Christopher

Drhoz's Shadowrun stories have reminded me of an old Shadowrun campaign.
 
The runners are an ork/troll group. Completely against stereotype, they specialize in stealth, subtlety, bluff, illusion, deception and misdirection.
 
Dent: ork, rat shaman
No-Step: ork, snake shaman, healer
Byte Force: ork, decker, chemist
Eye Spy: ork, rigger, drones, paramedic
Audacity Jane: ork, combat, stealth, security systems
Happy Jack: troll, combat, disguise, negotiator
 
The runners all live in the Ork Underground.
 
GM: You could live in different neighborhoods.
Happy Jack: We live in a neighborhood where 80% of our enemies stick out like a sore thumb, and we look like everybody else.
 
I have no idea how many of the GM's adventure ideas we screwed up by living in that neighborhood.
 
But in this episode, the GM decided to run with the Ork Underground idea. Alamos 20,000 somehow managed to steal some cyberhounds and reprogram them. True to form, they released them at an entrance to the Ork Underground and sent them in to slaughter anyone they found. Coincidentally, the cyberhounds entered the Ork Underground near the PCs location. The dogs didn't last long.
 
Dent: "Hey, real meat is on the menu tonight!"
 
Audacity Jane: (to Happy Jack) "Why did you insist on subduing the last one?"
Happy Jack: "So Byte Force can reprogram it and have a guard dog."
Byte Force: "I can't afford to feed a dog. They eat meat."
Happy Jack: "Meat? What are you talking about? Dogs eat kibble, just like people do."
 
After stripping the cyberware out of the dead cyberhounds...
 
Happy Jack: "Let's make friends with our neighbors. I'm going to pay one of the restaurants to chop it up and cook it for us. Then we can we have a neighborhood party."
 
The neighbors turn out in droves for free meat. Enterprising restaurants and store owners start selling nutrisoy side orders to go along with meat. It turns into an impromptu street festival.
 
..And then the corporate security team walks into the Underground and up to the festival...
 
Security Captain: "We've tracked our stolen property to this area. We want it returned."
Byte Force: "Have some barbecue."
Security Captain: "We're not interested in food. We're interested in our missing property."
Byte Force: "Then have some barbecue."
Happy Jack: (interrupting) "Captain, would your property happen to be four dogs?"
Security Captain: "You have seen our property."
Happy Jack: "So your property ran in and killed three of our neighbors?"
Large crowd of orks and trolls: "..."
Security Captain: "Um..." (pause) "Our property was stolen. We had no control over that. What happened to the dogs after that?"
Happy Jack: (grins) "They ran into me."
 
While the Security Captain was distracted, No-Step walked up behind him and yanked some hair out of his head.
 
Security Captain: "Hey!" (aiming weapons at No-Step)
Audacity Jane: "Captain, if any of you touch that skinny shaman, every man, woman and child here will kill you."
(long pause, as everyone freezes)
Audacity Jane: "Of course ... if you attack the troll, we're just going to sit back and laugh."
Security Guard #1: (to Happy Jack) "The orks don't seem to like you much, troll."
Eye Spy: "We like the troll just fine. We won't miss you lot, though."
Security Guard #2: "He's not even armed, and we have..."
...SHHKKKKKKKKKKT...
(Happy Jack had pulled a blade out of his jacket and yanked open the telescoping handle, turning it into a polearm.)
Audacity Jane: "You have SMGs. He's bulletproof. His polearm has Dikote, so it's going to cut through your armor like butter."
Security Captain: (trying to regain control of the situation) "We're not here for a fight. We're just here to retrieve our property."
Happy Jack: "Have some barbecue. Take it back to your corporation. Run some DNA tests on it. That's as much of your property as you can salvage."
(pause as the security team realizes what happened to the cyberhounds)
Security Captain: "What about the cyberware? You didn't eat that. We'd like it back."
Happy Jack: "Go talk to your corporate medics and wage mages. If they can find a way to bring our neighbors back from the dead, we'll see about getting your cyberware back."
Security Captain: "The people who stole the dogs are responsible for the deaths."
Happy Jack: "If we learn anything about the thieves, we'll be happy to pass the information on to you. But your negligence contributed to the situation."
(the security team turns to leave)
Happy Jack: "Captain, your corporation managed to generate a fair amount of ill-will through today's events. Let your bosses know that we would consider it a gesture of goodwill if they set aside an appropriate amount of money for the bereaved families."
Security Captain: "I'll mention it, but I can't guarantee anything."
No-Step: (holding up the strands of the captain's hair) "Persuade them, Captain."
 
After the security team leaves...
 
Dent: "How did they track the dogs to this spot? Tracer chips in the dogs' cyberware?"
Happy Jack: "And that's why we always throw stuff into farraday cages."

A certain amount of ranting about computer games

Cassius' player: I already have multiplayer gameplay - it's called 'have some friends over and play a game!'

Aladar: 'When we last left our villains...'

Aboard the drifting Ardent Crown, menaced by Tyranids, lurking Eldar, and a greater daemon. Unfortunately for Jrska, it's not a daemon that can be fast-talked - it's the entity known as The Hunter.

GM: It's a very old Daemon.
Cog: Crotchety.
Jrska: 'Get off my lawn!'

Aladar: He materialised in mid-air. So he's only got one direction.

Cassius: One Direction? I always knew they were a product of the Warp.

It's also armed with a demonic flintlock, which it starts using on our minions.

Jrska: There's an old joke retold on any planet with dangerous wildlife. 'I don't need to outrun the lion'

Cassius, meanwhile, is a knot of pure willpower holding itself together in the hellish Warpspace dimension, rebuilding itself one concept at a time. One of those concepts is a less than reassuring.

Jrska: 'I'm in the Warp... and I'm not dead'

He opts to broadcast this - after all, why not share the pain if you can?

Cassius: I'm directing this at Jrska - I'M NOT HAPPY

Cassius reassembles his soul rapidly enough to fend off the gathering pack of lesser Warp entities.

Jrska: At least you can push all your abilities without fear of side-effects. The worst has already happened... On the other hand, there is one major problem with using psychic abilities while you're actually in the Warp - attracting bigger predators.

Aladar: EVERYBODY BACK TO THE SHIP!
Jrska: *kills the last large Tyranid* I'm turning around and giving Aladar an expression that means 'And who the fuck put you in charge?' But since I don't want to confuse the witless minions with contradictory orders, give an internal sigh and say 'Back to the ship, ladies!' and give Aladar a dirty look. If Aladar's volunteering to cover the retreat I'm not complaining - he can be replaced.

Aladar uses Cog's Graviton Gun to pin the deamon briefly in place. That should give Jrska, the mutant crew, and her Kingfisher Girls, a few more seconds grace.

GM: And you're running?
Jrska: Yes. And waving the plasma pistol around so it'll cool down faster.

That's when she runs into an Eldar ambush, and loses a number of mutants to a cloud of monomolecular web. The Eldar seem slightly irritated that they had to cancel whatever they were doing, to deal with the deamon we inadvertently unleashed. Knowing the Eldar, they probably WANTED a ship-full of Tyranids to crash into Solace, as part of some convoluted plan to protect the Eldar, but apparently unleashing The Hunter on the populace was not part of their calculations.

Eldar Farseer: WHAT HAVE YOU DONE, YOU MON-KIEGH FOOLS??

The xenos psyker and the Warp Spider aspect warriors blink out, teleporting on towards the engine room.

Jrska, annoyed by the Eldar not hanging around for her amusement, orders pursuit. The mutant crew vacillate, and decide discretion is the better part of honour. After all, they can always claim they didn't hear Jrska yelling at them. Her Kingfisher Girls, naturally, obey without hesitation or fear, and the horde runs back towards the engine room.

The deamon and Aladar face off, and shoot each other. Naturally, Aladar comes off worse. Amazingly, he survives. Perhaps the Chaos gods are amused by his idiocy and intervened on his behalf.

Jrska: Possibly you got the bullet through the skull, where it couldn't do any damage.

Aladar, phased out of reality, drifts off through the floor, insubstantial, unconscious, and trapped in broken power armour.

The Farseer and the other Eldar arrive, and enter combat against the Hunter, but it's Cog who finishes off the monster. The deamon implodes, and Cassius returns, congealing out of the wound in reality to express his displeasure at the Eldar and anybody else nearby. And the Eldar have positioned themselves midway between Cassius, Cog, and Jrska's onrushing mob - tactical idiocy verging on suicide, but never mind - Jrska is a big supporter of euthanasia.

Jrska and her Kingfisher Girls pile onto the Eldar from behind, dismembering a Warp Spider exarch, and moving on to the one carrying a mysterious case.

Jrska: The only reason I didn't go after the Farseer is because Cassius wants a Farseer alive.
Cassius: And I would have filleted Jrska alive.

Cog fires his plasma weapon into the melee.

GM: You also hit six of Jrska's Kingfisher Girls.
Cog: ...
Jrska: Don't worry about it - they'll enjoy it.
GM: Being incinerated?
Jrska: Sure. Slaaneshi cultists - we enjoy anything.

Cassius goes after the Farseer, who is badly unmatched, even though Cassius is striking to subdue and not bisect. The Eldar succumbs to his fury, while Jrska casually vaporises the pack of Furies that followed Cassius out of the hole, without Cassius even being aware of the problem.

Jrska: Problem solved.
Cassius: What problem?
Jrska: Nothing important, my lord. Did you want a stun grenade for that one?
Cassius: No, this way is more fun *keeps punching the Farseer in the face to keep her unconscious*
GM: Effective, but time-consuming.

And where IS our pet idiot, anyway?

Aladar: I think I'm being carried.
Jrska: By what?
Aladar: I don't know. I can't move my head.
Jrska: He's been captured by the Tyranids, my lord. We should give up on him as a lost cause.
Cassius: ...I really like that lascannon.
Aladar: There's no skittering.
Jrska: He's been captured by slug-like Tyranids, my lord, we should give up on him.
Cassius: I REALLY like that lascannon. If you want to ensure your usefulness to me, get it surgically implanted.

GM: Cog is being carried by two of the mutants.
Cassius: Good work, men. But I'm afraid Aladar doesn't count as loot.

The Eldar ship backs away and starts opening fire. It looks like we won't be able to control the descent of the wreck onto Solace. Pity - billions killed in a crust-cracking fireball would have been a wonderful sacrifice to Chaos, as well as badly hurting the Imperial war effort here on the Fringe.

Cassius: You have two choices - loot, or live.

Cassius has Cog cut away the armour around Aladar's trigger finger, and props him up to cover our retreat. After all, any Tyranids left on board will be fleeing like rats towards our own vessel, and Aladar still needs to claim another skull for Khorne.

Aladar: Would I fail the objective if I kill MORE than 8 enemies?
Jrska: Of course not. Blood for the Blood God, Skulls for the Skull Throne.
Cassius: Khorne NEVER says no to more blood.

Jrska, Cog, the surviving Kingfisher Girls and mutants, and our captives and prizes, flee back to the Chains of Judgement - with any luck the Eldar fire will shake our ship loose of the wreck.

Cassius: What would a Primitive Lascannon be, anyway?
Jrska: A bundle of laser pointers and some duct tape.

The hibernating Tyranids are boiling out of the wreck like fire ants from a nest - we decide now is a good time to try and break the two ships apart, even if we are damaged in the process. Cassius arrives back on board just as we separate. Aladar is hurt that we didn't wait for him to take the helm.

