[Wushu] Actual Play - Gotham Nights

[indra]

Last night, I started a serial Pulp-Fu game I'm calling "Gotham Nights." It's set in 1920's Gotham City, where the PCs are a team of vigilante undercover cops whose mission is to use mafia-style intimidation tactics to shut down criminals the law can't touch. As it turns out, those tend to be criminals of the supernatural kind.

My ulterior motive is to playtest a variety of material from my indie games, both current and upcoming. Most of the mojo will be in the hands of the NPCs, but our intrepid heros will find themselves altered by their encounters with the supernatural. (One has already started down the mysterious path of Hoodoo :)

I'm also playtesting a technique for in media res opening scenes, based on the Held Dice mechanic from Wire-Fu. (I'm trying to emulate one of my favorite shows: the hyper-kinetic series "Fastlane.") I start each session by dropping the PCs into the middle of some bizarre and dangerous situation without any real context. We play through a couple of turns, then cut away to one of those "X hours earlier..." transitions. As they play through the events leading up to the opener, they can put dice into a communal pool by taking actions that help set up the scene. Once they catch up, they can draw on that pool to help get themselves out of whatever mess they've gotten themselves into. (See below for an example.)

Our cast of characters:

The Rumrunner - An undercover cop who works the speakeasy scene.
Traits: Drive Like a Maniac (5) Tommygun Terror (4) Bootlegger (3)
Likes the Ladies (1) has never hit a woman in his life.

The Grifter - A thrill-seeking criminal who's paying his debt to society.
Traits: Con Artist (5) Fights Dirty (4) High Society Connections (3)
Adrenaline Junkie (1) the bigger the risk, the bigger the thrill.

The Detective - A hard-boiled gumshoe who's seeking redemption.
Traits: Veteran Cop (5) Twin Revolvers (4) Pals in City Hall (3)
Vigilante (1) took the law into his own hands... & paid the price.

See also:
http://www.Bayn.org/wushu/pulp-fu.html
http://www.Bayn.org/games

[indra]

First Session: Zombies!

We open on a black screen and ambient city noises. "Gotham City, 1925" appears at the bottom, then fades out as we hear the sound of someone snoring. Suddenly, a figure looms above us and we realize that we're seeing things from the sleeper's point of view. Our attacker's eyes and mouth are sewn shut and he has our throat in a vice grip.

I tell the players that the same thing is happening to each of them and ask who wants to go first. A series of two-fisted fight scenes unfold while the players introduce such elements as a girl in the Rumrunner's shower (who has to be rushed out of the apartment in nothing but a towel), and a vase full of flowers, plus an attached love note, next to the Grifter's bed. The Rumrunner goes on the offensive and runs out of Chi first. His zombie attacker beats his head into a door frame and the screen goes black as he loses consciousness.

12 hours earlier... the PCs get their mission brief. A pimp and drug runner named Papa Sang has been growing fat off the misery and desperation of the impoverished inhabitants of Carrib-town, an ethnic ghetto on the city's fringe. He and his enforcer, Le Baron, have the locals too scared to even mention their names. (They believe it draws their attention.) The PCs are asked to shut him down by whatever methods they find most expedient.

The Detective and the Grifter head over to Carrib-town for some recon, while the Rumrunner plies his underworld contacts for information. In the guise of a Southern preacher, the Grifter manages to talk his way into Papa Sang's lair: the cellar of a derelict plantation house. The hoodlums do their best to get the "preacher" drunk, high, and deflowered. After an hour or two, the Detective causes a distraction by shooting at Papa Sang's teenage guards from the roof of a bar down the street. Unfortunately, his position is revealed when a bizarre fireworks show ignites the sky above downtown Gotham. A gigantic, yellow smiley face appears behind him, then its forehead erupts in a burst of crimson. When the Detective looks back down, he finds the guards staring up at him.

A thrilling chase scene ensues. I assign Threat Ratings of 4 to the Detective's and the Grifter's respective attempts to escape. The former leads a mob of hoodlums on a rooftop chase that ends with a toppled water tower and a flooded alley. The Grifter cuts off pursuit by holding out a crucifix to his enemies... then throws a handful of blinding powder in their eyes. When one guard grabs his arm, he frees himself with the cross' concealed knife blade. Drunk and soaked, they head back to HQ. (On the way, the Grifter stops at a candy shop and sends an apology gift to a woman he stood up in favor of tonight's escapades, thus setting up the flowers in his apartment. A die goes into their communal pool.)

