In the Service of The Quintus (Mutant Future play)

The party escaped the tunnels "beneath" the ziggurat after much difficulty upon discovering their map was rather flawed. The party had decided to offer allegiance and services to the Quintus and found themselves slightly rebuffed for the moment. The meeting with the Quintus was brief, he gladly accepted The Gamma Plasma Stone from the flatulent Desperados had them given purple headbands so they could travel safely in his territory and sent them on their way free to do as they wished with the notice "we may call upon you for aid in the future".

The party licking it's wounds returned to Fresh Pond and wisely avoided letting the locals in on what occurred out in the cinders. With the means they gains from a moderate bit of loot the party added A battle conditioned bloat to it's train of beasts and some fresh supplies.

The Quintus did not wait long before tasking his new found quislings with a mission. Through a gnarled acolyte concealed as a beggar they were tasked to travel to "Pleasant Valley Tech" and slip a disk given to them into the Master Control Computer secreted there.

The party easily hired boats to carry them and steeds across the river and spent a surprisingly pleasant evening in The Groves before moving on. One of the bloats was intoxicated by fungal miasma leaving the Groves but quick action on part of the party kept that from getting out of hand.

Outside the general location of Pleasant Valley Tech the party discovered a multi-layered ring of defenses. Mines, trip lines attached to explosives and nano-cameras that went unnoticed for a goodly amount of time. Passing through the killing field with surprising luck (only one Jackalope killed) the party came to a huge fence with a caged over top, traveling along that they found another section with a top that wasn't fenced over.
The party cut their way into the fenced area and discovered it to be populated by red bisons and packs of mini-Rex. A large and bothersome pack of the mini-rex predators were dodged at one point by the party dumping chunks of the jackalope that ran afoul of mines earlier. scouting revealed another fence between them and their goal.

After testing and a haphazard laser shot the party discovered the field past the fence and between their goal and them was occupied by a vast number of silvery sunflowers that retained and reflected light energy. The party waited until night and cut their way through the fence again and snuck across thanks to Craniax and his ability to manipulate light.

Past the sunflower field the party found a ditch with dirty water surrounding a hill which held a large wall with a faced built to look like ruined buildings from the distance. The faced proved easy to climb unfortunately for the party they discovered the security cameras just moments before three flying defense robots engaged the party. The defense robots undaunted by manipulation of visible light hammered the party. The newest member of the party, the android who served as an idol in the tunnels beneath the black ziggurat, was blown into hundreds of pieces in the first seconds of the engagement. Craniax and his ziggurat were grazed by shrapnel, the assassin android engaged one of the defense bots in flight with his katanna. Bobo and Craniax ran to the bloats and were guarded by the beasts bulk as they were hammered with autogun fire from tow of the defense bots overhead. They scurried into a culvert draining into the ditch as the assassin android lost his sword fight to auto cannon in the sky above them. Only 3 of the party survived hidden in the large pipe with the spidery a red dawg and a single jackalope.

Moving up the pipe Craniax and Bobo with the spidery snuck about the campus of the ancient college while invisible. With patience and luck they gained access to the information center.
Exploring the information center and dodging a defense bot the trio found their way to a poorly secured security monitoring station and manged to coax the spidery into incapacitating two guards with it's paralytic bite and captured a pair of dart guns before Craniax began to delve into the secrets of the computers there...

In the Black Ziggurat

More play in my Mutant Future campaign (2 sessions worth)

The Flatulent Desperadoes fled from the Black Ziggurat after scouting out it perimeter a bit longer and managed to return to Fresh Pond with map to the Ziggurat and limited details. With the information in hand the town started planning defenses but was in no hurry to launch raid and they wished the PCs fortune for wishing to do so.

The Flatulent Desperadoes returned to the perimeter of the ruins surrounding the Black Ziggurat and discovered the hostility field that usually surrounded the Pig Men didn't seem to be present and this seemingly was allowing them to gather in larger numbers and associate with a local population of mole-men and an ever growing number of mutant pilgrims traveling to the Black Ziggurat.

After a scouting run where Craniax while still invisible was almost caught by burrowing molemen the party discovered the Ziggurat was dominated by a being known as The Quintus a prophet held on a veiled palanquin borne by a number of slaves.

