Episode III: The Shambling (Part II), a.k.a. Hobo with a Shotgun

"...And you must be the magi," the man with the shotgun exhaled as he assumed a relaxed position and lowered his weapon.  His dress was priestly.  Loose-fitting, but not baggy.  I doubt he carried that shotgun around in plain sight all the time, though his presence was calming.  "I am Father George Jamieson, and I will be the Holy Church's impartial arbiter in this unexpected Sixth Grail War."

Masters and servants introduced themselves in turn, though Lancer still would not give a true name.  The priest did not seem surprised by the identities of the servants, given what he had seen.  When Ishmael introduced himself, Jamieson made reference to some obscure scriptural citation about two estranged brothers finally returning home to bury their father.  I could not help but notice a couple of the magi concentrating hard on Jamieson, no doubt scrutinizing him through magic.  Some pops and fizzles appeared in the air around Caster, seeming to indicate counter-force backlash, but oddly, nothing of consequence transpired.  Perhaps we were not simply imagining the Father's calming presence.

"Your presence here is fortunate, priest," Ishmael started in.  "We appear to have reached a quagmire that we need to pass quickly, before more of those 'things' show up."

"What is that, my son?"

Lowering his voice and drawing closer to the priest so that only the magi and servants could hear, Ishmael said, "These two," he indicated the youths we had saved, "are innocent bystanders who seem to have...lost their innocence so to speak.  Our friends have made some flashy displays, and there is no doubt that the secrecy of this Grail War is in question as long as those two remain able to speak what they have witnessed tonight."

Jamieson raised an eyebrow, looking inquisitive, "I see you paid attention to the bylaws of the Mages' Association.  You needn't worry for the moment.  Though the Mages' Association may pursue censure for grievous transgressions right away, what has transpired here appears to be maintained, and I will keep tabs on the comings and goings of your new charges.  For minor things such as this in the Grail War, I am responsible for enforcing the rules, so reporting this matter is sufficient for the moment."

"What do you suggest doing with them?"

"Whatever may please you, within reason, for the moment."  Jamieson grinned wryly.  "Keep them with you and the problem may even take care of itself," he said as he casually rested his shotgun on his shoulder.

"Well, for one thing, I don't wanna sit here all night, cleanin' up more of a mess for dealin' with these two right now," Isaac chimed in.  "Can't we wait until tomorrah?  We got more monsters on the way already."  He indicated in the direction of the growing moans to the north.

"The Holy Church has ways of taking care of cleanup," Jamieson retorted.  "You all just have to worry about killing each other."

"Then for their safety, can we leave these two young ones under your care?" Caster plaintively asked.

"Sure, why not?  I could use some extra hands to help mop up," Jamieson gave each teenager a smaller version of his firearm called a pistol.  "You all, however," he turned back to the servants and magi, "could do worse than to find the source of these monsters and stop them before they start eating the entire town."

"They are wandering and without number," Lancer piped up, "It would be impossible to track them all down before they kill someone."

"True," the priest replied, "but as I've observed them, they seem to be attracted to magic.  Since you all have some of the highest concentration of magic in the area right now, I think that these horrors will swarm to you like moths to a flame, for better or worse.  Move around, and you should be able to get them to trail you.  That should protect the populace until you can track down the source of these shades until stop this unnatural raising of the dead."

Isaac was flabbergasted., "Unnatural?  I thought it was just a European thing."

Jamieson took Ishmael aside, but I could still hear, "I know I'm supposed to be impartial in this matter, but if you want my advice, kill that one first."

I wonder if he was joking...

"Ok, Ishmael, let's get to your car!" Isaac was ready to go.

Ishmael seemed almost offended, "What makes you think I have a car?"

"Oh...well I left my tractor at home, and I can't really drive those little cars, so I just figured..."

...As it turned out, none of the masters or servants knew how to drive a standard automobile, especially not on a European road, and only three of the five of us could fly.

"I have a truck," the less shell-shocked of the two youths, who we found out was named Vanessa, said.

Just because we weren't going to fly the entire way to the root of the shambler problem did not mean that we weren't going to fly at least part of the way.  The shamblers blocked the path to Vanessa's jeep, so an aerial assault was on.  Ishmael hoisted Lancer as they both levitated upward. Isaac flew as well while readying his shiny pebbles.  Vanessa loaded her pistol and climbed on Jabir's back as he sprouted wings again.  I uprooted a tree and ran toward the approaching throng.  Jamieson walked calmly behind.

SNIKKITY-SLICE went Lancer's weapon as Ishmael flung her from on high through a pair of shamblers.  Jabir focused on balancing while Vanessa took shots at shamblers, punching holes through heads below her. Isaac did much the same, but with his reusable shiny pebbles.  Lancer got in my way (fueling my battle rage), so I was unable to perform the sweeping attack I had planned for the tree.  While holding the verdant weapon in my right hand, I caved in the chests of shamblers with my left, eventually discarding the tree.  What a waste.

We neared the jeep, and the last shambler fell to Ishmael performing an impressive spin and using the momentum of his landing to puncture the skull of a shambler with his knife.  Jamieson used an ability to detect evil presences with help from Isaac's mage sense to determine that the source of the shamblers was placed somewhere to the west.

Vague directions were better than no directions, so we were off.  Shamblers seemed to anticipate our arrival through their own magical senses.  They moved to block us or trail us, but most could be avoided.  I found myself wishing that my old horses had been as nimble as this truck with Vanessa steering.  Our path seemed to approach the local graveyard (of course), but the closer we got to our destination, the more densely packed the shamblers got.

"Guysguysguys!" Vanessa became frantic as a large pack of shamblers blocking the road came into view.

"Everyone, quickly!" I yelled.  "Thin their ranks!  Vanessa, keep going lest we be overrun by horrors trailing us.  Do not yield!"

