Normal Topic Emerald City Defenders Issues (Read 1258 times)
Majestic
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Emerald City Defenders Issues
Feb 1st, 2018 at 5:47pm
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With 3.0/MP, we decided to start up another group; this time the brand new team is based in our home stomping grounds (Seattle area).

After a few sessions, the team has named itself the Emerald City Defenders, and this becomes the fifth "title" in my 27 year-old campaign.

#1 – Strange New World – A mystical accident in Seattle transforms World of Warcraft players Kyle Anderson and Amy Rodgers, merging them with their in-game avatars.  Anderson is suddenly a gigantic, bull-like Tauren death knight named Brakus, while Rodgers is the Blood Elf hunter Seleriti.  The pair learn of each other via online chat, then agree to meet F.I.S.H. agent Kris Bestyea at a Dick’s Drive-In.  Soon after Bestyea meets them in the parking lot with new local hero Deschutes, the agent learns of a superpowered attack on a Harding Industries in the Industrial District.  Deschutes flies the heroes there, where they engage the rampaging villain Polymer.  The brute’s robotic body proves difficult to harm, but eventually the trio forces him to surrender.  Hours later, as they meet at Harborview Medical Center to visit children, they are attacked in the hall by Doctor Killjoy and his sidekick Spoilsport.  They swiftly defeat the pair, but then realize Seleriti has been badly cut.  Fortunately staff there are quickly able to provide aid and save her life.
  
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Re: Emerald City Defenders Issues
Reply #1 - Feb 2nd, 2018 at 5:10pm
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Last weekend we finally played this group again.

#2 – Day at the Museum – After setting up a makeshift headquarters in Kyle’s mom’s basement, the group helps out around the city and raises their public profile.  Upon hearing reports of a monster downtown, Deschutes flies Seleriti and Brakus to the Museum of History and Industry at the south end of Lake Union.  As the three heroes race inside and split up, each going to a different level, the lights go out.  Four vicious jaguars attack vulnerable citizens, but the vigilantes quickly dispatch them and their feral controller, Wilderbeast.  Power is restored, and in the museum’s basement they discover that manager Katy Tull absconded with a mystical Aztec artifact.  No longer affected by the relic, Wilderbeast transforms back into João D'Enso, an unwitting employee with no memories of his time as a beast-man.
  
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Re: Emerald City Defenders Issues
Reply #2 - Mar 22nd, 2018 at 2:33pm
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A few weeks back I had some of DSumner's bad organization (as shown in "Mall Madness") return.

#3 – H.A.R.M. at Home – The Chosen meets Brakus, Seleriti, and Deschutes in the Anderson basement. The four hear a scream and race outside into the yard, only to find Helga Anderson (mother of Brakus) held captive, surrounded by many H.A.R.M. troopers. The two sides battle, and the heroes speedily trounce the eight armored fanatics. Mrs. Anderson is rescued, and the house is found to have suffered only minimal damage.
  
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Re: Emerald City Defenders Issues
Reply #3 - Apr 27th, 2018 at 2:31pm
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#4 – The Triskelion Gambit - Jennifer Trevanian pesters best friend Amy Rodgers about her recent seclusion.  Their plans to visit a mall are interrupted when a truck pulls up to their Shoreline bus stop, and F.I.S.H. agent Bennett informs them of a robbery in progress.  Trevanian is shocked when Rodgers climbs into the vehicle and abandons her!  Seleriti meets Bennett and the Norwegian driver, who expertly weaves through traffic, swinging by her home to pick up her bow and pet, then stopping in Ballard to grab Deschutes and Brakus.  They arrive at the crime scene in Fremont, where paranormals and multiple henchmen are robbing a small blood bank.  Ripcurl gets away with a cooler of blood, fleeing via the Fremont Cut into Puget Sound.  The driver, Tyr, joins the fight, and the heroes take down Wither and all eight mercenaries.  None of the captured criminals know the purpose behind the theft.  Tyr assists the Emerald City Defenders the next day as they move into their new headquarters downtown.  They are called to the nearby Seattle Municipal Tower, where masked thieves are robbing the Diamond Exchange on the 50th floor.  Entering via the elevator, they defeat Glamazon, Hypersonic, Bloodsport, and five more hired thugs.  Outside the window, the villains’ massive “flying tank” takes off, and the blood diamond they attempted to steal is recovered.
  