Aladar: You're using the autopilot? Dude!
Jrska: It's a cogitator trained by studying Aladar. I suppose you could call it an expert system - but this is Aladar we're talking about.

Jrska: Does Aladar's Machine trait make him immune to my Beguiling Gem?
Cassius: Yes. He has no interest in you anymore.
Jrska: I told you we should have left him behind.

I remember this part of the adventure. We actually figured out how to fulfill the letter of our agreement not to touch anything in the office, but still get our hands on the credstick...
 
I don't recall the exactly how the discussion went, but it went something like this (after we were safely away):
 
"Morlock told us that we can't touch the stuff in the office. He didn't say anything about what we do to stuff outside the building. We wait until the chief editor takes the credstick out of the building, then we grab it from him. I can figure out a few possible scenarios. We just need to be able to cover those possibilities, and we're good."
 
"We know credsticks aren't for normal, legitimate business. They'd just run those through their normal accounts. It's either secret or dirty. If it's dirty, they don't want to be caught with it. If it's secret, they don't want to be asked about it. If this was a megacorp, nobody would think twice. They always keep millions in dirty or secret nuyen around. But this is a little publisher. Maybe the company is fronting for somebody. Maybe the editor is. Maybe the company or the editor is into something illegal and is hiding the money here. For the most part, it doesn't matter."
 
"If this is the chief editor's illegal stash, then he needs to move it before the company starts investigating thoroughly, and he'll have to do it himself to avoid arousing suspicion. Even if it's the company's money, he may claim that we stole it, then pocket it himself. That still means he has to move it himself."
 
"If the chief editor is just a loyal front man for something secretive or dirty, then he still has to move it. That safe just isn't secure, and he knows it. Even if there's another safe in the building, he can't use that either. It was in the chief editor's safe, because that ensures that he's the only one who can access it. If they put it anywhere else in that building, some other employee will be able to access it too. We made it clean enough that they have to wonder whether we had someone inside. If so, moving it to another spot in the same building could hand it to the inside man. They've got to move it to somewhere secure outside the building."
 
"Given what that program did inside of their system, they're going to get investigated. Big time. So they have to move it subtly. Maybe the chief editor moves it himself. Maybe he gets a bodyguard to accompany him. Maybe he uses a high-end bonded courier. If he gets much beyond that, he's going to attract attention. It's going to stay small. No armored vehicles. No squads of company men. No helicopters. It will be something that won't stand out too much in this environment."
 
"And we can make sure that they're under scrutiny. Once they've had time to discover the problem, we'll anonymously tip off a couple young and hungry reporters. They can hang around, asking questions, taking pictures, being nosy. With reporters around, they can't bring in big guns."
 
"After that, we just watch to see who comes in and compare the visitors to employees and clients. If a new face shows up before the chief editor leaves the building, that's the courier or bodyguard."
 
"So we need a plan to hit a moving vehicle. We're taking the vehicle and one or two occupants. We use disguises because we may be recorded by the reporters. We'll need enough diversion to cover our escape. That's the mission. Let's get some eyes on the publisher and come up with a real plan."
 
The conversation was done in front of the GM, and there was some metagaming that went into what was said. Either the GM could take the mini-adventure we had just handed him and run with it, or he could come up with some transparent, genre-breaking way to keep the money out of our hands.

Bulletproof Samaritan - Flying Brick 
Hombre Panthera - Were-Jaguar 
<UTF> (Universal Translation Fail - his name is never said the same way twice.) - 2 headed alien with Luck Manipulation and a ray gun.
 
We introduced a new character to the group last session: Ivy.
 
Ivy's a descendant of the druids living in a magically shielded location in Canada's far NW. She has druid magic powers over plants and animals etc. 
 
Scene: Ivy is out front of the UN Building giving a (boring) speech about the damage that pollution and over industrialisation are doing to the world.
The other heroes have come along to hear her speak. Hombre Panthera is an environmentalist and keen. The other two are curious as Ivy has been in the news of late as she has made her way across North America on a public awareness raising tour. 
 
Ivy is holding up a small branch from a rare species of tree as an example of what pollution is doing. <UTF> is bored and so he adjusts the dial on his luck manipulator "to make something interesting happen." 
Ivy feels her magic go off involuntarily and the branch grows into very large, fully grown pine tree. It starts falling toward the crowd but it's caught by Bulletproof Samaritan just in the nick of time.
 
Samaritan: (nods toward <UTF>) He fiddled with his knob and she got wood.
Ivy (wondering how her magic could have activated without her will): I will have to get to the root of this problem.
Hombre Panthera (pretending to be sick of the jokes): We should leaf it here.
<UTF> (supporting Hombre's suggestion): We should branch off at some point...
 
My girlfriend comes into the room wondering what all the laughing is about:
 
My GF (OOC): It took me a moment to twig, but I caught on.

Me: A Gelatinous Cube is an amusing monster - unless Ian is GMing, in which case it's a Total Party Kill.

This got us onto the topic of deathtrap dungeon design - and yes, Ian and his Gelatinous Cube with a glowing sword it ate earlier was referenced - including dungeons that seem minor enough to attract lesser adventurers, but are in fact designed to harvest their loot. The nearest village, of course, gets a fifty-fifty split.

Greenlight's player: The problem with that plan is that adventurers have families. Oh wait, no they don't. They spontaneously generate.

The next hour is spent talking about My Little Pony, and interesting examples of the Human in Equestria genre of fanfic, such as the one recently written by Greenlight's player, featuring a English knight from the period of the War of the Roses, and which has already attracted enough attention to reach the top of the front page of FiMfiction.

GM: Anyway, let's begin.
Greenlight's player: Yes, let us begin and stop alienating my brother.

Anyway - Mr B of the Orc Underground wants us to go back into that Aztechnology research park to rescue the geneticist responsible for the mutagenic virus. As it turns out, this isn't quite true, but since we're pretending to be virtuous Shadowrunners this week we agree to do so. This, on top of the initial 'finders fee', advance on the job, and looted Alamos20K funds, means we've already been paid four times for one job. If we rescue our Johnson from the NeoNazis, and if Felix's grandfather reacts the way he anticipates, we might end up bring paid 6 times.

Anyway, since we blew up the the sewer as we left last time, we're going to need another way in. One of orcs leads us to the wall behind the Aztech complex's security and communications node. Blow that up, and the complex will be cut off from the outside world.

GM: You're getting a tour of the sewers
Inkubus: I really didn't need to know where lost his virginity

Labrat gets to work. We still have a dose of the wall-softening catalyst, but Labrat is running short of shaped charges that will let us out again. Happily, if he leaves a few small blocks of hi-ex INSIDE the wall as we pass through, on a ten minute fuse, we can destroy the wall with ease.

Inkubus: The chunky salsa rules

Felix nips into the Astral to check for magical security, and sticks his head through the wall - and comes face-to-face with an Aztech security Mage just finishing his own astral patrol.

Felix: I've just done the astral equivalent of climbing over the chain-link fence while the security guard was waiting on the other side.

Inkubus comes to the rescue, after the initial exchange of spell fire and the other Mage rubs back to his body to raise the alarm. He does so by hitting the guy's Focus amulet with a Glue spell, neatly attaching the opponent to his chair in real life. He follows up with a summoned spirit to make sure the alarm isn't raised.

Inkubus: What would a summoned Spirit of Man look like down here, anyway?
Felix: They've been doing unholy experiments on people and making chimeras down here, and he's still glued to the chair, so... *grin*
Security Mage: *looks up at the Frankenstein's Monster that just materialised* F**k.

Happily its orders are merely to restrain the Mage (actually killing employees tends to annoy Megacorporations, who otherwise treat Shadowrunners as an unavoidable part of business life). We blow the security node and enter the facility, chatting about assorted ephemera while we wait for the plasteel wall to liquidise.

Greenlight: So there's Monster High and My Little Pony : Equestria Girls.
GM: They're making a live action movie of that.
Felix: *boggles*
Greenlight: Bullshit!
GM: Monster High, not MLP
Felix: Ah, THAT makes sense. How would they have gotten the ponies to talk, anyway?
Inkubus: They're ordering peanut butter by the tonne.

Inside the complex, they've obviously been slacking off on fire drills and the like. Practically everybody is continuing with their stocktake or card games despite the boom and the emergency lights coming on. Strolling through the complex shock-batoning or gel-bag shotgunning various technicians and security guards is a walk in the park.

Technicians: Why have all the lights gone - ooof! What the? There wasn't a wall here before! *look up at the wall of troll*
Inkubus as Titus: 'Group hug!' *grab*

Felix: Now, who brought the plastic cuffs?
Inkubus: Only the furry ones, and I didn't think they were appropriate.

Felix: This is going to look very bad on their mid-year performance review.

Felix: If my grandfather DOES question me about this I'm going to be very critical of the security in here.
Titus as Felix: '*I* managed to get past it!'
Felix: Twice! In one day!

Some of the doors are closed, and arguments ensue. After all, the woman we're seeking might be in one of them. Should we pick the lock or just kick the door in?

Felix: I've got an idea. *knock knock* No answer? Right then, on to the next room.
Inkubus: *applause* Welcome to the world of using your brain in Shadowrun.

Felix: I fear the main reason no-one has come running in response to the gunfire is because of all the extra sound-proofing on the rooms - to keep the screaming down

Labrat: I shoot the dog
Felix: pew pew pew!
Titus: I'm now picturing an entire team of Shadowrunners that do nothing but make 'Pew pew pew' noises.

One reason it's so easy is that we blast anybody that actually opens the door, and that we've already taken out the biggest danger - the Mage back in the first room, who currently has Frankenstein's Monster sitting on his head.

Inkubus: Yay for circumventing the plot. And we weren't even in a boat this time!

Some of the people in the complex have finally noticed the gunfire and are hiding under computer consoles, etc. We attempt to reassure one terrified young woman that we're not actually killing anybody - merely keeping everybody out of the way while we get on with the job - before stunning her and adding her to the pile.

Greenlight: *to Inkubus!* Get the sexy on!
Inkubus: Please tell me you didn't say that aloud.
Greenlight: No?
Inkubus: Preemptive cockblocking, wow.

Labrat: *to Greenlight* you're up.
Greenlight: What, I've got two X chromosomes and therefore I get to talk to women?
Labrat: No, I'm inviting you over because you've got the stun baton.
Felix: I'm sorry, could you repeat that? I think my brain derailed.


Titus stocks his head into one room, notes the sneering corporate-type, his PA, and a nervous security operative, and closes the door again. These guys apparently noticed all the noise and decided staying put and hoping we'd pass them by was the safer option.

Avatar: Could you tell whoever owned the dog that we're sorry about that? One of us really *really* doesn't like dogs.

Especially heavily cybered Rottweilers.

The last room is the main security centre of the Alpha complex, where a handful of technicians and security guards stand around in the emergency lighting being useless.

Felix: You could always pop out from under a table and taser them in the groin.
Greenlight: That's unsporting. I like it.

Greenlight: Zapping a guy in the junk is very effective
Inkubus: Yes.
Felix: We know.

It turns out our target is in one of the holding cells. There are Orc captives, apparently prepped for experimentation, in the others.

Dr Carol Oates: I won't fall for any of your tricks, Peterhoff!
Inkubus: Do I look like somebody that would work here?

