[HfL] Actual Play (warning: English and strong language inside)

[Ernesto Pavan]

My friends and I playe HfL just a few hours ago. We passed the first Checkpoint and were on our way to clear the second; hopefully we'll be able to end the game next week. Here's how it went.

The Frame

We started talking about a Lovecraftian setting, with the characters being cultists chased by something they summoned, but then someone got the idea of a zombie epidemy and, well, zombies are zombies. The main characters where members of the School Commitee for Parties; guess who crashed into the last event? You guessed dam right.
Gore Treshold was set at 3 (yuck!). The Drop-Off was during the last party organized by the Commitee, while we set the Destination at the closes military base with a working helicopter (cliché, I know). We set these checkpoints:

1) Get out of the school (possibly alive)
2) Blow out the mall (we didn't even know why, at the beginning; then someone got the idea, during the game, to turn the place into a gigant crysalis from whence horrible monsters spawned AKA the Devil's asshole, and then we got a good reason to blow it up)
3) Get into the military base

The Team

Our characters are:

Jenna: She's the Commitee "face" and a cheerleader. She's also evil and a whore. Her Flaw is Bitchy; her Talent is Angel Face (what a poser). She has a Gripe against Jeff (my character) because he didn't defend her from an aggression, being a Coward.
Jonathan: The groups "technician" and a selfish bastard. His Flaw is Selfish; his Talent is Inventive. He has a Gripe against Jenna because he's the only one she didn't sleep with.
JJ: Yeah, that's right, this man is known with his initials only. He's a deejay and forever alone. His Flaw is Uncomfortable around people; his Talent is Stealthy. He has a Gripe against Jamal, who is cooler than him and always gets all the attention.
Jamal (I think you noticed the pattern by now): Nice, I just noticed the dumbass took the character sheet (a shiny post-it) with him. Idiot. From what I remember, Jamal is a black football player. His Flaw is Overconfident; his Talent is Athletic. He has a Gripe against Jeff because sometime ago he got framed in a story of drug dealing and Jeff, who knew the truth, stood silent out of fear.
Jeff Winters: My character, and the only character with a second name. He's very attached to money and that's the reason why the Commitee has chosen him as moneykeeper. His Flay is Cowardice; his Talent is Negotiation. He has a Gripe against Jonathan because someone stole the Commitee's money a while ago and Jon, being a Selfish bastard, blamed it all on Jeff.

