Meanwhile in Nebraska: Cully went back to North Platte to perform an autopsy. On the way back from Hayden, she was told to go meet a new guy in the hotel lobby. And sure, clutching a copy of the Fortean Times, there he was - FBI computer analyst James McAffe. (He has a driving skill of about 70, so he's the designated driver from now on.) They set off to autopsy the dead girlfriend, but didn't find anything because Cully somehow managed to roll 95 ... out of 90.
Over in Hayden, Bones and Mulligan got a lift out to the radio telescope array where their Sheriff's department driver got attacked by the guard dog they reportedly don't have. There was tazering involved, and then hog-tying.
The staff at the radio telescope array were a peculiar bunch, particularly one of the other computer guys - who seemed to get through his days using a steady stream of JD.
After meeting back up, introducing McAffe to the rest of the party, the four investigators went to the home of the murderer to see if they could find anything. Insects, is the answer, lots and lots of insects. Insects that seemed to home in on Cully. But then, what are improvised flamethrowers for?
As we didn't really find anything at the house, McAffe stayed behind to go through the computer a bit more and the rest went to a tavern to see what else could be got out of the drunken computer guy. In Bones's case, a massive headache ... that can't be a good sign.
Is Mansions of Madness like Cluedo for Satanists?
As we had to fill a session with something due to being a player short, we decided to try the Cthulhu boardgame Mansions of Madness - a relative of Elder Signs and Arkham Horror. Three investigators went to an old mansion, where axe murderers abound!
... We didn't succeed. The GM won. Oh well.
... We didn't succeed. The GM won. Oh well.
Will the real Harry Potter please stand up?
As we unfortunately was a player down due to illness this session, we were going to play something else. I got instructed to bring a game I'd like to play, so I brought Jurisfiction. It just so happens that I've always wanted to do an adventure set in the Harry Potter books, and suddenly, both inspiration and opportunity presented themselves.
Agents Hastings (Agatha Christie) and Van Helsing (Bram Stoker) had to leave their Enid Blyton pet project behind in order to go over to Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince to investigate a Potions book that had been stolen and replaced with a cheap knock-off. As they dawdled, Severus Snape himself arrived at Jurisfiction HQ to convince them to get a move on.
From there, they ended up force-feeding a Puking Pastille to Fred or George Weasley, charging Snape with assault, admiring off-duty Dumbledore in what can only be described as Rocky Horror Picture Show gear, listening to a PageRunning Draco Malfoy's teenage woes, finding beautiful Fanon Snape snogging his favourite student Hermione over in Fanfiction, and learning that Harry Potter enjoys going on Character Exchange trips to Fanfiction, where he doesn't have to put up with any of that false modesty nonsense, and can be worshipped like the freakin' BookWorld rockstar that he is.
Oh yeah, and Marvin the Paranoid Android occasionally works in the admin department at Jurisfiction HQ. (He doesn't enjoy it, brain the size of a planet, and so on.)
Whatever they did, that copy of the Half-Blood Prince's old Potions textbook, which is just a teeny tiny bit pivotal to the plot, was still nowhere to be seen ...
Agents Hastings (Agatha Christie) and Van Helsing (Bram Stoker) had to leave their Enid Blyton pet project behind in order to go over to Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince to investigate a Potions book that had been stolen and replaced with a cheap knock-off. As they dawdled, Severus Snape himself arrived at Jurisfiction HQ to convince them to get a move on.
From there, they ended up force-feeding a Puking Pastille to Fred or George Weasley, charging Snape with assault, admiring off-duty Dumbledore in what can only be described as Rocky Horror Picture Show gear, listening to a PageRunning Draco Malfoy's teenage woes, finding beautiful Fanon Snape snogging his favourite student Hermione over in Fanfiction, and learning that Harry Potter enjoys going on Character Exchange trips to Fanfiction, where he doesn't have to put up with any of that false modesty nonsense, and can be worshipped like the freakin' BookWorld rockstar that he is.
Oh yeah, and Marvin the Paranoid Android occasionally works in the admin department at Jurisfiction HQ. (He doesn't enjoy it, brain the size of a planet, and so on.)
Whatever they did, that copy of the Half-Blood Prince's old Potions textbook, which is just a teeny tiny bit pivotal to the plot, was still nowhere to be seen ...
Gitmo's got nothing on Nebraska
Joining the very Special Agents Mulligan and Cully is a US Marshal, Robert E Bones, who has taken some time out from trying to hunt down Dr Richard Kimble. We're also going to get another player coming along in a few weeks, so that'll be fun.
