Sphere of Doom 2024: Encapsulated

 So this last Spring I re-envisioned my 2021 take on a Flash Gorden serial, Flash Gordon and the Sphere of Doom.

The first take was awesome. Things were groovy. Everyone was playing at least two characters and folks were introducing themselves to the comic strips.  This was not because of anything wrong with that campaign, but I had started to design a Dyson Sphere for roleplaying in.  So even after those takes I kept making notes.

Just a Little Off Course

So in session one, pretty sure there was only the two players  Iron Curtis and Peryton, Robin, playing the Characters Blix Bradigan and Professor Priscilla Vokraz. Aboard the Signus, the two were running an Oort Corps support mission for various space stations. One of the stations was the Ymir where Vokraz's husband Professor Elvis Vokraz was looking for the ninth planet.

Priscilla received a transmission that the Ymir was picking up promising gravitational findings and was going to change vectors of its orbit to investigate. Two weeks later, though, the research facility had not reported in. Ignoring orders to wait until further information could be collected, Lt. Bradigan, the vessel's captain, fired up the engines and headed towards the last known location of Elvis Vokraz and his crew...

Think We've Got Something
We try to keep our gaming groups flexible, which means my story line could take little diversions. The next time we met, Just Ben showed up and Robin would be showing up later. Bernard wanted to play a space princess and didn't mind randomizing her background. So while I kept Blix busy here and there with problems with navigation, the gravity just wasn't making sense, we had Princess Nova Veridian from Alpha Centauri B fleeing from the retribution of her father, the Emperor of Toliman after another almost baseless accusation of her trying to steal the throne again. She was a green-skinned Neptunian, a sub-species of human. Her ship was essentially a flying-saucer. When Vokraz finally showed up, I had both ships realized that they were in the gravity well of a massive sphere structure about four times the size of Jupiter. Neither of their vessels were designed for being close to masses much larger than smaller moons, so there were problems on both their ends.
Veridian's saucer would be shot by a mysterious yellow beam that would disintegrate it. This let me describe her species innate ability to survive for a few minutes in the vacuum of space, using its Quirk Space Face. Meanwhile the Signus moved in to save her, Blix did some highly skilled flying and Vokraz figured out a way to get the literal castaway aboard their ship with out killing her.

The Signus though was still in trouble and would have to find a spot to land.

Not Into the Underworld

Well Blix Bradigan was able to land the Signus without getting him and the others killed. The ship did need to get its power source "synced" and an external source of power would be helpful to recharge the reserve batteries as well. The first robot NPC for the space vessel, Boomstick, was created to handle this task. They were on the outer shell of the Dyson sphere and within walking distance of an unused structure that that the group decided to investigate. It was an out-of-the-way maintenance station. Considering that its nearest neighbor was roughly the distance from the Earth to the Moon, they pretty much had the place to themselves.
I had set a trap to get the PCs captured and taken towards the inner workings of massive world, but they avoided it. Blix and Veridian did manage to get themselves into trouble, while Professor Vokraz got power lines from the base to their ship. The two went out for a walk looking for access into any sort electronic communications network-- somehow we had determined that the base was isolated from any sort of communications outside of radio waves. Well about half a mile from the ship and now habitable base, they did find the super-science-y equivalent of a telephone pole and using power reserves from their own survival gear, started to hack the system so to speak.
Here they were able to get images of the Ymir in a low stable orbit around the sphere, but under attack or at least being disassembled by little specks being disgorged from a vacuum cleaner-looking vessel about a quarter of its size. Upon zooming in, the attackers appeared to be ape-men with metal parts and jet packs. Then the screen went fuzzy. This was because their space suits' power sources and reserves only had so much umpf to them. The two Characters were suddenly freezing.
Veridian got into true form and convinced Blix that they had to join their suits "to conserve energy and maintain warmth." Bernard did not make a vampy-chick character to not be noticed after all. Curtis Quipped, "My PC might be gay but she has big boobs." So instead of trying to walk back to where there was power the two Spacers huddled until Vokraz showed up on a OTR three-wheeler that she found in the base and saved them.

JerryTel showed up for a bit to play the Ming Character, Zargon Law, and we got into the politics of the Quad. The Quad being the most habitable, and therefore suppressed, realms of the Dyson Sphere.

