With our Keeper unable to prepare, we decided on a one-shot, but kept the game system to preserve the horror feeling. Enter our group, awakening butt naked, dressed only in dog tags, getting out of pods in a sterile room. We quickly pulled out the tubes connecting us to the pods, and groggily set to explore the room. We had no memories of anything, not even of who we were.
For our final session in the Australia chapter: the great outdoors! Well, somebody's backyard. But just as good for an underground shootout.
We were right back in the dungeon, on our way to Huston's cabin. We passed by the cultists on the ground floor, but the aboriginals noticed us, particularly the one previously burned by Sanchez. They started howling, alerting everybody. Huston awaited us with a lightning gun in hand, and his cronies soon arrived. We could not strike immediately, and so we stalled and drank whiskey and tea, hoping that the cultists would soon go back to work. Spoiler: they did not.
Or at least, this should be the final batch. With 32 girls completed, it was a very fun project.
We started by going back a bit to the previous scene, with professor Sanchez being struck by a bout of madness. In a panic, he rushed out. Huston just laughed, reminisced about the time he and his cultists lost their minds for the first time, then prodded us to go after him, just so a flying squid doesn't get him.
After a long string of banter and a short meta discussion about where we are and what we hope to accomplish, we were spirited back into the dungeon.[1]
While our characters rolled through the endless plains of the Australian outback, we had an era-appropriate dinner, consisting of ship biscuits, beef jerky and canned beans.
Due to unforeseen circumstances, Archie's character sheet was missing, so the fourth player instead assumed the role of professor Dodge. Just as well, so that Archie could lie down and rest, while Dodge and Sanchez rifled through the warehouse. They found a box with the same winged symbol, containing a telescope like device and a letter addressed to Edward Ganigan, in which Robert Houston describes the object as use for short range exploration by the Yithians. Yeah we have no idea what that means, but Robert Houston was the member of the Carlyle expedition supposedly seen alive, and Ganigan is a lead we have in London.
We started the session with a lot of administrativia, including skill progression, learning while aboard the cruise ship, and taking a look at the tome in our possession. The only one to comprehend some of it was Archie, who completed its study and learned to create voodoo zombies. Great.
Next stop: Sydney.
Well, we were in the middle of it. I quickly looked around but found no ceremonial weapons to beat the zombies with. So I started blasting. Fortunately, we had our weapons prepared. Even my gimpy backup pistol did work, and we only took 1 punch to Archie's chest before downing the living dead.
After a 6 months hiatus, the players reconvene to continue their investigation. Buckle up! Also, here's a picture with all the new props our Keeper provided: cards for any relevant people we meet with a portrait and space for notes.
As expected, we spent a lot of time trying to remember what we actually did, how the investigation went, and who did we meet. Notes and blog posts to the rescue!
We stopped playing, but I did lobby with the GM for painted miniatures with a granted bonus in the future. So here's the first batch of painted 3d printed heroines from the early 20th century.
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Another hard couple of days for the investigators.
We started by getting Archie out of St. Bartholomew's hospital. We really played into it by bringing a gift basket of fried chicken, watermelon and kool-aid.[1] The GM played into it by having a nurse accept some of it as well.
With half a day spent, we followed through our appointment with Jonah Kensington, Elias Jackson's editor. His Prospero Publishing House was to be found in a building full of such places. Kensington was a typical, middle aged, thick glasses kind of guy living in an informal library. He had lots of info to share on Elias and his investigation.
5 years passed since our adventures in Peru. We all kept in contact with each other and Jackson Elias, but lived our own separate lives. Lucy attended university, and carried on with her search for her father, accompanied by faithful Amos during her expeditions. Archibald returned to a life of crime. Karl was replaced by Prof. Sanchez, who felt the need to escape the university in Lima. We all received a telegram, asking us to reconvene our investigative group.
We met up at the Chelsea hotel and the designated day and hour, and walked up to Jackson's room 410. With no-one answering the knock on the door, Archie first tried to pick the lock, then kicked the door in. 3 masked men with machetes were standing around, having executed Jackson. They jumped out the window, down the fire escape. Archie went after them, followed by Amos. By the time I tried to step out, the entire structure collapsed. We rushed down to help Archie, pinned in place by a piece of iron ladder. Amos barely registered the killers' escape car, license plate NYL7.
By the time we got Archie out, the cops arrived as well.
Insert a month or so gaming hiatus during the summer holidays. However, we took it up quite smoothly next time.
We had cooked up a workable plan last time, but obviously we spent an hour rehashing it. It later turned out to be a good idea. So instead of me distracting Larkin at the chute while the others crawled out, we all crawled out together through the passage enlarged by Amos[1], while Jackson Elias lit up the puddle of fat.[2]
After a short recap, as usual, we continued with our investigation. We trucked our way to Puno, then switched to donkeys. Archibald fumbled his altitude sickness resistance, but he managed, somehow. We made sure to keep watch at night, and sure enough, one of the donkeys got sucked dry. We left some equipment, then carried on, without any further clues.
We met up in Lima, in a bar called Cortado[1]. Lucy, as the only Spanish speaker, rescued the other expedition members from being verbally assaulted by the proprietor, Ms Velazquez.
We put the Golden Vault D&D 5E campaign on hold to play Call of Cthulhu 7th edition instead. The adventure module we are starting, called Masks of Nyarlathotep, is exactly 666 pages long. The intro part is about us joining an archeological expedition in Peru, in the year 1921.
After some preparation, we put together our investigator party:
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