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Post by Rigil Kent on Aug 29, 2013 10:16:19 GMT -6
Poke. Poke. Anyone else?
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Post by LabRat on Aug 29, 2013 10:34:30 GMT -6
I am not going to write a lot this week because I feel like crap the dog dragged in. But I am a points whore, so here we go. I have done some scenarios in my last "write this week" which can apply to finding resources/making the journey. If food isn't a big issue right now, then replace food with cars (or whatever tickles your fancy) and go from there. Most of the mechanics and ideas still apply. The thing that I would add to the events of this week is that there have been additional acts of sabotage from an unknown source. Sure, Rigil's character got the jackals off the hook, but there is still someone at large that set the bus on fire. Maybe those attacks continue, maybe it can be staged to where it looks like the trail of evidence sourced from the PCs and they have to figure out who did it to save themselves. There are a lot of different options. I would write a plot summary dealing with those things and then spread it out over time. If the PCs want to actively pursue it, then I would have a good game plan, if not, then I would sprinkle events throughout the game play and see what sticks in terms of interest.
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Post by WxMAN on Aug 29, 2013 12:11:27 GMT -6
So... what I would do... ish...
My main goal is to get us away from the BSG group - I don't know how any meaningful zombie challenge will be found now that we have a large group to protect the herd. There is also less and less reason for our characters to stay together a "group" since we will slowly be integrating into the BSG group and kinda exploring our own actual social preferences as opposed to being forced together with our original group
Since there will be two missing folks for the game, it isn't really possible to break away from the BSG group though now, but I would be setting it up this week...
So... the mad group of 3 decide to scout ahead - using the brains, bullshittery and bullets that we have. The group goes along and encounters a small town wherein survivors are eking out a living. Again, I am trying to setup a "New Caprica" moment early as a very easy way to get the BSG group and our group to split. I think this should be done early as opposed to late as we will be integrating as the time goes on.
The town seems to be cautiously willing to allow the BSG group to join with them. They have rudimentary walls setup and guards which keep the zombies at bay - but the available food / water is limited. It is a hard living, but better than striking out for some magical "safe zone" which probably doesn't exist
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Post by Gigermann on Aug 30, 2013 8:11:17 GMT -6
For Session 106- ChrisIII —
- N8 +1
- Rigil +1
- ShLE +1
- SQ —
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Post by Rigil Kent on Sept 1, 2013 10:06:45 GMT -6
Writing Next Week: Episode 107 - As of 106, the party is split into two, with John, Korbin and Nicholas outside the hospital in Wamego, while Ann and Wes are back with the Harveyville people. From past experience, I know running a split up party session like this is difficult but is doable. So there are really two ways we could handle this: - Run two concurrent "events", perhaps with (as WxMAN mentioned on Friday) Ann & Wes getting jumped on patrol or perhaps while investigating who was really behind the bus bombing, while John, Korbin & Nick investigate the hospital.
- My personal preference would be to spin up a pair of new NPCs - probably kids or teenagers, also probably siblings - who budah & LabRat play at the hospital (you could then do the same thing next week, with Mike, WxMAN and myself taking over a couple of NPCs hanging with Ann & Wes for a session).
So, since the second option is my preferred/recommended option, I'm going to write for that. Session ideas: - John, Korbin, & Nick reach hospital but discover it (evidently) empty. No sign of zombies.
- Enter the hospital to discover it mostly intact - based on the drawing from last week, you said the town was a disorganized mess, with the few survivors just trying to go it alone and aren't being very proactive.
- While searching the hospital, they encounter a pair of young siblings - I'm thinking 10 or 11 - who have turned into badass Newt-like zombie slayers/survivors. Budah and LabRat take over these characters once the PCs have managed to talk them into assisting. Maybe the kids saw their parents turn and had to put them down?
- The kids reveal some new knowledge, like how they saw a person talking with a zombie or how they saw a dude(tte) walk through a mess of zombies (hey, that could work! A "mess") without zombies even noticing, or something TBD by GM.
- While in the hospital, Nick might be able to find some medical notes on zombies that will help his research into the creatures.
