Deadlands!
Jun. 25th, 2006 08:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
theweaselking"See, I knew he was dead all along!"
Our Intrepid Heroes, having shot the despicable bandit Rattlesnake Jake dead (again) at the end of last session, dragged his body back into town and strung it up at the crossroads. And then stood around it with guns drawn, expectantly. In a town full of (and terrorised by) bandits from Jake's gang. Where Jake's (crooked) brother Sam also goes by the name "Sheriff Roberts".
"I'm painting on the board: Rattlesnake Jake. Murder. Kidnapping. Extortion."
"You spelled Extortion wrong!"
"Quiet, you. I'd spell better if I didn't have YOUR BULLET in MY HEAD."
"At least take out the C!"
"This is paint! We can't just erase things!"
"I'll add a line and turn it into a K. That's better, right?"
"Oh, great. A sign that says
Rattlesnake Jake:
Murder,
Kidnapping,
Ecks
Eksto
Extro
Stealin' Stuff
So, they do this.
Ignoring the scurrying townsfolk as they close their shops, lock their doors, and press themselves up against the windows to watch.
Ignoring the people running straight to the Sheriff to tell him that those annoying strangers have killed his brother and are doing ignominious things to the body in town square.
Waiting, doing nothing, in plain sight, expecting the Sheriff to come gunning for them.
While still suffering some pretty severe wound penalties because Jake himself was a tough motherfucker with a bad habit of not being where he last shot you from.
And they still looked surprised and betrayed when the Sheriff came, in force, with heavy weapons, having deputised all those well-armed gang members, to arrest them for his brother's murder. After all, they announced themselves and their intentions, stayed in the same spot, and gave him *as much time as he wanted* to prepare.
And when the Sheriff didn't himself surrender to be arrested on unspecified charges related to letting Jake's gang run pretty wild around here, they seemed, uh, shocked that these well-armed folks who'd taken the time to surround them from the other buildings opened fire.
Many chips were spent avoiding damage, as the posse (two rifles, one shotgun, one Huckster playing "innocent bystander" with Phantom Fingers doing her best to make the bandits miss and shoot at each other) traded fire with the Sheriff and his 3 "normal" deputies (4 double-barreled shotguns, loaded with slugs for the first exchange) and the 5 "gang recruits" (3 gatling pistols, 2 rifles, in elevated positions to provide enfilading fire). Oh, and the "bad guys" are all wearing bulletproof vests, and Our Heroes are wearing... uh... jury rigged bulletproof vests whose reliability is going down with every shot they stop.
"I may be crazy, but I'm not stupid. Or the other way around. Or something. Either way, there's one of them that I'm not, I'm sure of it."
This goes... pretty much as you might expect.
The lady (who is, from her manner, apparently raised by Scientifically Minded Wolves) dove for cover inside the post office and started firing her rifle out the window.
The giant Irishman is a terrible shot, and wasn't aiming, and so didn't do a whole lot of damage - but they keep shooting him, with slugs, into the middle of his chest, and he just wasn't going down. Even with a bulletproof vest, that's gotta count for something.
Thesuicidal, homicidal, genocidal Undead Texas Ranger took cover behind the hanging body and a post, returning fire when he could to decent but not terrifying effect. When his shotgun ran out of shells, he dropped it, drew his Peacemakers... and charged to short range, in the open, against the men armed with shotguns.
And traded shots with the Sheriff at point-blank range, delivering some pretty good hits.
And promptly caught a slug to the brainpan in return.
"What's the plan?"
"I'm going to hole up here and shoot everybody until Lefty gets back up. It worked last time."
The Giant Irishman took off out the back, brightly realising that he's shit with a rifle at this range against guys in cover, and started going around the back to take them from behind in an old-fashioned "Here. Hold the rifle like this, and use it as a club!" Maneuver. This left our Manners Of One Who Was Raised By Wolves lady pointing her gun out a window, and not suspecting that she was being flanked until a shotgun was pointed at her from about a meter away, accompanied by a demand to surrender.
The Giant Irishman kicked the crap out of one guy, tossing him all the way across the street from the second floor and bouncing him off the far building. Mumble mumble something Strength Of 10 Because His Heart Is Pure mumble something. Unfortunately, when he came back down (intending to reposition and get another one - hit and run, smart) he found himself right in front of the Sheriff with a shotgun pointed at him.
To his, uh, "credit" he tried to grab the gun, thinking (correctly) that he could kick the living crap out of the Sheriff if the gun wasn't involved. He wasn't quite that fast. To the bulletproof vest's credit, it stood up to that one last slug pretty well, and left the Irishman down, winded, helpless, and not bleeding to death.
The Huckster, still playing Innocent Bystander but knowing that, well, the Sheriff and his deputies *do* know what she looks like and that she came in with those guys, takes a runner.