The party put its best foot forward.  Caster caused many of the approaching shamblers to spasm uncontrollably so that they could not add to the road block.  Ishmael used magic to launch tree branches at some, knocking them away.  I stood on the hood of the car while Isaac cast a spell to keep me level.  He lowered me into a position on the front end of the car such that I made a wedge to break through the horde. As I saw the rough road beneath me and heard the groaning horde ahead, I could not help wondering if this had been my best idea or my worst idea.

WHACK
Shamblers split apart at my touch, chunks flying every which way.
THUD
Monsters outside my reach hit the metal exterior of the truck.
EWWW
Lancer's yell as a chunk of necrotic flesh hit her in the mouth.
scrreeeeeeEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
Though we had cleared the horde, Vanessa was unable to maintain control of the vehicle.  It spun and toppled over, sliding to a halt at the graveyard's entrance, where a new horde anticipated its meal.



In case anyone was interested, we DID keep score.  Here's the Grand Murder Tally so far.

Grand Murder Tally	43
	Berserker	Caster	Isaac	Ishmael	Lancer
Total	14	14	4	3	8
Session 0: "Angry Birds"
Total Kills:	0	0	2	0	1
Itemized Kills:	Lolwut? (Not for lack of trying)		2 Geese		1 Goose
Session 1: "High School of the Dead"
Total Kills:	8	8	1	1	6
Itemized Kills:	8 Zombies	8 Zombies	1 Zombie	1 Zombie	6 Zombies
Session 2: "Hobo with a Shotgun"
Total Kills:	6	6	1	2	1
Itemized Kills:	6 Zombies	6 Zombies	1 Zombie	2 Zombies	1 Zombie

Episode II: Shambling, a.k.a. High School of the Dead

Author's note: Personally, I find it a little vexing that zombies are commonly portrayed as A) craving brains or B) saying, "Braaaains," while they are otherwise incoherent.  If you ever watch a zombie movie, it's rare for a zombie to actually eat a brain and even rarer for the brain to be targeted over any other organ.  Indeed, you would be hard pressed to find a single zombie movie in which the zombies actually said, "Braaaains."  For the purposes of this story, however, I'll be using, "Brains," in place of onomatopoeia for the shamblers' moans, gurgles, and sundry vocalizations.

"By grandpappy's beard!" Isaac exclaimed as a shambling horror tried to bite him only to get skewered on Lancer's javelin.

The discussion would have to wait (despite Ishmael's grumbles about "rules" and "witnesses"), for the night was suddenly alive with the dead.  Shambling monstrosities of human corpses were coming out of the shadows seemingly willy-nilly, and apparently dead bodies brought back to life hunger for the flesh of the living or the flesh of servants, which is not really flesh due to our lack of true physical bodies.  Also, apparently this insatiable hunger gained from becoming undead means that these horrors (which I will call "shamblers") is specifically for living human flesh, since they ignored the geese.

I grabbed Isaac, and lept atop a nearby building while Ishmael levitated into the air, and Lancer took the shamblers head-on.  Jabir (Caster) set about summoning homunculi in front of him and sent them toward the throng.

From the top of the building, I was better able to survey the situation.  A horde of shamblers was coming from the north, but the field where the party was situated had already been surrounded by no fewer than twenty of the wretches.  They did not seem strong in comparison to a servant, but the prime concern was not my safety or that of any other heroic spirit, but the magi, our sources of prana and links to this world.  The shamblers would be able to make quick work of them if we did not take action.  I am but a brawler, accustomed to fighting a lone opponent, and lancer seemed to favor throwing her weapon and then approaching the target to finish it; not the ideal strategy for dealing with a horde.  We were going to have to rely on Caster, I felt, to control the crowd.

I began to feel foolish in the faces of the magi; as the shamblers started to climb the building where Isaac and I were perched, both he and Ishmael used their magic to levitate out of the reach of their would-be assailants.  “Sic ‘em, Beowulf!” Isaac cheered before popping a shambler’s head open with a shiny pebble.  Isaac’s gleeful expression persisted even when he willed the gore-soaked pebble back into his bag (which was filled to the brim with his prized pebbles).  Ishmael decided to improvise, using nearby rocks to crush shamblers through creative levitation tricks.

“As you command,” I replied to my master.  I drew out the hilt of my broken sword, Naegling, more as a show to the other servants than out of real necessity.  In these grail wars, a servant is commonly measured by the impressiveness of his noble phantasm, which in my case is my legendary hand-grip.  In life, it was my custom to take a foe using literal strength of arms.  Even when my opponent was armed, that would be an advantage to him that I would make up for with sheer force.  No sword I wielded would withstand more than a single blow that I struck.  Such was the case in the final battle of my life and legend; against the great dragon that eventually slew me, I drew my great heirloom, Naegling, and clove it in twain even as it sliced into the great beast’s hide.  In this grail war, I found myself in a situation similar to mine in life: I was strength looking for a weapon.  While my hands were on a weapon, it gained the benefits of my strength and skill.  However, aside from my broken heirloom, anything I swung to strike, wood or steel, would shatter beyond use or repair.  I knew to use nothing important, only heavy things.

As I was saying before the history lesson: I drew out the remains of Naegling since it was more impressive than my bare (bear) hands.  Still, I could not help but think that compared to what Lancer (spear) and Caster (book) were bringing to the fray, I may have been coming up short.

Shamblers struggled up the side of the building, and I caved their heads in or slashed them in two, bellowing as they bit into my flesh.  I was quickly surrounded, but my battle rage was far from quenched.

