Alien: Chariot of the Gods (SPOILERS WARNING)

My group and I gathered for our first session of ALIEN RPG last night. There will be spoilers for anyone who has yet to play this scenario. You have been warned. All images may be subject to copyright. They are used here only to help visualize the recap.

Here is the first session recap to the best of my memory. It was a fun night to say the least. So many outcomes surprised us, especially when the improbable happened on the dice. Which is all a part of the fun!

Game Recap: Session One – Chariot of the Gods

Captain Miller – Paul

Pilot Davis – Hudson

Roughneck Cham – Talon

Agent Wilson – Scott

Medic Blanchard – Marc

Technician Rye – NPC (Marc rolling/assisting)

The crew of the USCSS Montero is awakened from cryo-sleep to deliver their cargo of Tritium/Helium gas canisters to Sutter’s World, a small colony operated by Weyland-Yutani Corp.  As the crew fumbles about the cryo-chamber drinking fluids and stretching their legs, the intercom crackles and the soothing voice of Mother, the ship’s computer, says, “Captain Miller, please report to my terminal for an important update.” Captain Miller grumbles about the summons but says, “Okay Mother, I’ll be there shortly.”

 

                  

Agent Wilson says, “Shall I join you Captain?” Miller hand-waves the agent with an affirmative. Cham decides to check on the Montero’s cargo holds. Rye decides to check on the FTL drive and reactor core. Blanchard goes to the galley to brew up some coffee and then to med bay. And Davis decides to go to the bridge to check on the star charts.

                As Mother updates Miller and Wilson (who already knows) on the mission status, Davis decides to check the sensors and navigational charts. The sensors indicate that the Montero is on an intercept course for an unknown sensor contact. A ship of some kind perhaps? Or perhaps another object? Davis decides to leave the blast shield for the Montero down. Looking at the charts, Davis discovers that the ship is nowhere near Sutter’s World, in fact they are only about half-way there and slightly out of the main shipping lane known as “The Gauntlet.” The sensors ping that the object is getting closer.

                Mother completes the update to Miller and Wilson. They are to investigate a somewhat garbled SOS signal coming from another Starship which is nearby. Again on the bridge, Davis reads a sensor ping indicating that the object is getting closer. Davis decides to wait on Miller and Wilson to get to the bridge. Davis receives another ping indicating that the unknown object/ship is probably within visual range but Davis decides to keep the blast doors shut and wait for the captain.

                Just as the captain and Wilson arrive on the bridge the ship’s alarm rings out and mother’s voice says, “Warning, collision in 30 seconds, all hands brace for impact!” Captain Miller yells out to Davis, “What are you doing, take evasive action?!” Davis fires up the ship’s thrusters and finally opens the blast shield only see a dark area approaching the Montero against a star-filled background. Miller yell’s “Floodlights! Evasive Action!” Davis realizes her mistake of delaying a response to the sensor pings and not taking a visual reference through the viewpoint and yells back, “I’m on it Captain!”

The Montero’s aging engines thunder with thrust and her maneuvering jets fire to aid in moving the ship down and to the side of the oncoming object. The flood lights blaze and see the dangerously close face of another large starship running with no lights or other signals. The ship growls with Davis’ piloting effort, not designed to be maneuvered this aggressively. Wilson and Miller strap themselves in to bridge seats while Cham, Rye, and Blanchard grab onto the nearest large object or pillar to keep from losing their footing. Warning klaxon’s sound throughout the ship, “Brace for impact, Brace for impact, brace for impact!”

 

The Montero dips below the oncoming vessel, they are close, really close – the flood lights illuminate an older version of the Weyland-Yutani logo and the name USCSS Cronus. The front of the Montero clears the bottom of the Cronus and just when Davis is about to yell out a whoop of triumph there is a grating scrapping sound of metal on metal and the ship vibrates and shudders from the impact. “Cargo bay section 20 Hull breach,” mother warns, “Sealing off Storage 2.” Finally the grinding stops and the ship stops shuddering, “Warning, FTL drive Offline.” Miller lets out a stream of profanities and Davis is finally able to breathe, “We’ve cleared most of it Captain.”  Miller and Davis banter about her piloting skills and her lax approach to the object but in the end Miller realizes that despite Davis’ mistakes, it could have been a lot worse. Cham confirms that the cargo is secure, but that he won’t be able to reach the Power loader to offload the gas canisters until they either touch down on Sutter’s World or they repair the hull breach in compartment 20. Rye informs the captain that it will take at least 3-4 shifts to get the FTL operable again with Cham’s help. Miller is not pleased but she turns to the task at hand and brief’s the crew on their change in plans. They are to investigate the drifting ship that they just scraped on and recover scientific data while rescuing any remaining crew members (if any). Mother updates their information. It is the Cronus. A scientific research vessel missing for over 70 years.

