Previously
Rick's estranged father, Rafe, resurfaced after months of being in hiding and on the run for his alleged, illegal, human experiments. The aftermath of the Mayzor raid in Brooklyn, NY left a solemn note in the air, as the pilots of Charlie Company underwent a series of psychological evaluations. Sarah pried the truth out of Dr. Harris who recounted the tragic events of the Chicago Catastrophe, where Rick learned his sister, Serena from Alpha Company, risked her life to save the only other survivors of Bravo Company, Laurie Bach and Leo 'Raspberry' Hayes. Rick had the unfortunate displeasure of meeting with Dr. Johnson who badgered him into depression about revealing everything his father had ever told him regarding the experiments, even though Rick sincerely didn't know anything.
Two months have passed since the Chicago Catastrophe, and Serena has steadily recovered in the hospital to the point where she's almost fully recuperated. Meanwhile, two new SAInt pilots have joined Laurie and Raspberry in Bravo Company, while Serena remains the only pilot left of Alpha Company.
Both Mother's Day and family weekend are just around the corner, and it also happens to be Jason's 14th birthday!
Rick's estranged father, Rafe, resurfaced after months of being in hiding and on the run for his alleged, illegal, human experiments. The aftermath of the Mayzor raid in Brooklyn, NY left a solemn note in the air, as the pilots of Charlie Company underwent a series of psychological evaluations. Sarah pried the truth out of Dr. Harris who recounted the tragic events of the Chicago Catastrophe, where Rick learned his sister, Serena from Alpha Company, risked her life to save the only other survivors of Bravo Company, Laurie Bach and Leo 'Raspberry' Hayes. Rick had the unfortunate displeasure of meeting with Dr. Johnson who badgered him into depression about revealing everything his father had ever told him regarding the experiments, even though Rick sincerely didn't know anything.
Two months have passed since the Chicago Catastrophe, and Serena has steadily recovered in the hospital to the point where she's almost fully recuperated. Meanwhile, two new SAInt pilots have joined Laurie and Raspberry in Bravo Company, while Serena remains the only pilot left of Alpha Company.
Both Mother's Day and family weekend are just around the corner, and it also happens to be Jason's 14th birthday!
Friday, May 9, 2031
The episode begins in a classroom lecture hall. Rick, Sarah, Jason, and all the other SAInt pilots and classmates are listening to Dr. Harris, as she finishes up a biology lecture. It's two days from Mother's Day and the start of family weekend, and the SAInt pilots from all three companies were told they weren't allowed to leave the Arx Jericho to go see their families, unlike most of their other classmates. This bummed most of the pilots out. Jason is probably hit the hardest, since it's his birthday and no one's said anything to him yet. Little does he know what Rick and Sarah have planned for him in just a few hours. On top of all that, Dr. Harris suddenly announces a pop quiz on last week's material before class ends! After they turn in their papers, Rick and Jason later find out they don't do so well on their quiz, while Sarah barely gets a passing grade by cheating off Serena.
Dr. Harris is the first person to wish Jason a happy birthday. He turns 14 today! Back at the foster home, Alex is nowhere in sight, and Jason sees a present for him addressed from his stepfather, Air Commodore (OF6) Martin Reyes (43) of the Preservation Forces, Western Pacific Division (aboard Arx Galilee over Sydney, Australia). There's a note wishing Jason a happy birthday, and Jason opens the present up to find a newly released, state-of-the-art hoverboard, the likes of which he had only seen in movies like Back to the Future. Jason's surprised to receive such an expensive gift from his stepfather, since that's never happened before.
Meanwhile, Rick and Sarah have occupied the two classrooms containing the Gaming Guild's computers and the Kendo Club's wooden floor and removed the wall separating the two to form a big space for Jason's surprise birthday party. Sarah texts Jason to get him to come over, while she and Rick finish preparing the balloons, video game stations, DDR machines, dance floor lights, music, snacks, soda, cake, ice cream, a surprise piñata, and, of course, presents.
The other guests in attendance are all SAInt pilots from Charlie and Bravo Company. There's Billy and Alex (Strudel), from C Company, of course, as well as Serena, team leader of B Company, and Laurie and Leo (Raspberry), both from B company as well. The two new pilots of B Company, Joanne and Stephanie, are also in the room. They're the same, two girls who are part of the Kendo Club with Rick, and they officially became SAInt pilots less than a month after the Chicago Catastrophe. They've both been intensively training the past month. Furthermore, all the SAInt pilots from all three companies are anticipating a mandatory, group simulation test on Mother's Day in two days.
 |
| Source: http://tinyurl.com/74uhjwf |
When Jason reaches the computer lab, the lights are turned off inside, and Jason knocks on the door before slowly walking in. It's silent. He can barely make out the faces and bodies shuffling in the dark. The lights suddenly go on and everyone yells, "Surprise!"
