Character Creation: Cold Steel Wardens

Got a few hours before Chill players get here, so let's make a character.

The Game: Cold Steel Wardens
The Publisher: Blackfall Press 
Degree of Familiarity: Not much. I played it at Origins a bunch of years ago, but I don't remember much about it.
Books Required: Just the one.

Cold Steel Wardens is a supers game, and I have a bunch of those, but this one focuses specifically on the Iron Age of comics. So inspiration comes from things like Watchmen, The Dark Knight Returns, The Boys, and so on. It's not that no one has super powers, but the staunch moral center of the characters is...perhaps a little skewed.

I remember thinking, when I played this game, that the concept was cool but the system didn't do much to bring the themes out. Looking back on the write-up I did when I played it, I also noted that there were some fiddly bits to the system that probably didn't need to be there but were legacies of other games (and boy howdy, I'm well familiar with those; Chill 2nd had a shitload).

Well, anyway, let's make a character!

Step One is to print out a copy of the character sheet, which I have.

Step Two is to think of a concept. Well, I don't have a concept per se, but I have a theme song:

That's "Fast Talk" by Houses. It's a song that's been in my rotation a lot of late. I really like the line "Maybe God is just a cop that we can fast-talk" but really the whole song is sad and evocative (which is kind of where my aesthetic lives these days, if we're honest). The chorus also ends with "we'd better run," but it's almost a throwaway, and I like that underlying feeling of danger.

So I think my character was a street punk. Did some mugging, burglary, looting during blackouts, but never sold drugs and didn't carry a gun. And then one night he and his pals picked the wrong woman to harass, and she killed them all (thinking here of the mugging scene in Watchmen, which, in the movie, involved Silk Specter stabbing a motherfucker in the neck). My character sat there up against an alley wall, bleeding out with a knife in his chest, and something changed.

He stood up and pulled out the knife, and saw clarity. He hadn't deserved to die, and neither had his friends, but then again, they didn't not deserve to die. They had brought violence to someone who hadn't deserved that, but then, she brought violence to others nightly. He had to stop this clarity before it drove him mad, but he knew three things: He was dead, he was alive, and the truth, the clarity, would always be there if he wanted to look at it.

He stumbled back to his shitty studio apartment and told his roommate about what had happened. His roommate (a former physics major who'd gotten thrown out of college for selling drugs) helped him test the limits of his ability, and somewhere in the experiments used the word "anomaly." It appealed to my character. In life, his name was Darren Darby, but now he stalks the nights as "Anomaly."

Cool, good start. I think Anomaly needs better-than-average physical prowess, and maybe some kind of heightened senses or precognition to represent his "clarity" power, but I'll get to that.

Step Three is to assign points to my Vitals, which form the acronym "MAFIANAP," which...OK, that's a little weird. I get 32 points to put in. How's this system work? Oh, right, it's d10 dice pool, target number is 6 or better, 0s count as two hits, and 1s cancel a hit (ugh). So it's OWoD, basically. Hrm. If I divide up my points equally, I'm at slightly better than average across the board (the book says 3 is about average), but I don't want to do that. So!

Magnetism: Social skills and charisma. Not something I think Anomaly needs. 2
Accuracy: Fine motor control, driving, ranged weapons. 3 is fine.
Force: Athletics and melee stuff. I want this high. 7
Intellect: Smart-making. 2
Agility: Speed and some athletics stuff. I need it a little higher; 5 is fine.
Nerve: Physical strain threshold. 4
Awareness: 2; I think what Anomaly does here is mostly informed by his powers.
Psyche: Mental strain. I've got 7 left, holy shit. Um. I'll put 5 here, and go back and add one to Awareness and one to Accuracy.

Step Four is Skills, Masteries, and Powers. I've got 85 points here. Good grief.

Well, let's start with Skills. The book says that without a rating in a skill, you've got no training it, meaning if you ain't got no Drive you don't have a license. I'm not sure I like that, but I do like that they pointed it out. I'm supposed to be well-rounded, skill-wise, and my max in a skill is the controlling Vital + 3, so that's useful, too.

Starting at the top, the physical skills are Athletics, Armed Melee, Armed Ranged, Stealth, and Unarmed. I kinda want all of these to have a decent rating, except maybe Armed Ranged, so I'll put in 5, 5, 1, 5, and 5, respectively.

Next up, Investigative. I have Canvass, Examination, Investigation (BOO REPETITION), Notice, and Research. I want Notice to be decent, but the other stuff doesn't need much. I think that Research we can actually skip. So I'll do Canvass 1, Examination 1, Investigation 2, Notice 4.

Social! Deception, Intimidation, Intuition, Persuasion, and Reputation. Well, Deception can be 1 (I see Anomaly as almost unaware that lying is an option), Intimidation needs to be high, so let's call it 4, Intuition likewise, 4, Persuasion is 1, and Reputation is 1.

Knowledge. Cultural, Criminal, Esoteric, Historical, Scientific. 1, 3, 1, 0, 0, respectively.

Finally, Technical. Driving, Fine Manipulation, Piloting, Mechanics, Vehicle Combat. What a weird collection of skills. OK, Driving 2, Fine Manipulation 1, Piloting 0, Mechanics 1, Vehicle Combat 0.

So in total, that's 49 points. I assume that's viable. On we go! Masteries! These are 3 points each, and they have prereqs. Let's see. OK, there are a bunch of these, but I like some of them. I want Quick (bonus to initiative), Tough (harder to hurt), Sense Ambush (which means I need to bump my Notice to 5, which is fine), Nightsight, and Street Fighting. That's 15 points, plus 1 for the extra point of Notice, so I've spent 65. 20 more.

Powers. Hmm. OK, so powers have a "buy-in" cost, and then you can buy a rating, too, which is 2 per dice. I assume the first die is covered by the buy-in cost, but it doesn't actually say that and there's no example of chargen GRR. I've only got 20 points left and some of the powers are expensive, so let's see what stands out.

OK, no special pre-cog like powers. I do like Affliction, though. Anomaly can touch a target and give them spasms of pain and cold, incapacitating them. It's a 10-point buy in, and I'll spend the other 10 points to give myself 5 dice in it.

That's all my points, and I do technically get Specialties in some of my skills, but I'm gonna jump ahead to Step Six and pick my Flaws. I have to take 2, but if I take more I get more points. Oh, I'm definitely taking a few, I like these, they're nicely low-key. I want Inattentive (I lose a die on Investigative skills) and Limited Charisma, which takes care of my required ones.

Now for the gravy, I'll take Low Tech (anything more complex than a car, I get a -4) and Merciful (I won't kill if I can avoid it and I don't torture). I'll take Poverty, too, and just because it's in-concept, I'll take Uneducated. That's 4 more Flaws, 12 more points. Neat!

OK, back to Step 5 for Specialties. I get a Specialty for every 3 dice in a Skill, and an Optional Effect for every 3 dice in a Power. Let's start with Skills. Wait, shit. Actually, I'll spend these last 12 points and then do this stuff.

Well, I still don't have a way to represent the power of "clarity," but I think some of it might be all in Anomaly's head. There is a power called "Sense," though...oh, wait, no, Sensitivity! Perfect! Anomaly can sense "chaos." If someone is in turmoil - scared, confused, crazy - he can sense them. Ah, hell, it's 10 to buy in, that's more than I thought, and it only leaves me with 2 more points. Hmm. Let's drop my point in Mechanics and take the Truthful Flaw (I mentioned earlier he's a lousy liar). That gives me 4 more points, meaning I can take Sensitivity at 3 dice, so I get an Optional Effect.

Cool! So now Specialties. I'll take:

Athletics (Climbing), Armed Melee (Improvised Weapons), Stealth (Hiding), Unarmed (none, that's what Mastery is for), Notice (Spot Motion), Intimidation (The Stare), Intuition (None), Criminal (Gangs).

OK, and then I get an Optional Effect for Affliction. I'll take At Death's Door, so I can choose not to kill with it.

Derived Traits! The formulae are on the sheets, so I'll just fill 'em in.

And, finally, Memories, Motivations, and Stances. I need two each, which is fine.

Well, memory is pretty self-explanatory; these are formative moments for Anomaly. "Stabbed to death while mugging a woman" seems pretty good, and then I think I'd like one from pre-death, so "breaking into a house for the first time."

Motivations! I think that atonement is obvious, but I think it's too obvious. "Understand the chaos" is one, and "protect people from their own chaos" are his motivations.

Stances! These are personal philosophies, written as things the character would actually say. Sure, sounds good. Anomaly's are "Everyone has chaos inside them, not evil" and "Lies are chaos."

Anomaly wears sturdy, black clothing and a half mask. He puts charcoal on his eyes to disguise them, and he wears fingerless gloves. He wears a special coat that his roommate designed; if pulled too hard, it comes off, meaning that if someone grabs it, Anomaly can shed it like a gecko's tail. 

Whew! Long process, but I think that's it!

