Welcome, my little critters, to Tales from the Crit Season 2, The Level Up.
We're an actual play podcast with an ever-changing cast of players making our way through a bunch
of different RPG systems, from micro-RPGs to some of the more well-known role-playing
games out there, and the occasional highly narrative tabletop game.
Content warnings can be found in the episode's description.
My name is Riley Groves, and I am the Crit Keeper on this episode of Tales from the Crit.
Previously, on Vault 69, A Tale from the Wasteland, a rowdy bunch of raiders set out on the search
for some heavy artillery.
They got a hint it laid to the east in the abandoned Tesla lab.
They soon discovered they were not alone in the desert wasteland where the old building
still stands, but it was in fact home to a mess of deathclaws.
As the group searched the building, they discovered your typical smattering of irradiated beasts,
but also a Colonel Gutsy guarding some rather impressive firepower.
And due to the typical American greed, our raider friends soon become the hunted, as
the deathclaws emerge from their desert lair.
Will it be a TPK, or will the raiders be able to make it out alive?
Find out now, on this episode of Vault 69.
Welcome back to Tales from the Crit.
I am Riley Groves, and I am joined by my beautiful, lovely co-hosts, Rebecca.
Hello.
And then I'm joined by my not beautiful, lovely co-hosts, Tim.
I'm beautiful.
Yes, you are.
I'm Mikey.
Hi.
And Derek.
I'm all right.
Okay, none of you are as beautiful as my wife, so you don't fall into the same bucket.
I could be.
We could try more.
Thanks, Riley.
Okay, I regret what I said.
My bad, guys.
Throw a little makeup on.
You clean up pretty good, Tim.
Yeah, we just need to spend more time together, and then you'll see me in a new light.
All right, what a weird day.
All right, so we're going to do something a little bit different than how we typically
start our games.
Instead of going to our pod deck, interview deck, to learn more about each other as people,
we're going to use the Ultimate RPG Campfire deck by James Diamato to find out actually,
to find out more about our characters.
Hmm, interesting prospect.
So the first question, not the first, the only question for the day, this one is based
on your companions.
And the question is, who among your companions do you worry about losing the most?
Maybe Tommen, because he just kind of runs into battle.
Okay.
I would have to say Marvin.
I think that from Augusta's standpoint on everything, he's probably the most crucial and versatile
to being able to get into other vaults and help with information gathering and that type
of thing.
Awesome.
Yeah, I'd probably have to say Augusta, because they seem like the only one that really knows
their way around a robot.
Okay.
Oh, I know my way around a robot.
A little sultriness.
Okay.
Old Tommen's like, myself.
I don't like any of these people.
I don't know if Old Tommen would like anybody.
Well, it doesn't actually say that you have to like them.
Just worry about losing them.
So it could be a tactile thing.
I think that's kind of what Augusta went for with Marvin.
Guess I'm going to go with, yeah, the robot for just wandering off.
Okay.
The other two at least would follow and yeah, you seem to get a little distracted and wander
off.
Poor Marvin.
Mr. Handy, I don't have legs.
I go where the thruster takes me.
All right.
With that, let's jump into it.
So the Death Claw is going to go first.
And as you see it raise its gigantic claw, we jump to Marvin and Old Tommen, who have
just gotten back inside the Tesla lab.
During the explosion, I'm going to tell Marvin to head to find a back door out to head back
to help the other two.
And Tall Man's going to head towards the second floor, no, the third floor and then the fourth
floor.
On the third floor, he's going to smash the door to the animal lab before heading to the
fourth floor to set off the building's alarms and shut the door behind him.
Okay.
So you push open the third floor first.
Trying to make as big of a distraction as possible by releasing the animals and by creating
sound to draw the other ones away from the den.
Would the animals still be alive?
He said there was stuff making noise in that room.
So like, they probably just died.
Oh, what?
There's something in there.
So you push in the door to the third floor and in front of you, you see a bunch of irradiated
rats and there's a couple that are just glowing and they have like just some ooze pouring
out of their mouth.
They're, you know, R-O-U-S's, so they're rodents of unusual size.
And as soon as you open that door, they all head right for it.
They have been in this third floor for way too long.
I'm going to run as fast as I can to the fourth floor to shut the door behind me so they can't
get in.
I know the lock's busted, but they shouldn't be able to get past the closed door and set
the alarm.
The fourth floor door doesn't lock anymore.
You guys had Colonel Gutsy cut the lock.
Yeah, shut it.
Try and knock something in front of it to hold it shut.
Cause there's rats.
They shouldn't.
Yeah, they're not that strong.
I'm hoping that as soon as they realize that there's something coming in the ground floor,
they're going to leave me alone.
That's my plan.
Just don't kick something in front of it to keep it shut and then set the building's alarm
off.
All right.
Mr. Handy, what are you doing?
You said to look for another exit?
Yeah, to go skirt around them at the death clause and head back to the lair, the nest,
to help them.
You're still in the lobby?
Yeah.
Okay.
