TSED
2009-08-11, 02:46 PM
I used the GRECE to roll up a huge list of good encounters. I then broke them up by level-appropriateness (for example, a lovecraftian kaiju'd black hole or the like would not work well as a 1st level adventure).
I am breaking them up to be somewhat modular, almost... comic book styled.
I am also using a host of houserules. The following:
1) All skills are in-class skills.
2) Gestalt!
3) Modified 84 point buy. Start at 0, every stat must be 3 before racial modifiers, and increasing a stat turns it up by 1. This gives an average of 14 across all stats, well above the race's average.
4) No save-or-dies. They do ability damage instead of instant kill. (Petrification would cause dex damage, at 0 you become stone. Necromantic SoDs would cause con damage. Etc.)
5) You don't die at -10. You die at -50. You are disabled (ie '0 hp') from 0 hp to -conscore.
6) Probably a lot more that just slip my mind right now, but those are the big ones.
I encouraged my players to get really whacky with their character concepts. We have the following:
Captain Villain, the Villain for Villains! A lesser drow warlock//ninja. I let his first invocation be Summon Monster I, which WILL scale up as he gains levels, but slower than the SM line. It's pretty strong right now, though, first level and all. The player wants to be ready for anything, and, well... Just check out his inventory list:
1 Rapier
Leather Armour
Bell
1 sets of Caltrops
5 candles
50 business cards
Crowbar
Fishhook
Flint & Steel
Grappling Hook
10' Ladder
Manacles
Mirror, Small, Steel
3 pints of oil
50' Silk Rope
Sack (of all this stuff)
Signal Whistle
Iron Pot
VILLAINOUS CLOTHES
Civvy skivvies [disguise]
Hourglass
Mogman (name not final), the Moogle Pizza Delivery Specialist! A light cavalry variant scout // swordsage. Focused on Desert Winds. A delightful touch is the "Distracting Embers" maneuver summons a molten cheese elemental (same stats, different fluff!). Max ranks in craft (pizza). Rides a bike. Leather armour is a jacket with his pizza logo on the back. I basically took Raptorans, made them small, and moved a few things around (like the air spells at +1 became teleport, lost the EWP for a +4 on Sense Motive). Probably should have given him a + to cha, but whatevs.
D Sharp, aka Daryl. No one has called him D Sharp yet. Bard//Wilder, sitar bard. No where near the eccentricity of the other two, unfortunately.
There should be a fourth, who is moving away soon. Unfortunately, she couldn't make it. What a bummer. She'll catch the tail end of this one, I think.
GRECE results in the adventure so far:
Elderly Roaming Band Of Irate customers
Boisterous Enchanted Anime fan
Toilet-Feeding Steam-Powered Joggers
Unhallowed Maintenence Punks
Synchronized Pair Of Stomping Duck
Scared Techno- Yeti
Kamikaze Mutated Crusty old fisherman
I'll let you figure them out.
How I started off the adventure:
"Welcome to Sigil, the City of Doors. In the thousands of years since the Multiverse has existed, magic has solved many, many problems. You are in a golden era of prosperity that promises to last for the rest of time. Less than 0.005% of the population is involved with the production of goods; magic has done away with almost all manual labour. Almost everyone is instead engaged in service industry jobs. The mystery of the world has been solved, and you know exactly what level you are, what a saving throw is, and what feats are. So does basically everyone else who isn't a clueless prime from some backwater world."
"You are a recent graduate of HeroU, a rather prestigious school for the development of Superheroics. You knew some other guys and the lot of you decided to set up your own Private Hero Business. Yeah, sure, lots of people do it. It's kind of like being a private investigator, except you DO things instead of find things out. After all, you've got Gestalt levels. That's ridiculous. And your point buy, sheesh! That's like, 99.9th percentile of people. My goodness, no wonder HeroU has such a reputation. Anyways, moving on..."
"You've been in business for all of four hours. Your sign out front reads "Superheroes for Hire. Cheap! Licensed!" with "also, pizza! we deliver" written with crayon underneath. The sign has already seemed to win in a customer. He bursts in and says:
"Guys, you gotta help! You're my only hope!"
"I own an underground nightclub. No, not for dwarves or gnomes or that kind of thing. I mean for punks and goths and such. And my customers have stopped coming! I asked around - all my colleagues like me have experienced the EXACT SAME THING. We're going to go out of business if we don't find some new customers quick!"
Thankfully, oh so very thankfully, the heroes took the job.
What happen!:
The heroes started off by checking the back alleys. They found several booze bottles, and quickly concluded that this was a really dumb idea.