The crew deliberates how to approach the boarding of the Cronus. They use the sublight thrusters to view the exterior of the vessel. Mother gives the crew specs of the vessel and a full schematic on the deck plans. The Montero’s crew discovers that the most accessible point on the Cronus is the ventral airlock. The airlocks on the Cronus lower deck appear to be damaged from the interior and are inoperable. They decide the front ramp access is problematic in space and too risky. While Cham and Rye go about setting up the umbilical, Wilson and Miller talk strategy. Blanchard gets some medical aid kits from the med bay and starts getting ready to go. Miller distributes the Montero’s available gear.

Miller: Motion Tracker and Pistol

Wilson: Opts for the Harpoon Gun

Blanchard: Takes the Bolt Gun

Rye: Doesn’t take anything extra

Cham: Takes the cutting torch and grabs a fire axe from a fire extinguisher station

Davis: Is staying aboard Montero to monitor the away team.

The team dons their compression suits and heads out. Cham and Rye lead the way, setting up the umbilical airlock after Davis lines up the Montero with the Cronus. Cham discovers the outer airlock door damage to the Cronus A deck ventral airlock. Cham has to use his cutting torch to get them inside the door. He rolls an outstanding success banking stunts for later. At the inner airlock door, Rye takes readings – it’s very cold (below freezing) and the air is fouled with a high concentration of carbon dioxide. It isn’t lethal levels yet, but it certainly isn’t healthy in the long-term. Miller correctly states, “Their Air Scrubbers must be Offline.”

The crew decides to split up. Miller, Wilson, and Rye will go see Cronus’s Mother Computer. Cham and Blanchard will go check on the Cryo Chambers. Right before they set out, Miller uses the motion tracker. She picks up a movement blip near the stair well. “What the hell?” she exclaims and the crew sticks together for a moment making their way to the stairway. They end up finding nothing and the blip goes away. Miller botches the power roll and it loses two of the five cells. “Aging piece of shit,” she groans.

Wilson uses his access card to open up Mother’s chamber. Wilson, Rye, and Miller successfully bring Mother Online. Wilson tries to download the science data from Mother but the data is stored in the science lab. He is able to access the ship’s logs and pull the last entry by XO Johns. Mother informs them that the Air Scrubbers need maintenance and the Reactor is not at full capacity due to a contagion present in the reactor control room. All Mother can say is that it is organic in nature. The lights on the Cronus come to life and the Air Shaft thunders to life causing a mist in vent system as warm air hits cold. But the Scrubbers must have their filters changed. The system will not rid the ship of dioxide until that is taken care. Blanchard and Cham find that the door to the cryo chambers has been sealed and reinforced. Cham says he can get it open but that it will take a bit of time to do so.

Mother informs the crew that the cryo chambers are being deactivated. Wilson tries to override that decision but Mother determines that her crew needs to be revived due to their long sleep and the possible failure in one of the cryo chambers. Cham and Blanchard get the door to the cryo chambers open just as the crew of the Cronus begins to stir. Davis is watching the events unfold on the Montero. Davis notices that the two mothers are “exchanging notes.” Davis notifies Miller and Wilson who both groan in unison. Great. Time to talk to Cronus people and figure out what the hell happened here.

The crew discovers that five crewman of the Cronus are still alive. Two of the tubes are filled with desiccated corpses. The Montero’s crew assists the Cronus members in their recovery but continues to wear their suits. Oxygen levels are checked and most of the crew is successful at maintaining their supply.

Cooper, a scientist, complains about headaches and nausea. Blanchard checks him out. His blood pressure is elevated but he would have to be moved to med lab to learn more. The Montero’s crew starts to question the Cronus survivors but they aren’t getting much. The Cronus crew is too disoriented by their long sleep. Johns, the Cronus XO starts to give them some information but is shut down by Clayton, the company rep on the Cronus. Before anything else happens, Cooper starts rambling incoherently and then goes into spasms and convulsions. A bloodbirster is born.