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Re: Emerald City Defenders Issues
Reply #4 - Apr 28th, 2018 at 12:01pm
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Majestic wrote on Mar 22nd, 2018 at 2:33pm:
A few weeks back I had some of DSumner's bad organization (as shown in "Mall Madness") return.

#3 – H.A.R.M. at Home – The Chosen meets Brakus, Seleriti, and Deschutes in the Anderson basement. The four hear a scream and race outside into the yard, only to find Helga Anderson (mother of Brakus) held captive, surrounded by many H.A.R.M. troopers. The two sides battle, and the heroes speedily trounce the eight armored fanatics. Mrs. Anderson is rescued, and the house is found to have suffered only minimal damage.


I'm playing around with some ideas for H.A.R.M. to make a return. More info on the organization, more bad guys for the heroes to beat up on, etc.
  

"There is no such things as a dangerous weapon, only dangerous men."

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Re: Emerald City Defenders Issues
Reply #5 - Jul 5th, 2018 at 1:38pm
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Last week was our 16th annual GuardianCon, so named after the long-running Guardians group in the campaign.  I didn't even realize until a year or two ago (when somebody else pointed it out) that we've had at least one event from the campaign each year of the Con (sometimes that event was not even run by me!).  So, to keep the streak alive, I ran another event from the campaign.  Here's the recap:

#5 – Blitzkrieg of Biters – Brakus, Tyr, and Sentinel Rejuvenator look out upon a field of Nazi zombies tearing into a large crowd of civilians.  Flashback: Henry Hyde (Rejuvenator) shares a cab with his mom Rose and friend Drake Ramoray, after a charter flight to Seattle to address the superhero’s dissociative identity disorder.  Ramoray identifies nearby supers activity with an app, and the cab diverts a couple of blocks to the area outside the Seattle Art Museum, where Brakus and Tyr try to contain the rampaging supervillain Karnage.  After chasing his friend and mother out, Rejuvenator uses the cab as a brawling weapon against the hawk-man while cabbie Sigmund Miller watches helplessly.  Eventually the trio works together to defeat the powerful creature, minimizing the loss of life.  F.I.S.H. arrives and alerts them to an emergent situation in Flint, Michigan, where monsters are attacking citizens at a park, who had gathered for a rally about their tainted drinking water.  The three heroes step through a gateway and engage fifteen zombies and their creator, Nazi Face.  The battle is long and hard, and at one point only Brakus stands against the enemy, but eventually Tyr chases Nazi Face away and the group takes down the horde.
  
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Re: Emerald City Defenders Issues
Reply #6 - Oct 26th, 2018 at 2:23pm
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A new player (someone met on the MHG forums) joined us, and looks like he might become a regular with this group.

The first half of this one was the introduction of my villain, the Cloud.  The last half was the finale of "The Triskelion Gambit".

