Mission I: The Harvest

I have returned to my roots, by which I mean I have once more sat down to run a game.

This time it was Phoenix: Dawn Command, which in its theme harkens back to many years ago when I was heavily involved in running Exalted Second Edition campaigns.

Phoenix: Dawn Command is a fantasy game with a setting reminiscent of the Ancient Rome Empire, at least, that's the feeling I get from looking at the art alone. The game itself can accommodate up to four players so I thought it would be a good fit for a third club game, since that usually gets only a handful of players.

While the game's website offers a set of pre-made characters, I thought that giving only four for players to pick from wouldn't be enough of a choice and some might feel like they're picking a leftover character. Instead of going with those, I sat down and created six characters, trying very hard not to have duplicate Traits between them. Additionally, I presented the players with a choice of basic supernatural powers to choose from to further customise their chosen character.

In the end, we ended up with a Durant, Forceful, Elemental and Shrouded.

Mission One: The Harvest

The first mission finds the group of Phoenixes, called a Wing, in the seat of Dawn Command's power when an urgent message is received. The Wing is approached by Cinder, a powerful Elemental who serves as one of their commanding officers. At this point, the scenario suggests asking the players to describe Cinder. It seemed an odd idea when I read it. You don't normally ask players to provide detail on the surroundings but I thought I'd give it a try nonetheless. Only one player provided some description of Cinder, which is more than I expected, so I picked some other elements from the provided ones that struck my fancy in particular.

We ended up with an old, bald man with sunburnt skin and an aura of heat surrounding him. He wields a tall charred staff. He has a long white beard that sometimes catches on fire and it is said that when he gets mad, people explode.

He gave them simple instructions: Enter the Imperial Flame (which acts as a gateway between their current location and Dawn Command's outposts throughout the Empire), Investigate and Survive. He also warned them that since whoever contacted them is not responding, they're most likely going straight into battle.

Exactly as predicted, the first Phoenix through, the Durant, stepped out of the flame and into a chamber of carved solid black marble where what appeared to be a gruesome undead knight was menacing an adept. They exchanged blows once before the Shrouded came through and promptly disappeared out of sight only to reappear behind the knight, stab him in the back and swirl its cape around his person so that when it fell, he was once again out of sight.
Unfortunately, the Dreadknight consumed the adept's fear as a mass of black cloud exited his orifices and flew into the horrendous being. A shockwave emanated from his person, injuring all who were nearby. When the Elemental came through, it seemed as if his Wingmates did nothing all this time!

The fight continued, the Elemental reached into the Imperial Flame and threw fire at the knight while the Durant took the Imperial Banner he found in the chamber and charged the undead creature with a fierce battle cry. The Forceful fought with lightning speed while the Shrouded, going by the name Tome, convinced the adept that he will be safe provided he flees from the violence. With the adept gone, the Dreadknight was left without his power source and was quickly defeated by the Wing's combined efforts.

After that scene concluded, I realised I made a mistake. Normally in a roleplaying game you have some system to define Initiative Order, the order of when all characters involved in a fight get to act. In Phoenix, however, you've got what's called a Torch. It's a card defining elements of the environment but it also functions as a marker of who gets to act. Whoever holds the Torch is the active player and may perform an action. Who's going next is entirely up to the active player as he passes the Torch to a fellow player.

As previously mentioned, it has a list of elements that are part of the scene. Players can interact with them to gain special benefits. In this case, they used them to improve their attacks. What I forgot about is that using an Environmental Element also allows a player to draw a card.

Thus we get to the point that drove me to getting this game. Instead of using dice as a form of action resolution, Phoenix uses special cards that you play in order to overcome a numerical difficulty. For instance, the Dreadknight they fought had a Defence of 4 so while performing their attack, a player must have had to play cards up to at least a total value of 4 for the attack to connect. Of course, there are limitations to what you can play and good roleplaying allows you to add onto the value of what you've played but I must sadly say that by forgetting about this rule, I've put the players at a disadvantage. I'll rectify this error in future fight scenes.

Since it was the first session and I spent a good chunk of time explaining the basic rules and setting information, by the time the fight concluded the pub was about to close. The Forceful managed to find the adept out in the corridor, which was strangely covered by a mist that gave him the creeps, and brought him back into the chamber. Said adept was having some form of panic attack but got progressively better the closer he got to the Imperial Flame from which the Phoenixes entered the stronghold. Talking to him they've learned that they're under attack by some masked lord with a cloak composed of shadowy faces and several of these knights in his entourage. They burst through the gates, stuff happened and the adept ran to call for help.

As the adept gave his panicked and rather lacking in detail description of the event that unfolded, Tome realised he had heard this place was once the stronghold of The Harvester of Fear, a powerful figure in local folklore called a Fallen One, that the Phoenixes banished from this world a long time ago. After which they repurposed the stronghold into one of their own.

Armed with this knowledge, they were resolute to stop The Harvester from reclaiming his power. The following session found the The Wing venturing out into the Aerie's corridors.

