at intimidation, Don Harper relied upon his 3rd use of the Deception Potion to shout “Surrender! There are 300,000 of us!” This did not seem to phase the unnaturally loyal mooks of Team Gopher, who made no move to lay down their arms.
After nearly 4 hours of playing through this single massive battle, the session ended In Media Res, with more fighting yet to go.