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Author Topic: Sister Mary Elephante's Baptism of Fire  (Read 1965 times)

Offline Grumbling Grognard

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Sister Mary Elephante's Baptism of Fire
« on: September 17, 2015, 04:08:41 AM »
Sister Mary Elephante's Baptism of Fire

This was my very first play of Strange Aeons, and I took "Sister Mary Elefante" a Catholic nun in a convalescent home recovering from a breakdown due to a pair of unruly youngsters from East LA.  Regardless, she is one tough lady as I took "tough" for her freebie skill and then went whole-hog and got her a .45 pistol and light armor (her special "support bra/girdle").  The nun also carries a old hair pin (i.e. a knife).  The other "agents" are Albert who is packing his pump shotgun (ie. 2-barrel) and a club.  Good old Albert is near impossible to keep down with his "jump up" skill.  Stephen is our last agent and he packs a (cane) sword but with the sword's ability to parry (from tenure as fencing captain at the university) he is much more "rugged" than he appears (his skill).  After this mission Stephen will reveal himself as an member of a covert "Vatican Action Team" and recruit the others into the fold of VAT (with his holiness's blessing of course).  

I decided to keep it (very) simple on my first game.  I picked "fight" and laid-out a simple table with fields that act as light cover only.  Heavy cover was only to found hiding behind the water tank on this battlefield.  And, as the plot above said, a set of railway tracks bisect the field near the north edge but that act only as eye-candy and provide no cover.  As Lurkers, I also kept it simple and picked 3 Mi-Go and left them unarmed (they fit so well at 5pts each that way).


Of course she knew they were just humoring her...  I guess you could not really blame them for not believing her, not really.  I mean, she had been one of the most well respected sister's at "Her Holy Mother's School For the Underprivileged", before she had her episode.  It was so long ago, now...or at least it seemed.  And so, very, very trivial those dealings with those two students that sent her over the edge when she compared them to what she had witnessed last night...

She had gone for a long walk at night to calm herself and pray.  The moon was near full and as she often did that when she was very, very upset she was lost in prayer when she realized that she was nearing the scene of the horror.  The brutal death of those the two children the police had found by the abandoned railway siding was enough chill anyone.  She had trouble finding solace in the police account that they had been hit by a train and somehow later moved to the abandoned siding by "animals".  Everyone knew that railway siding had not been used for years and what kind of animal would do that?  

It was just as she neared the water tank when she first heard that sound.  It was like a very loud bumble bee, almost in your ear it was so loud, but a higher pitch.  It was almost a whine.  And it was not near either, but it near enough.  In fact she could tell it was coming from the other-side of the tracks and was just rounding the water tank to look when she saw "them".  They were hideous!  As large a man they looked nothing like a human.  More like crablike bugs, with wings!  But it was not the wings that made the sounds...no.  It was far more horrifying than that. They had no heads!  Just a mass of tentacles or feelers that they flailed about wildly and made buzzing sounds with as they glowed in faintly different shades of green, blue and yellow...she was awestruck with terror!  She began to recite "The Lord's Prayer" and she was no longer afraid.  It was these things that had done those unspeakable acts to those poor childern!  Just as the brave sister was about to confront these abominations they stopped buzzing and all suddenly turned and took flight to the west and were gone.  That was last night.  It had taken her all morning to work up the courage to tell Albert.  He would listen.  He might even believe her.

Albert was in the maintenance hut as usual still trying to fix that old old gas heater.    He listened of course, and she 'thought' she caught something in his eye when she told him about the buzzing sounds she had heard and he had asked her several times to describe it...  But by the time her story was over, she was convinced he would only accompany her back to the spot because they were such close friends.  It was Ablert's idea to inform Stephen what had happened.  Stephen was a good sort (as far as administrator's went that is) and she was against it but Albert insisted he should know as soon as possible.  Sister Mary could not have been more surprised when Stehpen insisted on coming along that very night.

Setup: The Sister and her compatriots enter from the East side and stay in the open hoping to use their ranged weapons to full advantage against the spaghetti headed aliens!  The MiGo setup in a field on the other side trying to avoid these same weapons.

Turn 1 VAT and MiGo: The sister moves first and they move up full speed making it about half way to the cover of the tank and keeping away from the tall fields of corn and barley.  The MiGo stay the North, out of range and try to circle around using the cover of the crops to shield them from the firearms the humans carry.
« Last Edit: September 17, 2015, 03:34:13 PM by Grumbling Grognard »
Scott Clinton
(aka The Grumbling Grognard)

Offline Grumbling Grognard

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Re: Sister Mary Elephante's Baptism of Fire
« Reply #1 on: September 17, 2015, 04:10:31 AM »
Turn 2 VAT: Still way too away from the flying horrors any chance of a shot (even on their next move using an alert) all of the humans use both their actions to move to the water tank and take up positions.