Blue Rose: Back on the Road

Last night the intrepid party got back on the road to Aldis after finally leaving Verdaunen. One of the players opined that we might just skip straight there. HA. There's still like 400 miles to go.

The characters are now traveling with three of the Sovereign's Finest: Bresla (the sister of the man whose murder they were initially accused of; she's a Spirit Dancer); Gyell (a rhy-dog who has struck up a friendship with Pansy); and Pirry (a human warrior with a fascination with fire and a predilection for polearms).

They have a horse-drawn carriage now, so they travel by road, but stick near the Rose River so that Whirlpool can stay hydrated. Whirlpool has rededicated himself to physical perfection (after we determined that his previous Calling didn't really fit), and so he runs along the river's edge, does backflips, and generally acts extra as befitting a swashbuckler. The others trade off driving the carriage, riding "shotgun" (riding...short bow?), and chilling in the carriage itself.

They stop for the night and Whirlpool brings them fish to make into stew, and Arlen states that his blood is turning to stew, since that's all they seem to eat. They bed down, and on the morrow they get moving again.

The second day is a bit more eventful; Dobbin hears a noise in the brush and Gyell sniffs it out and reports that it's a deer, so they go a-hunting and bring the deer back to eat. That night they feast on venison and some green berries that Bresla finds called "bite berries," which are sour enough to make your face pucker, but that (she says) help stave off scurvy and can flavor meat nicely.

That night, Arlen dreams that the camp is empty, everyone is gone, and the horses are dead. He hears a whimper and sees Gyell, badly wounded, dragging the box that held the Mask - empty. He drops the box at Arlen's feet and rasps "I'm sorry, I couldn't stop-" before collapsing dead. Arlen wakes with a start - everything is fine. Whirlpool and Pirry are sparring, Bresla and Dobbin are packing up camp. Gyell notes Arlen's distress and asks if everything is all right. Arlen reports the dream, and they note that Pirry didn't sleep well the previous night.

That day, Arlen is driving the carriage and sees two people on a hilltop to the west. One yanks the other down as though to avoid being seen. Arlen reports this, and Kisha wonders if it might be bandits. Bresla passes this along to the others, and warns everyone to be careful, just in case.

A bit later, Dobbin spots a wooden platform in a tree. It might be a hunting blind, but they decide to check it out. Dobbin climbs the tree and finds nothing there but a dagger. She brings it down, and Gyell sniffs at it - there's a trace of human blood at the base. Arlen takes the dagger and casts Object Reading.

(And as an aside: I really that the TN of the fatigue test for Object Reading is equal to what you rolled to cast it; basically what that means is that the better you do on the test, the more info you get, but the more likely it is that you get fatigued which prevents you from just casting it on every damn thing.)

Arlen sees the scene from the dagger's perspective: It's in a boot, being carried up to the platform. There's a man with a bow there, a hunter, but the boot (and the dagger) belong to a younger person, gender indeterminate, with a leather cap and red hair peeking out. They talk a bit; the man with the bow is a hunter using the blind, but the redhead actually made the platform, so there's a bit of apology and "oh, that's fine, no problem, any luck?"

And then they hear two men stomping around on the forest floor, and the hunter peeks over, sees them, and says "Bandits!" The redhead sighs, says, "I know" and stabs the man in the kidney, killing him. He peeks over the edge and yells to the others, "Could you idiots try being a little more quiet? I just had to kill this old guy, that wasn't necessary."

"Sorry!" one yells back, clearly not all that sorry.

"They'll be passing by soon," says the redhead, "and I don't want them to see us."

"Why don't we just shoot them?" asks one.

"Look," says the redhead. "You shoot, I think, that's how this works." He kicks the old hunter over the edge. "And take care of that."

The vision ends, and Arlen relays it to the others. They talk amongst themselves about their options. They can leave the road and go hell-bent for leather to the nearby village of Sundown, but they aren't sure how well the carriage will take it. Or, they can keep to the road, stay vigilant, and strike off for Sundown once they hit the road that actually goes there; that's another day's ride, but at least the bandits can't surprise them anymore.

They decide on the latter, and strike off again.

Character Creation: Eldritch Ass-Kicking

Happy Thursday! Got my tea, got a little time, let's make a simple character.

The Game: Eldritch Ass-Kicking
The Publisher: Key 20 Publications, though it seems now to be available through Precis Intermedia 
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one.

 

"A game of arcane action and old men with sticks." Pretty good pitch, that. You could probably get mildly political with that, if you felt like expanding on the themes a bit, but it's pretty beer-n-pretzels as is and that's fine.

So, the basic premise here is that the world of Anhelm was once a fairly normal fantasy world, and then all the wizards went bananas and started blowing up the world and then started blowing up each other. You're playing one of the aforementioned wizards. Sure, you could be trying to fix the world, but it's just as likely that you're just blowing shit up for the same reason anyone else is (to wit: "dunno. BOOM!").

First up I need a concept. I'm surrounded by dogs. I want to make a dog-wizard. Like, a wizard that uses dog-magic, not a dog that is a wizard...no, wait, fuck it. I'm a dog that is a wizard.

Brenthalan the Boisterous was a pretty notorious storm-mage in his day, and then the craziness hit and he mixed it up with a Circe-like witch who turned him into a dog. He lost control of his storm and it blew him away, and by the time he woke up the spell had "settled" and become permanent (I have no idea if that's the kind of thing that happens in EAK, but it sounds good). He's now stuck in the shape of a big ol' bloodhound.

Brenthalan had to relearn some of his magic post-transformation, since he can't cast in quite the same way with a dog's body. But he's still got some chops and he's definitely angling to find the witch that did this to him and take revenge.

Right, now we determine Attributes. There's 3, they start at 1, and I get 12 points to throw around. I think I'll put 2 in Agility and 5 each in Endurance and Concentration.

Oh, this is cute. The sheet has Speed instead of Agility (Speed is actually the derived trait that comes from Agility). Whoopsie.

Speaking of Derived traits, I can fill those in; they're just the controlling Attribute x 3.

Skills, then! I get 35 points to divvy up. The Skills in question here are magical, and the ones that are listed are the classic four elements, but I can different things if I want to. Also of note: If I don't take a skill at chargen, I can't ever get it.

Well, I think that Brenthalan can roll around on the ground and manipulate earth and howl to manipulate air and sound. Since storms was something he was good at pre-quadruped, I'll take Storms at 8, Earth at 12, Air at 9, and Cacophony at 6.

Word of Power. Heh. Wizards get a word of power they can shout to add a bonus to a spell. While Brenthalan can talk, his word of power is his mighty bay, so it's basically "ARRROOOOOOO!"

His description is, basically, a big floppy bloodhound, but when he appears as a wizard, his every step echoes and kicks up gouts of dust or leaves stony footprints in his wake.

Background! I've kinda gone through it; Brenthalan lived in a high castle surrounded by a perpetual storm, and then Menalya the Mercurial challenged him to a duel and turned him into a dog, and he we are.

Events! These are misnamed; they really should be called goals, 'cause that's what they are. I get two minor and one major. My Major is easy: Find Menalaya, force her to turn me back, and take my revenge on her.

For my Minors, I want to find my old wizard staff, or whatever remains of it. True, I can't really use a staff anymore, but I don't want someone else using it, either.

Also, I wish to summon a demon that can act as a human-like minion for me, because it's hard for people to take a bloodhound seriously (he does like getting scritched behind the ears, though).

I get 600 gold coins, but there's no shopping to do (yay!) so that's actually me dog! WOOF!

Blades in the Dark: A Walk in the (Haunted) Park

Last night was Blades. On we go!

Last session involved water and squid punchery. This session, now that Copper's out of the clink, the crew wants to meet the Reconciled and perhaps get this war with the Church of Ecstasy resolved. Cage and One-Eye meet with Griggs, the Gondolier they've dealt with in the past, and ask about it it. He tells them he'll pass along a message to the Reconciled, but he has no idea how long it'll be before they get an answer.

Meanwhile, Siren and Copper talk with Kob, the demon expert (of Tycherosi descent) that Siren hired to consult on this whole "Seterra" issue. She tells them that Seterra is a sea-demon, variously described in texts as the most or least powerful of a nest of such demons. She also mentions that Lord Scurlock has a known history with her, but the particulars are unclear because there are conflicting agendas. Kotar, though, is usually depicted as a protector of the city, fair-haired and fond of wearing yellows and golds. This is relevant because Kob suspects that getting Kotar out of Siren's head (god this game is weird) might require a body for him to inhabit.

Cage, after touching base with the others, goes to visit Lord Penderyn and ask him about the connection between Seterra and Scurlock. Penderyn says that Scurlock has been in Duskwall for years, and in the year (or thereabouts) that the Cataclysm happened, Seterra made landfall in what is now Brightstone. Someone stood in the ruins and met her, and kissed her, and she receded into the water. Legends say that this man might have been Kotar, or Scurlock, or the Emperor - it's the kind of thing that looks good on a resume. In any case, though, Scurlock and Seterra have some kind of relationship, and it seems like this is relevant to what is happening now.

