Shub-Niggurath stirs in her slumber, threatening to awaken as her spawn begin to surface all around the world. Can musician Jim Culver and martial artist Lily Chen prevent the unthinkable, or is the Earth doomed?
". . . send the abomination back where it belongs." Lore 4 -1 +1[Lantern] [dice]0[/dice]
I'm really regretting the loss of my Blessed Condition. Back Injury Condition gained.
JULIUS is pretty clued up on the whole business: disaster for mankind, end of the world, etc., so he and Jim venture into the woods on the trail of the Goat Spawn. Half a mile from camp they come to a glade with a brook trickling through it, on its bank are the eviscerated remnants of several people. Julius claps his hand over his mouth and convulses, but spew still escapes between his fingers.
"Keep away from me," says Jim. He turns over a flap of flesh with his boot, which reveals a rib bone, "Ugh, disgusting."
"When d'ya think it happened?" says Julius, wiping his fingers on a fern.
"Recently," replies Jim laconically, feeling rather apprehensive. There is a splash in the brook behind him. He turns and beholds a naked woman with red smeared over her face, she is slurping on white sausages--entrails. Julius spews again at sight of the abomination, Jim wracks his memory for a Spell to send it back where it belongs. The Goat Spawn charges Jim, he panics, it butts him in the chest, throwing Jim against a rock wall.
OOC,We just can't catch a break! :cry: Passing that test would have been wonderful. Not only would you have had the second Clue, but retreating Doom might have bought us an extra turn before Shubby wakes up. I guess next turn I'll stay where I am, spending my first Action to Rest and then my next to turn some Health into Sanity. But let's see what the Mythos card does to us first. I just hope I can solve this Rumor before it's too late.
Cultist -> Space 14--11th Monster on game board, advance Doom by 2 (down to 4); discard Eldritch tokens (2 down to 3); Jim's Hallucinations Condition, Test Will 3 + Back Injury Condition, Test Strength 2 [dice]0[/dice] [dice]1[/dice]
Turn 12 Action Phase Lily finds a cave in the jungle to hide inside and enters a meditative trance. She feels much more confident and determined when she comes around.
OOC,[b]Lily[/b] regains 2 Sanity during the Mythos phase.
Action 1: Rest
Action 2: Spend 1 Health. Restore 1 Sanity.
Rest, and discard Hallucinations & Back Injury on a 5 or 6 [dice]0[/dice] [dice]1[/dice]
Conjuration Spell, Lore 4 +1 [dice]2[/dice]
.45 Automatic gained, Arcane Scholar to Reserve.
Turn 12 Encounter Phase
WIth fresh determination, Lily sneaks back to the island village as darkness sets in. She swipes a hooded robe hanging from a clothesline and puts it on to disguise herself, then joins a gathering around the bonfire dressed similarly. One of them has on a gaudily decorated robe that marks him as the chief. Fortunately, the villagers speak a dialect of Chinese, though Lily can tell they are somehow ethnically different. A Westerner might not be able to tell the difference, but she could. Then again, they had been able to determine that she was not one of them last time. This time they have no idea "Our rituals have successfully weakened the barriers between worlds!" proclaimed the chief. So that's why this has been happening, she thinks. "Tonight we shall shatter them once and for all! Chaugnar Faugn shall stride the world and assume his rightful place!" He raises an odd, misshapen object in both hands high over his head. "With this magic dingus, we shall open the door for him to arrive! Behold! Is this not the biggest dingus you have ever seen?"
"Dingus!" chants the mob. "Dingus! Dingus!"
Lily pushes her way forward. "May I touch the dingus?" she asks.
The chief brings it down in front of him and holds it forward. "Yes, but be careful with it. It is very fragile, and the only one of its kind. If anything were to happen to it, all of our plans will be ruined."
"Oh, really?" Lily reaches out for the dingus and lays her hand on it, then snaps it in half. "Oops!"