GM: There's two Ork women and three children. They're in hospital smocks. They huddle.
Felix: Right. Can we shoot that Peterhoff guy on the way out?
Inkubus: Labrat!
Labrat: I pop my head in and tell them to come with us.
Inkubus: Except we just called him Labrat. *headwall* Thud. Thud. Thud.

Actually using our names during a run was probably a bad idea, too.

Labrat sets up a large bucket of bleach and other cleaning chemicals, and a proximity detonator, outside the room with that exec - presumably Peterhoff.

Labrat: This guy f**ks with orcs, I f**k with him.

Apparently Peterhoff was planning to scapegoat Owens for the virus release that caused all the giant cockroaches etc earlier. Is there anything else in the complex we should know about?

Dr Carol Owens: Just the bodies of the virus victims.
Felix: That explains why they didn't answer the door then.

Inkubus and Felix go Astral to clean up our forensic fingerprints. Titus carries our bodies off to the first rendezvous point. After all, we can return to them anytime, providing we don't get lost.

Inkubus: That can be embarrassing. Mages - Do you know where your meat is?

We deliver Owens to Mr B, and discover we may well have delivered her to her own execution.

Mr B: Oh, Doctor Owens, I am ashamed.
Inkubus: I am disappoint.

Mr B: I want one good reason why I shouldn't have you shot.
Warhammer: I'll do it for free.
Greenlight: Shut up, Warhammer.

Mr B and Owens knew each other before the former's goblinization, and he's followed her work on the metahuman gene complex. He is not happy, in the least, that she went on to work on creating chimeras, lethal viruses, and experimentation on orcs.

The party convince Mr B that even if she had a choice about the way the way Aztechnology used her research, shooting her in the head and dumping her body in Puget Sound is wasteful, when she could instead be kept under house arrest in the Orc Underground and her knowledge put to good use.

Inkubus: Never, ever, ever get rid of a potential asset. Sure, she done goof, but if you kill her she can't fix it. What are you, stupid?

Inkubus: Not everybody gets a second chance - make the most of it.
Felix: For one thing if Warhammer ever sees you on the street he'll probably shoot you.
Titus: To be fair, that's a danger for everyone Warhammer meets.

Time to deal with the other loose end - the Johnson from Biogene that hired us to steal the data in the first place. The terrorists that hijacked the run are holding him at an Alamos 20K safehouse out in the Barrens. If we rescue him, he may prove grateful, especially after the FBI raid Biogene to arrest his terrorist-sympathiser superiors.

Happily, none of us have any particular qualms against killing NeoNazis - after all, they want to exterminate every nonhuman in the world, and they're just as phobic about magic.

GM: Magic is bad, m'kay?

Happily, their antipathy to magic means they have no defences against Felix and Inkubus scouting out the building Astrally. We even try to give the Johnson the heads-up about the imminent rescue.

Inkubus: Don't worry, we're coming to get you out.
GM: He's unconscious
Felix: Eh, it's the thought that counts.

GM: He's injured.
Warhammer: Oh, that must be painful.
Felix: ?
Labrat: Having your Johnson injured.
Inkubus: What is it with groin injuries and this group tonight?

Felix, Inkubus, Labrat and Warhammer set up to snipe, and Greenlight sneaks right past the guards without being noticed. One even fails to notice strolling past three feet away.

GM: He's too busy watching television - critical glitch XD
Greenlight: Sieg Heil!
Neonazi: *doesn't even look up* Ja, ja, Sieg Heil.
Titus: Probably watching Orc porn
Greenlight: Sounds about right

The rest of the team drop all the terrorists they can see, and Titus charges the building to introduce the survivors to his little friend the five-foot sledgehammer.

Titus: I run across the road. Straight at the wall. Ooh yeah!
Felix: You know, we really need to rename him Kool-Aid.
GM: You crash right through the drywall.
Felix: 60-year-old drywall.
Greenlight: Hulk smash!

GM: He didn't even get to the end of the sentence.
Greenlight: I'm not surprised - his pants were around his ankles.

Felix: So what were his last words before Titus got to him?
Greenlight: 'Protect me mien Fuhrer!'
Labrat: '....troll!'

Titus: To be fair, being responsible for twenty-five deaths isn't that different from your average Shadowrunner.

Greenlight: Add it to the list - hit a Neonazi so hard he explodes.

Greenlight: We exfiltrate, the Johnson over one shoulder.
Felix: Does the house explode behind you for no apparent reason?
Greenlight: Sure, why not.

We're just getting back to our vehicles when two nondescript Ford Americars roar up, and street samurai get out. They aren't reaching for weapons, so we refrain from the obvious response. And then Felix's grandfather, the Aztechnology exec, gets out.

This is going to be an interesting conversation...

The continuing stoooooory of a band of traitors, renegades and cultists who are masquerading as acolytes of the Imperial Inquisition in order to corrupt a loyal order of battle-nuns, and instead found, as Aladar puts it "A nut-house built on an Indian burial ground".

As we players arrive for the game -

Me: They're just bees. They have no interest in you unless you actually molest them.
Cassius's player: And that must be Drhoz. It's not just the volume, it's the content - bees and molesting.

Speculation as to what the Emperor would actually think about the sorry state of the Imperium, if he ever woke up.

The Emperor: I close my eyes for 10 millennia! You've trashed the front room! I told you, no parties!

On the gaming rooms' collection of malfunctioning and naked Furbys.

Cog's player: This is like one of Jrska's dreams.
Cassius's player: I don't want Jrska to find out about Furbys. Especially the one with the realistic tongue.
Cog's player: I want to find a planet with cute furry harmless animals.
Me: No such thing in 40K.

Cassius's player: Now we have two pun swords
Me: Pun swords?
Cassius's player: You make a pun, I hit you with this. It is your punishment.
GM: Should you hit yourself then?
Cassius's player: *does so*
GM: It's a bit pun-y.
Cassius's player: Puny? A Pune, a play on words?
GM: I'm not good with words, ok?
Cog's player: Zombie Shakespeare is rising from the grave...
Me: So he can hit him with the pun sword?
Cog's player: So he can die again.

Aladar's plan to appropriate a trophy from the convent's reliquary room presents major difficulties, including the fact the Sisters of Battle will probably notice if one of their most treasured relics suddenly goes missing. And, of course, how do you smuggle out a giant 40K pauldron anyway? Perhaps by replacing Aladar's codpiece with it?

The Sister assigned to guard our chambers goes off to see if she can find our missing servoskull, but comes back claiming there's no sign of it. Has it been appropriated by the Sisters, and the contents of its memory currently studied? This paranoia may explain our jumpiness that night, although it's possible the raised hackles and little noises in the corridors have a more supernatural cause.

Jrska: I would have quite liked to hear battle-nuns sneaking to each other's cells. It would give me hope for the future.

We insist on speaking to the Celestan after her morning prayers, claiming that the disappearance of the servoskull may be evidence of traitorous activity in the convent, and that we sent the skull searching because the ongoing security outage (that we instigated) would be the moment for any cultists to make their move. Cassius also reveals that he is a telepath, and given the Imperium's distrust of psykers, it's understandable that the Celestan doesn't react well. In fact, she draws her sword. Jrska instantly moves to reinforce the idea that Cassius is some kind of bound, conditioned psychic servitor, and not a traitorous space marine librarian that could make the Celestan's head explode with mind bullets.

Jrska: Take heed. Protocols x345, Zeta 9, Zeiton 11. The Celestan is designated ally - you are not to attack her. Defensive programs only. Acknowledge.
Cassius: *long pause, and bows, and telepathically glowers at Jrska* Don't enjoy this too much.

We insist on letting our 'bound psyker' do a full psychic sweep of the convent. Cog and our pet idiot Aladar will review the psychic defences of the convent. Jrska has her own priorities.

Jrska: Have Sister Bilitis brought to the interrogation room ( may as well achieve my personal goal in case we have to leave in a hurry > )

We have until noon to achieve whatever we want to do, before the security systems come back online.

Jrska: Pity I won't have a camera record of what I'm going to do with Sister Bilitis
Cog: You'll have your memories.
Jrska: Such happy memories.
Cog: Don't salivate too much
Jrska: They can't tell through the mask anyway >
GM: Do you have some sort of sponge in there?

Cog and Aladar manage to convince the Battle-nuns that the hexagrammic wards inscribed around the tower are faulty. And 'helpfully' demonstrate how to inscribe the 'correct' ones.

Cog: What they don't realise is the arrange of hexagrams forms an eight-pointed star in the middle.
Jrska: The Hidden Octed

That they can get away with this is a inditement of the Imperium's record keeping. Sure, they'll record everything. But most of those records are hand-copied, and archives will be indiscriminately purged if even one line ends up sounding heretical.

Cog: In 40K Grammar Nazis have fusion bombs.

GM: You'll be finished about the same time Jrska does.
Jrska: Stamina. Advantage of being female - no refractory period XD


Cassius is taken outside the convent walls to charge up his mind-fu.

Cassius: I don't want to make them any more nervous than I need to.

Jrska: Just nervous enough XD

The sisters assigned to escort him stand well back, and cheerfully offer to blow his head off if it looks like he's losing control. Actually, given some of the side effects of psychic powers, if Cassius really was an Imperial asset, euthanasia really is the merciful option. As it is, he merely corrupts everything for 20 meters around.

Jrska: All the caterpillars nearby go insane.

It's fortunate he didn't induce any of the more spectacular perils, such as rains of blood, or gravity inversion.

Cog: 'Wadd'ya know - a flying nun.'

A brief digression into why humanity is hopelessly devoted to Slaanesh, using banana-derived alcohol as evidence.

Cassius OoC: We're humans. If we can ferment it, we'll drink it.
Cog: Although possibly only the once.
Jrska: Ferment it and they will come.

Jrska continues her efforts to corrupt the cuter nuns.

Cassius: The convent's confessor - that's who you want to corrupt.
Cog: That'd be quite the confession.
Cassius: 'Forgive me sister, I have sinned. In fact I'm sinning right now.'
Jrska: You might want to compose yourself - we'll be here some time.
Cog: 'I brought a whiteboard '
Jrska: And a PowerPoint presentation.
Cassius: Although Jrska thinks PowerPoint presentations involve a strap-on.
Cog: And actual power points

Jrska: I suspect the main reason daemons have a problem with faith is that daemons exist by altering reality on a whim, and faith involves denying it.

Cassius is discovering interesting things - little trickles of psychic energy flowing up through the convent towards the reliquary. And other interesting things about the convent.

Escort: That area is sealed. We had a unfortunate faith incident.
Cassius: I tug on the handle.
Jrska : Testing that it is actually sealed

Aladar: When are you meeting with us?
Jrska: After I've given Sister Bilitis so many orgasms she passes out.
GM: Actually you haven't done that quite yet.
Jrska: Bringing her around. Expanding her horizons - and other things.

Eventually they end up in the reliquary chapel - where the missing servoskull is hovering in front of the dead saint's armour, and Cassius can detect the presence of something probing and altering the minds of the sisters as they enter and leave. He can also read the inscription around the armour's neck.

GM: Here Lies St. Recluse, May Her Faith Forgive Her Psychic Curse
Jrska: Called it.

Cassius plans to have a servoskull purposed to burrow through the psychic-active plateau beneath the convent, carving out Chaotic runes in the rock around the convent, to encourage and corrupt whatever entity he has discovered.

