Character Creation: FiveEvil

Not one not two not three not four but FIVE! FIVE EVIL!

The Game: FiveEvil
The Publisher: Handiwork Games
Degree of Familiarity: Well...I know 5e OK, and I know horror very well, but I've never played this

Books Required: Just the one

I'm actually a little surprised I backed this Kickstarter. I was pretty skeptical of the premise, and I find the whole "referring to D&D as the world's greatest RPG" thing to be pretty wanky and not at all true besides. But I was interested to the see the implementation, and since I'm actually running 5e, I figured I'd be able to appreciate it, whether it was well done or not.

And...I'm weirdly into it. Like, the problem I have with 5e and D&D generally is that it's not about anything. It's a corporate-produced RPG with all the edges sanded down, and that means it's easy to run and pretty easy to play, it's easy to understand, but the mechanics are not just simple but basic. They don't play into a theme because there isn't any, and despite the game's insistence that it's focused on combat, exploration, and intrigue, it's not actually about any of those. It's about "combat" inasmuch as it's about war-game style tactics, it's about exploration inasmuch as you find things and the GM tells you about them, and it's about intrigue inasmuch as it's...a roleplaying game. But none of the mechanics actually enhance those themes and ideas.

And that's fine, I hasten to add. I have lots of games that are very theme-focused and honestly? There are downsides to those, too. When you specify, you lose flexibility and (sometimes) accessibility. 

Anyway, FiveEvil takes the basic framework of 5e and then actually asks "if we want to do a horror RPG with these bones, what do we need to do to make that work?" And it...does a pretty good job.

First of all, on a thematic level, it treats horror as distinct from fear. You can't make a player feel fear (rather, you can, but never reliably; if it happens it's incidental). You can create horror, because horror is external. The game views the scenario as a trap that the characters fall into, and it's very clear that this is not a "story" per se because you need to play through it and let what happens, happen. That's simple and pretty obviously if you've been a GM for any length of time, but it's useful to say and would have been really useful to me in 1992 when I started running horror games.

Second, the mechanics actually do support the theme, and the best change that I've seen is what it does with Inspiration. In 5e, you get Inspiration when you play to your personality traits and then you can spend it to get advantage on a roll. In FiveEvil, you can take Desperation anytime to get bonuses on rolls, but if that builds up (which it's supposed to) you wind up taking penalties and/or losing access to your personality traits (on a mechanical level) as you become alienated. 

And finally, it approaches "combat" as "terror scenes," and tries to lean into the chaos of a scene like that, rather than make it strictly a tactical exercise. (And that, my friends, is something I wish we'd have thought to do with Chill. We talked about it a little but I wish we'd leaned into that idea a little harder and built the mechanics around it a little more heavily. Ah, well, too late now!)

So...fuck me, I think I'd run this, and it's really rare that a generic horror game makes me want to run it. Let's make a character!

Now, we run into the problem of there not being a default setting, of course, but there are a bunch of scenarios in the book, including one that's a little reminiscent of Cabin in the Woods, so I think I'll use that as my jumping-off point. This scenario assumes we're all about 10 years out of high school, meaning we'd be what, 28-ish (that also means we'd be born in 1998 or so, if the game is set now). 

The game wants me to start with a concept, and the conceit here is that we'll be having one last fun weekend together before we all collectively try and get our shit together. I'm gonna say my guy fronts a band. He's been posting snippets on Tiktok and so on for a long time, trying to build up a following, and it's kinda happened? But he's not getting offers to tour with Connor Price or anything (first "musician I learned about from video shorts" that came to mind), and maybe it's time to throw in the fuckin' towel. Let's call him Tyree Caulder. Tyree is 27, male, Black, fronts a band called Boxcutter (I'm thinking kinda like Houses or Foster the People). 

So the first thing I do is come up with descriptions. I get one at +4 and one at +2, and these basically apply whenever that description would. The first one is meant to be job, occupation, career, profession (yes, these are all listed). In Tyree's case, I actually don't think it's the band. I think instead he's worked in infosec for a while and he's pretty good at it, but he mostly freelances because he's still trying to make the band happen and wants his schedule free in case Connor Price ever calls (if by some weird coincidence Connor ever sees this, hey dude, love your music, "Trendsetter" gets stuck in my head a lot). 

Anyway, that first description can be unfocused freelance infosec. My second description is meant to be more a hobby or vocation, so we'll call that wannabe indie rock band front man.  

Cool, now I get to pick two skills that my first description applies to and one for my second description. Well, I think for the first one, Knowledge/Recall and Investigation make the most sense. For the second, I guess Persuasion? Oh, maybe Grit. There's not a Perform skill here, and I feel like Persuasion is the wrong skill set. Yeah, let's go with Grit - lots of late nights and long drives.

Right, and then the same thing for saves, except I just get one for each that my bonus applies. Here, I think we'll go WIS for the first one and CHA for the second.

Now we have Personality Aspects. These are the things I have to play to in order to lose Desperation. I get a Habit, a Belief, a Flaw, and a Relationship. These are expressed as sentences. Let's see...

Well, my Relationship should be with the band. I think we'll phrase it as It might be time to let the band die. No, let's say "go," not "die." "Die" is too aggressive. 

