Character Creation: Triune

There's probably a character sheet for this game somewhere but I'm buggered if I can find it. 

The Game: Triune
The Publisher: Happy Bishop Games
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

Interesting little sci-fi game, this. Basically in [the future], humanity goes into the stars and finds, instead of aliens, portals to Heaven and Hell. Well, anyway, portals to a realm where there are weird humanoid creatures that extol the virtues of conformity and have wings, and another one where the creatures are weird-looking and more varied but are generally of a "might makes right" sort of disposition. There follows a moment of revelation where everyone who believes in something - anything - strongly can alter reality, and then a three-way war between Heaven, Hell, and humanity in the personage of the Hegemony. 

And now here we are in the present of the game, and PCs are assumed to be officers of the Hegemony charged with enforcing the pogrom on religious faith and angels and devils in particular, since they aren't welcome on our plane of existence. Oh, and, each and every one of them has faith and can alter reality with prayer to Heaven, Hell, and...like, being in the service industry. 

I have...some confuzzles about this whole setup.

First of all, I don't understand why the "Heaven" bit of faith is patterned on real-world mythologies - Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism and so on. The book says that angels and devils will sometimes represent themselves as the beings from various mythologies, but they aren't, they clearly aren't, and besides which, most or all of those faiths have at least some dogma to them. If you're nominally Christian, but you're not into the dogma at least on a basic level, does that still jibe with have devout faith in this extraterrestrial realm? And why does Heaven get actual religions and Hell gets selfish and evil traits, but the Hegemony gets politics and bureaucracy, which have at least as many moral issues as "pleasure"?

The game smacks of a game about religion that didn't actually want to confront the fact that when you put any real-world religion in the position of having any part of its dogma or mythology be not just "real" but verifiable it falls apart real quickly (this, by the way, is the big reason there are no demons in Chill - if there are demons, there's a God, if there's a God, fuck him why is he letting vampires eat people?). 

Anyway, there are some very interesting ideas in the game. The idea of a war between Heaven and Hell with humanity caught in the middle that humanity actually won is really clever, and could have been the basis for a nice Good Omens/Paranoia mashup (indeed, Triune lists Paranoia as an inspiration), but it tries to have its communion wafers and eat them, too. 

Anyway, I asked my friends for a song early and my buddy Morgan gave me this one:

This song seems to me to be about sexual frustration, about watching other people indulge and, for whatever reason, not being able to make it work. It kinda works for this game, actually, since the crux of it is being a believer in a world where belief is forbidden. So I'm gonna make a character who was frustrated by his inability to get, erm, fulfilled and became the equivalent of a border patrolman to sublimate. Yes, that goes to some creepy places, but hey, you made it weird by insisting that to worship pleasure is to align yourself with Hell, buuuuuuddddy. 

My character's name is Idjmael Morizene. He looks late 20s, but his real "age" is kind of irrelevant (in this setting you can basic reboot your body if you get hurt or die, so physical age isn't generally one's true age). I also need to pick which "Authority" (member state of the Hegemony) Idjie is from. Somewhere repressed, I think. Let's see. Oh, let's be from the Mediterranean Union, that feels about right. 

Next up is attributes: Body, Mind, and Spirit/Soul (which one depends on where in the book - nay, where on page 36 - you're looking). I get 15 points to split up, 1 is infant, 9 is godly. Let's split them up evenly; I see Idjie as kind of even across the board. 

Each Attribute has three domains, a-like so:

Because I've got 5 in all three attributes, for each one I pick one domain to be a strength, one to be a weakness, and one to be average. 

OK, well, for body, I'll Fitness a strength, Speed average, and Muscle a weakness (though I think perhaps it's more to do with hesitancy then literal lack of muscle). For Mind, let's make Creativity the weakness (he is, after all, a believer oh snap), Intelligence average, and Awareness a strength. And for Spirit, let's make Charisma the weakness, Willpower the strength, and Empathy average. 

Resources are health-like traits, Health, Resolve, and Spirit (which means the table is a misprint). I've got 12 in each. 

Faith and prayers! Here's the juicy bit. I already know I want Pleasure as my Hell-faith. I'll take Islam as my Heaven faith, and for the Hegemony one, I'll take Military. 

And now I get a prayer for each one. For Islam, I'll take Ghowra's Lesson; I can make someone drop a weapon. For Pleasure, I'll take Intimidate - basically I can lower other people's rolls. Why's that under Pleasure? Don't know, don't much care. It actually kind of fits Idjie. 

Finally, for Military, I'll go for the basic prayer everyone gets and take Revelation; basically I can touch someone and know if they hold the same highest path (I guess that means faith?) as I do. 

Last thing: I get one non-weave item. Context: Everything in this universe is creating as-needed by mentally downloading quantum mumbo-jumbo and turning it into matter. But, since that would obviate the need for work, there's an artificial system of scarcity and labor attached to it, in what is probably the most believable part of this whole setting. All characters, in addition to being Commie mutant traitors having faith, have a non-weave item, something that was actually made by someone's own two hands. 

So for Idjie, I think it's a cotton shirt that someone in his family made for him back home. He feels guilty wearing it (it's hella illegal), but it feels comfier than his weave-shirts, and that breaks his brain a little. 

I picture Idjie as played by Tony Revolori, I think. He's got a flux between harmless and creepy that I think would work for Idjie. 

And that's it! No sheet and I'm not gonna make a stat block for this game.

Character Creation: Garden of the Giants

We are but mice. Squeakedy squeak.

The Game: Garden of the Giants
The Publisher: Ethan Hudgens
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

In Garden of the Giants, which abbreviates to GotG, which means something else in the popular consciousness, you play mice in the titular Garden. There's actually a lot of established setting, including a goal for the overarching campaign, but the structure of it would allow you, in theory, to replay the game using basically the same campaign but a world that evolves. And I think it's a pretty cool idea. 

But really, it's more likely that a group would play this campaign once, and that's fine. I think the idea that an RPG needs endless replayability hinders a lot of creatives, and one of the reasons I like, say, Forged in the Dark games is that the endgame is considered in the rules and text. 

Anyway, not going to go off on that particular tangent because MOUSIE. 

Characters in this game are, as mentioned, mice who wake up inside an old watering can and go out to venture into the Garden. They might be people that were turned into mice; that's something the group would decide at the beginning of the game. For my purposes, I'll assume that my mousie thinks he's just a normal anthropomorphic mouse that wears clothes and so on, but not discount the possibility that I might be a transmogrified human. 

First thing I do is set two of my Core abilities (Courage, Heart, Wits, and Charm) at d6 and two at d4. I feel like making a chubby little roly-poly sort of mousie, very clever and charming, so I shall put my d6s into Wits and Charm.

My three starting Traits are Curious, Nimble, and Hungry, so that's easy. 

I get two Knacks at d6, and they can be just about anything. My mouse is an expert on Flowers, but he's got no ability to garden, so he's not a farmer, this is more of a scientific interest. He's also good at Yelling. He's got a good set of pipes for a little mousie. 

Just a name and a description, then! His name is Mulberry. Mulberry is, as mentioned, plump and squishy. He wears a pair of brown breeches and a wide hat made from dried rose petals, and he carries a walking stick that he uses to poke at flowers to get a bit of pollen. Mulberry likes to sing, but he's not good at it. He is good at yelling to make a distraction, to make himself heard in a crowd room, or to test an echo. 

That's it! Very easy chargen. I'd totally run this game. It might not seem like much here, but a lot of the cool stuff is GM-facing, including the design of the Garden. 

 

Character Creation: The Hour Between Doggo and Woof

I use silly Internet terms to distract from the horror of the subject matter. 

The Game: The Hour Between Dog & Wolf
The Publisher: Errant Knight Games
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

The Hour Between Dog & Wolf is a two-player game, so right there it's not a game I'm likely to ever play. But I've been interested, because the concept of the game is interesting. One player is a serial killer, the other is an investigator hunting them. 

Now, that by itself doesn't necessarily need to get too disturbing - sure, "serial killer" is a pretty big ask for a lot of players, but such killers also occupy some mystique in our culture. But The Hour Etc dives into the deep end and explains serial killer pathology in a surprising amount of depth, using a lot of sources that look familiar to me from books like World of Darkness: Slashers. We're encouraged (if we're playing the killer) to make a character and consider their signature, their method of killing, whether they're organized or disorganized, and so forth. This game is 100% Not For Everyone, but it owns that and doesn't let you off the hook.

Would it be, for want of a better word, "fun" to play? I suspect with the right person it probably would, though I personally might enjoy it more as an epistolary game. Two-player games always feel weirdly, uncomfortably intimate for some reason, and this one would probably be even more so. 