Stuck In the Mud
So while the Signus, had garnered enough power for a take off from the area, the minions of the despot of the Quad and nominal dictator of the Ognim, the Sphere of Doom, had a take on them. The Mining Clans, cyborgs wrapped in clay, used their gravity cannons caused the Terrans a rather short flight.
Meanwhile, Kal Luin, Brett, showed up to start getting his hands dirty in some video table-top gaming. He then proceeded to produce an exact replicate of Blix Bradigan, named Brick Bradigan. He was the Security Officer of the Ymir, so I did some flashbacks.
    Poor Brick did the best he could to defend the Ymir against the ape-men with shining metal parts that were Zargon Law's Far Raiders, while the Mining Clans worked their gravity cannons dragging the ship downward. The space station would just shudder to a halt in the mud and gravel that made up most of the shell of the Sphere of Doom, where the Signus would land not to far from it.
    With a scouting party, Blix and Prescilla, would find Brick. Blix and Brick the fraternal twins would come together.
    "The last I heard you were on Mars."
    "I was." Replied Brick, "But things change."
    From there on their sibling rivalry would be a thing.



No Where Near
    As much as I hate railroading the PCs, getting to deep secrets was taking a bit longer than I wanted. So this episode was about fights and then forcing Priscilla into chasing her husband aboard a clay-cruiser. That slow moving subterranean craft, now with the Professor Vokraz aboard, would start making its way through the clay and sludge towards the interior realms of Sphere of Doom.  Blix and Brick stopped their bickering to get serious about following that Mining Clan vessel.

GenCon 2024: Ken's Not Dead Yet

 Speaking with JerryTel over at the GenCon Auction last night (Friday, August 2nd) he asked if Peryton or I had heard anything about Ken St Andre. There was a rumor going around that he had passed on. Well we had not heard anything and scrolled our media feeds and found nothing. I did say, "Well leave it to him to die on the Friday at GENCON." Still the three of us regaled a couple nicer and funny stories as one does when hearing such things. From what I can tell, this bit of gossip is exaggerated.

We moved on into reality, we are at GENCON the best four days in gaming. Since Wednesday night, Jerry has been sending me pictures of brews at favorite bars. Robin arrived late Wednesday so we only showed up on Thursday. I've completed my four events, only three went off. All were Crawlspace variations and little tales into the supernatural. With only me running events for three years now, "Peryton Gamers" is getting assigned spare rooms at the Marriott one day and the Hyatt the next day. Shuffling from one gig to another instead of having my primo spots at the JW Marriott.

On Thursday AM into noon"13 Ghosthunters" designed for, well, thirteen players had two participants. Laura and Seth were great. Really did the minor celebrity thing well for the first act. For the second and concluding act, they completed the ghost story and helped solve the mystery to find a missing kid sister. I hope

"The Seance" taking place a little after lunch, was full plus. Twelve player slots, eleven full seats around the two tables-- dammit missed one. Long time players, Ryan and Kaitlyn, along with a whole slough of new folks showed up. Of course I did not have enough PC sheets so we went without the sheets and turned the card mechanics into a paperless parlor game-- rather fitting for the work, I think. Things got wild, people were having fun. I had to move around the table and folks started doing that Crawlspace thing where they started moving around as well and scripting their own tales while I was busy. Ah perfection. I kept it short and campy. Kaitlyn really rocked in her role as a grieving widow. After the game local RPGers and I exchanged numbers for in town get-togethers. I look forward to seeing how this pans out.

The third event didn't have any players show, so Robin hit the 6:30pm traffic jam and headed to the flat. Pizza and sci-fi TV were had in bathrobes. Later, after my nightly nap, I woke up and finished my notes for "The Sleep Study 4: the Light Sleeper" Friday's concluding event. 

Friday's event started at the Hyatt at 1pm. Of course Robin made sure we would not be any earlier than 12:45. I forgot how efficient the Hyatt is, pizza, Starbucks, a dine-in spot, a bar complete with open gaming areas and conference rooms all within two meters of each other. It's a small game fest in and of itself while GENCON happens around it. The before game panics all happened in the same building, in a small contained area when compared to the mile or so of where everything else goes on.

