A Knight of Shreds and Patches Transcript Episode 28: Proceed Evasive Maneuvers Transcript by Cameron Robertson
Intro: [hurdy gurdy music begins]
Nick: Welcome, listeners, to A Knight of Shreds and Patches. An immersive actual play podcast. This episode features the talents of –
Cameron: Cameron Robertson as Emma Blackwood.
Sydney: Sydney Whittington as Cassidy Shard.
Nick: Nick Robertson as GM and Narrator.
Sydney: Hello listeners, this is your editor, Sydney, with today’s messages:
Hope everything’s going well for everyone out there! Thanks for being a listener, and we hope that enjoying our show can bring just a little bit more brightness to your lives. We’re coming up on a year that we’ve been running, and we’re excited for where we’re headed.
And with that, we wrap up today’s announcements and head into episode 28: Proceed Evasive Maneuvers. And so...
Join us, for now our tale to yours attaches To carry hope: a Knight of Shreds and Patches.
[hurdy gurdy music ends]
[electronic beeping] [robotic powerup noise begins] Distorted Robotic Voice: Power restored. Systems online. Reconfiguring audio connection. [robotic powerup noise fades to radio frequency static]
[over radio] Sydney (as Cassidy): Last time on A Knight of Shreds and Patches, we got our silica ore. It did take me almost falling into a badly covered mineshaft that exposed it, the use of all of our spare air in order to keep breathing while we mined it, Emma's mechanical expertise to get the lift working to get it out, and the mine did mostly collapse behind us as we left. But we got our ore. [radio static]
Episode Start:
Nick: Cassidy and Emma, the cold wind bites into your skin as you speed back to Eagle Hill. All we hear is the sputtering rumble of a rented motorcycle. What does your setup on this motorcycle look like as you head back? There are two of you and over 150 pounds of silica ore that you're trying to bring back to Shawn.
Sydney: So we're around the same way that we came in; Cassidy's driving, Emma is on the bike arms around Cassidy, and the sidecar is loaded up with all of their gear, the climbing gear and the spent oxygen tanks and everything, in addition to the giant pile of ore that they brought back. Everything has been strapped down and looks reasonably secure, which is good because these roads are kind of crappy, and it would be a silly way to lose some payout if they hit a pothole and it popped a rock out.
Nick: You've already crossed the wall, using the same rope and leverage system that you used before. You are on The Pike heading back towards Eagle Hill. Little flurries of snow are beginning to fall, not enough to stick but enough to obscure your vision slightly. And as you get closer to the city with the heavier weight in the sidecar of this silica ore that you reappropriated from an abandoned mine, you have to slow the motorcycle a little as the road begins to break up and be more rough closer to the city. You weave between some twisted ruins of what were once tall buildings and I need you both to make some average Perception checks with two black die.
Sydney: Cool. I am rolling two yellows and a green against the two purples and two blacks.
Cameron: I only have one yellow and two greens against the bad dice.
[dice rolling]
Sydney: I had three successes and three threats.
Cameron: Emma has two successes and a threat.
Nick: So you all see very clearly as you begin to slow down that there's something in the road ahead of you. It looks like a large rusted chain and you see it at the same time as it is pulled up about two feet off the ground between two buildings. You're in a narrow passageway between two bits of rubble. And you can see two large figures and leather jackets and plastic masks pulling on the chain that appears to be wrapped around two rusting steel girders driven into either side of the road, you have time to react. How do you respond to this?
Sydney: So we're between buildings in a way that there's not a way to get around it?
Nick: You could get around it but you'll have to drive very close to a person. So imagine pile of rubble, space where person is standing, steel girder, chain across a double sidewalks length piece of rubble that you're driving on, steel girder, person, pile of rubble.
Sydney: How much warning do we have? Like how many seconds until we hit it?
Nick: Probably about four seconds. You noticed very early.
Sydney: With that amount of time. Cassidy is not willing to try and duck or anything because they're still going at speed and that's a easy, error prone thing and it needs coordination between the two of them on the bike too. And four seconds is not enough time to discuss. So I think Cassidy is just gonna hook it hard and go towards the guy on the right side. Having flipped a coin in her head.
Cameron: Right as Cassidy swerves the bike, Emma reaches around over Cassidy's shoulder and points and yells, 'look!' I don't know if it's possible to hear her at all, because we're both wearing helmets, and we're on a bike and air is whizzing past our ears. But she points at least and that - it wasn't needed, but she noticed it too.
