We're Really Not in Parcher's Anymore... (Apocalyptic Dispatches from Parcher's Pt. 4)

It's so pretty it makes me feel pretty too! #ApocalypseWorld #AdvancedFuckery

A photo posted by Zack Schwartz (@thatwordyguy) on Jan 28, 2017 at 8:42am PST

Look what came! Not in time to run our fifth session of Apocalypse World, but still, it's a gorgeous book, though after running Apocalypse World off of print outs and tablets for the last two years it'll be an adjustment to run from a book, but a good adjustment.

Oh god. I really do apologize for this post, it's... it's not going to be a great recap. About an hour into the session I said out loud, to the players "Shit, I'm not taking any fucking notes, I am a shit GM" and then before I write the session up on Monday while it was still more or less fresh in my head, my wife and I got the stomach flu, probably from Gimli, the apoca-baby (whose arrival heralded the end of the first Apocalypse World game I ran for this group). So yeah, I'm trying to put this all together on like five words of notes a week after the fact through a haze of several days of fever dreams. I can make no claim that my recollection is actually what happened... Apologies.

So what maybe happened last time? Let's maybe find out!

Big Trouble on Little Rimpoche - New Year's RPG

So, as is our tradition, Thomas and I ran a Holi-New Year's RPG game. Previously we've called it New Year's D&D, though it hasn't always fallen on New Year's. Last year, of course, we attempted to each run the same dungeon of Dortherdoreft, and the year before we each ran a D&D 5e Planescape one-shot and I belief that my (in)famous all-"hobbit" ghoul-battle adventure was also a New Year's D&D game of the distant past... So, because we foolishly try to escalate our nonsense each year, this year we decided we would attempt to run a table-top game with us as tandem GMs.

Obligatory Ancient Psychic Tandem War Elephant pic.

The thought was that we would run a 10-12 player game where we ran it simultaneously, each handling 5-6 players. We discussed (re)using and expanding a Vampire the Dark Ages one shot that Thomas had written and run that was loosely based on or a sequel of sorts to my online influence heavy Toulouse game of yore, but I pushed for Fading Suns instead, thinking that VtDA will be the game I run for my Apocalypse World group once that campaign reaches its inevitable and fiery conclusion. After considering our options, we chose a planet/plot seed from the Weird Places supplement. Spoilers for the Rimpoche section of Weird Places follow...

Bringing a Hand Grenade to a Tire Iron Fight (Apocalyptic Dispatches from Parcher's Pt. 1)

First, a reminder, please consider supporting my 2016 Extra Life campaign. It's not often that I get to put my nerdy hobbies to the cause of good, so donations do mean a lot to me. Thanks!

So... last month I started a new Apocalypse-World Campaign, taking the second edition rules out for a test drive, and got to run a second session this last Saturday. For this particular campaign, I went in blind, not having any ideas what I'd run until the players chose playbooks and created their PCs, and so I ended up having the following to toy with (a note, Parcher is the Hardholder NPC I created once it was clear there wasn't a Hardholder PC to run the joint):

• Pinky - The Chopper
• A woman with a busted face, wiry body and kind eyes. Wearing combat biker wear and a grotesque prosthetic leg with lots of straps, buckles and a complicated harness.
• Has 2 harm gang medium savage mobile 1-armor, vulnerable to breakdown. Notable gang members: Winkle, Goldy, Stinky, Gary (the new Guy), Larry, Harry and Barry. Gang can call her Half-Pint, but no one else can.
• Left Man bleeding and did nothing.
• Has a side-car for Thirteen to ride in.
• Just coming back to Parcher's Hardhold on day 130.
• Ming - The Driver
• An older Asian woman with a fine-boned face, sad eyes and a slim and frail body. Wearing an immaculate windbreaker suit. Also has a comfortable, hand-built, prosthetic leg with a complicated harness.
• Has a Buggy that is fast, pristine, luxe and cramped.
• Has been with Firefly for days on the road.
• Also just coming to Parcher's Hardhold.
• Man - The Gunlugger
• Concealed gender, battered old armor, a dull face, sad eyes and a stringy body.
• Carries a silenced sniper rifle, a shotgun and a shit-ton of knives.
• Got Ming out of some serious shit and used to ride with Pinky's gang until they abandoned him in Parcher's Hardhold. Now serves as Parcher's enforcer and sometimes bodyguard.
• Firefly - The Battlebabe
• A woman with a girlish face, merciless eyes and a slim body, clad in display wear with high boots.
• Wields a long-bladed sword staff.
• Does odd jobs for Parcher, as well as Twice, who runs a club in the hardhold.
• Has fought shoulder to shoulder with Man. Trusts all the PCs but Pinky, who she thinks she can take in a fight.
• Thirteen - The Child-Thing
• A girl with a pretty face, wise eyes and a child's body, clad in scrounge wear.
• Always hiding from the Wolves of the Maelstrom, perversions of birth, who look like beasts under their disguises but they have empty holes for eyes and they only howl when their nature is revealed.
• She has a radio that speaks only to her, and her den is a crooked, labyrinthine set of interconnected tunnels and boltways with ways into basically everyone's spaces, even if they've taken pains to close them off.
• She thinks Ming and Man might be Wolves of the Maelstrom.

Fair warning... plenty of foul language below the cut...