On the way home, Cage is beckoned by a street urchin with white eyes. The (clearly possessed) scamp tells him to bring a vessel to Mistshore Park, a vessel strong enough to withstand possession. Cage heads home and the crew confers.

They aren't too keen to ask Scurlock what's going on, as they feel he might kill them. They toy with the notion of sending him a message, but figure that's maybe something to put on the back burner for now. Likewise, the idea of resurrecting Kotar seems to hinge on the right vessel, so do they need someone strong and blonde? Penderyn mentioned that some of his folks are considering a hull, but Cage thinks that that much energy in an object might be unwise.

In any case, they decide to take one of their adepts to the park to act as the vessel, though Copper fills him in on what's going to happen first. They arrive, disembark, and Clave, the intended vessel, sees something in the trees and bolts. Siren hits him with a bola and knocks him down, and they talk him down. One-Eye, true to form, hits him with a paralytic and they carry him to a set of stone benches. There's a gust of wind and something possesses him, whereupon it asks why this body's lips aren't working right. One-Eye hits Clave with a stimulant to loosen him up, and a bunch of ghosts flow into his body, changing his eyes different colors in rapid succession.

The crew converses with the Reconciled, and they agree to help with the Church. They just need the crew to bring them someone from the Church's leadership so they can possess them, meaning they need this person stripped of protections as well. They'd also like to do this to leadership of some other factions, like maybe Lyssa, leader of the Crows, but One-Eye says they can negotiate that separately.

They also ask about Kotar, and the Reconciled say that a body capable of handling Kotar needs to be able to handle the parts that are already available. The ghosts agree that a hull is not the way to go.

The crew heads back to the Ruby to buy Clave some drinks, and considers their next move.

Movie #517: Patch Adams

Patch Adams is a glurge-fest biopic starring Robin Williams, Monica Potter, Daniel London, Bob Gunton, and Philip Seymour Hoffman.

Hunter Adams (Williams) is aimless and depressed, and checks himself into a mental institution following a suicide attempt. There, he discovers that doctors are generally disinterested and arrogant, but that people laugh at his jokes, so he thinks he's helping them, so he leaves and goes to medical school.

Adams - nicknamed "Patch" by a famous mathematician (Harold Gould) in the mental hospital - is apparently a super-genius who reads and internalizes medical texts without really trying, but spends most of his time playing with patients at the teaching hospital. He also sexually harasses and pesters his classmate Carin (Potter) until, in the tradition of such movies, she relents and gets together with him, but it happens far too early in the movie so her only narrative purpose is to die. And, yes indeedy, she gets shot by a patient (Douglas Roberts) she goes to visit after listening to Adams' philosophy that people are basically good.

Adams is eventually (and quite reasonably) called to task over the fact that he's running a free clinic without licensure, but he gets let off because glurge and graduates without pants.

In case it isn't evident, I really detest this movie. It's not (just) because it's a shitty biopic; most biopics don't really tell the story of the person they're about because people are messy. It's because the real Patch Adams is an interesting guy and probably should have a movie about him, but this one came about during the 90s and they got Williams during his sad-clown phase, and so the movie, like a lot of movies in this phase of Williams' career, is just Williams doing his schtick in a particular setting.

Aside from the movie providing a textbook example of fridging a female character (fun fact: just because a female character dies doesn't mean she was fridged! But in this case she totally was), the other thing that annoys me about Patch Adams is that Adams is never shown displaying the slightest bit of medical aptitude. He's portrayed as being able to get straight As in his classes, but he never does anything to demonstrate that he has any medical knowledge. We never see him diagnose or treat any illness, just make people laugh and chat with them. As a result, the glurge is so thick it makes me roll my eyes throughout most of the film.

My Grade: D-
Rewatch Value: IINSIAIFWT

Next up: Paths of Glory

Character Creation: Firefly

"Since I found Serenity." Kinda the goal, yeah?

The Game: Firefly
The Publisher: Margaret Weis Productions 
Degree of Familiarity: Some with the system, though I've never played this particular game. Very familiar with the underlying source material
Books Required: Just the one? Tee-hee.

 
This is actually the second RPG based on the IP. The first was Serenity, which only licensed the movie, meaning that it had to talk around the TV show events. This book is based on the show, and as such is able to go much more in-depth with the characters and their history. The book actually goes through each of the 14 episodes and puts events from them in the context of the game, which results in a really readable and engaging way to learn a system.

Character creation, like Chill or Marvel Heroic, has three options: Play an established character, grab a template and tweak it, or build a character from scratch. I am, as usual, going for the third option, but that does mean I need to think about concept a bit. Hmm.

Oh, you know, I think I'm gonna do something a little out of character for me - I'm gonna take an existing character from the Firefly universe and stat him up. More specifically: Fess Higgins.

Fess is the son of Magistrate Higgins, the ruler of Higgins' Moon, which is where the crew found themselves in the surreal position of being surrounded by Jayne fans in "Jaynestown." At the end of this, Fess stood up to his father for the first time, which is the last we see of them, but for my purposes let's say that dear ol' Dad kicked Fess off planet. It's not like he's disowned; Fess could go back, but dad's still pissed and wants Fess to "make something of himself." So Fess has money, but no real experience to speak of. Good start.

Step One: Choose Attributes. We don't get to see much of Fess in the episode, so I'm not sure where he's really strongest. I'll leave his Attributes at d8.

Step Two: Choose Distinctions. I get three of these. I can pick them from the list or make them up. I know I want Gentry to reflect that Fess comes from money and privilege, and that his family name is important. Oh, Wet Behind the Ears is goddam (gorram) perfect. And then I think something like Heart of Gold or Honest or Caring. Based on what we see in the episode, I think Caring makes the most sense.

Step Three: Choose Distinction Triggers. Each of these Distinctions has three triggers. One is just that you can use it as d4 to get a Plot Point, but then they have other effects as well. I don't get them all, though, I just get to unlock a total of two more. Well, I know I want Noblesse Oblige; if someone asks me for help, I get a Complication that obliges me to try. And then I think I want Heal the Wounded Heart. Inara helped Fess through his insecurity and fear of his father and that he wasn't a "real man," and he carries that kindness and empathy forward.

Step Four: Step Up Skills. This is nice and easy. I start with a d4 in all the Skills, and then I step each one that associated with my Distinctions up one for every time it pops up. My Gentry Distinction gives me Drive, Fly, and Focus. Wet Behind the Ears gives me Drive (which goes to d8), Fix, and Treat. Caring gives me Focus (also to d8), Influence, and Treat again (so d8).

Cool. Now I get 9 points to spend to step up Skills. If I step up those Highlighted Skills, it's one-for-one, otherwise a step up costs 2 points. I'll spend 2 to buy Notice up to d6, four to buy Know up to d8 (Fess seems bookish to me), two to put Craft up to d6, and my last one to put Influence up to d8.

Step Five: Choose Specialties and Signature Assets. I get five points here. A signature Asset is one point at d6 or one additional point to step it up to d8, but it can't go higher than that. I'll create one such Asset - Higgins' Moon d6. It's not going to show up much, but Dad does basically run a small world. I'll buy four Specialties: Drive (Wheeled Vehicles), Focus (Frustration), Influence (Empathy), and Treat (Good Listener). And then I get a free one in Know, so I'll take High Society.

Step Six: Biographical Info. I've pretty much got this done, but just to flesh it out a little more: Fess booked passage off Higgins' Moon and wound up somewhere in the Red Sun system, where he listened to a sob story and got burned. He lost a lot of his money and he's considering asking Dad for more, but it actually feels good to get his hands dirty.

Without a group, I think that's pretty much it. I note, with some amusement, that Fess has stats in the book, and the only real point of overlap is the Wet Behind the Ears Distinction.

The Strange: Circle of Stones

Yesterday was The Strange, in which we are reminded both that the Cypher System is a pretty darned simple system, and that not playing a game for a month means that remembering how even a simple system works is somewhat difficult.

So! Last time, the characters bedded down at the Brewster Mansion after doing some snooping and appraising and so on. In the middle of the night, Carmen awakens suddenly. She concentrates and feels the Strange here, but isn't sure what - intrusion from another recursion, maybe? She wakes the others, and they go out into the grounds.

Alexander and Arnauld find a blood trail, but in following it back, Roxanne trips on the body of Priestly, the groundskeeper. The others help her up, but all the activity plays merry hell with any existing tracks. What's weird, though, is that Priestly is half-buried in a shallow grave. It looks like he was buried, tried to pull himself out, and then was shot in the chest.

The characters look around the area, but aren't able to find any other evidence as to how he got out here or who shot him. They head back to his cottage and find the door open, heavy bootprints leading in, and a lockbox from under his bed broken into. Edward notes that it feels Strange; maybe there was a cypher in it.

