SCRPG - "Halcyon Nights," Part 2

[Dave (***Dave Hill)]

Rather than risk my notes vanishing into a text file somewhere, wanted to post this from our 2-shot Menagerie special “Halcyon Nights,” using the Sentinels Comics RPG . I did not take notes for the first session, so this picks up in the second session.

Many thanks to Mike for putting it together, and to Bill and Margie for pulling back those old character memories with me.

My ultimate goal is to do an Alycia’s Tale version of this (I limited the notes to my PoV mostly), but in case I don’t …

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Interrogation of Handmaid (and Madhesive). Where is JQ?

This wasn’t suppsoed to happen. He was supposed to get us out of here. Instead, he paid us off and got out of Dodge.

GG (He?)

Flashback to Father interrogating as 11yo

She breaks (and I feel guilty and really don’t want to tell JQ about it)

Younger Alycia practicing her interrogation techniques

That Lectric guy doesn’t keep his word. Thought we were hostaging him. Off doing his sad villain in the rain act – justifying his actions before killing the victim.

Hannibal Lectric.

Where?

He had us meet him at the hydroelectric dam.
And then somebody had to break all my handbots.
Be glad it was just the handbots
A flicker of fear.

The one downstream, switched to when they decommissioned the old power plant. Leo. His Dad.

… montage! …

1. Recover health … up to the top of Yellow. (Minor twist to get an extra zone)
2. Help another char recover health (1 zone)
3. Boost for next scene

Infirmary.
And meditate a few minutes.
Awfully battered vs handbots, and the stress of the spider-bot. Exhaustion. And concern. Vitality is now a D6.

(GG hangs out in the conversation pit. Looks worried.)

(Summer / Radiance … (speaks to Colin). … Drones could get damaged …)

Ready to head out – Hannah and Barbara … done talking with police and AEGIS agents (Madhesive and Handmaid being hauled off), Bring Jason back for us. that madman!

…

Floating over the waters, blue and gray designer suit … lightning from the turbines … no Jason … dam, walkway over the top.

Radiance, making a hologram of Jason, ha ha, we rescued your hostage. (Boost)
HL is mystified. How did you get him out of the maintenance room without me noticing?

Dash in shadows across the dam toward the maintenance shack. Agile. Alert.

Lectric is not quite frothing at the mouth. Shouting for revenge.
Jason is coccooned in Madhesive’s glue. Nanobots are inactive.
Mouth covered. Looking at me with alarm, wanting to protect me SIGH.

Whip out stun batons. Remember experiments on deactivating / reactivating nanobots. Also … feels weirdly comfortable rescuing Jason. The nanits ripple.

GG shows up, trying to teleport him out of the glue (2 turns). She looks worried. (that’s my job)
Spells starts glowing … she looks reawlly worried! Then grits teeth with resolve. “Girls Night Together …” like some sort of muttered battle cry. The air gets frigid cold … (-1 penalty) … damn magic.

Winds whipping up outside. Hannibal Lectric is shouting something. Recognize that ego-bending tone of voice. Probably not as interesting as Father.

The sound of Jason’s laughter is coming from outside. Which is kind of disturbing. Hopefully it’s Radiance.

Have to hit the bots just right. Cold makes it difficult, but dedicated to getting him out of this deathtrap and into the action – both for him and my friends.

Nanites are moving. I rip off the glue over his mouth. “About damn time!” He squints and the nanites shudder … but don’t move against the remainigng glue.
Look.
Ghost Girl waves her hands and frees him. Her magic settles around his nanites, glowing.

Thugs burst into the room. “Hey, what are you doing here?”
We look at each other.
Jason nano-punches one of the thugs, who topples.

I kick the other guy three times in the head. He topples.

Huge peal of thunder from outside.

Sparks and electricity inside the maintenance shed. Zap!

Ghost girl flies out the door.

Lectric. Electrical powerhouse. But ego, both a strength and a weakness.

Jason charges out. I come out to see him try to snag Lectric with the bots, hindering him some.

Master plan: if his ego is wobbly, hit him with an attack. If it’s not taunt his ass.

Movie of images of much younger Menagerie stomping Hannibal Lectric’s ass somewhere in the city.

GG casts a spell, and suddenly feel like the spirits are on my side.

Cutting winds!

HL I will not be usurped by you little children! I am the master of lighting! I will have what I am due! I am Hannibal Lectric!

Huge blast at Jason, who shrugs it off (a bit on me). Jason drops down to his knees.

Lectric shouts something, but I can’t hear it. Lightning flares about him, above it all.
I shoot him, using all that buoyant spirit, part of my master plan, “You think one of us faltering will save you? You are outnumbered!”

Ghost Girl throws another magic bolt. He shrieks in fear.

Radiance shrieks peppers him with laser beams.
Jason hammers him with his nanites.
C taps him – and he is down!

GG grabs him before he is swept down the river.

Sorry about ruining your girls night out.
C - Don’t let it happen again. (Clearly need to work on his security systems.)
Radiance – make friends with a bear.
Picnic basket.
J Hope I’ll be okay.
C Don’t worry. You will just face him in your bare skin.
Everyone stares.
You’re supposed to end an adventure with some sort of ridiculous quip, right? Glower.