For Habit, I'm meant to consider what we'd see Tyree doing in his first scene. God help me, I think Tyree is going to be checking his phone and scrolling Tiktok a lot. (At least I won't feel too bad when he dies in the movie.)

Belief is the thing that would cause an intense argument early in the movie. I don't want to make everything about the band, but we could still make it if we got a break is pretty good here.

That just leaves Flaw, which is what would get me in trouble at the midpoint of the movie. I think Tyree films everything reflexively. Like, anything interesting or just vaugely unexpected happens, the phone's out. 

Cool! Now we do Ability Scores. The recommended method here is to roll 3d6 seven times and drop the second-lowest. Sure, fuck it, let's see how this goes. 11, 9, 7, 12, 12, 8, 4. Yep, that's about right. That means I drop the 7. 

Well, I'll put my 12s into CHA and INT. I'll put my 11 into CON. I'll put 9 into WIS, 8 into DEX, and that leaves me a 4 in STR. Jesus, that's pathetic. Guess Tyree doesn't work out much.

And that's it! I rather suspect Tyree won't last long if things get scary. 

The Strange: Travelers from Other Recursions

New game! Wooo! 

We used the "Spark" method to pick a game (based on the Spark RPG; more info here). Our sparks were as follows:

• Matt: The Gentlemen: Competency/badassery emerging from relationships and trust, winning but because of the effort and the relationships rather than isolated action
• Amanda: The Craft: Emerging supernatural power without the expectation that you’re necessarily going to be the Good Guy
• Cael: The Wildsea: Ocean-going and mobile base with base-building/upgrading elements, advancement geared around change rather than just increase
• Michelle: Murderbot Diaries: Identifying the problem and fixing it 
• Ada: The Stranger: Perception/POV changing emotional and environmental impact of stimuli/events

So based on all of that, I pitched a few games (Ashen Stars, Between Clouds, Conspiracy X, Stealing Stories for the Devil) but the one we landed on was The Strange!

Now, I ran The Strange once before, back in 2019-2020. We only got to play seven sessions and then the pandemic hit, and that particular group wasn't one that wanted to play online so we just put the game on indefinite hiatus (and obviously never picked it back up). But I always liked it; I enjoy the Cypher System anyway, and I like the idea of being able to universe-hop and change things a bit. 

So we made characters, and then last night did a little more character development and game setup, and that's what we're writing up today! None of these characters are from Earth, interestingly.

Aylin Aster, Strange Witch (Paradox) that Consorts with the Dead on Hallows. Aylin is from a recursion called Hallows, created from fictional leakage of things like Charmed, The Craft, and so on - it looks much like modern-day Earth, but magic and the supernatural are real. It's not common knowledge, but there are secret societies and government conspiracies galore. Aylin found a Book of Shadows in her grandmother's library and learned the technique of meditation and translation (which makes you wonder about her grandmother, doesn't it?). She translated to Earth and finds it interesting and familiar, but somewhat more limiting. On the other hand, since no one really has magic here, the little magic she can do really gives her an edge. Her focus on Earth is Explores Dark Places. 

Since being on Earth and hooking up with the Estate, she's started having nightmares about planetovores - eldritch beings from beyond the Strange - eating her world. That's enough of a motivation to get her to help out. 

Clay, Tough Vector that Changes Shape. Clay is from Ruk, a world governed by mad science. Clay is...kind of formless, a being that embraces change and evolution. They hibernated and, while their form rested, let their mind wander...and it wandered all the way into the Strange and onto Earth. 

Clay hates Earth. They can't shapechange here (their focus is Hunts With Great Skill here), and they feel extremely limited within its laws. But the Estate, and translation and other recursions generally, present new opportunities - perhaps Clay can find the recursion that allows them to truly evolve, and reach a zenith? 

Bismuth, Mechanical Paradox that Crafts Unique Items. Bismuth is from Waxen, a world governed by the principals of alchemy. Lead is non-toxic here, and can be used to create almost any substance by altering the balance of elements. And then the Grand Alchemist to the King performed some kind of experiment that started changing all matter into lead, and Bismuth, a crafter of metal and chemicals, found a way to escape. Of course, that may mean that everything in Waxen has been destroyed. 

Bismuth, therefore, has joined the Estate to help prevent similar disasters in other recursions. She doesn't mind Earth; chemistry works, albeit not quite in the same way. She does feel like she's less likely to explode here, but on the other hand, she's not a fan of how shiny everything is. 

Violet Spoon, Inquisitive Vector that Solves Mysteries. Violet is from Mapleplank, a recursion that just includes The House. Violet and her fellow little-folk live in The House, living around the big-folk and their mysterious ways. Violet, always natural curious, fell into a teacup next to a mysterious box of tea, and wound up on Earth! 

Earth is weird - there are no big-folk (or maybe we're all big? Although Violet is still pretty smol by comparison). But Violet likes it (she actually likes most places, because they're always interesting). She does enjoy the fact that there don't seem to be as many cats that are big enough to eat her here. Violet didn't have to be told twice to join the Estate; she wants to explore and this gives her an amazing way to do it!