As they moved through the waist high mist, they noticed odd shapes within. Black shadows the size of insects were writhing through it. After studying them for a moment, Tome, the Shrouded, came to the conclusion that these things were a type of spirit, tiny manifestations of fear. Whenever one grazed a Phoenix, they experienced visions of their first death.
At this point, the scenario suggested the players perform a Skill Spread. They had to aim for a value of 15 at a minimum or die instantly, consumed by their fears. Of course, the rules allow players to add 1 to their value for each Spark they are willing to spend. Sparks are a special resource used by players to activate their characters' supernatural abilities.

As a Game Master, I object to having players forced into such situations. I eased the consequences so that anyone unable to reach 15 would be given an Exposed Condition instead. This represented their character being in the grip of fear and gave them negative modifiers in a fight, putting them at a disadvantage later on. As written, this would have occurred provided a player didn't reach 20.

While they managed to shake off this fear effect, the Aerie's mortal staff was not as fortunate. First they encountered a soldier throwing around his sword wildly, seemingly fighting off unseen assailants. The Phoenixes unarmed and grabbed him but were unable to reason with the soldier through his screams of terror. After a moment he collapsed in Ram's, the Durant, arms. They found a chamber to leave him in and continued to the main gate.

At one point during their trek, Tome was reminded of a tale of the Fallen called The Harvester of Fear. It spoke of a Skavi warlord who made a bargain with The Harvester to get himself rid of a clan encroaching on his land. The Harvester gave material shape to the warlord's enemies' fears which slaughtered the clan. Unfortunately, the fears then turned on the warlord and ravaged his lands. This is most certainly who, or what, they were dealing with here.

Normally, going through a structure erected by an inhuman will would be difficult for someone who has never walked these halls before but the Wing knew exactly which path to take thanks to Tome's Astonishing Luck, a special Trait the character possesses. It turned out he remembered being in this very Aerie during his mortal days when he had to navigate his way through the twisting corridors blindfolded. While at the time he didn't encounter people lying on the floor in a catatonic state, screaming their throats out or seeing the bodies of people who tried desperately to claw their way out through solid stone, he nonetheless brought the Wing to the entrance.

As they inspected it, they noticed there was no forced entry. The gate must have simply swung open, allowing the Fallen to enter unmolested. This made sense considering this Aerie was once The Harvester's stronghold in this part of Skavia. As they pondered their next move, they heard screams coming from a lower level. Gale, the Forceful, dashed forward towards the sound. The Wing followed suit.

Gale ran down the stairs leading to the lower floors with astonishing speed. He was the first to reach a large chamber that once must have been the great hall of this palace. Within it stood a statue of an enormous ebony tree to which the Aerie's staff and local villagers were strung. An ominous figure wearing an ivory mask, wielding a sceptre and clad in a black cloak on which one could see faces writhing in agony moved around it. It was cutting symbols into a villager while assuring him that the longer he were to scream, the longer he would live.

The rest of the Wing joined Gale shortly after he witnessed a black mass bleeding out of the villager's wounds and being sucked up into a sphere atop the tree. Although the hall was additionally guarded by a Dreadknight similar to the one they fought earlier, they wasted no time before charging in.

Armed with knowledge as to what to expect of the creature, they defeated the knight with extreme prejudice before going after The Harvester. Unfortunately, the moment its knight fell, it called out to the knight's essence, creating a psychic shockwave that plunged each Phoenix into their personal nightmares. Some were able to shake off the effect while others suffered fear-induced hallucinations

Willow, the Elemental, slung fire at the Fallen One while Ram used his inhuman strength to drive a fist into it. That temporarily disabled The Harvester and it had great difficulties landing a blow. Meanwhile, Gale shot arrows at it while running towards and onto the tree. Tome proceeded with his surgical strikes from the shadows.

The entire Wing was certain they could take this creature down until The Harvester sucked out a portion of their power. It then turned to Gale as he released a rain of arrows onto it. It reached out into the fear that gripped Gale's heart and death was nearly upon him until Ram stood in the way of the tendrils shooting out towards his Wingmate. When they pierced through him, he noticed they had no effect on him personally as his heart was pure. This moment of confusion was all that Tome needed. He jumped out of his concealment and with all his supernal might drove a spear into The Harvester. The exertion costed him dearly as his body could not withstand the might of his personal Flame, he turned to ash as the Fallen lay defeated.

Since Phoenix: Dawn Command relies on playing cards as a form of resolving actions, rather than the typical dice rolling mechanics, it took some getting used to for the players last session. I was extremely happy to see how, in this second combat encounter, they worked together as a team, relying on their abilities to strengthen their Wingmates. The Elemental burned his Health so others could recover Sparks, while the Durant used a card to redirect The Harvester's attack. When the Shrouded decided to go for the killing blow, the rest of the Wing played cards that added to his result. I was worried that due to their extreme teamwork, they didn't get a sense of how powerful an opponent they were facing but I managed to land at least one blow that nearly killed a character... the look on the players' faces was truly priceless when they heard Gale would lose all but one Health Token if the attack were to connect.

Unlike during last session where I had to use a piece of paper for the Torch, due to the template that came with the game proving to be especially resistant to pencils, I managed to find a file on the game's website that had a print out of all the Torches for the published scenarios. Our main issue was explaining the Initiative Order which the game technically lacks.