#6 – Dark Cloud on the Horizon – F.I.S.H. puts Fred Meyer assistant manager Henry Callenid in touch with the Emerald City Defenders after he expresses concern that his manager, Jim Tufer, is being mind controlled. Tyr drives the group, which includes Seleriti, The Chosen, Deschutes, and Brakus, to the loading dock of the Kirkland Fred Meyer, where they witness Tufer in discussion with a customer. Local vigilante Chilblains and his robotic assistant S.I.D. observe the scene as well. Callenid approaches the group in the parking lot and says that they have arrived just in time to witness the problem customer, Troy Alexander. As Deschutes flies into the sky and others step out of the truck, the crowd becomes aware of the paranormals, so Alexander makes his way to his car while ignoring Tyr’s questions. Chilblains disables his vehicle right after it starts, so the man gets on his phone. Moments later, the smart phone of each hero gets an anonymous text with instructions to ‘back off’. They each then get a call, and a digitized voice threatens them if they don’t drop their investigation. The champions defiantly refuse. Alexander gets out and orders an Uber, while the Defenders get an alert that there is an intruder inside their base downtown! Chilblains joins the others as they race back in the truck, and as they travel down the freeway, the ghostly, digital form of the Cloud materializes amongst them! The villain explains that he has access to everyone’s digital secrets, and threatens their loved ones if they choose to oppose him; he then vanishes. At their base, they meet the long-retired Central African superhero Spiderwalker, who says that he is visiting them astrally. He magically conjures a briefcase full of information about Triskelion, an organization dating back to World War II that has possibly returned, and before departing warns of how dangerous they could be. Chilblains checks with F.I.S.H. and they ask him to continue to assist his new allies while they monitor Alexander. The next day F.I.S.H. shares that one of the thugs from the blood bank theft is bailing out soon. When he does Seleriti and Chilblains tail him to an abandoned vacuum parts warehouse in the Industrial District. The adventurers make their way inside, where they soon engage in battle with Quarry, Killshot, Electric Skull, Yellow Lotus, and multiple henchmen. One of the minions mans the .50 caliber gun aboard another Vector Thrust Tank and numerous heroes are felled before the enemies are defeated. Killshot retreats and villainess Viridian emerges, scoops up Yellow Lotus, and teleports out. The victors are stunned as four figures appear, reveal a bomb hidden in a wall, and disappear with the two remaining supervillains. The champions disarm the bomb and find the chest of blood and the tattered remnants of a floor plan to a museum or art gallery.
« Last Edit: Oct 30th, 2018 at 1:16am by Majestic »  
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Re: Emerald City Defenders Issues
Reply #7 - Jul 4th, 2019 at 4:33pm
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I just realized I never posted issue #7 here:

#7 – Thirteen Steps to Hell – Deschutes and friend Vic Thomas visit new T.O.T.E.M. elder Falcor Twotree on the outskirts of the Yakama reservation; he warns them that a “great evil” is about to happen and that the numbers one and three are significant.  C.H.E.S.S. Rook Tess McShane, accompanied by a Knight and Valkyrie, visits the team base and sets up a holographic message (going out to most superhero teams).  The Queen then warns that certain mystic migrations, nightmares, and the loss of psychic abilities over the last few years might indicate a major spell of potential cosmic significance!  Concerned about a possible incursion from Chaosia (Omega), she asks supers to be their eyes and ears, and cautions that they may be the first responders.  The next afternoon, Chilblains, The Chosen, Brakus, and Seleriti are flown by Deschutes to a break-in at a Harbor Island warehouse, where they swiftly defeat Cockroach and some hired thugs.  They receive an alert of something major happening to the north, and F.I.S.H. flies them to Maltby.  Their craft loses power as it lands, and they enter a foggy cemetery with many bats, where energy is drawn from a circle of six floating ghostly persons.  An Abomination and four Ghouls step out of a portal at the bottom of thirteen steps, and Chilblains fells the six humans with a mental blast.  As the demons are taken out, more emerge from the gateway.  During a pitched battle, the five overcome demons Mallus, Tregus, and Okawala, along with a half dozen priests.  They force the leader, Naamah, to flee and gigantic Saagor to retreat, and Deschutes throws the other unconscious adversaries back through.  Later, C.H.E.S.S. personnel shut down the gate.  The ghostly people are discovered to be supervillains Caster, Occult, Herald, Malastra, Devilspawn, and Malefactor.

  
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Re: Emerald City Defenders Issues
Reply #8 - Jul 4th, 2019 at 4:34pm
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For the 17th consecutive year, a Guardians campaign adventure was held at GuardianCon.  We'd originally decided against any campaign games anymore at the con, but when we ran short on games, I got asked to run this (as the namesake of the Con, Guardians games are sort of grandfathered in, anyway).

So for this one, I brought back a number of old supervillains, including a number that had been slain in the campaign a quarter century ago!

