A Blog with a purpose to discuss important things in life, like politics on multiple levels (mostly swedish), music, movies and video games together with the challenges in my personal life (that is none actually, it's just a smooth ride, or is it?).
Last update was probably the last for my DnD games for a while, or more likely ever. Nothing due to the group, sadly it's my own fault for not plan ahead when I had the time. At the end of this week I travel home to partake in the yearly crayfish party... and then I will probably remain there. After 7 years, I am forced back home. Not surprising, I stopped growing as a person 2 years ago when I entered the unemployment line, my whole life seemed so put on ice and now the transformation is complete. Broken, devastated. Nothing more than a husk of nostalgia and crushed dreams... damn that's depressing. I need something happy here otherwise its gonna seem like no hope at all. Umm... well... uhh... I'm going to Norway this wednesday! With the municipality, which will be the... last time with them... as well... Uhh, thats not helping.
So what will happen with this blog that have been devoid almost entirely of content and only saved by the weekly DnD summaries. I might start up what it was supposed to do, when it was relaunched in 2009 after a holiday break after my Washington trip in 2008, to discuss politics and the temperature is rising yet again with almost a year to the next general election and only 9 months to the European parliament election (and that's not even counting the church election in a month... I think). Hope we see each other then.
So the war of the cathedral is over thanks to me and the scum destroying the wall cannons, the red redemptions has overrun the rest of the mutant defenses. Avoiding further confrontation (as I only have 1 wound left) we find our way to the Red leader who gives us a small update and let us go to the medic. Were I regain 1 wound... lucky me. Well, better that than nothing like the scum who the medic botched to do anything, especially since he has a trait that makes him lightly wounded regardless of amount of wounds left. We at least can enjoy our stay for a while.
The others on the other hand is still in the heart of the cathedral, when the door closes and a warning is heard:
"Automatic Self-destruct sequence started. 5 minutes to detonation."
Makes you hear this music during this short segment:
The ribbins find a ventilation which they open with a chain-sword and rushes in. The cleric first that gets stuck in a corner and the psycher who has to push her so they can escape. He very sad for that since he got such a good roll on his agility test. As they run away, a silence suddenly breaks out, than a sound wave crushing everything in its way making everything white... than black (then green, then red and lastly blue... that was a joke we made, not that great).
Back in the infirmary we start to feel a trembling, everything shaking and we hit the floor (of course in character cursing the psychics name since that is the logical solution to believe). wall disappears then... silence. The red redemptions started a frantic search and rescue operation for those caught in the blast and we both knew that our friends were in the heart of the explosion. Still in bad condition we set out, me searching with the auspecs to find them. We find a huge pile of rubble with two life-signs in it so we start digging... for 1 hour and 10 minutes due to an extended test we both made at the same time for four successes. Meaning we had to roll 14 times... if you don't take into account we both used fate points as well pushing it to 17-18 rolls.
Meanwhile under the rubble the cleric awakens while the psycher has overstrained himself using so many psychic powers during the cave and raid on the cathedral so he lost conscious. The cleric wakes him up and lights a candle to gain some light. Around them they can hear the sound of digging sounds... not above them, but besides them. Some rodents of some kind. One even rears its ugly head and get a bullet in it from the psychics revolver. To get help the psychic decide to send a flair to alert us... and of course he gets a psychic phenomena, "the earth protest" or what it was called. An earthquake so that can explain why it took over 1 hour to dig in the pile as we fall forward and hit our faces. No damage for us though, it's a bit worse for the ribbins and they take a couple of wounds as their legs gets crushed. Now the air starts to thin out as well and they fall back into unconsciousness. In this moment me and the scum finds a sight of cloth in the rubble and uncovers the psycher who points us toward the cleric who don't breath when we uncovers her. We turn to the psycher who at the moment is our only medical trained personal at the moment and lift the rubble from his kegs and he crawls toward the cleric and does CPR in order to revive her. After that he instructs me to make a spleen for his legs since my intelligence is so much higher than the scum... didn't do him any good though so the scum and I have to pick them up and carry them to the infirmary. They get patched up a little and are rewarded some extra supplies and a truck so we set out to finish the last side-quests.
