Bulldrek v3.0

This first post will be edited later and be used to keep current character stats


William James Nichols (played by 3278)

Job: National Geographic photographer 2
Group: ??
Thing: Noticing Things 3
Good at: ??
Suck at: Social Conventions
Equipped as: ??



Raymond Giles Kelly (played by Bonefish)

Job: ????
Group: US Marine, non active 3
Thing: Tough Bastard 2
Good at: ????
Suck at: Running/jumping/etc(Limp, bad right knee)
Equipped as: ????[/b]



Lord Jonathan Arlington, III (Played by DV8)

Job: Dilettante
Group: ??
Thing: Adventure
Good at:
Suck at: Patience
Equipped as: ??



Benjamin Justin Nydus (played by Tiny Deev)
Ben is 5'6", with dark blonde hair and big green eyes. His skin is weather beaten and tanned.

Job: Carnival Operator 1
Group: Wanderers 3
Thing: Adventure
Good at: ???
Suck at: Reading (he's illiterate)
Equipped as: ???

NPC Stats and descriptions, will be updated as more NPCs occur or you learn more about them.

Stuff listed is stuff you have learned prior to the beginning of the game, from casual conversation and observation in the bus station and on the bus.


Beatrice Hastings, quiet nervous woman.
Librarian 3
Sucks at maintaining eye contact and noticing things
Strikes: 1

Bull Billings, laborer/farm worker travelling to look for employment, quiet and shy.
Good at Feats of Strength
Strikes: 3, Dead.




Gary Getz, traveling salesman
Sales 2
Good at Telling Jokes and making people at ease



Harry Goldmine, vaudeville actor, headed to Portland, Maine for waaayy off Broadway production.
Actor 2
Equipped as ventrilquist and vaudeville performer.
Strikes: 1



Oswald Bush, the bus driver. intense about schedules, doesn't do casual conversation.
Bus Driver 2
Good at calculations.
Strikes: 3, Dead.

By the way, in the IC thread, it says we're going to Providence, Maine; is that Providence, RI, or Portland, ME, or a fictional Maine city named Providence?

I meant Portland Maine. I was thinking Portland and typed Providence.

And would the main route from Bahston to Portland ordinarily travel over a dirt stretch?

No.

Then some other bastard better hurry up and post so I can make some kind of comment about it!

I was gonna wait on Deev to post something!

That's cool: I definitely don't mind waiting for him.

Still, one of the nice things about this posting format is that one person can't hang up the whole group: as long as one other poster and the GM have posted, you're free to go, so even if somebody's busy for a week, the game doesn't stop: their character just kind of gets swept along, like most people do most of the time, anyway. I definitely want to try that with my next game!

I've been off the grid for a bit. I'll post something tonight or tomorrow. Sorry for the delay guys, not exactly the start I wanted to make.

Don't worry about it. It's all been scene setting to far with no real action. Stuff will start happening soon.

How obvious is all these nervousness by Oswald?

Yeah, I'm curious about that, as well. It seems pretty obvious in narrative - because who writes about the trivial - but is it obvious on the bus?

It's fairly obvious. It's also a clear change from his behavior earlier.

I guess this is where I would want to "activate" my equipment and put it on the table'eh?

Ok what i picture kelly with is a Colt 1911A1. A preferred weapon of marine trench raiding squads. often used with a knife in the off hand. Kellly has a shoulder holster with a .45 holstered, with a sawed off shotgun on his other side. His shotgun is without a stock and with most of the barrrel cut away, mostly ready for short range encounters. Kelly remembers the trenches, and harbors an overwhelming desiree to fight to this day.

His attache case is noticable, too. It's big enough to hide a book, a few clips or boxes of shotgun ammo. Kellly is counting on his reputation. He thinks the only reason he is in this situation is because he is the courier. He is pretty sure that oswald canth kill him though the ben chs before he can put oswald's brains on the dash.

But, whate happens when oswald dies? Kelly is too slow to get to the bus before it goes out of controll. So we all die. Kellly is ready to die, but maybe something else shows. The shoot oswald in the head impluse is tempereded by the bus flys out of control.

Kelly is ready to shoot, but he needs an accurate time. He would wait until the time that Oswald slows down and concentrates on his parking. Kelly doesn't mind putting a bunch of people held at gun point, so long as he completes his delivery. Which is the pad locked attache case .

With oswald, i see Kelly waiting for his moment.

Bone, that all sounds good and makes sense. There might be a change of circumstances soon.


[quote="3278][I'd like to make what, in Shadowrun, I'd call "a perception test." How do I do that?][/quote]

You use which ever of your abilities is closest. In your case, Noticing Things is a great fit. Possibly add or subtract 1 depending on if phtographer 2 or suck at social conventions apply.

Then go to Invisible castle to roll the dice.
http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/

Use Ride Interupted as the campaign name.
fill in character name.
roll 1d4-1d4 and add your ability score. This will give you a result that has a Fudge-like distribution about your ability score. The number can be compared to this chart for an idea of the level of success (or I might supply target number ahead of time).

