[3:16] Gelatinous Cubes on Cezanne

[Darren Hill]

PLANET 1: CÉZANNE
Arid world, Oozes, Highest NFA-1, no Special Ability
(I did give them the Enrage ability, but never used it.)
The bleak desolate planet was considered uninhabited, and was being used as a staging point for the fleet.
The squad was sent into the mountains to check up on a comm. Station that wasn’t responding.
Sergeant Slim Williams, armed with Heavy MG: 4/6
Corporal Psycho Hendricks, with E-Cannon: 7/3
Trooper Goreman, with Slug Rifle: 6/4

On arrival, and after shooting up the prefab mess hall, they found signs of violence, partially melted or dissolved weapons but no bodies.
Pools of caustic slime here and there which suddenly came to life, and our heroes survived their first encounter with slimy aliens with no damage.
Pscho got the first hit with his 2d10 E-Cannon, and killed a measly three aliens. Goreman got both the other two Threats, for 1 each.
Trooper Goreman got the reactor working again, and the Sarge retrieved the last logs, including a discovery of some organic substance at Broken Bluff. He failed to stop a security protocol erasing the rest of the log.
From his vantage point atop the control room, Psycho spotted what looked like slime trails corroded into the rock leading towards Broken Bluff. So after reporting in, off they went, leaving behind NPCs Potemnkin and Hood.
They found a perfectly circular tunnel which looked bored into the rock. They started to pick up lifesigns from some trooper implants, and so headed in. Goreman made a point of declaring he was watching the ceiling, and without telling the others, planted a few grenades here and there to be used during their inevitable escape-under-fire.
The tunnels began to branch in all directions and in all shapes and sizes, but they had the life signals to follow – and then they were attacked.
A 4 Threat encounter. Goreman won the dominance roll and set the range to Far (none of the other troopers could do damage at this range!). In the first turn, only Psycho beat the aliens and I pointed out the rule which allows him to cancel his action in order to cancel everyone else’s successes, including the aliens who were about to hurt his buddies. But he wanted to get to Near range so didn’t.
The next two rounds were a slaughter, with all the PCs at Crippled and all but Psycho having used their armour. At that point, Goreman used a Strength, describing he familiarity with tunnels, potholing, and the like, and led the team back to the grenades he’d planted earlier, setting them off to destroy collapse the tunnel and destroy the aliens.
(d10 Kills for the Grenade took him into the to 10: in the lead. Sarge still had no kills.)
Now the team regrouped, and the players (not characters) were a little shell-shocked at how brutal this encounter had been.
Back in character, Sarge wanted to abandon the mission. He called back to Potemkin and Hood, who were distraught to hear that two NPCs had been killed, “Which two?” they asked, and there was a cheer from one of them as he’d won the pool…
Psycho, Goreman, and Nelson, the surviving NPC didn’t want to go back – there were marines in there to be rescued, dammit.
So they dug their way back in, only to encounter a small group of aliens coming from the other side: 2 Threat tokens. Goreman and Psycho made short work of them (10 kills for Psycho taking him to 14, and a few for Goreman taking him to 13. Again, none for the Sarge.)
After that encounter they were pleased to learn they continued to heal, even though no-one had been injured in that fight –they were all now hale and hearty, pumped up with a little easy bloodletting, and eager to get their buddies back.
They then broken into the alien hive – a collection of gelatinous cocoons, with 4 surviving troopers still in their armour, slowly being dissolved. They were tunnels leading in all directions, and through vertical ones sky could be seen above.
Goreman hung back guarding the entrance and the others went in to break out the prisoners, when the remaining alien strength came to defend their home: the players looked very worried when they saw 6 threat tokens.
This was a short fight, lasting two rounds. The aliens set the range at Close. Psycho was at bad range for his E-Cannon, and considered using grenades – but chose not to risk his squad and instead started digging marines out of the cocoon (and actually succeeded an NFA roll!)
Goreman shot one alien and widened the range, then got another hit: 1d6 kills, rolling 1. But now he was in the lead, with 15 kills to Psycho’s 14.
In the first turn, Sarge tried to increase the range to use his MG and failed. In the second round, “Fuck this!” and called in an E-Vac.
So the roof exploded, drop ships burst through blasting the aliens to kingdom come, doing a little collateral damage (falling rocks, nearby explosions, etc.) and our heroes were picked up along with the cocooned marines. A mission success!
Nelson had been killed in a rockfall.
Goreman and Psycho loudly complained at the lost opportunities for Kills (4 Threat tokens remaining!), despite the fact that they were both at Crippled and only one had armour left (admittedly the E-Vac had done some of that damage).
End of Mission Kills: Goreman 15, Psycho 14, Sarge 0.
I must admit, I expected the E-cannon user to leap ahead in kills, so it was fun to see just how close Psycho and Goreman had been throughout the mission.
Having used his strength, Goreman succeeded his promotion roll and is now a Corporal.
Psycho requisitioned himself a Power Claw for the next mission…
Total time to play: about 1.5 hours.