But, whatever, I'm just gonna make a character. The first choice, naturally, is whether to make the killer or the investigator, but when I was reading the book I had an idea for the killer so that's where we're going. 

The idea I had was for a killer who breaks into people's houses when they're home alone, lurks in the dark and watches them, waits for them to wake up and stumble to the bathroom or investigate the noise in the dark, and then slit their carotid artery with a razor or scalpel and simultaneously start the time on a stopwatch. It's got to be an analog stopwatch because he likes to hear it tick, and because digital ones get too messy to use if they get blood on them. He stops it once the victim dies, and then leaves it behind. 

I'll get more into pathology and so on as chargen progresses. For now, I think that's enough of a start to do stats. Killers have three stats, Compulsion, Cunning, and Control. I have 10 points to split up between them. 

Compulsion is exactly that; the higher your rating, the more impulsive and driven to kill the killer is. I picture my killer as being somewhere in the middle, maybe 3 or 4? I'll say 4 for now but I might lower it if I need the points elsewhere.

Cunning is intelligence and care for avoiding leaving evidence around. My killer is pretty careful in a lot of ways - he cases homes before committing, avoiding households with alarm systems, dogs, multiple residents, and inconsistent schedules. He unscrews light bulbs or cuts power when he can so that his victims don't turn on lights and reveal him. Sure, arterial spray means he's sometimes messy when he leaves, but he's learned to wear coverings over his shoes so at least he can take those off and not leave footprints. That sounds pretty high in Cunning to me, let's say 5. 

And actually, as I think about that, it seems to suggest a lower Compulsion, so I'm gonna keep Cunning at 5 but lower Compulsion to 2. 

Now, that would leave Control at 3, but that actually works, because low-Control killers are the ones that aren't really active outside their own little world. My guy lives alone, probably has a job he can do online and without interacting with people, and rarely talks to anyone. The investigator is probably going to wind up being his most significant relationship. 

Next thing is motive. The Stopwatch Killer (as the press calls him) is in it for Thrills, though he would probably say he's just interested to see what people do with their last minute. That's a subset of Hedonistic.

Next question is Organized or Disorganized; my guy is pretty obviously Organized.

Other details: Let's say that Stopwatch's only living family is his father, Ross. Ross frequently expresses his disappointment in his son in little passive aggressive ways, never enough that Stopwatch (whom I'll find a real name for in a sec here) feels justified in getting angry or confronting him, but always enough that it hurts. Ross is a PhD and a former professor, a published author, and a recognized authority in his field (some obscure field of mathematics, I think, which my guy never had an aptitude for), and feels likes his son could have done more with his life. 

Stopwatch's mother left them when he was very small, and made occasional attempts to have a relationship, but never stayed consistent or seemed enthused about it. When Stopwatch turned 12, she no-showed when she was supposed to pick him up for his birthday. His dad had already dropped him off (he was running late, and figured mom would be along soon, and this was in the days before cell phones) so Stopwatch wound up sitting at a little diner watching the clock for hours until finally someone asked him who he was waiting for and then called his father. 

Engram: this is the ideal encounter, the thing the killer fantasizes about. For Stopwatch - real name: Shaun Harris - it's his mother begging to spend one more minute with him, and then cutting her throat and watching her spend her last minute choking on her own blood. 

MO: I've covered this above.

Signature: Crime scenes undisturbed other than lights being disabled, victims dispatched with a single cut to the throat, stopwatch placed on or near the body. 

So Themes & Characteristics are four aspects that, if we were playing, would become important. For Shaun, I think we'll say: 

1. Father has no time for him
2. One clean slice (Shaun is especially proud when he can slice open the carotid with the flick of a wrist; he'll stab if he has to but it's not as satisfying)
3. Mother abandoned him
4. What do you do with your last minute?

The only other thing would be to set Victims, Evidence, and shared experiences, but all of that would require someone playing the hero, so that's about it.

I picture Shaun as being in his mid-20s. Average height, average build, not good-looking but not memorably ugly, either. Reading glasses, but he doesn't need them at night. He's got a shopping list of things he wants to buy for his killings - night vision goggles, maybe chloroform? But he's not sure where to get this stuff and he doesn't have a lot of disposable income anyway. 

That'll do it!

Cairn: Those Darn Kids

Cairn! Here's last time.

Our heroes go to the Brookflower to find Sarafina Bushytail, intending to ask about her experience being chased by the "Marma." They find, however, when they get there she's not in. Quirkly Shallowleaf, the owner of the Brookflower, says that she was so shaken by her experience that she's resting, and the night bartender, Trixat Flutterwatch is looking after her.

They head to her house, and Trixat answers the door. He tells them that Sarafina is feeling pretty delicate right now, and maybe they could come back later? He's pretty insistent, and so the Knights go and try and trace her steps. They find the point at which she started running, and it looks like someone jumped off a nearby roof and landed next to her. Russelet Leatherwind brings his tracking acumen to bear, and determines that whoever landed next to her has the posture and gait of a larger, leaner animal, like an otter or weasel, but isn't as big as they usually are. He also finds a tuft of hair on the roof. Ratatosk Longberry takes it and scampers back to the lab, and after some quick examination determines it to belong to a sugar glider.

Russelet knows that since the incident with the Blood-Walkers, some of the glider families from Sweetthorn Roost have moved closer to Cairn for safety. The Knights head over to the cluster of homes where they've settled and see a bunch of young gliders hopping about tree to tree. Snootabur Shadowbough starts juggling while Rumdiggle Sunsong plays along on her lute, and soon enough some of the gliders come down to watch. One of them chats with Snootabur, and Snoot quickly discovers that this glider (Bitta Covercloud) is probably too young and unfocused to be much help. She asks Bitta to find an adult, and she scampers off after her dad. Ratatosk follows her into the trees and talk with one of the adult gliders, and learns that there was talk of a second Marma, north of this cluster. A teenage glider named Astar Moontail joins the conversation - Astar is a big fan of Russelet and wants to join the guard when he gets older. 

Astar shows them to where he saw the Marma and tells them that it looked like it just appeared out of nowhere. Russelet figures that it probably appeared from over a rise, and he notes boot-prints identical to the ones that chased Sarafina. Following those prints backwards, they lead to where Rummy stashed the Marma costume...which is gone. 

The Knights follow the prints backwards, hoping to find where these thieves came from. In addition to the bootprints, which Russelet still believes are from a juvenile weasel or otter, they find prints from someone who lands and then jumps back into the air - probably a glider. And then there's one more set of prints, smaller than the boot-prints, but not as small as, say, a mouse? Whatever it was, Snoot finds a little hole where it dug up a bug for a snack. Hedgehog, maybe, or mole? 

The trail leads back around to the northwest side of Cairn, and the Knights find themselves at the Cider Mill Inn. They stop in and talk with Alyere Lovegood, and ask her about any young folks she might know that fit this general description. She says that Bert Stubtail, the son of Cripke Stubtail (whom the characters dealt with way back in the first story), is chummy with her daughter Anima, but she isn't sure where they were during the Marma's Day celebration. Alyere also tells them that Sarafina has apparently been telling stories about being chased by Marma last night, it's getting people in something of a tizzy.

They decide to split up. Snoot and Rummy go to the Brookflower to see Sarafina, while Ratatosk and Russelet go to the Root and see if Cripke is around. At the Brookflower, Snoot and Rummy enter to see Sarafina telling the story of the horrible Marma chasing her and giggling like a banshee. They interrupt before things get worse and talk to her, and she confirms that the "Marma" landed next to her out of nowhere, but she didn't really see it much after that. Then she heard high-pitched giggles coming from multiple angles. The Knights gently inform her that, in all probability, this was just a group of kids playing a prank, and Sarafina feels kind of silly. She asks Rummy to play a song with her, and Snoot relaxes and listens.

Meanwhile, at the Root, Ratatosk and Russelet find Cripke and talk with him about his son Bert. Cripke confirms that Bert was home when he came home on Marma's Day, but he does mention that he smelled the fungus-y earth typical of the Underground when he got home. The Knights file that away, and go to meet back up.

Snoot, in the meanwhile, drops in on Festa Lovegood, tending his worm farm, and asks about his sister and any gliders she might know. He confirms that Anima likes to hang with Bert Stubtail, a glider named Aloysius "Loy" Covercloud (maybe the brother of Bitta, whom the characters met earlier?) and a mole whose name he doesn't know. Armed with this knowledge, the Knights decide to go back out to the glider colony and see if they can find Loy.

On the way, though, they hear alarm bells from Cairn! A fire! They all rush back into town (except Rummy, who's here anyway, having taken the time to walk Sarafina home) and join the bucket brigade. The house that caught fire belonged to Eliza Greyhair, the old mouse who runs the Market, and the Knights hear rumors that the Marma did it! 

