For the Hudson River Valley game, I took a map of New York state and wrote all over it with different color sharpies and gave it to the players once they killed this one Hardholder, saying that it was his map.

They found another map of the federal prisons in New York state, as there is a growing empire, born from prisoners and guards, who use the prisons as fortresses.

While Harlan was losing his bacon at cards and Doc was talking to Eureka at the finest table in Cocktail in walks Rum, owing the Chemist money.

Doc walks out with Eureka and his posse, urging them not to hurt Rum in any way that he can't fix up.  They shot Rum in the knee and left him in Doc's care.

Doc doesn't waste any med-kits on Rum but he's stable.  But where to put him?  Bar's still waiting for a night with the Doc.  He goes up to see her, hoping to seduce her into letting him stow Rum here while he heals (failed roll).  They have a nice night and in the morning she kisses him on the head and says, "This ain't a hospital; get your junkie out of my joint."

They still don't know shit about Wheelyard, another town on the Rim.  They head out that way to find a town/junkyard run by Gila.  Gila's son, Corbette, greets him; doc recognizes the kid has Downs Syndrome.  Corbette has an Irish Wolfhound, an old guy, blind, who follows him around.

I effed with Cybelle a bit.  Gila called her New Ma, having heard about her time in R.V. and it tweaked her out.  Ma, still hitch-hiking in her noggin, was giving her some shit about using her Violation Glove so often.  She went off by herself to gather her head.  She went into the Maelstrom and immediately noticed Corbette's dog.  It approached her and while in the Maelstrom, talked to her.

The dog had a number tattooed on it, said something about her being a runaway from Area 51, something about the Colonel who fed him and how he used to chase down runaways, like her.

Doc cut a deal to keep Rum there and Gila serves them all lunch, talks to them about the politics of the Rim, how he'd love to see the Doc set up in his own Rim town but the Engineer-in-Chief wouldn't like that.

"If you were to get yourself a town, I know we'd all chip in to help you out.  We'd rally around you."

Doc said, "I'm not looking to rally anyone.  I just want to help people."

Doc's avoidance of local politics amuses the shit out of me.

Last drove into Wheelyard with his cycle all bent to hell.  Last is the guy who shot Fuse over cards in the first game.  He said there was an accident with a car.

They flipped on the sirens and went to it.

There was an accident with some bikes and a humvee.  Yeah, there were bullet casings.  Last got a gang together and tried to rob the Chemist's humvee and it went poorly.  One of them was showing gray matter.  All they could do was give him some chloroform and leave him to die peacefully.  The other two were run over.

Doc healed them up.  They left them with a wanna-be-doc in Hoover.  Doc said he'd train him to be a legit doctor if he saw to it that these two didn't die.

They slept in the Croaker just outside of Hoover.

At this point, Anthony looked over the Doc's character sheet and noticed that he was running short on meds and had a job on his moonlighting that we hadn't done up yet.  We decided the second job, termed Technical work, was surgery.

They were woken up by Eureka...the Chemist's kid was suffering due to appendicitis.  They ran into Vegas and meet Graham, the Chemist.  I picture him as the main character from Breaking Bad, a guy with a bad mustache and a comb-over holding his daughter's hand.  

Doc saved her.

Graham seemed real reasonable for the fella who sold drugs.  

He offered to set up Doc with his own town on the Rim.

Cybelle tried to open herself up to the Maelstrom and failed miserably.  I figured this meant that she was made.  The Chemist made her for a Brainer right off.

"Would you like work?  A Brainer is so helpful to have around.  I had one in my employ but he was shot.  I could, of course, pay you."

And he dropped down a book on the table: SPEC OPS MANUAL 053: Psychic Warfare

She tried to shake his hand.

"Violation glove?" he asked.

She said she would think about the job offer.

They brought Harlan down to a sub-basement and showed him a cherry Nevada State Highway Interceptor.  They need him to run a job, a dangerous delivery that they knew was going to go bad.

That is where we ended it, with the players in a safe, air conditioned bank building, being offered solid deals by a family man, a very reasonable devil.

^ That is beautiful.

Thanks.  I love it when gaming gives us this kinds of fun in-jokes and vocabulary from a fictional place.

Well, maybe not so much if you're the pig.

Unfortunately, Jim, the cruel apocalypse has no time for the feelings of pigs.

Awesome.  I'm happily watching/learning/cultivating an apocalyptic imagination.

Thanks, Ry.

He fired up the Croaker and found their bikes.  He ran the bikes all over and took the hooch back.  Not wanting to fuck with his car while they were on foot, the Carson and his gang ran for it. 

We rolled this as Go Aggro rather than Seize by Force.  Harlan wasn't out to kill anyone, but was totally into intimidation, destroying their bikes and getting that damned hooch back.  I was thinking about whether or not I made the right move here but looking back, it feels alright.

This is a reminder that I need to go back and re-read the MC chapters and the bits about the moves.

I am going to change the Chemist just a bit.  Rather than looking to take over Hoover, I am going to make him more about independence for Vegas.

1 - Steady slingin'
3 - Rumors on the black market of the Chemist's dealers looking for power station parts.
6 - An engineer turns traitor, takes refuge in Vegas.
9 - The Chemist's best dealers are arrested and put in crow's cages.
12 - The Chemist makes a public proclamation against the Engineer and when Vegas is put into the dark, the lights stay on.  He has his own power source.