They confer; Carmen suspects that this might be an intruder from a recursion similar to Earth (since they apparently have guns there), but has no real idea why such a being might have killed Priestly. She heads back out to the body and uses her Levitate Creature revision to pull his body out of the ground. Alexander digs a bit and finds the bullet; it's entered his chest at a downward angle and exited his back, so someone shot him standing over him. The characters also find that the grave is so shallow, it barely qualifies as a hole; all Priestly had to do to get out was sit up (whereupon he was shot).

Not sure what else to do at the moment, the characters call the police. Carmen and Roxanne do the talking, while everyone else goes to bed and pretends to have slept through it all. The police are very confused by the crime scene, but they wake everyone else up, including Mrs. Brewster. The old widow pulled Norris, the butler, aside and demands to have her lawyer here in the morning, a conversation that the characters notice. Arnauld puts in a call to a paralegal at the firm that represents Mrs. Brewster and asks for some inside info.

And indeed, next morning, one of the partners and the paralegal arrive. The partner goes in to talk with Mrs. Brewster, while the paralegal pulls Arnauld aside and tells him that the old lady is changing her will. He doesn't know what the change will be, but the original will left almost everything to Priestly - and it was made shortly after Mr. Brewster died, 20 years ago. A quick bit of research says that Brewster died from falling off the second floor balcony; his death was ruled an accident.

This brings a few things into focus. The characters wonder if Priestly and Mrs. Brewster had an affair; they already know that the marriage between the Brewsters was pretty cold. Roxanne talks to Desmond White, the cook, who seems pretty shook up by Priestly's murder. He doesn't confirm that anyone has been stealing from Brewster, but he does mention that food - simple stuff like sandwich fixings - has been going missing for a week or so. He suspects Priestly was taking it, and he doesn't really care, but does wish that he had left a note or something.

Arnauld reviews surveillance footage and finds that no one has enters or left the house through the grounds, so the killer is still here (or, maybe, went to a different recursion). Carmen wonders if an alternate version of Mr. Brewster came through from a different Earth, and not having any other way to look into this, decides to look at Brewster's shoes. She finds that much of Brewster's stuff has been picked off and sold, probably by Norris, but his clothes are still intact. His shoes are much too small to match the boot-print, but Carmen does find something else of interest in his huge closet.

She finds a small cypher, about the size of the head of a flashlight. But moreover, she finds a journal, marked on the inside cover as "Journal of John L. Brewster, vol 15." She takes both and heads elsewhere to read through it, and finds that Brewster was unhappy in his marriage. The last entry before his death is surprisingly benign - he mentions the gloomy weather and how it reminds him of London. Before that, though, Carmen finds an entry describing a ring of flagstones with strange etchings on them near the graveyard. Brewster stepped into the ring once years ago, and found himself suddenly in a seaside town where many people had bulging eyes and an oddly squamous countenance. Put another way, the ring took him to Innsmouth. A later entry says that the ring took him to a place where he saw people with metal wings and flying cars, but he didn't stay there long.

The ring of flagstones, then, can open gates to other recursions. The characters call Belding, and explain this, and he tells them he'll get out there as soon as he can, but they should keep investigating - hey, maybe see if they can activate the circle! But when they tell him about the murder, he's horrified. The killer, he says, is called "the Gravedigger," and is from a recursion very similar to Earth. The Gravedigger knocks his victims on the head, buries them in a shallow grave, and then shoots them as they try to climb out. He doesn't tend to kill women, though, he Roxanne and Carmen should be safe, but the men need to watch their back.

The characters go to the circle and find the flagstones. They look at the etchings, but they're not in an alphabet they recognize. Not wanting to chance using the circle (certainly not with the Gravedigger wandering around), they each take a stone from the circle to prevent it being used.

Next time, we'll see what Belding can tell them about the Gravedigger.

Movie #519: The Invisible Man

The Invisible Man is another classic horror movie directed by James Whale and starring Claude Rains, Gloria Stuart, William Harrigan, Henry Travers, Una O'Connor, and Forrester Harvey.

The movie begins in medias res with Dr. Griffin (Rains) taking shelter in an inn in the middle of a snowstorm. Bandaged completely, he insists on being left alone, though the old woman who runs the inn (O'Connor) suspects something wrong about him. Turns out, of course, he's the titular Invisible Man, a scientist working under Dr. Cranley (Travers) and engaged to his daughter Flora (Stuart). Griffin, using a strange poison from India, managed to turn himself transparent, though what he doesn't know is that it's slowing driving him mad.

Griffin hatches some completely ridiculous plan to take over the world by...killing people while invisible and crashing trains. He recruits Cranley's other assistant Kemp (Harrigan) to help him, who goes along with it at first out of fear, but then turns Griffin in and he spends the second half of the movie on the run. Eventually he's caught in a barn and shot, eventually dying from his injuries and becoming visible again.

While this movie is light on gore, it loves the invisible special effects (which hold up amazingly well). Rains narrates much of what he does to give the audience a sense of where he is, but we get objects flying through the air and moving on their own, and some good pantomime acting from the people he strangles to death. And then there's the little matter of him derailing a damn train and killing a hundred people, which I feel like the movie kind of glides over, but it does mean this film has a pretty significant body count. Likewise, the threat of Griffin actually accomplishing anything while invisible doesn't really seem to be taken seriously. He's not going to rule the world, but he's certainly able to strike fear into the country because he's invisible and he's just killing people for fun.

Rains is by turns megalomaniacal and highly controlled as Griffin. Stuart (who it took me quite some time to place as the old lady from Titanic) doesn't have a lot of great agency, but she's insistent about helping Griffin and doesn't get damseled. Harrigan is cowardly and appropriate desperate as Kemp. I will say that one thing this movie doesn't have is a square-jawed hero; the star is very much the villain, which isn't something that horror does often.

My Grade: A
Rewatch value: Medium-low

Next up: Patch Adams

Blue Rose: One of Three Revealed

Last night was Blue Rose, which is a sentence I seem to type with some regularity. Let's begin! Here's last time.

The characters are brought to the Academy and put in a classroom. Pansy is still twitchy, the party is still on edge. They hear Duallin and Jocen talking in the hall and Duallin confirms that the party hasn't officially taken him on as an advocate yet, and then they hear Vistul yelling in the hall and calling for Duallin. The door closes, and Duallin enters, asking them to officially confirm that he's their advocate.

The characters hesitate, though. They still don't know who the "one of three" is, and if it's Duallin (as Kisha suspects, given his proclivity for light and illusion magic), taking him as advocate could spell disaster. Duallin senses the discomfort and, a little hurt, gives them a moment to talk it over. The party discusses it, and decides that they don't have a lot of options here. Plus, Pansy doesn't seem uneasy around Duallin, and that's a selling point for Dobbin.

He comes back in with Jocen and they agree to the arrangement, and Jocen leaves to let them confer. Duallin has them recount the events of the day and asks some clarifying questions, and tells them to answer Jocen's questions honestly, but if he feels like a question is misleading or dangerous to answer, he'll stop them and ask for clarification. Jocen comes in and begins his questioning with Arlen...who promptly loses control of his Move Object spell, yanks a dagger out of Jocen's belt, and hurls it at him. Duallin, however, catches it, and the others confirm that Arlen's Wild Arcana sometimes gets away from him.

Jocen, a little rattled, questions the group, clarifying the events of the day that led to the fight in the jeweler's store and Magni's assault, as well as the previous events (making sure that everyone's story was consistent). He then taps some gems on his bracer, and the amulets fall off the characters' necks. He officially absolves them of any charges and tells them they are free to stay in Verdaunen or go as they see fit.

However, there is the matter of the mask. He asks Duallin to leave, and asks the party if they have any idea who the "one of three" is. They figure it's one of the three Headmasters - Vistul, Duallin, or Memne - but they don't know which one. Jocen leaves to let them confer, and they talk about their approach. They still have the bag that once held the Mask, so figuring that it worked once, Dobbin has Pansy sniff at it. Pansy just kind of panics, though, sniffling around the room and then curling up under Dobbin's chair.

Arlen, then, remembers that he can read objects with magic, and casts Object Reading on the bag. He sees the end of the fight from the bag's perspective - hung on Kisha's belt, thrown into the brush, and sees Pansy running up...but then a man reaches down and picks it up. Arlen can't see the man's face, but sees his hands, and they're pale and nicked with knife scars. Pansy comes running up and the man snarls "Go away, rat!" and flicks his hands at her, and she falls down twitching.

Kisha makes Psychic Contact with Arlen to see the images, and the group discusses it. It's not Vistul, since the voice and the hands were clearly male. That leaves Duallin and Memne. They think about those two, and note that Duallin is tanned, as he stays in the sun in his fruit grove. Memne, though, is half Kernish (and the Kerns are a pale people), and his chambers are in the basement - he's their man.

The party goes out into the hallway to tell the Finest, and ask for Jocen, but learn that he's rather surprisingly decided to return to the judiciary. They're on their own. 

