Freedom's Ring -- Session 3
Nov. 4th, 2014 11:19 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bluegargantuaHi,
More notes for my Apocalypse World game:
Vega is waiting for the Warden and expresses her concern over the Warden’s failure to protect her men out in the Salvage Reef. Warden assures her he will get to the bottom of this.
Warden decides to open his mind to the City to see if he can find a way out (preferably through paying off people), but his visions are indistinct and only suggest that his way out is to retire and go into the City.
The next morning, the Krewe comes out from the city. Everyone hears a jazz band in their heads. The Krewe (as a bizarre sort of funeral procession) shows up in Prosperity which is a bit unusual since they usually come straight into Freedom. Everyone turns out to see them. A small sub-group of the Krewe acts as the voice (with the members swapping out sentences). The subgroup is known as Metatron.
The Krewe announces that they want to help Prosperity out. They will leave an ambassador/emissary in Prosperity who will help attend to the needs of the town. This should free up the Warden to focus on bigger picture issues. They haul the coffin out of the hearse they’ve brought out and open it up to reveal Welcome (think Tom Hiddleston in Only Lovers Left Alive). The Warden tries to get a read on him and fails. Skel tries to open her mind and fails (causing bystanders to think that “hey, this Welcome guy might really solve things”).
The Krewe asks to take Skel back to the City. This doesn’t work out for the Warden who needs her. The Krewe is fine with this but they do take one of the fancy guns that Vega’s people carry. The Warden makes a mental note that he owes Vega a bit more and gets the gun transferred.
Finally it’s time for the stand-up. First order of business is fixing the water problem. Tai has worked out that the poisons are being carried in a complex organic “envelope”. When this envelope comes into contact with enzymes produced by the human body, they fall apart and release the toxins. This is why the whole river isn’t dead from poison. Tai has an idea on how to make an artificial enzyme that will expose the toxins and then an improved filter that will screen it out. This will require a lot of stuff she doesn’t have.
This ties in nicely with the bandits hiding out in the Salvage Reef. Whatever Tai needs will probably be way out there somewhere. So the Warden decides to take out the Ring and Ponch’s full gang in a show of force to clear out the area and find what Tai needs. The Warden secretly hopes that he might be able to convert the bandits into productive members of Freedom. As Ponch gets his gang together, the Warden pays a personal visit to Vega to assure her that things will be taken care of.
So everyone gets together and the Warden opens his mind to figure out the best approach. We see that in circumstances where the Warden is attempting to use the maelstrom to work out practical matters, the world becomes a huge jungle and the Warden himself is the top predator running down his hapless prey. In a practical sense, the Warden fugues out next to Ponch who drives his buggy at breakneck speed through the reef, followed closely by the other buggies. Rather like a rally car driver with a shaman as a navigator.
After a very wild ride, the group reaches the spot where Rash and Sky Boy were ambushed. Ominously, there’s no sign of the large haul truck Vega sent out with them. The Warden is still snarling so they take off after the tracks. Eventually they arrive at another ship where the skeletons of the large haul truck and the smaller pickup truck Vega’s original crew used are found. Both trucks have been picked clean and there’s sign of a lot of activity in the area. Tai reads the remains and gets the impression that perhaps the local pirates have been involved in this.
This hunch is confirmed when they go into the ship and find the remains of Vega’s men along with the trash and graffiti of the pirate’s makeshift camp. Tai opens her mind to try and find the materials she’s looking for. Tai’s mindscape is world of gears and mechanisms and circuit boards. They lead her through the reef to an old research vessel where she finds a small chemical lab with what she needs.
Coming out on deck, she looks around and discovers something else. Nearby is an old warship that’s been shoved up onto the beach. One of the bow guns is missing and the tire tracks suggest that the pirates used the scavenge trucks to haul it down to the see. The group inspects the warship and they figure the pirates have the gun and the ammo, but they still need to pull together the complex firing gear required to accurately aim them. Still, the guns are enormous and even without a lot of accuracy they could still do a lot of damage. If they can get the firing mechanisms working, they’ll blow Freedom wide open.
The Warden decides to put everything on a wartime footing. From this point back, the Warden will have every able-bodied person in Freedom/Prosperity scavenging parts and pieces and hauling them back to Vega’s factories. The plan is to build as many fast-attack boats as possible. When the pirates arrive with their big gun, Freedom will swarm them with attackers and try to take over. The Warden spends barter like water to get people moving.