Under cover of darkness the Flatulent Desperadoes were able to gain access to the Black Ziggurat. They ran afoul of guards and were stuck inside the first entry of the Zigguart but were able to hide themselves thanks Craniax bending light waves to hide them. Afterward they discovered a workshop in the temple high atop the Ziggurat and an elevator descending into the depths.

Exploring the workshop and discovering someone was working on some sort of flying machine they ended up trapped by The Quintus and some of his Acolytes. They discovered the Quintus was a co-joined quintuplet Mastermind unable to move himself swiftly with considerable mental abilities. The party was captured by The Quintus and given a chance to prove themselves by fetching the Gamma Plasma Stone hidden deep in the tunnels beneath the Black Ziggurat. The party chose the chance of success verse the chance of a certain death.

The tunnels beneath the Black Zigguart proved to be a vast multi-layer complex filled with bizzare technological death traps a number of mutant guardians and others tasked with the same pursuit as the PCs. In unfamiliar territory the PCs managed to deal with many of the occupants with negotiation and intimidation instead of simple force of arms. An automated auto-rifle gave the trouble a great deal of trouble and inflicted much damage on the party before they destroyed the device and were able to pass through the chamber without being harmed.

The poor mastermind that had recently joined the group found himself bisected in the vertical plane by a Hyper-Field Warp Scythe while stepping off a spiral staircase. the party increased it's caution an vigilance even more following this death.

After passing a guard chamber of owl men deep in their cups the party discovered a small number of the owl men sacrificing an immature spidergoat to an idol that party quickly realized was a deactivated android. The party slew the owl men present and set about reactivating the Android before the drunken owl men could respond. The android was able to frighten off the owl men guardians and spare the party a fight in their weakened condition.

Delving deeper into the tunnels the party found their quarry (by fabulous luck of choices) and discovered it emanated a dangerous amount of radiation. The party cunningly sent the pair of androids in their group (thanks to the new found ally) to capture the Gamma Plasma Stone inside a sack full of lead pieces where the lead might just protect them well enough to carry the device to The Quintus and hopefully gain their safety.

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Ref notes- I've gotten a number of sessions out of just a little fun work. The Black Ziggurat and the ruins about it are a couple paragraphs of text I whipped up , the Quintus actually takes up more note space then the Zigguart and ruins do. The tunnels beneath the Black Ziggurat are an edited random dungeon from here: http://www.apolitical.info/webgame/dungeon/

I did do a quick and easy PC replacement with the android replacing the idol in the chamber where owl men were otherwise sacrificing a spider goat. Sure it was quick and easy but fun should be that way sometimes.

The Flatulent Desperdoes and the Black Ziggurat

Session 6:
The battle at The Last Bridge went poorly for the Flatulent Desperadoes and they fled surrendering the field of battle to the Medusoids and minions. The party of marauders hid in the shadows of The Golden Dome and where they were attacked by a pair of violent cyborgs. The Flatulent Desperadoes were horribly wounded by the cyborgs and since they were still licking their wounds from the battle at the bridge they decided to flee back to the shelter available at the community of Fresh Pond. Alas poor Karhoo died on the return trip falling prey to mutant predators.

Session 7:
The Flatulent Desperadoes (or the remnants there-of) spent a fortnight healing up, resting and investing in new equipment. During that time Pigmen raided the outlying farms on three occasions. The new android party member gifted by the power of flight aided the militia in scouting and a losing battle against a large number of pigmen.
The town elders offered bounties for pigmen heads and the possible camp of this large force of pig men couldn't help but entice Bobo and his new found fellow adventurers (including a Pure Strain Human they just met at their favorite drinking spot ) to head off in search of the Pigmen.
The Pigmen trail lead into The Cinders and on the thrid day of the hunt the party realized their supply of water was far too low and made to return to Fresh pond when they encountered a Nomad Caravan heading for Fresh Pond. They discovered from the nomads that there were rumors of Pigmen gathering at the site of a Black Zigguart out in the cinders. After resupplying and appropriately equipping themselves for the desert that is The Cinders the party headed back into the wastes and met little adversity in findign their way to moderately intact ruins surrounding a several stories tall Black Ziggurat defended by unknown guards who were allowing processions of pilgrims to approach the Ziggurat (all seen thanks to fancy optics, no one got close enough for a proper investigation just yet).

