Fight Locations — Vehicles and Chases
Airplane
By TaveLet's say this is a plane that can hold all the PCs. These would be your 747, your military transport plane, and Air Force One (not a bad movie, but an escape pod? C'mon…).
Cool Things That Could Happen
There is such a thing as decompression. This is bad. Your PCs with guns should be aware of the risk they pose to the plane's integrity. (And no, I don't mean its moral values. Get a clue.). Mooks, however, are dumb. They will shoot all over the place. Most small arms fire won't do that much damage, but machine guns, shotguns, and window hits should prove disasterous.
Cramped quarters mean no fu powers whatsoever.
If you're on a civilian plane, there will be lots of innocent people on board. Botched rolls could spell disaster here. If you're on a military plane, there might be a small cache of weapons, but remember that decompression thing.
You've all seen the movies where the pilot and the co-pilot get shot. You know what to do.
If the plane has parachutes, look at the skydiving fight scene on this page. Good sets never die; they just have sequels.
For the really inventive, have a fight between two characters on the wings of a small plane. Dodging is halved, and keeping your balance is a continuous action. Fu powers should be impossible.
Inspiration
Executive Decision, Passenger 57, Octopussy
Chase, Car
By David EberThe Car Chase is one of the stock elements of action movies, and the number of different permutations which have appeared on television and on film are staggering. Unfortunately, there are no real rules for running a car chase in the Feng Shui rulebook. There's been a lot of debate over this topic on the mailing list, but I'm not going to reiterate it here. I'll provide the elements for the scene. How you make it work is up to you.
Car chases encompass a wide variety of options, starting with the number of participants. The most basic chase involves one car chasing another, followed by multiple cars chasing one car, one car chasing multiple cars, or multiple cars chasing multiple cars. The next element to consider are the vehicles involved in the chase. Besides cars, you also have motorcycles, vans, jeeps, pick-ups, 18-wheelers, tanker trucks, fire engines, helicopters, tanks, and even hovercraft.
Once you've decided what and how many vehicles are involved, you have to pick a location. A freeway will involve a lot of other fast moving cars and trucks, with a high potential for massive accidents. A city chase scene will also involve a lot of cars, as well as traffic lights, pedestrians, buildings, hard turns, and assorted obstacles. Collateral damage is very likely. A chase in the country will be relatively simple, but the narrow roads will be a problem. A chase on a mountain road, on the other hand, exposes characters to the risk of a long and fatal drop. Finally, a chase involving a bridge or tunnel will present it's own, unique set of challenges and perils.
Cool Things That Could Happen
Let's start with the basics: most car chases involve one or both participants shooting at each other. Gun combat between vehicles is a bit more complex than a normal fight, because presumably the combatants will be aiming for key areas of the vehicle. Hits on tires, gas tanks, and the driver will all disable or destroy a vehicle. Called shots of this sort should incur at least a −2 penalty. Also, it can be difficult to shoot out of a vehicle unless it is directly next to it's target. Characters will have to lean at odd angles out of the windows to get a clear shot, and that exposes them to gunfire. Of course, they could just kick out the windsheild for a clear feild of fire, but driving without a front windshield should prove difficult. Also, cars provide cover, making it even harder to hit the target. Smart characters should work around this. For instance, a smoke grenade thrown into a moving car will certainly take it out of the fight.
Car to car combat can also involve fists and knives instead of guns. This works especially well if one of the vehicles is a large truck, in which case characters can leap from their vehicle to the truck (a stunt in and of itself) and attempt to take it out. If the truck has defenders, you'll have a martial arts fight on top of a moving truck. Naturally, this should prove both difficult and dangerous, as sudden swerves can knock a combatant off of the vehicle. If the fight involves a helicopter, it can swoop down and open fire on characters on top of the truck, while characters on the side are in peril of being swiped off by other cars. Needless to say, going under a truck is dangerous in the extreme. Characters on the hood of a truck have a clear shot at the driver, but a sudden application of the brakes could send them flying. If they're clinging to the front, they can be mashed up against another car. If the fight is between two cars, you can pull the classic stunt where one character is being pulled between the two as they approach a divider or similar obstacle. This works best if the character in question is a scrappy kid.
Often, car combat uses not guns or knives, but the cars themselves as weapons. Sideswiping, ramming, and other tactics come into play as one car attemps to force the other off of the road. The location of the chase is especially important here, as the drivers may have to contend with everything from uninvovled cars to sharp turns. Canny drivers will make use off all of these things, attempting to force their opponents to crash into other cars or stationary objects. Since this is Feng Shui, you should feel free to have your villains arm their cars with wheel blades that shred their opponents tires. More exotic options, such as smokescreens, machineguns, caltrops, mines, and oil slicks a la James Bond are also available, but make sure you justify their use. After all, they aren't standard factory options.
Stunt driving should be a part of every Feng Shui car chase. This includes maneuvers such as car jumps, bootlegger turns, 360 spins, and riding up on two wheels. A very common stunt is to have a car drive under an semi truck, invariably smashing the top off of the car and making it into a convertible. Once again, scenery comes heavily into play here. Another classic scene involves jumping the drawbridge just as it is opening, while yet another involves the unaware granny who crosses the street with a baby carriage right into the middle of a car chase.
Car crashes are, of course, the highlight of every car chase. Like the chases themselves, the options are tremendous. Here are just a few possibilities:
One car crashes into another — This may or may not involve an explosion.
Multi-car pile-up — This may involve some of the cars flipping or rolling or even landing on top of each other.