The Warden is hopeful that Skel can use her freaky powers to help stop the pirates, but she’s not quite that powerful. The two of them decide to talk to Welcome. Welcome greets them warmly but is unable to offer any direct assistance. Welcome’s job is to deal with Prosperity and other matters are best left to the City. So the Warden (with Skel’s help) tries to open his mind to the City. When dealing with less concrete matters, the Warden’s mindscape is a nightmare where faceless doctors/scientists are experimenting on him. Skel (whose normal attire is faceless nightmare doctor) steps out of the mindscape and leads him up and out to a boardroom where Metatron sits.
Although the City gains a better understanding of what makes Skel tick, they can’t offer any real promises. Skel can come to the City and they might be able to help her, but it might take a long time. Frustrated, the Warden drops out of mindspace.
So Skel returns to Freedom and talks with Tai. Tai is flat out working on the water problem and helping out Vega with the attack boats, but she spends a bit of time with Skel trying to figure out how to make a psychic antenna to boost Skel’s power. Tai gets the impression that while this is very difficult, it will be much easier if they retrieve an artifact of the golden age -- in this case a broadcast dish and components from deep inside the city.
The buggies can make it to the outskirts of town, but then the rubble means that you have to go in on foot. It should be *just* possible to make it in, get the parts and come back out before nightfall, but it’ll be close. The Ring and a few guards camp out on the dunes just outside the City and at first light they charge in.
The City is a bewildering place that confuses and misleads, but Tai’s vision gives her an unerring sense of where she’s supposed to go and the rest of the group follows along. They reach the site and break up the communication dish and gear and make the slow trek back out.
As they approach the buggies, they reach a long, open stretch of street hemmed in by rubble. The Warden suddenly realizes they’re in an ambush. Foes have lined the sides and there’s a guy up ahead with a bomb who will either get them or bring down the building he’s standing in on them. The Warden gives a quick warning to Ponch and then everyone opens up.
Thanks to the Warden’s timely warning, everyone easily makes to cover while Ponch rushes up towards the guy with the bomb. The attackers, security guys from Kayquodek, are thrown off by the group’s prescient reactions and can’t really mount a coordinated response. Ponch sees his guy waiting by the door and so goes crashing through the window, as his foe turns around, he gets a faceful of Ponch’s shotgun and now Ponch has the bomb.
The fight is soon over with the Warden escorting people to the safety of the building. Everyone regroups and gathers up their stuff and gets it to the buggies and back to Freedom.
And that’s where we called it.
The game continues to be a good time and people seem to be having fun. Looking forward to the next game.
later
Tom
More notes for my Apocalypse World game:
Vega is waiting for the Warden and expresses her concern over the Warden’s failure to protect her men out in the Salvage Reef. Warden assures her he will get to the bottom of this.
Warden decides to open his mind to the City to see if he can find a way out (preferably through paying off people), but his visions are indistinct and only suggest that his way out is to retire and go into the City.
The next morning, the Krewe comes out from the city. Everyone hears a jazz band in their heads. The Krewe (as a bizarre sort of funeral procession) shows up in Prosperity which is a bit unusual since they usually come straight into Freedom. Everyone turns out to see them. A small sub-group of the Krewe acts as the voice (with the members swapping out sentences). The subgroup is known as Metatron.
The Krewe announces that they want to help Prosperity out. They will leave an ambassador/emissary in Prosperity who will help attend to the needs of the town. This should free up the Warden to focus on bigger picture issues. They haul the coffin out of the hearse they’ve brought out and open it up to reveal Welcome (think Tom Hiddleston in Only Lovers Left Alive). The Warden tries to get a read on him and fails. Skel tries to open her mind and fails (causing bystanders to think that “hey, this Welcome guy might really solve things”).
The Krewe asks to take Skel back to the City. This doesn’t work out for the Warden who needs her. The Krewe is fine with this but they do take one of the fancy guns that Vega’s people carry. The Warden makes a mental note that he owes Vega a bit more and gets the gun transferred.
Finally it’s time for the stand-up. First order of business is fixing the water problem. Tai has worked out that the poisons are being carried in a complex organic “envelope”. When this envelope comes into contact with enzymes produced by the human body, they fall apart and release the toxins. This is why the whole river isn’t dead from poison. Tai has an idea on how to make an artificial enzyme that will expose the toxins and then an improved filter that will screen it out. This will require a lot of stuff she doesn’t have.
This ties in nicely with the bandits hiding out in the Salvage Reef. Whatever Tai needs will probably be way out there somewhere. So the Warden decides to take out the Ring and Ponch’s full gang in a show of force to clear out the area and find what Tai needs. The Warden secretly hopes that he might be able to convert the bandits into productive members of Freedom. As Ponch gets his gang together, the Warden pays a personal visit to Vega to assure her that things will be taken care of.