The stoic lancer was taking the brunt of the assault on the ground, but held up with remarkable resilience.  Uttering not a word, she tore holes with her javelin and slashed limbs with her sword with a  certain eloquence that one does not oft see of spear fighters.  Knowing her enemies were legion, she never stayed one place long.

“Minions!” came the keen from Caster’s side of the field as homunculi clashed with shamblers.  What the constructs lacked in combat ability they made up in being wall-like.

For every shambler I killed, two more took its place.  I slammed my fist down and destroyed the roof below the creatures and myself.  Most of them fell awkwardly, breaking bones or landing on objects.  I crushed the remainder with tables I found, and exited the classroom back to the battlefield.

“Hey, guys, wait up!  We still gotta decide when to shank you!” Isaac flew at full speed (I assume) after the teenagers, who were trying to flee the scene again.

“BRAAAA-hurf!” the youths ran headlong into a shambler.  It clawed at them and tried to bite their necks, but they dodged with surprising aplomb.  Isaac “helped” their cause by lifting the youths into the relative safety of the air.  Unfortunately, this unexpected lifting made one of the teenagers miss a dodge and the shambler grabbed onto a leg.  The three bodies flew up into the air as one.

To make matters worse one of Caster’s spells went awry.  What was supposed to be an explosion in the midst of the shamblers reversed the gravity all around the battlefield.  Down became up and up became down for everyone but Lancer (who was outside the area of effect and in the process of elbow-dropping a trifecta of shamblers from atop a metal playground fixture).  Caster was easily able to fly, as were Ishmael and Isaac, who quickly adjusted to steering the youths.  Isaac shook the Shambler off the young ones, and it proceeded to fall upward.

The only problem left was me falling upward with two shamblers.  I tightened into a somersault while holding my sword arm out, slicing through both shamblers with one swing.  On my way down, I entered spirit form to avoid injury.  The other shamblers and their remains fell with bone-splitting cracks.

Ishmael looked around from his high vantage point.  “Gravity seems to be right now.  The field looks clear, but more of those things are coming from the north.  Let’s take a moment to assess our conditions once we take out that las-.”

“Capital!” Ishmael’s warning was interrupted by Isaac as he and his charges reached the ground.

“BRAAIN-“ KA-PLOWSHHH!

Everyone turned stunned looks at Isaac, covered in gore and shards of cranium with the last shambler right behind him.  The shambler, however, was missing its head and upper torso.  Behind the shambler, pointed at where the monster’s head used to be was the business end of (what I later found out was called) a shotgun held by a towering, white-haired man clad in somber robes.

Episode I: First Blood, a.k.a. Angry Birds

I suppose I may recount these events as I experience them.  Though these wars are secrets of the magi, there is no reason that the heroic deeds of the Heaven's Feel should go unremembered.  As I, King of the Geats, have found even from reading others' accounts of my own deeds: fate often leaves clues in the guise of history.  This account is by no means complete, nor have the events that it concerns yet fully reached their climax, I feel.  I pray that even if I am not the one to hold the grail, that I may at the very least be able to witness its use for a worthy purpose and hear the story sung in whatever passes for mead halls in this day and age.

When I first set eyes on my master, Isaac Morganstern, I was not sure if he was in awe of my presence, or he had just been struck sharply on the head.  As it turned out, he always looked like that.  His perpetual energy and good will reminded me of my own kin, Wiglaf, and his tireless dedication in the face of whatever odds.  I can only hope to do his memory proud in service to this young magus.  I had scarce been summoned when Isaac turned, bright-eyed, beckoning me to go, "'Splorin,'" this new area, Porto dei Stradoni, near the city of Venice in the lands far to the south of my ancient home.  Truly, much farther south than I had ever been.  It's quite warm here.

We left our house to take in the area, noting various buildings and roads, but overall taking a rather aimless approach to things.  Isaac seemed preoccupied with the local trees.  He talked at length about his family's holdings across the sea, specifically their fine vineyards.  He seemed frustrated (or at least slightly less phlegmatic than normal) at the lack of beehives in the area, saying that they were dying out and that he couldn't find enough of them anywhere anymore, and that one day soon he would muster them all to make his family's holdings the envy of the world.  Ambitious fellow.

The eventful part of our wanderings began when we reached a high school not long after the sun set.  The area was fairly wooded with short buildings sprawled out over a wide area.  Isaac began to giggle when he spotted a pair of youths (one boy, one girl) lying down in the middle of a green field of grass.  I would have smiled at the carefree youths as well had I not noticed the seven-foot tall swordsman riding toward them on a steed made of shadows.  Clearly, I was not the first servant to be summoned.

The rider noticed Isaac, and decided to switch his attack to my master.  I intercepted the attack by stopping the horse's charge and lifting it off the ground by its front legs.  The horse seemed suddenly lighter, and I noticed that at the same time that I stopped the horses' advance, a javelin had been lodged into the rider's chest and knocked him off his steed.  The rider, clad all in rags, was quickly on his feet before I could see who had thrown the javelin.  His rage was evident as he strode forward, right into a falling bird dropping.  He looked around in surprise and disgust, swatting at a flock of geese that had chosen this moment to begin harrying him.  Isaac wore an impish grin.

"You shall know fear!" he snarled through teeth like needles and a beard like steel wool as his sword's cruel edge made contact with my skin.  Seeing my own blood flow ignited my battle rage and I wasted no time.  I lept into the air, a full five meters upward, bringing the horse down upon the bearded servant's gnarled visage.  The shadow horse dissipated, revealing naught but a crater where the other servant had been.

A brief moment of respite allowed Isaac and me to take stock of our ally who had thrown the spear: a woman in ornate armor with light red hair.  Before we could make our introductions, she was flying toward my master, sword drawn.  Her unnatural speed alone was enough to mark her out as another servant.  She struck hard with her blade just behind Isaac.  Blood gushed from thin air, leaving the strong smell of alcohol, and the dark rider was visible once more.  "I will taste your suffering," he sneered, reeling in pain.

