Hey, everybody! Long time no talk! Our group hasn't been playing a lot of Action Movie World lately, so I haven't had a ton to say. But you should know that the first supplement, DELETED SCENES, is out right now, and it looks rad as hell.
The supplement includes two new actor playbooks (the Child Star and the Old Codger), and a great selection of new movie scripts: The Comic Book Movie, The Disaster Movie, The Trucker Movie, and The Vigilante Movie.
THAT'S RIGHT, YOU'VE BEEN WAITING FOR THAT SYLVESTER STALLONE IN "OVER THE TOP' ACTION MOVIE WORLD PASTICHE TO HAPPEN AND YOUR HOUR HAS COME ROUND AT LAST.
More thorough reviews coming soon, and play recaps as soon as we get to 'em! In the meantime, pick up your copy!
The bottom temporarily fell out of our Action Movie World playing, as we took a diversion into Pathfinder. If you are worried I'm going to start chronicling our Pathfinder shenanigans here, rest assured I am not. While our Pathfinder games are frequently hilarious, said hilarity mostly derives from giving our fellow player Jerry a ton of shit when he rolls poorly, which he does all the time, but it's less funny if you aren't there to see him bravely hide his tears of anguish behind an affable smile. Haha, Jerry, am I right?
So anyway, Action Movie World. We did play a few sessions, which I have neglected to recap, to my shame. They were good sessions, too, full of the kind of shenanigans I've come to expect from this group. Here are the episodes we've played to date, with some short descriptions:
Star Strife: The Legend of Laser Knife
This was a game Bill ran; a rip-off of Starcrash, Battle Beyond the Stars, and other cheapie space operas. I played Reb Brown as a robot named L.A.N.C.E. (Lifelike Artificial Neutralizing Cybernetic Entity). My notes consist of only a few choice elements: Planet Jon'Uston, Count Baddo, and also Planet Gyno-4. At one point we had to escape an evil galactic slave trader played by Billy Crystal. I wish my memory weren't so shit, because this was a game worth remembering.
Warlords of the Waste
This was a game I ran for my secondary Tuesday group; a rip-off of Starcrash, Battle Beyond the Stars, and other cheapie space operas. That's not a typo. We literally had two BBOS / Starcrash knock-offs in one week. Mine actually starred John Saxon and had a bit with a Mad Max style swamp buggy chase. Both games ended with a ludicrous melee aboard the enemy star cruiser. That's about all I recall.
Satan's Game 666: Albigensian Road Trip
This was possibly the final installment in the venerable Satan's Game series, at least until one of us comes up with a new idea. It was a riff on the Dungeons & Dragons cartoon, where a group of reprobates is drawn through a portal into the magical world of "Mazelord," the fictional OSR clone of the Satan's Game series. Yes, there was a little man with white hair named Mazelord. There was a Venger-style villain who rode a dragon and wanted their magical weapons. I did a scene in which Mazelord recited "fear not, Smartass, Gunfighter, Pugilist... and Yeller!" while summoning their weapons. Chances are this is only funny if you remember the show, and possibly not even then, but my players' screams of agony as long-lost synapses burned back into terrible life made the effort worthwhile. One of the highlights included a lengthy running gun battle with space goblins as the VW bus hurtled through an interdimensional portal. The story ended with the protagonists returning to earth and playing a gig at Coachella. Overall, huge success.
Attract Mode
This is the ongoing game for my secondary Tuesday group, a riff on "The Last Starfighter" wherein aliens place a video game on Earth as a training device in the hopes of recruiting a crack pilot for their actual interstellar war. So far, this one hasn't gotten off the ground (get it) -- the players are having too much fun kicking around the trailer park, poisoning the evil land developer* with expired corn dogs and shirking their shifts at the local mini-mart to play Stellar Defenders for hours a day. The alien invasion plot hasn't made an appearance yet, but who am I to stand in the way of the players' fun?
* played by a lesser Baldwin brother
And that almost brings us current, save for the game Bill ran most recently. Here was the pitch:
DEPENDENCE DAY (c) 1988 - Aliens have landed on earth to get us hooked on their space crack. Will this rag-tag group of rebels be able to overcome their evil scheme? Maybe. Will Nancy Reagan have a role to play in it? Almost assuredly. You liked Star Wars? Well then you'll love the Star War Against Drugs. When you see an Alien pusher, just say BLOW THEM AWAY!
Needless to say, I was excited by this idea. Bill ran this using the default Sci-Fi Flick template.
LET ME TELL YOU BROTHER
Having had enough of Reb Brown for the moment, I decided to roll a new actor: Hogarth Blezinski, stage name Cheesesteak Williams. He was modeled off of Hulk Hogan in the Eighties. His character was Hoagie "Freedom" Jones, a survivalist living in Colorado and building a garden behind his log cabin to cherish the memory of his departed wife. A wife who died of a drug overdose! Cue maudlin Michael Kamen music! Freedom played the Lead.
The rest of the lineup consisted of:
Chad Stevens, a welder modeled after Hugh Jackman (Frank / Gunfighter, I think)
Dr. Bella Bradley, a government researcher (Gina / I forget which playbook)
Orinoco Hammer, a badass cyborg or an alien or something, I'm not really sure (Greg / ???)
Yeah, my note-taking was great!
The best part of this session -- and I'm not sure Bill would agree with me here, but I feel this strongly -- it flew right off the rails almost right away. It derailed and it stayed derailed, and turned into one of the most gloriously over-the-top sessions of AMW ever.
The story began with the space shuttle Constellation, piloted by Scott Andrews (Bill Paxton) and a multicultural crew, running into some space radiation and making an emergency landing in Nicaragua. A news team dutifully reports the incident, but are interrupted by a manic Randy Quaid warning of an impending alien invasion. For the record, this was not Randy Quaid playing some character in the fictional movie, but actually Randy Quaid.
Quaid was hauled off by government agents, and Freedom and Chad depart to rescue him. I know it's egotistical to quote oneself, but I'm about to, because I'm proud of my One-Liner move (for which I rolled a 12, thank you very much):
"Look, Randy Quaid and I have been through a lot together. I didn't give up on him when he burned down fourteen hectares of Nebraska cornfield looking for discarded alien rectal probes. I didn't give up on him when he bulldozed the dinosaur museum in South Dakota because he thought it was run by Saurians. I didn't give up on him after that six-hour standoff at a Piggly Wiggly in Tennessee because he mistook the clerk for Whitley Strieber. And I'm not going to give up now."
Camaraderie +1!
At the police station, the heroes ran afoul of the Villain, a black-suited government agent named "Star" (Michael Ironside), who wears sunglasses and drives an infinite series of red Camaro sports cars. We blew one up in almost every scene, but every time the Villain reappeared, he had a new Camaro.
historically accurate food reference
Freedom and Chad are foiled in their attempt to rescue Randy Quaid, but manage to track him to a local Taco Bell. Meanwhile, Bella and Hammer have made off with the experimental spaceship they were working on (you see what I mean about the rail-flying-offing) and move to intercept.
What followed was an extensive bloodbath taking place entirely at the Taco Bell. Outside, the alien ship rained gunfire down on federal agents and Nicaraguan drug lords alike. Inside, tables and plastic trays were wielded as weapons. In a climactic scene, Freedom defeated government agent Renee Auberjonois by shoving two extra-saucy Enchoritos into his eyes while screaming some Taco-Bell related one-liner I can't recall. I think I made reference to the Bell Beefer because that was on the Taco Bell menu in the Eighties. That's how I roll.
