Team Briefing. You are called in the early hours of the morning and an unmarked car with blacked out windows takes you to an undisclosed location. Inside a plainly furnished conference room you find yourself faced with a panel of two women and one man dressed in smart business suits. One of the women stands up and addresses you: “Sorry for the short notice but you’ve been summoned here as a matter of urgency. Three hours ago the MV Northern Star radioed that she was being boarded by pirates, shortly after the radio went dead. A short while later we received a text only report from an anonymous source aboard the Northern Star that the bridge had been taken and the crew had been murdered and dumped overboard. “The Northern Star was been taken out to sea in order to be deliberately sank as part of an insurance claim, in addition to the insurance money Bergstrom shipping, the company that owns Northern Star, was taking the opportunity to earn some extra money by disposing of some,” she pauses whilst the man looks uncomfortably away, “undesired property for some third parties.” The man stands up and takes over, “Bergstrom are particularly anxious that the Northern Star completes her voyage as planned. You are tasked with recapturing the Northen Star and sinking her, if possible you are to locate any surviving crew members and rescue them, but of paramount importance Northern Star must be sank by dawn tomorrow morning” The first woman steps up once more, “The source indicates that the boarding party consists of at least 10 members, armed with automatic small arms and they are sailing the vessel to an undisclosed location. You have full access to the company armoury for this one, once you draw your weapons you’ll be transported by helicopter to the “Jean Jacques” a French oceanic survey vessel whose captain is sympathetic to our predicament,” Intuitively you take that to mean that the captain, crew and company have been rewarded handsomely for their efforts, “Once there Commander Reeves,” The second woman waves a hand and smile nonchalantly, “Will take a motor launch to the Northern Star, she is an experienced marine engineer and will accompany you aboard to ensure that the Northern Star completes her final voyage.” “You will be paid 2,000 each for the completion of the mission which will result in the sinking of the Northern Star, with a 500 bonus per person for the rescue of each surviving member of the crew.” “Are there any questions?” She pauses, “Please make your way to the armoury.” You are ushered from the room to a massive open hall with supermarket type aisles splitting up the open space. The room appears to contain a number of a vast array of different firearms and you are free to pick from amongst them. Kevlar vests and helmets are issued as you enter the door, as are webbing kits. ……………………………………………………………………………………………… Please ask any questions you want, then indicate what weapons you are drawing from the armoury, how much ammunition you’re taking and how many magazines you’re taking. ……………………………………………………………………………………………… You meet up with Reeves again on the Jean Jacques, the Captain of the Jean Jacques clearly resents your presence there and the reception from the crew is decidedly frosty. Reeves is an ordinary looking woman in her mid twenties, of average height and build with blonde hair worn in a tight bun, blue eyes and a pale complexion. She is wearing plain olive drab fatigues, an assault vest and is carrying a sub-machinegun. She is protected by body armour and a Kevlar helmet. She is also carrying what appears to be quite a heavy rucksack. Speaking only sparingly you make your way to the Jean Jacques’s motor boat and with Reeves in control head towards the Northern Star. As you approach the tracker beacon’s signal Reeves cuts the motor to a barely audible whisper, the sea seems unusually calm and a fog descends covering the area in a fine fog and reducing visibility to around 50 metres. Eventually you locate the Northern Star, her hull streaked with rust and covered in only patchy paintwork. She’s still moving but only slowly. As Reeves brings the motor boat in around the ship you notice a rope ladder, presumably used by the pirates when they boarded, roughly midway along the hull. The motor boat is tied up against the ladder, Reeves turns to you and smiling slightly, speaking in hushed tones asks: “Who’s going first?”
