CapnJim's Post-Apoc Stuff: Zone Run #8 Report Complete...Pg 12...08 Mar 24

[mikedemana]

Great start, Jim! I look forward to the conclusion (and maybe solving the mystery of the unfriendly ambulance... ).

Mike Demana

[Vagabond]

A good starter, I'm agog to know what happened to the road block. They seem a very competent crew and should do well, the eye in the sky is going to be invaluable.

[Bullshott]

A good starter, I'm agog to know what happened to the road block. They seem a very competent crew and should do well, the eye in the sky is going to be invaluable.

Invaluable, that is, until its electronics get fried when it gets too close to an anomaly or the crew try to use it somewhere 'hotter' closer to the centre of the Zone

[Doug ex-em4]

Enjoying this, Capt. Yeah, we need to know about the roadblock and the ambulance. I mean - an ambulance..!

Doug

[CapnJim]

Thanks, fellas.  Let's see how this finishes up...

And now, Ladies and Gentlemen (and you guys  ), the exciting climax to SAE30s first run into the PEZ...

There was stuff going on.  Newkirk tossed the single-wide, and found $550 in cold hard cash.  Must have been what the looters were after.  Malloy was out by the trailer's front fence eyeballing things.  And that BIG snake lunged (do snakes lunge?) at Carter, bit him, knocked him down, and grabbed on to his leg.  But Carter managed to hurt the snake too.  Pyle was Ready, trying to line up a shot at the snake, without hitting Carter.  He fired and missed the snake.  Luckily enough, he also missed Carter.  Pyle then got on Comms, informed Robinson of the situation, and suggested he and McGuyver come up with the van.  They did just that.

Meanwhile, in front of the corner store, the ambulance crew pulled up near the truck wreck, debussed, and got out their gurney.  Sensing time was of the essence, DeSoto ducked into the corner store to search the joint.  He fund $500 and a pair of binoculars.  And an Anomaly...

O'Rourke headed toward the Objective, and Newkirk hoofed it as fast as he could from the trailer toward the Objective.

Malloy wandered over to see if he could help Carter, who had been bitten again, but had stood back up, having shrugged off both bites (Carter, for some reason, hates snakes, and now he was pissed).  Carter stuck out the muzzle of his M4, and the snake bit on to it.  One trigger pull later, and the 1st few feet of the snake disappeared in a red mist...(I know what that looks like, after an, um, incident with a Copperhead at Basic Training...).

Pyle went over to the sidewalk in front of the corner store, keeping an eye on the Objective.  O'Rourke didn't wait for Newkirk, and tripped the Objective himself as he picked up the briefcase by the one body.  Another BIG snake came crawling out from under the wrecked truck.  Pyle took care of it.  Just (and I mean just) before DeSoto searched the corner store and triggered an Anomaly.  DeSoto had just enough time to think Oh Sh*t and duck below the counter as the Anomaly went off in a blast of heat (and dust and debris).  Freaked DeSoto out a bit, it did.  He got over it.  But the overpressure from the blast of heat blew out all the ground floor windows, including the one Pyle was standing in front off.  The blast knocked Pyle to the pavement, his ass, shoulders, and the back of his neck showered with broken glass and splinters.  And maybe a bit warm, too.

And the ambulance crew continued to go about their business.  Carter went over to have a word with them (or perhaps words.  Maybe some foul words, with him being a retired Marine and all).

As Pyle gingerly picked himself up off the sidewalk, McGuyver and Robinson had arrived on scene with Jupiter 2.  Just as Newkirk was almost to the Objective, O'Rourke discovered $500, a MedKit, and another Anomaly, but he deftly worked through it and grabbed a nifty artifact thingy.  A $4,500 artifact thingy.  Newkirk was impressed...

And with that, our 8 turns were up.

4 Dead looters, and 3 BIG dead snakes.  $1,550 in cash, binoculars, a MedKit, and a $4,500 artifact.  Not bad....

Carter had found out, after his chat with the ambulance crew, that they were just tired of responding to calls in the PEZ.  Especially the ones that involved gunfire.  They just wanted to get in and get out.  Their surliness wasn't necessarily directed at them, per se...Carter did talk them into taking Pyle to a medical center to get the glass and splinters removed.  But only after O'Rourke gave Pyle sh*t about the Marines not teaching him not to stand in front of windows, and Pyle telling O'Rouke to pound sand.  Or words to that effect...

Then they heard gunfire coming from a bit further down the road into the PEZ.  They snapped a pic of the license plate of the wrecked truck with a phone (they still worked), stowed Robot and the loot, hopped into Jupiter 2, and headed east...What happens next will be game 2, but they'll be without Pyle for this one...

In my next post, likely tomorrow, I'll say (type?) a few things about how the various rules meshed, and how things worked...       

   

[Bullshott]

Nice report. I'm looking forward to seeing what happens next

[mikedemana]

Snakes...why did it have to be snakes...? 

Seriously, hope you had as much fun playing it as we did reading it. It seems like everything worked well from the AAR. Looks great, too. Nice to get those recently-painted toys into a game right away!

Mike Demana

[CapnJim]

Nice report. I'm looking forward to seeing what happens next

So am I.  SAE30 will be going in without Pyle, and they won't have time to deploy Robot...I imagine I'll get to Game 2 within the next week or two...

Snakes...why did it have to be snakes...? 

Seriously, hope you had as much fun playing it as we did reading it. It seems like everything worked well from the AAR. Looks great, too. Nice to get those recently-painted toys into a game right away!

Mike Demana

You got that one, eh?     I'm developing character quirks as we go.  So far, it's Carter's dislike of snakes, and Pyle and O'Rourke's inter-service ribbing.  We'll see what I come up with for the others...