Anyway, here's where it started to get pretty weird. We learned that aliens were distributing a drug called SPAZ, which made your eyes turn green and gave you increased combat prowess even as it turned you into a zombie for the loathsome alien cartel. There as also an anti-SPAZ, a red pill that turned you into a raging Red Hulk type creature, while also counteracting the effects of SPAZ.
We rescued Randy Quaid, but he was controlled by the aliens and had an alien bomb in his chest, which he planned to use to blow up the White House. Chad made use of his Script Move to modify the experimental alien ship piloted by Bella and Hammer, which sort of fused Randy Quaid with it in a Cronenbergian body-horror nightmare. So we're flying to Nicaragua in an alien ship that is part Randy Quaid. The crew touched down in Nicaragua, heavily damaged and no longer airworthy.
Voice of Paul Reubens not included
There we proceeded to gun down more alien cartel guys in an attempt to rescue the downed Space Shuttle Constellation, and by "rescue" I mean fly it into space to take on the alien mothership directly. "Star" showed up in a fresh Camaro, and executed Chad Stevens with a bullet to the head (+2 XP). After a stunt-heavy fistfight, Freedom defeated Star by throwing him into a Space Shuttle engine after a cheesy but effective One-Liner ("every star must one day burn out... today it's your turn" or something like that). +1 Camaraderie!
Not yet finished, the crew scrambles aboard the Constellation as it takes off. Bella flies the shuttle close to the alien mothership, and Hammer takes one of the red anti-SPAZ pills, promptly Hulks out, and spacewalks over to the mothership to start beating up aliens hand-to-hand. Not content to settle for this pugilistic come-uppance, Freedom and Bella fire an oxygen tank directly into the mothership's bridge and ignite it, blowing up both the ship and Hammer (+2 XP). Earth is saved! I guess!
The story closes on Freedom finishing his garden out back of the log cabin, where he has added commemorative photos of Chad and Hammer to the flower arrangements. Freedom and Bella head off to new adventures. No word is given on the state of Randy Quaid, the sentient experimental spaceship. But that's a gold mine just waiting to be plundered.
This episode set a new bar for wackiness in our group. It's going to be hard to top.
It's time for another ACTION MOVIE WORLD recap! This week, we christened the War Movie script with "Holiday in Vietnam." It was Jerry's first time at bat as Director. He did research and had a slideshow prepared and everything. It was glorious. For a moment, I thought we might do a Vietnam movie in the style of a real action movie. And it was... if the writers did a mountain of cocaine and peyote first.
Here's the cast list:
Geofrrey St. James as Cassius Freeman (Greg / Smartass)
Yola Chogo as "Maggie" Code Name Magpie (Gina / Pugilist / Lead)
Berkeley Blower as Sgt. Crockett Buoy (Bill / Yeller)
Jason Jackson as Lt. Bob Bixley (Frank / Gunfighter)
Randall Guy as Pvt. Junior McQueen (Me / Gunfighter)
Two Gunfighters in the same group! Can the "plot" handle it? (Spoiler: yes.)
Before the game began, we were instructed to watch this video to prepare us for the central hook. Take a look, and I think you'll see where this is going right away.
The story begins with our characters getting up to individual shenanigans while on holiday leave in Ho Chi Minh city, and then being brought in for a secret mission. The commanding officer (played by R. Lee Ermey) tells us that the Vietnamese officer known only as "The Butcher" plans to disrupt the supply lines, which could cost the Americans the war in Vietnam. Only we can help keep the supplies flowing to our allies, by dropping behind enemy lines and making a dangerous supply run. The United States lose the war on Vietnam? Not on our watch! (Sound of magazines being slammed into automatic weapons.)
In this movie, "Maggie" was the undercover agent, who valiantly tried to keep the rest of us from acting like depraved lunatics throughout the mission. It didn't really pan out. Frank and I decided our characters had a relationship of "friendly rivalry," meaning we numbered our combat kills and got competitive about the body count like Gimli and Legolas at the Battle of Helm's Deep. I highly recommend this as a "relationship" tag in any action movie -- it really inspires you to bring the mayhem.
Not pictured: The PCs
So anyway, we parachute behind enemy lines and inexplicably run into some jungle cats, which, in accordance with the orders of our secret covert mission, we gun down on full auto while screaming like banshees (okay, that was mostly me). Somehow we are not compromised and move on to find our contact, Abramowitz (Bruce Spence), who is trying to hold the line in his remote mountain fortress.
The bad news is, "The Butcher" already has the supplies in hand. The good news is, we're here to get it back! To make our way down the mountain and infiltrate the Butcher's base, we're given -- you guessed it -- bicycles. We're going to ride down the mountain on bikes! It's like some kind of beautiful dream!
I immediately ask for a montage in which Junior McQueen welds his M-16 to the basket on his bike. Wish granted. Bixley has made friends with a young Vietnamese boy, who rides tandem on his bike and probably plummeted to a terrifying death or was incinerated somewhere in the confusion -- I don't know because we sort of forgot he existed not long after the next scene.
LOST POWER!
Our squad is biking down the mountain at high speed. Suddenly we ride past a group of Viet Cong soldiers who are themselves on bikes. Only their bikes have little engines. Gasoline engines. For the next dozen die rolls, the unrestrained mayhem writes itself.
McQueen leads the charge with a sweet BMX-style side flip while shooting his M-16. Crockett, armed with a rocket launcher, flips his bike upside down, fires the rocket into pursuers while upside down, and is righted by the blowback from his rocket. Bixley drops a grenade into a group of enemies, essentially rocket-jumping his bike over them as they explode. Maggie does some sweet Zorro moves, somehow managing to wheel-kick Viet Cong while flying down the mountainside at full tilt. Freeman is in the back, working some back-end Smartass dice exploit to get the gang's Camaraderie back after he tanks it all to get us free XP.
So many bicycle gas tanks shot. So very many. Anyway, we won that fight, putting Bixley just ahead of McQueen in the competitive bad-guy-killin'.
We move on to the next scene, where the enemy is occupying a bridge we have to get across. There are a couple of towers and some soldiers on the ground. Freeman snipes one opponent from the trees, while Crockett fires his rocket into the other, and Bixley uses his Demolitions move to settle up with the rest. McQueen, who has been hanging back the entire time, now rides calmly across the bridge as debris rains down, popping his gum and ringing the bell on his bicycle.
Suddenly, the Director says, a barricade drops, revealing a fortified machine gun nest. It was an ambush! I do what I've been hoping to do since I started playing this game: I volunteer to die!
Riddled with bullets, McQueen (played by Reb Brown, you remember) does the Reb Brown scream as he drops a handful of live grenades into the basket of his bike and plows into the machine gun nest, exploding in a fiery ball and getting me 2 XP. "We're even," Bixley says, recounting the body-count rivalry. "You son of a bitch, now we're even." Vengeance move unlocked!
I have to say, this was one of my favorite PC deaths of all time, partially because it was mine, partially because all the other players took his death to heart. Crockett took the bell off McQueen's charred bike, while Bixley took his gun (which also somehow survived). During the rest of the session, they talked about "what McQueen would have wanted" and made constant references to his death. I was so grateful and happy! Dying was the best move in the game. Meanwhile, I became Director of Photography and added ridiculous Brian de Palma split screen and slow-mo to subsequent scenes.
