From: Laserlight <laserlight@q...>
Date: Sun, 27 Feb 2005 23:51:03 -0500
Subject: [ECC AAR] [long]
Back from yet another great ECC. First person I met as I came through the door was the esteemed and wonderful Beth "Yes, Dice Have 1's in the Northern Hemisphere Too" Fulton. She gave me a (toy) authentic Australian sheep, thus getting the weekend off on the right foot (from my point of view, anyway...YMMV). Good to see Wi'Sel Wasserman, Phil Pournelle, Mike Sarno, Magic, Los, plus plenty of other regulars and new folks. Friday night was the pickup Stargrunt game, with the righteous Brethren of the Brown Rocks sweeping the hapless and craven Grey Rock Gang from the board, meanwhile demonstrating that "there's no point in shooting at Laserlight". I had the most heavily armored squad on the board and never had to make an impact vs. armor roll (although a persistent sniper did manage to suppress me a couple of times). Kurt Wasserman bravely played rear guard for the Grey gang until he was wounded and used as a Cub Scout merit badge project (read the quote board). Saturday morning I wandered up to the table where Stuart Murray was setting up "A Small Matter of a Bonus." Stuart looked over and said "I need a devious underhanded schemer to play the Weyland Yutani executive, so that's your faction." I sent the RDiv team off to capture Predator tech and the TechDiv team off to bring back an Alien queen egg plus royal jelly, making it clear that quarterly performance reviews were coming up soon (someone, probably Aaron N, said "at Weyland Yutani, quarterly reviews happen every week"). We had a minor setback when an overeager Marine lieutenant fired a warning shot *through* our dropship's bow; however, due to my take-charge management style, we converted this impromptu cost-cutting operation into a profit center by sending the Marines a 186 line-item bill for the dropship, its crew, environmental remediation, transportation, new-equipment replacement costs, etc etc. I also reviewed the reports, memos and PowerPoint presentations of the field managers who were leading their combat teams. The TechDiv team faced serious challenges, including fire from misguided Marine forces, and was unable to complete its mission on schedule. I am pleased to report that one of my subordinates, (Burke, Carter J., played by Adrian) displayed initiative and aptitude for an aggressive negotiation approach, and was able to accomplish his mission on time and within budget despite a significant reduction in force. At the end of the game, I accepted a promotion to Senior Executive Vice President. Saturday afternoon was Carnage con Queso, which will take more explanation than I can manage right now. Doug Perrins brought a squad which broke the 50 Cheese Points level (a large squad of undead with sniper, rocket launchers, and so forth--most players were under 20 Cheese Points). Mike Hudak's tank ran over two of the news crew but missed Brun Hilda four times, then tried to self destruct (to catch her in the blast) but failed, then machine gunned her, then bailed out and shot her with SMGs...and she still survived it all. On the other end of the map, some ninjas stole cheese from a squad of power troops, who chased them but couldn't pass the morale test to melee them; the ninjas (down to two by that point, IIRC) eventually charged the PA squad (which broke and fled), then slipped off the map with a d30-sized cheese. I brought Darth Baa and his Imperial Stormsheep, and really wasn't planning on winning. I gathered a few cheese containers and then settled in on top of a hill and planned to stay there. Beth tried to shoot at me, but I pointed out that I was Darth Baa, using the Force, and she didn't really want to shoot me, so she had to do something else. Unfortunately, one of the cards in the game was "Sheepishness", which if played on anyone *but me* would have caused that squad to retreat, but when played on me caused my squad to go baaserk and attack the nearest target. Unfortunately, the closest target was Beth's Nuns With Guns, who were at the bottom of the cliff that I was on top of. I tried pointing out that we were sheep not lemmings, but to no avail, so my Sheeptroopers cried "Baaanzai!" and jumped over the cliff. After a brief hand-to-hoof combat, both squads were down to 3 functional members and I retreated back to the top of the hill. Doug then shot rockets at me, but they bounced off Darth Baa's armor with nary a scuff, so he too decided "it's pointless to shoot at Laserlight". Beth (who was also not planning on winning, since she may not be available to run the event next year) then ran up the hill, dropped her cheese next to me, and withdrew. As a result, I nearly ended the game with 70 victory points, but fortunately Adrian hit me with a 50 point penalty for excessive cheesiness (all my PSB about "I'm using the Force, so you don't want to shoot me"--pure baloney, but I got away with it). As a result, Tony Finan discovered to his dismay that his 33 points made him the lucky winner of this year's Carnage con Queso. Saturday evening was the FMASheep game, which was not actually about finding TomB's soul (which was located on an entirely different continent, verify the directions next time). I will ....no. Let's just say that the GM really doesn't need to do anything to the players -- just provide the materials and they'll do it to themselves. Kudos go to Greg "Sgt Atkinson" Davis, who made his first appearance at FMASheep and managed to rescue the beautiful reporter, win the VC, and survive. Kudos also go to Tony Finan, who played the beautiful reporter (JM Fulton) in a manner which I shall definitely not be describing, and to Adrian, for an absolutely brilliant ploy which took me completely by surprise, and which I will let him explain. Don't try that again. :-) The rest of the player characters were incinerated by an exploding volcano, but in consolation, they found the silent warriors who wore white paint-- they discovered King Solomon's Mimes. Sunday morning was Aliens v Predators, with a generous helping of Corporate and Marine troops. My predators slew half a dozen alien drones in unarmed combat, which was a good thing as I couldn't hit anything I shot at. Then the Thing That Couldn't Be Killed crushed me in hand-to-tentacle combat, and I determined that when you die with honor, you're still dead. This was sort of a good thing, though, because I had time to examine Aaron's terrain and determine that if I start later tonight and work hard, I might have terrain that looks that good in time for an AvP game next year. And therefore, next year's FMA Sheep game may involve baaological weapons, brought to you by ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...