Once the fire is out, they find Lord Mayor Keeble Brownberry trying to calm citizens down. They tell him what's been going on, and he tells them that Eliza was chased into her home by someone wearing the Marma costume, and she got so scared she knocked over a pan of hot wax she was boiling to make candles and the house caught fire. Russelet talks to the citizens and reassures them that this was all just a big misunderstanding born of a prank, and the Knights go to find Bert Stubtail.

Bert is sullen and mumbly, but he does cop to the caper. He claims that he and his buddies found the costume in the woods, and Mimsy Underroot "made" him wear it to chase people around. The Knights tell Cripke to bring his son to see the Mayor tomorrow evening, and then the Knights split up - Ratatosk goes to talk to Alyere Lovegood about Anima, Russelet flies to the gliders to talk to the Coverclouds, and Rummy goes to the Underground to find Mimsy. Snootabur goes to the Lord Mayor to confirm that the youths will come to apologize. 

The Knights visit their respective offenders - Loy Covercloud is terrified and apologetic, Mimsy Underroot is cagey but ultimately acknowledges her role, and Anima isn't at the Cider Mill Inn, but Alyere makes it quite clear that she'll be having a stern talk with her daughter. 

Next session, we shall see how the apology goes!

Character Creation: Liminal

 Always room for a little urban fantasy.

The Game: Liminal
The Publisher: Modiphius Publishing
Degree of Familiarity: None, and yet, it feels so familiar
Books Required: Just the one

Liminal is an urban fantasy game with vampires, werewolves, mages, faeries, and ghosts, and hey, if you're thinking "like the World of Darkness or Dresden Files?" then yes, exactly like that. 

There's not a lot more to say about it. It's a game in that vein, except the focus is very much on the UK, which grants it some cultural context that sometimes gets lost in WoD (since that's a world of darkness). Urban Shadows is another game in the same family, though of course because that game is PbtA it's got a more bespoke quality to it. At the end of the day, though, the usual ingredients are here - secret world underneath or in the shadows of the mundane one, check, entrenched power structures, check, secret organizations within mundane human ones, checkaroony. 

This all sounds dismissive, but I think Liminal would probably be fun to play and it ain't like I'm ever going to run WoD again, so if I were going to run a game like this, who knows, might crack this one open. I'll say this, it's got a ton of support from the creator, so that's always nice. 

Anyway, let's make a character. I just rewatched Dog Soldiers the other night, and I've always liked the character of Witherspoon (or "Spoon", as his mates call him). Sure, he's a little too cavalier in the face of certain death, but he has hands down the most badass line in the movie ("I hope I give you the shits, you fucking wimp"). It'd be fun to make a character who survived a werewolf attack and is now hunting them down in this setting, both because it would open the way for a character arc where he becomes one (werewolves aren't infective in this setting but you can still become one if you go through a ritual) and because there's actually a lot of political shit going on with different gangs of wolves. 

Cool. So the first thing I do is come up with a Drive. I'll phrase it thusly: "To track down and kill the werewolves that nearly killed me." 

And then we choose a focus, either determined, magician, or tough. Obviously not magician, but I'm a little torn on the others. "Determined" is "great strength of will," and "tough" is "physically resilient," and they both fit what I want. Well, because determined boosts your Will and you spend Will to succeed on shit, I'll go with that. There's no place on the sheet for focus, must not be that important. 

OK, Attributes we kinda skip for now, because they depend on Skills, but I get a +2 to Will for being determined. Skills, then? I get 17 points, and there's a cap of 4. If I'm at 3 or better, I can spend a point for a specialty (see, even mechanically this feels pretty WoD). 

Pretty standard fare

Guess I should think about background. I think my guy has or had a job that was physically demanding but didn't come with a huge amount of training (it's all very well to play a former soldier, but a lot of times starting characters don't have the points to represent the capabilities of such a character). So let's say Pac, for 'tis his nickname, works for a moving company. Lots of lifting and carrying, and he keeps himself fit. Probably does crossfit, the weirdo (if that particular cult made it to the UK, I don't know). 

So with that in mind, let's just go ahead and dump 3 into Athletics. I'll put 1 into Awareness (which isn't much but it's more than he used to have), 1 into Melee (same reason), and 1 into Stealth. I'll put 2 into Survival; let's say Pac was always a bit of an outdoorsman and he's gotten more serious about it since the incident. That's 8 spent. 

Let's put 1 into Vehicles so I can drive, hur-dur. 1 into Medicine since he's learned to bind wounds. Social skills, here we go. Two into Charm, three into Conviction. Only 2 left. I'll drop one from Charm so I can have two in Taunt and one in Streetwise. 

Traits! I get 5 points for traits, but I can take Limitations to give me a couple more. I always find it useful to start with those, so let's see. Oh, no, those are just magical things, never mind. Back to traits! 

Well, I definitely want Brawny (bonus to feats of strength and damage). I'll take Breaking and Entering; Pac is in and out of other people's houses a lot and has learned about security systems and locks kind of secondhand. I'll take Rage (I can flip out and beat shit). I definitely want Fight On, which lets me spend Will and reduce damage taken. 

Last point...hmm. I'll take Artifact (using the Freedom Spelling!). Pac has a pair of trainers (or sneakers, to use the Freedom...Word! ok, I'll stop) that make him light on his feet. I get a +2 to Athletics when wearing them, and I can spend a point of Will to get a critical success on a defensive roll (there's a list). Call them the Trainers of Fast & Loud ("What? You what?"). 

So back around to Attributes. Endurance is 8 + Athletics (11). Will is 8 + Conviction + 2...oh, wait, "focus" isn't on the sheet but "emphasis" is. They must have changed the term at some point. Anyway, Pac's Will is 13. 

All done but the details, then! His full name is James Pascoe Jr., but his friends call him "Pac" (his family tends to call him "Junior" or "Jimmy"). Pac is on the shorter side, but wiry and muscular. He's got scars on his neck, shoulders, arms, and legs from where the wolves chewed him up, and he'll tell anyone who'll listen that they were fucking werewolves because it was a full moon, there was five of them, and they all turned into men and fucked off when they were done chewing him up. 

That was a couple of years ago, and Pac has been learning to track, fight, and stitch wounds in his spare time. He keeps himself fit and he'll still tell the story to anyone who'll listen, but he's starting to think maybe it was just some feral dogs. Pac just needs an inciting incident to jump into the hunt with both feet, though. 

Pugmire: Cat v Cat

Once more into the lands of dogness! Here's last time.

Our heroes are way out southeast of Pugmire, following a lead they found in the Underneath: a mural depicting a lithe, orange-red dog-like creature, under which was written "WHAT DOES IT SAY?" They went out to find this mysterious "fox" and couldn't but did meet a cat named Dmitri Mainecoon von Siberian. Dmitri pointed them towards a plastic quarry nearby (probably to get them to sod off). 

They find the plastic quarry in question, and Boomer and Dire immediately scamper down into it and start loading up their pockets. And then a group of mercenaries attack! Chaos erupts, Sausagedog manages to wreck some scaffolding doing barkour, and Petunia yells that they're Royal Pioneers and should get themselves under control!

But the battle is joined. Six mercenaries engage the Pioneers, three archers perched on the edge of the quarry and three ax-wielding warrior dogs getting up close and personal. They yell about "killing the Pitbull," but they don't seem to know which one (Petunia or Boomer). The archers fire at Petunia and she responds with a lightning bolt spell. Peppa casts a spell to speed Petunia up but otherwise remains in a support role, not wanting to hurt anyone. Boomer left his weapons at the top of the quarry and so climbs up the side to get them, while Dire engages the enemies with his war-hammer.

The miners, meanwhile, join the battle in various capacity, usually with a punch here or a shove there, but they aren't armed and they don't really know what's happening. One of them pushes one of the archers into the quarry and tries the same thing on Petunia, but Peppa's Haste spell makes her basically untouchable. The remaining archers, one of whom is masked and cowled and clearly in charge, aim their arrows at Petunia and nearly fell her, but down in the quarry things aren't going the mercs' way. 

Boomer, up on the edge of the quarry, retrieves his maul and rages. He leaps into the quarry and bashes one of the mercs' head in, and then a followup blow snaps another's neck. The third swings on Dire but loses his grip on his ax and it flies into the dirt. He goes scrabbling for it and Dire finishes him off. 

The mercenary leader, at this point, turns tail and flees. The other two archers try to run, but Dire charges at them, yelling "YOU DON'T GET TO RUN FROM ME!" Sausagedog, not wishing to see Dire murder someone in cold blood today, trips him and Petunia throws a Web spell to incapacitate these two.

