Big City Nights (Forgotten Ruin)

Before now, the platoon had stayed out of major urban environments, but now they would have to make their way into the great, local metropolis of Stave Harbour (population 3571).

Pan was sitting beside Goat Fjord and staring into the water. The cool, clear water of the fjord stared back at her. This was no metaphor for anything. A pair of golden eyes were looking up at her and she could not look away. A mission transmitted itself into her head. There were no voices involved, just an instantaneous knowledge that Tiger Troop needed to go to Stave Harbour. Ever since the thing that claimed to be a god had entered her mind, this sort of thing had started happening to her. She was not keen on it.

"Tiger Troop, we're heading into Stave Harbour. It is apparently the local big city, so we need to be a bit careful. Our primary mission is to eliminate a target, who has been stirring up the locals and getting the dumbasses and shitwits to join their cult. Our secondary mission is to scout the city. Now that we have pacified part of this area, we need to make more contacts and embed ourselves with the locals, but we need to know what we are getting into first."

At the edge of the city, Tiger Troop paused to check their kit and to deploy. The L.T. had approved the mission and given them extra ammo plus the support of the platoon mortar. Apparently, the L.T. also felt that this mission was important. Ahead among the city streets, strangely robed people could be seen slowly marching with feral purpose towards the troop. A group of archers was ready to support them.

"Corporal Adeyemi, your team will focus on scouting the objectives on our right flank. Lance-Corporal Bonolo, with me. We're going to get that complete cult. He must be with that large group somewhere."

The two teams moved out on their separate mission. As A Team advanced to the first scouting objective, B Team moved into cover and opened fire at the cultists. The cultists advanced unafraid (or braindead!) while the archers moved towards a firing position.

The din of the fusillades from B Team drowned out Pan's first attempt to radio in a mortar strike on the cultists, but B Team's fire was somewhat accurate and several fell.

Arrows flew towards Tiger Troop but A Team had adopted a defensive approach to advancing on the second scouting objective. As Adeyemi moved out to scout, the rest of the team opened fire on the archers, quickly whittling them down to a single man, who showed no fear and continued to shoot arrows at them right up until he was cut down. Pan's further attempts to call in a strike were more effective although the mortar stonk required correction. However, once on target, the cultists were felled and did not rise again. Pan checked and saw that the primary target had been killed.

"Target down. I repeat, target down. Fall back to the RP, Tiger Troop."

Tiger Troop did not need telling twice. B Team fell back quickly to the RP. A Team had been further forward, so it took them longer to fall all the way back. Pan remained on station ready to call in more fire if needed.

As B Team reached the RP, a small group of cultists emerged from a building behind them. Their droning cries wafting across to the soldiers on the light breeze. Firing a few shots to discourage them, Pan retreated to join her troop and led them back to camp. The small number of remaining cultists would not be a threat to the locals and now Stave Harbour (population 3543) owed the platoon a favour.

Conclusion

That mission went way too smoothly. I was a bit worried that the cultists would swamp Tiger Troop, but it turned out that our heroes could stand back and just shoot. Having both fire support and logistical support was probably a deciding factor here. Between the shooting and the mortar, the baddies did not even get close to hurting any of the soldiers. The archers were another question, but their shooting was woefully inaccurate in the end.

The troop scored the main objective and scouted one of the two secondary objectives. This was enough for a victory.

12 Ambyrmont - To Mantru

 Broneslav awoke early. It was too cold not to now that his fire had died down to ash. Pulling his warmest clothes around him, he looked down into the crater of the volcano. The first obvious feature was a massive lake at its centre. Near its shore, smoke rose into the sky. This would be the settlement he had guessed was here. Then his eyes took in the island at the centre of the lake. Even from this high up, he could make out some details of the ruins carved into the cliff on the west side of the island. There, then, was his objective. Broneslav grunted with satisfaction. If he could avoid falling over his own feet on the way down, then he would be within an ace of achieving his goal.

Clambering down the mountainside kept him warm and occupied his whole attention, so it was only when he reach the bottom that he had time to look around more. Ahead of him there was a small village with a palisade around it.

The Village of Mantru (from X1 The Isle of Dread. (c) TSR, Inc.)