The chief gets down in his knees and sobs. "No! My dingus! Not on the very brink of success!" He looks at the assembled crowd through a curtain of tears. "Oh, yeah. Kill her."
Lily battles her way out of the village and returns to the boat, where she casts off, leaving the angry mob behind. "If we still had the boat that brought us here, we could have chased her," said one of them. "Why did we burn it in the bonfire?"
"Well, the world was supposed to end tonight," said another. "We weren't supposed to need it any more."
"Well, that's clearly not going to happen now. Let's go eat the chief."
Well done, Lily, that was a close call. Now, if Jim can gain a Clue. . . .
Turn 12 Encounter Phase, Space 4 (Wilderness)
". . . evade all of their traps." Observation 2 +1[Lantern] [dice]0[/dice]
"LET'S take a look." Jim's torso is tilted forward and he feels his shirt rolled up. Julius whistles, and then says: "Your spine has been grazed,--it's all red raw--and there's bruises developing--pretty yellow and purple blotches."
"Thanks for the description," gasps Jim testily. "Make a fire, Julius, while I rest; among my stuff you'll find a billy can, and here,"--he produces a handful of tea leaves from his jacket pocket--"brew these--nice 'n' strong, mind." Julius busies himself preparing a hot drink; Jim tries muttering the archaic Spanish syllables again and is delighted when a .45 Automatic drops, with a thunk, upon the pine needles.
~
"Ahh bisto!" says Jim after he sips the scolding tea. "So what happened to the She-devil?"
"I have no idea," answers Julius; "I was too busy being sick." They both continue drinking. Far away, but coming nearer, a choral humming is audible--it has a sad, sweet and an unearthly note to it. "Oh, no," whispers Julius; Jim's enamel mug wilts in his grip and the tea spills on the forest floor.
"Run," says Jim, "Run!" They splash along the brook in hope that it will cover their tracks. A willow overhangs the brook, they hide beneath its leaves in deep shadow. They peek out, back to their fire with its billy can--still steaming--suspended above the flames. Five minutes wait and then the Goat Spawn trots into view, she is followed by others, all naked like Jim's erstwhile bed-friend but old and fat, male and female, their skin filthily dirty. The Goat Spawn snuffles at the ground where Jim and Julius were sat and dips her finger inside the billy can, she yelps. The creatures all bray at once, and then move away, humming their queer notes beneath the trees.
Turn 12 Mythos Phase
Advance the Omen: blue constellation
; Doom advances 2 (4 down to 2).
Reckoning Effects: Dark Young [dice]0[/dice]
Cultist -> Space 19--13th Monster on game board, advance Doom by 2 (2 down to 0) **SHUB-NIGGURATH AWAKENS**
Jim's Hallucinations Condition, Test Will 3 + Back Injury Condition, Test Strength 2 [dice]1[/dice] [dice]2[/dice]
Spawn Gates: London <- Lloigor.
Text Effect: Lily may move the Omen.
**
It's over, we are overwhelmed and our doom is inevitable. The Heart of Africa is infested by a Cthonian, Shub, 2 x Goat Spawn and Dark Young--that is 5, and I peeked at the next Mythos card, it has an Omen effect, which will guarantee a 6th Monster.
JIM stares hard after the departing Cultists for a full ten minutes to ensure that they have gone; their choral humming has long since faded, only a whisper of the unearthly notes play in his mind. "They've gone," he says at length. Jim turns to Julius who is shaking, his head thrown back and mouth open--the Goat Spawn is feasting on his exposed neck.
~
The celebration in the woods is chaotic. The mindless euphoria of the Thousand Young who are running around between the trees, their arms constantly being flung upward to the stars, is a sickening spectacle that Jim watches with one eye, the other is bloodied and useless. He is unbound but the tortured man simply lies on the ground, unable to raise his head even. The perfume of the pine needles remind him of the dish of pot pourri of which his mother was so proud and this is a comfort to him in his final moments. An enormous cloud from which dozens of tentacles extend and retract covers the sky--he beholds Shub-Niggurath's true, terrifying form, Jim is face to face with true, primal horror.