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Notes: hmmm, might have to stop calling the party the Flatulent Desperadoes, they lost the mutant with the gs attack and there are only 2 of the Desperadoes still alive, Craniax didn't accompany the party on the pigman hunt either.
Must get this fragment of the true Black Ziggurat ready for next session.

MutantBox Game Play 5

The Flatulent Desperadoes exited Spillside with haste after the mega-chilling at the bar. They quickly evaded a gang of canines on their train of Jackalopes and headed into the twists.
Their second day in the twists and the party runs into a mutant human being chased by a couple of Mants, they help the mutant and he joins the party.
The next night the Bay Aluminum notices a gamma Wyrm sneaking up on camp (they have a number of tasty jackalopes), battle is joined. Craniax whips up a little invisibility for himself and saves his Spidery from the Gamma Wyrm onslaught. The new mutant has a killing sphere mutation so he and Bay take on the Gamma Wyrm head on. To their dismay Bay Aluminum's radiation blasts cause no damage to the beast but the mutation does function. They are killed by it's acid breath before it is put down by Karhoo with a crossbow bolt.
When morning rolled around a patch of the Wyrms skin is harvested before giant rats arrive and start devouring the corpse.
The party found a pair of scavengers (an Android and a Mastermind) camped out on the edge of the twists within sight of the Dome ( a huge metallic golden dome). The two scavengers let the pay join them in their camp after some difficulties. When morning arrives the two decide to join The Flatulent Desperadoes and travel to the ruins rumored to sit in the center of the Tar Pit.
The party spotted but avoided a band of Leapers before trying to cross the Last Bridge instead of risking the chance of bumping into the Gargantuan Goliaths that hunt the Dry River. A minor fortified fence blocks the way across the bridge and the toll is way to high so the party assaults the barrier. The combined forced of a standard Goliath, a pack of Kamata and 4 Medusiods prove to be difficult for the party; land mines and an electrified barrier didn't' make it any easier for the party.
Karhoo tried to use his gas attack to whip out the guards (a Goliath a Medusiod and 3 Kamata) but wasn't' able to slay all of them in one blast. The party eventually killed the Goliath and 3 Kamata and launched an assault on the gate before retreating the onslaught of a larger pack of Kamata and the Medusoids.
When play stopped for the night we ended on a cliff hanger: The new Mastermind was climbing up a bridge cable trying to avoid a trio of Kamata hoping desperately the beast aren't bright enough to realize he is climbing a metal cable, Bobo is running off being harried by a pair of Kamata and Craniax is rushing to the side of Karhoo who has been poisoned by the Medusiods while the new android party member flies overhead on his mechanical wings trying to fire on the enemies below.

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The players all sort of dummy slapped themselves at one point when they realized their jackalopes could have bound over the barrier with ease, Craniax and his Spidery could have climbed over the side of the bridge and the flying android could have most certainly crossed without incident.
So 2 PC Deaths tonight, 5 so far in the game and 1 or 2 close to occurring as well.
I must admit I'm glad the new mutant with the killing sphere died so quickly a double whammy of killing sphere and toxic gas would have ravaged many encounters.

Flatulent Desperadoes, Mutant Future game play

In the last minutes of tonight's Mutant Future game the party gained a new name: The Flatulent Desperadoes.

Starting back at the beginning of the session the party equipped up with the funds gained in earlier play. Most of the party got Jackalopes, Bobo got a War-Jack and a Spidery is now the "loyal" steed of Craniax; the whoel party chipped in funds to get a Bloat to serve as a pack carrier.

Against all odds the party had an uneventful journey from productive Fresh Pond to the den of inequity known as Spillside.

The party found shelter at an inn that to us modern folks would look like a storage bin rental facility. Most of the party set off looking for a gun dealer leaving Bay-Aluminum and Karhoo behind. To their misfortune they ran into a gang of Goliaths and a melee ensued when Enakai leapt up and punched one in the mouth; She and Gevvin lost their lives in the fight. Craniax and Bobo looted the remains of their fallen companions and three fallen Goliaths before acquiring a shotgun at a dealer.

Following this downturn of events Bobo went out to mug a hapless victim while everyone else mourned the loss of their fallen friends. Bobo managed to scare off a pack of pig-men via empathy attack and gave up on his miscreant ways (briefly).

