Erin: Hi there. I'm Erin, your GM. And this is salvage, a tabletop actual play podcast using fantasy flight games, Genesis system. This game started out as a one-shot based off of Tsutomu Nihei, seminal science fiction, classic blame, and ended up. Well way different from that and becoming way more than just the simple one shot, we thought it'd be salvage starts out in this ever-shifting post-apocalyptic cyberpunk, labyrinth, and false cast of characters from the small pockets of settlements and civilizations that have hung on.

Despite everything as our three protagonists head out into the ever-shifting tunnels outside of their home, they end up lost and finding adventure with each other. we hope you like it. Also, Matt apologies for the bird sounds these first couple of episodes, we did everything we could. They were literally impossible to remove, but don't worry about the audio quality tends to steadily pick up as we go on and figure out what we're doing here.

Anyway. I hope you enjoy your listen and welcome to salvage.

So, well, let's, let's play some tabletop games. everybody wants to introduce themselves because we're meeting for, well, some of us are meeting for the first time for all of us

Dan: introducing ourselves, or are we introducing our character?

Erin: Yeah, yeah, yeah. We can, we can, Dan, Steve meet Tori, Tori, meet Dan and Steve.

Dan: Nice to meet you.

Steven: Yeah. What is your character?

Erin: Okay. and yeah, Tori, do you wanna start off with your character?

Tori: sure. So hi everyone. I'm Tori.

by Tori and I am going to be playing Ollie real name's Olivia, but, Ollie's a favorite nickname of hers. she is a back alley mechanic from a small sort of community called, West salvage.

and it's, it's sort of like this

Erin: hashtag rip East salvage.

Tori: Yeah.

Erin: it's, it's sort of this,

Tori: this town like that you would find like on the road between like different settlements and whatnot, really small town kind of vibe, but still very much a, you know, city kind of atmosphere. basically

Erin: it's

Tori: a lot of people that have like, you know, dug their way into little nooks and crannies of the machines that surround them and have just like, started to find their little niche and make the best of, you know, what they have scavenged, what they need and that sort of thing.

she is, short perpetually kind of, greasy,

Erin: all greased up all the time.

Tori: Like

Erin: not covered

Tori: in grease, but like, you know, she, she's always got a little bit of grease here and there, you know, got, got these really oversized, like baggy cargo pants with a bunch of useless shit in every pocket.

Steven: Really hard to wash off your hands.

So that's. Yeah, that's fair. Yeah,

Erin: I do. I mean, you can't waste drinking water on that sort of perpetually,

Tori: always chewing gum. Should I go into like more depth into her background?

Erin: Like, Oh yeah, absolutely. so what, what, what brought Ollie into venturing out past her, her town. All right. Yeah.

Tori: so. She is by nature, not the kind of adventuring type she

Erin: has

Tori: happily lived all of her life in, in West salvage, running this sort of, you know, mechanic shop with, with her, with her brother until a while back, like maybe a few months or so.

He, left, said he was going to some sort of town that like he should easily have come back pretty shortly from,

Erin: but

Tori: he didn't and for a while, sort of

Erin: a hashtag rip brother as well.

Tori: Yeah. Sort of has been holed up in, in her workshop, blast music really loud, so that. You know, she doesn't have to think about it too hard.

And eventually it just got to her, like she just can't stay there anymore. And so she packed up a little bit and went off to find

Erin: him doke. So, so her Salomon is a kind of built up, like in the sense she's able to, be a mechanic and, and, play music loud when she feels sad and that sort of thing. Yeah.

Okay, Brad, I'm gonna. Slide over to one of these fellows over here. Oh, Steve you're, I'm saving you for last.

Steven: What do you mean? You mean

Erin: you're, you're well-developed well thought out Cara,

Dan: completely original character that you definitely lead yourself

Erin: all on your own. The, those two hands right there that God gave you.

Steven: What was the name of that town?

Tori: Thank you.

Steven: That of Olivia is from Ollie.

Tori: that that'd be West salvage.

Steven: Let's say, I just decided that hobo Joe is from East salvage.

Erin: Is there anything left of East tillage? Tell me, tell me about each salvage a little bit. Bobo

Steven: John, after hobo Joel left, he took it all

Erin: damn. Okay. Okay. Okay. I'll slide back

Dan: to Canada because I want to see

Erin: what develops in the mean time. Dan, what, what, tell me, tell me a little bit about, what's your character's name.

Dan: Gregory it GAF

Erin: solid.

Tori: Okay. So,

Erin: so what is, what is, what is, what is, what is Greg steel? What, what what's what's it talking with?

Dan: Greg is sort of a resource scout for a local set of mint called North, salvage.

Erin: God damn it. No wonder y'all get lost.

Dan: Yeah, no one talks about South salvage. That was a bad, Oh my God. They're assholes.

Erin: I love that Steve plays strong silent types, typically because I love the idea of him just being from East salvage and Ollie never learns never.

Yeah.

Dan: Gregory is kind of like a resource scout. So we sort of goes out into the city, tries to find areas where things are up and running, you know? bigger teams can go out and bring resources back to town to sort of keep it running and not, you know, go all East salvage on it.

Erin: Okay. So it's a little, it's a little scrappier, a little more, it's a

Dan: little bit more wild West the Lake.

Erin: okay.

Dan: kind of like a bit more like rundown.

Erin: are they able to build stuff there or did they have the same sort of level of access to technology?

Dan: they have a pretty basic access to the technology, but I think like this really advanced stuff or not, but they can make like some basic like magnetic guns, that kind of stuff, but they don't really have like radios or like high communication.

It's mostly just like physical.

Erin: So you do not get to listen to music when you are sad.

Dan: someone's playing music nearby. Sure. But

Erin: okay. Bards are important. Of course. so. Okay. and so what, what, what brings you, out into the, the tunnels outside of your settlement to get wrapped up in whatever's going to unfold?

Dan: Just a standard scouting mission that kind of went wrong when the environment changed a little bit. So I can't really find my way back to North Salvador is

Erin: the issue of living in a giant ever-shifting lab for enthusiasts.

Dan: we haven't brought up at all. These we're just, we're treating all these towns, like they're sort of.

Part of a normal world. We haven't mentioned that we're just eating a giant ever-changing.

Erin: Oh yeah. Cause I completely blanked on the fact that I was supposed to do that because of the time making Steve's character and getting his audio Steve's character, the group getting it all. Yeah. and Steven, tell me, tell me all about.

Steven: Yeah.

Tori: Yes. What the fate

Erin: salvage?

Steven: Ah, well, hobo Joe, obviously we're fairly Savage. hobo Joe is just, he's a bastard.

Erin: okay. That's a scar.

Steven: Yes. let's see. Well, I'm going to say that East salvage is kind of like the shitty part of town. Except the whole town of

Erin: shit. I mean, it's yeah. It's, it's, it's a, it's a rough way to live.

Steven: Yeah. And I'm going to go with Hobo, Joe, not having a particular set of skills, but more relying on, you know, stealing shit and, you know, general.

Erin: Misconduct

Steven: general. Yeah. Hobo skullduggery. Right? I think I have that. I don't have that. I didn't think that far ahead.

Erin: I think that's what happens when you don't build your own character.

Steven: I didn't think I had it all, but then Dan built me a quality character. Probably we'll find out.

Dan: I don't know. I sort of just threw everything at the wall to get,

Steven: I've got a laser pistol, which. You know, East salvage definitely does not have the ability to produce. So, so clearly what happened was East salvage was bad.

Hobo. Joe arrived, East salvage became unlivable. Hobo joe has moved on. That is where we find Hobo joe just wandering, looking for a new place

Erin: to make unlivable.

Tori: Yes.

Erin: Okay. That is cool.

Steven: Hobo Joe brings places down to his level?

Erin: That's

Steven: Joe's backstory.

Erin: All right. so, I guess I'll get into the setting a little bit for, for context.

the world has expanded the future come and gone and left humanity behind the three of you are playing remnants of that humanity. In, in, a large structure that ostensibly resembles a city, it wasn't built by human hands. at this point outside of the, the, the machines that continue constructing it, you're not even sure what agency drives it.

you live in small scattered settlements. If that in, in this ever changing structure. That seems to have no end or at least none that you ever have or ever will experience. You find yourself lost past the short light of whatever civilization there is left, whatever brought you out to the, to the tunnels, past your homes, you have found yourself lost for whatever reason, trying to find your loved ones, trying to find your home, trying to find another place to sleep at night.

the three of you. Have found yourself cast into the inky blackness of the lower levels of the city, whatever happened, some of the structure collapsed and you find yourself waking up in the rubble of it, many levels down past where you could possibly have any bearing of, of knowing where you are and you wake up.

What do you do?

Tori: Do we all wake up like at the same time?

Erin: you can, you can wake up at your own leisure. I assume it's going to be staggered, but I just want to, I guess, get an understanding of where you guys want to go with, how your character would react to that. And we can, we can figure out how that all staggers from there.

Tori: I guess I could probably wake up first.

Erin: And what would, what would Ollie do waking up?