Meanwhile, the Rumrunner has conducted his information gathering with a single Scab Roll. He spends the rest of his time hitting on the ladies who work at his favorite bar, thus setting up the girl in his shower and adding a few dice to the pool. He also meets an old woman who refuses to give her name, but says the folks in Carrib-town call her Crossroads Cora. She warns the Rumrunner about Papa Sang's dark magic and gives him a foul-smelling gris-gris bag for protection. He sticks the bag in his pocket, rather than wearing it around his neck as instructed, and more dice go into the pool.

Back at the candy store (their HQ, a converted theater), the Detective makes a few calls concerning that fireworks display. With a 6 on his Scab Roll, he manages to find out that it was the work of a group of bored, wealthy artists who call themselves the Society for Creative Vandalism. (More on them in future episodes.)

The PCs hatch a scheme to undermine Papa Sang's power base by publically humiliating him and his underlings... starting with the street pimps. The players collaborate on a montage scene where they drive around Carrib-town, pummel pimps, mark their foreheads with crosses, and leave them tied to fire hydrants and street signs. They earn 13 dice and roll 8 successes, which I decide is more than enough antagonism to justify zombie reprisal. The shared dice pool tops out at 8 as we finally catch up to the opening scene.

We cut to a series of zombie attack clips: the Grifter pulling his attacker under the bed, the Detective shooting out a zombie's ankle, the Rummrunner getting his head beaten to a bloody pulp. When the Rumrunner regains consciousness, he finds Cora crouched over his zombie attacker, furiously stuffing its mouth full of salt. She turns and yells at him for not wearing that gris-gris bag around his neck, then tells him to put on some pants. His friends are in trouble.

The Grifter puts up a spirited fight, but ultimately gets knocked unconcious and has to be rescued. During the scuffle, the Rumrunner inhales the zombie's last breath and cements his connection to the netherworld. (The character gets a new Trait, Hoodoo (2), which can be used for sympathetic magic. It's one of the traditions I'm working on for the Wushu Guide to Wyrd-Fu.)

The Detective manages to beat his zombie down the old fashioned way, impale him with a cross, and light the bastard on fire. The rest of the crew shows up just as he's lighting himself a cigarette.

Our heros cook up a retaliatory plan involving a car bomb, a nail bomb, and Papa Sang's house. It earns them an 8-dice tactical pool, most of which is rolled to determine how on-fire the house gets. The answer: Plenty. The car bomb rolls in through the front doors and transforms itself into a raging bonfire. When the hoodlums come pouring out the back door, the nail bomb makes sure they're in no condition to seek revenge.

A few days later, our heros are told that Papa Sang's operation has fallen into disarray. There's no sign of him or his enforcer, and police believe they may have fled the country. (The players expect future reprisal.) Crossroads Cora has stepped in as Carrib-town's premier provider of illegal drugs and spirits. She also begins schooling the Rumrunner in the ways of the Loa.

Admittedly, I've got a good group of players at my disposal, but I was still pleased with how well the Held Dice mechanic supported my in media res opener. The players and I all introduced a ton of plot threads for future games and the action was quality pulp all the way. (Hopefully, they'll chime in below with thrilling tales of their favorite stunts.)

Next week: Big trouble in Little Moscow...

[Lord Minx]

Cool.

What I've been wondering: How was the Zombie-attack scene handled mechanically? It doesn't sounds like a regular Mook battle. (Cause it's kinds hard to get beaten to pulp by regular Mooks, IME. )

Also, the "Start everything in medias res and let them build up a pool of Held dice" ideas is brilliant. Very, very cool.

M

[indra]

In Pulp-Fu, I have players who regularly get beaten to a pulp by mooks (as describing the protagonist getting ghetto stomped is a very good source of noir Details), but no this was not a mook battle. I gave each of the Zombies 5 Chi and a combat Trait of 4 (which is the same as the PCs). Then, I let them share the first dice pool; I filibustered once for all three scenes and let each Zombie roll all 6 dice. After that, it was standard Nemesis fightin' all the way.

