In Which The Warlock Deals Some Death...

Let's start today's update with an image:

The first Deadlands book that I bought... :D

I love this image.  It evokes everything that I love about Deadlands:  monolithic evil in a familiar, yet terrifying, setting; steampunk wackiness in the form of the steam wagon; heroes facing down unfathomable odds; and a tentacled, Cthulhian horror.

The creature in question, in fact, is known as a Mojave Rattler--so named from their preferred habitat and the ominous rattling sound that occurs as the creature burrows through the earth.  When I first saw this image, I knew that I had to throw a posse up against one of these--it was just a matter of when.  This past Friday, I got my chance.

Hightailing it out of Shan Fan for a bit, in the hopes that things would cool down, our heroic posse decided to hunt down the glyph from our "flash forward", off near Reno.  Taking a Denver-Pacific train into Virginia City, they hoofed it south to find the glyph.  However, they didn't count on driving through a rattler nest in doing so!

With the battle joined, a few things have to be noted.  Mojave rattlers aren't stupid.  In fact, they're fairly intelligent--a point that gets expanded on in Hell on Earth--but their fighting skill isn't exactly spectacular.  That said, the rattler's most devastating attack is a massive slam:  the creature rears up and smashes down on its foes with a massive amount of weight.

Unfortunately for Tara--FridayNightJess's rodeo gal--she was on the receiving end of the brunt of that slam, along with Eddie van Horn, the New York boxer that the PCs freed from Rock Island prison.  But, where Eddie managed to get far enough out of the way to survive (strangely enough!)....Tara was squished like a bug.  Or, so it would seem.

An aside, briefly.  While Chris2 often comes up with great ideas, some of his are just...outright bad.  When the PCs managed to recover the Amulet of Rahashimir from Big Ears Tam and discovered its real effects--the ability to raise the undead--Chris2 suggested marching an undead army into Lost Angels to take down Grimme.  Bad idea.  As such, Chris2 earned himself the "Big Blind" chip--a chip that I could cash in on him....whenever I felt like it.

Tara's next step...

Jess was a touch down from Tara's death, but Chris2 had a plan:  an adventure card that summoned "aid from an unseen source".  I smiled.  I told him I'd let him play that adventure card, and I'd even take his Big Blind chip away...

...and, unbeknownst to him, bring Tara back as a Harrowed.

Again, an aside.  Anytime I have "secret information" to give out at our Friday night table, I take the player in question into the living room for a private conference.  ChaoticFred has been in my living room more than anyone thusfar, due to his connections with Big Ears Tam.  This time, though...everyone except Fred ended up in the living room, as secrets and information flooded through the group. 

And now?  The cats are all out of the bag.  FridayNightWill gave up control of body to the being in his head, which has helped him unlock the powers of Warlord Kwan's ancestral swords.  Jess is coming to terms with being undead, Eddie still manages to survive certain death (for unknown reasons), Chris2 has finally gotten hold of his contacts in the Agency, and Jules' shamaness has had a brush with a certain Servitor of Death...

...and we're just getting rolling!