An eventful birthday party ensues. First, there's a video game competition. Sarah's up against Raspberry in Shinobi Knights 4. Serena's watching, looking a tad grim, but smiles and cheers Sarah on, as Sarah wins. Rick plays Jason. The birthday boy wins, impressing Alex, but Rick still manages to impress his sister by almost winning. Unfortunately, he's been depressed for a good, solid month, and the loss doesn't do his ego any good.
As the party goes on, there are subtle and not-so-subtle signs of romance blossoming in the air. For example, Strudel and Stephanie seem to be hitting it off really well. They're constantly laughing together, playing DDR against each other, even holding hands. Joanne approaches Rick and challenges him to a game of DDR. Rick attempts to discern her emotions, but he can't on his own and needs Sarah's help. Together, they learn that Joanne seems to have a major crush on him, based on her body language. Rick is slightly confused but decides to play Joanne anyway. He does his best but she whoops his butt on heavy mode. Joanne laughs and sneers at Rick, followed by a wink and a smile. Her actions don't affect Rick too much. His ego is still shot.
 |
| Source: http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lqb607O3a31qbjtqb.png |
It isn't until the piñata that Rick finally slinks out of his depression. The kicker is that the piñata is in the shape of a Magnas, a replica of Belial to be exact. The SAInt pilots take turns wearing the blindfold and swinging the wooden stick, each time knocking more holes into the piñata Belial's masks, knocking loads of candy onto the ground. Strudel's eyes are already greedily scanning the ground, and his arms are snatching up any pieces that drop down in his vicinity, while Stephanie helps him. Rick, Sarah, Jason, and everyone else continues to swing, but when it comes back around to Rick again, he delivers the final blow, exploding the piñata Magnas's self-detonating core and releasing all the candy onto the ground. Strudel is in a frenzy. Everyone cheers Rick on, and his ego goes up a little, ending his depression.
Finally, it's time to open up the presents! Jason opens Rick's first. It's a copy of the new video game, Shinobi Knights 5: The Reckoning. Sarah's present is a sweet, fully functional airsoft gun. Alex and Billy went in on their present together. It's a brand new helmet and set of protective padding and gloves for Jason's new hoverboard, which all the other SAInt pilots totally drool over. It seems Alex knew Jason was getting a hoverboard all along. Serena gets him new clothes, others get him some boring gifts, and Laurie waits until everyone scatters to present her gift last.
She hands Jason an envelope with a very personalized card inside and a kiss on the cheek. She then asks him if he wants a drink. Laurie pulls out a small handle of vodka she snuck into the classroom with the rest of the sodas and juices. Jason responds, "Sure, why not?" and they start drinking, as the other teens step onto the dance floor. A set of slow songs come on, and the girls start dancing with the boys. Laurie invites Jason to dance and begins passing drinks around spiked with alcohol.
Jason and Laurie dance. Strudel pairs up with Stephanie. Raspberry even gets a dance in with Sarah, and Joanne looks like she wants a dance with Rick, but Rick goes over to Serena, who's by herself. Billy is by himself, too, at the opposite end of the classroom.
Rick asks his sister what's wrong, and Serena instinctively says she doesn't want to talk about it. Rick convinces her to tell him what's on her mind, and she says Billy has been a real jerk. She says Billy's sweet, but then he started pressuring her into speaking with Dr. Johnson and was saying mean things about their father and Rick. Serena glares across the room at Billy.
Rick glares angrily at Billy but decides to temper himself. Roughly an hour later, after most of the pilots have had more than a few drinks, Rick suddenly sees Billy and Serena standing next to each other, getting into an argument. Billy, drink in hand, shoves Serena. Rick rushes over to help and asks if everything's OK. Billy tells him to go away and shoves Rick backward. Rick lunges forward and twists Billy's arm. Billy's drink spills all over the ground, and Serena slaps Billy across the face before walking away. Rick lets go of his arm, and Billy stumbles out of the classroom with a wounded pride.
