World War Cthulhu: Monsoon Season (Part 2)

Following on from my last post, we continue with the events of Monsoon Season, the latest in my very irregular series of WW2 Cthulhu adventures. Last time we left our investigators / luckless victims, they had run into Gunther Teller, the Swiss manager of a neighbouring plantation to the Sungei Merah plantion.

Teller, accompanied by Mortimer King and Henning Vermuelen, returned to the main bungalow. Close questioning from the party discovered that the Swiss scientist was working on optimised crop growth solutions to feed the world with - or so he claimed. The Japanese, Teller explained, were here to steal his secrets to help them to feed their population in the event of disruptions to Asian trade routes caused by the war (very prescient of them, as it turns out).

Teller admitted the strange red weed was a formulation of his. It was being protected by an entity of his own creation - he called it his 'guard dog.'. He accused Tait of having no nerve and of letting it out. He explained that the 'guard dog' was hard to see, but vulnerable to fire and electricity.

The investigators pondered how to escape from the island. They were interrupted by the sound of explosions to the south, in the direction of Teller's plantation. Teller seemed incensed and accused the Japanese of destroying evidence of his work, to stop the British from using it.

The party assembled some Molotov cocktails made from King's stock of alcohol as well as some improved fire bombs from the store of kerosene in the work shop. Taking Teller with them, they left Elliot Parsons and Archibald Torrington behind to look after Tait (Parsons' player was absent - so this seemed like the best use of his character).

The crew took the plantation truck and headed in the direction of Teller's plantation. At this point the plan was still to tackle the Japanese at the plantation.

Reaching Teller's plantation, they found that it was surrounded by a chain link fence and that the front gates were broken, as if someone had rammed them from the inside. A burned belt of at least 5 yards in breadth ran outside the fence. Closer questioning of Teller at this stage got him to admit that the Japanese had been funding his research. He also said the burned belt was there to stop his creations from escaping. The group advanced cautiously through the gates but then encountered a pair of Japanese soldiers.

The investigators sought to reverse out of the plantation, but not before Vermuelen was hit and badly wounded. Luckily Agnes Lloyd was on hand to treat him and take over the driving duties as they fled through the rain back towards Sungei Merah.

On the way, they encountered one of the missing Tamil rubber workers standing in the middle of the road. They stopped to pick him up, but he jumped onto the bonnet of the truck and smashed the windscreen, trying to grapple with Vermuelen. It became immediately obvious he was completely infested with the red weed, and that it was growing out of his mouth and ears. Vermuelen fought him with his machete, doing considerable damage, before Lloyd braked and the man flew backwards onto the road. He was then run over with the truck.

Returning to the Sungei Merah plantation, the investigators encountered Torrington fleeing towards them. He told them that the weed had taken over control of Parsons as well and driven him crazy. This was confirmed as Parsons himself emerged from the bungalow, infested in a similar way to the Tamil. The investigators opened fire on him and he fell backwards into the bungalow.

King then became suspicious of Teller, who was sitting quietly in the back of the truck. I cannot recall exactly why King began to look askance at Teller, possibly because he did not seem particularly moved by the destruction of Parsons. He pointed his rifle at Teller and asked Torrington to tie him up, whereupon Teller told King to shoot himself (failed POW roll by King against a powerful suggestion spell). As King began to press the muzzle of his .303 rifle to his throat, Vermuelen jumped into the back of the truck and hacked into Teller with a machete, killing him.

Seeing the dead Teller's body now starting to transform into something else, something vaguely reptilian, the group quickly poured kerosene on it and set fire to it. Luckily there was plenty of kerosene available for lamps in 1940s tropical Asia. Indeed, even in India during my childhood in the 1970s we had plenty of kerosene in the house, due to the need for lamps in power cuts!

As they were watching what was left of Teller burn, the headless corpse of Parsons (head destroyed by a shotgun to the head) burst back out of the bungalow, only to be riddled again with bullets, and burned with kerosene. Shouts to Tait did not get answered - none of the PCs were keen to go back into the bungalow to find him. They decided to leave the plantation. In reality, Tait was still alive but had passed out due to fever and was unresponsive. He was not in danger at this stage, but was abandoned to his fate.

With the end of Teller, and the knowledge that there were Japanese troops at his plantation, the team decided to flee towards the nearby town of Telong. Sadly for the PCs, they found the bridge across the river had been blown up. Next to it was an abandoned car they recognised as Teller's. Turning their truck around, they began to drive back towards Sungei Merah, hoping to try the other bridge over the river (also destroyed by Japanese sappers). At this stage they encountered some more Japanese soldiers advancing with what looked like a big fat man in sumo costume.

The British (and token South African) decided to run the Japanese down. The enemy soldiers opened fire on the truck, and I think King took a bullet this time, although it did not kill him. The Japanese soldiers seemed to be wearing blindfolds. The truck hit them at full speed, including the sumo wrestler. The driver, I think, had been hit and failed a Drive roll, leading to the truck crashing into a half full monsoon ditch by the side of the road.

Climbing out, they saw the Japanese soldiers were dead, but the sumo wrestler was getting back to his feet. He advanced on them, and was promptly hit by a hail of rounds which took him down again. His body now seemed to be turning into some form of black goo, covered in hundreds of small specks of light. As small eyes began to open on the surface, the investigators decided to pour kerosene on it, and set it alight.

The PCs headed through the jungle towards the nearest point where they felt they had a good chance to swim the river with their wounded companions (I'm wondering whether CoC needs more rules to penalise wounded characters - there seems to be no midway point between healthy and dead). 

There were no further signs of pursuit from the Japanese. Swimming across around 80 metres of the muddy river water, the party headed for the opposite shore. Suddenly a massive, black, amorphous form arose out of the water behind them, and tried to pull Agnes Lloyd under the water. She made an Extreme success on her Swim roll (she had the highest Swim in the party) and managed to escape the clutches of the monster, swimming for safety and probably breaking the Welsh record for short distance swimming over 50 metres!

Reaching the opposite shore, the group struggled through the rain onto the road, and made for safety.

GM notes and what I would do differently next time

My intention is to use this as a one short tournament scenario. It can currently accommodate up to five players, as Uttamveer Singh can also be used as a PC if needed. Ultimately Archibald Torrington could be a PC at a push, and could start the scenario already at the Sungei Merah plantation, or perhaps on his way there.

I'm aware that in this game, the sighting of the Japanese early on by Agnes was taken seriously, as she correctly identified them as Japanese soldiers. While communications from the plantation had been cut by the destruction of the bridges, this was a catalyst for the PCs to immediately 'turtle' to await a Japanese attack.

There was an initial lack of motivation to visit the Teller plantation, which is in fact not essential for the story, but would have been entertaining. By the time the PCs did visit it, the Japanese had already destroyed most of it, and the key buildings were on fire. At this point the Japanese were moving to part two of their mission, which was to find Teller, who was in the process of trying to renege on his deal with them.

In Call of Cthulhu firearms are still seemingly more potent than anything else: had Teller been armed with a pistol, I think he could have been more dangerous than trying to overwhelm King with a spell. This is often the case with RPGs, where wielders of magic are at a major disadvantage if surrounded by hostile PCs, unless they have potent defensive magic in place already. They may look powerful, but in CoC, with limited magic points and only one action to cast with, they don't have much margin for error. The moral of the story - give your NPC a strong defensive spell which he can cast first!

I think the game requires a play through with a second group before it goes on the con circuit.