Dystopia and Giant Robots: Building the Cast

Well, I finally kicked off that game of Mecha that I've been wanting to start. Successful enough that my idea of trying a one-shot morphed into running a mini-campaign with my players. So, that'll mean updates on how that goes. (Still unsure how I'll wrap up Spark of Fae, but I'll figure that out...we ran into the great barrier of "the semester is over", and I don't know exactly how to get in touch with all my players.)

This also marks my first time running an organized game over online chat. It definitely lends a different quality to play, and it is incredibly nice to have an OOC and an IC channel. Keeps table chatter segmented off, away from roleplay. If only I could do that in real life...

(as a side note, I'll be using the "dgr" tag to keep track of my "Dystopia and Giant Robots" posts)

The Line-Up
We have a fun mix of players, including one who played in Spark of Fae. (As before, I'm using pseudonyms for privacy's sake)

• That would be Turniphead (previously known as Kenshi...there's a story behind this one...and yes, it involves Hayao Miyazaki), the calm and collected one. Not so much of a newcomer to RPGs any longer, she's eagerly delving into the creative aspects of the story. Plus, this system is a little simpler to manage than 4th Edition.
  
• Kureaa is probably the newest to RPGs. She's played in a game of Swords and Wizardry, and is active in freeform roleplaying. Kureaa is very socially outgoing, with a strongly engaging personality.
  
• Panda (yes, there's a long, long story behind that one) has been acting as DM for the previously mentioned Swords and Wizardry campaign, and both she and Kenshi have been active in a 3.5 D&D campaign. She's easily the dry wit of the group, and owns a Jayne hat.
  

I worked with each player, introducing them to the setting ("Revolution Deity Godblind", found in the Mecha sourcebook) and then working with them to make characters that engaged the world. Revolution Deity Godblind is a dystopia of sorts: the gods who live Up Above smite down people who rebel against their rigid framework of rules, which serves to keep everyone in line. It's not a bad life per se, and is marketed as a good existence for the common citizens. Not the players, of course. I told each player to give me a "Drive" for their character, something which they hold in secret from everyone, something which would break the bonds of the Living City's society. (The Living City is the quasi-sentient utopian city where everyone lives.)

The Characters!

• Janice, played by Turniphead, is the unhinged artist, who has just barely managed to keep off of the gods' radar. She has an affinity for painting with the color red, and goes off on demented rants to herself. She is a rather reclusive character, keeping tabs on her art very carefully, scrounging together extra canvasses in secret.
  
• Paige, played by Kureaa, is the petite, cute redhead mechanic-in-schooling who dreams of falling in love, as opposed to the arranged marriages of the City. To this end, we developed an NPC, Nathan, the skilled cellist with whom she shares feelings. The closeness of their relationship has been impacted severely by the threat of the gods' intervention.
  
• Katsuo is the nerdy mech technician (he works on the suits of the Protectors, the City's police force, who own the only legal mechs), who is utterly fascinated by mech technology. He hoards all of the data he can, even though the extent of his research is in highly forbidden territory.

As you can see, we have quite an eclectic group. So far, they've all somehow managed to slip beneath the gods' radar. Well, they find out just how that happens in the session to come...

Next time around: robots, romance, and rebellion.

Spark of Fae: Interview With the Fiddler

I had a bit of a mini-session the other day, with Sage, Haley, and Kenshi. Obviously the story had to be limited some, but it worked out all right. I decided it would work best to run a scene with Pock, Falcon, and Fade, giving the role of Fade to Kenshi (along with secret juicy GM-only info divulged to Kenshi as well). There was a very scant amount of dice-rolling in this session, but plenty of character action, and the story trotted along at a good pace.

Bring Out the Food!
Pock had arranged to meet Fade for a very, very late dinner, to iron out his concerns about the concert near the monastery, and to figure out more of the details. With his large stash of gold, the tavern staff was more than happy to comply with the nieblungen's request. Falcon sat against a wall, watching and waiting for Fade to show up.

Fade showed up, a tad late, and started to talk with Pock. The nieblungen expressed his concerns about the peoples' reactions. Fade seemed rather unworried about the whole thing. He insisted that it would be a good, public place for the music to unfold. Then, they moved on to discuss practical arrangements. Pock agreed with Fade's plan to open the show with Pock, Fade coming in later.

