Sometimes I have a bit of a problem playing certain games. I have this habit of attaching too much personality to otherwise silent characters. My FTL and X-Com characters have suffered from this (especially since I started naming them after people I know) and it's difficult to see them die after nurturing them through those early levels. This is the traumatic story about my latest causality Bob the Cook. Allow me to explain...
A few nights ago me and a couple of friends sat down to a game of The Awful Green Things From Outer Space, a board game from the 80's in which players either take control of the unsuspecting crew of a spaceship or the invading Green Things. The crew can pick up weapons with randomly determined effects to defend themselves whereas the GTs must spawn, grow and devour to win. It's very dependent on the players luck with the dice and mostly seems to play out like that scene from Aliens where all the marines die.
So having set up the board, listened to the rules and back story we started turn one.
Bob was tired. He had been working the late shift in the Znutar's kitchen, preparing a fancy meal to celebrate the crew discovering new life on the planet the had visited, not intelligent life mind you, but life none the less. The Captain had instantly approved of the idiot bird creatures and adopted one as his new pet, bringing it back to the ship with some green rock samples which were safely stored in one of the aft cargo bays for the science boys to study tomorrow.
"Now move one of your characters into an area with the GTs and all hell should break lose" our designated rule giver/game master/only person who had played before instructed me. I had already decided that this was to be Bob the Cook. I had marines, scientists, engineers and a freeking killer robot to play with so the cook seemed pretty expendable.
Bob screamed as he sounded the alarm. Moments ago he'd stepped from the kitchen and come face to face with two green, pulsating alien creatures. One lunged at him and he ducked just in time, the alien extremity missing him by mere inches. As he frantically called for help, he was relieved to see the Captain and first office charging out of the bridge, pistols at the ready. He had enough of his wits left to get out of their way as the aliens advanced down the corridor.
"Ok what happens now?" I asked my buddy with the rule book and in what I thought was the beginning of a few good turns, the ray guns my Captain and First Officer had proved to be pretty powerful and after some lucky dice rolls, I had the first two alien kills. Unfortunately for the rest of the crew, things did no start out so well. Acid and blow torches had little effect other than to stun the GTs and a marine hitting one with a pool que resulted in one of the aliens dissolving into a stack of smaller aliens.My opponent promptly spent the next couple of turns growing to full size before trapping and killing my robot, the most powerful crew piece on the board, it's one kill being to take out one alien as it exploded (it actually was so powerful it had its own section in the rules saying how OP it was). My luck had defiantly taken a turn for the worse and my casualties started to mount.
Two hours had passed since the Captain had saved Bob and charged off to lead the fight for his ship. Bob had retreated to his assigned battle station in the prow of the ship, away from much of the fighting. Initially he had been able to listen into his comrades progress over the ships comms but the last transmission had been over an hour ago. It had all happened so fast and no one seemed to know what the hell these things were. He shuddered as he remembered the doctors screams as they broke into the medbay. Things did not seem to be going well. Suddenly the intercom came to life in a burst of static. Bob could just make out the voice of his captain "ships overrun........save yourselves!".
"Game over man! Game over!" I cried (at this point, I really did feel like that marine from Aliens). I was down to my last 3 characters. A sensor officer, the stupid mascot and Bob. None were armed and I was not risking going across the ship to retrieve the good weapons from my fallen captain. My opponent had massed a sizable swarm of aliens, the most powerful of which could one hit kill me. I couldn't win the game, but I could deny my opponent the satisfaction of killing everyone. "Time to abandon ship I think..." and, after a check of the rules, that actually turned out to be a legitimate strategy. I steeled myself for what would be me penultimate turn, knowing I had one chance to save the survivors.
"Bob you have to save yourself, I'll hold them here with the stupid mascot while you get into the escape pod!" Bob started to protest was cut off as his friend and mentor Petty officer Nigel B. Riggly shoved him through the airlock doors and sealed them. Bob could only listen to his friend dying screams as the Awful Green Things swarmed over him. He had survived and as the escape pod jettisoned from the Znutar he breathed a sigh of relief. What could possible go wrong now.
The race to kill Bob had been a climatic end to the game with using some of my remaining characters as a meat shield, and as we shook hands and tallied the dead (and empty beer bottles) I smiled. At least Bob had survived.
"Not so fast..." my pulse quickened as my friend flipped to the last page of the rule book.
