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, Game 5, Game 6, Game 7, Game 8, Game 9
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.
Player Characters:
- Cytoblast: Dr. Douglas Hemlocke can control plants, including transforming himself into a plant form, all thanks to his mystical knowledge and his ancient magical staff.
- Dr. Comet: Possessed by a demon that travelled to earth inside a comet, Dr. Diana Aster can magically control fire and ice, though her powers often go often out of control when her emotions flare up.
- Jersey Devil: A barely human cryptid of mysterious origins, "Mr. Leeds" is both man and monster, able to teleport by way of a parallel dimension.
- Kid Radical: A highly skilled autodidact with a strict code of behavior, Kid Radical has a superhuman ability for following trends and learning new skills, although it often seems like he can't quite connect with modern society.
- Quasar Kid: A superhero teen from the far future, Quasar Kid has a cosmic metabolism, super strength, and the power of flight, but he hasn't yet adjusted to being in "the past."
Recurring allied NPCs:
- Starshadow: A retired intergalactic adventurer, Starshadow wields mighty cosmic powers, but he is often reluctant to use them.
- Bouncer: An invulnerable action movie star, Bouncer is also super-strong and capable of mighty leaps (hence the name "Bouncer"), but he hasn't been the same since the Oblivaeon Crisis.
A Very Quick Story Synopsis: In an alternate timeline where Baron Blade was killed decades earlier (causing countless changes to the world of Sentinel Comics), the heroes of the Multiverse are almost all killed in the "Oblivaeon Crisis." The few remaining heroes, especially the Alternates, are left to deal with the villains and interstellar threats that still endanger the Earth!
For more information about the West Coast Guardians of Freedom, check out the Game 7 Recap!
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The Alternates Episode #10 Recap:
“Not Available in Stores”
By Eddie Jaczerkowski
Only three episodes are left in Season One of The Alternates. And there’s good news - Season Two has already been ordered! Here’s your warning - spoilers below!
Episode Recap
Episode #10 opens where episode #9 left off - at a storage unit where the Alternates have found crates full of robot parts. The heroes briefly discuss what to do, but they decide that their newest robot friend - Veritas of the West Coast Guardians - might be able to tell them something about these robots.
For a long moment, Jersey Devil inspects one of the robot’s heads. It’s very reminiscent of the classic pose associated with Hamlet, where Hamlet is holding Yorick’s skull. It seems like the monstrous hero is a little confused by the inorganic “skull.”
Kid Radical packs up some robot parts and leaves a tracking pog in one of the remaining crates. Realizing they need to travel from Los Angeles to San Francisco, the Alternates aren’t sure how to get there fast, but Quasar Kid says he has an idea.
The next scene features the team in a rental car being carried hundreds of feet off the ground by Quasar Kid, who is slowly flying them back to San Francisco. The ride seems very rough and uneven, and Cytoblast complains about getting motion sickness. “I’m used to being in touch with the ground!” the mystical hero complains.
Nonetheless, the heroes reach the West Coast Guardians’ headquarters and sit down with Veritas in a conference room. The Alternates are a bit cagey at first, but tell Veritas that they tracked down some more robotic foes. Veritas tells them something in turn - he was able to find out who owned the safety deposit box they found at the bank!
The deposit box (which contained some very advanced devices which were also a few decades old) at the First Western Bank of San Francisco was owned by a common criminal named Manny Puerta. Veritas tells them that Manny was in prison a few years back for robbery - he broke into a warehouse and stole some run-of-the-mill electronic components. Apparently, though, the safety deposit box has been held in his name since before Manny's time in prison.
He also encourages the heroes to follow up on those clues, informing them that the West Coast Guardians aren’t going to be following up on the bank robbery. That’s when Kid Radical tells us that he is, indeed, a licensed and bonded private investigator in the state of California. That seems to mean the Alternates' investigation will be above board (since it does seem like Kid Radical isn't going to be a party to vigilante justice).
The heroes discuss with each other for a moment, and decide that - despite their dislike of him - they want to show the robot parts to Codebase, the hero on the West Coast Guardians who can “speak the language of machines.” Veritas calls Codebase to the conference room, and indeed, he is kind of an arrogant jackass.
Thankfully, Codebase doesn’t talk too much, telling the Alternates that the robotic parts are meant to be quickly and easily assembled together, by someone who had the right instructions. The robots were assembled in a unique factory constructed specifically to make these robots, and hundreds of robots of this type were produced before the ones that the Alternates found - someone has created a robot army!
The Alternates thank the West Coast Guardians, and they go off to find Manny Puerta. He’s working at a repair garage in San Jose, so the crew piles into their rental car and drives south!
They arrive at the garage and step up to the open garage doors. They get a lot of stares - they are, after all, costume-wearing superheroes in a world with very few costumed superheroes remaining. Kid Radical asks for Manny, and a man in front of the shop says he’ll go get him.
Moments later, Manny Puerta, a man in his late middle ages in greasy coveralls, walks tentatively up to the heroes. Kid Radical starts off by telling Manny that someone’s stolen from him. Manny, confused, asks him who stole what. When Kid Radical tells him about the safety deposit box, Manny doesn’t seem to know what he’s talking about. However, when Kid Radical mentions electronic parts, Manny suddenly remembers.