These four folks are a pretty good fit for each other - Bismuth and Clay are both scientifically minded, and Clay enjoys that Bismuth is trying to change. Aylin, likewise, sees that Bismuth is haunted by what happened to her world and wants to help her, and sees Violet as adorable and needing protection. Bismuth and Violet are both fundamentally curious people, and as for Violet herself, as long as you're relatively nice and not actively trying to eat her, you're fine! 

Next time, we'll see what hijinks these folks get up to!

Movie #986: Eragon

Eragon is a fantasy/adventure movie starring Ed Speleers, Rachel Weisz, John Malkovich, Jeremy Irons, Robert Carlyle, Sienna Guillory, and Garrett Hedlund. It's based on a fantasy novel (first in a series, as is the custom) written by a homeschooled kid from Montana when he was 15. I mention that just because I think it kinda shows. 

So anyway: the titular Eragon (Speleers) is a farm boy living with his uncle (Alun Armstrong) and his cousin (Christopher Egan) in the mystical land of Alagaësia ruled over by the evil King Galbatorix (Malkovich, collecting a paycheck), his slimy vampire/mage servant Durza (Carlyle), and an army of...Urgals? Basically reddish orcs. Also some men. 

Anyway, our Arwen analog, Arya (Guillory), fleeing from Durza with a big blue jellybean, magics it away and it winds up in Eragon's lap, and then soon hatches into a dragon named Safira (Wiesz), which is a cute little puppy-thing at first but grows up really quickly (apparently by magic). From there we get your standard hero's journey; Eragon hooks up with the village sad sack Brom (Irons, apparently enjoying himself) who turns out to be a disgraced dragon-rider and insists on taking Eragon to the Varden (the resistance living in the mountains, led by Djimon Hounsou before he learned to act).

Oh, dragon-riding is a big deal. Used to be that the dragon-riders were...you know, I don't actually know what their function in Analgesia was? Elite troops? Superheroes? Demigods? Likewise, this couldn't all have been that long ago because Brom was a dragon-rider and he's still alive (his dragon isn't; a rider can survive the death of a dragon but not vice versa, in a move we call the "one-sided Dragonheart"), but everyone in Eragon's village seems to regard them as myth? Anyway, Eragon is the first dragon-rider in a long time and that's a big screaming deal for getting the resistance to rally and go after the king or something.

This movie is bad, and I've been thinking about why. It's not the effects, those are actually pretty good. Obviously the dragon is CGI, but it looks decent - there were no moments that looked badly, obviously fake. The sound design when it's a puppy is actually really cute. The fight scenes are pretty shit, lots of jumpy cuts and these people clearly didn't do their own stunts, but whatever, not everything can be Lord of the Rings. 

No, I think it's bad because it feels at once very familiar and like they're not telling us enough. We don't really learn much about the history and culture of Aphantasia, just the very broad strokes that set up the plot. But without the context of that history, it's hard to know what the stakes really are. And at the same time, it feels so much like a surface-level Lord of the Rings (or Star Wars, or Harry Potter, or whatever) knock-off that we feel like we're going through the motions. 

If we had a lead that was charismatic and fun to spend time with, that might be something, but I'm sorry, Ed Speleers is no Daniel Radcliffe. He's OK, but he's blond and bland and...so, so white (as in bread), and it was another five years after this movie that he started getting work again (he has gone on to a fairly steady career, so presumably he learned to act at some point). Malkovich is phoning it in with an apathy that's almost inspiring; at least Carlyle and Irons muster the energy to chew the scenery. Guillory would have been more interesting with more to do, same for Hedlund as Murtagh, the rogue/ranger who shows up to follow Eragon around. I kept hoping they'd kiss, that at least would have been interesting. 

I have no idea if the book is any better (it'd almost have to be, since a lot of my complaints cook down to the movie letting the audience's knowledge of other fantasy properties fill in the gaps and the book probably doesn't do that at least as much), but it's pretty telling that the planned sequels to this movie were cancelled. Throw it on the heap with Alex Rider. 

My Grade: D
Rewatch Value: IINSIAIFWT

Next up: Siren

Midnight Muscadines: Twilight Snuggle

Yesterday we played a game of Midnight Muscadines, having finished out foray into Shadowrun. Let's jam!

(That's very funny if you know anything about this game. You can learn more here. It's pretty cool.)

We open at the Halfway Inn, a cozy little teahouse kind of thing. Five folks are around the table for some patisserie:

• Opal is a duskywhim (moth-like person) songheart, and a member of the Storycloak Guild. Of course, like all duskywhims, they don't really talk, but can play music on a lute-like stringed instrument. They also have a habit of staring at...everything. If they blink they might not see something!
• Torneko is a tatterling (mysterious hooded figure with button eyes; might be a walking teddy bear, we don't know) rookwright and one of the Cloud Coven. She has a small, mechanical creature with her called Bobbin. She also has a habit of falling asleep at inopportune times, meaning Bobbin acts as an alarm clock as much as anything.
• Timbertrod is a woadling (a plant-person) honeywarden of the Verdengarde. Timbertrod has a colony of bees living in their body (basically a walking tree, it's cool, there's room), and extracts honey to trade and give out. Their bees buzz in warning when something bad is about to happen, which is handy.
• Cinderspark Sooter is a patchfolk (basically a big, bipedal raccoon-person) wanderlustian of the Meadowlarch, and as such is an expert negotiator and trader. She also has a habit of compulsively apologizing for everything. She wears a smart coat and a hat with a nifty little tassel.
• Trill is a murmuren (weird furry-frog creature) wildergarde and member of The Fieldhouse. Trill (not his real name; his real name is unpronounceable to most other folk) is most at home among animals, and takes care of the shop night cat and the brindlehowls and mossbacks and so on that live in the area. He has no qualms whatever about stealing from people, since people take from the world all the time.

