ATTG Season 1, Session 6 Die Spartans!

 GMs Recap

Casting

• Adelphin "Adel" Jean-Baptiste (Laurie) Domains (Death and Magic), child of  Werethekau and Baron Samedi. Machiavellian meddler. Power unto herself. Adelphin can kill with a glance, manipulate magic as if she were born to it (she was), and doesn't seem to be able to actually die. Tagline: "I'm not the devil, but betray me and I will show you hell".
• Siv (NPC) Child of Odin, handed to Adelphin for protection.
• Cosmos aka Management (Ally), an unusual cat that is her hotel manager.
• Rui Qui (Ally) Theogenic demigod, hacker, magician.
• Liam O'Shea (Randy) Domain (Strength) and child of Dagda. A huge, powerful, and deadly warrior. A druid and generally a likeable guy. Taught the old ways but is comfortable with the modern. He's traveled much of the world and is looking to see even more. Tagline: "I told you I wouldn't fit."
• Mitzidu Ito (Rory) Domains (Business, Hearth/kitchen), child of Inari and Kojin. The teams business guru, event planner and entertainer. Taglines: "Life never tasted this good before!" and "The Hearth is the heart of the home, but food is the soul of a community"
• Suveer Patel (Christian) Domain (Clearing Obstructions), child of Ganesh.  Martial artist and student of a thousand styles, Suveer is one of the teams upfront fighters with fists or his gauda (mace). He can get past any obstacle put before him. Tagline: "You are in front of me and no obstacle can stop me. Find a better place to be."
• Yannis Papadopoulos aka The Courier (Chris D.) Domains (Communication, Secrets, Rainbows), child of Harpocrates and Arke. Team sneaker and postman. If you see him, its already too late, your package has been delivered. Tagline: "The thirty minutes or less policy is for those that like to live dangerously."
• Chad (NPC), child of Cupid

 Ready, Set, Fight!

After having rescued Maki the group opted to finish the kidnappers off to keep them from trying again and passing along a message to others who might be considering going after the group.

Awaiting a signal from Yanninis everyone but Liam is on the roof preparing to jump in through a skylight. 

Unfortunately the group showed its newness in working together and communication pus several tactical errors were made.

Rui breaks into the skylight over the far end of the boxing ring and jumps down, followed by Adelphin. Liam busts down the door (Hey big guy, it was unlocked!) with a dramatic "Oh, Yeah!" Garret (one of the three enemy demigods) activates a power (dont think we ever noticed what it was). Suveer drops down from the skylight over the near side of the boxing ring and middle of the building, landing on a cultist. Mitzidu realizes that its a pretty far jump (25 feet) onto concrete and heads towards the next skylight where Suveer went in. Yannis stalls trying to figure out the best action.

The cultists let loose with automatic weapons and enchanted guns, taking out Liam and Chad and crippling Suveers leg.  Yannis shoots Paul (the mage demigod) through the heart with a deadly rainbow and is overloaded by absorbing the godlings power. Mitzidu notes that someone (likely he or Adellphin) should have made sure the younger godlings new about that backlash from permanently killing another godling. Adelphin uses her deathgaze on Garret, killing him. Mitzadu leaps down into the ring, opting to land on Chad to break his fall (apprentices are supposed to be abused right?) and with his Acrobatics takes no damage. Suveer scuttles under the ring to avoid all the gunfire. The cultists shoot more, the group avoids most of the bullets, though only Mitzidu and Adelphin are unscathed. Apparently the cultist near Liam really liked that door as he continues to empty his gun into the already dead Liam, reloads and does it again. And again.

Rui heads upstairs to the office to eliminate the snipers while Adelphin raise dead cultists as zombies then decides to finish off the godling she already took out. She knocks herself out in the process. Mitzadu wondered why, maybe shes too obsessed with death? Surely shes not trying to ascend and in any case would have trusted the others not to take her kill.

At this point only Rui, a crippled Suveer, and Mitzadu are in the fight and several cultists are still shooting at us, along with Mary the remaining demigod who trades sword blows with Mitzadu.

Mitzadu is actually disarmed by Mary who easily saw through his feint and leaps back to avoid her blow while getting closer to the two remaining cultists shooting at him. Suveer finishes off the cultist who went after him, Liam bleeds more, Adelphin and Yannis take a nap, and Mitzadu summons his sword from the ground and beheads the two cultists just as he had the first one to shoot at him. As he turns to face Mary in hopes of a solid sword duel Suveer throws his cultist at her and then leaps and slams into her breaking her legs. Rui slept the guy unloading into Liam (He really had a mad on about that door!) and Mitzadu shakes the blood off his sword before sheathing it and stepping past Mary to go heal the wounded comrades.

Aftermath

We searched the building and questioned the survivors but aside from learning they were Spartans (Greek black Ops group) nothing much seemed to be had.

Suveer finished off Mary, though he asked the group first which Mitzadu appreciated but there was no honor in him taking her head.

The group called in cleaners to take care of the mess and noted that as no police had arrived, despite all the gunfire they had probably bribed the locals.

Mitzadu used a lot of his mana reserves, including that in his sword to heal everyone up and with her help Gated Maki back to Tokyo. The rest headed back to the hotel to clean up, stopping for fast food on the way.

AfterThoughts

We had a tense fight and the GM made some very lucky die rolls and the players (except for Adelphin) also made several critical failures. We also made some very poor tactical choices.

1. I think Mitzadu was the only one who had prepared charms ahead of time and used them (Lesser Celerity and Safeguard) and they helped keep him alive.
2. Liam, Adelphin, and Mitzadu should have had some combat charms prepared in advance and handed out.  If not we still had time before the fight to cast at least a couple of spells.
3. Relying on the infiltrator/stealth guy to give your signal has some drawbacks.
4. We should have positioned ourselves better, primarily Mitzadu. The player forgot Jumping did not reduce fall damage, only Acrobatics and he had to be in human form to use that. That cost him two turns once the fight started.
5. Finishing off the enemy godlings in the fight was a really bad idea. No fault to Yannis who didnt know, and the rest of us should have not assumed he knew.  I think I was the only player who anticipated a Highlander type Quickening and distraction and even I didnt anticipate you would go unconscious, figured Mental Stun which would still allow active defense, albeit at -4.  Not sure why Adelphin went for the kill. Both our character's should have known what was going on, the players should have thought to ask the GM and then tell the younger ones who had not gone through a harrowing yet. OTH the GM wanted it to be a dramatic reveal.
6. Liam opting to not take a reroll was a bad tactical choice but a respected role-playing choice. His foe crit hit him and he crit failed the HT check and could have used a wildcard point for the latter but figured the Fates or Norns were telling him something.

So lessons hopefully learned. The group needs to communicate better and be proactive with spells and charms.  Some body armor wouldn't hurt either. Ironically the only one not hurt was Mitzadu who had DR 0, but a bad Dodge roll and that would have changed.

The group is getting a powerup to spend saved experience from the last 6 games and 3 players also got a boost from killing demigods.  Armed with that and our battle experience hopefully were better prepared for4 the next fight.

It was a fun game though!