Standing in the lobby, you hear and see the radroaches now have adjusted to the light
coming in through the window.
They are back in this room and they are a buzz.
And I am just running to the back door.
I thought there wasn't cause you checked the perimeter.
Yeah, you checked all the perimeter and didn't find another door.
The first time we went in, remember?
I think Mr. Gutsy found the only other door off the roof.
Off the roof, the secret door, the forbidden door.
You got a hole in the window or the front door.
You could also lead the roaches out to be more of a distraction for the things.
You do you.
Yeah, I'll try and lead the roaches out.
Are you creating a distraction like you did previously by bashing your bat on things and
leading the roaches?
Yeah.
Okay.
Maybe get some of those mole rats or whatever.
Mole rats?
R-O-U-S-S.
Yeah, the rad rats are not down on the first floor.
Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah, give me an intelligence and I guess we'll call it speech.
Kind of charisma based, you know, trying to create a distraction.
One success is all you'll need.
I got two.
Okay.
So flip over an action point.
That's good.
Cause you guys are down to one.
And as you come out the hole in the window that old Talman had created before, five rad
roaches are following close behind you.
As you get out, you see that there is also a death claw really close.
Mr. Gutsy, there's the death claw.
Attack it.
You're asking Colonel Gutsy to attack it?
He's just kind of hanging out there.
I mean, he's just kind of sputtering.
Guns work.
Implement self-destruct mode.
They blow up big.
Perfect.
That's what we need.
He needs to be the savior.
Colonel Gutsy does actually successfully fire his laser cannon.
Where are the lasers?
And the laser cannon on Colonel Gutsy does hit the death claw several times and the death
claw responds in kind with seven successes and destroys what's remaining of the Colonel
Gutsy right in front of you.
And the rad roaches pretty much scatter when they get out into the light and see the death
claw doing this.
He just killed a robot.
Well, you didn't.
Yeah, I would probably.
I mean, I know I would have saw it because I have 360 vision.
I'm going to use a luck point to ask Colonel Gutsy to make a sacrifice and activate a self-destruct
subroutine.
And I'm going to tell him like, if you can, you may need to explode your core.
It will be a noble sacrifice and our future perfect robotic world will be made all the
better for your sacrifice.
Thank you.
I'll give you the opportunity.
Now, what I need you to do is roll.
What do you think?
One successor to you to talk.
I mean, he's already pretty dead.
I mean, he is already pretty dead.
And his protocols is to protect the building.
I'm leaning kind of toward one also because of the reprogramming.
It might.
Yeah, I agree.
More towards.
Yeah, he's an ally.
Yeah.
I'm going to need one success on a charisma and speech check.
Got it.
And a critical success.
All right.
So that's actually you can flip over to because that's three successes, right?
Excellent.
Awesome.
You watch as Colonel Gutsy is getting torn apart.
You hear a few seconds of beeping before it completely explodes in a gigantic explosion
and knocks this death claw very far back.
And it turns around very slowly and makes its way back towards the cave.
Let's go to Augusta.
All right.
You have some defensive clothing now, right?
Yeah, I've got some Brotherhood fatigues and an army helmet.
And so what's your what's your defense?
A one.
OK, this death claw does come down, raking its claws down across your torso.
Let's see how much damage it does.
This is it, man.
OK, so overall, it got four successes and three criticals.
So it's going to do six physical damage.
OK, I do have a two buffer there.
So I'll take four and then my action.
Yes.
All right.
I'm going to take off sprinting toward that silver thing as fast as I can.
I'm hoping that it is some sort of refuge I will be able to climb into and huddle down
until whatever happens happens.
OK, I'll give cover.
All right.
Just so you know, there are still two death claws that are, you know, between you and
it pretty much or at the mouth of the cave.
So oh, OK, they are.
I thought that they had headed in a different direction.
No, only one headed towards Marvin and Old Tallman.
And two of them are looking towards Guli Roberts direction.
But she's not like super far away from you.
OK, so it's four total.
Yes.
One's attacking me, one's heading toward the building, two are between me and the cave,
looking toward where Guli is.
Yeah, one of those is the extremely large one.
OK, then I will start sprinting west away the opposite direction of Guli.
So like if it's the cave, Guli, Tesla, I'm running this way away from Guli.
And I'm also going to I would have already had my gun.
I'm going to try to just fire my gun while running, try to create a distraction away
from Guli.
You can.
I don't want to aim at anything.
I just want to just fire it while it's out and I'm running.
OK, so you can get one space away and fire your gun.
OK, that's not far enough.
You can spend an action point to take another action, which you could dash by doing that.
OK, yeah, I'll spend an action point and dash.
So then with that roll to attack.
I'm using a 10 millimeter pistol.
OK, so that's agility plus small guns.
Yeah, doesn't matter.
You missed?
Yeah, 14 and 18.
OK, yeah, not great.
So you do just fire off some rounds and try to sprint.
Guli, what are you doing?
I don't know.
I'm just shooting at them, I guess.
Which ones?
So there's two looking at me, at least one going towards Augusta.