Light Sleeper had the pros of Crawlspace as players. Robin/Peryton co-creator, Natalie modified the game for her Supernatural TV show LARPS, and Michael whose played in at least one session at GenCon for over a decade. Their characters had me trying to keep up with them as I tried to craft my tale. Really I had to be on my toes. I felt comfortable enough with this group to not only go scary but creepy (as in blue). The appropriate level of disdain was shown by all, but that did not stop a high quality horror-thriller from unfolding. Wait I take that back Robin did show me an "X" card, but no one listened. It was a good and scary session, the "R-rated" tales that we usually get around midnight.

And then freedom...

Screw It 1: copy and pasted game sceanrio and its session

 Six Weeks Wobble: 17. May. 24

Artwork by Randy Market. Copyright the artist and Peryton Publishing, 2012

“Space Nazis on the Moon versus Radio Apes from the Tau Verse”
So Viago and Daisy Adair are called back to Prime Earth (Mu Gamma-2) because though the time stream hook was disabled months ago, there is something, or someone, that keeps sending signals trying to tap into it. That means someone is trying to reactivate it. When they, the PCs, show up they find that the signal is not coming from Earth but instead from the other side of the moon. And it’s nazis, from the moon, that are doing so.

The PCs will be ambushed by the “Mondtrupplen” (moon-troopers) and most likely captured. Unless they do something to hide the Albatross, it will be seized by the space nazis when they are captured. What is happening is that an outpost of the Uber-Worlds in the Omega Verse, that is actually from the future is trying to reestablish the connection.

30 Mondsritter, Q 70-120

6 Unteranfuhrer, Q 100-120
One per five moon-troopers. 1-6 on bravery scale.

Oberst Pierre Blik, Mondplatzbefehshaber, Q 150. 4^th Level Digger
Colonel Blik is the commander of the moonbase. He is from the future and his main mission is to make contact with the Uber-Worlds in this time period’s Omega Verse, which he has not been able to do. He has made contact with the Hitler Brain.

The nazis attempts to contact the future have not just been noticed by the Clock Trees. An outpost of Radio-Apes from Procyon has noticed and has sent a probe team to investigate. Of course shooting first and figuring stuff out later is the Overmind’s preferred way for “investigating” things-- they can always put things back together from rubble if need be.

8 Monitor Monkeys, Q 90-120
Some are veterans, while a couple are replacements. Varies in levels of experience and autonomous thought.

Z4A4 “Zira” Appliance Ape +, Q 260
Medical/Repairs office of the raiding party.

Quick-267 Appliance Ape, Q 200
Science officer of the raiding party.

Quack-78, Appliance Ape, Q 100
Second-in-Command.

1X4 "Connor," Robo-Rilla, Q 300
Commander of the raiding party.

Opening: Viago and Daisy get captured by Nazis. The villains of course reveal exactly what they are doing. And then they reveal that they have fond the body of Adolph Hitler. When they awaken him, Der Fuhrer seems a little off. He looks out at the fascists from the Omega Verse with a bit of chagrin and upon seeing our Professor he recognizes him. It’s Edmund Hitlervitz not Adolph Hitler.

Edmund (Hitler-Clone) Q 550, Ace
See Wobble, original text, for more details. In this case, this Wobbler is one of the Master Class. He is able to Wobble without devices given the “Days” rule. He’s been traveling between the dimensions for some thirty some-odd years now, he’s got quite a bit of lore.
MENTAL 200
Explain Mad Science (MENTAL plus 3D)- He’s been around it to not only to recognize it quickly, he gets where it’s going a lot quicker than others.
CHARM 200
Makes the Wrong Friends Fast- While he’d like his CHARM rating to be about 10, it is multiplied by 2D when encountering new and unwritten about groups.

Act One: A Barrel of Monkeys
The Radio-Apes attack. Some ships of the Overmind

Banana Boat
Piloted by a Chief, a pilot, and a navigator. It can carry up to six ape-sized beings comfortably.
MASS 40
MAN 75
DEF 50
SPD 40
OFF 100
Crew 3 minimum.
Notes: Most common fighter used by Radio-Apes

Monkey Barrel
Gunboats of the Overmind.
MASS 140
MAN 75
DEF 50
SPD 80
OFF 100
Crew 3 minimum.
Notes: Piloted by a Chief, a pilot, and a navigator. It can carry up to ninety ape-sized beings comfortably. Capable of transporting two Banana Boat-sized ships.