Sydney: Cassidy sees the finger over her shoulder and is at least, good. Emma knows what's going on, which means she knows the hold on.
Cameron: Yep. [laugh]
Nick: And you turn the bike and gun it towards this figure who had attempted to stop you and I need you to make a Driving check at average difficulty, but you can have two blue die for how much time you had in advance to change course.
Sydney: That is a yellow and three greens, two blues and two purples.
[dice rolling]
Sydney: A success.
Nick: Whoo. So it ended up being a lot closer than you thought it would be. This seemed like an easy route to thread your way through and back to safety. How do you drive this and just barely escape?
Sydney: Cassidy, having basically just fifty-fifty-ed what side she was going to take, going to the right means the side car is on the right side of the motorcycle, so she slightly shies away from that right wall making sure that she doesn't get it too close because she has a very good perspective on the left side of it, but that means that she ends up going in at an angle where she's hugging that post and it's almost close enough to reach out and touch with her other hand as she gets past it on the side where the sidecar is not. So the sidecar ends up with a fair amount of space, but it was a much tighter margin of error because Cassidy was overcorrecting on the other side.
Nick: The other thing that you didn't consider was that the person holding the chain would let go and try to grab one of you as you buzzed by. And the hands close on empty air just behind Emma's shoulders as the motorcycle goes by. And you are free and into the open road again, past these piles of rubble, but even over the sound of your motorcycle and the rushing wind and the beating of your own hearts at this near miss, you hear a chorus of additional engines starting up. And Emma as you look behind you, you see five other motorcycles, some of them in better shape than others, some simply frames with large engines bolted to them, others appearing to be designed for longer trips, a motley crew of motorcycles begin to gun and head in your direction, appearing like a murder of crows out of the rubble behind you, and giving chase. And I need you both to roll initiative.
[dice rolling]
Sydney: Three successes.
Cameron: Three successes.
Nick: Okay, and I need you to roll me two yellow die three times, please.
[dice rolling]
Cameron: First roll: three successes, one advantage.
[dice rolling]
Cameron: Second roll: two successes.
[dice rolling]
Cameron: Third roll: two successes and an advantage.
Nick: So it's five motorcycles chasing you down this road, you can see some of the motorcycles that are in the worst shape, clearly assembled by scrap that was never originally intended to be part of the same machine, driving towards you as a unit and the two large men who had pulled the chain slightly behind as they begin to jump on their own vehicles and chase after you. The Pike is a long stretch of road, sometimes broken sometimes smooth. On your way out, you noticed shacks and little groups of people in the far distance occasionally. No one was really interested in bothering you on the way out, but now that you're being chased, the entire landscape appears deserted. It's just you and your pursuers. And first up the group of three motorcycles attempt to cut you off from an angle gunning towards you. And please roll me two yellows at average difficulty for their Driving check.
[dice rolling]
Cameron: Two advantages.
Nick: So they don't begin to catch up. The group of three motorcycles doesn't quite cut you off. You're both too alert. Emma you point. Cassidy, you were already tracking on them as well, but to avoid a collision or to get in range of whatever weapons they may have, you're forced to veer off the road and slow down as you drive into more rubble and have to slalom through obstacles and the other two bikers begin to gain on you. And now it's both of your turns. What do you do?
Cameron: Cassidy - Do you have your headset on under your helmet?
Sydney: Yep.
Cameron: All right. So as we started hearing the motorcycle engines come online and come up behind us, Emma had turned got the count and position of where people were at. And then as soon as she saw that, got her little necklace radio mic, got it up around the chin strap of her helmet that she's wearing so that it's held basically where a headset would be and sets it so that it's just on, so when she talks it'll just go and says,
Cameron (as Emma): [over radio] Hey Cassidy, there's three crappy bikes and then there's the two chain guys on bigger bikes. The three are to the left, the back two we got flanked on either side, but they're further back.
Sydney (as Cassidy): [over radio] I was hoping they would try and make us stop and pay a toll~.
Sydney: Cassidy says she whips past a small shack, just trying her best to keep up as much speed as she can and break eyesight as much as she can. She has the disadvantage that they're from here and she is reacting to everything she sees.
Cameron (as Emma): [over radio] I think they were gonna have us pay a toll but I think we kind of bypassed that and now they're angry~.
Sydney (as Cassidy): [over radio] I didn't want to get hit in the face by a chain going as fast as we were~.
