Corpo di Spedizione della Santa Sede

Meet my league for Pulp Alley – CSSS or Corpo di Spedizione della Santa Sede (The Holy See Expeditionary Corps).

The adventures take place in the 1930’s and it is very much pulp – think Indiana Jones and you will get the idea. Different gangs, called leagues, are battling each other all over the world, trying to further their ideas – be it finding treasures, de-cloaking Cthulhu cults or further the ambitions of their state or order.

Enter the CSSS – a league sent by the Holy See to further the Only True Teachings and, of course, bring back artefacts to the collections in the Vatican. It is made up of clergy from the Church and men and women provided by the Italian Armed Forces.

As the Holy See has just received the Vatican State from Mussolini they feel that they can’t say no to the kind offer of state-sponsored help and neither can they refuse to further the goals of their benefactors - the Fascist Party and Benito himself.

I’m trying out the league at the moment, and we had a game at the club yesterday when they saw combat for the first time. More on that in a further post.

The League
CSSS relies heavily on its sidekicks (they have a Perk called Company of Heroes giving access to a second sidekick. A Perk affects the whole league and will cost you) and as servants of God they have a wide network of true believers all over the world that will help them (the Perk called Network of Supporters)

The characters:

Soura, Monsignore and Padre

The Leader

Monsignore Cadaverico

Monsignore is on a direct mission from God and he has no problem getting willing allies or followers on his adventures (he has the ability Commander giving him access to 4 points of Allies (costing 2 points) or Followers (costing 1)). He can access the wealth of Church and State (he got the ability Wealthy) and he is able to manipulate his surroundings (ability Savvy). His true strength is manipulation but as a leader he really is good at everything.

Monsignore comes from Shadows over Brimstone. I will change him into another miniature as soon as it gets delivered and painted. Could be some time…

The sidekicks

Don't you dare mess with me, punk!

Suora Innocenza

This is a sister you really don’t want to meet in dark alley. You really don’t want to meet her at all. She is a close-combat machine that will rush anyone (she’s got the abilities Brash (she can get into close combat with anyone without the usual limit of only being able to rush the one closest to you) and surprisingly fast – what you see is a package of muscles (Speedy  - she runs faster/longer than most)

Innocenza is a Reaper Bones miniature.

Padre with his most prized possesions - a cross and a tommy gun

Padre Sicario

A very active army priest that likes his cross as much as his guns. He is the sharp-shooter in the gang (Abilities Dead Eye (like Brash but for shooting) and Eagle Eyed (shoots longer))

Padre comes from Warlord and is modified with new head-gear and this and that.

Maligna, Tortura and a guy not used this time.

The Allies

These will differ a bit between adventures, but for the first game I used.

Soldato Tortura and Soldato Maligno

They are booth primarily shooters.

All soldiers from Perry Miniatures and their WWII Italian range. Notes on the paints used here - they are based on real uniforms.

A couple of other soldiers to be used later on. 

Note the map of Isola Pericolosa (Perilous Island - the name of the published adventure from Pulp Alley). As all treasure maps it has a great big X in the middle...

A final shot of the boats from last post, this time with occupants.