After Lily's boat returns to Cape Town, she hears horrifying stories of many strange beasts seen in the jungles to the north. She hurries off in that direction, fearing that she's too late, but determined to go down swinging.
OOC,Oh, nutbunnies! :cry: I take it that London is a green comet Gate? If it's not, all I have to do is move the Omen just before that one to buy myself the one turn I need to make it to the Heart of Africa and start squishing monsters. I had been planning to Acquire Assets in Cape Town this coming turn and pick up the Syndicate Agent (with a Bank Loan) as well as the Tear Gas or Fishing Net if I rolled well on Influence. That would have given me 10 base Strength in a fight, not even counting rerolls. Of course, I still could have missed with every roll again, but the odds of that go down the more dice I get to throw. If only we'd been a little luckier, we'd have had a chance. Losing that Blessing really messed us up. If you'd succeeded at getting the Clue and retreating Doom by 1, we'd have had another turn before she woke up. Or if I'd succeeded one turn earlier in solving the Rumor, I could have been in Cape Town already.
London Gate is a blue constellation. I had thought the San Francisco Gate and its green comet was still on the game board, but Jim closed that one. However . . . take a look at the Text Effect of the next Mythos card.
OOC,We're still not licked yet! First the Omen will advance to the green comet, then the monster surge will hit. Since there are no green comet Gates currently open, a new Gate will open automatically and a monster will spawn there. If that new Gate has a green comet, and there's a good chance considering how few Gates are still left to draw, then we can use the text effect (which is carried out last) to discard that Gate and gain another turn. Counting the Gates, the only one that has not yet opened is Istanbul, but I don't remember which symbol is on it.
Yes, it's a Gate at Istanbul with a green comet. Lily should have her "blaze of glory." Turn 13 Jim ". . .determine the ritual's purpose." Observation 2 +1[Lantern] [dice]0[/dice]
and Lily has an encounter in Cape Town:
Turn 13 Action Phase Lily returns to Cape Town one evening, but when she arrives there is panic in the air. Boys are selling newspapers with garish headlines mentioning a large number of beasts sighted in central Africa, slaughtering many people. She buys a paper and reads, her heart sinking with every word. The horde is moving south, judging by the trail of destruction it is leaving. No witnesses have gotten close enough to the beasts to give a good description and lived, but she is sure what it means. I'm too late! she thinks. The stars are right, and Shub-Niggurath has risen! My only hope is to slay her before she can overwhelm the world. But I need more time! She looks up at the stars in the heavens imploringly, and to her surprise they move backwards a little. Could it be? Do I have a chance after all?
Wasting no time, Lily purchases a fishing net from a fisherman at the harbor, then goes to a nearby dive bar where she has heard elements of the criminal underworld are known to gather. She strides in as if she owns the place and has every right to be there. "Take me to your boss," she tells the two mooks who block her path. Perhaps seeing the determination in her eyes, they do so without hesitation. They show her to a back room through a beaded curtain, where a dark-haired woman in a very expensive dress sits at a private table.
The woman motions for Lily to sit. "I'm Jacqueline Bauer," she says. "What is your business here?"
"I'm Lily Chen. No doubt you've heard of the beasts rampaging to the north that are on their way here."
"It's all anyone talks about now. What about them?"
"I mean to stop them."
Jacqueline laughs. "All by yourself?"
"No. I'd like your assistance."
"And how do you propose to stop an army of beasts? Whole villages have been wiped out! Thousands are dead!"
"By slaying their queen."
"And why should I stick my neck out?"
"They'll be here within days, and this city will be destroyed. And it won't stop there. The whole world will be overrun unless they're stopped now!"
"You sound like one of the superstitious natives. They're constantly going on about how this is the end of the world."
"They're right - unless we take immediate action. You're not afraid, are you?"
