Prevent the Kidnapping SA Scenario

[Litebrite]

Well with lots of time on my hands right now with this Covid-19 Isolation, I decided
to play a solitaire scenario of Strange Aeons.  I am using the Solitaire Deck I got
with the Kick Starter to facilitate this. Here is the Fluff intro to the Scenario and
the Scenario particulars with startup pic following. I will be posting every couple of
days. Hope that you enjoy this small diversion while you are home.

Harry came into the bustling with activity office of Threshold after finishing his
regular job's work day. Obviously something was up. He walked to the Director's office
and asked him "What's up?".

The Director was looking over a map of the area and said, "We got some intel that a
cult will be coming in sometime tonight to get a baby for a ritual sacrifice they are
going to perform tomorrow.  I have to send you out to cover the Western outskirts of
the town. I will be sending you out with Reginald and Sally Henderson under your wing.
They just arrived in town from New York and are fairly new to the game we play."

"Where are they now?", Henry asks.

"Sitting over there by the Window in the main room", the director responds.

Harry leaves the director's office and looks to where the director said. A man and a
woman sit on a bench by the Window. Harry guesses them to be in their late 20's. They
are dressed as if ready to go on a Safari and Harry thinks to himself "God, I hope
they aren't all "Gung Ho". He walks over to them and introduces himself. After a few
minutes of "get to know one another" chit-chat, he says: "Well ready to go?".

They respond positively. They pick up their rifle and shotgun that they brought with
them and the team heads out into the streets of the early evening. They take a truck
and drive outto a Hostel Harry is familiar with in the area they are to watch over.
Harry parks the truck beside the Hostel and they head into the Hostel's common room
and Harry goes up to the Hostel's desk. A plump older gentleman asks "How can I help
you folk?"

Harry answers, "Do you know of any couples in the area with new borns? We are here
looking to sell our company's baby products."
 
The Hostel Manager replies, "Only couples 'round here with a baby are the Thompson's
who live across the street. They just got home from the hospital a few days ago.".

"Thanks kindly for the information", Harry answers back. He walks over to Reginald
and Sally and passes on the information.

The sun is starting to set and the team heads out to the truck to get their weapons.
As they are pulling out their weapons from the back of the truck, they hear a scream
from the graveyard.  Harry states, "Looks like we are needed out there".

Scenario Particulars

STOP THE KIDNAPPING
The Cultists are trying to kidnap the baby in the long house so that they can sacrifice it to their god the next day.

Threshold: 15 pts

Lurker: 15 pts, all human cultists

Special Rules:

1) When a cultist enters the house, roll 1d3 and that is the number of activations
the figure must use to get the baby.

2) Threshold figures may not shoot at a Cultist that is carrying the baby.

3) Night: After the 2nd Threshold activation and each activation thereafter until the sun has set, the Lurker player rolls to see if the sun has set. It sets on a roll of 1. Each time after apply an additional -1 DRM (i.e. The third activation after the first roll would have a -3 DRM). Once the sun sets, visability is reduced to 10".

Threshold Victory: Stop the Lurkers from achieving their objective.

Lurker Victory: Capture the baby and exit off the nearest board edge.

[Litebrite]

Turn 1

Harry tells Reginald "Move up to the right to cover the road in front of the house
from the flank."
He then tells Sally " Lets head across the road behind the bushes to get infront of
those cultists to keep them out of the house."

The cult Leader tells his two lead cultists to move up to hedgerow and shoot anyone
they can see. Cultist Jake reaches the hedgerow and see Sally. He fires at her but
both .22 pistol shots miss.

[Sterling Moose]

I'm rooting for the cultists.  It's about time those Threshold do-gooders got what's coming to them.

[ZenWired]

I'm rooting for the cultists.  It's about time those Threshold do-gooders got what's coming to them.

Seconded! Those sanctimonious creeps need to check their privilege! 

[Litebrite]

Sally moves to the edge of the opening in the hedge between the car and the hedge and
unsuccesfully shoots her shotgun at the cultist across from her.  Harry moves up to
where Sally was and fires his shotgun at the .22 wielding cultist but misses.

Cultist Joe with the shotgun fires back at Sally and misses. Jake takes 2 shots at
Harry and one hits Harry in the shoulder. Harry's vest doesn't protect him and he
suffers 1 wound.

[Litebrite]

(Gameplay My House rules note for the readers: I have the "Reload" function for
Shotguns unless they are Pump Action. I always felt that if a rifle needs reload,
then so does a shotgun.
Also, I apply a negative 1 modifier for each wound that a multi-wound figure has.
This makes wounds mean something other than just how close to "Out of the Game" the
figure is.