They set off instead for the nightclub of the owner, which was closed this early in the day (about one pm). Still, the owner let them in and look around. They asked a few questions, trying to come up with some ideas.
Captain Villain, the Villain for Villains tried to figure out some possible causes. He cased around for blood... and well, he found some old blood stains. He asked about them. Punk club. Of course there'd be blood.
His companions decide to help out. They question the owner - how did they stop coming? Rapidly dwindling numbers in the course of a week. Any kidnappings or anything? Nope. Oldguard etc. disappearing first? Young uns? Nope. Isn't some new club - that'd at best fracture the demographic, and all the other clubs have the same problem. Know any of their numbers? Yeah. Some punk by the name of Fred was one of the last ones to stop coming. Had to get him a cab home one of the days before, still have his address.
BINGO.
Got ahold of his address. Went to meet this 'Fred.'
His door had vomit all over it. The Anarchy Symbol made out of vomit, actually. They were hesitant about knocking, but eventually did.
"WHAAAAAT"
"Hey, Fred?"
"I SAID WHAAAAT"
"Why haven't you been to the **** Off Club lately?"
"CANT FIND MA TRENCHCOAT"
"Your... trenchcoat is missing?"
"YEAH CANT FIND MA TRENCHCOAAAAT"
"OH HEY GUYS CAN YOU HELP ME OUT WITH MY MOHAWK TOO I RAN OUT OF GLUE"
Captain Villain, knowing what the Anarchy Symbol actually means, just walks in. Fred screams and jumps into his bed.
"WHAT NO YOU CANT SEE ME WITHOUT MA TRENCHCOAT"
"We're not going to rob you or anything, we're just going to help you find your trenchcoat."
They search the place. They find a lot of liquor, a lot empty liquor bottles, and a lot of cigarettes. And a lot of trash. In some of the trash they find a ripped up trenchcoat.
"OH YEAH I FORGOT TO MENTION THAT I MEANT I WAS TRYING TO FIND A NEW ONE"
With nothing else they could do here, our heroes depart. Fred was drunk, he probably passed out again shortly after.
Daryl, using his incredible bardic knowledge check of 16, knew a tailer. He decides to investigate.
Said tailer is a sprite, and comments on how maaaahvellous Captain Villain is. He gives Daryl disgusted looks.
After a quick bout of questioning, our heroes uncover the following:
1) Ghastly, garish metal men (NOT metalheads) buy up all the trenchcoats whenever they arrive.
2) He makes designs, sends the designs to the fabrication factory. Gets his shipments on tuesdays.
3) He is happy as a pig in mud because he is making SO MUCH MONEY off of this. Thinking of expanding, even.
"Have you tried making them in gross colours no sane person would wear?"
"[i]Punks."
So. They're not sure what to do, and consider just going home and waiting until Tuesday.
Except as they are on their way to do so, they cross in front of an Anime Shop with a large, angry crowd of large, angry, smelly, half-naked persons. With hair like mohawks, suicide spikes, et al. Curious.
Mogman shows up "HEY GUYS what is up?"
"She murdered a guy! And he was one of our guys! THAT's BAAAARF... uh... BAD, man! BAD!"
"She murdered a guy?"
"YEAH! Just stabbed him! We want *hic* revenge!"
They go inside the door. (The punks are drunk. And there is a sign that they are having trouble deciphering... it says "OPEN")
And indeed, besides the very nervous looking clerk, there is a girl. In a trenchcoat.
"Hey. Where'd you get that trenchcoat?"
"I got it off some guy out there."
" 'Got it', eh?"
"Yeah! I was like 'HEY I HAVE BEEN SEARCHING EVERYWHERE FOR ONE OF THOSE! I need it for my cosplay!' and he was like 'no go away' and I was like "HOW MUCH?" and he was like 'it's not for sale' , like, and I was like,"
<A katana was pulled out from hammerspace, nigh-instantly>
" 'YAH!' and now I have this awesome trenchcoat!"
...
...
...
Daryl decided to speak up. "Uhh, who are you goin-"
Mogman: "NOOOOOO"
Captain Villain: "NOOOOOO"
< one hour later >
"...and that's why I think he is the best and cutest ninja punk EVER and I am going to hav- SQUEEE IS THAT A MOOGLE!?"
And, as luck would have it, as the moogle was being grappled (small size, stood no chance), a large precision of 'metal men' went past the shop. Some punk screamed "THEY'VE GOT TRENCHCOATS!"
The punks tried to give chase, but they smoke too much and quickly got exhausted (as in, the crowd barely moved).
Daryl began running after them.