There's one like right behind Augusta.
How close are the ones looking at me?
They still haven't moved, so they're about between 75 and 100 yards away, still near the
mouth of the cave.
All right, I'm going to tuck behind the rock and I'm going to shoot at the one that's right
next to Augusta and try to kind of deter it from her, I guess with my hunting rifle.
That's medium range, is that?
Yes, that'll be fine.
So what role am I rolling?
It's a small gun and it does six damage and it has piercing.
Small guns is tagged on mine.
OK, nice.
And agility, you said?
Yes.
I have a three and a 19 and I needed to get an eight.
So it has a defense of two, so you don't hit it.
OK.
I'm sorry.
It is a very beefy creature.
OK, then that's all I do, I guess.
So you do make contact with the creature, but its hide is very thick and your bullet does
not penetrate it.
Old Tallman, let's jump to you.
You're up in the building, you've run back to the computer terminal that you know that
Augusta was working on previously.
Go ahead and give me an intelligence and science role.
I'll need a difficulty of two.
Oh, OK.
Well, neither one of those.
You do have enough action points if you wanted to try.
Yeah, I'd use them all just to try and get.
Leave one.
All right.
OK, flip over three action points.
Nope, I still only got one.
Success.
Not enough.
You fumble around with the computer.
I will give you the chance to redo that on your next turn.
However, you hear the radroaches scratching out the door of the Tesla lab or the main
lab that you're at.
Yeah, the rad rats scratching out the door.
So they are trying to push their way in.
They do.
They're very attracted by by you, but they're not in yet.
Mr. Handy, Marvin, what you got going on?
So I'm running back towards them, right?
Sure.
I've got the radroaches out.
They're gone.
They've scattered that you see.
You can see Augusta being pursued very closely by a death claw.
And you hear shots.
You'd hear Gullia making shots.
But the death claw that Mr. Gutsy hit didn't die.
No, but it is very injured.
And it's just running back home.
Yeah.
I'm going to go try and save Augusta.
OK, what do you do?
I'm going over there as quick as I can.
And then once I'm well enough in range, I'm going to try my new alien atomizer and shoot
at the death claw that's giving chase.
OK, let's see it.
It's a small gun.
So agility plus small guns.
I should have traded you for the Tesla cannon because I have big guns tagged.
Ooh, critical failure and a 14.
You get within range, which is close for the alien atomizer.
And the sun reflects in all three of my eyes, in all three of your eyes.
So you begin to miss.
However, it also reflects off your body in a very attention grabbing way.
And the death claw turns no longer pursuing Augusta and sees you and pursues you instead.
Quickly closes the gap.
You have a defensive one.
Yes.
OK.
Boy.
Marvin.
Oh, sweet Marvin.
It swings this gigantic claws at you.
And with the crits that it got with vicious as tagged, it does a total of 10 physical
damage.
God, is that it?
You only have eight.
I have eight and I took a hit earlier.
Let's let's see where where it hits you right in the torso to, by the way, the image resistance
of two.
OK, so it does eight damage overall.
And you are already at seven.
Is that correct?
Yeah.
Mr. Handy goes down.
Old Tallman quickly back to you.
You're going to try the terminal again.
Yep.
I'm going to try one more time at the terminal before Old Tallman gets real mad.
OK.
You say intelligence and science.
Yep.
Two successes needed.
Nope.
OK.
The terminal, upon failing the second time, brings up a new screen and it says attempts
left one.
Give it one more attempt.
OK, let's see it.
Is that a nat one?
It's a nat one and a 14.
So I'm going to.
Yeah.
I mean, with a nat one, that's a critical success.
That is to, in fact, two successes.
And yeah, I'm going to go with that and reactivate the alarm.
OK.
And whatever else is in that terminal.
Whatever defense system.
Is there a turret control?
No, the alarm just starts going off and it's extremely loud and it begins to go off in
all parts of the building.
And Augusta and Guli Roberts, you hear this and you can see that it attracts one more
of the death claw, the littlest one, towards the sound of the lab.
The large one still remains at the mouth of the cavern.
However, it is attracting it towards your way.
Why don't the two of you make me some intelligence and sneak checks?
I'll need one success from each of you.
I have one success.
One success.
OK.
No critical failures, right?
No.
All right.
So you're able to seek cover as the third one runs past your position and towards the
Tesla lab and steps right on Marvin's body in doing so.
I feel like you didn't.
That was a choice.
That was a choice you made.
Yeah, a little bit.
Insult to injury.
Yes.
And along the way, it does get the attention to and attract the one that was wounded from
the other Colonel Gutsy.
So there's two full health and the one that's all fucked up, all heading toward the back
toward the lab.
And they're all past except for the big one.
Except for the big one.
What is everybody doing?
Well, I'm sitting there in the dirt sparking.
Yeah, sorry, you're dead.
So we don't need to know what you're doing.
Augusta is going to continue moving west.
I'm going to try to keep giving Augusta cover as much as I can.
Who are you going to be firing at then?
Because there's three headed towards the Tesla lab right now.