#8 – The Malevolent Mage – Tyr gets a call from Wanda Stitch of G.A.L.A.N.T., who offers to make him a costume.  Psilight of the Sentinels then requests that the team escort Henry Hyde (Rejuvenator) to a psychiatric appointment once he arrives in town.  At Sea-Tac Airport, Tyr, Deschutes, and Chilblains watch as Hyde, accompanied by best friend Drake Ramoray and Alexander Payne (teammate Raijin) are confronted by a man dressed as a limousine driver, who serves paperwork to Ramoray.  The paranormals keep the situation calm as the man confronts Ramoray, who then confesses to his friend that his true name is Drake Russell, and that he’d adopted a false name to avoid spousal support.  Revivicator and Raijin transform into their heroic personas, and the server/investigator changes from Fausto Schultz into Z-Spiker.  F.I.S.H. agent Bestyea arrives and asks for their help dealing with a monstrous creature rampaging near Mount Saint Helens.  They fly the six heroes to a remote area outside the town of Cougar, where they swiftly take down the resurrected monster Terra-Rizer, who had been slain 25 years prior.  C.H.E.S.S. arrives, and Rook Karen Monak explains that Terra-Rizer’s return is a byproduct of some mystic in the Secret Land somehow raising previously dead villains.  Traveler sets up a portal there and gives them a device to find the location, as well as a way to call for extraction.  They then step through into the primordial jungle, where they soon witness enormous dinosaurs!  After fighting off assaults by a Tyrannosourus rex and a flying Pteranodon, they come across the ruins of an ancient ziggurat.  They race up the steps and interrupt a human sacrifice by primitives, but then a group of Smilodons savagely attacks everyone.  Once the saber-toothed cats are chased off, Black Seer emerges from the lower part of the structure, accompanied by formerly deceased criminals Anaconda, Mind Gem, Cicada, and Coral Snake!  The two sides battle, and Black Seer teleports away.  Eventually Cicada is defeated and Coral Snake convinced to stop fighting.  Mind Gem flees, and after a long fall back to Earth after grappling Deschutes, Anaconda is persuaded to surrender as well.
  
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Re: Emerald City Defenders Issues
Reply #9 - Jul 31st, 2019 at 4:46pm
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Last Saturday we played issue #9:

#9 – Answering the Call – A hologram of the GamesMaster appears to the team at their base, alerting them that the Cosmic Train has been hijacked and now runs only between Alpha and Delta.  The team then watches a press conference where businessman Lance Dragon explains that both dimensions are in danger, and that he and Doctor Apocalypse welcome aid by ‘capes’ as they contest the forces of Motivator and Lord Malek.  Later, as Chilblains hikes with friend Justine Batdorf in the Cascade Mountains, she expresses concerns about the Army feeding him jobs, encourages him to continue with his new teammates, and vouches for F.I.S.H. agent Jack Bennett.  She also warns that he might be part of an Operation: Trepanning, run by a Major General Josiah Wilkins.  Bennett and fellow agent Daylon Reed, along with Canadian hero Chat Noir of the Crimson Guard, meet Brakus, Seleriti, Chilblains, Tyr, The Chosen, and Deschutes at the Space Needle for lunch.  Chat Noir identifies two villain groups (Spectrum and the Sinister Seven) involved in their battle at the vacuum parts warehouse months earlier and suspects that the latter may have been mercenaries working for Triskelion; he also reminds them of the floor plans they recovered.  He explains that the targets (blood and diamonds) the team foiled Triskelion from acquiring in Seattle have been stolen in the last few months in Vancouver, B.C.  The group returns to their base and after a lengthy search find the plans, which they identify as belonging to the Museum of Flight in Seattle.  They call to warn the museum, who assure them that the superhero Apogee has been hired to guard the radioactive meteorite known as ‘Heaven’s Knock’.  Tyr drives there while The Chosen, Deschutes, and Chilblains visit city administrators downtown.  Tyr then watches from his truck as a van pulls up and three costumed criminals rush inside.  He calls Brakus and moments later Apogee flies out after being overwhelmed by the robbers.  Tyr disables the van and confronts the five Malevolents when they return, but is swiftly exhausted after Pulsator drains him of energy.  Greyhawk grabs Slab and Miss Fortune and flies away, as does Cerberus and Pulsator.  The responding Emerald City Defenders, being carried by Deschutes, chase them down and force the villains to the ground.  After a short fight that downs all their colleagues, Greyhawk and Slab agree to surrender and cooperate.
  
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