A Dark And Quiet Room

…tracking signal…
…re-establishing link…

…static…

….alarms went off. Alien attack!

Scramble!

There were getting to be far too many happy interludes. Something needed to be done! When in doubt, the aliens attack. So I went with that.

I reused the mission layout from the original Scramble! which worked out pretty well.

Mission Brief
…begin briefing…

Scramble!
Prevent alien from reaching base
Defeat enemy pilot
If either is failed, one non-pilot character is harmed (GM’s choice)
…end briefing…

Jude stormed out into the dreamworld, determined to prove himself to everyone. He easily dispatched one of the alien remotes and then destroyed the alien goo that poured out of the downed remote. Then he hotshotted a goal to take out Marcus’s target, too. He succeeded, but not before his jamming gear was blown off his ANIMa. In other words, his relationship with Rachel was broken. Then Leah punched him out before things got worse.

Marcus was running cleanup. The alien goo was pouring into the base, and he needed to stop it. So he reached out with his power fist and grabbed a building to drop onto it.

I don’t remember exactly what the roll was, but it was terrible. So terrible, in fact, that Gabrielle opted for Flashback. If both Pilot Safety and Mission Success receive a (-) result, then the pilot may immediately call for an interlude involving a relationship not already part of his ANIMa. If this flashback results in Intimacy-building, then the pilot may set Mission Success to (0), but he must incorporate the relationship into his ANIMa.

So Gabrielle flashed back to a time soon after Marcus married Beth. Things weren’t going well, so he went to talk to Eve. She fed him cookies and made him laugh. Before going, she patted him on the arm and said, “It’ll be okay. Don’t worry.”

There was a ridiculous amount of positioning going on in this interlude. The touching. The “eating together”. Crystal and Gabrielle both desperately wanted the Intimacy Building result. Which I gave them.

Eve was the “wind beneath his wings” to Marcus. So she manifests as jump jets. Firing them, he burns up the alien goo.

As an interlude, immediately after the mission, Marcus strips off his pilot suit and stalks off naked. He is tired and stressed and fed up. Trauma-Relief.

Then we called the game for the night.

Reflections on the game

We discovered that we don’t share the same opinion about the characters. For example, Crystal find Jude to be quite sympathetic, while Gabrielle and I aren’t really sure about him. But perhaps the most profound difference has to do with Joseph.

Crystal really doesn’t like Joseph. Gabrielle understands him. I really connect with Joseph. Indeed, aside from the authority figure, all my characters are the children. Except Joseph. I have ownership of him, too.

As we discussed the differences of opinions, Gabrielle connected it to our opinion of cops. Crystal’s experiences of police officers are almost universally bad. They are power-hungry, rude, and belligerent. Whereas, for Gabrielle and myself, growing up in a small suburb, the police were polite and embraced as a positive part of the community. We had a good conversation about some of this. Perhaps Gabrielle or Crystal will fill in some of those details.

Gabrielle also has been gaining a painful amount of insight into the male psyche. As I mentioned earlier, when Marcus found out that Beth was pregnant, her initial reaction was panic. “Another responsibility! I can’t handle this!” She asked me about this later, and I told her that it was indeed a completely realistic emotional response.

We are also enjoying the interplay between the relationships in the real world and the ANIMa usage in the dreamworld. When Rachel’s relationships was shot off Jude’s ANIMa, Crystal was thrilled. It seemed to fit that point of the story, especially as Jude’s relationship with Leah is developing. And, in general, it just seemed to make sense.

Finally, it occurred to me that, once again, I’m engaged with media that’s all about a lost cause. I have a soft spot in my heart for desperate last stands and lost causes. Just check out the video that I linked above. That kind of thing moves me deeply. What does that say about me? Does that mean anything for my future? I don’t know.

Rules question

I do have some rules questions as a result of this session. First, is it true that, by default, mission goals can be accomplished in any order? If so, then what about missions like Deep Probe, where you could just skip to the “important” goal, bypassing the others? Then your anchor just punches you out without penalty. Are we missing something?

Also, how are conflicts of narration adjudicated in an interlude? For example, what if I narrate my character saying, “I tackle him” and then you say, “No you don’t.” Now what? We played that the Judge had authority to decide these matters, but I couldn’t find it in the rules anywhere.

We’ve already played another session since these events, so I’m already behind on my reports. You will hear more from us soon.

But for now, this is Seth Ben-Ezra, of the Peoria Resistance Group, signing off.

…end transmission…