The crew moved on to the Butcher's compound, where they freed a group of prisoners and broke out in a fresh hail of carnage. Things were happening so fast and furious by this point that I don't remember a ton of details, but here are a few key scenes: Cassius Freeman speeding down a zip line with his sniper rifle (possibly popping off enemies as he went). Bixley discovering a tank and using it to loud, destructive effect before it was unfortunately blown up in a "Lose Your Stuff" director move. Crockett flew through the air on his bike and rocket-bombed a helicopter in slow-mo to the tail end of The Chambers Brothers' "Time Has Come Today," which I think we can all agree is amazing.
Maggie, as the Lead and undercover agent, tried to keep the gang organized, mostly to no avail. The Butcher arrived in the final reel, driving up in a jeep and shooting Cassius Freeman dead (Freeman, no!). Maggie leaped into the back of the jeep, hit and kicked the Butcher approximately a hundred times a la Fist of the North Star, and bailed just before the Butcher's vehicle smashed into a tree and exploded. Now there's an Eighties villain death if ever I saw one.
This session was amazing. We had a ludicrous action scene in the middle act, I got to die a valiant screaming death, and thanks to Spotify, we had a terrific soundtrack to power the narrative. Let me tell you, any Vietnam battle sequence can only be enhanced by the Commodores' "Machine Gun."
Tonight, we play our first unaltered Sci-Fi script! I'm excited!
It's not an Eighties movie without Al Leong. Thankfully, he showed up
At long last, the Ninja playbook is christened! This weekend, the gang got together for another impromptu session of Action Movie World. This was the “purest” AMW session in a while, since it used an unalloyed Ninja playbook that hadn’t been tinkered with or customized. This was one of our best sessions yet.
A Shogun, lost in New York hired to protect a ruthless martial arts master. A benevolent master teaching the unfortunates of the city a better way to live. When they meet, the Bronx will rumble but only one will emerge to be the... Downtown Shogun!
Frank was the Director for this game. In the vein of so many Eighties ninja movies, Downtown Shogun was heavy on white guys (including one in the lead) and light on Asians who weren’t villains. So, what follows is probably insensitive at multiple points; that it's "ironically" insensitive may or may not be a saving grace for you personally. All I can say is our characters all lack nuance. I'm imitating Reb Brown for crying out loud.
Thankfully, we did have an Asian heroine in the mix, and she wasn’t played by Scarlett Johansson. She also completely ran away with the Star Power and was cooler than everyone else, so we had that going for us.
The cast:
Randall Guy as “Lightning” Charlie Stokes, Vietnam vet, haunted mercenary and white ninja (Me! / Gunfighter / Lead)
Javier Simpson as Doctor D.I. Why, professor of anthropology and ninja initiate (Jerry / Smartass)
Yola Chogo as Angel Chung, schoolgirl, wheel-kicking dynamo and part-time ninja (Gina / Pugilist)
Berkeley Blower as Sumo Fokuda, noodle cart vendor and sumo wrestler (Bill / Yeller)
Berkeley Blower: he's a ninja
This was a pretty terrible lineup for a Ninja movie, so we played it (successfully) for laughs. Charlie Stokes was a former soldier turned mercenary Trying to Escape His Past, who made money selling plundered cultural treasures to Doctor Why to pay for rent on his shitty apartment, like the imperialist pig-dog he is. Sumo Fokuda was of mixed Japanese-Portuguese heritage in the story, but in the meta-fiction his actor was played by Brian Blessed covered in bronzer a la Sean Connery at the end of You Only Live Twice. Movie, no! Stokes had stolen an ancient medallion that belonged to Fokuda’s family, and had kept it because it was supposed to have mystical power.
Both Stokes and Fokuda were clumsy oafs whose “ninja” moves presumably had to be done by stuntmen -- we even described a few clumsy cuts and camera tricks designed to cover our complete lack of grace and skill. Meanwhile, Gina’s character Angel Chung never rolled less than a 13 on a Violence roll and made us all look like jagoffs. As it should be!
There’s a prologue scene in ancient Japan, where a group of samurai charge a village but disappear in a mysterious flash of light. They appear in modern-day New York. Why? How? These questions never get answered, or even asked!
We cut to the Red Star Dojo, where members of the evil Black Koi Dojo (led by a sinister Al Leong) are shaking down Mr. Minamoto, the Red Star sensei. “Mister Jackson wants his money!” Angel Chung and Charlie Stokes show up moments later and begin whaling the tar out of everybody. The bad guys flee, and we learn that the mysterious Mr. Jackson is running a protection racket on the entire neighborhood. If we don’t stop these goons, the Red Star Dojo is history! Doctor Why trails behind, leaving garbage and one-liners in his wake.
Reb Brown attempts to emote
The gang meets at Rose’s Diner, the local greasy spoon, to discuss their plans to stop Jackson and his Black Koi goons. Not one to let a good planning scene go uninterrupted, Frank decides Black Koi thugs show up at the diner to shake down Rose herself. The heroes take this as an opportunity to launch into a terrifying array of pie- and silverware-based attacks. The goons are driven off, not before one gets interrogated and gives up the name “Shinyuki.”
During these scenes, I decided Charlie Stokes, as lead, would try to take the moral road and avoid conflict. As it does in every action movie, this process would inevitably break down and lead to horrifying bloodshed when I finally snap. So I led each conflict with an Emote, which always failed misery because my character’s Drama is for shit. My attempt at peacemaking failed, I would go on to deliver savage beatings like a man should. Angel Chung, meanwhile, had usually flattened half the room by this time.
Angel Chung: She Already Killed That Guy
Back to our tale. Returning to the Red Star, we ask Minamoto the meaning of “Shinyuki.” We learn he was a legendary lieutenant of a brutal shogun, Ashikura, who lived in the distant past and committed terrible atrocities. Was this the Shinyuki of legend, or just someone taking his name to inspire fear? We didn’t really look into it very far, but instead ventured into the sewers to infiltrate Mr. Jackson’s headquarters, tear apart his operation, and get evidence of his extortion scheme so we could save the kids’ baseball diamond or whatever.
We take a short trip through the cleanest sewers of all time until we run across a room full of samurai dressed in period-appropriate armor. Frank has adhered to the cardinal rule of the ninja movie -- a room full of enemies! A fight full of “-messy” results ensues as we carve our way through sixteen ninja mooks. Since I was playing the Gunfighter but thought it gauche to use guns, I decided to use a bow instead, firing two and three arrows at a time in an orgy of action excess.
We heard you were talking shit
Mechanical Notes: just before the fighting started, I took a risk and use Camaraderie to get everyone their bonus XP and “inspire” everyone, as well as turn the medallion of Fokuda into an awesome weapon. Thankfully, it worked, and our Camaraderie reset to 0. We did this by doing our Red Star Dojo "sign" (the index and middle fingers of both hands extended and crossed in an X). We got a lot of mileage out of the sign thing later in the game.
For the rest of the game, the Smartass would shore it up with a Killer One-Liner or two, and we would use it to heal just enough harm to keep people from getting killed in the huge battle. This was the most use we’ve ever gotten out of Camaraderie, and it was way more fun than letting it sit at +3 as an XP booster.
At the end of the carnage, Jackson himself shows up -- but before we can get to him, he summons another sixteen bad guys, resulting in a second huge and bloody battle. This was deeply satisfying and got everyone to the edge of five harm, despite our Camaraderie heals. The tension rises! I don't know if we can take on another baker's dozen, guys!