The Master Pâtissier Beulah Crumb emerges and gives these folks an assortment of pastries and scones to try out (they're delicious), but is clearly fretting. It seems that the noted food critic Nibella McQuaff is going to be here soon, but the shipment of ingredients that the Meadowlarch was meant to deliver hasn't come! Beulah needs at least a few days to refine the ingredients and make the pastries, and is just beside herself that she might not be able to. If McQuaff gives them a bad review, it could spell the end of the Inn!

Cinderspark, a Meadowlarch herself, knows the fellow who was meant to be bringing these things, a nimmian (one of the two types of humans here) named Boss Mortimer. Mortimer isn't the sort to be late or to abscond with goods, so something is clearly wrong. There are six crates of ingredients that should have been delivered. Trill asks for a list, which Beulah readily provides, and Cinderspark looks them over. 

(A side note: magic in this setting is centered around jam, and you can make jam out of these ingredients, or mix ingredients to create jam that has an entirely new power! So these ingredients can be pretty valuable.)

The five of them agree to go out and try to go along the route Mortimer was taking and figure out what happened. Beulah says she needs to have everything in no less than seven days, or else she won't have enough time to make what she needs to make. That seems plenty of time! Beulah sets up a huge hourglass on the mantle and flips it, and sand begins slowly falling...

The group gets their adventuring gear together. Opal goes outside and rings their mossback bell, and their mossback, Kudzu (because she gets into everything) comes trudging up. Trill chips at her a bit (and Kudzu is happy to chat a moment), and then everyone heads out along the Twilight Road!

After a bit of travel, the road just...stops. And there's a mountain in the way. There shouldn't be a mountain here. It's just a huge, sheer cliff, stretching up into the night. Trill climbs a tree to look at the stars and orient himself, but yeah, they're in the right place, there's just a mountain here where there wasn't before. It goes for miles in either direction, so their only way forward is up. 

Fortunately, Opal has some Nimbrussle Jam. They spread a bit on a bit of scone and feed it to Kudzu, and Kudzu is weightless! Everyone gets on as she begins to float...but then she begins to freak out and tries to run through the air!

Trill grabs her harness and swings down in front of her (murmurens are small creatures, so this doesn't harm Kudzu), and uses his Balancekeeper's Touch ability, correcting Kudzu's imbalance and mitigating her fear. Problem is, of course, that the imbalance has to go somewhere, and Trill feels muddled. He climbs back on Kudzu's back, lays down and looks up at the stars, peeping to himself. 

The others continue to help Kudzu up. Timbertrod loops a bit of rope around a tree and pulls Kudzu up, while Torneko finds handholds that she might use. Cinderspark finally appeals to Kudzu's better instincts, ties a bit of scone on a line, and uses it to lure her to float upwards to the top (whereupon she munches the scone and starts snuffling around Cinderspark's pack for more). 

And now that we're at the top, what? The Twilight Road appears fragmented, with parts of it looking normal and beaten down, and parts obscured by old growth forest. And there's a weird, glowing cloud, inside of which the characters can see...events? It seems to be night, though, so Trill starts setting up camp. The others look at the cloud, though.

They see the butt of a naked nimmian disappearing into the woods. They see crates getting pulled away, they see chaos and movement...and then one of them touches the cloud, and everything gets very swimmy for a moment...

...and they're back at the Halfway Inn, sitting down for breakfast, and then Beulah rushes in to tell them about her missing ingredients. 

"I think we dreamed this," says Trill, still somewhat muddled. "And now we're doing it for real." The others are just as perplexed, but Torneko consults her watch and the hourglass and realizes that while her watch is keeping "accurate" time (that is, time has passed), as far as when they are now, it's earlier that day. They realize that they'll need to scale the cliff again, but this time at least they know they need to scale the cliff. 

Trill has an idea - there are some marsos in a nearby stable. A marso is a kind of possum/horse creature, good as riding animals, capable of climbing extremely well. 

WHO'S A GOOD MARSO

He slips into the table and chitters at the marsos a bit, explaining that they need to get up a sheer cliff wall and maybe they can climb it? The marsos are thrilled at the idea (they love climbing), and Trill unhitches their stalls and leads them all out silently, making use of his Shadowfawn jam to move silently. Opal, meanwhile, flutters around and plays their instrument, distracting anyone who might be nearby to see the marso heist. 

Timbertrod, before they head out, reaches into the roots and draws out the confusion that's getting in Trill's way, clearing up his mind ("where's my camping gear?"). 