Anyway, this time, we've been called to Hayden, somewhere in Nebraska, where we got caught in a freak hailstorm and needed to see a mechanic. A man claiming alien involvement went crazy and beat his wife to death. Might it have something to do with the big radio telescope array outside of town? There's only one way to find out ...
Anyway, this time, we've been called to Hayden, somewhere in Nebraska, where we got caught in a freak hailstorm and needed to see a mechanic. A man claiming alien involvement went crazy and beat his wife to death. Might it have something to do with the big radio telescope array outside of town? There's only one way to find out ...
Reneesme is obviously a runaway, sparkly vampire pig
IN WHICH WE RIP THE S#!T OUT OF TWILIGHT. Err ... Again!
Okay, so last week, there was no session, so here's another one of them filler posts from an old session. Next week, the quotes will be back to Delta Green, as that's what we played in this week's session. (If you hadn't noticed, the quotes are posted the week after the session where they originated.)
Meanwhile, he's what happened when the Jurisfiction agents decided to venture further into the Twilight series ... where they first encountered Pregnant Bella, followed by Vampire Bella - who may or may not be the mother of a pig.
To recap: A group of fictional characters, agents of Jurisfiction, are policing the BookWorld, namely:
The strangest thing is, today's post is only from about 20 or so minutes worth of playing ... make of that what you will. I thought there was only maybe one more post out of what was left of the recording, but apparently we're looking at two posts at the very least.
Okay, so last week, there was no session, so here's another one of them filler posts from an old session. Next week, the quotes will be back to Delta Green, as that's what we played in this week's session. (If you hadn't noticed, the quotes are posted the week after the session where they originated.)
Meanwhile, he's what happened when the Jurisfiction agents decided to venture further into the Twilight series ... where they first encountered Pregnant Bella, followed by Vampire Bella - who may or may not be the mother of a pig.
To recap: A group of fictional characters, agents of Jurisfiction, are policing the BookWorld, namely:
- Alice from Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
- Arthur Hastings from random Agatha Christie Poirot novel
- Frankenstein's Monster from Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, nicknamed "George"
- Gabriel Betteredge from Wilkie Collins's The Moonstone
- Hari Seldon from Isaac Asimov's Foundation series (although he was mostly asleep)
- "Outlander", i.e. one of the players playing himself, from the Outland
The strangest thing is, today's post is only from about 20 or so minutes worth of playing ... make of that what you will. I thought there was only maybe one more post out of what was left of the recording, but apparently we're looking at two posts at the very least.
Killing zombies with cake - possibly
As we had to fill another couple of sessions due to being a player short, we decided to have another go at zombie boardgame Zpocalypse. The first time we played it, it didn't go so well (we didn't survive the end of the first night), because we didn't have a strategy worked out.
By playing the game, we realised what we should have done ... so we thought we'd give it another go, doing all the things we realised we should have been doing in the first place. And sure enough, we survived the end of the first night! And the second! As we still had another couple of hours left, we decided to play on and see how far we could get. Third night went off without a hitch, but on the fourth night, one player's squad got killed just before we managed to take out the last zombies. But in the words of Meat Loaf, two out of three ain't bad.
This game was split over two sessions, as we ran out of time after the first night. However, as there were only a few quotes from each session, the two sessions are collected in this one post instead.
And yeah, at least half of these quotes were snagged from the adjacent Mutants & Masterminds table again, because they're actually roleplaying, and their quotability is higher than our boardgaming ...
By playing the game, we realised what we should have done ... so we thought we'd give it another go, doing all the things we realised we should have been doing in the first place. And sure enough, we survived the end of the first night! And the second! As we still had another couple of hours left, we decided to play on and see how far we could get. Third night went off without a hitch, but on the fourth night, one player's squad got killed just before we managed to take out the last zombies. But in the words of Meat Loaf, two out of three ain't bad.
This game was split over two sessions, as we ran out of time after the first night. However, as there were only a few quotes from each session, the two sessions are collected in this one post instead.
And yeah, at least half of these quotes were snagged from the adjacent Mutants & Masterminds table again, because they're actually roleplaying, and their quotability is higher than our boardgaming ...
The long, generic twilight of the BookWorld
We spent last session playing Zpocalypse again, to a much greater success than the first time, and we'll be playing that next session too. Since there was only like half a page worth of quotes from that session, I figure it would be better to post the two sessions in one go instead, so that's happening in next week's post.