Tori: I mean, I've, I feel like the first thing that. She would do is like, I'm not sure she would realize what was happening at first. Like probably wake up really slowly. Like not quite want to get up. are we on the sort of same sort of area or what, what is this place that we find herself in?

Erin: Okay.

Tori: Or like Gregory and Hobo Joe, just like, sort of.

Erin: Right next to tone. Tone. Validate that.

Steven: Yeah,

Dan: but with just the standard, we don't know this guy, so he's

Erin: totally his decision to call himself hope. Are

Tori: these two individuals near me?

Erin: Well it's yes. you have, Gregory, is probably closest to you in hobo.

Joe is, just kind of laying in a pile of rubble. My God, this is,

Steven: this is perfect. So you hear just kind of in the distance of belch and then just the crumpling paper bag.

Erin: He's the classiest man.

Steven: And then Joe just takes a drink out of a paper bag.

Erin: Is this while you were asking him why there were bottles?

Oh, God. Okay. All right. Yes. It's like, if, if

Steven: it didn't drink or rare, he would want to protect his precious bottle.

Erin: Nobody knows he has. Yes. I think paper's pretty rare though.

Steven: Then he wants to keep it with his precious bottle. So he's going to wrap his bottle and paper.

Erin: Okay. All right. We're we're living this life.

All right.

Steven: ages rolls around pig pen style in like his own filth and then looks around.

Erin: All right. So yeah, the first thing you see, when you wake up, Tori, Ollie sees just a large chasm above her. you can see like a couple. pillars in winding, pipe works in ventilation ducts, trailing up kind of like, like snakes coiled around each other and, all around you.

it's surprisingly, soft and spongy where you landed. It seems like it's some sort of a rubber or, or similar material used, like as a compression, a spot of compression for some sort of large machine that's inoperable in all around you is just a crumbled metal in cement. from, from the, the tunnels that you were in each of you before you, did we

Steven: all land on the soft, rubber or only Ollie?

Erin: Oh yeah, no hobo Joes, just pilot, concrete and rebar Tara.

Steven: Ooh, DM already showing your hand.

Erin: Yeah, by the way, Mark down, like to strain for that

Steven: Hobo Joe doesn't have a pencil.

Erin: Oh, hobo Joe should learn to be more prepared?

Steven: Hobo Joe has a pen probably hold on.

Erin: Hobo. Joe would not have been born if people were more prepared, a better timeline, to strain.

Okay. I can't imagine it's it's particularly right. Restful,

Steven: but is it better than what hobo typically has?

Dan: No, but usually don't fall into it.

Erin: Yes. This is fair. Yeah. So it's a little novel. It's about average

Steven: for her post show, but this time he slammed into it.

Erin: Yes. Got it. so, so Tori, please, is there anything you want to look for in protect killer?

Tori: Well, shit. immediately when I noticed Gregory, like unconscious, she would run over him, like sort of tap on the face, like, Hey, stranger. your dad,

Erin: right?

Dan: He probably just sort of snaps awake just then sort of waving a shotgun around, like what the hell just happened.

Tori: Okay. No, no, no need to get answered there.

gosh, hi, my name is my, is Ollie,

Dan: Gregory. Nice to meet you. What the hell happened here?

Tori: Well, from, from the looks of it, I guess I think I fell, same thing probably happened to you. do I know roughly what, what happened here?

Erin: the last thing that you recall before falling was some sort of like the sound of like echoing explosions throughout, the, the structure of the city until like getting closer and closer and closer until it finally hit where you were and the ground underneath you just started crumbling.

Tori: Oh shit. Yeah.

Dan: I guess we're going to start going around and checking to see if the rebels stable or if they should just get the hell out of Dodge right now. Cause we don't know how long ago that was, right?

Erin: yeah. you, you could have been, down there for quite a while now. Do we see you? You, you see hobo, Joe, just w what is hobo Joe doing here again?

I

Steven: think probably just sitting in the rubble. So he hears these two, trying to figure out how long they've been there. And he sniffs his coat and he's like, mm, yes, this hasn't been washed in two days and then burst out laughing. And he's like, ah, just kidding. It's never going to wash. I don't know how long I've been here.

Erin: I have no. And where would you find water to clean it? I mean, it's a waste. Right.

Dan: All right. are there any like tunnels or anything leading out of the giant rebel

Erin: death pile? it looks like. there are us coupled small branching. It looks like one ventilation shaft has, is, is, is open along with a, a series of pipes along it.

they're large. They're they're, they're, they're definitely, some of them are small, but, but, two or three of them are definitely a human size. We could split

Steven: up.

Dan: I mean, yeah, there's just two or three and there's two or three places. Clearly we just split up.

Steven: What do you think we spend the party?

Dan: It's the most efficient way for us to die.

Steven: She does have control of where the chefs go. They could just go altogether.

Erin: I mean, I was,

Tori: I'm not sure the splitting up is, you know, such a, such a good thing. I mean, I mean, granted, th this, this is,

Erin: it's almost like it would derail some kind of campaign

Steven: or something looks absolutely shocked that someone has met him.

And decided that leaving immediately is not the right course of action, just completely like blown away.

Dan: To be fair. We saw you in the immediate, started looking around for exits.

Steven: So, but that's that's every time someone sees hobo Joe,

Tori: like this, I don't have a child. This is, this is, is actually my first time in the tunnels.

And, like if, if. There's explosions and stuff happening there at, you know, safety numbers, that sort of thing.

Dan: Can I remember like a survival check to see if there's anything different about any of the ventilation shifts?

Erin: yeah, absolutely.

Dan: you know, just to like see if one, like, sounds like it leads to anything that might be that bad or,

Erin: yeah.

Sure. are you, are you going to, do you have anything to respond to Ollie with, or are you just kind of in your own.

Dan: And again, a Gregory sorta used to just be off on his own. So I feel like his way of dealing with things is just, well, there's a problem here. I'm a deal with it.

Erin: So, okay. So you are. So Ollie's kind of getting the cold shoulder a little bit.

Steven: Oh no, not from hobo Joe

Erin: what's hobo Joe saying, or doing

Steven: hobo. Joe is going to pretend that hobo Joe always has a group.

Erin: Okay. All right. Sell it. Come on.

Steven: I do have deception as a

Erin: yeah. Talk, talk, speak. But

Steven: generally, I think Hobo Joe was

Erin: going

Steven: to do a bad job of selling it, but he's going to try, he's going to try to sell the idea that we should definitely stick together.

Tori: Like,

Steven: how am I going to do this? I guess I have to get up.

Erin: You would have to get out of your pile of trash. Yeah.

Steven: So I got up, I kind of, you know, get myself together and I'll say like, Oh, I definitely definitely agree with Ollie here. Like this, this looks like a situation where we should. We should probably stick together.

And I might do that thing where I did to you too, in Newtown, where I just came up behind you and touched your, both on the shoulder. That seems like a hobo Joe thing.

Erin: Okay. All right. All right. We should stick

Steven: together.

Erin: What,

Steven: what does w what is it I'm doing? I'm motioning like the arms out, like group hug, shoulder, Pat deal.

Dan: Yeah, Gregory. Just sort of lightly grabs your hand, drafted to the side, pushes you slightly closer to Ollie and it goes off the ventilation

Erin: chest. Okay. All right. All right,

Tori: I'll go in for a shelter. Pet

Dan: sticky.

Erin: I'll use too good. A sport. Oh, sorry.

Tori: I don't think I catch your name stranger.

Steven: Ah, I'm Jo Jo, but they call me hobo Joe,

Erin: who calls hobo, chow, chow.

Steven: This is part of his deception that other people are a part of. It's like,

Dan: okay. All right. All

Erin: right. well, let's see. What's your vigilance

Tori: vigilance. It's it's Not good.

Erin: It's okay. There's nothing coming to find you in these tunnels. I'm sure if it, Nope,

Tori: no ranks and, to unwell

Erin: okey-doke no ranks into unwell. Okay. So that would be just, just, medium

Dan: or if it's a him receiving it, wouldn't be his stats versus hers.

Erin: Yeah. Yeah.

Steven: Oh, what am I rolling?

Erin: Yeah. So you're going to roll your deception. Okay. You're going to lie. It's kind of like, you're kind of be amazing, except you're going to lie to your friends.

Steven: Well, Whoa, who said these were my friends. I succeed. I had three S two net success. No advantage.

Erin: Right. Okay. All right.

so, looks like, it looks like you sell that lie. how

Steven: does hobo Joe has people involved in it? So Ollie

Dan: actually believes that you have successfully interacted with humans in the past.

Steven: God, this is going so well. Just inner monologue for hobo Joe.

Tori: Like yes. Nailed it. Joe. Hobo Joe? Which would she prefer?

Steven: any. Any of the words.

Tori: Alrighty. They're all good.

Steven: those words. Do you, do you look over and say Jobo yes?

Erin: Yes, Jobo. Okay. Okay. and, and Dan, you wanted to check out the tunnel?

Dan: Yeah. Just to check and make sure everything's all right now.

Erin: Okay. roll me that, perception.

Dan: Perception. Yeah.

Steven: Yeah. I look over and Ollie I'm like this Gregory Guy he looks at, what am I rolling

Dan: against?