Meanwhile, Reginald wants to help Harry and Sally out. He moves into a good non-blocked
line of sight firing position and aims his rifle at the cultist with the pistol.
The shot rings out and the cultist falls to the ground (taking 2 wounds) and will no
longer be someone to deal with.

The Cult leader hears this shot and then notices Reginald for the first time. He orders
the two cultists behind him, "Go deal with that irritation over there". Brutis and Leroy
both start heading over to confront Reginald.  The Cult Leader moves up beside Jake and
draws his .22 pistol and shoots at Harry. One shot hits, but Harry's vest stops the bullet
from penetrating.

(The sun set die roll is a 3, so still twilight).

[Litebrite]

Turn 4

Harry and Sally reload their shotguns. Harry then shoots at the now visable Leader
but the pain from his wound causes him to miss the mark. Sally fires at the cultist with her shotgun and sees him stagger back a bit, but the hit fails to take him down.

The cultist Leader shouts out to cultist Joe (shotgun) to "Hit that damn woman". Joe reloads his
shotgun and fires at Sally. But obviously the effects of her shot throw him off and he misses.

He also yells to cultist Leroy (knife) "Follow me and lets take out this Bowler wearing idiot".
The Cultist leader smashes through the hedgerow and charges across the road to engage
Harry. The cultist Leader strikes Harry with his knife but only a glancing blow. Leroy
arrives into the frey but is unable to get a strike on Harry with his knife.

(Sunset roll: 6)

[Litebrite]

Harry, the Leader and Leroy continue the melee.  Nither side is able to land a blow
on each other.

Reginald reloads his rifle and takes aim at the large axe wielding brute charging
towards him. He hits, but it only appears to be a grazing wound.

The melee continues and yet again, neither side gets the upper hand to land a blow on
an opponent.

Brutis (axeman cultist) is enraged by being shot and hit by Reginald and charges into him swinging
his trusty battle axe to strike a mighty blow. Reginald trys to block the blow unsuccessfully
and the axe blade strikes deeply into his side (critcal hit). Reginald crumples to ground
and looses conciousness.

(Sunset dieroll: 5)

[Ballardian]

Looks like a great game, I like your house shotgun rule, and introduced something similar a while back for my gaming group - I always felt that double-barreled shotguns should probably force the player to use an action to re-load if they've taken advantage of the two shots in a single shooting phase as otherwise they can be a little too much of an obvious choice when kitting out your investigator.

[Litebrite]

Turn 6

Harry swings his Cricket Bat which causes both opponents to pull back. Harry then moves away toward Sally to try and bring his shotgun back into play.

He shouts to Sally who is next to him, "I think Reginald is badly hurt". Sally looks in Reginalds direction and sees him on the ground. A grim determined look comes over her face as she reloads
her shotgun and fires at the cultist across from her. He cries out in pain and falls below the hedgerow. Harry reloads his shotgun and fires at the cultist Leader. A grazing wound.

The Leader charges back into melee with Harry again.  Harry succesfully strikes the Leader but the blow is shrugged off.  Leroy charges into melee with Sally and strikes a telling blow that wounds Sally and she falls to the ground out of the game.

(Sunset dieroll: 2 - It is now dark night)

[Litebrite]

The Cultist Leader finally strikes a blow on Harry that wounds him and he falls unconcious
onto the ground. The Leader then yells over to Brutis: "Get yourself over here and
bash that door down. We need to get that baby." Within a few minutes, they have the
baby and are quickly exiting the area. They hear the sounds of Police sirens in the
distance and thus have to leave their two fallen fellow cultists behind.

Once the Police arrive, they quickly get to tending the wounded.  The parents are both
greatly distraught at the abduction of their newborn. Jake dies, but Joe
is alive and placed into custody and will be questioned at the precinct.  Director
Roberts of Threshold arrives at the scene about 20 minutes later and realizes that a
rescue mission will be required on the morrow.  He returns to his car, and knows he
will have to go to the Police precinct in the morning to find out about where the Cult's
base is. He also knows that these 3 brave agents will be recouperating for many weeks
and will need to put together another team for the mission tomorrow.

I decided to play this scenario after constructing the 3 paper buildings.  I have more
to build and will likely use them in the next "Rescue" scenario. Until then, I hope that
all who have followed this AAR have enjoyed it and that it has brought some vicarious
gameplay into their Covus-19 isolation world.

[Sterling Moose]

Excellent game Lembit, thanks for sharing.