Saturday 3 May 2014

My FFO Campaign - Mayhem City Massacre part 1 - Week 2

This is a departure from my usual FFO campaign batreps, in that it does not feature Team Vampifan. Mayhem City is a big place and I want to tell stories about its many heroes and villains during the time of the zombie apocalypse.
This scenario, "Bushwhack" is a variant of the "Robbery" scenario, both of which appear on p.71 of the ATZ-FFO rulebook. This Encounter took place in the evening of Day 9 of the apocalypse. This Encounter will use the rules from the FFO rulebook and some of my House Rules. I will be using Colgar6/Hugh's deck of Random Events cards instead of the table on  p.59.  As before, this batrep will be rules heavy for the benefit of new players. All notes relating to the rules will be written in blue text to differentiate them from the rest of the batrep. All page numbers will refer to the ATZ-FFO rulebook.
The Encounter began with a gang of 8 African/American Crips Gangstas outside a warehouse they owned facing one of their most hated rivals, a gang of 10 Hispanic Kill Krazy Kommandos, who had arrived in a sedan car and a van. For the purpose of this Encounter the Crips were classified as the player character group and the Kill Krazies as the enemy. I simply diced to see who was who, as I had no preference over who were the good guys and who were the bad guys. To me, they were both equally bad.
Encounter = Bushwhack (see p.71)
Location = Urban Centre of Mayhem City, USA
Time = Evening during Day 9 (Week 2)
Initial Encounter Rating = 5

CAST - The Crips
Adam Obunge. Rep:5 Star Ganger with Cruel and Hard as Nails Attributes.
   Skills = Drive:3, Melee:5, Shoot:5, Fitness:5, People:4, Savvy:5.
   Weapons = Automatic Shotgun, .50 Desert Eagle Big Ass Pistol, Machete (1HW).
Frederic Blackmore. Rep:5 Co-Star Ganger with Stone Cold Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:3, Melee:5, Shoot:5, Fitness:4, People:4, Savvy:5
   Weapons = 9mm M92 Beretta Pistol.
Quadri Ogunkoya. Rep:5 Ganger with Brawler Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:3, Shoot:5, Melee:5, Fitness:4, People:4, Savvy:5.
   Weapons = 5.56mm M16 Assault Rifle, Knife (1HW).
Michelle Warboyes. Rep:5 with Wary Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:4, Melee:5, Shoot:5, Fitness:5, People:3, Savvy:4.
   Weapons = 5.56mm Steyr AUG Assault Rifle.
Paul "MC Hellraiser" Mafolabemi. Rep:4 Ganger with Party Animal Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:3, Melee:2, Shoot:4, Fitness:3, People:4, Savvy:4.
   Weapons = 2 .50 Desert Eagle Big Ass Pistols.
Jevon Yenga. Rep:4 Ganger with Nerves of Steel Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:3, Melee:4, Shoot:4, Fitness:4, People;2, Savvy:3.
   Weapons = 12g Pump-Action Shotgun, Knife (1HW).
Josh Winkler. Rep:4 Ganger with Reckless Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:3, Melee:4, Shoot:4, Fitness:3, People:2, Savvy:4.
   Weapons = .45 Thompson Sub-Machine Gun.
Joseph Dosenmu. Rep:3 Ganger with Wishy-Washy Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:3, Melee:3, Shoot:3, Fitness:2, People:2, Savvy:1.
   Weapons = 12g Olin Automatic Shotgun