Erin: You are rolling. I would say, I'd say about three dice, three purples, three purples. Yep. That's

Steven: what I say. Gregory Guy. He looks like, he looks like he knows what he's doing, man.

Erin: No. speaking of which, now that you've all kind of met each other a little bit, what do you look like? Do I need to

Steven: do

Erin: Oh yeah.

Tell me that rich description. And that just overwhelmed me with the sensory information that you've,

Dan: the check was no, did not succeed, but just have one extra advantage.

Erin: Okay. so, Oh, how do you wanna spend that advantage?

Dan: can I just give it a blue dice going forward for any other checks in that

Erin: time?

Yeah. So, so, so you don't really see. Much of anything. but, and, and you're not quite sure if it's safe, but you, you, but you, you kind of got a little bit of a bearing of it so far, so you're, you're just a little more prepared in case anything comes down the line.

Dan: So I guess we're going to go through character

Erin: descriptions now.

Yep. So, so. T tell, tell me about yourself. Oh, you get to go last Steven as always. Terry, would you like to start or Dan, would you like to start?

Dan: I feel like we've been kind of walking out Tori for a little bit, so let's let her go.

Tori: Alrighty. so, Ollie, as I sort of described her a little bit before, she is, quite short.

A little over five feet. his got this, this long red hair that like, you know, you get the sense was maybe once put up in some sort of style, but at this point is, is just a bit of a mess. And

Erin: yeah, like

Tori: not to say that she's filthy or anything, she's more of like the kind of messy where like you would hesitate to hug her.

Necessarily,

Erin: surely she's just a great hug friend.

Steven: I'm on this.

Tori: Oh shoot. She does give great hugs. Like, you know, everybody's missing out by the fact that they're not hugging her, but she has a little greasy. as she's standing here, she probably like, reaches into one of her many pockets and these

Erin: ridiculous

Tori: baggy cargo pants that she has, pulls out a stick of gum and pops it in.

let's say she's. got, got, got a nice sort of, jacket on. What, what do you call those like pilots jackets is, is, is that a thing?

Erin: Like a bomber jacket. Bomber jacket? Yeah.

Tori: She's got a, she's got a bomber jacket and, freckles. Definitely freckles.

Erin: Nice.

Tori: Yeah, she she's. She's a cutie patootie, rough and tumble kind of scrappy gal

Erin: okey-doke.

Everyone loves those, those, those scrappy gals. and, Dan T tell, tell me about your schmuck.

Dan: well, Gregory was a bit older, like mid thirties to early forties, kind of looking guy, starting to go a little bit gray on the sides. and he's been like out in the. Tunnels. So often these kind of got like a really rough look to him, sort of tons of like pouches filled with like random bits and bobs that will help them out all over himself.

obviously it looks a little bit more rough and tumble than he usually does, given that he just fell down, probably a few stories in a giant deadly landslide, but Hey, you mean everyone has their off day?

Erin: When what kind of stuff is he wearing?

Dan: just like a cargo vast, so that like makes it like really like, kind of like loose clothing does easy to move in.

It I'm pretty light stuff. So like he's able to like stay physically exerted for

Erin: okay. Between that, that description and the voice I'm kind of in my head, imagining him as like the future cyberpunk hellscape equivalent of a plumber.

Dan: Okay. If you want to go for that,

Erin: this is my, that's my vision, but that's clearly, it's not your,

Dan: I'm not really sure how to describe picture in my head right now.

Erin: Oh, that's fair. That's fair. and Steven, tell me about shell.

Steven: So I'm thinking Joe is probably going to have, Tori. You familiar with Firefly?

Tori: Erin don't kill me. No, I'm not.

Erin: Okay. I won't

Steven: I'm right. How would you describe the Firefly dress? It's kind of like a practical Midwestern kind of like weird stuff.

That's like heavy leather.

Erin: Okay.

Steven: But also like, you know, that's good.

Erin: So you've got like a long duster sort of

Tori: jacket. Yeah. I get like

Steven: heavier jackets, you know, but everything's kind of

Tori: like,

Steven: It's not, it's not ripped and like destroyed, but it's, it's just well-worn and, and sort of it blends in with the surroundings to the point where he can lay in a pile of rubble and just

Erin: be

Steven: part of liberals at this point.

Erin: He's one with his environment. Yeah. A real, real crunchy sort of back to nature type. Yeah.

Tori: And

Erin: this. Type of nature if you want to be charitable, at least. Yeah.

Steven: Like the kind of guy where I don't know if you'd be able to describe the color of his hair.

Erin: okay. All right. All right.

Steven: I'm debating. If, if hobo Joe should be the kind of guy that's got, like the long hair man bun type thing, or just like the, like, he, he chopped his hair off with his pocket knife at a certain period of time. And he's got like a Jagadish

Erin: disheveled kind of self.

Steven: I don't know. I kind of like the short, like.

Just like,

Dan: okay. So we're implying that he does care enough about his appearance to cut his hair, but nothing else,

Erin: like when he needs it,

Steven: needs it for something he'll cut his hair off. That seems like hopelessness.

Erin: Well, yeah. So w where in the cycle are we,

Steven: where are you? Right. Where in the cycle?

Dan: does he only cut off, like just enough hair for it?

Yes. He needs like, for a little

Erin: bit

Steven: of room. Right. So,

Tori: perfect. Perfect. He's got like, he's got half

Steven: of his. Like half of his hair,

Erin: he used the other

Steven: half last week for something. Yeah.

Erin: Well God's green earth that he used that for.

Steven: He was in a bind,

Tori: you know, he had to get out,

Erin: it's got to get away.

Steven: So he took, you know, he took some hair, maybe jammed a mechanism or something, gummed it up with hair in the gear.

You jammed the door and slid through, you know, he just, Joe bowed his way right out of there.

Tori: Just imagine the

Erin: horror.

Tori: Oh, wandering through these tunnels. That's just all, all of this, you know, Chrome and metal on weird technology. And then there's just hair. Yeah.

Erin: Tween the gear. Yeah. Somebody like, Oh God.

Yeah. So it's come across. That is like something terrible happened here. And it was just like, Him sticking his stupid ass hair.

Dan: No, Erin I'm actually liking this even better because now he can trace his path through the city, by the brand and stuff. He's come his hair.

Steven: God, God,

Tori: you can trace Chanel.

Steven: Should Joe have spurs on his boots.

Erin: I mean,

Dan: what is he going to do ride that needs?

Erin: I feel like he would have

Steven: made. Spurs because it's something he would like

Erin: out of garbage. All right. So tell me about the cultural, rich cultural context that hobo Joe having spurs. Like how, how did he get there? You know, how does he even know what that,

Steven: do you know how crows like shiny things and collect them?

Erin: Okay.

Steven: Hobo joe is like that

Erin: find a fucking pair of cowboy boots. I was like, yeah.

Tori: Yeah.

Erin: About this. Yeah. Post-apocalyptic cyberpunk. Hellscape no one knows how long it's been like that, but damn those boots. All right.

Dan: Oh, it got even better. If you just found the spurs, just put them on like a pair of sneakers that he was wearing.

Erin: It might be his dad.

Steven: Yeah.

Erin: Okay.

Steven: All right. It's not super important, but you get his vibe.

Erin: Okay.

Dan: It is a definitely a vibe

Steven: and luckily not his smell because he doesn't exist physically.

Erin: But that is the benefits of, of this medium. okay. So, so you guys are going to stick together, is Gregory. Okay. With that, given how solitary he seems to be?

Dan: yeah. He's is here. They haven't, you know, left or anything.

Erin: Oh yeah. I mean, I guess, I guess he's sort of leading the way a bit. Okay. so could you all roll me? A vigilance check.

Dan: Oh, this is going to be good. I got to check against anything or,

Erin: it's it's going to be against to purple dice.

Steven: What was I get?

You get an advantage, but no, no success.

Dan: No, no, you don't get an advantage. You've completely canceled out.

Erin: Oh,

Steven: nothing. Literally nothing.

Tori: that's a success and an advantage for Molly.

Erin: Yeah. Okay. what would you like to spend that advantage on?

Tori: Ooh, what can I spend it on?

Erin: you can spend it on, any, giving yourself a blue dye for later or just, just a small narrative.

Thing. it can be anything that it can't be, you succeeding at what you are trying to do, but it's anything that could be just a small, positive result of what you were trying.

Tori: Hmm. And what we were trying to do is be vigilant,

Erin: be vigilant.

Dan: All right. So while she's thinking of that, you get to have a bit of fun with my four disadvantages.

Erin: Oh,

Dan: I succeeded on

Erin: what had you so much, did you succeed by?

Dan: I succeeded by two, but I have four disadvantages have fun with that.

Erin: Okay. I think I know exactly how that's going to go. can you, cause you're like an experienced Explorer of these, these tunnels here scout right out there for awhile. So, you know, Like sixth sense style, you know, that something is creeping up on you.

All right. The issue is, well, yeah, you're staring down this tunnel, trying to look down at me, threats that way you ha you are fully certain that it is behind you. And because of both how compact the tunnel you're in is the ventilation shaft. And given that the two people following behind you, you really don't have so much of an option to immediately respond.