Then came the question of payment. At a suggestion of 70/30, Pock very verbally balked, and reminded Fade exactly who had played whom out of the tavern earlier that night. They agreed on 50/50.

Misgivings
Falcon had a little chat with Pock about everything. She still mistrusts Fade greatly, but Pock pointed out that if Fade goes and does something else, they get to keep all the money.

Falcon wasn't done with Fade, though. Pock went to bed, but Falcon went sneaking...she wanted to find out exactly what Fade was up to. Sure enough, she found Fade scoping out the monastery, yet again. She began following him as he walked along one of the walls...

And then they began to hear screams. Those of you who've been following Spark of Fae no doubt realize that these would be the screams of dead monks. That means it'll be interesting to fit the two continuities together, but I think I can manage. Well, when Fade turned around to see if anyone nearby was causing the screams, he spotted Falcon right off the bat.

They had a bit of dialogue, and Falcon said that she'd been curious about the screams in the monastery, and that she'd heard some earlier. Can anyone say bluffing hand over fist? Well, Fade was okay going along with that, and he then went along and tried to get in by the front door. No dice.

That was when a curious figure showed up. He was dressed in white robes, held a rod with curious inscriptions, had the front half of his head shaved, with a small goatee on his chin. He raised the rod, and knocked down both Fade and the door in one fell swoop. Then, the guy walked right past both Fade and Falcon, and went into the monastery.

They followed. There were dead bodies in the courtyard. Monks, of course. Cue the curtain.

Spark of Fae: Snip-Snap, and the Plot Thickens

This is the session I was waiting for, and hoping to get done far earlier. From this point, though, the campaign should get moving along a lot quicker. Plot points came together, and things got ticking. Now, it's just left to springboard things into action. Let's have a quick summary of exactly what happened...

Tavern Goodsauce
We had a fiddle duel.

That's right, a fiddle duel. A dark-skinned fellow with a streak of green in his black hair showed up, very suavely stepped onto the table, and challenged Pock the skald to a fiddle duel. I ran this as a mini skill challenge, and Sage rolled very impressively. Pock, with the help of an NPC run by another player who was there (we had to start sans three players, more or less, but the rest showed up, save Scribbler), blew the roof off of the tavern with his performance.

The performance concluded as Pock's fiddle skills and touches of Fae magic served to isolate the newcomer off in a corner. He gracefully took defeat, and then beckoned to Pock. He told him that he wished to discuss something with him. The fellow introduced himself as Fade, and they both moved outside, and started walking. Falcon (the knife-fighter) discreetly followed her friend at a distance.

Fade and Pock discovered that they both had Fae connections, Fade having a much stronger tie to the Fae than Pock. Fade showed immediate interest in Pock's work of spreading the stories of the Fae to people, and suggested they play a concert at the town square where the monastery was built. After all, he pointed out, any town square which is popular enough to have a monastery built nearby (for ease of feeding the poor, of course) will be good for a concert.

Pock left Fade examining the monastery (yes, this is while all of the carnage is going on inside...), on the promise of grabbing something to eat later, as a late dinner, to discuss plans. Falcon ran back into him as he doubled back, and they had a bit of a talk. (Her player arrived quite late, but we had a great bit of RP to end the session.) Falcon was very, very suspicious of Fade, and encouraged Pock to be incredibly careful.

The House by the Woods
Remember that alchemist whom Augris ran into? Well, Augris produced the heart of Daelu, which he had removed for further study, in hopes that the alchemist could identify it. Questions were asked...and the alchemist demonstrated his ice alchemy, to see if Augris could discern it from the Fae magic he'd encountered. Augris couldn't.

And then Jayth started trying to break into the house. He found one of the nodes by which the ward on the house was sustained, but failed to correctly disable it. So he did some more stealth-failure around the house, which alerted the alchemist to his presence. Well, there was some intruder-seeking, and eventually the alchemist found him.

By the end of things, here's what came out. Daelu had been a Lieutenant in the Amber Empire's military. She'd been in charge of overseeing the area around Woodshire, and then something had happened to her during the Fae Unsettling. Now, the alchemist is in charge of something which he claims will help to seal off the Fae Realm.

His last words? He noted that Augris had raw magical ability, and that Jayth had some alchemical training, so he told them that they could assist him in the work he was attempting...

