Avenger Assembled

Moira is a very scary godling. :)

Heh, this is true. I'll say Avenger delved into his stolen medical supply bag stock for today, given that he thought he might be around a really bloody crime scene. (Avenger rarely steals blood from blood banks; that's unethical! There's a blood shortage!) Heh. If my informants aren't pop-culture savvy enough, it may not be a matter of knowing the difference between the three. Okay, here's my result for searching the Master Bedroom. And the two upstairs bedrooms. I'll let you actually describe them, since you actually know what they look like. ;)

OK, that's three rolls of Knowledge: Streetwise, Arcane Lore, and Gather Information, taking 10 on each for a total of 16, 12, and 16, respectively, taking up most of the first day of Avenger's investigation. It helps not having to eat or sleep.

It was late at night when Avenger arrived at the Dickson house, the costumed adventurer lurking in the dark overhang of a nearby tree as he studied the house. There were a lot of good reasons to be here; Avenger needed some crime-solving cred if he was going to work well with the police, and Jack needed to find out if a vampire was behind these brutal slayings. More to the point, though, the pictures of the Dicksons reminded Jack far too much of his own long-dead mortal family. He'd grown up in a neighborhood not too different from this one, though out in the suburbs almost to Bedlam, and it was easy to put the faces of his own mother, grandfather, and teenaged self over that dead family. So he'd made what inquiries he could, finding out all he could learn from the neighborhood, the police, and his own supernatural connections. That had all been in the daylight, of course, well before sunset brought out his full vampiric nature. Now that he could do that, it was time to go looking on his own. Gotta make you guys proud, he mused as he slipped into the night, a puff of mist in the air as he drifted in through the Dickson attic window, far above and away from the police tape and cordon line below. It was time to hunt for answers at the scene of the crime.

Okay, great. I am definitely looking forward to seeing what you come up, Doc.

As one of the two still-conscious bar patrons tears through their men like a hurricane and another shouts with the authority of an angel and fury of a god, the three remaining soldiers step back with shocked looks on their faces. "Geez, they're supers!" calls one, slapping at a red button on his chest. "We need backup in the West End, now!" The other two drop their shock prods and pull out handguns, pointing them with shaking hands at the unconscious Stephanie and the bartender. "You'd better back up, or they're history! I mean it; put your hands up!" The men with guns are focused on Moira, the infuriated goddess, so it's the guy with the radio who calls out, "Pluto's might, where in Hades did the other one go?" Sure enough, Jack has disappeared entirely.

You can take 10 when you're attacking minions, fist-to-face or otherwise. And so far I think I've done OK running the minions; these are just low-level goons in body armor with shock prods using a slightly modified soldier template. I have a feeling Moira will take them down pretty easy. If you want to, though, lemme know!

Avenger is indeed a dark, gritty vigilante, a fierce predator of the urban jungle who preys on the criminal element. Mwahaha! :bat: But he is not averse to working in teams, under the right circumstances.

Yes, well. Jack usually doesn't think, "Boy, I sure hope no one can tell I'm the undead!" while he's in costume. Usually, anyway.

"Dark down here. No windows." Avenger thinks for a moment, then says, "Stay behind cover, out here. Goin in through the ducts. I'll be back in a minute." With that, he reaches over and flips the row of exterior light switches off, plunging the stairs and the room beyond into darkness. A moment later, while his ally's eyes are still adjusting, he drops down into mist and fog and rolls right underneath the open door, taking a moment to suss out the situation beyond before taking action.

I'm sold, this is definitely the sort of thing Avenger would get involved in. He and Scarab would make an interesting pair of comrades.

Multiple attacks on minions in the same round is a function of the Takedown Attack feat. You should be able to do the first one easily enough, though; it's a full-round action to hit one guy, grab him, then chuck him at another one.

Okay, joshie, we're waiting on you here.

I am in agreement with the sentiments expressed above.