All right. Tori, you both have an advantage and a success. D do you know what you want to do with that S advantage?

Tori: So w with, with the, with the success, I know that there's something that's creeping up on us.

Erin: Yes. You, you do see what is, what is starting to creep up on you? maybe you've turned back to look at hobo Joe, who is blissfully blissfully unaware of everything.

That's about to unfold.

Tori: CA can I, could I maybe use my advantage to make him aware? Where's that two car.

Erin: Ooh. that might be just a little too powerful, but you could, like I said, with, being able to give yourself a blue dye for later for, just good positioning or awareness or, or all of that, you could give him one.

I would love to do that. Okay. So he's not aware of what's going on, but, but so you take that to, to call out and let him know. Guys are something behind us.

Steven: we turn,

Erin: I turned what you see, Ollie is just a large, large, large bulbous extension from the hang from one of the walls of the chasm that you fell down before, where it was dark.

It has clicked on and. Lights. it's like almost like a series of cameras. Our eyes have lit up all across it and it, you could see it, it starts spinning a little bit in a whirring as, at the same time you see flashes of light start appearing, all over the walls and floor of that chasm kind of lighting it up almost.

and you said you have no experience in the tunnels before?

Tori: I do not.

Erin: Okay.

Steven: is Ollie a quick learner?

Dan: We'll find out its first,

Erin: she she's, she's quite intelligent.

Tori: She's bright.

Erin: She's a smart cookie.

Dan: Yeah. So with my disadvantages that I was looking the wrong

Erin: way. You, you are that I just couldn't get

Dan: to it.

Erin: You are caught on awareness. Well, you're not caught unawares. You are turned in the opposite direction from it. You're not looking at it. You, you, you are kind of, you're going to be real sluggish and being able to react to it. I'll probably give you a two disadvantage for that, right? For, for whatever reaction you try and take, but you hear that noise because you're an experienced scout.

You hear that noise and that whirring and you see the, the, even just the light. Shining on the tunnel in front of you and you know absolutely what that is.

Dan: All right.

Erin: Yes.

Dan: I was wanting to ask, like, based on my experience, how dangerous are they is something we can fight or is this more of a, get the hell out of there?

Erin: This is kind of a, get the hell out of Dodge scenario. It is a, you don't know necessarily what they're called. 'cause it it's, it's just more of a experiential threat than one that you really have a name for. but this is a kind of, kind of like a security spotlight for, for the city. And when it, when it catches like that, when it notices here, it is starting to, not just, just call attention to you being there, but also.

Start start summoning up, part of the, the security of the city. All right. The sort of mechanical. A server tours that do that. All right.

Dan: I'm not sure I want to use one right now, but we never established how many, story points do you and

Erin: of you generates one story point,

Dan: right? So we have three story points and you have one for yourself right now, right?

Erin: Yes. All right.

Steven: Can I just ask for some clarification about our surroundings?

Erin: Sure, absolutely. So

Steven: there's this chasm where this thing is, and

Erin: we are where at the floor of that castle. Okay.

Steven: And so are we at like near the edge of the chasm and there's. Those tunnels we were looking at

Erin: before are like, like in the wall, on the wall.

Okay. In fact, you might actually need to like climb up just, just a little bit. It's easy. Cause there's like some small footholds. Okay. Other small open pipes and vents that are too small to crawl through, but the one year your car, like thirds are like a little bit up.

Steven: Yeah.

Erin: All right.

Tori: So, so, so how,

Erin: how would you all like to react to this everyone except for, for, Joe of course.

Are we and

Dan: initiative, was that, was it the check was, or is that just

Erin: like a spot? This thing was just a spot to see if you get what's going

Dan: on to, we're just able to act right now just as it is.

Erin: Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's not, in rounds, but I'm, I'm basically determined if you are allowed to react to this.

Dan: All right. Based on his past experience. Does he know any way to like slow this down or stop it? Or is it like, just start running

Erin: that the type of situation that this is it's it's it will just, until you are out of range of it, it will just keep, spawning essentially, security agents.

Dan: Now, is it like a.

Set like everything in like 600 yards is going to get screwed or is it like a visual IC enemies? I'll keep spawning.

Erin: It's it's kind of it's it's it's it's it's line of sight based. So it is official. All right.

Steven: Do I have a hacking abilities to interact with this thing?

Erin: Do you, do you have hacking? I mean,

Dan: he has the hacking tools.

Yeah.

Erin: Yeah. Okay. Yeah. You then would be able to, but you didn't notice it.

Dan: Right.

Tori: How, how would I heck

Dan: didn't all try to warn him or is that

Steven: this would be like next round, cause this is a surprise round, I guess,

Erin: essentially,

Dan: I guess he takes locker situation. as soon as you wanna make a check to see like what's the fastest way to get out of line of sight then, because obviously we can't go backwards.

Erin: Yes. probably the fastest way would be to scurry through the tunnels. I am letting you, act first because you got the highest actual amount of successes.

Dan: All right, follow me. We can't fight this thing and he starts, running forward.

Tori: I, I I'm going to carry on after him.

Erin: Okay. So, you both bail out of there, which normally would give you enough time to, to keep it from, to interrupt it.

It's it's, it's spawning of, of, took your agents like that. But hobo Joe over here is, is, He, he, he got your message. So he will be able to react better when he realizes what's up. But you kind of have no idea why they're running forward,

Steven: which way the tunnels gave me the like, exit things that you were running for

Erin: almost at the man anyway.

Steven: Okay. You were running, you're running there towards them. Okay.

Erin: Oh, no, they, they have run into them. They're into them. Okay. You are stating just a little bit, a ways away from, from them. Okay. and they just, they just bail in are like yelling. Okay. Well, how, how, how did you react to that? You have no context for why they're doing it.

Steven: Okay. I am going to, what I'm gonna do is I'm going to scoop out of my pocket, the accumulated dirt. That just fills my pockets.

Erin: let's rewind. Just a tiny, just a little carry

Dan: around in

Erin: dirt in your pocket. Yeah, here's a pocket full of dirt, a dark pocket

Tori: dirt. It's like a pocket sand

Erin: kind of like a dirt bag, but a little market it's built

Steven: into his, his multi-function jacket. So he just scoops out some of this, this high-quality fine.

Fine. Dusty powder throws it in the air and shouts Jobo shield, and then runs towards the tunnels.

Erin: You have? No, you don't know why that running,

Steven: but I'm gonna follow them because these are the only people I know.

Erin: Wait, wait, like, what are you shielding yourself from

Steven: magic light that just came and made everybody run away.

I'm doing what they're doing. This is, this is pretty intuitive. I think I follow people that I just met. Did her

Dan: here, Gregory yell. We can't fight that thing following me

Erin: enough. Fair enough. It,

Dan: along with the

Erin: magical bread spot dish that you have though allows a couple of enough time for a couple of the security agents to materialize my pocket, filth,

Steven: obscure their site at all.

Erin: If they were able to feel anything like a human emotion, it would be confusion.

Steven: Oh, I thought you were going to go with complete indifference

Dan: if you could feel the human emotion, they would feel indifferent is so much better.

Erin: Yeah. A little bit. Well, I'm fat. And about, three of them pull themselves up out of some of them pull themselves up out of the, out of the flooring, Elana, Don, some of them, even just one of them pulls up out of the wall that you were just climbed into.

One of them pulls itself up out of the rubble that you fell from. It honestly, even too small furtive even come from in it.

Steven: I started shouting about out them about, you know, what happens when you get through the Joe blow shield. And I pull out my laser pistol, obviously.

Erin: Okay. All right. I'm going to roll, how many successes did you have again, Dan?

Dan: I had two successes.

Erin: Okay.

Dan: But when I started the initial visual check.

Erin: Okay. All right. I'm going to roll. Cool for them and they're not particularly cool. So let's

Tori: see.

Erin: Okay. Doke. All right. So that is, that is, two fails and one advantage. so I just want to show, they'll get a certain element of, of a surprise on you a little bit.

Steven: on who in particular

Dan: I'll be the only one they can see

Steven: me.

Erin: Okay. but they will go last in initiative order. so you guys have three rounds of initiative that you get to divvy up before they go. Who wants to,

Dan: so do we know that Joe is not following us or if we just sort of assuming that he is,

Erin: I think it's up to you.

Here's the question. How much at this point, do you care about the bodily integrity of hobo Joe?

Dan: I mean, He is another meat shield to put up between us and whatever is going to kill us

Erin: cold as fuck I get, I like this

Steven: Gregory fellow nobody's cared this much of

Dan: it. It wasn't a character voice.

what are you thinking, Tori?

Can we actually go back and help them? Cause that's what flair characters would do for real cute,

Erin: because that's what play your characters would do

Dan: or do we just try not to be dead for this random hobo? That's. Yeah.

Erin: Tell me color that he leaves his hair, places. It throws dirt in the air and calls it some kind of shield

Dan: shield.

Erin: I think the funny thing is I can see that actually having some practical useful, or him given BNB factor and having a laser. Yes. Yeah. But damn, if it's confusing as hell for anyone else.

Dan: All right, let's put it this way. I'm not taking the person who should have slots and everyone else say

Steven: I'll go first initiative if nobody else wants to.

