Jack Skwatt - Space smuggler and owner of FSS Phoenix
Trouble - Deep in debt to ruthless mega-corp
Well connected in black market
Shoot first ask questions later
Soft spot for street urchins
Good: Quick
Fair: Forceful Sneaky
Carl - the clockwork clown
Trouble - I’ll do anything for attention (“Look ma no hands”)
Jury-rigged with interchangeable parts
Searching for my creator
Space squid think I am funny
Good: Flashy
Fair: Clever Quick
Midday in a small mining community. The town itself is mostly deserted. The party have earlier parked their flying steamship at the nearest space port and appropriated a hand cart to take yourself to “Flatulence Falls” a small mining outpost only accessible by the rails.
Overall - Flatulence Falls - Known for crystallized natural gas which occasionally showers it from the nearby gas giant
Skeevy dive bar (on dusty main street)
small crowd of hardened “regulars”
No sign of contact
Dusty Main street in a small town
Tumbleweed
Abandoned railway station (on dusty main street)
“Found” handcart - party’s conveyance
The party walk into the bar where Jack tries to contact his contact by putting on a red scarf which was the pre-arranged signal to identify the contact. (Sneakily create advantage and rolled -3 for a -1. Jack chooses to succeed with cost.) As the group enter the bar a man with a red handkerchief a this collar is being hauled out to the police station next door by the town sheriff. I declare that the contact is visibly intoxicated and apply the Drunk aspect to be overcome before they can get anything useful out of their contact.
(New area created off main strip with a new NPC)
Town lockup and storage depot (on dusty main street)
Storage Lockers
Explosives
Doubles as county drunk tank
NPCs
Sheriff (Honest)
Possible Contact (Drunk, Red handkerchief)
Carl the clown points out I neglected to describe the Sheriff NPC and states that he thinks the sheriff looked like a Space Squid. (rolls -2 on his Quick glance to create advantage and fails badly) I decide the sheriff is not a space squid but he has a Pet (Juvenile space squid, amorous) that lurks outside the station that will now cause grief for Carl. The sheriff tosses the drunk in the holding cell applying a difficult “Locked up” aspect to the contact. Meanwhile the newly created space squid catches sight of Carl the clown’s reflective metal exterior and falls madly in love. The squid slithers into the bar, Again sees its reflection in Carl’s chrome chassis and attempts to get friendly with its reflection. (It tags amorous, and ‘space squid find me funny’ on Carl and rolls well to get a 8 on its attack! Carl nets a 1 on his creative defense and take a 3 stress and a Slimed moderate consequence)
Jack rushes over to the lockup and quickly creates the troublemaker aspect on the space squid pounding on the entry and calling “Sherrif, sherriff your pet is in the bar making trouble again!” He succeeds with style cashing one of the free invokes to get the sheriff to rush out of the lockup to deal with the squid. Meanwhile Carl’s player states that the Sheriff departed in such haste he was “Forgetful” and creates the aspect with style on the sheriff. The sheriff uses his next action to overcome troublemaker and corrals his pet.
Jack slips into the lockup while the sheriff is distracted with his amorous cephalopod. Carl calls out to the Sheriff tagging his “space squid like me” aspect talking about pets and hamming up his Slimed consequence to force the Sheriff to take pity on him. He flashily shames the the sheriff by being so understanding despite his dripping ooze that the sheriff feels obligated to sit down and talk with the clockwork man his pet attacked and offer him a drink or at least tin of a degreaser to take off the squid slime.
While the sheriff and his pet are tied up Jack attempts to wake the contact (overcomes drunken aspect) to find out that the contact was playing drunk to get into the lockup where he could lift the goods from an evidence locker. The contact points out a Well secured storage locker that should contain a crate of rare pink gas crystals that are the goods. Leaving the contact in the tank "so he has an alibi", Jack uses one invoke on forgetful to create the advantage Sheriff's forgotten keyring inside the lockup.. Carl also states that because the sheriff left in such haste and was forgetful he didn’t set any alarms back at the station. Creating the “Alarm system disabled” aspect to make it safe for Jack to investigate the storage locker and get the goods. The duo then manage to get the goods and end the scene.