When The Harvester had its Speed reduced by 1 after getting Stunned, the players seemed confused why when their Initiative Order reset itself, it went before them. Surely, the Fallen One should have gone after them but rather than moving a character up or down on an initiative track, Phoenix Dawn Command allows each player to take an action in whatever order they decide. The only restriction is that each of them has to act before the cycle resets. This ensures that each player has a chance to act. Non-player characters, however, act after a number of Phoenixes equal to their Speed have acted. This caused some confusion for players who are used to every participant acting once before the entire cycle begins anew. I have to admit, keeping track of active participants is somewhat tricky but overall, the fight went well and we finally had a heroic death!

Which means Tome will get an upgrade when he is reborn for the next mission.

As Tome's body turned to ash, so did The Harvester's physical form slowly dissolve. It lay on the marble floor, slowly turning to nothingness, but before it dissipated completely, he left the Phoenixes with a warning. It said that they may have won this battle but they shan't defeat... Ram violently stomped on its mask. I didn't expect Ram, the Durant, to try to silence the Fallen One in such a grievous manner.

Fortunately, his words were telepathic, seemingly whispered into their ears, so despite its shattered face, it continued to speak of how it will return so long as there is fear in the hearts of the Aerie's staff.

With his body returned to the Dusk, their culture's version of the underworld, the Phoenixes heard glass cracking. They all turned towards the top of the tree where the black mass within the sphere writhed ferociously. It began to crack.

Gale, the Forceful, continued his climb, grabbed the sphere and released the Flamekeeper they came to rescue. With Tome, the Shrouded, being a smouldering pile of ash, their expert warlock was unavailable for comment. They all turned to Willow, the Elemental.

Willow took the sphere into his hands and examined it closely. More cracks appeared on its surface. He managed to get a rather impressive score on his Skill Spread so I provided him with some useful information. It appeared that the sphere contained all the fear of the people tortured by The Harvester and without the Fallen One to stabilise it, it was breaking apart. Left unattended, it would soon explode and ravage the surrounding land, making it uninhabitable.

They had two choices at this point, other than allowing it to lay waste to the Aerie. They might attempt a ritual that would bind the sphere to their Wing and, with any luck, stabilise it long enough to bring it back to the Grand Aerie where the Marshals can deal with it. The other option was to wait for it to explode. It would instantly destroy whoever held it but a Phoenix could then bind the escaping fears to their Flame and drag them with him to the Dusk. Of course, Willow left out that said Phoenix would have to then face each fear in his Crucible, their personal underworld, and defeat each and every one before his rebirth.

As a group they decided to let Willow do his thing as neither of the other characters actually understood the situation they were in. I had to point out that although both their characters are Strength-based that did not mean they were stupid but, as it turned out, they were simply roleplaying ignorance. As Ram is a soldier and Gale a hunter, neither of them was wise in the mystical ways of spirits. As it made sense, I rewarded Willow with a bonus to his Skill Spread to bind the sphere.

Willow was a shaman's apprentice in his first life so he did exceptionally well on his Skill Spread, allowing him to stabilise the sphere and hinder it from exploding for the time being. Meanwhile, The Harvester's victims slowly began to wake. Although they appeared mostly healthy, it quickly became apparent that whatever wounds were inflicted upon them were deeper than flesh. When asked, the Flamekeeper spoke of being taken by the Dreadknight and abandoned in a vast forest with untold horrors lurking around until he saw Gale and he was back in the Aerie.

The Wing did not dare to leave the mortals with fear hanging above them. Ram walked amid the people and reassured them they were under their care. For was it not true that the Phoenixes came the moment they were in danger? One could not anticipate all that is to come but they may rest soundly knowing that whatever comes for them, will have to go through the Phoenixes' Flame first. And their flame burns brighter than darkness can consume.

The mood in the Aerie was lifted and the Wing got a sense that The Harvester won't be able to return for at least a couple of months. With that in mind, they bid the Aerie's staff farewell and began their march back to the Grand Aerie.

At this point the scenario proposes an interlude to give characters who didn't die an opportunity to do just that but as none of the three remaining characters cared to make a sacrifice after the battle with The Harvester, I decided to go straight into the epilogue for this mission.

Upon their safe return, the Wing gave the sphere to Cinder who congratulated them on a job well done and took it away for further study. The Wing found Tome chilling with a glass of wine in the hall. He told them he decided to come back as a noble this time around hence why he was wearing a toga. While previously his Wingmates were unable to tell his gender due to his tendency to change his clothing on a semi-regular basis. Now that half his chest was bare, they were fairly certain he was a man.

The Plot Thickens

First of all, I should note is that I am no longer running a World of Darkness game...
The whole line has been renamed into Chronicles of Darkness!

With that out of the way, I shall note that since I haven't used either of the scenes I had prepared for last session, I only had a bare minimum to prepare for this one. Our were-polar-bear had a nasty surprise when he was coming home only to hear his dogs barking that there's an intruder on his territory. Yes, he has the uncanny ability to understand animal speech to some extent.

Suffice to say, Devlin's attempts to remain sneaky and locate the intruder in his own home ended up being fruitless. Fortunately, he called in the cavalry and VT managed to spy someone sneaking out of his house by the backdoor. A chase ensued shortly thereafter.

I personally don't require players to have read an entire corebook just to sit down and play. That sounds like way too much homework to me. Games should be accessible for newcomers and I found no surer way to discourage someone from gaming than slapping him with a 300+ book to read within a week... oh, and make sure you'll remember everything.