Cassius: This way if I get killed my dying words can still be "And I will still have my revenge." And the hero will dismiss it as the blustering of Chaos, and the Inquisition will go "oh, fuck".

That the skull was here, but our escort never found it, is odd, since according to the thing's log, it's been hovering here the whole time, while something rifled through its memory. It appears the escort was made to forget she saw it here.

Aladar: What happens in the reliquary stays in the reliquary.

GM: Your communicator buzzes
Jrska: I got a use for that

Aladar: Why does your servo-skull have so much porn on it?
Jrska: It's called life-blogging.
Cog: ... dear lord.

Jrska interrogates the escort, to confirm that her memory was altered, and to ask what her recurring nightmares are about. Hers are about a power failure trapping her in her power armour.

Jrska: Gee, I wonder where she's getting THAT idea from XD
Cassius: Faith can bind more securely than any witchery
Jrska: It's looking more and more like it's the psyker's spirit bound to the armour that's the problem. Well, their problem. Our opportunity.

Cassius and Cog team up to investigate the limits of the dead saint's power. And to talk it around to their point of view - perhaps easier than it sounds, since it's been feeding on the resentment and madness of the inmates for decades, and is almost ready to lash out anyway.

Cassius: There's something mechanical going on with me, and something mechanical going on with you.
Jrska: And sometimes something mechanical going on with me, but it generally involved Sybians.
Cassius: And lots of lube.
Cog: *facepalm*

Cassius: I'm making the Sign of the Aquila but I'm focusing on these two fingers.

Cassius decides the best way to test the spirit's telepathic editing abilities is to 'discover' Aladar's desecration of a minor relic, and see if the Celestan promptly forgets about it.

Jrska: Time to call in the expert - and I know all about how to deal with sin and corruption. Usually it involves lots of lube and pauses for refreshment.
Cassius: Sports drinks. Lots of sports drinks.

Jrska follows the mortified nun up the stairs to the the chapel, while Cassius amuses himself by plodding along ahead, filling the corridor with his hulking size.

The Celestan: How can this be? How could such evil have been hidden right beneath our gaze?
Jrska: The enemy is perfidious - it could be right behind you the whole time, ready to stab you in the back.

The Celestan is also desperate that word of the discovery doesn't reach the outside world.

The Celestan: We have many enemies
Jrska: *pats her sympathetically on the shoulder* I know, I know.

The Celestan wants to talk to us privately, after she takes the desecrated sword off to be re consecrated, and we go over the chapel with a fine tooth comb, to give it a 'clean bill of health'. She promises us interesting details of the convent's history.

This will give Cassius and Cog a chance to replace the sacred pauldron with one of Aladar's own, suitably altered. And by doing this themselves, they'll steal a little bit of Aladar's Infamy.

Jrska OoC: Like that neural whip you got me - 'I've got something for you, Jrska' and my ears pricked up and I said 'How do you want me, lord?'

Happily, Aladar's player is OK with being the party's butt-monkey.

Jrska: Although I am a bit irritated with how jaded Aladar has become. He's not even any fun in bed any more. He's the human equivalent of a yeast infection.

Ian continues to make himself the most hated and beloved character on DayZ.

For one thing the other players now think the Haunted Forest has a wookie as well as a Pigman. That's because he donned a Ghillie suit, leapt out on three PCs, and beat them to death with a fishing rod.

The suit also proved useful in another stunt, which cost 36 lives before he got bored. He parked an armoured car in the middle of a empty  field surrounded by trees, then lay down three feet in front of the vehicle with a sniper rifle trained on the driver's seat. He then announced over the server that there was a prize just waiting to be claimed.

And despite knowing it was Ian, and knowing there was no possible way this could end well, 36 players still showed up.

True, some of them did turn up in teams, trying to figure out where the sniper fire was coming from, but they were all watching the tree-line. One player figured out that he had to be hiding somewhere in the field, and drove a tank over every suspicious bush, but managed to miss the one that was actually the Pigman. Ian then waited until the other PC got out of the tank to hook a tow rope to the armoured car, and shot him in the head.

The GMs love him, of course - and they've worked together to punish people that actually hack the game. When the Pigman got bored with the slanty shanty, and discovered an island well away from the mainland, they encouraged his efforts to become  Governor Pigman, as he built a large high-security prison. At the moment the only inmate is one of the aforementioned hackers, whose character got taken down by the Pigman and dragged off to a cell on the island, where the Pigman gloats at him from the roof. The player is livid, of course, and has even tried to starve his character to death so he re-spawn back on the mainland, but the Pigman just beats him unconscious and force-feeds him.

None of the other players have figured out about the island yet - they've seen him driving armoured cars out to sea, but apparently they think it's just the Pigman taking loot out of circulation again.
 

DNA DOA Pt 2 : The Run : Break into a high-security Aztechnology research park, steal all the data on a particular project, and deliver it to our client who is presumably from a rival biotech company. Complications - somebody is blackmailing Greenlight into handing the info to them, or they'll kill his brother. And Felix used to work for Aztech, and half his family still do, and he still has some loyalty to the brand. But at we know that some of the third party's claims about bugs on his person are bogus, which is a relief to Greenlight, and Felix can always email his grandfather after they have the data.

Felix: 'Dear Grandfather - if you know anybody involved in Project X, tell them to abandon ship now.'
Inkubus: 'A little bird tells me it's just been torpedoed'

Plus, Felix doesn't believe the rumours about Aztech anyway.

Inkubus: Half of Aztechnology feeds the world, the other half is ... Demon-spawn Incorporated.
Felix: That's just propaganda by other megacorps.
Inkubus: .... This is why you need to stick with me.

The client provided us with a map of the Tacoma sewers, and a catalyst to soften the plascrete walls of the Aztech lab. Aztech's formidable security is still a worry.

Titus: It's Aztechnology, they'll have some sort of poison gas to pump in after us.
Felix: It's the sewers, they don't have to ADD gas.

Inkubus: The sewers are the one place in Seattle you don't behave to worry about devil-rats!
Labrat: The demon-rats eat them.

Demon-rats notwithstanding, the sewers do have inhabitants. Three sleeping orcs that Warhammer stuns, just in case, and a team of apparent Shadowrunners, who are lost, and that we avoid.

GM: They're hiding from the cops.
Greenlight: They're hiding from a group of trees?
Inkubus OoC: .... I want to rearrange the table. Drhoz up here, punsters down there.

Breaking in through the wall proves relatively simple, although at Felix's suggestion Labrat sets explosives to collapse the sewer after we leave. The ventilation shaft on the other side is cramped - especially for Titus - but a bigger concern is the torn out gratings, flashing emergency lights, and blood trails. The cells next to the lab, and mutilated bodies, don't bode well.

Felix: I think I've seen this movie
Greenlight: Well, none of us are black, so we can't be killed.

Apparently some airborne agent has been released.

Felix: So, who's glad I insisted on portable air supply?
Greenlight: Um.
Titus: I brought mine.

But that doesn't explain the state of the bodies, or the THINGS scurrying around the premises.

Labrat: There are lots of things that have claws. Rats, cats, dogs....
Felix: Deinocheirus
Labrat: Exactly

Felix: Was there provision for extra danger money in this contract?

Felix photographs everything - he is rather upset.

Felix: I think I'll be sending a strongly worded email to my grandfather. It doesn't do the company's reputation any good when they actually ARE doing stuff like this!

Felix: Somebody remind me why we're doing this job?
Inkubus: We're being paid.

Something is eating, noisily, in one of the side rooms. We unhook assorted incendiary, concussion, and frag grenades, toss them through the door, and slam it.

Felix: There's no kill like overkill.

Unfortunately, whatever was in there is annoyed, not dead, and comes out to complain.

GM: It's a flaming troll
Labrat: Its dress is FABulous
Felix: Well, it DOES look like the dress from Hunger Games.

Labrat: I know what it is and I'm panicking
Felix: YOU'RE panicking?! We threw four grenades at it and it's mildly pissed off!!!

Happily massed firepower does take it down, although it was just as well we added a few more white phosphorus grenades and Titus introduced its skull to his sledgehammer, since it was getting up again. That probably explains the Aztech security team we find barricaded into one if the offices. We claim to be Aztech security sent to back them up, and warn them to stay put until the decontamination teams arrive.

Felix: What I want to know is why the rest of Aztech security hasn't turned up to reinforce these poor fuckers
Labrat: They're currently chasing something worse.
Inkubus: This is a good thing and a bad thing.... I mean, I'm sure they'll catch it.

The dead thing appears to be a mutated, knobbly troll, with grotesquely long and muscular arms.

Greenlight: Evidently it skipped Leg Day

Labrat sucks the data from the computers, and carefully sets thermite and high-ex in the vault to destroy the rest of their research and bio-weapons. Apparently Aztech have been making sentient lions, tigers, and bears. Oh my. And whatever did THAT to the troll, cockroaches, and nematodes, is not something we want to exist, anyway.

We blow our way back out through the re-hardened wall with a shaped charge - that way we can save the other dose of the softening catalyst for another time. We're sure it will prove useful. And then off to the frieghter for the hand-off, wondering when whoever blackmailed Greenlight will show up, and musing about the cover of Shadowrun 2050, where a dwarf is breaking a cyber deck over the head of a security operative - very stupid, given the ridiculous expense of 2050 cyber decks.

Labrat: That's because we don't see what happens next - the dwarf screaming "what did I just do?!?!?"
Titus: There is the chance that it's not the Dwarf's cyber deck.
Greenlight: It's the elf that's jacked into something.
Inkubus: *wince* in that case, once he gets over the dump shock, the elf will kill the dwarf

We arrive at the docks - being paranoid, Felix checks the astral landscape before we proceed, and discovers there are at least 12 people waiting, instead of one. Also, they've apparently chosen the locale because of its proximity to the warehouses where thousands of orcs and trolls were burned alive during the Night of Rage some years ago. Felix and Warhammer climb to a roof where they can snipe from, just in case, although the storm and rain aren't helping visibility. Labrat tells everybody to head to Dock 90 if shit goes down, for some reason. We soon discover that the client's operative has been replaced with the asshole holding Greenlight's brother. We play it cool, even after ten armed men come out of hiding, and even after we notice most of them are wearing Alamos 20K armbands. These are the genocidal terrorist group that claimed responsibility for the Night of Rage atrocity, and many other murderous attacks.

Greenlight demands they bring his brother out, which they do, keeping a gun to his head. Greenlight hands over a corrupt data chip, and the terrorist - apparently rather startled it's all going so smoothly - says he's going to go check. Labrat warns them to not try anything, and holds up the insurance he had in his pocket - a bundle of extremely hi-ex and a detonator.

Labrat: I have a C12 grenade.
Warhammer: I want one.

This is when the entire deck is lit with spotlights, a dozen Aztech security choppers descend from the sheets of rain, Aztech combat vehicles roar down from the gates, and a loudspeaker bellows at to all remain where we are. We had, unfortunately, neglected the possibility of magical pursuit. At least we'd all been wearing generic environment gear, and didn't use any magic, while we were inside Aztech - with any luck Aztech will assume it was all Alamos 20k.