Jackson holds up the incriminating evidence we needed from his office. “Looking for this?” He hands the book off to Ashikura, who withdraws. We split up: Angel Chung and Stokes take on Jackson, while Why and Fokuda pursue Ashikura. Fun twist: we don’t know who the Villain is at this point, so it’s possible Why and Fokuda could be charging to their deaths.
The battle with Jackson is swift and decisive: he gets a couple hits in but Stokes and Chung take him apart. Meanwhile, Ashikura begins beating Fokuda and Why to a pulp. Stokes and Chung rush to their aid. During the battle, I take five harm and am “killed” by a sword stroke from Ashikura. All my Star Power is zeroed out (a first for our group). That’s trouble for everybody, because Ashikura is the Villain and I’m the Lead! Things look grim for our heroes!
Mr. Minamoto played by Pat Morita. Or maybe he wasn't. I just assumed
I roll against Camaraderie to see if the magical medallion will heal me in a magical deus ex machina. It does! (I realize I don’t need to do this to get back in the game as Lead, but it was fun anyway). I do a rad cartwheel flip and put an arrow through Ashikura’s heart. Red Star Dojo is saved! We return to Minamoto in victory and return the ancient medallion, which is suddenly significant somehow.
This game was a blast, and I really hope there’s a sequel. My only complaint is that none of the PCs died, which is 100% their choice, but a ninja movie without a Vengeance move feels like it’s missing something somehow. Maybe next time!
It's time for another recap of our latest Action Movie World adventures! As I've said in previous installments, one of my aims with the ongoing "Satan's Game" series was to make a sort of meta-commentary on sequels in the same way AMW itself makes a commentary on action movies.
It should be obvious by now, if you've read any of the other entries in this series, that "Satan's Game" has heavy action-horror elements (or action-horror-comedy elements, if we're being honest). I grew up watching various horror franchises I enjoyed (Halloween, Hellraiser, Friday the 13th, etc.) take their good ideas and either beat them to unrecognizable pulp or bleed them dry as dust over many sequels. I wanted to emulate that same terrible effect in gaming form (because I enjoy irony and cheap laughs, you see). Spiritually, I set out to make "films" that wanted to be Halloween but ended up being Hellraiser III. With cops.
This plan finally came to fruition with...
Satan's Game 4: Lord of the Maze (1990)
The sequel nobody asked for! Our cast was mostly the same as the previous installment. Aside from Frank's characters, who die like dogs in every movie, we've stuck with the same crew for a bit now:
Anna Citizen as Kelly Bishop, City Accountant turned. P.I. (Gina / Thespian)
Berkeley Blower as Angus Bellows (Bill / Yeller / Lead)
Garland McDonald as Pete "Muddy" O'Haran (Jerry / Musclehead.)
James Oakley as Leon Graling, a former Wild West sharpshooter turned bounty hunter (Frank / Gunfighter).
The face of pure evil
The movie opens on a couple making out in a car on a remote lover's lane, because I want the players to know right away: this movie is creatively bankrupt. Their impending teenage coitus is violently interrupted by an ominous figure in black. It's none other than the resurrected Dwight Meddles (Eddie Deezen), who cackles in a whining falsetto as he ends their lives. That's right, Eddie Deezen is now the villain! Standards have not fallen! This was a good choice! (But seriously, the players were very excited by the thought of fighting an evil Eddie Deezen.)
Once again, it falls to the "police" of Detroit to solve the mysterious murders. Angus Bellows, being the Lead, gets personally involved in the investigation. He, Kelly, Muddy, and Oakley go undercover at a local game shop, Merlin's Attic, to gather clues. Finally, after four movies, I get to fulfill my dream of PC cops fighting evil roleplayers!
Guest starring as one of the roleplayers is "Slade" from Razorfist: AD 1995, who starts an edition war that turns into a real war. Bloodshed ensues when the cops discover the game shop owners have some of the old Mazelord books with the psychoactive ink from the previous movie. Every gag gets re-used... that's the crappy sequel way! Slade uses "exotics" (which means he blocks with his face), but he and the other Evil Gamers are soon subdued by nightsticks, tasers to the crotch and falling shelves laden with deadly Avalon Hill games.
Oh no, it's getting pretty scary you guys
An interrogation of the devil-worshipping gamers leads the protagonists to the Corn Fun Fear Farm outside Detroit. (This is a real place, though I don't know if it existed in 1990.) There, Dwight Meddles (whose initials are DM, get it?) will prove himself to be the true master of Mazelord (because it's a corn maze, get it?) by literally summoning Satan on Halloween night. Dwight has kidnapped his own mother, Patsy, and tied her to a scarecrow pole. As the players arrive, lightning strikes the pole and the anti-Mazelord crusader messily expires. Patsy done got red-shirted.
A frantic battle ensues in which the "cops" (and bounty hunter and P.I.) battle a legion of pumpkin-headed misanthropes wielding chainsaws and pitchforks. Oakley botches a chase roll and plows his sports car into a power pole. Dwight Meddles fires Roman candles from his sleeves into the car (presumably while screaming "lightning bolt!") and Oakley is incinerated in the explosion. Vengeance move unlocked! Frank gets 2 XP and becomes a script consultant. He recommends Dwight literally become a demon at the end, proving magic and the Devil are real. I enthusiastically agree.
The climactic battle ends with Angus Bellows, the police commissioner, impaling the demonic Dwight Meddles on the charred pole that held Meddles' deceased mother. So, that's horrifying! But the threat is ended, and Satan's Game finally comes to an end... OR DOES IT, QUESTION MARK?
No, it doesn't.
Satan's Game 5: Evil's Conduit
And how can this be? For he is the Kwisatz Haderach Smooth Operator!
After the end of Satan's Game 4, the players were inexplicably eager for more. I said I would be happy to see more, but it was time for me to step aside and let someone else take over the franchise. I'd beaten it as far into the ground as I personally could. Frank volunteered, and the next week we continued with yet another sequel, doubtlessly cranked out in a white heat by the studio for a buck-fifty.
Randall David Guy as Raymond Zen (Me! / Gunfighter)
Let Me Tell You About My Character: I based Raymond Zen on Reb Brown, but not playing as a Yeller. I focused on the "crying" and "stiff acting" aspects of Reb Brown's style. I only occasionally descended into the Brownian "screaming like a banshee," but it never had any mechanical effect. My meta-story was that the actor did lines of coke between some takes and would seem inexplicably manic on screen. The best of all possible worlds! Raymond and Damian Grace were old Vietnam buddies, so naturally we had some Vietnam flashbacks and monologues about "the war" during the game.
So, on with the story! After the events of Satan's Game 4, the gang packed up and moved to the West Coast, where they formed G.L.O.R.I.A., the Government Led Occult Research and Investigation Agency. If you recall, Gloria was also the name of "Muddy" O'Haran's hammer, which is convenient because it pretty much sums up how we approach investigative problems.
Apparently, Dwight Meddles' attempt to summon the Devil at the Corn Fun Fear Farm in Detroit resulted in a "conduit" being opened between this world and the supernatural, meaning all sorts of inhuman baddies could come through, and it's up to us to stop them.
"So basically, we're Scooby Doo now," said Jerry, Muddy's player. No one could find it in their heart to disagree.
The face of pure evil
The story begins with some missing kids on Venice Beach. "I have never prepared less for a game," Frank says just after we start, and personally, I take that as a feature and not a bug. This is no longer a "cop" script, or really any of the scripts as written. I'm not sure what it is now, but we had a blast anyway.
