I’ve been spending a lot of time these past months reading RPGs rather than playing them (I suspect it’s a common sub-hobby!), but I finally got some friends gathered around the table again, nearly six months after our February Stonehell session. I’ve really had Lamentations on the brain lately, and expected my next gathering would be a return to Stonehell, or perhaps a hexcrawl (World of the Lost, perhaps?), but there was literally something in the air that put me in a different sort of mood last month [or the month before last, rather… this post has been in a long draft state!].
Smoke! Myriad wildfires in Washington and British Columbia filled the usually clear air of Seattle with a hazy, brown/yellow smoke that was more typically a feature of my Montana summers. Each morning I rode the bus, with the red sun sitting dully on the horizon, watching the haze-concealed towers of Seattle’s downtown draw into view, and I couldn’t help but get into a more apocalyptic mindset. Simultaneously, and coincidentally, I picked up the Mutant: Year Zero pdf bundle via Bundle of Holding. I began to formulate a plan… no more delays! Weeks were dropping off the calendar, and it was time to play some games, not just envision them for some hypothetical “someday!” I sent out some e-mails, and managed to gather a quorum. The game was on!
The Game
If you’re unfamiliar, Mutant: Year Zero is a game of the post-apocalyptic genre, wherein players take on the role of the titular “mutants” as they explore The Zone… the hazardous desolation surrounding their home (“The Ark”). The game has two sides: the community-developing “Ark” game, during which players pursue projects and interact with NPCs to advance their fledgling society (i.e., “let’s build a water purifier”), and the exploration-focused “Zone” game, where they go on expeditions sector-by-sector to discover resources and artifacts (and encounter hazards and obstacles to overcome).
You can probably find a more comprehensive review of game mechanics elsewhere, but the system uses a simple dice pool, where, basically, you just need to roll one 6 on a d6 to succeed at an action. Additional successes can grant some bonuses, but otherwise, the premise is that one would build a handful of dice matching your base stat, plus skill stat, plus any applicable gear, then roll and hope for a 6. It seemed simple enough, and I’m pleased to report that the impression was correct– I found it a lot more intuitive than the “dice interpretation” that was necessary when playing Edge of the Empire… and I just kind of like the physical action of rolling a handful of dice.
The Mutants
It was a smaller group for the session, just three players, one GM, and one baby (our little guy’s first RPG session!). The roster:
- Gug “the Bug”, a burly Enforcer who rolled “Insectoid” for his mutation!
- Quirk the Gearhead, with the “Puppeteer” mutation, and a gift for gab.
- Tula the “Crab” Handler, a four-armed, slightly houseruled Dog Handler who had a big mutant crab instead of a dog
- And The Crab: our baby in a little crab costume that we got at a rummage sale.
The Session
We began in media res, with the group having finally arrived at the fabled “Pure Plant,” a water treatment center a few Stalkers have identified as being a likely source of uncontaminated water. In the heat of summer, without the rains, drinkable water was running in short supply at the Ark, and a reliable source would help the community considerably. Trouble was, this wasn’t the first group to try to find the Pure Plant– they were on the trail of a previous excursion, hoping to find out what had happened, and the area was rumored to be inhabited by Zone Ghouls, a persistent problem out in the waste.
Things looked quiet from a distance, however. The facility appeared to have dozens of pools and holding tanks (some of which appeared to be of various colors), pump lines, and a defunct smokestack, topped with an enormous bird nest. Tula had the sense the nest was that of a Scrap Hawk– an enormous mutant predatory bird, large enough to carry an unwary mutant away, so the group opted to pursue a stealthy approach from the treeline to the open terrain of the plant. After hacking up some vegetation and crafting a large, woven bower to carry over themselves, the group made their way to a stairwell adjacent to a couple holding pools, and opened the door into the tunnels running beneath the grounds of the facility.
At this point, The Crab was getting restless, so Tula “kept watch” outside as Gug and Quirk entered the darkened tunnel. It wasn’t long before a pair of Zone Ghouls was encountered in the narrow confines, but between Gug’s scrap axe and Quirk’s application of his Puppeteer ability, the duo soon had a guide “leading them to the clean water.” This plan would’ve worked better had Quirk anticipated that the “clean water” was also the central lair of over 50 Zone Ghouls!
