Here's a recap of the latest session of my Sentinels RPG campaign "The Alternates"! As per usual, there's a narrative recap (written as if it was in-metaverse) and then I go over the actual running of the game, and any lessons I learned as the GM.
If you're lost, you can catch up with the previous Game Recaps: Game 1, Game 2, Game 3, Game 4
Brief Description of the Game: In the meta-verse (where Sentinel comics is a published comic book multimedia empire), there is a premium cable computer-animated (in a style similar to “Into the Spider-Verse”) television series (which itself is based on a comic series called "The Alternates"). This RPG campaign represents that show, with each game session (ideally) representing one hour-long Episode of the show. The recap below is written in-metaverse as if it was an article on a popular website that posts recaps of episodes.
The PCs are Cytoblast, Dr. Comet, Jersey Devil, Kid Radical, and Quasar Kid. The characters Bouncer and Starshadow are featured NPCs. Enjoy!
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The Alternates Episode #5 Recap:
“The End of the Beginning”
By Eddie Jaczerkowski
Hello, readers! Today I'm covering Episode #5 of The Alternates, "The End of the Beginning." There are a few twists and turns in this episode, but it all ends up about where you might have expected... but we'll get to that! As always, this recap will contain spoilers for this episode, but no spoilers for what might happen in later episodes!
Episode Recap
This episode opens with another character flashback, this time for Kid Radical. The scene looks like it's in sunny California or somewhere similar, possibly in the 1980s or 1990s, but it's hard to say for sure. The camera opens in a park, with a group of teenagers riding skateboards on some concrete stairs, sliding down the handrails and performing flips and such. (I will admit here that I am not very familiar with skateboard tricks, but I'll do my best!)
One of the kids falls flat on his face, stands up, brushes himself off, and pulls out a cigarette. Suddenly, the music changes to The Go-Go's hit, "We Got the Beat." The teenagers all look up as someone comes their way. Of course, it's Kid Radical on his highly advanced skateboard, The Tech Deck. He skates up to the kids, doing flips on the board, then proceeds to pull out two yo-yos and perform tricks with them while balancing on the skateboard.
The teenaged tech hero introduces himself, saying, "I'm Kid Radical, and you're about to make a mistake!" He then proceeds to pull out a squirt gun and shoot water all over the skater's lit cigarette.
(I just want to say that, although Kid Radical seems like he's supposed to be a teenager, the character design for him in the Alternates sometimes looks to me like a guy in his 30s who is just dressed like a teenager. I don't know if that's something they're doing on purpose, or if it's just my mind playing tricks on me. Anyway…)
Kid Radical starts to talk to the teens about the dangers of smoking - asthma, yellow teeth, bad skin. He sounds very much like an outdated brochure in the nurse's office of your local middle school. The teenagers are completely confounded at being confronted by a living after-school special, so Kid Radical takes the time to deliver a good old-fashioned "play by the rules" talk about smoking. Finally, the skateboarder with the soggy cigarette spits on the ground in front of Kid Radical, yelling, "Thanks a lot, narc!" The other jaded teens have a little chuckle. Then, the spitting kid says, "Let's get out of here," and they all skate off away from Kid Radical.
For a bit, Kid Radical juggles some devil sticks while performing tricks with the Tech Deck, but within moments, he's alone in the park, performing flashy flips and other skateboarding tricks for an audience of none. The awkward scene seems to finally sink in for Kid Radical, who stops his routine and just sullenly looks down at the ground for a moment. I found myself feeling bad for Kid Radical. In the end, he seems to mentally brush it off and skate out of the park, although all the smiles and grins he had moments earlier are gone from his face.
That takes us to the next scene, back in Rook City, with Grand Scion Voss (my name for him - the credits just say "Rainek Kel'Voss"), stands atop a pile of rubble, with fallen heroes - Absolute Zero, Legacy, and others - laying all around him. Tempest kneels nearby (although he's not kneeling to Voss, it is clear he is kneeling because of Voss). Voss has clearly undergone some upgrades under Oblivaeon - he's got large crystals protruding from his back where he previously had bony spikes. Voss glares down toward the bottom of the rubble pile.
At the bottom of the pile are the only remaining superheroes in the fight against Voss, those who survived Oblivaeon previously - Dr. Comet, Cytoblast, Quasar Kid, Jersey Devil, Kid Radical, and Bouncer.