- PCs obtain their supplies.
- SUDDENLY, the hospital fire alarm goes off! (Providing it could. I dunno. Could it?) By the time the PCs get to ground level again, there are a lot of zombies on approach ... which baffles Nick cause he thought they weren't drawn by sound.
- Alternately, the PCs might find the hospital being swarmed by living thugs/survivors who are freaked out at the noise and are terrified it will attract zombies so they're trying to find a way to shut it off. OOC: Knowing that zombies are drawn to "life signs", this is a self-fulfilling prophecy!
- One of the kids needs to latch onto a PC sort of like Newt did to Ripley. Like, maybe the boy recognizes John from the zombie movies and, in his mental fugue, isn't able to acknowledge that those were movies and this is real life, or the girl thinks Nick is exactly like her favorite uncle, or Korbin reminds one of them of an awesome teacher they had. In this way, the characters have an emotional attachment to saving the kids, beyond just being "good."
- And then, to fulfill the GM's deep sadist (and assuage his hunger for PC blood since they're temporary PCs), he can kill off those kids in suitably gruesome and dramatic ways. Zombies gang-tackled the boy and eat him. The girl takes a stray bullet fired from one of those freaked out locals and it opens her jugular. That sort of thing.
- End session with the three PCs returning to meet with Father whatshisface on the side of the road and they (the PCs) are emotionally shattered, angry, shocked, and one step closer to going Crichton.
And then, the following week, we'd do this same sort of thing, but with Ann and Wes being the Live PCs...
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Post by Gigermann on Sept 3, 2013 14:29:04 GMT -6
I was prepared to "split screen" it, but since ChrisIII is out, I'd rather just ret-con Ann into the truck—Wes would have changed things WRT the attempted stripping of the other truck, but Ann probably wouldn't have changed anything (that I can think of).
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Post by Rigil Kent on Sept 3, 2013 14:38:41 GMT -6
AHHHH! She was asleep in the back and we didn't notice! Man, talk about a jump-scare moment!
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Post by LabRat on Sept 3, 2013 16:19:43 GMT -6
AHHHH! She was asleep in the back and we didn't notice! Man, talk about a jump-scare moment! Yeah, that would probably result in someone blowing Ann's head off. Poor girl
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Post by Rigil Kent on Sept 3, 2013 16:44:44 GMT -6
Fortunately for you, it was John and he's not a murder machine. He might have screamed girlishly ... or might not, depending.
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Post by Gigermann on Sept 9, 2013 8:33:51 GMT -6
Anyone not going to be here this week? Do we have a full house? I need to plan accordingly.
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Post by thedefiantbudah on Sept 9, 2013 9:44:39 GMT -6
As of the writing of this post, I will be attending
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Post by Rigil Kent on Sept 9, 2013 13:37:04 GMT -6
I'm thinking about skipping just to see if I can cause Giger to have a stroke.
No, not really. I'm planning on being there.
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Post by WxMAN on Sept 9, 2013 16:05:34 GMT -6
Shelley and I are planning on being there
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Post by Gigermann on Sept 11, 2013 8:04:55 GMT -6
I've still only heard from one of you regarding the next session's "what I would do."
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Post by WxMAN on Sept 11, 2013 15:06:37 GMT -6
Clarification: Shelley will NOT be attending, it appears we are not as young as we once were and the afternoon long concert get her sick again.. with strep...
As far as what to do, with Shelley gone and Chris (hopefully) returning, I'd just retcon that Chris was in the truck, passed out or something...
You have us where you want us in a lot of ways, which is good... Our characters are the good guys and we've been tasked with getting medicine for the sick... We are alone, so I would expect a zombie filled romp through the hospital, snatching as much drugs as we can carry. It should also end with us on the roof of the hospital, surrounded by zombies and having to jump off the roof and grab onto a well placed rescue helicopter... with explosions in the background... which we won't look at since we are so awesome
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Post by Rigil Kent on Sept 11, 2013 15:52:59 GMT -6
Hey ... I might be able to fly the helicopter!