And the Players Said...
I think they generally enjoyed this session. We didn't have any monk violence, as Silas' player was busy, but plot threads moved along. Now, we've got a couple (potentially three) distinct strands, but I think I can tie them together. I spoke with players afterwards, and they definitely enjoyed the events.

Adderfang now wants a way for Augris to join the military. PC ambition for the win!
Jayth has gotten into a very interesting situation, and that's all I'll say here. Kenshi likes where things are going, though.
Haley, though she didn't make it for much, was quite intrigued by the latest plot developments, and will be closely watching Fade...
Sage was quite pleased with having a fiddle duel, and also found Fade to be interesting.

Tune in next time for...GIANT EVIL OCTOPUS OVERLORDS OF ANCIENT DOOOOOOOM! Well, okay. Maybe not.

Spark of Fae: Boom Goes the Dynamite

Heh heh heh. Suffice it to say, a little bit of madness ensued in the session. I'm still struggling with divergent plot threads, but they're coming together (hopefully). It's time for the recap of this crazy session...

Where We Started
The last session wound up leaving the "party" a bit scattered. The storm knight Augris was around the mysterious house to the north of Woodshire, and decided to start exploring it. Jayth the sellsword was headed back to town. The zealot Silas turned towards the local monastery, to get information for his mission. Pock and Falcon were in the tavern.

Stormy Days
Augris poked around the house, and found that there was a ward around it: not a Fae ward like the circle, nor a ward like his innate storm power. This particular ward stretched all around the house, and threatened to zap him if he tried pushing through. He found a root cellar, discovered that the barrier extended all the way down, and then decided to break through it. He took damage, but he busted his way through. He then proceeded to explore the house, finding a kitchen, a hallway, and stairs up...

As he ascended the stairs, he came face to face with a blue-clad fellow who wore gloves with alchemic sigils. This guy then threatened to cause Augris to explode, unless he explained what he was doing.

Wandering Town
Jayth proceeded to head to the inn for a rest. He walked into the tavern, and there was a militia member inside who informed him that he had to stow his sword before going in. The fellow didn't like that, so he aimed to climb instead to a nearby roof, to take a nap there. The climb went well, but going unnoticed did not. There were members of the town watch patrolling, and they noticed Jayth. He climbed down, and kept walking. He took some time to rest, recovering health, and then went to explore the mysterious house.

Monk Mayhem
This is where things really got crazy. Silas discovered very quickly that the monastery sheltered monks of several faiths. When he got a private conference with the one monk who shared his faith, he discovered that this monk had been working as part of an intelligence network of monasteries across the Empire, working against the Empire. He then ran the monk through for being a heretic (supporting other faiths in the monastery).

Silas proceeded to dress up as the monk, and attempt to bluff his way around to kill all the rest of the monks. His bluff got called by one monk, who was the next to die, but whose death alerted the other monks in the courtyard of the monastery. They pulled out daggers, and whistled for reinforcements...

Bar Time
I'll be opening the next session with something that's about to potentially change the fortunes of Pock and Falcon, since I've been leaving them be for now, unfortunately. Should draw the plot threads closer together, though.

Spark of Fae: There's a Zombie in your Woods

So, before the session recap. Highs and lows of the weekend.

High: Gaelic Storm played at an Irish fest, and because we got there just for Gaelic Storm (last act of the night), tickets in were only $5. It rocked. Seriously. I live for Irish music.

Low: Gaelic Storm's concert stole my voice along with my heart. It's interesting, to say the least...

High: Was part of Kenshi's surprise birthday party.

Low: This morning, I find out that somebody hacked my e-mail account and has been sending spam with it. BLAH.

So, then, on to the recap!

The Beginning of Things
All the players knew that we were doing a combat to kick things off, and mix the pot, and I think it worked decently well. The session began focusing on three characters: Kenshi's sellsword Jayth, Scribbler's witch-hunter Silas, and Adderfang's storm knight Augris.

Augris had washed up at the mouth of a river, after his encounter with the magic storm. He's been following the river ever since, drawn onward by a strange compulsion.

Silas has been told by his church to investigate the Fae Unsettlings, starting with Woodshire.

Jayth is after a bounty on Daelu the Deathwailer, who is purported to deal in necromancy.