It's been my rule for quite a few years now. The problem with doing something this often is, unfortunately, that you end up forgetting you're doing it. So with a slight embarassment, I realised I should have reminded people earlier on that they can spend Willpower points to add 3 dice to their rolls. Instead, I only did that after it was clear who the dice smiled upon that day.

The players managed to catch the intruder who turned out to be a woman. Latter interrogation revealed she is also a shapeshifter and was snooping at the 'murder' scene as a deer. We had a glimpse at VT's warform which was appropriately creepy. A large falcon with human hands for talons and, unless I'm misremembering, a human/falcon hybrid face.

During their interrogation they learned that the woman was named Fawn and she followed a trail from Fairbanks to hear when she was looking for whatever/whoever was responsible for kidnapping people off the street. She wasn't very talkative at first but after being unable to break Peyton's webbing and receiving a punch from Devlin, she warmed up a bit.

In the end, Fawn went to stay with Peyton, her Striking Looks Merit working like a charm, while Devlin noticed he was invited to dinner by the head of the local hunter's club.

A Split Party

Allow me to pre-face this entry by saying that no (were-)bear has been shot or otherwise harmed during our last session and that we do not condone violence towards animals. Especially ones that can turn into hulking monstrosities and rip your face off.

This time I came in with two scenes in mind that I could use, neither of which saw any use other than a hint here and there. It's entirely my fault as I tend to be a reactive GM and already having established an issue within the setting, I wanted to give the players a chance to react to it in their own ways. I was waiting for a hook I could use to start off either of the scenes I came in with. Even though none appeared, everyone had fun so I can't say our time went to waste.

We went on to the day after everyone has given a statement on what happened in the woods. I began the session asking people what they would be doing the very next day.

VT decided to look at the scene again from the skies. She clearly likes her falcon form. She decided to track where Windy (official nickname) went by looking at snow patterns. Since her falcon form gives her Keen Sight and a Perception bonus I allowed it and she found out the trail of fresh snow leading from the scene of gruesome murder up to where the hunters' group was gathering. There was also a doe having a look at the aforementioned scene. Then it went off to graze on leaves and twigs. Perfectly normal behaviour!

Devlin had a look through his mother's notebooks in hopes of finding something that could cause blizzards out of nowhere. Going through books sounds boring but we had a nice glimpse into Devlin's backstory. I do love it when players take time to flesh out their characters. We've learned that Devlin's mum is in prison. She's innocent but took the blame for his father's murder when he was beating her and young Devlin snapped, turned into a bear and frenzied in the living room. I loved the story enough that I rewarded him by saying he found mentions of one Wayne Webster who was good friends with his mum and a source of most of her information on local tradition.

At that point Devlin wanted to go and speak with him but I ruled by that time it would be too late for a polite visit. This was mainly because I didn't want to have the whole evening spent on single-player scenes. I try to avoid the lack of player-to-player interaction during a game.

Next up was Peyton who, while working at a hospital in Fairbanks, went to the local coroner to see if he could provide them with the autopsy reports of the body they found. Whenever I see coroners on screen, they always seem unfazed by dead bodies. I take it, it comes with the territory but then I thought that this was probably a horrific event in this guy's life, I'd make him be uncomfortable talking about it... and just when I was about to give out some information, I realised there's actually a Social system of Opening Doors that I should be using rather than making things easy and simple. Things were said and done, and Peyton had a very good approach at convincing the coroner to do him a favour.

At the end of the evening, both in-game and out-of-game, the characters met in a pub. VT was already chatting people up about a new extreme sport she thought of that incorporated logs, lakes and hills. Devlin didn't get into a fight, amazingly enough. Some girl tried to flirt with Peyton because she thought they were a boy. I'm so glad I could come up with some randomness. Especially considering social interactions are certainly not my forte.

Without a Trace

When you’re forced to leave the game early due to circumstances beyond your control, there’s always a chance you’ll have to bring a new character for next session. Fortunately, our werebear player decided to make his character into a proper Engine of War and his trait, Warrior’s Restoration, allowed Devlin to heal up the hole in his side in an hour.

As impressive as that may sound, it’s even more impressive that Devlin managed not to punch the hunter who shot at him. In his defence, he thought he was shooting at a polar bear. While VT flew off to get her gun, Devlin and Peyton met with some hunters and had a chat. Most of them wanted to finish it quickly solely because Devlin has a reputation of punching people for no reason… even if they have guns.

During their chat, Peyton noticed that the hunters were wearing similar clothes as that severed armed that nearly hit him during the blizzard. Oddly enough, the players decided to try and track down the beast, now nicknamed Windy by VT. Sadly they lost the track. The wind and snow destroyed what little signs they could follow. The only thing they were sure of is that Windy headed for the town… and that it disappeared in mysterious circumstances.

I’m extremely glad Bill noticed that although VT was perched on a building overlooking where Windy would have emerged, she saw naught. Normally, you could hand-wave that as a simple plot hole but I do have a reason as to why Windy vanished. A reason which I shall keep to myself… such is the beauty of Game Mastering.