Tori: I think that that makes sense. Like, I definitely want to want to help hobo Joe. but I don't think she probably is. I think her first priority right now is, Oh shit. I'm running.

Steven: You're you're there for me in spirit, but not, not in person is what you're telling me.

Tori: No, like she's, she's there, if she notices that you need help.

Dan: All right. actually quick question, the size of these things. Can they fit inside the menu?

Erin: Okay. So what I was, I was about to sort of start describing them to you. what you kind of have so far is, is it's it's it's, an oddly segmented. Bipedal humanoid almost kind of, it's got, it's kind of skeletal it H short, shorter back legs.

It's kind of almost like hunched over and they're just sorta like crawling at you LAR larger, larger, arms and legs. It's almost like it's sort of pulling itself along

Dan: almost like, like a skeletal gorilla or something like that.

Erin: Yeah. Like with, with a longer elongated, like. Snout sort of shape almost

Dan: the skeletal gorilla dog.

Erin: Got it. Yeah. Horrifying. Like I said, it's, it's, it's sort of segmented in its, its, its its face. If you could call it that it's it's honestly just, I, I honestly, it just looks like bone and then, like a couple cameras where eyes would be it's completely, expressionless

Dan: and this can, or can't fit into the ventilation.

Erin: They definitely can fit in the ventilation shaft.

Steven: And there's three of them.

Erin: There's three of them.

Steven: And how close are they to hobo Joe?

Erin: relatively close. They'll probably be able to catch up with given how fast they're going. They'll probably be able to catch up with you, in the end, the next turn that they go.

Steven: Do I get a movement and an action.

Erin: You get one, one maneuver and one action.

Steven: Okay. How, how far am I from the ventilation chefs

Erin: you are? What year? You're just about. Right there, like right in front of it. You haven't done the little climb up to get in.

Tori: Is there like,

Steven: is there a good cover or things I can,

Erin: well there's there is all the rubble from, from yeah.

Steven: Like good terrain. I can,

Erin: yeah, you can definitely get yourself behind some of it. Yeah.

Steven: Around him. Cause I feel like hobo Jo hobo Joes is more agile and he's quicker on his feet than you suspect. He is. That that's how, that's how he survives. He has for agility, so,

Erin: Oh, okay. Solid. Yeah. okay, so, so he's taking like an aggressive stance.

so do you, are you all okay with, with hobo Joe taking a first action? Yep.

Steven: I think he's gonna, like,

Dan: I mean, it makes the most sense. He's right there.

Erin: All right. Yeah. what, so what are you doing with your money for you want to take cover

Steven: Hobo joe has got to take over hobo Joe's style. So he's probably going to like.

Like run and grab some rebel Lee rebar. That's sticking out of the wall and like swing behind a piece of concrete.

Erin: Okay. And, and what do you, what, what's your action.

Steven: And then, and then he's gonna pull out his pistol and shoot.

Erin: All right. So is that a separate pocket from your dirt pocket? Or do you keep that like kind of together?

It's like dirt gun.

Steven: Most of the pockets have dirt in them.

Erin: Hobo, Joe lets you live like this.

Dan: Who could stop him from living? Like this is the better question.

Erin: Yeah,

Steven: but bro, just through fucking pockets

Erin: check. It's gotta be so heavy. He moves.

Tori: That's the thing.

Steven: That's why it's so unnatural his movement. You're like.

Tori: But

Erin: how it's cause he's wearing that weighted jacket.

Yeah. Fucking trained him up.

Tori: Yeah.

Erin: He just fills it with dirt

Steven: trains and then sheds the

Erin: dirt

Steven: directly. He's even down half his hair.

Erin: So, so, so you are about, I would say medium distance from them at this point. Okay. so are you going to take that shot? Yeah. All right. So from your, from your cover, you're going to get some, some fence from them.

Yeah. And, fire off. Okay.

Steven: What's there Comey. Purple's

Erin: my blue now

Steven: she gave me a blue. Didn't she?

Erin: Yeah. Holly.

Steven: Ah, thank you. All right. How many purples medium is?

Erin: You know what? I will, God, I can't believe I'm fucking saying these words. I will give you an additional blue from your side. Stupid hobo shield.

Dan: Yes, Joe Bo shield,

Erin: because it would probably like get in the way just enough. It's that

Steven: terrible finder that gets in sensors and really messes things

Erin: up. So, so, so, so it, it freezes one of them up just a little bit, so you can squeeze off a shot.

Steven: Oh guys. Perfect.

Erin: Okey-doke

Steven: Drago's advantage over the machines.

Erin: All right. So, so that would be two because it's medium. Okay.

Steven: All right. Let's do this.

Erin: I like how everyone else is running for their life. And you're just like, Oh,

Steven: okay. You succeeded

Tori: for success.

Steven: Okay. And Holy shit. two advantages. Yeah. Yeah.

Erin: Okay. What do you want to spend the advantage on? Well, you

Steven: can grow. What's the crit on the quit three. Okay. I can, I can give, Tori a,

Erin: a blue dye back.

how, how, how would you do that?

Steven: presumably I would have taken a good position. My shenanigans will have made noise to notify her. Where things are. So I'm going to say, Joe Bo is an experienced combatant and

Erin: you'd have to be to get a law, say, live this long,

Steven: slayed the battlefield. Well, as what I'll say, he has drawn them to, a good position for,

Erin: okay, so you draw some heat.

Yeah. Yeah. Like you say,

Dan: he was very loud. There was like, Oh, we killed this guy first.

Erin: Right? Okay. so you're giving it to Tori.

Steven: Yeah, probably.

Erin: Okay. Congrats story.

Steven: so my gun is damaged five with four net 16.

Erin: All right. So nine, right. Okay. So you just Pierce too.

Steven: It's a quickness. Good. Cool.

Erin: Okay. Yeah. So that just, you, you, do you want to describe it or.

Oh, you

Tori: can. Okay. All

Erin: right. So you, you squeezed the trigger and, it just light just pulses out of it. And honestly, where the closest one, there was. Th distracted cut, hesitant, because of the Joebo shield and your terrible dust, handmade dusts. Oh God. Is it all skin cell does? No,

Tori: it's just like

Steven: crushed concrete powder.

Erin: That's better. More wholesome.

Dan: Wait, you crushed concrete powder just for the hell of it. Okay.

Erin: No, collected. So you've you fire into it and you, you fire into the, the dust cloud event. and it diffuses a little bit of a dust because it's a laser. Yeah. and it just, it just blooms a little bit. And when, when you can finally see again, it's just a huge hole in what was, what was once there, the half of the.

Weird like snotty skull mouth is just our face or whatever. It's just cheered right off, just a big hole through it. it doesn't go any further than that. but then it just falls to pieces in front of you.

Dan: Okay, so it is dead.

Erin: Oh yeah. Yeah. It's it's it's it's you've got like, oil and coolant, just leaking all over the place.

All right.

Steven: I feel like I should shout ye hall right

Erin: now, then shout it, my friend.

Steven: That's that's totally what that's totally what Joe's going to do. I don't know where he's picked this culture up from, but he has

Erin: it.

All right. All right.

Tori: see, I was wondering, I was wondering if y'all were gonna get on me for all these vaguely Southern accent, but you're just like coming out here and showing me up on

Erin: all fronts. Oh yeah. What's next?

Dan: I think Ollie would probably go next because I'm not going to teach anything Gregory's doing and totally realizes.

Oh,

Erin: Oh crap. Tony bird, how are you going to do it? What's Ollie going to do?

Tori: I mean, I'd imagine like, you know, D how loud is this laser pistol?

Erin: Oh, fucking loud.

Steven: How loud was the hall

Erin: louder, comparatively quiet. So just very loud. Sound muffled, yeehaw.

Tori: Oh, I love that.

Erin: Yeah. The subtitles for this episode would be very funny.

Tori: Yeah. I think upon turning around and seeing that, like, you know, despite Greg's, You, it was this sense that we shouldn't fight these things, seeing that there's a fight going on and it's going well for us. Question Mark.

Erin: Oh yeah.

Tori: Yeah. what, what would it be a maneuver to get out her gun?

Erin: What indeed,

Dan: isn't it? Hmm. Isn't it an incidental to draw your weapon

Erin: or no, that's only if you have a quick draw talent. Ah, right. Sorry. Yep. Yeah, that would be a maneuver.

Tori: All right. Well then in that case, she's, she's going to open up her jacket and sort of strapped to the insights or like along her side is, her, her trustee, rifle who, if she didn't build it herself,

Erin: she definitely modified

Tori: it a lot.

Erin: Okay.

Tori: and

Erin: I mean, given the kind of world you live in building it yourself is probably like a very likely option. And

Tori: next sort of etched into the side is, is the name of Slugger. And she she's, she's going, she's going to, draw this weapon and

Erin: comically, not a shotgun, according to this character sheet I have here.

Tori: Yeah, no. how, how, how many of these things are there?

Erin: There are two now, two now.

Tori: And am I within medium range of one of them?

Erin: I would say you are at far range. Or long whichever one's three dies. All right.