CAST - The Kill Krazy Kommmandos
Ricardo Santana. Rep:5 Star Ganger with Resilient and Wary Attributes.
   Skills = Drive:4, Melee:4, Shoot:5, Fitness:5, People:3, Savvy:5.
   Weapons = 5.56mm MI6A2 Assault Rifle, .50 Desert Eagle Big Ass Pistol, Knife (1HW).
Leon Hedoya. Rep:5 Co-Star Ganger with Stone Cold Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:4, Melee:5, Shoot:5, Fitness:4, People:3, Savvy:5.
   Weapons = 9mm Heckler and Koch MP5A Sub-Machine Gun, Knife (1HW).
Chico Rivera. Rep:5 Ganger with Grease Monkey Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:4, Melee:5, Shoot:5, Fitness:3, People:4, Savvy:5.
   Weapons = Franchi SPAS12 Shotgun, .44 Desert Eagle Big Ass Pistol.
Miguel Castillo. Rep:4 Ganger with Greedy Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:3, Melee:3, Shoot:4, Fitness:4, People:2, Savvy:4.
   Weapons = Franchi SPAS12 Shotgun, Knife (1HW)).
Julio Cesar De La Hoya. Rep:4 Ganger with Agile Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:3, Melee:3, Shoot:4, Fitness:4, People:2, Savvy:4.
   Weapons = 2 9mm Glock 17 Pistols.
Jesus Escobar. Rep:4 Ganger with Brawler Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:3, Melee:4, Shoot:4, Fitness:4, People:2, Savvy:3.
   Weapons = Franchi SPAS12 Shotgun, Knife (1HW).
Donna Ippolito. Rep:4 Ganger with Attractive Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:3, Melee:3, Shoot;4, Fitness:4, People:4, Savvy:2.
   Weapons = 9mm Spectre M2 Machine Pistol, Knife (1HW).
Hector Lopez. Rep:4 Ganger with Dim Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:4, Melee:3, Shoot:4, Fitness:3, People:2, Savvy:4.
   Weapons = Franchi SPAS12 Shotgun, Knife (1HW).
Samantha Mercer. Rep:4 Ganger with Haggle Attribute.
   Skills = Drive;2, Melee:4, Shoot:4, Fitness:3, People:4, Savvy:3.
   Weapons = Franchi SPAS12 Shotgun, Knife (1HW).
Linda Velazquez. Rep:4 Ganger with Tough Attribute.
   Skills = Drive:3, Melee:4, Shoot:4, Fitness:4, People:2, Savvy:3.
   Weapons = .50 Desert Eagle Big Ass Pistol, 9mm Micro-Uzi Machine Pistol.

The Encounter took place on a 60" by 30" game board with the vast majority of the action taking place outside the entrance to my large Stoelzel's Structures Warehouse. This was the first time I had used the Warehouse in a game.
This photo shows the western edge of the board. The board was divided into nine equally-sized sectors, each measuring 20" by 10". Sector 1 is in the bottom left hand corner of this photo, next to Sectors 4 and 7.
And this a view from the northern edge looking south. Although there are only five buildings on the board, they covered all nine Sectors with the Warehouse straddling six sectors (2, 3, 5, 6, 8 and 9). It did dominate the game board.
I diced for the placement for the three PEFs (Possible Enemy Forces). PEF:1 was Rep:4 and was placed inside the office block in Sector 4. To keep things easy, I placed the PEFs on the roofs of the buildings just to remind me where they were.
PEF:2 was Rep:5 and was placed in the garage in Sector 1. If there is a building in a Sector, the PEF is always placed  indoors (see p.60).

PEF:3 was Rep:3 and was placed inside the shop in Sector 3.
I did not roll for the initial placement of zombies. I did not want to complicate matters on Turn 1 as I knew this was going to be a very busy Turn. Zombies would be generated by noise, as normal... and in this Encounter there was going to be a LOT of noise!
Police would arrive in 1d3 Turns after a shot was fired. I did not bother to roll for Lack of Sleep for either gang. Again, I thought it was an unnecessary complication given the numbers involved.