The gaming so far

I framed the first scene at the Drop-off, which was a party in the school's gim. The Objective was "to make it to the corridoor". I asked JJ's player which music he put on, then we discussed about how the Commitee organized the party. After that I narrated a zombie biting a girl, screaming and blood pouring everywhere.
Jenna's player narrated her discovering the friend she was in the bathrooms with having beein turned into a zombie. The creature tried to bite her, she tried to evade and the game's first Challenge was called! I said "if you fail, you're gonna evade the zombie, but it will tear your clothes and you'll pee in your pants." Too bad the player rolled a Hit and the zombie impaled itself on a broomstick. At this point I made a mistake: I didn't remember than the scene was supposed to end after the Callenge, so we played two more in the same scene before aknowledging that. In any case, we got out of the gim with everyone still alive.
The second scene was set in the corridoor. The Objective was "reach the chem's lab". We reached our lockers and JJ pulled a shotgun out of his (everybody: "WTF?! Jenna's player: "Oh, you're into the Young Republicans too?"). Then we went to the baseball room, where Jamal lockpicked the bats' locker and everyone took a bat. Jenna's player narrated the zombies coming close and I challenged JJ: "if you fail we're gonna become fucking sick of you and leave you here to die." But he rolled a Hit, so he came away with us.
The next scene was sent in the Chem lab. The Objective was "arm ourselves with explosives", which JJ kindly made from scrap (everybody: "OMG man, who are you? A fuckin terrorist?"). No Challenge here.
The fourth scene was set in the school's courtyard. The Objective was "to reach the hall". Jamal said something to Jenna, to which she replied: "Man, you're still thinking about that thing?" Jamal WTFd and Jenna pointed at her thigh... where a disembodied hand was touching her. Jonathan tried to burn the hand away with hairspray and a lighter (bad idea, man), someone Challenged him and... BOOOOM! COLLAPSE! Jenna got a burning mini-skirt and we found ourselves surrounded by zombies. We ran away.
Fifth scene was set in the school's hall. The Objective was "to barricade the exit" (the one opening into the courtyard we came from). JJ wanted to used the trophies board, but Jamal started bitchign about it and I Challenged him: "if you fail you're gonna break some useful barricade material and let some zombies in". He rolled a Hit and cleared the Checkpoint (we were at 6 VP and he had 3 pips), so we ran awy with the catering's van.
The next scene was a Rest scene (the first one) called by Jamal's player (the Heat was around seven dice, lol!). While the rest of the group was plundering gasoline and food, Jamal and Jenna started to discuss about Jamal's behavior in the school's hall, when he put our lives at stake. Soon Jamal got tired and hit Jenna, making her bleed. Jamal's player changed his Flaw from Overconfident to Bully, Jamal took a Trauma and we reduced the Heat by four.
After that the group resumed traveling to the mall. JJ started making nitro in the back of the van (no WTF this time, for we got used to those kind of things) and asked everyone to empty the bottles we got while plundering. He handled Jamal a bottle of beer, which he immediately drank; Jenna protested "You're the one driving! Your shouldn't be drinking!" and I immediately put a mother with baby crossing the street. Challenge! COLLAPSE! Luckily we didn't have to take the "double jam" out of the windscreen, because the van then hit a wall and stopped working. I mean, there was mommy and sonny blood everywhere, but we had no more use for the van, so we just let it there and went to the mall by foot.
The next scene was at the mall. We sneaked into it and discovered a Zerg-like mutation chamber, with pulsing fles everywhere and the noise of fast-moving creatures coming from somewhere.There were zombies over the stairs, so Jonathan blew them off throwing a gas can at them and shooting it (with what gun, now I remember, we didn't even ask. Probably we supposed he got his hands on JJ's shotgun). Luckily there ware other, non-filled-with-burning-gasoline stairs to reach the gun shop on the second floor. We got there, equipped ourselves with everything and more (but all the rest of the group put a veto on JJ's player idea of a Gatling gun) and felt the ground shaking. We got out of the gun shop, Jeff looked at the first floor, and together we described a horrible monster looking like a bloated woman with red slimy tentacles. Jeff vomited on her and she spit acid at him, missing. Then Jamal had the great idea to shoot it to find its "weakspot" and was immediately Challenged for that. He caused a Collapse, leading to the last Trauma that caused his death and confirming that the black guy always dies first.
We stopped here, but we will surely finish it next week. Everyone was enthusiastic!

Some questions arose during play and in my mind after it:

1) Can you include a character's death in the "if you fail..." clause?
2) What happens to the Heat after a Collapse? We assumed you resolved the effects and then rebuild it with the same number of dice.
3) When you roll a Shotgun and both dice end in the Target, does it count as a double Hit (therefore allowing the clearing of Stress)?
4) If a scene closes due to a Challenge's result, but the scene's Objective hasn't been reached, what happens? Should the next plater frame a scene at the same location and/or with the same Objective?

[Kevin]

Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant! That was a very entertaining read.

It looks like you're totally fucked, if you've already lost a player! Good job! That's the spirit!

Here's the answer to your questions:

1) No. Just try to make them do something they don't want their character to do.
2) After a Collapse, resolve the effects and rebuild the stack. However, you will either be building it with more dice (if the result was a Spotlight or a Complication) or less dice (you will get one or more Traumas, reducing the stack by that many dice).
3) Yes, yes, yes! Totally. You managed the improbable and you deserve a reward!
4) It's up to you. If you think that the Objective was sufficiently interesting or important, you could continue the next scene from the exact moment the last scene left off, or you could cut to some other place, much later on. Just think about how many VP you need to acquire before you reach the next Checkpoint, where you are now, and try to frame a scene that intersects with that timeline appropriately.