Captain Villain, thinking fast, summoned a Fiendish Spider. The girl screamed so loud and ran away so fast that I rolled a d4 for damage to our poor mooglese hero. [3!]
Our heroes began chasing the steam powered joggers. A small number of them ran out and unleashed a rain of barrels upon the street. Captain Villain did not think of what to do quickly, and was bowled over for a couple points of damage. Daryl figured "all barrels explode!" and used Energy Ray to set one on fire. He now had a flaming barrel rolling down the street towards him. He retreated a bit. Mogman just hid behind a traffic light and let a barrel bounce off, then quickly biked up. Daryl ran towards the newfound opening and voila!
The barrels HAD definitely won the steamjoggers time, though. They were out on a busy street, and now the party had to dodge things like T-Rexes, low-flying saucers, horseless chariots, and even a rocket-narwhal. Or at least they would have if they didn't think to use the sidewalk, which allowed them to make up for some lost time.
The joggers turned a tight corner, and one set of joggers threw their bundle atop the other set, and blocked the doorway.
Mogman was riding a bike really fast to catch up. They suddenly stopped. Hello, domino effect. Daryl followed this up with an Electrical Ray. It barely hit and rolled a 1 for damage. The steamjoggers essentially ignored it.
Four out of eight remained standing. One tackled Mogman clear off his bike. One sailed clear into Captain Villain. One tried to tackle Daryl, but a readied Frost Ray definitely blew him back and away - max damage. Ouch. Captain Villain tried to pull off an eldritch blast, but failed the concentration check. Mogman utterly failed a grapple check (2 - 2 = autopinned, basically).
The steamjogger pinning Mogman tried to smack him, but failed. The steamjogger grappling Captain Villain tried to pin him, and the results were inconclusive. They both responded with a successful escape artist check, and then Captain Villain realised he could summon a celestial porpoise inside the water tank. I was in the middle of saying "no because there's not enough room" when I realised how friggin' AWESOME that'd be. Gave the steamjogger a saving throw - made it, unfortunately. 19. He had started summoning the porpoise too late and instead it flopped out of the steam valve, flopped about, and then vanished. Still, it flopped about on top of that steamjogger, which slowed him down in relation to his peers, which were running in.
They were going down a manhole. And down they went themselves - Mogman made a ride check to pull off a sweet trick to get down there, but all of a sudden... it was dark! REALLY dark! There was some light filtering down from random grates, but only Captain Villain could really, really see. Still, they chased after the jogger... UNTIL A GIANT SLUG POPPED OUT OF A SEWER GRATE OH MAN. It reached out and latched Daryl, poor bugger.
Captain Villain made his fingerguns to Eldritch Blast it. He actually surprised it (as he was running quietly in the fore, the slug missed him) and got his Sudden Strike in on it too.
Snake eyes.
Mogman's hit was much less inconsequential. Using Burning Blade, he lovingly stabbed it for around 12 points of damage. Since I was inspired my Captain Villain's drawing of the sewer grates of an old video game and didn't actually have any stats for the slug, I ruled it was well enough to down the thing. Daryl was both relieved and skeeved, because let's face it - ewwwwwwwwww.
They had lost the jogger, for sure. But as they walked, they saw torchlight up ahead! Hurray! IT WAS FRED!
"HEY GUYS I SAW THESE ROBOTS GO INTO THAT BIG SLIDEY DOOR"
He pressed a button on a control panel. A large, steel-esque door slid open and out marched two huge robotic constructs. They were in the style of the steamjoggers - random valves everywhere, steam billowing out. Only they were ducks. And they were moving together. Each had a shiny chrome label on their chest - 'CR7 Certified!'
"LICENSE AND REGISTRATION" they bellowed in electronic Donald-Duck-esque voices.
Not missing a beat, Captain Villain showed his Hero's License. And was promptly thrown backwards violently. Ouch.
"WROOOOONG"
"LICENSE AND REGISTRATION PLEASE."
Mogman tried to use his crayon to write 'License to steal all trenchcoats' on the wall, but didn't get it written in time. Luckily, he managed to dodge the 'thrown back violently' trip.
After also trying Mogman's pizzeria license, business cards, Daryl tried his musician's license. "ERROR: COUNTERFEIT LICENSE DETECTED. INITIATE STOMPING."
The ducks began stomping. Synchronized. Our heroes retreated into the hall, where the stomperducks were too large to follow. They fell back and began stomping, staring maliciously at the party.
Captain Villain tries to throw an Eldritch Blast or two at the Stomperducks. Nothing happens. Mogman shoots an arrow, which pings off their metal plating harmlessly.
A slight DM hint to get them thinking about how they arrived here - Fred on the control panel.
