[DL] Tale Tellin

["Dom Gallegos" <stylenz@hotmail.com>]

This is the account of my posse's slip into Deadlands. (We had a blast last 
night and I'm going to share it with y'all. Unless of course you just his 
the delete key. Warning this is going to be a looooooong post.)

Background:
Jerome a New York Tin horn two gun kid. Alex a Georgia gambler/huckster. 
Crow an Apache Shaman. John a Montana ranch hand/tempest. Petra an English 
lawyer.
This will contain some sensitive information, so players be warned.

Basically there is a pox/rabies outbreak in town. The indians and whites are 
fighting. The posse is caught in the middle.

John was riding the trail alone and was attacked by Dread Wolves. He failed 
his roll so his tempest goes off with a blue chip effect. I also had a link 
happen between him and the wolves because of this effect. I know this 
wouldn't happen via the rules, but I like to mess with my characters. You'll 
see why at the end. He survives his encounter after spending most of his 
chips, losing his horse, a boot and his vest.
The characters are at town and have a few encounters with spirits, shooting 
regular wolves, and putting together a Rabies Healing Squad.

It's night now and a mother comes running up to them, her children have run 
off chasing a goat that got loose. Cue a vision for John, he's seeing 
through the wolves eyes as they hunt the children.
So the posse mount up and head out. After some horrible tracking roles and a 
backlash for Alex they get on the trail.

Which is of course what the wolves' master wanted. My plan is to split up 
the party and take them out alone. Cause well, the wolves couldn't stand up 
to the posse. While on the trail they find the kids split up. And the posse 
is so worried about these wolves that they actually decide to not split up 
and just save one kid! I coudln't believe it. John says, "These are not like 
ordinary wolves. Their big, n mean and will eat you. At least we can tell 
the mom we saved one."

So now I'm thinking, crap, how am I going to get them to split up. They hear 
some noise by the other kid who they gave up. Crow goes sneaking off by 
himself. "I'll do better if I'm alone. So I'll stay out in front." yeah 
right! what's the first rule about looking for things in the dark? But hey 
it worked! Also he does that leave no track ritual (can't remember the name 
right now). So the party has no clue he's run off. So he gets surrounded by 
wolves. Now a vision comes to John of Crow getting surrounded. He shouts a 
warning and rides off toward the noise of the attack.
Crow finally realizing that he's walked into a trap. Runs for the party 
screaming. 4 attack rolls later, he's down due to wind. Meanwhile the party 
is trying to work through the woods to get to him. Looks like I've solved my 
problem.
Jerome and John make it to Crow as the wolves run off into the shadows. 
Petra can't make a ridin' roll and gets left behind. Alex stays put to cast 
spells to 'buff' up. The posse is now spread apart about 50 yards in the 
dark woods.
The wolves make an appearance on Petra and Alex. They laugh and say, it's 
just wolves. Then....the wolves do their thing. Their skill is amazing and 
none of my players made their guts roll. And I could see the group look at 
each other and realize what's going on. The wolves jump Petra and Alex. 
Petra gets knocked off her horse. Alex spends some chips.
Now Alex has only one card after all the effects and negatives of the scart 
table. So he throws it down and says I head for town. I ask him, "So do you 
jump over Petra or go around her as you leave her behind in the pack of 
wolves?" "oh....you have the loyal hindrance? It's ok, you'll just have the 
value as a negative to everything until you get rid of your guilt." So after 
spending a ton of chips on both their parts he controls his horse, runs by 
her, scooping her up and heads towards the other posse members.
Meanwhile, John forces a vision to see through the wolves. And gets the one 
that's right behind him. He then makes an amazing spirit roll and spends a 
blue chip to activate his tempest/soul blast. Which drops the wolf. Jerome 
sees all this, which gets his attention to the wolves behind them. He runs 
over and cuts the second one in half with his shotgun. "Seem like normal 
wolves to me."
I'm thinking the playing field is even and it's going to be a good fight. 
The party is together, zero chips and Crow's down. So what do the heroes 
decide to do? Return to town and help the mother pray over her lost 
children. Every single one of them didn't think it was worth the risk to 
save two children. So they pack it in and return to town.
Fine...remember John and his visions? As they are riding off one hits him 
again. He sees two kids 9 & 11 with their backs to some rocks. Swinging 
branches and throwing rocks. Then a wolf catches the branch, pulling it 
free. A moment of tense silence as his vision lunges at the kids......well, 
you get the idea. I made sure to be very descriptive to John so he knows 
what the consequences were. The player covered his face and just yelled no. 
Then we left it as the group was taking the mother back in a wagon, all 
sitting around her reading from a bible.

It was a good night.

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