Wednesday, January 16, 2013

Quick Recap

This will be short because I have a batch of grading that must get done. 

Last Friday, I stepped aside to let one of our most creative players take the reins as DM.  It was ostensibly a Swords & Wizardry game, but Charlie couldn't care less about the rules.  We quickly rolled up characters, using "whatever method makes you happy, man", and had a party of 4 PCs (a cleric, a mage, and two fighters). 

Opening scene: we're not a very good adventuring party.  We've been together for a while but haven't gotten much in the way of gold or glory, that's why we're still 1st level.  As we were commiserating about our lives, we see & hear a falling star.  Cha-ching!  If we can get to it first, there's money to be had.  So, we quickly grab our gear and head out for the spot we think the star landed.  After a few days of travel and searching, we find a crater with an odd temple-like metal structure at the bottom.  There is obviously a door as two ogres are standing outside it and arguing over the body of a human-sized corpse.  We make our way down and hear that the ogres are arguing over whether to eat now or later.  We have a nice conversation which leads my character to offer to cook up the corpse in an attempt to get them to not eat us instead.

Taking the body, I strip it down and we dole out the goodies.  I then try to set up a fire and cook a leg.  The ogres dislike it and take their anger out on me.  However, I had grabbed the corpse's belt and had activated something.  The punch from the ogre sent me sailing 30 feet, but then I slowed to a stop and gently landed on the ground.  No damage at all.  One of the fighters had grabbed a bent rod device and pointed it at one ogre.  Zap!  Dead ogre.  The other fighter and the cleric gang up on the remaining ogre and take him down.  Now we have access to the structure.

We go into the "temple" and find there are lights along the ceiling and floor....lights which produce neither heat nor smoke.  We cannot access them.  Going further in, we find a room with 6 chairs, in three rows of two, all facing the opposite wall.  There is blood in a couple of them, but no other bodies.  As we investigate, we release a ball about 1.5 feet across.  It speaks oddly, then makes some other sounds while changing colors and then speaks in Common.  It says it's part of an "AI" with a "prisoner transport ship" heading to some set of numbers and letters, which do not sound like any city or country we know.    It asks for permission to conserve energy in order to go with us.  We answer "yes" and it chirps, changes color, and announces "conserving energy, sarcasm mode initiated, shutting down library functions".    It then asks us questions about a prisoner which we know nothing about.  It then tells us how dangerous the prisoner is and how our world is a prison planet.  We ask if there are other prisoners or items like the belt and rod on board and to show us where they are.  We investigate further.

Going deeper into the "ship", we discover that Charlie used the floorplans of the Millenium Falcon.  We find 4 large tubes, one of which is broken.  In the other three, we find a flumph, a grell, and something else from the Fiend Folio but I can't remember what.  I let the flumph out and it starts trying to eat me.  I flip it over and question it.  It's being sent here for tax evasion and insider trading.  We kill it with prejudice.  We figure if he's the least problematic one, the others are worse so we just kill them as well.  We take all we can and then leave the ship to go hunting the escaped prisoner.

It was presented as a one shot, but it may turn into a campaign.  It'll be science fantasy and silly and very rules light.  I'm not sure if we'll be able to play it regularly because Charlie's job sometimes pulls him into remote places for weeks at a time.  I'm looking forward to the next game.

1 comment:

Stan Shinn said...

If I had to summarize the feel of the game, it was "'Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy' meets 'D&D'".

:-)