MAYHEM CITY MASSACRE
TURN 1.   Activation - Crips = 5, KKK = 3, PEFs =6.
Adam Obunge led his seven colleagues outside when he was notified that a black sedan car and a black van had parked outside the front of his freight warehouse.
"What the fuck do they want?" he muttered as he saw Ricardo Santana stride purposefully towards him. Both gangs were fully armed and openly carrying guns in plain sight. Santana was the leader of the notorious Kill Krazy Kommandos, a Hispanic gang who were sworn enemies of not only the Crips but every African/American gang in Mayhem City.
"Yo, Bongo Bongo Man!" Santana sneered, deliberately goading Adam by insulting him personally. "I've got something for you, nigger!"
"Fuck you!" Adam retorted as he cocked his Automatic Shotgun.
"No, fuck you!" Santana replied with a sadistic grin. "Let 'em have it!"
For the purposes of the Bushwhack Encounter, both sides set up 2" apart with weapons already drawn. After determining which side is active both sides take an In Sight test and combat ensues. An In Sight test (see p.17) involves each figure in sight of an enemy rolling a number of d6 equal to their Rep score and modified by circumstances. All Active characters (the Crips) suffered a -1d6 modifier. Ricardo Santana and Michelle Warboyes each had the Wary Attribute, which granted them a +1d6 bonus. There is no maximum or minimum number of dice that may be rollled. Each roll of 1, 2 or 3 is classed as a success. The highest number of successes acts first moving down to the lowest and last. Those with the same number of successes act simultaneously. Reactions are not taken until after all In Sight actions have been made.
The eagle eyed amongst you may have noticed something different between this photo and the last one. Big Ollie, the Crips Ganger at the far right of the group has been replaced by Josh Winkler, who had a higher Rep and a better weapon. The dice in this photo shows the number of successes each figure scored. Everyone scored at least one success, meaning, in theory, that everyone could fire.
On 4 successes were from left to right, Leon Hedoya and Ricardo Santana for the KKK.
On 3 successes were from left to right, Michelle Warboyes, Adam Obunge and Quadri Ogunkoya for the Crips and Donna Ippolito, Miguel Castillo, Hector Lopez and Chico Rivera for the KKK.
On 2 successes were from left to right, Frederic Blackmore and Josh Winkler for the Crips and Julio Cesar De La Hoya and Samantha Mercer for the KKK.
On 1 success were from left to right, Joseph Dosenmu, Jevon Yenga and Paul "MC Hellraiser" Mafolabami for the Crips and Jesus Escobar and Linda Velazquez for the KKK.
The shooting began and it was devastating! Ricardo Santana was the quickest to the trigger. He fired his 5.56mm M16A2 Assault rifle at Adam Obunge and Quadri Ogunkoya, hitting both men and knocking them down. He actually killed Adam, but the Crips leader had the Hard as Nails Attribute which allowed him to treat his first Obviously Dead result as a Knock Down result. Lucky!
Ricardo's chief lieutenant, Leon Hedoya, was just a fraction of a second slower than his boss. He had selected full automatic fire on his 9mm Heckler and Koch MP5A Sub-Machine Gun and blew Frederic Blackmore and Michelle Warboyes off their feet. These were important results as it now meant that the Crips had no one left on 3 successes to return fire when the KKK characters who scored 3 successes came to act.
Donna Ippolito fired a full burst from her 9mm Spectre M2 Machine Pistol into the blonde-haired (from a bottle) Crips Gangsta called Joseph Dosenmu. The teenager went down in a  hail of bullets as she practically cut him in half. He was dead before he hit the ground.
Jesus Escobar could see that Frederic Blackmore, Adam's right hand man, was down but still alive. He aimed his Franchi SPAS12 Shotgun at Frederic's head and watched it disintegrate in a welter of blood and gore as he pumped shot after shot into the prone target.
Hector Lopez targetted Jevon Yenga who stood directly opposite him. Jevon took a few minor flesh wounds to his arms but suffered a major wound to the stomach. Although not a fatal blow, it was still enough to knock Jevon out of the fight.
