Judoom! : Doctor Who Adventures in Time and Space

07/13/2014

Judoom!  A Judoon Rescue Mission
One Shot

Dr. Who - Adventures in Time and Space

This was to be the first published game system that Rocky was to run.  Although he first wet his toes running a game using a home-brewed system we cooked up that combined elements of Houses of the Blooded, FATE, Mage the Ascension and Castle Falkenstein, this was to be Rocky's first game session run with a module.  As huge fans of Dr. Who, I once got a relatively unknown role-playing game called Continuum for Rocky to someday try running, if he ever opted to run games.  Considering I introduced him to the world of table top role-playing games, it makes me truly happy to know my partner has gotten the gaming bug enough to research systems on his own and even volunteer to run a game to introduce gaming to new people!  And even more awesome, this adds to my 12 new games for the year list.

Ah yes.

I created a character called Dame Judi , inspired by Judi Dench (as always), whom I saw as an elderly woman who used to go on misadventures with the Doctor during her younger years.  So sort of a cross between River Song, Sarah Jane Smith and M (of the James Bond series).  She was Argumentative, an experienced Time traveler with the knack of Boffin technology, shutting people down with her words and using her Attractiveness and Voice of Authority to great success.  She, however, was clumsy due to her old age.  Thankfully this did not interfere with her proficiency in Running.

We had a young thief from the future, who had very Resourceful Pockets and his own Sonic Screwdriver (one he had found and tinkered with through the years), an Archaeologist from the past who had been trying to locate the Doctor for so long, and a member of Torchwood who had joined the doctor for a few adventures.  We were all travelling with the Doctor to celebrate his unbirthday by watching the Perseid shower of 2020.

What we end up doing, however was manifesting inside a ship.  A Judoon cruiser.  And the Judoon surround us and demand an explanation why we are here.   We eventually speak with the Captain of the vessel and learn of the problem:  Some kind of virus or disease has infected some members of the crew.  The Captain wants us to go through sections of the ship and mark down the areas that are not safe.  We notice there is a damaged console, and realize its probably the communications console.   The group heads down to help.

Most of the Judoon simply refer to those who were infected as "not Judoon."  We find the food supply area of the vessel (which seems to be a wilderness habitat thing) and there notice another communications console.  Given the ship being within the path of the Perseids, the damage it would be receiving would eventually cause more trouble for the ship.  The Doctor, the archaeologist and the Torchwood agent head further on to investigate.  The thief and I, however, realize the communications console is worth looking into.  We jury rig it back to functional status and switch it on:

The commercial starts playing.
More interestingly, the Judoon standing guard reacts extremely negatively against the ad!  The thief and I start to consider what this can mean given the damaged communications console.  I try distracting the Judoon to head back to the Tardis, but it doesn't work.  The Judoon clearly are serious about things.  We decide to rejoin the others.

The others have discovered more signs of damage and conflict.  But the most interesting part is when they find a room that has its windows' blackened out and a voice from within seems to be playing I Spy with... himself.  The voice is odd, sounding almost English in accent, but at the same time.. sonorous.  When we arrive, we all share findings and decide to open the door.  Inside, we discover a Judoon who talks and acts almost human.  His name is Flo and he looks like what we think is the effects of the sickness.   But as Flo shares the story of the signals, of the Captain's actions, of the Electroform that they were trying to capture, the group begins to wonder if the Captain has already been infected by this Electroform, and if the ship was steered into the Perseid in an attempt to blow it up?

As half the team heads down to the engines to try to repair them, I head back to the bridge with Cassandra on an attempt to talk the Captain into heading down with us.    The team heading to the engine with Flo are nearly blocked and caught by security Judoon, but the thief's quick thinking has his nimble fingers draw out the Psychic Paper he had stolen from the Doctor earlier to explain that they are bringing the Judoon to the engine bay.

The Archaeologist and I have trouble convincing the Captain to join us until we use the guns to hold him hostage and lure him down with us.  Down below, the others rig up the engine to act as a conduit for the Electroform.  Batteries are rigged to emit a reversed polarity to draw the thing to them.  The conflict goes well and the Electroform being shunted into the engine ends up expiring as well!

In the end, the Captain shares his side of the story.  He shares how the mission to capture the Electroform was also a ruse.  The Electroform had broadcast itself to the ship as the distress call from a planet to capture the Electroform, and later then started to infect the crew.  He had maneuvered the ship just before losing control to the Perseids in hopes of causing the ship to crash and protect his people.  Flo, oddly becomes both the Hero and the Outcast of the people.  No longer fitting in with them, we suggest that he joins Torchwood instead.  The Doctor agrees its a good way to resolve things and we all hop back into the T.A.R.D.I.S. for another misadventure.

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Congratulations again to my partner, Rocky, for running this fantastic game!