My Life As A Gamer: Running Through The Rifts (Pt. 2)

(Following from yesterday's post.)

Recap

Alexandros the Undead Slayer, Prince of his Atlantean clan and son of Apollo, departed from Tolkeen via Ley-Line Phasing south to El Paso. There he will establish a base of operations and begin building up his forces before moving across the river into Mexico and upon the Vampire Kingdoms therein.

The problem is that (a) he is, at present, alone and (b) El Paso is barely more than a boomtown run by a cattle baron. While the local militia gets the job done, it does so only because of its location- otherwise it would be like Ciudad Juarez.

That saving grace is that it is on the north side of the Rio Grande. Were it not for that river--that body of running water--it would be as riddled with Vampires as Ciudad Juarez on the other side.

Alexandros, therefore, has as his first challenge to take over the city-state.

Do Not Be Deceived By Appearances

To all outward appearances, El Paso is a city. It has a government. It has a militia. It has several gangs. It has an entire merchant class that is either semi-permament or permanently in residence, and in addition to the general personnel necessary to operate all of these institutions there are others present that have their own interests- and these parties are not all friendly to each other. Furthermore, there is a master that lives outside the city and several other satellite settlements that feed into (and claim protection from) El Paso.

Strip away the trappings, however, and the ludologist sees this for what it is: a mega-dungeon and its surrounding region with several contending factions.

Alexandros, being trained in Intelligence, sees the situation in analogous terms. For many of you, allow me to use media examples to get the point across.

And this always in the background.

To this end, Alexandros will need to get the lay of the land (time spent, then an Intelligence skill check). He will need to be cautious, circumspect, and discreet; even if he can bring El Paso to order, his real targets across the river may not wait for him to cross the river- and even if they can't come to him, they can dispatch others that can.

El Paso is a dungeon. Yes, it's an open air dungeon, but a dungeon nonetheless for all intents and purposes- and not a wholly self-contained one as the more dangerous half is across that river.

This means that the way to run this scenario is no different than running an Advanced Dungeons & Dragons dungeon with resident factions that are in conflict. The Referee has a map drawn up, territories are outlined, factions located, key players pinpointed, and relations therein marked down- a more orderly version of what Vampire Kingdoms has in its pages.

The First Turn

As this occurs in downtime, the initial action aforementioned is easily resolved. "Your man spends a week roaming the city under your assumed name to gets a solid lay of the land" the Referee says, "and he does not sense anyone yet picking up his tail or noticing his movements. The cover story of being a mercenary looking for work is accepted."

With this threat map (and local map) in hand, Alex decides that the best course of action is to split the militia from its cattle baron master but that has as its own prerequisite the solving of several persistent problems that said militia either cannot solve or are prevented from solving.

And this is where we leave things off for now.