Apparently driven by some arcane purpose, Isaac used his magic to take the bleeding servant's ragged shirt.  Wounded and perhaps embarrassed, the rider focused his attention on Isaac, slashing at him with abandon.  Reflexively, Isaac used his magic to summon a nearby flock of geese to cushion the blow that was mean for him.  Feathers sprayed everywhere. The servant who had thrown the javelin (who I assumed was lancer) ran toward the shirtless servant, leapt over him, and threw her sword into his shoulder as she pulled her spear from his torso.  Upon landing, she quickly lanced a goose, and slammed it into the dark rider's face.  He crunched the goose menacingly.  Honks mixed with snarls as blood mixed with feathers.  It was a horrible sight that provided just enough distraction for Isaac to tackle the female youth and for the new magus to make his approach.  Three servants and two mages were on the field, it was on like Donkey Kong.

It was at this moment that Isaac noticed the two youths on the field had begun to flee.  It was also at this moment that the youths noticed another magus flying toward them.

Isaac attempted to corral the youths, "Hey, guys.  Y'all shouldn't run away from somethin' unless you know what it really is.  This one time, me and my buddy, Paul, summoned a greater abyssal alligator to deal with the infernal muskrat problem my grandpap had called into this plane while trying to fix the lawn mow-."

"What?!"  The dark rider's head quickly turned, his bloodthirsty eyes full of scorn.  "Let me have my fun!" he demanded of a presence nowhere to be seen.  "Oh very well," he pouted as he turned his horse around and began to ride off.  "I will feast upon your fear when next w-," *KA-KLUSH*.  The rider let his guard down to deliver his parting words, and I took his head off with a straight punch.  Blood, brains, and cranium showered the area (especially the youths) and we all looked on in horror.  The headless torso on the horse gasped rhythmically in what we only assume was a laugh based on its posture as it rode away, taking dark clouds with it.  Isaac and the newcomer magus both settled back on the ground.  None of us said something for a bit, but we were all thinking the same thing: that dark rider had taken blows that would fell a normal servant and merely shrugged them off.  Even the loss of his head was mere comedy and our combat nothing more than a sadistic game.  These thoughts were made words as a dark haired, dark skinned man in a turban flew on a pair of bat wings down from the top of one of the nearby buildings, saying that he had seen the whole thing.

"Ah, that guy...hoo.  He looked pretty nasty.  I'm sorry I couldn't get here sooner to help you with him, but I don't look forward to running into him any more than I have to in this Grail War," the winged man mused while flipping through a book.

"Another servant?" I thought aloud.  "It seems that we are out in force tonight.  What brings you this way?"

"Well, seeing that we're all in this grail war together, more or less, and there are strong maniacs like that running around, and my master is a very busy person, my master has asked me to see if any of you would like to form a temporary alliance during the first part of the war."

"That sounds like an intelligent decision, I agreed. "We all need our allies, and at the very least the fewer enemies we have, the less we have to worry about the unexpected.  This way we can seek honorable, glorious combat without constantly having to look over our shoulders for other members of the war taking an opportunity to unexpectedly show up with superior numbers at a time when decisive action will lead to one winner and one loser."

"The word fer that is 'gankin'',"  Isaac informed me.  "Y'know, like this one time me and my buddy, Paul, found this fresh beehive full of fresh bees, but we only had one bee suit, so I took the hive over to our apiary, but then I found this other beehive on the way, and well, we got those two to where Paul was waitin' with our first apiary-full of beehives, and well, it turns out when you put a bunch of bees from different hives together, their fury is greater than the sum of their parts.  Also, they don't just attack each other.  In fact, they just attack you (at least if yer not wearin' a bee suit).  Oh maaaaaaan, Paul couldn't even breathe until we drained the swellings that were coming in on top of 'is swellings cause he's been stung so much."

Lancer and the magus with her were notably silent.

"Okay, okay, I can take a hint."

"Those two there," Lancer's magus said, coldly indicating the blood-soaked youths we had saved from certain doom, "need to be dealt with.  We all know the rules of the grail war.  How do we want to do it?"

I approached the youths like a hulking, armored, blood-soaked father, "Go home.  Drink lots of mead.  Hopefully you won't remember this in the morning."

"That won't due," the frigid magus said.  "We can't expect them to just go home and forget about everything. We must do something more controllable.  Is it your intention to harbor these teenagers and avoid the issue that you know will arrive, or do you intend to...deal with it?"

Isaac had something to say about this, but I can't for the life of me remember what it was, but it may have been mildly offensive to (demonic?) otters.  The long and short of it is that we got off topic and then I remembered my manners.

"But wait, where are my manners?" I said, silently chastising myself, "We are all combatants in this grail war together, are we not?" (the dark-skinned may or may not have said, "We are.")  "Where I come from, it is honorable to know the name of those with whom you do battle that you may honor their names to the gods if they prove worthy combatants and so that you may inform their next of kin.  You all helped save these fine youths," I indicated the teenagers, who stopped slinking away then, "and you gave that horseman a good fight.  I look forward to doing battle all of you.  I am Bodvar Bjarki, Beowulf, son of Ecgtheow, king of the Geats.  You may also call me Berserker."

"And A'hm Isaac Morganstern..."

The others looked unsure.

"Yes, those Morgansterns..."

The others looked quizzical.

"I can see it in your eyes, that stunned look.  Clearly, you have not had much experience being in the presence of such nobility.  I understand, I was the same way when I first looked upon my grand-pappy," Isaac was utterly sanguine.  "You'll get used to it once we've been teamed up for a while."