Cameron (as Emma): [over radio] Oh no, I'm not complaining about what you did at all. I'm just saying I think they're mad~. [breathy laugh] All right, this group of three is over to the right now. Still behind.
Sydney (as Cassidy): [over radio] Do you have anything you can do to slow him down? Knock something over, shoot at them or some- you don't have a gun.
Cameron (as Emma): [over radio] I don't have a gun!
Sydney (as Cassidy): [over radio] Cause we were told not to bring gear. Thank you, Shawn.
Cameron: Emma has just been looking back and forth over each shoulder, just consistently switching back and forth and as soon as Cassidy says throw something at them or something, she starts rummaging around in the side car and picks up one of the empty oxygen tanks. How far would you say the group of three is? If they were trying to cut us off, are they close enough that I could throw it at them?
Nick: Yeah, they're probably Medium range. You could throw it. So normally, you can only throw things Short range, but you really just need to throw it to where they'll drive into it. So,
Cameron: Yeah.
Nick: That'll work fine.
Cameron: So Emma picks up one of the empty gas containers and chucks it like she's doing a lateral pass, chucks it at the trio of bikes.
Nick: That would be an average Ranged Attack with two black die for being on the back of a speeding motorcycle.
Cameron: I'm going to aim.
Nick: Yes, that will give you a blue die.
Cameron: So I've got a yellow, a green, a blue, two purple and two black.
[dice rolling]
Cameron: Two successes.
Nick: What's your Brawn?
Cameron: Three.
Nick: We'll say an oxygen tank is plus one damage. So you actually take somebody off of one of the motorcycles in the group that's closest to you.
Cameron: Emma chucks it sideways, aiming towards the guy to the farthest right so that if it doesn't quite make it, it hits one of the other two, because she's really not concerned about actually throwing it too far with the way she's throwing it. So she throws it and because she's sitting on a motorcycle and is throwing this kind of to her side and behind her, it's not a high throw. So by the time it reaches the trio of bikes, it is no longer at person height, where it would be hitting them in the head or the chest, it's now like right at headlight, wheel level of the bike. And they're slightly to the side of her, so it goes in and hits the side of the front wheel of the bike and takes out a bunch of the connecting spokes and the wheel just leaves the bike and the bike just very abruptly stops after sliding a little bit and the guy just gets abandoned by his friends.
Nick: The bike engine rises to a high whine that cuts above the rest before sputtering out as the wheel shreds into small shrapnel flying ahead and behind the motorcycle and the front forks of this motorcycle dig large furrows into the snow scattered ground and the rider leans back managing to keep his balance as he is left behind, the motorcycle completely taken out of commission. And the last thing you see before you whip around a corner, Emma, is this bandit angrily punching at the starter and the handlebars of a motorcycle that can no longer go.
Cameron (as Emma): [over radio] Now it's a unicycle.
Cameron: [laughing] Cassidy just hears this quietly through the radio.
Sydney: Cassidy is too busy driving to comment on this, at this point. Cassidy is trying to figure out what would be the ideal terrain for their bike versus the other ones and comes to the conclusion that honestly with the sidecar, probably best for them is to just get back on the main road and get there quickly because she doesn't think that these guys, as aggressive as they are being right now this is their home turf and you start getting into Eagle Hill and people who are not super fond of highway robbery, that they will turn around. So she's actually at the next intersection, she's gonna hit it hard and whip it around 180 degrees to go back the other way at a weird angle to get back to The Pike itself as quick as possible, hopefully in a way that the other guys will overshoot and give them a little bit of breathing room to get back up to speed with specially with their crappy bikes.
Nick: Okay, make me a average Driving check. No black die on this but I would like to flip my GM Story Point to swap out a purple for a red.
Sydney: So that is one yellow, three greens, a purple, and a red.
[dice rolling]
Sydney: Four successes.
Nick: Yep, you're wildly successful. What does it look like as you leave the worst bikes behind? They're vastly outstripped, it's going to be very difficult for them to catch up to you.
Sydney: So the closest one sees Cassidy slam on the brakes and turn the bike sideways and they turn to look at this and immediately hit the wall of a shack and send the somewhat flimsy construction flying in different directions. The roof collapses down. This is behind Cassidy, but it's one of those, she sure hopes that people who weren't involved in this are okay cause the bandits are the ones that forced her this direction. But the other one sees this turn, sees it in time to react cause he's a little bit further back turned sharply and then promptly has the bike slide out from under him because the crappy bike doesn't have tires good enough to hold on to that kind of traction. So instead of trying to slow down, he just went turn and promptly put the bike under him and then his face goes into the ground and the bike goes shooting off into the distance into the hole in the other shack, knocking the bottom half of that wall down and ending in a pile with both bikes and the first rider.