If I haven't been clear, I'l gladly elaborate.

Thanks for your support!

Sebastian.

[Ernesto Pavan]

Thank you Sebastian! You've been crystal clear. I must say that everybody liked the game and we grasped the rules quite easily, even if I only red them twice (I still managed to forgot some, but that's me ) and the others didn't even know the game existed before yesterday. It was very nice and funny, in a deeply perverted kind of way. =:-)

[Kevin]

I'm really glad that you've stuck to the core of the system. It's a lot of fun to play when you can enjoy all the dice stacking energy. It is a perverse kind of game, and it rewards a gooey sense of humour. Thanks for reporting.

I'd really love to see how the rest of the game goes. Particularly, I'm interested to see how you get on in the end game, and how many Rest Scenes you need just to make to the end.

Good luck! (Though I think you're all going to get munched by the brain-eaters.)

[Ernesto Pavan]

Yesterday we ended the game (without JJ's player - the late Jamal's player took his role). The result was kinda expectable... :-P
After the Big Bad Monster died, we ran into the mall's basement. The stairs tried to eat us in the meantime, but nothing serious happened (someone was Challenged, but he won). In the basement we found out the remainings of a Satanic ritual and started to guess the origin of the zombie plague. Immediately thereafter, mutated zombies (think about crawling dead humans with Alien-like tongues and you'll have an idea) attacked us, backed up by Jamal's higher body half, but thanks to my skill in throwing dice we made it and cleared the Checkpoint (which, in the context, basically meant we shot everywhere, throw some explosived and strated a chain reaction which ended up blowin everything up). We managed to escape, again, on a stolen van.
The last Checkpoint was about entering the military base. I thought that the military, being armed and surrounded by big walls, weren't exactly prone to let anyone in, dead or alive, and the others agreed. So we narrated them shooting people with fliying Apaches. Just the kind of things we needed! Now we just had to get one of those...
The van stopped. Jonathan's player had a great idea: "What if a zombie's hand is shutting up the tail pipe?" We all agreed and I asked who wanted to be Challenged by a hand jumping at his throat. JJ's player took the chance and managed to score a whopping 4 VPs; being that a big step forward the completion of the Checkpoint, he was a bit uncertain about how to narrate it. I suggested that, while throwing away the hand, he located a pile of dead soldiers with their uniforms still on, which we could pillage.
Immediately after that I called a Rest Scene, because the Heat was at 6 dice and we didn't like it. Jeff freaked out and started vomiting, shouting "We're all dead!" and the like. Jenna played the evil sergeant and threatened him with a bullet in his head. I took a Trauma and changed Jeff's "Coward" Flaw with Suicide Instincts (lol). After that there was a short scene about fixing the van to reach some natural caves we believed we could use to access the base from the underground; the idea ended up being agreed on and then totally forgotten.
Now we had only 1 VP left to reach our Destination. I said: "Hey, my Talent is Negotiation and I haven't used it yet, so why don't we just drive there and pretend to be soldiers?" Unfortunately, when raising the Heat, the butter-fingered me made the last die fall. We barely managed to survive an Apache gatling's gunfire.
In the next scene we were running away in our van and met a barricade of trampled cars. The driver (I believe it was JJ) was Challenged and we made it, so everyone described their characters doing absurd things like throwing explosives behind the van to give it enough push to use the cars as a fu**** ramp to jump straight into the base. Time for the Finale!
We chose the following 4 missions: "Kidnap a pilot", "Steal an helicopter", "Blow up the heart of the Infestation" and "Fly away to our freedom". We didn't make it past the second mission. Jenna was shot by an officier; Jeff suicide-bombered to buy the others some tine, shouting "Only true Americans will survive!"; Jonathan was fried by the helicopter's anti-theft system and JJ managed to convince the pilot to make the thing fly, but it was shot down by a rocket seconds after that.
We all died! GG!

[Kevin]

We all died! GG!

Weeee!

I'm so happy! Thanks for posting your energetic and fun play report! Whisper me your postal address and I'll send you a Travel Target to say "grazie i bravi!"