Party is on a handcart with the goods getting late in the afternoon. It is the hottest point of the day. The group states that they acquired some coal in the town before they left to explain their trip to the mining town from the spaceport. The box with the crystals is carefully hidden at the bottom of the pile of coal on the handcart as the party is cranking back to the spaceport. The party has just come to the middle of a long railway bridge over a deep chasm when a train rounds a bend. Train is forceful 4. Party need to make opposed forceful rolls to get off bridge in time. I start play it in order of quickness with each round ending with a forceful contest to see if they can get off bridge in time. First side to 3 successes wins. Party is now cursing having clearly specified how well they buried their treasure while I laugh at their predicament.
First round: Party specify the train was coming from behind. They also specify that there are maintenance tracks up ahead right after the bridge as they see there is no way to get the goods off in time and win the challenge. On my turn I say that they are trying to crank so powerfully that sparks are flying from the crank mechanism successfully creating the advantage “Sparks flying”. They spend their invokes to squeak by on the first round while I save mine.
Second round Jack states that the tracks are so straight you can see for miles to create the advantage “Far behind” on the train. Carl uses his “I’m larger on the inside” stunt to open his frame up and lie over the coal overcoming the risk from the sparks (Stunt gives him +2 to cleverly overcome obstacles using his rearrangeable parts). The second round ends in a squeaker but the group uses its free invokes on the train to win.
Third round Carl declares that by flattening his leather and wood frame over the coal he has made the handcart aerodynamic. Jack states that there is a manual switch to the track and it is currently set to the maintenance tracks. I smile knowingly concede that they can get to the tracks and flip the switch in time and set up for the next scene. I ask in passing “So why do you think the tracks are set to maintenance track when a train is scheduled to arrive around now?” They look at each other and palm there faces stating “train robbers” and the scene is set.
On maintenance tracks with on coming train right behind them. It is still sweltering hot and miles from the spaceport. The party ask about how the robbers were equipped and I tag Jacks trouble aspect of “In debt to ruthless multi-corp” trouble to state that the robbers are 2 off duty ruthless corp employees freelancing in hostile takeover of a rival train line. He asks how he could tell and I state that they are Quite dumb and forgot to change out of their Ruthless Inc overalls though they did remember to put bandannas over their faces. The party asks how the ruthless corp employees got here (looking for transport as to avoid another run in with a train) Looking at the aspects I laugh, point at quite dumb and state that they walked - During high heat - through the desert. We all agree that after that the employees must be exhaustedand likely drank all their water but say that since they are from Ruthless multi-corp Jack can not physically harm them without serious repercussions if he is found out.
Zone: Maintenance track, Near tracks, Main track
Oncoming Train (massive, powerful+4)
Track switch (Disused but with a large spanner nearby for manually changing the tracks)
Party’s Handcart (goods are hidden here, Covered with Coal, Buried treasures that go boom)
2 would-be train robbers
Ruthless inc overalls,
Not so bright,
Exhausted,
Heavily Armed
As the handcart coasts onto the maintenance tracks Jack and Carl spring into action. Jack quickly uses the spanner to change the train switch to the regular line so the 509 train won’t crash into the handcart. Meanwhile Carl spends lavishly stating that the Exhausted robbers were drowsing as they were waiting for the 509 because they were Not so bright. He succeeds well enough on his attack to give them the consequence Dozing which will last until the train roars by in one round. Carl once again uses his “I’m bigger on the inside” stunt to overcome the armed aspect hiding the guns inside himself. Jack does his best to stay in the background and not be noticed since he owes Ruthless megacorp a mint. And when the goons wake Carl cashes all the party’s advantages flashily crying, “Oh my god are you alright? We saw those bandits going through your pockets as we came up but they ran off before we could stop them.” Carl gets a huge total and the goons eat the story up. He has convinced them that they were left for dead in the sun, picked over by bandits and only rescued in the nick of time by Carl and his quiet companion. The goons swear they will pay back the party for rescuing them, and help the group crank the handcart back onto the main tracks and back to the spaceport.
This is where we end the session. I declare it a milestone and Carl cashes in his “Space eels find me funny” aspect for “Those goons from Ruthless Megacorp owe me big”.