They decide to split up. Whirlpool and Dobbin (and Pansy) go downstairs to guard Memne's door, while Arlen and Kisha go out to find Vistul. Upon hearing that Memne might be a Shadow Dancer, she grows immediately cold and asks for proof. Their evidence is circumstantial, but worth checking into, so she grabs a sword and a mail shirt and accompanies them.

Down in the basement, Dobbin listens at the door and hears two voices, but can't understand the language. And then she hears a third voice say "Whirlpool." Those creatures that Whirlpool describe were earlier identified as mock hounds, and she relays this to Whirlpool, but just then, Pansy barks.

Their surprise blown, Whirlpool kicks in the door, and they see Memne standing in the middle of the room looking surprised. Dobbin sees through the illusion, though, and spots the night person and his two mock hounds hiding behind an illusory curtain, but before she can shout a warning, Memne casts a spell on her and sends her to the ground in pain. Whirlpool charges over and punches Memne, and the night person and his hounds join the battle, one biting at Whirlpool and the other dog-fighting with Pansy.

The battle is joined, and Whirlpool is outnumbered. Ionlt, the night person, clubs him with his cudgel, and although Whirlpool can take some punishment, this isn't going to end well, not with Dobbin incapacitated. But then, Arlen, Vistul, and Kisha arrive! Vistul helps Dobbin get over the spell, while Kisha rushes in and casts a spell of her own, creating illusory duplicates to confuse Memne.

With Vistul's help, the party kills the two mock hounds. Vistul slices up Ionlt, leaving him open for a blow from Arlen's psychic weapon, but Arlen pulls his blow and merely knocks Ionlt out, refusing to kill. Memne puts on the Mask, but still can't draw a bead on Kisha, so he backs up towards the fireplace in his room, grabbing a staff off the floor and readying himself.

Whirlpool, furious, charges across the room and pushes him into the fire.

Memne screams in pain, and Arlen uses Move Object to pull him out. Dobbin flips the Mask off, and the party wraps him in a blanket to extinguish the flames. Whirlpool asks why Arlen saved him, and Arlen replies that he doesn't kill people, not even people so corrupted as a Shadow Dancer. The Finest arrive, take Ionlt and Memne into custody, and heal Pansy (who beat her mock hound opponent, but not without taking some bites herself).

The party finally gets to relax in Verdaunen as free people, and Duallin takes Arlen aside. "You didn't let Memne die," he says, impressed. "If you don't see the Hart someday, I'll be very surprised."

The party gets a locked box to transport the Mask in, and asks for a couple of Finest to escort them to Aldin. That leg of the journey we'll kick off next time!

Movie #516: Frankenstein

Frankenstein, of course, is the classic 1931 adaptation of Mary Shelley's novel (well, really, it's an adaptation of a couple of stage play versions), directed by James Whale and starring Boris Karloff, Colin Clive, Mae Clarke, John Boles, Edward Van Sloan, Dwight Frye, Marilyn Harris, and Lionel Belmore.

The film plays pretty fast and loose with the story. Henry Frankenstein (Clive) is working feverishly on his experiment, despite pleas from his fiancee Elizabeth (Clarke) and his friend Viktor Moritz (Boles) to slow the hell down and stop playing God. Of course, he succeeds and creatures the Monster (Karloff), who goes bananas after abuse from Frankenstein himself and his mean little assistant Fritz (Frye), tosses a little girl (Harris) into a lake to drown (by accident, in fairness), throttles Elizabeth nearly to death, and finally tosses Frankenstein off a damn windmill while the good citizens of the local town wave torches and pitchforks.

(Frankenstein lives, however, and marries Elizabeth, which was apparently a last-minute change brought on by negative test screenings.)

Everyone has a general sense of how the story goes, and while there are severe departures from the novel, a lot of the central themes are intact, if simplified. When Michelle and I watched the movie last night, we listened to the commentary by a film historian, which was interesting because it gave us the history of the adaptations of the novel and the casting and political decisions that led to the movie. It also told us about the degree of censorship that has followed the movie - many versions omitted the shot of the Monster throwing little Maria into the water, and omitted the line "Now I know what it feels like to be God!" because every era has its frumpy MPAA folks, apparently.

The performances from Clive as the mostly manic Frankenstein and Karloff as the Monster are the standouts, but the cast as a whole is good. Whale got basically everyone he wanted, and the result is a cast that seems comfortable with each other. Frederick Kerr as Frankenstein's father is, perhaps, unnecessary, but his scenes do serve to lighten the mood a bit.

All in all, it's a fascinating look into early horror. I'd love to see a well-made adaptation that hews closer to the book, though.

My Grade: A-
Rewatch value: Medium-low

Next up: The Invisible Man

Movie #515: 47 Meters Down

47 Meters Down is a natural horror movie starring Mandy Moore, Claire Holt, Chris Johnson, Yani Gellman, Santiago Segura, and Matthew Modine.

Sisters Lisa (Moore) and Kate (Holt) are on vacation in Mexico following Lisa's breakup with her boyfriend. Seeking to emulate her adventurous sister, Lisa agrees to go diving in a shark cage after the girls meet some handsome Mexican fellas who suggest it, but when they're in the cage, the cable breaks, sending them to the ocean floor 47 meters down (which is like 154 feet, which is pretty damn deep), running out of air, and surrounded by great white sharks.

The rest of the movie is the girls' attempts to survive and await rescue or get to the surface, and it's filmed underwater, so while the sharks are all CGI, the atmosphere feels real and threatening. Moore brings a real panic to her role as Lisa, who isn't a trained diver and is completely out of her depth, while Holt manages to convey the more focused fear of knowing what could go wrong and how likely it all is.

The supporting cast is good, too; Johnson plays Javier, one of the hands on the boat who's kind of a tool, while Modine plays the captain. All of these folks are fairly professional, but the whole thing looks kind of sketchy if you're a gringa, and so the audience isn't sure to what extent the human beings are going to be antagonists (answer: not at all, but the girls don't know that right away).

All in all, it's a tight, simple horror story, and it's well worth a watch or two. The sequel...not so much, but you can't have everything.

My Grade: B+
Rewatch Value: Medium high

Next up: Frankenstein

Character Creation: Damn the Man, Save the Music!

I was gonna do this a little bit ago, and then I opened Youtube and there was a new ERB, and then I had to go buy dog food, but now I'm doing it! Woo!

The Game: Damn the Man, Save the Music!
The Publisher: Make Big Things Games
Degree of Familiarity: None, but I've seen Empire Records a bunch of times
Books Required: Just the one! 

 

So, I've seen any number of story games that go for very specific genre emulation, but I don't think I've ever seen one that seeks to emulate one specific movie (again, Empire Records) quite so directly. In DTMSTM, you're playing one of the employees of Revolution Records, and today's the day Rex Manning a Bigshot is coming to the store for a signing. You've got to do your job, you've a couple of relationships with other employees to think about, and you've got your own personal goal that you need to fulfill (by 1:37 exactly! No, it's not that on the nose).

To make a character, I first choose a Role. I think I'll go with the Overachiever; I want to play someone who's been at the store long enough that they know how everything works, they know just what pipes to bang on to get the furnace running, and they know all the procedures cold. I think my guy doesn't necessarily want to work at the store forever, but it's been part of his life long enough that it's important to him.

So, there's not a hell of a lot of "character creation" to go through, really. My character's name is Buzz (his real name is Bertrand, but his family has been calling him "Buzz" since he was a little kid and he prefers it). He's 21. He's been working at the record store for 3 years; he got the job right out of high school, did a year and a half of college and then dropped out.

His style is grunge lite - jeans, flannel, black t-shirts, some jewelry, but everything is in moderation and he can clean up nice if he needs to. He listens to nu-metal, and he doesn't have to be embarrassed about it because it's the 90s (as an aside, the book recommends making up bands and songs rather than forcing the people at the table to rely on their real knowledge of 90s trends; haven't decided how I feel about that, but I'm glad it's addressed).

Now I need a Goal. I can make one up or choose one from the list on the sheet. I'm disappointed to note that the goals on all the sheets are the same, and there's no dedicated space to write one.

Hmm. "Get a promotion" seems appropriate for Buzz, but I think it's better if he's already assistant manager and he's trying train a replacement. That's a good goal.

OK, so the only thing left would be to choose Relationships with two other characters, but of course it's just me. If I were playing, I'd probably wind up thinking about how the other characters do at the store as employees, but also how Buzz interacts with them on off days, because I can totally see Buzz not giving a single fuck about the store when he's not on the clock (or at least, not to the same extent). When he's there, he's doing a hundred things at once and making it all look easy, but he's a mess and a slacker anywhere else. That's why he wants to name a replacement assistant manager and get gone.

And that's it, actually.

Blue Rose: Battle in the Fruit Grove

Blue Rose! Woo!

Last time, we ended with the characters learning that Magni, their friendly innkeeper, wasn't around. Whirlpool, upon hearing that he hasn't been seen since lunch was served, rushes into the kitchen to look for him. He finds the unfortunate night person in the root bin, covered in blood, but still (barely) alive.

