LogDunslough Cartographic Society-Jason-4

Game log for the 2018/04/01 session of Blades in the Dark: The Dunslough Cartographic Society, as taken by Jason

Washout deciphers Edwina Hewish's notes. It concerns a man-portable lightning barrier system. It's a year or two away from being something anyone could build, but it would act as a portable containment system design, a sort of super improved lightning hook, or possibly a defensive shield. He tells the group that there's a potential design there for a better lightning hook.

Clip decides that it's been too long since he paid any attention to his old enemy Riven, and does a little checking. The chemist makes a drug called "Lush", a bioluminscent mixture taken by mixing it with alcohol, usually in a shooter. It works like Ecstasy, making everything nice and more fun. It's very popular on campus.

Pool and Clip take a look at the area and find out that he's on the fourth (top) floor of a rowhouse. The fourth floor has a large balcony, in a neighborhood where each balcony stretches a little further out than the last. A footbridge connects his building to one across the street / canal. He shares the fourth floor with at least one other tenant.

Pool encounters her old friend Arvus at a bar. She goes over to say high, but it's been long enough that he doesn't recognize her. She reminds him about her parents' death, and then the penny drops. He only just moved to the city, and tells her he's given up the law business. She offers to introduce him to some new friends, who live in an old eel-processing plant. He stops to make sure this isn't a day job.

She takes him to the Cartographic Society hideout, in the former cold room, and introduces him.

We plan to rent the adjacent flat to Riven and use it as a base of operations, with some thought that we'll just go right through the wall. We're pretty nervous about our timing, since the fake identity and letter of credit that got us the flat could unravel at any time. Washout tries drilling through the wall to observe the next room, with a little help from Arvus. Riven's at home. We're looking into his kitchen. Pool can make out at least three voices and someone playing a hurdy-gurdy. There's a candle on the table but nobody in the room. Clip hands Washout his vial of sleep essence in case there's a chance to get it into the food.

Pool leads Washout and Arvus into Riven's kitchen, aided by Clip's description of Riven's layout and personal habits. Clip and Dr Oz stay behind to watch the rented flat. Once inside, the intrusion party hear the music and the people having fun. Washout hands Arvus a smoke bomb, which Arvus tosses into the parlor, filling it with smoke. Pool and Arvus leap in and try to subdue everyone in a blinding (and smoke-blinded) flurry. Pow! Smack! The music stops, as Pool absolutely KOs the musician on the way in. There were four people in the room, and none of them have a chance to react before they get hit. Dr Oz, following behind, uses his blowgun to shoot the first person who tries to get back on his feet, and poor sucker gets shot full of standstill poison. Arvus follows behind but gets a lungfull of smoke. He sucks it up and smacks another target, but gets wrapped up.

Pool scoots into the lab and begins picking the lock on the lab. It takes her a little longer in the smokey hallway but she gets through.

Washout moves to the front door, blowgun at the ready, to cut off anyone's escape. Arvus trades punches with his opponent, and being armored, he doesn't take any punishment.

Pool gets into the hallway that leads to the lab. She skips past the first door and goes to where the expects the lab to be. She goes to the lab door and spots the security plate outside the door in time to step on it properly as she opens the lab door. She avoids the electroplasm shock trap on the doorframe, too. She quickly searches the place and finds a sort of satchel with pockets for vials, four of which are full of Lush. She looks for the formula, and while there are some notebooks, she figures the safe in the back of the lab is more likely, and picks that safe.

Arvus gets smacked right in the face, as his attacker deciphers the secret of the armored coat. Another figure approaches Washout out of the smoke, and Washout tries to blowgun him, but misses. The guy slams into him, and the blowgun dart he was going to use in self-defense tags Arvus instead, paralyzing the ex-cop for an hour or so.

Pool cracks the safe easily, scoring 3-coin worth of drugs and a notebook. She swipes it all.

Washout tries to stay mobile, avoiding getting tied up. He does so but one of the guys in the room gets passed him into the apartment hallway. Dr Oz goes running after him and ends up wrestling with a 19-year-old coed, whom he hits over the head with a frying pan. He pulls her back in and shuts the door.

Pool keeps looting the place, cramming everything she can get into her loot sack. Having scored what she thinks of as the mission critical items, she goes back to the parlor to try to help out with the fight. The guy who had been fighting Arvus was heading for Washout, but Pool catches up, kicks him in the knee, and then stomps his head. Fight over! Washout doses Arvus with Alcahest so he can move again.

Washout goes to the lab, grabs the biggest crate he can find, coats it in drift oil so it floats in air, and fills it up with all the loot he can grab.

Clip has been busy faking like he's going to be moving in soon when he hears someone in the hall. The landlord comes in and says that the line of credit seems to have come from a nonexistent bank. Clip sways them with drink and cash, aided by Washout's impersonation of a shamelessly abject and inept servant.

Dr Oz cracks some windows to aid in the dissipation of the smoke, then he starts rifling pockets and bedrooms, just to maximize the profit from the job. On close examination, the good Dr thinks the guy fighting with Arvus was probably a dealer by trade.

Washout, as a servant, and Arvus, as a mover, make "another trip down to the canal," successfully escaping from the building. Pool and Dr Oz leave via Riven's front door. Clip, last man in, goes and kicks Riven's unconscious body several times, giving him a little lecture about what happens when you hold grudges.

We come away with 4 coin (not counting what Dr Oz scoured). We pay one coin to Arvus, to compensste him properly, and spend the rest, plus most of our accumulated loot, to tier up to tier 1. Washout indulges his vice and heals himself, then begins working on an Oracular Prognosticator, which (in game terms) will give him one stress-free flashback per score. When he finishes it, it will be a fine item. It will take 6 ticks to design it and 8 ticks to build in, though he can put coin toward build ticks. Dr Oz figures out how to unlock the Map of Esketra. If he can get his hands on it, he can unlock it. Esketra was a Skovlan princess, who supposedly traded her soul to a demon in exchange for the death of her husband and his family. The map would be worth an enormous amount to a Skovlandic occultist, but to Akerosi, it's mostly a curio. Clip indulges his vice and trains Resolve. Arvus drinks. A lot. We agree that our heat is getting high and that we need to work in it as part of the prep for our next score in Charterhall.