The immediate threat over, the miners yell at the Pioneers (mainly Dire and Boomer) for stealing from them - if they come in under quota they are the ones that suffer, not the boss-man. Dire drops his ill-gotten gains immediately; he's not down with stealing from the little guys, and Boomer allows himself to be convinced. The Pioneers interrogate the webbed-up mercs, and learn that they were hired by the dog(?) in the mask to kill "the Pitbull," but then they got here and there were two. They don't know why, and they don't know who hired them. 

The characters follow the merc leader's trail off into the woods, and shortly come across said leader locked in single combat with another masked figure of similar build. Peppa susses out which is which and directs the others to capture the one they're chasing, which everyone utterly fails to do until Boomer just walks up behind her and grabs her in a big bear hug. They yank down her mask to reveal a cat! Not one they recognize, though. The other combatant lowers her mask, too - also a cat. 

She introduces herself as Amaranth von Rex, and says that the one they've captured is Pickles von Shadow. She (Amaranth) is a bounty hunter, and has been tracking Pickles for quite a while. She's wanted on a number of crimes in the Monarchies, but the most serious one is consorting with the Unseen. She doesn't know why Pickles has it out for Pitbulls, though. Boomer squeezes her a bit and she finally talks.

There's a prophecy that a warrior will rise from the Pitbull family and lead Pugmire against its "greatest enemy" - cats. Pickles says that these dogs have gotten attention lately and has some reason for thinking that either Boomer or Petunia might be this Pitbull, but isn't saying why. Amaranth doesn't know anything about this, but then, she's a tracker, not a mancer. She asks if the Pioneers would be willing to help her get Pickles back to a population center, somewhere she can get transport home and hire some muscle.

As they're talking, the plan evolves further. Peppa has heard whispers of similar prophecy from the Friends of Man, although they of course have much more favorable views of the "Pitbull Warrior." In the end, they decide they need some more information about the cat side of things, and offer to escort Amaranth all the way back to the Monarchies. They want to stop off in Pugmire first to gear up and touch base with the Guild, though, so they start heading north...

Character Creation: Lightning War

Yay, I picked something fun! 

The Game: Lightning War
The Publisher: Games, Ink
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

I guess small publishers just don't have websites as much anymore.

Anyway, Lightning War is a game in a genre that's not exactly underrepresented: fantasy WWII. But where it's different from, say, Fae Noir or Wild Skies: Europa Tempest that touch on some of the same themes is that this world is inspired by ours but manifestly isn't. 

That's nice because it frees us from a lot of the baggage of our own history, but it also places a bigger burden on the writing because now not only do you have to bring across the setting, but also doing it without the benefit of easy touchstones. I'm happy to say that Lightning War does it. The relevant history of the world (note "relevant", thank you for not giving me prehistory through now) brings us up to speed, here's a few pages on the "Big Five" nations and why they're at war, go.

Character creation consists of making a specialist and two grunts. I was leery of making three characters, but grunts basically just get a name, a species, and one relevant trait and then if/when your specialist packs it in, you can promote a grunt. Since the game is designed around tactical play (which for a game set in war makes sense), I think that's a nice feature. 

Would it play well at the table? I have no clue, but I'd be interested to find out! Let's make a character. First thing we do is determine Abilities; this is a 2d6 roll for each of them that then translates to a modifier. So I get: 4, 2, 5 (nice!), 2, 3, 4, 2. And then I gotta assign these values to Accuracy, Communication, Dexterity, Fitness, Intelligence, Perception, Willpower, in order. 

Next, I pick a species. I kinda want to be a flamethrower operator for reasons I can't quite enumerate, so I'm gonna be a dwarf. I was thinking cinderfolk (flamey elemental types) but maybe you don't want to put the guy who's sometimes on fire wearing the flamethrower? 

So, as a dwarf I get darkvision, stonecunning (I can retrace my steps and track time underground). I can take an urgosh (a dwarven polearm weapon) instead of my standard melee weapon; maybe, I'll have to see what I'd normally get. And I can resist fear with Intelligence instead of Willpower, which is at least a bit of a bonus.

I could roll for a personality trait, but I kinda like the "never forgive, never forget" one. My dwarf is a refugee from one of the pogroms. See, the dwarves in this setting all come from Gundundren, this massive underground nation, but most of them are very into "purity". There are some progressive dwarves, like my guy and his clan, who push for diversity and not being dicks to the rest of the world, and the powers that be have been known to just...bury them alive. That's what happened to my family, and so he's very much of the opinion that anyone that sides with the fascist nutbags of the Apex can just burn. 

(War is hell, baby.)

As a flamethrower, I get stuff. I get a flamethrower (doy), a pistol, a fuel tank, and a helmet. As written I get a knife, but I think I'll invoke my dwarven thing and take an urgosh. I get a "light kit," what's that mean? Oh, just means less ammo than a heavy kit, easy. And then I get two perks to start. 

Well, I feel like I should take tunnel rat, since I'm a dwarf and it feels an obvious fit. And then I think I'll take slow burn; my flamethrower effectively has more shots because I'm disciplined with my trigger finger. 

My dwarf's name is Qud Delzender (and thank you for including naming conventions for each of the races). He speaks his native language of Gundundran, but is also fluent in Meridian, as that's where he fled to after his family died. Qud is short (doy), stocky, and has burn marks and singed bits all over. He takes no overt joy in burning enemies to death, but an almost spiritual, ferocious reverence.

Cool, now two grunts! Grunts get a species, name, basic traits, and they give you a bonus. So I want a Prepared Grunt that gives me an extra utility slot, and a Precise Grunt that gives me +1 Accuracy. 

The Prepared one is an orc. Her name is Ines. She's fussy but very well organized. The Precise one is a cinderfolk called Murrae. They're hoping to be a sniper one day, but part of being a sniper is, um, not being noticed, which is hard when you're on fire. 

 And that's it!

Character Creation: Universal Storytelling System

"Universal." Imagine that in the same tone of voice as Rick Flagg saying "Peacemaker" or Scar saying "Long live the king." 

The Game: Universal Storytelling System
The Publisher: Palegain Press (their site is gone, tho)
Degree of Familiarity: I could have sworn I'd played this, but then I read it and I really don't remember ever doing it
Books Required: Just the one

One of my favorite video game reviewers often complains about how broad appeal generally leaves you with something without heart or personality, all the edges sanded down, and it might look very polished but it really isn't about anything. That's true of most mass media, I think, including RPGs, and in almost all cases, that doesn't much matter to the people who like the thing either way. I personally think D&D is generally bland and tasteless, a lot of people seem to think that about the MCU, and so on and on, but I think it's worth noting that people don't spend money on something unless it's doing something for them.

With that said, if you're going to try and differentiate yourself in a saturated market (and aren't they all), the way to do it is not with a "universal" product. If the strength of your game is that you can "do anything," then players get paralyzed for choice. Fate and Savage Worlds (and to a lesser extent, systems like Cypher and Gumshoe) work not because they're "universal" but because they're fun, and because they do something and do it well, and because their respective owners have put a shitload of work into them.

Which brings us around to Universal Storytelling System. The title is bad, right off the bat. It's shit to Google, it's too long, and it's not memorable at all. The "core" book is less than 50 pages, the artwork is really bad (other than the cover, which I have to admit is pretty dope). 

And I don't have a PDF, and of course I can't find a sheet, which is annoying. So let's just make a damn character and get on with our lives. 

The system is card based, which I enjoy in theory, though I find that card-based systems tend to be hard to get your brain around in practice (I should know, I wrote one for another game no one ever plays). 

I need a concept, which means I need a setting. Handily, there's a list of eight story ideas (well, nine, but the first one is "use your favorite book/movie/whatever!" which is lazy af) so I shall just roll a d8. And I get: "A deadly virus will be released in a short time. Your team must find and contain the virus."

Well, let's use the easiest possible interpretation of that scenario and assume it's modern day and we're in an Outbreak kind of situation. That's fine (another way to look at this would be Pandemic the RPG, which...hmm. That'd be an interesting idea. Rabbit hole for some other time). Let's say my character is a biologist whose work in viral detection is being heralded as a New Big Thing. He's young(ish), kind of on the haughty side, and hasn't ever really seen what viruses do on a big scale. He's used to seeing them through microscopes and reading numbers, not seeing dead bodies stacked up in refrigerated trucks. His name is Noel Bryant, PhD. 

Step two is physical/emotional traits. No mechanics, here, just describe yourself. I think I already described Noel emotionally. Physically he's tall, thin, hunched a bit, and has thinning blonde hair and blue eyes. He wears glasses, of course, favors cargo pants (not shorts, thanks, he's a grown-up). 