Act Two: Moon Pies and Monkey Wrenches in the Works

Cool bits in the tool-kit:
1.) Flashbacks to Alejandro
Shadow shows of what he’s learned during his dalliances.
Discussion of Time-Slipping

2.) More about PRIME Earth (MU-Gamma 2)
The Mazel-Tough
Prime Earth’s Israeli secret space station with a super laser. Not so much interested in killing nazis as much as blowing up Arab stuff. Mentioning something “Palestinian” will get co-Captains Sid and Lewis’s attention.
MASS 140
MAN 75
DEF 50
SPD 80
OFF 100
Crew 3 minimum.
Notes: Piloted by a Chief, a pilot, and a navigator. It can carry up to two hundred human-sized beings comfortably. Capable of transporting four fighter-sized spacecraft.

Aleph-16
Space fighter vessel of Prime Earth.
MASS 20
MAN 75
DEF 50
SPD 90
OFF 100
Crew 1
Notes: Most common fighter used by the Israeli Secret Space Force. Can carry up to four people uncomfortably.

Act Three: What Actually Happened

So a long term, but infrequent player showed up, needing a new Character and intro. Came up with a backstory for him. Played it out in parts. New Player Character Brick-Clone awoke aboard the Monkey Barrel coming to raid the nazi moonbase. In the medical bay, resembling a butcher shop mixed with an auto shop, of the vessel there were four other clones of him but not yet complete. He was able to break free from the “medical” Application-Apes’ “care.”
The Albatross wobbled into the Mu Gamma-2 universe and discovered the signal that they were tracking was coming from the far side of the moon, not the Earth. They also detected an UFO headed along towards the signal as well. This was the Radio-Ape ship, which they followed undetected due to the skill of the pilot, Dasiy Adair. They then and caught the new Player-Character, and four other our clones of their original when they were ejected from the gunboat. Professor Rudolpho Viago took a look at the new technology aboard his Wobble-Ship mostly ignoring the castaways. Daisy stepped in leaving the ship on autopilot.
So the Radio-Apes assaulted the Space Nazi moonbase. Our Characters stayed in orbit but hacked into what was going on through the complex's surveillance cameras. I was going to make a mini-game making one Player take the side of the nazis and the other the Radio-Apes, but no one was interested. Because of the numerical advantage, and due to my rolling, the nazis were able to not only defeat the raiding party, but they captured the monkey barrel minus its cloning equipment-- the Players were too busy talking about the movie Barbarella to notice.
I railroaded Edmund Hitlervitch saving himself to inject the NPC into the wobbling party for the next session.

Rulings and New Rule(s) Developments during Play:
First Wobbles
Accidental
Rule 117- When two or Wobblers encounter each other, they must make a SR not to go on a wobble. See random tables for where they go. GMs should tailor such tables to their scenario’s needs.
Survival
While striving to stay alive helps a Wobbler find out that they can wobble. Unless the PC has a strategy in mind, LUCK will be their ID Stat.
Experimental
This is the conscious effort of the PC knowing that they can wobble. They decide their ID Stat and do things that utilize Saves to eventually have a wobble.

Clone’s Luck
Clone Characters are going to have identity issues as well as the disadvantage of being low level to No level at the games they enter into. If their first Saving Roll is within one or two points of a success, give them a break. They still receive no XP for that roll though.

Appliance Ape +
 A model of Appliance Ape that has advanced processing capacity, but unable to assume command positions.

That’s a Wrap:

Plot Points:
1.) Avoid death (100 XP)
2.) Save Edmund from nazi-enslavement (100 XP)
3.) Retrieve the Albatross (90 XP)
4.) Blow up the moonbase and its time-travel communicator to keep it out of the Overmind’s grasp. (75 XP)

Everytime At the Table: Spacers 180° Sideline

New notes.