With so little to go on, our heroic shapeshifters went back to find the severed arm and piece together the identity of the victim. His name was Jonathan and none of the characters knew of him having any ties with the local hunters. Being the good citizens they are, they informed the local authorities who, quite sceptically, sent a state trooper with them to check it out.

The disbelief vanished quite quickly and was replaced by a visage of horror!

The site was secured, CSI was called in and statements were taken.
No other player got shot at.
For now…

Someone Heard You Scream

As a GM, I never know how to start a game.
A typical fantasy game starts in a tavern, I'm told, when an old wizard judges your motley of low-level adventurers worthy a task so grave that it can only be given to a random bunch of strangers... but what do you do when there's a significant lack of wizards and taverns in a given setting?

How am I supposed to know?
I just asked the players what their characters are doing in the woods on the outskirts of town... yes, yes, yes, that's a cool story. Oh, by the way, you hear a scream of terror followed by gunshots from within the woods!

That's as good a hook as any... and so, the local werebeasts found themselves checking out the scream. Coincidence or Fate? We may never know.

They went on in the direction of where the scream originated. Stopping only when encountering a blizzard! Expecting something supernatural going on, VT turned into a falcon and went on ahead to scout. Especially after one of them got nearly hit by a severed arm of some poor chap. I was expecting the players would stop and think things through. Maybe try and gather some more information but after VT returned to say she found an enormous beast with control over the winds, which might be responsible for dismembering a human being in no time... they decided to go and try to kill it.

It might seem like a bad plan but they do have a gigantic were-polar-bear. All things considered, they might have been successful... if not for VT getting swept away, the blizzard mysteriously disappearing and someone shooting at the enormous bear next to a poor, defenseless student.

There were so many rolls between players to keep Devlin from going on a rampage.
I was expecting someone to fail.

At the end of the session, Devlin regained his composure, turned back to human form and started putting his clothes on while someone was approaching the group.

It begins

'Any ideas as for characters you'd like to play?' I asked.
'An adrenaline junkie werefalcon.'
'I think I'll play a polar bear lumberjack.'
'Together, they fight crime.' Bill remarked.

Actually, that's a very good description of the scenario I have in mind... mostly because murder is generally considered an illegal act.

It's been a while since I've last run a game. I used to do it fairly often but even so, I was dreading sitting in the GM chair again.

I started off with two players, had elevator-pitch for the game and felt like my handling of the system was sketchy at best... but as we sat down and bantered, I felt happy to be were I started.

Last week we did character creation.
We didn't do as much as I had hoped and I'm at fault here. I intended half of the 2 hours we had to be spent making characters and the other hour on fitting them into the setting but I was worried that putting dots on the sheet would go fast that I feared all would be done in half that time... it didn't.

No plan ever survives contact with players, mark my words!

Fortunately, the sheets require minimal input from the players and I started working on some additional player characters for drop-ins.

Knowledge is Power

I would not expect a roleplaying game, nor session, to be an educational pursuit. Especially considering that when I received my first roleplaying game in the mail (Vampire: the Masquerade Revised), my dad informed me it's an acceptable alternative to being addicted to drugs. I've since assumed that's what most would think about this hobby we partake in.

However, during our recent session, as we were being described the scuttling noises made by some bots infiltrating our station, we learned that they were not, in fact, attempting to sink us. Moreover, as we progressed from Bill and Prince Marik showcasing their Thesaurus-like skills in finding synonyms for the word, we engaged in banter over what beings may scuttle, why elephants wouldn't and the effects of low gravity on a creature's ability to scuttle.

While a highly enjoyable conversation, we still had the problem of our corrupted former selves planning to murder us... or so we assumed. There was only one thing we could do, we split the party! Bill's tiny octopus changed colour, and thus camouflaged, counter-infiltrated the vessel docked to our station. While he was going about the ship, avoiding traps and our originals, and gathering intel, the rest of the group did a similar thing.

As GM Jon's Achtung Cthulhu! game did not have enough players, we were joined by Jack who took on the role of Bill's muse. She hacked into the system, a risky move considering we were warned the whole system was compromised, and found out we were dealing with a Basilisk Hack which could infect through audio (and possibly visual) contact. This put a major dent in our plans to jury rig a devive to send a warning. We had very little time to figure something else out because something was at the door to the chamber we were in. Whatever it was, it was cutting and slashing into it so a fight was inevitable. Armed and ready, we opened the door only to find my own mutated character!

It was described as a mutated person with horrific disfigurments all over its body. All this Corruption made us instantly think of Warhammer 40k so we had to roll against being confused by tropes! No? Just me? Well, I did fine on my roll... despite shamelessly looking through my character sheet on a Windows Phone.

Suffice to say, we killed it. Although in true horror-esque fashion, bits of it fell off, scuttled away and hardened on the walls and floor. Then, our octopus infiltrator came back, told us of how the other more dangerous versions of us were destroying the ship's AI and then everything went momentarily dark...

BOOM!!!

Said octopus's other body went limp.
It seems the muse inhabiting it had the excellent idea of beaming itself out of the station and harm's way...

The Enemy Within

I may have failed to mention that you can legally download a pdf copy of Eclipse Phase, so there's no reason for you not to peruse the game.

With that out of the way, let's return to our attempts at survival in space!

Remember those strange noises we heard as last session came to an end?

