frp

Date: December 5, 2014
Characters in attendance: Hex, 99, Quantum, Shimmer, Lady Paladin
Experience awarded: 2

After defeating the initial wave of other-worldly creatures, the team observes what appears to be actual dragons circling overhead. Luckily, none of them take notice of the RC5, but some of them appear to be attacking others on the ground. At this time, Supersonic calls for a status report from all of the teams. Of the other seven teams: * The Five have won their initial fight, and are engaging a red dragon * The Heartlanders are still fighting the initial attack * The Metros are also still fighting their initial attack * The Johnny Rebs won their fight, but have severe injuries, and are holed up. They are safe, and hoping to continue onward in a short while. * The first group of independents were severely injured, and are heading back out of the walled city * The second group of independents won their attack, and are moving forward * From Freedom Force there is no report

Finally there is a frightened call from Erg, the youngest member of Freedom Force. She reports that the group is trapped, cannot escape, and are fighting to a standstill. Shear (the brick) has been critically injured. Guide has been injured, and is trying to defend Shear. Reflex and Erg are fighting the monsters but making no headway, and are at the brink of exhaustion. Supersonic asks if there is any other group that can assist them; the closest is Rose City Five, nobody else can make it to them in time.

The team decides to go help them, their GPS shows the other group to be about 600m away. There are occasional groups of wandering creatures, but the team's friend, Thrall, had an innate knowledge of the area, and guided the team through back alleys and hidden passages to come out near the other team.

There they see what they are up against. Reflex and Erg are doing everything they can to defend against four monsters, while the other members are cornered in the ruin of a small building. The monsters take damage from every attack, but almost as quickly their injuries heal. Thrall tells them, “Trolls. This is bad.”

The fight against four trolls begins. Thrall tells them that unless they use fire or acid, any damage against them will heal quickly. The team gets to work; Shimmer hunts for oil lamps and other wood in the stone buildings. 99 gets a torch from Thrall to create a flaming improvised weapon. Once a fire is started, Quantum uses his telekinesis to grab chunks of thatched roof and adds it to the fire. Hex attacks the trolls, and does what he can to keep the injured people safe. Lady Paladin continues her new technique of picking up the trolls and throwing them dozens of yards away. The trolls aren't hurt by this, but it takes a while for them to get back to the fight.

Meanwhile, Erg and Reflex take short rests before coming back to help. Clearly Erg, a young woman (and the youngest member of the team) is overwhelmed, but does what she can. Reflex, however, is clearly quite confident in his abilities, and won't show any weakness. He does snap a bit when taunted by 99, but tries to remain in control. Even going so far as to hold one of the trolls down in the fire, which burns his arms. It also destroys the arms of his costume, and everyone can see the sleek minimal exoskeleton under his costume. Eventually three of the trolls are destroyed in the fire, and the fourth one runs off.

Hex's first aid attempts stop Shear's bleeding, and Shear and Guide agree to head back outside of the wall. Reflex insists that he and Erg continue with the RC5 towards the center of the walled city; he is not going to let Freedom Force be seen as weak. The group moves inward, and Thrall's expert guidance takes them to the center of the walled city without encountering any other hostiles. During the trip, Erg confides to Lady Paladin that even though she likes being in Freedom Force, Reflex, the leader, is sometimes too overconfident and is occasionally too “friendly” with her.

The combined group makes it to the next impass: another round stone wall surrounding a tall castle about 500 ft across. Here they encounter The Five, bloody and injured but victorious over their fight with a dragon. They are glad to see the RC5, but immediately go on the defensive when they see Thrall, an obvious dark elf. They are suspicious, since all of the groups have encountered dark elves leading groups of other monsters. Our team assures them that he is an ally, and The Five trust them at their word.

The now-large group look at this next wall, and start making plans to get past it. The Commander muses out loud, “This whole city makes no sense, not even as a medieval city. What could it's purpose be?” A quiet response from Thrall, “It's a prison.” He continues, “The outer areas were where the lesser criminals lived, and the more serious prisoners were held in this castle. The worst were kept down in the dungeons below the castle.” Somebody asked Thrall how he knew this, although many already suspected the answer he gave, “I was held in those dungeons for over a hundred and fifty years.”