Tori: Well, and, and is, is, how about Joe within medium of them? He's like, one of the range bands closer.

yes. Here's a wild idea.

Erin: Please go for it. I'm going to move closer. Yeah. Use that money over.

Tori: Yes. And I'm going, I'm going to try and, levy a shot off at one of them.

Erin: Okay. Romi you're, you're shooting along with, the medium difficulty then. and so, so I guess, do you leave the tunnel or do you just like move back to like the mouth of it?

And

Tori: if I can move back to the mouth of it, I think that'd be what I do.

Erin: Okay.

Tori: And I get the, I get the, the one, the one,

Erin: boost. Yep. You get that blue

Tori: that's two successes.

Erin: Nice. and give me, give me a, what are the numbers on your, on your, gun?

Tori: That would be a us based damage of seven.

Erin: Oh, damn. Okay.

So that's a nine. And is there any other, Qualities on the weapon auto fire, but I'm not using it. Okay. All right. So, so, you fire off a shot at one of the, large, bounding machines coming at you. Well, I guess coming at hobo Joe at this point and you fire off a couple shots and a couple of them bounce off, but one of them happens to dig right into, its arm, right.

As it's about to. put its weight on that to, to run forward. And it's just, just trips itself up and it keeps on going it, but it's just, you can tell that that the machine is sorta sorta ground against itself and it's, it's, it's pretty much almost almost done.

Tori: Joe. What, what was the thing? You, you, you were shouting earlier

Steven: that one.

Tori: Yeah,

Steven: I think Joe and Ollie are going to get

Erin: along well. Okie doke. And, for Gregory.

Dan: Well Gregory just here. Okay. Follow me, run. And then all of a sudden, all here's this just tons of gunfire,

Erin: large laser

Dan: to

Erin: two small ye Hawes in a series of gunshots.

Dan: All right. And the thing with this thing is if you stay in its site, it will just keep making more,

Erin: right.

Dan: So he just sorta like,

Erin: but you'd have you haven't informed anyone but yourself on this. So this is actually, some good, good player, character separation guys.

Dan: I do my best. All right.

Erin: So I guess

Dan: like his first instinct is to keep running, but he realizes if they're just going to stay back there and keep fighting, it's going to just keep them alive for a long enough that there's going to be a freaking horde coming after him.

If he doesn't. So he's got. Three like about faces on his heel, runs back to Ollie and just goes, we cannot fight them. You can keep killing. They were pretty easy to kill, but they're just going to keep coming at us. If we don't keep making more, we need a way to seal off this vent. So I guess he's going to like look around and see if there's any rebel or anything nearby that if nothing else could like slow them down long enough for us to lose pursuit.

Erin: Okay. Everyone gets in the vent. Yeah, yeah. I would say, Oh, what would you, what would you want to role for that in Tori? Do you have anything to Zali, have anything to say? Or she just kinda lost in the, the fucking Ihara madness going on around her.

Dan: I mean, Neha Madison is a good place to be lost. I'd say the two things that make the most sense will have either, perception or survival.

Erin: I would go with survival. This is for you to actually like grab this, whatever and

Dan: try and do the same for me either way.

Erin: Yeah. also hobo Joe is not in this tunnel. So you tried to seal it off is hilarious, but

Dan: again, hopefully he gets to us like I'm not actively trying to seal him out.

Erin: Okay.

Dan: Actually not at all.

We just try to get the hobo Joe in here. what am I rolling against?

Erin: I would say I'll go with medium for this.

Dan: All right. So two purples.

Erin: Yep. And while this, while this is happening while you're all rushing about, you see two more, lights show up to show that that, looks like two, two more, security agents are going to start spawning.

Dan: All right. am I going to use the blue dice from checking the vent earlier?

let's say I failed, but I have a net one advantage.

Erin: Okay. what, what do you want to do with that advantage? so luckily for Joe, you do not barricade him out,

Dan: find any robot that's nearby. do you have any suggestions? Cause I, I, I could just

like

Erin: give myself like, Yeah. Also, if just a side note, if you guys ever are having trouble or anything, this is, this is collaborative.

If you have, if anyone at the table has any ideas for someone else's advantages, feel free to share them. I mean, ultimately final vote goes to the person who who's doing the action, but, it it's a big free for all. Y'all.

Dan: there was a smaller event too. Could we get into that?

Erin: w th th there are a couple of smaller events in pipes, but they're not quite.

Big enough for people in the other ones that are, are, above the one that you're in. So you would have to like fully pull yourself up into them.

Dan: yeah, I'm not really sure. I guess just like, maybe give Ollie like a boost ice on her next action.

Erin: Yeah, you could do that.

Dan: just cause I'm trying to get like her to

Erin: Oh yeah.

Makes sense. You're you're kind of scurrying around. It kind of sells how serious you are. okay. In the. The security agents run at you? well, let's be real about this. the one that is perfectly fine runs at hobo Joe, and because of the Mo, even though, you kind of caught its attention, Ollie, having shot at it and then knee hard, you're a little hard out.

it, it's still kind of following through with the momentum. Of of eight, about to pounce on, Joe. So, so Joe, you are getting, two to two attacks. Okay.

Steven: How far away are they?

Erin: They are literally right up at you. You still have the, the barrier between you. So, we'll add that your, with your cover I'll, I'll add that, defense die in the

Steven: hobos show.

Heavy jacket.

Erin: and the first one, the first one snaps at you, I'm just like, it feels it's just complete physical. It's a nothing. So it's another thing. so, so it runs the snaps at you and ends up getting it. It's just a big cloth full of like rebar and concrete without actually getting you, you lucky duck.

the other one though. Takes a swipe. And that's very funny. Exactly. The same thing. God,

Steven: Jill is

Erin: amazing.

Steven: Yeah.

Tori: Flawless so far. Oh my God.

Erin: Okay. Yeah. So your, your, your choice to throw dirt and hide behind concrete has fucking saved your life. So it's just like, they're just tearing apart this rebel in front of you.

And you're just like,

Steven: I blended. Remember when I said I just blend into the rebel?

Erin: Yeah. Yeah. They just thought,

Dan: Oh, this giant pile of rebar

Steven: clearly the hobo.

Erin: Yeah. Okay. and with that, it's it's it's, y'all's turn again. there are now two more of these things pulling themselves up out of the ground and, and wall.

Steven: Oh shit. Do I see that in the distance or not?

Erin: Yes. Okay. the, the alarm that you set off and just keeps on, keeps on spinning, right? It's screaming at you. Aye,

Tori: Joe, we can hear y'all later. it's it's time to get the heck out of Dodge. They

Steven: do stupid. We could probably run. I say, as I'm standing next to them and they're digging into a pile of dirt.

Tori: Well, let's go.

Erin: Okay. Okay. So, so do y'all, I assume because you're running, you're going to use both of your maneuvers to get out of Dodge

Tori: correctly.

Erin: Okay. All right. Do you want to, so you have one maneuver. Do you want to spend your action running as well? Do you want to do anything with your action?

or do you just want to use strain to get to maneuvers or D how do you, how do you wanna, how do you wanna do that?

Tori: I'm going to use my action as another maneuver.

Erin: Yeah. Okay. All right. So not taking any more strain and just baling

Steven: and less and less. no, but I don't, I don't actually know the status of the vent tube that they're in.

So I would probably just run into that one instead of trying to climb into a different one. Okay.

Erin: So, then again, not taking any strain and just dump two, actually two maneuvers. Okay. All right. So yeah. So you are, you are out of sight of the alarm. And as you, as you start getting far enough into the tunnels there of that, that bent shaft, again, this is the large twisting, it's almost like you're in the gizzard of some kind of snake or something, the way it winds around.

And it has like little, pipes and, and, and, all that just sort of hanging from it, wires and whatnot, and the alarm eventually. You can hear it still going for a while. And then it cuts at both after you've gotten far enough away. And it's sort of timed out through the, through the cycle of, of its alarm going off on the other hand, the stuff's still right.

Steven: It's running down the vent shaft.

Erin: Yeah. It's, it's starting to like Scrabble. It's wa they're starting to scramble their way into how

Steven: large diameter are we talking?

Erin: The vent shaft. Yeah, I would say just about a half a foot taller than the tallest. One of you three.

Steven: Okay. But you can still walk through it.

Erin: Yeah. You don't have to, you don't have to hunch. Okay.

Dan: Yeah. Thank God. We're amazingly all two feet tall.

Erin: Yeah.

Steven: Good thing. We all agree on

Dan: that. We've all agreed that we were two feet tall. So these things are just going to really see the closest

Tori: thing up. Unfortunately, I already mentioned that, Ollie was just over five feet.

Erin: Yeah.

Steven: Damn team player toy

Dan: screwed us by not reading the future.

Erin: So you're, you're, you're both short and yourself description and the tallest one amongst them.

Tori: We can't do this.

Erin: No, we can't

Dan: actually spending a story point. We can

Steven: just. Oh, God,

Dan: no,

Erin: no clear. Yeah. Yeah. I just had a deer in the headlights. Yeah.

Yeah.

Dan: Most already.

Erin: I didn't expect hobbits for this game.