Manny explains that, many years ago, he did a job for a mysterious person who referred to themself only as “The Cloaksman.” The job involved robbing a storehouse on the outskirts of Reno, Nevada, and it was all pretty easy. But Manny (and his unnamed accomplices) realized that the storehouse belonged to Baron Blade! While Baron Blade had been reported dead months before that, Manny and his friends were still afraid he’d come back and get them.
The Alternates are pleasantly surprised to find that Manny is so cooperative, but nonetheless, Kid Radical presses him to tell them anything he might have left out. Manny starts to admit to all kinds of things, from crimes when he was a kid, to cheating on his taxes, to doing a rolling stop at stop signs. Kid Radical stops him, but then Manny looks behind the Alternates and shouts, “What’s that?!”
Behind the Alternates, quadcopter drones swoop down from the sky, each carrying a large metal box. Before the team can even react, the metal boxes drop from each quadcopter, and the boxes transform into quadrupedal robots with laser turrets on top! Naturally, the robots attack the heroes.
In an instant, Cytoblast says, “Manny, get down!” and pushes Manny behind him as he transforms into his hulking man-plant form. (He pushes Manny a little bit too hard, though, and the former criminal falls to the ground in a moment of slapstick comedy.)
Kid Radical rushes at the robots, flashing his yo-yos and shouting, “Yo-yo Rodeo!” The robots attempt to target him, but his quick moves throw off their weapon tracking. This creates an opening for Dr. Comet, whose icy blasts destroy half the robots in one attack. (And this time, she doesn’t hit Kid Radical accidentally!)
The team quickly knocks out the robots - Quasar Kid cracks them apart with super-strength, Cytoblast’s hefty arms smash them to bits, and Jersey Devil’s teleporting strikes completely overwhelm the combat robots.
Manny gets to his feet and begins shouting. “See! It’s Baron Blade! He’s back for revenge!”
But Kid Radical assures him, “If Baron Blade wanted to kill you, he’d have announced it first.”
The camera pans up to the air, where we can see the quadcopters flying off into the distance. The credits roll over the song “Plug It In” by Basement Jaxx.
Final Thoughts
This show has many gears. The first six episodes were action and tragedy, and the show shifted to a bit of comedy, and now a bit of mystery. This is an advantage of the superhero “genre” - it’s a broad umbrella under which many kinds of narratives can fit. It can fit dark antiheroes, silly comic relief, and knights in shining armor all in one story - heck, all in one team! “The Alternates,” as a show, tries to explore all sorts of stories in a single show while remaining very “serial” in its execution.
The West Coast Guardians are apparently not interested in investigating a crime, even when a super-being was involved. They also don’t seem to be interested in figuring out where the robotic sea serpent came from. In Episode #7, they did run off in an excited hurry to fight the sea serpent, but it seems like now that there’s actual work to do, they’re not interested. Or, perhaps, since they’re an official team of the United States government, there’s another agency taking care of these investigations, and the West Coast Guardians are just there to leverage super powers. In any case, it feels like they’re slacking.
Some nerdy notes!
- It looks like the Alternates could really use some sort of “Alterjet” or “Alternamobile” or something. Their ongoing struggle with transportation is obviously a satirical element of the show, since those sorts of questions are generally ignored in comics. In comic books, typically, no one really asks how the characters get across the planet in minutes (but occasionally, they have super powers that explain it).
- I’m still wondering about the identity of the mysterious voice that called into Kid Radical’s wrist communicator to tip them off to DJ Doctor Dancefloor’s location.
- As the Alternates entered the West Coast Guardian’s headquarters, there was a photo of the core Guardians of Freedom team, but if you didn’t know what to look for, you probably didn’t see it! Don’t worry - I suspect we’ll see them in an episode soon.
That’s all for this week! Be sure to watch Episode #11, titled “Space Is Limited,” and check in next week for my episode recap!
Eddie Jaczerkowski is a staff writer who loves comic books and writes about television.
Running the Game
Another week of running the game under social distancing, so we're remote on Discord using some screen-sharing. This time, we used GMnitron to do dice rolls, which worked well. Unfortunately, we had a lot more technical difficulties with microphones failing, etc. This is by no means a perfect way to run a game, but we're doing our best.
Again this week, I used much less than a full complement of elements in the action scene, and it worked just fine. When time is limited and the action is just meant to move along the story, this works great. I'm not really trying to make every action/combat scene an enormous battle-to-the-death, although that is often how comic books are written. ("In this issue, EVERYONE DIES! Just like they were supposed to in last month's issue!")
Right now, I'm doing a few "episodes" of mystery/investigation, and there's a whole "shadowy unseen enemy" element to the story right now, but I know I fall back on that far too often. Too many of the games (of D&D, Star Wars, Blades in the Dark, etc, etc, etc) I've run in the past have been one mystery box that opens to reveal another mystery box, and I don't want to just fall into that routine again. So by the end of "Season 1" (which will be Episode #12), I'll be switching gears to a different kind of story. For instance, I have a dozen or more original characters and/or alternate versions of existing Sentinels characters, and constant mysteries will slow down how many "new character" reveals I can do! That's no good!
This whole pandemic situation is leaving me with less free time, which is something of a surprise, so planning games and the other aspects of running this game have been squeezed tighter and tighter. I hope that week 3 of isolation brings a little bit more of a groove and I can get at least as much done as I did before this started. I guess we'll see!
Thanks for reading!