LogThe Watch-Jason-1

Game log for the 2020-05-17 session of The Watch, as taken by Jason

We plan our mission and assign roles. Lomo botches his Watch Their Backs roll and owes a Complication. Rezi struggles with her navigating and we all mark Weary. Yeli scores a partial on recon and marks Weary. Toby scores a partial on Take Point, owes a Complication, and marks Weary.

During the mission, Palita gets separated from the squad and is never seen again. Draile gets killed. Something follows us home.

The squad gets assigned to escort a wagon train. We're all marching alongside the wagons, moving through the forest between map locations four and five. Resi's talking with Draile, and just as Draile makes a joke that cracks the Corporal up, she goes down with an arrow in her neck. Yeli had been checking on something farther back and sees archers up in the trees. Tovy had been scouting ahead, convinced the Shadow was planning an ambush, but then comes running back and engages with her bow. She sees that the archers attacking them have the forms of men, but no mouths. Their faces are seamless between nose and chin. Lomo initially hits the deck, then also fires arrows back. Once we kill a few of the ambushers, they disengage in stages, and since our goal is to protect the convoy, we don't pursue. Lomo and Tovy discover that the dead bodies are melting, which is disgusting. When they return, Lomo realizes Palita's gone, and asks Rezi what happened. Rezi's not sure, but she curses the way people never seem to hold formation as expected. She gets the formation moving, reminding everyone of their spot in the formation, and also to keep an eye out for Pelita. Laya, driver of the lead wagon, approaches Rezi and warns her that speed is important. The Corporal agrees and orders people forward, although Yeli's not pleased that we're leaving someone behind. She wouldn't like it if it was her. She mutters something under her breath, and Rezi mutters that next time, it's going to be Yeli who gets it. We get to our destination camp near dark.

At the camp, Rezi delivers a eulogy for Draile, but stammers to a halt, and has to ask Yeli to come help her finish it. Lomo steps up and speaks a prayer for Polita, too.

Lomo then wanders off to the shadows at the edge of camp, bearing a flask of the strong stuff, and gets a little hammered while staring at the sky and thinking about the melting bodies she saw today. She has a vision of the stars going out, replaced by a darkness covering the sky, and then the sky begins raining hot, back, acidic goo on her. Black hands come out of the puddle she's in and grab at her limbs, and that's when she snaps out of it. She then goes to open up to Rezi about her gried for Palita.

She finds Rezi having a drink, talking about the day, enjoying having made it through her first battle as a Corporal. She invites Lomo to have a drink with her, and Lomo promptly starts talking about the need to go search for Palita. Rezi tells her it's great that she found someone to care about, and she should hang on to the hope that Palita's going to make it back.

Tovy finds herself arm-wrestling with Marro, who is absolutely jacked, and gives her a good run for her money. Tovy ends up losing, but she came so close that she feels a renewed commitment to training. Then Yeli comes to talk to her about Palita, and Tovy just shuts her down hard, and lays into her about not showing respect to the Corporal. Yeli doesn't seem quite as enthusiastic about military discipline as Tovy, and their conversation ends in mutual anger.

Tovy then unburdens herself to the Corporal, talking about her guilt for having misread the Shadow's intentions during the day's skirmish. Rezi ironically gives her the same "do a little better each day" speech that Tovy gave Yeli, but delivered with a little more kindness. Tovy promises to be on the corporal's team tomorrow.

Rezi comes back to the campfire, feeling a little tired after hearing about everyone's problems, and decides that she is not even a little bit in the mood to have Initiate Ega sitting in her spot by the fire. She teaches Ega respect.

We all wake up to screams and cries of anguish. The camp is under attack! The air smells of smoke. Camp defense mission! Rezi has a hit but still marks Weary for not having Cameraderie with everyone. Yeli's on Lookout and, with a little help from the Corporal, makes a strong hit. Complications: Ega is wounded and marks 2-harm. Palita dies. Ega is captured by the enemy.

Yeli hears the sounds of fighting and gathers her equipment, shouting for people to stand to arms, but she doesn't leave her tent until ordered. Lomo picks up her bow and goes to work. The attackers have lit some of the tents on fire, but that's the only illumination we have to see the 8' tall attackers. They're using 8' long flaming tree limbs as both clubs and incendiary devices. Ega shouts for instructions from Rezi, who tells her to fight as she was trained. She doesn't get far before she's clubbed right into a tent, which collapses in flames on top of her. Tovy isn't sure it's safe to use her bow in this uncertain light and fights at close quarters with shield, sword, and spear. Some of the Initiates try imitating Tovy rather than following their own training. Yeli spots some smaller figures that run on all fours that start dragging Ega and the tent she's in. Rezi pursues and spears one, and rather than dying, the thing starts trying to crawl up her spear. The other one gets away with Ega. Lomo jumps on top of a wagon to get a better view and starts using his bow to pick off enemies, and sees that the enemy has archers of their own. One of them has Palita's green cloak, and she taks special care to take that one down. Eventually one of the 8' titanic attackers goes down, and the squad that was attacking it goes to attack another one, causing the balance of numbers to slowly but inevitably shift in favor of the Watch. As the enemy withdraws, Tovy calls out to Rezi for permission to pursue. "Go! Go! Go!" replies the corporal. Lomo switches from bow to sword and joins the pursuit, and Yeli follows. Rezi brings up the rear to keep the squad focused. Pursuit becomes our new mission.

Yeli botches the Recon, but Lomo's there to pick up the slack. Yeli and Tovy get full successes on scouting and walking point. Complications: something follows us home, we lost a pivotal asset.

The pursuit is odd because the "titans" don't really want to run and keep standing to fight. The smaller ape-things and the archers move faster, and we have to rely on arrows, or on them making mistakes. It's all going great until we crest a rise and confront an enemy battalion. Our force cannot possibly match an enemy battalion. Rather than a great victory, the pursuit turns into a rapid withdrawl and a hasty evacuation of the camp. The wagons we just led here now retreat with us, leaving behind a burning camp. Once we've covered some ground, the Lt Cmd calls a halt and begins planning the new front. Our squad is assigned to carry the news of this retreat back to Reti.