Karhoo figured out a way to mask his negative empathy using his illusion generation power, or so he thought. Trying the stunt out in the bar attached to the inn proved to a failure. Karhoo managed to use his gas attack twice and Bay fire his Radiation and integrated laser pistol to finish off the patrons and staff of the bar in 4 rounds.After waiting for the gas to clear an quickly looting the dead before reclaiming their stabled steeds Craniax jokingly refereed to the gang as "The Flatulent Desperadoes" (unknowingly within ear shot of a hiding stable hand).

Mutant Future gameplay 3

We played our 3rd session of Mutant Future in the MutantBox setting this past Tuesday.

The party was trapped and spread out in the a subterranean labyrinth under an old hospital defended by stitched together Frankenstein guards in orange jumpsuits with sun-glass visored yellow helmets armed with stun guns and security robots.

Crainiax managed to deactivate the vivisection robot and save Gevin from death but poor Gevin still lost an arm. After finding and reactivating Bay Aluminum Gevin made his escape through the air duct system while Craniax and Bay waited things out while invisible (Craniax couldn't fit his big head into the air duct).

While Craniax, Bay and Gevin were busy elsewhere the remaining party was fleeing through the labyrinthine complex and came into an unoccupied cafeteria and found their way into the recently evacuated kitchens. after making it look like they had exited the area by a different route they hid themselves in a meat locker and suffered the cold to avoid the security forces.

Gevin crawled his was through the air ducts which was still and easy enough task even with only one arm since he has perfect balance. He eventually exited in a large lavoratory to discover himself in an area of Dorms. He wandered until he stumbled upon a large number of grey and yellow stripped suited occupants going about their business and fled back into the ducts. Greed or curiosity got the better of him however and he popped out back in on of the dorm rooms and tried to open and search through a locker in a dorm and was apprehended by an orange suited security guard.

Craniax and Bay slipped past security bots while invisible and discovered a number of guards and with a security barrier between them and the elevators. Their ambush was quick and efficient and they ran off with captured stun guns until the came upon another security force.

Enkay. Carhoo and Fluffy exited the meat locker and were immediately engaged by a security robot, Carhoo was stunned and Fluffy managed to lock the security robot in the meat locker before the three bumped into a hapless janitor mopping the floor out in the cafeteria. Enkay tried to incapacitate the janitor but to no avail so fluffy dispatched the poor fellow. They spotted a security barricade and once they revived Carhoo they rushed the guards.

Lucky for all Craniax and Bay Aluminum heard the combat and rushed to join it. The battle was brief but left Ekay stunned. The party fled up the elevator shaft of a now disabled elevator with Enkay tied onto fluffy.

Gevin woke up with his head bumping as he was being dragged down a flight of stairs being dragged by a security guard. He made his escape using his planar-sift mutation.

The rest of the party managed to escape the under complex and the hospital. they avoided a herd of Xeno Cattle. All was going well as they made their way to the cave they had discovered in the junk pile north of the 175th Street. Blocking their way were 10 glowing humanoids. To their dismay the stun guns they had captured no longer functioned (being deactivated once the owners knew which ones were missing) so bitter and desperate melee was joined. Fluffy succumbed to radiation poisoning suffered when he bit and clawed the glowing mutants. Carhoo dispatched a few of the mutants with his gas attack and the remainder fled up into the junk pile.

The next morning the party made their way back to Fresh Pond to rest up and sell the spoils of their adventures. Luckily for them a merchant caravan arrived in town during the week so they made some lucrative sales on a few items ad were able to get anything on the equipment list they could afford.However Bay Aluminum was an awful haggler and made about 1/100th of what Craniax did for the sale of the deactivated but seemingly functional stun guns. Gevin returned by the end of the week and the tales of their exploits encouraged a new mutant ape man to offer to join them on their next forray into the ruins.

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So first PC death and 1 PC is missing an arm, no surprise Fluffy died he spent the whole session with 1 hp. All the surviving PCs earned enough experience points to level up. They plan on returning to the complex under the hospital- I might have to draw a map.

Mutant Future gameplay

In my current mutant future Mutantbox campaign the hardy band of scavengers has gone deeper into the hospital after battling some pigmen that came snooping about in the lobby area previously occupied by the Mansquitos and their hemofowl. Fluffy was almost killed in the battle with the Pigmen and was rather sheepish about his wounds for a while. Carhoo manged to dispatch the last of the Pigmen with his gas weapon.