The Alamos 20K gawp, Greenlight yells "Go!", Felix drops the one holding Greenlight's brother with a stunbolt, Titus drops the leader with a sledgehammer to the jaw, the leader and the hostage are grabbed, and the team jump overboard as more terrorists pour out of the warehouse and Aztech and Alamos 20k open fire on each other.

Warhammer and Felix linger on the roof, since nobody has spotted them yet, assisting the chaos by sniping anybody about to throw a grenade, then cover the team's motorbikes with a tarp and scampering off to Dock 90. The others have already been there for some time - luckily they still had those self-contained air supplies. It turns out Labrat had bought an Aztechnology cruiser after our last run, and by a happy co-incidence he'd had it berthed at these very docks the whole time. We head out into Puget Sound to enjoy the fireworks as Aztech and Alamos start using RPGs and the like on each other.

Greenlight's brother wakes up, and surprises us with something Inkubus and Titus had already figured out, but was news to the rest of us.

Greenlight's brother: SIS!?
Inkubus: Yeah, Greenlight is actually a girl.

Then there's the terrorist we brought with us, who proves completely unable to resist Inkubus's mind proves, spilling every secret he knows, including Alamos 20k banking details, the identity of his superiors in the organisation, the fact that our client's superior at Biodyne is a Alamos 20k sympathiser ( which explains how they managed to hijack the plan ), what they wanted the research for ( a virus to wipe out all meta humans ), and why he joined Alamos 20k in the first place.

Greenlight: He hates metahumans because an elf girl dumped him.
Labrat: He hates them because an Orc boy dumped him XD

We hand the terrorist and the info on Alamos 20k over to Warhammer's CIA contact, and drain their banking account. Labrat bundles the data on Homo felis, Homo ursus, and the other less horrible research, and sends it off to one of the independent broadcasters. Greenlight gets to work teaching her little brother what he'll need to survive, while they try to find their parents.

Felix: The Shadowrun equivalent of 'Operation' - 'Bomb Disposal'
Greenlight's player: I love the fact that whenever the PCs in any of my games have children, they immediately start raising them as the next generation of PCs.

One oddity is that her brother doesn't seem to have aged at all, since the day Renraku corps security bundled him and his parents into the back of a truck. He doesn't remember anything concrete about the intervening years, either.

Ah well, back to the main plot, which we've derailed again.

GM: What is it with you lot derailing my plots by getting on a boat?
Greenlight: We're just awesome that way.

Nonetheless, Labrat still gets a phone call from Mr B, who rumour holds is a big name in the Orc Underground. We've been invited to a meet.

Inkubus: I bring a six-pack of Hurlg. And manage to resist drinking any.
Greenlight: Good - I don't want to have to carry you.
Inkubus: If you have to carry Inkubus, there isn't any beer.
Labrat: If you drank so much Hurlg there won't be any Inkubus

The big mystery here is how did they figure out we were involved in the business at the wharves, and why would they trust us after that anyway?

Felix: If they noticed whose boat left the dock, and whose bikes were left behind, they may well figure that somebody embarrassed Aztechnology and got dozens of Alamos 20K assholes killed, and think 'these are our kinds of people!'

That appears to be the case. We're even given the incredible honour of a visit to the top-secret underground complex the Orcs have under Seattle's lava and ash flows. One of the things we discuss with Mr B is the fate of our original client. Apparently his boss had him 'delayed' and he's probably going to need rescuing. True, we failed on the run, as far as he knows, but rescue and the chance to climb the corporate ladder after his boss gets arrested for terrorist ties should go a long way. Besides, we got more money out of the terrorist accounts than we were going to be paid, anyway.

He's not the only one who needs rescuing. The scientist - a long time friend of Mr B - who made the virus possible is very upset with the way her work was perverted. But there's not they can do about it, since they're still effectively a slave to Aztechnology. And she wants out. And they're being kept secure in the same complex we raided earlier. Just as well we kept a dose of the wall-softening catalyst.

Felix: We should extract them soon. While they still think nobody would be stupid enough to try this twice

Bizarrely enough, Ian had nothing to do with this



But he did  update me on his campaign of terror in DayZ. He's decided to build a base for himself. He didn't used to have a base - just an outhouse on the middle of the Haunted Forest. Teams would go into the forest hunting for his non-existent base, and walk right past the outhouse. He eavesdropped on one assassin that had gone in hunting him - the other PC radioed back "I've got to the outhouse - what do I do now?", dithered for a bit, then lost his nerve and fled back to town.

Anyway, his new base isn't as elaborate as most - it's just a barn. It's the accessories that make it the target of rage across the server. As one of Ian's friends asked him -

"Why have you spent four cases of gold on grenades?"

The grenades became the thirty-meter deep minefield around the barn. So far, nobody has even got to the door, despite him 'helpfully' arranging (booby-trapped) oil drums to jump between. One player even tried to drive a tank up to his door, and it got blown up too. Ian cheerfully looted the bodies and parked the tank beside his barn, and invited the player to come retrieve it. One team did try to land a helicopter on the roof, but Ian had deliberately chosen a building with a sloped roof. They slid right off into the minefield. Naturally, the carnage has greatly improved Ian's pile of loot. To the fury of the other players, he just stores it all in the barn.

Player: I got him! I finally got him! Wait, he's not carrying any loot.
Player 2: what? He took my best rifle last week!
Player: he says he stashed it in the barn.
Player 2: fuuuuuuuu-

Of course, they could just fly a plane into his barn, just like he did to those other players, but while he was bored one day he discovered something interesting. He was building a tower from scaffolding, just to see how tall it would go, and was well above anything in the game when a plane flew into it. The plane blew up - and the tower stayed standing.

Ian thinks "I've just invented a giant flyswat". He's intending to build them at the end of each airport runway.

He recently spotted one of the other players heading to the traders camp, and wondered what he was buying. So he took off his burlap sack and followed him in. It turned out he was buying a car, and then medical supplies. So Ian got into the back of the car while the other player was off buying stuff, laid down on the back seat, put the burlap sack back on, and waited. And once they were driving down the road, sat up and started squealing and gibbering in the driver's ear.

After the car crash, the other player admitted it was pretty funny, but was slightly peeved that the car was a write-off and he'd been killed in the impact. The Pigman, predictably, survived.

One of his victim's put some of Ian's shennanigans on DayZ up on YouTube!

New one is up:
952 Weather or Not

If it can talk and think, it is 'alive', and this trigers Code VS Killing.
 
Exceptions: Demons. If they talk, just don't listen.

If you are a normal human, never get into a romantic relationship with a superhuman.  The best you can hope for is being used as a hostage; at worst you'll be stuffed in a fridge.

Never underestimate the power of the press to make a superhero's life more difficult.
 
A laboratory accident is like a box of chocolates. You never know what abilities you'll wind up getting.
 
One world's mutant terrorist is another world's freedom fighter.
 
Stick to dealing with supervillains robbing banks. If you try to solve a real world problem with superpowers, the press will crucify you if you make a mistake and the government will start getting twitchy if you succeed.
 
Never get into a romance with someone more powerful than yourself. If the relationship ends badly, you can be in for a world of hurt.

To non-superpowered people, they're the Laws of Science.  To the superpowered, they're the Occasionally Helpful Suggestions.

Be careful about casual use of violence. You may come across someone better at it than you.

Time travel is a fine thing for anyone who feels like chasing their own tail.  

My brother has found a new game to terrorise - the Day Z mod for ARMA 2, although he's been amusing himself on the standalone too. He's already got the point that the entire forest occupying the middle of the map is effectively his personal domain. Players will rather run the gauntlet of sniper-infested townships rather than take a shortcut through what is now known as the Haunted Forest.

He started his campaign of terror by wearing a hessian sack with one eye-hole over his head, a lantern under one arm, hefting a fireman's axe and playing creepy music over the game's audio stream. Then he stood behind a bush and just waited, while players armed with crowbars etc nervously investigated the light and creepy music. Which is when he set his head to deranged high-speed wobbling, changed the music to what he describes as creepy yodelling, and leaped out of the bushes screaming gibberish and laying about him with the axe.

Picture the scene.

Not surprisingly the other players completely freaked. The only one with a gun managed to accidentally shoot his own friend, and after they'd all run off blindly into the woods they agreed it was the scariest thing they'd ever fucking seen. And then Ian turned it up to eleven. He would interrupt the chat channels with distant pig squeals and giggling "looking for you, fishie...Gonna find you, fishie...." and carrying out these promises in a campaign of terror that made the Pigman a creature of nightmare. And this in a zombie apocalypse setting.

He does have a certain amount of social justice in his make-up. Such as when snipers would set up shop on the cliff tops to kill re spawning players. You see, Ian has discovered that, unlike walking, sneaking, or even standing still, rolling along the ground has no associated sound effect. So he would silently roll up behind a sniper, and start using another bug in the game to poison the other PC.

The Pigman: Feed person rotten fruit. Feed person disinfectant. Feed person blood pack.
Sniper's HUD: You have a bad taste in your mouth.
Sniper: Eh? I've been poisoned! How - *turns around to find the Pigman looming over him, head wobbling maniacally, and squealing like a stuck pig*

At this point more than one of the snipers has recoiled right off the cliff.

And then he got hold of a crossbow. PCs lurking around the woods would hear things the following.

The Pigman: reeeeeeeeeeeee, fishy fishy.... I can see you....

And then everybody would hear a p-chunk, and get the message that another PC was dead. Ian had a grand ol time stalking one of them.

The Pigman: reeeeeeeeeeeee, looking for me, ain't you, fishy? You're a cute one... Gonna make love to you.... reeeeeeeeeeeee

At this point Victim One runs for it, Ian shoots him the leg, and he screams for help. An ally comes running, right past Ian who has ducked down, his hessian sack the same colour as the tree bark. Ian then shoots the new guy in the leg as well.

The Pigman: Two little fishies! Two little fishies! Dunno what I'll do... Cut the head off one and the bottom off another.... reeeeeeeeeeeee.

The two victims are completely losing their shit, begging the Pigman to let them go, and frantically offloading everything they own as bribes - weapons, gear.... And clothing.

The Pigman: Getting me excited now, fishies!

The Pigman does go into town occasionally, when he needs gear his victims aren't carrying. Once, he spotted another PC going by the name of Kahleesi. She was talking to a trader, so Ian rolled up behind her and started a campfire. She was a bit upset when she burst into flame.

The Pigman: You're not the Khaleesi! The true Khaleesi is immune to fire!

The Khaleesi also fell victim up Ian's method of disposing of unwanted petrol drums. This involved piling them up near a random base, and attaching some C4. The resulting mushroom cloud was visible and audible across the entire map. The Khaleesi was not pleased to find her base reduced to concrete walls and her loot scattered across the landscape.

Occasionally, well-armed teams DO go into the woods. One such laid a line of flares out behind them, so they wouldn't get lost. The Pigman silently stalked them, extinguishing each flare as he went.

PC: What happened to our flares? I thought they were supposed to last for hours.
PC 2: .... Oh no.
The Pigman: reeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
All PCs: *scream, panic, flee into the darkness in random directions*

One character managed to get the drop on the Pigman, back before everyone knew what he was capable of, and they still thought he was a special GM event. He demanded weapons and loot. Pigman started jiggling and swaying from side to side.

Other PC: You don't have any weapons?

Pigman spasms and jerks, and carefully places a book on the ground.

Other PC: You want me to read this? Well, OK.