Control panel.
Mogman darts out, presses the button Fred hit, and darts back. He watches the door close.
Then Captain Villain gets brilliant.
Summon. [i]Monkey.
...
One round later, the stomperducks have stopped. They began chanting in their freakish voice "ERROR. ERROR. DESYNCHRONIZATION." Over and over and over again. Our heroes fled back into the sewer network, waiting for an explosion. Nothing came, except for more ERROR reports. Eventually, they braved in. The monkey opened the door, so the moogle just ran in biking.
There was a wall there. Ouch.
They immediately suspect Fred, and run back out to find him. And they find him, alright, passed out drunk as he was running away. Our heroes begin dragging him topside, when they find a large four-armed fish-man (a sahuagin, not that they knew) chowing down on that slug they killed.
"whoah man this is so good", "omnomnomnomnom", and the like are heard through the corridors. They decide to reroute and go around (which will not take that much time, really), but it spots them anyways. "oh man hey guys this is so good want some?"
"Uh... no thanks. Actually, we killed that thing."
"really guys wow here take this," followed by the four-armed fishman handing them a handful of copper coins so eroded most shops probably wouldn't accept them as legal tender. "hey guys so whatre you doin down here man"
"We're actually in search of these metal men-"
"oh man i HATE those guys you see those stomperducks theyre douches agh"
"We kind of broke those, too, actually."
"really man wow thats hard to believe i mean wow one second" The sahuagin disappeared for a few moments, dragging the slug behind it. It returned, sans slug. "wow man guys thats so cool i hate them so much"
"Why do you hate them so much?"
"man i used to live there right and theyre all 'hey get out' and im all 'naw' and theyre all 'hey get out' and im all 'dude naw' and then the engineer threw me out with his stomperducks bunch of douches"
"Engineer?!"
"yeah man he was like this douche who was all big and smelled like him" - while the sahuagin gestured to the passed out, sewage-coated, unwashed Fred, "but he cant see down here too great so i just keep boarding up all the exits to screw with him"
"So, could you maybe take us to him?"
"yeah man that is like the least i can do for you dudes"
After leading them through some twisty tunnels, he points. "yeah man he is like right over there dude i got some slugchow to get to bye"
Yep. Not even 20' around a corner was a huge beast of a thing, huddled in a corner. Its fur looks like it may have once been white, but it was definitely not now. Assorted pieces of its flesh were replaced with mechanical chunks and steamvalves.
"AAAAAAAA! AAAAAAAA! AAAAAAAA! Oh you're not monsters. Hi."
"You're an... intense... fellow," noted Captain Villain.
I, unfortunately, do not really remember this conversation, I got too into the character. This big ol' Scared Techno-Yeti basically screamed at any statement of a noun. Magic. Robots. Men. Metal. Anything.
The heroes tried to be understanding and non-threatening. They really should have pressed the fact that it was a blubbering mess. Daryl's mentioning of several things, such as trenchcoats, eventually led the yeti on to realise he's dealing with enemies of some sort here, and attacked.
Captain Villain pops out an Eldritch Blast on his mechanical eye. Different AC, and all that jazz. Max damage, Half damage to objects, though, so I ruled that the glass was broken and he was clutching at his eye and screaming, but light was still emanating from that machine.
Daryl threw a knife at the eye hoping to finish it off, but couldn't quite break the AC here. Touch AC is a lot easier to hit than normal AC, after all.
Mogman then charged, and did a nasty 3d6+2 damage plus made everyone make a will save or be dazzled (with a bonus to Mogman's teammates, afterall they've worked with him and he shouted about light and eyes and stuff). Everyone, including yeti, made it.
Yeti responded by clonking Mogman into unconsciousness by 1hp. He had been accumulating damage, and a decent roll on 2d6 bludgeoning won't help you stay up.
Captain Villain finished off the eye, and Daryl threw his last power point (for some reason neither of us thought to suggest wildsurging it) in the form of a frost ray. Crunch. Blind in the dark (Daryl was close and knew where he was flailing about before he fired the ray, a big help), the yeti charged. And slammed into a wall. KO'd! Unfortunately, he still clipped Daryl - against all odds, he managed to tag him. -2 health (see houserules as to why that's not a big deal).
Captain Villain searched the yeti and found a secret compartment while Daryl made sure Mogman was ok. Inside of it, he found a letter. He arbitrarily decided (as in, was arbitrarily decided for) that he cannot read this letter in the sewer.
Daryl took Mogman off to the free clinic. [This is fairly Tippyverse-esque, so free healing wouldn't be a problem with traps of CLW. Just gotta wait in line, show off some records so that they can trace you if a crime was involved, and bam.]
