Round 2 of Strange Octobers!

Round 2 of the Strange Aeons October Campaign and boy was there some pain this time! Ryan and I managed to squeeze in 4 games of Strange Aeons, what was nice was that we were able to show two other interested players about the game and should have some prospective recruits to expanding the cult…er gaming circle soon!

On with the show! I had revamped my team this time after the loss of my two pistol agent from last Sunday. At first I was going to give another Dex boost back to the Tommy gunner before I realized it was a waste of points and better spent on adding something to the character to better lead a larger team.

After some revision here was my team, yea 26 points and well, one game went well and the other not so well…

The Team

Character: Sword, Hollow Points with Improved Command

Agent (injured prior with +1 Dex that canceled his -1 Dex and had Agoraphobia) sold off his Tommy gun and coat for a change of clothing and hollow points to go with his .45.

Agent with Lt. Skill with a double barreled shotgun.

Agent with Dex -1 to be able to hit again on a 4+ with a Tommy gun

Agent with Dynamite and Heroic, so he could move, light and throw.

Civilian with .22 pistol base.

Game 1: Quest (me) (used a map piece)

Ryan’s choice to keep him from using the massive team size in points to beat me under the table this time. So, I picked the Hostage game. Let me be the first to say, this mission SUCKS! Turn 3, the lurker just has to wait and kill all the hostages. If you are playing on a 2x3 that means you have 36” to cross, movement 5 on average twice is 10, so by turn 3 you could  be there, maybe…if scenery and you don’t spend time killing annoying cultists in the way!

Ryan picked out a flock of cultists for this one including a pair of cult leaders and some standard cultists with a suicide bomber. He had a mix of pistols, shotguns, cleavers and a Tommy gun in the gang. Game started off well with me running for the edge. Then I was able to kill off some cultists he threw at me with the new Tommy gun agent killing two cultists. Then the demolitions expert charged forward and did a bad throw, lucky roll pulled the dynamite back just enough to not hit anyone but I had hoped to kill the suicide cultist, a few pistols shots and things looked bad as he ran up to my men and went BOOM! Taking out the demolitions expert the next turn, everyone kept their cool and we kept pushing forward only to hear the sound of a Tommy gun, a shotgun and a clever chewing the hostages to pulp. *sigh* I managed to beat the remaining cultists and the last cultist fled off the table.

So, it was a hollow win for me as all the hostages was dead and my demolitions expert ended up with a -1 CON now!  No map rolls as I did not win the game either!

Deployment

Cultist sulk far in the corner!

Threshold Advances!

Into the graveyard!

It's too late but we will make them pay!

Game 2 Bag Man (Ryan)

Ryan pulled out his new team, adding two new Civies to the team and the Priest was slipped up to Agent status, he kept his points a bit lower to avoid giving me a huge sum of points to build a nasty lurker team.

Ryan's team with Unlce Adolf leading!

After joking around, I picked a Cult Priest and Serpent Man to try out some magic in the game. Oh was this a bad idea? YES! I rolled my spells getting a 2-4-6 for my Evil Spells for the Priest and a 6 for the Serpent, yay, all short range and temporal movement….well I got the control and the death touch…if I could get close enough.

Well, the first few turns were a dash down the edge as I cut over towards where he was. My Serpent Man took a wound and then ran forward ready to charge. Well, Ryan shot with the priest with his shotgun as he is always Alert (good move) but failed to hit. Then Serpent man at that point picked his target! Charge! The Priest failed his Resolve check on a 3+ and balled up soiling himself as the Serpent man took him out of the game.

Then things we wrong, very wrong. The Serpent Man was turned to paste by the Tommy gun and the Priest took a wound, he advanced forward, so far I was only able to use the two temporal spells to get to where I needed to be the last two turns. Then I hoped to get in range to charge with the hand of death and instead went with the compel spell as I was too short to get there. I went after the Tommy gun guy hoping that would be a good bet but rolled that lovely 1 and ran away in fear! Oh boy, then I was shot down.

The table..

Lurkers rush forward to the fields...

See where that Serpent Man is? That was where the Priest was!

End game. Ryan lost the Priest (Agent) that had the holy book and shotgun and did get one map piece.

Game 3: Bag Man (me)

Well, the tables turned and it was my turn to run the gauntlet. Ryan picked a priest, a cult leader and some cultists with assorted weapons. He also rolls 2-4-6 for his Evil spells! Well, I rushed forward thinking we would be in a firefight by turn 2 more than likely. I had to be watchful of the spells….a good roll and a twist could be bad for me.

The board....

The Cultists charge into the fields..

Threshold advances, bag man in the back....

Ryan advanced forward and my demolition guy ran forward tossed a stick of dynamite again and missed, it scatters back enough to take out both him and 3 cultists! The rest of the team rushes forward and I managed to pin down the cult leader and the Priest was dancing with my character in a blade fight. He managed to back away and cast compel on my Tommy gun, guess what? He didn’t roll a 1 like me! Well, luck had it nothing happened, either he failed to miss or wound. I was able to take both the leader and priest out the next turn for the win. I laughed when I told Ryan the guy he compelled was the one with the bag!

I got one map piece but the Demolitions expert just could not take any further abuse and died. Poor Joe Blow, he was a good man and died so his friends could live! We will never forget your sacrifice Joe!

Game 4 Treasure Hunt (Ryan)

Well, Ryan fixed up his team slightly and offered me 19 points to work with on the latest mission for him. He added “Pappy” an old timer with a rifle to the group…

So, I pulled out a Mummy, Poltergeist and a Giant Vermin again I could have made better picks but it is what it is.

The game went with him running all over trying to search the board for the remains to remove the Poltergeist quickly from the game. Ryan hates Poltergeists with a passion and was determined to get rid of her quickly.

Well, the game opened up well for me at first, I managed to disrupt his chain by taking out the agent with the Tommy gun and removed his Lt. Option from that side of the table. By turn 3 he was ready to search for treasure but the Undead was still a major threat. The Poltergeist fizzed out twice rolling a 1 for number of shots twice in a row until he figured out the last sector was the one with the remains and managed to remove her from the game. The Mummy then started to shamble off and beat down his agents and civilians without anyone to command. Towards the end of the game Ryan only had Pappy and the Character left standing. The Giant Vermin died quickly to a charge and was very disappointing early on and once the Poltergeist the Mummy was the star and was he hard to take down!

Finally Ryan found the treasure about mid table and started to drag it back to his table edge until the Mummy caught up and was knocked down then beaten by combat in hand to hand and finally removed from play.

Threshold deploys...

Searching the ruins for the Poltergiests bones.

Mummy and Giant Vermin advance.

Poltergiest takes the lead.

Uncle Adolph hides in the corner.

Uncle Adolph drags the treasure away...

Oh crap, that damm Mummy again!

So, we closed out the night with the following stats:

Rya: 2 wins, 1 Civilian, 1 Agent Dead, 1 Map Piece and Scroll.
Patrick: 1 Win, 1 Loss (technical), 1 Agent Dead, 1 Map Piece.

The Dead: Ryan's Civie, My Agent with Dynamite and his Agent with Shotgun/Holy Book

Campaign Total:

Ryan: 4 Wins, 2 Civilians Dead, 1 Agent Dead, 1 Map Piece and 1 Scroll

Patrick: 2 Wins, 2 Losses (1 technical), 2 Agents Dead, 2 Map Pieces.

More photo's later from Ryan's phone once I can sort them.