LogCrucible-Jason-2

Game log for the 2017/09/24 session of Legacy: Crucible, as taken by Jason

Ash and Chevron eventually emerge from the sandstorm, stank but none the worst for wear. They immediately head for mesa.

Walton decides that he needs allies to deal with Mesa and rides for Girdertown, but gets delayed by the outskirts of the same sandstorm that waylaid Ash and Chevron.

Adriel meets up with some strangers, Smiths from the south. They're travelling around with a gentleman who wears a large hat, the Visitor. They're squatting in Farnsworth's hole, near the Children of the Fire. She tries to persuade them to join up with her wacky cult. The Smiths are nomadic and not real keen on joining up with anyone. She manages to talk them into it anyway, and they also tell her that other people are looking at Down Low, and about the fight between the Kinmont and Mesa.

Walton arrives in Girdertown, which was once an urban megalopolis, made primarily from cultured monocrystalline steel girders, grown in place. The original architecture got slagged in the apocalypse and now it's both unrecognizable and hard to maneuver through, unless you either know the layout, or feel comfortable exploring. It has a large population with a very materialistic bent and no body of religious belief. The Girderfolk know the Kinmont and some of them remember Walton; he's very well respected there (12 on his Statesman roll). He suceeds in negotiating his treaty: Girdertown will not trade with Mesa until Mesa gets right with the Kinmont. He also rounds up a gang of vigilantes to help raid Mesan traders in the wild.

Ash and Chevron arrive in Mesa, and Ash hears about the conflict between Mesa and the Kinmont. Ash doesn't want to get caught up in any of that funky shit going down in the city, though. He's rounding up his whole family and taking them back to the dish. He shows them the tech manual, as a symbol of all the riches contained therein. We also establish that Chevron knows about the dish tech manual, and that Ash thinks that dismantling the dish will help them disable the weapons that brought about the apocalypse, and has told Chevron so. Chevron doesn't oppose that goal, but he's going to insist on going along. Ash offers to let him come along and take some of the tech in exchange for protection while they loot the place. The tech will let them use radio communication. Chevron says sure, but he has no intention of following through. Since Ash trusts him, Chevron has a free chance to screw him at some point during the looting process.

Adriel is going around Down Low and finds evidence that people have been there fairly recently, but doesn't actually find anyone there. She sees tracks leaving toward Mesa, enough for a large group. She sets up a camp and then continues checking to make sure she's all alone there. She finds that some buildings were nearly complete, while others were just slabs. Many people have stopped through at different times. The construction is not fancy but they were clearly built to be defensible, if they were all complete. She camps inside one of the more complete buildings, for safety.

Walton then goes to Fort Passage, near the ford in the big river. Walton negotiates the hell out of the treaty, and the men of Fort Passage will boycott trade with anyone who defies the Kinmont throughout this age and the next. His recruiting is also successful and the Kinmont no longer need recruits.

Chevron finds his people in the market. He explains about the difficulties he's had and the opportunity represented by the dish. He makes no reference to any treaty with Ash, he just says they're straight up going to loot the dish and gain control of the weapons. According to Chevron, taking possession of the dish will square things up between The Old Suns and Ash. The Old Suns and the Tech-Bedou posse up and prepare to head out again.

Adriel goes off recruiting. She's headed to Girdertown, because she knows it's very populated, and so it offers a big upside. As she crosses the wasteland toward Girdertown, she runs into a military party from Fort Passage, whose sentries hail her and invite her into camp. She's led to Captain Crow, who wants to know what she's seen wandering about the desert. She explains that she's a wandering missionary. That fails to delight them. They hold her, which gives her a chance to preach. In exchange, they talk to her about the people of the trees.

As the Kinmont party travel from Fort Passage to the Holes, they stumble across a protected Mesan trading party. Walton orders Brutus to take his men and "settle their hash", which Brutus does with his customary efficiency.

Adriel and the Fort Passage party meet up with the Kinmont just as the fight with the Mesans end. The men of Fort Passage haven't heard about the conflict between the Kinmont and Mesa, nor the treaty, and they aren't immediately inclined to assume these Kinmont (who are, after all, acting out of character) are friendlies. Adriel agrees to go back to the Holes with Walton's warband.

Ash and Chevon return to the dish. The Old Suns have come loaded for bear, and that's a hell of a thing to see. Chevron and Ash each take a few followers through the hole into the dish, while leaving some more people up top. The Old Suns go first to sweep and clear, and also to try to loot it before the Tech-Bedou get in. Sadly it's full of electronics racks but not weapons racks. When they come back, they report it safe but also picked pretty clear. The Suns do not feel happy about this apparent weapon deficit. For the Tech-Bedou, the abundance of communications gear looks a lot better, and Ash goes to look for a way to power up the system. Once its up, the Old Suns want a demonstration of the weapons, but the Tech-Bedou want to tear it apart so that the weapons can't be used. The Old Suns take exception to that plan and insist that they want control of the weapons, even if they're not discriminate.