1 HP spent to temporarily acquire Takedown Attack. Moira, you're up!

Jack squares off against the men surrounding him, the tall, slim guy bending down in a wary wrestler's crouch. The goons surrounding him evidently realize quickly that he's not going to surrender without a fight. Two of them jab at Jack, sizzling bolts of electricity stabbing at his face and midsection as he ducks and weaves. Jack's new to this sort of combat, though, and doesn't realize it's a feint until the third goon strikes directly for his heart with his sizzling stun gun. The third soldier misses too, though, Jack dodging out of the way of what would otherwise might be a painfully punishing blow. "You have no idea what you're dealing with," growls Jack, his deep, menacing voice a sharp contrast from the charming pretty boy only a few minutes ago. He could kill these men in a dozen ways; lay them low in a dozen more, but so very many of them would involve revealing his vampiric nature to them and to the nearby Moira. "You think I'm just going to stand here and let you hit me?" He lands a sudden, solid punch to the face of the soldier who attacked him, the man's face visor cracking as Jack punches him out right through his helmet! Jack keeps moving, too, lights from outside cutting odd shadow shapes against his pale skin as he suddenly leaps up into the air and simultaneously kicks his two other attackers in the face in a bit of super-fast kung fuery worthy of a John Woo flick. They fall, too, their helmets bouncing as they come in for a very uncomfortable landing, and Jack lands on his feet in the darkness.

The once-familiar bar is lit only by the terrible glares of the spotlights, casting it into a bizarre combination of bright light and truly black shadows. Since you passed the Fort save, you can see okay; it's just very...evocative.

you passed the dazzle with flying colors. Good thing they didn't come loaded for superhuman bear! I'll let you post Moira's reaction to all this before I start with the first round of combat.

Jack's initiative (14) Group 1 (vs Jack) (23) Group 2 (vs Moira) (8)

Okay, make a Fort save and roll for initiative.

"All right, here's what I think we should do." Whatever Jack's brilliant idea, events are already moving faster than he can deal with. No sooner has he spoken than two huge spotlight beams stab their way through the bar's window, powerful blasts of light that cast everything they don't touch into light but nearly blinding everyone who can see. His eyes protected against such things, Jack blinks away the glare without a problem, but a moment later it's not so easy when the door bursts open in a shower of wooden shards! A half-dozen men in body armor enter, carrying shock rifles, and with a nod three each run towards Jack and and Moira each. "Surrender now and you won't be harmed," says one of the men, his voice filtered uncannily by the helmet and gas mask around his head, his eyes invisible behind his bodily protection.

Divine's friends are drunks! No need to say it was just in the booze; it could have been in the food, too, or something in the air.

"Your loss, man!" Stan bolted like he'd been shot from a gun, leaving Jack and Moira the only two conscious in the bar. Jack, a deeply concerned look on his face, had left his erstwhile sweetheart behind to check on the welfare of the others. "I don't know, I...I don't know of anything like this! I don't think it was anything magical..." He sat back on his heels, alarm on his face. "They're alive, I think, just unconscious to a man. It's like they've all been drugged." He licked his lips and was about to speak again when the lights went out, this time for good. Jack could see fine, naturally, but that didn't stop him from cursing explosively as he bolted to his feet. "The nearest police station is two blocks down Durham," he says, with surprising knowledge of the neighborhood for a new guy. "How fast can you get there?"

"Hm," is Avenger's guttural reply to Tarantula's insight. "If I finish first, I'll come find ya." He turns back to Annalyn at that. "Basement." It's mostly a question; while he could get down there easily enough, getting there with a middle manager while avoiding fights is going to be hard to do blind.

Jack scooped up the cue with a graceful little flourish, making a great show of popping his back and flexing his fingers. Cue in hand, he bends over the pool table an instant below the lights go out. The moment of darkness is accompanied by the sudden, terrifying sound of bodies and tables falling, glass shattering, and a sudden scream from the corner. When the lights snap back on, everyone at the bar with the exceptions of Jack, Moira, and Jack's friends in the corner table have collapsed to the floor like so many boneless dolls, knocking over tables and breaking glasses as they go. A few things happened quickly after that; the first of which is that the small party in the corner rose and bolted as one, leaving behind their drinks and unconscious "dates" with as much care as one might leave behind a sandwich in the event of a bear attack. One only lingers at the door, Stan reaching out for Jack. "C'mon, Jack! You gonna stand there all night?" A thoroughly stunned Jack had dropped his cue by now, and he'd bent down to check Stephanie's vitals. The pretty woman had slumped in her chair, her head drooping as if she was just entirely too drunk. "She's alive...Stan, get out of here! Call the police! The real police!"