Pulp Mini Six - Session One: Part One

Today was a good day for gaming.

After getting my Thursday game group's character converted from Open D6 to Mini Six we finally got to kick off our pulp adventure RPG. I decided to go with Mini Six because of its simplified rules and the better mesh to the loose conventions of the pulp genre.

The characters are an American professor, Dr. Louis "Louey" Jenkins and a wealthy British aristocrat, Johnothan Sussex IV. My two players decided that their character had a sort of ongoing arrangement where Sussex kept Jenkins on retainer to assist in his interests in antiquities, oddities and all things esoteric. Jenkins even benefited from a chair position at his university of employ due to this arrangement, allowing him some degree of freedom and unfettering him from teaching.


So, the adventure began dramatically with our heroes pinned down behind a luggage cart on the tarmac of an airstrip in Calcuta as they wound down their "last" adventure - trying to secure and keep a sacred monkey idol from evil hands. An upscale sedan and a covered truck blocked their way to the plane that waited to take them to safety and several turbaned, submachinegun toting goons were laying down a thick wall of suppressing fire to make sure they couldn't move.

Jenkins and Sussex were doing their best to return fire, hoping that the wall of steamer trunks would be enough to keep them protected until they could figure a way to the plane. Sussex was searching through a few of the pieces of luggage, hoping to find something that could be used in a diversion when several brazziers, a girdle and a ladies dress fell down on him.

Louey called out, "Find anything yet?"

To this, Sussex replied, "I think I might be able to fabricate a catapult if I had more time," referring to the rather generous cups of the ladies undergarments and the elastic body shaper.

The two adventurers decided that they could not remain there for long and decided to try to angle their way toward the plane with Sussex pushing the cart and their cover in an arc around the front of the sedan. Of course, in true pulp fashion, this move in the action and the SMG-armed thugs inability to get through to the characters prompted an escalation in the action. The canopy on the back of the truck dropped down and out of the way to reveal two more thugs scrambling to assemble a tripod and machine gun, and obviously greater threat than the SMGs.

Seeing this, Jenkins took aim and managed to take out one of the thugs, making the task of readying the menacing machine gun a much more daunting task for the now worried thug. The explosion of a hat box above their heads prompted the heroes to take greater cover again. It was then that the weight shifted in the sedan and out stepped the looming form of the villain's prime henchmen, a massive Indian with a broad scarred chest, massive bristling beard, and a polished, massive sword.

As the swordsman started his purposeful, direct stroll toward the moving baggage cart, Sussex called out, "Your turn to push,"  to the more physically capable Jenkins. Jenkins took up the task of pushing the cart while Sussex covered them.

Sussex took a shot at the swordsman who shockingly managed to parry the bullet (or it ricocheted off the blade). Shocked and amazed, Sussex called for a stepping up of pace and tried for another shot, but his pistol jammed. Jenkins handed over his .45 .

As Henry, Sussex's driver/pilot, leaned out the window of the plane's cockpit and shouted for them to hurry, Sussex began to scrabble for something he could use to take on swordsman. As he looted through the piled trunks and suitcases, lessening the amount of cover they had, a heavy bronze idol tumbled from a trunk. Jenkins recognized it as a precious treasure depicting a very powerful local deity. Sussex slid the idol out to one side of the cart and was relieved to see the superstitious thugs drop their guns and scramble to try to recover it. Meanwhile the swordsman drew ever closer.

Sussex tried once more to shoot the swordsman but the .45 jammed. The hulking henchman smiled a knowing and disheartening smile, revealing a mouth full of diamonds where his teeth should be.

"If that mountain crumbles, I claim the mining rights," exclaimed Jenkins roguishly.

Sussex took the monkey idol out of the satchel it had been carried in, stuffing the bag full of jewelry and other bits of luggage and then flung it out toward the swordsman. The swordsman, recognizing the satchel as that which had carried the monkey idol dropped his sword and caught it. Seeing the man's advance halted, Sussex and Jenkins both put their backs into pushing the cart and closed the remaining gap between them and the plane.

As they scrambled up the stairs to the plane they could hear the anguished cry of the Rajah who had been waiting inside the sedan for his prize. They closed up the door to the plane and rumbled off down the runway, listening to the rattling and clanking of spraying SMG fire as they went.

The plane flew off into the night and was replaced by a string of red lines moving across a map with stops in Egypt and Paris until it stopped in New York.

To be continued...