 

The crew of the Cronus yells out almost in unison to “kill it, kill it now!” Before the creature can act, Captain Miller freaks out and empties her handgun at the creature wounding it in an uncontrolled series of shots. Cham takes a swing at the creature with his axe but misses wide hitting the cryo chamber wall. Wilson shoots the harpoon gun right into the creature’s mouth, through its tail and into the cryo chamber behind it, effectively spearing and pinning it. The creature shrieks out and gushes fluid all over the place but wriggles and dies. Everyone from the Montero freaks out. Miller and Wilson get into a heated discussion with Clayton and Flynn (Cronus Medic) about what is really going on aboard this ship. They get a little bit from Flynn because he is dismayed that his friend Cooper didn’t take his shot of a “vaccine” they developed to stop what happened to Cooper from happening. Again, Clayton shuts Flynn down before he gives up too much, but it’s enough to worry everyone from the Montero. Miller orders Davis to lock the airlock doors on the Montero. Effective immediately, there is a quarantine in effect.

There is a long discussion on strategy. The crew of the Montero decides to withdraw to their own ship and regroup. Rye has slipped away to head back to the Montero already. He wants to fix the FTL drive on the Montero. As Rye is heading back, Mother informs Miller that a cascade failure is eminent aboard the Montero. Miller tries to override. Wilson tries to override. No dice. At the airlock, Rye is yelling at Davis to let him in. Davis is not complying. Even after the Mother warning, Davis is still not letting Rye into the ship. So Rye hacks the airlock and gets into the ship. Rye tries to stop the drive failure. He informs Miller that this is impossible, they must abandon ship. Everyone is REAL worried now.

Mother takes control of the ship from Davis and begins to thrust away from the Cronus. Rye and Davis barely make it into the umbilical and detach it from the Montero before it shears off from the strain. The Montero goes to full sub-light speed away from the Cronus. Ten agonizing minutes go by and the Montero explodes. The Cronus shakes from the shockwave but is far enough away from the Montero to not be damaged by the blast. On her way out of the Montero, Davis grabbed the incinerator unit. She’s seen all the footage on the body cams. She’s not leaving a potential weapon behind!

 

Aboard the Cronus the crew of the Montero feels doomed. After checking out the bridge, they fully realize they have work to do. Scrubbers are the priority. Agent Clayton takes Reid (Cronus Marine) and heads to the corporate suite. The Montero’s crew wants to see what is left in the armory. As they near the armory, they run across a dead man in a space suit, his brains blown all over the wall, a shotgun lying on the floor. His arms are strangely elongated and have ripped the sleeves on the compression suit. Captain Miller theorizes that the “vaccine” might have done something to make that crewman mutate or go crazy. Despite Flynn’s (Cronus Medic) insistence that everyone take the vaccine, Miller instead tells everyone to remain in their suits, “None of my people are taking that shit.” The tension builds. Miller grabs the shotgun and shells. She offers her pistol to Wilson. Blanchard finds a pulse rifle in the armory much to his delight. Davis, Blanchard, Rye, and Cham head to the cargo hold to get the replacement air filters for the air shaft. XO Johns and Flynn go to see if they can find any more compression suits. Miller and Wilson want to go check on Clayton and Reid to find out what the hell Clayton has been up to. Neither Wilson nor Miller is trusting Clayton very much at the moment.

 

As Wilson and Miller enter the corridor to the corporate suite, an air return vent explodes outward as a large grayish white xenomorph surprises them; lashing out at Miller with a horrifying scream and sharp tail. The tail strikes Miller in the chest but doesn’t penetrate the upper chest piece, leaving a deep gash in the metal instead. Wilson freezes in panic. Miller jams the shotgun into the xeno’s face and pulls the trigger, wounding it. The creature lashes at Miller then Wilson missing them.  The Neomorph then attempts to grab Captain Miller and pull her into the vent system. The creature almost has Miller but the slickness of the creature’s blood on Miller’s arm causes it to lose its grip (Story Point saves the day!) and it turns back to Wilson. Miller had emptied then dropped her shotgun after her initial attack and thus picked up the shotgun and tried to use it like a baseball bat but missed. Wilson tries to find courage with his spear gun but this is too much horror. Wilson drops the spear gun and runs around the corner towards the stairs. The others hear the shotgun and shrieking coming through the vents. They run for the corporate suite. The Neomorph eyes Miller and starts to attack again when the door to the corporate suite opens and Sergeant Reed says, “Not on my watch you filth!” BOOM the shotgun in Reid’s capable hands splatters green goo and blood all over Miller and the wall. The xeno appears to be dead.

To be continued….