Our protagonists interrogate beach-goers and find out there's a coven of vampires in Venice Beach. Raymond Zen gets coked up and rides his motorcycle all over the beach, unnecessarily spraying sand everywhere. I also take the opportunity to use the one-liner "you might be from another world, but I'm Ray Zen Hell," which made everyone want to die and was the whole reason I named the character the way I did.
Satan's Game 5: Evil's Conduit was simple and to the point. There were some vampires. They kidnapped Kelly Bishop (the trope still in effect five movies in!) The head vampire (played by Edward Hermann) gave a monologue explaining his plan. The rest of us laid assault to his lair (an office building) with automatic weapons and wooden stakes and put paid to the lot of them in a bloody conflagration. Venice Beach's vampire problem is solved!
Not appearing: oily Lost Boys saxophone guy
Mechanical Notes:
This was one of the few games where we used Camaraderie to get an awesome weapon (a Gatling gun that fired stakes), and personally, I'm a big fan. Bonus XP is nice. Insane weapons that create absolute mayehm are nicer.
At the end of the session, Frank explained that every character in the game was either named or based after a character from The Lost Boys, which was perfect. The soundtrack consisted mostly of The Go-Gos, which was also perfect somehow. I couldn't say what otherworldly terrors the members of G.L.O.R.I.A. will encounter next, but I'm eager to see where it goes... and kinda glad I'm not in charge.
Whatever AMW games I run in the future, I want them to be from fresh playbooks. We haven't even visited the Ninja, War or Sci-Fi playbooks yet at all. There's a lot of territory left to cover, and I'm eager to break out into new ground.
If Michael Ironside comes back from the dead, does anyone really notice?
I'm weeks behind on these play reports, but there's been a lot of Action Movie World happening! A few weeks back we played the third installment in our Satan's Game series of movies. As I may have said previously, Satan's Game is a series of cop movies (which have really become "cop" movies in scare quotes) about police fighting the true threats of the Eighties: drug dealers, Satanists, game shop owners, roleplayers, rock musicians, readers, and other nonconformists. The general idea is to make every installment more ridiculous and over-the-top than the previous installment, until the first Satan's Game looks like Oscar bait by comparison.
The final scene of Satan's Game 2 ended with a gunshot and a black screen, with the audience uncertain if lead Kelly Bishop had survived. (The players, of course, knew she did -- she was the Lead!) Satan's Game 3: Chaos Rising opens a year later, with some new faces and a few familiar characters:
Anna Citizen as Kelly Bishop, City Accountant turned. P.I. (Gina / Thespian)
Berkeley Blower as Captain Angus Bellows (Bill / Yeller)
Garland McDonald as Pete "Muddy" O'Haran (Jerry / Musclehead. Modeled after Richard Kiel, wields a huge hammer he's named Gloria. This will become hugely important later.)
Jason Jaxon as Jack Cobb, brother of Jack Cobb (Frank / Pugilist. Modeled after Jason Statham. Like his brother, he dies; unlike his brother, he only dies once.)
"And you can count... on me joining the SWAT team and killing people with a hammer!"
We also added a new player, Shane, who took to the game like a duck to water and grasped the vibe of the festivities right away.
Chance Davis Jr. as Steve Bushman (Shane / Smartass / Lead. Modeled after Kurt Russell). Chance Davis Jr. is a closeted gay actor who is down with all the ladies on screen and has a fast car and / or motorcycle he drives everywhere. You may not know Shane (which is to your misfortune if true) but Smartass is the role he was born to play, and thankfully he knew this.
As the movie begins, a group of mysterious hooded cultists lead unfortunate game shop owner Dwight Meddles (Eddie Deezen) into a remote graveyard, promising him an exclusive copy of the new Mazelord game. Instead, they offer him up in blood sacrifice to resurrect Damien Chaos, the henchman who died in a bloody conflagration in the first movie and who is now the new Villain. That's right, magic and resurrection is now real, this cop movie series is officially off the rails!
We cut to the hospital, where Kelly Bishop is in a coma after the events of the first film. She is stalked by one of the last Brides of Chaos, Eris (Rebecca DeMornay in a nurse's outfit because the classics never die), but Kelly comes out of her coma at a very convenient moment and snaps her neck. Adios, Eris, like so many AMW baddies you had one line and then you're dead.
Then there's opening scene where Jack Cobb (wielding a samurai sword) and Muddy O'Haran (wielding a giant hammer named Gloria) break into a drug house all by themselves and massacre and maim the criminals inside. I don't know what it is about re-enacting Eighties movies that brings out garish descriptions of violence in me, but this scene was horrifyingly violent. But I figure if we're doing a Cannon Films style cop movie set in Detroit, I don't know why we'd pull any punches. We would pull swords and hammers, apparently. The hapless drug lords give up some information under duress, implying that the super-drug "Lids" is once again back in town! Never let me be accused of non-lazy writing!
Mayor Henry Post: the terrifying Ned Flanders of the Satan's Game universe
Meanwhile, after being read the riot act by Mayor Henry Post (an extremely polite Harry Anderson), Angus Bellows (now police commissioner) sends the group to the Pony Keg, hoping they might uncover the mystery of the missing kids and the return of the "Lids" drug. Steve Bushman does what any undercover cop would do, which is to challenge the menacing duo "Pop and Lock" to an illegal street race. Naturally, he wins, and gets into the good graces of the villains, Creed Ruin (Brad Dourif) and Father Apocrypha (Robert Englund). What are Eighties movies without stupid villain names? Probably movies from some other decade!
After Angus Bellows is attacked in his home by the undead Chaos himself, it's clear terrible forces are afoot. Bushman is enlisted by Ruin to assassinate the enemies of Chaos; starting with Jack Cobb, who is in his dojo. A spectacular and ridiculous fight ensues. The group made a Camaraderie roll to get an awesome weapon: a minigun which they mounted in the back of Muddy's van. A gang of Chaos Rising punks on motorcycles attacked the dojo by driving through the windows and driving in circles inside the dojo (like ya do), and got cut to shreds by Jack and Kelly while Muddy, Steve and Angus gunned down the rest of them outside. Father Apocrypha was crushed by a car (I think), but Kelly was kidnapped by the bad guys via a Separate Them director move (by this time, quite the running joke, one the player in question loves).
Super scary priest guy who was in the movie for like ten seconds
Cut to, once again, the goddamn Universal Church of Holy Waters, where the final showdown happens for THE THIRD TIME IN AS MANY MOVIES. Damien Chaos, Creed Ruin, and the remainder of the thugs square off against our heroes, who drive through the stained glass windows to the tune of "White Wedding." Jack Cobb is once again gunned down in a hail of cultist bullets; his player collects 2 XP. The rest of the bad guy mooks are mowed down unceremoniously. (After this, I resolved to have that whole church paved over. We've re-used the set enough.)
Muddy, the Lead, swings at Damien Chaos but takes "succeed at a cost;" he loses his hammer Gloria, which slides under a pew. Angus Bellows tries to fight the Villain, but takes a boatload of Harm and is thrown through the air. Apparently mortally wounded, he gives a "go get 'em" speech to Muddy and hands him the hammer, which he has retrieved. I cue up Laura Branagan's "Gloria" on the soundtrack. Vengeance Move! Muddy rises up and smites Damien Chaos for the final time. He's super-double-dead for sure now and definitely will not come back when the popularity of this series begins to flag.