That includes searching for the friend to the tech-priest that gave me the auspecs. We locate his house, but no one answers the door and it's blocked. The psychic is resting in the truck due to his fatigues so me and the scum push the cleric inside so she can take the rubble away from the door. While clearing away she finds a man dead inside, lying on the floor in a pool of blood. She stops to look under his robes and she sees that one of the legs have been crushed and taken away. She hurries up to get the rubble away and the rest of us can enter. We search the body and the room finding an id-card on the man and a golden case with a chant written on it that the thief pick up. In the blood we discover footsteps going toward the stairs to the second floor. As I obviously recognize this as a sign of the mutant who did the same to me, but instead of a leg it was the arm, Archimedes Noxt. Still severely wounded after a long battle we prepare the best we can as we climb the stairs. While walking we hear rapid metallic sound right at the corner at the end of the stairs. The scum (having the highest defenses, armors and life) walks first at something is thrown toward him and as he fails his rapid reaction he is hit in the face with... paper from a writer hooked into a couple of monitors and auspecs. We find a window that is open and assume Noxt left there a long time ago so I pick up all the papers I can find and bring it with me to the base. On the way back I sit in the back and holds the tome I got from the cathedral and warns the ribbins that it might get out of hand. The psychic gets suspicious and warns me not to read it, telling him straight up that this is the only chance I got I open the book. I don't read it, somehow its content is directly transmitted into my mind. A story of Logar, the first to betray the emperor (I think, I'm not that good with the fluff of this world). Then a huge beast snarls at me in the book, zap, and he is closer, zap, and closer until he bite my throat. I scream in terror and awakens with the book closed. Insanity now risen to 21 and corruption of 5 so while the psychic scolds me I can't do anything else than laugh and talk about the knowledge of the universe I have and how their fears is keeping them away from progress.
At the base the scum returns the grenades since they clearly was to many faulty ones (jokingly we thought we should show this by pulling the pin on the last two we have and throw them with the others, worthy a comedy). I on the other hand returned to the tech-priest and gave him back his auspecs (which he scolded me on due to upsetting the machine spirit for forcing unwanted parts on it), the id-card and the data from his dead friends house. Apparently a environmental nut since had focused on the pollution levels and they have apparently diminished due to the war. How that worked I don't know. I also mentions the case that contains an unknown machine and he want me to bring it to him so I go and get the scum and wouldn't you know, they contain a pair of glasses, how nice. With enhanced dark-sight, + 5 literacy and the case is even psycher resistant (that one was probably due to me asking since it had a chant on it and the glasses would very likely be destroyed by a cry of the banshee anyway). All that fixed we give our report to the commander and gets transported to a shuttle to take us back early to the inquisitors ship. Due to segregation policies the ribbins is in the back and the scum not far away while me, a respectable adept of the empire sits in the front with the tome in front of me. I hear high heels against the floor and a women sits down besides me. Beautiful if it wasn't for a scar across one of her eyes that have gone blind.
"Do you have it?"
"Yes, here it is!"
"We promised you the knowledge of the universe as thanks for getting us this, so what do you want to know?"
"... who am I?"
And that is how we end this session and this part of the campaign. Awesome is it not? So filled with clichés, but goddamned it, it's fantastic.