"There are rules for this epilogue. Rolls one last die"
I rolled a 2.
"Bob doesn't have enough fuel to get to a planet and is destined to be lost in space forever"
Dammit
A few nights ago me and a couple of friends sat down to a game of The Awful Green Things From Outer Space, a board game from the 80's in which players either take control of the unsuspecting crew of a spaceship or the invading Green Things. The crew can pick up weapons with randomly determined effects to defend themselves whereas the GTs must spawn, grow and devour to win. It's very dependent on the players luck with the dice and mostly seems to play out like that scene from Aliens where all the marines die.
So having set up the board, listened to the rules and back story we started turn one.
Bob was tired. He had been working the late shift in the Znutar's kitchen, preparing a fancy meal to celebrate the crew discovering new life on the planet the had visited, not intelligent life mind you, but life none the less. The Captain had instantly approved of the idiot bird creatures and adopted one as his new pet, bringing it back to the ship with some green rock samples which were safely stored in one of the aft cargo bays for the science boys to study tomorrow.
"Now move one of your characters into an area with the GTs and all hell should break lose" our designated rule giver/game master/only person who had played before instructed me. I had already decided that this was to be Bob the Cook. I had marines, scientists, engineers and a freeking killer robot to play with so the cook seemed pretty expendable.
Bob screamed as he sounded the alarm. Moments ago he'd stepped from the kitchen and come face to face with two green, pulsating alien creatures. One lunged at him and he ducked just in time, the alien extremity missing him by mere inches. As he frantically called for help, he was relieved to see the Captain and first office charging out of the bridge, pistols at the ready. He had enough of his wits left to get out of their way as the aliens advanced down the corridor.
"Ok what happens now?" I asked my buddy with the rule book and in what I thought was the beginning of a few good turns, the ray guns my Captain and First Officer had proved to be pretty powerful and after some lucky dice rolls, I had the first two alien kills. Unfortunately for the rest of the crew, things did no start out so well. Acid and blow torches had little effect other than to stun the GTs and a marine hitting one with a pool que resulted in one of the aliens dissolving into a stack of smaller aliens.My opponent promptly spent the next couple of turns growing to full size before trapping and killing my robot, the most powerful crew piece on the board, it's one kill being to take out one alien as it exploded (it actually was so powerful it had its own section in the rules saying how OP it was). My luck had defiantly taken a turn for the worse and my casualties started to mount.
Two hours had passed since the Captain had saved Bob and charged off to lead the fight for his ship. Bob had retreated to his assigned battle station in the prow of the ship, away from much of the fighting. Initially he had been able to listen into his comrades progress over the ships comms but the last transmission had been over an hour ago. It had all happened so fast and no one seemed to know what the hell these things were. He shuddered as he remembered the doctors screams as they broke into the medbay. Things did not seem to be going well. Suddenly the intercom came to life in a burst of static. Bob could just make out the voice of his captain "ships overrun........save yourselves!".
"Game over man! Game over!" I cried (at this point, I really did feel like that marine from Aliens). I was down to my last 3 characters. A sensor officer, the stupid mascot and Bob. None were armed and I was not risking going across the ship to retrieve the good weapons from my fallen captain. My opponent had massed a sizable swarm of aliens, the most powerful of which could one hit kill me. I couldn't win the game, but I could deny my opponent the satisfaction of killing everyone. "Time to abandon ship I think..." and, after a check of the rules, that actually turned out to be a legitimate strategy. I steeled myself for what would be me penultimate turn, knowing I had one chance to save the survivors.
"Bob you have to save yourself, I'll hold them here with the stupid mascot while you get into the escape pod!" Bob started to protest was cut off as his friend and mentor Petty officer Nigel B. Riggly shoved him through the airlock doors and sealed them. Bob could only listen to his friend dying screams as the Awful Green Things swarmed over him. He had survived and as the escape pod jettisoned from the Znutar he breathed a sigh of relief. What could possible go wrong now.
The race to kill Bob had been a climatic end to the game with using some of my remaining characters as a meat shield, and as we shook hands and tallied the dead (and empty beer bottles) I smiled. At least Bob had survived.
"Not so fast..." my pulse quickened as my friend flipped to the last page of the rule book.
"There are rules for this epilogue. Rolls one last die"
I rolled a 2.
"Bob doesn't have enough fuel to get to a planet and is destined to be lost in space forever"
Dammit