 So of course scheduling with a group that likes late nights and multiple GMs is proving to be a bit difficult. Peryton and Iron Curtis were still able to show up last night for a "just us" session. I was flattered both of them have expressed to me how much they like Spacers games. Since this game is on the side of the larger group, including Ben, William, and Simon recently, new characters were developed. I've also been in the mood for some Sphere Romance versus nuts and bolts so I pulled out notes from 2020 and dusted off the Flash Gordon Versus the Sphere of Doom. I decided that I had plenty of details unique enough to do some fidgeting and come up with something fresh. 

The long and short of this is that things were ready to go with very little prep. I placed the date one hundred and forty years from now. So far we've got Robin playing Priscilla Vokraz, a Synthesizer who's "Big Idea" (a new game mechanic, I came up with for the Class last night) is to synthesize human and mechanical "activity" (life). Curtis is playing Lieutenant Blix Bradigan, the Scrapper, in command of the OCR Signus. The Signus is a Barracuda class ship acting as a PT Boat/Supply ship for space stations out in the Oort Cloud. OCR stands for "Oort Corps Resource" by the way.

With all of the above established, we got playing. The OCR Sigmus was, like way, way, out in the Oort Cloud supporting Ymir Station which was even farther out. Dr. Vokraz's husband Elvis Vokraz was the Chief-Director (Egg-head for captain) looking for a ninth planet in our solar system. After a "I'll tell you later" phone call between the husband and wife, the space station disappeared. Finding this out Blix said "let's go." Karen Complex from the far away Pluto-Charon system, advised waiting for further study but their message was burned up in the engine flare as the rocket sped away. Head on into trouble.

When getting to the Ymir's last known position, the PCs found a lot of nothing (alotta nadda). Luckily our Oort Corps "Out-Rangers" had the background data from the earlier scene's phone call. What they got was a triangle. The bottom of the triangle was white, most of the middle was red, the top was green turning to blue. It didn't take a Science Officer to figure out that this was a thermal image. Captain Blix went on to theorize that they were looking at an emission trail. Vokraz was the one to pull back enough to realize that they were dealing with a dark structure at least fourteen times the size of Jupiter. Its darkness indicated that was enclosed. A sphere, a mini-Dyson Sphere so to speak.

Alarms went off as the Signus entered the gravity well of The new Sphere of Doom. 

Oh yeah, Spacers: 180°

In 1997 I really never planned to work with D20, but now? Wow.

I apologize. Yet another edition of Spacers(TM) has been released. My little sci-fi niche for nuts and bolts (and whimsy) just won't leave me be. Blame Bernard Assif, Ben, for encouraging me. He became a co-author as well as an editor. I've actually become a co-editor as well as an author. I just bet the man is wanted for crimes against complacency in Belgium or some other place. Seriously, his love of gaming and roleplaying is a treasure that anybody in the hobby would do well to emulate.

So Spacers has moved past 2d6 mechanics and venturing into D20 and its accompanying polyhedrons. Spacers: 180° is out. Still there is a lot of "winging it" because this OSR-style roleplaying game is not afraid of using the other dice that make up the term "polyhedron." It fails to incorporate odd-sided dice, that games promising to be "gonzo by design," so it's not that daring. The dice we do use are going to be used.

Types have become "Classes." Four of them. The Scrapper, the Spacer, the Solver, and the Synthesizer. With that last one, I think we've mastered the tropes needed for a good start for space opera. Thank Ben for the Synthesizer, I'm not that hip. Then there is the player-Character with psychic abilities. All things Psychic may just take over that Character's role. Quick note, it hasn't happened yet since 1997-- Even psychics still have to turn wrenches in Spacers-Verse.

For all the pressure on him to do otherwise by, well, others; Ben, has helped define how narrative Spacers rules should be focused. While the Playtest edition of Spacers:180° is out, the rules that will be added will hopefully be helpful not defining.