The heroes look at one another in quiet tension, until finally Quasar Kid breaks the silence, saying, “We need a plan.” Cytoblast adds, “We need to find a way to stop this invasion.” The others nod in agreement.
Jersey Devil tells his new teammates that, if they can restart the Oblivion Engine, it will destroy Voss and his entire army (and the Earth), saving their universe from his conquest. Before the others can raise objections, he teleports off to the Oblivion Engine.
At this point, Voss commands Tempest, saying, “M'kk Dall'ton, now that you are finally in my service, I have a job for you. Dispose of these Earthlings.” Tempest summons a whirling lightning storm and starts walking down the pile of rubble towards the heroes.
The Alternates quickly hatch a plan - Cytoblast and Dr. Comet plan to attack Voss and look for a weakness they can exploit. Kid Radical, Quasar Kid, and Bouncer plan to deal non-violently with Tempest, hoping to break whatever mind control he is under.
Back at the Oblivion Engine, Jersey Devil attempts to infuse the device with his infernal engines, but nothing happens. We hear the disembodied voice of Bayeb, the minotaur man from Jersey Devil’s flashback in Episode #2. The voice says, “Struggle only breeds pain, not success. And we all meet our end. Life is only suffering. Joy is unattainable.” Jersey Devil shakes his head and says, “No, there is another way,” and teleports back to the group. There, he tells the other Alternates that the crystals in the Oblivion Engine are of the same type as the crystals in Voss’s back.
Cytoblast hits Voss again and again with huge wooden fists, but it’s to no avail. Meanwhile, Dr. Comet assailts Voss with waves of ice using her magics, probing for weaknesses. She finds that the crystals in his back are now the sole source of Voss’s power, so they could be used against him.
Back with Tempest, Quasar Kid is trying to talk sense into him. “You’re one of the greatest heroes of this age,” he says. “Act like it!” Meanwhile, Bouncer is harassing and bumping into Tempest as he tries to control the storm - he’s not trying to hurt the Maerynian, but he is keeping him distracted.
There are a few important moments in the fight to call out. At one point, when Tempest hits Quasar Kid with a lightning blast, we hear a disembodied voice (it’s Quasar Kid’s voice) reciting an oath to defend the galaxy. This is Quasar Kid’s motive to keep fighting - he believes in his oath, and his mission.
Similarly for Dr. Comet, when Voss resists her ice powers, we hear voices making insults and casting doubts on her. These are the voices of her past, telling her what she can’t do, what she isn’t capable of, what she won’t accomplish. While it might seem like bitterness on her part, she has a neverending will to succeed, fueled in part by those who have doubted her in the past.
I think the writers included these little tidbits to help us understand how these characters keep fighting in these circumstances. We don’t really know these characters yet, and this helps us get to know them. Earlier, Jersey Devil hears a voice from his past that challenges him with despair. Later in the episode, Cytoblast says that new growth will rise up when a fire destroys a forest, and that is a metaphor for his own motivator for fighting in the face of certain destruction. These are subtle touches that help us understand the characters.
Back to the action - Thorathian soldiers have joined the fight, so Kid Radical breaks off from Tempest to slow them down. Jersey Devil joins him in fighting the soldiers. As the Thorathians fall, Jersey Devil steals their life essences - their souls, even - to gain greater power.
With the soldiers mostly defeated, Kid Radical skates over to where Tempest is bringing down lightning and wind on Bouncer and Quasar Kid. Just like in his speech from the flashback, he tells Tempest, “You’re about to make a mistake!” But this time, he gives a better lecture. “You’re about to do something wrong when the voice inside you is telling you not to. That voice is more powerful than whatever Voss has done to you.” Kid Radical’s code of honor (“Following the rules is cool!”) comes through here, and Tempest shakes off the mind control. The Maerynian locks eyes with Kid Radical and nods, but continues summoning an even greater storm.
Dr. Comet alerts her teammates that she’s figured out Voss’s greatest weakness - the crystals are susceptible to the Duality Stabilization Field Generator, so the same device that banished Oblivaeon can be used to destroy Voss’s power source!
But first, they have to break Voss’s defenses. During his attacks on Voss, Cytoblast has been leaving saplings and branches all around the rubble pile. He finally causes all of them to grow together, and he plants himself (no pun intended) in the center of the rubble, delivering a shattering blow to Voss. At the same time, Dr. Comet fires a barrage of ice spikes at the Thorathian warlord. Although he remains unharmed, this assault finally gets Voss’s attention, and he stands to confront the heroes.