I had to take a toilet break at that point, but could hear the players talking animatedly, eagerly tlking about what weapons they'd get next time or how they'd improve their characters. Mention was made of just how important both stats (FA and NFA) are and they were of a consensus that neither can be safely ignored.

[Darren Hill]

PLANET 2: REMBRANDT
A Forest moon, inhabited by furry savages.
AA: 2 + halve the Highest NFA and Lowest = 7.
Special Ability: Swarm.
The company is tasked with establishing a beachhead, and holding it till evening when reinforcements will land and secure the area.
Encounter One: 3 Threat Tokens. So our heroes find themselves attacking small furry creatures, armed with sticks, bows, blowpipes, and blow them all to hell. It’s a short encounter, punctuated by cries of “Ewoks! We get to kill Ewoks! Yeehaa!”
In the aftermath, lots of marines posing near bodies of their kills for photographs, holding up dead ‘teddy bears’ as trophies, and other wholesome activities.
Then they secure their area of the perimeter and discover a group of alien scouts nearby, who tried to lure them into an ambush (complete with forest traps, catapults, etc.) but were slaughtered by the marines. One of the players did ask, “Is our armour white?” prompting a brief discussion about Imperial Stormtroopers.
The day is won, and our heroes get an hours kip. Then they are sent out into the woods to destroy an army of savages gathering to prepare a counter-attack.
The initial attack was fairly inconclusive – neither side did any damage, and the ewoks swarmed so they were now all at Close range. Much description of ewoks swinging in on ropes, coming up out of holes in the ground, unleashing tree trucks on ropes as weapons, the whole Forest Moon of Endor bit.
One of the players had the bright idea of using grenades – and the others, seeing they weren’t hurt, thought that was a good idea, so _everyone_ used grenades!
Worst case: everyone takes 3 Kills, and – after using armour – is one wound away from death!
They rolled, and only Goreman failed, He used Combat Drugs to turn that to a success, and alien scum died in blast after blast.
The last threat token was quickly dispatched, and in the aftermath, I described several alien mothers clutching babies, and cowering, pleading for their lives.
The player of Goreman, who always plays the most compassionate moralistic characters in other games, said, “Dude, they are Ewoks.” Blam!
A final counter-attack by the last surviving aliens was seen off with ease, and the planet was cleansed.
End of Mission Kills: Psycho 24, Goreman 23, Sarge 14.
Time to Play: just over 1 hour.
I hadn’t been rushing the game, exactly, but I’d been framing scenes fast – it’ll be interesting to see if a mission can last us a full session when played in a more laid back style.
Really, I expected the Ewoks with their AA 7 and Swarm ability to put up a better fight, but the dice weren’t with me during this mission.
Conversely, I’d expected the first mission to be a nice easy into, and almost wiped the team out in the second encounter. Ah fun.
I had to call it a day at that point, ignoring the players eager cries for another mission. So the game was definitely a success.