So that's another hysterical session down. Our new player definitely wants to come back for more. What does the future hold for Satan's Game? Some more crappy and ridiculous sequels! Stay tuned!
I've never seen MEGAFOOT (and from a cursory Google, it looks like I may never see it), but I know a good Action Movie World Sci-Fi movie primer when I see one.
Motorheads, sportos, geeks, sluts, bloods, they all think Damien Chaos is a righteous dude
After a long hiatus, I finally got to run Action Movie World again! Last night, we played a sequel to the Cop movie "Satan's Game." The first installment revolved around a plot by a manic cult to addict a city to destructive drugs. During play, I decided one of the supporting henchman, Damien Chaos (Michael Ironside) was a Manson-style bigamist and serial killer. But he didn't really get to do much, as he was vaporized in a magnificent barfight explosion. I thought it might be fun to have his wives try to avenge his death (and also include all the campy Eighties elements I didn't get to bring to bear in the previous game).
The cast was as follows:
Anna Citizen as Kelly Bishop, City Accountant turned. P.I. (Gina / Thespian / Lead)
Javier Simpson as Faustino Ramirez, Ex-Cop turned P.I. (Jerry / Smartass)
Chase Brody as Damien Grace, Smooth Operator Cop (Greg /Smooth Operator). Greg wanted to try out a new Playbook, so he gave the Smooth Operator a shot.
Berkeley Blower as Captain Angus Bellows (Bill / Yeller)
Benjamin Baird as Sgt. John Cobb, SWAT (Frank / Gunslinger). Cobb was straight-up killed in the last game and the player asked if he could come back for the sequel with absolutely no explanation as to why or how. Of course I said yes.
This game was intended as a riff on the Satanic roleplaying scares of the Eighties, popularized by Mazes & Monsters and Pat Pulling. The plot is literally about a Satanic cult using a roleplaying game to turn kids into homicidal psychopaths. The story opens with a bunch of kids playing an RPG called Mazelord in a footbridge tunnel. After rolling a critical failure, one of them (I described him as Troy from Final Sacrifice) goes berserk and starts killing all the other kids. Combine with a montage of a mysterious female biker gang driving into the city to the tune of blaring (and dangerous) rock music. Roll opening credits!
The scene opens a year after the events of the first movie. Kelly Bishop has been training with Damien Grace in the style of Terminator 2. Where she was "all girly" (Gina's words, not mine) in the previous movie, now she's buff and ready for combat. Bishop and Faust have opened a private investigation firm and are trying to get their business off the ground. Bishop has a conversation with Lana Williams (Pamela Hensley), the Channel 5 news reporter from the previous movie, about these "Mazelord Murders" that are rocking the city. High school and college kids have gone berserk with the rock music and pretending to be elves!
Lana Williams (Pamela Hensley)
Meanwhile, Captain Blower sends Grace and Cobb to investigate the murders. Grace is a Don Johnson-type character with a Ferrari who buys his lifestyle at drug auctions and has a devil-may-care attitude about everything. They do the Eighties thing and hit the mall, looking for a Toys-R-Us or Waldenbooks, the terrifying hubs of roleplaying game occult activity in 1987. Grace runs into a mysterious, attractive biker thumbing through a Mazelord book. This is Lilith Chaos (Jane Badler), one of the Brides of Chaos. Being a Smooth Operator, he immediately moves to seduce her and they get busy at the Sleep City next door.
Blower, who is tailing Grace to keep tabs on his bad behavior, runs into Patsy Meddles, my own take on Pat Pulling. She's played by Edie McClurg and runs MAM (Mothers Against Mazelord). She reveals her son Dwight (Eddie Deezen) runs a game shop and she fears for his life because of "this awful game." Blower promises to investigate on her behalf.
Yes, Lilith Chaos wore sunglasses. Yes, we made jokes about her being a lizard person.
The investigation eventually leads Bishop, Cobb and Faust to an occult bookstore, which I named the Albigensian Heresy. ("I have no idea what the fuck that is," said one player.) They interrogate the proprietor about Mazelord, who assures them snootily that "imagination is not a crime" and that Mazelord could not turn kids into murderers. Shortly thereafter. Lilith Chaos and a group of bikers show up outside and assault Bishop and Faust.
Faust fails a One-Liner roll and then fails his ensuing Stunt. I judge Lilith wraps a chain around his neck and starts dragging him behind her motorcycle. Faust's player asks if he can "just die" and I say sure. Faust is horribly beheaded, Jerry collects 2 XP and becomes the Stunt Coordinator. Bishop, traumatized, lays into the bikers with her sword (!) Vengeance move against Lilith is now in play. (But is Lilith the villain? Not really! More on that soon.)
Cobb (who, by the way, has been dressing like a ninja and sharpening his knives at every opportunity this entire time) throws a knife to support Bishop. I decide the proprietor is in on the attack, and he brains the cop with a heavy copy of Frazer's Golden Bough. Lilith manages to get away, but the rest of the bikers are cut down. In the shop, Cobb discovers some mysterious green ink, which he deduces is being used in the printing of the Mazelord books. The green ink is "Lids," the psychoactive drug from the first movie. Mazelord really is turning kids into crazed killers!
After Faust's funeral, the group decides to end this once and for all. Gina rolls a Soliloquy move for her Thespian and declares the biker gang is holed up in the Church of Holy Waters, the location where the last movie ended. Cool, this will really keep the budget down! The PCs make a frontal assault in Action Movie World style. Bishop drives her truck into the church and starts a fight with Lilith. Outside, Grace and Blower begin mowing down bikers, but a "succeed at cost" roll from Grace means a biker rocket-bombs his Ferrari and blows it to smithereens. "Can I have a Vengeance move for my Ferrari?" the player asks.
Tragically not appearing in this episode: Eddie Deezen
The highlight of the battle comes when Cobb's character picks up an assault rifle, takes five harm, and is gunned down in exactly the same fashion as the first movie. He's even standing in the exact same place. 2 XP for Frank.
There's even the same soundtrack and the same flock of doves flying into the sky. Bishop finishes off Lilith with her sword. The remaining bikers are killed or driven off, and we pull back from the wreckage of the burning Church of Holy Waters. The threat is over... or is it?
Cut to a final scene. Bishop is packing up Faust's personal belongings at the P.I. office. Lana Williams, the reporter who has been Bishop's only friend, stops by to see how Bishop is holding up. She drops off a file with information on the Brides of Chaos. "Turns out there was one last Bride," Williams explains, "the mastermind behind the whole thing."
Bishop opens the file. Inside is information on Clytemnestra Chaos, the right hand of Damien Chaos. The picture is of Lana Williams. Bishop hears the click of a revolver hammer being drawn back. Stealth villain! This was the unveiling of the "villain reveals she has been in disguise the entire time" move.
"Do you really want it to go down this way?" Bishop asks, looking at her gun lying in the desk drawer.
"You take what you can get," says Clytemnestra.
The players decide the session ends there, with a hard cut to black and the sound of a gunshot.
Mechanical Notes
This was my second session running with a Smooth Operator in the group, and I have to say that playbook isn't my favorite. I find the harm-nullifying move kind of disruptive and drab. But it's not a game-breaker by any means, and as long as the players are having fun, I'm fine with it.
I put together some custom moves for this game (here's the actor script if you want it), which ended up with mixed results in execution. I need more practice making them fit the "feel" of the game.