As Broneslav approached the stockade around the village heads popped up looking over it. Excited children ran out of the main gate, goggled in wonder at his shining armour and shouted questions at him, none of which made sense to Broneslav because they all shouted over the top of each other. The villagers clearly felt safe from him and were not hostile, so he waved to the children and smiled at them. A small delegation of adults awaited him at the gate. They were armed with spears and were more wary than the children.

Broneslav raised his empty hands to show his peaceful intent and stopped short of the gates.

"May I approach? I mean no harm?"

The adults in the gateway conferred briefly and gestured to him to come forward. The mandatory questioning then occurred in stilted Common. Broneslav found their accents hard to understand, but they too found his difficult. In the end, he was invited in and taken to the chief's hut, where he was introduced to Fano, the "talking chief", and Umlat, the village's priest. Both men were extremely old and infirm. Fano was badly scarred from a fight or accident and his left arm hung limply at his side. Umlat was simply ancient, having lived far beyond the normal lifespan of others in his tribe. Between the two was a stone statue of an old man, which was introduced to Broneslav as "the chief".

Fano interpreted "the chief's" wishes and questions while Umlat supplemented with questions of his own. In short order, Broneslav had been interrogated and found welcome. He was soon seated on the sandy beach by the lake edge with about fifty villagers enjoying a meal of baked fish and yam paste, and fruits, together with a yam beer, which Broneslav considered to be an acquired taste.

On top of this, he had been told that he would stay the night with one of the extended families that lived in the large huts, and had been given the opportunity to put his belongings in there. These huts were long and open inside with sleeping benches lining each side. The whole family lived in this single room with no walls or divisions for privacy. This felt weird to the young warrior, who was used to having his own sleeping cabinet.

Feeling very full and relaxed for the first time in a while, Broneslav conversed with those near him and found out more about the village and his surroundings. He repaid this information with tales of his adventures, which some of the adults looked sceptical about, but the children loved. After the meal, Fano and Umlat joined Broneslav once more.

"We have a problem and your stories tell us that you might be able to help solve it," began Fano, "There is a tribe of headhunters living on the island you can see in the lake. They have recently moved in and are creating trouble for us. They are more warlike than we are, but more importantly, we cannot set foot on that island because it is taboo to us. Our gods require that we stay away from it. Will you help us by driving them off?"

"Of course!" Broneslav's response was instant. "Tell me all you can about them, and I shall travel there in the morning to see what I can do."

The "talking chief" and the priest told Broneslav everything they could and promised to let him use a canoe to get to and from the island. They said that they would offer whatever other help they could, but that no one from the village could actually join him on the island.

"Not a problem," the youth replied with a confident grin, "I work better alone anyway."

He was satisfied with this. With the villagers' help, he could reach his objective and the information about the headhunters there was a useful warning. As he lay down to sleep in the hut, he wondered what else he might find there. Well, tomorrow he would know for certain.

The Necromancer's Tower (Forgotten Ruin)

The eldritch glow of purple fires streaming up and down the tower at Outfield Mound was not the worst part of this patrol. Nor was it slogging up the hill towards the tower. No. The worst part was not knowing what kind of twisted, reality-warping shit they would find at the top. Tiger Troop were all grim-faced as the bears they were riding slogged up the hill in the dawn light and the early morning rain. The night before, Pan had briefed them. Friendly locals had asked for their help in eliminating a key inhabitant of the tower and retrieving items of value that had been stolen. The L.T. had added a requirement to investigate the area too and had got Deadeye Vigrestad on standby to support them. Deadeye was the platoon's best sniper. However, while A Team and Pan were going to make the assault, B Team would be patrolling the other side of the hill to distract the occupants. Clearly, there were some serious bad guys here and the platoon probably did not have the resources to take them all out in one go, hence the diversion. Still, they had bears to ride to the ops zone. It made a nice change not walking in through the mud and had caused some hilarity when Mary fell off her bear several times. Private Smith was clearly not someone well suited to riding.

Pan and A Team dismounted near the base of the hill, and moved into the forest. Despite the near constant rain, the forest floor was not too muddy.

They pushed forward hard until they could see the outer buildings around the tower. A large wooden hall dominated a rise, and a fountain sprayed lilac energy, not water. The rest of the ops area was covered in brush and trees, undulating ground and large boulders. Ahead they could make out the hostiles.