As Rick walks over to console Serena, the pilots hear Billy's voice outside talking to Dr. Harris and claiming that they've all been drinking. Everyone hears Billy march off in a drunken stupor, as Dr. Harris approaches the classroom. Rick, Sarah, and Jason quickly take charge to get everyone out, while they scramble to hide all the liquor and help the other pilots escape through an open window. Everyone but Rick, Sarah, Jason, Serena, and Strudel manage to escape when Dr. Harris enters the classroom. She looks around at the mess, casually smiling, and pokes her head around a few times before asking the pilots how their party has been. The pilots responds, "Fine," and Dr. Harris tells them Billy claimed they were all drinking. Sarah sweeps one last bottle under a table, behind her, and responds that they were drinking soda and juice. "Oh, of course!" Dr. Harris smiles, "You kids have fun! Make sure to clean up everything when you're done!" They don't know whether Dr. Harris believed them or simply turned a blind eye, but she leaves and the five all sigh in relief.
Two days later, Jason calls his mother up, who lives just outside Sydney, Australia, and wishes her a happy Mother's Day. She, in turn, wishes him a belated happy birthday. Sarah also calls her parents up in New Alamo. They haven't spoken in a month, and Sarah's mother, Julia (44), tells Sarah that her brother, Allen (17), already called to wish her a happy Mother's Day. Julia and David (49), Sarah's father, ask how she's doing, and Sarah gives them a cursory summary of her life, so far, as a SAInt pilot. Sarah's parents spend more time talking about Allen and his current success in the military. They say he's being considered for the Preservation Forces as a Robbie pilot. Meanwhile, Rick and Serena, unfortunately, don't have a mother to call; Meredith Hunter nee Buchanan, an English Lit teacher, was taken by a Mayzor swarm about a year ago, just outside the Metro Scotia defensive barrier, and neither Rick nor Serena could save her. They decided to join the SAInt program soon after and were transferred to the Arx Jericho after officially becoming SAInt pilots.
Later that day, Bravo and Charlie Company meet up together at the testing facility for a team-oriented, group, SAInt simulation test against a replica of the Dominion class Magnas, Vepar - the same kind that took out the majority of Alpha and Bravo Company in the Chicago Catastrophe. However, there's a catch. AK-47 announces that Billy and Serena are to be switched for the purposes of this exercise. Serena is now the leader of C Company, and Billy is the new leader of B Company. The Chipmunks immediately take charge and work together to convince Billy to play nice, despite all the drama that's happened. Not only do they get Billy to cooperate, but Billy publicly apologizes to Rick and Serena as well. Jason and his SAInt stay at High Balistics (HB) range, firing off sniper shots at the Magnas, while his teammates fire blindly at it as a distraction. Jason crouches down behind a building to reload his gun, while Strudel helps him take cover. The Magnas fires off its lasers, and Sarah helps Jason out as well, deflecting Veper's shots with her Arc Shield. Rick instructs Billy and the rest of B Company to move up to Firearms (FA) range and start firing at the Magnas.
 |
| Source: http://tinyurl.com/lbyu7mm |
Jason gets up and takes another, well-aimed shot at Vepar, hitting him, as B Company lays into the monster with immense firepower. Strudel sticks with Jason, while Serena, Rick, and Sarah move up to get into FA range, so that they can fire at the Magnas as well. With all of B Company, and most of C Company, continuously firing at Vepar, Jason reloads his gun and fires one last shot, which penetrates the Magnas's defensive core and causes it to explode on the spot. Both companies evade any collateral damage, and the simulation test ends.
AK-47 tells C Company that they've greatly impressed. She congratulates them all on taking initiative and sticking to the real objectives which revolved around teamwork. Based on the test results, AK-47 decides to keep Billy as team leader of Bravo Company, for now, and designates Serena as the new team leader of Charlie Company. AK-47 also rewards Charlie Company by officially promoting them as the new Alpha Company.
The rest of the month is full of more boring lectures, tests, SAInt simulations, and tons of drama with all the new and growing relationships. Both Alpha and Bravo Companies are now full, and a new Charlie Company emerges, as several more teenagers are accepted into the SAInt program. Nothing new has surfaced regarding Rafe's situation, and Jason will be leaving the foster home and moving into the dorms the next month!
Next Time
An interface test meant to separate the SAInt pilots causes them to have vivid dreams that come together. Past, present, and future events reveal themselves! Stay tuned!
An interface test meant to separate the SAInt pilots causes them to have vivid dreams that come together. Past, present, and future events reveal themselves! Stay tuned!
END OF EPISODE 03
Who ever thought a PC's birthday party could take up over half the session and remain immensely fun all throughout?
