DAY 5 – APRIL 22nd 2000

PRASZKA, POLAND – MORNING

The players gather their booty from the unit at Garage Hotel and are then escorted into the town. They enter from a makeshift barricade erected between two buildings that are mostly still intact. They notice that the lower windows of the buildings overlooking the road have been walled up with bricks, while the upper floors’ windows are lined with sandbags and wooden panels with slits from which the defenders can fire down on the street.

The town of Praszka – its still inhabited portion – presents itself much like most small towns of war-ravaged Poland. Most noticeable is a prolonged lack of basic maintenance: the roads are cracked and littered with potholes, with grass tufts springing from every crevice and little debris of all sorts lining the streets on both sides, though it looks like the have swept along the curbs to keep the central part of the roads traversable.

There’s an overgrowth of vegetation in every yard in sight, and most windows at street level have been boarded up. Most building have suffered some kind of war-related damage, like breaches created by mortar shelling and holes from small arms fire. Some buildings have collapsed and other seems on the verge of joining them, but overall, this part of town is faring well, with weathered facades in need of repainting and a number of roofs needing some patching up.

There’s little foot traffic visible on the road the players are escorted through, yet all four have a feeling they are being watched. Looking around two things are particularly noteworthy:

• There’s a surprising number of intact windows on the upper floors of the buildings
• There’s not a single vehicle in sight, unlike the other town where useless, rusty, gasless cars used to line the streets

The players are shown their quarters which are deemed comfortable enough for modern-day standards. They then decide the following:

• DONNA and ALEX will go to the town’s hospital and lend a hand (any resemblance with a pre-war hospital ends with the name, as it is located in a former gym)
• LED and NASCAR will go to the town arsenal for some trading
• Later on, NASCAR will remain with DONNA at the hospital while LED and ALEX are going to have a chat with the local authorities

[The players feel comfortable enough to split the party, but they are not willing to leave anybody alone]

WITH the EYES of the REFEREE – PRASZKA [click to expand]

I have a somewhat clear vision for the town of Praszka. Most information is not available to the players at this stage and more details will follow as they explore different parts, but for the sake of conciseness, here’s a few notes about how I envisioned Praszka in TW2000’s world:

• Praszka had a pre-war population of over 7.000 people, now reduced to a few hundreds
• The town has seen some combat between NATO and Russian troops within its borders, but has been largely spared of major attacks. Its most valuable target where the industries at its periphery, which were targeted using long range conventional weaponry, sparing most of the inhabited part of the town
• As the national and regional government collapsed, Praszka was forced to fend for itself, and the remaining citizens entrusted the local police and the major with the organization of the town, which basically became a community where the common good trumps all other concerns. Labor is organized and supervised by local authorities and all services are centrally distributed
• As the war progressed and the situation worsened, stricter rules were put in place and the local authorities started to use the national rhetoric of the XIX century to instill a sense of unity and belonging in the citizens, where the town took the place of the nation.
• The system has kept the town safe from most outside threats, and the municipality still has some very basic form of services that have disappeared by most cities. There’s no electricity or running water, but the citizens have a canteen in which they eat once a day, there’s a school for children, the possibility of showering once a week. All the unoccupied buildings outside the perimeter have been scavenged and everything useful is now stored in a few warehouses and is assigned to the town’s citizens according to their needs.
• The internal affairs are handled by a central Committee, consisting of five people that are elected yearly by an assembly of all citizens who are 18 and above
• There’s a myriad of small vegetable patches scattered in and around the town, and large fields of wheat just past Wanda Chotomska school (which was turned into an outpost for guarding the cultivated fields)

And here is the current state of affairs for the town:

• The food situation is getting more and more dire. The output of the fields is decreasing with every harvest, and people are concerned for the radioactivity of the ground (which they have no way of measuring). Vegetables production is still at decent levels, but meat is getting more and more of a rarity on the peoples’ menu, with teams of hunters spending days in the areas surrounding the town only to get back with meager preys that held little rations
• The authorities have done a fairly good job in keeping order inside Praszka so far. In the recent months though, increased pressure from marauders, the dwindling resources and the growing limitations to personal freedom have created a climate of unrest. While major crimes like murder are a rarity, thefts and aggression are on a slow but steady rise and face no consequence from a militia that is already stretched thin just trying to defend the town from outside menaces
• The town arsenal is relatively well stocked and all defeated marauders are looted for everything they carry from their weapons to their boots. The town has found a way to produce improvised grenades from equipment scavenged from the old bombed industries that used to employ a vast slice of its pre-war population. AT weapons are however in short supply. There is little gasoline, used mainly to operate salvaged industrial machineries and portable generators

FINAL NOTE: the town of Praszka is briefly described in the Black Madonna expansion for TW2K, which wasn’t available to me when I played this part of the campaign. The state of the town is therefore my creation, and doesn’t conform to the official ‘canon’.

