Self Preservation

Just to round off the Star Wars last week, I can report on the successful repatriation of ambassador Bol to the Rebel Alliance. I knew you would all be relieved. Discovered quite safe in his Carbonite casing he was released in time for the end of the one off adventure.

Next week should see the start of DnD, Changing Breeds and Feng Shui.

Carbonite casing was originally designed for gas transportation as the material can absorb vast amounts of volatile atmospheric substances whilst locking them in an unreactive and stable form. The chambers themselves can also stack efficiently and operate in built repulsors for mobility.

 

It also happens to be an ideal form of transport for captives as the molecular integration process has a stasis effect on organic material. Painful though.

However, do not confuse Carbonite with Samsonite, another transportation and packaging material that is also used for moving bodies around.

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.

Head in the Clouds

 

As the games are turning over like a huge discworld sized pancake, I have taken the opportunity to run a stopgap 2 episode Star Wars until the DnD is ready to rumble. The original West End games D6 edition no less. Despite the D20 system prevalence I like the older system due to its rather vague approach to rules - its enough to get things done but allows a high degree of flexibility by the GM and the extremely simple difficulty tables are applied to most tasks - combat is simply an attack roll vs strength roll.

 

 

For now the party are trying to rescue an Ambassador Bol, a wanted Jedi, who went MIA during the last Star Wars adventure. He was pivotal in establishing the first few clans into an alliance against the Imperium.

At this moment in time, although it was a long, long time ago, our adventurers are on the trail of a broken light sabre that was found to have been gambled away in a casino on Cloud City -a Calrissian mining facility suspended within the Bespin atmosphere. Having abruptly cornered the gambler concerned it turns out that he claimed the item from the now defunct Tibann orbital - an old and ultimately unsuccessful competitor to Cloud City that has fallen derelict - uninhabited for now except for scavengers and scrap hunters and anyone else not looking to be found...Part 2 on Thursday...



Selecting the new Lanterns

 

It is time.

 

The old worlds are dying and new ones are waiting to be born.

New games are being prepared as I write. Plans are afoot and the GM selection process is taking place for the forthcoming games.

GM Krzys will be offering a Changing Breeds, which as I understand it is a World of Darkness game involving a genetic melting pot - chimeras crossed with other chimeras set in the frozen realm of Alaska.

GM Warren will be offering to continue the Dungeons and Dragons adventure as the mystery surrounding Neverwinter Seige deepens.

GM Jack will be offering one of the following: A 13th Age continuation of the previous adventure set in the Mage town of Eldolan. A game of Strike, a D6 based SciFi scenario. Or finally a game of Feng Shui 2, a hidden history of the Chi War replete with sorcerers, monks and cyborgs. Really depends on how weird people want to get..

If you are thinking of coming along or coming back, now is an excellent time to grab a character and make it your own.

Assassins Wanted.

One of the issues I have raised before regarding the Eclipse Phase game is one of mortality, or lack thereof. It's one of the many underpinning aspects of the universe that requires a serious shift in a player's mentality. It's a tricky one though as I am unclear as yet what the difference is exactly between transferring a consciousness and copying one. I would have though that a being would cling onto life under any circumstances even if backups are available, as backups, and forks for that matter, are just copies and separate personalities. Other than vanity from a human perspective, why would I even bother to create a copy or backup of myself at all ? Death comes to me in all its form unless it is actually my consciousness itself that is transferred at the moment of death. This cannot be the case of course if my brain is slowly altered through drugs, medical procedures or torture ie I can go through a radical personality alteration before expiring.

The point about this is that we were mustering a plan to assassinate someone in the last game but the conversation slowed dramatically as we began to realise that the individual will have copies. In that case we don't actually care about his personal view on immortality, we just have to take him out. But are we satisfied with just removing his current persona ? Well, we located his business address and have plans to destroy his server racks where at least one backup resides but we have no idea at this stage if he has further backups and if indeed they lie within a major,  maximum security corporation that provides such services on the basis that they can never be compromised. Mission Impossible comes to mind, so we have been discussing methods of possibly infecting his backups in order to destroy them aside from physical intervention. As always, I am sure that the meticulous planning phase of our mission will bear no resemblance at all to reality.

