Ran the set-up and first mission for a new BoB game last night: the players picked Zora and decided she was basically a radiant, awe-inspiring “goddess of the Legion”, with the Legion focused on achieving glory by rushing head-long into the teeth of battle and taking on powerful enemies one-on-one.
This made for an interesting “Rescue the Commander” mission as their main play was “Stealth? We don’t need no stinking stealth”: directly confronting threats, racing across open areas instead of sneaking around, blowing things up and burning things down to create distractions (Resisting ticks on the Alarm clock). And finally, kicking in the doors and facing the Cinder Guards and Inquisitor head-on.
The Heavy held their own against one, while the squad (Silver Stags: “No matter the cost!”) held off the other (and actually managed to pin it to the floor with fine halberds the Officer Channeled-up). With those distracted, the Medic and the Officer broke into the interrogation chamber to confront the Inquisitor. The mission ended with them freeing (though badly injuring) the Commander and leaping out a huge, stained glass window into the moat below the keep (where a waiting squad fished them out).
They lost only one legionnaire: the Rookie character (who had been shaping up to be the unlikely hero of the session), who Trauma-ed out by 1 point of Stress when she helped everyone else get out the windows. Every single character maxed out their Stress track pulling off this improbable rescue.
On a “this is so cool/amusing” note regarding the Commander: the players decided he was a big, old Panyar (think: Idris Elba with giant ram horns) who is the oldest surviving member of the Legion. But no one in the Legion actually knows his name – so the legionnaires, aware of how Panyar names work, have a betting pool going, with an odds sheet laid out.
They also used Flashbacks a lot: finding out exactly where the Commander was being held by interrogating a captured Black Oak Knight pre-mission; inspiring the rookie squad to face certain doom by charging the Cinder Guard; planning with Zora to fire a canon-blast at the gates to cover their own explosive entry into the keep from below; gaining a sacred bullet made with a drop of Zora’s blood; and having had the plan all along to jump out the windows into the moat.
It sounds like everyone is interested in continuing, and we’ll have a full command staff for the game. They’ll be facing off against Render and Breaker.