One wing of the hospital proved to be secured and seemingly untampered with. After failing several attempts to gain access via door the party set to hammering their way through the walls and after a fair amount of time. Gevin and Enkay first explored through the hole the party dug in the wall and ran afoul of security robots resulting in the female mutant fleeing down the corridor and Gevin being hauled away to a vivisection chamber.

In time the rest of the party managed to regroup with Enkay and find their way into the secret sub-tunnels under the hospital where they encountered orange clad security men with stun pistols. Craniax and Bay Aluminum battled the security men and robots for a time until Craniax set ff deep into the tunnels to find the power source for the place.

Bay fell to the security robot after dispatching the security guards with the help of
a nearly dead Fluffy. While fluffy was reviving the other members of the party Bay was hauled away.

Luckily for all Craniax ran into the path the security robot was traveling with Bay and found his way into the heart of the complex. He discovered vivisection chamber just as Gevin was having an arm removed by a medi-bot acting under the instructions of three freakish Whitecoats he was able to silence with a captured stun gun.
We ended the night with Craniax attempting to still the medi-bot and save Gevin while the rest of the party was trying to find safety in the tunnels from an oncoming security force.

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Due to a number of recent issues and scheduling problems we haven't played for a month so it was fun to leap back into the game. I had prepared a simple map of one wing of the hospital on a sheet of paper and simply changed the room contents on the fly as the party explored with just a couple of possible encounters pre-planned and in mind.

Yet More of the Unknowable

over at grognardia the value of not having all the answers came up in this post: The Unknowable.

While I myself do enjoy long richly detailed histories and long hidden secrets driving the action behind the scenes RPG campaigns really don't need all that all the time.

By Example my current Mutant Future campaign takes place in the remains of a massive coastal metropolis that might have once looked like a 21st century American city. I have no idea what city it is, I have no idea how long ago "the apocalypse" happened, who killed who, why they did so or what weapons were involved. It will never matter to the campaign, even if we get a year or two of play out of it I can't imagine how it will ever be relevant. Time spent answering those questions would be wasted and only lead to more questions with answers that don't matter one bit or that will restrict me as GM.

My campaign has plenty of mysteries to resolve in just the remains of one moribund megalopolis, I have no reason to worry about the whole world and the why behind it all is easy...to play a game and have fun.

First session in the Mutant Box

We had our first session in my MutantBox campaign last night. It was fun.
The Characters:

Fluffy- A 17' long mutant wolverine. Weather Control, Increased Balance, Gigantism
Carhoo- A bearman. Negative Empathy, Phantasmal Damage, Accumulated Resistance (kinetic),Ancestral Form, Toxic weapon (Gas cloud), Phantasm Generation
Bay Aluminum- Basic android, combat model, look droidish. Night Vision, Thermal Vision, Optic Emissions (gamma eyes)
Enkay- female mutant human, Bizzare Appearance (glows, even in daylight), Intellectual Affinity (Tinkerer), Increased physical Attribute(Dexterity)
Craniax- Mastermind. Pain Sensitivity, Quick mind, Control Light Waves, Damage Turning
Gevin- wolfman. Forcs Screen(greater), Plane shift, Ancestral Form, Increased Balance.

I decided to pass on using the hex map and simply use the rough sketch-map instead, it has more character.

The players started with a simple goal, scrape up enough loot to get themselves some armor, Fluffy needs some barding.

They left Freshpond quickly leaving the safety provided by Lookout Hill to travel along the southwest border of The Cinders before they were inevitably drawn to the lure of 175th street.
They discovered the northern route into 175th st was mountains of debris, ancient garbage and useless junk. In the maze of junk they were jumped by a rabid wolf-rat (no one got contaminated) and were ambushed by a potential ally. They managed to claim a damaged laser, two sensor device, an energy grenade and an auto-grapnel after the ambush.

Moving down into 175th st past the mountains of garbage they discovered 175th st to be everything they were told a spooky surprisingly intact stretch of city that was less and less battered as they traveled in towards it's center. They were walking down the mostly clean and broad avenue when they came across a line of old worn sneakers in a crosswalk just laying there as if people had been wearing them walking across the street. Bay Aluminum spotted a sniper looking at the party and they fled to a nearby alley and began to sneak towards the sniper, a while afterward they heard a scream.
Investigating the scream the party found a lair of blood sucking mutants dwelling in the lobby of an ancient hospital. The party took a slight beating against the blood suckers and their pets but the fight was quick. They gathered up the blood suckers feeble loot and are getting ready to explore the hospital.The grenade was used by Craniax to save him from a flock of red roosters but the party found some coin and a couple of medical devices as reward.