Chico Rivera fired his Franchi SPAS 12 Shotgun from the hip at Josh Winkler. His aim was slightly off and although he failed to land a fatal blow, he blew a huge hole in Josh's right shoulder, rendering him out of the fight. As Chico cranked his Shotgun to finish off Josh, it clicked on empty. He was out of ammo. He cursed under his breath for failing to fully load it. Now the two Crips Gangers who had scored two successes were down and out before any of the KKK with two successes had acted. This was turning real brutal!
Julio Cesar De La Hoya fired one of his two 9mm Glock 17 pistols at Adam Obunge, even though the Crips leader was already lying on the ground. Julio wanted to make sure the bastard was dead! However, his shooting was not effective as it could have been and he scored nothing more than a minor flesh wound.
Samantha Mercer was one of the few Caucasian gang members of the Kill Krazy Kommandos but she was every bit as vicious as her Hispanic colleagues. She raised her Franchi SPAS12 shotgun and blasted Paul "MC Hellraiser" Mafolabami twice in the head, blowing his brains out the back of his skull. No sooner had she fired than her Shotgun clicked on empty. She, too, had run out of ammo. At this point every one of the Crips Gangstas were down and out and unable to act. There were still two more KKK gangers who had yet to act and they sure as hell weren't going to let an opportunity like this pass them by.
Jesus Escobar tried to take out Michelle Warboyes with his Franchi SPAS12 Shotgun but only succeeded in hitting her once and getting a second Stunned result.
Finally, Linda Velazquez took careful aim at the badly wounded Josh Winkler with her .50 Desert Eagle Big Ass Pistol and shot him between the eyes for an instant kill.
When the smoke cleared, the Kill Krazy Kommandos stood victorious. They had inflicted four deaths, one Out Of the Fight and three Knock Downs without a single loss. It was a scene of absolute carnage!
The three Knocked Down Crips Gangstas all had to take reaction tests. Adam used his Star Power to reduce his Knocked Down to Carry On (see p.5) and succeeded. Although he was Outgunned by Ricardo Santana, who had shot at him, he did not have to take this test because Stars can never be Outgunned (see p.24). This left him with the Man Down test. Because he was a Star, he could choose to pass 2d6, 1d6 or 0d6. His options were Carry On (this would have been suicidal under the circumstances) or Runaway. Wisely, he chose to pass 0d6 and he fled off the board. Do you blame him?
Quadri Ogunkoya and Michelle Warboyes each rolled 2d6 once but applied the result to all reaction tests that applied to them. For them that included the Man Down test and the Recover from Knock Down test. Whichever result was the worst would apply to them. they both passed 2d6, meaning they could Carry On for the Man Down test but were Stunned as a result of the Recover from Knock Down test. They would have to spend one full turn of activation lying on the ground doing nothing. 
Note that Frederic Blackmore was a Co-Star, meaning he too, had the Star Power Advantage. This could have potentially reduced his Obviously Dead status to Carry On if he rolled well enough. Despite rolling 5d6, looking for successes on rolls of 1, 2 or 3, he rolled three 6s, one 5 and one 4. The three sixes reduced his Star Power from 5 to 2 and more importantly, he was still dead. He was very unlucky.
So, all that was left to do this turn was to dice for zombie reinforcements. I rolled 28d6 in four batches of 7d6 to keep things simple. With this Encounter taking place in an urban area, zombies would arrive on any d6 roll of 4, 5 or 6. For direction I rolled 1d12, counting the numbers as the numbers of a clock dial with 12 o'clock being North. The first group totaled 4 and they appeared at 2 o'clock from the KKK to the right of the skip. The second group consisted of 3 female zombies who appeared at 1 o'clock, to the left of the skip.
There were 3 zombies in the third group and they appeared at 11 o'clock in the car park.
Finally, the fourth group appeared at 8 o'clock behind the KKK and they were made up of 4 females. 
TO BE CONTINUED
COMMENTS. At this point you'd be forgiven for thinking this was game over. I must admit, so did I. But I decided to play on and I'm glad I did. Believe me, there is still a lot more to come in this Encounter. I'll be honest, I did not expect the gunfight to be so one-sided. The Kill Krazy Kommandos were brutally efficient and their tactics were spot on in taking out opposing gang members before they could act. Tune in next time for a lot more action, excitement and gory deaths!