And that was the *start* of the session.
I really didn't expect them to pick a fight and then let their enemy set *all* the terms of it. Really. I had planned for the eventuality, but that was mostly as a "Oh, they CAN'T make THAT mistake" kind of contingency planning.
After realising that they were so outnumbered, outpositioned, and outgunned, I didn't expect 'em to stand and fight, but I was prepared for it.
I REALLY wasn't expecting The Undead Guy to charge out into the open at short range against guys armed with shotguns - but, hey, if you're saving your shot for a better target, there really are few better targets than a guy running up to short range in the wide open.
So. One of Our Heroes is pushing up daisies. Two more are thrown in jail. The third is hiding from the law in the best place she knows - the town doctor's office! Of course, then the Sheriff and his deputies come in for a patchup job.
To her credit, she just ninjes (yes, that IS how you conjugate "To Ninja") and lets them go by, and sneaks out to the jail after dark.
A brief conversation later, and with the timely (and unnecessary, as it turned out) intervention of of a pair of mysterious strangers, the Giant Irishman busts a hole in the wall of the jail cell[1], pulls out the bars on the lady (Sioux name: Manners-Of-Wolves)'s cell, breaks open the dead guy's cell to bring him along ("He's been dead before! He'll get up ANY minute now!"), and tosses the unconscious guard into the fourth cell - in the process freeing the fourth prisoner, who now exists because Dead Guy's player has had time to make a new character and this seemed like a good idea to him.
"Don't you have the Curious flaw?"
"Yes, but I'm pretty sure the street address of the Sheriff's office is NOT a mystery I need to solve after breaking out of jail!"
Three of them hightail it. The last wants her confiscated stuff back. She breaks into the back room of the Sheriff's office, completely botches her one-round Search roll, and instead of getting her own pack with her notebook, camera, samples (including the classic Vial O' Beef Juice), she gets somebody else's pack with a notebook, cheap whiskey, a couple of changes of men's clothing, and some frilly women's underpants.
"You find women's underwear."
"Frilly? Lacy? Like it's from France?"
"Yes."
"I smell it."
[everyone else in a chorus:] "Gaaah!"
And on that note, I quit for the day and went for dinner and beer.
[1]: It's scary what happens when you've got a 3d10 Strength, the Smite miracle (to raise your strength to 3d12+6), and then a Huckster with Corporeal Tweak (to up that to 3d12+16). For those of you who don't know Deadlands: A giant demon-cow (read: Gorgon) has a 3d12+8 Strength. A sea serpent has 5d12+6.
Our Intrepid Heroes, having shot the despicable bandit Rattlesnake Jake dead (again) at the end of last session, dragged his body back into town and strung it up at the crossroads. And then stood around it with guns drawn, expectantly. In a town full of (and terrorised by) bandits from Jake's gang. Where Jake's (crooked) brother Sam also goes by the name "Sheriff Roberts".
"I'm painting on the board: Rattlesnake Jake. Murder. Kidnapping. Extortion."
"You spelled Extortion wrong!"
"Quiet, you. I'd spell better if I didn't have YOUR BULLET in MY HEAD."
"At least take out the C!"
"This is paint! We can't just erase things!"
"I'll add a line and turn it into a K. That's better, right?"
"Oh, great. A sign that says
Murder,
Kidnapping,
Eksto
Extro
Stealin' Stuff
So, they do this.
Ignoring the scurrying townsfolk as they close their shops, lock their doors, and press themselves up against the windows to watch.
Ignoring the people running straight to the Sheriff to tell him that those annoying strangers have killed his brother and are doing ignominious things to the body in town square.
Waiting, doing nothing, in plain sight, expecting the Sheriff to come gunning for them.
While still suffering some pretty severe wound penalties because Jake himself was a tough motherfucker with a bad habit of not being where he last shot you from.
And they still looked surprised and betrayed when the Sheriff came, in force, with heavy weapons, having deputised all those well-armed gang members, to arrest them for his brother's murder. After all, they announced themselves and their intentions, stayed in the same spot, and gave him *as much time as he wanted* to prepare.
And when the Sheriff didn't himself surrender to be arrested on unspecified charges related to letting Jake's gang run pretty wild around here, they seemed, uh, shocked that these well-armed folks who'd taken the time to surround them from the other buildings opened fire.
Many chips were spent avoiding damage, as the posse (two rifles, one shotgun, one Huckster playing "innocent bystander" with Phantom Fingers doing her best to make the bandits miss and shoot at each other) traded fire with the Sheriff and his 3 "normal" deputies (4 double-barreled shotguns, loaded with slugs for the first exchange) and the 5 "gang recruits" (3 gatling pistols, 2 rifles, in elevated positions to provide enfilading fire). Oh, and the "bad guys" are all wearing bulletproof vests, and Our Heroes are wearing... uh... jury rigged bulletproof vests whose reliability is going down with every shot they stop.