Ash: "This is not the kind of weapon you take down a stalker with. This is the kind of weapon you take out Girdertown with."

Chevron: "Fucking love it."

Ash tries to agree that the Old Suns can keep the targeting laser, which, with enough power, might be a powerful weapon (he says). Chevron doesn't want the designator, he wants the real thing, which he thinks could maybe be brought down. Ash does not see how that could happen. So far as they know, the only weapons here are big ones, which they will not allow to be released. Ash, their case fortified by all the tech on display, manages to sell the Old Suns on the idea that the laser is a weapon. They stage a fake display in which the targeting laser appears to blow something up, but in truth, the Tech-Bedou do not hand over a useful weapon, and they know that the Old Suns will be quite wroth with them once the deception becomes apparent. Meanwhile, Ash rigs something to destroy the control center, but it will require time to charge up. While waiting for it to charge, the Tech-Bedou keep Ash's word and improve the radios of the Old Suns. After it's over, the Tech-Bedou scatter, while the Old Suns go to Mesa. The explosion of the Dish at first provokes the Old Suns into a threat response, and then into a general feeling that it was a good day and it's all fine.

In the Holes, the Children listen to Walton, and some of them begin to condemn Mesa publicly. They also sign on to Walton's war treaty, and the Children will uphold the treaty until the end of the next age.

Chevron tries to convince Clive to take a radio in case "something big comes out of the wasteland" in exchange for recruits, but Clive wants to see the Old Suns in action - specifically, he wants them to kill some Kinmont. No murder for hire, no Kinmont. Chevron won't take that deal without a lot more consideration. He talks to the Old Suns and they go looking for answers on what's really going on. They will all rendezvous in Girdertown.

Ash heads for the Holes, hoping to get away from the Old Suns before their betrayal is discovered. In the wilderness just north of the river, west of the Holes, they find an ancient depot, with a working chiller in one room. They try to use one of the widgets in their bag of tricks to get in, and then some crab-looking things start pouring out of the other bunker. The Tech-Bedou scatter in confusion, and blame Ash for leading them into a disaster.

The Kinmont head south to try to make contact with some of the nomads. On the way, they find an ancient road uncovered by the sandstorm, and a group of vehicles by the roadside. The convoy was on the road from Girdertown to the reactor, which tells us that Girdertown had actually tried to respond to the emergency somehow. We always thought they'd been overwhelmed all at once, so this changes our understanding of the apocalypse.

The Suns arrive in Girdertown and meet with Neomi, who runs it. They recruit there from the populace and eliminate their need for recruits.

Adriel scouts on ahead instead of getting bogged down trying to loot an ancient dessicated convoy. She finds some free lovers, who have no liking for the Children.

The Old Suns hear the truth about what happened between Mesa and the Kinmont, and file the intel away as leverage over anyone who tries to make a treaty with them. Chevron would rather side with Mesa, not because he agrees with them, but because he wants their trade.

The Tech-Bedou return to Mesa. They already know about the feud between Mesa and the Kinmont, and Ash asks to speak to Clive. He's not around, but Audrey is. Ash offers the services of the Tech-Bedou as blockade runners, coming and going without interference from the Kinmont. She asks if they can get guns. Audrey wants to negotiate hard, thinking she's safe on top of the mesa. Ash threatens that if she doesn't want to play their game, they'll level the mesa. She seems to think that having the Tech-Bedou as intermediaries is a favor to them, rather than a solution to a Mesa problem. Ash offers to turn the mesa's Van de Graff generators into an anti-plasma field that will protect the elevator. The offers is accepted and Ash performs the necessary modifications, but the field is tempermental and someone needs to stay with it all the time to keep it running. They teach the Mesans how to maintain the field, which solidifies relations between Mesa and the Tech-Bedou. Ash also gives the Mesa a spyglass and a power source, to enable them to see the Kinmont coming. Those gifts just barely persuade the Mesans to make a treaty with the Tech-Bedou to act as their trading intermediaries, which resolves the Tech-Bedou's need for trade.

Adriel has a theological dispute with the free lovers and convinces them that the Children have a superior doctrine, and maybe they should think about converting. The free love advocates who convert agree to move into Down Low, allowing the Children to expand their holdings and fulfilling their need for land.