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Post by Gigermann on Sept 13, 2013 10:00:54 GMT -6
For Session 107- ChrisIII —
- N8 +1
- Rigil +1
- ShLE —
- SQ —
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Post by Rigil Kent on Sept 16, 2013 16:16:53 GMT -6
Damn. Writing the next installment is going to be difficult in the wake of the events that happened on Friday ...
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Post by Gigermann on Sept 17, 2013 9:29:53 GMT -6
Well, if it helps at all, I'm planning on giving you guys a bit of time to let that settle in before I hit you with it again.
Also, planning to fast-forward (mostly) to get everyone back to the convoy, so we can get the band back together
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Post by WxMAN on Sept 17, 2013 9:38:17 GMT -6
Well, PC's get back to the main convoy fleet. Discuss event happenings with big wigs. This'll likely lead to a very interesting split between the more religious faction and the more science faction of the fleet, though since no decisions will need to be made immediately there won't be any real warring between the groups.
In the interim, being that we just brought back a shit ton of meds and a ex-preacher, Saul will discreetly ask us to go back to Harveyville as he forgot something important.
On our way back we encounter a small band of people keeping themselves hidden / distanced from the main convoy... They capture the PC's and then give us all cake... obviously this was likely a setup by Saul to have us run into these people but that do they want? Why are they following? Are they batman?
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Post by Rigil Kent on Sept 17, 2013 11:32:10 GMT -6
I would be tempted to go a different direction entirely. As the PCs get closer to where they are expecting to encounter the convoy, they instead observe great columns of smoke. Drawing closer, they discover smoking, burned out vehicles and dozens of dead, some of whom look to have been gnawed up while yet others were clearing shot. Even worse are the ones that are cut clean through, like a laser through hot butter. Naturally, none of the Named NPCs are present so the GM would have the later option of bringing them back, but this is more than a little troubling to the PCs. Searching around, they discover Ann, buried under debris from what looks like it used to be a truck or a car. She's unconscious, battered and bruised, yet hasn't been bitten or shot. If she possessed a firearm, it's completely empty of ammo. If she had extra ammo, that's all gone too. When revived, Ann is mildly concussed and every time she tries to remember what happened here, she experiences sharp, stabbing pain in her head, like the memory is being forcibly suppressed or something. For cool effect, she might even weep blood each time she tries to remember. Also? Her vision is a little wonky at the moment, like she's recovering from temporary flash blindness. Thinking there are no survivors, the PCs are released to do what they want. Father Whatshisface is understandably freaked, especially if the PCs have told him about the weirdness they saw. Now here's where I'd go left field. As the GM, I'd get with Ann's player secretly and let her know that her character has been possessed by a demon. She might need to watch a few Supernatural episodes that are directly relevant to demon possession, but the idea would be that said demon is hiding and observing the actions of the PCs. As to what the characters do from this point, that's up to them. Some suggestions might be: - Say the hell with this and find some place to hold up where they can hide.
- Search for survivors (which could lead them to the Named NPCs and any other surviving nameless NPCs.)
- Decide to press on to the military base as was the original plan, only now with a significantly smaller group.
- Investigate the wreckage.
In any event, the columns of smoke will attract attention. Cue potential firefight with raiders on ATVs and motorbikes. One of them is bare-chested but wears a hockey mask, while another is a raving lunatic with a mohawk and a very feminine-looking boy-man riding behind him. If GM wants to just have some violence ensue, these clowns might attack without hesitation or warning. As we (the PCs) have a terrible tendency to vamp and get started late, GM might even end the session with the raiders rumbling forward and shooting so we have a nifty cliffhanger...
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Post by Gigermann on Sept 19, 2013 8:40:16 GMT -6
So while the "Write Next Week" concept gives me what I really need, here, it seems to have taken away something else—full participation. Before, everyone was participating, nearly all the time; now it's just Rigil & N8 (and in one case, Shelley).
WTF guys? Bad timing? Can't be bothered? Too hard? I didn't mean to ask for a Rigil-type treatment, just a "I would do X next," or even a "What he said, but X."