We decided to wrap it up here.
I am breaking them up to be somewhat modular, almost... comic book styled.
I am also using a host of houserules. The following:
1) All skills are in-class skills.
2) Gestalt!
3) Modified 84 point buy. Start at 0, every stat must be 3 before racial modifiers, and increasing a stat turns it up by 1. This gives an average of 14 across all stats, well above the race's average.
4) No save-or-dies. They do ability damage instead of instant kill. (Petrification would cause dex damage, at 0 you become stone. Necromantic SoDs would cause con damage. Etc.)
5) You don't die at -10. You die at -50. You are disabled (ie '0 hp') from 0 hp to -conscore.
6) Probably a lot more that just slip my mind right now, but those are the big ones.
I encouraged my players to get really whacky with their character concepts. We have the following:
Captain Villain, the Villain for Villains! A lesser drow warlock//ninja. I let his first invocation be Summon Monster I, which WILL scale up as he gains levels, but slower than the SM line. It's pretty strong right now, though, first level and all. The player wants to be ready for anything, and, well... Just check out his inventory list:
1 Rapier
Leather Armour
Bell
1 sets of Caltrops
5 candles
50 business cards
Crowbar
Fishhook
Flint & Steel
Grappling Hook
10' Ladder
Manacles
Mirror, Small, Steel
3 pints of oil
50' Silk Rope
Sack (of all this stuff)
Signal Whistle
Iron Pot
VILLAINOUS CLOTHES
Civvy skivvies [disguise]
Hourglass
Mogman (name not final), the Moogle Pizza Delivery Specialist! A light cavalry variant scout // swordsage. Focused on Desert Winds. A delightful touch is the "Distracting Embers" maneuver summons a molten cheese elemental (same stats, different fluff!). Max ranks in craft (pizza). Rides a bike. Leather armour is a jacket with his pizza logo on the back. I basically took Raptorans, made them small, and moved a few things around (like the air spells at +1 became teleport, lost the EWP for a +4 on Sense Motive). Probably should have given him a + to cha, but whatevs.
D Sharp, aka Daryl. No one has called him D Sharp yet. Bard//Wilder, sitar bard. No where near the eccentricity of the other two, unfortunately.
There should be a fourth, who is moving away soon. Unfortunately, she couldn't make it. What a bummer. She'll catch the tail end of this one, I think.
GRECE results in the adventure so far:
Elderly Roaming Band Of Irate customers
Boisterous Enchanted Anime fan
Toilet-Feeding Steam-Powered Joggers
Unhallowed Maintenence Punks
Synchronized Pair Of Stomping Duck
Scared Techno- Yeti
Kamikaze Mutated Crusty old fisherman
I'll let you figure them out.
How I started off the adventure:
"Welcome to Sigil, the City of Doors. In the thousands of years since the Multiverse has existed, magic has solved many, many problems. You are in a golden era of prosperity that promises to last for the rest of time. Less than 0.005% of the population is involved with the production of goods; magic has done away with almost all manual labour. Almost everyone is instead engaged in service industry jobs. The mystery of the world has been solved, and you know exactly what level you are, what a saving throw is, and what feats are. So does basically everyone else who isn't a clueless prime from some backwater world."
"You are a recent graduate of HeroU, a rather prestigious school for the development of Superheroics. You knew some other guys and the lot of you decided to set up your own Private Hero Business. Yeah, sure, lots of people do it. It's kind of like being a private investigator, except you DO things instead of find things out. After all, you've got Gestalt levels. That's ridiculous. And your point buy, sheesh! That's like, 99.9th percentile of people. My goodness, no wonder HeroU has such a reputation. Anyways, moving on..."
"You've been in business for all of four hours. Your sign out front reads "Superheroes for Hire. Cheap! Licensed!" with "also, pizza! we deliver" written with crayon underneath. The sign has already seemed to win in a customer. He bursts in and says:
"Guys, you gotta help! You're my only hope!"
"I own an underground nightclub. No, not for dwarves or gnomes or that kind of thing. I mean for punks and goths and such. And my customers have stopped coming! I asked around - all my colleagues like me have experienced the EXACT SAME THING. We're going to go out of business if we don't find some new customers quick!"
Thankfully, oh so very thankfully, the heroes took the job.
What happen!:
The heroes started off by checking the back alleys. They found several booze bottles, and quickly concluded that this was a really dumb idea.
They set off instead for the nightclub of the owner, which was closed this early in the day (about one pm). Still, the owner let them in and look around. They asked a few questions, trying to come up with some ideas.