What I now need is what kit you're carrying, Kevlar body armour including leg and arm pads as optional extras is available as are kevlar and steel helmets, Miltary webbing and assault vests are pretty much standard. Broadly any 20th-21st century firearm is available and you are free to choose what you want, all I ask is if the weapon is later than the early 1990s you provide me with a good link which contains at least the cyclic rate, magazine capacity and a brief write up of the weapon's good and bad features. I'll need to know as appropriate how your characters are carrying their weapons, whether it's unloaded, loaded/uncocked, loaded/cocked or loaded/cocked/safety off. I'll also need to know what setting you're using (i.e. single shot, 3 round burst, automatic as appropriate, changing your fire mode for most weapons will cost an Action) Your character may perform a number of Actions per turn equal to your Reaction characteristic, a turn is roughly 5 seconds. Think of an action as anything that takes up to a second or thereabouts to perform. You may perform more than 5 actions a turn since an action is considered to take up to a second and may be considerably less. So, cocking your weapon is an Action, loading and cocking is two, loading cocking and taking the safety off is three. Loading, cocking, taking the safety off and firing a burst is four actions. You'll react faster if your weapon is ready, but you're less likely to do something unfortunate like end up shooting yourself as you climb up the ladder if your weapon is kept safe. Armour and equipment may weigh your character down and encumber them and temporarily reduce your reaction characteristic, the size and type of weapon your character is carrying will also affect your in-game Reaction, put simply it takes longer to bring a heavy barrelled machinegun to bear than it does a pistol. The enemies you could face are viral zombies (Think Resident Evil/T-Virus type zombies, because Zombies are cool) and Mutants (Because mutants are cool too), and people. People get wounded and die as people do, they vary between ruthless trained professional killers and innocent, untrained, unskilled civilians who just want a quiet life. The quickest way to kill viral/plague zombies is shots to the head, but enough damage to the body or limbs will incapacitate or kill them. Mutants vary between animalistic deformed humans of practically no intelligence and multi-limbed armour plated kiling machines with almost human intelligence (But no technical abilities). So... ...Who's first up the ladder?
"You boys trust a woman to go first?" (what?) Colt Combat Elite (US, Pistol, .45 ACP) (3 extra clips- 7-rounds ea) in-holster, loaded and cocked, safety on, semi-automatic fire mode C7 (Canada, Assault Rifle, 5.56mm NATO) (2 extra clips- 30-rounds ea.) in one hand, cocked, loaded, safety off 3 Mills Grenades hanging from back of belt, pins through belt (can change/remove this as neccesary) climb up, peek over the edge for guards, climb guardrail, motion for others, flatten against the wall half-crouched
Full body armor (Kevlar vest, arm and leg pads, helmet) A semi-auto/manual shooty thing with silencer and 3 extra clips (I'll have to trust my teammates/employers recommandation here) (loaded, uncocked, safety on) 2 flashbangs, 2 smoke grenades, 1 flashlight (belted on the waist) IR-goggles (take a rough guess where I'll wear these) A couple of feet of rope (worn across the shoulder) *climb up, peek over the edge, attempt to climb over, stumble, muffled cry of pain, muffled curse, get against the wall, muffled curse*
Turon Blank, Crude, Reeves and Rhino climb up the ladder and board the Northern Star. The deck matches the general appearance of the hull, paint is patchy and there are puddles of rusty water and the deck itself is slimy and slippery after considerable neglect. Skyhawk remains below securing the motorboat. Turon reaces the railings first, the rest following in order with Rhino having to pause to allow Reeves to catch up - she's apparently struggling with the extra weight of her rucksack. To the right, in the direction of the Bridge superstructure and roughly 40 meters away are two ranks of containers. Turon notices the pungent smell of strong tobacco and hears indistinct voices, turning her head in the direction of the sound and smell she sees 3 or possibly 4 shadowy figures by the nearest one of the containers. A match flares as another cigarette is lit. As the team clamber over the railings Crude stumbles, swearing under his breath, the others glare in angry silence at him but the figures don't seem to have noticed and after a brief pause everyone makes their way over the railings and onto the deck. From the container there's a loud snapping sound as something is broken, a tool, possibly some bolt-cutters, is dropped to the deck, the figures shout jubilantly and punch the air, the nearest one appears to take a swig from a bottle of some description which is passed around the group. Reeves points in the direction of the figures and holds up 4 fingers. There's a quiet click as she takes the safety off her own submachinegun. ........................................................................................................... Over to you.
attempt to check for weapons and other useful info using goggles, signal found intel, lock and load, stick to the back
Nod, smile, lob grenade toward enemy group, round the corner, open fire (blasted chirstmas vacation.....forgot about all this stuff
Stix, at least two of the group ahead appear to be carrying slung weapons of some description. Suggest you check your Private Message (Can use email if you prefer) There's a clanging sound as one of the group ahead noisily opens the container, the door swings open and away keeping these four in view. They step rapidly back and seem to be fumbling for weapons. You hear shouts of alarm from up ahead as Reeves, crouching, opens fire with short bursts. Blaster, if the Admin haven't sorted you access here yet you can either PM your reply to me or respond in the Member's Lounge thread and I'll copy and paste. I'll directly PM Ricky/Roel/Chris/Skua? (Seems he's back as Admin now?) in the new year and see if we can't get you access rights.
look for best/nearest cover and get over there shout between the shots of others that the containers seem to contain non-human living cargo.