I incorporated two dangerous encounters from The Savage After World
I'll leave them up to folks to search out and read there if they wish as I don't want to give more away then I may have above for those fun and enjoyable encounters.

Importance of Resources in the MutantBox

"Resources" - food, ammo and the cheap treasures. What they are, where they are and how can the PCs get their grubby hands, claws and tentacles on them?

For sandbox play I feel it's important for resources to be scattered about, each town should not have a general store that supplies most adventuring needs. Enforcing travel, risk and contact with NPCs keeps the campaign busy.

Start cheap. I'm all for limiting the amount of starting equipment available. It supports the scavenging/scrounging limited stuff model of post apocalyptic adventure and gives the players early and clear goals. You want to see a motivated player?: have all but the lowest grade of armors be too expensive for initial purchase.

Food. Lot's of folks gloss over this to some degree, food is heavy, takes time to prepare, is sought after by everything else that eats and it goes bad too. A case of cup-o-noodle is a pretty good haul for a post apocalypse scavenger, ready-to-eat and self-heats are even higher value hauls. I like to keep track of food in "meals" and track the use of these meals. Put a random encounter chance on eating/preparing different foods and what rations the players pack becomes more important then scribbling "Iron Rations 1 Week" on a sheet. Another trick I favor but use nowhere near as often as I like is putting food going bad and other food related events on random encounter/event tables; it can sound minor but in campaigns where it matters "bread grows mold" is a fairly notable occurrence and will bother penny pinching players more then 20 mutant tribesmen would.
Freshpond is the place to go for fresh food but that requires one to avoid offending the locals and dealing with an active militia force.

Water. Three days without water and you are probably dead. People need a surprising amount of water to stay healthy and active. Less then a quart a day is almost as bad as no water. Most adventurers are going to need 2 quarts or more a day, even more if they have mounts.
I've got a lot of water sources on my mutantbox map, deciding where to collect it is something the players are going to have to learn. Would you drink water from a pool in the tar-pit? Is it safe to drink out of the centuries old cistern? Can you drink acid rain (you know that really dangerous RPG acid rain)?

Ammo. Sure you got a bow, crossbow, musket or SMG but just where does one get ammunition?
The presence, manufacture and availability of ammo can play a biggie on choice of tactics and influence where and how far the PCs will wander.
Spillside is the place to go in my MutantBox if one is looking for blackpowder, this requires travel, dealing with wily merchants and dangerous gangs of toughs to get a large and economic supply.

Wild Goods. The goods of the wild wastelands and all they offer will certainly keep players busy and on the move searching out supplies. Some mutant powers could carry over to the hides or other goods scavenged from the remains of mutant kills; surely leather armor made from the hide of a gamma sloth has more going for it then then that made from some three horned cows.
The mutant berries I've posted in my blog are a resource to be sought out with some recognized value, some of them require processing and these secrets require PCs to learn them from NPCs.

Recreational Consumables. Drink, smoke and stupider ways to abuse ones own body for entertainment have been popular since the birth of civilization (I once read that bread was invented as a mobile beer kit instead of as a food source itself at first). These make great bargaining devices, moderately portable treasures and some players just can't be kept away once they discover they are available. Who makes them, where they are stashed and how much you can score the goods are again a reason to keep the PCs moving and involved with NPCs.

To keep resources important have NPCs treat them like they are important. The old RPG hooks of monster X is threatenign the village, the caravan needs guards and we need macguffin X from village Y but no one has come from there in a while all require resources someone in the campaign cares about. If that someone who cares is the players then the campaign can acquire a life of it's own.

Trial Hex Map

I whipped up a trial hex map for my MutantBox setting using the free version of Hexographer. I screwed up the horizontal dimension a bit so east-west isn't as large as it should be; I counted hexes east/west instead of carefully figuring out the distance conversion to hexes when measuring from the original map. I'm figuring on 1 mile hexes as I want things to all feel local. I'll have to come up with shorter then one day long outdoor turns considering the map scale.
There are no labels on this lo-res sample map just in case one of my players checks out the blog.