Captain Villain, the Villain for Villains tried to figure out some possible causes. He cased around for blood... and well, he found some old blood stains. He asked about them. Punk club. Of course there'd be blood.
His companions decide to help out. They question the owner - how did they stop coming? Rapidly dwindling numbers in the course of a week. Any kidnappings or anything? Nope. Oldguard etc. disappearing first? Young uns? Nope. Isn't some new club - that'd at best fracture the demographic, and all the other clubs have the same problem. Know any of their numbers? Yeah. Some punk by the name of Fred was one of the last ones to stop coming. Had to get him a cab home one of the days before, still have his address.
BINGO.
Got ahold of his address. Went to meet this 'Fred.'
His door had vomit all over it. The Anarchy Symbol made out of vomit, actually. They were hesitant about knocking, but eventually did.
"WHAAAAAT"
"Hey, Fred?"
"I SAID WHAAAAT"
"Why haven't you been to the **** Off Club lately?"
"CANT FIND MA TRENCHCOAT"
"Your... trenchcoat is missing?"
"YEAH CANT FIND MA TRENCHCOAAAAT"
"OH HEY GUYS CAN YOU HELP ME OUT WITH MY MOHAWK TOO I RAN OUT OF GLUE"
Captain Villain, knowing what the Anarchy Symbol actually means, just walks in. Fred screams and jumps into his bed.
"WHAT NO YOU CANT SEE ME WITHOUT MA TRENCHCOAT"
"We're not going to rob you or anything, we're just going to help you find your trenchcoat."
They search the place. They find a lot of liquor, a lot empty liquor bottles, and a lot of cigarettes. And a lot of trash. In some of the trash they find a ripped up trenchcoat.
"OH YEAH I FORGOT TO MENTION THAT I MEANT I WAS TRYING TO FIND A NEW ONE"
With nothing else they could do here, our heroes depart. Fred was drunk, he probably passed out again shortly after.
Daryl, using his incredible bardic knowledge check of 16, knew a tailer. He decides to investigate.
Said tailer is a sprite, and comments on how maaaahvellous Captain Villain is. He gives Daryl disgusted looks.
After a quick bout of questioning, our heroes uncover the following:
1) Ghastly, garish metal men (NOT metalheads) buy up all the trenchcoats whenever they arrive.
2) He makes designs, sends the designs to the fabrication factory. Gets his shipments on tuesdays.
3) He is happy as a pig in mud because he is making SO MUCH MONEY off of this. Thinking of expanding, even.
"Have you tried making them in gross colours no sane person would wear?"
"[i]Punks."
So. They're not sure what to do, and consider just going home and waiting until Tuesday.
Except as they are on their way to do so, they cross in front of an Anime Shop with a large, angry crowd of large, angry, smelly, half-naked persons. With hair like mohawks, suicide spikes, et al. Curious.
Mogman shows up "HEY GUYS what is up?"
"She murdered a guy! And he was one of our guys! THAT's BAAAARF... uh... BAD, man! BAD!"
"She murdered a guy?"
"YEAH! Just stabbed him! We want *hic* revenge!"
They go inside the door. (The punks are drunk. And there is a sign that they are having trouble deciphering... it says "OPEN")
And indeed, besides the very nervous looking clerk, there is a girl. In a trenchcoat.
"Hey. Where'd you get that trenchcoat?"
"I got it off some guy out there."
" 'Got it', eh?"
"Yeah! I was like 'HEY I HAVE BEEN SEARCHING EVERYWHERE FOR ONE OF THOSE! I need it for my cosplay!' and he was like 'no go away' and I was like "HOW MUCH?" and he was like 'it's not for sale' , like, and I was like,"
<A katana was pulled out from hammerspace, nigh-instantly>
" 'YAH!' and now I have this awesome trenchcoat!"
...
...
...
Daryl decided to speak up. "Uhh, who are you goin-"
Mogman: "NOOOOOO"
Captain Villain: "NOOOOOO"
< one hour later >
"...and that's why I think he is the best and cutest ninja punk EVER and I am going to hav- SQUEEE IS THAT A MOOGLE!?"
And, as luck would have it, as the moogle was being grappled (small size, stood no chance), a large precision of 'metal men' went past the shop. Some punk screamed "THEY'VE GOT TRENCHCOATS!"
The punks tried to give chase, but they smoke too much and quickly got exhausted (as in, the crowd barely moved).
Daryl began running after them.
Captain Villain, thinking fast, summoned a Fiendish Spider. The girl screamed so loud and ran away so fast that I rolled a d4 for damage to our poor mooglese hero. [3!]