Number Difficulty
0 Simple even for someone with no training
1 Easy for most people
2 Some difficulty for amateurs
3 Somewhat difficult
4 Difficult
5 Very Difficult
6 Extremely hard even with luck and skill
7 You have to be kidding me

Hopefully it's okay that I spelled "interrupted" correctly.


1d4-1d4+3=3

(I'm a bit late. hehe)

Benjamin Justin Nydus
Ben is 5'6", with dark blonde hair and big green eyes. His skin is weather beaten and tanned.

Job: Carnival Operator 1
Group: Wanderers 3
Thing: Adventure
Good at: ???
Suck at: Reading (he's illiterate)
Equipped as: ???

( I didn't just barge into this game uninvited. I asked Nicephorus, and he said it was alright! )

This is about the clearest image I could find of the type of bus you'd be riding.





edited, to not use direct link.

That's awesome. It's an angelfire, apparently?

Here's how the mechanics work out for what was essentially an initiative roll:

Oswald has driver 2, which implies a fast reactions but reactions of all sorts aren't central to the idea to -1 down to 1. attempt to recover from crash (1d4 - 1d4 +1=3) forgot to subtract 1 for being more shook up, and another 1 for possibly having to recover the pistol because it was in his hand during the crash so =1.

Kelly has Marine 3, which would implies fast recovery from beign violently thrown about. But he sucks at moving fast so -1 for that.Kelly attempts to get to bus driver. (1d4 -1d4 +3 -1 =1)

Oswald rolls better to even out the crappier starting value. If Kelly wants to shoot the driver, he'd roll 1d4 - 1d4 + 4 (marine + equip bonus). Oswald would roll 1d4 - 1d4 + 1 (for equipment) + whatever ability might apply, if any. Loser takes damage equal to half the difference, rounded up.

Ok, so I need to roll that now and PM you the results?

Bonefish wrote:Ok, so I need to roll that now and PM you the results?

You can roll it on invisible castle and paste the results here or in the IC thread.

On the Init test I rolled -1(2, -3). If I'm not dead after that, and Oswald is threatening, I'm gonna shoot him in the torso a few times. Rolled 2(3, -1) for that.

I didn't include any modifiers, because I don't know which ones apply, other than your examples.

I had taken the liberty of rolling the initiative for you last post to spped it up.

Oswald shoots at Kelly (1d4 - 1d4 + 1 + 1=3)

Kelly gets a total 6, roll of 2, marine 3, 1 because equipment is applicable.
The difference of 3 gives two strikes to Oswald, in addition to the one he had from the crash. 3 strikes= he's outta there.

FYI, most but not all NPCs are weaker than PCs, 1-2 strikes to instead of 3, 1-3 of the 6 total abilities, often maxing out at 2 instead of 3. Oswald could take 2 strikes/hits before being impared, the 3rd strike is death.


And I just noticed that DV8 doesn't have numbers assigned to his abilities.

No doubt about it, Kelly will shoot ozzie again unless he drops the gun. But i expect it's time for much confusion to occur!

Will is going to look around for: a) anyone who needs immediate help, and, b) any way to get out of the bus without getting between Oswald and Kelly. That's actually going to be my "action" for the "turn," so I guess I may as well roll for it, instead of just look about:

1d4-1d4+3=2

I've tried to figure out if buses of the 30s had emergency exits. Based on the first picture above, I think no. Which leaves ad hoc exits or the main door which is now top front. I did find out that laminated glass with a middle film to hold it together, appeared in the late 20s so flying glass wouldn't be as dangerous was it would be a decade prior when it was pretty much the same as window glass in houses.

With Oswald dead, not getting between them shouldn't be as big of a deal. I'll post what you notice in the IC thread.

Here's a view of the surrounding area, note the scale of ~1"=200 ft. It's a rather dry here for this time of the year. The bus would be in the middle of the pic, on the left/south side of what is labelled as McLucas road. Map is north up.

Same site, zoomed in one level, bus crudely drawn in with Google maps shape draw.
There are quite a few trees in the area but many of them lack leaves.

Also, what sort of Pistol did Oswald have?

A snub nosed .38 revolver. But it doesn't really matter as the rules don't distinguish details. Either your equipment would apply to the situation or it wouldn't, rarely another +1 for giving you a distinct advantage. So, a rifle vs. a pistol would some times make a difference. Differences between two pistols would almost never matter.

The rules aren't highly tactical. I prefer the focus to be higher level, like to shoot or not, who to shoot, path to take, retreat or camp, who to believe, who to ally with, stuff like that.

Oh, I jsut wanted to know what it was, so I can describe it correctly in the future. For example, I had assumed it was a semi-auto pistol, similar to a PPK. But revolve makes more sense.

For those - like, say, me - who aren't particularly familiar with Maine, the terrain is hilly with a vengeance, but falls a little short of mountainous in the area we're in.



For reference, that yellow line in the middle is about 100 feet long [and roughly centered on our bus; the view is looking south]. The hill to the left there is about 400 feet high.