Next step is the sex/gender/attraction matrix. No, I'm not kidding, and I really wish I had a PDF so I could post a screen cap of this. Basically there are dots in each of these three things, and I have no idea what this is meant to add to the game to get this granular. Anyway, Noel is a cisgender male, and while he thinks of himself as straight, the truth of the matter is that he's more demi than anything. 

Goals! Noel achieved his first major goal (PhD, baby). His next one is a high-ranking post in the Dept of Health, or the CDC, or some other similar body. Short term, of course, is to prevent this virus from being released. 

Abilities! There are six, they each get a dot, and then I have six more to split up, max three. 

Agility, Power, Endurance, Intelligence, Creativity, Nerve. Well, I think Noel needs a high Intelligence and Creativity, so I'll blow 4 of my six and put those there. I'll put one of the remaining two into Endurance, and one into Agility. 

Skills! These work in a ladder kind of thing; generalized skills (driving), specialized (driving a car), expert (driving a race car). Dots are one-for-one, but I have to put three in a general before I get a specialized, and two in a specialized before I can get an expert. And there's a max of five dots per skill, and I get 20 dots. OK. 

Well, Biology is listed on one of the example characters as generalized, so:

Biology 5 --> Virology 3 -->Epidemiology 1
Research 5 --> Medical 2

That's 16 points. And then I think Medical 2 (generalized), and Computer Use 2. Done.

Next step: Advantages. One Advantage needs to be chosen. You know, when I was starting out as a game writer, "no passive voice" was drilled into my head (see what I did there?). I don't necessarily recommend freelancing for RPG companies, since they tend to be pretty exploitative, but maybe learn to write a little more better? Or get a good editor? 

Anyway. Good lord, these are dumb. OK, if you're going to have a "universal" system, but a finite list of ads and disads, that says something about the kinds of games you expect people to play with your "universal" system. And these are just kinda bog standard combat/exploration focused things. 

I'll take Cold Acclimation. Noel just doesn't get cold easily. 

Next step: Inner demon. Something that Noel wouldn't want other people to know about. Sure, let's say Noel got his plum research position in grad school at a premiere institution because his aunt (a well-known doctor in her own right) pulled some strings. Noel wasn't too proud to take the bump, but he really doesn't want to be known as a "nepo baby" both because that's a stupid phrase, and because he actually did work his ass off and accomplished some impressive things.

Ten freebie creation points. Abilities are three points each, so I'll spend six and bump up Nerve and Power to 2. With my remaining four, I will buy the Contacts Advantage. I get two Contacts, one of which is going to be his Aunt Cleo, and the other is one of his cohort, Varun Bhat, who is now working at a big Indian hospital. 

Speed is Agility x 15, Perception is Agility + Nerve, or 30 and 4, respectively. 

Name: Noel Bryant, PhD
Abilities: Agility 2, Power 2, Endurance 2, Intelligence 3, Creativity 3, Nerve 2
Skills: Biology 5 --> Virology 3 --> Epidemiology 1; Research 5 --> Medical 2; Computers 2
Advantages: Cold Acclimation, Contacts (Cleo Bryant, MD; Varun Bhat, PhD)

That's it! Gotta pick something fun for the next one.

Wicked Ones: The Last March of the Confraternity

Last time, we celebrated the death of...er, mourned the life of...anyway, Queequaz the Querulous died. This time, we open in the sanctum of the Sepulcher of Suffering, as the two-headed monster that is Yog-en-Yeg is tossing Queequaz' shit out of his room. "TOO MUCH STUFF! TOO CROWDED!"

The others - Baldruf, Thudd, and Fnort - stand in the sanctum and watch this. "We OK with this?" says Fnort. 

"Can you fight?" yells Baldruf. Yog-en-Yeg pauses and emerges from the lair. "WHO YOU?"

"I'm Fnort," says the fuzzy kobold. 'He's Baldruf, that's Thudd." 

"NAMES MEAN NOT FOOD," says one head. "NO IT DOESN'T," says the other. They eventually decide that these folks aren't food, and the other Wicked Ones decide that Yog-en-Yeg are quite welcome here. 

About this time, an imp piloting a corpse wobbles in and goes up to Thudd. "Uh, hey, boss. Boys were wondering if since Queequaz is dead we were still gonna worship Crevis, or what?" Thudd puts this to the other Wicked Ones, and they discuss the various gods in the Imperial Family and the Wild. There's some talk about devoting the Sepulcher to all of the gods, but then they decide it makes more sense if, since they just annihilated the Confraternity of the Three, if their temple is to a "Dark Three," the opposites of Ubu, Uwu, and Amael.

They choose as their "Dark Three": Nezame, the Joyful Hedonist is the opposite of Amael, God of Chastity. Dalgeth, the Grumbling Malcontent is the opposite of Ubu, God of Obediance. And Zaheen, the Dancing Madman, is the opposite of Uwu, God of Authority. There are also little niches and shrines to the other Dark Gods - it's a temple, there's room. The problem is that as this starts to take shape, the imps split into factions. Some want to worship Zaheen, some worship Vanhoona, the Howler at Night, and some still cling to Crevis. 

But the Wicked Ones have other fish to fry. They've discovered a crop of glowy mushrooms in the tunnel behind the altar. Also, a slaad has slithered up into the hole that they dug to drain the water out from when the dungeon flooded, so he's made welcome. And, of course, they need new minions. Fnort goes and recruits a new batch of young kobold guards. Thudd makes friends with the ghoul that's been creeping around lately. Yog-en-Yeg and Baldruf each get a skeleton out of the ossuary. 

That handled, they all get to work on other projects. Yog-en-Yeg starts digging (sloppily) a hole to another level of the dungeon. Thudd develops an electromagnet, perfect for pulling armor right off an adventurer (in theory)! Fnort continues work on the reliquary, even going so far as to leave his special Dice of Zaheen, but then a skeleton animated by the sheer chaos of the Dancing Madman comes and dances with Fnort until he's ready to drop. 

Baldruf takes Yog-en-Yeg and makes a little trip to the goblins of Breaker's Bridge, inviting them to come and worship at the Sepulcher, maybe have a little cookout. He brings them a gift basket just to make them feel welcome. 

This is all very well, but the paladins of the Confraternity aren't all dead, and one evening the Sepulcher finds itself invaded! It's the Leader of the Confraternity, a paladin with sparkly armor, plus a heavily armored Knight, the Chastiser and the Merc Convert from the monsters' last raid, and three novitiates. 

One of the novitiates, too eager for his own good, tries to open the door and nearly falls into the spike trap. The party heads into the main hall and approach the statue (that's really a mimic). It leaps at the Leader, but he casts it back, and the mimic decides it has better things to do than die and skitters off forever. 

The party checks the room and awakens Skiathrax, the umbral dragon! It slithers out of its hole and strikes at the Leader, this time injuring him. Alas, the Leader wields the powerful magic of the Three, and strikes the spectral serpent down. All that remains is scales. 

The party then find the door locked with the bone puzzle. Sadly, someone forgot to reset it, and they bypass it without a problem. The Leader spots a pile of bones on the floor and identifies it as an undead creature, and indeed, it's the skeletal priest of Dalgeth that Yog-en-Yeg recruited! It leaps up and casts a spell at the Merc, amplifying his greed. He stabs the Leader in the back, and the Chastiser beats him about the head and shoulders, casting out the dark magic. The Merc falls to his knees in supplication and the skeleton pulls off a couple of bones and re-locks the door. Unfortunately, it's on the same side as the adventurers, and they make quick work of it. The bone puzzle doesn't slow them down even when it is set, either, and the party continues into the guard post.

But that means KOBOLD SWARM! Fnort's guards surge forward and pull the eager novitiate down, bashing his head on the floor and knocking him out. They scatter, and then swarm back at the Leader. The Knight storms into the room and kills two of them before the others manage to pull him to the ground, but in so doing they take their attention off the others. The kobolds fall, but they've definitely done some damage.

The party moves forward into the Scriptorium, where they destroy a couple of unholy artifacts and rally to their mission once more, and then descend into the dark. They emerge into the Sanctum, but the Wicked Ones have heard them coming.

As they enter, Fnort scampers up and bops the Chastiser with his flail. Yog-en-Yeg is back in his room clearing out Queequaz's stuff again, in this case the immense boulder that Queequaz used as an altar ("THIS TOO BIG!"). He hurls it out into the sanctum and it flies over Fnort's noggin, scraping the Leader's head and landing right on a novitiate ("huh?" squish). 