"Sarge," Wigbert queried, "Are we in a Sinbad movie?"

"What are you talking about Wigbert?"

"Well, those hostiles ahead look like skeletons!"

Pan cursed the vagaries of whatever quantum state had landed them here. Yes, dammit, they were skeletons, but her team would have to destroy them and finish their patrol.

A Team at bottom right of the picture. Hostiles at middle and top.

"Fear not, brave paladin," a voice in Pan's head declared, "You have the power to defeat this foul sorcery."

Pan wondered when her internal monologue had become male.

Pushing forward, A Team began the process of fire and manoeuvre that they had practised and used for so long. As they launched grenades and bullets at the hostiles, several of them disintegrated in clouds of dry bone and a zap of lilac energy. However, many more seemed to just soak up the bullets.

"Sarge, how are we supposed to kill these hostiles if a double tap to the heart just passes through them?"

"Just shoot them more and hit the bits that are there," snarled Pan.

A Team did as instructed and the closest mob of undead was soon reduced to just a few individuals. However, two more mobs were shambling forward to the fray.

Suddenly, Pan had an intuition. She called on the voice in her head. Even as she stood up and pointed, a blast of ice erupted from the ground near one of the groups of skeletons. Brittle, dry bones shattered in the eruption of energy. Pan heard curses of wonder over comms as the others realised what she had done. Despite the astounding happenings, they still continued to reduce the skeletons to powder.

With only a few of the undead remaining, A Team prepared to move out onto the objective. Suddenly, there were crackles of lilac energy all across the battlefield and the remaining skeletons collapsed to the ground. A Team breathed a sigh of relief, only to be horrified as even more of the skeletons appeared ahead of them.

"Move out!" ordered Pan, "We can take the objectives and get back out, if we are quick. Those things are not exactly fast."

She checked the two groups.

"Wigbert, Tarquin, the main target is with the group advancing towards you. Take it out!"

Wigbert took up position by the large hall as Tarquin dropped a grenade onto the advancing horde. It still kept coming, but there were half as many of them remaining.

Pan blasted the other advancing horde with more ice and it too disintegrated. As Wigbert and Tarquin tried to take out the skeletons coming towards them, the others were able to disintegrate the remains of the other horde, and Justice was able to scout the area as ordered and to advance to the hall, where she recovered the pig that they had been sent for. Mack the Hoe had said it was a golden pig, but it just looked grubby brown and hairy to Justice. Still, it did not seem to mind being stuffed into her pack for the ride home and grunted happily in her ear.

As the last of the skeletons charged towards Wigbert, he fumbled his reload. Tarquin was also slow. The skeletons reached him and Wigbert was knocked out of the fight in the furious melee. Seeing what had happened, Mary pointed her TSW at the group of three undead and scythed them down in a furious rain of copper-jacketed lead that emptied her magazine.

"Target down." Mary's unsmiling voice reported the result over comms.

"Very good. All objectives complete. Grab Wigbert and pull back."

Even as Pan gave the order, the L.T came onto comms.

"We have a new target registered. See if you can take it out, but not assess the risk first."

Pan acknowledged the order and told her team to pull back. Whatever the L.T. said, she could see no targets anywhere near her and she was going to get her team out of here. They pulled back in good order and were soon riding their bears home again.

Wigbert had a headache, having taken a bad dunt to the head, but his environment suit had saved him from a worse injury. Having ascertained Wigbert's survival, Pan was free to go for debrief and to report the success of the mission. Mack was so pleased with getting his pig back that he gave Pan a magical hammer.

Conclusion

This was my first special mission and I was not sure how it would work out, because you generate three objectives and have to complete two to win. As usual, the dice set up the story nicely, so there was that. They also decided to play silly beggars. I cannot recall rolling so many 1s in a row before... ever! Good job quantity has a quality all of its own. The sheer number of dice I rolled really helped there.

As usual, I did myself no favours by forgetting that I had support until half way through the game. Never mind. Maybe I shall remember next time. Overall, this mission was a stonking success, even though I was not able to achieve the extra objective due to a lack of enemies on the table. They arrived just as the game ended.

This was the first game where I have used magic. It worked nicely, but costs you the initiative, so Pan will need the rest of her troop to ward her if she is going to use it a lot in the future.