And this is wear Ian abuses ANOTHER bug in the game - a book, when read, occupies the entire screen.

The Pigman: *reaches across and handcuffs the other PC*
Other PC WTF?!?! Dude! You can't leave me like this!!!!
The Pigman: *just stares for a long time, without moving, then flips the bird and fire off a few rounds into the air to attract wandering zombies, and runs off, squealing like a pig and babbling about little fishies.*

It's got to the point that the mere sound of pig squeals provokes panic, regardless of the situation.

The Pigman: reeeeeeeeeeeee
Player: Oh god.... I just fired 400 rounds into the bushes. I'm out of ammo and I'm in the middle of nowhere.

Ian did manage to terrorise one team's base, by popping up at windows, silently jiggling and wobbling spasmodically. The player inside, of course, opened fire, but Ian had already ducked back down.

Player: ... Did I just see that?

Ian repeats this performance at another window, provoking the same response. At the third window, he starts squealing as well, and the people inside lose their shit completely.

Players: We're friendly!!! We're friendly!!!! Don't kill us, we're friendly!!!!
The Pigman: Fishies don't shoot when they're friendly. Reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!

He's also taken to jelly-beaning the unwary, leaving a trail of almost empty ammo cartridges off to an obvious trap - a valuable firearm, just sitting on the ground. And all the terrain around it shot up with hundreds of bullet holes. The Pigman then hides in the bushes nearby and waits. He's watched players stand there for minutes at a time, thinking about whether to risk it.

One more unwise individual wanted to go back for the gun, with help. His more experienced friend wanted nothing to do with it.

Paranoid Player: I'm not going there with you. I'm not going there with an army. I know who's behind this - he's hilarious but completely fucking insane. I've watched him throw that hessian mask one way, and while you're shooting at it he's running up behind you with an axe. He'll put that mask on one of your wounded allies and while you're shooting at your friend he's running up behind you with an axe. He will be there, watching you
Insufficiently Paranoid Player: But it's a really good gun! One-shot kill!
Paranoid Player: And how long will it take you to load it?
Insufficiently Paranoid Player: ... 30 seconds?
Paranoid Player: Right. 30 seconds for him to run up behind you with an axe.

As it was, the insufficiently paranoid player found a noob to watch his back. The Pigman rolled up to the noob, tasered him, and after they figured out that this wasn't some sort of electrical trap and they were being hunted by the Pigman, he already had them covered with a shotgun.

The Pigman: Drop your pants. Drop your loot. Fishie fishie.

He has them both strip to their underwear, cuffs them, force feeds them rotten fruit, and drags them off to a cliff top. Their, he throws the antidote ( itself corrupt, but he doesn't tell them that ) off the cliff, and gives them an ultimatum - one jumps off the cliff, and ones goes free. The noob, having less to lose, jumps.

Noob: Hey, I survived! Wait, I'm still handcuffed. And I'm bleeding. And now I'm dead. Fuck.
Insufficiently Paranoid Player: You'll let me go now, right?
The Pigman: No fishie fishie .... You and me get to play a game....
Insufficiently Paranoid Player: *is dragged off screaming into the woods*
Other players on the audio channel, wondering at the noise: What are you screaming about?
Insufficiently Paranoid Player: He's got me! He's going to do something!
Paranoid Player: I warned you. You deserve everything you get.


What he gets is being dragged to an abandoned house, his leg broken, his hands cuffed behind his back, and informed that somewhere in the house are the keys to the cuffs, a medipack, and a gun with one bullet. Also, that he'd better hurry, because there are people coming over.

The Pigman: *fires multiple shots into the air to attract zombies, and leaves. * Fishie Fishie.

And that's just the Zombie mod of the game. Wait until you hear about everything else he's been up to...

I was at Swancon the evening of the second session, but they recorded some quotes for me. Some, perhaps thankfully, without attribution or context.

-Thing about being a Troll, it's sort of like having the stretching powers. Don't Lord it over the rest of us!

Inkubus: Which is a better spell, Prophylaxis, which I have to sustain, or just Cure Disease?

Greenlight: he's shaking dice at me!

Greenlight: Do I see any traps?
GM: no.
Labrat: All the girls in here seem to be the real thing.
Titus: Hey! I was going to make that joke!

It appears that whoever tried to kidnap Euphoria had a back-up plan. At least, a second back-up plan, after their attempted mid-ocean kidnapping went so badly wrong. Her desperate publicity agent gets in contact with Inkubus, in the hope this is another stunt by his charge. He then offers Inkubus 20,000 NuYen to hire some shadowrunners than can track her down. Inkubus, not being an idiot when it comes to being paid twice, demands a finder's fee.

Inkubus: What's my cut?

He may well be hiring all his friends, and sharing the finder's fee as a bonus with us, but we don't need to tell the agent that XD Some time is spent running around gathering clues as to the kidnapping. A good deal of this is the GM's attempt to steer the plot back on track, after we so spectacularly derailed it by taking Euphoria on a sailing trip last session. Labrat experiences the sim-sense recording of the kidnapped actress.

GM: You feel the soft silk of her clothes against her skin -
Greenlight: "...the shuffling of a too tight G-string..."

Labrat: I give the team a full rundown, especially the guy with the T-Shirt that read "Garrity's Bar and Grill" I don't need to be hit over the head with a clue bat to spot one.

Labrat: Would the name of the Bar be E.O?
GM: No, why?
Labrat: That would make it the Barrio.

Greenlight: Who the heck is narrating this adventure, Max Payne?

The trail leads to a small shop, where somebody appears to have investigating the same case, and was turned into wallpaper for his pains. There is also an extremely skeevy individual hanging around - so skeevy that Greenlight shoots it. Despite shooting it with a mere pistol it splatters all over the alleyway.

Greenlight: *stares down at the pistol, then makes Final Fantasy victory theme*

This is rather disturbing. As is the clue that points towards the factory out in the Barrens where they're making Ambergel, the new food sensation that Euphoria is supposed in Seattle to promote. One look at the factory in the Astral is more than slightly disturbing, and the group decides that heading in there right away will be a spectacularly bad idea.
 
 
 
Inkubus is accused of being "overly excited"

Inkubus: I don't want to say anything...
Labrat: We don't want you to say anything!
Warhammer : Never, ever.

The team starts calling in favours, and draining the expense account. For one thing, we need to know all we can about the thing Greenlight shot. And we need more firepower. And as much insecticide as we can get from the every convenience store we can get to. And backup, in case this doesn't work and the factory needs to be wiped off the face of the map. Happily, Warhammer's buddies in the FBI, Lone Star law enforcement, the Knights Errant, and the United Canadian and United States Army actually listen, and one of his friends in the latter pulls up with a semi-trailer-slash-mobile-armoury. We start kitting up - or rather, Greenlight, Warhammer, Titus and Labrat do - Inkubus and Felix intend to offer astral support. Body-armour, combat drugs, portable air supply and Infra-red goggles are a must. Incendiary mines and white phosphorus grenades likewise. Some way to best utilise Titus' size and Warhammer's army experience seems a good idea..

Labrat: Can we get a shoulder-mounted minigun?
Armourer: *grins, and pulls out the rack of backpack seat/ammo bin +shoulder-mounted minigun* It's a standard configuration
Various: We now have a standard Troll/Dwarf Minigun assembly!
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
But we have to bring back any unexpended munitions - they do belong to the United Canadian and American States Army.

Titus: New! Tachikoma strength Raid!

Titus: Bomb everything that's on fire! Then keep bombing it until it's on fire again!

Greenlight sneaks up onto the roof of the factory, where sentries patrol. At ground level, Titus and the others make their own entrance. Actual architecture notwithstanding.

GM: The sentries run to the edge of the roof and look over.
Greenlight: Run over and kick! THIS IS SPAAAARRRRTAAAAA!

Greenlight: (on the effect of a rotary minigun) - It's damage is I @#$%^%& your mother and I'm coming for you next!

Titus: (on discovering the depths of the Insect Hive) - this is DEEP, man!

The plan - jam the elevators and flood the ground floor with roach bombs. We don't want any of the insect spirits or their victims getting out past us. The heart of the nest is many floors below ground.

Felix: We're lucky we're going in loaded for para-bear, aren't we?

Meanwhile, in the Astral, where everything appears in its Ideal Form

Inkubus: Skin-tight denim, waist-length hair flowing out behind me, surfing on a guitar, the whole deal.
Greenlight: So basically you look like an anime character
Inkubus: Yes

GM: They're probably alerted.
Titus: I just Kool-aided two walls, they know we're here.

Inkubus: Because of what I need to do in order to do what I need to do... Fuck that was terrible English.

Warhammer: I need some speakers on my minigun belting out Ride of the Valkyries.
Greenlight: Hall of the Mountain King might be better. Dun dun dun-dun dun.
Labrat and Inkubus: That's A Night on Bald Mountain
Greenlight: It is?
Labrat: How about the Fourth Movement of Beethoven's Seventh?
Greenlight: Ode to Joy?
Inkubus: Sure, why not?

As well as dozens of Gigeresque monstrosities, and a giant pulsing cocoon, there's a human mage.

GM: His name is Craft.
Felix: We don't care.
ALL : *Hose the room with WP grenades, gunfire, and magic. Warhammer somehow manages to miss everything, despite the minigun.*
Felix: ...How? Were you too busy head-banging to Ode to Joy or something?
Inkubus: That's the problem - he should have been playing Machine Gunn Eddie

Inkubus OoC: Will the conditions down here help my Metal Mage specialities?
Greenlight: We're underground and everything is on fire.
Felix: Can't get much more metal than this

Inkubus manages to banish the Insect Queen's spirit back to what Lovecraftian dimension they come from, but the deathscream is enough to send him bonkers. Warhammer is slightly miffed that the fight seems to over so quickly.

Inkubus: I've looked into the Abyss and realised it was looking back.
Felix: With big compound eyes.
Inkubus: My trousers are full.
Felix: Astral trousers?
Inkubus: Real trousers. The guy back at the truck is looking down at our bodies and thinking 'he just crapped himself - what the f**k is happening down there'.

Warhammer: I can't believe I didn't get to kill anything in this room.
Felix: Just use the rest of your incendiary grenades on the way out.
Warhammer: Someone else can do that - I'm upset now.

GM: Shadowrun is a week of planning, three days of set-up, and ten seconds of utter chaos.
Titus: Occasionally followed by running away very quickly.

The surviving Insect Spirits are berserk, but so is Inkubus. He summons a major fire spirit. In corporeal form.

Inkubus: What the hell, let's kill myself doing this.
Greenlight: I think you mean kiln yourself.

God of Hellfire: I am the God of Hellfire! And I bring you ... FIRE.
Felix: And in the Astral I'm looking at Inkubus with the Platonic Ideal of What The F**k Are You DOING?
 
 
 
 
 
 

Inkubus: Kill every f**king bug in this building!
GM: It looks at them ... Looks at you.... Looks at them and growls GLADLY

Now would be a good time to grab Euphoria and bug out. For one thing the oxygen in the room is rapidly running out, and there's a large number of crazed on-fire Insect Spirits running about. By the time we reach the surface large numbers of the military, Lone Star, and Knights Errant are converging on the inferno.

Labrat: We geared up and decided white phosphorus was our friend.
Felix: And there's not many circumstances you can say that in.