Thudd quickly slaps together a bear trap and slides it out, but the Merc spots it and triggers it with a thrown dagger. Baldruf, hiding up one of the columns, takes careful aim and puts his magical crossbow bolt in the Leader's neck. He falls dead, and Thudd turns on his new magnet and yanks the Knight out of formation and closer to him. The Knight raises his sword and lets go, and it flies right at Thudd. He ducks right in time and avoids getting face-stabbed.

Yog-en-Yeg emerges ("WHAT ALL THIS NOISE?!") and sees the melee. He advances and rips the Knight's breastplate right off him ("TOO CLANKY!"), hurling it at the Merc. Thudd alters his angle of attack and tries to pull off the Knight's helmet. He rolls and pops up right in front of Thudd, and stabs at him with his dagger. Fnort slides over and appears in between them, letting his skin armor take the blow. Baldruf, meanwhile, slinks out of the shadows and dispatches the last novitiate.

The Knight backs off, retrieves the Leader's bladed staff, and hurls it at Fnort and Thudd. Yog-en-Yeg try to grab it, but it burns with holy fire ("HAND OUCHIE!"). Fnort leaps up and tries to smash the spear away, but gets it through his shoulder and goes down. 

Yog-en-Yeg grabs the Merc and hurls him across the room, bouncing him off columns with a crunch. The Knight tries to stab the ettin, but one of the heads looks down him and growls "FOOD NO CRAWL AWAY!" The Knight tries to flee, finally beaten, but Thudd stabs him in the back with his spring-loaded dagger, severing his spinal cord.

The Wicked Ones have repelled yet another invasion, the worst one yet, and have utterly destroyed the Confraternity of the Three. Their master plan proceeds, and next they intend to spread the word of the Dark Three across the land! Perhaps beginning with the idiots pirates at Briggon's Notch?

Character Creation: Xenopolitan

Here's an odd little RPG.

The Game: Xenopolitan
The Publisher: A. Hagen, I guess? Maybe Willy Elektrix?
Degree of Familiarity: None; system-wise it's Fudge, so that's easy
Books Required: Just the one

This game perplexes me a little. The introduction tells us that it's meant to be an RPG about people living their normal lives:

...yeah. You didn't get very far before deciding to throw in aliens because RPGs in which you portray normal people doing normal shit is boring. Even the dirty hippie indie games that have you doing (relatively) normal shit either have some kind of mechanic gimmick that make them interesting, are designed to played as one-shots, or both. 

There's a reason this is a joke, is what I'm saying.

But you introduce the idea of a floating city above Earth populated by species from all over the galaxy and run by a kind of hyper-capitalist hive mind, with a system of laws that would make libertarians a little hot and squishy, then you've got a pretty compelling setting for an RPG. But it's hard to argue that it's about "stories about everyday life."

I have to say, though, that the description of Ingress (the aforementioned city) and the in-game setting text is well-written and engaging, in stark contrast to the game I did yesterday. 

Well, anyway, let's do a character. Ingress came to be because the Federation of Planets (I think that's what it's called - Confederation of Worlds? No, that's HoL. Democratic Order Of Planets? That's Futurama) wanted to buy some of the raw materials on Earth, but humans were destroying them so fast that they'd all be gone by the time we figured out that life existed beyond our planet. Can confirm, sadly. 

So I think I want my character to be a kind alien version of Tom Smykowski, someone who deals with both an off-planet business and the various human governments. He (more on gender later) is from a planet whose name is unpronouncable in human languages (it requires organs they don't have), so for ease of use they refer to it as Community 3. 

The principle residents of Community 3 are humanoid and display some characteristics that Earthlings recognize - bilateral symmetry, interal skeleton, skin, front-facing sight organs, stuff like that. They don't reproduce the same way humans do; reproduction requires a long and kind of arduous compatiblity process in which two (or more) Communitites gradually alter their biochemistry to allow it. They're capable of physical intimacy, and that's a rabbit hole I don't necessarily need to go down. 

Anyway, Communitites are here for one very specific reason: the ocean sunfish (google it if you want). The Communitites don't actually need the fish per se, but there are parasites that feed on the fish's skin that can be rendered into a paste that the inhabitants of Community 3 finds very useful (rumors state that it's medicinal, or it's cosmetic, or it helps narrow down the mating game, or it's a sex aid, or it's a delicacy - really no one knows and there aren't many Communitites in Ingress, so it doesn't get discussed all that much). Since the sunfish ranges every ocean, Community 3 sent a couple of reps to Ingress to deal with various Earth governments and negotiate fish-scraping rights. And then they discovered that "international waters" are a thing, so they downsized the "liason" program and now it's pretty much just my guy. 

His name - again, adopted for Earthling purposes - is Mo (/m/ and /o/ are very easy sounds to make and almost every Earth language uses them, plus it's often short for "Mohamed" which is one of the most common names on Earth). Mo isn't really "male", but he's learned that a) he/him or she/her pronouns are the easiest ones for most humans to grasp and b) he/him pronouns get a better response in the world of business. Mo is about adult-human sized. Like all Communitites, his skin is gray, mottled, lump, and looks like it has the texture of an oyster shell (it's actually much softer than that to touch). 

Mo is 116 years old on his planet; it equates to about 30 Earth years. He's lonely - there aren't many of his species in Ingress and they rarely come to visit (Ingress kinda sucks, if we're honest, unless you're very rich). His job is probably safe, and he likes being able to go to Earth periodically. He lives in Franc (all of the districts in Ingress are named after Earth currencies, in a fantastic bit of world-building), and the only two other Communitites he knows get together with him to get dinner once a week. They don't have a lot in common other than their homeworld, which is enough to maintain the relationship, but it's not like he'd considering reproducing with either of them (it would take forever to get compatible).

So Mo is looking for something to get his attention. He's disaffected, aimless, but affable. Unlike Mr. Smykowski he really does have people skills. Also his skin feels like a horse's nose if you touch it, and he's learned that a lot of humans seem to enjoy that. 

So! That's the first bit of chargen done. Now we move on to Skills. I get 22 points to bump Skills. Some of them start at Fair, some start at Poor. Let's see here. 

Well, Friendship, Persuasion, and (sorry to say) Deception need to get some love. Culture, Technology, and maybe some kind of Professional Skill to represent maritime law? Let's check how it works.

Of course all of those default to Poor. Spending two of my points bumps a Poor to Fair (same ladder as Fate). I think Friendship is Mo's go-to strategy, so I'll put 3 points into it and go to good. I'll put two into Deception (Fair), and three into Persuasion (Good). And what the heck, I'll put one into Romance and knock it up to Mediocre. That's 9 of my 22 spent.

I'll spend one on Alertness (Mediocre), three on Insight (Good), one on search (Mediocre)...and then we're into Mental Skills. Well, Professional (Law) is how I make my bread and butter, so I'll dump four points there and put it up to Great. Actually, no, three points for Good, and I'll make Culture my Great Skill. That gives me one point left. I'll put it into Politics (Mediocre). 

Keen, then Advantages and Disadvantages. I get two Advantages free, and if I want up to two more I can take a like number of Disadvantages. Any Disadvantages I know I want? Sorry, Drawbacks? 

OK, for crying out loud. Look at this.

I thought we were telling stories about normal people (in context) doing normal shit. But my dark secret, you know, normal stuff like having an affair or BEING A SERIAL KILLER. 

Anyway. All of the listed Drawbacks a little too dramatic for my tastes. Advantages? Sure, I'll say that Communitites are Amphibious (oxygen-breathing, sure, but they can breathe it in water or gaseous form), and I'll take Marsupialism (Communitites are even more composed of water than Earthlings, with the effect that their bodies are squishy and malleable, enabling them to fold their "skin" and create pockets). 

And that's it! Let's go to Tchochke's.

Character Creation: Flashback

Here, boy! Come get your breakfast!

The Game: Flashback
The Publisher: flashbackrpg (that's how it's listed on DriveThru, anyway, and the actual website for the game gives me a malware warning)
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

Bit of a dog's breakfast, is my point. 

So, Flashback is something of a heartbreaker, I guess. It's a steampunk-esque sort of setting, what with its oppressive Empire ruled over by a figurehead regent and a bunch of noble houses, its ornithopters and skyships, and immense steam-powered "goliaths" that were built to fight Titans (see below) but mostly get used to suppress revolts. 

It's got a Last of Us-style Spore Sickness that has an actually very evocative origin story, and an Annihilation-style element were "Starfalls," in which otherworldly metals crash to Earth, start gathering up matter around them and eventually form into giant monsters (Titans). There's even a system for moving between body locations on the Titans, which immediately calls to mind Shadow of the Colossus, and that's always a good thing to call to mind.