Nick: So there's a large pile of motorcycles left behind as you regain The Pike and take a beeline back for Eagle Hill and hopeful safety. And Cameron, I need you to roll me two yellows and a green at hard difficulty with a blue die added for previous advantages.
[dice rolling]
Cameron: Three successes, two threats and a triumph.
Nick: As you've regained The Pike, this blazing red chopper come soaring through the air. It must have hit a ramp, some piles of boxes, but Cassidy you see it too late. There's no way to avoid it as reaching down one of these leather, clad plastic masked, gigantic men that you saw earlier, whips a razor edge chain down at your motorcycle. Emma, you don't get hit by the sharp part, but you do take eight damage as the heavy blow of the chain at the full force of a motorcycle at full speed cracks across your back. And for the triumph, the razor part of this chain wraps around the thin struts that affix the sidecar to the rest of the motorcycle and you hear them snap as the driver goes by. And the sidecar begins to head at a different direction from the rest of you.
It's still within reach. It's balanced perfectly, you packed it well, but you only have a few seconds to react. For the threats, this driver lands nearby and very shakily, obviously launching your motorcycle through the air is not the most conservative of maneuvers, and if you were to attack it or try to unbalance him you would have two blue die against him. And up next is another NPC slot. The other motorcycle, someone who in his gear and mask looks almost indistinguishable from the first except that his chopper is black, pulls on to The Pike next to you Cassidy and you see him whipping a sling above his head and he lets go. Cameron, can you roll me a yellow and a green with a blue die at easy difficulty please?
[dice rolling]
Cameron: A success and an advantage.
Nick: The bandit lets go of one string on this sling and a peppering of bits of nails and screws flies into your chest, most of its absorbed by your jacket but you do take four damage, Cassidy, as you are hit by this shrapnel and the motorcycle pulls alongside.
Sydney: Cassidy takes two damage. She has a soak have two.
Nick: It's the kind of weapon you use to terrorize people on foot. It's not particularly good at motorcycle to motorcycle combat. Really, most people would not engage in motorcycle to motorcycle combat because it's a bad idea.
Sydney: Which means these guys are either very overconfident or very desperate.
Nick: The group of three motorcycles are nowhere to be seen. You doubt that they'll be able to catch back up to you in time. You all continue at pace. The black and the red motorcycle are fairly close to you. As you begin to enter the outskirts of Eagle Hill, they show no indication of peeling off. The side car is beginning to drift away - still at speed enough to stay balanced. And we're back to a PC slot.
Cameron: Emma got hit by the chain which would have thrown her forward and slightly to the side, so Cassidy probably felt some impact of Emma coming forward. But if it came through and then hit the side car, then it threw Emma a bit to the right as well. So then she's right there next to it so she can grab on easily.
Cameron (as Emma): [over radio] [breathless] Fuck~. [coughing] Ow. [coughing]
Cameron: And Emma is just going to continue to try to breathe for a little while, while she grabs on frantically to the sidecar and tries to keep it close to the motorcycle.
Nick: It's an Athletics check to grab it and basically your goal would be to jam the now broken struts into the body of the motorcycle and hope that it sticks enough that you don't have to hold it just with your strength because balancing while doing that would be nearly impossible.
Cameron: All right. What difficulty of Athletics check?
Nick: You caught it soon enough, you're right there - average difficulty. So if you do well you can shove it in. You would still probably need to keep a hand on it if you do any turning or anything.
Cameron: All right, so my pool is a yellow, two green and two purple.
[dice rolling]
Cameron: One success, one advantage.
Nick: Great. You're able to grab it. You don't have to support its full weight. How do you rescue, not completely but at least for the moment, your payload? Your pay day?
Cameron: I think it really starts with Emma just collapsing her upper body onto it. So if you're starting to fall over a cliff and you're scrambling with your arms at the top of the cliff trying to hold on, kind of that because she got thrown down on it, and then realized it was moving and was like 'aHhHhH' and is trying to grab it while still trying to catch her breath back. The panic of seeing its start to shift away from the bike causes her to overly react slightly in pulling it back towards her. She does it more so than was really necessary, but it gets it and shifts it slightly off from where it was and it's now sitting slightly farther on the back closer to Emma because she pulled it back to where she was and has jammed into the body of the bike. Doesn't puncture anything important, there's just these handy holes where it's just waiting to hold on to these brackets from the sidecar. Emma is still coughing. And so Cassidy just felt the impact of Emma go down slightly and then start coughing and collapsed onto the sidecar behind her.