Camaraderie went almost totally ignored this game, except to bump it to 3 and leave it there for the bonus XP. That's becoming by far the most common use of Camaraderie in our group.
The players are already anxious for Satan's Game 3!
I don’t have any Sunday games for at least the next two weeks, so now I’m just going to bloviate about random Action Movie World stuff. I had a conversation with my Pugilist player the week after our Razorfist AD 1995 game, wherein his supporting Pugilist wiped the floor with any and all adversaries. It occurred to me that the Pugilist + the Fighting Tournament playbook can create something of a no-lose scenario with experienced characters. And a no-lose scenario is not necessarily bad, but it is potentially a bit dull.
To run some numbers:
Say you pick the Pugilist playbook. You give him an ability set that grants him Agility +2, and take the “Sting Like a Bee” move, which lets you roll +Agility instead of +Muscles in melee. You also take “Go for the Gut,” adding an extra +1 to Agility. If the Pugilist then takes the "Hands of Stone" move from the Fighting Tournament movie script, that’s an additional +1 to close combat and stunt rolls, making for a total of +5 to melee and close combat rolls. If they add a "Training Montage" move beforehand, the total goes even higher.
The upshot of this: the Pugilist, under these circumstances, will never fail, and only succeed with a cost if he rolls a 2, 3 or 4 on 2d12. His average roll will be more like a 12.
How big a problem is that? It depends. Having a Lead who always mows down the bad guys without breaking a sweat is perfectly within genre, if a little Steven Seagal-ish in dimension. But it does tend to flatten the action a bit. Since the Director never rolls the dice in Action Movie World, the only chance to execute a Director move is when a hero either fails or succeeds with a cost. If that failure state never occurs for a character, then the chances anything interesting will happen to that character drop dramatically. The “sweet spot” for Action Movie World lies in that 7-9 roll where you get the push-and-pull of success and failure together.
To be fair to my player, it’s not like he set out to break the game. He’s just a natural and highly skilled min-maxer. (You should see his Shadowrun characters -- better than the entire rest of the party combined.) He likes to succeed at everything, and taking joy in failure does not generally come naturally to him. So if he sees a chance for a bonus that helps him succeed, he’ll take it. But unfortunately, succeeding all the time in AMW is even more boring than it is in other games. If you never roll below a 9, the bad guys literally can’t touch you -- unless someone else makes a move that says you get hurt.
So What’s the Solution?
To be honest, I’m not sure this represents a serious problem. In our session, the Pugilist was just one of a whole troupe of characters, and there was plenty of interesting, juicy failure to go around. Also, the supreme bonus-stacking only applies to combat rolls -- which, while likely to be copious in any AMW game, are hardly the only roll in the game. Such a focused Pugilist isn’t going to be very good at one-liners, drama, or anything except killing and beating people. A whole squad of min-maxing Pugilists could present a problem, in that all your combats would be extremely boring because the PCs would ace every single roll and never take a hit. They’d be like late-career Bruce Willis: their contract says they can no longer take a savage beating, and they might become a bit of a snore to watch.
The Pugilist player is talking about retiring this particular actor, as it looks like he’s painted himself into a corner game-wise. Even if he doesn’t, having that one guy who shows up to effortlessly beat the living daylights out of everyone isn’t a bad thing. My only real gripe as a Director is that this allows the character to rack up massive Star Power without providing a lot of nail-biting excitement at the table. But with movies changing Leads every game, that only amounts to a bonus XP.
So again, not a huge problem, but it does present an interesting dilemma in the long term: the more capable the characters become in AMW, the less exciting the action might become. The real juice lies in their failure.
"The story opens on a terrifying hellscape of ruined Detroit." "So, basically just Detroit."
It’s time for the recap of our latest AMW session, Razorfist: A.D. 1995! This was a birthday game for a friend, who requested the Fighting Tournament playbook. He theorized we would never use the Fighting Tournament playbook unless someone requested it. He’s probably right. Here’s the narrated “trailer” I put together:
In the last days of the 20th century, the melting of the polar ice caps has left the world in ruins.[a shitty computer graphic of the East and West coast of the U.S. disappearing]Torn by war, racked by starvation, what's left of humanity hides behind walls.[Some establishing shots of watery, rainy Detroit, grubby humanity packed in like sardines]The only way out – off the planet![Two young people watch from a rooftop as a starship achieves escape velocity in the distance]And some will do anything for a chance at salvation.[Splash screen of movie title in stain-less steel “futuristic” font]RAZORFIST! A deadly battle of fighting prowess in which the winner takes all... and the loser loses everything.[montage of fighters battling in a neon-lined arena, cigarette smoke thick in the air, disaffected Asian men in suits giving hooded gazes over cigars as they watch the brutality]Now, one man must do what it takes to survive – or die trying![a silhouetted figure finds themselves cornered in a dark, blue-lit alley as the only exit is blocked off by a vehicle. Voice-over: “Don't you get it? The game's rigged! None of us are getting out alive!”][Cut to disaffected Asian man in white suit with cigar: “Now… finish it.”]RAZORFIST! Rated R!
This was not going to be a complicated game. The characters would get into the illegal fighting tournament, beat the crap out of some NPCs, then each other, and then the villain (the evil businessman who created the tournament). We got down to character generation. We had a full crew of the usual suspects, plus one new player (Naomi). The cast was as follows:
Berkeley Blower as Gipper Frost, an American football star banished from the United States for “fighting his way into the White House” and attacking the President for socialism. (So right away, we set a certain tone.) Berkeley was the Lead, and his player described him as “Brian Blessed, constantly sweating and out of breath.” He was a rival of...
Scott McCheddar as Arnaud “Toronto Terror” Gaultier, a French-Canadian fighting champion who always had a drink and a cigarette in his hand and disdained everything that wasn’t Canadian.
Javier Simpson as Ernie “Calcutta” van Evenhoeven, an ill-educated Ultimate Fighting participant who paid opponents to throw matches and then bet on himself. He was caught and had every bone in his body broken by Arnaud. Video of the beating became famous worldwide. He was childhood friends with... Anna Citizen as Brandy Daniels, a holovid producer out to expose the corruption in Razorfist and get a great story in order to promote her career. Benjamin Baird as Ken Wu, a three-time Chinese gold medalist turned journalist, hired to go undercover in Razorfist. To my delight, Wu’s player told me to completely ignore the journalism subplot once it was introduced and put it on the cutting room floor. He was the unlikely brother of Gipper Frost.
And introducing Sami Fin as Luci Adieux, a fighter whose brother was killed by the reigning Razorfist champion, Crusher Liu (Bolo Yeung), and is now out for revenge. She chose the Smooth Operator playbook and modeled herself after Geena Davis.
Act One
I tried to get the characters together as quickly as possible. “Cal” and Brandy, being old childhood friends, met on the plane into Detroit. Cal recognized Gipper from his famous attack on the White House and fannishly bulldozed his way into Gipper’s life. They drove to the hotel in preparation for getting into Razorfist, and Cal’s player drove up the Camaraderie with some one-liners about the tournament and its participants (“more crooked than a Cambodian highway.”)
"Imagine Brian Blessed in the red diaper from Zardoz."
Meanwhile, Ken Wu and Luci Adieux got the attention of Razorfist officials by charging into a pit fight in a downtown venue. Luci, being a Smooth Operator, didn’t have huge fighting skills, so she mostly set up stunts for Ken. Together, they defeated both opponents and got the attention of Crusher Liu. They also “met” Arnaud when Ken was thrown out of the ring and smashed Arnaud's table during a fight, upsetting his drink. They agreed they would meet up at the tournament later.