PCs for the MutantBox

Tonight we put our regular D&D game on hiatus and rolled up characters for the MutantBox.

A quick overview of the characters (I'm sure I missed something):

A 17' foot long wolverine (thanks to giantism) with weather manipulation
A Basic Android that is obviously a mechanical man with thermal vision, night vision and optic emissions (radiation)
A bipedal albino wolf with a force field, increased balance, planar shift and ancestral form.
A bipedal bear with pain sensitivity, phantasm generation, kinetic resistance, negative empathy and a toxic gas weapon.
A Mastermind with light manipulation,damage reflection, phantasmal damage

I've started everyone poor with 3d6+18 U.P. (I'm using my alternate wasteland coinage)
We are using a slightly expanded price list that incorporates some of the extra equipment and weapons I've posted here on this blog.

We have two other players joining us who haven't rolled up characters yet.

I gave the players a look at the sketched map and explained a couple of the features to them.
We'll be starting in Fresh Pond.

To Hex or Not to Hex?

So I find myself wondering, should I use hexes in my MutantBox ?

Hexes make lots of sense for wargames when you have two players competing over large areas and regulating movement to be as fast as possible without having to fall back on using rulers to measure distance.

Directions with hexes aren't very organic, depending on alignment of the hexes relative to north and south you have: North, Northeast, Southeast, South, Southwest and North West or East, Northeast, Southeast, West, Southwest and North West; in both cases you are losing a cardinal direction.

Hexes work when numbered for placing of encounters and features but again it's a short hand and not absolutely ideal. Dots (or other symbols) on an un-ruled map with an index code would function just fine and some features could be less then a hex apart from each other. A numbered grid would also work just fine, it's also pretty easy to use coordinates listed om the map edge with a grid and not fill a map with numbers as one often sees with hex maps that are so keyed.

Hexes for regulating movement seems nice and simple and is if one doesn't worry too much. movement is usually factored for the hex being entered (if moving into a mountain hex yuo pay the cost for the mountain terrain to enter that hex) but it doesn't consider how far one enters the hex or how easy it is to get from one hex to the other. Possibly figuring out the cost to cross the border from one hex to another based on the nature of each hex is the way to go?

Subdivingor reducing hexes for smaller scale details can be a pain. Often detail scale hex maps align 90 degrees to the larger scale hex map they are detailing, I find this annoying in the extreme. Also if one has a 24 mile hex (for example) is it measuring from center to center, edge to edge or point to point, it doesn't' matter too much on the large scale but when zooming in for a smaller scale detail map it makes a difference.

So hmmmm... to hex or not to hex, that is the question?

Civilization Among the Ruins

There are a couple bastions of "civilization" in the MutantBox I'm brewing.

FreshPond and Lookout Hill- A Small Township composed of two villages, the agrarian village that rests mostly along the western side of Fresh pond and the remainder on the nearby fortification of Lookout Hill.
Fresh Pond is mostly Agrarian with communal and individual farm plots spreading about the pond and towards the Merry Gloom River. People tend to live clusterd in the village proper with only those farm plots nearest to the center of the territory occupied at night in small farmhouses.
Look Out Hill is at it's core an ancient structure that has been reinforced, expanded and fortified over the years. The population of Lookout Hill serves as the local militia as of late with members drawn from among the general population of Fresh Pond with about 100 militia composed of a handful of officers and lifers but mostly 4-year men who serve before gaining the right to farm nearby. Lookout Hill provides a good view of all the farms of Fresh Pond and notable incursions can be quickly spotted and reacted to; the fortification also provides a goodly view of The Cinders, The Shells and the somewhat ominous towers of 175 street.
Current rule is by "The Coop" a Cooperative of established elder farmers and three senior officers from Lookout Hill.
population: 1,200 mixed (30% Pure Human, 50% Mutant Human, 20% Mutant Animal)
goods: food,cloth, some alcohol, beasts of burden and leather goods

Spillside- Once a growing concern this center of rubble scavengers and chemical distillers has shrunk in recent years due to incompetent leadership and rampant crime. The community still holds together by inertia waiting to utterly fail or for new leadership to guide it along a new path.
Current rule is divided among merchants and gangs, no one has dared to call themselves mayor for 3 or 4 years.
Population: 500 mixed (mostly Mutant Human with a few resident Mutant Plants)
Goods: Alcohol, Black Powder, Junk and numerous Chemicals.