Since the last episode was so dreary and depressing, I wanted to liven the mood up with this episode and focus more on the teenagers, their down time and social interactions, and, of course, plenty of drama! The only prep I actually did for this episode was asking the players which PC's birthday it was. Everyone decided it was Jason's birthday, so I rolled with it. We actually played this session on Mother's Day in the U.S., so I came up with the Mother's Day/family weekend bit on the spot as well. Ultimately, the prep boiled down to asking Rick and Sarah what they had planned for Jason's birthday and finding opportunities for plenty of actions and trials that would trigger motivations and Spirit checks for gaining/losing Ego.
The piñata scene was especially memorable. Not only did it pull Rick out from an ugly depression, but the way we went about it was a little unorthodox, mechanically-speaking. We all decided to assign the piñata an arbitrary number/CR. I think it was right around 40 or so, and every time a PC rolled a Close Combat action, we subtracted the result from the total until it reached 0. It was Rick's swing that finally busted it, and he passed a Spirit check, earning him the Ego which brought him out of his depression.
The teamwork simulation test against the Magnas, Vepar, went smoothly for the most part. At first, I wasn't sure whether to treat it as a single action or a trial, but since we didn't have a trial for the birthday party, I decided to treat the test as one. When Charlie Company took charge, I really wasn't sure what to do with Bravo Company who just took orders and fought in the background. I just had them deal one point of structural damage to the Magnas every time the PCs hit it, but I'm pretty sure that wasn't correct accordingly to the rules. Unfortunately, we still didn't have a correct grasp on the all the rules yet and didn't utilize any engage actions, so the battle still seemed a bit easy for the PCs.
Ego and Id were actually going up and down this battle, and we actually witnessed scourging for the first time. Jason's Id rose higher than his Ego at one point, putting his simulated SAInt at risk of frenzying, and Jason scourged (lowered) his Id, taking a point of Injury in the process. I don't know if SAInt pilots can take Injury for scourging Id in a simulated test, but we rolled with it, and no one objected.
All in all, for having absolutely zero prep going into this episode and playing to find out what happens, Episode 03 turned out really well! It was great seeing relationships start to blossom, and based on things that happened in this episode, I gained a lot of ideas for future episodes and introducing even more drama.
Director Commentary
Who ever thought a PC's birthday party could take up over half the session and remain immensely fun all throughout?
Since the last episode was so dreary and depressing, I wanted to liven the mood up with this episode and focus more on the teenagers, their down time and social interactions, and, of course, plenty of drama! The only prep I actually did for this episode was asking the players which PC's birthday it was. Everyone decided it was Jason's birthday, so I rolled with it. We actually played this session on Mother's Day in the U.S., so I came up with the Mother's Day/family weekend bit on the spot as well. Ultimately, the prep boiled down to asking Rick and Sarah what they had planned for Jason's birthday and finding opportunities for plenty of actions and trials that would trigger motivations and Spirit checks for gaining/losing Ego.
The piñata scene was especially memorable. Not only did it pull Rick out from an ugly depression, but the way we went about it was a little unorthodox, mechanically-speaking. We all decided to assign the piñata an arbitrary number/CR. I think it was right around 40 or so, and every time a PC rolled a Close Combat action, we subtracted the result from the total until it reached 0. It was Rick's swing that finally busted it, and he passed a Spirit check, earning him the Ego which brought him out of his depression.
The teamwork simulation test against the Magnas, Vepar, went smoothly for the most part. At first, I wasn't sure whether to treat it as a single action or a trial, but since we didn't have a trial for the birthday party, I decided to treat the test as one. When Charlie Company took charge, I really wasn't sure what to do with Bravo Company who just took orders and fought in the background. I just had them deal one point of structural damage to the Magnas every time the PCs hit it, but I'm pretty sure that wasn't correct accordingly to the rules. Unfortunately, we still didn't have a correct grasp on the all the rules yet and didn't utilize any engage actions, so the battle still seemed a bit easy for the PCs.
Ego and Id were actually going up and down this battle, and we actually witnessed scourging for the first time. Jason's Id rose higher than his Ego at one point, putting his simulated SAInt at risk of frenzying, and Jason scourged (lowered) his Id, taking a point of Injury in the process. I don't know if SAInt pilots can take Injury for scourging Id in a simulated test, but we rolled with it, and no one objected.
All in all, for having absolutely zero prep going into this episode and playing to find out what happens, Episode 03 turned out really well! It was great seeing relationships start to blossom, and based on things that happened in this episode, I gained a lot of ideas for future episodes and introducing even more drama.
No comments:
Post a Comment