The play group suggested one more fight on the way to Razorfist, on the “hydro-train” to the arena. Some punks showed up on the train, started causing trouble, and were promptly given a savage beating. (I mentioned that the thugs had just wandered over from the Satan’s Game set and were dressed exactly like them, which seemed to be a big hit.) I liked that one of the players said “no, we need an inconsequential action scene in between the two acts” and then we just made that happen.
Act Two
Finally, we got down to the real business of the session: making the PCs fight each other! I got out a printable bracket and had the players sign their names on it. At the end, I gave the Lead discretion on which opponent he got to fight first. He chose Cal (the Smartass). Before the fight, there was some dramatic scenery-chewing between the PCs and the Villain, Mister Tokunaga. (For whatever reason, keeping his name straight became a huge problem throughout the game, and it became a running joke of supposed continuity errors.)
I based one of the NPC fighters, "Slade," on Ray Jackson from Bloodsport, because of course I did.
Tokunaga, who had forced Gipper Frost into the fight in the first place, secretly instructed Arnaud to kill Frost during the fight in order to drive the ratings up. Tokunaga also revealed that he planed to make huge profits by simulcasting the illegal tournament worldwide and “going public” with Razorfist. The villain gave a speech about Darwinism and declining civilizations, like you do when you’re a heavy in a vaguely post-apocalyptic game. Frost’s player brought the house down with a one-liner that went something like: “Tonight, it’s not going to be morning in America... it’s going to be mourning all over the world.” The player was wearing a hat that said RONALD REAGAN when he did this. He then rolled a 12 on the one-liner and raised Camaraderie to 3.
Razorfist begins! I cued up the Spotify playlist of Eighties montage songs I'd put together and kept it going for the rest of the game. “The weenies at the front of the tournament bracket should fall like wheat before a scythe,” says the AMW rulebook, and that’s exactly what happened. The first three matches were against NPCs with goofy names (Kalimama, Slade, Johnny Cuidado), and they were quickly dispatched. Luci Adieux crushed Kalimama's throat with her boot to prove she was serious business.
Then Frost “The Cold Warrior” went up against Calcutta. Cal’s player did a spit-take when he found out he was battling Frost, which I think might have counted as a one-liner. The Frost / Calcutta battle was brutal and brief. Cal used his Smartass to taunt Frost into doing something stupid, but then botched his follow-up stunt. Liberal use of the “Not Tommy! NO!” script move was made here, earning both players some XP. Frost did a wrestling-style drop onto Cal, who took five harm and chose to "accidentally" die. Calcutta, shattered by the blow, expired in the arena, opening up the Vengeance move for Frost. Cal’s player became Fight Choreographer.
Meanwhile, Brandy Daniels stealthily made her way backstage to get dirt on Razorfist. She used her Thespian Soliloquy move to determine that Tokunaga was running a huge, fraudulent electronic gambling operation, and that he stood to rake in huge profits from Razorfist’s public debut. She succeeded at a cost, so her character was once again captured. I felt a little bad about that, since that’s what happened in “Satans’ Game” too, but it was the only move that made sense.
Then came the next battle in the bracket, Arnaud vs. Luci Adieux. This was probably the most challenging battle, mechanically speaking. I gave people the option to pick a new Pugilist playbook before we started, but no one did. A Pugilist fighting a Smooth Operator in a PvP battle was a bit of a mess. The Pugilist rarely mounted anything less than an 11 on his die rolls, meaning he dealt enormous harm with every move he made, but the Smooth Operator could use her move to just soak it for huge counteracting bonuses.
At first, it looked like this was just going to create table tension instead of an exciting fight. Then the players decided that Arnaud would take the fall in the match, and then they would team up to take down Crusher, kill Tokunaga, and destroy Razorfist. Okay then!
Act Three
The third act promptly descended into awesome mayhem. I thought we were going to go all the way with PCs fighting each other and the Lead fighting Crusher. That just goes to show, never assume anything where player characters are concerned. Brandy Daniels pulled off a one-time stunt to push Crusher Liu out the window of the VIP box onto the arena floor, and Ken Wu (the Gunslinger) got out his pistols and just shot him down. So much for a tense match with the Razorfist champion!
"Very good, but brick not hit back--" [hail of gunfire]
But things were grim -- Wu succeeded at a cost and was already suffering major harm from his battles in the arena, so he chose to die, gunned down by Tokunaga’s bodyguards. Adios, Ken Wu. His player became Pyrotechnics Expert. (Minutes later, all of downtown Detroit was on fire for no reason because of rioting.) Arnaud and Luci Adieux engaged in a massive brawl with the bodyguards while Tokunaga dragged Brandy up to the roof toward his waiting helicopter. There were a lot of success-at-cost rolls being made, so I was triggering the Villain moves of getting help from bodyguards, whipping out military hardware, etc.
Frost’s player pulled off a Stunt and asked if he could break into a display case that contained a glove studded with razors -- aka the actual Razorfist -- and use it in battle. I said hell yes. Frost and Tokunaga confronted each other on the roof (villain move: villain reveals his secret fighting skills) while Brandy tried to commandeer the helicopter.
Long story short, Frost pulled off his Vengeance move, impaled Tokunaga on the Razorfist glove and threw him off the roof. Then the helicopter dropped onto him and exploded. “So there’s not gonna be a sequel,” said the Smartass. We ended on a freeze-frame of Frost throwing up his hands and yelling “YEAH!” and I cued up “Love is the Way” from Kickboxer. End credits!
Mechanical Notes
The AMW rulebook says “this is the sort of movie in which The Pugilist can really shine,” and that’s no joke. I’d say the Pugilist ends up eclipsing any other playbook type. When we tallied up Star Power at the end of the game, most players had two to four Star Power. The Lead had five. The Pugilist player had eleven. Between the Hands of Stone bonus, his existing moves, and the Training Montage, he missed one roll the entire game, only because he rolled snake eyes. I think if I were ever to use this Playbook again, I’d make “all Pugilists” a requirement. I knew things would shake out this way going in and was fine with it, so I don't consider it a flaw in the design.
Having players fight each other is fun, but something I’ll probably want to do in moderation in the future -- and again, the playbooks involved makes a huge difference. The Pugilist fighting the Smooth Operator in this game was like the irresistible force meeting the immovable object. This could be awesome or meh, depending on the context.
One thing I may house rule, or at least clarify, is the “you inflict harm, but are driven back” result from the Violence move. I’ve noticed it tends to get used (even by me, during the first session we played) as a cost that isn’t really a cost. “Driven back” is an abstract term that doesn’t necessarily create much in the way of a disadvantage unless it’s enforced. In the future, I think I’ll mandate that “driven back” means either being separated from the group in some way, or some other tangible drawback.
The Fighting Tournament script is also damned hard on Camaraderie. It kept resetting to zero when characters died. Our group doesn’t like to draw on Camaraderie; they prefer to hoard it to get that extra XP at the end of the game. So it would reset and suddenly people are scrambling to lay down zingers so they can get it back up to 3. That became a tough road once the Smartass died in the middle act.
Setting this game in the Dark Future was probably gilding the lily, but I don’t care. We already came up with a great name for the sequel starring Gipper Frost. RAZORFIST 2: COLD DAY IN HELL.