Turn 2  Lurker: As the sister and her friends rounded the water tank the MiGo let loose an loud chorus of buzzing and hesitate just a moment before turning and swooping directly toward the sister and her friends (i.e. I measured a few times and thought about it...thought about it again...thought about it some more...and said ah heck lets charge!)
« Last Edit: September 17, 2015, 04:29:08 AM by Grumbling Grognard »

Offline Grumbling Grognard

  • Scientist
  • Posts: 244
Re: Sister Mary Elephante's Baptism of Fire
« Reply #2 on: September 17, 2015, 04:11:46 AM »
Turn 3 VAT: Near panic, Albert lets loose with a pair of blasts from his 12ga and hits with a critical hit (just like shooting geese), but the shot has no effect on the alien beast (rolls a 1 to wound)!  The sister with much the same luck also rolls a "1" to damage (this would be a trend for the VAT team).  With the failure to slow the enemy at all, and with the horrors closing on the good sister (and with nothing to shoot with) Stephen charges the nearest MiGo with his (cane) sword.  With his "rugged" skill he does not need to test, and with his parry he easily wins...but fails to wound the critter even when he is able to win with ease (yes, another "1" to wound).
« Last Edit: September 17, 2015, 04:31:11 AM by Grumbling Grognard »

Offline Grumbling Grognard

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  • Posts: 244
Re: Sister Mary Elephante's Baptism of Fire
« Reply #3 on: September 17, 2015, 04:14:38 AM »
Turn 3 MiGo: Charge! It was at this point, things got bad...  Stephen is against two MiGo by himself, but wins!  And then rolls another "1" (slicing off one tentacle at a time is not really that effective Stevie!).  Good old Albert also got charged and makes his Res test with ease ("Heck this'n looks like my sister in law!") and swings his club enough to gain a tie and keep going for another turn.

Turns 4-5 Everyone:  Sister Mary charges in to help Steven and lots of flailing, shrieks and buzzing of wings ensue...  

The MiGo hit Albert and the Sister on turns 4 and 5 respectively but fail to wound (no wonder on the sister, but Al was just lucky).  Stephen is not to be bested in melee by these critters...but also seems clueless on exactly where to stab these beasties to make them go down (he rolls another "1" to hit on turn 4...then turn "5" brings it up a notch and rolls a 3 to fail again).  The sister, also fails to wound.

Turn 8 Everyone: Steven and Albert both wound there beastie with a single wound point matching their con.  The sister wins this time but fails to do a wound with her hairpin (knife).

Turn 9 Everyone: Lots more shouting, buzzing and trumping....but no damage to anyone.





« Last Edit: September 17, 2015, 04:32:57 AM by Grumbling Grognard »

Offline Grumbling Grognard

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  • Posts: 244
Re: Sister Mary Elephante's Baptism of Fire
« Reply #4 on: September 17, 2015, 04:20:33 AM »
Turn 10 Everyone: All miss or fail to wound except Stephen who does 2 wounds to his alien and kills it dead (lopped his "head" off....errr...well his lump of tentacles anyway!)  He then moves to help the sister.

Turn 11: This turn sees the end of the second MiGo who was out-numbered when the sister kills it with two wounds in a single stab.  Albert just misses killing his several times and in the end it is the sister that has to run over and plunge her trusty hair pin into the thing to render it inert (major injury).

Wow.  11 turns...45 min.   Sure, solo, but a newbie as well.  Nice, smooth, fast game.  Fun fun fun!

After game activities saw no "bonus" abilities (ie. no rolls of "6") and I gave my earned point to the sister (of course!).  She has decided it is time to bow up and deal with this evil and found she is a lot tougher than she had thought before, yep, she is now "tough" (I kinda like a high CON and now maybe she can shed the support girdle....oh...bad...bad picture just formed in my mind, talk about scary!)

Thank you Uncle Mike for a great game!


« Last Edit: September 17, 2015, 04:33:36 AM by Grumbling Grognard »

Offline Litebrite

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  • Posts: 273
Re: Sister Mary Elephante's Baptism of Fire
« Reply #5 on: September 17, 2015, 02:07:32 PM »
Good write up.  I really like reading "Fleshed" out AARs. Hope to see further adventures of Sister Mary and her companions.

Lem  :)

Offline styx

  • Scatterbrained Genius
  • Posts: 2972
Re: Sister Mary Elephante's Baptism of Fire
« Reply #6 on: September 18, 2015, 01:36:55 AM »
Great write up!
Check out my blogs!

Warhammer 40k, Fantasy and more!: http://armyoftheweek.blogspot.com

Warhammer Historicals: Legends of the High Seas and Old West, Gladiator: http://diceoflegends.blogspot.com/

Strange Aeons: http://strangeraeonsadventures.blogspot.com

 

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