Not Everytime at the Table Jan 2024

 

Deep winter is so great for Spacers.
Image copyright Simon Tranter and Peryton Publishing

So the usual suspects, Just Ben, Peryton, Iron Curtis, and myself have started playtesting the D20 rules for Spacers, (Spacers: 180 °). We were joined by Ben's brother William. This year's sessions promise to be quite fun. First off, Ben has agreed to, with his usual unbridled enthusiasm, to run scenarios. We will be alternating the GM spot and playing the space lizard, Gal Qix'tar. I hope this has the feel of an episodic SF TV program for everyone playing. I get to play a bit. The tone and atmosphere changes from session to session. There are no negatives here.
    The Spacers, Alezander Delu, Nextremi 37, Gal Qix'tar, were joined by Punches Pilot, aka "Co-Pilot" because Alezander feels a little insecure about being a mediocre pilot while he is "the Captain" of the ship. Co-Pilot is a replicant. Being an imposter for a human, he was discovered by the human colony he was the governor of, so he had to get out of town quickly. Now he is getting by as a pilot-for-hire aboard the Arcadia. Nextremi did some deep Character development and added a scarf to go with her hat from last season.
    The cast of Characters assembled, the Arcadia, was in the Earth System. Specifically where the Pluto-Charon settlements (collectively known as "Karen Complex") wasn't too far away. They were receiving a low-energy distress signal, from a ship supposedly in the Alpha Centauri system according to last data dumps. So the crew set about trying to triangulate the signal, where I got to shine as Gal Qix'tar of the Gykko Clan of the Devvah species. I tried to sell insurance to the Oort Corps' Pluto Emergency Response Patrol (P.E.R.P)...
    I can't go into too much detail here. The work is going to be published in the "playtested" version of Spacers: 180°. Let's just say topical jokes and ridiculous abbreviations as well as nuts and bolts science fiction flowed like milk and honey.

Woo. Nextremi has grown up.

Robin, Curtis, and I were needing some Red Bat this last weekend. I billed it as "Rev" as in revised Rat Bat rules, but it ended being the regular rules-- I mean I've got this whole D20 thing going on these days. I wasn't feeling too pulpy, more gritty urban fantasy, so to start things off I went with a scenario called "Low Bar: Six Zombies Walk Into a Bar" .

    Iron Curtis developed Cyd Cyne, a bartender at the establishment known as the Low Bar. Unbeknownst to the PC he has demon blood in his veins. This might explain his failed career as a city medic and proclivity towards violence. The Wednesday night gig, six muscle-bound dudes in leather claiming to be "Men at Work Down Under" were scheduled to do their dance act. They were intercepted by a Dr. Patrick Neal Benson (Neal Patrick Harris in appearance) and given a celebratory drink. As they walked into the bar, they, well, um... they turned into zombies. So six zombies, supposedly from Australia, walked into a bar. What they didn't count on was that the twenty-four patrons there were martial arts instructors, cops, body-builders, and other physical fitness enthusiasts. Five were quickly subdued. Cyd had to kill one, because it was attacking him and going for the cigar humidor-- Jeremy, the Low Bar's owner, would have a fit.
    The second act of the night, Liz Kroft, shows up as the police cars are everywhere. Peryton had showed up late and started developing her Character during the fight scene. While she is a successful Insurance Fraud investigator, like actually working for the company and not just contracted, her passion is singing. Her seeing Cyd and her neighbor Jessica T- consoling each other, she got the story. Taking a clue from the homeless guy that recognized Dr Benson from the plasma donation center down on Tulsa Boulevard. Jessica revealed that she was bitten by one of the zombies.
    In the ER, where Jessica was treated, Cyd just knew, that she wasn't going to get better. He and Liz only talked about it half the time that she was in the same room (Cyd is not that subtle). It is here that Jessica insisted they find the bastard behind her ailment and fix things. Some serious on-line research commenced. Liz pulled her Obscura Perk and got more than GobbleTubeFace blather. He wasn't living out in suburbs, he had a small mansion off a "city-rich" street, Golden Dawn Drive, just half a mile away from the Plasma Center.
    Going a bit Meta here. Figuring on Peryton and Iron Curtis's tendency to not indulge in my dramatic pacing, I had a whole "Watch-and-Wait" script worked out for the two players to observe.
    So while Jessica waited in the car, Liz and Cyd were debating climbing the iron-pole fence surrounding Dr. Benson's lot. Meanwhile three SUVs full of tactical-looking guys crashed the doctor's gate. One was left to watch the still running vehicles.
    Liz decided to sneak forward and get a license plate if possible (NO WAY! DID THAT JUST REALLY HAPPEN?). While she was scribbling down the plates, a hearse from like 1960 pulled into the driveway as well. The guard in the driveway started shouting about a "Zip" into his radio and started shooting with a silencer on his Ithaca, as an Eyeball-headed humanoid stepped out. It would wave its left hand and the man would clutch his chest and keel over. It would then proceed into the house.
    Flashes would indicate that gunshots were happening, all the weapons had silencers, and screams would happen. Two people would run out of the back of the house, observed by Cyd still in the bushes next to the iron fence. Neal Patrick Harris,... err Patrick Neal Benson would scream and the house would go dark. The two survivors would get into a black-clad SUV and peel out. A minute late, much more casually, the Eyeball would get back into its hearse and leave.
    Our "adventurers" would need my NPC to prompt them to search the house. Jessica reminded them that she did not want to be a zombie. They discovered in a house full of corpses, a secret closet with a red book, indeed the Liber Rubrim. They'd hear noises at the front door.
    Slipping out the back door, the PCs moved into the woods around the house.A dozen people in tactical gear would be all over the house. Bodies would be removed from the house and loud radio exclamations of "It's not here!" would mark the scene. An hour later all the SUVs and a fake ambulance would leave.
    Sneaking away, our PCs would end up back at Liz and Jessica's apartment building. Cyd would still be saying that things were not going to end well. Liz steadied things by mentioning that they should take a look at the phone book-sized journal in front of them. While she and Jess' would only see patterns on each page, sometimes a a hand-written note with an ink pen on the margins, they just couldn't make heads nor tails of it.
    Cyd though could.
    He brewed a weird concoction into a tea and had Jessica drink it. He sent Jessica to her bed and told "Everything is going to be good now." He was going to sleep on her couch. Liz would go to her apartment across the hall.
    In the morning, Cyd would knock on Jessica's door. Opening it slightly after a rustling sound, he'd face Jessica in full on ZOMBIE MODE...