LED and NASCAR are taken to a blocky building near the church, on the opposite side of a park. A sizeable portion of the park is full of civilian vehicles parked under the tall trees and in different state of decay. The soldier escorting them explains that the vehicles are kept for parts until they have nothing valuable anymore and they are dragged out of the city limits or used to reinforce the barricades.

The building is the former Praszka museum, now the city arsenal. There’s militia men outside on the sidewalk surveilling civilians unloading a couple of wooden carts full with small boxes. The entire façade is covered by sandbags up to the ground floor windows and the wide sidewalk has been recently swept clean.

On the same corner of the park is the municipal building, its facade traversed by multiple cracks and showing numerous bullet impacts, mostly around the windows. A shield with the town’s coat of arms is still hanging over the main entrance.

Inside the arsenal they are directed to a man sitting behind a heavy wooden table, his tall figure hunched down as he’s writing in a ledger. The duo approaches the man who upon noticing them deposits the pen and closes the ledger with his bony hand. He stares at them from behind thick, round glasses, then takes them off and passes two fingers on the bridge of its nose.

He folds the glasses and puts them on the table “what do you have and what do you want?”

TRADING IN TW2K (and in PRASZKA) [click to expand]

Time for some trading: the Player’s Manual (page 90) offers some guidelines as to how to conduct bartering, as well as how to determine the availability of gears, weapons and everything else.

First of all, I need to decide what the players are looking for. Since they have not yet decided their next step in the campaign, LED and NASCAR are looking for basic useful items; in particular:

• There’s only 2 players left with a medikit, so they’ll need at least 2 more
• They have used 3 grenades so they have 2 left. Having one each would be a good standard, so they’ll need 2 more
• LED is looking for some ammo for his M1911A1 (ha has 5 rounds left), but .45cal won’t be easy to find
• Overall, they’ll try to have weapons that employ the same type of rounds, so they can share ammo if needed. I wouldn’t go as far as having the same for all players though
• Assault rifles are a bit clunky to use in close combat (they suffer a -2 penalty at close range), so LED will try to acquire a carabine, possibly an M4 (which uses the same caliber as DONNA’s M16) and some ammo for it
• At the opposite end of the spectrum, it would be nice to have something with a bit more kick than ALEX’s hunting rifle, like an M21 (which has the same range and damage, but a lower crit and twice the rate of fire)
• ALEX and LED are in need of a flak jacket, but they doubt the arsenal has some for sale
• The group has used its only AT weapons, but they know the town is in short supply of those, so they really don’t expect to leave the building carrying one
• Rations, extra backpacks and other tools will be traded for once the players decide their next move

Now let’s see the value of what the players are willing to trade: Twilight 2000 uses small arms rounds as currency, with gears and weapons each having a value. Damaged items are worth less, with weapons reducing their value by approximately 10% for each drop in their reliability.

Here’s what the players could trade:

This is the value of what the players have accumulated and they are currently not using.

The following is the value of what the players are using and might trade for something better:

The players also carry a total of 15 spare rounds.

DONNA could use a secondary weapon, so they might keep the P-83, which is also used by NASCAR and ALEX meaning they can share ammo.

The pickup battery and fuel will be kept for now, as they might come in handy as an incentive to a persuasion roll the players are anticipating.

Now the question of what is available for trading in Praszka. The Player’s Manual (page 90) indicates the average availability for a certain type of supply. Using that as a guideline I’m house-ruling the following:

• The arsenal won’t trade any AT weapons with the players as the town is in short supply
• The arsenal won’t trade any protective gear with the players as they need it for the militia
• The arsenal is well stocked with pistols, assault rifles, knives, clubs, and hunting rifles looted from the marauders attacking the town. Plus, last night’s fight has provided an influx of extra weapons. The town’s defenders tend to employ Polish weapons, so the arsenal will likely trade away weapons from other nationalities
• The arsenal is reasonably stocked with ammo for everything mentioned in the above voice
• The town manufactures its own grenades, so improvised grenades can be traded for, but regular grenades are not for trade
• Spare parts and basic tools are available for trade

For the remaining objects I’ll use the Manual’s system to determine the availability:

• COMMON (C) items are fairly ubiquitous even in the year 2000. Roll a D6. If the result is 3 or higher the item is available. A new roll can be made each week.
• SCARCE (S) items are not easily available, but individual items can be offered for trade from time to time. Roll a D6. If the result is a 5 or a 6, the item is available. A new roll can be made each week.
• RARE (R) items are not generally available, and tightly guarded by anyone who possesses them.