Sydney: And then Cassidy promptly got hit with a spray of very sharp shrapnel.
Cameron (as Emma): [over radio] [coughing] Ow. [coughing] Cassidy, don't take any sharp turns.
Sydney (as Cassidy): [over radio] [yelling] What?!
Sydney: Cassidy throws a very quick glance over her shoulder and sees that the side car is not where it used to be.
Cameron: Emma is still seated. She's not necessarily holding on to Cassidy with their arms anymore. She has let go upper body, her left leg is what's really keeping her on the bike right now as she leans over to the right.
Sydney: Cassidy sees this, abandons the maneuver she had been about to do, and then with a lot of blood lust at having the other dude just hit her, her immediate follow up action is to pull one of her throwing knives out of a holster that was hanging on her waist. Look quickly over at that dude and then throw it across her body towards the dude that slung the thing at her.
Nick: Make me a Ranged Attack. It'll be easy difficulty, he's right next to you, but it will be two black die because you're driving.
Sydney: This is why Cassidy has been practicing all that time. It's to be able to do something with one hand in a closer range situation. With the risk of the sidecar now being loose, any of the aggressive maneuvers that Cassidy would have attempted are now keep it straight and level and give herself a good shot at the ranged weaponry and be as nice as she can to Emma who is holding on to it with the risk of being an easier target for the other dudes, but that's why she's trying to get rid of that problem. So the combination of leveling out to stabilize her platform then being her aim. So I am then rolling three yellows, a green, a purple, two blacks and a blue.
[dice rolling]
Sydney: Three successes and an advantage.
Nick: How much damage is that?
Sydney: Plus one. These are going to be somewhat disposable because they're throwing knives. They're well balanced to be able to be flick thrown as opposed to like straight line thrown, but not anything super special. I don't think.
Nick: So yeah, just add your Brawn to the damage. So you had three successes. What's your Brawn?
Sydney: Two.
Nick: And then the knife does one, so that's six damage.
Sydney: Yeah.
Nick: So Cassidy you whip this knife at the nearby biker, it buries into his chest but you can see that the thick leather that he's wearing absorbs a lot of the blow. He looks down grabs the knife with one hand while maintaining his balance and pulls it loose with a little spray of blood flying behind him and continues to give chase. And up next is an NPC slot that I'm going to be using for some obstacles. You're beginning to get into the more crowded part of the city. You're by no means downtown but this is where people live and work on a regular basis. It's early evening so the roads are beginning to crowd with people heading home after a long day's work. And in front of you is a large cart that has one of the gigantic moose from the train that appears to have stopped and refused to move in the middle of the road. You're going to need to get around it. I'm going to need a Driving check from you at average difficulty but with two black die for moose and being harried by bikers.
Sydney: I think I've made this check before so.
[dice rolling]
Sydney: Two successes, two threats, and a triumph.
Nick: Huh. So for the successes you're able to quickly drive around this moose. It isn't spooked, the driver barely notices you as focused as he is on getting his beast of burden to move. And the moose is actively avoiding him. I think as you drive by you catch a glimpse of it sitting down in its harness, refusing to go. For the threats, the motorcycle begins to sputter. You had to gun it pretty hard to get around, and you're not out of gas, but you're pretty close. Is there anything that you would like to use the Triumph on.
Sydney: So the moose that's sitting down in the road just actively being obstinate and not wanting to continue to go forward has a real reason, and there's actually a subtle sheen across the road for maybe like five or ten feet. Something slightly up the slope of the road sprung a leak and it's drizzling oil down and it's just a mess, but it's not something that's like an immediate problem. Moose smells that and can see it and is not happy about it and does not want to continue on. We had taken our trajectory in around this moose that was in a fairly straight line because Cassidy is doing her best to drive conservatively to keep that sidecar from escaping or causing any further problems. So Cassidy took this at a very clean, smooth line, but the bikes behind her are trying to gain that ground and they're driving aggressively and they're flicking in and out and around obstacles and people, the occasional vehicle they're on the road, but that means that one of them flicks out and around hard turn right as they hit this oil slick.
Nick: Yeah, what they are going to do is use the second NPC slot to try to prevent crashing terribly on this, so can you make me a Drive check at two yellows versus three purples and a black please.