The winged servant piped up, putting his pen away, and closing his book, "I think some of us aren't exactly comfortable with giving out our identities.  Customarily, in a grail war, the identity of a servant is one of his best-kept secrets, since it can give clues to his powers and weaknesses."

"Ah, come on, we're all friends here," Isaac retorted.

"Well, I suppose you did offer your name first," the winged servant visibly made a decision, "I am Jabir ibn Hayyan, an alchemist and Caster in this Grail War.  You've probably never heard of me."  Rather than walk all the way over to shake my hand, he elongated his arm some five meters and shook my hand, which I turned into a bear claw.  Being a servant is great our knowing gazes said in accord.

The other master allowed himself a small concession, "You can call me Ishmael.  This is Lancer."

"Well met, mage," said I, "But lady, who are you?  You clearly know your way around a spear.  It would be an honor to know your lineage."

Lancer was reticent.  "That's not going to happen," Ishmael chimed in.

I took the look of consternation off my face after one second, feeling mildly affronted.  "So be it."

"I hate to bring this up again, but we are going to have to do something about these two young ones," Caster said as unobtrusively as possible.

"There can't be any witnesses.  You all know the rules of the grail war.  Sorry Beowulf, but heavy drinking just won't cut it," Ishmael said quietly, but decisively.

Isaac was first to respond, "Agreed.  We could get a catfish and-,"

"BRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAINS"

Fate/Heresy "Season 1" preview: Shades and Whispers

There's been a tradition in my gaming/blogging group of putting up chronicles/recaps of sessions that have happened weekly or otherwise.  So far, it's generally been left to Flask or 'Dat Heretic.  Now I volunteer!  Here begin the chronicles of the 6th(?) Heaven's Feel (Grail War) from the perspective of Berserker (Beowulf).

The players:
Stormshrug: GM

BearMetal: Berserker, servant to: Isaac.  Known as Beowulf, Bodvar Bjarki, and other bear-son legends.  A notable berserker in his time, he went to Denmark when King Hrothgar outsourced the job of exterminating the monster, Grendel.  Beowulf handily (pun intended) deafeated the monster and its mother, then ruled over his own kingdom of Geatland until he was slain in battle to defend his homeland by a dragon which also fell in the conflict.

Mister Flask: Isaac, master of: Berserker.  Hillbilly to some, nobility to others.  He seeks the grail to gain absolute power over all bees to augment his family's agricultural holdings (and probably rule over the bayou with an iron fist filled with stingers and honey).

Mduo: Ishmael, master of : Lancer.  A secretive trueborn magus from the United States.  He enters the grail war with a steadfast demeanor and is ready to get treacherous up in this bitch.

Chibi:  Lancer, servant of: Ishmael.  A quiet, red-haired woman of spear and sword.  She flies toward her foes with unconventional tactics that lead to the pointy end winding up in the bad guy.

Ricecakes: Caster, servant of : Unknown (at least at the beginning of the campaign).  Explosions from nothing? Check.  Lightning from hands?  Check.  Body morphing?  Check.  Healing?  Check.  Flesh into fire?  Check.  This alchemist's got enough for all y'all.


In the "Fate/----" continuum, our heroes (or villains) find themselves pitted against the horrors of folklore as they attempt to get their deepest desires granted.  The fate of our PCs is at stake.  The fate of the world is at stake.  The fate of fate itself is at stake.  Our heroes strive to fight against their destinies, but destiny's a total hardass.  It's fate/heresy.


First session's chronicle coming soon.

Those lovable rogues

Almost forgot to carry out THAT MEME on the pair of characters played in our one-shots.  Straightforward, yes, but elegant in their simplicity.

From the Rogue Trader one-shot when we found out we FOWUL ALIUMS can be PCs, Kaptin Bluddflagg (my homage to Relic games):

His backup should Bluddflagg have to tackle a rubric marine down a 25 meter hole in the floor to save his crew, the crocodile to Bluddflagg's Captain Hook, Orok the Kroot:

And from our Deathwatch one-shot, it's Julius, assault marine from the Blood Angels:

Back from the dead

Good ol' Stormshrug reminded me that since we just finished an RPG campaign, it's time for a new "What I Played".  Here it is for Ceros, Techmarine of the Storm Rhinos (successor chapter to the Imperial Fists):

:-D

It is a point of pride for me that the major things getting changed in the new Fantasy Flight RPG book are the ones that this character was built on.

Also, I'm reviving the blog for the thematically appropriate task of talking about zombies.  Personally, I have a hard time seeing why people are so fascinated by an army of incoherent walking corpses, but I'm right there with the general public.  I often wonder what life would be like in a situation where people some kind of contagion has made so the dead come back to life and try to eat you and you are at risk of becoming like them/normal people are infected by some plague that turns them into mindless consumers of human flesh.

Zombies in concept are fairly old hat by now, and the bottom line for most zombie movies (especially those made by George Romero) is that humans are the real monsters.  See also 28 Days Later, the video game "Dead Rising", the Left 4 Dead comics, and many other sources for examples of this.  After all, zombies only try to eat you, so you generally know what you're up against.  Humans are the unpredictable ones.

Zombie movies also tend to follow certain rules (I know I'll be leaving out several at least):
1. Zombies don't eat other zombies.  (Don't ask me why)
2. Zombies don't swim.  (They'd drown?)
3. Zombies are attracted to noises.  Loud noises.
4. Zombies don't use tools.
5. Zombies are weak to head shots. (Not saying that removing the head or destroying the brain is the be-all and end-all, but there is no situation where it doesn't help at least a little).
6. At least one of the protagonists or villains will become a zombie.  It's just good for drama either when the character has to be put down (if a protagonist) or to show the character's monstrous nature taking form (if a villain).
7. If an uninfected character is unarmed in a room with a zombie who is aware of that character's presence at any point before that character leaves the room, barring the use of improvised weapons at the last minute, that character is toast.
8. In general, if there's more than one zombie and nobody has a weapon, someone is going to die.
9. Zombies have Feel No Pain.