Dan: lengths

Erin: or feet. Aren't hairy. Okay. Yes. It's that? Okay. Timeout for five seconds. Is that like the one distinguishing feature between hobbits and halflings is just like. How acceptably groomed your feet are

Dan: now. I think it's the world. You, you don't have to, you know, pay royalties to

Erin: yeah.

Pretty much. okay, so you run, what do you do Gregory? Because,

Dan: did he get past me

Steven: or. No, you were, you were ahead.

Erin: You were ahead.

Dan: For instance, Ollie ran past me. He took two maneuvers.

Erin: Oh, okay. So yeah. So they've re run past you at this point. All right. So you're still out of sight of the thing, but

Dan: all right.

Sorry. I'm running, but I'm like keeping it the rear guard. Cause like my shotgun could at least slow them down with a knockdown.

Erin: Okay.

Dan: Or the inside of me

Erin: or yes, one of them is actively starting to like Scrabble its way into the tunnel. That's taking my maneuver to

Dan: run further into the tunnel and The second, my action is going to be to shoot with the shotgun, I guess.

Erin: All right. give it, give it a, give it a shot.

Dan: All right. Are these things faster than a normal person or,

Erin: they seem to be keeping pace with you, but you can, you can kind of tell that they're just sort of getting up to speed. All right. They were just born cut him some Slack

Dan: now. All right. So yeah, I'm going to shoot the closest one with the shotgun.

Erin: Okey-doke that would be at about medium range at this point. All right.

Dan: So two purples.

Erin: Yep.

Dan: Any other modifiers or,

Erin: I would say no at this point, it's kind of vulnerable a little bit. In fact, I will give you a blue because it's preoccupied with trying to climb this thing, right? Triumph. Why.

Dan: triumph three extra successes and two disadvantages.

Steven: Interesting.

Erin: how many successes?

Dan: three total successes. four, if you count the triumph in with that, two disadvantages, I think they're triumph there's to knock down a disadvantage to, or was it just,

Erin: it, it, it has an advantage built into it that you can discount, so you can cut one of those disadvantages out, but you can't lose the, you don't lose the triumph.

Dan: Right. So that's a triumph, one disadvantage and the three other successes.

Erin: Okay. So that's the four successes of what's the damage on the shotgun?

Dan: one second, base damage is eight,

Erin: eight okey-doke you. in fact here, I'm going to help you set up that triumph just a little bit if you're down. so it's, it's the one that's made the main one that's sort of scrambling its way.

And then there's another one sort of like, again, these things are like almost, they're not even thinking one of them is practically, like trying to get into, and it's like almost crawling up the back of the other one. and you fire off that shot. And what do you want to do with that triumph?

Dan: Well, I think the, the goal I have is to keep these things as far away from us as possible.

So maybe like clog up

Erin: for

Dan: a bit with their bodies.

Erin: So, so I'm

Dan: clear to at least be moved out of the way before they can resume the chase.

Erin: All right. I can, I think I can do that for you. the shotgun has knocked back, correct?

Dan: it has blast for knocked down and vicious too. It's a good gun. I have absolutely no other equipment besides.

Erin: Yeah. I mean, all right.

Dan: It's a good guy,

Erin: but what run me through those again? Real quick. I was just in all of them too much to pay attention.

Dan: Shotgun ranged, heavy damage, eight crit three. let's see. Encumbrance three blessed, four knockdown vicious too.

Steven: Does the blast mean it affects the others that are near?

Erin: Yes. So I will let you spend that triumph to, to get that, for requirement for the blast. And I'll let you use the triumph aspect of it as well. so you, as they actually finally make you, you give them some time and lead them a little bit, and as they finally get into the tunnel, these, these big, big things.

Again, PR one practically crawling over the other. They're just rabid trying to get at you and you fire in as you do. You just rack both of them, just the shotgun blast, just sprays and just tears. The two of them apart because of how they're they're, they're, they're kind of structured. They, they kind of not entirely, but partially obstruct.

The, the vents that you have that you're calling through the entrance to it. So it will slow down any of the others that are coming up.

Dan: All right. Good. Then the rest of my move is just spent Woking it out.

Erin: Okay. All right. and with that, you took out two.

Tori: so there should be one left.

Dan: Great

Steven: too. Yeah,

Tori: because wait, no, because

Erin: the one, he, the one you shot was still limping along.

Oh, yeah. So there's

Dan: one injured, one healthy, and then

Erin: that, okay. And what I'm going to rule with that is Tory, the one that you injured because of how it's injured. And after, after trying to pull itself up, it just doesn't have the strength to pull itself past all the, the clogged bodies at this point. But the other one leaps like pulls itself past and through it late.

So, so your shot has effectively made it that, that one can't, it's not dead, but I can't follow you.

Dan: I think we definitely work with that

Steven: too. There's only one, one

Erin: triumphs are good guys. And I mean, also Tori practically killed it. It was like hanging on by like one wound. So

Tori: players don't kill people, characters do

Erin: you're right.

Ollie really fucked it up. All right. so, so yeah, so it, it, it, because it's slowed down, it, it makes a double maneuver and runs after you, who is, who is in the back at this point?

Dan: I think it would be Gregory because he just did that shot.

Erin: Okay. And, what you hadn't seen, you hadn't seen any, like. Mouth or anything on this sort of thing, but like just a large, almost like a scissor sort of opens up in what looks to be it's had in the two, like with, like two pronged to scissor blades, almost at the top of it and one at the bottom.

So you could see sort of how they fit together. And it just, all the way, turns to the side a little bit in it opens up. All the way almost as if there's a hand you can't even see at the back of it opens up and tries to close in on you almost like some sort of a executioners plate or something. All right, right around your, your, torso.

Lovely. Yeah. Whose move is it? It's their move

Steven: Palmer.

Erin: Yeah. It's a bad time

Dan: too. She was just describing an attack. So I'm pretty sure it's, it's not like, Oh, this is going to happen. And we just like, okay, well we just wanna keep running out of the range.

Tori: Okay.

Erin: So,

Tori: let's see.

Erin: And what is. You're soak my friend,

Dan: soak is

Erin: three okey-doke okey-doke

Dan: and 19 wounds.

Erin: What the hell

Dan: I took, look see you. I decided to make this fair for the short lifespan. So I took with all my experience. I bought a lot of talents. I took the cup in twice

Erin: to your God

Dan: and I forget what the one that gave me an extra so well, that

Erin: costs a lot too, because of the ranks.

Dan: It took a durable and tough and twice, I think that's what gave me.

Erin: Okay. So you will see if you live okay, please succeeds. Definitely. Yes. And, Two is enough to create with, with the particular type of, of weapon that it's it's it's using. all right, so you take, so let's say you take nine wounds.

Dan: That's a good chunk. I'm glad I

Erin: stocked up on him. So you, you managed to get away, but it crunches down on you.

Could you roll on the critical wound table for me?

Dan: 31. Okay.

Erin: And,

Dan: I have, let's see. So you have tough as nails and durable, which I think both reduce.

Erin: what do they do again?

Dan: just give me one second to, it'd be the labor arch type, if you want to look up.

Erin: okay. That was, Neil's fine. It has,

Steven: Oh

Tori: yeah.

That it does reduce your vicious.

Steven: That's what I was going to

Erin: three on it.

Dan: Oh, lovely. So we're gonna need to figure out what the modifiers from this freaking thing is. Like, it might be a 30 positive on the,

Erin: that is suspicious. It's 30 positive. Yes.

Dan: And I don't see durable. I'm gonna see. Oh, there we go. And durable is your character to reduces any critical injuries.

They suffer by 10 per rank. Adorable. So it's a 51 then.

Erin: It's not great.

Dan: A fearsome wound target increases difficulty of all presence in willpower checks by one until this critical injury is healed. Honestly, I'm thinking, willing to take that.

Erin: Okay. It's got to stick around and I'll boost any other Chrissy tech.

Dan: I mean, I'm going to. I mean, just doesn't feel right. To take a nine damage and normally get a minor, Nick.

Erin: Okay. Yeah. Yeah. How does this thing end up injuring you? How do you like get twist away from it?

Dan: Well, I think it just like, as he's running away, he sort of like sees it coming up to the side. So we just sort of like rolls forward.

It just makes a big gash in the back.

Erin: Okay. So, so it's just like, like,

Dan: it didn't quite catch it, but like, it gets deep in like his. Sides

Erin: doesn't it doesn't quite get your spinal column. It just sorta, it's like,

Dan: I'm actually like going to like a V that just sort of lightly bisects your sides, but just misses the like

Erin: important spine.

Okay. So, so you're in a lot of pain and that'll keep you from being personable. Yeah, I think more importantly having good Welltower

Dan: is great. Cause I already have willpower one, so that's going to be my best stat now.

Erin: Okay.

Steven: Wait, you have willpower zero now?

Dan: no, no. I saw willpower one. It's just the difficulty of the check goes up.

Steven: Oh, okay. It doesn't modify that.

Erin: okay. Okay. so I'm going to guess, given that you just got this big injury, would you, would you be fair, like giving up first reaction to this.

Dan: if anyone else wants to take it. Yeah. I feel like his, you can either say he's like, he's still stumbling forward, so yeah.

