Inquisitor/Pulp Alley: Thermospheric Terror

Another rip-roaring, sci-fi game of Pulp Alley today, this time featuring the debonair, quip-cracking, buckle-swashing Archduke Ramirez Connery Bond and his adventuring companions versus the nefarious, drug-fueled mercenary forces of the Purgators.  It was also a great opportunity to get my first game in with my new Battle Systems interior terrain.

“Anvil 459” (digital-art-gallery.com)

Like many settled human worlds, a large number of artificial bodies orbit Krellborn.  Composed of vessels, stations and equipment from many varied sources which occasionally predate Imperial settlement, the various points of light that cross the Krellborn sky at night are collectively known as “Anvils”.  Whether this title is connected with the objects propensity to unexpectedly plummet from decaying orbits onto the planet below is lost to history.

Many orbital Anvils are still in use by legitimate concerns.  Due to the loose and distant connection between Krellborn and much of the rest of the Imperium, many are also used to house shadier enterprises that highly value their independence.  

Although it maintains life support via solar scoops and atmosphere generating self regulating hydroponics, Anvil 459 was was abandoned seven solar cycles ago.  However, due to the planetary upheavals caused by the exposure of the Ragna Rock and the subsequent stirring of the buried Necrontyr, information located in Anvil 459 has unexpectedly rendered it a battleground between mercenaries and adventurers.

————–

The Forces

The Purgators. L to R: Codename: Pig Iron, Codename: Cypher (officer), Codename: Bull, Codename: Holy Smoke, 3 x Purgator trooper.

The Companions. L to R: Tumbleweed, Dr Voidstrom, Archduke Ramirez, Freeway, Maximilian Reactorsmith, L’Oreal Wangst.

————-

The Objectives

Medical data can be extracted from the Auto-Doc unit in the Infirmary.

Shipment details are available from the Cargo Console in the Cargo Bay.

The station overseers log is available from a Datapad in the Barracks.

The Holo-Generator in the Supply Depot potentially contains more clues.

The maintenance record for the Turbine in Engineering will tie down the timetable of events.

————-

The Game

After combining their resources in a flurry of tough talk and sabre rattling in order to gain access to the abandoned satellite station, the two groups have split up to cover more ground…

…meaning that the initial in game deployment is spread around the complex.  The action starts as each side realises that the other has no intention of cooperating beyond this point and pistols are drawn.

Tumbleweed accelerates the growth of spores from the hydroponics area to block Purgator entry to Engineering from the North. L’Oreal advances on the Turbine, determined to gather early intel.

Max orders Freeway to advance and engage. With a synthesised, metallic growl, the cyber-pooch sprints down the corridor and attacks a Purgator trooper, who is lucky to remain standing…

Unfortunately for dog-lovers the brutally combat modified Pig Iron counter charges and backhands Freeway to the floor.

Ramirez and Dr. Voidstrom consolidate the Adventurers position in Engineering…

…just in time to see the bloodied body of Max being hurled through the door by the roaring brutish form of Pig Iron…

…which is then followed up by a fiery enfilade from Holy Smoke on the opposite side of the room.

Meanwhile Cypher proceeds down the Western corridor…

…and gets to the Infirmary unopposed. A deft flick of a mechadendrite gets Cypher the required information from the Auto-Doc, putting the Purgators in the lead.

L’Oreal uses his fey agility to avoid the gouts of burning promethium.  Never one to be outdone in style stakes, Ramirez cartwheels over the turbine and downloads the machine schematics via noospheric connection before he lands. Never that keen on fire, Tumbleweed heads for the North-West exit with Ramirez while L’Oreal holds the Purgators off.

Tumbleweed blocks the Northern Infirmary exit, forcing Cypher to leave via the Eastern door, leaving Ramirez time to search the Barracks…

With a brief moment to digest the gravity of the information in the station overseers Datapad, Ramirez countenance becomes grim. “When you are quite finished Ramirez…” snarks L’Oreal over the com. “…things are getting a bit sticky in Engineering…”

Meanwhile after his auto-repair protocols rerouted power from his auxiliary systems the miraculously resuscitated Freeway has been holding the cyborg known as Bull from discovering the information available in the cargo bay.

Enthusiasm got the better of the pict-remembrancer at this point, meaning that the stark image of a diverted Pig Iron avoiding the cyber-mastiff and ripping the cargo room console from the wall will have to be imagined by the viewer…

Dr Voidstrom – a lover not a fighter – is ill equipped to take part in the firefight in Engineering and retreats to the Supply Depot, only to be confronted by a masked Purgator trooper.  “Shall we Parlay? slobbers the crustacean.

Voidstroms gambit works, throwing the Purgator trooper off guard enough to allow the Doctor to quickly download the data from the Holo-Generator and escape through the door into engineering…

…where the Decapodian is dismayed to find a toxic, part industrial machinery, part man armed with a syringe bearing down on him. All hope is not lost however, as Freeway (visible in the top of the image) is busily ripping the throat from another Purgator trooper and on his way to save the physician.

Knowing that the success of the mission relies upon the data that Dr Voidstrom is carrying Ramirez runs towards him with Tumbleweed in tow, hipshooting at any Purgators en route. Unfortunately L’Oreal has been overwhelmed…

…and passes out in a pool of his own inhuman blood.

As Codename: Bull is attacked yet again by the tenacious Freeway, Voidstrom decides that it is time to initiate the rite of Claw-Plach and leaps at the cyborg, claws snapping and head-fin fully extended…

…three way battle rages…

…but just as the Adventurers gain the upper claw, the timely intervention of Codename: Pig Iron drops the Decapodian.  “Physician, heal thyself” rumbles Pig Iron with a distrubingly tinny laugh.

Ignoring the epic struggle between cyber-mastiff and bulldozer-man, the weird form of Cypher extracts the data crystal from the immobile body of Dr Voidstrom, ending the game in a draw.

—————

Pulp Alley delivers again, generating a fun game with real decisions to be made and entertaining narrative full of derring-do and narrowly avoided scrapes.  The new card terrain was fun to use and despite some concerns as to how the doors and the like might effect the tight six turn limit of a Pulp Alley game, it worked out perfectly in the end.  PB also managed to get his newly painted Purgator force on the table, which was cool.