"No more than you. I'll tell you what. I'll come with you on your little safari, in return for a favor to be named later. One day, perhaps tomorrow, perhaps years from now, I will ask something of you. It could be anything. Whatever it is, you will do it. It may never happen, but if it does, you will comply without hesitation. Are we agreed?"
Lily is desperate, and she needs all the help she can get. "Done."
"Good. I'll gather the needed supplies and a vehicle for the expedition tonight. We'll meet in the morning."
OOC,Woohoo! We're not doomed yet! 8-)
You never took your Actions for Turn 13, so we'll say I'm the Lead Investigator this turn, but I think you should be for Turn 14. You can cast a Spell, such as Conjuration (there will be new stuff in the Reserve now) or Feed Your Mind. You can also Rest to recover from whatever the Spell does to you and try to get rid of your Conditions, or you could cast two Spells. Once you've done that, I'll post my Encounter Phase, and then yours will take effect using the roll you've already made. Then the Mythos Phase can be processed and Turn 14 can begin. I think I have a real chance. You might be able to help out, as I may very well need Instill Bravery. Also, you could move back to Alaska on Turn 14 and then go to Tokyo. Having Encounters there could help defeat monsters in the Heart of Africa. It's a shame the Agency Quarantine was already used, but we really needed it for the Shoggoth. I don't know how tough [b]Shub[/b] is, but I can face her first. If I beat her in the first round, we win immediately. Otherwise, I should at least be able to soften her up. When the next Reckoning hits, the Ancient One's Reckoning effect kicks off first, and I'll get another round before any of the bad stuff happens. I'm also confident that I can probably kill both Goat Spawn, and if I take a Dark Pact, I can also eliminate either the Chthonian or the Dark Young, whichever is worse, and then fight the other one and have a chance of beating it or at least weakening it.
Action 1: Travel (11->15)
Action 2: Acquire Assets.
Influence roll (2):
[dice]0[/dice]
Awesome! :shock: I'm taking a Bank Loan for an extra 2 successes, then gaining the Syndicate Agent and the Fishing Net (unless the Arcane Scholar is better;the Reserve was never updated, nor was the Game Board thread in general). Debt Condition gained.
I don't know how tough Shub is, but I can face her first
You need to encounter each non-epic Monster first.
I have no intention of updating the other topics,--too much work--but here are the new reserve items: Personal Assistant, Vatican Missionary and Dynamite (and I'll leave Tear Gas in there as well).
Jim'll head for Tokyo next Turn; he placed an Eldritch token on the Mystery this Turn.
OOC,Oh, okay. I only bought two Assets this turn, though. The Arcane Scholar had replaced the .45 automatic you get, but the card was never shown. So I guess only the Personal Assistant and Vatican Missionary go into the Reserve, and not the Dynamite. :cry: Not that I'd have a chance to snag it anyway. I still think I can survive fighting my way through all the non-Epic monsters (except the one that I get rid of with a Dark Pact) to reach [b]Shub[/b], and any Reckoning effects mean she will attack me directly for a second round before I have to face any surviving or newly spawned monsters. I don't know her stats, but I can probably beat her in two combat rounds, as I expect to be able to do 3-4 damage to her on average per round.
You should still take your Actions for the current turn before we have our Encounters. If you're not sure what to do before you Encounter the Mystery, I recommend casting Feed Your Mind to improve your Lore again. That'll help when the time comes to cast Instill Bravery. For your second Action, you can Rest to fix any consequences of the Spell and try to get rid of your Conditions.
OOC,Wow, that Dark Young is tough, though it does cause less damage than [b]Shub[/b]! :shock: In that case, I'll take a Dark Pact to get rid of the Dark Young and take my chances fighting the Chthonian after I deal with the Goat Spawn. I'll Rest as my first Action on Turn 14, but I worry more about Sanity than Health. I'm probably going to need Instill Bravery to encounter [b]Shub[/b] twice without going nuts, and I doubt I'll be lucky enough to beat her in the first round. I only get nine dice, so I'd expect to get three hits on average.