Intermission: Norway Ablaze

 

Session: In-between 89 & 90 (REDACTED 2019)

For some  donkey fuck of a reason I did not do my usual crummy session recaps for our time at war. Which really bites as we had a lot of fun playing it straight for a a number of sessions before the weird began to appear and tie us back to the larger campaign. So what will be presented will be the even broader strokes.

World's Third Shortest Game Review

WWII: Operation Whitebox (Small Niche Games: Peter C. Spahn) - Based off the oldest of old school rules. Since we were already playing B/Xish the transition to a different skin was very easy. We had lots of fun planning missions, sneaking around and shooting the bad people of the 3R. Sadly we didn't blow up any commies but the two ends of extremism are closer together than most folks figure. Anyways, if you feel like playing WWII using the original rules, OWB is locked and loaded. It also has some very simple scalability guidelines depending on how you like to play your DOOM. 

Aside: When I choose this system as our WWII engine I was back and forth between either OWB or The Front by Mark A. Hunt. The Front is a very tight skin over our favoured Olden School Rules and is also strongly recommended. I probably went with OWB because I had it first and there was accessory support not that The Front couldn't have been easily converted. Flip a coin or whatever, either game delivers. Sometime in the nearing future we will play Mark's "Gangbusters B/X" to make up for the snub(nosed-revolver).

OWB: Allied Missions I - We played the three missions in Norway Ablaze before I derailed our historical wartime back into fantasy. The three were very easy to run laid out in a logical manner with very nice maps. Not much to say other than the two published mission books are an essential piece to get you up and defending the free world. 

April 9^th, 1943. Location Lunna House, Lunna Ness Shetland Island, Scotland.  

As the smoke cleared we were not who we were or where. Our troop where transformed into troopers awaiting a briefing in northern Scotland. First we were joined by a group of British Commandos and then the brass rolled in to layout our objective.

    Operation Claymore: In conjunction with resistance fighters we travel to Norway (Stamsund in the Loften Island chain) in hopes of bringing liberation from Nazi control. Starting with a tactical mission to cripple the German's communication network we then we blew up the fish oil factory to cripple glycerin extraction for the manufacture of explosives. The mission was also a cover for a commando raid elsewhere in the region. This resulted in the third and final mission to take at the machine gun bunker overlooking the harbour and was preventing the extraction of the commandos.

    This stuff was played straight WWII style until the final mission when a German U-Boat was infiltrated and strange documents were recovered in it and in the bunker before Armin Zola was able to collect the same materials from bunker. The documents spoke of black magic and entities from beyond and traveling across galaxies. Now, the weird was turned on. Learning of Hilter's right hand of occult oversight, Johann Schmidt aka. the Red Skull was going to conduct some sort of ritual in a Norwegian castle far to the north of us within the next few days - this crazy talk now had weight and time was of the essence. There was also reference to a number of other secret Nazi societies involved - Vril, Thule, Hollow Earth and the Black Sun all of which were enacting Baron Heinrich Zero's doomsday plan (Der tag) Along with the presence of many key names in the Reich's paranormal and extra-planar expeditionary division - the SS Verfugunstruppe.

       Dietrich Eckart - Master Magician of the Nazi Party and was known to be dead!

       Karl Haushofer - Occult adept and the carrier of secret knowledge concerning trans-human entities, follower of the 'Great Old Ones'.

        Dr. Ernsy Schafer - Leader of the SS Tibet expedition that discovered the Hollow Earth, he was the Nazi Indiana Jones            

    Upon presenting the information to our COs it was decided that the squad were the only available troops to run the mission as the commandos were in rough shape to recover further information and if possible disable whatever was going on in the "Keep".

The Keep - as pointed out by far more wordsmithy type reviewers this adventure and the included rules in particular leave something to be desired. We simply needed a castle packed full of Nazis suitable for infiltration and neutralization. This was provided rather nicely.

The group made their way across the frozen expanse dodging german patrols until arriving in the vicinity of the Keep. Next a way in was needed and found by ambushing an execution unit getting rid of some pesky civilians and stealing an official vehicle. They got in, snuck around and planted timed demolitions all over the place until eventually zeroing in on the ritual taking place in church within the basement of the keep.  Follow the chanting they say. They should have done that earlier as the clock were ticking things were gonna start shaking soon enough. Victory or Death.

The Red Skull stood before some sort of shimmering orb the large the size of an elephant leading the ritual. I am the Devil's advocate! Before him stood a patrol unit armed and equipped for a mission being presented by Dr. Schafer, and the clearly apparition like entity that once was Eckart (he was floating!). As we slowly snuck forward the patrol began marching into the simmering orb and disappearing. It took our soldiers a moment to catch their wits before they realized that for some reason unknown to them they most follow through the passage. Weird visions of different lives on a different world populated by mythical creatures flashed before their eyes. Yes, this was the end one way or another of the lotus dream. The Red Skull now saw them and called the alert,

                        "Welcome to our sanguinary sect of worship
                        Feel at home in our black conventicle
                    As we anathematise all those who oppose us" Dave Mustaine

And so the final battle commenced. We were outnumbered, outgunned, running out of time and the Red Skull showed superhuman strength and speed. Diving behind the massive pillars that supported the keep above our troopers had temporary reprieve from bullet fire but the Germans under herr Skulls direction were cutting the angles quickly. "Probably wouldn't take too much to bring the place down", clips were emptied to buy the time needed to set the charges. The Red Skull took matters into his own hands and forced us back into the open. We were really run-in out of time on multiple fronts. It was decided that the only way we were going to escape was by rushing the portal with the help of a whole bunch of grenades. The chamber became obscured with dust and smoke along with some good luck the Skull appeared to be at least temporarily disoriented by a grenade that landed at his feet. The gambit worked and a path opened up before our troopers. They dropped everything and just ran for it. Under the cover of smoke and dust the regular soldiers could only shoot wildly as the Skull fought to rise to his feet. They jumped into the unknown as the timers on the demolitions expired. 

We may never know if we turned the tide of the War by defeating the insidious Red Skull and the rest of Hitler's paranormal apparatus. 

We did have the suspicion that Dr. Schafer and the apparition Eckart would one day cross our paths yet again in some strange dimension.

Engulfed once more in the smoke of the white lotus dimensions passed before us like half remembered dreams.