The other two, Pock (the skald) and Falcon (the shifty knife-fighter) are at a tavern. Regrettably, they didn't get a lot of screen time. I still feel kinda bad about that, and I'll make sure they get to see some action next session. (Not combat, but...more of a centerpiece action thing) While the rest of the session was going on, the skald was entertaining the crowd, and the knife-fighter was pickpocketing.

Throwdown with the Fae
The other three characters all wound up moving towards Fae ruins on the north of Woodshire. Woodshire is a town divided in half (north and south) by a river, and the central tourist markets are on a large bridge that houses a variety of merchants. There's a monastery to the north of the river, and a strange mansion farther north, where Daelu is supposed to make her abode. That's the tip that Jayth followed, towards the mansion. Silas, going towards the woods, spotted Augris, who was being magically drawn towards the Fae ruins.

Jayth, waiting at the mansion, spotted the other two, and followed them. More importantly, she also spotted a glow in what they would discover were the Fae remnants. All three of them stumble upon a circle of essentially Celtic Knotwork, which is glowing. There's a woman standing in the center. Silas hides in the woods. Augris continues to stumble towards the circle, and he can tell that the pull is very strong.

Well, the fight begins when the woman brings up four Fae-looking undead from the ground. In game terms, I basically just made zombies. There were also a number of light wisps that flew around. Game-wise, they didn't deal any damage, but made attacks against Will to pull players around. ("Don't look at the lights!") The woman herself, I based off of the idea of a banshee. A scream (Close blast 3) that dealt a little damage and also slowed characters. The synergy worked pretty darn well.

Balance...oops
I neglected a couple things in my formula. First, we had a striker, a defender, and a quasi-defender. Second, we had three characters. Third, the paladin had (for RP reasons and slight synergy with race) switched his radiant damage to lightning or thunder. Killing at least one PC was very possible. This became readily apparent when a couple of the zombies ganged up on Augris, and Adderfang (Augris' player) came very near to depleting his pile of hitpoints. (We're using poker chips to track HP, and it works really well so far.) Needless to say, I sent the other two zombies after Jayth instead. Adderfang would have his hands full.

Scribbler mostly had Silas lie in wait, watching the magic-users duke it out. Kenshi was new to this combat thing, but that's okay. She's studying Jayth's character sheet now, to be better prepared. It worked out okay, though. She definitely made introvert jokes ("AAAAUGH! Physical contact!") when the zombies came for her character. Jayth handled them pretty well, though. He's a cool dude.

The banshee woman commanded the wisps to pull Augris and Jayth around, so that she could keep hitting them both with her scream, and then when she came within range, Scribbler brought Silas in, with a fierce smashing charge. He almost dropped her down in a single hit.

When Daelu did go down, I had all of the zombies get frozen up (save ends), just to let the players thin their numbers with ease. That was also part of compensating for too much monster at the start of the encounter that I threw in, improvising. I also had the wisps wink out when she went down, as well as when a player dropped a zombie with a crit (two nearby wisps winked out). From that point on, it was a quick mopping-up by the players.

The Aftermath
Scribbler had Silas take the woman's head as a trophy, for when he reports back to his superiors in the Church. Jayth took her hand, which had a strange design on it, to claim the bounty. Augris managed to find a weird magical stone that had been tied around her upper arm...

Loot will be coming to the players, I just need to figure that out. For the meantime, they have some plot hooks, and also things that will be redeemable for benefits later. (Help from the Church for an ongoing investigation, payment for the bounty, an enhancement of magic...though at what cost?)

I'm also resolved to remedy the "Sage and Haley didn't see much playing time" problem. That should be resolved better next time, as combat won't be coming again very often.

Plans
Next up, we're going to bring the party together, and have some investigation into the events of Woodshire...

Spark of Fae: My 4E Campaign!

Spark of Fae: Pre-Session

Well, I've decided that the recaps will be best served to go on Tuesdays. I'll have some time after the session to wrap things together, especially seeing as how I tend to find sociable things to do on Saturdays and whatnot. I'll be writing up my posts for Friday in advance, then, focusing on other things. This Friday, it'll probably be a sort-of review of a game called Pandemic, and what board games can teach RPGs (and I don't mean all of this talk about D&D 4th Edition being a board game, either).

So, then!

Getting Them Together
This was the first time all of my party members had gotten to know one another, though a few of them were already pretty well acquainted. It was more a case of introducing the newbies to the group. So, here's a brief rundown on the group's members. I've assigned nicknames to each of them, for anonymity's sake.

