Ilam Horror! Oct '03

Abstract

A twilight killing round and pacifist warfare scenario based loosely on the Arkham Horror boardgame.

Back story Once again, those agents of the crawling chaos, the Reformed Church of the Great Old Ones, are plotting some sort of villiany. By placing the Black Pnakotic Pentagon Seals in the eerily marked Places of Power in the Ilam gardens, and performing certain fell rituals at sunset, they seek to plunge the world into eternal night, for some reason or another. Maybe their insidious master, Nyarlathotep has cornered the market on light bulbs or something. However, rescue is at hand; the Dictator, realizing that they will be no more sleeping in until midday if there is no more day, has dispatched the KAOS Expeditionary Army to thwart their evil plans. Will they remove the seals in time? Will the cultists hold them at bay long enough to complete the ritual? Or will it all go horribly wrong, resulting in the accidental summoning of some hideous mockery of life from beyond space and time that will rampage about, trash the sacred obelisk, gobble up some cultists and KAOS agents before returning to it's own dimension?

Objectives

The first part of Ilam Horror is a twilight killing round where the cultists protect the seals located at the Places of Power so that some are still in place at the time the sun sets and they can begin their ritual, while the KAOS agents need to capture as many seals as possible and return them to their rallying point before sunset to thwart the cult's nefarious plans.

When the sun sets, the game masters will declare the killing round part to have finished, total up the seals collected and kills made, and declare a winner. Then the cultists will perform their set piece ritual, it will all go wrong, and and ensuing pacifist warfare fight and super soaker drenching fun and frolics will commmence.

When

Saturday 11th October 18:00-20:30, or Sunday 12th October 18:00-20:30 if the weather is bad. Postponements and cancellations will be posted to the partylist.

How to sign up

Email Amy, or see her in the LCR or Smokers' cafe.

What to bring Water pistols, all the way up to supersoaker size. PET bottles containing water for extra ammunition is a good idea. Paper swords (or similar foam rubber and fun noodle weapons. Warm clothes (it's still chilly after sunset in October), but try to avoid camo gear. KAOS black or cult robes should be OK. Where to go Meet in the UCSA car park outside the entrance to the LCR at 18:00. The game will be played in the Ilam Gardens, starting at 18:30. The game will finish and the battle will start at about 19:45.

Round Protocol

Game play

• There are two teams; the Cult and KAOS.

• The main game is basically a 'capture the flag' scenario with the seals acting as multiple flags, using KAOS touch kill style combat. However, as it can be a bit tricky to work out whether you've been shot in the gloaming light, and we're going to have a battle afterwards, super soakers and paper swords are the weapons of the day, and the usual 'don't soak people' rules are relaxed (though anyone showing unnecessarily zealous enthusiasm for drenching people will likely find themselves first to be executed during the Dictator's purge/first in the maw of Cthulhu when the stars are right).

• Player 'lives' are indicated by wearing of coloured scarfs, blue for the cult and red for KAOS. They use similar rules to KAOS badges in regular rounds - you must be wearing one to be able to handle a seal, make a kill, and generally be on the field of play. When a player is 'killed', they must immediately drop any seals they carry, and give up their scarf to the opposing player who killed them. Being caught concealing your scarf gets you killed.

• Once killed a player must return to their rally point and get another scarf from a game master. Note that you don't have to give up enemy scarfs once you've been killed, and you probably want to take them back to the rally point to add to your total kills.

• Kills only count for the final score if members of the team claiming them return captured scarfs to the game master at their rally point, and all players are strongly discouraged from hording scarfs in the field as some sort of means of blockading the other team, and are reminded that a river runs quite close to the gardens and it's still rather cold at this time of year...

• Seals at the rally point, or at their place of power count as 10 points for the respective team, while kills claimed count as one point each.

• An air horn is used to announce the beginning and end of the twilight round with a long blast. Seals are only considered captured if they are already at the KAOS rallying point after the final horn, and kills are only considered for final tally when their tokens are returned to the teams rally point for counting - so anything that hasn't reached a rally point by the time the horn goes off doesn't count.

• In the case of the cult, seals only count if they are touching a place of power, one seal per place, after the final horn. However, they must have at least one seal in play to win.

• If you hear several short air horn blasts, this means that someone has got into trouble, so unless you are those people, head back to the rally point and wait for the game masters to give the all clear.

Don't do that

• Don't walk on the gardens, if you can help it, as you might damage plants and upset the facilities people. Stick to the paths.

• Keep away from the river; you have to go through gardens to get down to it, you might fall in, and no one wants to be squirted by water full of duck shit anyway. Bring extra ammo in PET bottles and leave it at the rally points.

• Don't bring rubber knives, replica waterpistols or anything that looks even faintly like a real weapon in dim light. Don't wear camo gear, either. We're in a public place.

• Don't upset the locals. There will be staff at the Staff club, students passing through on the way to the halls and back, and various other bystanders about. Don't give them a reason to get upset with KAOS.

Game boundaries The Staff club to the south; you can use the gravel path between the three bridges from the KAOS rally point, west, but don't go on the grass or enter the car park. Ilam road, to the east. Stay off the foot path. The black gates of collage house, to the west. Don't even approach them. The Ilam fields to the south. You can go here if you like, but don't interfere with anyone's game.