I'm really lookin' forward to these in media res openings. I'm gonna see how bizarre they can get. Plus, it means I get to mandate at least one action sequence every session, since I can plunk them down in the middle of whatever I want, and then they do all the heavy lifting to make it happen. Good, good stuff.

--Dan

[Lord Minx]

Originally Posted by indra

In Pulp-Fu, I have players who regularly get beaten to a pulp by mooks (as describing the protagonist getting ghetto stomped is a very good source of noir Details), but no this was not a mook battle. I gave each of the Zombies 5 Chi and a combat Trait of 4 (which is the same as the PCs). Then, I let them share the first dice pool; I filibustered once for all three scenes and let each Zombie roll all 6 dice. After that, it was standard Nemesis fightin' all the way.

I see. And yeah, players narrating how their characters get a good beating is absolutely in genre. I was talking about getting a beating as in "loosing all their Chi". Which I've yet to see against regular Mooks.

I'm really lookin' forward to these in media res openings. I'm gonna see how bizarre they can get. Plus, it means I get to mandate at least one action sequence every session, since I can plunk them down in the middle of whatever I want, and then they do all the heavy lifting to make it happen. Good, good stuff.

Everything that means less work for the GM is a good thing, IMO.

M

[indra]

Gotcha. I did stack the deck against the players a little, since I wanted to make sure at least one of them was taken to death's door. I used those zombies the same way I use Agents in Matrix games: they're just as good as the PCs, but have more Chi and roll nothing but Yang dice every round.

More fun tonight, which means another Actual Play report by Thursday.

--Dan

[Lord Minx]

Originally Posted by indra

Gotcha. I did stack the deck against the players a little, since I wanted to make sure at least one of them was taken to death's door. I used those zombies the same way I use Agents in Matrix games: they're just as good as the PCs, but have more Chi and roll nothing but Yang dice every round.

Yeah, I can see that being nifty, especially if they get back part (or all) of their Chi when the game returns to the scene. It also gives the players this immediate "Oh fuck, those guys are tough" impression.

More fun tonight, which means another Actual Play report by Thursday.

Yay!

M

[indra]

Second Session: Werewolves!

We open with a man yelling angrily off-screen, then a pool cue swings towards & through the camera. The Grifter pops up, having just ducked said pool cue, and pops a Russian guy in the mouth. (That was my opening for this week :) The Grifter presses his advantage by taking the pool cue, jabbing his opponent in the eyes, and pushing him backwards over a pool table. Someone yells, "Hey! We'll teach you to talk about other people's mothers that way!" (That was my other contribution. It points the way towards how they ought to get themselves into this mess.)

Thugs jump to their feet all around the pool hall, including one to either side of the Rumrunner, who has been passing time with a girl. He pulls a gun from his coat and kneecaps the thug on one side, while pushing the other back with a side kick to the stomach. Since the first guy ain't gettin' up, the second grabs a shotgun from atop one of the hanging light fixtures, pulls the girl away from our loverboy, and levels the shotgun!

Meanwhile, the Detective is about to make the winning shot at a nearby table when the kneecapped Russian falls into him... making him scratch. He pays his opponent with one hand, then shoots him with the other. He spins around and knocks aside the shotgun that was about to ruin the Rumrunner's pretty face, but accidentally hits the girl in the process. (That last detail wasn't a critical failure or anything. It actually earned the player a die!)

Back at the center of the shit storm, the Grifter grabs an 8-ball and uses it to punch another Russian in the jaw. Then, he jams the 8-ball in the guy's mouth, uppercuts him, and sends a right hook into his cheek. The poor bastard's head spins around and his teeth spray out across the bar. That's when another thug grabs the Grifter by the shoulders, kicks out his knee from behind, and drops him to the floor. He snarls at his victim with a mouth suddenly full of fangs and his eyes glow with infernal, red light!

30 minutes earlier... Our heros are pouring over a new mission brief at the candy store. It seems that Little Moscow is being plauged by gang violence with all the earmarks of a turf war, but the cops only know of one gang in the area: the 7th Street Gang. The immigrants who live there don't normally talk to American cops, but on this issue, they're even less talkative than normal. Their goals are 1) to identify the other side of this conflict and 2) end the turf war any way they can.