So before we began this session I just want to inform you that I bought an extra wound (more or less HP) in a Sound Constitution upgrade, totaling my wounds at 13. This is important. We started were we left of, a scream of agony. We geared up and run toward the escape tunnel, which of course have the enemy guarding it. A huge living machine that I can only describe as Devastator from Transformers, with a drill for the left hand and a bulldozer for the right. An epic battle ensues as the scum and cleric both flame the creature and in rage it fills the cave with fumes. I take a shot with my shotgun, rolling a righteous fury and and end up dealing 21 damage to the left arm (without accounting for his defenses and toughness, brining the actual damage down to 13). It goes on for one more round and his chest explodes flinging his breastplate toward us, hitting me and the psycher and then falling on top of the cleric, pinning her to the ground as the oils catches fire and heads toward her. The scum tries to lift it, but fails before she has escaped and then have to slippery hands to do it again. The psychic focus more on healing himself so it's left to me. And for some reason I gain super human strength as I lift the arm up and she crawls away, the scum pick her up and we run away from the ensuing explosion.
Quick healing we run towards the secret passageway into the cathedral (I want to point out that during the battle I used 2 fate points, which I didn't have to spend since I rolled a 9 both times, awesome session so far). We find it, but it's blocked by a wall... and here we stand for a while arguing what to do. So I sacrifice one of my fate points and get the clue, "smash it in". No speak friend and enter I can see. Well it works, while going through the corridor the psycher decide to help me searching for the writing kit of the saint, which we find and I take with me. We arrive at the cathedral and divide the group as there feels to be something important down here, but we are pressed for time as the red redemptionist already started the attack, The psycher and scum heads up to the wall while I and the cleric find the archive. The archive consist of servitors walking around, almost all broken down and a lot of cherubs hanging on the shelfs. I feel a pulling sensation from within the archives and I walk there, more insane than ever. I find a door, opens it and in there is a case with purple mist. Without thinking (to be fair I did, but I'm temporarily insane at the moment so) I open the lid and grabs the book inside with my mostly good right hand... and it begin to freeze as the preserver machine did its job. Screaming in pain the cleric rushed forward and destroyed the machine. Holding my hand until I could feel it again I grabbed the book once again. The sound of screaming cherubs behind the door. I grabbed my shotgun, kicked the door open and blew them away and began to run to the exit. There the cleric ran before me and I grabbed the closest shelf and dragged it before the door and then closed it.
The others headed for the wall and started head-shooting the gunners on the cannons and released a mech on the battle field, hopefully turning the tide to our favor. We teamed up again headed to destroy the rest of the cannons, unfortunately a most gruesome sight befall us, the sight of the tech-priest body, crucified and his head cut of and no where to be seen. The psychic located it and we divided the groups again, the cleric and psycher searching for the head and me and the scum taking out the last cannons. Easier said than done, first cannon easy, but sadly the second one had a psycher that throws fireballs at me and the scum, leaving me with 1 wound (that I want to remind you, I bought right before the session). Lucky for us he rolls a 9 himself and disappears. The small fry flee and we demolish the last cannons, suddenly the psycher reappears again, but the scum hits him with his hammer and throws him over the wall. To be sure we drop a grenade on him... that doesn't explode. We survived at least. The others found the chamber with the head, connected to wires... and talking. Saying the names of who he saw. And another tech-priest, connected to the head as well. Yada yada yada battle, they kill him, disconnect the head end of session. So I got one side-quest left, then we wrap it up. Hopefully without losing my last wound.
Well this took longer than expected, but better late than never, right? Let us begin with the GameCube game, Battalion Wars:
Released in 2005 I missed out on this game since I still lived at home, it wasn't until 2008 I bought it I believe. Didn't play it much since I went of to the US at the time and I also bought Super Mario Galaxy at the time. The problem when you get older is that you don't have time to play them, or if you are unemployed you don't have any money to play them. I also had to import it from Germany which is another problem with games, if you don't get it around release date, there is a big chance it's gone forever. Story is you follow an American look-a-like army as they fight a soviet stand in, but wait ze evilz german attack both and you must join up. Gameplay is a RTS-game with you taking control of any of your troops and lead them against the enemy. I wasn't that good, but with practice maybe, sadly no tv or the game near me. Sold enough to spawn a sequel.