Fortunately, their leader was subtly impressed by the brazenness (or amused by the stupidity?) of the intruders, and interested enough in talking that the two groups came to an arrangement. In exchange for their guns, bullets, and grub, Gug & Quirk could leave alive with as much water as they could carry… if they took care of a thorn in the “The Pure One’s” side. The previous expedition was holed up in the command center of the facility, and the leader wanted them gone. They’d shot enough of his people from their surprisingly defensible position, and he didn’t want to wait for them to starve to death.
Quirk’s negotiations took things a step further, though. The Ark needed a supply of water, right? Perhaps the Pure Plant could provide that, in exchange for…? The Leader pondered the proposal. The Pure Ones had survived here for generations, of course– what could these envoys of a warped rabble possibly offer? They subsisted on food gathered from the nearby woods, and had all the water they’d ever need. Still, guns and bullets were in short supply, as well as more novel foodstuffs than what their sector provided. The Zone was dangerous, even to Zone Ghouls, so perhaps these rubes could gather some scrap, grub & guns, deposit them on his doorstep, and allow him to secure his position among his people without endangering them with foolhardy salvage expeditions. And if they died, or betrayed their end of the deal? At the very least, he’d have what they traded today– and all he had to do was send them away with a few dozen gallons of water.
A deal was struck: in exchange for guns & grub, left under the railroad bridge at the end of the canal, emissaries from the Ark would find drinkable water. Quirk was feeling quite pleased with himself, but their mission wasn’t over yet, they still had to extricate the previous expedition from their stockade.
Fortunately, the sentry was a lousy shot, and Quirk & Gug were able to meet up with the previous expedition. It seemed things went downhill for them right away, when their stalker Vorhan got snatched up by the Scrap Hawk, and the rest of the group fell afoul of the Zone Ghouls. They’ve been hunkered down for days, and it took a lot of convincing from Quirk (and some intimidation from Gug) to convince the remains of the expedition to give up their guns, grub, and bullets to a bunch of savage Zone Ghouls– there was still the trip home they’d have to survive, after all. Nelma, the thick-headed enforcer who had taken over the survivors after Vorhan was carried off, wouldn’t leave without recovering Vorhan’s equipment from the Scrap Hawk’s nest, but that suited Quirk just fine. Gug “the Bug” could climb the smokestack to the nest easily… and probably handle himself pretty well in case the Hawk returned.
Gug recovered Vorhan’s stuff, and discovered why Nelma was so agitated to get it back– Vorhan was carrying a pretty nice scrap rifle, and quite a haul of rations and bullets! He was also carrying a strange little pink bottle full of a weird liquid that smelled like flowers. Curiously, he noticed another, much older skeleton in the nest. These remains didn’t have much of note in them, but there was a notebook he found, which seemed to still be legible in places. Gug’s friend Astrina the Chronicler liked these sorts of things, so he figured he’d give it to her.
Gug was just getting ready to climb back down, when the Scrap Hawk returned! The ground team supported Gug as best they could with some well-aimed shots, and Gug hacked at the bird with his trusty scrap axe, managing to kill it. Once he returned to the ground, Quirk was ready to hit the road, nervous that the sounds of their gunfire might draw the attention of the Zone Ghouls again. Laden with jugs of water, the group returned to the Ark. Nelma gave a discrete report to Boss Marlotte about the full story of Quirk’s acquisition of the water (and the details of his trade deal). She wasn’t too keen on the idea of bartering with Zone Ghouls, but she did like how it grated on her rival Boss Maximon to see the expedition successful. If she could secure a steady supply of water during the dry months, that would really secure and raise her influence in the Ark, and maybe she could get into a position to finally some stuff done around here…
Marlotte told Quirk to keep the deal, round up some spare grub & guns, and keep the water coming… on the down-low, though. She was an open-minded sort, you see, and others might not take kindly to the idea of sending weapons to Zone Ghouls.
And with that, the session ended, and the seeds of some next adventures had been sown. They’ll need to find all those extra supplies somewhere, right? Which means someone will need to head out into a new sector to see what they might find…
Aftermath
Two Artifacts were found! The Diary, and a Bottle of Perfume. Both of these were given to the chronicler Astrina by Gug, who made sure they made their way to the Dawn Vault for study.
Also, part of Mutant: Year Zero is that at the end of each session, the Ark loses 1d6 members of the community, being a sort of “doom clock” to get the players to find a way to stabilize (and grow?) the population. This week, the two deceased denizens were the stalker Vorhan, eaten by a giant scrap hawk, and the grunt Leto, who succumbed to sickness after drinking the Rot-contaminated water adjacent to the Ark. The Ark’s population is now 226 mutants.