Greenlight: Could you please never summon the God of Hellfire again?
Inkubus: I make no promises.
Titus: Oh, I don't know, he seemed nice.
Felix: As the factory goes up in a pillar of flame behind us.

Inkubus: Yeah, we handled it, we're awesome-
Felix: A Balrog?! A f**king Balrog!? You summoned a f**king Balrog!?
Inkubus: .... *cowers* just the one....

Warhammer: This should do our street cred a lot of good
Felix: Well yes, hundreds of military, Lone Star and f**king Knights Errant turn up, with us walking out with a burning factory as a backdrop?!?!?
Warhammer: Ah, sorry guys, I didn't actually need your backup, it wasn't as hard as I thought.
Felix: *now looking at Warhammer the way I was previously looking at Inkubus* You think that was *easy*!?!?
Greenlight: Geez, calm down, how long have you been working the streets, anyway?
Inkubus: You met him on his first Run.

Inkubus: When we get home we're breaking out the special bottle of Taéngelé
Felix: Not until our hands stop shaking.

Felix: Ok, I'm only to say this once - form some kind or perimeter. If you see anything coming out of that building that isn't a twenty-foot winged demon of fire, fucking kill it. And if it is a twenty-foot winged demon of fire, get the f**k out of its way.

Warhammer is feeling fairly chipper, and when he gets home intends to strip to his underwear and dance.

Inkubus: *sings* Take that old record off the shelf
Warhammer: Serenade me - it's time to power slide. With a shotgun. It'll look like air guitar.

What to do with our very sizeable pay for this nights work (oddly enough nobody seems inclined to chastise us about the property destruction, although some interesting rumours about what we faced are circulating in the Runner bulletin boards.)

Inkubus: F*** charity, I'll spend it all on booze and Cheerios
Titus: I assume the Cheerios are a local cheer-leading squad?

It's a couple of months until our next job offer.

Felix: Summer in Seattle. It's raining. Big f**king surprise.
GM: Who wants to be called with a job offer?
Warhammer: The troll.
Titus: Sure.
Felix: 'I've got whitefly in my garden, I was told you're good with plants.'

Greenlight however, has been given an offer he can't refuse. Somebody claims they have his missing brother at their mercy - interesting news, given Greenlight's entire family were kidnapped by Renraku Corp years ago) and they'll kill him if he doesn't tell them everything we find out about a job we haven't even been offered yet. Apparently it's something biological Aztechnology are working on. They also fit Greenlight with a bug, and they kill his brother if Greenlight talks to anybody about it, or takes it off. Greenlight, of course, quickly finds a way around this. Magical contact telepathy courtesy of Inkubus helps, while we're en route (dressed in our very best suits) to find out about the job in hand.

Labrat: It's not a bug, it's a locator
Greenlight: Muthaf**ka!
Inkubus: Sorry Labrat but I don't feel comfortable touching you for any longer than necessary.
Labrat: Do you have a problem with me being an Ork?
Inkubus: No, I have a problem with you being damn ugly. Hey, Bubbles! That night three weeks ago, did I have a problem with Orks?
Felix: *sigh* No.

We're meeting the client at the classiest restaurant in Seattle. Inkubus, as usual, thinks 'Chippendale Dancer' is the height of fashion.

Felix: Sigh. I'm assuming they never thought they'd need a 'No Shirt No Service' sign.

GM: The elevator deposits you at the very tip of the Seattle Needle.
Greenlight: Oh shit. Balance checks!

Inkubus: I hope you don't mind us eating, but it conceals the fact we're having a business meeting.
Warhammer: Plus we're hungry.

The client wants us to break into Aztechnology's research park, via the sewers, steal all the data pertaining to a particular project, and rendezvous at the docks. He's slightly concerned that whoever was blackmailing Greenlight already knows about the run. Felix is concerned because half his family work for Aztech, but keeps schtuum until we're somewhere secure.

Felix: I used to work for Aztech. My grandfather still does.
Greenlight: We guessed.
Labrat: A third of the country works for Aztech, one way or the other.
Felix: But they're not all mid-level execs.
Greenlight: We know.
Felix: How did you know I was from Aztlan, with a surname like Bethke?
Inkubus: You don't have your Seattle tan yet, dude.

It's a risky run - not least because it involves one of the major megacorps. Someway to block the sewers during our retreat is probably a must.

Felix: Maybe some sort of canister that expands into quickset foam?
Inkubus: That stuff only works in the movies.

And so off to plan.

Now the villanious versions that had to be mayorly rewritten;
1. Get the loot first, then start the superfight.
34. If you’re leaving scorch-marks, you need a bigger gun.
34b. If you're not even leaving sorch-marks, you should have run.
As hero in order to get the mooks to give up: "The bad news is you are not even leaving scorch-marks. The really bad news is, neither will I"

I kinda like the Maxims from Schlock Mercenary Verse:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schlock_Mercenary#The_Seventy_Maxims_of_Maximally_Effective_Mercenaries
 
While they are undoubtedly fitting for any dark champions game or supervillains/mooks, adapting them to a superheroes is tricky. Here is what I got:
For most you can repalce grunt with Sidekick or "Primus Agent", Sergeant with Sidekick and Officer with Hero and get something meaningfull.
 
1. Gather Evidence, then start a superfight
2. A Sidekick in motion outranks a hero that does not know what is going on.
3. An ordnance technician/mad scientist at a dead run outranks everybody. (afaik that is a Aphorism of the US Airforce too)
10. Sometimes the only way out is through. . . through the wall.
11. Everything is air-droppable at least once. Somethigns and somebodies more then once
14. "Mad Science" means never stopping to ask "what's the worst thing that could happen?"
15. Only you can prevent friendly fire
16. Your name is in the mouth of others: be sure it has teeth
17. The longer everything goes according to plan, the bigger the impending disaster
18. Sidekicks, if the Heroes are leading the Charge, watch out for an attack from the rear.
24. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a superweapon.
28. If the price of collateral damage is high enough, you might be able to get a win by not starting the fight.
29 The enemy of my enemy is my enemy's enemy. No more. No less.
32. Anything is amphibious if you can get it back out of the water
41. "Do you have a backup?" means "I can't fix this"
44. "If it will blow a hole in the ground. It will double as an entrenching tool"
47. "Don't expect the enemy to cooperate in the creation of your dream engagement."

As part of an ongoing attempt to help one of the team, a genetically engineered super soldier (TAO or Tactically Augmented Organism) learn there's more to life than combat missions, the female members of the team have an extended "Ladies' night" After hearing one of them refer to it as a slumber party, TAO does some online research that results in this statement:
 
"In preparation for the slumber party operation I have downloaded a list of appropriate activities: making humorously deceptive phone calls to former sexual partners, the consumption of frozen diary products and uncooked cookie mixture, the exchange of trivial unsupported facts about the social lives of others and, according to several of the training videos: mock combat with sleeping cushions while wearing diaphanous garments that leads to noncommittal lesbian sex play is a standard procedure."

The plan! Serve the designs of Chaos by going to an Imperial shrine world, infiltrating a convent, seducing a few of the nuns to Evil, and leaving them to spread the infection across the sector. This should do our reputations a lot of good - some of the Chaos Gods are impressed by that sort of audacity, at least when it works.

Jrska: With my Dark Soul I've already got two levels of Fear vs. the Ecclesiarchy. And since we're going in disguised as the Inquistion, they're right to be scared either way.

Such a plot also gives the GM a chance to dig out the Dark Heresy book that covers faith-based characters.

Pious Arsehole: I am a paragon of light! .... Where did this sword through my chest come from?
Jrska: Pity you weren't a paragon of dodge

GM: You're going to the Shrine World of Voluptua
Jrska: *giggle*
Cassius: Voluptua?! Really? We don't even need to change the name!
GM: Nestled between...
All: LOL
Cog: Please, tell us exactly what it's nestled between
GM: The omens are favourable, my lord

Jrska: Good little heretek *pats his head*
Cog: I swear I'll weld her door shut.
Cassius: You want to lock her in with all her toys?
Jrska: Cog, I've burnt out the motor in this one again, can you fix it?

Rather like warfare, space travel in the 40k setting is periods of boredom punctuated by terror. The terror comes while travelling through the Warp. Sub-light travel once we're back in real space and joining the queue of pilgrimage ships, Battle-nun transports, and hospital ships, is more than boring enough.

Aladar: I'm glad we live so long, these delays are terrible.
Cog: Lord Cassius is going to live forever, we'll die of old age.
Jrska: Speak for yourself, I'm going to be a demon princess *poses in imaginary Disney Princess dress*

One oddity about the branch of the Imperial cult on Voluptua is the way they downplay the actual identity of the saint they venerate. Not unheard of, but intriguing. It might be related to the minor export they have of psycho-reactive minerals. Perhaps the nameless saint was a psyker themselves? Not something they'd want to advertise.

We decide a low-key entry is best. Loudly proclaiming our 'Inquisitorial' status will attract too much attention. A covert insertion past all those paranoid starships too risky. So we simply announce our arrival and let them worry for themselves.

Jrska: This is the Inquistorial ship 'Chains of Judgement'. Make ready a berth. Any delay will be noted.

Jrska convinces her master that it will be more believable if she pretends to be the one in charge - Cassius cautiously agrees, but assures her of his swift retribution if she fucks up. Since Cassius and Jrska are slightly more difficult to disguise, we'll send Aladar and Cog ahead to arrange landing permission and transport.

Jrska: The most important part of a disguise is to distract the observer from the actually distinguishing features. May I suggest the Spanish Galleon? *holds up giant black codpiece*
Cassius: Well, nobody will be looking at his face...
Jrska: Exactly.

True, neither Cog nor Aladar are quite as skilled in lying as Jrska, but we do have micro-bead comlinks.

Aladar: Jrska can coach you over the micro-bead. Her tongue is in your ear.
Jrska: blalalalalalah.

Aladar: I don't think I could handle a minion
Jrska: We know. We don't trust you to be responsible for anybody. Even yourself.

The cleric that greets us asks us not to bring any heavy weapons down into the shrine-cities, despite his cautious welcome.

Customs-Priest: We don't desire damage to our shrines and temples.
Jrska: Heritage listed buildings...
Aladar: We will of course require our personal arms.
Jrska: Nothing rated for urban renewal.

Aladar is bringing a lascannon anyway. He justifies this on the grounds it's fitted with suspensions, so isn't heavy at all. The suspicion from the Sisters of Battle that escort Cog and Aladar around the spacedock is heavy, however. They ask a few questions about our purpose here, and Cassius' suggested imperial proverbs aren't dissuading them.

Jrska: The Emperor favours the closed mind.
Cassius: Blessed is the mind too small for doubt.

Aladar: There is a person in the tower with information we require.

Jrska: Why not tell them the truth? We have information that agents of the enemy intend to infiltrate the tower.

Aladar completely botches his explanations. Possibly it's the giant codpiece, or the way he forgot to come up with a fake name.

Jrska: Why do we keep sending him on mission-critical tasks?
Cassius: *headdesk* I. Don't. Know.

Happily, he manages to recover. However, it doesn't bode well. And the Sister's distinctly alarmed reaction when we mention the Tower of Silence - the convent where Sisters go after a crisis of faith - is very odd. Perhaps there's already something going on they don't want the Inquisition knowing about?

Cassius: 'To question is to doubt'

Jrska: 'We could tell you, but then we'd have to kill you.'

