[HoE] Something About A Sword... (Spoilers)

[OUR0B0ROS@aol.com]

  Baron 11 mentioned...

<< Something... was just not a very good adventure.  It seemed an excuse to 
 drop the sword into the world. but this has already been addressed, and I 
 am tired. >>

  I'm running "Something About A Sword" right now, and you're right.  It's 
not a very good adventure.  I was dropped into GMing the adventure in the 
middle of it when the former GM gave up in disgust and left it in my hands.

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  Something both he and I agree is that the sword is very powerful, and it 
just too simple for the Templar to get it, since at pretty much every point 
in the adventure he has people telling him about Elliot's magic sword, 
everyone knows he's a Templar (even though Templars usually do things in 
secret), and he gets reminders at every turn to "make sure you find that 
magic sword and don't let it fall into the wrong hands!"
  Our GM kept the quest that the Templar (called Violence Jack) was going on 
a secret, and was ordered by Simon to not tell any of the others in his posse 
about the magic sword.  Also, very few people along the way knew that Elliot 
was a Templar, they just knew that he was a decent fella who helped them when 
he could.

  The thing that disgusted our GM so much was...

  Well, when the group got to Last Chance, two of the posse members (the 
Junker and the Templar) accepted Blossom & Myra's offer, and thus the hole in 
the fence was never quite fixed.
  When the attack occurred, the Grundy swordmistress and the Syker went out 
on foot, her to attack those mean Mutant overseers that she remembers from 
her childhood a year ago in Lost Vegas and hates with a passion, and the 
Syker/Road Warrior out to move his truck out of the way of danger.
  The Doomsayer and the Templar got out onto the roof to take sniper 
positions with their NA M-42's.
  It was at this point, while the inhabitants of Last Chance were getting 
their guns ready, and getting the noncombatants down into the storm cellar, 
that the mutants came rushing in, the overseers throwing their doomstones 
here and there, doing major property damage.
  Violence Jack & Jeb the Doomsayer were taking their shots, Bear the Road 
Warrior/Syker was trying to kill all the mutants he could that were between 
him and his truck, while Katie the Grundy did all she can to leave the 
mutants between her and the overseers unharmed.  She easily killed every 
overseer she encountered, then had to kill some of the mutants that tried to 
overwhelm her.
  Meanwhile, Malias, accompanied by another Doomsayer, continues his attack 
by tossing a nuke at the main building.  In fact, he throws it at Violence 
Jack, the first sniper he saw get on the roof.  
  Bill, the guy playing Violence Jack, asks the GM, "Is it coming right at 
me?  Does it look like it was aimed at me?"

  "Yes, and yes."

  "Okay, I'll try to deflect it."

  At this point, hilarity ensues as everyone starts hauling out their copies 
of Last Crusaders to figure out what he's talking about.  And the GM is 
looking pissed, then as he looks up Deflection, he looks nervous, then REALLY 
pissed...
  Turns out that Bill purchased one level of Deflection a little earlier, and 
he ends up doing it, taking the nuke on the bulletproof car door he uses as a 
shield and batting it back at Malias the Doombinger, who most likely answers 
the nearby doomsayer's inevitable "What do we do now, Lord?  

  With a, "Now?  We die."

  And all of the players are laughing and slapping themselves on the back, 
high-fiving Bill and each other until we see a burning truck leaving the area 
of devastation and heading away over the hills, a driver in burnt green robes 
at the wheel.  

  And the party dives into their truck dragging Katie along with them (even 
though she thinks they should make sure "all the kids are okay."  They take 
off after the truck, even though they see a huge fireball erupt behind them 
as the gas station explodes.
  Katie is shouting "We should go back!  Julius?  Make them go back!"  As the 
posse chases after the Doombringer for over a day, and never catches up to 
him...

  End of session.
  GM quits, and I take over.

  Talking to him, I find out that Katie was right to want to go back.
  1.  The chase was futile.  Malias was killed by his own nuke.
  2.  The person we saw fleeing was the doomsayer, injured by the explosion.
  3.  The gap in the fence was large enough to let in another pack of mutants 
who held their attack until they saw the posse driving away.
  4.  We just gave them the win by taking off before the area was secured.