Battalion Wars 2, or BWii (get it? For the Wii?) released in 2008 in Europe. As you can guess I got this one before the original one. You begin repelling an invasion on the Japanese by the British as they search for a super weapon. Afterwards you explore a similar action years before, but with the Americans and soviets. Then you switch perspective as the British fight back the Japanese and that is as far as I got. Some mission were you needed to clean a statue and giving air-support to the cleaning team. I couldn't steer the god damn plane with the Wii control. And now onward to the latest game in the series:
For the DS, Advance Wars: Dark Conflict (or as in the states, Days of Ruin). Another one I didn't finish, I'm just at the end as well if I remember correct. Much darker than any other game in the series. Not much to say that the story of the single campaign is interesting in the human extinction and humanly engineered pandemic. Sadly I missed the original CO:s, none of them appear other than in the multiplayer (I presume, I can't check and it was a couple of years since I played it). Yeah, much shorter list and not much about any of the games due to me not finishing them.
Missed a couple of sessions again, been busy with work and other things during the time so I apologize so let me recap the session I missed and the others up until last friday. The group escaped the thieves den, all except the tech-priest that was taken hostage by... mutants I guess? He was at least taken to the mutant stronghold. The rest of the group fought a demon and escaped in a truck that was blown up forcing them to take cover to keep attacking mutants away while the psycher was out cold. The following sessions when I returned was us getting back to the encampment, which we did after being pushed of the road by suicidal thieves. We restocked our supplies and after some information gathering come to the conclusion our next goal was the red redemptionist stronghold and then onward to the mutant cathedral through a secret tunnel.
We steal some transportation with me driving and it goes as you can expect, we get ambushed by a truck of suicidal thieves who pushes us of road. Both vehicles destroyed we execute the survivors and coincidental we are right outside the red redemptionist HQ. We enter and do some small business, I found the general location of the secret tunnel in a mining cave leading into the cathedral. The cleric gets the redemptionist to support us with an all out attack on the cathedral for some good words with the inquisition while the psycher dispatches another of the worms. Oh and the scum was tortured by me as he had to guard me while in the library since we all know that is the most dangerous place in any setting. While this goes on our tech-priest tries to escape, but fails as he walks into the sleeping quarters of the mutants who pretty much kills him. Yeah, and the sniper who believed no one could die in this game.
We set out the next day and are guided by a librarian through a passageway system for pilgrims that wanted to visit the cathedral. I notice a gathering of people in front of us and sure enough, mutants that have captured imperial guards. After some planning we attack, killing everyone, unfortunately leaving one killed and the other mortally wounded only able to utter that we need to rescue the communication tower that jams all communication between us. Taking this short detour (we have time limit before the attack but it was something like 18 hours). We head of and arrives at the tower, were we decide to scout out the area before entering. I use my auspecs and see life sign in it... and it is now the session turn from awesome to fail. The psycher decide to use his power to scout it out. He rolls a NINE! Even more fun, it is the screaming banshee one destroying all glass and alarming everyone in a radius of a kilometer that we are here. It's worse, my glasses, my auspecs, the psychers binoculars, his first aid kit and all our gas masks are destroyed. Almost all of our equipment... and it gets worse, me and the scum are paralyzed for six turn. Standing up while the doors to the tower opens and the mutants attack. The psycher pushes the scum to the ground while the cleric fails to do the same to me. After the battle the cleric and scum enters the tower and comes upon a tech-priest that takes forth a grenade and threatens to destroy the tower. Meanwhile I finally recovers. The cleric distracts the priest while the scum shouts the arm clean of. I enter with the psycher and start working on the computer since I'm the only one with tech use. "Roll for successes" the DM says, I manage three in three rolls, each roll being one hour spent there. And then roll after roll after roll. I don't know how many hours I spent there, but my final roll is 01. The best roll you can have... being 6 successes in one roll. I knew it would come to that. We now have 4 hours left. Meanwhile the scum and psycher checked the tower more in depth and found another worm which the scum had to face alone in the dark. It ended with him being cover in small tick like creatures biting him as he run out and rolled on the ground crushing them and get covered in blood. We then hurried away... after I was able to get a monitor that I could fix the auspecs with.