Do I need to roll this back?
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Post by thedefiantbudah on Sept 19, 2013 10:16:50 GMT -6
been having trouble with memory override ... sorry
keeping things a little simple...
check with the priest to see what happened and make sure he's ok get back to the convoy to find out what happened in the aftermath of the barn talk to bill and let him know what happened at the hospital has there been a change in "power" since we left
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Post by Rigil Kent on Sept 19, 2013 10:32:42 GMT -6
That's what you want to do, not "write next week if you were the GM."
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Post by LabRat on Sept 19, 2013 10:58:24 GMT -6
WTF guys? Bad timing? Can't be bothered? Too hard? Short Answer: I've been really sick for a really long time and just haven't had the drive to do it. It is more difficult to WNW when you aren't there and know you won't be there the following week. Sure you can read the adventure recaps but it isn't the same as being there. I plan on participating a lot more once I'm back in the game. For this week: This one is more difficult because it feels like you guys wrapped up a significant event and then we are dealing with the aftermath. So what do you do? Well first the players are going to have to convince Ann that what they saw was real. That could provide some useful roleplaying because I can go ahead and say that she is probably not going to believe them. So maybe as GM I would stick in a piece of evidence that the players could take back with them to corroborate their story. Or at least something that can give more questions than answers. Depending on what the players do in terms of being open about what they saw, as a GM, I would say that a lot of rumors are being spread among the populace. I would think about how the caravan would react. Would people start to panic? Think the end is nigh? Set up baby sacrifices? A lot of crazy crap has been going on, and this might cause them to snap. As a player, I would want to do research about the two cosmic beings that the group encountered. We have names, so I would like to know more about them and what that may mean for our world. Is Pyriel a good guy that is here to save us? Out of Character, I know that Abbadon is a really nasty demon. He is the embodiment of destruction. Pyriel is more unknown to me. I know of a Puriel, and if he's the same then both of these guys are bad news. Puriel is like God's Boomstick, extremely unforgiving and judgmental. But, I doubt our characters would know that. So my character would either talk to the priest to see what he knows about it, or be on the lookout for a library to grab a few books on the subject. It seems like this is the time where as a GM you can do two options: Sit back and see what the players want to do next, or you give them a carrot that will lead to an eventual plot point so that we can pick up the adventure. I've been out of the loop for almost a month, so I don't know if all of the basic needs have been met (so we don't have to go questing for food, or basic needs) or if there are any lose ends that need to be tied up. If so, then I would press the caravan onward to whatever their destination is. Okay, I just read what the others posted, I will say that I do like Rigil's suggestion that something weird does happen to the caravan, thus eliminating your problem with Ann not being a 'believer". It may not have to be as extreme but it does kill two birds with one stone: gives you the next interesting thing for the players to investigate, and gets all the players back on the same page.
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Post by thedefiantbudah on Sept 19, 2013 10:58:36 GMT -6
good point...lemme think some more
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Post by Gigermann on Sept 19, 2013 11:07:54 GMT -6
=Bad Timing Not related to your "next week" writeup, I would mention (so you can be thinking about it) that the rumour going round the convoy is that Bill Adams "put down" Lenny (who was known to have been bitten, and was a goner), but he swears Lenny went nuts and attacked him; he supposed it was related to the Turning, but refused to speculate further. Some folk are suspicious. Some folk are scared (if they get bitten, they get shot?).
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Post by Gigermann on Sept 19, 2013 11:43:06 GMT -6
Not related to your "next week" writeup, I would mention (so you can be thinking about it) that the rumour going round the convoy is that Bill Adams "put down" Lenny (who was known to have been bitten, and was a goner), but he swears Lenny went nuts and attacked him; he supposed it was related to the Turning, but refused to speculate further. Some folk are suspicious. Some folk are scared (if they get bitten, they get shot?). Also, nobody's seen Wes since that happened
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Post by Gigermann on Sept 20, 2013 8:03:27 GMT -6
For Session 108- ChrisIII +1
- N8 +1
- Rigil +1
- ShLE +1
- SQ —
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