  Personally, I don't have a problem taking over.  The GM was so thrown by 
Malias being killed that he didn't really know what to do with the rest of 
the adventure.  I decide that the doomsayer that got away was Brian Kirkland, 
one of Silas' Adepts.   He's put lots of research into different spells - I'm 
gonna have some fun with those - but he ranked lower than Malias, his former 
student.
  So they're now facing a guy who isn't quite as tough, but who is much more 
crafty.
  I decide that due to the fact that they just left this town to die, I am 
going to do several things...
  - When they get back to Last Chance, they will discover that no one is left 
alive.  It is a ghost town, because THEY FUCKED UP.  I will make them realize 
that, so they won't ever be so selfish again.  Later, while scrounging in the 
storm cellar, they discover that one of the mothers set off a grenade down 
there with all of the women and children so that the mutants couldn't get 
ahold of them.
  - Kirkland is going to head straight for Rock Springs, go into that 
Apfeltech plant, and make his bargain with the Manitous, and begin setting up 
his defenses.  I am not going to be easy on the party and have Kirkland make 
his bargain with the Manitous conveniently at the moment that the posse walks 
in the door.  If they don't hurry their asses up, the deal will be done, 
Kirkland will be setting his defenses, and more and more Muties will be 
arriving day by day, coming to serve their new warlord.

  -  Oh, and the big one, Elliot Ritter came back Harrowed.

   Screw Violence Jack and screw Simon.  
  I'm not going to just GIVE that sword to him.  It's just too powerful to be 
handed over like that.  Jack is gonna have to really EARN it.  Elliot, well 
actually, a greater manitou comes back, instantly takes over Elliot's body 
for the long run, looks at his key around his neck that would have opened the 
box that holds Evanor, sees that it melted down when his heart stopped, and 
shrieks, "GodDAMMIT!"
  Snce then, he's been haunting the ruins of Rock Springs, trying to quietly 
destroy enough combots to tear out enough meat to heal himself (before the 
ever-so-handy groups of muties started showing up), developing his Harrowed 
powers, and I figured, as a greater manitou, a servant of the Reckoners, 
wouldn't he be able to instantly become an Anti-Templar?

  Sure he can!  And does.

  When they finally get into Rock Springs and they use the key to track down 
the box, The manitou will be watching, realize what the key is, high-tail it 
back to his water tower (which I've changed a bit - it'll be one of those 
those types that have one large thick leg that the whole thing stands on, 
which will have a climb down to a skittery walkway hanging beneath the water 
tower (over a bunch of tangled metal covering a fairly deep hole - climb down 
onto the skittery walkway, clutch Evanor's box to his chest in his left arm, 
and wait for the party...
  If everything goes right, they'll get to the tower, they'll search it, the 
key will ping long enough to realize that one of them will have to go down 
below, of course the Templar will volunteer, since it's his mission, he'll 
have to be lowered down to where the body is, he'll encounter the corpse 
(I've decided that Elliot came back with the level 5 dessicated, so he REALLY 
looks dead) down there in the dark, clinging to the rickety walkway that only 
one posse member can stand on at a time, and after he says his prayers to the 
Saints for his departed brother Templar, he'll have to break Elliot's left 
arm to get the box.  After he uses the key to open the box, he'll hear a 
raspy, "Thanks..." as he sees Elliot grinning up at him pointing a finger at 
him...
  Fear roll versus a fear level 5 for the town, and isn't level 5 Dessicated 
a Terror level 9?  Hee hee...
  Elliot pointing at him "pulls the trigger" of his finger, enacting ... oh, 
what's the name of that power where the victim can't use chips to remove 
wound levels, and the Harrowed can't, either?  Elliot will pop on that power 
and grab for the sword, while the catwalk collapses under their movement, and 
both of them plummet into the wreckage below...
  What I hope to do in the following fight is for Elliot to lop off Jack's 
weapon arm and putting a "killing" blow into his chest before announcing, 
"Ain't too useful a Templar anymore, are ya?" and slipping away down a 
drainpipe, chewing away on Jack's arm, Evanor in hand...

  I like my option better because Jack will have to start using his sword in 
his left (off-hand), he'll probably end up getting a bionic replacement in 
Junkyard (I just like the idea of him havng this clunky bionic arm with 
visible pistons and a giant hand), and he'll hear about (or see first hand), 
the wreckage left at Burke's former home as Elliot pays him a visit, and the 
ruins of Jarret, Wyoming, as Elliot goes home...

  I proved to them in the last fight I ran that they have to be afraid of me 
GMing their game, because the fight they had with some mutie bikers left them 
almost entirely chipless, and unlike other GM's in our group, when someone 
gets stunned or goes unconscious, the bad guys continue to put a few shots 
into them just to "make sure."  In the end, just to prevent the posse from 
being obliterated by the muties, the doombringer tossed a nuke into close 
quarters, destroying several of the groups' motorcycles, killing one of the 
members of the posse, and very nearly killing two other members of the 
group...

  Desperate times call for desperate measures.
  

  Jack will eventually end up with Evanor, I figure, but there is absolutely 
no way that I plan on letting him get it without a fight.  I don't plan on 
screwing the group, I just want them to appreciate the things they get 
because they DAMNED well won't get them easily...


  Whattaya think, Sirs?

  And does anyone have any other ideas for me?


  - The Worm Ouroboros