A Few Times At the Table Since: the Halloween Special

 Well, I was going to summarize the Wobble mini-campaign, Wobble: Espionage on Prime Earth but Peryton has asked me to recap last Tuesday nights ICONS scenario. Iron Curtis and the gal decided between a choice of another Crawlspace session or a continuation of eight year-running superhero setting. We rekindled the four-color printer and got up to some play. Return To the Townhouse of Terrible it was.

A bit about the Terrible Townhouse in my supernatural super-heroics additions to the shared Beta City setting. It is sort of my answer to DC's House of Mystery. Instead of say time-travel and hell being the mainstay like for the TV show Legends of Tomorrow, ours is more based on Robin's first ICONS campaign about dimensional shifts and incursions from other realities. I, being a fan of the supernatural superheroes from DC, as well as Marvel and even Charleston, has worked plenty of of those elements though. So when last we met, Santo Luna, or Jay or Landshark's boyfriend err husband, as we tend to keep calling him, he was taking over stewardship of the place. It being not only a nexus to many locales in the multiverse, it is in the Archway Neighborhood of Beta City, where other nexuses are as well. He was taking over for Professor Hemm who had taken over for Doctor Philosophy before him.

Okay, Terrible Townhouse is modeled after a row house complex where Peryton lived for fifteen years in Cleveland, Ohio. I actually lived in three out of the four apartments available. So while the rooms and abodes change to the inhabitants, there are certain areas that never do though are warped due to the time and experiences shared by past residents. Many of the villains are former bad neighbors of our days in place. The locales around the residence are often running jokes made by the wife and me. On with the story...

Across the street is Ralph's Ant's House. Ralph is an NPC that is always obsessed with whatever Character Robin is playing, his aunt, whom he lives with, is The ANT a mystical termite gnawing at the Tree of Existences. In an earlier adventure, some supernatural heroes, including Santo Luna, defeated the minions of the Ant. Well new neighbors have moved in. From the chaotic dimension known as Fairy Tale. 

