The Train Job, Spirit of the Century style
I played a game of Spirit of the Century last night... It was a good time.
As far as I'm concerned, it's basically Exalted played with badass normals and set in the 1920s.
I'll spare you the rest of the session behind cuts, but here's an outline:
I should probably start with a cast of characters...
To set the scene, we are at a party preceding the 1922 Nobel Prize ceremony. Of note is the recipient for physics, Neils Bohr, who is receiving it for his work on energy levels and the structure of the atom. After a short bit, a bunch of men with guns burst in, order everyone to the floor, and start taking the Nobel laureates aside. Their stated aim is that they are taking them hostage to force the League of Nations (whose head is the recipient of the prize for peace this year) to reduce the requirements of the Treaty of Paris which ended the Great War. We stay on the ground for awhile, before remembering that mooks in this game really are mooks, and giving them a good thrashing. They go retreat, and we give chase, for awhile, resulting in a rather interesting and excessively well-balanced car chase. This goes on for awhile until we put enough bullets in their car that they pull over and concede. Interrogation reveals little, as it turns out that they weren't the plot hook after all. The plot hook was in the other castle.
We return to the party to find out that everyone is abuzz with the news that Niels Bohr's notes had been stolen. He tells us that, in fact, they contained plans for a so-called quantum unraveller. This is an obvious plot device, as it is explained that, in quantum mechanics, waveforms collapse under certain circumstances (like, you know, observing them), and this device collapses them harder. As it turns out, this releases a remarkable amount of energy, producing something at least as powerful as a nuclear weapon. After the ceremony, we take a quick flight back to Bohr's home of Copenhagen, to discover that, not only were his notes stolen, but the prototype unraveller in his lab had been stolen as well. However, someone dropped a hint of a particular hotel, where, it turns out, they have rented out the entire top floor. Some inquiry with the cleaning staff reveal that they have been barred from a couple of the rooms. An obvious target! Now, how to get in without too much trouble...
None of us could figure out a way to break in and examine things which wouldn't result in us fighting at ridiculous odds again, and we hadn't exactly won the fight before the Nobel Prize ceremony; we merely forced their retreat. At this point, rntz suggested we hire some prostitutes as an excuse to get Ruby into one of the rooms. Apparently he was joking. However, lacking a better plan, we hired the relevant women. Ruby, with her elite team of hookers, went to go invite the German terrorists to have a night of enjoyment. This worked acceptably to thin out their numbers in one of the rooms, but that was about it. It also shut Sully down for a good while, in which he went to get a drink and regain his composure. Eventually, we went back to the room and broke in, using a special extra ability on Pete's arm to deliver sleeping gas to those in the room. It had all the stuff stolen from Mr. Bohr, as well as several more constructed quantum unravellers, one of which could likely have obliterated the entire city. We puttered around trying to figure out what to do now before Ruby went to go stand watch outside. Unfortunately, it turned out that the bad guy and his minions had all gathered around the door in that time. A staring match ensued, wherein he demanded we leave his stuff behind, while we refused. The banter made it reasonably clear that the villain was none other than Dougal's archnemesis Count Conquest. Eventually, Dougal and Blaine climbed out the window, while Pete used his sleeping gas again, putting most of the people in the room to sleep. Following Dougal's lead, the two of us who had escaped sprinted back up to the top floor, and a quick fight ensued, ending when, after tossing the villain's large firearm out the window, he made an exit via the same window, warning of a bomb. Dougal convinced the remaining mooks to run, and we found the bomb, which Pete handily disarmed. Searching the rest of the floor revealed a train manifest for travel to Germany, with implications that the plan was to detonate a quantum unraveller in Hamburg and try to blame the incident on Denmark. This means we need to catch a train before it gets there, and the train had already left. Sounds like it's time for a train job, and we have just the pilot to pull it off!