Our heroes began chasing the steam powered joggers. A small number of them ran out and unleashed a rain of barrels upon the street. Captain Villain did not think of what to do quickly, and was bowled over for a couple points of damage. Daryl figured "all barrels explode!" and used Energy Ray to set one on fire. He now had a flaming barrel rolling down the street towards him. He retreated a bit. Mogman just hid behind a traffic light and let a barrel bounce off, then quickly biked up. Daryl ran towards the newfound opening and voila!
The barrels HAD definitely won the steamjoggers time, though. They were out on a busy street, and now the party had to dodge things like T-Rexes, low-flying saucers, horseless chariots, and even a rocket-narwhal. Or at least they would have if they didn't think to use the sidewalk, which allowed them to make up for some lost time.
The joggers turned a tight corner, and one set of joggers threw their bundle atop the other set, and blocked the doorway.
Mogman was riding a bike really fast to catch up. They suddenly stopped. Hello, domino effect. Daryl followed this up with an Electrical Ray. It barely hit and rolled a 1 for damage. The steamjoggers essentially ignored it.
Four out of eight remained standing. One tackled Mogman clear off his bike. One sailed clear into Captain Villain. One tried to tackle Daryl, but a readied Frost Ray definitely blew him back and away - max damage. Ouch. Captain Villain tried to pull off an eldritch blast, but failed the concentration check. Mogman utterly failed a grapple check (2 - 2 = autopinned, basically).
The steamjogger pinning Mogman tried to smack him, but failed. The steamjogger grappling Captain Villain tried to pin him, and the results were inconclusive. They both responded with a successful escape artist check, and then Captain Villain realised he could summon a celestial porpoise inside the water tank. I was in the middle of saying "no because there's not enough room" when I realised how friggin' AWESOME that'd be. Gave the steamjogger a saving throw - made it, unfortunately. 19. He had started summoning the porpoise too late and instead it flopped out of the steam valve, flopped about, and then vanished. Still, it flopped about on top of that steamjogger, which slowed him down in relation to his peers, which were running in.
They were going down a manhole. And down they went themselves - Mogman made a ride check to pull off a sweet trick to get down there, but all of a sudden... it was dark! REALLY dark! There was some light filtering down from random grates, but only Captain Villain could really, really see. Still, they chased after the jogger... UNTIL A GIANT SLUG POPPED OUT OF A SEWER GRATE OH MAN. It reached out and latched Daryl, poor bugger.
Captain Villain made his fingerguns to Eldritch Blast it. He actually surprised it (as he was running quietly in the fore, the slug missed him) and got his Sudden Strike in on it too.
Snake eyes.
Mogman's hit was much less inconsequential. Using Burning Blade, he lovingly stabbed it for around 12 points of damage. Since I was inspired my Captain Villain's drawing of the sewer grates of an old video game and didn't actually have any stats for the slug, I ruled it was well enough to down the thing. Daryl was both relieved and skeeved, because let's face it - ewwwwwwwwww.
They had lost the jogger, for sure. But as they walked, they saw torchlight up ahead! Hurray! IT WAS FRED!
"HEY GUYS I SAW THESE ROBOTS GO INTO THAT BIG SLIDEY DOOR"
He pressed a button on a control panel. A large, steel-esque door slid open and out marched two huge robotic constructs. They were in the style of the steamjoggers - random valves everywhere, steam billowing out. Only they were ducks. And they were moving together. Each had a shiny chrome label on their chest - 'CR7 Certified!'
"LICENSE AND REGISTRATION" they bellowed in electronic Donald-Duck-esque voices.
Not missing a beat, Captain Villain showed his Hero's License. And was promptly thrown backwards violently. Ouch.
"WROOOOONG"
"LICENSE AND REGISTRATION PLEASE."
Mogman tried to use his crayon to write 'License to steal all trenchcoats' on the wall, but didn't get it written in time. Luckily, he managed to dodge the 'thrown back violently' trip.
After also trying Mogman's pizzeria license, business cards, Daryl tried his musician's license. "ERROR: COUNTERFEIT LICENSE DETECTED. INITIATE STOMPING."
The ducks began stomping. Synchronized. Our heroes retreated into the hall, where the stomperducks were too large to follow. They fell back and began stomping, staring maliciously at the party.
Captain Villain tries to throw an Eldritch Blast or two at the Stomperducks. Nothing happens. Mogman shoots an arrow, which pings off their metal plating harmlessly.
A slight DM hint to get them thinking about how they arrived here - Fred on the control panel.
Control panel.
Mogman darts out, presses the button Fred hit, and darts back. He watches the door close.
