Venice, 188-. Word is afoot that an illegitimate child of the ancient line of the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha has taken up residence in the old city – and is guilty of two crimes.
Firstly, the Child is a Romantic Poet, penning anonymous verse for scandalously licentious journals and consorting with the middle-classes.
As if that was not bad enough, the Child hides a darker secret: in its veins flows the anguished blood of Transylvania, gifted to it when its father, Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg & Gotha, second son of HM Queen Victoria, had a youthful tryst with a minor Romanian Princess. The result was the Child, who, shunned by its royal father but secretly educated and brought up in the English school system carries the blood of the werewolves.
It seems the poor Child’s education is complete. It has thrown off the suffocating bonds of the and reverted to it’s wild type. Who knows where it travels - perhaps back to haunt the mountains of it’s ancestry? A series of murders across the Continent has lead a blood-spattered trail to Venice, and here it wanders, in the moonlight in a lonely corner of La Serenissima - the Serene Republic.
Any number of nefarious Companies have hurried here, knowing that to kill and expose this embarrassing menace would command great power and influence over the Royal House: a rich a source of imperial ransom or blackmail. Others may seek Her Majesty’s favour by discreetly pruning this wild tendril of the royal vine…
But who is the Child? Old or Young? Boy, Girl or adult grown?
Only the Moonlight will unmask the secret…
*******
The scene is a forgotten corner of Venice. Shabby
palazzos overlook the slopping green canals. A church tower totters over the wharf. In the middle of a small cove, one of the few cemetaries hosted by the island squats dark and quiet, the tombstones reflecting back the murmurs of the city in an oddly flat and disturbing clarity. Despite the dark, pedestrians, a train of pack-mules, carts, even a stagecoach navigate the bridges and streets. Crates of goods are stacked alongside the water.
La Serenissima...
A view looking east, where the disc of the moon can be seen rising...
Some more daguerrotypes of charming Venice:
In the east, the moon is rising.Tonight the Inscrutable Black Dragon Tong, lead by the mysterious Dragon Lady Herself takes stage. Next to be seen scuttling along wharf and over bridge is the irascible danger of Professor Abir and his daughter, and their red-cowled cultists. O’er yonder are the members of the Cult of Kih-Oskh, themselves masked in purple fanning out across gloomy piazzas and
sottopassagia.
Doubtless these three have sinister motives to weaken and humiliate the British crown. Who, if any, are there to save the face of Her Imperial Majesty? Ah - there is Lord Curr, with his steady companions Singh and McFarlane - perhaps he serves a more noble purpose?
The companies moved onto the map, eyeing each other off and wondering which of the myriad bystanders was their quarry. Lord Curr’s men fanned out across the southern wharf, the Kih-Oskh the west, and Abir’s cultists form the northwestern corner. A faded rococo Palazzo, jarringly styled like a small French Chateau, occupied a prominent position in the North east. From it flitted the Tong.
Here comes the Black Dragon Tong:
…and in the east, the moon was rising…Inevitably the companies came into conflict. Soon there was a scuffle between Abir’s cultists and the Tong. Steel on steel, club on bone. The Dragon Lady, following the mysterious path of shadows, emerged into the flight, knocking down three of the cultists with her mysterious Dragon’s Touch. Meanwhile Master Wu-jen and a Dragon Warrior duked it out with Sairah and the professor, none able to land a telling blow.
The Tong and Professor Abir's minions disturb the peace...
Across the cove, the hiss, crackle and flash of Curr’s arc rifle, and the chatter of steam-powered machine guns. Singh and a trio of Kih-Oskh cultists traded gunfire across a canal, the crack of bullets echoing around. One of the cultists went down, followed by McFarlane.
Lord Curr and his men exchange pleasantries with the cultists of Khi-Oskh across a canal:
…and in the east, the moon was rising…Still the fight went on. Singh slumped and fell, red-cultists dropped to the stones. A Kih-Oskh follower was enveloped in sparks, and was hurled into the water, which fizzed and popped and glowed as he sank into the weedy lagoon.