They hop in the Rumrunner's ride and head over to the 7th Street Gang's HQ: a pool hall on the outskirts of Little Moscow. On the way, they notice a column of black smoke on the horizon, silhouetted against the setting sun. Ominous ;)

When they reach their destination, they decide not to go in together. The Rumrunner enters first, spies the barmaid's twin sister, and strikes up a conversation. (Two dice go into the shared pool, one for setting up the girl and one for that bit about the twin sister.) The Detective enters next and begins his pool sharking. (Enough detail goes into it that 3 more dice enter the pool.) Finally, the Grifter walks in and starts givin' everybody the stink eye. When no one seems to notice, he gets a little ticked and asks one of the Russians, "Where did you learn to handle a stick like that? Your momma?" (There were a few more embellishments, but that was enough to kick off the violence and drop one more die into the pool.)

We montage through the first few minute of violence: The Grifter ducking a swing, the Rumrunner kneecapping a guy, the Detective accidentally hitting the girl, and 8-ball's teeth spraying out across the bar. (Unfortunately, the Grifter had gone into negative Chi by the end of the opener, so he's out for the count. However, his attacker had lost control of his mad werewolf skillz and isn't in any condition to finish him off just yet. I'm using the mechanics from "Werewolves Bite;" lycanthropes have a pool of bonus dice they can draw from, but the dice they leave in the pool are used to make their self-control rolls. This guy failed, so he wigs out and transforms completely into a wolf. That takes a few, excrutiating seconds.)

In the meantime, the bartender conjures a metal chain, swings it around the Detective's neck, and yanks him backwards onto the pool table. He hops over the bar, wraps some chain around his knuckles, and pounds the velvet where his victim's head had been moments before. The Detective rolls back with a pool ball in each hand and bashes the Russian's temples like one of those cymbal-banging monkeys. That buys him enough time to regain his feet. He also tosses one of those balls into the air and shoots it, blinding the barkeep with a cloud of plaster dust (or whatever pool balls are made out of).

True to form, the Rumrunner turns his back on the fight in favor of making sure the girl is okay after her konk on the head. He keeps at it, calling the sister over to help, even as a super-strong thug picks him up by his collar and hurls him clear across the room! It's about that time that a mountain of a man emerges from the back, fires a shotgun into the air, and tells his boys to "put it back on the leash!" The gangers back off and the PCs see an unusually large dog flee out the front door. The gang leader also tells the strangers to pick up their ill-mannered friend and get the hell out of his place. Luckily, the Rumrunner is still in the twin sisters' good graces. After taking one of them home & tending to her injury, she lets slip a lead: the gang's been fighting with a bunch of "cultists" who are camped out in an old Orthodox church.

About an hour later, the group returns to Little Moscow and pulls up outside the dilapidated church. The Rumrunner and the Grifter go in the front and meet a friendly Russian immigrant named Gregor Iyanovov. He tells them all about the glory of serving Baba Yaga and how the 7th Street Gang is a bunch of demons who've been terrorizing Little Moscow. (These guys are an NPC group from "Werewolves Bite.") Gregor invites one or both of them to join the cult and get some kewl powerz, but they decline and make a graceful exist.

In the alley behind the church, the Detective has a pleasant conversation with a woman named Mary Miller. She seems to know a lot about the werewolf packs and claims to have "an interest in things that go bump in the night." She recommends turning the packs against each other, since they're too powerful to confront individually. Afterwards, several passers-by urge him to flee the city; it seems the Germans/British/Aliens/Armies of Hell are invading the city. They heard it on the radio, so it must be true!

When the group meets back up, they decide to pull a Yojimbo. They arm up and head back to the pool hall on 7th Street with the following tale: the cultists had hired them to mess up the pool hall, but then refused to pay. Now, the PCs say they want the gang to help them get some sweet revenge. The hellhounds go for it, but only after the PCs promise to bring some explosives and heavy artillery. They ask for an hour's prep time (so the Detective can sneak back to the church and warn the cultists, ensuring maximum carnage) and the clock starts a' tickin'!