Bay Town- Nestled among the half sunken ancient structures of Black Bay is this growing religious community permits outsiders to travel and fish in the waters but not to go treasure hunting above or below the waves in it's territory. The Sea Temple is run by approximately 40 priests known as The Acolytes. Androids, cyborgs and Robots are "deactivated" and stored beneath the waves.
Current rule is divided between The Commodore and The Acolytes.
Population: 800 (40% pure human , 55% mutant human, 5% mutant animals)
Goods: Salvaged metals (seldom irradiated), newly forged weapons and armor, seafood, pearls and the best boats in the area.

More locations in the MutantBox

A few more locations in my MutantBox.

The Tumbles- once a vast array of public housing for a thriving ancient metropolis they have all since collapsed. The curiosity of this mass of ruins is how it looks like they all slipped and tumbled over with entire sections seemingly more or less intact before being enshrouded in rubble and overgrown as they are now. It's been known for scavengers to simply be walking along a well used trail and fall into a stories deep space that suddenly opens beneath them. (some megadungeoning here)

The Merry Gloom River- and ancient river that has walked east and west of it's former route a number of times. It currently is lost somewhere in The Crack. Surprisingly enough most of the fish within the river are edible and most of the vegetables seem to be generally edible.

The Groves- A patch of forest once a large swath of suburbia which was washed clean of a great deal of waste by the Merry Gloom in years past before it settled in it's current banks. the groves have a lot of good fruit and hunting ;who is the hunted and the hunter can change from minute to minute of course. (a couple trees from The Groves can be seen in the northwest corner of the map shot)

Pleasant Valley Tech- a large technical college that has long been surrounded by multiple layers of security fencing and other defenses since the before times. Some claim the barriers have been expanding outwards in recent years. Nothing is known of those who may live there as all attempts to breach it's defenses have failed and there is no front doro to knock on. (Partially visible on the map shot posted previously on the western edge)

Dry River Bed- this stretch of ground used to be the course of the river that became the merry gloom. There is a brackish marsh where the sea still laps inland during high-tides. It's widely known to travelers and scavengers that the Dry River Bed is the hunting ground of a large pair of Goliaths.

The Last Bridge- an ancient superhighway bridge spans the Dry River Bed and can be seen for miles about. The population of avian mutants that nest here can prove to be a challenge for anyone trying to cross.

175th Street- an amazingly well preserved stretch of high-rises, office buildings and shops somehow survived the destruction of most of the city and what remains proves a draw for scavengers and beasts to this day. It's an eerie reminder of what was lost.

Mutant Future Campaign Development (MutantBox)

So After a bunch of unrelated games I'm going for it and developing a mutant future campaign.
To coin popular current terms it'll be sandbox and megadungeon campaign. I suppose I'll be calling it the MutantBox for now. I sketched out the setting in a flurry of inspiration here is a bad webcam shot of some of the sketched crude map:


(yeah not amazing yet but it was whipped up quickly and shot on a webcam)

Some of the locations on the shot of the map posted here:

The Petrified Forest- an ancient forest transformed into a hard stone like substance, leaves like blades keep sane folks out. What secrets could it keep safe?

The Dead Flats- nothign taller then 6 feet occupies this pulverized stretch of scrub overgrown rubble. Avian predators are a menace during the day and at night it's rumored the dead roam hunting for the flesh of the living.

The Tar Pit- A vast flat patch of oozing tar with the remains of ancient vehicles and salvage materials serving as a haphazard maze to gain access to the structure in the middle. Predators and scavengers of all sorts are drawn to the edges and out along the makeshift bridges to feed upon those that find themselves stuck in the tar. (possible mega-dungeon location)

The Glow- A flattened stretch of land that glows with an eerie light each and every night.

The Dome- A great golden dome half buried within an age of rubble. (obvious mega-dungeon location)

The Crack- A huge fissure in the earth hundreds of yards wide in places and possibly a mile deep. A river ruins into it's depths ands is lost. Many dozens of cavities and entrances can be seen along it's shattered walls. (possible mega-dungeon location)

Green Hell- A vast and riotously overgrown span of ruins full of a bewildering array of mutant plants.

There are more areas shown on the shot above and several more off the edges of the area shown. As time goes by I'll update and expand.