So to preface this was our second major game and our first where we had remote players via Roll20. There were a few technical issues starting up, but it went surprisingly well, especially because we had 3 online players and 5 in person players. We’re all still learning the game so there were some slow bits, but for a big group we did get through quite a lot.
The team assembles before the mission with a few new recruits and a few missing. FNU the paratrooper and Shadow the dogface went out drinking a bit late (well…early… I mean it was 4 AM) and couldn’t be roused for the mission, but Artem a disgraced Tunguskan Securitate, and Dr. Aziz came aboard to assist. Recapping the mission the team needed to secure car 2 of a 6 car train riding on a spur track of the Gernot Multiway behind Combined Army lines. Their contact and a douchebag, Atherton Wingate had informed them of probable antiaircraft turrets and the fact that car 3 appeared to be set up for passengers. The team had set up a hiding place for the ship and were set to burst in from camouflage, flying beside the train in order to stay out of LOS of the turrets.
As the ship popped out from cover the train team composed of Artem, Ken the space dandy, and Kirk ‘Survive’ Lazarus jumped aboard the speeding monorail train and managed to land on car 2 thanks to a combination of climbing plus and in Ken’s case pure luck.
Ken and Kirk set up explosives on the train coupling to blow the rear cars off. Artem then managed to get a deployable repeater on board the train and 1337 H@><><0R Kotsya broke into the trains admin software, and gave the team’s hackers super user permissions. Following that part time hacker, full time sniper Sayid set up a firewall to defend the hackers while they were in the admin area. Dr. Pilot Aziz managed to keep the ship mostly upright, and avoided the PanOceania grade anti aircraft turrets range of fire. However the Combined Army had installed a missile turret of their own! As it popped up Dr. Pilot Aziz just barely managed to avoid the missile and Takeshi opened up with the ships defensive guns, obliterating the turret.
Unfortunately in all the maneuvering the ship suddenly suffered a failure on the port aft thruster making keeping the ship steady and out of range of the turrets that much more difficult. Luckily right around this time, Hans a paratrooper and occasional pilot fell out of his bunk where he’d been sleeping it off. He took the controls from the famed doctor/pilot Aziz, who promptly/probably drunkenly smacked his face into a bulkhead on his way to attempt repairs. Luckily the ‘good’ doctor manages to repair the ship’s port thruster’s systems, so Hans could keep the ship steady and below the train’s turrets. Bursting up from the passenger train car, two fireteams, arrived to challenge the train team in person. The Morat led Unidron teams interrupted to act first levelling a painful volley of combirifle fire at Kirk Lazarus, second team interrupted to come forward and volley more combirifle fire this time at Artem. The team returned fire, leaving one fireteam with a Morat and one heavily damaged Unidron and the other team with two Unidrons and the morat remaining. However then Takeshi levelled the ships HRMC’s at the passenger car and tore the top off the train, dropping the two link teams back into the passenger compartment and staggering them from the fall.
The sudden huge damage to the train caused the team on the roof to nearly be shaken off and Ken with his ever so perfect pompadour tumbled into the open passenger car where he spotted two more link teams that were dazed from the HRMC shot as well as one more link team downed completely. Ken managed to toss a smoke grenade then move back into the interior of train car 2, where he spotted the massive machine they were hired to steal alongside a Daturazi Witch Soldier! Kirk Lazarus jumped down into the open topped passenger car and sprinted up to the Daturazi blinding him with a massive slash across the face. In his aggression, he did manage to also slash right into the Combined Army device they’re all trying to steal. The Daturazi retaliated with a point blank blast of Vulkan Shotgun into Kirk’s leg which promptly ignited in a burst of flame. Causing minimal physical damage, but some significant psychological damage. Kirk now appears to believe he is completely immune to fire…that probably won’t come back to bit him later…
By this point the hackers had broken into more systems and set up a timer on the brakes of the for the rear cars to shut them down just as the coupling explosives fired. When the coupling blew the rear cars of the train rocketed away as their emergency brakes clamped down and tore a hole in the back of car two. The train car shakes violently tossing Ken out the nearby door. He just barely clings on to one of the broken power cables and is basically dragged by the train. Finally the hacker team worked furiously to shut down the forward antiair turret, just as the turret targetted Artem still atop Car 2’s roof and started to spool up and fire the hacker team managed to shut it down.
Back inside traincar 2, the Daturazi takes another shot at Kirk, doing minimal damage, but keeping the fire going. Artem jumps down and takes a shot at the Daturazi punching a hole in the Witch Soldiers chest, but he stays up. Finally Ken the space dandy manages to pull himself back onto the train, and stylishly flicks out his switchblade comb. He puts one comb through his lucious and greasy pompadour then stabs the Daturazi poisoning him with hair gel and taking him down.
Back to the exterior and Doctor Pilot Aziz manages to get the ship over the top of the train car and Hans jumps down to attach the cable couplings. Kotsya hacks into the train cars couplings via the repeater and pops the clamps. Lastly, Takeshi opens up one more time destroying the tracks behind the monorail car. The Combined Army had gotten the rear of the train up and running again as each car of the monorail has its own engine, but they tumbled off the end of the destroyed tracks. Unfortunately destroying the tracks cut power to the monorail’s engine which smashed into the cargo container nearly knocking the ship off course, but Doctor Pilot Aziz gracefully stabilized the ship and managed to keep the cargo container stable.
The team examined this Combined Army device they’d been hired to steal while debating about whether or not to deliver it. They managed to glean 4 assets in information and schematics of this device, and after much debate decided to bring it to the rendezvous with Atherton Wingate. After a brief discussion about the damage to the device, where Sayid managed to convince Atherton that it was totally like that when they found it (a piece fell off in the middle of the conversation). The team loaded back up into the ship, now with all of the title and credentials to legally own it. Then Dr. Aziz pivoted the ship 180° and blasted Atherton Wingate with exhaust launching him back and leaving him shaking his fist at the departing team.
There’s no way that’ll come back to bite them…
It Rhymes with Hockey 