There’s also a roll to determine how many of that item are available.

The players are looking for medkits, which are considered Common:

• MEDKITS (C) – roll[D6] = 6 -> Medkits are up for trade in a number equal to roll[D6] = 4

LED is looking for a carabine, which is considered Common:

• CARABINE (C) – roll[D6] = 2 -> The arsenal has no carabines for trade

LED is also looking for ammo for his M1911A1, which I’ll consider Scarce:

• .45 Ammo (S) – roll[D6] = 5 -> .45 is available in a number of rounds equal to roll[D6+D6]x10 = 110, I’ll halve this number on account of the rounds being scarce, for a total of 55

(the arsenal has probably accumulated rounds of this caliber but has no weapons that employ it; LED could get a good deal out of it)

ALEX might be interested in a sniper rifle like an M21; I’ll consider a sniper rifle to be scarcely available:

• SNIPER RIFLE (S) – roll[D6] = 3 -> The arsenal has no sniper rifles for trade

I’ll also roll for somethings the players might be interested in:

• FLASHLIGHT (C) – roll[D6] = 1 -> The arsenal has no flashlights for trade
• ANTI-PERSONNEL MINES (C) – roll[D6] = 3 -> available for trade in the number of roll[D6] = 2 encumbrance units.  Each anti-personnel mine weights ½ unit, so there’s 4 mines available. As for the type of mines, I’ll roll a D6: 1-3 they are M16 American mines, 4-6 they are OZM-4 Russian mines. Roll[D6] = 3 -> they are M16 US made mines
• FOOD (C) – roll[D6] = 1 -> there’s no rations available for trading (the players will receive food while in town, but there’s no food available should they want more to stock)
• SLEEPING BAG (C) – roll[D6] = 4 -> The arsenal has roll[D6] = 2 sleeping bags up for trade (the sleeping bag grants +2 to Survival rolls when sleeping on bare ground and +2 for Stamina rolls against cold)
• SMALL TENT (C) – roll[D6] = 4 -> the arsenal has roll[D6] = 5 small tents (+1 to Survival rolls for making camp; fits four people)
• PROTECTIVE MASK (C) – roll[D6] = 1 -> The arsenal offers no protective masks for trading
• VEHICLE SPARE PART (C) – roll[D6] = 6 -> There are roll[D6] = 6 spare vehicle spare parts available for trading (the players might find what they need to fix their pickup)

Finally, the players might be interested in radios, specifically portable ones: a radio is considered scarce. The players saw the town militia use one, so radios are present in Praszka, but I’ll house-rule they’re not for trading (for now at least).

Absent a carabine, LED will trade for a US assault rifle; I’ll house rule that there’s one available and roll a D6 to decide which one: 1-3 is an M16A1 and 4-6 is an M16A2. Roll[D6] = 3 -> it’s an M16A1. Also, according to page 91 of the Player’s Manual, I have to roll a D6 to establish its reliability. Roll[D6] = 3 -> its REL is 4/5

In this first trade, LED and NASCAR will ask for:

In exchange they offer what follows:

The players are offering less then they’re asking for; they’ll try to barter with an opposite PERSUASION roll with no bonuses (meaning NASCAR won’t be able to help LED and LED’s Psy Ops specialty won’t come into play). I’ll assume the person in charge of the arsenal is accustomed to bartering, so he’ll have a good PERSUASION level (I went with EMP C and Persuasion B).

If the players win, they will conclude the trade, if the guy in charge of the arsenal wins, he’ll raise the original price by 10% with no further possibility for a persuasion roll:

Opposite PERSUASION roll:

• LED rolls[D10+D10] = 0 SUCCESSES (rolled 4 and 5)
• ARSENAL GUY rolls[D10+D8] = 1 SUCCESS (rolled 8 and 2)

LED pushes the roll, casually mentioning his arm is bandaged because of what happened in the school earlier in the morning.

• LED rolls[D10+D10) = 2 SUCCESSES (rolled 7 and 8)

LED convinces the other guy and the goods are exchanged.

Only after the pushed roll I remembered that LED was already at 4 stress points, and rolling a 1 on a pushed die would have meant collapsing to the ground from exhaustion…

DONNA and ALEX are directed to a former gym that now serves as the town’s hospital. To access the building, they first pass a militia checkpoint on a street where a giant crater forces people to walk right against the buildings on either side. The players are then taken to an inner courtyard where they’re instructed to wash their hands at a small fountain activated with a hand-crank. There’s no soap in sight, but the water looks clean enough. Concrete stairs lead to a basement level room with windows just on the upper part of the walls. Most of them are blocked by sandbags while others let light and air in, but wooden panels are lying on the floor against the wall, ready to be propped up to cover the windows.