Meanwhile, we're going back to the BookWorld to continue the investigations of the Jurisfiction agents. They've now left Wuthering Heights and decide to go and check out Twilight, because if you're looking for a modern novel that's badly written, you might as well just start there.
Amongst all the Generics in Forks High School's cafeteria is Bella Swan, who seems more preoccupied with dreaming about her bewuved Edward than the fact she's being accused of multiple homicides. (Each to their own, and that ...) And then the agents have a brainwave as to how to solve the problem of Bella missing from the narrative if she's brought into questioning: have Frankenstein's Monster take her place.
Roleplayers, eh? Can't take 'em anywhere!
Meanwhile, we're going back to the BookWorld to continue the investigations of the Jurisfiction agents. They've now left Wuthering Heights and decide to go and check out Twilight, because if you're looking for a modern novel that's badly written, you might as well just start there.
Amongst all the Generics in Forks High School's cafeteria is Bella Swan, who seems more preoccupied with dreaming about her bewuved Edward than the fact she's being accused of multiple homicides. (Each to their own, and that ...) And then the agents have a brainwave as to how to solve the problem of Bella missing from the narrative if she's brought into questioning: have Frankenstein's Monster take her place.
Roleplayers, eh? Can't take 'em anywhere!
Dances with zombies?
After having successfully obtained the zombie boardgame Zpocalypse off Kickstarter, we decided to play it, as we're still a player short, and therefore want to wait until starting Delta Green back up.
In Zpocalypse, the zombie apocalypse has happened and you're trying to not get swarmed by zombies (we did), or get our brains eaten (we did), but y'know, survive and kill them all (we didn't). We didn't even survive the first night.
As we played, though, we realised how we should have been playing it from the beginning, so if we play it again, we're probably going to try that instead and see how we could hopefully become a bit more resilient.
Although, it should be pointed out, at least half of these quotes were snagged from the adjacent Mutants & Masterminds table. *cough* We love you?
In Zpocalypse, the zombie apocalypse has happened and you're trying to not get swarmed by zombies (we did), or get our brains eaten (we did), but y'know, survive and kill them all (we didn't). We didn't even survive the first night.
As we played, though, we realised how we should have been playing it from the beginning, so if we play it again, we're probably going to try that instead and see how we could hopefully become a bit more resilient.
Although, it should be pointed out, at least half of these quotes were snagged from the adjacent Mutants & Masterminds table. *cough* We love you?
50 Shades of Enid Blyton
We're doing some other bits for a couple of weeks or so, while one of the players is away. For this session, we played a two-player Jurisfiction adventure, to see what that was about.
Arthur Hastings, from Agatha Christie's Poirot novels, joined forces with the new recruit Dr Abraham van Helsing, from Bram Stoker's Dracula. The Bellman never told them that it's technically a single-player mission, but hey, if you take a complete rookie and the somewhat dimwitted veteran Hastings, it sort of adds up to a single, competent player.
The mission itself was a simple matter of internal plot adjustment: making Shadow the Sheepdog by Enid Blyton have a happy ending. It should have been a simple mission that couldn't possibly go wrong, but ... alas ... they got out of a sticky situation by teaching a bunch of villagers all about S&M, in a bid to turn their idyllic rural village into something from Midsomer Murders.
Arthur Hastings, from Agatha Christie's Poirot novels, joined forces with the new recruit Dr Abraham van Helsing, from Bram Stoker's Dracula. The Bellman never told them that it's technically a single-player mission, but hey, if you take a complete rookie and the somewhat dimwitted veteran Hastings, it sort of adds up to a single, competent player.
The mission itself was a simple matter of internal plot adjustment: making Shadow the Sheepdog by Enid Blyton have a happy ending. It should have been a simple mission that couldn't possibly go wrong, but ... alas ... they got out of a sticky situation by teaching a bunch of villagers all about S&M, in a bid to turn their idyllic rural village into something from Midsomer Murders.
Tearing monsters a new bottom
Last time, we got to a field past a sugarcane field and there was shooting. Murphy was down to three injuries, Sutcliffe was still injured from previous sessions and the "unlucky" Hatch somehow didn't have a scratch on him ... which is more than can be said for the NPCs.
We continued the firefight - this time aided by the Bayou Ranpan, a.k.a. the big, scary, invisible monster. Somehow (read: open-ending dice rolls by lots at the right time) we took it down. And then we took the last minion down, while Father Etienne beheaded the other remaining baddie.