Tempest takes the opening, unleashing the entire fury of the storm on Voss. Lightning strike after lightning strike hit Voss with full force, knocking him to one knee. Tempest raises his right arm to the sky, and points his left finger at Voss. All the lightning of the storm flows through Tempest and into Voss, but the power surge overloads Tempest, and his left arm is completely destroyed.
Staggering, Voss stands back up to approach the heroes. From behind him, a swarm of black particles swirl and gather together, coalescing into the body of the cosmic hero Starshadow! Starshadow grabs the largest of Voss’s crystals and starts to channel dark energy into it. Voss freezes in place, grimacing in pain as black energy flows downward into his body. “I can’t hold him for long,” Starshadow says. “What’s the plan?”
Dr. Comet explains her plan to use the Duality Stablization Field Generator on the crystals, and Starshadow agrees, clearly impressed.
Jersey Devil teleports Quasar Kid to the hoverjet, where the device is still stored in the cargo area. Quasar Kid flies it back to Dr. Comet (helpfully reminding us that the generator can’t be teleported).
Dr. Comet channels her fire magic into the generator as a power source, and Kid Radical pushes a few buttons. The generator hums to life. Starshadow suggests the crystals are all connected, so she can just fire it at the big one in the Oblivion Engine. Soon, a yellow beam shoots out from the device, into the giant crystal in the distance.
All the crystals begin to glow red, including the ones in Voss’s back. Starshadow, who is still holding the crystal in Voss’s back, turns red and throws his head back in a silent scream. Red and purple energy emanates out from Starshadow, and red energy particles float up from his open mouth, dissipating in the atmosphere.
Finally, the crystals shatter into a fine, glittering dust. The dust floats upward for a moment, then disappears altogether. Rainek Kel’Voss screams in anguish, and falls to the ground dead. Behind him, Starshadow returns to his human form and collapses. Jersey Devil teleports to Tempest, and finds him still breathing but badly injured.
The heroes look around, but any Thorathian soldiers who were nearby have fled, and the genebound troops who had just begun to disembark from their dropships are now standing idly by, apparently unable to act without the orders of their warlord.
The scene zooms out, and we see the dropship invasion has failed, with genebound aliens simply wandering around, or retreating back into their dropships. The song “The Riot’s Gone” by Santigold plays over the scene, and then the credits roll as the song continues.
Final Thoughts
Now that we’ve hit Episode #5, the bulk of the “backstory” of the Alternates has now been told (hence the episode title, “The End of the Beginning”). There are still a few more elements to be sorted out in the next episode, and then the show will probably start into where the comic book series began. (All the events of the show so far were told via flashback and exposition in the original comic series.)
A few notes for the super-nerds:
- Tempest loses his left arm in this episode, which also happened to the version of Tempest from the Iron Legacy timeline.
- If you look closely, you can see the black particles synonymous with Starshadow’s power appearing near the heroes at various points before he finally reforms.
- We’ve now seen 4 out of the 5 main characters flashback, so next week will probably feature a Cytoblast vignette!
That’s all I have for this week! Next week’s episode is titled, “Funeral for a Friend,” which is half of an Elton John song! I wonder who the funeral is for…
Eddie Jaczerkowski is a staff writer who loves comic books and writes about television.
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Running the Game!
This was a pretty standard scene. I did give the players options - fight Tempest or try to "snap him out of it". Also, trying to hit Voss was optional - they could try to distract him with attacks, or if they left him alone, a different challenge would appear (a few simple lieutenants). They went with the "distract Voss by attacking" option.
I did the "break Voss's defenses / distract Voss by attacking" part as a quasi-Challenge. It had Challenge boxes, but they weren't for Overcome. A player could Attack Voss, and if the Attack did 8 damage, it checked a box. This was because Voss wasn't really a combatant, and I didn't want this to just be a pile of hit points. This might also work for things like "Break down a wall" or "Destroy a space cruiser from the inside" or something.
Starshadow wasn't dead after all! I mean, of course he is, he's my beloved special NPC. ;-) But I did let Tempest live, since the players decided to talk to him rather than fight him. So Tempest and Parse are definitely still alive!
I've been sick all week (in fact, I was almost too sick to run game this week), so I have not finished my sketch of Cytoblast. Sorry, everyone will have to wait until next week for another PC sketch.
Until next time - thanks for reading!