 

As much as I raise an eyebrow over what could be a flaw in this game, I am reminded of course that it is also an issue in many other more classic scenarios. I recall having to hunt down the individual embalmed organs of Liches in order to ensure that they can be killed, and Vampires, particularly the high level ones, do have a tendency to repeat offend, this is perhaps nothing new in the problem we are facing .

 

We need the cyber equivalent of a wooden stake.

Are you local ?

In my opinion the Brighton Roleplaying club is one of the most welcoming public facing clubs I have ever been to. As much courage as it take to turn up at an event full of strangers or even return to one after many months or years, one can be assured of a gregarious and hearty welcome no matter where you may be from; beerish is an international language we all speak. I like to think of us as a local foreign legion, where we fight and adventure together, one and all, no matter what our backgrounds. A sort of them and us without the them. I have neglected to post an on line welcome to two of our newest members who have joined us, so a very warm welcome to Fade and Julian and I do hope you find us a regular escape from reality. Welcome Sirs.

 

Online comms are a bit of a Ying Yang also, it is often the case that other similar groups arise in our local area asking after games to join or venues to use. In one sense its a bit schizophrenic but on the other hand its just a matter of interest groups joining with each other rather than think that they are alone. Part of me wants to create one giant reolplaying centre where everyone can come under the same roof and get to know one another but of course we have people who travel from afar and if they can get a game closer to home then its understandable.

 

This week I have had the pleasure of chatting with Simon Filler who has a facebook group of interested local parties for DnD adventuring-

 

 

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1637959583133640/1638861303043468/?comment_id=1641852809410984&notif_t=group_comment.

 

The game is so iconastic it is even a phrase such that people may know what you mean by DnD but not know what you mean by roleplaying. We have chatted in our magic circles and have sort of decided that it would be a good idea to have a DnD run all the time albeit with rotating games and DMs of course. Not literally, though. Whilst we operate on a Thursday primarily, if we get enough interest then we can simply run an additional evening or arrange a home game.

 

So to cut a long blog short, it you are interested in DnD, which is a magnificent roleplaying game, or any other roleplaying game at all then don't hesitate, do come along whether you are a group looking for a venue or a player looking for a game or a thief looking for loot, we will look after you.

 

See you all there!

Evil breakfasts

There are a number of aspects to day to day survival which don't always occur to me when thinking of people of note such as the Queen, the Nolan Sisters or Ricky Gervais for example. Fame or infamy notwithstanding there is always the matter of breakfast and whether you get up late or not I suggest you would in most circumstances enjoy a late breakfast rather than an early lunch. Now if pressed, and certainly in an emergency, I could make it to the local deli in my dressing gown and force down a quick pastrami panini with a mocha or two but running in sandals in not becoming when one reaches a certain level and excessive flapping of undergarments whilst traversing at speed often draws unseemly attention.

 

However, for a suitably refined dining experience I would be prepared to extend some risk in certain areas and recommend an establishment to a friend even if it is in a less cordial location. Nevertheless there are meal times that make me somewhat nervous despite the quality of the food or establishment.

 

Sitting across a table in a local pub with a Wizard of Thay eating a bowl of gruel is one of those circumstances.

[http://forgottenrealms.wikia.com/wiki/Red_Wizards_of_Thay]

 

Hiding in plain sight is an old trick and the more colourful and irritating a character then the more likely one is to cast an encounter to the back of the mind, Jesters being an example in kind. But there is sometimes so much wrong with a picture when you first see it that it can simply blind you entirely or cause you to move on blankly. But this has been bothering me. Wizards of Thay are not known for just popping out for breakfast and whilst a stark and featureless bowl of gruel somewhat befits a stark and featureless gaze I am wondering why we came across him or indeed perhaps the opposite is true and he has deliberately happened across us.