“Luckily,” Thrall continued, “I learned a few things in that time. Like where all the hidden passages were” and leads the group to a nondescript building nearby. Inside, part of the floor was removed, and a tunnel went down. The entire group followed him, and they travelled through hundreds of yards of tiny passages until they finally emerged into a larger corridor, that Thrall told them was the actual dungeon. He warned them that they should watch out for the rats, just as an evil-looking rat the size of a large dog appeared. He killed it with one of his sais with barely a thought. The team's communication devices stopped working once they were underground.

They continued down passageways that made no sense, as if it was deliberately mazelike. Around one corner they heard footsteps, and a confident whistling. Everyone prepared for battle, but Thrall told them that it wasn't necessary; from around the corner appeared the handsome Shade, and the RC5 assured everyone that he was also a friend. Thrall lead them to a massive door that hadn't been opened in decades; the bricks in the combined group made short work of it. Inside was a large room about 30 feet across, with a short stone dais about six feet across in the center. The mystical members of the group all agreed that this was the point of strongest power, and while some people prepared to defend the room, Reflex brought out the small wooden cube that was given to them, and placed it on the dais. Soon there was a glowing area over the cube, and out stepped the Cabalist.

He looked around the room, and started examining all parts of the room and the dais. “Yes,” he said, “this is the location of the Nexus of Power. I'm glad you were able to locate it. The powers of the creatures in this city are too strong; I would not have been able to survive by myself, but I knew that at least one group of heroes would make it all the way inside. From my analysis, I can see that it took immense power to cause such a large area to transfer from one world to another, and it took somebody on either side to do it. For me to set it right, it will also require somebody on each side to reverse the effects. I can send a small group through to the other side, and their task will be to find my counterpart. He will know what is required on his end.”

The large group starts making plans on who will go through. Obviously Reflex insists on going through, but the Cabalist stops them all. “I know who will go through; the quintet from Portland, and the two who have already traveled from that world.”

“But what do we do? Just stand around?” asked Reflex.

“No,” the Cabalist replied calmly, “our job is just as important. Already our presence here is known to all the denizens of this city, and I expect that wave upon wave of them will try to make it in here to stop us. We must defend this place, and allow the others to do their job.”

Preparations are made. Thrall draws some simple maps to show the general layout of the dungeon and some of the secret passages. Some of the heroes will attempt to sneak out of the dungeon and coordinate with the surviving teams, and the rest will defend this room. The heroes wish the RC5 members good luck, and nobody can miss the look of envy on Reflex's face. The team steps on the dais, and the Cabalist pulls a small notebook out of his front shirt pocket. The cover of the notebook has an odd symbol of ten circles with interconnecting lines (a sephirot). He flips to a specific page, and reads some mystical words that nobody understands. A glowing ring appears around them. After a few seconds, they are somewhere else. It is the basement of a large modern building under construction.

And they are surrounded.

By large orcs.

All holding M16s.

I was trying to come up with a good game mechanic for doing the trolls' regeneration, and just did the normal Regeneration power of 5 points per turn, defined as one point on each one of their phases. I also gave them a freaking big 25 recovery, so that they get a third of their stun back every post-segment twelve. They also had a nasty bite if they ever grabbed anybody, but never got the chance. I did have the dragons written up, but since it was getting late, the players just avoided that encounter.

I'm not so good with NPCs yet. I have pretty good ideas on their personalities, and how they will react to certain situations, but am not great at role-playing them.

Most of the NPCs are straightforward personalities, but the members of Freedom Force are not stereotypes, and have some subtle aspects to their personalities. However, I don't think that came through during the game.

Reflex is NOT an overconfident, pompous asshole, but it kind of seemed that way from the way I played him. He is a powerful, charismatic, proud man, and not a jerk. Given the choice, he would protect his team instead of taking off. But he doesn't like being seen as weak, and definitely will put on a good show. He's also not quite the ass-grabbing jerk, just that he makes Erg uncomfortable sometimes.

As for Erg, she is a woman in her mid-twenties, fully capable, confident, and not a helpless, scared teenager. Both of them are at least as powerful as any member in Rose City Five, and capable of holding their own.

Thrall is the quiet guy in the back with a deep but soft voice. People tend to ignore him until he makes himself known, and he doesn't often make himself known. It appears that he isn't used to being around other people.