These tropes are pervasive, so I have adjusted my expectations of zombie movies to account for their presence (nay necessity).  However, I have grown to expect something different from the modern day zombie movie.  While it's all well and good to pay homage to the classics, the fact is that they're classics because they've tread over this ground.  Ironically, I want something full of life from my zombie movies, not something old and rotting.  Shawn of the Dead is a very good example of this: it sticks to or avoids all of these tropes, but adds to it that the characters (who are modern day people) will simply refuse to admit that they're in a zombie movie.

Shawn: The Apocalypse is on.

Ed: Let's go to the pub like we always do.

I like it when movies teach new tricks to old dogs, so finding subversions of tropes in zombie movies is a definite plus.

Taking Stormshrug's book, I'm using a version of Rome's Rapid Rubric for critiquing anime (Action/Plot/Fanservice).  Behold the ZRR: Action/Fanservice/Zed-Score.  

- Action: I heartily believe that, at their core, zombies are mobile punching bags that give you feedback when you're sloppy.  As such, the action element of a zombie movie is paramount.  Games like Left 4 Dead, Dead Rising, House of the Dead, and even Spiderman: Web of Shadows point out to the viewer that since zombies need to be made less dangerous (de-animated?), they are going to kill you, and "that's not your mother anymore" (Shawn of the Dead), you may feel free to dispatch them in whatever way you see fit.  Have fun with it.  Go crazy (but not sadistic, otherwise you're the villain).  Disarm them (literally?) and put them out of their misery.

- Fanservice: Unlike anime fanservice, this ties heavily into the action.  What I'm talking about here is the sheer amount of lulz that can be pumped into a scene of the living beating the tar out of a walking corpse.  How much style is there?  Is it done imaginatively?  The premises for zombie movies are generally far-fetched, so let's roll with it.  Am I laughing during the movie at all?  If yes, higher score.

- Zed-Score: When it comes right down to it, a zombie movie is still a movie, and so should be judged like any other.  This score is one to assess the quality of the film in the context that it is a zombie movie.  This score largely depends on the other two scores, but will be adjusted based on the qualities that the movies has as a movie (consistent characters, snappy dialog, etc.).

Scores are from 0-10.

With all this in mind, it's time to get to my thoughts on some zombie movies.

The Horde

ZRR: 7/8/6.  This movie took me by surprise.  First of all, it's the first French horror movie I've ever seen, but the plot sounded like anything you'd get from the U.S.: cops try to take out some narcotics dealers, and while they're doing so, the zombie apocalypse hits.  So the dealers and the cops work together with a resident of the tenement that they're in to try to get to safety.  There's very little exposition, which is totally acceptable.  Neither the audience nor the characters actually know what determines who became zombies or that the apocalypse is going on until it's beating down the door.  This lack of explanations left more time for break-neck action.  What you get from this movie is mostly a subversion of rule #7: survivors fight back even while unarmed.  Somebody forgot to tell the characters in this movie that zombies are supposed to be scary.  When a person alone and taking on more than one zombie with naught but his bare fists, he is not cowering, he is fighting for his life, and he is fighting dirty.  Beyond the action, the cinematography is fairly nice, but the characters are largely too grizzled and hell-bent on revenge against their teammates to give them much depth. They are, however, a hardcore group of survivors who aren't afraid of getting their hands dirty.

Dead Snow

ZRR: 9/9/9.  I've played most of the Call of Duty games, so when I saw, "Nazi Zombies," in this movie's description, I found it hard to resist.  The story revolves around a group of Swedish medical students taking a spring break vacation to a cabin in the frosty Scandinavian mountains.  Shortly after getting there, they meet a man who warns them of evil in the area and then leaves.  What follows is an exhilarating homage to zombie gore-horror (e.g. the blatantly-referenced Evil Dead series).  This is mainly a subversion of two standard rules.  First: the zombies have retained much of their knowledge, and they were all S.S.  Second: the protagonists fight back when outnumbered and even when out-armed.  I watched this once alone and once with my dad and brother, and I found myself laughing in all the same places and even a few new ones.  The zombies are engaged and dealt with in ways that are tried and true (note the chainsaw in the box art) and in ways that are new and imaginative (e.g. one's face gets abraded off with a snowmobile).    

Mutant Vampire Zombies from the 'Hood

ZRR: 3/3/2.  I was skeptical about this movie and I probably should have listened to myself.  With a title like that, there's got to be some good comedy to come out of a zombie movie like this.  Turns out I was wrong.  From the dated visuals to the stilted writing, to the appalling acting, this was a bad movie.  Sure, you've got kung-fu being done on zombies.  Sure you've got someone actually working with the idea that, "If zombies are just people who have lost all their higher functioning, and are purely at the mercy of their basic instincts, wouldn't they start trying to do one of the other four F's once they've been fed?"  The four F's, by the way, are the functions mediated by the hypothalamus in the limbic system of the brain.  They are: feeding, fighting, fleeing, and mating.  Well.  Zombies know no fear and don't fight other zombies...  Actual quote from the movie: "I have had it with these mother fucking zombies in my mother fucking hood." *sigh*

Dead Alive (a.k.a. Brain Dead)

Seriously, guys, you should watch this.