The escorts asks for time to prepare. Perhaps they can bring the person we want to meet to meet us, rather than disturb the convent?

Jrska: It does not suit our purposes to give them any time to prepare.

They reluctantly agree, but instead use the time to organise a company of Battle-nuns to amass near the convent. Just in case there HAS been corruption, and we need back-up. Although they insist it is unlikely any infiltration of the convent has taken place.

Sister of Battle: The sisters come into contact with each other, but not outside the convent.
Cassius: The convent of the Blended Petals
Jrska: The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence.
Sister of Battle: They interact-
All : LOL
Jrska: I want to film this entire mission. We'll have a home movie that would make Ken Russell green with envy.

We start hitting problems immediately - the sheer piety of the locals is grating intensely on our nerves. Judging by the way we have to keep spending Infamy points to reroll willpower checks, we're finding it very difficult to not just run amok through the crowd, like wolves among sheeple.

Jrska: It's not that I hate the Ecclesiarchy - hate is too Khornate. But I do consider them with withering contempt. They're so rabidly anti-fun.

Local Shuttle Pilot : kumbaya, my lord, kumbaya....
Jrska: I'll give him a kumbaya....

Jrska: It's the stench of incense and unwashed pilgrims.

Even Cassius is having difficulty in not lashing out.

Jrska: Obviously the way i'm pretending to be in charge is rubbing you the wrong way.

GM: Some of the more annoying street-preachers are going to be found dead in alleys later, but you manage to refrain from killing them right there in front of the crowd.

Jrska: I've only been here ten minutes and I'm already in serious need of relaxation.
Cog: You're pent up

Once we're out of town ( overtaking the convoy of Sisters who 'just happen' to be going out for training near the convent ) we can relax and decide which of the Ruinous Powers to dedicate the mission to.

Jrska: Dedicating this compact to Slaanesh will help us fit the tongue to the ear. *long, slow, lick of her muzzle.*

Goals of the compact include taking some of the sisters with us when we go - Jrska has another. Seducing one of the nuns and leaving her behind when we go. Mostly because it'll be an amusing challenge.

The Tower of Silence is a very typical fortress-nunnery. The psychic aura around the plateau is more unusual.

Jrska: So they've built the nunnery on top of an outcropping of psychically active rock? Gee, that was bright.

We're tracked by heavy bolter emplacements as we march up to the door. Evidently they take their vows of seclusion seriously.

Aladar: I wonder if those are manned.
Jrska and Aladar's: Womanned.
Aladar: Sorry, I didn't know we were being politically correct today.

Jrska bluffs the group inside.

Jrska: We are here on the business of the Inquistion. ( Which is true, since the business of the Inquisition is heresy )

Jrska: We have become aware that agents of Chaos have, or are going to, infiltrate your convent. We are here to determine whether or not this is true.

The Celestan in charge of the convent is mostly convinced, but remains suspicious of Aladar and his Spanish Galleon.

Jrska: Excuse his appearance and behaviour. We find it useful to present a distraction from the actual investigation at times. Think of him as a useful idiot.
Aladar: I grin and bear it.
Jrska OoC: And the rest of us are thinking he's not even useful.

Cassius intends to stay silent, hulking, and generically threatening throughout our stay at the convent. As long as he keeps the robes on, the Sisters can speculate and worry all they like. Is he some kind of servitor? An Arcoflagellant just waiting for the command word to curbstomp everything in sight? Or even a bound daemonhost, locked in a warded exoskeleton to keep it under control? Either way, he can keep passing on telepathic orders to the rest of us. It's not like Jrska has much practise at resisting stray thoughts.

Jrska: My brain is as wide open as my legs.

The Celestan wants to know more details about the rumours that brought us here. We fob her off with ambiguous platitudes. The news that the convent hasn't had a new inmate in 20 years does put a slight crimp
in our plans, but we remain confident. Jrska effortlessly passes Cog off as a tech-priest here to review the security systems. ALL the security systems.

Cassius: Those who keep silent can hear.
GM: What does that even mean???
Cassius: Whatever we want it too.

Aladar: I'll follow Cog
Cog: If you help me in any way I will drop you off a balcony.

Cassius: 'The seeds have been planted, and now they have come to harvest.'

Jrska takes a particular pleasure in close examination of the Sisters escorting us, because her Dark Soul is putting them all on edge. They even quietly converse with the Celestan about it.

Battle-nuns: 'She's really scary, miss!'

Jrska: You seem uncomfortable. Guilty conscience, perhaps?

Jrska: Battle-nuns are expected to operate under there own resources for extended periods. Basically, sisters are doing it for themselves.
Cassius, Cog, GM: ...*headdesk*

GM: The security room probably has a tech-priest. Going with the theme, it's most likely a woman - tech-priests aren't fussed by that sort of thing.
Jrska: Tech-priestesses have Etheric Beam Locators.

Cog: What does she look like?
Aladar: She's hot.
Jrska: What does your phrenological assessment of her tell you - 'hmm, good Bump of Technological Innovation there'?

GM: Cog is getting flustered trying to talk to the tech-priestess.
Jrska: It's those double D Etheric Beam Locators.

Cog eventually finds his tongue, and overcomes the tech-priests suspicions by berating her about her maintenance schedules and the way mysterious flickers and rolling security blackouts plague the nunnery. As she flusters, Aladar goes to check the video bank, and prod a few buttons, despite the battle-nun escort.

Aladar: Done any worse and I'd have accidentally switched on the porn channel.
Jrska: AKA the recreation room camera
Cog: All that volleyball team
Cassius: *Headdesk.* I'm used to this sort of thing from these two, but it's disconcerting from you.
Cog's player: I'm sorry, I haven't been sleeping well.

The Sister wants to know why Aladar was checking the video feeds.

Aladar: I'm his assistant.
Jrska: That doesn't reflect well on Cog.
GM: It's hard to tell through the helmet but she seems to be raising an eyebrow.
Cog: Sometimes I need an idiot to test live power-cables.
Aladar: Why am I the butt-monkey?
Jrska: Because you are.

Jrska: I'm worried that army of battle-nuns is outside to stop us getting away if we DO find corruption. Kill us to protect the Sisters' reputation. 'The convent mysteriously blew up. What Acolytes?'

At least the inspection is given us a good understanding of the layout, defences, equipment and possible escape routes - exactly as Jrska planned. The fact that all the nuns, not only our escorts, are kept fully trained with bolt guns to hand and ammo under construction even as we pass by is somewhat worrisome. But we do learn the armoury is stocked with anti-demon rounds. Valuable, if damned souls like ourselves could even handle them without third-degree burns.

GM: No, there's no Pentient Engine here.
Cassius: Pentient or Penitent?
GM: Penitent.
Jrska: 'Penitent Inside'

Aladar actually manages to resist Cassius' telepathic SMS.

Cassius: You actually succeed the one time we want you to fail? You fail at failing!
Jrska: You're surprised you couldn't get your thoughts into his head? Why? Nothing else sinks in.
Cog: He's so thick nothing gets through.

Meanwhile, Jrska is off questioning the youngest inductee to the convent. She's been here 20 years, ever since she survived a demonic incursion that killed all her battle-sisters. Sister Joanna flinches and avoid looking at us, Cassius looms, Jrska asks probing questions, and our escort visibly twitch when she brings up the matter of dreams. Clearly *something* is up at the Tower of Silence.

Joanna is also alarmingly perceptive - she immediately picks Cassius as a psyker, but fortunately Jrska has already ordered the escort from the room before Joanna drops her other bombshell.

Sister Joanna: I don't understand... Why are a mutant and a psyker of the Angels of Death here to see me?

Evidently the situation at the convent is not quite as we believed - it's not just the religiously doubting that come here in retreat. This is where the sisters send the ones that actually go nuts. And keeps them fully armed. On top of a mountain of psychic-reactive crystal.

Jrska OoC: 'I've got a good idea - Let's house these nuclear terrorists in a uranium mine!'

Ramza the Belligerent (CN M Human Artificer) - My character
Kimpa Proudheart (NG F Leonin Ranger) - My wife
Karee (NG F Human Fighter) - the DM's wife
Nodwick - human henchman
 
We were hired to journey into the sewers to find out what was causing that awful stench. As it turns out, the giant s***-eating beetles in the sewers were being poached by kobolds.
 
Ramza (After frying a large group of them with a well-place fireball): "Yes folks, come on down to Colonel Ramza's for some deep fried Kobold Nuggets!"
 
Turns out a Black Dragon was preventing the Kobolds from reaching their regular hunting grounds.
 
Kimpa - "Ooh! Big scaley-faced kitty! I wanna pet it!"
Ramza - "No! No petting the dragon! It will wake up and spray acid on you!"
Karee - "Is that what you are calling it nowadays?"
 
After killing the dragon, I skinned it.
 
DM: "You took craft taxidermy?"
Ramza: "I'm an artificer, so I add +4 to all craft skills plus the +5 from my high INT Score. Plus I have a wand of Magecraft for another +5."
DM: "Why do we even have dice?"
 
Later:
 
DM: "Okay, so Nodwick has finished hauling up your dragon hides and you spend the next few days curing them. Is there anything else you want to do before you leave?"
Ramza: "Well, now that you mention it, I have a list of modifications I want to make to the airship."
DM: "That's a big list."
Ramza (pointing at my wife): "That's what she said."
*My wife slaps me*
 
After we are FINALLY ready to disembark
DM: "Okay, it will take you a month to reach the lost ruins. Ramza, you said you were stocking up on various raw materials for you to craft magic items. What are you working on?"
Ramza: "I have a list, complete with what I need to roll to successfully craft."
DM: "That's a big list."
Ramza: "I feel as though we've had this conversation before...."
 
Just as we are about to disembark we are attacked by a necromancer.
 
Ramza: "Didn't we just kill this asshole?"
Karee: "He must have gotten better."
Kimpa: "I don't recall Ramza turning him into a newt."
Ramza (after getting double-teamed by a pair of wights): Less talky-talky, more plinky-plinky!
 
(plinking is the term we use for archery).
 
DM: "The necromancer pulls a scroll and starts to cast."
Ramza: "Spellcraft check! 32!"
DM: "Cure Critical Wounds."
Ramza: "Screw that! Scorching ray on the scroll! 21 to hit!"
DM (Rolls on the spell-misshap chart for damaged scrolls): "Ooookay. He is unsuccessful at casting Cure Critical Wounds, and instead casts (Rolls) Flamestrike. Centered on him. 7d6 damage. He is burned to a crisp
Karee: "Hey! That hits me too!"
Ramza: "Sorry! I loot his body."
Kimpa: "Wait a second. I double-tap him. *plink-plink* Okay it's safe.
DM: "You find a wand of animate dead with 6 charges.
Ramza: "Sweet! I reanimate the f***er to keep him from coming back to life."
Karee: "What are you going to do with the zombie?"
Ramza: "Well I've always wanted my own butler."
Kimpa: "What does that make Nodwick?"
Ramza: "Bait."

I guess Dhorz would be talking to himself for a while. Shouting too. Is there a word for flirting with death and oneself at the same time?
 
Because judging by this part I think I know who he plays:
"Sister Dominque: The Emperor guides my hand.
Roland the Rat OoC: That sounds so wrong.
Sister Dominque OoC: It's hard to give up sexual innuendo. Really, really hard.
Vin OoC: That's what she said."