Then Captain Villain gets brilliant.
Summon. [i]Monkey.
...
One round later, the stomperducks have stopped. They began chanting in their freakish voice "ERROR. ERROR. DESYNCHRONIZATION." Over and over and over again. Our heroes fled back into the sewer network, waiting for an explosion. Nothing came, except for more ERROR reports. Eventually, they braved in. The monkey opened the door, so the moogle just ran in biking.
There was a wall there. Ouch.
They immediately suspect Fred, and run back out to find him. And they find him, alright, passed out drunk as he was running away. Our heroes begin dragging him topside, when they find a large four-armed fish-man (a sahuagin, not that they knew) chowing down on that slug they killed.
"whoah man this is so good", "omnomnomnomnom", and the like are heard through the corridors. They decide to reroute and go around (which will not take that much time, really), but it spots them anyways. "oh man hey guys this is so good want some?"
"Uh... no thanks. Actually, we killed that thing."
"really guys wow here take this," followed by the four-armed fishman handing them a handful of copper coins so eroded most shops probably wouldn't accept them as legal tender. "hey guys so whatre you doin down here man"
"We're actually in search of these metal men-"
"oh man i HATE those guys you see those stomperducks theyre douches agh"
"We kind of broke those, too, actually."
"really man wow thats hard to believe i mean wow one second" The sahuagin disappeared for a few moments, dragging the slug behind it. It returned, sans slug. "wow man guys thats so cool i hate them so much"
"Why do you hate them so much?"
"man i used to live there right and theyre all 'hey get out' and im all 'naw' and theyre all 'hey get out' and im all 'dude naw' and then the engineer threw me out with his stomperducks bunch of douches"
"Engineer?!"
"yeah man he was like this douche who was all big and smelled like him" - while the sahuagin gestured to the passed out, sewage-coated, unwashed Fred, "but he cant see down here too great so i just keep boarding up all the exits to screw with him"
"So, could you maybe take us to him?"
"yeah man that is like the least i can do for you dudes"
After leading them through some twisty tunnels, he points. "yeah man he is like right over there dude i got some slugchow to get to bye"
Yep. Not even 20' around a corner was a huge beast of a thing, huddled in a corner. Its fur looks like it may have once been white, but it was definitely not now. Assorted pieces of its flesh were replaced with mechanical chunks and steamvalves.
"AAAAAAAA! AAAAAAAA! AAAAAAAA! Oh you're not monsters. Hi."
"You're an... intense... fellow," noted Captain Villain.
I, unfortunately, do not really remember this conversation, I got too into the character. This big ol' Scared Techno-Yeti basically screamed at any statement of a noun. Magic. Robots. Men. Metal. Anything.
The heroes tried to be understanding and non-threatening. They really should have pressed the fact that it was a blubbering mess. Daryl's mentioning of several things, such as trenchcoats, eventually led the yeti on to realise he's dealing with enemies of some sort here, and attacked.
Captain Villain pops out an Eldritch Blast on his mechanical eye. Different AC, and all that jazz. Max damage, Half damage to objects, though, so I ruled that the glass was broken and he was clutching at his eye and screaming, but light was still emanating from that machine.
Daryl threw a knife at the eye hoping to finish it off, but couldn't quite break the AC here. Touch AC is a lot easier to hit than normal AC, after all.
Mogman then charged, and did a nasty 3d6+2 damage plus made everyone make a will save or be dazzled (with a bonus to Mogman's teammates, afterall they've worked with him and he shouted about light and eyes and stuff). Everyone, including yeti, made it.
Yeti responded by clonking Mogman into unconsciousness by 1hp. He had been accumulating damage, and a decent roll on 2d6 bludgeoning won't help you stay up.
Captain Villain finished off the eye, and Daryl threw his last power point (for some reason neither of us thought to suggest wildsurging it) in the form of a frost ray. Crunch. Blind in the dark (Daryl was close and knew where he was flailing about before he fired the ray, a big help), the yeti charged. And slammed into a wall. KO'd! Unfortunately, he still clipped Daryl - against all odds, he managed to tag him. -2 health (see houserules as to why that's not a big deal).
Captain Villain searched the yeti and found a secret compartment while Daryl made sure Mogman was ok. Inside of it, he found a letter. He arbitrarily decided (as in, was arbitrarily decided for) that he cannot read this letter in the sewer.
Daryl took Mogman off to the free clinic. [This is fairly Tippyverse-esque, so free healing wouldn't be a problem with traps of CLW. Just gotta wait in line, show off some records so that they can trace you if a crime was involved, and bam.]
We decided to wrap it up here.