The characters haul him out, and Whirlpool gets to work. He manages to staunch the bleeding and save his life, while Dobbin and Kisha run out into the street and call for a healer. Arlen looks around the room, and finds a knife stuck into the top of the root bin, holding a note: "More people will die. Return the Mask. Tonight, sunset, fruit grove. Tell no one."

Dobbin and Kisha return with the Sovereign's Finest and a priestess. The priestess uses magic to heal Magni, and points out that if Whirlpool had not acted, the innkeeper would certainly have died. Jocen (whom you'll recall is one of the Finest and has been kinda dogging the characters' steps since they got here) asks everyone what happened. Arlen tells him about Rrusha and his encounter earlier, but keeps the note to himself - he doesn't know what will happen if he tells the Finest about the drop, and he doesn't want anyone else to die, nor does he entirely trust that there isn't an informant within the Finest.

Jocen, noting that the party has been helping Magni out with the inn, allows them and the other guests to stay, but leaves behind Gyell, a rhy-dog and member of the Finest, to keep an eye on things. Things having now calmed down, Whirlpool and Arlen go out and catch the smith that was making Whirlpool his cestae, which are finally complete. The smith points out that because they needed to be buckled under the palm to remain stable, Whirlpool probably isn't going to be able to put them on and take them off without help, but they should hold up, even underwater. Whirlpool pays him and they head back to the inn.

Dobbin, meanwhile, has realized that with the dagger that Rrusha left behind, they could perhaps track her with Pansy's help. They gear up (to the extent that they can; their weapons are still in the judiciary) and head off, following Pansy's nose!

Pansy leads them to the woods behind the Academy, to an entrance to the grounds that doesn't require scaling a fence. Up ahead, near the fruit grove, they spot a woman hiding up a tree. Dobbin has Pansy attack, leaping up and knocking her down. It is indeed Rrusha - they surround her and attack, trying to make sure she can't make use of her knives. Arlen creates a psychic weapon, Dobbin hangs back and throws rocks, Kisha uses her staff, and Whirlpool punches with his cestae.

But then, Kisha feels a strange compulsion to take the Mask and toss it into the brush, to keep it away from Rrusha. She does, and Dobbin notices her toss the bag. She tells Pansy to "fetch!", but then hears the dog cry out in pain. She follows, and finds Pansy lying on the ground, twitching, but not obviously harmed. The bag is there, torn open. The Mask is gone.

The characters incapacitate Rrusha, and Kisha removes her necklace, banking on it summoning the Finest. It does, but it also causing her to collapse with vertigo. The Finest arrive and replace the necklace, take Rrusha into custody, and demand explanations. Jocen asks Duallin, who was with the Finest, to take everyone into the Academy for questioning, since the judiciary is a good distance away and they're not entirely sure what's going on. Duallin complies readily.

Next time: The exciting conclusion to this storyline!

Blades in the Dark: SQUID PUNCH

Last night was Blades in the Dark. On we go!

Last time the crew was out on the Void Sea, in two boats carrying Skovic refugees. They're ready to head back toward land, and then in front of them, they see a woman rise out of the water.

The woman is tentacles from the waist down, and has entirely too many arms - every time she moves, more of them fold out of her torso. The scoundrels recoil from this horror and the Skovs panic, forcing Cage to threaten the ones on his boat with a pistol so they stop freaking out and don't capsize the craft. The woman drifts over toward Siren, but One-Eye gets on her bullhorn and asks what she wants.

She moves over to One-Eye and touches her forehead, and suddenly the water is transparent. One-Eye sees all the way to the bottom of the ocean (and feels some pretty intense vertigo), and sees a bell - a bell that the crew put there way back here. The tentacle woman demands that the crew destroy it, and claims she'll keep them safe in the water and prevent them from drowning. One-Eye asks for a moment to prep, and calls Siren over from the other boat.

The three of them (Copper, Siren, One-Eye) talk it over, and are pretty firmly of the opinion that destroying the bell would be unwise, long-term. Cage, over on the other boat, hears the voice of the woman, and she repeats the demand and promises that the crew won't die if they do it. Cage notes that this doesn't seem to be a good arrangement for the crew's future, and the creature says that she won't kill them tonight.

Copper tries to get Cage to attune and see if there's a way to avoid this, but Cage refuses, figuring that things are bad enough already. Copper attunes on her own, and gets a sense of exactly how vast and teeming with squamous life the ocean really is. She also gets the sense that this creature's influence is limited and they could maybe outrun it.

Meanwhile, Siren makes contact with Kotar, who says that this creature - Seterra - is a demon and has a restricted field of power, but he isn't sure if the boats can move fast enough to get away from her. He also isn't sure what happens if Siren dies at sea, but it probably isn't good. If they destroy the bell, though, it's likely that Seterra will destroy Duskwall.

The crew decides to run. One-Eye, as it happens, had already installed devices on both boats that allow a burst of speed, though using it will necessitate repairs later. They turn the boats, but the creature notices, and tentacles whip out and grab several of the Skovs. Copper slashes about with a blade and saves some of them, but one is pulled under. The boats take off, and the skies explode in storm.

Siren and One-Eye manage to negotiate the waves well; a few people fall out, but Cage and Copper tie down others and keep them safe. And then a huge tentacle, taller than a tower, reaches out of the ocean in front of the boats.

Copper leaps up on the cabin of the Black Lotus and leaps, striking the tentacle and knocking it off-center enough that it falls off to the side of the boats. She, however, falls into the ocean. Cage tries to rescue her with a grappling hook, but misses, and the boats speed on.

The water suddenly calms, and the crew realizes that they're out of danger. They approach the lightning wall between Silkshore and Whitecrown, and hide out in the wake of a huge freighter (it spots one boat, but Siren signals the lookout and promises to pay him off). They head to Crow's Foot and drop off the surviving Skovs, and Ulf Ironborn pays them handsomely.

They go about indulging vices and training and so on, and a couple of days later, a ship comes in carrying Copper. They pay off the sailors who rescued her (they're a Tier III crew now, so it really doesn't pay to cheap out when someone saves the life of one of your leaders), but Copper goes to jail for a few months thereafter - their Wanted Level is high, but they pay a lot of money to the Bluecoats and manage to make the sentence a little more reasonable. Siren also hires a demon expert to tell her about Seterra and Kotar.

The crew decides that they need to end this war with the Church of Ecstasy, and for that they need allies that can bring something special to the table. They decide to make contact with the Reconciled, a group of powerful spirits who are reputed to be able to possess people for longer and more capably than others. Next time, we'll see where that goes.

Character Creation: Time & Temp

Playing a one-shot tonight. Not of this game, but of Perseverant, which doesn't have character creation rules as I'm looking at them for purposes of this project.

The Game: Time & Temp
The Publisher: Dig a Thousand Holes Publishing
Degree of Familiarity: None, just read it.
Books Required: Just the one.

So, there are a few RPGs out there with the conceit of "you're playing employees or agents of a time-preserving force," including Timewatch and TimeZero. This one, however, merges corporate culture with that paradigm, and has the folks getting zapped around in time be temps, because temps don't have enough of a temporal footprint to matter and are therefore less likely to cause paradox. Having been a temp for a fairly good period of my employment history, I can confirm this.

However, I really struggled with including this game in my chargen project at all, because this is the extent of the character creation section:

Not exactly extensive. Plus I hate making resumes. But, as I often say to Michelle when a movie we both hate comes up in the other project, society has rules. So I'll find a free online resume builder and go from there.

Need to conceptualize a bit first, though. Temps can be from any era, and I kinda want to make someone modern, so I'll say that my hapless temp graduated from college in September 1974 (he had one lousy science class to make up and he had to do it in summer, so he couldn't graduate in spring), right after Nixon resigned.

Brent Riker, Jr. was a college Republican and a business major, and was right along with Nixon, defended him to his friends...and then everything kinda fell apart, Nixon resigned, and Brent had to eat some crow. Except, true to form for people of any political stripe, he didn't, because admitting he was wrong was difficult, and he wound up graduating and looking for work, only to find that a lot of his contacts had dried up (I think maybe he went to school in the DC area). And then he got drunk one night, struck up a convo with a guy in a bar named Todd (the guy, not the bar), and wound up getting recruited by Marigold Staffing. What the hell, it's better than nothing.

Let's figure that Brent worked as an intern/assistant at a financial firm (at the business factory, as it were, Vincent Adultman), but mostly did gofer-type work. Every job he had before that was your basic fast food type of situation, and he doesn't put those on his resume. He can type pretty well, and he's got a minor in history, which is actually applicable to his current position.

Brent was pretty shaken up by Watergate, but even more shaken up to learn about the history of the future and realize that Nixon's transgressions had far-reaching, horrific political ramifications. Brent can't fix them, obviously, but he does struggle with the temptation to leave past-Brent a note saying "Vote Humphrey."

