Metal Angel #2

 Solo Gaming Appreciation Month

Metal Angel #2

Following the last scene, Metal Angel is flying across Eagle Harbor. A new hero, Scarlett Wing, is taking her first flight, and one of the men who almost killed him is watching her. And he’s dressed as a cop!

For this scene, the prompt is The Empress.

A matriarchal goddess, a beautiful earthy woman - experience of being part of nature and rooted in natural life, the appreciation of the senses and the simple pleasures of daily existence. Without this Great Mother within us, we can bring nothing to fruition, here is patience and gentleness to wait until the time is ripe for action. She governs the orderly rules of the seasons and the laws of the cosmic, she gives birth of new life, is initiative and has an eye for details. She is a caring and protecting wife and virgin, accepting the responsibility of own feelings, she has strength which nourishes and sustains. There is sweetness, passionate love and a playful erotic invitation to dance.

The obvious connection is between the Empress and Scarlet Wing—she’s a woman and as a flame-based hero, she’s tied to “being part of nature.” But, let’s ask some questions of The Loom of Fate and see what we can come up. Is the robber/cop still present when Metal Angel arrives? 24 No. Does Scarlet Wing approach Metal Angel? 03 No, and Unexpectedly…02 Tying off. Tying off implies that a major plot thread is either resolved or moves forward substantially. Since the main thread is Metal Angel’s search for answers about his origin, it has to be part of that. I assume that Scarlet Wing is involved with the robber, certain that he is actually a police officer. I reinterpret the first question to mean that the robber flees as Metal Angel approaches, and that Scarlet Wing will intervenes to protect him. She has no interest in Metal Angel, and will flee once she is certain her beloved is safe.

The crowd was enthralled at Scarlet Wing’s graceful and delicate flight over the park.  Of course, most weren’t watching them herself, instead snapping photos and recording videos of her flight. She knew how to work a crowd, and as the initial excitement began to fade, she began offering flights and rides to young children, keeping the crowds attention, and affection. As Metal Angel came flying in, a good number of the phones and cameras turned to him. He paused just above the park, scanning. Everyone looked at either him or Scarlet Wing, all hoping for either a meeting of heroes or the inevitable fight that happens when heroes first meet.  Scarlet Wing was far more beautiful in person than on the low-quality twitch stream, but he did his best to ignore her. Because everyone wasn’t looking at them. One of them, a man dressed as a police officer, was quietly walking away. “You!” Metal Angel cried, and dove towards the man. Scarlet Wing looked at where he was flying to, then snapped her head back. “No!” She cried and moved to intervene. If the crowed was enthralled in the beautiful new heroine before, then were now ecstatic. There’s no better way to get likes than to stream a superbrawl!

The first fight of the game, and both characters are holding back. Metal Angel has no desire to harm Scarlet Wing, and so will pull his punches if she gets too hurt. Scarlet Wing just needs to hold Metal Angel off. I’ll say it’ll take 3 rounds for her lover to escape, and she will leave soon thereafter. Metal Angel will need to overcome her by that time, or else he will lose his prey.

Scarlet Wing stats. I use some of the random tables provided by the Heroes Unlimited GM’s Guide to do a quick workup of Scarlet Angel. She has the following combat stats. Hand to Hand style: Assassin, Number of Attacks 4, Strike +8, Parry +9, Dodge, +11, Damage +5, Roll +3, Initiative +1. HP 20, SDC 126 Superpowers: Major: Control Elemental Force: Fire.        1)      Fire Blast:4D6+2 Damage        2)      Spontaneous Combustion        3)      Fuel Flame        4)      Create Flame Wall        5)      Extinguish Fire        6)      Create Smoke Minor: Flight: Winged (Flame Wings), Extraordinary Physical Beauty

