Lead Adventure Forum
Miniatures Adventure => Pulp => Topic started by: Wirelizard on June 08, 2008, 07:42:23 AM
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Corey (Burgundavia, here) and I had a good pickup 45A game a few evenings ago. I've just finished painting a new batch of Pulp Figures, so we got together to drink beer and give some of the new figs an outing.
We scratched up the scenario and most of the characters right there, tweaking a few previously created characters and a few from various 45A sourcebooks. The encounter markers were ginned up on the spot: Ace was "crate containing stone slab with Map to Lost City on it", there were spiders at another encounter, and a bunch of "nothing" markers.
Burgundavia took Dr. Fred "Ohio" Smith, whip-wielding pseudo-archeologist, his assistant Jim, their bulldog, and Dr. Smith's pistol-toting dame of the moment, 'Debbie and/or Marion' (he's terrible at remembering the names of the women he sleeps with in exotic corners of the world...)
I had "Red" Lily, International Women of Mystery, possible agent of the Comintern, and not quite as good a pilot as she thinks. She had her infamous (and dangerous) assistant, "Evil" Ivan Evilski, and two armed thugs Lily had hired near the port.
Dr. Smith and co started on one side of the 2x2 table, next to the riverbank and their small hired steamer. Red Lily and her gang started on the other corner of the table, next to the airplane they'd just arrived in. Incompetent (bribed?) local stevedores have lost the crate with the Lost City Tablets somewhere in the tropical muck around the docks, and the chase is on to find it!
Red Lily found the crate personally a few turns in, after Evil Ivan found some spiders and Dr. Smith had found a noose trap (both escaped). The damn bulldog nearly ripped one of Lily's tommygun-wielding thugs to pieces. Lily lugged the crate back to her plane, but meanwhile Ivan and Jim had started a truely epic brawl, both skilled sluggers battering each other for ages.
Jim turned out to be even more dangerous in a brawl than Ivan, and left him battered and broken in the dirt. Ivan ended the game surrendering after Jim interupted a spirited attempt to crawl into the jungle with a broken leg.
The dog attempted to board the plane just after Lily started it, was kicked out, but actually killed Lily's last thug in the attempt!
Lily gunned the throttle, the plane bounced across the open field, gaining speed, until 'Debbie and/or Marion' shot out one tire!
The plane slowed long enough to allow Dr. Smith to catch up, and use his bullwhip to latch onto a strut! Then one of the truely great moments of the game: 'Debbie and/or Marion' took a shot at Lily with Dr. Smith clinging to his bullwhip nearly in the line of fire. We decided that if Debbie/Marion missed, she had to roll an additional attack - not against Dr. Smith, but against his bullwhip!! So... she missed Lily, hit the bullwhip, cut it with a single pistol shot, and sent her man sprawling into the dirt as the plane bounces away, gaining speed for takeoff!
Ah, but this is not the end! Not at all! Dr. Smith gathers his resources and makes a mighty leap onto the wing, then into the cabin! He and Lily struggle over the controls, and he succeeds in pulling the throttles back to rest, just as the short, rough jungle strip ends!
Nearly at takeoff speed, the plane SLAMS into the brush! Lily breaks her leg, Dr. Smith dislocates his shoulder, but the scene fades out with Dr. Smith's pistol pressed to Lily's head as she surrenders in her wrecked airplane, and Dr. Smith's faithful companions run toward the wreckage!
Next time!!! Will the dangerous and beautiful Red Lily and her fearsome assistant escape from Dr. "Ohio" Smith's river steamer? Will the rumoured savages of the unexplored Costagauno jungle be the end of all of them?? What resources will the shadowy Comintern Exploration Branch send to rescue Lily??? What is the secret of the Lost City of the Costaguano??? Tune in next time!!!
[fade to black, with stirring music]
This was an impromptu game, fueled by moderate amounts of beer and paint fumes, but it was a blast.
Debbie and/or Marion's odd name was a result of my comment during character creation that Indy´s female companion was Marion, not Debbie. Corey's excellent rejoiner was "Marion, Debbie, whatever. You think someone like that actually remembers her name in the morning?" lol
The great moment of Debbie/Marion's shooting of Ohio's whip was prompted by my suggestion that, since he was so close to her line of fire at Lily, if she missed we should roll for a shot at him. Corey disliked that, but we both agreed that an attack on Ohio's whip was entirely and perfectly in line with the sort of Angels of Coincidence pulp story we both wanted!
An excellent game, a great first outing for some of my recent painting (pictures soon, I promise!), and just possibly, the accidental creation of a set of recurring characters and story arc for us. Oh, and the beer was good, too.
By Cthulhu, this got a bit long, didn't it? It's OK, it's over, you can all wake up from your naps now!
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Other great vignettes included Rover chasing off "the white-shirted thug", attacking him like only a pitbull can all the way across the table straight into the aircraft where a few final bites finished him. Witness then Rover being dragged out of the aircraft as it sped up, White Shirt firmly in his jaws. Witness Ohio and Lily fight it out over the controls. Iily actually managed to hit takeoff speed before Ohio managed to wrestle the controls back. Witness Ohio, emerging only hurt by the airplane crash. Witness Marion or Debbie emerging, lady-like, without a single scratch.
All in all, a good game. Ironically, the Crimson Lily badly outgunned Ohio. Ohio, Marion and/or Debbie and Jim only had pistols, while Rover had his faithful bite. Ivan had a Tommy Gun and White Shirt a rifle, but of which became mostly useless when Jim and Rover closed for the brawl. 90% of the damage was actually dealt out via brawling, as most of the shooting missed. I also managed to roll about four 1s in a row for guts checks, thankfully I had 15 hero points to spend.
In a side note, apparently my dice luck continued today when I was GMing 4th Ed D&D. The only reason the group finished on time was because I couldn't hit worth a damn, which shortened the combats.
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Cool! I just love these stories. Hitting the bullwhip is absolutely nothing to be ashamed of. No, no, this is reality, ladies and gentlemen!
And now I'm hooked to know how things will continue from here...
Time to get back to painting... Thanks for the inspiration!
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Great story Wirelizard. Sounds like it was a really fun time.
(he's terrible at remembering the names of the women he sleeps with in exotic corners of the world...)
lol Don't we all have that problem! ...ok, maybe we would if we weren't at a desk painting miniatures in our free time.
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Nice one. Did you use car rules for the plane and have it take off when it reached a certain speed? 8)
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We used some of the car rules, like for crashing (when Marion or Debbie shot out the tires), but we just arbitrarily said that 10" was takeoff speed.
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We also said acceleration was d10 per turn - the field was rough, so getting to takeoff speed was a bit chancy!
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Cheers. ;)
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Great game report gentlemen!!sounds like you had a blast !Looking forward to those pic.s
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Pics?
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Alcohol. Need I say more?