[dice rolling]
Cameron: Two failures, a threat, and a triumph.
Nick: Hmm. So with his failures, he loses control of his bike and lays it down in the oil slick. It skids off in a different direction from him as he slams up into the sidewalk. For his threat, the motorcycle flies through a shop window. We get a shot of people behind a shop counter, their eyes growing wide as they dive out of the way as this motorcycle comes tumbling through and makes a large hole in the far wall. The people are fine but property has been damaged and the motorcycle is sparking. For the triumph, you see that the driver, before you once again whip around a corner, has gotten to his feet and doesn't appear badly hurt, peels off the leather jacket and the mask looking like a strong but fairly average citizen of Eagle Hill. And right before you turn the corner you see him toss his distinguishing clothes into an alleyway and fade into a crowd. You see the sling that he used to attack you earlier mixed in amongst his leather jacket and know that this is the biker who was on the black motorcycle and will no longer be troubling you but will have no consequences for his actions at this time. And up next is a PC slot.
Cameron: Emma, while being collapsed onto the sidecar, has managed to pull out a piece of Cassidy's rope and is going to try to more securely attach the sidecar to the motorcycle again so she can stop holding on to it. Can I argue Mechanics for the role? Because I know where to tie into the bike to make it sturdy?
Nick: Absolutely. You can use Mechanics to reattach this so that the bike works functionally. I'm gonna say this is average, but you have two black die because you're on the side of a speeding motorcycle.
Cameron: All right, I have a knack for Mechanics, so I'm going to remove the two black die. May I also have a blue die for my Inventor talent for constructing new or modifying existing items to reconstruct devices?
Nick: Yeah, absolutely. [laughing] You are reconstructing the motorcycle having a sidecar.
Cameron: Alright, so I've got three yellows, a blue and two purples.
[dice rolling]
Cameron: Three successes.
Nick: You are able to fully affix the sidecar back. The way that you tied it on using the rope, honestly, it's probably better attached now than it was originally. You feel pretty good about it. Do you want to tell Cassidy that she has full maneuverability again?
Cameron (as Emma): [over radio] [pained] We're gonna have to fix that before we turn this back in. Side cars back on though, by the way. You're good. Proceed evasive maneuvers. I don't know.
Sydney (as Cassidy): [over radio] Ah perfect.
Cameron: And Emma has sat back up and is now holding on to Cassidy again.
Sydney: Cassidy, feeling Emma's arms around her waist again, immediately turns hard left and darts through a narrow alleyway in an attempt to lose this guy, seeing that apparently, they'll just walk away if they get bored. So.
Nick: Trying to lose someone in busy streets in the late evening, in a city you've lived in for several months, is not affected as much by your ability to drive. It's more affected by knowing your surroundings and where good shortcuts are. So I'm going to need you to make me a Classical Knowledge check at hard difficulty, but you can have a blue die for having lived in the city for quite a while.
Sydney: Can I have another blue die because I've been actively making maps of the area?
Nick: Yes, you can.
Sydney: I'm gonna flip a Story Point for this too. So my total for this role is two yellows, two blues and three purples.
[dice rolling]
Sydney: Two threats.
Nick: So you take this hard turn, you go down an alleyway, the engine coughs and begins to lose speed. You take another turn, and the engine completely dies. You're able to coast for a while but you can hear the red motorcycle behind you beginning to catch up. He's taking the turns carefully, realizing that he's the last one chasing you, but he's definitely coming and it's his turn next.
The motorcycle putters to a stop, you're down an alley you can see the crowds a ways away on a more busy road, but it's quiet here. The city noises are muffled and you hear the red motorcycle pull to a stop and you hear the clanking of chains as this large man in a leather coat walks around the corner towards you. And you can see that there's a smattering of dried blood on the knuckles of his gloves and there's no compassion behind that plastic mask. As he slowly whirls the chain and approaches you both and he makes a guttural animal noise deep in his throat and glares you down. He's doing a Coercion check. We're going to do it that you both have to roll against his Coercion as the difficulty. So you all roll your Discipline against a red and two purple, and I'm going to flip my story point to upgrade the check for Emma so she'll be rolling against two reds and a purple.
Sydney: Cassidy's rolling two greens against this red and two purples.
Cameron: And Emma's got two greens and two reds and a purple.
[dice rolling]
Sydney: Two threats.
Cameron: A success.