Jessica Jones, yes, from Marvel's Netflix saga, played by Robin, happened to be helping Jay move in. Bruce, or Landshark, was out of town visiting Jay's family. Professor Hemm was there to hand over the keys to place, then was zipped out of existence due to some trans-cosmic emergency. From next door a clan of goblins, the Garski Gobblers, have moved in. Being burglars and miscreants by nature, they of course started breaking into the Terrible Townhouse, mostly to steal its copper. Well, the man-witch now had to do something about that. For every time he and scrapper got the last couple out, others would appear elsewhere. So a mystical solve was required.

Poor Curtis, his up and coming superhero wizard was at loss. I absolutely refused to solve the problem for him, but I did overwhelm him with information about my mystical milieu of our ICONS setting. We brought in various NPCs, including Robin's Wisp character, to act as advisors. Landshark even came home to help Mz Jones whap the buggers. Still no solution. I created a Peck goblin, a variation on Pechs, named Jamboree to start acting as the Handyman around the place. He vaguely suggested "Sex Magic," I'm sure our passed on friend Charlie Wylie would've been all over that, but Iron Curtis was more embarrassed than anything. Finally a barrier portal for anything mystic was designed and constructed by Jay, Wisp, and the Peck. It would ward off anything not more powerful than the three of their Magic Skill levels combined. This thwarted the break-ins. Wisp returned to her Laboratory of Whimsy up by Greenbay, Wisconsin-- Robin did a great job with her cryptic dialog.

Oh there was some outrage in the Ant's House because no one pushed them around, or something. The Yagga, witchy den mothers to many a Gobbler goblin, what the Garskis are, clan did some conjuring to summon some trouble to help them out. The entity known as Ogre wandering around our world after being trapped here six years ago in another game session. While not particularly a villain, Ogre, looking like a very tall, buffed-up goblin, likes a good fight. With a little persuasion he'd join the ruffians in an assault on the Terrible Townhouse.
Out in the street, the Garskis and Ogre started throwing things at the magic-laden structure. Ogre was throwing chunks of street pavement no less. Mean Yagga was conjuring up a storm to assist them as well. Of course Jay, Landshark, and the visiting Jessica Jones would not let this go unanswered.
So it was working class fighting in the street with alcohol more than likely involved.Ogre and Landshark took one look at each and immediately got locked in a battle of strength, looking a lot a game of Mercy from High School.Santo Luna was really annoyed at this point. He showed the Yagga how to cast lightning without any theatrics, she was down for the count first round. Meanwhile Jessica would be trying to curtail the two, no, three, no, four Garskis popping in and up around them.
I was proud of the challenge my combat setup was for the Players. Landshark had bit off a bit more than he could. Jay had to deal with a goblin or two that were trying to get him. Jessica was frazzled by the goblin tactics but was steadily taking one of them per combat round. When all the Garskis were foiled, the two heroes piled onto Ogre to help out their buddy, in true Marvel superhero fashion.
Ogre tried to run but was stopped by Jessica leaping in front of him and punching him backwards. Jay would then sizzle the beast with another lightning strike. This left Ogre's alter-ego, Jeffry O'Garsky, a 17 y/o boy dazed, confused, and more than a little bruised.
Now the cops generally don't come to the Archway Neighborhood. More occult-dealing means govern the place. The Ant's House slipped away to the lot next the Gas Station at the corner, right next to Block House of Cacophony Every Weekend almost a mile away. Meanwhile Zodia Atrologa's (a new NPC) Duplex of Diabolical Dealings replaced it. The fortune-teller sorceress knew Jay's grandmother, indeed they studied together. She took the teenager O'Garsky into her care and promised to help return him where ever he'd like to go. Poor kid thought it was still 2017.

Meanwhile, I presented a cut away scene. Somewhere else in the depths of the Townhouse of Terrible. There the enigmatic Wandering Pimp, adorned in his golden suit and matching homburg hat, spoke to the shadows.
"They've been distracted long enough." He said. "You can come out now."
Stepping out was a rip-off of Darkseid, but red, Arkon.
He would look around him, wave his hands, and a massive collection of poles, looking like a Festivus Pole, but with branches.
"It is time for the X-MASS TREE to begin its work." He'd say in a gravelly voice.

(GM's note, Arkon was originally named Sidedark, but you know, that sucked.)