33 comments:

  1. Great report soo far :)
    I got ATZ-FFO to but where can i find the Stone Cold , Cruel, Tough Attribute??

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    1. Hi, Hobbyworker. The FFO scenario pack High Rise To Hell lists 36 brand new Attributes that characters can use. Any Attribute you don't recognise as coming from the FFO rulebook came from that supplement.

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  2. Crips down, now some zeds and perhaps the cops to deal with! I wonder if their luck continues? Great rep as usual Bryan, looking forward to part 2.

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    1. Well done, Dave, for not forgetting about the cops. They will arrive very soon.

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  3. Very cool, and a day early, cant wait for the next part.

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    1. I finished working on part one this morning so I decided to post it a day early. I'm sure no one will mind, Shinto.

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  4. Brutal! Scratch one gang! Great start Bryan, will the KKK carry on their rampage unchecked or will the cops respond in force? I can't wait to find out.

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    1. Sorry, Bob. No spoilers here. You'll just have to wait and see.

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  5. Bloodbath. I would like to say something more constructive but I can't! Totally one sided slaughter. But no doubt that will change.

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    1. Bloodbath is spot on, Clint. Once again, I'm afraid I'm remaining tight-lipped about what happens next.

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  6. Gang warfare just ain't pretty!

    I'm curious to know what happens next because I would have imagined this to be the end of the game - yet you say that it isn't? Intriguing...

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    1. At this point it does look like it is all over, Hugh... but it isn't. There's a lot more still to come.

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  7. Excellent, as usual. I'm waiting anxiously for the next installment...

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  8. Fantastic! It's always amazing how brutal combat in this game can be. This is quite probably the best round of shooting I've ever seen.

    I can't wait to see what happens next!

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    1. I would certainly agree with you, Jon, about this being the best round of shooting. It was extremely brutal. More to come next week.

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  9. Auch!!!!! Damn those are blazing guns!

    I look forward to seeing how they behave or react against the undead!

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    1. Guns ablazing and bullets flying with considerable accuracy, Johnny. Keep on watching, my friend.

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  10. Interesting game - I didn't knew the stand-off would be THAT up close and in the open. As others, I'm really interested in seeing how the game changed so much it wasn't over just yet!

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    1. That's the way the scenario was presented, Mathyoo. The beauty of ATZ is that it quite often writes itself and goes off in directions you never expected. From a storytelling point of view, this is great!

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  11. Lovely AAR, Bryan. I await the next instalment on tenterhooks.

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    1. Thanks, Simon. Make sure to check in next Wednesday.

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  12. Great start! I love your city terrain. Hopefully we get to see the inside of the warehouse in play.

    For a moment I wondered if it was all over, I mean everyone was dead to start it seemed like. Then, of course, zombie spawn! 28d6 is the stuff of nightmares, at least you didn't get too many.

    Plus the remaining gangers are pretty well armed... I'm looking forward to the next bat reps!

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    1. Thanks, Nobody667 and don't worry, you will get to see inside of the warehouse. Out of 28 possible zombies I ended up with 14, a perfectly average score given the 50/50 odds of them appearing.

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  13. Ouch! Lots of zombie food there Look forward to part 2!

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    1. Lots of zombie food, Simon and lots of zombies as well.

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  14. Now that was bloody good, waiting for more and loved the comment (from a bottle)!

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    1. Thanks, Fran. Joseph's hair colour had to come from a bottle as African/Americans just don't have natural blond hair.

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  15. Good stuff.

    I thought it would be good to share your blog so I have nominated you for a Liebster award:

    http://insosworld.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/liebster-award-questions-and-nominations.html

    It gets the word on the street so I hope you join in.

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    1. Many thanks, Steve. I'll see what I can come up with..

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  16. Even though it's a fairly implausible initial set up and the outcome of the intial "exchange" of gunfire almost inevitable given the range, I too would have said that the KKK would now race for their vehicles and skeddadle (or flee the area to safety, utilising the closest the edge of the board ) as any good ganger surely would ?

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    1. Spot on, Joe, on every single point! The set up is wholly implausible but that's the way it was written.

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  17. Great to see a Batreo again Bryan, thank you. Looking forard to seeing how this developes and great to see the warehouse in a game too, looks great!

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