Erin: Okay. If your

Steven: critical was 10 worse, you would be slightly dazed. I know. It's crazy. It's cool.

Tori: That's great.

Steven: Isn't it?

Erin: Yes. I love it. if it was one word, what would it be? let's see. Head ringer. so,

Steven: it's almost the same.

Erin: Who wants to go next? Ollie, orange owl. Or

Steven: Joe I think would go, I don't know if is okay with this because Joe,

Erin: Joe is in the front too.

Steven: Okay. Joe can't lose any of the more friends that he doesn't have.

Erin: So. So, so are you telling me that Joe, in this moment of being like, Oh, why I have interacted with human beings? They tolerate me is now ride or die? Yes, Joe is

Steven: 100%, Joe.

Dan: Joe, is this isn't going to be another East scrap fill or whatever each salvage towns?

Steven: No, hopefully

Erin: not mystery alley. We'll never know.

Steven: So what I'm hoping is. So the thing takes a, like a, like a swipe it at Gregory does Gregory like stumble away from it

Dan: a bit. And he's sort of like the only reason he didn't dies. Cause he's sorta like swapped last second sort like

Erin: threw himself forward

Steven: himself forward.

So that does that give Joe and op a clean line of fire to the thing that just took?

Erin: I would say so, you do have Ollie between. You and the thing though, still, I would let you use a maneuver, gonna say, can I spend a

Steven: maneuver to, to aim?

Erin: Absolutely. as part of that, would you like yell to Ollie to like Doug?

Yeah.

Steven: Yeah.

Erin: Hey, so what'd he say, Dolly?

Steven: is there time to say more than doc

Erin: or I've taught it as a free action, but you know, I know

Steven: that's true, but I mean, in, in. Universe in situation. I'm not going to be like, Hey Ollie.

Erin: Yeah.

Steven: If you would consider dunking

Erin: so that I

Steven: could shoot that thing over there. I'm probably just going to say like, like Ollie get down or Ollie dock or something like that.

Erin: Okay. I'll he gets down. All right. Ollie gets down. could you, could you roll me that then? Sure.

Steven: so AME gives you a blue,

Erin: right? Aim gives you a blue

Steven: and what range are we talking? Medium. Cause he's right there.

Erin: So I have

Steven: one success and five advantages.

Erin: Oh, Holy Mike is three. Yeah. I'm going to tell you that.

Given the numbers you have. Laid this thing low. Okay. I'll you know what here, Steve, would you mind if I show you some of those advantages of yours? That's fine. Yeah. Okay. so you fire off again, Ollie, you get down, and as you fire you. God lucky for you. your, your, your laser just super precise this time as, as it fires out and it carves, right.

Instead of like, diffusing and blooming like that, it carves right through the one in front of you making it sort of just like faults and skid to a, to a stop. And it goes right through like, Perfectly right through the pile of, of, of dead bodies, right through the one that, Ollie shot in just right into the wall behind.

Steven: So, so there's no more of them that we're seeing.

Erin: Yes.

Steven: So I think we run over too early, so I'm going to run over to, to Gregory and

Dan: make sure he's already knows. Are we safe now or is this still a

Erin: there's no alarm. you don't hear any sounds of, of, Any others and given what you know, you know that no more have spawned.

Dan: All right.

Steven: Have you, do we know this? I don't know. He knows

Erin: you don't know shit

Steven: net, right? Yeah.

Dan: Actually how much does hobo Joe know? Cause he's apparently

Erin: a wanderer. Okay.

Steven: You might, but I there's no reason.

Erin: Does he kind of just sort of live his life on a cloud,

Dan: essentially, just like he does stuff just

Erin: sort of happens.

Dan: I mean, he does, he giant Ross and just his first reaction. Isn't runaway it's pocket dirt.

Erin: Yeah.

Dan: So

Steven: pocket dirt, go up those sensors and then,

Erin: So, so he has experience dealing with these things. It sounds like, but you might have

Tori: a sophisticated

Steven: classification for enemies, you know, he's got, he's got bad dude and shiny thing, you know?

Erin: what, what does, what does Ollie do, as things sort of calm down a bit? What is my

Steven: intelligence?

Erin: Three?

Tori: Gregory

Steven: is not as stupid as I thought I might be playing this a bit. All right. Yeah. Sorry. Sorry. Go on.

Tori: Thank you. All right. Can you walk?

Dan: Oh yeah, I can keep walking. Then we got a bit of a chunk out of me.

I guess we like just like pull some bandages out from a

Erin: sized chunk on the ground of Gregory.

Tori: Oh, she doesn't

Dan: think I get hit. They're

Erin: not fair. Fair

Dan: yet. Did you just like start saying like banjo is keep it from,

Steven: you know, of any molecular tape

Dan: flapping open, like two extra miles on the

Erin: side of his desk.

Can I help?

Dan: yeah, just all this keep compression on this side while I work on

Tori: no, I know how wounds work.

Steven: Do you have medicine as a skill?

Tori: I do.

Steven: Oh, I could possibly assist. Cause I'm not as dumb as I thought initially.

Tori: Yeah. I'm actually, I'm actually really good at medicine in character. I'm actually really good at medicine.

Erin: Oh,

Dan: wow. Then start taking some of this stuff because I've only no basic first date. I also kind of liked the in character realization of hobo.

Like I'm not as dumb as I thought I was

Erin: learning lots about himself today.

Steven: I love

Tori: to sort of help bandage them up.

Erin: Absolutely. could you roll. Oh, what would just be just like getting my wounds back

Dan: with medicine

Tori: to heal the

Erin: critical, yeah, it would be, it

Tori: would be medicine.

Erin: Medicine was what I was about to say.

Tori: Beautiful. What's

Erin: the difficulty. Okay. the difficulty, I would say, for that wound, what's that critical wound debt it's,

Tori: 51. So that's, that's that's that's two perps,

Erin: two perks. Okay. That, that would be two.

Tori: All right. So that's three successes in one threat.

Erin: Okay.

Dan: can I roll the help since he's also trying to work on himself

Erin: or honestly what she would do with you, if both of you assist, you'd both get to, to give her additional blue dice.

So Tori, would you like to roll two more blues,

Dan: Joe assisting or is he just sort of like fascinated, realizing that he's smarter than he thought he was?

Steven: Okay. Another success,

Erin: right. So, so, so four successes.

Tori: First successes and no threat.

Erin: Yeah. How would you like to describe this? Talk to me about your doctrine.

Tori: So it was, it was sort of like a,

Erin: sort of a V R

Tori: a Y shaped, gash in his back and whatnot. And you had, you had the bandages on you.

Dan: He had some just like spare bandages, cause he's out in the field a lot. So he tries to keep at least some stuff on him, not the highest quality stuff, but just enough to.

You know, you get the job done.

Erin: I mean,

Tori: shit. It seems like pretty simple stuff to me. I guess I just like do the thing of, you know, applying pressure and like, you know, that stuff. I mean, let's be real. Ollie is deficient in medicine. Tori is not

Erin: okay. Fair. Would you like me to help lend you some of my medical knowledge?

Tori: Please do.

Erin: Okay. You, you, you, I assume you have, a couple just like medical supplies, just like, or at least stuff you could use to, to do this. all right. So you start, you, you, because you have some time to just sorta sit down and get your bearings. you, you, wet some cloth and clean the wounds and start wrapping them in and, and gauze and bandages.

And it's it's, let's see that's for you. So you'll get, four wounds back.

Dan: Right. And I took nine, so,

Erin: okay. So, so, so you still down five, but also the, you will still have the, the, effects of the, the critical wound.

Dan: All right. So it did not get rid of the critical,

Erin: so you're going to need some more substantial healing for that.

You

Steven: can attempt that the book says. Character may also attempt to help someone recover from a critical injury by making a medicine check with a difficulty equal to the severity rating of the critical. Sure.

Erin: Yes. That'd be for more of like a long-term care kind of thing. Yeah. I think you were just saying like,

Dan: given how recent it is and what facilities we have, it's not really

Steven: ventilation shafts.

Erin: It's not, well-stocked like a first day type of medical.

Dan: That'd be real here. He just got it. Even if you stitch it up, it's going to be hurting for a little bit. So I'm kind of fine. Yeah. I'm fine with, still suffering the critical one. I mostly just wanted to not die points back.

Erin: Yes. okay. Yeah. And let's see, 14 months

Dan: right now, then.

Erin: Okie doke. All right. And so now that you've, you've, you've, you've had some time to think and you're kind of, you have kind of trapped yourself a little bit in this tunnel. D do you guys want to take some time to get your bearings talk a little more, or are you just going to try and head out?

Dan: I mean, I think Gregory is sort of a fan of walk-in talk, given that they just got back from a nightmare hellscape of bubble land.

Erin: So

Dan: he probably wants to put as much distance between him and the near death experience as he possibly can.

Erin: Okay. So the three of you. Have just survived a close encounter in the tunnels below the levels he used to call home. And as you sort of get your bearings and gather your stuff up, you head out further down the tunnel to whatever may come.

Dan: All right. Sounds good to me.

Erin: Alright.

Steven: Yeah, Eugene wasn't here and it went flawlessly so weird.