ZRR: 9/10/10.  This is the work that made Peter Jackson famous.  Once you watch it, you'll think to yourself: I really liked the Lord of the Rings movies, but who the that it would be a good idea to let Jackson direct them based on this?  No one will answer you even if you ask the question out loud.  No one, because you're alone, so very alone.  With tongue firmly in cheek, this movie sets out to make a bloody mess of the plight of the late 20th century 20-something male still living at home with his widowed mother.  The mother gets bitten by a Sumatran Rat-Monkey (you read that right), gets sick, and to make a long story short, you get a cult classic gore comedy with too many oddly funny moments for me to recount here without doing them disservice.  This may be the only movie that I've ever watched twice in one week of my own volition when I've had other things to do.  

What got me to consider watching this movie in the first place was a friend's description of one of the later scenes wherein the main character walks into the anteroom of his house, which is full of zombies.  He summarily starts up the lawnmower he's holding, faces the blades ahead of him, and trudges through the crowd.  He wipes the blood out of his eyes, and turns around to assess his handiwork.  He sees that there are still more zombies and a few spots that he missed in his initial walk.  He sighs, picks the lawnmower back up, and resumes his steady walk.  A waltz plays in the background.

I'll be back: Bulletstorm revisited

In the past weeks, I have gotten to play Echoes and Anarchy in Bulletstorm.  Here are my takes:

Echoes: It's Bulletstorm without the dialog, cinematics, and walk long walks between battlefields.  Hooray!
Also, you start out with full ammo in your loadout with three charge shots and three thumpers.  All of these get set back to full whenever you link into a dropkit.  What's not to like?

Anarchy: Just what I expected.  The Bulletstorm formula holds up surprisingly well in a smash-tv sort of arena brawl.  This good style of gameplay comes with a high discipline requirement in stark contrast to the game's generally chaotic gameplay.  In order to make any meaningful progression through the constant waves of enemies, you are asked- nay required- to listen to your teammates; a surprising concept coming from a game that could have been designed by orks.

Gork and Mork help you if even one person on your team is mucking about.

At this point I have played a mixture of styles on each of the maps.  Here is what I have learned about the possible team compositions assuming that you do not have any means to communicate verbally with anonymous teammates (because of the madness-inducing chatter coming from the other end of that mic):

You + someone you know and trust --> Nirvana:
The way the game was meant to be played.  You work together to pull off the team skillshots when necessary, and sometimes you'll just happen to make some awesome flukes.  It's especially good if you can coordinate when to activate the thumper or blood symphony as these actions are time-sensitive and have the potential for high point yields. Having said that, my advice to newcomers to this mode is to make sure that you have at least one person with you who has beaten the campaign and to whom you will all defer (at least a little bit).  Everything in anarchy is time-sensitive, so you lose your rhythm and it breaks up the pace if you have to look up how to perform certain kills in the skillshot database.  Therefore, it helps to have one dedicated lexicon of murder variety to explain what a certain kill is and/or tell someone to stand in a certain spot and leash an enemy while he teaches by murder-example.  In this situation, however, it is imperative that you listen to a) when someone notices that there's an enemy with the team skillshot icon over his head and b) when the murder-lexicon explains the plan.  This strategy has worked with a number of different people, is easy to pick up, and makes a two person party completely viable in this game mode.  When you have four people who can all communicate, hilarity will ensue, but everybody'd better make sure that each individual knows what he or she is doing and to hold off when someone announces the intention to use the thumper or blood symphony.

You + someone you know and trust + 2 anonymous punks --> Semi-Heretical:
You've got a good thing going, but then someone has to go and mess it up.  While you and your teammate are executing your precisely coordinated executions, the biggest challenge is getting to the kills before your pair of lone wolves do and try to take all the apples for themselves.  The enemy is the least of your worries.


You + 3 anonymous punks -->  Do not attempt:

Lead for the lead god: my take on Bulletstorm

Those of you who know me know that I'm a fan of things that are over the top.  Epic and People Can Fly recently released the game Bulletstorm, which I felt would tickle my fancy.  This game is heavily based on style and aesthetic.  For those of you who have not been following it, consult the following hastily-made chart:

Any questions?

Having said all this, I shudder to call this a true review of Bulletstorm rather than just my personal take on it.

In recent years, shoot-'em-up games (or sh'mups as some call them) have taken two different directions:

1. Realistic - e.g. Call of Duty, Tom Clancy Games.  You are a soldier who is equipped with weapons that existed in the last century or are likely to exist in the next ten years.  You can take more than a normal person could before going down and you heal unbelievably quickly from bullet wounds, but that's just the nature of the video game beast.

2. Superpowered - e.g. Gears of War, Far Cry: Instincts, Halo, Red Faction.  You are a fighting machine (literal or otherwise) who does things that a realistic soldier can do, but better (e.g. somersaulting in combat), you have super weaponry (e.g. lasers from space), and you may be given superpowers (energy shields, super speed).

Each has its pros and each has its bros who support the games heatedly.  As time has progressed, the challenge has gone out to developers to do something ULTRA-REALISTIC while still building on video game styles of fun  in shooters.  In contrast, while the pursuit of realism in a simulation is a worthy effort, developers making games designed to be ultra-superpowered has been surprisingly lacking.  

Enter Bulletstorm.

I'm pretty confident that when Gears of War was released, Epic Games was pretty pleased with itself.  Sure cover mechanics had been used in shooters before (see PsyOps, Kill.Switch, etc.), but Gears did it with style, polish, and a chainsaw on a gun.  Way to raise the bar, Epic!  Now to top it...

Too much is never enough.

So then People Can Fly said, "We see what you did there," and took Gears to its logical conclusion (sans the iconic chainsaw gun).  Reductio ad absurdum at its finest.