So everyone gets together and the Warden opens his mind to figure out the best approach. We see that in circumstances where the Warden is attempting to use the maelstrom to work out practical matters, the world becomes a huge jungle and the Warden himself is the top predator running down his hapless prey. In a practical sense, the Warden fugues out next to Ponch who drives his buggy at breakneck speed through the reef, followed closely by the other buggies. Rather like a rally car driver with a shaman as a navigator.
After a very wild ride, the group reaches the spot where Rash and Sky Boy were ambushed. Ominously, there’s no sign of the large haul truck Vega sent out with them. The Warden is still snarling so they take off after the tracks. Eventually they arrive at another ship where the skeletons of the large haul truck and the smaller pickup truck Vega’s original crew used are found. Both trucks have been picked clean and there’s sign of a lot of activity in the area. Tai reads the remains and gets the impression that perhaps the local pirates have been involved in this.
This hunch is confirmed when they go into the ship and find the remains of Vega’s men along with the trash and graffiti of the pirate’s makeshift camp. Tai opens her mind to try and find the materials she’s looking for. Tai’s mindscape is world of gears and mechanisms and circuit boards. They lead her through the reef to an old research vessel where she finds a small chemical lab with what she needs.
Coming out on deck, she looks around and discovers something else. Nearby is an old warship that’s been shoved up onto the beach. One of the bow guns is missing and the tire tracks suggest that the pirates used the scavenge trucks to haul it down to the see. The group inspects the warship and they figure the pirates have the gun and the ammo, but they still need to pull together the complex firing gear required to accurately aim them. Still, the guns are enormous and even without a lot of accuracy they could still do a lot of damage. If they can get the firing mechanisms working, they’ll blow Freedom wide open.
The Warden decides to put everything on a wartime footing. From this point back, the Warden will have every able-bodied person in Freedom/Prosperity scavenging parts and pieces and hauling them back to Vega’s factories. The plan is to build as many fast-attack boats as possible. When the pirates arrive with their big gun, Freedom will swarm them with attackers and try to take over. The Warden spends barter like water to get people moving.
The Warden is hopeful that Skel can use her freaky powers to help stop the pirates, but she’s not quite that powerful. The two of them decide to talk to Welcome. Welcome greets them warmly but is unable to offer any direct assistance. Welcome’s job is to deal with Prosperity and other matters are best left to the City. So the Warden (with Skel’s help) tries to open his mind to the City. When dealing with less concrete matters, the Warden’s mindscape is a nightmare where faceless doctors/scientists are experimenting on him. Skel (whose normal attire is faceless nightmare doctor) steps out of the mindscape and leads him up and out to a boardroom where Metatron sits.
Although the City gains a better understanding of what makes Skel tick, they can’t offer any real promises. Skel can come to the City and they might be able to help her, but it might take a long time. Frustrated, the Warden drops out of mindspace.
So Skel returns to Freedom and talks with Tai. Tai is flat out working on the water problem and helping out Vega with the attack boats, but she spends a bit of time with Skel trying to figure out how to make a psychic antenna to boost Skel’s power. Tai gets the impression that while this is very difficult, it will be much easier if they retrieve an artifact of the golden age -- in this case a broadcast dish and components from deep inside the city.
The buggies can make it to the outskirts of town, but then the rubble means that you have to go in on foot. It should be *just* possible to make it in, get the parts and come back out before nightfall, but it’ll be close. The Ring and a few guards camp out on the dunes just outside the City and at first light they charge in.
The City is a bewildering place that confuses and misleads, but Tai’s vision gives her an unerring sense of where she’s supposed to go and the rest of the group follows along. They reach the site and break up the communication dish and gear and make the slow trek back out.
As they approach the buggies, they reach a long, open stretch of street hemmed in by rubble. The Warden suddenly realizes they’re in an ambush. Foes have lined the sides and there’s a guy up ahead with a bomb who will either get them or bring down the building he’s standing in on them. The Warden gives a quick warning to Ponch and then everyone opens up.
Thanks to the Warden’s timely warning, everyone easily makes to cover while Ponch rushes up towards the guy with the bomb. The attackers, security guys from Kayquodek, are thrown off by the group’s prescient reactions and can’t really mount a coordinated response. Ponch sees his guy waiting by the door and so goes crashing through the window, as his foe turns around, he gets a faceful of Ponch’s shotgun and now Ponch has the bomb.
The fight is soon over with the Warden escorting people to the safety of the building. Everyone regroups and gathers up their stuff and gets it to the buggies and back to Freedom.
And that’s where we called it.
The game continues to be a good time and people seem to be having fun. Looking forward to the next game.
later
Tom