After Pete insists on altering the landing gear to latch onto a box car, as opposed to Blaine's plan of just having people jump off the back of the plane with speed matched to the train we sought, we go off to catch a train. We arrive with it snaking through hills. I really wish I could see this in a movie; it seems like it would be epic. It'd also be really hard on the stunt pilot, I expect. Anyway, we come in and land on the train. We wanted to arrive near the front, but the Count has his huge gun again, and getting close threatens to make holes in Blaine's airplane, so we back off and plunk down somewhere in the middle. At this point, we debate just disconnecting the back part of the train, as had been our original plan, but Dougal is encouraged to chase after the Count because Pete thinks he can handle the bomb himself. As such, the party is split: Blaine and Dougal go to take in the Count, who poses an obvious threat for anyone assaulting his person, while Pete and Ruby go to the back of the train with the bomb. Unfortunately, back there, they encounter an assassin by the pseudonym of the yellow knife. (Incidentally, the pulp genre in general, at least as it was originally written, is pretty racist. I bet you can guess the general part of the world this guy comes from. c.c) Because neither Pete nor Ruby has anywhere near the capability to defeat him, they eventually buy him off, offering his life (there's a bomb there, after all) and a large sum of money, if he will let Pete disarm the bomb. Meanwhile, Blaine and Dougal have gotten in a firefight with the Count's bodyguards. Eventually, after clearing some of them off a flatbed of logs, Blaine goes back to his airplane to force the Count off the roof of the car he is on, while Dougal provides covering fire, particularly with the aim of disabling the Count's large cannon, which he succeeds at for the second time. (The first time was in the hotel.) Blaine buzzes the Count and his men, and, after another short exchange, Dougal convinces the count to come quietly. Blaine brings his plane into pick people up, and everyone flies off to clean up loose ends, at least until the next adventure...
All in all, a good time.
As far as I'm concerned, it's basically Exalted played with badass normals and set in the 1920s.
I'll spare you the rest of the session behind cuts, but here's an outline:
I should probably start with a cast of characters...
- Played by Michael "rntz" Arntzenius is Dougal Daring, a half-breed South African of a Scottish father and a native mother. He was in the fighting at Gallipoli and, when he became disillusioned with the campaign, he sabotaged several supply depots on his own side. He is a capable and veteran warrior and now captain of a seaworthy vessel. Additionally, he has a personal vendetta against one Count Conquest, who seeks to create strife and murdered the former captain of his ship.
- Played by Matthew Glisson is Piston Pete, an obsessive engineer who, when he lost his left arm, replaced it with a mechanical one that contains his entire toolbox and practically his entire workshop, as well as a combat blade. He works for the British military doing this and that. At one point, he captained a zeppelin, but it has since been grounded. His contacts within the British military give him phenomenal resources, as well. He lives for tinkering with things, and quickly gets bored if there is neither anything to slice up nor anything to fix or build.
- Played by Laura Abbott is Esther "Ruby" DeRoux, a hobbyist woman of the night who has been pretty nearly disowned by her (wealthy) family. Of American origin, she has discovered that she has a knack for getting people to tell her things they probably shouldn't be revealing, so, these days, she travels the world tracking down evil or criminal organizations. Her feminine wiles and disregard for propriety have served her well where her inability to hold up against skilled warriors would have failed her.
- Played by Richard Halstead is Benjamin Blaine, a freelance pilot who has achieved reasonable success flying odd cargoes odder places. Having lied about his age and joined the French Foreign Legion to fly planes in the Great War without losing his American citizenship, he demonstrated a virtuosity in the air and a general dislike for fighting. These days, he seems to get a fair amount of business from Ruby, allowing her to better chase her leads, despite her distaste for flying.
To set the scene, we are at a party preceding the 1922 Nobel Prize ceremony. Of note is the recipient for physics, Neils Bohr, who is receiving it for his work on energy levels and the structure of the atom. After a short bit, a bunch of men with guns burst in, order everyone to the floor, and start taking the Nobel laureates aside. Their stated aim is that they are taking them hostage to force the League of Nations (whose head is the recipient of the prize for peace this year) to reduce the requirements of the Treaty of Paris which ended the Great War. We stay on the ground for awhile, before remembering that mooks in this game really are mooks, and giving them a good thrashing. They go retreat, and we give chase, for awhile, resulting in a rather interesting and excessively well-balanced car chase. This goes on for awhile until we put enough bullets in their car that they pull over and concede. Interrogation reveals little, as it turns out that they weren't the plot hook after all. The plot hook was in the other castle.