• Sage, the party's nieblungen skald (game terms: gnome bard). He's analytical, has gotten his feet wet with 4th Edition a few times (primarily 3.5 player), and is very interested to see the story unfold, something which he's expecting will tailor well to 4E's ruleset.


• Kenshi, the party's human sellsword (game terms: human swordmage). She's a newbie to RPGing, though not to console and computer RPGs, so that'll make some of the learning easier. Though not generally outspoken, she's very excited about the "first RPG" experience.


• Adderfang, the "gate-touched" thunder knight (game terms: genasi paladin). He's had some experience playing and DMing 4th Edition. He's also an actor, so that'll make it quite interesting.


• Scribbler, the human witch-hunter (game terms: human ranger). I think he's also played some 4th Edition, and is an actor as well. He's also into Dagorhir, along with Adderfang.


• Haley, the human healer (game terms: human cleric). She's new to D&D, but not to roleplaying; she's been around a few sessions of the Hunter: the Vigil campaign that I played in. She's very, very enthusiastic in general, and is very much looking forward to playing.

Definitely NOT a Tavern...
I'm going to be starting the party off in a much less typical place than the good ol' standby of a tavern. So far, the current plans are as follows: three of the party members (the witch-hunter, sellsword, and thunder knight) are all after the same bounty: a necromancer. They meet up in a fight to open the session. The other two (bard and cleric) have been hanging around in the tavern, having met previously and gotten to be friends. And where it goes from there...well, I've got some ideas.

And that's pretty much it for now! Stay tuned next week, for the kick-off... (there's a zombie in your campaign...)

Anticipation in the Air!

I mentioned Spark of Fae here in an earlier post, but I'm reposting about it, because the campaign is about to kick off! I've been talking with the players (well, most of them), and we've got some wonderful stuff built up right out of the gate.

What I'm Doing
In order to make a more fleshed-out world, I decided to do some preliminary worldbuilding, but then to dialogue with the players to see what they wanted. Awesomely, they've all been onboard with everything I'm doing, and offered some very interesting tidbits.

I've been discussing character concepts with people, and at this point we've got some nice ones fleshed out. Now I'm planning on getting them together, in a pre-session, to discuss two things: their take on the world I've made, and their take on how the party should come together.

The main point of this is to provide coherency in the group. I want all of them to be on the same page as me when we're talking about the world, which is also a reason that I'm cooperating with them in part, getting input from them. I also want them to go into the game with a sense of how their characters can come together.

I don't plan to have them all meet in a bar. ;)

The Characters
So, without further ado, I'm presenting the current characters that I have so far. None of them have names that I'm aware of...yet.

• The nieblungen skald, a trickster fellow who has stories to tell, and knowledge to share.


• The "thunder knight", a sailor who was consumed by a magical storm, and washed up on the beach, transformed into a devoted fighter.


• The wandering sellsword, who augments his fighting ability with alchemic magic.


• The witch-hunter (well, more accurately, necromancer-hunter), who has an open opposition to all magic but that power which comes from The One God, and who is a multi-weapon specialist.


• The two-weapon healer-maiden, beautiful but tormented.

In case you're wondering what the classes are, they're (from top to bottom) bard, paladin, swordmage, ranger, and cleric. Suffice it to say, I'm excited to see where this goes. There's the promise of intra-party conflicts, intra-party tension, but not to the degree where it'll tear the party apart. In fact, the guy playing the witch-hunter specifically said that he wanted to avoid that, that he'd be slanting character actions towards "tolerant, even while disapproving", and also open to change.

So long, folks! There will be a pre-session soon, and then a pre-session report!

Late Again??

Oops. Well, folk, I've been a tad busy, getting ready to move back to college, visiting with an old friend, that sort of stuff. So, I'll keep things brief by offering a little something for all of you to peruse. I'll be running a campaign next semester, and I've got a little page up about it.

Obsidian Portal for Spark of Fae

There's not a whole lot there (Races and info on the power sources is just about all that I've got viewable to all so far), because I'm working on a lot of behind-the-scenes stuff, which will all be made visible shortly enough. But yes, you may want to have a peruse. I'm aiming to make a fun setting that's a good deal simpler than the standard cosmology and such.

Also, keep an eye open as I begin the campaign and give session recaps...