# First session from a player's perspective



## Redbadge (Aug 3, 2011)

*WARNING SPOILERS FOR FIRST PART OF ADVENTURE 1 AHEAD*

I thought I would share the e-mail I just sent to the rest of my group:

"Team,

 The first report is attached. I think it has some entertainment value to it. In particular, I would check out the casualty list for the Coaltongue Sabotage. I named our team RHC Gold, to differentiate it from any other RHC teams that may exist. If anyone objects, let me know.

 Does any else feel like we’re playing in a movie like James Bond/Mission Impossible/Indiana Jones? I do; Zeitgeist is incredible.

 Take the first session, for instance.

 The movie/adventure opens with a cold open, right out of every James Bond movie you’ve ever seen. RHC Gold, a team running the gamut from intense to witty, scans a crowd of hundreds behind a long police cordon. Meanwhile, the audience sees the dockers slowly moving through the crowd ready to make their move. The movie quickly introduces us to each of the stars: Kirk, Bellicose, Irony, Doran, and Rai, who immediately demonstrate their proficiency by rounding up the troublemakers and working with another character to wrap up the scene.

 Cut to the crowd flowing to the ship, with dignitary after dignitary arriving while Inspector Delft (RHC’s M) briefs the team on their first mission. And since it’s on screen for the audience (and it’s on the maiden voyage of a ship), something is bound to go wrong, right out of Speed 2, Titanic, and Under Siege. What else, but terrorists.

 The heroes interact with the villainess immediately, in order to put a face on the bad guy (one who will obviously get away, otherwise there is no rest of the movie). There is even a Bond girl with an unusual name who is actually something other than she appears to be (Eladrin Handmaiden Sokana Rell). The camera cuts back and forth between the unaware, but alert RHC as they move about the ship and the Duchess’s agents as they work behind the scenes to sabotage the ship (think the beginning of Con Air, Speed 2, Air Force One, Pelham 123, Diehard, and many others).

 Meanwhile, the heroes talk to guards and engineers who tell them about the wards in the magazine, or the vulnerabilities and countermeasures for the engine room boiler. For the audience, this is known as Chekov’s Gun. And obviously, these characters only have names and more than insignificant screen time, so that the heartstrings of the audience are tugged when the terrorists mercilessly kill them later.

 Then, the all important fight/action scene as our rookie heroes stumble on to the terrorist act in progress. Bad guys go down, steam busts out of the wall while the camera works its way through the cramped corridors of the ship, the key villain gets away, and the second-in-command escalates the situation so that it appears hopeless. The bomb is ticking down, and the audience doesn’t know whether it is the red wire or the green wire. Cue Techno Babble - Television Tropes & Idioms. Just in time the heroes pull of a very cool resolution to the problem, timing the brand firing to exactly coincide with the crescendo of the national anthem, not only saving the ship, but not even interrupting the party above in the process.

 The heroes get commended, the king gives his speech, and we all learn that the king wants peace and will marry a Danoran.

 With the traditional cold open complete, cue the opening credits/title music: [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHQGvJ7F4ew"]‪ZEITGEIST: The Gears Of Revolution‬‏ - YouTube[/ame]

 


With the credits finished, the team is lounging around HQ when they are called into M’s (Delft) office. What awaits us there but another bond girl; indeed one who tests our worthiness before sending us on a dangerous mission, similar to A-Team, Dirty Dozen, or [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAYhNHhxN0A"]Mission: Impossible[/ame]. 




The heroes accept, and the audience sees a montage of them gearing up… and that’s where we left off.

 Not only do I think this is awesome, I can’t wait to play again. Beats the heck out of popping goblins in the middle of a dungeon."

I also attached the "police report" that I sent them. I made most things up, such as the first names of certain individuals, as well as ages and heights. For those curious, the DM designed a calendar based on the Zeitgeist Planets. There are eight months, with 28 days each (four weeks of 7 days). Each Season has two months: Spring (start of year): Apet, Mavisha, (Summer): Vona, Jiese, (Autumn): Avilona, Urim, (Winter): Av, Nem.


Also, here is a brief listing of the party:


Kirk Fleetfoot (me): male human Yerasol veteran thief
Rene "Bellicose" Bosson: male tiefling gunsmith hunter
Doran: male elf docker whirling barbarian
Irony: female eladrin Vakeshi mystic cunning bard (multiclass swordmage)
Rai: male windsoul/cindersoul genasi (smoke half-elemental) martial scholar shielding swordmage


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## Colmarr (Aug 4, 2011)

Great observations! 

Any chance of a spoiler warning in the title or the OP? I know that at least one of my players reads this forum. He says he avoids spoilers but he might "stumble in" to the thread and see the Duchess' and Sokana's true colours before he finds out for himself on Sunday night.


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## Redbadge (Aug 4, 2011)

Just opened up my report from another computer. It seems the font I used doesn't always show up right in some versions of Word. For those of you that are reading the report and scratching your head at poor formatting, I just want to say that my original report (and the one that I printed out for my "case files") looked well-formatted and elegant.

If you are seeing a "bad" version, just try to enjoy the content and ignore the formatting. I'll see if I can't choose a more universal font setting for my next report. I was trying to go for elegant but readable "handwriting".

Also, some of the group didn't seem too enthusiastic about the name "RHC Gold". We'll probably have another designation in the next report, a change perhaps spurred by our upcoming mission.

Anyways, thanks for reading.


EDIT: I've attached a scanned pdf version of my original report. It may be a slightly better version for those that are interested in reading it.


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## benfromidaho (Aug 6, 2011)

I just read your incident report, and I LOVE IT!  I'm half tempted to require my player's to file incident reports, just to see what they'd come up with.


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## Redbadge (Aug 16, 2011)

*More spoilers*



We've made it to the lighthouse on Axis Island so far, and we'll work our way up the docks to infiltrate it next session (when we last left off, we had just swam up behind the boat by using Water-breathing, in order to avoid the lamp-lit bridge).

Last night, I helped the DM put together a battlemap for next session, since it seems that it will play an important role in next session's scenes. Photos are included below (taken on my phone). I admit it is altered from the original map, for layout and stability purposes. Hopefully it won't hurt us any. I see that their are numerous guards here, where there didn't appear to be many across the complex at-large. I guess they understand the tactical significance of the seagate. To bad it won't help them any.


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