Ooof! Master Wu-jen succumbed to a blow and his soul began the long journey to join his ancestors.
…and in the east…the moon had risen!
Clouds parted, bathing the scene in a sickly yellow-green. Near the Chateau, where moments earlier had stood a beautiful young red-haired woman in a green dress, there now hunched a tormented beast, with rippling muscles ‘neath a ragged coat of grey fur, dripping yellow fangs, and savage claws. An anguished howl that stopped the hardened citizens in their footsteps.
The werewolf reveals herself:
The werewolf lunged across the bridge, where the Tong seized on their proximity to attack it. The Dragon Warrior had a silvered sword, and the Dragon Lady herself attempted to stifle the monster with a flicker of her fan, which momentarily conjured the image of a dragon enveloping the beast in ethereal flames. The monster shrugged off the image, and swung a distended arm, savaging the Dragon Warrior, his two-bladed polearm clattering to the cobbles as he fell.
Sarah danced forward across the bridge - standing beside the Dragon Lady as their ancient enmities were fleetingly forgotten in the face of a greater evil.
Mortal enemies confront a greater evil...
In a moment the Dragon Lady herself was next to succumb, her lavishly embroidered silk gown shredded by dripping fangs, a peony fan floating in the waters like a grotesque implication to the gods…then Sairah fell, her poisoned silver knife skittering away as she lay dying on the time-worn flagstones.
The Werewolf capered across the bridge, sending Abir’s cultists - next in line of her path - scattering before it.
A cultist foolishly tries to stop the werewolf:
Still Lord Curr and the Kih-Oskh fought a deadly duel the purple clad minions slowly being whittled by the slow-firing but deadly blasts of the Irish Peer’s arc-fire. But soon their attention was drawn to the approaching kerfuffle of Abir’s flapping acolytes.
Lord Curr gives a Kih-Oskh cultist
what-forThe Werewolf was padding along, seeking the sanctity and salvation of the graveyard. Standing in its path were two of the Kih-Oskh. They turned as one to confront the beast, and paid the price of their foolish lack of preparation. Paralysed in horror, their bullets sprayed far from their target, and they were swept aside under the maddened tide of tortured beast…
The Werewolf sweeps through the companies:
A lone survivor, Curr muttered a single cryptic phrase: “Father, I beg thee Bless my Arc Rifle…” then turned and disappeared into the streets even as a rising fog masked the fate of the Lost Child of Saxe-Coburg & Gotha.
******
A classic evening of adventure. This game was gothic-themed derring-do from stem to stern, set on one of our favourite backdrops - Venice. Based on the Bad Jack scenario - and using the ideas suggested in the recent thread
here, we turned the companies’ nemesis into a Werewolf who would emerge when the rising moon had reached it’s peak.
The table was scattered with all the civilians, carts, coaches and other gear I could scrape together from my collection.
The moon is a
Lemax Lighted Village Moon, which is mounted on an antenna type stand, and telescopes upward d4cm per turn until it reaches maximum height. When this happens, one of six nominated ‘bystanders’ is randomly determined as the werewolf, who will fight and claw its way to the archway at the end of the cemetery, killing any who cross its path. The companies must destroy it with silvered weapons, only one of which is allowed per company. Naturally the companies cannot resist fighting among themselves.
This time the Werewolf (the Hybrid form described in the now lost pre-release PDFs) was too powerful for the 150 point mini-companies. We found that although players allocated the silvered weapons to their more powerful characters, the risk of them becoming casualties (either to the werewolf or in general combat) meant that some were left unable to destroy the creature. Future iterations will permit the general purchase of silvered weapons.
Perhaps we’ll encounter it again sometime along it’s lonely and terrifying pilgrimage…
Photo credits must go to my lovely and tolerant better half, Prunella
Enjoy