Thus newly equipped, the party heads back out, two of them each on a marso (they leave Kudzu behind, which doesn't thrill Opal, but they have to admit that Kudzu isn't going to want to float back up a cliff). They get to the cliff and the marsos easily make the climb, and now they're back at the weird jumble of road and the glowing time-cloud. Trill tells the marfos to head back to the stable, you know, whenever they feel like it. 

They try and track what happened (avoiding the cloud), and Cinderspark realizes she's standing in a giant footprint. The foot was wearing a shoe (and a darned nice one), and it looks like whatever made these prints chased someone down a path. Another path looks like it was made by a cart; that was probably the Meadowlarch troop coming in, so no point following that. The last one has crates being dragged away. 

The characters follow the first trail, and the woods quickly grow thick and oppressive. And then they notice a long tendril-like thing snaking around the handle of Torneko's weaver blade. Opal notices it first and gets excited, thinking it's a thread they can eat, but no, it's a vine. 

The creeper vines - for that's what they are, semi-sentient plants that steal whatever they wrap up - try to yank the blade away. Opal tries to free it, Trill tries to point out where to cut it, and Torneko tries to pull it free, but it's Cinderspark whacking it with her quill and repeating "LET GO LET GO LET GO" that does it. They continue walking and, looking up, see clothes, boots, and trinkets hanging from vines. (Trill's eyes get big, everyone else reminds him that they have other things to focus on.)

And then they hear yelling, and find Mortimer strung up in vines, naked as a jaybird, calling for help. As they approach, they are confronted by a small creature with wings, riding a glasshare - a pixie! The pixie grandstands a bit, talking about having rightfully stolen Boss Mortimer.

Trill, however, while he's very much OK with stealing things, is not OK with stealing people. He sneaks behind Mortimer (who is hung up on multiple creeper vines), making use of his Shadowfawn jam, and starts cutting the vines with his cutpurse knife. Meanwhile the others keep the pixie, Gilderboots, talking, until finally there's a crash and Mortimer tumbles to the ground. 

Gilderboots makes some grumbly noises, but Trill says that he's rightfully stolen Mortimer, and the pixie sods off on his glasshare. Mortimer gets dressed (and Trill steals everything else that was hanging from the vines) and everyone heads back to the wagon, which Mortimer starts to turn rightways up. He also says that his partner, Rance, is still missing, as are the mossbacks that were pulling the wagon. 

The characters follow another path and, in the distance, see a strangely constructed shack. It just...leans weird. There are people milling around, and a couple of mossbacks. Apparently they've found Rance? 

They talk with Rance (except Torneko, who finds a very comfy bed in the shack and goes down for a nap), and he's clearly confused. He seems to have forgotten...well, who he is, what he's doing here, his mossbacks' names. Trill talks with the mossbacks and learns that they're called Acorn and Butternut, and they don't seem to be missing any memories (not that mossbacks have long memories to begin with; they would very much like to get back to pulling the wagon, which they both enjoy). 

But as they're talking, a figure in ragged clothes approaches (or appears?). Its hands are too long, its voice is soft, and it calls itself Oublie. It offers to help, but wants to bargain, and Opal recognizes it as a "dwindler," a creature that can slowly steal memories from others. 

[There was a pixie named Niceshoes in here, that rode a night cat, but buggered if I can remember what he did during this scene.]

Bargaining, though, is what Cinderspark does. She negotiates with Oublie, offering up an ingredient she's carrying, some of the trinkets that Trill swiped (which Trill reluctantly volunteers), and, best of all, Timbertrod calls up an ancient memory of his race. The stakes are high, though - Cinderspark bargains not only for Rance and the mossbacks, but all of the other people trapped here. Some intense discussions follow, but Oublie eventually accepts the deal, and the characters leave with their prizes (and someone does remember to wake Torneko up). 

They return to Mortimer and reunite him and Rance (though Rance doesn't remember him, but Mortimer is willing to make new memories with him now). They hitch the mossbacks up to the wagon, and follow the path with the crates, hoping to find them intact.

As they approach the end of the path, they hear someone huge weeping. They round the corner and, near the edge of a cliff, they find a...giant pixie? It looks like a pixie, but it's immense, and it's wearing really, really nice shoes. The crates are splayed out around it, and a couple of them have been cracked open. 

They talk with the pixie (whose name is Swankyclogs), and he reveals that he was the smallest of the three brothers and wanted to be bigger. So he ate a couple of those ingredients and now he's too big, and wants to get small again! But not too small. He still wants to be bigger than his brothers. 

The Marmeteers realize that the two crates he ate from were Wikenweed (which pulls dreams into the waking world) and Zephyr's Dew (which can alter reality). Eating those two things together must have brought his dream of being bigger to life, but in an uncontrolled way. Torneko gets him to focus on being the right size, while Trill helps him to think about balance ("not too, not too") while a bit more Zephyr's Dew is applied, and Swankyclogs shrinks to his normal size - maybe a bit bigger? 

He calls up his mount, a sugarnewt named Glucose, and tells the Marmeteers to get these crates out of here; he doesn't trust them. At last the characters have everything put together, but what they don't have is enough time to get everything back. And how would they get the wagon down the cliff, anyway?