[insomn14 (Mike)]

Oh!
Thanks for taking notes, Dave!
I’ll see if tomorrow I can post some of my notes from that first game, along with the artwork I prepped for it.
If I don’t remember to do so before D&D tomorrow, remind me at the game.

[insomn14 (Mike)]

Session One Recap
It’s girls’ night out as Charlotte, Summer, and “Alice” are out at the Bump & Grind for 80’s Night. Everyone’s looking to get away from their problems for the night: Radiance having recently dealt with a giant mutant shark attack at the waterfront; Ghost Girl dealing with a spat of unintentional summons and curses laid out by people with a smidge of magical talent; and Charade being forced to do paperwork by Parker, cataloguing all sorts of hyper science finds for AEGIS.

(Out of game, I speculate that Agent 1337 was previously in charge of this but had to be taken off the project due to some sort of mishap. Never leave a hacker alone with interesting tech for too long unless you want an office fire. )

After everyone’s had a chance to get some drinks and reminisce, Maury Jones rolls up wanting to talk to Charlotte about her work as the Magus. Charlotte’s able to delay the conversion to next week, but Maury makes her promise to tell her all about her time as a teen in the Antabellum.

After Maury leaves, Alycia’s phone is buzzing. Everyone’s phone was supposed to be silenced, but this is the phone that Alycia can’t silence.

It’s Parker. She’s gotten word that there’s been an emergency call from the Quill Compound and officers are in route. She’s giving Alycia the heads up due to her personal involvement with Jason. After explaining the situation, everyone agrees to go and Charlotte teleports the group to the Conversation Pit.

From the Pit, they find Barbara pinned to the dining room wall, cocooned in glue, while Hannah tries to pry her off with a serving tray while on the phone with emergency services. Radiance dislodges Barbara from the wall and the pair explain what happened. While Hannah was in the bathroom, some team of villains broke in through the window, disabled Barbara and Jason, and then a man with sunglasses took Jason.

With a bit of investigation, Charade notices activity at the Foundation warehouse. The three head down there (after changing into their secret identities) and discover Handmaid and Madhesive ransacking the place! (Both villains are from Bill’s Silver Seven Field Deployment Guide. Give it a look!)

Handmaid’s art is by (I believe) Yanahn / Kristen Chin. (Bill, correct me if I’m wrong.)

A fight breaks out between the two villains, Handmaid’s Handbots, and our heroes.

Highlights:

• Radiance gets glued and has a bad time.
• Handmaid summons more Handbots. Too many Handbots!
• Cosmos Jones comes to investigate the noise, only to get held hostage by a pair of Handbots! Fortunately, Charade is able to disable the bots with some well placed shots and Cosmos is able to escape to safety.
• Unfortunately, the shot ricochets and reactivates a long dormant Chin Spider Bot!
• More fortunately though, the Spider Bot’s first target is one of the Handbots!
• Charade disables Handmaid while Ghost Girl blasts Madhesive into a wall!

With the fight complete, we then continue to Session Two (which Dave has outlined above).

Some notes of my own:

• First time running Sentinel Comics RPG, which I had previously played. In that game, I played a lost in space Space Bug, who was a hoot.
• This adventure was actually adapted from a rough outline of a story I had in mind when I made Charade’s SotM deck. In that one, the final villain was a bit different but I think it worked better with Hannibal Lectric getting to make a return.
• Speaking of, something I don’t think I got across too well was that Lectric hired Handmaid and Madhesive through the evil version of Bill’s ASIST concept: while ASIST is a collective good, giving people the opportunity to contribute with crises that they have the skills and abilities to assist with; this version is more like a post-Uber gig economy nightmare for villains. Hannibal basically got henchmen from Fiverr (and then double crossed them anyway).
  
  
  
  For anyone who cares about the exact motivations, the way I picture it is Hannibal putting out a call that he’s going to do a high stakes kidnapping with a profit share. Handmaid and Madhesive both sign up thinking “oh cool, we’re going to ransom whoever we’re kidnapping and then split the money.” Except Hannibal never clarifies that there’s not going to be any ransom, he’s just going to kill Jason. Handmaid and Madhesive complain, leading Hannibal to blast a whole in the warehouse and say “You want a payday? I’m sure you can sell some of Quill’s toys. Grab whatever you want!” before flying off, leaving HM and MH with the decision to either cut and run or try to scrounge some money from whatever hyper-tech they can pilfer. You folks caught them in the midst of the latter.

[garrett (Bill Garrett)]

There’s a villain forum described in Phase 3 for this kind of coordination.

@garrett

Alex explains for her benefit. “The Dark Web. Traffic goes through a series of anonymizing hosts, like playing a game of gossip where everyone is forced to tell the truth. The message gets through but nobody knows the source. This Dark Web site looks like some kinda villain message board…”

Emma enters some credentials. “Port Royal. Thing is, you have to login to use it. And it’s by invitation only, so there’s no plebes allowed. If anyone’s been nosing around this place, maybe someone in the local villain community has noticed.”