"I may be crazy, but I'm not stupid. Or the other way around. Or something. Either way, there's one of them that I'm not, I'm sure of it."
This goes... pretty much as you might expect.
The lady (who is, from her manner, apparently raised by Scientifically Minded Wolves) dove for cover inside the post office and started firing her rifle out the window.
The giant Irishman is a terrible shot, and wasn't aiming, and so didn't do a whole lot of damage - but they keep shooting him, with slugs, into the middle of his chest, and he just wasn't going down. Even with a bulletproof vest, that's gotta count for something.
The
And traded shots with the Sheriff at point-blank range, delivering some pretty good hits.
And promptly caught a slug to the brainpan in return.
"What's the plan?"
"I'm going to hole up here and shoot everybody until Lefty gets back up. It worked last time."
The Giant Irishman took off out the back, brightly realising that he's shit with a rifle at this range against guys in cover, and started going around the back to take them from behind in an old-fashioned "Here. Hold the rifle like this, and use it as a club!" Maneuver. This left our Manners Of One Who Was Raised By Wolves lady pointing her gun out a window, and not suspecting that she was being flanked until a shotgun was pointed at her from about a meter away, accompanied by a demand to surrender.
The Giant Irishman kicked the crap out of one guy, tossing him all the way across the street from the second floor and bouncing him off the far building. Mumble mumble something Strength Of 10 Because His Heart Is Pure mumble something. Unfortunately, when he came back down (intending to reposition and get another one - hit and run, smart) he found himself right in front of the Sheriff with a shotgun pointed at him.
To his, uh, "credit" he tried to grab the gun, thinking (correctly) that he could kick the living crap out of the Sheriff if the gun wasn't involved. He wasn't quite that fast. To the bulletproof vest's credit, it stood up to that one last slug pretty well, and left the Irishman down, winded, helpless, and not bleeding to death.
The Huckster, still playing Innocent Bystander but knowing that, well, the Sheriff and his deputies *do* know what she looks like and that she came in with those guys, takes a runner.
And that was the *start* of the session.
I really didn't expect them to pick a fight and then let their enemy set *all* the terms of it. Really. I had planned for the eventuality, but that was mostly as a "Oh, they CAN'T make THAT mistake" kind of contingency planning.
After realising that they were so outnumbered, outpositioned, and outgunned, I didn't expect 'em to stand and fight, but I was prepared for it.
I REALLY wasn't expecting The Undead Guy to charge out into the open at short range against guys armed with shotguns - but, hey, if you're saving your shot for a better target, there really are few better targets than a guy running up to short range in the wide open.
So. One of Our Heroes is pushing up daisies. Two more are thrown in jail. The third is hiding from the law in the best place she knows - the town doctor's office! Of course, then the Sheriff and his deputies come in for a patchup job.
To her credit, she just ninjes (yes, that IS how you conjugate "To Ninja") and lets them go by, and sneaks out to the jail after dark.
A brief conversation later, and with the timely (and unnecessary, as it turned out) intervention of of a pair of mysterious strangers, the Giant Irishman busts a hole in the wall of the jail cell[1], pulls out the bars on the lady (Sioux name: Manners-Of-Wolves)'s cell, breaks open the dead guy's cell to bring him along ("He's been dead before! He'll get up ANY minute now!"), and tosses the unconscious guard into the fourth cell - in the process freeing the fourth prisoner, who now exists because Dead Guy's player has had time to make a new character and this seemed like a good idea to him.
"Don't you have the Curious flaw?"
"Yes, but I'm pretty sure the street address of the Sheriff's office is NOT a mystery I need to solve after breaking out of jail!"
Three of them hightail it. The last wants her confiscated stuff back. She breaks into the back room of the Sheriff's office, completely botches her one-round Search roll, and instead of getting her own pack with her notebook, camera, samples (including the classic Vial O' Beef Juice), she gets somebody else's pack with a notebook, cheap whiskey, a couple of changes of men's clothing, and some frilly women's underpants.
"You find women's underwear."
"Frilly? Lacy? Like it's from France?"
"Yes."
"I smell it."
[everyone else in a chorus:] "Gaaah!"
And on that note, I quit for the day and went for dinner and beer.
[1]: It's scary what happens when you've got a 3d10 Strength, the Smite miracle (to raise your strength to 3d12+6), and then a Huckster with Corporeal Tweak (to up that to 3d12+16). For those of you who don't know Deadlands: A giant demon-cow (read: Gorgon) has a 3d12+8 Strength. A sea serpent has 5d12+6.