And then the matriarch down by the cave.
I would not shoot and draw a test.
Yeah.
And I think I'm just going to crouch behind the rock for a bit and wait for those three
to run past me.
They're past you and Augusta at this point.
You should ready.
Just prepare an action in case you can go.
Can old tall men after setting the alarm off head towards the roof to take pot shots at
the death clause that haven't headed towards the building?
Really?
What are you attacking with?
I am going to attack with the Tesla rifle, not really caring that it might not actually
go that way or that far enough.
I'm just trying to draw attention.
If it does hit, it doesn't matter if it does damage.
It just needs to draw attention back to.
Okay.
And do you say that was a big gun or was it a small gun?
Big gun because Mike made that comment about how he should have had it because he has efficiency
in large weapons.
I also have an energy weapon classification.
Does it count as that?
It is an energy weapon.
Yeah.
Okay.
Then it's that.
So it'd be perception and energy.
I have a success and a failure.
Yeah.
You lob a shot down there and it hits around the three death clause that are headed towards
the Tesla lab.
It doesn't do any damage, but they continue making their way towards the lab.
Okay.
And they're essentially at the bottom of the building at this point.
Okay.
So I'm trying to keep their attention and draw the attention on the matriarch if I can.
I know she's far away.
She's much further away.
I'm hoping that if I cause enough commotion, she might come help her.
I have a question.
Are these things smart enough that they'll know to go through the door at the bottom
or they're just animals?
I don't think they'd be like, ooh, a door, but they're going to see an opening that's
right next to the door that's been blown out by a gigantic super mutant that busted out
of it and be like, there's an entryway.
And that's what they're doing.
Fly me into that entryway.
Huh.
What are you two doing?
At this point, if the cave is here, I'm hoping I moved out west enough to be able to start
kind of heading perpendicular.
The idea being that if the matriarch does leave that cave that I can make it to whatever
this silver thing is.
So probably reducing from a run to more of a strategic kind of half crawl, slowly just
trying to stay down and hidden while moving.
Yeah.
Sounds like you're trying to do an agility plus sneak roll.
Difficulty of two.
That's two twos.
So actually that would be a, you said sneak.
That's two criticals.
Two criticals.
Okay.
So that's four successes.
So go ahead and turn over to action points and you're able to stay hidden as you sneak
around.
Gulea, anything that you're doing?
I don't really know what to do.
I'm starting to get a little concerned about the death clause getting into the building
and going after Talman.
Derek says don't worry about Talman.
So I'm going to not worry about Talman.
All right.
I just want to be able to give cover to Augusta if the big one starts coming after her.
Oh, I guess too.
If you started kind of doing some shots that way, it would distract her from the cave so
that I can get into whatever or I could find whatever the silver thing is and hope it's
a turning point in the battle.
So should I start shooting at her and draw on her towards me?
It's up to you.
It could potentially give me an advantage to be able to do something.
I also have a question.
This is that I have a jet.
Really understand what that means because I wrote extra action cost one less AP brief.
Can I fly?
Jet is a chem.
No, a chem.
Oh, damn.
Okay.
All right.
I'm going to shoot at this motherfucker, the bacon.
You're going to need two successes to hit it.
So what weapon are you using?
My hunting rifle.
Okay.
So you're going to roll.
That was small guns and agility.
Okay.
That's a six and a two.
Small guns is tagged.
I got one success on a six.
Okay.
You hit it and you do draw its attention.
It is now moving slowly your direction.
Okay.
Which is what I want.
Okay.
So Augusta is definitely going to start moving toward the silver thing.
The creature's back is to Augusta.
I think that they will be a little less cautious and kind of really just try to pick up the
speed to get to that object.
Okay.
If you're going to run for it, give me an agility and survival.
Difficulty of two.
I got a nat one and a 15.
So a failure and a critical should be two.
Yeah, you sprint to it and you get to the armor.
This death claw is not very far from you though at this point and you get to where this shiny
metal thing is in the sand and you're able to uncover it.
And it is a power down suit of power armor.
Am I able to access the cockpit?
You will have to like dig it out from the sand because it is half buried.
Okay.
So I'm going to, whatever side is further from the thing there, I'm going to lay down
right next to it and kind of just like scoop the sand out while kind of laying down trying
to be as out of sight as possible.
Okay.
We'll come back to you, Guli Roberts.
Yeah, I'll shoot it again and keep it coming towards me.
Okay.
I have an 11 and a five, so one success.
You hit it.
It does not do any damage though and it is now picking up speed towards your location.
Does it specifically see me or just know that shooting is coming from this area?
Now that you've shot it several times, I'm going to think it knows where you're shooting
it from.
Okay.
Good to know.
Can I take another pot shot at the matriarch?
She is like a quarter mile away.
Yeah.
I don't even think your energy would hit that far.
However, you do hear loud sounds coming from the rest of the building now and you hear
the door get broken down in the stairwell and you hear several rad rats die quickly
and sound seemingly painfully and you know that there are death claws in the staircase.