It turns out it wasn't anything serious. We only found out after taking a quick trip to the fusion reactor chamber, fixing another opened airlock and going back through the greenhouse (centre of the station) and trying to get into our AI's, Hans, server room. The scurrying sound was caused by some of the worker bots watching us. Eventually, they attacked but not being specifically built to fight, they were quickly destroyed.

Just before the fight broke out, we noticed the very same ship we remembered planning on exploring coming ever so closer to our station. We were unable to reach Hans but we did get his logs and as we looked through them, an ominous message was being received. We decided to risk it, put together a crude two-way receiving device and turn on communication.

On the other side of the transmission... were us!

Finally some existential angst occurred. Were they really us after the backup? Which of our groups is compromised? How can we live with ourselves now? What's the optimal temperature of tea?! With all these questions in mind, one thing was clear!

As much as our original copies tried to sound shocked and sincere, we could sense something sinister in the background... and as they called us (or themselves) on our (their?) empty threats of blowing their (our?!) ship up, they docked.

Moments later, they cut through the barricades we had set up. We felt the air pressure of two atmospheres equalise, as a putrid stench filled the station. Many bots came out crawling to scout out the surroundings... and then, something came out...

In space, no one can hear you scream

As you may have had already heard; new games started being run last week at our wonderful club.

My use of a semicolon was not unintentional as prior to Eclipse Phase starting, we had a very interesting discussion on the pluralisation of an octopus. Lines were drawn, alliances formed and backstabbing commenced between the camps of octopi, octopuses and octopodes. As no clear victor emerged from the rubble, we went on to roleplaying!

I must say, even though I picked a ready-made character, it still took me quite a while to copy everything onto a blank sheet. Fortunately, GM Rob was kind enough to explain some of the character aspects I wasn't sure about which is always helpful. I'm told that making a character from scratch for Eclipse Phase is highly time consuming.

The current session started off with us waking up in our spare bodies. If you're unfamiliar with Eclipse Phase, suffice to say it's a sci-fi setting where conciousness is downloadable so changing bodies is everyday business. Last thing we remembered was getting ourselves backed up before venturing out of our space station to check out some ghost space ship that happened to drift by. That was too weeks ago (how ominous!).

The rest of the session was spent on getting around and trying to stop our oxygen from leaking out as something was attempting to open up the station's external hatches. Some of the doors were also welded shut with junk. Ferocious cutting and chopping was had!

We managed to stabilise our situation and started to breathe without fear of running out of air when.. suddenly... a cliffhanger happened!

Something's coming for us...

and it's not existential angst...

that was sorely lacking...

Someone Call 999

With the lady-necromancer dead in the street and Bluecoats surely on their way to the scene of the crime, we were forced to make a quick exit. Fortunately, I was shooting from an out of view location, Marcus (The Whisper) had his spirit mask on and the Lurk was in disguise, so getting out of Dodge wasn't difficult.

Regrouping at our base, we decided that the next step in our plan to obliterate the Lampblacks was to set fire to their headquarters. We needed to act fast while the news of their ally being dead didn't reach them. A few hours later, we were all prepped up with combustible materials and plans as to where to place it all. We took Mercer with us because we knew all too well the Lampblacks clearly outnumbered us.

Our Lurk got into their base once so entering again and setting everything up for a fire was a simple matter of time. We waited out of sight until the whole building went ablaze. The Lurk opened a backdoor for us and we made our way towards their treasury while the Lampblacks were distracted by the surrounding inferno.

'Who goes there?' Some Lampblacks blocked our way. I gave them a very stern talking for leaving their stations and casually walking around while everything was in flames! Confused and bewildered at first, they quickly realised the error of their ways and politely asked for guidance. As such, I had to go with them, leaving the rest of the gang behind, and coordinate their efforts to put out the raging fire.

The group continued onwards to the treasury. Mercer stepped in through the treasury's door after our Lurk dealt with the lock, only to find several Lampblacks inside.

HOW? WHAT? WHY?

With little to no time for explanations, he tried to close the door as said Lampblacks charged the group.

Meanwhile, the Lampblacks' attempts to douse the fire weren't going so well. It may have had something to do with me sending them out to the most dangerous places and giving out reckless orders. After a while I tried to slip away but some of the Lampblacks decided they wanted to get paid for their job... thus a chase through the burning building began.

It concluded when I reached the corridor leading to the treasury and where the rest of our gang was. Noticing the slew of enemy gang members, Marcus shouted for me to duck. I slid on the floor as he released the spirit he wrenched control of from the lady-necromancer. It took care of most of the Lampblacks and we killed whoever remained.

We made our way back, with what little valuables we could find, only to have our way blocked once more by none other than Bazo Baz!

Although he proved a fierce opponent, he succumbed to our numbers and went down in flames... literally.

Never Trust an Old Lady

In my last update, I might have asserted that we won't be using updated rules in our game... it turned out to be a falsehood. This session started with us transferring dots onto our new sheets. Other than two skills being combined into one, skill distribution changes among the classes and me losing a concealed blade for ectoplasmic ammunition, there weren't many visible changes... but let us get back to the game!

After every successfully performed job, our merry band of sociopathic thieves likes to engage in our personal relaxing activities. For some they include culling the local prostitute population, for others it's visiting their succubus friend for the night... and out Lurk prefers to gamble his money away.