But like...it's called Flashback. It's billed as "A Roleplaying Game About Changing History." It's not about that at all. The only "flashbacks" that happen in the game are an advancement mechanic, so when you want to boost a Skill you can do a backstory reveal and show how your character used to apprentice with a weaver or whatever and that's how come you can weave, muthafucka (props to Eddie Izzard there). 

That's it! That's all the flashing back in the game. It's maybe 500 words out of the 212 page book. It's not enough to hang a concept on, and what's more, the game's concept is so all over the place that the flashback mechanics (which might have been interesting, though much too thin to be the game's centerpiece as written) get completely overlooked. Like, literally; I was reading the book and skipped the flashback section entirely because it was buried in the advancement section, and I don't normally read that too carefully because it tends not to matter for chargen purposes.

It's all sort of sad, because there are elements to the game's setting that I really like. There's nothing so wholly original that it makes me want to convert this to Fate or something and run it, just kinda makes me wistful because if this game had been Fate (or SWADE, or - ooh, best of all - Forged in the Dark) it might have been really interesting. As it is, it just feels flimsy. And there are no examples of play, so there's no attempt to sell the game as a game, just a lot of in-game fiction.

Ah, well. Let's make a dude. Guess I should come up with some kind of concept. Thinking back over the game book, there are actually quite a few little details that I thought were cool, so if some intrepid soul were to run this, what would I find most interesting to play? 

Well, I think the Titans are probably my favorite part of the setting as presented, and it'd be interesting to apply a "professional exterminator" vibe to the character. That is, my guy is who you call if you've got Prototitans romping around; once they get full-sized that's above his pay grade. That to me sounds like someone who's precise and prepared. I think I'd want like a gas-powered harpoon or something, but I don't know if that's doable.

Character Attributes are arranged into six pairs of Traits, and so for each one I have to decide which one is dominant. 

Charm can be either Deceptive or Forthright. My guy feels Forthright. Judgement breaks down into Cautious and Curious; I think Cautious is dominant, but it's a near thing. Vigilance is made up of Faithful and Skeptical, and despite the word choice it's not really about religious devotion. I'll go with Skeptical. 

Strength can be Disciplined or Reckless; my hunter is clearly Disciplined. Agility can be Calm or Aggressive. I'm actually gonna go with Aggressive here, because again it's kind of a near thing. Finally, Fortitude is either Dynamic or Stubborn. My guy is well aware how fluid situations can be, so Dynamic it is. 

I get 2 in all my Dominants and 0 in my Lesser Traits, but then we move on to the next step. I pick one of my Dominant traits and come up with a reason why that is my shit. So what's my Titan-exterminator really good at? I'm torn between Cautious and Disciplined. I think I'll go with Disciplined, making this guy more hands-on. 

Ah-ha, but now I must pick one of my Dominants to be kinda shite. I think I'll got with Forthright. Titans are a fraught topic, and there are a lot of snake oil salesman around. My guy isn't great at selling himself, so he tends to come across a little shifty, purely by accident. 

OK, so, my flawed trait (Forthright) drops to 1, my favored one (Disciplined) bumps to 3, and all six of my Attributes start equal to the Dominant Trait. So Charm is 1, Strength is 3, everything else is 2. 

Secondary values! Body starts at Strength + Agility + Fortitude, which is 7. Mind is Vigilance + Judgement + Charm, or 6. Stamina is equal to the higher of Body or Mind, so also 7. Confidence is (Mind x 2) + Body, Toughness is (Body x 2) + Mind, 19 and 20, respectively. 

Defenses! Melee Defense is Strength + Fortitude (5), Ranged Defense is Agility + Vigilance (4), Ability Defense is Charm + Judgement (3). 

And that's it. There's no attention in chargen paid to equipment, name, personality (beyond the Traits), history, or anything else like that. OK, then!

Igan Burnwood's family were ratcatchers in Criar, the Empire's capital city. It always bothered Igan that no matter how many rats you kill, there are always a thousand more you'll never see. His father saw that as a feature, not a bug, of the business - the job would never be complete, so there will always be work! Igan just hated rats, maybe.

When Igan was a young man he accompanied his brother Usuf out of Criar to buy some gear from a ratcatcher who was no longer in the business. When they got to the meet, they found out that he was "no longer in the business" because he'd been dismembered by a Titan. Igan was fascinated by the idea of a creature that was, in some ways, a colony on its own, and he struck up a friendship with Saleh, the deceased ratcatcher's daughter. He decided to accompany her on her quest to kill the Titan (which, in fairness, had eaten a lot of rats so had some rat-like qualities), and together they managed it. Igan decided his family could handle the business back in Criar. This might be niche, but he's getting good at it.

Igan was pretty lean, but he's filled out since leaving Criar. He has thick, luxurious black hair and strong, steady hands, nicked with nibbles from a thousand rats. He's still working on the notion of a flashpowder or gas-powered harpoon gun, but hasn't quite made it work yet. 

Chill: A Pleasant Hike

Back in big sky country. On we go!

We start off mid-afternoon on August 1st, 2020. Jax sods off to go score, and isn't seen again this session. 

The rest of the envoys, however, have much to do! Jordan comes home from brunch and fields a bunch of questions and saucy remarks from Willa and Darnell. Dylan heads to his room and does a little more digging. He finds, interestingly, that the sightings of the Wolf that Won't Die over the years map almost perfectly to the route of the Nez Perce tribe during the eponymous War. Digging further, he finds that one of the decisive battles - the Battle of Big Hole - was fought about six hours from Boise in Montana. 

As he's working, he hears the distinctive sound of canine claws running behind him. He starts, tries to dodge, and winds up falling on the floor. Everyone else rushes up to check on him, but apart from being a bit freaked out he's unharmed. 

He shares what he's found about the Wolf, and the envoys decide to make a trek out to Big Hole Battlefield. They book a couple of room at one of the few nearby motels, and Jordan spends a couple of hours filling shotgun shells with scrap silver and wolfsbane (Willa also mashes some wolfsbane down to a paste, and they make the container very carefully). They mount up in a couple of SUVs, stop by a Best Buy to grab a couple of hotspots, and head out of town. 

On the way, Zoe does a bit of digging into the Nez Perce. More specifically, the language - properly known as nimipuutít - is highly endangered, with less than 100 native speakers remaining. She finds a site that teaches her some of the basics, and hears the phrase from her dream: "manáa wées 'iním we'níikt?" It simply means "what is your name?" She immediately plays a recording multiple times, trying to get it memorized, since it's clearly important.

Meanwhile, in the other car, Dylan glances over at his window and sees his reflection. For a second, it changes to the face of an older man with a dark complexion and a severe expression, and then it looks him dead in the eye and speaks: "tá'c haláxp, sooyáapoo." He starts and tells Jordan what he's seen, and she raises a Mental Shield over him. The image fades and Dylan calms, and they continue on their way.

They arrive at the motel and check in, and Zoe and Dylan compare notes. Dylan learns that the phrase he heard basically translates to "good afternoon, white man" in nimipuutít. Based on his description, the man he saw might very well have been of Nez Perce extraction, but there isn't much else to go on. The envoys have some dinner (they brought food in coolers), and Dylan and Jordan ward the rooms. Everyone sleeps well that night, despite their concerns.

In the morning, they head over to the nearby diner/general store and get some breakfast. They talk to the lovely woman at the diner, and learn that a ranger and a park custodian at the nearby battlefield park just didn't show up for work last week (Aidan and Curt). Jordan asks if they've gone missing, and the woman says that she doesn't know about that, maybe they just decided to quit. 

Zoe asks if there are wolves around - she's paranoid about wolves. The woman says that there are, but they don't really get this close to town (such as it is). The fellow in the kitchen yells out that he heard wolves howling sometime last week, but the counter lady says it was just coyotes. 

The envoys buy some maps and sunscreen and so on at the store and then head down the road to the park. They pull into the visitor center and have a chat with Harvey, a very nice older gent working the desk. He tells them the basic rules of the place (no swimming, no overnight camping, no fires, no fishing without a permit, no littering, no alcohol), and, as they get him talking, confirms that Aidan and Curt just didn't show up last week. He doesn't seem especially worried about them, though, certainly no reason to suspect foul play. 

The envoys drive to the nearby trailhead parking lot and start on their hike. They keep watch for wolf tracks, as well as any sign of dead bodies (Zoe is pretty convinced that Aidan and Curt are dead and left out here somewhere). It's a very pleasant day's walk, and then the trail bends and they can see the Big Hole River. Zoe spots tire tracks leading towards the river, and they go down to investigate. They find evidence of a campfire, a discarded beer can, and some footprints. Looks like someone had a party and made sure to clean up, either out of not wanting to get caught, responsibility, or both. 