"We lick the cloud," says Trill. Gather everything together and make use of the time loop. They gather everything up, all hold hands, and...lick.

The character's gather round the table for breakfast pastries, only now there are two very perplexed mossbacks and a bunch of crates with them! Beulah has her ingredients, and is able to make the pastries for Nibella McQuaff! 

The reviews are positive, though not exactly glowing. This only spurs Beulah, in the way of a true artist, to try harder in future, and the story of the Halfway Inn continues. 

Shadowrun: Of Course You Know, This Means War

 (guest post by Michelle)

Wednesday morning arrives, and our group wakes up late after crashing the night before. Val (formerly Cleo) takes off to go check in on her place and make sure no one’s hocked her stuff, after imparting everything she can remember about the abandoned warehouse in the Barrens where the war council is supposed to take place. Coil and Kombucha get some blueprints of the place and set about making a plan with the rest of the group for how to approach the event. Hocus heads over in early afternoon to get some astral recon in, and what he sees is basically an empty warehouse with fenced yard around it and a gate, and a couple of nonmagical guards hanging around the door. There’s a main section that’s a huge warehouse/truck loading area, and then an office side that’s only one story high, sort of built onto the side of the main space.

After some discussion, the team decides to get a couple people in position a little bit before the event, and then spends the day doing upkeep, maintenance, and generally getting ready. The other thing that gets noted is that the commentary on the “Ripper” means that Griffin, the missing street hitter, is likely running a Jack the Ripper chip (a bad idea no matter who is running it) and is probably linked to the dead, cut-up hookers being left on street corners in the Barrens in the last two weeks.

A little detective work on the part of the team, combined with running the local Lone Star police blotter feed records, yields a 15 block radius in the Barrens, just northwest of the main inhabited/business area of the Barrens, down toward Bellevue. Looking over things, the team decides that the best way to get Griffin’s attention is to use one of their own as bait. Since Cappy’s the prettiest, they decide to dress Cappy up after the war council in some of Kombucha’s clubwear and set up  an ambush. First, though, the war council and Khan/Cooperman have to get taken down.

So after they pick up some dinner on the way out to the council in the Gorpmobile, Kombucha parks a few blocks away and sends in his drones. Hocus and Coil sneak into the yard and climb up on top of the warehouse so they can peek in one of the skylights. There’s a skeleton crew of Blood Ragers there, getting the place ready. Inside, there’s a table set up with a couple kegs of beer, some chips, and a bowl of candy – it’s all giving big “con hospitality suite” vibes. The rest of the group waits, and then five after 8, everyone arrives at once (in the way of gang war councils). There’s like a parade of gang colors, each with a leader and a small entourage and bannerman driving up and being let in, one group at a time. They each take their place in the yard, forming up around various burn barrels. Eight different groups show up, followed at the end by Cooperman surrounded by a contingent of Blood Ragers and flanked by two women acting as bodyguards. Each of the gangs has a clear leader along with a single second/bodyguard – they all go inside, accompanied by Cooperman and his two guards. The rest of the gangers start milling about outside, more or less civil if not exactly social.

As the initial refreshments and festivities get kicked off, Diablo sneaks in, dressed in plain black leathers, to ostensibly sell some “party favors” to the gangers. He knows a couple of them, so they nod him in and he makes a quick sale for cover. He eventually sneaks closer to the building until he’s standing by the window with a clear shot inside as needed, letting everything else move around him and all the others forget he’s there.

Not too longer after he gets in place, Cappy comes over the side fence, offering booze to the group in front of the gate in an effort to get them out of the way . Kombucha has his drone Bad Harry around the very back of the building, out of sight, start playing some music. Cappy says that the booze is courtesy of the Khan, and he’s just charming enough that the gangers fall for it, moving out of the way.

Meanwhile, inside the building, Cooperman has taken his place on the podium inside the building. The two bodyguards flank him, one on either side, and a quick scan tells Hocus that they’re both street mages. This prospect didn’t get impossible, but it’s not going to be the cakewalk that Val was. Still, nothing’s going to make it better. One of them casts a spell – Detect Enemies, but between Hocus and Coil, they manage to make their Will saves so that the spell doesn’t detect them, and none of the rest of the team is in potential line of sight.

Hocus casts a manaball, but it doesn’t do much to the mages (works decently on the other gang leaders, though) and people scatter. His air elemental swoops down and tries to smother Cooperman, but the mages are defending him, so he has a chance to fight it off. Diablo draws out his bow and aims at one of the mages, skewering her quite effectively before she can do anything to interfere. Coil keeps an eye out for trouble and bodyguards Hocus, taking shots at the gang leaders below, while Cappy starts hoofing it back over the wall and to the van after locking the gate behind him, to slow down pursuit.

The second mage throws up an Armor spell and gives up her attention to defending Cooperman. Again, though, Diablo goes early and often, and manages to put an arrow in her eye well before anyone even knows where they came from, shooting through the window as he is. Hocus stenches the rest of the leaders inside, drooping a bit from spell drain, and the air elemental manages to incapacitate Cooperman and whisk him out through a window, showering glass on the ground.