Sadly, he quickly found out that his regular gambling den banned him. As such, he started looking for a new one. In the process, he noticed an obvious member of the Lampblacks' gambling his money away in one of the city's fine establishments.

Surely enough, our gang was swiftly informed of this. Offended by the travesty of their further existence, we decided to eradicate them from the surface of the planet or, at the very least, from the city we're in.

Our plan was simplicity itself: walk in under the guise of gamblers, wait for our target to appear and follow him to the Lampblacks' current lair. Turns out they set up shop right next to their previous hideout... or whatever rubble remained thereof. We had to admit the idea was brilliant. Even the Bluecoats underestimated their sheer stupidity.

The following two days, we observed their operations while the Lurk snuck past their security and had a look around inside. It seemed they were trying to regain their foothold but morale was low. Other than locating their current treasury and having a look at their badly made propaganda posters, there wasn't much else to see.

Outside, however, we noticed an old lady in very expensive gard cordially walking inside. Our Lurk informed us that she had some private dealings with Bazo Bas but could not gather any more information on the subject.

Opting for a more direct approach to information gathering, we waited for a lone gang member going out to a gambling den again and spirited him away. It turned out that he knew me, claiming I killed him. I had to mention that didn't narrow down his identity so I chatted with him about his death's circumstances while the Whisper tried to gleam some information out of him. A moment later he informed us that this person was simply an empty husk being possessed by a spirit.

Putting a spirit into a body was no simple task and our new friend was highly reluctant to tell us who helping him into this body. A few threats and some supernatural compelling by our Whisper helped change his mind.

The old lady we saw earlier was Bazo Bas's cousin and a high-level necromancer for hire. Presumably, they had some sort of deal worked out between them where she was putting the spirits of deceased Lampblacks back into their bodies. After all this information was gained, the Whisper bottled up the ghost and we went on to planning an assassination.

We knew she would have leave the Lampblacks' base at some point and deal with some other contractual work but until that happened, we had to wait. Eventually, sometime close to dusk, she headed out to see her other clients. We followed in the shadows. The Whisper warned us that some sort of spirit was following us. It did try to fly off, probably to warn our quarry, but the Whisper forced it to stay put.

Her first client was someone living in a mansion. We knew we wouldn't have much time so we prepared a quick trap. As the old lady came out the mansion, through the gate and onto the street, our Lurk ran up to her in the guise of a random passer by. Being stationary, she was a much easier target for me so I shot her through the shoulder. She staggered back... and regained her balance. It was at that moment, when she completely ignored the pain of being shot, that we realised she too was a spirit possessing a dead body.

She reached for a vial hanging from her neck and shattered it on the pavement, releasing her guardian. Our Whisper mentally wrestled with the angry spirit, I kept shooting at it with ectoplasmic bullets and the Lurk beat and cut the lady-necromancer. When all was done, the Whiper, with great effort, captured the spirit and the Lurk delivered the final blow to our enemy's exposed neck.

A Plot-Twist Appears!

We return to our regular schedule after a two week break.

How did we survive two weeks without roleplaying is anyone's guess.

Apparently, Blades in the Dark went through some rule changes in our absence but I don't think we'll start using them just yet.

Our last job left us in possession of a significant amount of drugs and as such, our first order of business was to figure out what to do with them. Brainstorming away, we decided to not only add flour to it but to sell them as fishcakes! Of course, with hardly any cooking skills of our own, we had to turn to the recruitment of new staff in order to make use of the recent market demand caused by the previous supplier going down under... literally. We managed to find a nice old lady with an extensive CV which included such things as drug distribution and brothel management, and cooking! She was hired on the spot.

Second order of business was to set up a distribution centre. We had some problems coming up with good ideas until we realised that the nearby Church of the Forgotten Gods is in dire need of new management. It does help that the building was very nice. Our Slide went to work giving out free samples and making the local congregation realise the current management wasn't good enough for their worship and that under our management, things would change for the better! We would even introduce scantily clad waitresses to serve fishcakes during sermons!

With the congregation looking forward to the upcoming change of management, all that was left to do was to make the change. We attended an evening service and while the Slide took care of the congregation outside the church, Mercer took the main priest to the side and explained the situation to him. Sadly, he didn't agree with our views and as such, we had to turn to Plan B.

Oddly enough, a candle just happened to fall rather loudly to the ground, giving Mercer the appropriate opportunity to stab the priest in the gut... and that's when we realised he was, in fast, a demon... hiding his massive horns underneath a cloak.

In the ensuing fight we once again had an opportunity to make use of the flashback mechanic present in the system when GM Jack asked me if the bullet I shot at the demon was silver. Remembering that the Lurk had a spare downtime asset roll hanging about, I asked him if he might have procured one in the morning. Turns out that yes, he did, and he even lend it to me because he didn't own a gun himself and I was clearly interested in the ballistics of a different type of ammunition being used... but then the dice decided that no, silver doesn't actually work against demons!

Resorting to bladed weapons, it took us a while to hack the demon into pieces. It was a very stressful fight, stressful enough that I was the first to obtain a point of Trauma... a few more and my character will suffer a mental breakdown, bringing him out of the game, it seems.