Next session the psycher was away so everyone took a deep sigh of relief that we wouldn't be killed by our own teammates. Needing to hurry up we headed for the cathedral, but as the communication was on we got a distress signal from a nearby imperial convoy under attack. A bit of a detour so we headed over there and I was awesome killing two of the mutant attackers with my shotgun from above high and then had to change weapon to my revolver. The scum was almost killed by a auto-burst from the mutants when he jumped at them with his hammer. After the battle we got a truck and headed toward the cathedral. While on our way to the mining entrance the scum who was the driver lost control of the truck and crushed the back of it. We were already there so no problem so we entered the caves. Abandoned for 70 years most we found was skeletons and old machines. Pressed for time we searched for a map or any clue about where the secret passage could be and we ventured deeper into the mine until we found the living quarters for the workers. We decided to raid the supply store finding only a small glow lamp and a room with two dead bodies, one on the floor and the other in the ventilation shaft. We pull it out reveling a destroyed face and a lost arm. The cleric jumps in and see to her horror how the arm is dragged away, she gets out and faints. The scum makes a small trap with shoestrings and a grenade.
Last friday session. Everyone is gathered and we head into the back. A door block our path and the scum and psycher tries to get on the roof above the door while the cleric check some rubble while I scan for life signs, don't find any and just open the door. Of course it isn't locked, but can only open a small part due to being blocked, the ribbins walk in and open for us, meanwhile they hear sounds and sees shadows everywhere. We get in and look around finding a dead body and papers indicating the location of the living quarters. We go one floor up, but while on the stairs we here something metallic rolling and falling toward us. The scum acts instantly and jumps over the ledge to take cover. Out a smoke grenade comes and the psycher kicks it making it fall right in front of the scum. We head up and hear a door close. We comes up the stairs and only one door is closed, preparing to enter the door opens and a grenade comes out. Here I loose my nerve and panics and runs down the stairs. The psychic follows to stop me. The grenade is a dud, but doors open and close randomly, shadows on the walls. The scum in one instance is locked in a room with the cleric in the hall. Meanwhile the psycher catches me and calm me down. While heading back he tries another psychic power to hide himself... and rolls a NINE! Blood rains from the sealing and this is to much for me so I'm paralyzed with fear. The psycher walks up the stairs scaring the cleric as the scum breaks down the door. They regroup and enter the original door finding a dead corpse and some notes. Meanwhile I hear footsteps behind me in the blood, I spin around and see something invisible walking toward me so I fire a shot. The others comes running down. and we leave the place and head for the living quarters. During the walk the cleric seems to see her mother at the top. We enter the second floor and into a door, the scum taking the lead. He sees the person he put in jail and faints as he turns into a demon and attacked him, destroying the glow lamp. Meanwhile the auspecs show no life signs except us (THERE ARE FOUR LIGHTS!) and some rodent we burnet into crisps with a flamer. We go up with me in the front and find a door we opens with some keycards we found on the dead bodies. Inside is another dead person and a desk, while I go through the desk something grabs the cleric from behind and begin pulling her over the reeling, struggling for help (not shouting for some reason) the scum tries to pull her in and the psycher tries to shed light upon the thing grabbing the cleric, but there is nothing there. The scum pulls hard enough and falls backwards with the cleric on top who gets paralyzed and now can't move. After getting up we find a key on the corpse and a safe that contains maps over the mine. There I finally have a location to head for that coincide with some casualty reports I found earlier about a certain mysterious death. A gigantic explosion is heard and we see the house with supplies explode and a gigantic roar from the tunnel we are headed for. I guess the trap went of.