That'll do it!

Character Creation: Out of the Blue

No point standing on ceremony.

The Game: Out of the Blue: The Buddy Cop RPG
The Publisher: Broken Razor Games
Degree of Familiarity: None; I read it this morning
Books Required: Just the one.

 

Out of the Blue seeks to take the buddy-cop genre and make it an RPG. The first issue to confront there, as I see it, is that those movies really only have two main characters, and the focus is on them. The RPG does that nicely by limiting it to the two cops and the Beat (not exactly a GM, since the game is more collaborative than that, but the Beat is the playing the opposition). The cops have 14 scenes (a week in game time) to solve the case and achieve their respective goals.

I rarely only have three people at my table, but with the right three people I can see this game being a lot of fun. Sadly, there is no character sheet, but there is a character creation system, so let's do it!

There are four types of cop: The Veteran, the Rookie, the Rogue, and the K-9. I don't feel like making a dog, I don't think. Hmm. Of the three other types, I think Veteran appeals the most - it'd be interesting to play someone like Alonzo Harris in Training Day, but maybe not quite so corrupt. Oh, more like Jack Vincennes in LA Confidential, then. Cool.

Now, the next stage would be to design the city, but that's really a group activity. I'd also answer questions - the questions are paired and in two columns, and I and the other cop's player would each answer one of a pair. So I'll just pick one from each column to answer.

What's your name and rank? Detective Sergeant Alford Sturm ("just say 'storm,' kid, it's easier"). He really doesn't like going by "Alford," but "Storm" sounds really hokey, so for god's sake, just call him "Al."

Where d'ya go to relax or reflect when the day is over? Diver's Bar (known almost exclusively as "the Dive"). It used to be a cop bar back when Al joined the force, and it's been steadily getting gentrified ever since. Fred Diver, the owner, married Al's sister Vera thirty years ago, and out of respect for her, he's kept the tiny corner booth that Al likes just the way it was, and kept his favorite whisky on the shelf.

What d'ya love or hate about the city you live and work in? Al hates that it changes. "Bad" neighborhoods had crime, sure, but they had personality. They had families. People knew each other, and there was respect. Criminals were often violent scumbags, yeah, but they were violent scumbags who took care of their families and brought cases of good beer to block parties. Shit gets gentrified, and now the criminals are gone, but we've got white-collar crime, and those guys are sociopaths.

And now, Skill ranks! I've got five Skills: Pursuit, Combat, Dialog, Bureaucracy, and Investigation. They're ranked 1 to 5, so I'll arrange them this way:

Bureaucracy 5
Dialog 4
Investigation 3
Combat 2
Pursuit 1

He's been on the force long enough to know where all the cracks in the system are and how to wiggle through them, and he's pretty good at talking people into giving up what they know. He's never been great at being a detective, but he's decent, especially with a more observant partner. He was once good in a hand-to-hand scrap, but arthritis, sciatica, and just plain old age have taken a toll (likewise for Pursuit).

As a Veteran, I get Ace in the Hole (which all cops have), Wisdom, and "I'm Too Old for this Shit!"

And that's actually it! I picture Al as being played by Brion James (who sadly cannot accept the role, as he passed away in 1999).

Him, but a little older.

Name: Detective Sergeant Alford "Al" Sturm
Role: Veteran
Skills: Bureaucracy 5, Combat 2, Dialog 4, Investigation 3, Pursuit 1
Abilities: Ace in the Hole, "I'm Too Old for this Shit!"
Wisdom: 10
Goal: Retirement

Character Creation: Evernight

Don't think I'm gonna hit my secondary goal of 100 characters this year, but I'm still something like seven weeks ahead of my primary goal of one a week, so y'know, take the wins where you can.

The Game: Evernight
The Publisher: Pinnacle Entertainment Group
Degree of Familiarity: None with this particular game, but it's 1st Ed Savage Worlds and I'm pretty comfy with that
Books Required: Evernight and some version of Savage Worlds

Evernight presents a very readable, brain-friendly history, and you might know that I'm not usually one to read and enjoy fantasy-RPG history. The basics are that nowadays, things are pretty boilerplate fantasy, except that the over-reliance on "heroes" to solve problems is called out, which I like. The idea is that you'd play novice heroes and then the "night" part of "Evernight" kicks in, the spider-people come back, everything goes back, and basically it's all Mordor up in here. I can dig it.

Assuming that I'd be making a character for the beginning of the game (pre-Invasion), my first step is to pick a race. I have the standard fantasy array - elf, dwarf, human, half-elf, half-orc, hobbit half-folk. I don't really fancy any of them, but I do like the depiction of the Dragon Isles. It's a chain of volcanic islands, except that there are dragons in the damn mountains. They're voyagers and raiders, with dark brown skin and black hair, and they're also described as "tattooed," so that's cool. I'll be a human from the Dragon Isles.

My character is the younger brother of a well-known raider. His brother, Draich, came back from a voyage with an infection in his leg. He recovered, but he took ill with fever and missed his ship going out again. His younger brother, though (my character), Tlasi, who looks a lot like him, grabbed his cloak and stowed away on the boat. Through circumstance, he ended up in King's Port. He's thought about trying to get home, but he's heard so many tales of the Seven and other heroes that he figures maybe he'd like to try that.

Sounds good! I get the usual 5 points to buy dice in Attributes. I don't normally do this, but I'm just gonna spread them out evenly - d6 across the board.

For Skills, I get 15 points and going over a d6 in anything will cost double. I want:

Boating d6
Climbing d6
Fighting d6
Notice d6
Repair d4
Shooting d4
Streetwise d6
Swimming d4
Throwing d6

Pretty good spread for an ex-pirate. Next up are secondary stats, except not really. Ahem. Special Abilities are actually next, which means I get a free Edge and I can (and will) take Hindrances. Well, I'll take a Minor Wanted (ex-pirate) and I'll take Clueless (my character has been on a boat and the Isles, but isn't really savvy about city life). One more Minor; I'll take Big Mouth. I feel like I've taken that before, but it's in-concept.

Oh, wait, I can't take Wanted in this game. OK, how about Illiterate?

Right, Edges! I get one for free, and none of the ones in Evernight work, so let's look at the core. I'll take Fleet-Footed, it's pretty cool. And then I get 4 points, so I could buy another Edge. Let's see if anything jumps out. Oh, I think Steady Hands makes sense for him, since he's used to being on a boat. I need a d8 in Agility, though, so I'll use my other two points to get that.

Now we do derived traits. Pace is 8 because of my Edge, Parry is 6, Toughness is 6, Charisma is 0. I could spend money on gear, but eh. We'd assume Tlasi would have some light armor, a couple of throwing daggers, maybe a set of thieves' claws, since you figure they'd be useful for pirates.

Tlasi has grown a bit since setting sail from the Isles. He's filled out and is lean, but not breathtakingly muscular. He did well on a ship, but his crew turned him out when they found out he wasn't Draich (but didn't throw him overboard, out of respect to his brother). He figures he'll go home someday and see his family, but for now he's doing minor errands and heroics in King's Port. It's not like the world's gonna end before he can get home, right?

Movie #514: George of the Jungle

George of the Jungle is a family comedy starring Brendan Fraser, Leslie Mann, Thomas Hayden Church, Richard Roundtree, Gregg Cutwell, Abraham Benrudi, John Cleese, and Holland Taylor. It's a under-appreciated classic, in my humble opinion.

George (Fraser) is a beefy, cheerful, hunky white American kid accidentally lost in the jungle as a baby. Raised by Ape (voiced by Cleese), he grows into the "Jungle King," capable of communicating with animals, swinging around on vines and crashing into trees with no lasting ill effects. He meets Ursula (Mann), an heiress out on safari through the jungle with her clueless, conniving finace Lyle (Church), and through a series of bumbles George winds up back in San Fransisco and then back in the jungle where he and Ursula marry.

The story is pretty thin on the face of it, but the magic in this movie is the narrator (Keith Scott) breaking the fourth wall left and right, the childlike, cartoonish nature of all of the characters, and the early reassurance that no one dies or gets seriously hurt in this movie. The jokes manage to land, even the bathroom humor (which is not something I'm normally into), and while Ursula gets rescued more than a few times, it's really George that gets ogled. Likewise, George is polite and kind, and while he definitely has feelings for Ursula, he asks for advice on how to manage them (with comic results, because he asks a gorilla, but like, it's a comedy).

All in all, I'm a little surprised we didn't own this movie before, but I'm glad we picked it up. It's silly and fun, and frankly I could use a little of that.

My Grade: B+
Rewatch value: High

Next up: Patch Adams

MHR: Prologue

Last night we started playing Marvel Heroic Roleplaying. I've run a few Events in an interconnected world; the last one was more than two years ago (real time). As such, a little prologue to remind players of the system and who their characters and so on. To wit, the heroes:

• Arcanix, the robotic Sorcerer Supreme of this world.
• Spore, the nightmare fungus descended from the world-conquering Phylum race.
• Rift, the reality-hopping hero.
• Juno, the latest wielder of a magical bracelet.
• Inferno, St. Louis' fiery hometown hero, secretly billionaire Stephen Maxwell Lewis III.