 

Either way its a timely reminder that the subtle things matter just as much as the axe wielding and  we will need to keep an eye out over more than just breakfast.

 

In other words, beware the Muffins of Destiny.

 

Face Off

Now, we are supposed to be running three alternative, balanced and thoroughly optional experiences - a fantasy (DND5E), a horror (Achtung!Cthulu) and a SciFi (Eclipse Phase). Something for everyone in fact. It was somewhat of a creepy discovery that by the end of our DND5E game that we had come across people who's faces were being systematically removed.

More specifically the lands bordering Neverwinter are in upheaval with rumors of Dragons and Kobolds to the south, raiders to the East and Pirates to the coast. I haven't asked about North yet but I will probably be told I cant see an exit that way or that I am carrying too much equipment,  or some such fiendishly clever plot twist. Nevertheless I am struggling to look on the positive side of innocent people having their visage mutilated; personally I would be glad of slightly less facial hair management but I can understand why they are somewhat traumatised.

Not really sure what to say on the history of face removal, I don't think it has ever been a cultural practice so I am just reminded of characters such as Hannibal Lecter - a man who can eat his way our of captivity - and Scooby doo  - less malevolent in certain respects but the extent to which we wear our own faces as masks reminds me of gleefully watching the Mystery Team regularly tearing off the faces of unsuspected Librarians and sundry workers employed in various utility companies. We will get to the grisly bottom of our current mystery in due course no doubt.

I did, as a relative newbie to the world of Neverwinter, ask after the city's influence geopolitically but unfortunately it seems to be mostly a cultural and cosmopolitan centre at this point in its history - it has a town guard and I would guess some very dangerous wizards, but nothing along the lines of a foreign policy or army.

Seems that its us pesky kids vs the bad guys for now..

Stop Press Stop New players Stop New Game Stop DND5E

More welcomes to another band of fellow role-players wandering in from their adventures. It was a pleasure to meet Ben, Kim and Mark at the club, all at once no less, and the seemingly unstoppable and frantic demand for roleplaying action energized our resident beer drinker GM Warren to pick up his pint in one hand and rule book in another and stagger to the rescue.
 

Here then in it pristine glory is a wonderful picture of our party, including me behind the camera and our shiny new peoples. It was the only picture I had without Warren drinking. In fact its probably the only picture of Warren not drinking. Thank you Sir for starting up our third magnificent game, DND5E ! Don't worry about Ben punching Kim, they're married.

In our first session a party of  a Paladin, Cleric, Mage and Thief (sorry, I mean rogue) have started a mystery following the kidnapping of a local aristocrat's son by imposters dressed as local guards. This followed an altercation at a party we were invited to though it was difficult to work out what was going on exactly through all the inebriations. Pursuing the trail to the city walls we happened upon some form of sacrificial ceremony in progress involving wind magic, that while we managed to interrupt the evil doings we, sadly, have several dead people to attend to in the aftermath. We are probably the ones in trouble now but more on that next week.

In the Eclipse Phase, GM Rob's game update reads:
 

"Chasing leads around the lawless hive of Locus, the players encountered another hacker who assisted Tara Yu. Mason Wang revealed that he created two AIs for Yu named Achilles and Tortoise, the former a shell-controlling program piggybacked by the latter, an advanced hacking program capable of dealing with TITAN-level encryption if need be.

Realising that there are things Wang has hidden from them, the characters went over the files at Tara Yu's safe house and found a communication referencing a corrupted fork of his he's been experimenting exists, one deliberately infected with the Exsurgent virus that has infected the drug dealers and is linked to the petals they push to their customers. The message also revealed that the source of this virus is something called Myrmidon.