Round 1

Initiative: Since Metal Angel is flying towards the man, I assume that Scarlet Wing automatically has initiative for this round. 1st Attacks Scarlet Wing’s first attack. She needs to roll a d20 (19) and adds her Strike bonus (+8), for a total of 27. Metal Angel has an Armor Rating (A.R.) of 17, which means attacks below that do no damage. She easily beats that. He could attempt to Dodge, but since he doesn’t see her attack coming, he is left vulnerable.  She rolls her damage of 4d6+2 and gets a 13, all of which is applied to Metal Angel’s SDC of 800, taking him down to 787. Metal Angel’s turn. For his action, he turns and flies to close the gap with Scarlet Wing. 2nd Attacks Scarlet Wing attacks again. D20 (18) +8 for a total of 26. Again, this beats Metal Angel’s A.R., and so she rolls damage and gets 15.  Metal Angel could attempt to roll with this to reduce the damage, but that would cost one of his actions. He has plenty of SDC, and so takes the damage, reducing his SDC to 772. Now that he’s close in, Metal Angel will attempt to punch Scarlet Wing. His attack is D20 (12) plus his Strike bonus of +6 for an 18. Scarlet Wing will attempt to defend herself by Parrying (which doesn’t cost one of her actions.) She rolls a D20 (15) and adds her Parry bonus +9 for a 24. She easily avoids his attack. 3rd Attacks Scarlet Wing: 11 + 8 for 19. Metal Angel attempts to parry, and gets a 6 + 6 for 12. She hits, and does 15 points of damage. Metal Angel’s SDC drops to 757. Metal Angel: 10 + 6 for 16. Scarlet Wing attempts to parry, and gets a 15 + 9 for 24. She parries. 4th Attacks Scarlet Wing: 2 +8 for 10. Metal Angel attempts to parry, and gets a 10 +6 for 16. He parries and takes no damage. Metal Angel: 5 +6 for 11. Scarlet Wing attempts to parry, and gets a 12 +9, for 21. She parries and takes no damage. 5th Attacks. Metal Angel has 5 attacks per round, while Scarlet Wing only has 4. She cannot attempt to attack this round, but she may attempt to parry. Metal Angel: 1 +6 for 7. Scarlet Wing attempts to parry, and gets a 20 +9 for a 29. She easily parries and takes no damage.

The two heroes danced and flew through the skies over the park, trading blows and bursts of flame. Metal Angel bore scorch marks from Scarlet Wings attacks. “What are you doing, Scarlet Wing? That man down there isn’t a cop! He’s one of the ones behind what happened to us!”

Round 2

Initiative. Each character rolls a d20 and adds their Initiative bonus to the results. Highest goes first. Metal Angel 3 +0, for 3. Scarlet Wing 7 +1 for 8. Scarlet Wing goes first. 1st Attacks Scarlet Wing: 14 +8 for 22. Metal Angel attempts to parry. 14 +6 for 20. She hits, and does 21 points of damage. Metal Angel’s SDC drops to 736. Metal Angel: 11 +6 for 19. Scarlet Wing attempts to parry. 13 +9 for 22. She parries, and takes no damage. 2nd Attacks Scarlet Wing: 7 +8 for 13. Metal Angel does not parry, and her attack is below his A.R., and so does no damage. Metal Angel: 11 +6 for 19. Scarlet Wing attempts to parry. 15 +9 for 24. She parries, and takes no damage. 3rd Attacks Scarlet Wing: 19 +8 for 27. Metal Angel does not parry, as he can’t beat that. She does 12 points of damage. Metal Angel’s SDC drops to 724. Metal Angel: 19 +6 for 25. Scarlet Wing attempts to parry. 9 +9 for 18. Metal Angel hits. A normal punch does 1d4 damage, and Metal Angel rolls a 4 and adds his Strength bonus of +36, for 40 points of damage. Scarlet Wing’s SDC drops to 86. 4th Attacks Scarlet Wing: 14 +8 for 22. Metal Angel attempts to parry. 5 +6 for 11. She hits, and does 19 points of damage. Metal Angel’s SDC drops to 705. Metal Angel: 19 +6 for 25. Scarlet Wing attempts to parry. 2 +9 for 11. He hits, and does 38 points of damage. Scarlet Wing’s SDC drops to 48. 5th Attacks Metal Wing: 11 +6 for 17. Scarlet Wings attempts to parry. 13 +9 for 21. She parries, and takes no damage.

She was fast, and graceful, and powerful. Metal Angel could barely get his hands on her, as her flame strikes kept pummeling him and keeping him off balance. He managed to get a few lucky blows, and his powerful metal fists were taking their toll. Both seemed to be losing their taste for the fight.