The room is large and fully covered by square white tiles that are cracked and broken in multiple points. Wooden tables serve as beds and metal shelves that line most walls and are full of boxes and various containers. It takes little time before the players recognize the place as a former locker room. A middle-aged man with a blood-stained lab coat and thick glasses is suturing a leg wound on a woman of the militia. Judging by her expression, nothing was used to numb the part, though the wound looks surprisingly clean.

The only other person who seem to know what they’re doing is an elderly woman, who’s taking the pressure of a man lying on a table breathing irregularly with his full chest covered in bandages. There are a few more people helping, but as far as DONNA can see, nothing they do is strictly medical. DONNA drops her helmet, flak jacket and rifle in a corner, and goes around the room to get a grasp of the situation. Then she gets to work, ALEX by her side acting as her interpreter and extra set of hands when needed.

WITH the EYES of the REFEREE [click to expand]

I didn’t bother with medical rolls: DONNA is treating patients with little rush and in controlled conditions. I’m assuming she’s doing the best she can with the available equipment.

Here, I’m house-ruling that the local improvised hospital has a set of surgical instruments that are disinfected in boiling water after every use, and same goes for everything else that can be sterilized and re-used.

There’s still a few soap-bars in the hospital supplies, that are reserved for more invasive procedures. As for other specialized medical supplies, I’m going with the availability chart on page 90 of the Player’s Manual, with a few tweaks: the chart is used to decide whether something is up for trade or not, but here I’m talking about the town’s supplies, so I’ll treat every item as Common (C) and I won’t bother with quantities, assuming everything the hospital has is in low supply.

• DOCTOR’S MEDICAL KIT (C) – roll[D6] = 4 -> basic medical equipment and drugs are present, these include 10 doses of each drug type below, bandages and tools for minor surgery
• ANTIBIOTICS (C) – roll[D6] = 5 -> there’s extra doses of antibiotics
• PAIN RELIEVER (C) – roll[D6] = 6 -> painkillers are also available

Lucky rolls for Praszka’s makeshift hospital (and good for the players too).

DONNA and ALEX are still occupied when LED and NASCAR join them at the hospital escorted by MARKO.

DONNA briefly raises her eyes from the back wound she’s treating and exchanges a nod with LED.

“I don’t see our former guests here”

LED looks around “I think they keep the prisoners somewhere else”

“And I, a doctor, say they belong in here”

“Tough luck DOC” says NASCAR “you’re not a citizen, your opinion don’t matter here”

“I guess my services are appreciated only as long as I keep my mouth shut” says DONNA “the world went through a literal apocalypse, and still women get the short end of the stick”

LED looks at ALEX “let’s see what we can do about that, shall we?”

“Yes” answers ALEX “let’s go find this Committee CJA was talking about”

“I still need a translator” says DONNA.

“MARKO is here, he can help” says LED, who then turns to NASCAR “you stay here and cover DOC. Make sure she doesn’t kill anybody”

“Copy LT” confirms NASCAR.

“Hey, I’m doing the best I can here” protests DONNA pointing at the wounded man she’s helping.

“I wasn’t talking about the patients”

DONNA goes back the wound “okay, fair”

“You know, I was thinking” says NASCAR “we’re going through a lot of trouble for this one guy, you know, the prisoners’ leader. How come we’re trying so hard to save the guy who commanded a squad that tried to smoke us?”

A brief silence follows.

“Well, I’m Polish and so is he” says ALEX “but I guess that works just for me. Plus, we practically ambushed them; he was trying to keep his men alive, and that’s something I can relate to”

“The prisoner, the one I captured with their leader, I told him we would help his captain in exchange for him convincing the others to surrender” says LED “well, he came through for us, and now it’s our turn”

“Also” says ALEX “this won’t make much sense given the state of the world, but… I mean…”

“It’s the right thing to do” finishes DONNA in her most authoritative voice.

Everybody nods, and that ends the discussion.

---

FINAL COMMENTS

It’s my first time using the trade mechanics of TW2K, and I therefore proceeded step by step by rolling on equipment availability, calculating the values of what is offered and what is demanded, then applied some persuasion and ruled on the final result. It’s a very textbook approach and one I might tweak in the future.

The process was faster than it appeared by the number of words used to describe it, I just wanted to make sure every step and every reasoning was written down for future reference. The calculations involved are simple and – as per usual – any result can be house-ruled for conveniency, speed, or the sake of the story.

On the campaign side: the group has had its first contact with the city of Praszka, and its appearance is of a tightly run, yet slowly sinking ship (or at least it’s what I’m going for).

There’s of course more to see and to understand.