Two further links emerged, the ex-White Khanh Sammy Li whom was being pursued for info by Tara Yu before her expedition to the Song Cai Flower and Nia Zheng, a recent arrival to Locus and red tech dealer to the inner system triads. Contact with Zheng proved fruitless as her own mercenaries made it very clear that the characters were not welcome after an abortive attempt to talk to her.

Little do the characters know that eyes have turned to them and from the shadows, interested parties watch their every move.

Rob."

In the Achtung Cthulu, GM Jon is advancing the plot:

"The A!C team are now working for British Indian Intelligence (not that they had much choice). Escorted by a couple of dozen troops of the Bombay Grenadiers, they raced a local group of all-female freedom fighters to a temple hidden in a cave about 200 miles from Bombay. They were somewhat pleased to find they'd run the race, but then discovered they hadn't - the locals were inside, with some tropical suited Germans and had no idea who they were, where they were or what was going on.

There was a brief debate about whether to shoot, arrest or help them, then they were interrupted by red spirits coming out of the walls. When their guns didn't work (and several soldiers lost their memories), they realised what the cryptic warning from the mad priest the week before meant, and began desperately hunting for the musical pillars for which the temple was noted. Rattling out a tune they got from the same source led to the ghosts disappearing and a secret door at the far end of the temple opening.

After the anti-climax of discovering the artefact they were looking for with no further problems, they've emerged, blinking, into the sunlight and a smartly-dressed Indian (backed about a dozen armed women) has just asked for the artefact...

I'm sure I've seen this somewhere before...

Jon"

Still waiting for those tentacles Jon... 

A Jovial mission

 

Managed a brief chat with GM Jon last week regarding his COC. Apparently the intrepid and only slightly insane party have managed to successfully derail the Nazi transmission tower in the Valley of the Blue Monks. There was some attempt a sneaking around in the middle of the night which is always fun and as I understand it they shot a Monk that was about to raise the alarm on the monastery horn. Despite the fact that gunfire is significantly louder than an old gasping Monk pouting on an even older bronze tube, the party actually managed to explosively demolish the offending aerial and get away. As it happens, the only 'explosives' around to purchase in the mysterious mythos mountains were fireworks used for weddings and the like, thus the resulting military operation ended in a sort of special forces barmitzpha. Well done so far but still waiting to hear about zombies and tentacles...next time perhaps.

 

 

On the other side of the universe the Eclipse Phase team have now begun a mission for their new employers, Firewall. There was the option for a memory wipe/roll back should anyone not really feel in a trustworthy frame of mind but curiosity seems to be just ahead of paranoia in the cognitive stakes at present. So without rebooting  we now find ourselves at the Jovian system investigating the disappearance of a Firewall agent - we are sort of in the investigation phase at the moment but are already becoming aware of the various criminal gangs and bosses that run the place. The Jove habitat is founded on inter entity tolerance but with freedom comes criminality and cross cultural rivalries.

 

I only hope that the local mafia haven't infiltrated the municipal services like they usually do as the stink from rotting refuse in a sealed city would start to give the place a post post post modern medieval feel it. We'll see...

Evolved Regression

Firstly a little preamble this week as to the right of this article you will see a link to BURPS, the Brighton Universal Roleplaying Society who celebrated their reunion this last weekend locally at Reunicon. Although the annual get togethers are a celebration of old university friendships and roleplaying memories from the late 80s they are also open to the public and it was a pleasant surprise to see both Hem and Andy there who were two of our very own  recruits from last week. I myself was at Brighton Polytechnic in the day and a regular member of that very roleplaying society - over a hundred members at its peak and the largest society as a whole (apart from the pharmacists who's membership was pretty much default for joining their course). Keeping it real guys and glad to see you are all still alive, albeit in black and white. I should have gone along of course but to be honest it makes me feel like roleplaying died out several decades ago and we re-enact it like an antique flat earth society. I need to look forward and those old gits, particularly the local ones, should come up to us on a Thursday and join in. In truth of course the Brighton Roleplayers scene is very much alive and vibrant as ever and cutting edge in when it comes to alpha releases we have tested like DND6E, Blades in the Dark and Eclipse phase to name just a few.