We jumped straight into action - the Lewis Building is under attack! The assailants are a cadre of robots, all identical, black with green running lights. They aren't plated or clunky, but sleek and fluid, and they seem to be made of some kind of super-hard plastic rather than metal. As the scene opens, Arcanix and Inferno are outside the building, many stories up, fighting some of the robots in mid-air, while Juno, Rift, and Spore are inside on the floor the robots smashed into. 

Inferno blasts several of the robots and it seems to hurt them, but not enough. A bunch surround him and try to pummel him, but he calls a fiery shield up and deflects them. Arcanix, though, is not so lucky - his metallic body isn't as strong as theirs, and they dent and damage him. Inside, several of the robots rip into the walls to expose the server room, and Spore expands to try and block them. Their bodies heat up and burn right through his fungus, though. A couple of robots attack Rift and Juno, but they deflect the probably handily - Rift dodges and the robot smashes into a copier, and Juno blocks hers with her bracelet's force field, and then blasts it with force.

Rift pulls a freeze grenade out of a gate and hurls it at the robots, but they just shake off the rime and keep on. Spore tries to infect them to try and learn what they are, but they burn off the pollen again. Outside, Arcanix calls up magical bands to ensnare them, and Inferno blasts fire at them again. Rift notes multiple realities, and sees one into which Spore's fungus covers the world and chokes out life.

The robots stay on mission, though. The ones inside charge the servers and touch them, and the whole server bank shuts down. Rift, annoyed, conjures an even bigger freeze grenade, but as she's ready to throw it, one of the robots glances at her and the grenade explodes, freezing her arm and torso. Juno uses her bracelet to heal her, but the robots turn and fly off, leaving the heroes beaten and bewildered.

Inferno has his people check what was taken, and finds that it was a massive data breach, potentially very harmful. Worse, he starts getting contacts from his shareholders and partners, as someone is stealing their money and selling their stock. He contacts the SEC and has the transactions stopped, but a great deal of damage has already been done. Meanwhile, the heroes discuss the attack. Spore notes that he (they, really, as Spore is a collective) was pretty ineffective against these things, but Juno says that they all were. Spore questions whether someone might have been puppeteering these beings.

Carlsson, the agent from AEGIS (I started running this game before Masks was a thing, OK?) arrives just then, and asks the heroes what happened. He asks them to come along for a debrief, if they'd like, but none of them work for him anymore. Arcanix chooses not to - he flies off on his own, saying that he will investigate in his own way. 

We'll return in a month to see where this all goes!

Blue Rose: The Mysterious Rrusha

Been a while, but last night we played Blue Rose. On we go!

Whirlpool is in the kitchen, helping Magni out with cooking. Magni is something of a hummingbird in the kitchen, zipping from place to place; he's used to doing everything himself. He gets Whirlpool situated chopping veggies and so on, though. And then Whirlpool notices something outside a window - a strange snuffling sound, and a couple of pairs of eyes. He beckons Magni over, and they see that in addition to the strange eyes, there's a pair of feet - bare, but wearing greaves, and the skin tone is the pale green of a night person.

They go out to investigate (Magni grabbing a meat mallet), and they strange figures have gone, but there's enough disturbance in the dirt that Whirlpool can do some tracking. He figures that the creatures are quadrupeds, and from the size and shape of the prints, they're canine and pretty big. He follows the tracks (Magni gives him the mallet and heads back to the kitchen), and finds the creatures. They are indeed hound-like, but pale of skin and when they see him, one says "Whirlpool." This is more than a little disquieting.

The man holding the leash growls "where is Rrusha?" Whirlpool truthfully says he doesn't know who that is, and manages to defuse the situation enough that the man describes "Rrusha" a little - human, fair skin, green eyes, Kernish. Whirlpool still hasn't seen her, and the man says that he needs to deliver her a message, but doesn't remember why. He then leaves, and Whirlpool returns to the inn, feeling good that he managed to calm that down without it getting bad.

Meanwhile, Dobbin and Kisha go back to the Academy. Dobbin meets with Vistul, and asks about the history of the war and the supposed lich-tower that the characters have occasionally heard about. Vistul says that she's heard those stories - the tower is supposed to be southeast of the city, about a day's ride from the river at Bone's Bend, but she doesn't think there's anything there anymore. The lich was destroyed, the tower lost.

Dobbin also asks her about advocates, and if she knows anyone who might be able to help the group. Vistul says that Master Duallin has been known to advocate on occasion, so they might ask him.

Kisha heads to the library again and starts doing more historical research into the Ebban family. She learns that they started in Aldis, heading north, and settled in the Pavin Weald, and we know how that turned out. But she also finds a reference to a marriage in Verdaunen, some years after the line ends in the Weald - Vans Ebban married Lunal Rhys. They had no children and Vans died young, but the Rhys family still lives here, and they're scribes.

Arlen goes to a livery stable and asks for work, and is told to clean and brush the horses and then he'll get coin. It's not exactly the sort of work he enjoys - he grew up around horses and while he knows how to handle them, he's of a more artistic bent - but it's money.

The party meets back up at the inn in the morning; Arlen smells like horse, but otherwise everyone is intact. They share their news, and they decide that this morning, Arlen and Kisha will go to visit the Rhys family and see if they have anything to add (Kisha fully expects that this is a red herring, but it's not like the party has a lot else to do with their time), and Dobbin and Whirlpool will go to see Duallin and ask him for help as an advocate.

Duallin meets them in his fruit grove again, and listens to Dobbin's request and their story of what happened. He agrees to help; he'll go to the judiciary today, see what the case against the party actually consists of, and make sure there's no conflict of interest (the victim, Bescek, was the brother of Bresla, one of Duallin's former students). If there's not, he'll act as their advocate. He warns them, too, that the man who was investigating their case, Jocen, is known in the criminal underworld as "the friend" - he'll seem kind and understanding, but he's highly skilled at getting people to say just enough to convict themselves.

Kisha and Arlen go to the Rhys family home/shop, and meet with Ritick Rhys. He's interested to hear their request (it's about his family, after all) and looks up the marriage between Ebban and Rhys. It didn't last long - Vans Ebban died a year later - but what's interesting and a little macabre is that their wedding vows included a promise from Lunal to Vans to kill him if he ever got sick and "lost [him]self to the whirlpool of the mind." To Arlen and Kisha, this sounds a lot like corruption...so did Ebban become corrupt, or did he die of a wasting disease, as the book says?

Arlen, at this point, notices someone watching them in the window. She has a scarf wrapped around her face, but her eyes are green and her skin is fair, which catches Arlen's notice. She points this out to Kisha and Ritick, and Ritick waves her in (maybe thinking she's a customer), but she moves to leave. Arlen, concerned that this person might be the mysterious Rrusha (and therefore in some kind of trouble), follows.

Rrusha, however, is a skilled acrobat, and the chase leads them over rooftops and through alleys. Arlen keeps up using magic to pull Rrusha back, and eventually chases her through a window into a jeweler's shop. Rrusha runs for the door, but Arlen closes it with arcana and holds it fast, and Rrusha hits it and bounces off. Arlen pins her (again, magic - Move Object is a highly versatile spell!), and notes that she's carrying multiple daggers.

Rrusha gets up, and Arlen tells her that someone was looking for her to give her a message. She says that she knows, but she's "never going back to him - I don't need him." She draws daggers from her sleeves, and Arlen realizes she's carrying something else in a bag on her hip - something the size and shape of a mask.

Arlen blocks the door and grabs a jeweler's tool, hoping to cut the strings on the pouch and get the mask, but Rrusha throws a dagger at the shopkeeper. Arlen grabs it with Move Object, and pulls it back deftly, cutting the pouch-strings. He grabs the pouch and feels a familiar urge to open it and put on the mask - it's definitely the Ebban Mask. He casts Light Shaping and turns himself and the shopkeeper invisible, and Rrusha screams in rage. She re-affixes her scarf and says "You give me that mask back, Arlen, or I'll kill you all. You think an arrow on a boat is the worst I can do?" And with that, she leaves, vanishing into the crowd.

Arlen runs back to the Rhys home and collects Kisha, and then they meet back up with Dobbin and Whirlpool at the inn for lunch. Arlen shows them the mask and relates the story. Now they know the identity of the murderer, but there's still a lot they don't know. Who was the night person looking for Rrusha, and who was the message from? How does Lady Eleria figure into this? Who was the "one of three" that Bescek referred to in his dying breath?

In addition to all of this, the characters need to be careful. Rrusha is dangerous and she knows their names and where they are. She's also shown she's willing to harm others to get to them. What about Magni, for instance? The characters figure they should warn him, so they ask after him.

"Good luck," says another patron. "Haven't seen him since right after lunch was served."