I am going to look around on the roof to see if there's anything that would help me get
down off of the building.
Or if there's an air vent system you can drop down into.
Something that's sticking out of the building I can land on, an air vent, rope, even like
softer stuff towards the bottom even if I have to use a lock pointer.
Oh, aim for the bushes.
I once heard a wise robot say that.
Maybe not wise.
A rapscallion robot.
I'll give you for free that there is an air ventilation system on the roof that must lead
down into the building.
It will not be easy for Old Holman to move through that.
You are quite large compared to air ducts.
I'm guessing that would probably be agility and survival or athletics to get through that?
To get through, yeah.
I would need that probably per floor to get through.
Or it would be strength and athletics.
I think it's a little bit more of a finesse situation.
Okay, well.
Because you are large, the biggest thing is air ventilation systems don't support a tremendous
amount of weight.
They're meant for air moving through, not people traversing.
There'd be any way to climb down the outside of the building.
No, it is a concrete building.
Just checking.
I mean you could try to like do some sort of thing where you rappel down or fall down
window to window, but that would be.
Even harder.
Extremely difficult.
Yeah.
I'm just thinking because my strength is so much higher than my agility.
That might actually work out.
But screw it.
Let's try it for the air vents.
Okay.
Opening the air vents pretty easy.
Jumping in, I guess, and falling to the fourth floor is going to be your first thing.
So give me an agility and an athletics to try to climb down into the fourth floor.
I got a success.
Okay.
You managed to get your body into the air duct and you are currently on the fourth floor
in the air vent.
And you can hear outside of the air vent that there is a death claw, at least on the fourth
floor.
Augusta and Gullia.
Scoop and sand.
Just scoop and sand.
Scoop and sand.
Okay.
You scoop away and you get to the back of this power armor and probably realize there
is no fusion cell in this power armor.
I immediately start sprinting toward the broken body of my friend Marvin.
Okay.
Give me an agility and a survival roll.
Difficulty of two.
A failure and a net one.
Okay.
You make it back to Marvin's dead body.
I go for his core.
Okay.
Gullia Roberts, this death claw matriarch is making her way.
She is not far from you at this point.
What are you going to do?
How far away am I from Marvin's body then?
I'd say Marvin's probably about 50 yards from you.
So you can see Augusta.
He had a flamethrower on him.
He did.
Would that be something I could pick up and use?
I know it was like part of his body.
Yeah, not really.
Okay.
You would have to sprint to make it to his body.
I think I just want to keep her from seeing Augusta because that's going to be the chance
that we've got to defeat her at all, I think.
Right?
So you're going to stay?
She sees me anyway, so I'm going to shoot at her, but I'm also going to run away from
Augusta and everything and try to find another rock pile to hide behind.
Okay.
All of that will take at least three actions.
So you will need to spend an action point in order to run, hide, and shoot.
Okay.
Then I'll just shoot and run.
Okay.
You can move one section.
I'm about 75 feet or 75 yards from Marvin's dead body.
So go ahead and take a shot.
So you're going to do agility plus small guns.
I have one success.
Okay.
You do not hit the matriarch and she continues to pursue you.
You do get a little further away.
She will be here in about one turn, but you do distract her away from Augusta.
Okay.
Old Talman.
Let's try this again.
Hey, I have a success.
You managed to clamber down onto the third floor.
You're one floor further down.
We're going to just keep jumping back and forth between everybody.
Augusta, now you're going to sprint back across the desert.
Hell yeah.
Run, run, run, run, run, run.
Okay.
You run, run, run, run, run.
You've done it a couple of times now and the death claw is even closer to Guli Roberts.
So you don't really need to be that sneaky.
You get over to it with the core.
Give me an intelligence and science roll.
Difficulty of one.
That is a success and failure.
Okay.
You were able to install this fusion core into the power armor and it does power up.
Fantastic.
All aboard.
Choo-choo.
We got to go.
Okay.
You climb inside.
It is a little slow.
It does not have any weapons on it itself.
Okay.
So there's no mini gun, but you are now inside of a power armor.
Cool.
It's going to give you a defense of two and an HP of 50.
Okay.
And then just melee attack like fisticuffs.
I don't remember what you have for weapons.
Oh, I can use my weapons.
You can use any of your weapons.
Yeah, you can use your weapons still.
They'll just be the same as they were before.
Okay.
Yeah.
And then start making my way to a Guli.
Okay.
Guli Roberts.
Yes.
You are up now.
Okay.
Well, can I see that Augusta's in the armor?
I'm not sure you can see that he's in the armor.
I think of it as a cinematic moment where the gigantic monster is much too close of you,
taking up most of your field of vision at this point.
Do I know anything about death claws?
Yeah, they're really, really, really hard to kill and they mostly just kill anything
on sight.
Are they really dumb?
Like if I bury myself in the sand, can I?
They're not dumb.
They're apex predators, so they're actually pretty intelligent.
So essentially it's a T-Rex.
Probably smarter than a T-Rex.
I would say think of nearly a T-Rex size velociraptor.