On the upside, turns out demon pieces are worth a lot of coins so at the end of the evening, we managed to extend our crew's territory, created a source of income and earned a significant amount of coin and prestige.

Not many crews can boast murdering a demon...

The Gamers: Dorkness Rising

I hope everyone enjoyed the weather over the recent bank holiday weekend and half-term. Now that said weather had turned slightly grim, I would like to point you to a Kickstarter project.

Although, it's been years since I first saw The Gamers: Dorkness Rising, I still fondly remember enjoying the film. It's about a group of roleplayers starting a new game with a player new to gaming. The action switches between the group at the table and the group within the fantasy world, one reality influencing the other.

I will be extremely happy having this as a Blu-Ray on my shelf and in case any of you would like to add it to your collection, be sure to back it as it seems it will be out as a limited edition to Kickstarter backers.

Click on the widger to the right or on the link within this post.

Blow Things Up and Walk Away

Our third session saw our return to taking a job for the Red Sashes to further complicate Lampblacks' operation.

This time we were asked to plant a device in the Lampblacks' Headquarters. A device that we learned would attract a great many angry/deranged spirits to cause general mayhem. We had a lovely chat with the Red Sashes' leader but after reaching the point where no more information would be gained, our group went on to scount the area and come up with a plan.

It was decided that the best course of action would be to go in from below since otherwise, the building was well guarded. Fortunately, our Lurk was intimately familiar with the lay of the underground tunnels. Although our group was lacking the heavy-hitter Mercer, the three of us managed to take out the one lonely guard and break into one of their Headquarter's storage areas.

The device was set up and we had about half an hour to get out... but we simply couldn't pass up on the chance to get our hands on all of the Lampblacks' valuables. After all, it would be a shame to see them disappear under a pile of rubble.

While I and the Lurk maneuvered ourselves from prying eyes, the Whisper gave in to his need to figure out what made this artifact tick... and so, just before we started breaking into the Lampblacks' main office, the Whisper's ghost-friend startled us, only to inform us that everything was going fine.

Unbeknowst to us, the Whisper's tampering accelerated the time on the device and the ghost was sent to warn us... unsuccessfully.

Suffice to say that what followed was a short scruffle with the Lampblacks' leader, as our attempts to sneak in and quietly assassinate him didn't work out... defenestration was involved.

Before the rest of his gang had a chance to join the fray, the building suffered a sudden and unexpected assault by angry spirits. Pieces of the roof began to collapse, the ground shook and we used the chaos to slip away the same way we entered.

We met up with the Whisper outside, atop a nearby structure with a beautiful view of the ensuing carnage. It was truly a wonderful sight to behold.

In and Out

Last week saw our band of thieves pull off a successful job, as such we went on to advance our characters. Interestingly enough Blades in the Dark does not use a standard experience system that most gamers are used to. Instead, each group of skills gains an advancement bar, which, when full, allows the player to gain a point in one of the relevant skills. These bars are gained by either using your skills during the game of spending downtime training them.

Unfortunately, we didn't have time for the final stage of the session: DOWNTIME... which we addressed at the start of this one.

Downtime represents time our characters go through between jobs. We relax, reducing our stress levels, and make progress on our personal projects. Although there are other options, like reducing our gang's Heat rating, we all went with personal projects. My character was busy creating a false persona to infiltrate the Bluecoats, which as I understand is a gang that acts as the local police force, while the Lurk worked on getting into their treasury. The Whisper decided to research the existence of angels, which involved casual pillow talk with a succubus. Mercer, the Cutter, started to look for an appropriate site for a temple (to the Forgotten Gods).

After the downtime, it was time for actual play. Which in our case means: breaking, entering and thieving. This time we weren't offered a job by one of the more well-renowned gangs in the area. Instead, our Whisper was approached by a contact with a favour. Mainly, to break into a competitors warehouse and disable some security measures thus giving him an economic advantage in the current marketplace... or some such... thieving was involved, other details seemed less important!

Our initial reconnaissance showed minimal security. A few guards patrolling the outside area in a predictable pattern and one inside an office. Fortunately, the Lurk managed to locate an appropriate entry point on the roof so it all seemed like an easy job.

We got in without too much of an issue (that hole was a bit tight though). The first obstacle we faced came in the form of three guards. Whilst we were setting up an ambush, me character and Mercer had an argument over the appropriate measures of murdering people, with my character explaining to Mercer he can't possibly perform a stealth kill.

Surely enough, after all was said and done, Mercer, alongside half the group, liked to remind my character that he killed two guards with a single swing of his axe while I was still struggling to stab one guard. My annoyance with the situation resulted in an inappropriate amount of dead body stabbing.

After this short scuffle, we nearly got caught unaware by an electroplasmic fence acting as a further security measure. The Whisper disabled it and we moved on to the safe.

The final obstacle was the aforementioned office guard. I had to suffer a constant string of comments directed at my murder skills. Naturally, I was annoyed enough that I needed to prove my worth. I took out a pistol, aimed through the window and, despite wounds suffered earlier, I shot the guard through the skull, the bullet ricocheted, revealing the safe, and went through the guard's heart... for good measure.

The Lur opened the safe, we took as much as we could carry and went off... all in all, a very simple job resulting in a boost to our income.