Nick: So you all prepare to deal with this person. You've already risked your lives to get this and you need it to move forward with your lives. You're not going to give it up just because some scary guy with a chain comes after you. But Cassidy you can't help but feel your hands shake a little bit, just naturally at the feeling of a coming fight against a strong foe. And your next action will have two black dice against it.
Sydney: Cassidy is keenly feeling the small squad size right now because this would be an easy fight for Wyatt.
Nick: And Emma it doesn't affect you. Why doesn't it?
Cameron: Cause Emma's pissed because this guy hit her with a chain. She's just angry.
Nick: And up next is a PC slot.
Cameron: We arrived just before he came around, so Emma had gotten off the bike so that she was turned around and facing him as he was approaching us and without moving she just reaches over and grabs the head of her pickaxe and pulls it out and then rushes him. You said that he's a big guy right like?
Nick: Mhmm.
Cameron: Emma's going for the knees with a pick axe.
Nick: All right, make me that Melee attack.
Cameron: I've got two yellows, a green, and two purple.
[dice rolling]
Cameron: Three successes and an advantage.
Nick: So Emma the pickaxe is plus one, it's not designed for combat. It's unwieldy, but it is designed to go through things so it will have Pierce two and ignore this bandits armor. How much damage do you do?
Cameron: That'll be seven total.
Nick: He screams as the pickaxe buries itself in the side of his knee and falls to the knee that's been injured and then yells again at the pain of the impact. He is struggling to do something but he hasn't done it yet. He isn't down, but he's not feeling good either. And it's Cassidy's turn.
Sydney: Cassidy's bloodlust is also up having seen the splatters across Emma and with the holes in herself and this guy's not defenseless yet, he's still trying to do whatever he's trying to do. And Emma having met him at the entryway to this corner of the alleyway, there's a little bit of space and Cassidy takes that moment to pull her bow up using her Quick Draw talent that allows her to do it as an incidental from where it was packed away inside the sidecar. Quickly with her well practiced hand whips out an arrow from the quiver that was stored next to it, knocking it and as she's pulling back her bow, the camera zooms on the arrow. Again in a delicate calligraphic hand, it says 'this way towards enemy,' and she releases it.
Nick: All right, roll me that attack. You're at close range. So it'll be one difficulty.
Sydney: I have two blacks from the intimidation. So I'm rolling three yellows, a green, a purple and two blacks.
[dice rolling]
Sydney: Three successes and a threat.
Nick: How much damage is that?
Sydney: That'll be 11 total.
Nick: Yeah, you put this guy down. How do you finish him off?
Sydney: Cassidy in the slight bit of rattle of, I guess we're fighting this guy now, my team is not here. I'm not prepared for a melee fight. Normally, she does tend to go for the body shots for the conservative one, but he's down, not out but hurt and so instead she goes for the face and ends up the end of the arrow going towards the enemy goes through the mouthpiece of the facemask, and then you see it jab violently out the back. As the guy basically stiffens and then falls limp backwards, away from his wounded knee and away from Emma.
Nick: Emma the arrow whipped over your shoulder and through this guy's mask and he collapses to the ground, pulling the pickaxe out of your hands where it's still stuck in his knee. And there's no more enemies around.
Cameron (as Emma): Ew.
Cameron: Emma get her pickaxe and wipes it off on the guy.
Sydney: Cassidy goes over and pulls her arrow back out as best she can. I think the threat is that it doesn't come out intact.
Nick: Yeah, the arrow breaks in half as you pull it free and you're left holding a jagged shaft with some feathers on the end.
Cameron: Yeah as soon as it's obvious that Cassidy is going for the arrow, Emma's like no, and turns away. [laughing]
Sydney: It makes kind of a mess.
Nick: Yeah. And you're in an alleyway. Not too far from commuters walking home, no one's noticed yet. You've got a motorcycle full of silica ore and a dead body. Cassidy you know that there are laws in the city that protect the safety of people, and that they're mostly enforced by the various syndicates around the area, but you've found that situations like this can usually be explained. And that if someone else was the aggressor, that there's usually very little trouble given to whoever defended themselves.
Sydney: Yeah, so Cassidy, she doesn't know exactly what the ritual would be for killing someone in a city. But she goes to try to get an arrow back, it doesn't go well. She tucks it in her bag anyway, wiping the blood off on the dead guys clothes because at least she can salvage the arrowhead. And unfortunately, it was one of her nice arrows, but that's the ones that get shot at people and then starts doing the inventory of the working bike, doing her best to ignore that dead body that's still warm behind her.