Okay.
Like, Indominus Rex.
Yeah, that would be very close.
If you were to watch any of the new Jurassic parks, which I didn't, so I don't actually
know what that is, but it sounded depressing.
I'm just going to shoot at it again.
I have one success.
Okay.
You take another shot.
And I move backwards.
It pursues you very quickly as you continue to shoot and move backwards.
And it does catch up to you and it swipes at you with its gigantic claws.
And to stop you from running, it slices down doing six damage to your right leg.
Well then.
Six physical damage.
You will take your damage reduction off for your right leg.
I think you got a one.
Yes.
So you're going to take five damage and you're actually going to take a wound on your right
leg.
Okay.
You immediately fall prone as your leg gives out underneath your weight and you can no
longer take the sprint action.
And the move action is now a major action for you for the moment.
So if I move, that's all I can do?
Yes.
Okay.
Got it.
Old Tallman, let's see you descend to the second floor.
I did it.
Okay.
You climb down into the second floor and you hear another death claw mulling about in the
second floor.
So Augusta, now you're making your way towards Gullia.
Movement is a little slow in this suit, but you're able to cover about half the distance
in just a normal movement.
Okay.
You can dash or you can try to attack.
I think I'm going to have to dash because I have a close quarters weapon.
Gullia, to your surprise, you see the sun gleam off this power armor as it comes up
from behind this death claw.
Can I come up yelling?
Yeah.
I'm yelling to Gullia to hang in there.
Okay.
Then give me a charisma and...
And I'm looking to get its attention.
I want to distract it from Gullia.
I got you.
Give me a charisma and speech.
Accomplished a few things at once.
That's two successes.
Excellent.
You manage to get its attention and it turns seeing a foe that it already bested, making
its way right up close to it.
And it for the moment does not attack Gullia Roberts.
Use a stand back.
Real quick, Marvin, give me an endurance and survival test.
Nope.
Nevermind.
You don't have a fusion corn.
You're dead.
Your body's been sucked apart.
So okay.
Gullia Roberts, what do you do now?
You're very close to this thing, right?
Yes.
Okay.
So baseball grenade is probably not what I want to do.
He can take it.
Oh yeah.
He can take it.
I could take it.
He can take it.
You'd be fine.
Sure.
I'm going to take the grenade.
Okay.
Just aim for the mouth so it explodes inside of it.
Yeah.
I'm going to time it for when it's roaring.
Okay.
You're either going to give me perception and explosives or agility plus throwing.
And so typically if you're going to aim for a specific type of body, the difficulty is
going to go up by one, but I will negate that if you want to spend a luck point to try to
accomplish exploding it in its face.
I will use a luck point, which just gives me one success, right?
So I still have to get the other success?
No, it doesn't give you a success.
You still need to succeed on the roll.
It's just going to make it so that you don't have to achieve three successes on your roll.
I did better with perception and the other thing.
Explosives?
Yes.
Okay.
That does an eight and a two is tagged for explosives.
Okay.
So roll me two dice.
You're going to need two successes.
Nope.
You can spend some action points too.
Okay.
I have to spend three to get two more.
Correct.
Sorry guys.
I'm doing this.
Go for it.
Yes.
I have one success.
Okay.
I'll give you a partial then go ahead and roll three attack dice.
Two blanks in a person.
You explode this grenade in its face, not in its mouth or where you were exactly aiming,
but it does back the creature up several feet away from Augusta.
Old Tallman.
Last floor.
Let's see you get down there.
Ah, no.
What'd you?
A success on a crit fail.
Oh, from floor two to floor.
Oh, you're going to spend one?
I mean how bad it's going to be.
It's still going to be a 20.
It doesn't reroll a roll.
It just allows you to roll an additional dice.
So no, if I roll the, with that, if I roll the crit, if it would cancel it.
If you want to spend the last action point and try to roll on that one, then yes, I will
allow it to negate that.
Tim's like, yeah, go for it.
No.
All right.
No, I'm going to stick with the.
You come from the second floor down into the first floor and you crashed through the ventilation
system landing hard on your back onto the first floor and actually landing on your neck
out onto the first floor.
Go ahead and take one damage from that fall, but you were on the bottom floor and alone.
If I'm alone on the first floor, I am going to move quickly and quietly towards the entrance
and make sure that there's not anything directly out side.
Okay.
You don't even need to roll for that.
There's nothing in your way in between.
Then I'm going to make a mad sprint towards them.
You hear the noise when you get out of the building and you're sprinting across the sand,
which the sun is beginning to go down.
So the sand's not quite as hot anymore.
You see a suit of power armor standing over Guli Roberts and a gigantic death claw fighting
the two of them.
That's where I'm headed.
Okay.
I'm going to try to get as much distance as I can cover with sprint dash, whatever.
Augusta.
I'm going to attack with my 10 millimeter pistol.
Okay.
And I do that.
With a small gun and agility roll, you're going to roll 2D20 and try to get two successes.
Something that's been elusive for you guys on almost any shot.
All right.