And now I'll stop butting in. Sorry, too used to being the GM's right hand.

Much of it is more heavily forested than the mountains I'm used in the Rockies. Where I grabbed this pic, there's a line where it gets so thick that you can't see the road from above - I'm guessing that it's due to the time of year the satelite pics come from.

Is that the same location? You're good! I can't do google 3d at work - our machines are locked down and we don't have admin rights on our own machines so no installs of extras. From the top-down, I had thought that the north was higher elevation and it sloped down to the south - I'm no expert at satelite reconaissance.

edit, here's a pic from nearby (within a couple of miles) of typical landscape.
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/4542895
It came out huge when pasted in so I made it a link.

I always find it cool and scary how dense some forests are. The linked pic turns out to be 100 feet behind someone's house. Other than car noises and such, it can be hard to know how close you are to a road or structure until you're right on it.

Nicephorus wrote:Much of it is more heavily forested than the mountains I'm used in the Rockies. Where I grabbed this pic, there's a line where it gets so thick that you can't see the road from above - I'm guessing that it's due to the time of year the satelite pics come from.

That is correct. The western areas there were shot in spring or fall: the only green trees there are the evergreens; the shot to the east is May 16 of last year, and thus has foliage. I like the idea, though, that it's summer, and yet the trees look like that: why? Could something strange be going on...?

Nicephorus wrote:Is that the same location? You're good!

Thank you, thank you. I use Google Earth to plan all my expeditions, including the ones I don't have the time or money to actually go on, so I spend a lot of time in it. And I know Maine fairly well, although I've never actually, you know, been there.

Nicephorus wrote:edit, here's a pic from nearby (within a couple of miles) of typical landscape.
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/4542895
It came out huge when pasted in so I made it a link.

Here you go:

<img src="http://mw2.google.com/mw-panoramio/phot ... 542895.jpg" width="400"></img>

Nicephorus wrote:I always find it cool and scary how dense some forests are. The linked pic turns out to be 100 feet behind someone's house. Other than car noises and such, it can be hard to know how close you are to a road or structure until you're right on it.

Dude, it's crazy. I spend most of my time in second-growth forests, like, stuff that was logged in the last few decades, so it's not like I'm in the mystical deeps of New Zealand or the Amazon or Canada or something, and yet I regularly am standing less than ten feet from a trail, and cannot see it at all. I've been within rock-throwing distance of houses and not known it. Other than, as you say, the sounds of civilization, you don't have to get far back before it's easy to forget it's 2011.

As for what it's like in old-growth Canadian wilderness...yeah, well. Let's just say I'm leaving here as soon as Ana graduates.

Tiny Deev wrote:Ben's head whips around when he hears the shot, and slowly crouches down when the big man told him to hug the ground. He walks close to the bus but doesn't go inside, and cocks his head slightly, listening, trying to make out where the bullet came from.

What would he need to roll for this? A "perception" check I guess.

See above for the details on Invisible Castle.

There are no skills beyond your chosen abilities. Chose one that's and use that value, or add a new one in an open slot. If it's not a good fit, subtract 1.

In your case, I'm not sure. You're scouting the countryside for one guy. Maybe wanderer -1, so roll 1d4 - 1d4 then add 2.

I'll try to post up later tonight or by tomorrow. I've been swamped with shit that keeps me from getting in character these last few days. I had some good ideas last night, but the internet was down and I ended up going to bed.

I'm trying to look for a "safe" way towards the shooter, or into the forest so I can get behind the shooter. I rolled the same dice as last time.

1d4-1d4+2 &#8594; [2,-3,2] = (1)

Ben doesn't notice anything obvious other than to get into the creek bed that the shooter is in and move along it.

I'll wait to update to see if Will goes along with Kelly's idea.

situation according to my understanding:
in the bus: Gary, Will, Ben
Behind the bus: Jon, Beatrice, Harry
headed for behind bus: Kelly

Nicephorus wrote:

If this is the set up and the gunman is coming from the south-west (in this frame), do I understand it correctly that we're between the bus and the road. Are we (mostly) sitting at the front of the bus or the back of the bus? Regardless, I move to the other end of the bus than where most people are.

Will would like to look, specifically, for somewhere they could all go where the rifleman couldn't shoot, or a way to sneak someone closer to him.

Once again, the same roll: 1d4 -1d4 + 3=3

I'm an idiot. I meant south by south east , the lower right of the above pic.

Those not in the bus are against the underside, near where the pushpin in the pic is. DV8, moving to the opposite end would put you near the front.

t

Beatrice rocking the Derringer: awesome.

Where is Jon crawling towards?

Along the road, toward the shooter.

Nicephorus wrote:I'm an idiot. I meant south by south east , the lower right of the above pic.

Those not in the bus are against the underside, near where the pushpin in the pic is. DV8, moving to the opposite end would put you near the front.

t

Hey, didn't this post used to include the results of Will's perception roll, trying to look for cover or a route to assault?