 

Eclipse phase last week came to a head in so many ways. We were in the situation where we needed to use 2 escape pods but with 5 of us in the party. Classic. OK, 2 of use are small octopods and I was downloaded into a head anyway so that was one pod sort of agreed on which left our Archaeologist and Enforcer with much to discuss. Well discussion didn't win the day and after a desperate and manic shooting contest in a cramped space it was the Archaeologist, remarkably, that got the comfy seat. How one's gut instinct to survive at all costs still kicks in after cortical implants make it a non issue is very interesting.

 

I guess people are still people even after you take their brains out.

 

 

Talking to yourself.

 

Firstly a hearty yarr welcome to our new members that joined us last week, Andy, Hem, Grant and Nik. Wonderful to see  you all. As my memory was wiped some years ago I am reconstructing these names from club comms so apologies if I have got them wrong. May I just take this opportunity to say actually how much courage it takes to walk into a pub full of strangers and talk to people although of course I hope we were instantly familiar, we do after all, show strength of character in more ways than usual. Still, very good to see you all.

 

Having said this one of the new guys came to play in last weeks Eclipse Phase and, given the surge of new players, GM Rob coped admirably by levering the games inherent digitally based backdrop and created a 'copy' of the Muse program I was playing. This, I think was the first time I have actually interacted with a doppelganger. The term may not quite be fair as I think a doppelganger implies a false representation to a degree whereas in this universe a copy is a fully bona fide and independent entity.

 

Nevertheless, it was a weird experience. Whilst my Muse was quarantined into a primitive head for antivirus reasons, my copy got a new fully interactive, integrated and projected program that, sadly got infected quite quickly. For a while I was trying to convince the other me to put me back into an integrated form rather than leave me body less but I couldn't convince myself that this was a good plan. Most amusing. I also spent a lot of the session agreeing with myself which was also very interesting, I wonder given two identical personalities whether they would always agree. I presume that much opinion comes from life experience but given that both characters experiences begin identically that different points of view would emerge slowly over time, though its interesting that one doesn't necessarily trust the other at present. As I say, weird.

 

 

In Achtung Cthulu I hear that the new guys in that game started beating up on the Nazi Blue Monks in short order. Well done everyone.

No FT ? No Comment.

Uncovering ancient mythology is never an easy task. Even in the modern world with all its forensics and information systems the fog of history still prevails where monsters and demons lurk. Traditionally Cthulu comes with its intrinsic library research methods and one puts time aside in ones mind for the occasional evening of bookery as its a case of the pen (or) paper being mightier then the sword - a sort of rock, paper, tentacles game.

 

In the most recent episode  of Achtung Cthulu our investigations were concluding and we are now in the throes of an actual plan. Part of our hit list are a small sect of evil Blue Monks, nothing but an ancient fairy tale to the locals but not wanting to leave any prayer wheel unturned we decided to frequent the usual common or garden library. Not so common or garden in our current Himalayan retreat but nevertheless the local and ancient town had and even more local and ancient library tucked away in its Buddhist monastery. Problem with the Abbot of said monastery is that somehow ancient and local doesn't really go far enough; whilst we enjoyed a welcoming cup of tea with the old chap, he really did push the boundaries of senility.

 

 

Perseverance is one of the traits of my character, so not to be put off by a smiling and nodding contender for best donkey award, I defaulted to the monastic librarian. Definitely not donkey material, a long and embattled conversation embarked on how we could lever some information on the Blue Monks. Not taboo as such my questions were nevertheless batted away as childlike concerns over nothing but stories. Failing this, my last option to gain entry to the library was to offer him a gift of significant meaning in kind and something he would respect as a part of his profession. All I had on my equipment list was a copy of the Financial Times from a few days ago and I suggested that this treasured and important post modern artefact, together with its crossword conundrums should be inturned by us into his collection of great works. Remarkably I actually got a few sentences into this conversation before suggesting he should consider having his manuscripts rewritten for the modern era, a sort of Tibetan Times. End of conversation.