That's not only going to be two successes.
One of them is critical.
Right on.
Here's the attack dice.
So how much damage does your 10 millimeter do?
Four.
Okay.
Four attack die.
That's two heads and a bang.
Okay.
Roll this here.
Actually, you have a pit boy, so you can say what location you are looking at and it will
not increase the difficulty.
Oh, I'm looking right at its stupid head.
You get a good shot off right into this matriarch's head, popping it back and she takes a step
back.
Guli Roberts.
Yes.
You are pretty wounded laying on the ground.
What are you doing?
I mean, I don't really know what else to do, so I guess I'm just going to keep shooting
at it.
My hunting rifles ranged.
Yeah, it's a medium, so it would be more difficult to shoot it with that.
Although you have other guns.
I have a pipe gun.
I'll do that while I failed.
How badly?
No critical failures?
No criticals.
Just not good.
You just missed.
Old Talman, you are closing the distance.
How close am I?
Medium.
You could get there in a sprint probably.
I'm just wondering if I should use part of my movement and shoot at it or if I should
close the distance and slam into it.
I don't know if I'm close enough to do.
You would have to spend an action point to take another action if you were to sprint
over there and body slam it.
If you close part of the distance and shoot, that's fine.
I'm going to close part of the distance and take a shot at it with the Tesla rifle.
Okay.
And I am going to spend.
One action point.
I'm going to close off by one.
And that's a three.
Okay.
So did you get two successes?
I got, no, I got one success.
Okay.
It's got a defensive two.
So you need two successes to.
Ew.
Okay.
Then I won't burn that.
I wouldn't get it with that.
All right.
Death Claws turn.
It is going to attack the power armor and it is successful.
Can I see those dice please?
It rates you with its claws in your torso doing nine physical damage.
However, you do have a physical damage reduction of four.
So you're actually only going to take five damage and it's back to your turn.
All right.
I'm going to want to shoot and speak.
Speaking doesn't take anything.
Oh cool.
So.
Agulia, you should get to Marvin's gun.
Get to the alien weapon.
We need more power.
And then I'm going to shoot my 10 millimeter again at this dude's face.
Or that was what I wanted.
Oh, I got one failure and a nat one, a critical.
Okay.
So that's enough to do damage.
So go ahead and roll the damage dice.
We got the face and four bangs.
You let off another shot into this Death Claws face.
And although you're doing good damage, it doesn't really seem like it's taking too much
of it.
Oh, its brain is in its tail.
I'm not sure if that's the case or not.
Typically not, but there's weirder things that have happened, I think.
I'm more or less hoping to like maim it in some way.
Like maybe eventually like, you know, it hits one of the eyes and now it has trouble.
You know, it has a little bit of a disadvantage as far as seeing where we are.
I was trying to do as much damage up top to like fuck it up.
Right on.
Yeah.
And you rolled an at one?
Oh yes.
Yeah.
Okay.
So it's a face and it took damage from a grenade to its face.
Okay.
I will give you on that.
Actually, you were able to take out one of its eyes.
Awesome.
And it does send a screech through the thing's body and it takes a few steps backwards away
from the power armor.
Guleah.
I'm going to try to get over to that alien gun.
Okay.
But I don't move good.
No, you can only move about half the distance because you can't dash.
Okay.
So you're halfway there.
How much damage does the sledgehammer do?
The baseball bat does six.
I'm trying to see if it does more.
Sledgehammer does five.
Okay.
Damn, not as much.
No, I know.
Crazy.
I am going to run in and-
Wait, your baseball bat does more because you get a bonus to physical, right?
No.
Oh.
That's without my bonus to physical.
No shit.
Okay.
Yeah.
That's why I think it's weird.
That is weird.
Because the hammer in the game is-
The hammer-
Pretty hardcore weapon.
Yeah.
In the book, the hammer is stronger than the baseball bat.
Oh, it is?
Yeah.
So the baseball bat does six, and then I have a two melee bonus.
All right.
Anyway, I'm going to hit it with the baseball bat.
Okay.
As hard as I can in whatever leg is closest.
Okay.
If you're going to target a specific leg, it's going to increase the difficulty to three.
Oh, okay.
Well, then I'll just do the normal.
Nope.
And I missed on both.
No critical failures?
No critical failure.
You are up on it now, and it is-
It's turn.
When coming crashing into it with the baseball bat, you definitely draw its attention.
Can I have the damage dice, please?
Oh, old tall man.
I was doing okay.
I have so much more health than you.
Oh, man.
Let's see where it hits.
As you were trying to aim for its left leg and not successful, it aims for your left
leg and it hits you for 10 points of damage.
Oof.
I'm still alive.
You are alive.
Your leg, similar to Guli Roberts-
It's crippled.
It is crippled, and you immediately are knocked down.
All right.
Augusta.
I'd like to move to put myself between tall man and the monster and go to shoot it in the
face again.
I just didn't know if there was a way I can give him a weapon.
One of my melee weapons.
To give him one would be an action, so not on this turn.
I needed a seven.