I fear this report will become a novella if I try to recount all of the top notch violence that followed, so here's the highlight reel: The PCs toss a few grenades into the church and the hellhounds launch a full assault just as a panicked mob floods the streets. The Rumrunner saves a mother and child from death by trampling, while the Grifter stops Gregor from unleashing mustard gas on the innocent crowd. A miscellaneous werewolf gets lit on fire, then tosses the Detective across the road and through a storefront. The were-torch then leaps over the crowd and smashes a parked car as it lands. It hurles itself at the Detective, who grabs a hat rack from the store window and runs the creature through! Gregor slips his leash and, while he's in mid-transformation, the Grifter ghetto stomps him to death.

Having finally extricated himself and his charges from the rampaging mob, the Rumrunner returns to his car and recovers one of the clay werewolf dolls he created during their hour of prep time. Spying his victim on the church's roof, he begins methodically twisting and breaking the doll's limbs, tearing a gash in its side, and accidentally knocking its head clean off. (This was a filibuster, so the player got to roll the max pool of 6 dice against her new "Hoodoo (2)" Trait. I wasn't counting it as combat, because she was just trying to stop the werewolf from sneaking up on someone, so all she needed was one success... which she barely managed to get. We had decided previously on a set of milestones that would cause her Hoodoo Trait to increase; using it successfully was the first, so the Rumrunner now has "Hoodoo (3).") The hapless werewolf howls in pain and tumbles off the roof.

Finally, I threw one more riot-related complication at them. Some idiot had hijacked a city bus and was frantically careening out of town. He took a turn too fast and rolled the vehicle into the church, rupturing its gas tank and knocking out one of the church's support structures. The Rumrunner hastily creates a clay model of the bus and busts open a fire hydrant to douse it in water, thus preventing the gas from catching fire. The Grifter kicks in the windshield and starts dragging people out while the Detective uses his "Veteran Cop" Trait to order passers-by to do the same. (I gave the whole situation a Theat Rating of 5, which they manage to knock down in one round.) As they pull the last passenger to safety, the church collapses in on itself, crushing the bus and any werewolves who may still have been inside.

On their way to the hospital, they stop by the pool hall with several cans of gasoline. 8-ball is the only ganger who stayed behind. The Rumrunner shows him the hoodoo doll he made using some of 8-ball's missing teeth and tells the Grifter to point a gun at it while he pours gas on the bar. 8-ball considers his options, then grabs his hat from the back room and heads for the door! As they leave, flames engulfing the building behind them, the Grifter asks the Rumrunner if he wants that hoodoo doll. When he answers in the negative, the Grifter tosses it in the fire. Howling echos through Little Moscow for the last time.

I was again very pleased with how the Held Dice mechanic worked. My players didn't need to use them to resolve the pool hall fight, but they came in extremely handy during later encounters with other werewolves. For instance, they saved the Grifter's bacon during his climatic battle with Gregor. I was also happy with how the milestone thing worked out for the Rumrunner's new Trait; it should shape up as an excellent replacement for experience points. Finally, I got to turn the Detective into a werewolf, which fits him to a T!

Next week: Down the rabbit hole...

[John Marron]

Dan,
Can you discuss the rule specifics of how the milestone idea worked? I'm wanting to run a longer Wushu game and might want to incorporate that option.

Thanks

John Marron

Edit: Missed descriptin of how held dice worked in the first post!

[indra]

There's not much to it. Since Wushu Traits only range from 2-5 (not counting Weaknesses), there are only 3 steps from novice to master. Rather than use a point system, I came up with a set of events that would mark the character's development along the new path:

2-3: Use hoodoo successfully (power over the material realm).
3-4: Defeat a hoodoo creature or houngan (power over the supernatural).
4-5: Become a houngan (take up a place within the hoodoo community).

I don't expect the character to make that last leap, as it would be a bit out of character, but you never know what the future may bring. This is also the only character with a development arch like this, so it'll just be used the one time. (My new werewolf will have to shuffle his existing Traits around if he wants to increase his Self-Control.)

The idea came from the one reasonable objection I've been hearing to my heart-felt stance against character advancement: the Hero's Journey. Personally, I think Campbell was full of it, but I also started to think, "If you want your character to grow more powerful as they go through the steps of the Hero's Journey, why not just link stat changes to the actual steps along that journey?" With Wushu, it's easy to do because there's only room for 3 steps.

That's about all there is to it. So far, it's working like a charm.

--Dan