And of course, someone outside yells, “it’s a trap!” not knowing what’s going on, and the fragile truce that was holding for at least the duration of the meeting is broken, and everyone starts attacking everyone else, running for cover and generally making bad decisions. Someone’s going to come out on top, but it’s not going to be Cooperman at this point.

The air elemental rushes Cooperman back to the Gorpmobile and drops him through the roof hatch. Coil jumps off the roof and heads over the wall, while Hocus levitates off the roof to the street. Diablo manages to Kool-Aid man his way through the closest fence and everyone gets picked up by the van at the end of the street, with Kombucha driving off like crazy and manages to get away in the confusion.

While Kombucha is driving, Hocus looks for the chip in Cooperman’s datajack. He sees it, looks it over, and pulls it out. In the process, however, something sparks hard, there’s a terrible smell of burnt flesh, and Cooperman convulses. Hocus tries to heal him, but Cooperman’s dead and the chip is zorched. Once they’re far enough away, they pull over and Kombucha pulls out his tools, taking a run at fixing the chip. Coil took a look first, but he’s more of a coder than an electrician. Kombucha’s all about the hardware, though, and manages to clean up and mostly repair (or at least confirm it’s accessible) the chip’s data.

The team grabs a quick moment of respite and some snacks, dumping Cooperman’s body along the way. Cappy gets changed into his outfit and they drive up to an abandoned, partially burnt-out old truck stop over by the highway that’s within the area. There’s a working streetlight and some smaller buildings around to give some cover. The group sets up – Kombucha pulls the van around out of sight, and his spider drone Edith Piaf takes a ride in Cappy’s beard. Diablo goes up on the roof of the main building and lays down with a gun, acting as oversight. Coil goes inside the building and covers Cappy, while Hocus is in a secondary building waiting to set his fire elemental on Griffin as needed. A couple of people stop – this area’s rep as a “rest stop” is well known, apparently; the regulars who work this spot have the sense to take some time off so as to avoid getting slashed up, which means the coast is clear. Both are sent on their way by Cappy. Finally, a black sedan pulls up and a man gets out, wearing all black, with glowing yellow cybereyes in the misty evening air.

He asks for directions, mentioning the weather, and offers a moment out of the rain in his car. Over comms, Coil confirms that this guy is Griffin, and Cappy plays it a little coy. He talks money and gets closer, and then Griffin flexes and his hand razors come out. Luckily, no one is surprised, and the whole team comes to Cappy’s rescue. Griffin/Jack is snarling and cursing as he attacks Cappy, determined to do some up close slashing damage. It doesn’t take long to put him down, though Cappy only evades the first couple attacks by the skin of his teeth. Diablo and Coil shoot and put Griffin down, proving that sheer fuckery is really no defense against a couple of well-placed bullets.

With Griffin shot and down, Coil this time goes to remove the chip, and nothing seems to go wrong. Griffin gets dropped at a doc shop given that he did try to help Freya, and the kills weren’t really his doing and the team have a little bit of ethical code going on. They call Roxanne and get told to meet her at the Banshee, where she and Urlan take back the chips, as agreed, and pay the team handsomely, as agreed. On the way over, it comes up that no one here feels like making decisions above their paygrade about what people might intend to do with these chips; it’s enough to do the small bit of general good having kept the company in Urlan’s hands and out of Junior/HSE. Shadowrunners aren’t paid for ethical or moral qualms, after all. In the end, everyone starts planning for how to spend/invest their pay, and maybe—just maybe—they’ll work together again in the future.

Movie #985: Sinners

Sinners is a horror movie (but that's really simplifying it) directed by Ryan Coogler and starring Michael B. Jordan, Miles Caton, Jack O'Connell, Hailee Steinfeld, Wunmi Mosaku, Delroy Lindo, Jayme Lawson, Omar Benson Miller, and Li Jun Li. 

In 19332, the Moore Twins, "Smoke" and "Stack" (both played by Jordan in an Oscar-winning role), return to the Mississippi Delta after serving in the Army and then going to Chicago to work for the Mob (Capone is mentioned, but they were apparently playing both ends against the middle anyway). They set up a juke joint and recruit their cousin Sammie (Caton) to sing and play guitar, local blues legend Delta Slim (Lindo) to play music, Smoke's wife Annie (Mosaku) to cook, local grocer Grace (Li) and her husband Bo (Yao) to provide signage and materials, and their very lorge buddy Cornbread (Miller) to work the door. 

They open the place and play host to a bunch of locals, including Stack's ex-lover Mary (Steinfeld) and Sammie's crush Pearline (Lawson), and Sammie blows the doors off playing and singing; his music reaches across time and summons dancers and musicians from the past and the future, the roof burns, and everyone comes together in reverie. 

While the joint is hopping, however, an Irish vampire named Remmick (O'Connell) shows up, and this situation turns into From Dusk Til Dawn real fast - everyone is killed except for Sammie and Smoke, and Smoke hangs around until the dude who sold the twins the place (David Maldonado - the dude, not the place) comes back with all his Klan buddies and fucking massacres them. Cut to 1992, and Sammie is an old man playing the blues in Chicago when Stack and Mary (both vampires) show up to say hi and offer him immortality (which he refuses). 