And then we saved the lady, only to find she hadn't just lost her brother, but indeed her entire family had been tortured and then butchered by the same guys we had just "taken care of" (read: dumped their bodies in the Bayou). Sadface. At least we got to steal the baddies' remaining truck so we didn't have to take the train back to New Orleans.
We returned the dame to Fat Dan in his Absinthe House, got our $100 bar tab (and free drinks to celebrate!), slept soundly and then went to cash in our $200 reward with the guy at Hexaco, seeing as how we had removed his problem from the swamp and had the exoskeleton to prove it. Thanks to a very open-eneded dice roll, Hatch made sure he couldn't screw us out of the reward money and got it in writing.
So now we're RICH! And also alive. That was unexpected.
We continued the firefight - this time aided by the Bayou Ranpan, a.k.a. the big, scary, invisible monster. Somehow (read: open-ending dice rolls by lots at the right time) we took it down. And then we took the last minion down, while Father Etienne beheaded the other remaining baddie.
And then we saved the lady, only to find she hadn't just lost her brother, but indeed her entire family had been tortured and then butchered by the same guys we had just "taken care of" (read: dumped their bodies in the Bayou). Sadface. At least we got to steal the baddies' remaining truck so we didn't have to take the train back to New Orleans.
We returned the dame to Fat Dan in his Absinthe House, got our $100 bar tab (and free drinks to celebrate!), slept soundly and then went to cash in our $200 reward with the guy at Hexaco, seeing as how we had removed his problem from the swamp and had the exoskeleton to prove it. Thanks to a very open-eneded dice roll, Hatch made sure he couldn't screw us out of the reward money and got it in writing.
So now we're RICH! And also alive. That was unexpected.
Murder on t' winding, windy moors
As we ended up playing Relic last week, which didn't end up being very quotable, here's something we played earlier. At a ChimeraCon in fact. This session was the Blogkeeper's first ever go as a tabletop GM.
To recap: A group of fictional characters, agents of Jurisfiction, are policing the BookWorld, namely:
At this stage of the session, the characters have been briefed about some gruesome murders taking place within the world of fiction - murders that shouldn't have happened in the characters' usual narrative - and after much ado, they set off into Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights.
They got to Trushcross Grange (try saying that quickly three times in a row!) only to discover the Lintons' fancy manor house was on fire, which is very out of character for it. But with their parents away, can the Canasta-playing Edgar and Isabella actually be saved or will the murderer have claimed two more lives?
To recap: A group of fictional characters, agents of Jurisfiction, are policing the BookWorld, namely:
- Alice from Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
- Arthur Hastings from random Agatha Christie Poirot novel
- Frankenstein's Monster from Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, nicknamed "George"
- Gabriel Betteredge from Wilkie Collins's The Moonstone
- Hari Seldon from Isaac Asimov's Foundation series (although he was mostly asleep)
- "Outlander", i.e. one of the players playing himself, from the Outland
At this stage of the session, the characters have been briefed about some gruesome murders taking place within the world of fiction - murders that shouldn't have happened in the characters' usual narrative - and after much ado, they set off into Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights.
They got to Trushcross Grange (try saying that quickly three times in a row!) only to discover the Lintons' fancy manor house was on fire, which is very out of character for it. But with their parents away, can the Canasta-playing Edgar and Isabella actually be saved or will the murderer have claimed two more lives?
Is sugarcane flammable?
This session was going to be the last one, but as luck would have it, combat tends to take longer than expected, so we had to pack up and leave it for next time.
You see, we went back to Manchac. The town had been torched by some bad guys, who had driven up to Morgan Freeman's house (the one Sutcliffe didn't burn down). We requisitioned a vehicle and drove up there, blew up one of the trucks and walked through fields of sugarcane toward gunfire.
On the plus side, we found the dame we'd been looking for, and her brother, and a Voodoo priest.
On the downside, we also found a gang of baddies with a tommy gun.
On the other hand, the invisible monster was also about to show up ...
You see, we went back to Manchac. The town had been torched by some bad guys, who had driven up to Morgan Freeman's house (the one Sutcliffe didn't burn down). We requisitioned a vehicle and drove up there, blew up one of the trucks and walked through fields of sugarcane toward gunfire.
On the plus side, we found the dame we'd been looking for, and her brother, and a Voodoo priest.
On the downside, we also found a gang of baddies with a tommy gun.
On the other hand, the invisible monster was also about to show up ...
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