Zoe uses Postcognition and sees the party in progress. She counts ten people, mostly in their 20s, but there's one guy who looks to be in his early 30s. She also spots one person she recognizes - Emma Whitman, the unfortunate girl who was killed by the wolf yesterday. As she watches, it starts to rain blood. The youngsters freak out a bit (as is appropriate), and then a man walks out of the woods, much older than they are, wearing jeans and buckskin boots. He pulls a knife from his belt, and one of the people, a young man with darker features, looks at the man and says "manáa wées 'iním we'níikt?"

The man doesn't answer. He just looks furious. The rain stops, and he backs up into the woods. Someone says "who the hell was that guy? What'd you say to him, Ted?" Ted replies, "I just asked his name. I don't know, I panicked." The guy in his 30s stands up and says, "OK, that's it. Everyone out. Get in the truck. I shouldn't have let you in." 

The people head to the truck nearby (a tan-colored pickup truck), and the last one to speak kicks out the fire and douses it with water. The vision fades, and Zoe relays this to the others.

Probably the man with the knife is the one that Dylan has been seeing, and the guy who "let [them] in" was probably Aidan, the ranger. Who are the others? The envoys have no idea. They look around for more clues, but don't see anything useful. Jordan finds some boot tracks in the woods, probably the mysterious man, and sees that they fade into wolf tracks. Zoe tries to use Postcognition on those to verify what they already suspect, but something goes wrong. She feels flashes of the battle that took place here, hears gunshots and screams, and then gets a splash of blood on her face. She cries out and falls over, and the envoys start helping her back to the car.

They decide to head back to the motel - there's not any obvious benefit in continuing the trail and they don't want to split up. As they get back, Jordan gets a call from Darnell. The guy that died at the storage place has been identified as Xander Smart. He's a recent Boise State grad. Darnell sends along a picture, too.

Jordan and Melanie both get online and do some digging into these people, from different angles - Jordan looks for information on Aidan, and Melanie looks for info on Xander. They're both successful. 

Xander Smart had a picture on his Facebook page of him with some friends. They're all tagged: Rose Velez, Chrissy Pelt, Peter Lennert, and Emma Whitman. Jordan finds an old employees page from the park, with pictures of Aidan Fisk and Curt Waylon. Doing a little more digging, she finds that Curt lives in Anaconda (yes, there's a town in Montana called Anaconda, and the story of why it's called that is ridiculous). His brother lives in Bozeman with his girlfriend...recent Boise State grad Rose Velez.

The pieces are falling into place. Curt and Corey know the students, including Xander and Emma, through Rose. Aidan must have let them into the park after hours. Now Xander and Emma are both dead and Curt and Aidan are missing. But who's "Ted" then?

Dylan, figuring that if this guy speaks nimipuuít there has to be a reason for it, checks his student records. Turns out Ted Norman is a grad student in sociology; his advisor is one of Dylan's colleagues. He's involved in a linguistic revitalization project, and probably has been involved in some of the online resources that Zoe has been using. 

Dylan puts in an email to Ted's advisor to ask for his contact info, and the envoys consider their next move.

Wicked Ones: The Death of Queequaz the Querulous

Wicked Ones! Here's last time.

Our heroes, having tricked the villagers of Ikae's Refuge into calling for help from the Confraternity of the Three, now take up positions around the Confraternity's camp. They watch as the paladins, astride their majestic white horses, ride north towards Ikae's Refuge, and pick their moment to strike.

Fnort has already scouted this place out. 

The walls are short, barely high enough for a goblin to hide behind. They're clearly meant to be the foundations of a church, but the Confraternity hasn't made much progress. The tents are, well, tents. In front of one, a lone man with dark hair sits in prayer. At the nearby fire, an older soldier, clearly a veteran of the War, sits toasting something on a stick. Between the tents in the church foundation is a man in vestments to Ubu (God of Authority), talking to/at a hireling. The Wicked Ones recognize this hireling - he fled from their dungeon some time ago.

And then over by the northeast-most tent, a man patrols the area, watching the shadows. But the Wicked Ones are far too stealthy - they are completely concealed and poised to strike. And that's about the last break they got all night.

Queequaz the Querulous and his goblin acolytes are hiding up a tree and summon up some fearful gloom-fog to confuse and terrify the guards. The spell goes awry, however, and winds up going all up in Fnort's head. Fnort decides that this whole set-up is too perfect, and the only way to really approach this is to charge straight into battle! Fnort and his kobold guards go charging up the road toward the veteran, and they manage to charge right into the traps he's laid. Fnort exhorts his minions on, they charge through the pain, and the veteran hurls a handful of knives and kills the minions easily. 

Fnort, never one to be dissuaded, leaps at the veteran and tackles him. Meanwhile, Thudd and his imps creep up on the praying man and mess with the strings on his armor. To their surprise, he addresses the imps directly in the Dark Tongue, telling them that serving Crevis is just a short trip to being slaughtered, and here, in service to Ubu, they'd be treated with dignity. The imps look at Thudd with a kind of "uh, really?" and Thudd argues, saying that these guys have to live by rules and they don't get to do anything fun.

The penitent man stands, draws his sword, says "well, I tried" and beheads an imp. The others fall back, confused.

Baldruf, meanwhile, creeps up to the tabernacle, perhaps intending to pick the lock. But then he spots the hireling, remembers him, and grinds his teeth. He loads the mysterious crossbow bolt he found on the body of an adventurer and fires it at hireling, but the bolt banks around in a circle and strikes him in the chest!

But all is not lost! Baldruf thought ahead and had his elf friend give the Confraternity a set of bones that needed to be "consecrated." Those bones now form into a skeleton (Baldruf's minion), which comes stomping out of a tent and strikes the penitent with a chair leg. Thudd tries to hurl a bottle of Outburst Draught at the veteran, but misses the throw and it goes straight up. He catches it without breaking it, but is overcome with paranoia about his minions and just how willing they were to get into this "Light" thing, and hurls the Draught at them. It smashes into their faces and they back up, confused. 

Fnort is rolling around with the veteran, and tries to get up and throw the veteran into the fire. It...doesn't work. The veteran nimbly throws Fnort into the bonfire, and he rolls out, burning. 

Meanwhile, Queequaz and his minions are in the tree. They call upon the power of Crevis and summon up all the foulness and corruption. Centipedes and bugs chew into the foundations of the church, sinking it into the ground. Of course, Crevis being Crevis, the bugs overdo it and the tree the goblins are in collapses. Queequaz winds up hanging from a branch by his breeches like a meat piñata, and his minions try desperately to get him down. The patrolman whistles for his horse, and comes barrelling towards the goblins. Queequaz yells a distraction and the patrolman backs up, but pulls a spear off his back and hurls it. He impales both of the goblin acolytes, and they die, whispering praise to Crevis. Queequaz calls up whatever magic he can manage and turns himself into a mass of centipedes and bugs, momentarily escaping death. 

The skeleton and the imps finally fell the penitent. Fnort charges at the hireling and smacks him with his burning flail, and the hireling falls back, beating at his clothes. The chastiser intones something in Light Tongue and Fnort backs off. Baldruf tries to sneak up behind the chastiser, but the chastiser spots him. Thudd takes the opportunity to sneak around and get near the tabernacle. The chastiser invokes Ubu and turns the roiling mass of rock and centipedes to white marble.

The imps creep up on the veteran and try to cut the straps on his armor, and they wind up getting sliced by up the dude's armor-blades. But Fnort jumps up and pounds the guy's head in with his flail. Thudd opens the tabernacle, but a blast of Light magic throws him back. The patrolman charges him, and they wind up playing tag around one of the big stumps for a moment. But then Queequaz reforms in the tabernacle, calling upon Crevis' power to defile it.

The whole place starts becoming a fetid swamp. Baldruf, Thudd, and Fnort grab everything in the tabernacle and flee, just as the patrolman comes up behind Queequaz and impales him. Queequaz falls into the morass (and the quicksand consumes the remaining imps and the skeleton), but Crevs has spoken. The whole place becomes a monument to agony and fear. 

The Wicked Ones fall back to the Sepulcher to await the inevitable retribution. When they get there, they find a big ol' two-headed giant arguing with itself about whether to burst in and take the the place over, or knock politely. They let Yog-en-Yeg, the ettin brute, into the dungeon, and point him towards a lair. He winds up moving into Queequaz' old room, and that seems to fit.

Baldruf takes a chisel to the Crevis iconography and starts replacing it with Irion. Thudd gets very drunk and tells his magic marionette to set fire to his imps' bunk beds (it does, then wanders off into the dungeon). He, Fnort, and Baldruf pour one out for Queequaz and their dead minions. 

But hey! They brought back the loot. They're moving up in the world, and that means they're ready to take on more powerful adventurers....right?