Pete, Anthony, Sarah...seriously, you don't want to read this.  Its more fun if you discover this stuff through play.




STOP READING.
















Thoughts and suggestions are appreciated, particularly with the mechanical stuff.

Fundamental Scarcity: Fear (of the dark)

Warlord - Collector

The Engineer-in-Chief is the third generation in a long line of engineers who have kept Hoover Dam running.  The dam's electricity has made it a bustling marketplace and a hub of the rim towns, including Las Vegas, which has no electricity of its own.

She rules over the wire-sheriffs or wire-knights who look after the connections that run to the towns and holds her power through the engineers with their steel monkey wrenches they carry on the hips of their overalls.  If a rim town disobeys her, she sends them into the black, turning off their power, a sign to every jackal in the desert that it is open season on that town and its inhabitants.

Her contribution to the dam is figuring out how to capture the brainwaves of the dead who are drawn to hoover due to its odd engines.  She uses the knowledge of the dead to know more about local politics, uncover goods and more.  If someone's knowledge is valuable and she can't control them, she will order them killed so that she can hold their brain's electrical activity in a cell deep within Hoover.

Countdown Clock
1 - The Engineer in Chief is gathering tribute, feuding with Vegas and all's well.
3 - She discovers how to store the ghost-brainwaves in still-living people.
6 - She discovers how to use Hoover's batteries to spy on people she has marked.
9 - She discovers how to use Hoover's batteries to contact Brainers all over the world.
12 - She gains information from dead person's brainwaves that is really fucking big...I dunno, maybe a nuke or someone with game-changing old world info or something huge.  We'll see.

Custom Move

When you attempt to anchor someone's brainwaves who is drifting towards Hoover, roll Weird:

10+, you anchor them to a spot and they will haunt it unless someone willfully breaks the tether.
7-9, you must either take them into your own mind or put them into someone else's...if you don't, they're gone to Hoover.
5, MC's choice...they're gone to Hoover or they're hitch-hiking in your own brain or their in an animal or they've becoming something else within the psychic maelstrom...

Warlord - Dictator

The Chemist is the drug dealer who runs Vegas.  He constantly feuds with Hoover but has enough pull within the city that she can't quite make war on him or put him into the dark just yet.

The Chemist not only makes highly addictive drugs but also some medicine.

I have some ideas of the Chemist being a Breaking Bad-inspired family man but they haven't quite come together in my brain just yet.  His soldiers are a mix of slick, market-savvy drug dealers and desperate addicts.

Countdown Clock

1 - Steady slingin'
3 - There is rumbling discontent in Hoover about the Engineer's leadership
6 - An engineer turns traitor.
9 - There are anti-engineer riots in the market.
12 - The Chemist has an army gathered and is ready to take Hoover.

Designer Drug (I have an idea for one that sends the user into the psychic maelstrom in search of answers to dep mysteries but it isn't right yet.)

Babalicious (Obviously, I wouldn't use this if a Battlebabe was in play)
When you take Babalicious in order to do violence, roll Hard

10+ You do violence with efficacy and brutality.  In the coming fight. choose one person who lives and one person who dies.

7-9 You only get to choose either one person who lives or one person who dies and you now crave this drug...Take an XP if the next time you get into any kind of trouble you decide that it would be best solved with a hit of Babalicious.

Miss, you wake up after a violence-fueled orgy of death, covered in blood, having gone way overboard and in deep trouble and you crave another hit of this drug.

Landscape - Breeding Pit

Some assholes in Vegas had a show with Ligers back in the day.  When the world ended, they released them into the grand canyon and they've spawned a pride of the monsters.

Countdown Clock
1 - There is the occasional liger sighting outside of the canyon.
3 - Liger are reported outside of a rim town but it ran away when a shot was fired.
6 - A child or loner is snatched up by a liger.
9 - A known gang is ripped to shreds by the pride.
12 - A rim town is wiped off of the map.

Custom Move
When the pride is hunting you, roll Cool...

10+ You read the signs, know what's up and get a +1 on your counter-ambush or on simply GTFU of dodge.

7-9 You panic a bit, choose 2:
You lead the pride to more people.
You wedge yourself in a place where they can't immediately get at you but you also can't get out and can't get away.  You're trapped.
You run away, frantic and lose something.
You run straight into it and deal out +1 harm but also take +1 harm in that first exchange.

On a miss, they are going to get you good...

Brutes - Family

The rim towns around Hoover pay their tribute to the Engineer-in-chief for their electricity.  No one wants to be left out in the dark.  There are too many burned out graveyards where rim towns used to be for that.

They aren't a united family but each town closes ranks and protects its own.  Its more of a system of brutes than the rim towns being one united brute.

Countdown Clock
1 - Paying tribute, it could be worse, at least we're in the light.
3 - A town has a catastrophe and won't be able to make a payment for the coming month.
6 - A known town goes dark.
9 - Rim towns have a meeting to discuss going to the engineer-in-chief and asking for more say in how things work in Hoover.
12 - Is there anyone to gather them?  Does a leader rise up?  Is there revolution or are they put back in their place?