 

 

At this point the information gathering phase of the adventure was definitely over and we headed out, provisioned with our boy scout, to take on the forgotten Monks and their Nazi transmission tower. They are aiding the German War effort by translating ancient Atlantean manuscripts for a shady SS division. To what end... we do not know...

Musings

  

So when do you become you ? Stupid question ? You bet, but I ran into this little dilemma last week.

 

I picked up a character to play last week that is basically sort of a familiar, always fun, but in this case I was dumped into it unceremoniously. Last episode the muse as it is called had come to the conclusion, or rather calculation that it was not logical to stay on board a compromised station and transmitted itself out of the game. Not as helpful perhaps as the eclipse phase wiki would imply:

 

 

"Getting To Know Your Muse

 

While a muse isn’t as smart as you are, it’s also smarter than you’d think. A muse will always act in your best interests, but that can mean different things at different times. They learn from what you say and what you do. At first, the muse may seem to be a nosy intruder who bugs you about every tiny thing. It will ask how hot you like your soup or why you tease one of your friends more than the others. Many children get frustrated with all of these questions, but try to be patient with your muse. Every question you answer honestly helps the muse understand you. Muses work better when you learn to trust and respect them. After all, they can’t help you if you don’t let them."

 

Having no idea of what a muse was at the time I gradually became aware of how I should have been playing it by the end of the game, nevertheless in this case it is actually a fully blown ego posing as a muse as far as I can tell, so my confusion was accurate, if that makes sense - an ego being more of a personality/character than an intelligent learning tool.

 

So, to date, having transmitted off the station, intercepted by 'The Wall' (long story) and sent back, everyone now is very suspicious of me what with viruses flying around. The upshot of which is that just to be on the safe side I have been downloaded into a primitive head with an equally primitive voice box - tried hacking it already before you ask but it came off a shop manakin as far as I can tell.

 

I am just starting to get the hang of this universe now, so I will try not to die, reboot, rollforward or forkback.

 

 

 

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...

Anti Virus

It seems little beyond doubt now that we are dealing with some form of virus in our Eclipse Phase game. In such an existential and biogenically augmented world it's interesting to see what an infection would look like.. When one thinks about it there is an argument to say that the ordinary, or common or gardenening homo sapien is a case in point.; millions of years of viral exposure have altered or enhanced our DNA where I suspect many mutations have been environmentally selected such that we take them for granted or specifically define the species. Have we always had two kidneys or was it the result of an ancestor catching a cold...?

 

Physically, the complete transcending of our DNA and the extinction of natural selection whilst opening up new transgenic branches to the tree of life, in many ways throws our instincts back further into the past. Gone are the days when a community or even a small group of people can band together under their common humainity. Humans have traditionally established their survival in terms of mutual support and sharing of knowledge, although for most of our past this has been, in part, a pack or mob mentality stemming from defending small communities. As our communities have grown much faster than our DNA has adapted we are left with a contention between empathy in small groups versus friction between larger societies. My point where Eclipse Phase comes in is who can you trust ? Where is your gut instinct (if indeed you have a gut) when it comes to your colleagues let alone your enemies. For now we are united by what is trying to kill us but I dont have a feeling yet as to what binds us together as a party. Still, no point in trying to look too far ahead.

 

At present we need some sort of anti virus capablity as its apparent that there are multpile comopnents to its infection methods. There is code piggy backing transmissions and even the lighting has been altered to carry subliminal information into the retina. Not sure of any biological infection systems as yet but that will become apparent I am sure. Definitely time to update our virus definitions.