Nick: As you try not to look at it, you can't help but hear Wyatt's voice in the back of your head saying that they should be remembered.
Cameron: Emma having turned away and noping out of there when Cassidy starts to go for the arrow, returns to our bike, puts her pickaxe back in the sidecar and has pulled out some rope and walks our motorcycle over to next to the other motorcycle and sets it down and then goes and stands by the body and looks down at it and says,
Cameron (as Emma): Well, he was an asshole, but I'm sorry he died.
Cameron: And then nods her head and then walks and starts affixing the rope to the back of the working bike and then tying the other end of it to the front of our bike so that we can tow our bike with the good bike.
Sydney: Cassidy hearing Emma give a goodbye feels the pull enough to walk back over and just stands and looks down at the guy, hearing the sounds of Emma re-readying for travel behind her.
Sydney (as Cassidy): [inhale and sigh] Good fight.
Sydney: And then turns and walks back over.
Cameron: Emma is walking back towards the body and very gingerly, trying to avoid the blood parts, shifts the body over so that she can fully remove the chain that he'd had in his hand and then collapsed onto and goes and tucks that underneath some ropes in the sidecar to grab that bonus metal as well. And is just muttering under her breath the whole time,
Cameron (as Emma): [mumbling] Freaking chain's painful. Hit me with a chain... gonna melt this down and it's gonna be something stupid like a screwdriver.
Nick: And the next thing we see is Shawn Ward hard at work in his foundry. The forge is glowing as he draws out molten metal adding additional minerals to make it the right pliability and strength, pulling it out into a glowing string that feeds on to a spool. And as the machine takes hold and begins to continue his work, Shawn looks up to the sound of a motorcycle, and he walks outside. The foundry is an old building made of once white marble, at least on the facade with 10 or 15 worn steps and several columns before leading into where Shawn works. And he stands at the top of the steps as a red motorcycle pulls up.
Cameron: So motorcycles were not meant to be towed in this fashion. That is why when you see someone towing a motorcycle, it is on a stand in a trailer. It is not actually the entity being towed, but we got to make it work. So at first, the only thing that Shawn sees is Emma on this large red motorcycle that doesn't have anything attached to it. But then the speed that we were having to go to get here was faster than one might normally want to go when towing something because we had to go fast enough that the motorcycle that Cassidy was on could remain upright, and she could control it. So as the red bike stops, and Shawn sees Emma, the other motorcycle had enough of a lead with the rope that it comes to the side and parks next and a little bit behind the red bike, and that's the one that has all of the stuff and that's the bike that Shawn's seen before, but it's not looking great.
Nick: His eyes widen as he takes in the motorcycle with Cassidy leaning against the sidecar and sagging as it's held together mostly with rope at this point and Emma on a vehicle that he's never seen before and he scratches at the back of his head. A little bit of soot marks his face and he looks down at you and says,
Nick (as Shawn Ward): This was supposed to be a milk run.
Cameron: Emma takes off her helmet and shakes out her hair, like you would expect someone who had long hair to do but she doesn't have long hair, and puts her hand on her hip and the other one holding the helmet against her hip.
Cameron (as Emma): Imagine what this would have looked like if I'd been on a unicycle.
[hurdy gurdy music swells]
Outro: Aly (as Zee-o): End of episode. Commencing end credits. The following information will be placed in the show notes for your added convenience.
This has been A Knight of Shreds and Patches, an actual play podcast using the Genesys game system from Fantasy Flight Games. The show is edited by Sydney Whittington, and features the talents of:
Sydney Whittington as Cassidy. Sydney can be found on our Discord server, which is linked in the show notes, and on Twitter @ sydney_whitt.
Cameron Robertson as Emma. Cameron can be found on Twitter @ midnightmusic13 and on Instagram @ reading_and_dreaming. Cameron is also a player on Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars Edge of the Empire actual play podcast.
And Nick Robertson as narrator. Nick can be found on Twitter @ alias58. Nick is also the GM for Tabletop Squadron, which you can support @ Patreon.com/TabletopSquadron
This podcast features the musical talents of Dora Violet and Arne Parrott. You can find Dora at facebook.com/doraviolett. You can find Arne at atptunes.com.
The official artwork for this podcast was created by Rashed AlAkroka, who can be found on Instagram and Artstation @ rashedjrs.
You can follow the Patina on Twitter @ akosap_podcast or visit the website: www.akosap.com. Until next time…
...Audio Offline. [hurdy gurdy fades]
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