I got a seven and a two.
Two is tagged as a two on the small gun, so that's a crit.
So what are you doing?
I'm looking right at the other eye.
I'm aiming for the other side of the face now.
I want to cripple, at least try to cripple this thing enough so that we can potentially
get away from it and not have to finish the battle and then-
Let's see it.
Get out of there before those other three-
Come back.
Exactly.
We got to go, we got to go.
Oops, two faces.
I rolled a crit and a miss.
This point is taking one grenade and three bullets to the face.
You are able to shoot it not directly into its other eye.
However, you do hit it in the face similar to where you have hit it now several times.
It takes a few steps back and it kind of like holds its head in a weird way.
You see some radiated blood pouring out of its head, giving you all a momentary reprieve
to get away, I would say, because two of you have injured legs.
You're going to need to do something to stabilize yourselves or take some drugs or something
to make it so you can run.
I'm still going for that gun.
Okay.
You make it over to the gun and give me an intelligence and science check to try to get
it off, unless you're just trying to rip it off, in which case give me a strength and
science roll up to you.
I'm going to go with a strength and science roll for a seven.
And I failed on both counts.
You want to spend an action point?
Okay.
Just reroll one day.
Yep.
Oh, that's an eight.
Nice.
Isn't that a success?
No.
Okay.
Nice.
All right, you do not get the alien gun off of Marvin's dead body.
Okay.
Now what are the two cripples going to do?
Do you guys have anything that'll help you?
I'm going to shoot it in the face.
The death claw?
Yeah.
Okay.
Let's see it.
That is a natural one and a natural two.
Okay, two successes.
Let's see it.
A creatinine success.
Yeah.
This thing does five.
So bang, two faces, another face.
So four faces and a bang.
You managed to shoot it in the face again.
It lets out a howl, takes its hands away from its face and it moves off about 20 yards in
a different direction from you guys.
With this, this thing has two shot.
Does that mean it fires two shots at the same time?
No, it just uses-
Or does that mean it has a double tap option?
It just uses two ammo.
Oh.
Oh, okay.
All right.
You are still crippled and so are you, Gulea.
And what are you doing, Augusta?
I'm going to- so I'm not as fast in the power suit.
No, but I'm not really going to make that a determining factor.
I'm going to toss.
Okay, wait, there's only one action per turn unless I use one of those.
Okay.
Can I go first?
Sorry.
Oh, sure.
Gulea is going to pull out an iguana on a stick and start munching on it and I will heal
four points.
Okay.
I'll say that's enough to make it so that you can dash, although you are still injured.
I'm going to toss Tall Man a Nappa Cola, which is plus two HP plus one action point.
Cool.
Flip over an action point.
Drink the cola.
The sugars will help you feel, well, better for a moment.
The crash can be rough.
Thank you.
No problem.
Gulea, we got to go.
We got to go.
I'm up.
I'm ready.
Good thing I had that iguana on a stick.
How close is Marvin's body?
Gulea is on Marvin's body.
Oh, shit, right.
You are where Gulea used to be, essentially.
How long will it take me to get to Gulea's location?
You could move there in one turn.
Okay.
I would like to move there to pick up Marvin's body.
Okay.
You're in a power armor.
I'm going to say it's not overly difficult.
You're not going to be able to do anything else while you're holding the body.
As soon as I grab him, we're running east.
Okay.
Everybody disengaging?
Is old Talman disengaging or is he staying to fight?
Talman, we got to go.
We got to go back.
We got to go, but how much does an iguana on a stick?
Four.
Four?
Okay.
Can I grab Marvin's body and run away with it?
Oh, he's got.
Oh, sorry.
I don't know if I got his got Marvin's body.
You and I are supporting.
Okay.
I had the power suit, so I figured it'd be the easiest for me to grab it.
Both of you still have injured legs.
All right.
Where do you run off to?
I think that we should go right back to our camp to resupply and repair.
As the sun sets on day four, which has taken much longer than originally anticipated, you
guys get back to your rager camp with Marvin's dead body and mostly wounded, but with some
new guns and a new set of power armor.
All right.
And that's going to do it for this episode of Tales from the Crit.
So we will see you next next Tuesday.
Tales from the Crit is part of the Wolfbeard Games podcast network.
We hope you've enjoyed today's episode, and if you have, please subscribe and leave
a review wherever you get your podcasts.
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This isademactился.
Take care.
Previously, on Vault 69, A Tale from the Wasteland, a rowdy bunch of raiders set out on the search
for some heavy artillery.
They got a hint it laid to the east in the abandoned Tesla lab.
They soon discovered they were not alone in the desert wasteland where the old building
still stands, but it was in fact home to a mess of Deathclaws.
As the group searched the building, they discovered your typical smattering of irradiated beasts,
but also a Colonel Gutsy guarding some rather impressive firepower.
But due to the typical American greed, our raider friends soon become the hunted, as
the Deathclaws emerge from their desert lair.
Will it be a TPK, or will the raiders be able to make it out alive?
Find out now on this episode of Vault 69.