In Bulletstorm, you take the role of a space pirate voiced by Steve Blum as he takes on hordes of crazies, monsters, cannibals, and other kinds of monsters with his freshly cyborgified friend, Ishi (which means "man").  Your ultimate goal is to take revenge on your foul-mouthed former boss.  Five minutes into the game, you drunkenly fly your space ship through the big-bad's space ship.  The rest of the story is framework for set pieces and ridiculous situations in exotic, deadly environments.  The story is ass, the characters are archetypes, the environments are scenery gorn.  You play Bulletstorm 1% for "witty banter" and "marvelous views" and 99% for gameplay.

Your options in gameplay are guns on normal fire, guns on charged fire, the boot, and the leash.

- Guns generally fire bullets or explosives.  Good times.

- Alt-fire guns usually just do more damage and have a special effect (e.g. setting something on fire).  Therefore they can be used to kill things quickly to get points quickly.

- The boot (straight out of Duke Nukem) can be used to launch enemies (including by using the slide, which is essentially a sprint-kick).

- The leash is a take on Nero's demon arm from Devil May Cry 4.  It's a means to pop guys into the air en masse or bring guys from out of cover to right in front of you (the pull to the boot's push).

The guns are fitting.  Sure you've got your basic assault rifle, but it's alt-fire fires 100 bullets at once and flays all the skin off a guy's body. Another popular one is a bola gun with a grenade on either end.  It wraps around an enemy, immobilizing him and turning him into a bomb that can be kicked, leashed, or just plain blown up.  Or you could not blow him up, toss him into an industrial fan, and get the "sadist" skill shot for 100 points (he blows up once he's dead anyway).  I don't want to spoil how the other weapons work, but suffice it to say they are plenty cool and plenty manly:

Who the hell do you think I am?!

These are what you have to work with.  The trick with Bulletstorm is making them work together, which is something that most shooters don't make you do.  In Call of Duty, for example, you have a go-to gun and a secondary gun for special situations.  This leads to most combat activities being straightforward shootouts while you hide behind cover to reload or heal.  The difference with Bulletstorm is the skill shot system.

My favorite game ever is Devil May Cry.  Its plot is so bad and inconsequential that you can just ignore it, it establishes a cocky, badass protagonist, the enemies are big, ugly monsters.  It's a pretty standard third-person action game where you fight demons and .  What is non-standard about it is that it implemented the "style" system which rewards you with points (which can be used to purchase items and upgrades) and the satisfaction of pulling of bitchin' combos.  A complaint that will be levied at button mashers such as fighting and action/adventure games (e.g. God of War) is that there will be one combination of moves that will just dominate all others, so why would you ever use a different one?  The style meter creatively deals with this problem and opens up the imagination of the gamer not just to play the game, but to play with the game.

This is what Bulletstorm does by implementing the skill shot system (more on this later).  With its approach to combat, it is a cross between Devil May Cry and Gears of Awesome.  No enemy is difficult to kill in this game.  Everything can be dealt with handily just by unloading bullets into it.  But where's the fun in that?  Bulletstorm borrows core concepts from a lot of other places and integrates them in a very satisfyingly tongue-in-cheek manner.  Not only are you rewarded with flashing lights and funny titles for your kills, skillshots are how you fuel your destruction.  Ammo dumps are frequent in this game, but you need to complete skill shots in order to use them to buy your ammo and upgrade your guns.  If you don't play this game like a normal shooter, then you'll be stuck running and gunning with the assault rifle all the time.  If you play this game like a stylish badass, you will have flail grenades and canon balls coming out your ears and the mayhem will not cease.  The boot and the leash are essential for skill shots.  They allow you to arrange the battlefield the way you want it, and they also give you some breathing room.  The great thing about this pair of tools is that they each put a time distortion field around their target when used (no, they never justify why your boot slows down time).  

Za warudo!

It's the interplay between all of your options and the coaxing that you are given to utilize all of your options that makes this game so great.  As the developers say, "Stop playing a shooter, and start playing Bulletstorm."

Apart from the single-player mode, there are two others: echoes and anarchy.  Echoes takes you to different spots in the campaign, gives you a set of weapons and makes ammo dumps automatically refill your ammo but take away your ability to upgrade gear.  You are then promptly sent on your way to make as big a mess as you can in the shortest time possible.  Your scores are posted online and you can compare them with friends.  It's fun and arcade-style, good for a short romp doesn't bother with plot.  Anarchy is a mode in which you and three other players try to get the highest score you can in wave after wave of enemies.  I haven't played much in this mode, but if you die in it before wave 9, you either suck or have a bad connection.  The hard part isn't the enemies, it's getting enough points to get to the next wave.  Each round, you get a chance to use your points to upgrade your gear, buy new weapons, or buy ammo.  You level up with play, but the only things that stay with you from game to game are your outfit options.  The fun thing about anarchy is that it unlocks new skill shots that are team-based.  These are essential to progressing through the match as some enemies will indicate that they will yield more points if you work together in a certain way to dipatch them (e.g. kicked them to your partner so he can shotgun blast them off a cliff).  While fun in concept, there is a trick to its execution: lone wolves don't work.  This is a game mode that (like Left 4 Dead) is MUCH better when played with people you know and can talk to.

Long story short: Bulletstorm is a fantastic game that satisfies your craving for things that are ridicu-awesome.   In my eyes, it breathes life into shooters as a genre by forming a cunning hybrid with beat-'em-up games.  Reviewers have claimed that this game is a good first step, that there is something shining beneath a gritty exterior and the game needs to be polished to a shine.  I agree.  Bulletstorm is a great first step and I fully endorse the trend that it heralds.  Not to spoil the ending (like it matters), but it leaves the franchise wide open for a sequel.  I anticipate this sequel eagerly.

Less originality, more theft.

Bears deserve equal rights to humans.  Bear lawyer will make sure they get them.

http://bearlawyer.wordpress.com/page/14/

Rather than think of an original post...

I'll just link you to this other one that I found entertaining.

http://www.headinjurytheater.com/article73.htm