There is so, so much I'm leaving out, because this movie is goddamn fantastic and layered and beautiful. It is legit one of the best horror movies ever made, it's beautiful shot and visually realized, and the soundtrack and score are the best things I've heard in a movie since O Brother Where Art Thou? Michael B. Jordan's performance is amazing, he makes both of the twins distinct and recognizable, and manages to act with himself to the point that it's very easy to forget that it's one actor playing both roles. Miles Caton is not only an amazing singer, but imbues Sammie with an old soul quality and a naivety that makes him a perfect POV character, but this is very much an ensemble cast. We get Mary's frustration at not being allowed to be fully part of this world, Pearline clearly just being out for fun and then being pulled into something much bigger (and then killed), and Annie realizing, I think before everyone else does, that there's no way any of them are walking away.

And then there's Jack O'Connell, playing a vampire who adapts his approach in seconds, going from begging for his life when he's being chased by vampire hunters to trying to talk people into letting him and his cohort in (they're that type of vampire) to resorting the vicious threats when manipulation doesn't work. And yet, you can almost feel a bit of sympathy for him, as he mentions that long ago his people were driven out by the Christians, and all he wants is to see his people and hear his own music again. 

I don't really have criticisms. This was my pick for Best Picture last year, and I'm still annoyed that One Battle After Another, which by comparison I found really trite and forgettable, beat it. 

My Grade: A
Rewatch Value: High

Next up: Probably whatever Toasty gives me today, but failing that, Siren

Character Creation: Harvest

It's a bear, it's a bear, it's a man, it's a man, in a cage/big wicker dude.

The Game: Harvest
The Publisher: Possum Creek Games
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

Harvest was crowdfunded along with Grand Guignol, and I have to say, I think this one sticks the landing a lot better. It's much more focused and tells a three-act story with a defined break point between acts, and it has very solid media touchstones (two of which I was referencing at the start of this post). Coincidentally one of my groups was looking for a GMless game to play on Devil's Night, so I think we're gonna give this one a whirl. Which of course just means I should make a character to try it out!

(The chargen process is not at all complicated, of course, it's a Belonging Without Belonging game, I'm mostly just going to circle some things). 

Anyway, Harvest is a folk horror game that tells the story of the people on the Island (off the English coast), and the days leading up to the sacrifice. Like other BwB games, players can get tokens by doing some moves and spend them to do others, but unlike, say, Dream Askew where it's "weak" vs. "strong" moves, here you spend tokens to use occult moves and have your power (the otherworldly entity that you're involved with) do things for you. It's all pretty intricate and the story beats are timed around certain tokens getting spent in certain places, and I'm pretty keen to try it out.

So, first thing we do to make a character is pick a playbook. These all very much pass the Chupp test for me. I think I'm gonna pick The Stranger, because I know I won't want to play that when we actually play but I think it's a cool character (the archetype here is Sgt. Neil Howie in The Wicker Man, though Josh from Midsommar works, too. Actually a bunch of the characters from Midsommar work).

Starting off: Name, pronouns. One of the suggestions for "name" is "a dashing mononym." I think we'll call my guy "Kingfisher." 

Three things that people notice: naval tattoos, a commanding voice, hands scarred by violence. I think Kingfisher was a military man, but not an officer or a toff. Very much a working man (which is why I didn't choose "a sense that you're out of place"). 

Why can't I just leave? Oh, man, all good choices, these. I think I'll pick "there's a terrible storm brewing;" if I were actually playing I'd want to tie that in to the thing that happens if the sacrifice fails (one of the choices is "the island is swallowed by the hateful sea"). 

Three things I've brought with me: ooh, definitely a pistol loaded with a single shot. That's downright Chekovian, that is. Also "nightmares of carnage and blood on your hands" and "a well-thumbed Bible." 

Two things I left behind: The name my parents gave me, and...man, some great choices, but the one that keeps calling me is "my Christian faith."

Next would be ties to other PCs, but as always, just me, so I'll skip that.

My occult power is either The Church, The Crown, or The University. Pretty obviously not the last one. Eh, I think it's gotta be the Crown, the Church assumes I'm actually there to spread the good word, and I don't wanna do that. 

OK, so what's Kingfisher's mission from the Crown? I think it's "to make this place a bloody example." Someone in the government either knows what's going on here or has some other reason to think this place is doing seditious, pagan shit, and they've had Kingfisher come in to stop things, messily. Ooh, no, wait, I got a better one - "arrest the seditious ringleader!" Kingfisher is a kind of bounty hunter for the Crown, that's where he got the name (a kingfisher is a bird that catches fish). I note my three occult moves on my sheet; I don't get the other ones until I actually succumb to my power a bit. 

And that's it! Kingfisher is big, strong, rough, older gent, multiple naval tattoos on his arms and chest, but all above the elbows (they aren't easily visible when he's dressed). White hair, clean shaved, blue eyes - I'm trying to think of who could play him and I keep coming up with Stephen Lang, but that's not quite right. Actually, change the eye color and Djimon Hounsou would be fantastic.