And I did enjoy playing it out.  And yes, the rules mash-up worked out quite well.  Here are my thoughts on how that aspect went...

Fistful of Lead   

That was pretty straightforward.  In Zona Alfa, there are the 3 character classes (Veteran, Hardened, and Rookie IIRC), with stats, abilities, and gear done up according to each class's experience level.  Fistful or Lead has 2 ways to do that.  First are the Leader/Specialist/Regular classes, which govern traits and gear.  It also uses d12/d10/d8 for Veteran, Regular, and Green, respectively.  I made my crew a Veteran Leader (Leader and 3 traits, and 3 gear "slots"), and 7 Regular Specialists (2 traits and 2 gear "slots").  in addition, all have chest rigs, ballistic plates (8+ armor), and personal comms for free.   I wanted a fairly experienced Zone Crew.  It all worked well.

And, a la Zona Alfa, I decided that the Leader trait gave Carter the ability to give his actions to other figures within his command radius.  He didn't do that this game, what with trying to flag down the ambulance and not getting eaten by that snake.  Carter was kind busy most of the game....

Zone Hostiles were easy too.  I've only done up the table for when PEZ is Soft (TL1), and it's based on my minis collection.  I stat'ed them up with d10 and 3 wounds as the base, and adjusted from there.  For example, those snakes are d10, but only have 2 wounds.  Regular-size dogs are d8 with 2 wounds, but big dogs are d10 with 3 wounds.  The humans all have 3 wounds, but the looters are d8, while the bandits (who haven't appeared just yet) are d10.  The humans' weapons were whatever I felt like grabbing from my figure trays (I have plenty to choose from, and SAE30 is gonna have a cow if an RPG gets whipped out...   Good thing Jupiter 2 has light armor...).

And the movement, combat, task, and recovery mechanics were used straight out of the box.

And, I used the "What happened to him" chart in the campaign section of the book.  Pyle was the only character to end the game with a wound (Carter and O'Rourke had both been wounded, but ain't the Queen of Hearts a great card?), so his roll on the chart will see him miss the next game.  I bet he stays away from windows now...   

I still have to figure out Renown Points for character advancement.  I'll figure that out in due time.  But they'll have to learn new traits/abilities within the context of the game and campaign play, so some characters might miss a game or 2 as they go off to attend some course...and they can use their "discovered" cash to get more equipment (I'll use the charts in Zona Alfa for pricing, and the SAE will get their 25% cut, ya know).  But, they have to be someplace where this stuff might be available.  Jethro and his gas station, and Mr. Chambers and his hardware store, may come in to play there...I can tell you this though, Robinson is gonna be pissed off if something happens to Robot...

Zona Alfa

I used some of the abilities and equipment from Zona Alfa.  They translated almost exactly.  The only difference is that in Fistful of Lead, high rolls are good, while in Zona Alfa, low rolls are good.  So any modifiers were just reversed for play in Fistful of Lead.

I already discussed the Zone Hostile Table.  I'll develop tables for when the PEZ is Medium and Hard when we get there...y'all might be surprised what might appear, due to my figure collection...

I used the Objective/Hot Spot and Anomaly Tables right out of the book.  The only thing I had to figure out was how a character negotiated any Anomalies they found.  Fistful of Lead does not have anything comparable to a Will Stat.  After giving it some thought, I ultimately decided that it took a successful Medium Task Roll (5+) in Fistful of Lead terms, and the modifiers in Zone Alfa (the detector and a leader's presence) to work through an anomaly's counter-measures.  Using the d12/d10/d8 mechanism in Fistful of Lead, a d12 approximates a Will Stat of 7 in percentage terms, a d10 to a Will Stat of 6, and a d8 a Will Stat of 5.  Close enough for government work, and it worked out OK.

Black Ops

The Civilian Reaction Table was inspired by the one in Black Ops, only reversed so that high rolls are good, and includes the possibility of civilians affecting Hot Spots and Objectives.  As in Zona Alfa, Zone Hostiles can't trigger them, but I see no reason civilians can't, intentionally or otherwise...and civilians may even be somewhat useful...I do want to flesh that table out a bit more, though.  I'll do that prior to Game 2, but it worked well enough for Game 1.

Conclusion

I think that does it.  My rules mash-up worked out quite well, I think.  A couple tweaks before Game 2, and we're off and running.

And here's a teaser - I think we may find out what happened to the roadblock in Game 2.  And there may be more hints about the goings on in the PEZ

[Dan55]

Very nice.  Good story telling, and good pictures to back it up.  A nice in-depth background for the characters.  One question however - who called the ambulance?

[Mr. White]

  One question however - who called the ambulance?

[CapnJim]

Sorry Dan.  Tweren't that fella.   .
We might find out who called the ambulance in game 2....

[mikedemana]

...and just as importantly, why would the ambulance bother going into the zone? Wouldn't the government have warned them off of answering calls to that area? Or wouldn't they refuse to go in without escort? 

Mike Demana

[CapnJim]

Patience, my friends.  Patience.  The questions regarding the ambulance and the roadblock should be answered in Game 2.   

[Vagabond]

Enjoyable story Cptn and interesting how you amalgamated the 3 rule systems. I'll have to look at Black Opps civilians, I dont remember them.

Who called the ambulance,  who cares....we do.

Snakes, why did it have to be cobras, it seems like there's some pretty big anomalies in PEZ. 

[CapnJim]

Enjoyable story Cptn and interesting how you amalgamated the 3 rule systems. I'll have to look at Black Opps civilians, I dont remember them.

Who called the ambulance,  who cares....we do.

Snakes, why did it have to be cobras, it seems like there's some pretty big anomalies in PEZ. 

Thanks.  I'm just about ready for Run #2.  Some questions should be answered.

And Big Stuff-wise, wait until they get into the next higher threat level area.....