Truck crash — This often involves the truck falling onto it's side and skidding or jackknifing. If it was a tanker truck, it should be carrying flammable liquid which either does or will explode (the latter is better if the players and/or innocent civilians are trapped nearby). You could also have it filled with toxic waste, deadly gas, or liquid nitrogen. If the truck is an 18-wheeler, it should scatter it's contents everywhere, adding to the chaos and possibly causing secondary crashes.
Motorcycle crash — Motorcycles are fragile. When they crash, it often involves spectacular mid-air flips and the like.
Head-on collision — This should be as catastrophic as possible, and almost certainly involve an explosion.
Helicopter crash — Helicopters that crash may (i.e. should) slam into the road and go up in a fireball, taking several other cars with them and causing tremendous destruction. If the chase is in the city, have the helicopter slam into a skyscraper instead.
Failed Jump — Bad guys never seem to be able to pull this off as well the good guys. What happens here depends on where the jump is. If it's over a drawbridge or the like, the car will end up in the river or smashed on the cliffs below. The car could also fall short and slam into whatever it was trying to land on, resulting in a firey explosion.
Long Drop — This usually happens when the chase is on a bridge or a mountain road. The results will be the same as mentioned above. Be sure to describe the slow-motion shot as the car drops to it's fate.
Building Crash — Urban chases usually involve one or more cars ending up inside a building, usually by means of a plate glass window. Since the cars sometimes take a while to stop, feel free to describe the destruction in as much lengthy detail as possible.
Finally, there is a lot of extra detail to consider when staging a car chase. If there civilians around, they will certainly be in peril, especially if the chase spills onto a sidewalk or into a park (which it often does). Also, the cops will get involved, adding to the participants and the destruction. If the chase is on a bridge, the characters will have to be wary about falling, and if the fight is in a tunnel, the characters will have to deal with the tight confines. The flow of traffic around them is also a factor. If it is fast moving, the difficulty will increase. If it is slow moving, the drivers will either have to dodge and weave or they'll end up crashing. What about telephone poles, lamp posts, mailboxes, benches, trash cans, and hot dog vendors? And what about the weather? Rain, fog, ice, sleet, and snow will all add to the scene. The environment is key in staging a fight scene.
And remember, the more spectacularly destructive the chase is, the better.
Inspiration
The Road Warrior, The Blues Brothers, Rumble in the Bronx, Lethal Weapon 2, Terminator 2, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, The Rock, Goldeneye, Goldfinger, any episode of the A-Team or Knight Rider or Viper or the Dukes of Hazzard.
Train
By MorixA fight scene onboard a moving train can be very exciting. You may even want to base an entire gaming session around it. PCs shouldn't have a problem with explaining how they've come to be onboard a train. They could simply be travelers, or perhaps hired as bodyguards for an important person or object.
Many different areas of a train contain different thing to do in combat. Let's take a look at the various parts of a train and examine what action can be wrought from it.
Cool Things That Could Happen
Locomotive: If the train is an old-fashioned one, there will likely be a roaring oven of fire putting out immense amounts of heat and flame. With a clever stunt, one could use it as a way to intimidate or even to take out a bad guy. Various levers and pulleys will be hanging all over the place, which could be used to knock someone around. GMs should be careful when running a fight in the locomotive. One wrong move on either side's part and the train will stop (or start) moving when you don't want it to.
Passenger Cars: This is where you have tiny suites stacked along one side of the car with a narrow aisle running along the other. This is a great place for a shoot-out, because the suites provide natural cover. Just lean out the door and cut loose with a spray of bullets down the corridor. Fighting hand-to-to hand should be difficult in the cramped quarters. Subtract 3 from each character's Dodge rating when fighting inside one of the suites. Reduce Action Values by 3 for anyone using a long weapon, such as a sword or club. Beds and luggage compartments often fold up into the walls and-or ceiling. Be sure to open one of these at the proper moment to knock somebody on the head.
Dining Cars: Luxury trains will have two-level dining cars, complete with sprawling table arrangements, silverware, and small carts carrying trays of food. All of this of course should be knocked aside as the fighting ensues. Chairs and tables make for good cover, and weapons. There should also be a bar in one corner; this makes for even better cover. Don't forget all those bottles of flammable liquor. Enough material has been produced for a kitchen fight should the action carry into the kitchen car.
Flatbed: Transport trains will have a few of these. An empty one will be an excellent arena for a climactic one-on-one duel. Flatbed cars could also be carrying almost any number of things, but mostly heavy objects too big or awkward to fit inside a regular transport car, like perhaps a helicopter.
Boxcars: Commonly found on trains in 1850, boxcars hold any type of cargo. They are often dark and musty, making combat a stealthy pursuit. They could be full of crates, barrels, livestock, or nothing at all. If you wish to add some comic relief, have a hobo sit up in the corner when the shooting starts and have him complain that the combatants are too noisy and interrupting his beauty sleep.
If the opposition is overwhelming the PCs (or vice versa), they may wish to escape by climbing out a window onto the roof. This is also a great place for a fight. If guns are involved, combatants can take cover between the cars. If it's martial arts fight, there is a chance one or more of the fighters could slip and fall over the side. If a character fumbles, they should make an Agility check to see if they can grab hold of something and not fall off (they will however, likely be put into a precarious position, giving the opponent an advantage).
If a PC does fall off (or get thrown off) a moving train, they will more than likely be in a lot of trouble. Not only will they take damage from hitting the ground at a high rate of speed, they will have to pull off an extraordinary stunt to get back on the train before it leaves them behind and stranded.
Inspiration
Back to the Future 3, Broken Arrow, From Russia With Love, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, The Hunted, Live and Let Die, Octopussy, The Peacemaker, Supercop, Under Siege 2: Dark Territory