Round 3

Initiative: Metal Angel 6 +0 for 6. Scarlet Wing 20 +1 for 21 1st Attacks Scarlet Wing: 8 +8 for 16. Metal Angel does not parry, as this is below his A.R., and so does no damage. Metal Angel: 12 +6 for 18. Scarlet Wing attempts to parry. 13 +9, for 22. She parries, and takes no damage. 2nd Attacks Scarlet Wing: 12 +8 for 20. Metal Angel attempts to parry. 18 +6 for 24. He parries, and takes no damage. Metal Angel: 1 +6 for 7. I rule that Scarlet Wing parries, as this is below her bonus, and so cannot fail. She takes no damage. 3rd Attacks Scarlet Wing: 2 +8 for 10. Metal Angel does not parry, as this is below his A.R., and so does no damage. Metal Angel: 12 +6 for 18. Scarlet Wing attempts to parry. 12 +9 for 21. She parries, and takes no damage. 4th Attacks Scarlet Wing: 6 +8 for 14. Metal Angel does not parry, as this is below his A.R., and so does no damage. Metal Angel: 15 +6 for 21. Scarlet Wing attempts to parry. 7 +9 for 16. He hits, and she takes 38 points of damage, dropping her SDC to 10. 5th Attacks Metal Angel: 19 +6 for 25. Scarlet Wing attempts to parry. 6 +9 for 15. He hits, but doesn’t want to hurt Scarlet Wing. He will attempt to pull his punch. He needs to roll above an 11 to successfully pull his punch, and his Hand to Hand: Expert skill gives him a +2. If successful, he can inflict as much or as little damage as he likes, from 1 to as high as his damage roll. He rolls, and gets a 1 +2 for 3. She will take full damage, or 3 +36 for 39. She had 10 SDC left, and so this drops to 0. The remaining 29 is applied to her Hit Points, of which she only has 20. As the damage is greater than her which drops her SDC to 0, and the remainder impacts her Hit Points, dropping her to -9. The normal rules would have her enter a coma, with long term implications for her injuries. Based on house rule 3, however, she is just knocked unconscious and will be fine soon.

Metal Angel’s eyes were blurred with smoke and ash, but he could see her pause for just a moment, drawing even more smoke and around her. He tried to hold back, to just lightly tap her, but the fast speed they were flying at and his limited sight took him off balance. He struck her, hard, and she began falling. He dove after her and caught her before she hit the ground. Carrying her, he flew off into the city, and the crowd booed and jeered at him. He had just come out of nowhere and beaten up the lovely young girl who had so recently been playing with their kids. And the fight was already going viral.

Wow, this game is already getting darker than I had wanted. But, Heroes Unlimited is a pretty brutal system, all things considered. I need to know what Metal Angel does next, and so I turn back to the Loom of Fate. I assume he’s going to try and take her somewhere safe, and find out what he can.

Does Metal Angel know where Scarlet Wing lives? 82 Yes, and… Ok, he’ll fly her home. Since the “and” reinforces the answer, I say that it’s fairly close by and has a convenient balcony for entrance. Is the robber/cop there? 03 Not, and Unexpectedly…Upstaged. Upstaged means an NPC makes a big move. I’m not sure what this will be yet, and I decide to resolve it in the next scene.

He flew Scarlet Wing back to Kelly Adam’s apartment. It was actually very close to the park, but he took off in the opposite direction and flew around the city, to shake any of the crowd and throw them off. He didn’t know how much she cared for her secret identity, but he wasn’t going to risk exposing her. Things had gone bad enough already. After half an hour of flying around, he doubled back to her apartment, and landed on her balcony. He carefully opened the balcony door and ducked his wings as he carried her inside. He carefully laid her on the couch, and was about to go find her some ice for her bruises when he heard a voice behind him. “Ah, Metal Angel. What a fortunate coincidence.”

Well figure out what happens next with the prompt of The Emperor.

Solo Gaming Appreciation Month 2017 Base Game: Heroes Unlimited, Second Edition. Story Structure: Zero Tarot Oracle: +Zach Best’s Conjectural Roleplaying GM Emulator Other Tools: BOLD, Universal NPC Emulator, and The Everyone, Everywhere List #SGAM                       #SGAM2017