We return to the party to find out that everyone is abuzz with the news that Niels Bohr's notes had been stolen. He tells us that, in fact, they contained plans for a so-called quantum unraveller. This is an obvious plot device, as it is explained that, in quantum mechanics, waveforms collapse under certain circumstances (like, you know, observing them), and this device collapses them harder. As it turns out, this releases a remarkable amount of energy, producing something at least as powerful as a nuclear weapon. After the ceremony, we take a quick flight back to Bohr's home of Copenhagen, to discover that, not only were his notes stolen, but the prototype unraveller in his lab had been stolen as well. However, someone dropped a hint of a particular hotel, where, it turns out, they have rented out the entire top floor. Some inquiry with the cleaning staff reveal that they have been barred from a couple of the rooms. An obvious target! Now, how to get in without too much trouble...
None of us could figure out a way to break in and examine things which wouldn't result in us fighting at ridiculous odds again, and we hadn't exactly won the fight before the Nobel Prize ceremony; we merely forced their retreat. At this point, rntz suggested we hire some prostitutes as an excuse to get Ruby into one of the rooms. Apparently he was joking. However, lacking a better plan, we hired the relevant women. Ruby, with her elite team of hookers, went to go invite the German terrorists to have a night of enjoyment. This worked acceptably to thin out their numbers in one of the rooms, but that was about it. It also shut Sully down for a good while, in which he went to get a drink and regain his composure. Eventually, we went back to the room and broke in, using a special extra ability on Pete's arm to deliver sleeping gas to those in the room. It had all the stuff stolen from Mr. Bohr, as well as several more constructed quantum unravellers, one of which could likely have obliterated the entire city. We puttered around trying to figure out what to do now before Ruby went to go stand watch outside. Unfortunately, it turned out that the bad guy and his minions had all gathered around the door in that time. A staring match ensued, wherein he demanded we leave his stuff behind, while we refused. The banter made it reasonably clear that the villain was none other than Dougal's archnemesis Count Conquest. Eventually, Dougal and Blaine climbed out the window, while Pete used his sleeping gas again, putting most of the people in the room to sleep. Following Dougal's lead, the two of us who had escaped sprinted back up to the top floor, and a quick fight ensued, ending when, after tossing the villain's large firearm out the window, he made an exit via the same window, warning of a bomb. Dougal convinced the remaining mooks to run, and we found the bomb, which Pete handily disarmed. Searching the rest of the floor revealed a train manifest for travel to Germany, with implications that the plan was to detonate a quantum unraveller in Hamburg and try to blame the incident on Denmark. This means we need to catch a train before it gets there, and the train had already left. Sounds like it's time for a train job, and we have just the pilot to pull it off!
After Pete insists on altering the landing gear to latch onto a box car, as opposed to Blaine's plan of just having people jump off the back of the plane with speed matched to the train we sought, we go off to catch a train. We arrive with it snaking through hills. I really wish I could see this in a movie; it seems like it would be epic. It'd also be really hard on the stunt pilot, I expect. Anyway, we come in and land on the train. We wanted to arrive near the front, but the Count has his huge gun again, and getting close threatens to make holes in Blaine's airplane, so we back off and plunk down somewhere in the middle. At this point, we debate just disconnecting the back part of the train, as had been our original plan, but Dougal is encouraged to chase after the Count because Pete thinks he can handle the bomb himself. As such, the party is split: Blaine and Dougal go to take in the Count, who poses an obvious threat for anyone assaulting his person, while Pete and Ruby go to the back of the train with the bomb. Unfortunately, back there, they encounter an assassin by the pseudonym of the yellow knife. (Incidentally, the pulp genre in general, at least as it was originally written, is pretty racist. I bet you can guess the general part of the world this guy comes from. c.c) Because neither Pete nor Ruby has anywhere near the capability to defeat him, they eventually buy him off, offering his life (there's a bomb there, after all) and a large sum of money, if he will let Pete disarm the bomb. Meanwhile, Blaine and Dougal have gotten in a firefight with the Count's bodyguards. Eventually, after clearing some of them off a flatbed of logs, Blaine goes back to his airplane to force the Count off the roof of the car he is on, while Dougal provides covering fire, particularly with the aim of disabling the Count's large cannon, which he succeeds at for the second time. (The first time was in the hotel.) Blaine buzzes the Count and his men, and, after another short exchange, Dougal convinces the count to come quietly. Blaine brings his plane into pick people up, and everyone flies off to clean up loose ends, at least until the next adventure...
All in all, a good time.